“Bring her here,” was the laconic reply.
And so it happened that the mercy which Dick Strangely subsequently received that night was taken humbly and penitently from the hand of the woman he once professed to love, but whose husband and home he ultimately tried to ruin.
The banker returned the money that night of which he had defrauded his friend, and he also returned the mortgages. He offered indeed to pay back double, but his offer was refused with scorn and loathing.
Dinner at Mr. Cargill’s was an hour late that night, but it was eaten with great joy and happiness of heart. “The happiest Christmas eve of my life,” exclaimed Mrs. Cargill with eyes whose radiance was momentarily dimmed by their moisture; and so said they all.
“Wilfred,” exclaimed the happy wife and sister as she rose from table to leave the two gentlemen to their after-dinner cigar, “I will never, never understand how you accomplished what you did. I believe you must have hypnotized Mr. Strangely. Did you, sir, tell me?”
“Perhaps,” was the reply with a curious smile curling the outer wave of his moustache. “Ben, the port wine is with you!”
“Tell me, Wilfred, how you managed it,” pressed his brother-in-law.
“Well,” replied the other after a pause, “it is not fair to make me disclose the secrets of my success, but I had a good deal of influence over that fellow Strangely, at school. On one occasion I caught him at a very disgraceful trick and gave him a very memorable thrashing. After that he seemed to drift into my power somehow, partly by reason of his disgrace, which I kept to myself, and partly because a good thrashing is an excellent beginning in hypnotism among boys. As the result, I could make him do anything I liked. With such a ground-work I had no difficulty in bringing him under my influence last night, more especially as I have become a pretty successful hypnotist by long practice and study.”
“Could you, do you think, have made him do what he did if you had not known him previously?”
“No, I think I would probably have had to go to work some other way with him, but I imagine he would have had to disgorge all the same. Hypnotism as an art is full of resources.”