SCARLET LIGHTS
This story presents the fulfillment of an extraordinary prophecy made one night, suddenly and dramatically, at a gathering of New Yorkers, brought together for hilarious purposes, including a little supper, in the Washington Square apartment of Bobby Vallis—her full name was Roberta. There were soft lights and low divans and the strumming of a painted ukulele that sang its little twisted soul out under the caress of Penelope's white fingers. I can still see the big black opal in its quaint setting that had replaced her wedding ring and the yellow serpent of pliant gold coiled on her thumb with two bright rubies for its eyes. Penelope Wells! How little we realized what sinister forces were playing about her that pleasant evening as we smoked and jested and sipped our glasses, gazing from time to time up the broad vista of Fifth Avenue with its lines of receding lights.
There had been an impromptu session of the Confessional Club during which several men, notably a poet in velveteen jacket, had vouchsafed sentimental or matrimonial revelations in the most approved Greenwich Village style. And the ladies, unabashed, had discussed these things.
But not a word did Penelope Wells speak of her own matrimonial troubles, which were known vaguely to most of us, although we had never met the drunken brute of a husband who had made her life a torment. I can see her now in profile against the open window, her eyes dark with their slumberous fires. I remember the green earrings she wore that night, and how they reached down under her heavy black braids—reached down caressingly over her white neck. She was a strangely, fiercely beautiful creature, made to love and to be loved, fated for tragic happenings. She was twenty-nine.
The discussion waxed warm over the eternal question—how shall a woman satisfy her emotional nature when she has no chance or almost no chance to marry the man she longs to marry?
Roberta Vallis put forth views that would have frozen old-fashioned moralists into speechless disapproval—entire freedom of choice and action for women as well as men, freedom to unite with a mate or separate from a mate—both sexes to have exactly the same responsibilities or lack of responsibilities in these sentimental arrangements.
“No, no! I call that loathsome, abominable,” declared Penelope, and the poet adoringly agreed with her, although his practice had been notoriously at variance with these professions.
“Suppose a woman finds herself married to some beast of a man,” flashed Roberta, “some worthless drunkard, do you mean to tell me it is her duty to stick to such a husband, and spoil her whole life?”
To which Penelope, hiding her agitation, said: “I—I am not discussing that phase of the question. I mean that if a woman is alone in the world, if she longs for the companionship of a man—the intimate companionship—”
“Ha, ha, ha!” snickered the poet. I can see his close cropped yellow beard and his red face wrinkling in merriment at this supposition.
“I hate your Greenwich Village philosophy,” stormed Penelope. “You haven't the courage, the understanding to commit one big splendid sin that even the angels in heaven might approve, but you fritter away your souls and spoil your bodies in cheap little sins that are just—disgusting!”
The poet shrivelled under her scorn.
“But—one splendid sin?” he stammered. “That means a woman must go to her mate, doesn't it?”
“Without marriage? Never! I'll tell you what a woman should do—I'll tell you what I would do, just to prove that I am not conventional, I would act on the principle that there is a sacred right God has given to every woman who is born, a right that not even God Himself can take away from her, I mean the right to—”
A muffled scream interrupted her, a quick catching of the breath by a stout lady, a newcomer, who was seated on a divan, I should have judged this woman to be a rather commonplace person except that her deeply sunken eyes seemed to carry a far away expression as if she saw things that were invisible to others. Now her eyes were fixed on Penelope.
“Oh, the beautiful scarlet light!” she murmured. “There! Don't you see—moving down her arm? And another one—on her shoulder! Scarlet lights! My poor child! My poor child!”
Ordinarily we would have laughed at this, for, of course, we saw no scarlet lights, but somehow now we did not laugh. On the contrary we fell into hushed and wondering attention, and, turning to Roberta, we learned that this was Seraphine, a trance medium who had given séances for years to scientists and occult investigators, and was now assisting Dr. W——, of the American Occult Society.
“A séance! Magnificent! Let us have a séance!” whispered the poet. “Tell us, madam, can you really lift the veil of the future?”
But already Seraphine had settled back on the divan and I saw that her eyes had closed and her breathing was quieter, although her body was shaken from time to time by little tremors as if she were recovering from some great agitation. We watched her wonderingly, and presently she began to speak, at first slowly and painfully, then in her natural tone. Her message was so brief, so startling in its purport that there can be no question of any error in this record.
“Penelope will—cross the ocean,” Seraphine began dreamily. “Her husband will die—very soon. There will be war—soon. She will go to the war and will have honors conferred upon her—on the battlefield. She will—she will,”—the medium's face changed startlingly to a mask of anguish and her bosom heaved. “Oh, my poor child! I see you—I see you going down to—to horror—to terror—Ah!”
She cried out in fright and stopped speaking; then, after a moment of dazed effort, she came back to reality and looked at us as before out of her sunken eyes, a plump little kindly faced woman resting against a blue pillow.
Now, whatever one may think of mediums, the facts are that Penelope's husband died suddenly in an automobile accident within a month of this memorable evening. And within two months the great war burst upon the world. And within a year Penelope did cross the ocean as a Red Cross Nurse, and it is a matter of record that she was decorated for valor under fire of the enemy.
This story has to do with the remainder of Seraphine's prophecy.
CHAPTER I
(January, 1919)
VOICES
Penelope moved nervously in her chair, evidently very much troubled about something as she waited in the doctor's office. Her two years in France had added a touch of mystery to her strange beauty. Her eyes were more veiled in their burning, as if she had glimpsed something that had frightened her; yet they were eyes that, even unintentionally, carried a message to men, an alluring, appealing message to men. With her red mouth, her fascinatingly unsymmetrical mouth, and her sinuous body Penelope Wells at thirty-three was the kind of woman men look at twice and remember. She was dressed in black.
When Dr. William Owen entered the front room of his Ninth Street office he greeted her with the rough kindliness that a big man in his profession, a big-hearted man, shows to a young woman whose case interests him and whose personality is attractive.
“I got your note, Mrs. Wells,” he began, “and I had a letter about you from my young friend, Captain Herrick. I needn't say that I had already read about your bravery in the newspapers. The whole country has been sounding your praises. When did you get back to New York?”
“About a week ago, doctor. I came on a troop ship with several other nurses. I—I wish I had never come.”
There was a note of pathetic, ominous sadness in her voice. Even in his first study of this lovely face, the doctor's experienced eye told him that here was a case of complicated nervous breakdown. He wondered if she could have had a slight touch of shell shock. What a ghastly thing for a high spirited, sensitive young woman to be out on those battle fields in France!
“You mustn't say that, Mrs. Wells. We are all very proud of you. Think of having the croix de guerre pinned on your dress by the commanding general before a whole regiment! Pretty fine for an American woman!”
Penelope Wells sat quite still, playing with the flexible serpent ring on her thumb, and looked at the doctor out of her wonderful deep eyes that seemed to burn with a mysterious fire. Could there be something Oriental about her—or—or Indian, the physician wondered.
“Doctor,” she said, in a low tone, “I have come to tell you the truth about myself, and the truth is that I deserve no credit for what I did that day, because I—I did not want to live. I wanted them to kill me, I took every chance so that they would kill me; but God willed it differently, the shells and bullets swept all around me, cut through my dress, through my hair, but did not harm me.”
“Tell me a little more about it, just quietly. How did you happen to go out there? Was it because you heard that Captain Herrick was wounded? That's the way the papers cabled the story. Was that true?” Then, seeing her face darken, he added: “Perhaps I ought not to ask that question?”
“Oh, yes, I want you to. I want you to know everything about me—everything. That's why I am here. Captain Herrick says you are a great specialist in nervous troubles, and I have a feeling that unless you can help me nobody can.”
“Well, I have helped some people who felt pretty blue about life—perhaps I can help you. Now, then, what is the immediate trouble? Any aches or pains? I must say you seem to be in splendid health,” he smiled at her with cheery admiration.
“It isn't my body. I have no physical suffering. I eat well enough, I sleep well, except—my dreams. I have horrible, torturing dreams, doctor. I'm afraid to go to sleep. I have the same dreams over and over again, especially two dreams that haunt me.”
“How long have you had these dreams?”
“Ever since I went out that dreadful day from Montidier—when the Germans almost broke through. They told me Captain Herrick was lying there helpless, out beyond our lines. So I went to him. I don't know how I got there, but—I found him. He was wounded in the thigh and a German beast was standing over him when I came up. He was going to run him through with a bayonet. And somehow, I—I don't know how I did it, but I caught up a pistol from a dead soldier and I shot the German.”
“Good Lord! You don't say! They didn't have that in the papers! What a woman! No wonder you've had bad dreams!”
Penelope passed a slender hand over her eyes as if to brush away evil memories, then she said wearily: “It isn't that, they are not ordinary dreams.”
“Well, what kind of dreams are they? You say there are two dreams?”
“There are two that I have had over and over again, but there are others, all part of a sequence with the same person in them.”
The doctor looked at her sharply. “The same person? A person that you recognize?”
“Yes.”
“A person you have really seen? A man?”
“Yes, the man I killed.”
“Oh!”
“I told you he was a beast. I saw that in his face, but I know it now because I dream of things that he did as a conqueror—in the villages.”
“I see—brutal things?”
“Worse than that. In one dream I see him—Oh!” she shuddered and the agony in her eyes was more eloquent than words.
“My dear lady, you are naturally wrought up by these dreadful experiences, you need rest, quiet surroundings, good food, a little relaxation——”
“No, no, no,” Mrs. Wells interrupted impatiently.
“Don't tell me those old things. I am a trained nurse. I know my case is entirely different.”
“How is it different? We all have dreams. I have dreams myself. One night I dreamed that I was dissecting the janitor downstairs; sometimes I wish I had.”
Penelope brushed aside this effort at humor. “You haven't dreamed that twenty times with every detail the same, have you? That's how I dream. I see these faces, real faces, again and again. I hear the same cries, the same words, vile words. Oh, I can't tell you how horrible it is!”
“But we are not responsible for our dreams,” the doctor insisted.
She shook her head wearily. “That's just the point, it seems to me that I am responsible. I feel as if I enjoy these horrible dreams—while I am dreaming them. When I am awake, the very thought of them makes me shudder, but while I am dreaming I seem to be an entirely different person—a low, vulgar creature proud of the brutal strength and coarseness of her man. I seem to be a part of this human beast! When I wake up I feel as if my soul had been stained, dragged in the mire, almost lost. It seems as if I could never again feel any self-respect. Oh, doctor,” Penelope's voice broke and the tears filled her eyes, “you must help me! I cannot bear this torture any longer! What can I do to escape from such a curse?”
Seldom, in his years of practice, had the specialist been so moved by a patient's confession as was Dr. Owen during Penelope's revelation of her suffering. As a kindly human soul he longed to help this agonized mortal; as a scientific expert he was eager to solve the mystery of this nervous disorder. He leaned toward her with a look of compassion.
“Be assured, my dear Mrs. Wells, I shall do everything in my power to help you. And in order to accomplish what we want, I must understand a great many things about your past life.” He drew a letter from his pocket. “Let me look over what Captain Herrick wrote me about you. Hm! He refers to your married life?”
“Yes.”
The doctor studied the letter in silence. “I see. Your husband died about four years ago?”
“Four years and a half.”
“I judge that your married life was not very happy?”
“That is true, it was very unhappy.”
“Is there anything in your memory of your husband, any details regarding your married life, that may have a bearing on your present state of mind?”
“I—I think perhaps there is,” she answered hesitatingly.
“Is it something of an intimate nature that—er—you find it difficult to tell me about?”
“I will tell you about it, doctor, but, if you don't mind,” she made a pathetic little gesture, “I would rather tell you at some other time. It has no bearing upon my immediate trouble, that is, I don't think it has.”
“Good. We'll take that up later on. Now I want to ask another question. I understood you to say that when you did that brave act on the battle field you really wanted to—to have the whole thing over with?”
“Yes, I did.”
“You did not go out to rescue Captain Herrick simply because you—let us say, cared for him?”
For the first time Penelope's face lighted in an amused smile. “I haven't said that I care for Captain Herrick, have I? I don't mind telling you, though, that I should not have gone into that danger if I had not known that Chris was wounded. I cared for him enough to want to help him.”
“But not enough to go on living?”
“No, I did not want to go on living.”
He eyed her with the business-like tenderness that an old doctor feels for a beautiful young patient. “Of course, you realize, Mrs. Wells, that it will be impossible for me to help you or relieve your distressing symptoms unless you tell me what is behind them. I must know clearly why it was that you did not wish to go on living.”
“I understand, doctor, I am perfectly willing to tell you. It is because I was convinced that my mind was affected.”
“Oh!” He smiled at her indulgently. “I can tell you, my dear lady, that I never saw a young woman who, as far as outward appearances go, struck me as being more sane and healthy than yourself. What gives you this idea that your mind is affected? Not those dreams? You are surely too intelligent to give such importance to mere dreams?”
Penelope bit her red lips in perplexed indecision, then she leaned nearer the doctor and spoke in a low tone, glancing nervously over her shoulder. Fear was plainly written on her face.
“No—it's not just the dreams. They are horrible enough, but I have faith that you will help me get rid of them. There's something else, something more serious, more uncanny. It terrifies me. I feel that I'm in the power of some supernatural being who takes a fiendish delight in torturing me. I'm not a coward, Dr. Owen,” Penelope lifted her head proudly, “for I truly have no fear of real danger that I can see and face squarely, but the unseen, the unknown——” She broke off suddenly, a strained, listening look on her face. Then she shivered though the glowing fire in the grate was making the room almost uncomfortably warm.
“Do you mind giving me some details?” Dr. Owen spoke in his gentlest manner, for he realized that he must gain her confidence.
Penelope continued with an effort:
“For several months I have heard voices about me, sometimes when no one is present, sometimes in crowds on the street, at church, anywhere. But the voices that I hear are not the voices of real persons.”
“What kind of voices are they? Are they loud? Are they distinct? Or are they only vague whispers?”
“They are perfectly distinct voices, just as clear as ordinary voices. And they are voices of different persons. I can tell them apart; but none of them are voices of persons that I have ever seen or known.”
“Hm! I suppose you have heard, as a trained nurse, of what we call clairaudient hallucinations?”
“Yes, doctor, and I know that those hallucinations often appear in the early stages of insanity. That is what distresses me.”
“How often do you hear these voices—not all the time? Do you hear them in the night?”
“I hear them at any time—day or night. I have tried not to notice them, I pretend that I do not hear them. I do my best to forget them. I have prayed to God that He will make these voices cease troubling me, that He will make them go away; but nothing seems to do any good.”
“What kind of things do these voices say? Do they seem to be talking to you directly?”
“Sometimes they do, sometimes they seem to be talking about me, as if two or three persons were discussing me, criticizing me. They say very unkind things. It seems as if they read my thoughts and make mischievous, wicked comments on them. Sometimes they say horrid things, disgusting things. Sometimes they give me orders. I am to do this or that; or I am not to do this or that. Sometimes they say the same word over and over again, many times. It was that way when I went out on the battlefield to help Captain Herrick. As I ran along, stumbling over the dead and wounded, I heard these voices crying out: 'Fool! Fool! Don't do it! You mustn't do it! You're a coward! You know you're a coward! You're going to be killed! You're a little fool to get yourself killed!'”
“And yet you went on? You did not obey these voices?”
“I went on because I was desperate. I tell you I wanted to die. What is the use of living if one is persecuted like this? There is nothing to live for, is there?”
He met her pathetic look with confidence.
“I think there is, Mrs. Wells. There is a lot to live for. Those hallucinations and dreams are not as uncommon as you think. I could give you cases of shell shock patients who have suffered in this way and come back to normal health. You have been through enough, my young friend, to bring about a somewhat hysterical condition that is susceptible of cure, if you will put yourself in favorable conditions. Do you mind if I ask you straight out whether you have any objections to marrying a second time?”
“N—no, that is to say I—er——” The color burned in her cheeks and Owen took note of this under his grizzled brows.
“As an old friend of the family—I mean Herrick's family—may I ask you if you would have any objection to Captain Herrick as a husband—assuming that you are willing to accept any husband?”
“I like Captain Herrick very much, I—I think I care for him more than any man I know, but——”
“Well? If you love Herrick and he loves you——” Owen broke off here with a new thought, “Ah, perhaps that is the trouble, perhaps Captain Herrick has not told you that he loves you? I hope, dear lady, I am not forcing your confidence?”
“No, doctor, I want you to know. Captain Herrick cares for me, he loves me, he has asked me to marry him, but—I have refused him.”
“But why—if you love him? Why refuse him?”
“Oh, can't you see? Can't you understand? How could I think of such a thing, knowing, as I do, that something is wrong with my mind? It is quite impossible. Besides, there is another reason.”
“Another reason?” he repeated.
“It has to do with my married life. As I said I would rather tell you about that some other time—if you don't mind?”
He saw that she could go no farther.
“Exactly, some other time. Let us say in about two weeks. During that time my prescription for you is a rest down at Atlantic City with long walks and a dip in the pool every morning. Come back then and tell me how you feel, and don't think about those dreams and voices. But think about your past life—about those things that you find it hard to tell me. It may not be necessary to tell me provided you know the truth yourself. Will you promise that?” He smiled at her encouragingly as she nodded. “Good! Now be cheerful. I am not deceiving you, Mrs. Wells, I am too sensible an old timer to do that. I give you my word that these troubles can be easily handled. I really do not consider you in a serious condition. Now then, until two weeks from today. I'll make you a friendly little bet that when I see you again you'll be dreaming about flower gardens and blue skies and pretty sunsets. Good morning.”
He watched her closely as she turned with a sad yet hopeful smile to leave the room.
“Thank you very much, doctor. I'll come back two weeks from today.”
Then she was gone.
For some minutes Owen sat drumming on his desk, lost in thought. “By George, that's a queer case. Her other reason is the real one. I wonder what it is?”
CHAPTER II
WHAT PENELOPE COULD NOT TELL THE DOCTOR
(Fragments from Her Diary)
Atlantic City, Tuesday.
I cannot tell what is on my mind, I cannot tell anyone, even a doctor; but I will keep my promise and look into my past life. I will open those precious, tragic, indiscreet little volumes bound in red leather in which I have for years put down my thoughts and intimate experiences. I have always found comfort in my diary.
I am thirty-three years old and for ten years, beginning before I was married, I have kept this record. I wrote of my unhappiness with my husband; I wrote of my lonely widowhood and of my many temptations; I wrote of my illness, my morbid cravings and hallucinations.
There are several of these volumes and I have more than once been on the point of burning them, but somehow I could not. However imperfectly I have expressed myself and however mistaken I may be in my interpretation of life, I have at least not been afraid to speak the truth about myself and about other women I have known, and truth, even the smallest fragment of it, is an infinitely precious thing.
What a story of a woman's struggles and emotions is contained in these pages! I wonder what Dr. Owen would think if he could read them. Heavens! How freely dare I draw upon these intimate chapters of my life? How much must the doctor know in order to help me—to save me?
Shall I reveal myself to him as I really was during those agitated years before my marriage when I faced the struggle of life, the temptations of life—an attractive young woman alone in New York City, earning her own living?
And how shall I tell the truth about my unhappy married life—the torture and degradation of it? The truth about my widowhood—those two gay years before the great disaster came, when, with money enough, I let myself go in selfish pursuit of pleasure—playing with fire?
As I turn over these agitated pages I feel I have tried to be honest. I rebel against hypocrisy, I hate false pretense, often I make myself out worse than I really am.
In one place I find this:
“There is no originality in women. They do what they see others do, they think what they are told to think—like a flock of sheep. Their hair is a joke—absurd frizzles and ear puffs that are always imitated. Their shoes are a tragedy. Their corsets are a crime. But they would die rather than change these ordered abominations. So would I. I flock with the crowd. I hobble my skirts, wear summer furs, powder my nose, wave my hair (permanently or not) according to the commands of fashion, but I hate myself for doing it. I am a woman!”
I am a woman and most women are liars—so are most men—but there is more excuse for women because centuries of oppression have made us afraid to tell the truth. I try to be original by speaking the truth—part of it, at least—in this diary.
On one page I find this:
“The truth is that women love pursuit and are easily reconciled to capture. Why else do they deck themselves out in finery, perfume themselves, bejewel themselves, flaunt their charms (including decolleté charms and alluring bathing suit charms) in every possible way? I do this myself—why? I have a supple figure and I dance without corsets, or rather with only a band to hold up my stockings. I wear low cut evening gowns, the most captivating I can afford. I love to flirt. I could not live without admiration, and other women are the same. They all have something that they are vain about—eyes, nose, mouth, voice, teeth, hair, complexion, hands, feet, figure—something that they are vain about. And what is vanity but a consciousness of power to attract men and make other women envious? There are only two efforts that the human race take seriously (after they have fed themselves): the effort of women to attract men, the effort of men to capture women.”
Wednesday.
In searching back through the years for the cause of this disaster that has brought me to the point where a woman's reason is overthrown, I see that I was always selfish, absorbed in my own problems and vanities, my own disappointments, grievances, emotions. It was what I could get out of life, not what I could give, that concerned me. I was vain of my good looks. I craved admiration.
Once I wrote in my diary:
“I often stand before my mirror at night before I go to bed and admire my own sombre beauty. I let my hair fall in a black cloud over my shoulders, then I braid it slowly with bare arms lifted in graceful poses. I sway my hips like Carmen, I thrust red flowers into my bosom. I move my head languidly, letting my white teeth gleam between red lips. I study my profile with a hand glass, getting the double reflection. I smile and beckon with my eyes. Yes, I am a beautiful woman—primeval, elemental—I was made for love.”
Again I wrote, showing that I half understood the perils that beset me:
“Women are moths, they love to play with fire. They are irresistibly driven—like poor little birds that dash themselves against a lighthouse—towards the burning excitements connected with the allurement of men. They live for admiration. The besetting sin of all women is vanity; vanity is a woman's consciousness of her power over men.”
And again:
“It is almost impossible for a fascinating woman not to flirt a little—sometimes. For example, she passes a man on the street, a distinguished looking man. She does not know him, but their eyes have met in a certain way and she feels that he is attracted by her. She has on a pretty dress with a bunch of violets. She wonders whether this man has turned back to look at her—she is sure he has—she longs to look back. No matter how much culture and breeding she has, she longs to look back!”
No wonder that, with such thoughts and inclinations, I was always more or less under temptation with men, who were drawn to me, I suppose, just as I was drawn to them. And I tried to excuse myself in the old way, as here:
“It is certain that some women have strong emotional desires, whereas other women have none at all or scarcely any. This fact has an evident bearing upon the question of women's morality. Some women must be judged more leniently than others. I have wondered if there are similar differences in men. I doubt it!”
Of course I had agitating experiences with men because I half invited them. It seemed as if I could not help it. As I said to myself, I was a moth, I wanted to play with fire.
On the next page I find this:
“Seraphine disapproves of my attitude towards men. She gave me a great talking to last night and said things I would not take from anyone else. Dear old Seraphine, she is so fine and kind! She says there is nothing in my physical makeup that compels me to be a flirt. I can act more discreetly if I wish to. It is my mental attitude toward romantic things that is wrong. Thousands of women just as pretty as I am never place themselves in situations with men that are almost certain to lead them into temptation. They will not start an emotional episode that may easily, as they know quite well, have a dangerous ending. But I am always ready to start, confident that my self-control will save me from any immediate disaster. And so far it always has.
How earnestly Seraphine sounded her warning. I wrote down her words and promised to heed them: “Remember, dear, that emotional desire deliberately aroused in 'harmless flirtations' and then deliberately repressed is an offense against womanhood, a menace to the health, and a degradation to the soul.”
Thursday night.
I am horribly sad tonight—lonely—discouraged. The doctor wants to know about my married life, about my husband. Why was I unhappy? Why is any woman unhappy? Because her love is trampled on, degraded—the spiritual part of it unsatisfied. Women are made for love and without love life means nothing to them. Women are naturally finer than men, they aspire more strongly to what is beautiful and spiritual, but their souls can be coarsened, their love can be killed. They can be driven—they have been driven for centuries (through fear of men) into lies and deceits and sensuality or pretence of sensuality.
The great tragedy of the world is sensuality, and it may exist between man and wife just as much as between a man and a paid woman. I don't know whether the Bible condemns sensuality between man and wife, but it ought to. I remember a story by Tolstoy in which the great moralist strips off our mask of hypocrisy and shows the hideous evil that results when a man and a woman degrade the holy sacrament of marriage. That is not love, but a perversion of love. How can God bless a union in which the wife is expected to conduct herself like a wanton or lose her husband? And she loses him anyway, for sensuality in a man inevitably leads him to promiscuousness. I know this to my sorrow!
Perhaps I am morbid. Perhaps I see life too clearly, know it too well. I do not want to be cynical or bitter. Oh, if only those old days of faith and trust could come back to me! When I think of what I was before I married Julian I see that I was almost like a child in my ignorance of the animal side of man's nature....
∵
Friday.
Dr. Owen thinks my trouble is shell shock, but he is mistaken. I have taken care of too many shell shock cases not to recognize the symptoms. Can I ever forget that darling soldier boy from Maryland who mistook me for his mother? “They're coming! They're coming!” he screamed one night; you could hear him all over the hospital. Then he jumped out of bed like a wild man—it took two orderlies and an engineer to get him back under the covers. I can see his poor wasted face when the little doctor came to give him a hypodermic. There he lay panting, groaning: “Oh those guns! Oh those guns! They break my ears!” Then he sprang up again, his eyes starting out of his head: “Look out, there! On the ammunition cart! Look out, Bill! Oh my God, they've got Bill—my pal! Blown him to hell! Oh, oh, oh!” and he put his head down and sobbed like a woman. That is shell shock. I have nothing like that. I know what I am doing.
∵
There was a storm today with great crashing waves, then everything grew calm under a golden sunset. I take this as a good omen. I feel happier already. The infinite peace of Nature is quieting my soul. I love the sea. I can almost say my prayers to the sea.
∵
Saturday.
The swimming master pays me extravagant compliments every morning when I splash about in the pool. I know my body is beautiful. Thank God, I have never imprisoned it in corsets.
I love the exercises I do in my room every morning. They bring back the play spirit of my childhood. When I get out of bed I slip into a loose garment, then I lie on the floor and stretch my spine along the carpet—it's wonderful how this exhilarates one. After that I take deep breaths at the open window, raising and lowering my arms—up as I draw my breath in, down as I throw it out. Then I lie down again and lift my legs straight up, the right, the left, then both together. I do this twenty times, resting between changes and taking deep breaths.
I sit cross-legged on the floor with my feet on a red and gold cushion and rotate my waist like an oriental dancer. I stand on my head and hands and curve my body to right and left in graceful flexings. I do this no matter how cold it is. I do not feel the cold, for I am all aglow with health and strength. Then, before my bath, I do dumb-bell exercises in front of the mirror.
I remember dining with my husband one night in a pink lace peignoir—we had been married about three years—and during the dessert, I excused myself and went into my bedroom and, posing before a cheval glass, I let the peignoir slip off my shoulders, and stood there like a piece of polished marble, rejoicing in my youth and loveliness!
How I hated my husband that night! He had taught me to drink. He had made me sensual. He had not yet assumed the coarse, red-faced brutish aspect that he wore later, but he had a coarse, red-faced brutish soul. Alas! his body was still fine enough to tempt me. And his mind was devilishly clever enough to captivate my fancy. He took away my faith, even my faith in motherhood. That was why I chiefly hated him.
For three years my husband disgusted me with his unfaithfulness. No woman was too high or too low, too refined or too ignorant, for his passing fancy, if only she had physical attractiveness—just a little physical attractiveness. Anything for variety, shop girl or duchess, kitchen maid or society leader, they were all the same to Julian. He confessed to me that he once made love to a little auburn-haired divorcée while they were in a mourning carriage going to her sister's funeral. Et elle s'est laissée faire!
He was like a hunter following his prey, like an angler fishing, he cared only for the chase, for the capture. That was the man I had married!
What a liar he was! He poisoned my mind with his lies, assuring me that all men were like himself, hypocrites, incapable of being true to one woman. And I believed him. The ghastly part of it is I still believe him. I can't help it. I have suffered too much. I can never have faith in another man, not even in Captain Herrick. That is why I shall never marry again—that is one reason.
∵
Sunday.
A wonderful day! I strolled along the board walk in my new furs, and met a young mother pushing a baby carriage with two splendid baby boys—one of them sucking at his bottle. Such babies! She let me hold the little fellow and I cuddled him close in my arms and felt his soft cheeks and his warm little chubby hands on my face. How I long for a baby of my own! I have thought—hoped—dreamed—
I went to the movies this evening with some friends and laughed so hard that I thought I would break something in my internal machinery.
When I returned to the hotel I found a letter from Captain Herrick—so manly and affectionate. He loves me! And I love him, more than anything in the world. I feel so well today, so glad to be alive that if Chris were here, I think I would promise him whatever he asked. I long to give myself entirely—my beauty, my passion, everything—to this man that I love.
And yet—alas!
Am I bold and vain to call myself beautiful?
∵
I find myself in my diary siding strongly with women against men in anything that has to do with emotional affairs, although I like men better than women. My tendency is always to blame the man. This is partly because of the hideous wrong that was done me by my husband and partly because I like to believe that, however blame-worthy women are in the sex struggle and, whatever faiblesses they may be guilty of, the fundamental cause of it all must be found in centuries of men's wickedness and oppression.
I have written about this with much feeling. In one place I say:
“Sometimes I feel as if there were a conspiracy of men—all kinds of men, including the most serious and respectable—against the virtue of attractive women. What a downfall of masculine reputations there would be if women should tell a little of what they know about men! Only a little! But women are silent in the main—through loyalty or through fear.”
And again:
“What happens to an attractive woman who is forced to earn her own living? In the business world? In the artistic world? Anywhere? I do not say that men are a pack of wolves, but—I had such a heartbreaking experience, especially in my brief musical career. I might have had a small part in grand opera at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York City, so one particular musical wolf assured me, if I would show a little sympathy with his desire to assist me in some of the rôles—occasional private rehearsals, and so on. Oh, the beast!... He gave the part to another girl (her voice did not compare with mine) who was less particular, and she made her début the next season. I went to work at Wanamaker's store!”
And still men pursued me.
I find this entry:
“Roberta took me to dinner yesterday at the Lafayette with her friend Mr. G——, a man of sixty, red-faced, fat and prosperous, the breezy Westerner type. He is giving a grand party at Sherry's and wants me to come. I said I was afraid I couldn't, my real reason being that I have no dress that is nice enough. He said nothing at the time, but kept his eyes on me, and this evening, when I got home, there was a perfectly stunning dinner gown—it must have cost $250.—with a note from Mr. G—— begging me to accept it as I would a flower, since it meant absolutely nothing to him.
“How I longed to keep that gown! I think I should have kept it if Seraphine had not happened in.
“'Isn't this lovely?' I said, holding it up. 'Do you think I can accept it?' Then I told her what Mr. G—— had said.
“She looked at me out of her kind, wise eyes.
“'Do you like him?'
“'Well—rather.'
“'Is he married or unmarried?'
“'I think he's married.'
“'Is he the man who gave Roberta her sables?'
“'Y-yes,' I admitted.
“She looked at me again.
“'I can't decide for you, Pen; you must settle it with your own conscience; but I am sure of one thing, that, if you accept this dress, you will pay for it, and probably pay much more than it is worth.'
“It ended in my sending the gown back and missing the dinner party, which made Mr. G—— furious, he blamed Roberta for my resistance, and a little later he threw her over. Like most men of that type who promise women wonderful things, he was hard, selfish and exacting—a cold-blooded sensualist. And poor Roberta, indolent and luxurious, was obliged to go back to work—up at seven and on her feet all day for twenty dollars a week. She had been spending twenty dollars a day!
“What is a woman to conclude from all this?” I wrote despairingly. “I know there are decent men in the world; there are employers who would never think of becoming unduly interested in their good-looking women assistants, who would never intimate that they had any claim upon the evenings of pretty stenographers or secretaries; there are lawyers who would never force odious attentions upon an attractive woman whose divorce case they might be handling—'Dear lady, how about a little dinner and a cabaret show tonight?'—There are old friends of the family, serious middle-aged men who would never take advantage of a young woman's weakness or distress; but, oh dear God! there are so many others who have no decency, no heart! A woman is desperate and must confide in someone. She has lost her position and is struggling to find another. She craves innocent pleasure—music, the theatre, the dance. She is so horribly lonely. Help me, counsel me, she pleads to some man whom she trusts—any man, the average man. Does he help her? Yes, on one condition, that she use her power as a woman. Not otherwise. This is a great mystery to women—how men, who are naturally kind, can be so cruel, so persistent, so infernally clever in forcing women to use their power for their own undoing.”
∵
Tuesday.
Here is an interesting thing that Kendall Brown once said on this subject—I recorded it in my diary along with other sayings of this erratic Greenwich Village poet and philosopher:
“The sex power of women is the most formidable power ever loosed upon earth,” he declared one evening. “Thrones totter before it. Captains of industry forget their millions in its presence. Cherchez la femme! This terrible power is possessed by every dark-eyed siren in a Second Avenue boarding house, by every languishing, red-lipped blonde earning eighteen dollars a week in a department store. And she knows it! Others have vast earthly possessions, stores of science, palaces of art, knowledge without end—she has a tresor that makes baubles of these—she is the custodian of life, she has the eternal life power.”
How true that is!
Again I wrote:
“It may be argued that women are willing victims of this man conspiracy, I say no! Every woman in her heart longs to love one man, to give herself to one man, to be true to one man. Even the unfortunate in the streets, if she receives just a little kindness, if she has only half a chance and is encouraged to right living by some decent fellow, will go through fire and water to show her gratitude and devotion. But men give women no chance. They pluck the roses in the garden and trample them under foot. Here is the great tragedy of modern life—men wish to change from one woman to another, whereas women do not wish to change. A characteristic sex difference between men and women is that men are naturally promiscuous, but women abhor the thought of promiscuousness.”
∵
Sunday.
A wave of repulsion runs over me as I quickly turn the pages of my life with Julian. And then a faint whisper comes to me: “The truth, you have promised to tell it—at least to your own soul.”
Slowly I turn back to what I wrote in those unhappy days:
“Why do I live with him? I no longer love him. At times I despise him and his slightest touch makes me shiver with disgust, yet I continue to endure this life—why?
“It is because of the great pity I have for him. He is weak and helpless, almost child-like in his dependence on me. I am the prop which holds up the last shreds of his self-respect. If I left him, he would drift lower and lower, I know it. Sometimes I pass some awful creature staggering along the sidewalks. He is dirty and uncared for. Long matted hair falls across his bleared and sunken eyes. I say to myself: 'But for you, Penelope Wells, that might be Julian.' And this gives me courage to take up my burden once more.”
∵
And again I find:
“I am beginning to fear. I have been looking in my mirror and it seems to me that my face is taking on the lines of animalism that I see daily becoming deeper in Julian's face. Must I continue this degradation? If I were helping him to raise himself—but I am not, not really. It's too heavy a weight for me to bear. I am sinking ... sinking to his level. I cannot stand it. It is killing me....
∵
And again:
“I am too heartsick to write....
“I began this a week ago in agony of soul when I tried to set down my feelings about a horrible night with Julian, but I could not. He has been drinking—drinking for weeks—neglecting his business, breaking all his promises to me. What can I do? How can I help him, strengthen him, keep him from doing some irrevocable thing that will utterly destroy our home and make me lose him? In spite of his weakness, his neglect, his faithlessness, I cannot bear the thought of losing him. My pride is involved and—and something else!
“He had not come home for dinner that night and it was ten o'clock when I heard the door slam. Julian came into the living room and as soon as I saw him my heart sank. He dropped into a chair without speaking.
“'Tired, dear?' I said, trying to smile a welcome.
“'Dead beat,' he sighed and stared moodily into the fire.
“I went to him and rested my hand lightly on his head and smoothed back his hair as he liked me to do. He jerked away.
“'Wish you'd let me alone,' he muttered fretfully.
“I drew back, knowing what this irritability meant, and we sat in silence gazing into the glowing ashes. His fingers beat a nervous tattoo against the chair and presently, with some mumbled words, he rose and moved towards the door. Now I knew the fight was on, the fight with the Demon, drink, that was drawing him away from me. I followed him into the hall.
“'Don't go,' I pleaded, but he pushed my hand from the door-knob.
“'I'll be back soon,' he said, reaching for his hat.
“'Wait!' I whispered. Deep within I breathed a prayer: 'Brave heart, have courage; nimble wit, be alert; warm, white body hold him fast.'
“'Come back ... before the fire ... I want to talk to you,' I leaned against him caressingly, but I could feel no response as I nestled closer.
“'Don't you care for me any more?' I questioned tenderly.
“He was still unyielding, his brain was busy with the thought of the brown liquor that his whole system craved. Purposely I drew back my flowing sleeve and placed my warm flesh against his face. He turned to his old seat before the fire.
“'All right, I'll stay for ten minutes ... if what you say is important.'
“When he was once more comfortable, I brought a cushion to his chair and snuggled down at his feet, with my head resting against him. I drew his half reluctant hand around my throat, then I exerted every part of my brain force ... to hold him. Ceaselessly I talked of our old days together—camping trips to the Northern woods of Canada, wonderful weeks of idling down the river in our launch, days of ideal happiness, spent together. I appealed to his love for me, his old love, and the memory of our early married life. He was unresponsive, and I could feel the restlessness of his fingers in my hair.
“Presently he pushed me aside, not ungently this time but, nevertheless, firmly. Once more the struggle began, and now I must rely on the old physical lure to hold him.... Well, I won. I kept him with me but was it worth such a sacrifice? As I think ... I burn with shame.”
There are many entries in my diary like this, for my life with Julian was full of scenes when I tried so hard ... so hard ... all in vain!
∵
Here is another picture:
“Last night Julian came home in a hilarious mood. His habitual sullen look had gone and he almost seemed the man who had won me—before I knew him as he really is.
“'Come along, Penny,' he laughed as he caught me in his arms. 'We're going to celebrate. Dress up in that lacy black thing—you are seduction itself in it.'
“His praise made me happy and, responding to his mood, I changed my clothes quickly, and we set forth joyfully in anticipation of a pleasant evening.
“Everything went well through the dinner, although I hesitated when Julian ordered wine; but I was afraid to oppose him or to speak a single jarring word.
“'Drink up, Penny, and have some more. My God, but you are glorious tonight!' he whispered as he leaned across the table.
“I smiled and emptied my glass, and soon I became as reckless and jovial as he. We went from one cabaret to another, laughing at everything. All the world was gay. There was no sorrow anywhere—only one grand celebration. Julian was never so fascinating. I was proud of his good looks, of his wit, of his strength as he lifted me from the taxicab and almost carried me into the house.
“'My darling!' I breathed as my lips brushed his cheek, 'I love you!'
“'You see, Penny, how wonderful everything is when you are reasonable. If you will only drink with me once in a while, I'll never, never leave you.'
“He placed me gently in a chair. Soon the room began to whirl around ... and I knew no more....
“This morning my head ached and a thousand needles were piercing my eyes. I rang for the maid and asked for my husband.
“'He brought you home last night, but he went out again later and he hasn't come back,' she said and her eyes did not meet mine.
“'Was I—was I?' I stammered, shame possessing me.
“'Yes, Mrs. Wells, you were....'
“God! What have I gained? I have degraded myself without doing Julian any good. I have sunk to his level and have not even been able to keep him at my side. I hate him! I hate myself even more!”
∵
I find a pitiful entry that I made only a few months before Julian was killed. In a fit of anger he had left me, accusing me of being a drag on his life, saying that I was to blame for all his follies. He was going to be rid of me now. So he took all the money in the house and went off—I should never see him again. At last I had what I had longed for, my freedom, he had given it to me, flung it in my face. And then—
This is what I wrote six weeks later:
“Well, I'm a failure all right. Never again may I think well of myself or feel that I am entitled to the joys of life. For I'm just a plain moral coward. I couldn't even keep what was forced on me—my liberty.
“Last Wednesday he came back, such a miserable wreck of a man, so utterly broken in every way that it would have moved a heart of stone. Inside of me is a sorrow too deep for expression, but somehow a peace also. Now I am sure that my bondage will never cease. But I couldn't refuse to take Julian back when I saw what a state he was in. His spiritual abasement was such an awful thing that I could not shame him by even letting him know that I understood it.”
∵
Monday.
I walked for hours beside the ocean, watching the waves, the sky, the soaring gulls,—trying to tire myself out, searching into my heart for the truth about my life—about my illness. I cannot find the truth. I have done what Dr. Owen told me to do as well as I can and—I do not see that any good has come of it. I have stirred up ghosts of the past—leering ghosts, and I hate them. I am sick of ignoble memories. I want to close forever the door on those unhappy years. I want to be well, to live a sane life, to have a little pleasure; but....
∵
Thursday.
I am tired of Atlantic City. I am going back to New York tomorrow. No doubt I have benefited by these days of rest and change. My bad dreams are gone and I have only heard the Voices once. Dr. Owen will say that his prescription has been efficacious, but that is not true. I know They are waiting for me in the city, waiting to torture me. Then why do I go back? Because it is my fate. I am driven on by some power beyond my control—driven on!
Penelope will cross the ocean. Her husband will die very soon. There will be war soon. She will go to the war and honors will be conferred upon her on the battlefields. Then she will go down to horror—to terror!
How that prophecy of Seraphine haunts me! All of it has come true except the very last. Horror! Terror! These two are ever before me. These two already encompass me. These two will presently overwhelm me unless—unless—I don't know what.
Seraphine is in New York, I have meant to go to see her, but—I am afraid, I am afraid of what she will tell me!
New York, Saturday.
I must set down here—to ease my tortured brain—some of the things that have happened to me since I last wrote in this book, my confessional.
When I got back to town I found an invitation to go to a Bohemian ball, and I decided to accept. Vive la joie! So I put on a white dress and went with Roberta Vallis and that ridiculous poet Kendall Brown. It was the first time I had danced since my husband died and I enjoyed it.
Such a ball! They called it a Pagan Revel and it was! Egyptian costumes and a Russian orchestra. Some of the Egyptian slave maidens were dressed mostly in brown paint. Kendall says he helped dress them at the Liberal Club. Good heavens! Kendall's pose of lily white virtue amuses me. He went as a cave man with a leopard skin over his shoulders, and I danced with him two or three times. His talk reminds me of Julian. How well I know the methods of these sentimental pirates! What infinite patience and adroitness they use in leading the talk towards dangerous ground! How seriously they begin! With what sincerity and ingenuous frankness they proceed, and all the time they know exactly what they are doing, exactly what effects they are producing in a woman.
Kendall spoke of the modern dance in a detached, intellectual way. He dwelt on one particular development in the fox trot—had I noticed it?—there! that naval officer and the languishing blonde were doing it now—which seemed to him unæsthetic. It might be harmful in some cases, say to a Class A woman. Being curious, I asked what he meant by a “Class A” woman and this gave Kendall his opportunity to discourse on fundamental differences that exist among women, so he declares. I wish I knew if what he says is true. He assures me he has it on the authority of a Chicago specialist, but I never put much dependence on anything that Kendall Brown says. If this is true the whole romantic history of the world will have to be rewritten and the verdicts of numberless juries in murder trials passionels ought to be set aside.
The statement is that physical desire is universal among men, but not among women. One-third of all women, Kendall puts them in Class C, have no such desire; therefore, they deserve no particular credit for remaining virtuous. Another third of all women are in Class B, the normal class, where this desire is or is not present, according to circumstances. The last third of all women make up Class A, and these women, being as strongly tempted as men (or more so), are condemned to the same struggles that men experience, and, if they happen to be beautiful, and without deep spirituality, they are fated to have emotional experiences that may make them great heroines or artists, great adventuresses or outcasts.
I am sure I do not belong in Class C, I hope I belong in Class B, but I am afraid—
∵
I knew They were waiting for me. Last night I heard Them again—after the ball. It was a horrible night! I shall write to Dr. Owen that I must see him at once.
CHAPTER III
A BOWL OF GOLD FISH
(A letter from Penelope)
New York, February ——.
Dear Dr. Owen:
Did you think I had vanished from the earth? I know I ought to have reported to you a week ago, but—I fear Penelope Wells is an unreliable person. Forgive me! I am in great distress.
I will say, first, that Atlantic City did me a lot of good. I came back to town happier than I have been for months, in fact I was so encouraged that I decided to amuse myself a little, as you advised. Last night I went to a rather gay ball with some friends, and I was beginning to think myself almost normal, when suddenly—alas!
I had a strange experience this morning that frightens me. I was sitting at my desk writing a note when I glanced towards the window where there is a bowl of gold fish, three beautiful fish and two snails. It amuses me to watch them sometimes. Well, as I looked up, the sunshine was flashing on the little darting creatures and I felt myself drawn to the bowl, and for two or three minutes I stood there staring into it as if I expected to see something. Then, presently I did see something, I saw myself inside the bowl—in a kind of vision. I saw myself just as distinctly as I ever saw anything.
In order that you may understand this, doctor, I must explain that Captain Herrick took me home from the ball. It was two o'clock in the morning when we left the place and it had blown up cold during the rain, so that the streets were a glare of ice and our taxi was skidding horribly. When we got to Twelfth Street and Fifth Avenue there came a frightful explosion; a gas main had taken fire and flames were shooting twenty feet into the air. I was terrified, for it made me think of Paris—the air raids, the night sirens, the long-distance cannon. Captain Herrick saw that I was quite hysterical and said that I mustn't think of going up to Eightieth Street. I must spend the night at his studio in Washington Square, only a few doors away, and he would go to a hotel. I agreed to this, for I was nearly frozen.
When we entered the studio I was surprised to find what a beautiful place it was. It seems that Captain Herrick has rented it from a distinguished artist. There is a great high ceiling and a wonderful fireplace where logs were blazing. I was standing before this fireplace trying to warm myself, when there came a crash overhead, it was only a gas fixture that had fallen, but it seemed to me the whole building was coming down. I almost fainted in terror and Chris caught me in his arms, trying to comfort me. Then, before I realized what he was doing, he had drawn me close to him and kissed me.
This made me very angry. I felt that he had no right to take advantage of my fright in this way and I told him I would not stay in his studio a minute longer. And I did not. I almost ran down the stairs, then out into the street. It was foolish to get so agitated, but I could not help it. I went over to the Brevoort and spent the night there. You will understand in a minute why I am telling you all this, it has to do with the vision that I saw in the bowl of gold fish.
In this vision I saw myself enter Captain Herrick's studio just as I really did—in my white satin dress. Christopher was with me in his uniform. Then I saw myself lying on a divan and—Chris was bending over me, kissing me passionately. He kissed me many times, it seemed as if he would never stop kissing me—in the vision. All this was as clear as a motion picture. The extraordinary part of it is, that I neither resisted him nor responded in any way, I just seemed to be lying there—with my eyes closed—as if I were asleep.
I am very much distressed about this. I know that I did not really lie down on Captain Herrick's divan—I would not have done such a thing for the world. I know Captain Herrick did not really kiss me in that passionate way, as I saw him kiss me in the bowl of gold fish, but I feel that he did. I am afraid that he did. I can't get over the feeling that he did. This sounds like madness, doesn't it? A woman cannot be ardently kissed by a man without knowing it, can she? Perhaps I am mad—perhaps this is the way mad people feel.
Help me, doctor, if you can, and above all please see Captain Herrick—he is an old friend of yours—and find out exactly what I did at his studio. I must know the truth. And I can't ask Chris, can I?
Yours in anguish of soul,
Penelope Wells.
P. S.—Please telephone me as soon as you get this and make an appointment to see me.
CHAPTER IV
FIVE PURPLE MARKS
During his thirty years of medical experience among neurasthenic and hysterical women, Dr. William Owen had never encountered a more puzzling case than the one before him on this brisk winter morning when he set forth to answer the urgent appeal of Penelope Wells. Here was a case fated to be written about in many languages and discussed before learned societies. A Boston psychologist was even to devote a chapter of his great work “Mysteries of the Subconscious Mind” to the hallucinations of Penelope W——. Poor Penelope!
When Dr. Owen entered her attractive sitting room with its prevailing tone of blue, he found his fair patient reclining on a chaise longue, her eyes heavy with anxiety.
“It's good of you to come, doctor. I appreciate it,” she gave him her hand gratefully. “I expected to go to your office, but—something else has happened and I am—discouraged.” Her arm fell listlessly by her side. “So I telephoned you.”
“I am glad to come, you know I take a particular interest in you,” he smiled cheerily and drew up a chair. “We must expect these set-backs, but you are improving. You show it in your face. And your letter showed it. I read your letter carefully—studied it and—”
“You haven't seen Captain Herrick?” she asked eagerly.
“Not yet. I have asked him to dine with me this evening.”
Penelope sighed wearily and twined her fingers together in nervous agitation.
“It's all so distressing. I can't understand it. Why did I see myself in that bowl of gold fish, so distinctly? Tell me—why?”
“You mustn't take that seriously, Mrs. Wells. These crystal visions are common enough—the books are full of them. It's a phenomenon of self-hypnotism. You are in a broken-down nervous condition after months of excessive strain—that's all, and these hallucinations result, just as colored shapes and patterns appear when you shut your eyes tight and press your fingers against the eye-balls.”
This did not satisfy her. “What I want to know is whether there is any possibility that I really did what I saw myself do in that vision? Do you think there is?”
“Certainly not. I believe you did exactly what you tell me you did—you spent a few minutes in Christopher's studio and then came away angry because he kissed you. By the way, I don't see why one kiss from a man who loves you and has asked you to marry him should have offended you so terribly, especially when you admit that you care for him?”
His tone was one of good-humored indulgence for capricious beauty, but Mrs. Wells kept to her seriousness.
“I didn't mean that I was really angry with Captain Herrick. I was angry at myself for the thrill of joy I felt when he kissed me and I was frightened by the wave of emotion that swept over me. I have been frightened all these days—even now!” She covered her eyes with her hand as if shrinking from some painful memory.
“Please don't agitate yourself. You must not get hysterical about this. You must have confidence in me and in your own powers of recuperation. And you must be sure to give me all the facts. Did I understand you to say that something else has happened—since you wrote me?”
“Yes, something quite unbelievable—it happened last night.”
“Tell me about it—quietly, just as if you were discussing somebody else.”
Penelope smiled wistfully. “How kind and wise you are! I will try to be calm, but—it is hard for me. I had a dream last night, doctor, and this dream is true. I have evidence that it is true. I did something last night without knowing it, and then I dreamed about it.”
“You did something without knowing it?”
“Yes, I put on a red dress and a black hat that I have not worn for four years, not since my husband died. For four years I have only worn black or white.”
“Do I understand you to say that you put on these things without knowing that you put them on?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know you did?”
“My maid told me so. You see my dream was so extraordinarily vivid—I'll give you the details in a minute—that, as soon as I awakened, I rang for Jeanne and questioned her. 'Jeanne,' I said, 'you know the red dress that I have not worn since my husband died?' She looked at me in a queer way and said: 'Madame is laughing at me. Madame knows quite well that she wore the red dress last night.' Then she recalled everything in detail, how I sent her to a particular shelf where this dress was folded away and got her to freshen up a ribbon and press the skirt where it was wrinkled. Jeanne is also positive that I put on my black hat. Then, she says, I went out; I left the house at five minutes to nine and came back about eleven. There is no doubt about it.”
“And you remember nothing of all this?”
“Nothing. So—so you see,” she faltered, then she leaned impulsively toward the doctor. “As an expert will you please tell me if it is possible for a woman to act like that unless her mind is affected?”
Dr. Owen tried to take this lightly. “I'm a fairly sane citizen myself, but if you asked me which suit I wore yesterday, I couldn't tell you.”
“You couldn't suddenly put on red clothes without knowing it, if you had been wearing black clothes for years, could you?” she demanded.
He laughed. “When it comes to clothes I might do anything. I might wear a straw hat in January. But I couldn't go out of the house without knowing it. Do you mean to tell me you don't remember going out of the house last night?”
“I certainly do not. I remember nothing about it. I would have sworn that I went to bed early,” she insisted.
“Hm! Have you any idea where you went?”
“Yes—I know where I went, but I only know this from my dream. I know I went to Captain Herrick's studio. You—you can ask him.”
“Of course. You haven't asked him yourself—you haven't telephoned, have you?”
“No, no! I would be ashamed to ask him.”
The doctor noted her increasing agitation and the flood of color mounting to her cheeks.
“Steady now! Take it easy. Have you any idea what you did at the studio, assuming that you really went there?”
Penelope hesitated, biting her lips. “I know what I saw myself do in the dream. I acted in an impossible way. I—I—here is a little thing—you know I never smoke, but in the dream I did smoke.”
“Have you ever smoked?”
“Yes, I did when my husband was living. He taught me. He said I was a better sport when I was smoking a cigarette.”
“But you haven't smoked since your husband's death?”
“Not at all. I have not smoked once since he died, not once—until last night.”
The man of science eyed her searchingly. “Mrs. Wells, you are not hiding anything from me, are you?”
“No! No! Of course not! Don't frown at me like that—please don't. I am trying my best to tell you the truth. I know these things did not happen, but—”
Here her self-control left her and, with a gesture of despair, Penelope sank forward on a little table beside her chair and sobbed hysterically, her face hidden in her arms.
“There! There!” soothed Dr. Owen. “I was a brute. I have taxed you beyond your strength.”
“I can't tell you how grateful I am for your patience and sympathy,” murmured Penelope through her tears, and, presently, regaining her composure, she continued her confession.
“I want you to know everything—now. In my dream there was a scene of passion between Captain Herrick and myself. He held me in his arms and kissed me and I—I responded. We both seemed to be swept on by a reckless madness and at one moment Chris seized me roughly with his hand and—of course you think this is all an illusion, but—look here!” She threw open her loose garment and on her beautiful shoulder pointed to five perfectly plain purple marks that might have been made by the fingers of a man's hand.
“Extraordinary!” muttered the doctor. “Let me look at this closer. Have you got such a thing as a magnifying glass? Ah, thank you!”
For some moments he silently studied these strange marks on the fair young bosom, then he said very gravely: “Mrs. Wells, I want to think this over before giving an opinion. And I must have a serious talk with Captain Herrick.”
CHAPTER V
WHAT REALLY HAPPENED AT THE STUDIO
For the purposes of this narrative, which is concerned almost exclusively with the poignant strangeness of a woman's experiences, it is sufficient to say that Captain Christopher Herrick was what is generally known as a fine fellow—handsome, modest, well-to-do, altogether desirable as a lover and a husband. At thirty-five he had made for himself an enviable position as a New York architect, one who was able to strike out boldly in new lines while maintaining a reasonable respect for venerable traditions. He had served gallantly in the war and he was now, for quite understandable reasons, desperately in love with Penelope Wells.
On this particular evening when Christopher had been summoned by his much respected friend, Dr. Owen, to dine and discuss a matter of immediate importance, the young officer had accepted eagerly. For some time he had wanted to talk with the doctor about Penelope's nervous condition. He was drawn to this girl by a force that stirred the depths of his being—he could not live without her; yet his love was clouded by anxiety at her strange behavior.
Christopher's face was troubled. His brain was in a turmoil. The happenings of the last few days bewildered him. Life had seemed so simple, so beautiful, with just their great love for each other to build on; but now.... He was only sure of one thing, that from the moment Penelope Wells had come to him as a ministering angel across the scarred and broken battle field, he had adored her with a love that would endure until the day of his death ... and, he told himself, beyond that!
“Chris, my boy,” began Owen in his bluff, cheery way when they had retired to the study for coffee and cigars, “I am in a difficulty, I must ask you some questions that may embarrass you—it's the only way out.”
Herrick's clear, honest gaze met the doctor's eyes unflinchingly.
“That's all right, sir. Go ahead. I suppose it's about Mrs. Wells?”
“Yes. I am very much interested in her case, not only on your account, but because she is a wonderful woman. When I write your father I'll tell him he's going to have a daughter-in-law who will make him sit up and take notice. Ha, ha!”
The young man's heavy brows contracted gloomily.
“I wish that were true, sir, but—you know what I told you?”
“About her refusing you? Don't worry over that. Just wait until we get her health built up a little.”
“Do you think she will change her mind? Did she say so?” Herrick asked eagerly.
“Pretty nearly that. If she doesn't marry you, she won't marry anyone. The fact is—Mrs. Wells is suffering from a nervous strain, I'm not sure what it is, but there are abnormal symptoms and—I hate to force your confidence, Chris, but, speaking as Mrs. Wells' medical adviser and a mighty good friend of yours, a sort of representative of your father—you know how close your father and I have always been?”
“Yes, sir, I know. I'll do anything you say.”
“You want to help this lovely lady? You want to make her happy?”
“That's what I want more than anything in this world,” the officer's grey eyes flashed with the spirit of a lover and a soldier.
“Good. Now the way to do it is—you must help her by helping me. I think I understand the situation up to a week ago, but since then—well, it's a little complicated. Mrs. Wells has paid you two visits in the last few days, hasn't she?”
“Yes. Did she tell you?”
“She told me a little. Try some of that port, Chris, and light another cigar,” the older man said genially. “We may as well be comfortable. There! Now tell me about Mrs. Wells' first visit—after the dance?”
At this invitation the young officer began quite frankly and with a certain sense of humor to describe the circumstances that led up to the climax, but presently he hesitated, and, observing this, Owen said: “No false delicacy, please. It's extremely important to me as a doctor to know everything that happened. You say Mrs. Wells came in chilled and frightened and—then what?”
“Then I threw a couple of logs on the fire and was just going to get her some brandy against the cold when there came an awful racket overhead, it shook the whole place and Penelope was so startled that—just instinctively I put my arm around her. She clung to me and—I tried to soothe her and before I knew it—I couldn't help it—I kissed her.”
The doctor smiled. “If you hadn't kissed her under those circumstances, my boy, I would never have forgiven you. Perhaps she wouldn't either. Well?”
“It's going to be pretty tough, sir, to tell you—some of this,” stammered Herrick, frowning at the carpet. “Penelope got awfully angry and said she was going to leave. I apologized and tried to square myself, but she wouldn't have it. She said I had insulted her and she refused to stay in my place another minute. I asked her to wait until I could get a dry coat and umbrella for her and then I would take her wherever she wanted to go. She agreed to wait and I went into the other room.”
Christopher paused and drew his chair closer to the doctor.
“Now here is a most extraordinary thing. When I left Penelope she was standing before the fire, furious with me, but when I came back, not two minutes later, she was lying on the divan with her eyes closed, apparently asleep. As I had been out of the room for so short a time, it seemed incredible that she could have really fallen asleep, yet there she was. I looked at her in astonishment. I wondered if she could have fainted, but I saw that her cheeks were flushed, her lips were red and she was breathing regularly. I didn't know what to make of it.”
“Well?” questioned the doctor.
Herrick shifted uneasily on his chair. “I haven't had much experience with women, sir, but I know they are complicated creatures, and I couldn't help thinking that Penelope was playing a little joke on me; so I bent over her and, after I had made up my mind that she wasn't ill and wasn't asleep, I—I kissed her again. That's another queer thing. Her lips were warm, her breathing was as soft and regular as a child's, but she never moved nor spoke nor responded in any way. She just lay there and—”
“You thought she was shamming?” suggested Owen.
“That's it, especially as she had been so angry with me just a few minutes before. I couldn't imagine anything else. So—er—”
“Go on,” said the older man.
“You know I have always respected women, and this woman was more to me than anything—she's the woman I want for my wife, so you see I would be the last man in the world to show her disrespect, but—” the young fellow flushed—“as I looked at her there on the divan—so beautiful—I longed to hold her in my arms and I said to myself that, even if she was tricking me, it was quite a pleasing trick—if she could stand it, I could—so I—I kissed her some more. I begged her to speak to me, to respond to me, to tell me she returned my love and would be my wife; but she didn't answer, didn't move, or speak, she didn't even open her eyes, and presently I was filled with a horrible sense of shame. I felt like a thief in the night, stealing caresses that were not meant for me or willingly given. I realized that something terrible must have happened to Penelope, although she looked so calm and beautiful.
“And now my only thought was to call for help. I hurried into the next room and tried to get you on the telephone, but they said you were at the hospital and could not be reached for an hour. Then I rushed back to the studio and, as soon as I came in, I could scarcely believe my eyes but there was Penelope standing in front of the fireplace, just as I had left her the first time. She was looking at the blazing logs with a thoughtful expression and when I came close to her, she faced me naturally and pleasantly as if nothing had happened.
“You can imagine my astonishment, I could not speak, but—I was so relieved to find her recovered that I put my arm around her affectionately and just touched my lips to her cheek. Heavens! You should have seen her then. She sprang away from me indignant. How dared I take such a liberty? Had she not reproved me already? It was incredible that a man who professed to care for her, a gentleman, should be so lacking in delicacy. And before I could do anything or explain anything, she had dashed out into the night alone, refusing even to let me walk beside her. Now then,” Christopher concluded, “what do you make of that?”
“Strange!” nodded the doctor, “very strange. And in spite of this she came to see you again?”
“Yes, two evenings later, without any warning, she burst into my studio about nine o'clock.”
“In a red dress?”
“Yes.”
“And a black hat?”
“Yes.”
“Good Lord, it's true!” muttered Owen. “Go on, my boy. I want the details. This may be exceedingly important. Go right through the scene from the beginning.”
After a moment of perplexed silence, Christopher continued: “When I say she burst in, that about expresses it. She was like a whirlwind, a red, laughing, fascinating whirlwind. I had never seen her half so beautiful—so alluring. I was mad about her and—half afraid of her.”
“Hm!” grunted Owen. “What did she do?”
“Do? She did a lot of things. In the first place she apologized for having been so silly the time before—after the ball. She said she was ill then, she didn't want to talk about it. Now she had come to make amends—that was the idea.”
“I see. Well?”
“Well, we sat before the fire and she asked me to make her a cocktail. She said she had had the blues and she wanted to be gay. So I mixed some cocktails and she took two, and she certainly was gay. I didn't know Penelope drank cocktails, but of course it was all right—lots of women do. Then she wanted to sit on the divan and she bolstered me up with pillows. She said she liked divans. I hate to tell you all this, sir.”
“Go on, Chris.”
“Pretty soon she wanted a cigarette and she began to blow smoke in my face, laughing and fooling and—finally she put her lips up so temptingly for another light that I ... I'll never forget how she bent over me and held my face between her two hands and kissed me slowly with a little sideways movement and told me to call her Fauvette—not Penelope. She said she hated the name Penelope. 'Call me Fauvette,' she said. 'I am your Fauvette, all yours.'”
“Extraordinary! This was the woman who had been furious with you only two nights before for daring to kiss her once?”
“Yes, sir. Now she was a siren, a wonderful, lithe creature, clinging to me. I almost lost control of myself. Once I caught her sharply by the shoulder—I tore her dress....”
Christopher stopped as the power of these memories overcame him. He covered his eyes with one hand, while the other clutched the chair arm.
The doctor waited.
“Well, sir,” the young man resumed, “I don't know how I came through that night without dishonor, but I did. There was a moment of madness, then suddenly, distinctly, like a gentle bell I heard a voice inside me, a sort of spiritual voice saying two words that changed everything. 'Your wife!' That is what she was to be, my wife! I loved her. I must defend her against herself, against myself. And I did. I got her out of that place—somehow. I got her home—somehow. I have been through several battles, doctor, but this one was the hardest.”
Captain Herrick drew a long sigh and sat silent.
“What's the answer, doctor?” he asked presently.
“I don't know, Chris. Upon my soul, I don't know.”
CHAPTER VI
EARTH-BOUND
(From Penelope's Diary)
Tuesday Night.
Heaven help me! I have heard the words that sound my doom. I saw Dr. Owen this morning. It is all true—my dream, and what I saw myself do in the bowl of goldfish. True! I did those incredible things. I wore my red dress and my black hat. I went to Captain Herrick's studio. I lay down on the divan—everything is true. Oh, God, this is too horrible! How can I ever face Christopher again? I wish I could die!
Dr. Owen questioned me about the name Fauvette—why did I ask Christopher to call me Fauvette? I have no idea. I hate and despise that name. It brings up memories that I wish might be forever blotted out of my mind. That was the name Julian used to call me when he had been drinking. He would pretend that I was another person, Fauvette, and sometimes Fauvette would do things that I refused to do. Fauvette would yield to his over-powering physical charm and would say dreadful things, would enter into his mood and become just the sort of animal creature that he wanted. It was like a madness.
Wednesday morning.
I cried my eyes out last night and lay awake for hours thinking about my unhappy life. All my pride and hopes have come to this—an irresponsible mind. It makes no difference whether the cause is shell shock or something else, the fact remains that my mind does not work properly—I do things without knowing or remembering what I do. I am sure I cannot live long—what have I to live for? I have made a will leaving my little fortune to Chris—he will never know how much I care for him—and my jewelry to Seraphine, except my silly thumb ring, which is for Roberta Vallis. She loves it.
This afternoon They came again. They never were so bad. I was walking down Fifth Avenue and, as I reached the cathedral, I thought I would go in and say my prayers. I love the soft lights and the smell of incense, but just at the door They began insulting me.
“Little fool! Little fool! She is going to say her prayers. Ha, ha!” They laughed.
I knelt down and breathed an old benediction, shutting my ears against the Voices:
“The peace of God which passeth all understanding—”
“Fauvette! Fauvette!” They mocked me.
“Keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God—”
“She's a pretty little devil. I like her mouth.”
“And of his son, Jesus Christ our Lord—”
“Red dress! Red dress! Divan! Divan!”
“And the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost—”
“She can't remember it. She's thinking of her lover. She wants to kiss her lover.” Then They said gross things and I could not go on. I got up from my knees, heartbroken, and came away.
∵
Thursday night.
I thought I should never be happy again, but whatever the future holds for me of darkness and sadness, I have had one radiantly happy day. Christopher telephoned this morning and arrived half an hour later with an armful of roses. He took me to luncheon, then for a drive in the Park, then to tea at the Plaza where we danced to delicious music, and finally to dinner and the theater. He would not leave me. And over and over again he asked me to marry him. He will not hear of anything but that I am to be his wife. He loves me, he worships me, he trusts me absolutely. Nothing that has happened makes the slightest difference to him. Dr. Owen is going to cure me in a few weeks, there is no doubt about it, Christopher says, and anyhow, he loves me.
If I were in Europe now I'd make a pilgrimage to the shrine of some saint and heap up offerings of flowers. I must do something to make others happy; my heart is overflowing with gratitude!
I thrilled with pride as I walked beside my lover on the Avenue this afternoon. He looked so tall and splendid in his uniform. I love his eyes—his shoulders—everything about him. My Christopher!
I am to give him his answer within a week, but—what answer can I give him?
∵
Friday morning.
Alas! I have paid for my happiness—it was written, it had to be. I have lived through a night that cannot be described. Seraphine's prophetic words have come true. Horror! Terror! I cannot bear it any longer. It is quite impossible for me to bear it any longer. I have sent for Seraphine, begging her to come to me at once—this afternoon, this evening, any time tonight, before I sleep again. I would sooner die than endure another such night.
∵
Saturday morning.
Seraphine did not get my note until late, but in spite of a snow-storm, she came to me and stayed all night. Dear Seraphine! She spends her life helping and comforting people in distress. She sees nothing but trouble from morning till night, yet she is always cheerful and jolly. She says God wants her to laugh and grow fat, so she does.
We talked for hours and I told her everything—or nearly everything. There is only one abominable memory that I can never tell to anyone, I may write it some day in the red leather volume of my diary that is locked with a key and that must be burned before I die. I told Seraphine how I was suddenly awakened Thursday night by a horrible feeling that there was a presence near me in my bedroom. Then I slept again and saw myself all in white lying on the ground surrounded by a circle of black birds with hateful red eyes—fiery eyes. These birds came nearer and nearer and I knew I was suffering horribly as I lay there, yet I looked on calmly without a shred of sympathy for myself; in fact I felt only amused contempt when I saw the dream image of poor Penelope start up from the ground with a scream of fright.
While I opened my heart Seraphine sat silent, watching me like a loving mother. Several times she touched my arm protectingly, and once her gaze swept quickly down my skirt, then up again, as if she saw something moving.
“What is it? What do you see?” I asked, but she did not tell me.
When I had finished she kissed me tenderly and said she was so glad I had let her come to me in my distress. She told me there was a great and immediate danger hanging over me, but that God's infinite love would protect and heal me, as it protects all His children, if I would learn to draw upon it.
I asked what this danger was and Seraphine said it would strike at me very soon through a dark-haired woman; but she would try to help me, if I would heed her warnings. I don't know why but I immediately thought of Roberta Vallis, and the strange part of it is that within an hour, Roberta called me on the telephone to say she was coming up right away. Roberta and Seraphine had not seen each other for years, not since that night when Seraphine made her prophecy about me.
Within a half hour Roberta arrived very grand in furs and jewels, quite dashingly pretty and pleased with herself—the real joie de vivre spirit. She was perfectly willing to reveal the source of this sudden magnificence, but I did not ask her—I know enough of Bobby's love affairs already—and I could see that she was uneasy under Seraphine's gravely disapproving eyes. She had come to invite me to a house-warming party that she is planning to give at her new apartment in the Hotel des Artistes. I shall meet all sorts of wonderful people, social and theatrical celebrities, and there will be music. Seraphine's eyes kept saying no, and I told Bobby I would telephone her tomorrow before six o'clock. I was not sure whether I could accept because—“Haven't you an engagement for Thursday with Captain Herrick?” suggested Seraphine.
Whereupon Bobby, with an impertinent little toss of her bobbed-off black hair, said: “Oh, Pen, why do you waste your time on a commonplace architect? He will never satisfy you—not in a thousand years. Bye-bye, I'll see you at the party.” Then away she went, her eyes challenging Seraphine who stands for all the old homely virtues, including unselfish love, that Bobby Vallis entirely disapproves of. What shall I do? Seraphine says I must not go to this party, but—I want to go!
∵
I have accepted Roberta's invitation, in spite of a warning from Seraphine that something dreadful will happen to me if I go. I have a morbid curiosity to see what experiences can be in store for me that are worse than those I have gone through already. Besides, I do not believe what Seraphine says—it is contrary to my reason, it is altogether fantastic. And, even if it were true, even if I really am in the horrible peril that she describes, what difference does it make where I go or what I do? I am just a spiritual outcast, marked for suffering—a little more or less je m'en moque.
∵
I have hesitated to write down Seraphine's explanation of my trouble, even in my diary. I reject it with all the strength of my soul. I consider it absurd, I hate it, I try to forget it; but alas! it sticks in my thoughts like some ridiculous jingle. So I may as well face the thing on paper, here in the privacy of my diary, and laugh at it. Ha, ha!—is that false-sounding laughter?
Seraphine says that the great war has thrown the spirit world into confusion, especially in the lower levels where the new arrivals come and linger. Millions, have died on the battle field in hatred and violence. Great numbers of these have gone over so suddenly that they are not able to adjust themselves to the other plane where they constitute an immense company of earth-bound souls that long to come back. There are myriads of these unreconciled souls hovering all about us, crowding about us, eagerly, greedily, striving to come back. Some do not know that they are dead and rebel fiercely against their changed condition. The drunkards still thirst after drink. The murderers want to go on killing. The gluttons would fain gorge themselves with food, the lustful with bodily excesses. All these evil spirits, cut off from their old gratifications, try to satisfy their desires by re-entering earthly bodies, and often they succeed. That is the great peril of the war, she says. What a horrible thought! I simply refuse to believe that such things are possible.
And yet—those Voices!
CHAPTER VII
JEWELS
If this were a conventional novel and not simply a statement of essential facts in the strange case of Penelope Wells, there would be much elaboration of details and minor characters, including the wife of Dr. William Owen and an adventure that befell this lady during a week-end visit to Morristown, N. J., since this adventure has a bearing upon the narrative. As it is, we must be content to know that Mrs. William Owen was an irritable and neurasthenic person, a thorn in the side of her distinguished husband, who was supposed to cure these ailments. He could not cure his wife, however, and had long since given up trying. It was Mrs. Owen who quite unintentionally changed the course of events for sad-eyed Penelope.
It happened in this way. Dr. Owen received a call from Mrs. Seraphine Walters on the day following Seraphine's talk with Penelope and was not overjoyed to learn that his visitor was a trance medium. If there was one form of human activity that this hard-headed physician regarded with particular detestation it was that of mediumship. All mediums, in his opinion, were knaves or fools and their so-called occult manifestations were either conjurers' trickery or self-created illusions of a hypnotic character. He had never attended a spiritualistic séance and had no intention of doing so.
But in spite of his aversion for Seraphine's métier, the doctor was impressed by the lady's gentle dignity and by her winsome confidence that she must be lovingly received since she herself came armed so abundantly with the power of love. Furthermore, it appeared that the medium had called for no other reason than to furnish information about her dear friend Penelope Wells, so the specialist listened politely.
“You are the first spiritualist I ever talked to, Mrs. Walters,” he said amiably. “You seem to have a sunny, joyous nature?”
Her face lighted up. “That is because I have so much to be grateful for, doctor. I have always been happy, almost always, even as a little girl, because—” She checked herself, laughing. “I guess you are not interested in that.”
“Yes I am. Go on.”
“I was only going to say that I have always known that there are wonderful powers all about us, guarding us.”
“You knew this as a little girl?”
“Oh, yes, I used to see Them when I was playing alone. I thought They were fairies. It was a long time before I discovered that the other children did not see Them.”
“Them! Hm! How long have you been doing active work as a medium?”
“What started you at it? I suppose there were indications that you had unusual powers?”
“Yes. There were indications that I had been chosen for this work. I don't know why I was chosen unless it is that I have never thought much about myself. That is the great sin—selfishness. My controls tell me that terrible punishment awaits selfish souls on the other side. I was so happy when I learned that the exalted spirits can only manifest through a loving soul. They read our thoughts, see the color of our aura and, if they can, they come to those who have traits in common with their own.”
“If they can—how do you mean?”
“My controls tell me that many spirits cannot manifest at all, just as many humans cannot serve as mediums.”
At this moment a maid entered the office and spoke to Dr. Owen in a low tone saying that Mrs. Owen had sent her to remind the doctor that this was Saturday morning and that they were leaving for Morristown in an hour to be gone over Sunday. No message could have been more unfortunate than this for Dr. Owen's equanimity, since he abominated week-end invitations, particularly those like the present one (which Mrs. Owen revelled in) from pretentiously rich people.
“Very well. Tell Mrs. Owen I will be ready,” he said, then turned with changed manner to poor Seraphine, whose brightening chances were now hopelessly dissipated.
“Suppose we come to the point, Mrs. Walters,” he went on. “I am rather pressed for time and—you say you are a friend of Mrs. Wells? Have you any definite information bearing upon her condition?”
“Oh, yes,” she replied and at once made it clear that she was fully informed as to Penelope's distressing symptoms.
“She is suffering from shell shock,” said the doctor.
“No, no!” the medium disagreed, sweetly but firmly. “Penelope's trouble is due to something quite different and far more serious than shell shock.”
Then earnestly, undaunted by Owen's skeptical glances, Seraphine proceeded to set forth her belief that there is today in the world such a thing as literal possession by evil spirits.
“You mean that as applying to Mrs. Wells?” the doctor asked with a weary lift of the shoulders.
“Yes, I do. I can give you evidence—if you will only listen—”
“My dear lady, I really cannot go into such a—purely speculative field. I must handle Mrs. Wells' case as I understand it with the help of means that I am familiar with.”
“Of course, but, doctor,” she begged, “don't be vexed with me, I am only trying to save this dear child, I love Penelope and—I must say it—you are not making progress. She is going straight on to—to disaster. I know what I am saying.”
For a moment he hesitated.
“What do you want me to do?”
“I want you to have a consultation with Dr. Edgar Leroy.”
“Dr. Edgar Leroy? Who is he? I never heard of him.”
“He is a New York doctor who has had great success in cases like Penelope's—cases of obsession or—possession.”
“Oh! Does he believe in that sort of thing? Is he a spiritualist?”
Seraphine felt the coldness of his tone and shrank from it, but she continued her effort, explaining that Dr. Leroy had been a regular practitioner for years, but he had changed his methods after extended psychic investigations that had led him to new knowledge—such wonderful knowledge! Her deep eyes burned with the zeal of a great faith.
“I see. Where is his office?”
“In Fortieth Street—it's in the telephone book—Dr. Edgar Leroy. If you only knew the extraordinary cures he has accomplished, you would realize how necessary it is for Penelope to have the help he alone can give her.”
She waited eagerly for his reply.
“How do you happen to know so much about this doctor?”
“Because I have been allowed to help him. He uses me in diagnosis.”
“You mean that Dr. Leroy relies upon information that you give him as a medium in treating cases?” He spoke with frank disapproval.
“Yes.”
Dr. Owen thought a moment. “Of course, Mrs. Wells is free to consult anyone she pleases, but I would not feel justified in advising her to go to Dr. Leroy.”
“But you must advise it, you must insist upon it,” urged Seraphine. “Penelope relies entirely upon you, she will do nothing without your approval, and this is her only hope.”
“My dear lady, you certainly are not lacking in confidence, but you must realize that I cannot advise a treatment for Mrs. Wells that involves the use of spiritualistic agencies when I do not believe in spiritualism. In fact, I regard spiritualism as—”
Seraphine lifted her hand with a wistful little smile that checked the outburst.
“Don't say it—please don't. Will you do one thing, doctor, not for me but for poor Penelope? Come to my house Monday night. I have a little class there, a class of eight. We have been working together for three months and—we have been getting results. You may be allowed to witness manifestations that will convince you. Will you come?” she pleaded.
“You mean that I may see a spirit form? Or hear some tambourines playing? Something of that sort?” His tone was almost contemptuously incredulous.
The anxious suppliant was gathering her forces to reply when the hall clock struck solemnly, bringing back disagreeably to the specialist's mind his impending social duty, and this was sufficient to turn the balance of his decision definitely against Seraphine. He shook his head uncompromisingly.
“I cannot do it, madam. I am sorry to disappoint you, but I have strong convictions on this subject and—” He rose to dismiss her. “Now I must ask you to excuse me.”
In spite of this disappointment Seraphine did not lose faith. “Dear child,” she wrote to Penelope that night, “I am like a man in the darkness who knows the sun will rise soon and is not discouraged. Before many days Dr. Owen will listen to me and be convinced.”
Firm in this confidence, the medium returned to Dr. Owen's office the following Monday morning, but she was coldly received. A rather condescending young woman brought out word that the specialist was exceedingly busy and could not see her.
“But it is so important,” pleaded Mrs. Walters with eyes that would have moved a heart of stone. “Couldn't you ask him to give me a few minutes? I'll be very grateful.”
The office assistant wavered. “I'll tell you why you had better come back another day, madam,” she began confidentially; “Dr. Owen is very much upset because his wife has just lost some valuable jewelry. You see, Mrs. Owen went to Morristown for the week-end and took a jewel box with her in her trunk—there was a pearl necklace and some brooches and rings; but when she came to dress for dinner last night—”
“Wait! I—I hear something,” Seraphine murmured and sank down weakly on a chair. She closed her eyes and her breathing quickened, while the young woman bent over her in concern; but almost immediately the psychic recovered herself and looked up with a friendly smile.
“It's all right. You are very kind. I am happy now because I can do something for Dr. Owen. Please tell him his wife is mistaken in thinking that she took the jewels with her. The jewels are here in this house—now.”
“What makes you think that?”
“My control says so.” The medium spoke with such a quiet power of manner that the office assistant was impressed.
“Suppose I tell Mrs. Owen?” she suggested.
“Very well, tell Mrs. Owen. Ask her if I may go to the room where she last remembers having her jewel box?”
The young woman withdrew with this message and presently returned to say that Mrs. Owen would be glad if Seraphine would come up to her bedroom. A few minutes later Seraphine faced a querulous invalid propped up against lace pillows.
“I am positive I put my jewel box in the trunk,” insisted Mrs. Owen. “It is foolish to say that I did not, it is perfectly useless to look for the jewels in this house. However—what are you doing? Why do you look at me so strangely?”
“The jewels are—in this room—in a chintz sewing bag,” the psychic declared slowly, her eyes far away.
“Absurd!”
“I see the sewing bag—distinctly. There are pink roses on it.”
“I have a sewing bag like that,” admitted the doctor's wife, “it is on a shelf in the closet—there! Will you get it for me, Miss Marshall? We shall soon see about this. Now then!” She searched through the bag, but found nothing. “I told you so. My husband is quite right in his ideas about mediums. I really wish you had not disturbed me,” she said impatiently.
But the medium answered pleasantly: “I have only repeated what my control tells me. I am sorry if I have annoyed you. I advise you to search the house carefully.”
“I have done that already,” said Mrs. Owen.
Whereupon Seraphine, still unruffled, took her departure, with these last words at the door to the office assistant: “Please tell Dr. Owen that I beg him most earnestly to have the house searched for his wife's jewels. Otherwise one of the servants will find them.”
And Dr. Owen, in spite of his scientific prejudices, in spite of his wife's positive declaration that the jewels had been stolen during her visit, and that the house had been thoroughly searched, acted on this suggestion and had the house searched again. And this time the missing jewel box was found, with the necklace, rings and brooches all intact, in a chintz sewing bag covered with pink roses!
It seems that Mrs. Owen had two chintz bags, one for ordinary sewing, one for darning, and in the latter bag, hanging on a nail behind the bureau, where the doctor's wife had absent-mindedly hidden it, the missing jewel box was discovered.
“This beats the devil!” exclaimed the doctor when he heard the good news. And an hour later he sent the following telegram to Seraphine: “Jewels found, thanks to you. We are very grateful. I have reconsidered the matter and accept your invitation for tonight. Will call at eight o'clock.”
CHAPTER VIII
WHITE SHAPES
(From Penelope's Diary)
New York January 31, 1919.
An extraordinary thing happened on Monday night at Seraphine's apartment. I must write down the details before they fade from my memory. Seraphine telephoned Monday morning that there was to be a meeting of her occult class in the evening and she wanted me to come as Dr. Owen had promised to be there. She regarded this as a great opportunity to help me. Darling Seraphine! Of course I could not refuse, although I abhor spiritualism. I love Seraphine for what she is, and in spite of her queer beliefs.
When we were gathered together and after introductions to her class (there were six or seven devout believers), Seraphine explained that it was difficult to obtain psychic manifestations in the presence of active disbelief, and she begged us to maintain an attitude of friendly open-mindedness. I am afraid I did not do this all the time.
We had first some psychic reminiscences and Seraphine described in detail how on a certain night years ago she and her sister were sleeping together in a heavy mahogany fourposter bed, when the whole bed with the two women was lifted several inches from the floor and rocked about, and was then held suspended in the air while the chamber resounded with strange music. In my opinion, this was a dream or an illusion.
I am also skeptical about the testimony of one of the group, a New York minister, who told us that his dead wife has come to him in the night on several occasions in materialized form and has spoken to him, kissed him, and taken loving counsel with him about the children and about other matters. I am sure this minister was the victim of some kind of hallucination.
And I cannot believe a statement of Seraphine's regarding a Southern woman who is possessed by an evil spirit that forces her to drinking excesses so that she has spoiled her whole life. Seraphine described to us with ghastly vividness the appearance of this evil entity which she is able to see, through her clairvoyant vision, with its hideous leering countenance, inside the lady. For my part I refuse to believe it.
I admit that I began to have creepy sensations when Seraphine went into an entranced condition in the cabinet. Then came the happenings that I do not understand and I know Dr. Owen does not understand them either, but that does not prove that they were supernatural. I distinctly saw two white shapes rise from the floor—one of them was so close to me that I could have touched it with my hand, but I did not because I was afraid. Besides, I was sitting in a semi-circle with the others and our hands were joined. Dr. Owen, however, was at the end of the line with one hand free, and I saw him reach out towards the apparition (it was about four feet high) and it seemed to me that his hand and arm passed right through the white shape. As he did this I heard a long sigh and a rustling sound and I was conscious of a chilling breath on my face. I asked Dr. Owen about this afterwards and he said that when his hand touched the shape it felt as if he was grasping thick smoke.
The appearance of the second white shape was more terrifying because Seraphine came out of the cabinet when she evoked it. She wore a loose white garment and moved about the room in the near darkness like a woman walking in her sleep. She repeated a beautiful prayer in a slow dreamy voice—I wish I could remember it, the idea was that a great disaster might be averted if God would open the eyes of two of His doubting children. I suppose she meant Dr. Owen and me.
Then the second white shape appeared and seemed to rise and grow into the likeness of a woman, but presently it wavered and dissolved. Seraphine reached out her arms towards it imploringly and I saw a woman's hand take shape clearly and rest on Seraphine's hand, but this presently faded away, like a thing of vapor, and was gone. I have no idea what those white shapes were, or why they came, or why they went; but neither have I any idea as to the operation of X-rays. These white shapes may in a few years turn out to be perfectly simple laboratory phenomena, no more mysterious than wireless phenomena were twenty-five years ago. I refuse to believe that a living person can be possessed by an evil spirit!
Looking back at this séance, what troubles me is an utterance about myself that is supposed to have been made by a voice from the other side. This came at the very end when Seraphine went into an entranced condition again, with the lights up.
“I have a message for one who is tenderly loved by an exalted spirit,” she said, sighing heavily, her eyes closed, “one who would come to her, but there is a barrier. She can regain health and happiness if she will cleanse her soul of evil. She must confess a sinful purpose that she entertained in her heart on the night of June 14, 1914.”
June 14, 1914! I looked up this date in my diary and find that it was the occasion of Roberta Vallis' party when Seraphine made her prophecy about me. Now I remember. We were considering what a woman can do to satisfy her emotional nature if she has no chance to marry and longs for the companionship of a man. I said, according to my diary, that “there is a sacred right given by God to every woman who is born, a right that not even God Himself can take away—” Then I was interrupted by Seraphine and I did not tell them what that sacred right is or what use I personally proposed to make of it.
But I knew and know still, and the question that distresses me is whether an exalted spirit (could it be my mother?) really possesses this knowledge of my wicked purpose—if it was wicked—or whether this is simply a case of mind reading by Seraphine.
“She can regain health and happiness if she will cleanse her soul of evil—” That was the message. Is it true? Is there evil in my heart? Have I entertained a sinful purpose? Have I the courage to answer this question truthfully, even in these secret pages—have I?
Yes, I will put down the truth and justify myself in my own eyes. Then I will burn this book. I would die of shame if Christopher should ever read this confession.
As my chief justification, I dwell upon the frightful wrong that my husband did me when he took away my faith in men, my faith in their ability or willingness to be true to one woman. He did this by his words and by his acts. He assured me that sex desire in the male is so resistless that, when conflict arises between this desire and the teachings of religion, it is the latter which are almost invariably set aside; with the result that great numbers of men, brought up as Christians, either renounce Christianity (if they are honest) or find themselves forced into a life of hypocritical compromise in regard to sex indulgence. Julian told me this over and over again, no doubt to excuse his own delinquencies, until it was burned into my soul that, whatever happened, I would never marry another man, and expose myself to torments and humiliations such as I had endured with him—never!
After my husband died I had to face a problem that confronts thousands of high principled young women, widows, divorcées, in America and in all countries—how could I bear the torture of this immense loneliness? How could I adjust myself to life without the intimate companionship of a man? How could I satisfy my emotional nature? How?
There were two solutions, a second marriage and a lover. I rejected the first solution for reasons already given and the second solution because of evidence all about me that one lover usually means two, three, half a dozen lovers, since men grow weary and change and women, in loneliness or desperation, change also. Never would I let myself sink to the degrading level of sex complaisance that is sadly or cynically accepted by many women, self-supporting and self-respecting, in many American cities, simply because they cannot combat conditions that have been created and perpetuated by the stronger sex.
Therefore I worked out a third solution that was to satisfy my emotional nature and at the same time give me a reason for existence. I would adopt a little waif as my child, a French or Belgian waif, and I would bring up this child to be a useful and happy man or woman. I would love it, care for it, teach it, and with this responsibility and soulagement, I would be able to endure the loneliness of the long years stretching before me. I would find this child while I was in France working for the Red Cross and bring it home after the war, only—
My purpose was to adopt a child that should be born of my own body!
That is my sin, a sin never committed, save in intention, yet a sin that would have been committed, if things had happened differently. The arguments (based on the sacred right of motherhood and the longing for a child) that led me to my original purpose still seem valid to me. It is terrible to say this now, but I must tell the truth and the truth is that, if I had not met Captain Herrick, I would have done this thing. My whole plan of life was changed because I loved Captain Herrick. What was previously impossible became possible, and what was previously possible became impossible because I loved Captain Herrick.
That is the truth.
∵
Tuesday.
If I love him so much, why am I possessed by a horrible fear that I will refuse to be his wife? Good God, what a woman I am! I love Captain Herrick so much that I would gladly die for him—I have risked my life for him already—and yet—
I have promised Christopher his answer when we meet at Roberta's party on Friday night, but I am not sure what I will say to him. Three days! I told Roberta I would not go to her party unless she invited Christopher, so she did.
Wednesday.
I feel much encouraged about my health. For nearly a week my sleep has been free from dreams and They have not come near me. I begin to think Dr. Owen is right. I have been suffering from nervous disturbances caused by shell shock, and I am on the road to recovery. I need rest and recreation, especially recreation—anything to divert my mind from fears and somber thoughts. I say this to Seraphine when she warns me that I must not go to Roberta's party. She says I will go at my great peril, but I refuse to entertain these fears. I crave the gaiety and insouciance of Roberta's care-free Bohemians. Besides, I shall see Christopher. I will tell him that I love him with all my soul and will marry him—the sooner the better—any time. Within a month I may be Mrs. Christopher Herrick. How wonderful!
Thursday.
While I was looking back through my diary I came upon a reflection of Julian's—he said that men take no real interest in other men, as men, although they are interested in all women. The fact that men are sex animals makes no impression upon other men, whereas the fact that women are sex animals makes an enormous impression. A man would hear of the tragic death of a thousand unknown men with comparative indifference, he declared, but would be distressed to hear of the death of a hundred unknown women. I wonder if that is true. I know that women are intensely conscious that all other women are sex animals. Is that due to jealousy?
I came upon another thought of Julian's—about temptation. He pictured a drunkard who has sworn off drinking. This man announces his virtuous intentions from the housetops—he will never drink again, he will avoid temptation, he will not attend a certain convivial gathering, say tonight at nine o'clock. He repeats this to himself and to others—he will not be present at this gathering. But all the time, deep down in his heart, he knows that he will be present. He knows that nine o'clock will find him in his accustomed seat smiling upon flowing glasses....
I am afraid of tomorrow night. I am afraid of what I will say to Captain Herrick!
Friday morning.
I dreamed last night that I was in a great purple forest and again I saw the black birds with fiery eyes. They were in a circle around me, judging me. They wanted me to say something or do something, but I did not know what it was, and I was in despair. Suddenly the trees opened and I saw a smooth black river pouring over a precipice and the birds bore me to the river and dropped me into it. Then, as I struggled in the water, Chris leaped from the bank to save me, but I fought against him and we were both swept along towards the precipice. He caught me in his arms, but I struck at him and screamed—and then I awakened.
∵
Seraphine gave me a beautiful prayer or affirmation to say when I am afraid. I say this over and over again and it comforts me: “I am God's child. God is my life, God is my strength. My soul is in unison with the perfect love of God. There is absolutely nothing to fear. All thoughts of fear are banished from my mind. I will no longer be bound by thoughts of fear.”
I shut my eyes tight and say this when I am going to sleep.
CHAPTER IX
THE CONFESSIONAL CLUB
In setting forth the happenings at Roberta Vallis' party (with their startling psychic consequences to Penelope Wells) it is necessary to say a word about the Greenwich Village poet Kendall Brown, since he originated the Confessional Club. This remarkable organization grew out of a tirade against American hypocrisy made by Kendall one night in a little Italian restaurant on Bleecker Street.
What was most needed in this country and in all countries, the one thing that alone could redeem mankind, declared Brown, soaring away on red wine enthusiasm, was truth. “Let us be honest and outspoken about things as they are, about men and women as they are,” he ran on in his charmingly plausible way. “We are none of us very important, there isn't much difference between saints and sinners—I'll argue that point with any man—but there is one immensely valuable contribution that we can all make to the general store of life-knowledge, we can speak the exact truth about ourselves and our experiences, instead of hiding it. That would be a real service to humanity, for this composite truth, assembled and studied, must lead to wisdom; but men and women are such pitiful cowards, such cringing toadies to convention. It makes me sick!”
He refilled his glass slowly and continued: “Why is our talk stupid—all talk, so stupid that we have to get drunk in order to endure life? Why are we bores—all of us? Because we are afraid to say the essential things—what we know. We talk about what we don't know, like monkeys, and call it civilized. By God, I'd like to start a society for the dissemination of the truth that everybody knows and nobody tells!”
This phrase caught the fancy of Roberta Vallis whose fluttering, frivolous soul was appealed to by any line of reasoning that tended to put saints and sinners on the same level. She made Kendall repeat his idea and then and there proposed that they adopt it. A society for the dissemination of the truth that everybody knows and nobody tells! Splendid! They must found this society—immediately. When should they have the first meeting?
In this casual way the Confessional Club came into being, with no fixed membership, no dues or constitution, no regular place or time of meeting, and added one more to those amusing (sometimes inspiring) little groups that have flourished in Greenwich Village. It certainly had a real idea behind it. “We are loaded with human dynamite. We tell the truth that is never told,” became the watchword of the society.
All of which bears upon the present narrative because Roberta Vallis had arranged to have one of these self-revealing séances as a feature of her party; and she insisted that Penelope contribute an emotional experience.
“You must confess something, Pen, my sweet one, in order to be in the spirit of the evening,” she explained with bubbling exuberance, “any little thing. We all do it. Only be careful you don't make that architect of yours jealous,” she teased. “Think up a classy confession, something weird—understand? Don't look so darned serious. It's only for fun. You can fake up something, dearie, if you're afraid to tell the truth. Why, what's the matter?”
Penelope's face had changed startlingly, and was now overcast by sombre memories—by fears. Why had those lightly spoken words moved her so strangely? Afraid to tell the truth! Was she afraid? With sinking heart she recalled that message of Seraphine's exalted spirit—Penelope must cleanse her soul of evil!
But—had she not cleansed her soul already? Had she not confessed the truth about her longing for a child? And written it down in her diary and prayed God to forgive her? Was not that enough? Why should this pressure to confess more be put upon her? Could it be that frivolous, selfish Roberta Vallis was the unconscious agent of some fateful power urging Penelope Wells to look into her soul again?
Suddenly, in a flash of new understanding, Mrs. Wells decided. This was no longer a trifling incident, but a happening of deep spiritual import. She was struggling desperately for health—for happiness. Perhaps this was her way of salvation, if she could only bring herself to say the one thing that—that ought to be said. After all, the opinion of these careless Bohemians mattered little—it was God's opinion that mattered.
“Do you mind if I bring Seraphine to the party?” Penelope asked with a far-away look in her eyes.
“Of course not—we'll be glad to have her.”
“All right, Bobby. I will make a confession. There is something I want to confess. I don't know just the details, but—yes I do, too, it's about—” she hesitated, but went on with strengthening resolve, “it's about a trip I made once on a Fall River steamboat.”
Roberta's eyes danced at this prospect.
“Splendid, Pen! We'll have yours last—just before the supper.”
And so it came about that it was Penelope herself who set into action forces of the mind or the soul, memories and fears that were to change her whole future.
We need take no account of the other confessions (except one), tinsel or tawdry fragments from the drift-wood of life, that were offered blithely by three or four members of the gay company. We are concerned with Penelope's confession, and with this only as it leads up to subsequent developments of the evening. There was an ominous significance in the fact that Mrs. Wells made this confession before the man she loved. Why did she do that? Why?
Penelope sat beside a Japanese screen of black and gold on which a red-tongued dragon coiled its embroidered length and, by the light of a yellow lantern just above (there was also a tiny blue lantern that flung down a caressing ray upon her smooth dark hair and adorable shoulders) she glanced at some loose leaves taken from an old diary. Then, nerving herself for the effort, she began in a low, appealing tone, but rather unsteadily:
“I am going to tell you something that—it's very hard for me to speak of this, but—I want to tell it. I have a feeling that if I tell it I may save myself and someone who is dear to me,” she looked down in embarrassment, “from—from a terrible danger. I feel more deeply about this because—some of you remember a strange thing that happened four years ago when I was present at a meeting of this club.”
There were murmurs and nods of understanding from several of the guests who settled themselves into positions of expectant attention.
“Are we to have a second prophecy, Mrs. Walters?” inquired Kendall Brown briskly of Seraphine, whose haunting eyes kept Penelope in loving watchfulness; but the medium made no reply.
“The second prophecy has already been made, Kendall,” Mrs. Wells answered gravely. “I have come here tonight knowing that a disaster may result from my presence. Seraphine says that a disaster will result, but—I don't believe it. I can't believe it. What harm is there in my coming to this party?”
She spoke vehemently with increasing agitation and the guests watched her with fascinated interest.
“A disaster? Tonight? Extraordinary! What kind of a disaster?”
Such were the questions and exclamations called forth by this startling announcement, and incredulous glances were addressed to the psychic; but Seraphine offered no enlightenment. She merely rocked placidly in her chair.
“Go on, dear,” she said.
And Penelope continued:
“You know I have been ill since I came back from France. There are symptoms in my illness that are—peculiar—distressing. I have horrible fears that I have to fight all the time. Horrible dreams, one dream in particular lately of a thing that happened on a Fall River steamboat.”
“A thing that really happened?” questioned a little gray-haired woman.
“Yes, it really happened to me during a trip that I made on this boat; and now, years later, it continues to happen in my dreams. It terrifies me, tortures me, for the thing was—it was something wrong that I did. I—I suppose it was a sin.”
A sin!
There was a tremor in her voice, a pathetic catch in her breath, almost a sob, as she forced herself to speak these words; then bravely, pleadingly, she lifted her eyes to her beloved.
Over the gay company there came a surprised and sympathetic hush. Herrick straightened awkwardly, but never flinched in his loyalty or fondness—what an ordeal for a lover!—while Penelope paused as if gathering strength to go on.
“May I ask if this was before you were married?” queried the poet.
“No.”
“After you were married?”
“Yes. My husband was with me.”
Penelope's voice sank almost to a whisper, and the unconscious twining together of her fingers bore witness to her increasing distress. Everyone in the room felt the poignancy of the moment. If the operation of soul cleansing involved such stress as this, then even these heedless members of the Confessional Club drew back disapprovingly.
“Hold on, Pen!” interposed Roberta Vallis good-naturedly, wishing to relieve this embarrassment. “You're getting all fussed up. I guess you'd better cut out this story. I don't believe it's much good anyway. If you think there are any sentimental variations on a Fall River steamboat theme that we are not fully conversant with, why you've got another guess coming.”
Penelope wavered and again her dark eyes yearned towards Christopher. It was cruelly hard to go on with her story, yet it was almost impossible now not to tell it.
“I want to make this confession,” she insisted, strong in her purpose, yet breaking under womanly weakness. “I must cleanse my soul of—of evil—mustn't I?” her anguished eyes begged comfort of Seraphine.
“You are right, dear child,” the medium answered gently, “but wait a little. Sit over here by me. We have plenty of time.” She took her friend's icy hand in hers and drew her protectingly to a place beside her on the sofa.
“To cheer you up, Pen,” laughed Bobby, “and create a general diversion, I'll tell a story myself—you'll see the kind of confession stuff we generally put over in our little group of unconventional thinkers. Attention, folks! Harken to the Tale of Dora the Dressmaker! Which proves that the way of the transgressor, as observed on Manhattan Island, is not always so darned hard.”
Then she told her story in the most approved Greenwich Village style, with slangy and cynical comments, all of which were received with chortles of satisfaction by the men and with no very severe disapproval by the ladies—except Seraphine.
“Dora was a pretty, frail looking girl—but really as strong as a horse,” began Bobby gleefully, “one of those tall blondes who can pass off for aristocrats without being the real thing. She came from a small Southern town and had married a man who was no good. He drank and chased after women; and, in one of his drunken fits, he was run over on a dark night at the railroad crossing—fortunately.”
Penelope stirred uneasily at the memories in her own life conjured up by this picture.
“Dora had the usual small town collection of wedding cut glass and doilies, which she put away in the attic, after husband's decease; and, with them, she also put away all respect and desire for the married state. She was through with domesticity and all that it represented, and made up her mind to devote the rest of her life to earning as big a salary as she could and having the best time possible.”
The rest of the story was a sordid account of this girl's effort to combine business with pleasure, as men do, and of her startled discovery one day, just at the moment of her greatest success—she had been offered the position of head designer in a wholesale dress house with coveted trips to Europe—that she was about to become a mother.
Penelope sighed wearily as she listened. Could she never escape from this eternal sex theme?
“You see,” Bobby rattled on, “Dora knew she couldn't go to roof gardens and supper parties alone, and she couldn't keep a chap on a string without paying—so she paid. Of course she camouflaged this part of her life very daintily, as she did everything else, but going out evenings was as important to her as her business ambition was.”
Mrs. Wells smiled faintly at the word camouflaged, for she knew better than anyone else that this supposed story of a dressmaker was really the story of Roberta Vallis herself, thinly disguised.
“The point is that after years of living exactly like a man,” Miss Vallis became a shade more serious here and a note of defiance crept into her discourse, “with work and pleasure travelling along side by side, Dora was called upon to face a situation that would have brought her gay and prosperous career to a sad and shameful end in any well-constructed Sunday School book; but please notice that it did nothing of the sort in real life. Did she lose her job? She did not. Or her health or reputation? Nothing like that. After she got over the first shock of surprise Dora decided to go through with the thing, and, being tall and thin, got away with it successfully. No one suspected that the illness which kept her away from her work was anything but influenza, and—well, the child didn't live,” she concluded abruptly as she caught Seraphine's disapproving glance. “The point is that Dora is today one of the most successful business women in Boston.”
A challenge to outraged virtue was in her tone, and all eyes turned instinctively to the psychic who was still rocking placidly.
“Poor woman!” Seraphine said simply, which seemed to annoy Miss Vallis.
“Why do you say that? Why is she a poor woman? She has everything she wants.”
“No! No indeed,” was the grave reply. “She has nothing that she really wants. She has cut herself off from the operation of God's love. She is surrounded by forces that—Oh!” the medium's eyes closed for a moment and she drew a long breath, “my control tells me these forces of evil—they will destroy this girl.”
Roberta essayed to answer mockingly, but the words died on her lips, and there fell a moment of shivery silence until Kendall Brown broke the spell.
“That story of Dora is a precious human document,” was the poet's ponderous pronouncement. “It is unpleasant, painful, but—what is the lesson? The lesson is that infinite trouble grows out of our rotten squeamishness about sex facts. This girl craved a reasonable amount of pleasure after her work, and she got it. She refused to spend her evenings alone in her room reading a book. She wanted to dance, to enjoy the society of men—their intimate society. That brings us to the oldest and most resistless force in the world, a blessed force, a God-given force upon which all life depends—you know what I mean. And how do we deal with this most formidable of forces? Are we grateful for it? Do we acknowledge its irresistible supremacy? No! We deal with it by pretending that it doesn't exist. We say to Friend Dora that, being unmarried, she has nothing whatever to do with sex attraction, except to forget it. Does she forget it? She does not. Do the men allow her to forget it? They do not. And one fine day Friend Dora has a baby and everybody says horrible, disgraceful! Rubbish! I maintain that the state should provide homes and proper care for the children we call illegitimate! What a word! I say all children are legitimate, all mothers should be honored, yes, and financially protected. A woman who gives a child to the nation, regardless of who the father is, renders a distinguished service. She is a public benefactor.”
“Hear, hear!” approved several, but the little grey-haired woman objected that this meant free love, whereupon Kendall was off again on his hobby.
“Love is free, it always has been and always will be free. If you chain love down under smug rules you only kill it or distort it. I am not arguing against marriage, but against hypocrisy. We may as well recognize that sex desire is so strong a force in the world—that—”
To all of this Penelope had listened with ill-concealed aversion, now she could no longer restrain her impatience. “Ridiculous!” she interrupted. “You exasperate me with your talk about the compelling claims of oversexed individuals. Let them learn to behave themselves and control themselves.”
“Mrs. Wells is absolutely right,” agreed Captain Herrick quietly, his eyes challenging Brown. “If certain men insist on behaving like orang-outangs in the jungle, then society should treat them as orang-outangs.”
This incisive statement somewhat jarred the poet's self-sufficiency and he subsided for the moment, but jealousy is a cunning adversary and the rival awaited his opportunity for counter-attack.
As the discussion proceeded Kendall noticed that one of the loose pages from Penelope's diary had fluttered to the floor and, recovering this, he glanced at it carelessly, then smiled as he plucked at his yellow beard.
“Excuse me, Mrs. Wells,” he said. “I could not help reading a few words. Won't you go on with your confession—please do. It sounds so wonderfully interesting. See—there—at the bottom!” He pointed to the lines.
“Oh!” she murmured as she saw the writing, and two spots of color burned in her cheeks. “Let me have it—I insist!”
“Certainly. But do read it to us. This is a real human interest story. 'Let me bow my head in shame and humble my spirit in the dust'—wasn't that it?” laughed Kendall maliciously.
At this, seeing the frightened look in Penelope's eyes, Captain Herrick stormed in: “You had no right to read those words or repeat them.”
“I am sorry, Mrs. Wells. I meant no offense,” apologized the poet, realizing that he had gone too far, but the harm was done. Something unaccountably serious had happened to Penelope Wells. Her face had gone deathly white, and Roberta, suddenly sympathetic, hastened to her.
“It's a shame to tease you, dearie. No more confession stuff. Now, folks, we'll have supper—down in the restaurant. Then we'll dance. Come on! Feeling better, Pen? What you need is a cocktail and some champagne.”
But Penelope lay like a stricken creature, her beautiful head limp against the pillow of her chair, her eyes filled with pain.
“I—I'll be all right in a minute, Bobby,” she whispered. “Please go down now—all of you except Captain Herrick. We'll join you—a little later. You don't mind?” she turned to Herrick who was bending over her anxiously. Then she said softly: “Don't leave me, Chris. I don't feel quite like myself. I'm a little frightened.”
CHAPTER X
FAUVETTE
Thus it happened that Penelope and Captain Herrick did not descend to the flower-spread supper room where dancing and good cheer awaited the gay company, but remained in Roberta's black and gold apartment, two lovers swept along by powers of fate far beyond their control, and now facing the greatest emotional moment of their lives.
The catastrophe came gradually, yet at the end with startling suddenness.
At first, when they were alone, Penelope seemed to recover from her distress and began to talk naturally and serenely, as if her preceding agitations were forgotten. She told Christopher that Dr. Owen's wise counsels had reassured her, and she now felt confident that her bad dreams and other disturbing symptoms would soon leave her.
“You see something has conquered all my sadness, all my fears,” she looked at him shyly.
For a moment he sat motionless, drinking in her splendid beauty, then he leaned towards her impulsively and spoke one word that carried all the devotion of his soul: “Penelope!”
“Dear boy!” she murmured, her voice thrilling, and a moment later he had clasped her in his arms.
“You're mine! You love me! Thank God!”
But she disengaged herself gently, there was something she wished to say. She would not deny her love, her great love for him. She realized that she had loved him from the first. Her resistance had been part of her illness—it was not coquetry, he must not think that. Now her eyes were opened and her heart was singing with joy. She was the happiest woman in the world at the thought that she was to be his wife.
“My darling! How I love you!” exclaimed Christopher, drawing her towards him, his lips seeking hers.
“No—no,” Penelope's voice was so serious, so full of alarm that her lover instantly obeyed. He drew away from her with a hurt, puzzled expression in his eyes. Very gravely Penelope went on. “I love you, too, my darling, but I must ask you to make me a solemn promise. I shall be most unhappy if you refuse. I want you to promise not to kiss me,—as—as lovers kiss, passionately, ardently, until after we are married.”
“But, Pen, you—can't mean that seriously?”
With a wistful little smile she assured him that she did mean it most seriously.
In vain he protested. “But why? It's so absurd! Why shouldn't I kiss you when I love you better than anything in the world.”
“Chris, please, please don't talk like that. You must trust me and do what I ask. You must, dear!”
A pathetic earnestness in her tone and a strange look in her eyes made Christopher forget his privileges, and he made the promise.
“Thank you, dear. Now I must tell you something else,” she went on. “I must explain why I was so disturbed when Kendall Brown read those words from my diary. I must tell you what they meant.”
But a masterful gesture from Herrick stopped her. He did not wish to know anything about this. He trusted her entirely, he approved of her entirely, they must never speak of these old sad things again.
Tears of gratitude suddenly filled her eyes.
“Take this, dear, it belonged to my mother,” she said fondly and gave him a circlet of twisted dolphins and he put it on his finger. Then he gave her a brown seal ring, engraved with old Armenian characters.
“I got it in Constantinople, Pen. It's a talisman. It will bring us luck.”
They talked on, forgetful of the supper party downstairs, until a waiter came with cocktails and champagne that Roberta had sent up, but Penelope would have none of these, saying that her love was too great to need stimulation.
“I must drink to your health, dear,” said Herrick, and pouring out the bubbling liquid, he offered her a glass, but she shook her head.
“No? Not even a sip? All right, sweetheart. I'll pledge you the finest toast in the world,” he lifted his goblet. “My love! My wife!”
As Christopher set down his glass and turned to clasp his beloved in his arms, he realized that there was a curious change in her face, a subtle, an almost indistinguishable change—the sweet radiance had gone. It was the word wife that had stabbed Penelope with unforgettable memories and brought back her impulse to confess. Once more she tried to tell the story of that tragic steamboat, but Christopher firmly and good-naturedly refused to listen. Whatever she had done, her life had been a hundred times finer and nobler than his. Not that he had any great burden on his conscience, but—well—With a chivalrous idea of balancing scores, he mentioned that there had been one or two things that—er—and his embarrassment grew.
Penelope's eyes caressed him. “I'm so glad, Chris, if there is something for me to forgive. Is it—is it a woman story?”
“Well, yes.”
“Tell me. I won't misjudge you, dear,” she spoke confidently, although a shadow of pain flitted across her face. Then he began to tell of a hotel flirtation—a young woman he had met one night in Philadelphia. She wasn't so very pretty, but—her husband had treated her like the devil and—she was very unhappy and—they had rather a mad time together.
Christopher spoke in brief, business-like sentence's as if desiring to get through with a painful duty, but Penelope pressed him for details.
“What was her name—her first name?”
“Katherine.”
“Did you have supper with her—did she drink?”
“Was she—how shall I say it?—an alluring woman? Did she have a pretty figure?”
The soldier looked at his sweetheart in surprise and, without answering, he struck a match and meditatively followed the yellow flame as it consumed the wood. Penelope watched his well-shaped, well-kept hands.
“Did she?”
“I—I suppose so. What difference does that make? Do you mind if I smoke?”
“Of course not.” She took a cigarette from his silver case. “I'll have one with you—from the same match! Voilà!” She inhaled deeply and blew out a grey cloud. “Tell me more about Katherine.”
His frown deepened.
“Poor woman! She was reckless. I am sure she had never done a thing like this before. I hadn't either. I don't mean that I've been an angel, Pen, but—” he paused, then, with a flash of self-justification: “I give you my word of honor, in the main I have not done that sort of thing.”
She caught his hand impulsively. “I know you haven't. I'm so glad. Now I will drink to—to you.” She rose and stood before him, a lithe young creature vibrant with life. “Touch your glass to mine. My dear boy! My Christopher!”
They drank together.
Then Herrick resumed his explanation. “I must tell you a little more, darling. You see I was sorry for this woman, her story was so pathetic. I wanted to help her, if I could, not to harm her. So I suggested that we each make a pledge to the other—”
He was intensely in earnest, but Penelope's eyes were now dancing in mockery.
“Oh you reformer! You ridiculous boy!” she laughed.
“It's true, I assure you.”
“I don't believe it. What was the pledge? No, don't tell me! Tell me if you kept it.”
He moved uneasily under her searching gaze, but did not answer.
“Did you keep your pledge?” she insisted.
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
He shifted again uncomfortably.
“For several months,” he began, “but I must admit—”
“No, no!” she interrupted with a swift emotional change. “Don't admit anything. It was wicked of me to mock you. Come, we will drink to the lady in Philadelphia! Fill the glasses! To Katherine! And poor, weak human nature! Katherine! And all our good resolutions!”
Pen's eyes teased her lover with a gay diablerie as she slowly emptied her glass, and Herrick's heart quickened at the realization that this beautiful woman belonged to him—she belonged to him. At the same time he was conscious of a vague uneasiness under the increasing allurement of her glances. Were there ever such eyes in the world? Was there ever such a woman? Adorable as a saint, dangerous as a siren!
“There is one pledge I will never break, Pen,” he said tenderly. “I'll never fail to do every possible thing to make you happy.”
“Will you take me back to Paris, Chris? I want to spend a whole year in Paris with you. We'll go to fine hotels along the Champs Élysées, we'll prowl through those queer places in Montmartre, remember? and once you'll take me to a students' ball, won't you, dear? I'd love to dance at a students' ball—with you!” Her eyes burned on him under fluttering black lashes—such long curling lashes! “Let's drink to Paris—toi et moi, tous les deux ensemble, pas? Come!” She snatched up her glass again and emptied it quickly.
A spirit of wild gaiety and abandon had caught Penelope—there was no restraining her. They must sit on the divan under that dull blue light, and talk of their love—their wonderful love that had swept aside all barriers—while she smoked another cigarette. Christopher forgot to be afraid—he, too, was young! Vive la joie!
She nestled close to him against the pillows and, as they talked in low tones, he drew her closer, breathing the perfume of her hair. She caught his hand and clung to it, then slowly, restlessly, her fingers moved along his arm.
“My love! My love!” she whispered.
“Sweetheart!” he looked deep into her soul, his heart pounding furiously.
“It was horrid of me, Chris, to make you promise—that,” she bent close offering him her lips.
“Promise what?” he asked unsteadily.
“Oh, Chris,” she whispered and her soft form seemed to envelope him. “I am yours, yours!”
Then silence fell in the room while she pressed her eager mouth to his.
“Penelope!” he thrilled deliriously.
“Don't call me Penelope. It's so prim and old fashioned. I told you what to call me—Fauvette. That's the name I like. Fauvette! I am your Fauvette. Say it.”
Her eyes consumed him.
Christopher realized his danger, but he was powerless against the spell of her beauty.
“My Fauvette!” he caught her in his arms.
“Ah! Ah! Mon cheri! Wait!” Swiftly she turned off the lights, then darted back to him in the darkness.
At this moment of supreme crisis the door of the apartment opened slowly and, as the light streamed in, a figure entered that came like a gentle radiance. It was Seraphine.
CHAPTER XI
THE EVIL SPIRIT
Penelope sprang up from the divan panting with anger. Her hair was dishevelled. Her bare shoulders gleamed in the shadows. She glared at Seraphine.
“How dare you come in here?” she demanded insolently. “What do you want here?”
With a smile of infinite compassion Mrs. Walters approached like a loving mother. “My child! My dear child!” she said tenderly.
But the mad young creature repulsed her. “No, no! I hate you! Go away!”
The newcomer turned reassuringly to Captain Herrick. “I am Penelope's friend—Seraphine.”
“Ha! Seraphine! I am Fauvette! What do I care for you?” The frantic one snapped her fingers at the other woman.
“Penelope!” pleaded Christopher, shocked at her violence.
She turned on him in fury. “You fool! You wouldn't take the chance I offered you.”
“I will quiet her,” said Mrs. Walters to Herrick. “Don't be alarmed.”
“You can't quiet me. I'll say anything I damn please. Go on, quiet me! Quiet Fauvette! I'd like to see you do it. Ha, ha, ha!” Her wild laughter rang through the apartment.
Christopher's face was tense with alarm and distress. “What can I do? What is the matter with her?” he appealed to Seraphine.
“She is ill. She is not herself,” was the grave reply. “I'll call Dr. Owen; I'll tell him to come at once.”
He hurried out of the room and the two women faced each other.
Fauvette sank back on the divan and lay there in sullen defiance. “Now we're alone—you and I. What are you going to do about it?” was her harsh challenge.
The psychic did not answer, but her lips moved as if in prayer; then she spoke sternly, her deep eyes widening: “I see your scarlet lights, your sinister face.”
From the shadowy corner Fauvette sneered: “I see your soft, sentimental Christmas card face. I'm not afraid of you. I laugh at you.” And peals of shrill, almost satanic, laughter rang through the room.
Seraphine advanced slowly, holding out her hands.
“I know your ways, creature of darkness. I command you to leave this pure body that you would defile.”
And fierce the answer came: “No! Damn you! You are not strong enough to drive me out.”
“Think of the tortures you are preparing for yourself.”
“Don't you worry about my tortures.”
“Have pity on Penelope. It will be counted in your favor.”
There were snarling throat-sounds, then these menacing words: “No! I'm going to put Penelope out of business.”
“Where is Penelope now?”
“She is sleeping. Poor nut!”
“She knows nothing about Fauvette?”
“Nothing.”
“She remembers nothing that Fauvette says?”
“Nothing.”
There was a long silence in the darkened room while Seraphine prayed.
“You know very well that Dr. Leroy can drive you out,” she said presently.
“He can't do it. Let him try. Nobody can drive me out. Besides, you won't get Dr. Leroy.”
“Why not?”
“This other doctor won't have him.”
“Dr. Owen?”
“Yes. I know damned well how to fix him. I'll tell him some things that will make him sit up and take notice.”
“How do you mean you will fix him?”
“Never mind. You'll see. If I can't have Herrick, Penelope is never going to have him.”
The medium closed her eyes and seemed to listen. “You mean Penelope will never have him because of something you are going to tell Dr. Owen—something about—about chemistry?” she groped for the word.
“Dr. Owen will not believe you.”
“He will believe me.”
“No!” declared Seraphine dreamily. “There are greater powers than you fighting for Penelope.”
CHAPTER XII
X K C
We come now to what has been regarded by some authorities as the most remarkable feature in the case of Penelope Wells, a development almost without parallel in the records of abnormal psychology. All books on this subject record instances of jealousy or hostility between two recurring personalities in the same individual. A woman in one personality writes a letter that humiliates her in another personality. A little girl eats a certain article of food while in one personality simply because she knows that her other personality hates that particular food. And so on. It almost never occurs, however, that an evil personality will commit an act or a crime that is abhorrent to the individual's fundamental nature. Neither through hypnotism nor through any manifestation of a dual nature will a person become a thief or a murderer unless there is really in that person a latent tendency towards stealing or killing. There is always some germ of Mr. Hyde's bloodthirstiness in the benevolence of Dr. Jekyll.
But Penelope Wells, under the domination of her Fauvette personality, now entered upon a course that was certain to bring disgrace and sorrow upon a man she loved with all her heart, a man for whom she had risked her life on the battle field. Here is one of those mysteries that will not be cleared up until we better understand these strange and distressing phenomena of the sick brain or the sick soul.
In presenting this development it must be mentioned that Dr. William Owen was not only a specialist on nervous diseases but a chemist of wide reputation in the field of laboratory investigation. For a year and a half preceding the end of the war he had held a major's commission in the army and had spent much time in a government research laboratory, studying poison gases.
In August, 1918, he had discovered a toxic product of extraordinary virulence, not a gas, but a tasteless and odorless liquid containing harmful bacteria. These bacteria showed great resistance against heat and cold and were able to propagate and disseminate themselves with incredible rapidity through living creatures, rats, earth worms, birds, cattle, dogs, fleas, that might feed upon them or come in contact with them. The deadliness of this product was so great, as appeared from laboratory tests, that it was believed all human life might be exterminated in a region intensively inoculated (from airplanes or guns) with the liquid. This was only a possibility, but it was an enormously important possibility.
A report on this formidable discovery had been prepared by Dr. Owen for the Washington authorities with such extreme secrecy that the chemical formula for the liquid had been indicated simply by the letters X K C, the product being referred to as X K C liquid. Moreover, the only person, except Dr. Owen, in possession of the full facts touching this discovery was Captain Herrick who had assisted the doctor in his investigations. Herrick had been cautioned to guard this secret as he would his life, since there was involved in it nothing less than the possibility of preventing future wars through the power of its potential terribleness.
The bearing of all this upon our narrative was presently made clear as the conflict developed between tortured Penelope and the psychic in Roberta Vallis' studio.
For some moments the two women eyed each other in hostile silence, which was broken presently by the sound of footsteps in the hall.
“Ah! Here comes your doctor!” mocked the fair creature on the divan. “Now watch Fauvette!”
The door opened and Dr. Owen, followed by Herrick, both grave-faced, entered the apartment.
Christopher turned anxiously to Seraphine: “What has happened? Is she better?”
Mrs. Walters shook her head, but when the young officer looked at Penelope his fears were lessened, for she (was it from dissimulation or weariness?) gave no indication of her recent frenzy, but seemed to be resting peacefully against the cushions.
“Let's have a little more light here,” said Dr. Owen, and he turned on the electrics. “I'm afraid you have overtaxed your strength, Mrs. Wells.”
Penelope answered gently with perfect self-possession: “I'm afraid I have, doctor, I'm sorry to give you so much trouble.” And she smiled sweetly at Herrick.
The specialist drew up a chair and studied his patient thoughtfully. There was an added austerity in his usual professional manner.
“Captain Herrick tells me that you made some rather strange remarks just now?” he said tentatively.
Mrs. Wells met him with a look of half amused understanding.
“Did I?” she answered carelessly, and as she spoke she took up a pencil and made formless scrawls on a sheet of paper. “I suppose he refers to my calling him a fool. It is a little unusual, isn't it?”
She laughed in a mirthless way.
“Why did you do it?”
“I haven't any idea.”
“And you spoke unkindly to Seraphine? That isn't like you.”
“No? How do you know what I am like?” she answered quickly, her hand still fidgeting with the pencil.
Dr. Owen observed her attentively and did not speak for some moments. Seraphine and Christopher drew their chairs nearer, as if they knew that the tension of restraint was about to break.
“You must realize that you have been under a great strain, Mrs. Wells,” resumed the doctor, “and you are tired—you are very tired.”
Her answer came dreamily, absent-mindedly: “Yes, I am tired,” and, as she spoke, Penelope's tragic eyes closed wearily. But her fingers still clutched the pencil and continued to move it over the white sheet.
“Look!” whispered Seraphine, “she is making letters upside down.”
“That's queer!” nodded Owen. “She is writing backwards—from right to left. Hello!” He started in surprise as he saw, on bending closer, that Penelope had covered the sheet with large printed letters—X—K—C, written over and over again.
Greatly disturbed, Dr. Owen roused his patient and questioned her about this; but she insisted that she had no idea what she had written or what the letters meant. A little later, however, she acknowledged that this was not true.
“What! You did know what you wrote?” the scientist demanded. His whole manner had changed. His eyes were cold and accusing. He was no longer a sympathetic physician tactful towards the whims of a pretty woman, but a major in the United States Army defending the interests of his country.
“This is a very serious matter, Mrs. Wells, please understand that. You told me just now that you did not know what you wrote on the sheet of paper?”
Penelope faced him scornfully. Her cheeks were flushed. Her bosom heaved.
“I said that, but it wasn't true. I lied to you. I did know what I wrote.”
“You know what those letters mean?”
“Yes, I do!”
“They mean some kind of poison stuff that you have made for the army.”
“How do you know that?”
“He told me,” she turned to Captain Herrick who had listened in dumb bewilderment.
“How can you say such a thing?” Chris protested.
“Because it's true,” she flung the words at him defiantly.
The young officer went close to her and looked searchingly into her eyes.
“Think what you are saying,” he begged. “Remember what this means. Remember that—”
She cut in viciously: “You shut up! I have no more use for you. I tell you it's true.”
“Don't believe her, doctor,” interposed Seraphine: “She is not responsible for what she says.”
“I am responsible. I know exactly what I am saying.”
“It is not true, sir,” put in Captain Herrick. “May I add that—”
“Wait! Why are you confessing this, Mrs. Wells?”
Like a fury Fauvette glared at Christopher.
“Because he turned me down. I'm sore on him. He's not on the level.”
“Not on the level? Are you speaking of him as a lover or an officer?”
“Both ways. He's not on the level at all.”
“Oh, Penelope!” grieved the heartbroken lover.
She eyed him scornfully. “You needn't Penelope me! I said I have no use for you. A Sunday school sweetheart! Ha! I'll tell you something else, doctor, I'm not the only one who knows about your X K C stuff.”
“Mrs. Wells,” Dr. Owen spoke slowly, “are you deliberately accusing Captain Herrick of disloyalty?”
“Yes, I am.”
Herrick stiffened under this insult, white-faced, but he did not speak.
“He meant to sell this information—for money,” she added.
“My God!” breathed Christopher.
“Captain Herrick told you this?”
“Yes, he did. He said we would go abroad and live together—like millionaires. You did! You know damned well you did,” she almost screamed the words at Herrick, then she sank back on the divan exhausted, and lay still, her eyes closed.
The doctor's face was ominously set as he turned to his young friend.
“Chris, my boy, I need not tell you that I cannot believe this monstrous accusation. At the same time, I saw Mrs. Wells write down those letters that are only known to you and to me. I saw that with my own eyes—you saw it, too.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you heard what she said?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Under the circumstances, as your superior officer, I don't see how I have any choice except to—”
Here Mrs. Walters interrupted: “May I speak? It is still possible to avert a great disaster.”
The doctor shook his head. “You have heard Mrs. Wells' confession. No power on earth can prevent an investigation of this,” he declared with military finality.
Seraphine's lips moved in silent prayer. Her face was transfigured as her eyes fell tenderly upon the white-faced, tortured sleeper.
“No power on earth, but—God can prevent it,” she murmured and moved nearer to Penelope whose face was convulsed as if by a terrifying dream. Then, with hands extended over the beautiful figure, the psychic prayed aloud, while Herrick and the doctor, caught by the power of her faith, looked on in wondering silence.
“God of love, let Thine infinite power descend upon this Thy tortured child and drive out all evil and wickedness from her. Open the eyes of these men so that they may understand and be merciful. Oh, God, grant us a sign! Let Thy light descend upon us.”
Captain Herrick has always maintained that at this moment, as he watched his beloved, his heart clutched with horrible forebodings, he distinctly saw (Dr. Owen did not see this) a faint stream of bluish radiance playing over her from the direction of Seraphine, and enveloping her. It is certain that Penelope's face immediately became peaceful and the convulsive twitchings that had shaken her body ceased.
“Look!” marvelled Christopher. “She is smiling in her sleep.”
Seraphine turned to Dr. Owen, with radiant countenance.
“It is God's sign. Come! Penelope will awaken soon and must find herself alone with her lover. It will be the real Penelope. You will see. Let us draw back into the shadows. You stay near her,” she motioned to Herrick, then turned down the lights except a yellow-shaded lamp near the sleeper.
And, presently, watching with breathless interest, these three saw Penelope stir naturally and open her eyes.
“Why, how strange!” she exclaimed. “I must have gone to sleep. Why did you let me go to sleep, Chris?” she questioned her lover, with bright, happy eyes in which there was no trace of her recent perturbations of spirit.
“It's all right, Pen,” he said reassuringly. “You were a little—a little faint, I guess.”
She held out her hand lovingly and beckoned him to her side.
“Sit by me here. I had such a horrible dream. I'm so glad to see you, dear. I'm so glad to be awake. Oh!” She started up in embarrassment as she saw that her dress was disarranged. “What's the matter with my dress? What did I do? What has happened? Tell me. You must tell me,” she begged in confusion.
“Don't worry, sweetheart,” he soothed her. “It was the excitement of all that talk—that ass of a poet.”
Penelope passed her hand over her eyes in a troubled effort to remember. It was pathetic to see her groping backwards through a daze of confused impressions. The last clear thing in her mind was exchanging rings with her lover. How long had they been here? What time was it? What must Roberta think of them, staying up in her apartment all alone?
Christopher assured her that what Roberta thought (she and her gay friends were still dancing downstairs) was the very least of his preoccupations, and he was planning to turn his sweetheart's thoughts into a different channel when Seraphine came forward out of the shadows followed by Dr. Owen.
“Why, Seraphine!” exclaimed Penelope in astonishment. “Where did you come from? And Dr. Owen?”
Seraphine greeted her friend lovingly and kissed her, but there was unconcealed anxiety in her voice and manner.
“Dear child, something very serious has happened. You were ill and—Dr. Owen came to help you. He wants to ask you some questions.”
“Yes?” replied Penelope, her face paling.
Then the doctor, with scarcely any prelude and with almost brutal directness, said: “Mrs. Wells, I want you to tell me why you accused Captain Herrick of disloyalty.”
Poor Penelope! She could only gasp for breath and turn whiter still. Accuse her dear Christopher whom she loved and honored above all men of any wrong or baseness! God in heaven! If she had done this she wanted to die.
“I—I didn't,” she stammered. “I couldn't do such a thing.”
But the doctor was relentless. “If what you said to me a few minutes ago is true,” he went on coldly, “it will be my duty, as a major in the United States Army, to order the arrest of Captain Herrick for treason against the government.”
At this startling assertion Penelope fell back as if struck down by a mortal wound, and lay still on the couch, a pitiful crumpled figure. The others gathered around her apprehensively.
“You were very harsh, sir,” reproached Herrick.
“It was the best thing for you and for Mrs. Wells,” answered Dr. Owen, bending over his patient, who lay there with dark-circled eyes closed, oblivious to her surroundings. “At least I have no doubt as to her sincerity, I mean as to the genuineness of this shock.”
The doctor was sorely perplexed as he faced this situation. What was his duty? Here was a definite charge of extreme gravity made against a young man of unimpeachable character by the very last person in the world who would naturally make such an accusation, that is the woman who loved him. Must he assume that the patient's mind was affected? The idea that Christopher Herrick could be capable of a treasonable act was altogether preposterous, a thing that Owen rejected indignantly, yet there was the evidence of his own senses. Penelope had written those letters that were not known to anyone except Herrick and himself? And she knew what they meant. How did she know? Was it possible Chris had told her?
But, even so, why had Penelope betrayed and denounced her lover?
At this moment Seraphine turned to the doctor in gentle appeal.
“Don't you see what the explanation is?” she whispered with eloquent eyes.
“It seems to be a case of dual personality,” he answered.
“It's more than that, doctor.”
The scientist moved impatiently, then, remembering what he had seen at Seraphine's apartment, and the recovery of his wife's jewels, he softened the skepticism of his tone.
“You think it is one of those cases you told me about of—possession? That's absurd!”
“Why is it absurd? Doesn't the Bible speak of possession by evil spirits? Is the Bible absurd? Did not Christ cast out evil spirits?”
“I suppose so, but—times have changed.”
“Not in the spirit world. Oh no!”
“Anyway, the thing is not capable of proof.”
“Yes, it is, if you will not shut your mind against the evidence. Oh,” she pleaded, “if you only had faith enough to let Dr. Leroy treat Penelope! What harm could it do? You say yourself this is a case of dual personality. Do you know how to cure that trouble? Do you?” she insisted.
“Perhaps not,” he admitted, “but—that is not the only thing. It must be made clear to me how Mrs. Wells came into possession of an extremely precious secret of the war department.”
The medium's face shone with an inspired light as she answered: “That is the work of an evil entity, doctor, I know what I am saying. You must let me prove it. Look at that young woman—honored by all the world.” She pointed to Penelope resting peacefully. “Think what she has done! Think of her bravery, her kindness, her sincerity. Look at Captain Herrick—the soul of honor! You know him, doctor, I tell you it is impossible that these two are guilty of treason.”
Dr. Owen could not resist the power of this appeal. He was deeply moved in spite of himself. “You say you can prove that Mrs. Wells is possessed by an evil spirit? How can you prove it?”
“Give me permission to take Penelope to Dr. Leroy's hospital for a few days—will you?” she begged. “You will see for yourself that I am right.”
“See for myself? Great heavens! You don't mean to tell me that—?” the doctor stopped short before the vivid memory of those white shapes that this woman once before had so strangely evoked.
Seraphine stood silent in deep concentration, then she said slowly: “Yes, that is what I mean. I believe that God, for His great purposes, will let you see this evil spirit.”
CHAPTER XIII
TERROR
(Statement by Seraphine)
At the request of Dr. William Owen I am writing this account of what happened last night after Roberta Vallis' party. What happened during the party was terrible enough, but what came later, after the doctor and the guests had gone and we three women were alone together, Roberta and Penelope and I, was infinitely worse.
I am told to put down details of the night, as far as I can remember them, so that these may be kept in the records of the American Occult Society. There never was a clearer case of an evil spirit working destructively against a living person, although other noble souls have faced a similar ordeal, especially returned soldiers and Red Cross workers, and some have not survived it. Remember those pitiful, unaccountable suicides of our bravest and our fairest. In every case there was a reason!
Penelope did not go home after the party, she was in no condition to do so, but stayed at Roberta's, and I stayed with her, at least I promised to stay, for I knew she needed me. I knew that the greatest danger was still threatening her.
When the guests had gone we took off our things (Roberta let me have her little spare room on the mezzanine floor and she gave Penelope her own big bedroom with the old French furniture), then a Russian singer, a tall blond, Margaret G——, came in from the next apartment and we talked for a long time. Pen and Bobby smoke cigarettes and drank cordials; they drank in a nervous, hysterical way, as if they felt they must drink, and, strangely enough, the more they drank the more intensely sober they became. I understood this!
Such talk! Miss Gordon had just returned to America by way of Tokio. She had been in London, Paris, Petrograd, Cairo; and, everywhere, as a result of the war, she said, she found a mad carnival of recklessness and extravagance. Everywhere the old standards of decency and honor had been set aside, greed and lust were rampant, the whole human race seemed to be swept as with a mighty tide, by three fierce desires—for money, for pleasure, for sensuality. And God had been forgotten!
I, who know how hideously true this is, tried to show these women why it is true, especially Penelope, whose eyes were burning dangerously, but they were not interested in my moralizing. “Let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die,” mocked Margaret G——, emptying her glass, and Roberta joined her, while Penelope hesitated.
“Wait! For God's sake, wait!” I caught the poor child's arm and the wine spilled over the carpet. Never shall I forget the look in her eyes as she drew back her head and faced me. I realized that the powers of evil were striving again for the soul of Penelope Wells. Poor, tortured child!
“Why shouldn't we eat, drink and be merry?” she demanded boldly, and I was silent.
How could I explain to this dear, misguided one that, even as those rollicking words were spoken, I felt the clutch of a cold foreboding that I know only too well.
For tomorrow we die!
The Russian singer presently withdrew as if she were annoyed at something, saying to Roberta that she would see her later. It seems they had arranged that Roberta should pass the night in Margaret G——'s apartment so that Penelope might have the large bedroom.
It was now after two o'clock and I suggested that we all needed sleep, my thought being for Penelope; but she was aggressively awake, and Roberta, as if bent on further excitement, started a new subject that came like a challenge to me. She began innocently enough by putting her arm around Penelope, as she sat on the bedside between the draped curtains—I never saw her so beautiful—and saying sweetly: “You don't know how terribly I'm going to miss you, Pen, when you get married.”
Married! That word, so full of exquisite sentiment, seemed to stir only what was evil in Penelope. Her face hardened, her eyes narrowed cynically.
“Good old Bobby! I'm not so sure that I shall marry at all. I'm a little fed up with this holy matrimony stuff. Perhaps I want my freedom just as much as you do.”
For a moment I caught her steady defiant gaze, then her eyes dropped and shifted. I knew that Penelope was gone.
After this outburst the other one was restrained enough for a time and did not betray herself by violent utterances. Apparently she was listening attentively to Roberta Vallis' views about life and love and the destiny of woman, these views being as extreme and selfish as the most wayward nature could demand.
I realized that the moment was critical and concentrated all my spiritual power in an appeal to Penelope, praying that God would bring her back and make her heed my words. I spoke gently of God's love for His children and said that we need fear no evil within us or about us, no dangers of any sort, if we will learn to draw to us and through us that healing and protecting love. We can do this, we must do this by establishing a love-current from God to us and from us to God, by keeping it flowing just as an electrician keeps an electrical current flowing—every day, every hour. It is not enough to pray for God's love, we must keep our spiritual connections right, exactly as an electrician keeps his electrical connections right, if we expect the current to flow. We cannot make our electric lamps burn by merely wishing them to burn, although there is a boundless ocean of electricity waiting to be drawn upon. We must know how to tap that ocean. Similarly, the power of God's infinite love will not descend upon us simply because we need it or ask for it. We must ask for it in the right way. We must establish the right love-connections. We must set the love-current flowing, and keep it flowing, from God to us and from us back to God; and this can be done only by confessing our sins, by cleansing our hearts of evil thoughts and desires. Not even God Himself can make the sun shine upon those who wilfully hide in the shadows!
I saw that they were listening impatiently and more than once Roberta tried to interrupt me, but I persisted and said what I had to say as well as I could, with all the love in my heart, for I knew that my precious Penelope's fate was hanging in the balance.
When I had finished Roberta got up from the bed where she had been sitting and lighted a cigarette.
“Now, then, it's my turn,” she began. I could see her eyes shining with an evil purpose. “You've heard her pretty little speech, Pen. You've heard her talk about the wonderful power of God's love, and a great rigamarole about how it guards us from all evil, if we say our prayers and confess our sins and so on. I say that is all bunk, and I can prove it. Take women—they've always said their prayers more than men, always confessed their sins more than men, always been more loving than men, haven't they? And what's the result? Has God protected them from the evils of life more than men? He has not. God has let women get the worst of it right straight along through the centuries. Women have always been the slaves of men, haven't they?—in spite of all their love and devotion, in spite of all their prayers and tears? How do you account for that?”
She flashed this at me with a wicked little toss of her head and Penelope chimed in: “Yes, I'd like to know that myself.” But, when I tried to answer, Roberta cut me off with a new flood of violence.
“I'll let you know how I account for it,” she went on angrily. “It's because all the churches in the world, all the smug preachers in the world, like you, have gone on shooting out this very same kind of hot air that you've been giving us; and the women, silly fools, have fallen for it. But not the men! The women have tried to live by love and prayer and unselfishness; they have said: 'God's will be done,' 'God will protect us'; and what is the result? How has God protected the women, who did believe? And how has He punished the men who refused to believe? He has made the men masters of the world, lords of everything; and He has kept the women in bondage, hasn't He?—in factory bondage, in nursery bondage, in prostitution bondage? Is what I say true, or isn't it true? I ask you, I ask any person who has got such a thing as a clear brain and is not simply a mushy sentimentalist, is what I say true?”
Again I tried to answer, but again she cut me short and rushed on in a blaze of excitement.
“So it has been through all the pitiful history of women, until a few years ago, the poor, foolish creatures began to wake up. At last women are getting rid of their delusions and emerging from their slavery—why? Because they have begun to imitate men, and go straight after the thing they want, the thing that is worth while, by using their power as women, and not depending upon the power of love or the power of God or any other power. Believe me, the greatest power in the world is the power of women as women, and we may as well use it to the limit, just as men would. We can get anything we want out of men by learning to use this power, and, I tell you, Pen, there isn't anything better in this good old United States than money. So far men have had the money, they've ground it out of the poor and the ignorant, especially women, but now women are going after money and getting it, just like the men. Why not? If I want a sable coat and a limousine and a nice duplex apartment, why shouldn't I have them, if I can get them without breaking the law? And I can get them; so can you, Pen, if you'll play the cards you hold in your hand. Haven't I done it? You don't see me eating in Childs restaurants to any great extent these days, do you? And I'm not worrying about clothes, or about paying my rent.”
The poison of her words was stealing into Penelope's soul and defiling it, yet I was powerless to restrain her.
“Listen to this, child, and remember it, women are the equals of men today in every line, and they're going to have their full share of the good things of life. They're going to have freedom, and that means the right to do as they please without asking the permission of any man. Women are going to have their own latch keys and their own bank accounts. They're going to cut off their hair and put pockets in their skirts, and have babies, if they feel like it, or not have them, if they don't feel like it. The greatest revolution the world has ever known is going on now, it's the revolution of women. Let the men open their eyes! How did women get the suffrage? Was it by praying for it? Was it by the power of love? Was it by the mercy of God? No! They got the suffrage by fighting for it, by going out and hustling for it, just the way men hustle for what they want. If women had depended on the power of God's love to give them the suffrage, they wouldn't have got it in a million years.”
Of course, those were not Roberta's exact words, but I am sure I have given the substance of them, and I cannot exaggerate the defiant bitterness of her tone. She was a powerful devil's advocate and I saw that wavering Penelope (if it still was Penelope) was deeply impressed by this false and wicked reasoning. She looked at me out of her wonderful eyes—unflinching, cruel, then the balance swung against me.
“I believe you are right, Roberta Vallis,” she spoke with raised forefinger and a show of judicial consideration. “It's a bold speech for a woman, I never heard the thing put that way before, but—I'm damned if I see what the answer is except—”
“Oh, Penelope!” I interrupted, trying in vain to reach her with my eyes.
“You shut up,” she answered spitefully. “I said I'm damned if I see what the answer is except your answer, Bobby, that women have always been fools and dupes—dupes of religious superstition invented by men for the benefit of men and never accepted by men.”
Roberta applauded this. “Bravo! little one! I'll tell that to Kendall Brown. Women have always been dupes of religious superstition invented by men for the benefit of men and never accepted by men! Go on! Tell us some more.”
And Penelope went on, flinging aside all restraint, while my heart sank.
“Take my own life. Look at it! I had an ignoble husband. Why didn't I leave him? Because I was loving, trusting. I thought I could save him. I said prayers for him. I asked God to strengthen him. And what was the result? The result was that Julian not only destroyed himself, but he destroyed what was best in me. Did God interfere? Did God give any manifestation of His infinite love? Not so that you could notice it.”
She paused with heaving bosom and then swept on in her mad discourse.
“And then, when I was left alone in the world, what happened? I went abroad as a Red Cross nurse. I tried my best to help in the war. I took care of the wounded—under fire. I bore every hardship. I said my prayers. And God put a curse upon me—yes He did. He took all chance of happiness and health and love away from me. He made me do things that I never meant to do, that I don't remember doing.”
Her cheeks were burning scarlet, her eyes shone like black stars. I tried to stop her. “My darling, you are ill!”
“Ill? Who made me ill? God made me ill, didn't He? That's my reward, isn't it? That's what has come of all my love and faith. If that's what God does, you can have Him. I don't want Him. I'll go with Roberta. I'll do as Roberta does—yes, I will.” She almost screamed the words.
How I prayed then for wisdom!
“No—no!” I said slowly but firmly. “You will not go with Roberta. You will go with me.”
“I must say I like your impertinence,” Roberta put in, her face white, her voice trembling with fury. “This happens to be my apartment, Mrs. Seraphine Walters, and now you can get damned well out of it.”
I saw that I could no nothing more, for Penelope's eyes were hard set against me. They both wanted me to go.
“Good night. God bless you, dear,” I said.
“Don't you worry about God's blessing us. You can tell Him the next time you make your report that there is a young woman named Roberta Vallis living at the Hotel des Artistes who is getting along quite well, thank you, without—”
“Don't say it, please don't say it,” I begged. “You have no idea what dangers are threatening, what evil powers are about us—even now—here.”
She laughed in my face. “I snap my fingers at your evil powers and your God of Love. I don't believe in either of them. I'm not afraid of either of them. Evil powers! Ha! Let them come if they want to. Here! We'll drink defiance to the powers of evil. Come on, Pen!”
“Defiance to the powers of evil,” laughed my poor soul-sick Penelope, lifting her glass.
With a shudder I watched these two tragically led young women as they stood there, draped in white, and drank this sacrilegious toast; then, heavy-hearted, I came away.
It was nearly four o'clock when I reached my home and I was so exhausted by the emotions of the night that I lay down without undressing and almost immediately fell into a troubled sleep. Then, suddenly, I awoke with a start of alarm and a sense that a voice had called me. And, though my bedroom was dark, I distinctly saw a white vaporish form passing over me as if someone had blown a cloud of tobacco smoke in my face. Once before I had had this experience of a white form passing over me—it was when my mother died.
I got up quickly, knowing that this was a summons, and, as I put on my hat and cloak, I heard my control telling me that I must go to Penelope. I knelt down and prayed that I might not be too late. Then I hurried back to the hotel and got there at half-past five. It was still night.
A sleepy elevator girl took me up to Roberta's apartment and I found that the door opened at my touch. In another moment I was standing in the silent hall looking down a long passage that led to Penelope's bedroom. The bedroom door was ajar and a dim light from the chamber illumined the way before me.
Thus far I had acted swiftly, almost mechanically, knowing that I had only one thing to do, and I had been aware of no particular emotion except a natural anxiety; but now, the moment I entered this apartment and closed the door behind me, I was conscious of a freezing, paralyzing fear, a sensation as real as the touch of a hand or the sound of a bell. It was something that could not be resisted. I was bathed in an atmosphere of terror. I was afraid to a degree that made my breath stop, my heart stop....
The passage leading to Penelope's bedroom was not more than six yards long, but it seemed as if it took me an hour to traverse it. I could scarcely force my lagging steps, one by one, to carry me. And every hideous moment brought me the vision of Penelope lying on that curtained bed, her beautiful face distorted, her eager young life—crushed out of her. Oh God, how I prayed!
When at last I came into the bedroom I faced another struggle. There was absolute silence. No sound of breathing from the bed, although I saw a woman's form under the sheets. But not her face, which was hidden by the curtain. For a long time I stood beside that bed, rigid with fear, before I found courage to draw the curtain back. At last I drew it back and—there lay Penelope, sleeping peacefully, quite unharmed. I was stunned with relief, with amazement and—suddenly her eyes opened and she gave a wild but joyful cry and flung her arms around my neck, sobbing hysterically.
“Oh! Oh! My dear, dear Seraphine! You came to me. You forgave me. You did not abandon your poor Penelope.” She clung to me like a child in frantic, pitiful terror.
Then she told me that she too had gone through a frightful experience. When Roberta had left her, about an hour before, to sleep in the adjoining apartment, as they had arranged with Margaret G——, Penelope had tried to compose herself on her pillow, but she had scarcely fallen into a doze when she was awakened by the same sense of horrible fear that had overcome me. She was about to die—by violence. An assassin was coming—he was near her. She could hardly breathe. It was almost beyond her power to rise from the bed and search the apartment, but she did this. There was nothing, and yet the terror persisted. She huddled herself under the bed-covers and waited, saying her prayers. And when I entered the apartment and came down the passage—so slowly, so stealthily!—she knew it was the murderer coming to kill her. And when I paused at her bedside—how long it was before I drew the curtain!—she almost died again, waiting for the blow.
Of course I did not leave Penelope after this, but comforted her and prayed with her and rejoiced that her madness was past. Then we tried to sleep, locked in each other's arms, but, shortly after six, there came a timid knock at the door and, all of a tremble, Jeanne entered, Penelope's French maid who had come with her mistress to Roberta's party and had occupied a small room overhead, and she told us with hysterical sobs that she had not closed her eyes all night for ghastly visions of Penelope murdered in her bed.
Now it is easy to scoff at premonitions and haunting fears, but there can be no doubt that on this night an evil spirit was present in Roberta's apartment, a hideous, destructive entity that came and—wavered in its deadly purpose against Penelope, then—manifested to Roberta Vallis in the adjoining apartment, for when I went in there a little later I found Roberta—she who had mocked God and defied the powers of evil—I found her in her bed, her face convulsed with a look of indescribable terror—dead!
The hotel doctor reported it as a case of heart failure, but Doctor William Owen, who has an honest mind, acknowledged that all this was beyond his understanding. This tragedy made him realize at last that there may be sinister agencies in us and about us that cannot be dealt with by mere medical skill. And, at my pleading, he directed that Mrs. Wells be placed immediately in the care of Dr. Edgar Leroy.
Thank God, my precious Penelope will receive psychic treatment before it is too late. There is no other hope for her but this.