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UNCANNY TALES
LONDON
C. ARTHUR PEARSON, LIMITED
HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.
1916
Transcriber's Note:
Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note. Dialect
spellings have been retained. The oe ligature has been transcribed
as [oe].
CONTENTS
PAGE
I. THE UNKNOWN QUANTITY 7
II. THE ARMLESS MAN 19
III. THE TOMTOM CLUE 33
IV. THE CASE OF SIR ALISTER MOERAN 43
V. THE KISS 63
VI. THE GOTH 73
VII. THE LAST ASCENT 88
VIII. THE TERROR BY NIGHT 97
IX. THE TRAGEDY AT THE "LOUP NOIR" 113
UNCANNY STORIES
I
THE UNKNOWN QUANTITY
Professor William James Maynard was in a singularly happy and contented
mood as he strolled down the High Street after a long and satisfactory
interview with the solicitor to his late cousin, whose sole heir he was.
It was exactly a month by the calendar since he had murdered this
cousin, and everything had gone most satisfactorily since. The fortune
was proving quite as large as he had expected, and not even an inquest
had been held upon the dead man. The coroner had decided that it was not
necessary, and the Professor had agreed with him.
At the funeral the Professor had been the principal mourner, and the
local paper had commented sympathetically on his evident emotion. This
had been quite genuine, for the Professor had been fond of his relative,
who had always been very good to him. But still, when an old man remains
obstinately healthy, when his doctor can say with confidence that he is
good for another twenty years at least, and when he stands between you
and a large fortune which you need, and of which you can make much
better use in the cause of science and the pursuit of knowledge, what
alternative is there? It becomes necessary to take steps. Therefore, the
Professor had taken steps.
Looking back to-day on that day a month ago, and the critical preceding
week, the Professor felt that the steps he had taken had been as
judicious as successful. He had set himself to solve a problem in higher
mathematics. He had found it easier to solve than many he was obliged to
grapple with in the course of his studies.
A policeman saluted as the Professor passed, and he acknowledged it with
the charming old world courtesy that made him so popular a figure in the
town. Across the way was the doctor who had certified the cause of
death. The Professor, passing benevolently on, was glad he had now
enough money to carry out his projects. He would be able to publish at
once his great work on "The Secondary Variation of the Differential
Calculus," that hitherto had languished in manuscript. It would make a
sensation, he thought; there was more than one generally accepted theory
he had challenged or contradicted in it. And he would put in hand at
once his great, his long projected work, "A History of the Higher
Mathematics." It would take twenty years to complete, it would cost
twenty thousand pounds or more, and it would breathe into mathematics
the new, vivid life that Bergson's works have breathed into
metaphysics.
The Professor thought very kindly of the dead cousin, whose money would
provide for this great work. He wished greatly the dead man could know
to what high use his fortune was designed.
Coming towards him he saw the wife of the vicar of his parish. The
Professor was a regular church-goer. The vicar's wife saw him, too, and
beamed. She and her husband were more than a little proud of having so
well known a man in their congregation. She held out her hand and the
Professor was about to take it when she drew it back with a startled
movement.
"Oh, I beg your pardon!" she exclaimed, distressed, as she saw him raise
his eyebrows. "There is blood on it."
Her eyes were fixed on his right hand, which he was still holding out.
In fact, on the palm a small drop of blood showed distinctly against the
firm, pink flesh. Surprised, the Professor took out his handkerchief and
wiped it away. He noticed that the vicar's wife was wearing white kid
gloves.
"Oh, I beg your pardon!" she said again. "It--it startled me somehow. I
thought you must have cut yourself. I hope it's not much?"
"Some scratch, I suppose," he said. "It's nothing."
The vicar's wife, still slightly discomposed, launched out into some
parochial matter she had wished to mention to him. They chatted a few
moments and then parted. The Professor took an opportunity to look at
his hand. He could detect no sign of any cut or abrasion, the skin
seemed whole everywhere. He looked at his handkerchief. There was still
visible on it the stain where he had wiped his hand, and this stain
seemed certainly blood.
"Odd!" he muttered as he put the handkerchief back in his pocket. "Very
odd!"
His thoughts turned again to his projected "A History of the Higher
Mathematics," and he forgot all about the incident till, as it happened
that day month, the first of the month by the calendar, when he was
sitting in his study with an eminent colleague to whom he was explaining
his great scheme.
"If you are able to carry it out," the colleague said slowly, "your book
will mark an epoch in human thought. But the cost will be tremendous."
"I estimate it at twenty thousand pounds," answered the Professor
calmly. "I am fully prepared to spend twice as much. You know I have
recently inherited forty thousand pounds from a relative?"
The eminent colleague nodded and looked very impressed.
"It is magnificent," he said warmly, "magnificent." He added: "You've
cut yourself, do you know?"
"Cut myself?" the Professor echoed, surprised.
"Yes," answered the eminent colleague, "there is blood upon your
hand--your right hand."
In fact a spot of blood, slightly larger than that which had appeared
before, showed plainly upon the Professor's right hand. He wiped it away
with his handkerchief, and went on talking eagerly, for he was deeply
interested. He did not think of the matter again till just as he was
getting into bed, when he noticed a red stain upon his handkerchief. He
frowned and examined his hand carefully. There was no sign of any wound
or cut from which the blood could have come, and he frowned again.
"Very odd!" he muttered.
A calendar hanging on the wall reminded him that it was the first of the
month.
The days passed, the incident faded from his memory, and four weeks
later he came down one morning to breakfast in an unusually good temper.
There was a certain theory he had worked on the night before he meant to
write to a friend about. It seemed to him his demonstration had been
really brilliant, and then, also, he was already planning out with great
success the details of the scheme for his great work.
He was making an excellent breakfast, for his appetite was always good,
and, needing some more cream, he rang the bell. The maid appeared, he
showed her the empty jug, and as she took it she dropped it with a
sudden cry, smashing it to pieces on the floor. Very pale, she stammered
out:
"Beg pardon, sir, your hand--there is blood upon your hand."
In fact, on the Professor's right hand there showed a drop of blood,
perceptibly larger this time than before. The Professor stared at it
stupidly. He was sure it had not been there a moment before, and he
noticed by the heading of the newspaper at the side of his plate that
this was the first of the month.
With a hasty movement of his napkin he wiped the drop of blood away. The
maid, still apologising, began to pick up the pieces of the jug she had
broken; but the Professor had no further appetite for his breakfast. He
silenced her with a gesture, and, leaving a piece of toast half-eaten on
his plate, he got up and went into his study.
All this was trivial, absurd even. Yet somehow it disturbed him. He got
out a magnifying glass and examined his hand under it. There was nothing
to account for the presence of the drop of blood he and the maid had
seen. It occurred to him that he might have cut himself in shaving; but
when he looked in the mirror he could find no trace of even the
slightest wound.
He decided that, though he had not been aware of it, his nerves must be
a little out of order. That was disconcerting. He had not taken his
nerves into consideration for the simple reason that he had never known
that he possessed any. He made up his mind to treat himself to a holiday
in Switzerland. One or two difficult ascents might brace him up a bit.
Three days later he was in Switzerland, and a few days later again he
was on the summit of a minor but still difficult peak. It had been an
exhilarating climb, and he had enjoyed it. He said something laughingly
to the head guide to the effect that climbing was good sport and a fine
test for the nerves. The head guide agreed, and added politely that if
the nerves of monsieur the Professor had shown signs of failing on the
lower glacier, for example, they might all have been in difficulties.
The Professor thrilled with pleasure at the head guide's implied praise.
He was glad to know on such good authority that his nerves were all
right, and the incidents that had driven him there began to fade in his
memory.
Nevertheless, he found himself watching the calendar with a certain
interest, and when he woke on the morning of the first day of the next
month he glanced quickly at his right hand. There was nothing there.
He dressed and spent, as he had planned, a quiet day, busy with his
correspondence. His spirits rose as the day passed. He was still
watchful, but more confident; and, after dinner, though he had meant to
go straight to his room, he agreed to join in a suggested game of
bridge. They were cutting for partners when one of the ladies who was to
take part in the game dropped with a little cry the card she had just
lifted.
"Oh, there is blood upon your hand," she cried, "on your right hand,
Professor!"
Upon the Professor's right hand there showed now a drop of blood, larger
still then those other three had been. Yet the very moment before it had
not been there. The Professor put down his cards without a word, and
left the room, going straight upstairs.
The drop of blood was still standing on his hand. He soaked it up
carefully with some cotton-wool he had, and was not surprised to find
beneath no sign or trace of any cut or wound. The cotton-wool he made up
carefully into a parcel and addressed it to an analytical chemist he
knew, inclosing with it a short note.
He rang the bell, sent the parcel to the post, and then he got out pen
and paper and set himself to solve this problem, as in his life he had
solved so many others.
Only this time it seemed somehow as though the data were insufficient.
Idly his pen traced upon the paper in front of him a large _X_, the sign
of the unknown quantity.
But how, in this case, to find out what was the unknown quantity? His
hand, his firm and steady hand, shook so that he could no longer hold
his pen. He rang the bell again and ordered a stiff whisky-and-soda. He
was a man of almost ascetic habits, but to-night he felt that he needed
some stimulant.
Neither did he sleep very well.
The next day he returned to England. Almost at once he went to see his
friend, the analytical chemist, to whom he had sent the parcel from
Switzerland.
"Mammalian blood," pronounced the chemist, "probably human--rather a
curious thing about it, too."
"What's that?" asked the Professor.
"Why," his friend answered, "I was able to identify the distinctive
bacillus----" He named the rare bacillus of an unusual and obscure
disease. And this disease was that from which the Professor's cousin had
died.
The professor was a man interested in all phenomena. In other
circumstances he would have observed keenly that which now occurred,
when the hair of his head underwent a curious involuntary stiffening and
bristling process that in popular but sufficiently accurate terms, might
be described as "standing on end." But at the moment he was in no state
for scientific observations.
He got out of the house somehow. He said he did not feel well, and his
friend, the chemist, agreed that his holiday in Switzerland did not seem
to have done him much good.
The Professor went straight home and shut himself up in his study. It
was a fine room, ranged all round with books. On the shelves nearest to
his hand stood volumes on mathematics, the theory of mathematics, the
study of mathematics, pure mathematics, applied mathematics. But there
was not any one of these books that told him anything about such a thing
as this. Though, it is true, there were many references in them, here
and there, to _X_, the unknown quantity.
The Professor took his pen and wrote a large _X_ upon the sheet of paper
in front of him.
"An unknown quantity!" he muttered. "An unknown--quantity!"
The days passed peacefully. Nothing was out of the ordinary except that
the Professor developed an odd trick of continually glancing at his
right hand. He washed it a good deal, too. But the first of the month
was not yet.
On the last day of the month he told his housekeeper that he was feeling
a little unwell. She was not surprised, for she had thought him looking
ill for some time past. He told her he would probably spend the next day
in bed for a thorough rest, and she agreed that that would be a very
good idea. When he was in his own room and had undressed, he bandaged
his right hand with care, tying it up carefully and thoroughly with
three or four of his large linen handkerchiefs.
"Whatever comes, shall now show," he said to himself.
He stayed in bed accordingly the next day. His housekeeper was a little
uneasy about him. He ate nothing and his eyes were strangely bright and
feverish. She overheard him once muttering something to himself about
"the unknown quantity," and that made her think that he had been working
too hard.
She decided he must see the doctor. The Professor refused peremptorily.
He declared he would be quite well again in the morning. The
housekeeper, an old servant, agreed, but sent for the doctor all the
same; and when he had come the Professor felt he could not refuse to see
him without appearing peculiar. And he did not wish to appear peculiar.
So he saw the doctor, but declared there was nothing much the matter, he
merely felt a little unwell and out of sorts and tired.
"You have hurt your hand?" the doctor asked, noticing how it was
bandaged.
"I cut it slightly--a trifle," the Professor answered.
"Yes," the doctor answered, "I see there is blood on it."
"What?" the Professor stammered.
"There is blood upon your hand," the doctor repeated.
The Professor looked. In fact, a deep, wide stain showed crimson upon
the bandages in which he had swathed his hand. Yet he knew that the
moment before the linen had been fair and white and clean.
"It is nothing," he said quickly, hiding his hand beneath the bed
clothes.
The doctor, a little puzzled, took his leave, but had not gone ten
yards when the housekeeper flew screaming after him. It seemed she had
heard a fall, and when she had gone into the Professor's bedroom she had
found him lying there dead upon the hearthrug. There was a razor in his
hand, and there was a ghastly gash across his throat.
The doctor went back at a run, but there was nothing he or any man could
do. One thing he noticed, with curiosity, was that the bandage had been
torn away from the dead man's hand and that oddly enough there seemed to
be on the hand no sign of any cut or wound. There was a large solitary
drop of blood on the palm, at the root of the thumb; but, of course,
that was no great wonder, for the wound the dead man had dealt himself
had bled freely.
Apparently death had not been quite instantaneous, for with a last
effort the Professor seemed to have traced an _X_ upon the floor in his
own blood with his forefinger. The doctor mentioned this at the
inquest--the coroner had decided at once that in this case an inquest
was certainly necessary--and he suggested that it showed the Professor
had worked too hard and was suffering from overwork which had disturbed
his mental balance.
The coroner took the same view, and in his short address to the jury
adduced the incident as proof of a passing mental disturbance.
"Very probably," said the coroner, "there was some problem that had
worried him, and that he was still endeavouring to work out. As you are
aware, gentlemen, the sign _X_ is used to symbolise the unknown
quantity."
An appropriate verdict was accordingly returned, and the Professor was
duly interred in the same family vault as that in which so short a time
previously his cousin had been laid to rest.
II
THE ARMLESS MAN
I first met Bob Masters in the hotel at a place called Fourteen Streams,
not very far from Kimberley.
I had for some months been trying to find gold or diamonds by digging
holes in the veldt. But since this has little or nothing to do with the
story, I pass by my mining adventures and come back to the hotel. I came
to it very readily that afternoon, for I was very thirsty.
A tall man standing at the bar turned his head as I entered and said
"Good-day" to me. I returned the compliment, but took no particular
notice of him at first.
Suddenly I heard the man say to the barman:
"I'm ready for another drink."
That surprised me, because his glass was still three-quarters full. But
I was still more startled by the action of the barman who lifted up the
glass and held it whilst the man drank.
Then I saw the reason. The man had no arms.
You know the easy way in which Englishmen chum together anywhere out of
England, whilst in their native country nothing save a formal
introduction will make them acquainted? I made some remark to Masters
which led to another from him, and in five minutes' time we were
chatting on all sorts of topics.
I learnt that Masters, bound for England, had come in to Fourteen
Streams to catch the train from Kimberley, and, having a few hours to
wait, had strolled up to the collection of tin huts calling itself a
town.
I was going down to Kimberley too, so of course we went together, and
were quite old friends by the time we reached that city.
We had a wash and something to eat, and then we walked round to the
post-office. I used to have my letters addressed there, _poste
restante_, and call in for them when I happened to be in Kimberley.
I found several letters, one of which altered the whole course of my
life. This was from Messrs. Harvey, Filson, and Harvey, solicitors,
Lincoln's Inn Fields. It informed me that the sudden death of my cousin
had so affected my uncle's health that he had followed his only son
within the month. The senior branch of the family being thus extinct the
whole of the entailed estate had devolved on me.
The first thing I did was to send off two cablegrams to say that I was
coming home by the first available boat, one to the solicitors, the
other to Nancy Milward.
Masters and I arranged to come home together and eventually reached Cape
Town. There we had considerable trouble at the shipping office. It was
just about the time of year when people who live in Africa to make
money, come over to England to spend it, and in consequence the boats
were very crowded. Masters demanded a cabin to himself, a luxury which
was not to be had, though there was one that he and I could share. He
made a tremendous fuss about doing this, and I thought it very strange,
because I had assisted him in many ways which his mutilation rendered
necessary. However, he had to give way in the end, and we embarked on
the Castle liner.
On the voyage he told me how he had lost his arms. It seemed that he had
been sent up country on some Government job or other, and had had the
ill-fortune to be captured by the natives. They treated him quite well
at first, but gave him to understand that he must not try to escape. I
suppose that to most men such a warning would be a direct incitement to
make the attempt. Masters made it and failed. They cut off his right arm
as a punishment. He waited until the wound was healed and tried again.
Again he failed. This time they cut off his other arm.
"Good Lord," I cried. "What devils!"
"Weren't they!" he said. "And yet, you know, they were quite
good-tempered chaps when you didn't cross them. I wasn't going to be
beaten by a lot of naked niggers though, and I made a third attempt.
"I succeeded all right that time, though, of course, it was much more
difficult. I really don't know at all how I managed to worry through.
You see, I could only eat plants and leaves and such fruit as I came
across; but I'd learnt as much as I could of the local botany in the
intervals."
"Was it worth while?" I asked. "I think the first failure and its result
would have satisfied me."
"Yes," he said slowly, "it was worth while. You see, my wife was waiting
for me at home, and I wanted to see her again very badly--you don't
know how badly."
"I think I can imagine," I said. "Because there is a girl waiting for me
too at home."
"I saw her before she died," he continued.
"Died?" I said.
"Yes," he answered. "She was dying when I reached home at last, but I
was with her at the end. That was something, wasn't it?"
I do hate people to tell me this sort of thing. Not because I do not
feel sorry for them; on the contrary, I feel so sorry that I absolutely
fail to find words to express my sympathy. I tried, however, to show it
in other ways, by the attentions I paid him and by anticipating his
every wish.
Yet there were many things that were astonishing about his actions,
things that I wonder now I did not realise must have been impossible for
him to do for himself, and that yet were done. But he was so
surprisingly dexterous with his lips, and feet too, when he was in his
cabin that I suppose I put them down to that.
I remember waking up one night and looking out of my bunk to see him
standing on the floor. The cabin was only faintly lit by a moonbeam
which found its way through the porthole. I could not see clearly, but I
fancied that he walked to the door and opened it, and closed it behind
him. He did it all very quickly, as quickly as I could have done it. As
I say, I was very sleepy, but the sight of the door opening and shutting
like that woke me thoroughly. Sitting up I shouted at him.
He heard me and opened the door again, easily, too, much more easily
than he seemed to be able to shut it when he saw me looking at him.
"Hullo! Awake, old chap?" he said. "What is it?"
"Er--nothing," I said. "Or rather I suppose I was only half awake; but
you seemed to open that door so easily that it quite startled me."
"One does not always like to let others see the shifts to which one has
to resort," was all the answer he gave me.
But I worried over it. The thing bothered me, because he had made no
attempt to explain.
That was not the only thing I noticed.
Two or three days later we were sitting together on deck. I had offered
to read to him. I noticed that he got up out of his chair. Suddenly I
saw the chair move. It gave me a great shock, for the chair twisted
apparently of its own volition, so that when he sat down again the
sunlight was at his back and not in his eyes, as I knew it had been
previously. But I reasoned with myself and managed to satisfy myself
that he must have turned the chair round with his foot. It was just
possible that he could have done so, for it had one of those light
wicker-work seats.
We had a lovely voyage for three-quarters of the way, and the sea was as
calm as any duck-pond. But that was all altered when we passed Cape
Finisterre. I have done a lot of knocking about on the ocean one way and
another, but I never saw the Bay of Biscay deserve its reputation
better.
I'd much rather see what is going on than be cooped up below, and after
lunch I told Bob I was going up on deck.
"I'll only stay there for a bit," I said. "You make yourself comfortable
down here."
I filled his pipe, put it in his mouth, and gave him a match; then I
left him.
I made my way up and down the deck for a time, clutching hold of
everything handy, and rather enjoyed it, though the waves drenched me to
the skin.
Presently I saw Masters come out of the companion-way and make his way
very skilfully towards me. Of course it was fearfully dangerous for him.
I staggered towards him, and, putting my lips to his ear, shouted to him
to go below at once.
"Oh, I shall be all right!" he said, and laughed.
"You'll be drowned--drowned," I screamed. "There was a wave just now
that--well, if I hadn't been able to cling on with both hands like grim
death, I should have gone overboard. Go below."
He laughed again and shook his head.
And then what I dreaded happened. A vast mountain of green water lifted
up its bulk and fell upon us in a ravening cataract. I clutched at
Masters, but trying to save him and myself handicapped me badly. The
strength of that mass of water was terrible. It seemed to snatch at
everything with giant hands, and drag all with it. It tossed a hen-coop
high, and carried it through the rails.
I felt the grip of my right hand loosen, and the next instant was
carried, still clutching Masters with my left, towards that gap in the
bulwark.
I managed to seize the end of the broken rail. It held us for a moment,
then gave, and for a moment I hung sheer over the vessel's side.
In that instant I felt fingers tighten on my arm, tighten till they bit
into the flesh, and I was pulled back into safety.
Together we staggered back, and got below somehow. I was trembling like
a leaf, and the sweat dripped from me. I almost screamed aloud.
It was not that I was frightened of death. I've seen too much of that in
many parts of the earth to dread it greatly. It was the thought of those
fingers tightening on me where no fingers were.
Masters did not speak a word, nor did I, until we found ourselves in the
cabin.
I tore the wet clothes off me and turned my arm to the mirror. I knew I
could not have been mistaken when I felt them.
There on the upper arm, above the line of sunburn that one gets from
working with sleeves rolled up, there on the white skin showed _the red
marks of four slender fingers and a thumb_! I sat down suddenly at sight
of them, and pulling open a drawer, found a flask of neat brandy, and
gulped it down, emptied it in one gulp.
Then I turned to him and pointed to the marks.
"In God's name, how came these here?" I said. "What--what happened up
there on deck?"
He looked at me very gravely.
"I saved you," he said, "or rather I didn't, for I could not. But _she_
did."
"What do you mean?" I stammered.
"Let me get these clothes off," he said, "and some dry ones on; and I'll
tell you."
Words fail to describe my feelings as I watched the clothes come off him
and dry ones go on just as if hands were arranging them.
I sat and shuddered. I tried to close my eyes, but the weird, unnatural
sight drew them as a lodestone.
"I'm sorry that you should have had this shock," he said. "I know what
it must have been like, though it was not so bad for me when they seemed
to come, for they came gradually as time went on."
"What came gradually?" I asked.
"Why, these arms! They're what I'm telling you about. You asked me to
tell you, I thought?"
"Did I?" I said. "I don't know what I'm saying or asking. I think I'm
going mad, quite mad."
"No," he said, "you're as sane as I am, only when you come across
something strange, unique for that matter, you are naturally terrified.
Well, it was like this. I told you about my adventures with the niggers
up country. That was quite true. They cut off both my arms--you can see
the stumps for that matter. And I told you that I came home to find my
wife dying. Her heart had always been weak, I'd known that, and it had
gradually grown more feeble. There must have been, indeed there was, a
strange sort of telepathy between us. She had had fearful attacks of
heart failure on both occasions when the niggers had mutilated me, I
learnt on comparing notes.
"But I had known too, somehow, that I must escape at all costs. It was
the knowledge that made me try again after each failure. I should have
gone on trying to escape as long as I had lived, or rather as long as
she had lived. I knelt beside her bed and she put out her arms and laid
them round my neck.
"'So you have come back to me before I go,' she said. 'I knew you must,
because I called you so. But you have been long in coming, almost too
long. But I knew I had to see you again before I died.'
"I broke down then. I was sorely tried. No arms even to put round her!
"'Darling, stay with me for a little, only for a little while!' I
sobbed.
"She shook her head feebly. 'It is no use, my dear,' she said, 'I must
go.'
"'I'll come with you,' I said, 'I'll not live without you.'
"She shook her head again.
"'You must be brave, Bob. I shall be watching you afterwards just as
much as if I still lived on earth. If only I could give you my arms! A
poor, weak woman's arms, but better than none, dear.'
"She died some weeks later. I spent all the time at her bedside, I
hardly left her. Her arms were round me when she died. Shall I ever feel
them round me again? I wonder! You see, they are mine now.
"They came to me gradually. It was very strange at first to have arms
and hands which one couldn't see. I used to keep my eyes shut as much as
possible, and try to fancy that I had never lost my arms.
"I got used to them in time. But I have always been careful not to let
people see me do things that they would know to be impossible for an
armless man. That was what took me to Africa again, because I could get
lost there and do things for myself with these hands."
"'And they twain shall be one flesh,'" I muttered.
"Yes," he said, "I think the explanation must be something of that sort.
There's more than that in it, though; these arms are other than flesh."
He sat silent for a time with his head bowed on his chest. Then he spoke
again:
"I got sick of being alone at last, and was coming back when I met you
at Fourteen Streams. I don't know what I shall do when I do get home. I
can never rest. I have--what do they call it--_Wanderlust_?"
"Does she ever speak to you from that other world?" I asked him.
He shook his head sadly.
"No, never. But I know she lives somewhere beyond this world of ours.
She must, because these arms live. So I try always to act as if she
watches everything. I always try to do the right thing, but, anyway,
these arms and hands would do good of their own accord. Just now up on
the deck I was very frightened. I'd have saved myself at any cost
almost, and let you go. But I could not do that. The hands clutched you.
It is her will, so much stronger and purer than mine, that still
persists. It is only when she does not exert it that I control these
arms."
That was how I learnt the strangest tale that ever a man was told, and
knew the miracle to which I owed my life.
It may be that Bob Masters was a coward. He always said that he was.
Personally I do not believe it, for he had the sweetest nature I ever
met.
He had nowhere to go to in England and seemed to have no friends. So I
made him come down with me to Englehart, that dear old country seat of
my family in the Western shires which was now mine.
Nancy lived in that country, too.
There was no reason why we should not get married at once. We had waited
long enough.
I can see again the old, ivy-grown church where Nancy and I were wed,
and Bob Masters standing by my side as best man.
I remember feeling in his pocket for the ring, and as I did so, I felt a
hand grasp mine for a moment.
Then there was the reception afterwards, and speech-making--the usual
sort of thing.
Later Nancy and I drove off to the station.
We had not said good-bye to Bob, for he'd insisted on driving to the
station with the luggage; said he was going to see the last of us there.
He was waiting for us in the yard when we reached it, and walked with us
on to the platform.
We stood there chatting about one thing and another, when I noticed that
Nancy was not talking much and seemed rather pale. I was just going to
remark on it when we heard the whistle of the train. There is a sharp
curve in the permanent way outside the station, so that a train is on
you all of a sudden.
Suddenly to my horror I saw Nancy sway backwards towards the edge of the
platform. I tried vainly to catch her as she reeled and fell--right in
front of the oncoming train. I sprang forward to leap after her, but
hands grasped me and flung me back so violently that I fell down on the
platform.
It was Bob Masters who took the place that should have been mine, and
leapt upon the metals.
I could not see what happened then. The station-master says he saw Nancy
lifted from before the engine when it was right upon her. He says it was
as if she was lifted by the wind. She was quite close to Masters. "Near
enough for him to have lifted her, sir, if he'd had arms." The two of
them staggered for a moment, and together fell clear of the train.
Nancy was little the worse for the awful accident, bruised, of course,
but poor Masters was unconscious.
We carried him into the waiting-room, laid him on the cushions there,
and sent hot-foot for the doctor.
He was a good country practitioner, and, I suppose, knew the ordinary
routine of his work quite well. He fussed about, hummed and hawed a lot.
"Yes, yes," he said, as if he were trying to persuade himself. "Shock,
you know. He'll be better presently. Lucky, though, that he had no
arms."
I noticed then, for the first time, that the sleeves of the coat had
been shorn away.
"Doctor," I said, "how is he? Surely, if he isn't hurt he would not look
like that. What exactly do you mean by shock?"
"Hum--er," he hesitated, and applied his stethoscope to Masters' heart
again.
"The heart is very weak," he said at length. "Very weak. He's always
very anaemic, I suppose?"
"No," I answered. "He's anything but that. He's----Good Lord, he's
bleeding to death! Put ligatures on his arms. Put ligatures on his
arms."
"Please keep quiet, Mr. Riverston," the doctor said. "It must have been
a dreadful experience for you, and you are naturally very upset."
I raved and cursed at him. I think I should have struck him, but the
others held me. They said they would take me away if I did not keep
quiet.
Bob Masters opened his eyes presently, and saw them holding me.
"Please let him go," he said. "It's all right, old man. It's no use your
arguing with them, they would not understand. I could never explain to
them now, and they would never believe you. Besides, it's all for the
best. Yes, the train went over them and I'm armless for the second time.
But--not for long!"
I knelt by his side and sobbed. It all seemed so dreadful, and yet, I
don't think that then I would have tried to stay his passing. I knew it
was best for him.
He looked at me very affectionately.
"I'm so sorry that this should happen on your wedding-day," he said.
"But it would have been so much worse for you if _she_ had not helped."
His voice grew fainter and died away.
There was a pause for a time, and his breath came in great sighing sobs.
Then suddenly he raised himself on the cushions until he stood upright
on his feet, and a smile broke over his face--a smile so sweet that I
think the angels in Paradise must look like that.
His voice came strong and loud from his lips.
"Darling!" he cried. "Darling, your arms are round me once again! I
come! I come!"
* * * * *
"One of the most extraordinary cases I have ever met with," the doctor
told the coroner at the inquest. "He seemed to have all the symptoms of
excessive haemorrhage."
III
THE TOMTOM CLUE
I had just settled down for a comfortable evening over the fire in a
saddle-bag chair drawn up as close to the hearth as the fender would
allow, with a plentiful supply of literature and whisky, and pipe and
tobacco, when the telephone bell rang loudly and insistently. With a
sigh I rose and took up the receiver.
"That you?" said a voice I recognised as that of Jack Bridges. "Can I
come round and see you at once? It's most important. No, I can't tell
you now. I'll be with you in a few minutes."
I hung the receiver up again, wondering what business could fetch Jack
Bridges round at that time of the evening to see me. We had been the
greatest of pals at school and at the 'Varsity, and had kept the
friendship up ever since, despite my intermittent wanderings over the
face of the globe. But during the last few days or so Jack had become
engaged to Miss Glanville, the daughter of old Glanville, of South
African fame, and as a love-sick swain I naturally expected to see very
little of him, until after the wedding at any rate.
At this time of the evening, according to my ideas of engaged couples,
he should be sitting in the stalls at some theatre, and not running
round to see bachelor friends with cynical views on matrimony.
I had not arrived at a satisfactory solution when the door opened and
Jack walked in. One glance at his face told me that he was in trouble,
and without a word I pushed him into my chair and handed him a drink.
Then I sat down on the opposite side of the fire and waited for him to
begin, for a man in need of sympathy does not want to be worried by
questions.
He gulped down half his whisky and sat for a moment gazing into the
fire.
"Jim, old man," he said at length, "I've had awful news."
"Not connected with Miss Glanville?" I asked.
"In a way, yes. It's broken off, but there's worse than that--far worse.
I can hardly realise it; I feel numbed at present; it's too horrible.
You remember that when you and I were at Winchester together my father
was killed during the Matabele War?"
I nodded.
"Well," continued Jack, "I heard to-day that he was not killed by the
Matabele, but was hanged in Bulawayo for murder. In other words, I am
the son of a murderer."
"Hanged for murder!" I exclaimed in horror. "Surely there's some
mistake?"
"No," groaned Jack, "it's true enough. I've seen the newspaper cutting
of the time, and I'm the son of a murderer, who was also a forger, a
thief, and a card-sharper. Old Glanville told me this evening. It was
then that our engagement was broken off."
"Your mother?" I asked. "Have you seen her?"
Jack nodded.
"Poor little woman!" he groaned. "She has known all along, and her one
aim and object in life has been to keep the awful truth from me. That
was why I was told he died an honourable death during the war. I've
often wondered why the little mother was always so sad, and so weighed
down by trouble. Now I know. Good God, what her life must have been!"
He rose from his chair and paced up and down the room for a minute; then
he stopped and stood in front of me, his face working with emotion.
"But I don't believe it, Jim," he said, and there was a ring in his
voice. "I don't believe it, and neither does the little mother. It's
impossible to reconcile the big, bluff man with the heart of a child,
that I remember as my father, with murder, forgery, or any other crime.
And yet, according to Glanville and the old newspapers he showed me,
Richard Bridges was one of the most unscrupulous ruffians in South
Africa. In my heart of hearts I know he didn't do it, and though on the
face of it there's no doubt, I'm going to try and clear his name. I am
sailing for South Africa on Friday."
"Sailing for South Africa!" I exclaimed. "What about your work?"
"My work can go hang!" replied Jack heatedly. "I want to wipe away the
stain from my father's name, and I mean to do it somehow. That's why
I've run round to see you, old pal, for I want you to come with me.
Knowing Rhodesia as you do, you're just the man to help me. Say you'll
come?" he pleaded.
It seemed quite the forlornest hope I had ever heard of, but Jack's
distress was so acute that I hadn't the heart to refuse.
"All right, Jack," I said, "I'm with you. But don't foster any vain
hopes. Remember, it's twenty years ago. It will be a pretty tough job to
prove anything after all these years."
During the voyage out we had ample time to go through the small amount
of information about the long-forgotten case that Jack had been able to
collect from the family solicitors.
In the year 1893, Richard Bridges, who was a mining engineer of some
standing, had made a trip to Rhodesia with a view to gold and diamond
prospecting. He had been accompanied by a friend, Thomas Symes, who, so
far as we could ascertain, was an ex-naval officer; and the two, after a
short stay at Bulawayo, had gone northward across the Guai river into
what was in those days a practically unknown land. In a little over a
year's time Bridges had returned alone--his companion having been, so he
stated, killed by the Matabele, and for six months or so he led a
dissolute life in Bulawayo and the district, which ended ultimately in
his execution for murder. There was no doubt whatever about the murder,
or the various thefts and forgeries that he was accused of, as he had
made a confession at his trial, and we seemed to be on a wild-goose
chase of the worst variety so far as I could see; but Jack, confident of
his father's innocence, would not hear of failure.
"It's impossible to make surmises at this stage," he said. "On the face
of it there appears to be little room for doubt, but no one who knew my
father could possibly connect him with any sort of crime. Somehow or
other, Jim, I've got to clear his name."
My memory went back to a tall, sunburnt man with a kindly manner who had
come down to the school one day and put up a glorious feed at the tuck
shop to Jack and his friends. Afterwards, at his son's urgent request,
he had bared his chest to show us his tattooing of which Jack had,
boy-like, often boasted to us. I recalled how we had gazed admiringly at
the skilfully worked picture of Nelson with his empty sleeve and closed
eye and the inscription underneath: "England expects that every man this
day will do his duty." Jack had explained with considerable pride that
this did not constitute all, as on his father's back was a wonderful
representation of the _Victory_, and on other parts of his body a lion,
a snake, and other _fauna_, but Richard Bridges had protested laughingly
and refused to undress further for our delectation.
We reached Bulawayo, but no one in the city appeared to recall the case
at all; indeed, Bulawayo had grown out of all recognition since Richard
Bridges had passed through it on his prospecting trip. It was difficult
to know where to start. Even the police could not help, and had no
knowledge of where the murderer had been buried. No one but an old
saloon-keeper and a couple of miners could recollect the execution even,
and they, so far as they could remember, had never met Richard Bridges
in the flesh, though his unsavoury reputation was well known to them.
In despair, Jack suggested a trek up country towards Barotseland, which
was the district that Bridges and Symes had proposed to prospect,
though, according to all accounts, Symes had been murdered by the
Matabele before they reached the Guai river.
For the next month we trekked steadily northwards, having very fair
sport; but, as I expected, extracting no information whatever from the
natives about the two prospectors who had passed that way years before.
At length, Jack became more or less reconciled to failure, and realising
the futility of further search suggested a return to Bulawayo. As our
donkey caravan was beginning to suffer severely from the fly, I
concurred, and we started to travel slowly back to Bulawayo, shooting by
the way.
One night after a particularly hard trek we inspanned at an old _kraal_,
the painted walls of which told that at one time it had served as a
royal residence, and as I had shot an eland cow that afternoon, which
provided far more meat than we could consume, we invited the induna and
his tribe to the feast. Not to be outdone in hospitality, the old chief
produced the kaffir beer of the country, a liquid which has nothing to
recommend it beyond the fact that it intoxicates rapidly.
A meat feast and a beer drink is a great event in the average kaffir's
life, and as the evening wore on a general jollification started to the
thump of tomtoms and the squeak of kaffir fiddles. There was one very
drunk old Barotse, who sat close to me, and, accompanying himself with
thumps on his tomtom, sang in one droning key a song about a man who
kept snakes and lions inside him, and from whose chest the evil eye
looked out. At least, so far as I could gather that was roughly the gist
of the song; but as his tomtom was particularly large and most obnoxious
I politely took it away from him, and Jack and I used it as a table for
our gourds of kaffir beer, which we were pretending to consume in large
quantities.
A gourd, however, is a top-heavy sort of drinking vessel, and in a very
short time I had succeeded in spilling half a pint or so of my drink on
the parchment of the drum. Not wishing to spoil the old gentleman's
plaything, which he evidently valued above all things, I mopped up the
beer with my handkerchief, and in doing so removed from the parchment a
portion of the accumulated filth of ages.
"Hullo!" said Jack, taking the instrument from me and holding it up to
the firelight. "There's a picture of some sort here. It looks like a man
in a cocked hat."
He rubbed it hard with his pocket handkerchief, and the polishing
brought more of the picture to light, till, plain enough in places and
faded in others, there stood out, the portrait of a man in an
old-fashioned naval uniform with stars on his breast, and underneath
some letters in the form of a scroll.
"That's not native work," I exclaimed. "These are English letters," for
I could distinctly make out the word "man" followed by a "t" and an "h."
"Rub it hard, Jack."
The grease on the parchment refused to give way to further polishing,
however, and remembering a bottle of ammonia I kept for insect bites, I
mixed some with kaffir beer and poured it on the head of the tomtom. One
touch of the handkerchief was sufficient once the strong alkali got to
work, and out came the grand old face of Nelson and underneath his
motto:
"England expects that every man this day will do his duty."
Jack dropped the drum as if it had bitten him.
"What does it mean?" he gasped. "My father had this on his chest. I
remember it well!"
I was, however, too busy with the reverse end of the drum to heed him.
On the other side the ammonia brought out a picture of the _Victory_,
with the head of a roaring lion below it.
"Good God!" exclaimed Jack. "My father had that on his back. Quick, Jim,
rub hard! There should be the family crest to the right--an eagle with a
snake in its talons and R. B. underneath."
I rubbed in the spot indicated, and out came the crest and initials
exactly as Jack had described them. There was something horribly uncanny
and gruesome in finding the tattoo marks of the dead man on the
parchment of a Barotse tomtom two hundred miles north of the Zambesi,
and for a moment I was too overcome with astonishment to grasp exactly
what it meant. Then it came to my mind in a flash that the parchment was
nothing else than human skin, and Richard Bridges' skin at that. I put
it down with sudden reverence, and, beckoning to its owner, demanded its
full history. At first he showed signs of fear, but promising him a
waist length of cloth if he told the truth, he squatted on his hams
before us and began.
"Many, many moons ago, before the white men came to trade across the Big
Water as they do now, two white baases came into this country to look
for white stones and gold. One baas was bigger than the other, and on
his chest and on his body were pictures of birds, and beasts, and
strange things. On his chest was a great inkoos with one eye covered,
and on his back a hut with trees growing straight up into the air from
it. On his loins was a lion of great fierceness, and coiled round his
waist was a hissing mamba (snake). We were sore afraid, for the white
baas told us he was bewitched, and that if harm came to either he would
uncover the closed eye of the great inkoos upon his chest, which was the
Evil Eye, and command him to blast the Barotse and their land for ever.
"So the white men were suffered to come and go in peace, for we dreaded
the Evil Eye of the great inkoos. They toiled, these white baases,
digging in the hillside and searching the riverbed; and then one day it
came to pass that they quarrelled and fought, and the baas with the
pictures was slain. We knew then that his medicine was bad medicine,
otherwise the white baas without the pictures could not have killed him.
So we were wroth and made to slay the other baas, but he shot us down
with a fire stick and returned to his own country in haste. Then did I
take the skin from the dead baas, for I loved him for his pictures, and
I made them into a tomtom. I have spoken."