The Last Miracle

by M. P. Shiel

"Yes, indeed. My sister and I glanced at each other when we saw the pile of milk toast going, going, and then gone. But he consoled poor Lizzie, who, if she has just a touch of vanity, is to be condoned on the score of her youth—you know, of course, Mr Templeton, that my sister is my junior by three years—he consoled her by saying that he had never tasted anything so nice; and it is only just to my sister to admit that she can make milk-toast. But he had hardly finished the milk-toast when he began to nod, and before we knew where we were we had him fast asleep on our hands. He muttered afresh that he had a headache, that he wished to be allowed to sleep on the sofa, and that he would like his hair to be brushed while he slept! then he threw himself down, and was instantly asleep. Imagine our plight! What could we do, Mr Templeton? Lizzie, who was quite distracted, put a chair under his feet, and proposed to me to brush his hair! I simply would not! She maintained that it was my duty to assume the initiative, since I am the elder, but I could not see eye to eye with her, and at last, after a great deal too many words, she decided that, since it had to be done, and I would not, then she must, being the younger——"

"That was brave and charming of Miss Lizzie," I said.

"You think so?" asked Miss Jane, with a weighing look at me: "to tell the truth, we here are not much in favour of adventures and new departures, and rather affect the quiet old monotonies; but since you think so——At any rate, he slept for an hour; and every afternoon since then he comes, eats a pile of milk-toast, sleeps an hour, and has his hair brushed. What can we do or say? We are in the maze of an enchantment! Punctually as the clock strikes four his ring is heard at the gate, and in he comes, happy and smiling."

"It is an idyll," I said; "but I have an urgent message for him, if one may venture to disturb his Excellency's siesta."

"I fear he would hardly approve of being awakened," said Miss Jane; "but he won't sleep long now, I know. We might go in softly, and see them...."

On this we went in, to find Miss Lizzie, all brown silk and mitts, sitting in patient vigil over the Styrian, from whom came a note of slumber. To me nothing could have been funnier than this casting of his gross weight by Baron Kolár upon these dainty ladies, and at the sight of it I was afresh pierced with laughter. Miss Jane now took Miss Lizzie's place as watcher, while Miss Lizzie came to ply me with hushed questions about the miracle, till at last the baron opened his eyes, showed his teeth in a smile, moaned for happiness, and sat up.

I informed him that he was being sought by the Prime Minister, and presently, after some talk, we two left Dale Manor together for Goodford.

"Dear beings," he said happily to me of the Misses Chambers, "nice people, charming people, I like them. These are not women, oh no, they are angels. It is astonishing to what differentiations the human species lends itself: here in these ladies you have a type which is not the highest anthropologically, and yet may be as unapelike as the exactest genius of our age. Primitive creatures spent their lives in a passion of earnestness, seeking their food, and defending themselves from violence; but evolution is toward the appreciation of trifles. The earnestness of the engineer, of the statesman, is still brutish: he bestrides the world wild of eye, while to these ladies a parish is the world, tiny traditions are their life, whatever arises causes them to exchange a code of glances. Nice people, gracious people: their velvet manners, their cushions, their shaded interior—everything nice and luxurious, and, I assure you, they make very good toast—very good. Nor does it displease me to find them devoid of ideas, oh no, there is no need for them to say anything: merely as listeners they have a merit. I am only sorry that this so-called miracle has come to excite and unsettle them."

"But 'so-called,' Baron Kolár!" I could not help crying out: "surely you saw the miracle with your own eyes, like the rest of us!"

"Well, yes, I saw it," he said; "oh yes, I saw it, too. But this looks to me a case in which it would be well not to place too much faith in the senses. If we know that miracles cannot happen, then, when we see them, we can only regard them as due to some caprice of our fancy; and if Providence is warned beforehand that we shall so regard them, it will be the less tempted to trouble us with any. On the whole, a mood of impassive aloofness seems to me the wisest with regard to what we witnessed on Sunday night. Do not permit it to engage or modify you at all; just say to yourself: 'let the vulgar millions lose their heads, but let me and my friends watch them with an impregnable eye.' Or do you not think that my advice is good?"