“By signs at first—gradually making them more simple and suggestive. The elimination of signs kept pace with the development of his intuitions. It was slow work and hard work, but I gave all my time to it. After he became familiar with a sign, I began to make it less pantomimic, until finally a lift of the eyebrow, a movement of the lips, or an inclination of the head served to express my meaning. In time he could detect the passing shades of expression in my eyes and understand them. Look at me,” said he, laying his hand on my head and watching my eyes as the firelight shone upon them, for it was now evening.
“Don't you know, my boy, that your eyes reflect what is passing in your mind? Then there are countless nerves and muscles in your face which proclaim thought. They aid my intuitions to discover what you do not speak. You wonder—ah! you are afraid!—afraid of me.”
I started in my chair, for while he was looking into my eyes a strange gleam came into his own. He turned about suddenly and looked into the bright fire that burned on the grate before us.
“Never fear,” he continued, nervously twirling a lock of his white hair. “Never fear, sir—I am not mad. Not yet. I have been afraid of it, but my reason will outlast my life. Do you ever pray?”
“Every day,” I answered.
“Then you employ the interior language. We commune directly with the Holy Spirit. You get some message from Him every day more satisfactory than words. It's the answer of your prayers. I tell you, sir, words are an invention of the devil. Do you like Rayel?” he asked, turning upon me abruptly.
“You need have no doubt of that,” I answered, “or of my willingness to look after him if it should be necessary—to take him away with me and cherish him as I would a brother.”
“Good! Good!” he exclaimed smiling and rubbing his hands joyfully. “I have not long to live. When the time comes, take him out among the knaves and fools! But we must hurry: our time is short. We must prepare him for a second birth. You will find him an apt pupil—a very apt one. He already knows more of the world than I thought possible. I don't think you will find him troublesome—he can help you; he will teach you wisdom; he will enlarge the issues of your life. My fortune will be ample for his needs: use it as you see fit. I have one servant left,” he said, drawing his chair closer to mine and speaking scarcely above a whisper: “I would like this to be his home when I am dead. It will be better, however, to place him in some public institution where he can be well provided for. I shall leave a sufficient allowance for him. The manner of its bestowal I leave entirely to your judgment. There were two of them—you have seen the other. He was a faithful fellow. They were poor fools, both of them, but uncommonly wise,” he continued. “They kept it to themselves. I found them in an asylum twenty-five years ago. They called them idiots. Idiots! God help us!”
That strange light seemed to kindle in his eyes again while he was speaking, and it conveyed anything but a cheerful suggestion to my mind.
“There is this difference between idiots and madmen,” he continued. “The former are born outside the pale of human sympathy; the latter overstep it. In either case they are not of this earth—they are embodied spirits living in a world of their own creation, biding the time of liberation from the flesh. And do you know, there are more madmen in the world than it dreams of?”