If there was the least doubt in Chick's mind that this was really Harry,
it was dispelled by the sight of the person who the next moment stepped
up to his side. It was none other than the Nervina.
“Harry Wendel!” gasped Watson. It was too good to be true!
“Surest thing you know, Chick. It's me, alive and kicking!” as they
grabbed one another.
“How did you get here?”
“Search me! Ask the lady; I'm just a creature of circumstance. I merely
act; she does all the thinking.”
The Nervina smiled and nodded. Her eyes were just as wonderful as
Chick remembered them, full of elusiveness, of the moonbeam's light, of
witchery past understanding.
“Yes,” she affirmed. “You see, Mr. Watson, it is the will of the
Prophet. Harry is of the Chosen. We have come for the great Dr.
Holcomb--for the Jarados!”
And she led the way. Watson followed in silent wonder; behind him came
the Geos and the rest, quiet and reverent. The soft glow still held, so
that they seemed to be walking through the walls of cold fire. At the
end of the passage they came to a door.
The Nervina touched three unmarked spots on the walls. The door opened.
The queen stood aside, and motioned for Chick and Harry to enter.
It was a long room, pear-shaped, and fitted up like the most elaborate
sort of laboratory. And at the far end, seated in the midst of a strange
array of crystals, retorts and unfamiliar apparatus, was a man whom the
two instantly recognised.
It was the missing professor, looking just as they remembered him from
the days when they sat in his class in Berkeley. There was the same trim
figure, the same healthy cheeks, pleasant eyes and close-cropped
white beard. Always there had been something imperturbable about the
doctor--he had that poise and equanimity which is ever the balance of
sound judgment. Neither Chick nor Harry expected any rush of emotion,
and they were not disappointed.
Holcomb rose to his feet, revealing on the table before him a queer,
dancing light which he had been studying. He touched something; the
light vanished, and simultaneously there came an unnameable change in
the appearance of certain of those puzzling crystals. The doctor stepped
forward, hand extended, smiling; surely he did not look or act like a
prisoner.
“Well, well,” spoke he; “at last! Chick Watson and Harry Wendel! You're
very welcome. Was it a long journey?”
His eyes twinkled in the old way. He didn't wait for their replies. He
went on:
“Have we solved the Blind Spot? It seems that my pupils never desert me.
Let me ask: have you solved the Blind Spot?”
“We've solved nothing, professor. What we have come for is, first,
yourself; and second, for the secrets you have found. It is for us to
ask--what is the Blind Spot?”
The professor shook his head.
“You were always a poor guesser, Mr. Wendel. Perhaps Chick, now--”
“Put me down as unprepared,” answered Chick. “I'm like Harry--I want to
know!”
“Perhaps there are a lot of us in the same fix,” laughed Holcomb. “We,
who know more than any men who ever lived, want to know still more! It
may be, after all, that we know very little; even though we have solved
the problem.” His eyes twinkled again, aggravatingly.
“Tell us, then!” from Harry, on impulse as always. “What is the Blind
Spot?”
But Holcomb shook his head. “Not just now, Harry; we have company.”
The Geos and the Jan had entered. “Besides, I am not quite ready. There
remain several tangles to be unravelled.”
As he shook hands with the Geos, he spoke in the Thomahlian tongue. “You
are more than welcome.”
The Rhamda bent low in reverence and awe. His voice was hushed. He
spoke:
“Art thou the Jarados, my lord?”
“Aye,” stated the doctor. “I am he; I am the Jarados!”
It was a stagger for both young men. Neither could reconcile the great
professor of his schooldays with this strange, philosophic prophet of
the occult Thomahlians. What was the connection? What was the fate that
was leading, urging, compelling it all?
“Professor, you will pardon our eagerness. Both Harry and I have had
adventures, without understanding what it was all about. Can't you
explain? Where are we? And--why?” And then:
“Your lecture on the Blind Spot! You promised it to us--can you deliver
it now?”
The professor smiled his acknowledgement.
“Part of it,” he said; “enough to answer your questions to some extent.
Had I stayed in Berkeley I could have delivered it all, but”--and he
laughed--“I know a whole lot more, now; and, paradoxically, I know far
less! First let me speak to the Geos.” He learned that the struggle
outside had terminated successfully for the Rhamda and his men. All was
quiet. The Senestro had made his escape in safety back to the Mahovisal.
The doctor ordered that he was not to be molested.
The Geos and the others left the room, escorting the Aradna, who was
too exhausted for further experiences. There remained with the doctor,
Chick, Harry, and the Nervina.
“I will reduce that lecture to synopsis form,” began the professor. “I
shall tell you all that I know, up to this moment. First, however, let
me show you something.”
He indicated the table from which he had risen. Chief among the objects
on its top were fragments of minerals, some familiar, some strange.
Above and on all sides were the crystal globes or, at least, what Chick
named as such--erected upon as many tripods. One of these the professor
moved toward the table.
Simultaneously a tiny dot appeared on a small metal plate in the centre
of the table. At first almost invisible, it grew, after a minute or so,
to a definite bit of matter.
The professor moved the tripod away. Nearby crystals, inside of
which some dull lights had leaped into momentary being, subsided into
quiescence. And the three observers looked again and again at the solid
fragment of material that had grown before their eyes on that table.
Something had been made out of nothing!
The doctor picked it up and held it unconcernedly in his fingers.
“Can anybody tell me,” asked he, “what this is?”
There was no answer. The professor tossed the thing back on the table.
It gave forth a sharp, metallic sound.
“You are looking at ether,” spoke he. “It is the ether itself--nothing
else. You call it matter; others would call it iron; but those are
merely names. I call it ether in motion--materialised force-coherent
vibration.
“Like everything else in the universe it answers to a law. It has its
reason--there is no such thing as chance. Do you follow? That fragment
is simply a principle, allowed to manifest itself through a natural law!
“Try to follow me. All is out of the ether--all! Variety in matter is
simply a question of varying degrees of electronic activity, depending
upon a number of ratios. Life itself, as well as materiality and force,
comes out of the all-pervading ether.
“This object here,” touching the crystal, “is merely a conductor. It
picks up the ether and sends it through a set degree of vibrational
activity. Result? It makes iron!
“If you wish you may go back to our twentieth century for a parallel--by
which I mean, electricity. It is gathered crudely; but the time will
come when it will be picked up out of the air in precisely the same
manner that men pick hydrocarbons out of petroleum, or as I sift the
desired quality of ether through that globe.
“This, I am convinced, is one of the fundamental secrets of the Blind
Spot. Is there any question?”
Wendel managed to put one.
“You said, 'back in the twentieth century.' Is it a question of time
displacement, sir?”
“Suppose we forgo that point at present. You will note, however, that
the Thomahlian world is certainly far in advance of our own.”
“Professor,” asked Watson, “is it the occult?”
“Ah,” brightening; “now we are getting back to the old point. However,
what is the occult?” He paused; then--“Did it ever occur to you, that
the occult might prove to be the real world, proving that life we have
known to be merely a shadow?”
Silence greeted this. The professor went on:
“Let me ask you: Are you living in a real world now, or an unreal one?”
There was no response. “It is, of course, a reality; just as truly as if
you were in San Francisco. So,” very distinctly, “perhaps it is merely a
question of viewpoint, as to which is the occult!”
“Just what we want to know,” from Harry.
“And that,” tossing up his hands, “is exactly what I cannot tell you.
I have found out many things, but I cannot be sure. I left certainty in
Berkeley.
“Today I feel that there is some great fate, some unknown force that
defies analysis, defies all attempts at resolution--a force that is
driving me through the role of the Jarados. We are all a part of the
Prophecy!
“We must wait for the last day for our answer. That Prophecy must and
will be fulfilled. And on that day we shall have the key to the Blind
Spot--we shall know the where of the occult.”
He took a sip from a tumbler of the familiar green fluid.
“Now that I have told you this much, I am going back to the beginning.
I, too, have had adventures.
“How did I come to discover the Blind Spot?
“It was about one year prior to my last lecture at the university. At
the time I had been doing much psychic-research work, all of which you
know. And out of it I had adduced some peculiar theories. For example:
“Undoubtedly there is such a thing as a spirit world. If all the mediums
but one were dishonest, and that one produced the results that couldn't
be explained away by psychology, then we must admit the existence of
another world.
“But reason tells us that there is nothing but reality; that if there
were a spirit world it must be just as real, just as substantial as
our own. Moreover--somewhere, somehow, here must be a definite point of
contact!
“That was approximately my theory. Of course I had no idea how close I
had come to a great truth. To some extent it was pure guesswork.
“Then, one day Budge Kennedy brought me the blue stone. He told me its
history, and he maintained that it was lighter than air, which of course
I disbelieved until I took it out of the ring and saw for myself.
“I went at once to the house at 288 Chatterton Place. There I found an
old lady who had lived in the house for some time. I asked to see the
cellar where the stone had been unearthed. Understand, I had no idea of
the great discovery I was about to make; I merely wanted to see. And I
found something almost as impossible as the blue stone itself-a
green one, heavier than any known mineral, answering to no known
classification but of an entirely new element. It was no larger than a
pea, but of incredible weight.
“Coming upstairs I found the old lady a bit perturbed. I had told her my
name; she had recognised me as well.
“'Come with me,' she said.
“With that she opened a door. She was very old and very uncertain; yet
she was scarcely afraid.
“'In there,” she said, and pointed through the door.
“I entered an ordinary room, furnished as a parlour. There was a sofa, a
table, a few chairs; little else.
“'What do you mean?' I asked.
“'The man!'
“'The man! What man?”
“'Oh!' she exclaimed, 'he came here one night when the moon was shining.
He sat down on the doorstep. He was just the kind of a lad that's in
need of a mother. So I asked him to lie on the sofa. He was tired, you
see, and--I once had a son of my own.'
“She stopped, and it was a moment before she continued. I could feel the
pressure of her hand on my arm, pitiful, beseeching.
“'So I took him in there. In there; see? On that sofa. I saw it! They
took him! Oh, sir; it was terrible!'
“She was weird, uncanny, strangely interesting.
“'He just lay down there. I was standing by the door when--they took
him! I couldn't understand, sir. I saw the blue light; and the moon--it
was gone. And then--' She looked up at me again and whispered: 'And then
I heard a bell--a very beautiful bell--a church bell, sir? But you know,
don't you? You are the great Dr. Holcomb. That's why you went into the
cellar, wasn't it? Because you know!'
“Her manner as much as her story, impressed me. I said:
“'I must give this room a careful examination. Would you be good enough
to leave me to myself?'
“She closed the door after her. I had the green stone in my hand; it was
very heavy, and I placed it on one of the chairs. The blue stone I
still held. At the moment I hadn't the least notion of what was about to
happen; it was all accident, from beginning to end.
“All of a sudden the room disappeared! That is, the side wall; I was not
looking at the dingy old wallpaper, but out through and into an immense
building, dim, vast and immeasurable.
“Directly in front of me was a white substance like a stone of snow.
Upon this substance was seated a man, about my own age, as nearly as I
could make out. He looked up just as I noted him.
“Our recognition was mutual. Immediately he made a sign with one hand.
And at once I took a step forward; I thought he had motioned. It was all
so real and natural. Though his features were dim he could not have been
more than ten feet distant. But, at that very instant, when I made that
one step, the whole thing vanished.
“I was still in the room at Chatterton Place!
“That's what started it all. Had this occurred to any one else in the
world I should have labelled it an unaccountable illusion. But it had
happened to me.
“I had my theory; between the spiritual and the material there must be a
point of contact. And--I had found it! I had discovered the road to
the Indies, to the Occult, to all that other men call unknowable. And I
called it--
“The Blind Spot.”