I. My Late Husband
II. A Fond Father
III. My First and Second
IV. Nursery Confessions
V. A Spoiled Child
VI. Protoplasm and Froth
VII. A Biologist and a Baby
VIII. Hush-a-by, Number One!
IX. A Boston Girl
X. An Uncanny Flirtation
XI. A Mysterious Elopement
*I.*
*When Reginald Was Caroline.*
_That night the wife of King Suddhodana,_
_Maya the Queen, asleep beside her Lord,_
_Dreamed a strange dream._
_THE LIGHT OF ASIA._
*CHAPTER I.*
*TRANSPOSED.*
But what a mystery this erring mind!
It wakes within a frame of various powers
A stranger in a new and wondrous world.
--_N. P. Willis_.
To begin at the beginning: the tragedy or farce--whichever it may prove
to be--opened just a week ago. I turned on my side, as I awoke last
Wednesday morning, to look into my wife's face, and, lo, I beheld, as in
a mirror, my own countenance. My first thought was that I was under the
influence of the tag end of a quaint dream, but presently my eyes, or
rather my wife's, opened slowly and an expression of mingled horror and
amazement shone therein.
"What--what--" groaned Caroline, in my voice, plucking at my--or perhaps
I should say our--beard. "Reginald, am I mad--you look--where are you?
What is this on my chin--and what have you done to yourself?"
Whether to laugh or swear or weep I hardly knew. The bedroom looked
natural, thank God, or I think that at the outset we should have lost
our transposed minds even more completely than we had. The sun came in
through the window as usual. I could see my trousers--if they were
mine--lying across a chair at the further end of my dressing-room. It
was all common-place, natural, homelike. But when I glanced again at my
wife, there she lay, pale and trembling, with my face, beard, tousled
hair and heavy features. I rubbed a slender white hand across my
brow--or, to be accurate, the brow that had been my wife's. There could
be no doubt that something uncanny, supernatural, theosophical or
diabolical had happened. While we lay dead with sleep our respective
identities had changed places, through some occult blunder that, I
realized clearly enough, was certain to cause us no end of annoyance.
"Don't move," I whispered to Caroline, and there flashed before my mind
a circus-poster that I had gazed at as a boy, marveling in my young
impressionability at the hirsute miracle that had been labeled in red
ink, "The Bearded Lady."
"Don't move," I continued, hoping against hope that by prompt measures I
might repair the mysterious damage that had been done to us by this
psychical transposition. "Shut your eyes, Caroline, and lie perfectly
still. Don't worry, my dear. Make your mind perfectly blank--receptive
to impressions. Now, we'll put forth an effort together. I'm lying
with my eyes closed, and I am willing myself to return to my own body.
Do likewise, Caroline. Don't tremble so! There's no danger. Things
can't be worse, can they? There's comfort in that, is there not? Now!
Are you ready? Use your will power, my dear, for all it's worth."
We lay motionless, blind, silent for a time. That I should gaze into my
wife's own face when I opened my eyes again I fondly imagined, for I had
always been proud of my force of will. Caroline, too--as I had good
reason to know--possessed a stubborn determination that had great
dynamic possibilities.
"Ready!" I exclaimed, presently. "Open your eyes, my dear!"
Horror! There was my wife gazing at me with my eyes and pulling
nervously at my infernal beard. As she saw that I was still occupying
her fair body, my eyes began to fill, and a man's hoarse sobs relieved
my wife's overwrought feelings.
"Is it--oh, Reginald!--is it reincarnation, do you think?" she
questioned in her misery.
"Ah, something of that nature, I fear, Caroline," I admitted,
reluctantly. "It's a new one on me, anyway. But it can't last. Don't
be impatient, my dear. It'll soon pass off."
But even as I spoke I knew that I was using my wife's sweet, soft voice
for deception. Whatever it was, it had come to stay--for a time at
least.
"I think, Reggie, dear, that, if you don't mind, I'll have breakfast in
bed."
Like a flash, Caroline's remark revealed to me the frightful problems
that would crop up constantly from our present plight. Number one
presented itself instantly; I had an important engagement at my office
at 9:30. If Caroline remained in bed I couldn't keep it. Then it came
to me that if she rose and dressed I should be in no better case.
Dressed? She would be obliged to put on my clothes, anyway! What other
alternative was there?
"I think, Caroline, dear," I suggested, gently, "that we'd better wait
awhile before we make our plans. It may go away suddenly. A change may
take place at any moment."
"It came in our sleep, and it'll go in our sleep," said my wife,
confidently, and I was struck by the gruffness that a firm conviction
gave to my voice. I had never noticed it when I had been in full and
free possession thereof.
"If we could only go to sleep," I sighed, glancing again at my trousers
and suppressing a harsh expletive that arose to my beautiful lips.
"I couldn't sleep, Reginald. I'm sure of that. I feel a horror of
sleep, but I need something. Perhaps--oh, Reggie, it can't be that!--but
I can't help thinking that I want a--a--cocktail."
Caroline hid her borrowed face in my great, clumsy hands.
It required an effort of memory for me to put myself into sympathy with
her present craving. I hadn't thought of a cocktail since I had
awakened. It was only once in a very great while that I indulged in an
eye-opener. But I had been out very late Tuesday night--in fact, it had
been this morning before I had reached home from the club--and I was
not, upon reflection, altogether astonished at the wish that my poor
wife had expressed with such awkward coyness. But to grant her request
demanded heroic action, and I hesitated before taking what might prove
to be an irrevocable step. If I left the bed under existing conditions,
a temporary psychical maladjustment might become permanent. Then,
again, I realized that my little feet felt repelled by the chill that
would come to them if exposed to a cold draught that blew through a
window open in my--or, rather, Caroline's--dressing-room.
"Go into the bathroom and take a cold plunge," I suggested to Caroline,
to gain time. "It's more bracing than a cocktail."
"You ought to know, Reginald," she remarked, in my most playful voice.
Her ill-timed jocosity struck me as ghastly.
"Caroline, dear," I began, "we must beware of recriminations. 'It is a
condition, not a theory, that confronts us,'" I quoted, mournfully. "If
we should fall out, you and I----"
"If we only could!" sighed Caroline.
"Could what?" I cried, in shrill falsetto.
"Fall out, Reginald," she answered, grimly. "Can't you think of
something else to try? Really, it's too absurd! What is the matter with
us, Reggie? Are we dreaming?"
I listened, intently. The servants were astir down-stairs, and through
the windows came the clatter of early vehicles and the thin voice of a
newsboy crying at eight o'clock the ten o'clock "extra" of a yellow
journal. There was nothing in our environment to suggest the
supernatural or to explain a mystery that deepened as the moments
passed. The external world was unchanged, and--startling
thought!--Caroline and I must confront it presently under conditions
that were, so far as I knew, unprecedented in the history of the race.
"That's no dream!" I exclaimed, terror-stricken. My wife's maid had
rapped, as usual at the outer door of our apartments. "Good God,
Caroline, what shall we do?"
"Tell her I don't want her this morning, Reginald! Send her away, will
you? She mustn't see me--yet."
"But my--your--this hair, Caroline? How'll I get it up without
Suzanne's help?"
"I'll do it for you," answered Caroline, in a voice that sounded like a
despairing moan.
"Look at those hands--my hands, Caroline! You can't dress hair with
them. Take my word for that."
Suzanne rapped again, thinking, doubtless, that we were still asleep.
"I'll be there directly, Suzanne," cried Caroline, in my voice.
We turned cold with consternation. What would Suzanne think of this?
My reputation in my own household had been jeopardized on the instant.
"Caroline! Caroline! You must pull yourself together!" I whispered.
"Have courage, and do keep your wits about you! Act like a man, will
you? Keep quiet, now. I'll speak to Suzanne."
With a courage begotten by desperation, I sat erect. Fear and hope had
been at war within me as, for the first time since I had awakened, I
changed my posture. I had dreaded the uncanny sensation that would
spring from further proof that I was really imprisoned in my wife's
body. But I had clung to a shred of hope. It might be that Caroline and
I in motion would find the psychical readjustment that had been denied
to us in repose. I was instantly undeceived. As I sat up in bed,
Caroline's luxuriant dark tresses fell over my shoulders and I looked
down at a lock of hair that lay black against my tapering white fingers.
A wave of physical well-being swept over me, and, despite the horror of
my situation, my heart beat with a great joy in life. The blood came
into my well-rounded cheeks, as I recalled Caroline's recent request for
a cocktail. What a shame it was that a big, healthy man should want a
stimulant early in the day!
"Suzanne!" I cried. "Suzanne, are you still there?"
"_Oui_, madame," came the maid's voice, a note echoing through it that I
did not like.
"I shall not want you for fifteen minutes, Suzanne," I said. "Come back
in a quarter of an hour." I felt a cold chill creeping over me, and
Caroline's sweet voice trembled slightly. "And may the devil fly away
with you, Suzanne!" I muttered, as I fell back against the pillows.
"We've had our sentence suspended for fifteen minutes, Caroline," I
said, presently. "But how the deuce am I going to get through my
toilet? My French is not like yours, my dear, and you never speak
English to Suzanne. It's actually immoral, Caroline, the way I get my
genders mixed up in French."
"Oh, don't say that, Reginald!" exclaimed my wife, in a horrified basso.
"Say what, Caroline?" I asked, petulantly.
"That about mixing genders being immoral, Reggie," she fairly moaned.
"I'm not immoral, even if--if--if I have got your gender, Reginald. I
didn't want it," she added, sternly, "and I can't be held responsible if
I am masculine or neuter or intransitive. My advice to you, Reginald,
is not to say much to Suzanne in any language."
I could not refrain from a silvery chuckle, the sound of which changed
my mood instantly.
"How often I've said that to you, Caroline!" I remarked, most unkindly.
"I don't gossip with Suzanne any more than you do with your man,"
growled Caroline, in a tone that hurt me deeply.
My man! Great Lucifer, I had almost forgotten his existence. He would
be in my dressing-room presently to trim my beard and make of himself a
nuisance in various ways. Jenkins had his good points as a valet, but
he was too talkative at times and always inquisitive. I could have
murdered Suzanne and Jenkins at that moment with good appetite.
"Caroline," I said, gloomily, "Fate has ordained that you and I, for
some reason that is not apparent, must make immediate choice between two
courses of action. We can commit suicide--there's a revolver in the
room. Or we may face the ordeal bravely, helping each other, as the day
passes, to conceal from the world our strange affliction. I have no
doubt that while we sleep to-night the--ah--psychical mistake that has
been made will be rectified."
My voice faltered as I uttered the last sentence. Neither my experience
nor reading had furnished me with data upon which I could safely base so
optimistic a conclusion.
"I--I don't want to die, Reggie," muttered Caroline, with a gesture of
protest.
"The club was rather quiet last night," I remarked, musingly; but my
wife did not catch the significance of the words. "Well, if we're to
brace up and stand the racket, Caroline, we must begin at once. You
must give me a few pointers about Suzanne. I'll reciprocate of course,
and you'll have no trouble in bluffing Jenkins to a standstill. There
he is now! Call out to him, my dear. Don't be afraid of using--ah--my
voice. Tell him you are coming to him at once." Unbroken silence
ensued.
"Now, Caroline, be a man--that's a good girl! Tell him you'll be out in
five minutes."
My wife's stalwart figure was shaking with nervousness.
"Oh--ah--oh, Jenkins," she roared, presently. "Jenkins, go away. I
don't want you this morning. Go away! go away! Do you hear me? Go
away!"
"Yes, sir," came Jenkins's voice to us, amazement and flunkeyism mingled
therein in equal parts. "Yes, sir. I'm going at once, sir."
"Now you have done it, Caroline!" I cried, in a high treble of anger.
"Great Scott! how that man will talk down-stairs!"
For a moment the sun-lighted room whirled before my eyes like a golden
merry-go-round, and I lay there, limp and helpless, awaiting in misery
Suzanne's imminent return.
*CHAPTER II.*
*A WEIRD TOILETTE.*
My spirit wrestles in anguish
With fancies that will not depart;
A ghost who borrowed my semblance
Has hid in the depth of my heart.
--_Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen_.
"Madame seems to be in very low spirits this morning," Suzanne had the
audacity to remark to me as she deftly manipulated my wife's dark,
luxuriant hair, to my infinite annoyance. She spoke in French, a
language that always rubs me the wrong way. I gazed restlessly at the
dainty furnishings of Caroline's dressing-room, and remained silent.
Presently Suzanne spoke again. "I hope that madame has received no bad
news."
"Great Scott, girl! what are you driving at?" I heard my wife's voice
exclaim, and my recklessness appalled me. Suzanne was paralyzed for a
moment. I could see her pretty face in the mirror, and it had turned
pale on the instant.
"Pardon me, madame," she gasped, "but I--I thought----"
"Don't think!" I cried, crossly. "Tie up my--this--ah, hair, and let me
do the thinking, will you?"
Repentance for my harsh words came to me at once. Suzanne stifled a
gasp and a sob and continued her work as a _coiffeuse_. I realized that
I must control my impulsiveness at once. I had never understood what my
friends had meant when they had accused me of a lack of imagination. I
had taken pride in the fact that I was a straightforward,
two-plus-two-makes-four kind of a man, not given to foolish fancies nor
errant day-dreams. I had attributed my success in business to this
tendency toward the matter-of-fact, but now, for the first time in my
life, I regretted my lack of imaginative power. I must, for my dear
Caroline's sake--yes, in the name of common decency--preserve my
psychical incognito in the presence of my wife's maid. Suddenly, I was
startled by hearing my voice in the bathroom uttering something that
sounded much like an exclamation of horror. In my consternation I sat
erect, listening intently.
"What is the matter, madame?" whispered Suzanne, excitedly. "Monsieur,
too, seems out of sorts this morning."
I realized that Caroline had found sufficient courage to set out in
quest of the cold plunge that I had advised in lieu of a cocktail.
There came the sound of running water from the bathroom.
"Go on, Suzanne," I said, gently. "Get through with this hair of mine,
will you? There's nothing the matter. Caroline--Reginald--ah--Mr.
Stevens didn't get quite enough sleep, that's all. He's made the spray
too cold."
Suzanne's hands trembled perceptibly as she resumed her task.
"There's a note for madame this morning," she said, presently, lowering
her voice again, and always speaking her detestable mother-tongue.
"Of course there is," I remarked, astonished at the maid's manner.
"Her--ah--my mail is full of 'em. Who's the note from, Suzanne?"
"Madame is so remote to-day!" murmured Suzanne, helplessly. "Did I not
tell madame that he would write to her?"
A chill ran through my veins, but I made neither sound nor movement.
Apparently my wife's maid had become a discreet postmistress, whose good
offices it might behoove me to look into.
"I'll read the note later in the day, Suzanne. Are you nearly done with
this infernal hair?"
"_Mon Dieu!_" exclaimed the girl, but she went no further.
A splash, a groan, followed by a hoarse yell, echoed through the suite.
"Damn it!" I cried, desperately. "Why didn't Jenkins stay here?
She--he'll never get dressed!"
"Where is Jenkins, madame?" asked Suzanne, nervously. "Monsieur seems
to be excited. And madame--what is the matter with madame?"
The girl's consternation was not strange. Caroline, the _grand dame_,
gentle, self-poised, unexcitable, sat before the wide-eyed Suzanne,
swearing in a voice that had been fashioned by nature for nothing
harsher than a drawing-room expletive.
"Caroline," came my wife's borrowed voice, faintly, as if she were
talking to herself. It was some time before I realized that she was
calling me.
"Yes--ah--Reginald!" I managed to cry, in a trembling falsetto.
"Monsieur seems to want you, madame," said Suzanne, wonderingly. "Where
is Jenkins, madame?"
"God only knows!" I exclaimed, desperately. "Down-stairs, I suppose,
talking through his hat. Send him to me at once, girl."
"Madame! Jenkins? Send Jenkins to you? Madame, I do not comprehend."
"To me? I didn't say to me, did I? Send him to Car--Reginald--Mr.
Stevens! Wasn't that what I said? Go, Suzanne! And--wait a minute.
If you mention my name to Jenkins--that is, if you gossip with him
coming up-stairs, I'll dismiss you this morning. Tell Jenkins to hold
his chattering tongue, or he'll get the grand--ah, _manner nayst pah?_"
Suzanne burst into tears, and, instead of obeying my behest, fell, with
true French impetuosity, upon her knees at my feet, and, seizing my cold
hands, buried her face in them, sobbing hysterically.
"Oh, madame! madame! What have I done to deserve this?" she moaned, in
her diabolical French. "Why do you speak to me--treat me--this way? It
is so cruelly cruel! Oh, madame, have I not been faithful, discreet,
blind, deaf, dumb? Have I ever betrayed even a little, little secret of
yours?"
"Caroline!" There was a note of mingled anger and dismay in my voice as
it came to me, harsh and unwelcome, from my distant dressing-room, the
door of which Caroline had closed.
"I must go to her!" I cried, springing to my feet, and tripping over my
dressing-gown as I pushed by the kneeling, hysterical maid. Suzanne
grasped what I now believe to have been the hem of my garment.
"Oh, madame, you must not go to him! Monsieur's voice is so wild! I am
sure that he is not well. You must rest here, madame! See, I am going.
I will send Jenkins to monsieur at once. _Mon Dieu_! _Mon Dieu_! I
go, madame! I shall return to you very soon."
Suzanne had really gone, and, pulling myself together by a strong effort
of will, I stumbled from the dressing-room, crossed our bed-chamber and
knocked on the door, behind which I could hear Caroline uttering subdued
exclamations in my raucous voice.
"Who's there? Go away! Who is it?" cried my wife, in a panic.
"Don't get rattled, my dear," I called out, in Caroline's sweetest
tones. "Suzanne has gone to find Jenkins. Let me in, my dear. I may
be able to give you a few tips."
The door flew open and I saw that Caroline had managed to don my
underclothing. My heavy features displayed the joy that my wife felt at
my arrival. I learned afterward that she had been having serious
trouble with my linen shirt.
"Oh, Reggie," she exclaimed, making my voice tremble with emotion.
"I've had such a horrible time!" She threw my great, muscular arms
around her neck, and I felt my beard scratching my--her smooth, delicate
cheeks.
"Sit down, Caroline, and calm yourself," I implored her. "This is no
time for this kind of thing. We've got but a moment to ourselves.
Suzanne has gone to bring Jenkins back."
Caroline shuddered, but said nothing.
"You gave me a terrible shock, my dear," I remarked, calmly. "I feared
that some terrible accident had happened to you."
"The very worst has happened, Reggie," she mused, in something like a
prolonged growl. "I don't think I'll ever be able to go through with
it."
"We've made a bad beginning, Caroline. I'll admit that. But all is not
yet lost. Jenkins and Suzanne doubtless imagine that you are merely
suffering from a somewhat stubborn and persistent jag."
"How horribly vulgar!" groaned Caroline.
"Don't disabuse Jenkins's mind of the idea," I implored her. "It's hard
on you, I'll admit, but it's better than the truth. We can't tell them
that we've changed bodies for a time. They'd think us crazy, Caroline."
"We will be, Reginald," growled the dismayed giant, seemingly on the
verge of tears. "If I were only dressed I wouldn't be so frightened.
But you are such a clumsy creature, Reggie."