Karl nodded,--and El-Râmi, with a brief “good-night,” ascended the

staircase rapidly and soon disappeared. A door banged aloft--then all

was still. Karl sighed profoundly, and slowly cleared away the useless

supper.

“Well! How wise men can bear to starve themselves just for the sake of

teaching fools, is more than I shall ever understand!” he said half

aloud--“But then I shall never be wise--I am an ass and always was. A

good dinner and a glass of good wine have always seemed to me better

than all the science going,--there’s a shameful confession of

ignorance and brutality together, if you like. ‘Where do you think you

will go to when you die, Karl?’ says the poor old Herr Doctor. And

what do _I_ say? I say--‘I don’t know, _mein Herr_--and I don’t care.

This world is good enough for me so long as I live in it.’ ‘But

afterwards, Karl,--afterwards?’ he says, with his gray head shaking.

And what do _I_ say? Why, I say--‘I can’t tell, _mein Herr_! but

whoever sent me Here will surely have sense enough to look after me

There!’ And he laughs, and his head shakes worse than ever. Ah!

Nothing can ever make me clever, and I’m very glad of it!”

He whistled a lively tune softly, as he went to bed in his little

side-room off the passage, and wondered again, as he had wondered

hundreds of times before, what caused that solemn low humming noise

that throbbed so incessantly through the house, and seemed so loud

when everything else was still. It was a grave sound,--suggestive of a

long-sustained organ-note held by the pedal-bass;--the murmuring of

seas and rivers seemed in it, as well as the rush of the wind. Karl

had grown accustomed to it, though he did not know what it meant,--and

he listened to it, till drowsiness made him fancy it was the hum of

his mother’s spinning-wheel, at home in his native German village

among the pine-forests, and so he fell happily asleep.

Meanwhile El-Râmi, ascending to the tower, knocked sharply at a small

nail-studded door in the wall. The mysterious murmuring noise was now

louder than ever,--and the knock had to be repeated three or four

times before it was attended to. Then the door was cautiously opened,

and the “Herr Doctor” himself looked out, his wizened, aged,

meditative face illumined like a Rembrandt picture by the small

hand-lamp he held in his hand.

“Ah!--El-Râmi!” he said in slow yet pleased tones--“I thought it

might be you. And like ‘Bernardo’--you ‘come most carefully upon your

hour.’”

He smiled, as one well satisfied to have made an apt quotation, and

opened the door more widely to admit his visitor.

“Come in quickly,”--he said--“The great window is open to the skies,

and the wind is high,--I fear some damage from the draught,--come

in--come in!”

His voice became suddenly testy and querulous,--and El-Râmi stepped

in at once without reply. Dr. Kremlin shut to the door carefully and

bolted it--then he turned the light of the lamp he carried full on the

dark handsome face and dignified figure of his companion.

“You are looking well--well,”--he muttered,--“Not a shade

older--always sound and strong! Just Heavens!--if I had your physique,

I think, with Archimedes, that I could lift the world! But I am

getting very old,--the life in me is ebbing fast,--and I have not done

my work-- ... God! ... God! I have not done my work!”

He clenched his hands, and his voice quavered down into a sound that

was almost a groan. El-Râmi’s black beaming eyes rested on him

compassionately.

“You are worn out, my dear Kremlin,”--he said gently--“worn out and

exhausted with long toil. You shall sleep to-night. I have come

according to my promise, and I will do what I can for you. Trust

me--you shall not lose the reward of your life’s work by want of time.

You shall have time,--even leisure to complete your labours,--I will

give you ‘length of days’!”

The elder man sank into a chair trembling, and rested his head wearily

on one hand.

“You cannot;”--he said faintly--“you cannot stop the advance of death,

my friend! You are a very clever man--you have a far-reaching subtlety

of brain,--but your learning and wisdom must pause _there_--there at

the boundary-line of the grave. You cannot overstep it or penetrate

beyond it--you cannot slacken the pace of the on-rushing years;--no,

no! I shall be forced to depart with half my discovery uncompleted.”

El-Râmi smiled,--a slightly derisive smile.

“You, who have faith in so much that cannot be proved, are singularly

incredulous of a fact that _can_ be proved;”--he said--“Anyway,

whatever you choose to think, here I am in answer to your rather

sudden summons--and here is your saving remedy;--” and he placed a

gold-stoppered flask on the table near which they sat--“It is, or

might be called, a veritable distilled essence of time,--for it will

do what they say God cannot do, make the days spin backward!”

Dr. Kremlin took up the flask curiously.

“You are so positive of its action?”

“Positive. I have kept one human creature alive and in perfect health

for six years on that vital fluid alone.”

“Wonderful!--wonderful!”--and the old scientist held it close to the

light, where it seemed to flash like a diamond,--then he smiled

dubiously--“Am I the new Faust, and you Mephisto?”

“Bah!” and El-Râmi shrugged his shoulders carelessly--“An old nurse’s

tale!--yet, like all old nurses’ tales and legends of every sort under

the sun, it is not without its grain of truth. As I have often told

you, there is really nothing imagined by the human brain that is not

possible of realisation, either here or hereafter. It would be a false

note and a useless calculation to allow thought to dwell on what

cannot be,--hence our airiest visions are bound to become facts in

time. All the same, I am not of such superhuman ability that I can

make you change your skin like a serpent, and blossom into youth and

the common vulgar lusts of life, which to the thinker must be

valueless. No. What you hold there will simply renew the tissues, and

gradually enrich the blood with fresh globules--nothing more,--but

that is all you need. Plainly and practically speaking, as long as the

tissues and the blood continue to renew themselves, you cannot die

except by violence.”

“Cannot die!” echoed Kremlin, in stupefied wonder--“Cannot die?”

“Except by violence--” repeated El-Râmi with emphasis, “Well!--and

what now? There is nothing really astonishing in the statement. Death

by violence is the only death possible to any one familiar with the

secrets of Nature, and there is more than one lesson to be learned

from the old story of Cain and Abel. The first death in the world,

according to that legend, was death by violence. Without violence,

life should be immortal, or at least renewable at pleasure.”

“Immortal!” muttered Dr. Kremlin--“Immortal! Renewable at pleasure! My

God!--then I have time before me--plenty of time!”

“You have, if you care for it--” said El-Râmi with a tinge of

melancholy in his accents--“and if you continue to care for it. Few

do, nowadays.”

But his companion scarcely heard him. He was balancing the little

flask in his hand in wonderment and awe.

“Death by violence?” he repeated slowly. “But, my friend, may not God

Himself use violence towards us? May He not snatch the unwilling soul

from its earthly tenement at an unexpected moment,--and so, all the

scheming and labour and patient calculation of years be ended in one

flash of time?”

“God--if there be a God, which some are fain to believe there

is,--uses no violence--” replied El-Râmi--“Deaths by violence are due

to the ignorance, or brutality, or long-inherited foolhardiness and

interference of man alone.”

“What of shipwreck?--storm?--lightning?”--queried Dr. Kremlin, still

playing with the flask he held.

“You are not going to sea, are you?” asked El-Râmi smiling--“And

surely you, of all men, should know that even shipwrecks are due to a

lack of mathematical balance in shipbuilding. One little trifle of

exactitude, which is always missing, unfortunately,--one little

delicate scientific adjustment, and the fiercest storm and wind could

not prevail against the properly poised vessel. As for lightning--of

course people are killed by it if they persist in maintaining an erect

position like a lightning-rod or conductor, while the electrical

currents are in full play. If they were to lie flat down, as savages

do, they could not attract the descending force. But who, among

arrogant stupid men, cares to adopt such simple precautions? Any way,

I do not see that you need fear any of these disasters.”

“No, no,”--said the old man meditatively, “I need not fear,--no, no! I

have nothing to fear.”

His voice sank into silence. He and El-Râmi were sitting in a small

square chamber of the tower,--very narrow, with only space enough for

the one tiny table and two chairs which furnished it,--the walls were

covered with very curious maps, composed of lines and curves and

zigzag patterns, meaningless to all except Kremlin himself, whose

dreamy gaze wandered to them between-whiles with an ardent yearning

and anxiety. And ever that strange deep, monotonous humming noise

surged through the tower as of a mighty wheel at work, the vibration

of the sound seemed almost to shake the solid masonry, while mingling

with it now and again came the wild sea-bird cry of the wind. El-Râmi

listened.

“And still it moves?” he queried softly, using almost the words of

Galileo,--“_e pur si muove_.”

Dr. Kremlin looked up, his pale eyes full of a sudden fire and

animation.

“Ay!--still it moves!” he responded with a touch of eager triumph in

his tone--“Still it moves--and still it sounds! The music of the

Earth, my friend!--the dominant note of all Nature’s melody! Hear

it!--round, full, grand, and perfect!--one tone in the ascending scale

of the planets,--the song of _one_ Star,--our Star--as it rolls on its

predestined way! Come!--come with me!” and he sprang up excitedly--“It

is a night for work;--the heavens are clear as a mirror,--come and see

my Dial of the Fates,--you have seen it before, I know, but there are

new reflexes upon it now,--new lines of light and colour,--ah, my good

El-Râmi, if you could solve _my_ problem, you would be soon wiser

than you are! Your gift of long life would be almost valueless

compared to my proof of what is beyond life----”

“Yes--if the proof could be obtained--” interposed El-Râmi.

“It shall be obtained!” cried Kremlin wildly--“It shall! I will not

die till the secret is won! I will wrench it out from the Holy of

Holies--I will pluck it from the very thoughts of God!”

He trembled with the violence of his own emotions,--then passing his

hand across his forehead, he relapsed into sudden calm, and, smiling

gently, said again--

“Come!”

El-Râmi rose at once in obedience to this request,--and the old man

preceded him to a high narrow door which looked like a slit in the

wall, and which he unbarred and opened with an almost jealous care. A

brisk puff of wind blew in their faces through the aperture, but this

subsided into mere cool freshness of air as they entered and stood

together within the great central chamber of the tower,--a lofty

apartment, where the strange work of Kremlin’s life was displayed in

all its marvellous complexity,--a work such as no human being had ever

attempted before, or would be likely to attempt again.

X.

The singular object that at once caught and fixed the eye in

fascinated amazement, and something of terror, was a huge disc,

suspended between ceiling and floor by an apparently inextricable mesh

and tangle of wires. It was made of some smooth glittering substance

like crystal, and seemed from its great height and circumference to

occupy nearly the whole of the lofty tower-room. It appeared to be

lightly poised and balanced on a long steel rod,--a sort of gigantic

needle which hung from the very top of the tower. The entire surface

of the disc was a subdued blaze of light,--light which fluctuated in

waves and lines, and zigzag patterns like a kaleidoscope, as the

enormous thing circled round and round, as it did, with a sort of

measured motion, and a sustained solemn buzzing sound. Here was the

explanation of the mysterious noise that vibrated throughout the

house,--it was simply the movement of this round shield-like mass

among its wonderful network of rods and wires. Dr. Kremlin called it

his “crystal” disc,--but it was utterly unlike ordinary crystal, for

it not only shone with a transparent watery clearness, but possessed

the scintillating lustre of a fine diamond cut into numerous prisms,

so that El-Râmi shaded his eyes from the flash of it as he stood

contemplating it in silence. It swirled round and round steadily;

facing it, a large casement window, about the size of half the wall,

was thrown open to the night, and through this could be seen a myriad

sparkling stars. The wind blew in, but not fiercely now, for part of

the wrath of the gale was past,--and the wash of the sea on the beach

below had exactly the same tone in it as the monotonous hum of the

disc as it moved. At one side of the open window a fine telescope

mounted on a high stand pointed out towards the heavens,--there were

numerous other scientific implements in the room, but it was

impossible to take much notice of anything but the disc itself, with

its majestic motion and the solemn sound to which it swung. Dr.

Kremlin seemed to have almost forgotten El-Râmi’s presence,--going up

to the window, he sat down on a low bench in the corner, and folding

his arms across his breast gazed at his strange invention with a

fixed, wondering, and appealing stare.

“How to unravel the meaning--how to decipher the message!” he

muttered--“Sphinx of my brain, tell me, is there no answer? Shall the

actual offspring of my thought refuse to clear up the riddle I

propound? Nay, is it possible the creature should baffle the creator?

See! the lines change again--the vibrations are altered,--the circle

is ever the circle, but the reflexes differ,--how can one separate or

classify them--how?”

Thus far his half-whispered words were audible,--when El-Râmi came

and stood beside him. Then he seemed to suddenly recollect himself,

and, looking up, he rose to his feet and spoke in a perfectly calm and

collected manner.

“You see”--he said, pointing to the disc with the air of a lecturer

illustrating his discourse--“To begin with, there is the fine

hair’s-breadth balance of matter which gives perpetual motion. Nothing

can stop that movement save the destruction of the whole piece of

mechanism. By some such subtly delicate balance as that, the Universe

moves,--and nothing can stop it save the destruction of the Universe.

Is not that fairly reasoned?”

“Perfectly,” replied El-Râmi, who was listening with profound

attention.

“Surely that of itself,--the secret of perpetual motion,--is a great

discovery, is it not?” questioned Kremlin eagerly.

El-Râmi hesitated.

“It is,” he said at last. “Forgive me if I paused a moment before

replying,--the reason of my doing so was this. You cannot claim to

yourself any actual discovery of perpetual motion, because that is

Nature’s own particular mystery. Perhaps I do not explain myself with

sufficient clearness,--well, what I mean to imply is this--namely,

that your wonderful dial there would not revolve as it does if the

Earth on which we stand were not also revolving. If we could imagine

our planet stopping suddenly in its course, your disc would stop

also,--is not that correct?”

“Why, naturally!” assented Kremlin impatiently. “Its movement is

mathematically calculated to follow, in a slower degree, but with

rhythmical exactitude, the Earth’s own movement, and is so balanced as

to be absolutely accurate to the very half-quarter of a

hair’s-breadth.”

“Yes,--and there is the chief wonder of your invention,” said El-Râmi

quietly. “It is that peculiarly precise calculation of yours that is

so marvellous, in that it enables you _to follow the course of

perpetual motion_. With perpetual motion itself you have nothing to

do,--you cannot find its why or its when or its how,--it is eternal as

Eternity. Things must move,--and we all move with them--your disc

included.”

“But the moving things are balanced--so!” said Kremlin, pointing

triumphantly to his work--“On one point--one pivot!”

“And that point----?” queried El-Râmi dubiously.

“Is a Central Universe”--responded Kremlin--“where God abides.”

El-Râmi looked at him with dark, dilating, burning eyes.

“Suppose,” he said suddenly--“suppose--for the sake of argument--that

this Central Universe, you imagine exists, were but the outer covering

or shell of another Central Universe, and so on through innumerable

Central Universes for ever and ever and ever, and no point or pivot

reachable!”

Kremlin uttered a cry, and clasped his hands with a gesture of terror.

“Stop--stop!” he gasped--“Such an idea is frightful!--horrible! Would

you drive me mad?--mad, I tell you? No human brain could steadily

contemplate the thought of such pitiless infinity!”

He sank back on the seat and rocked himself to and fro like a person

in physical pain, the while he stared at El-Râmi’s majestic figure

and dark meditative face as though he saw some demon in a dream.

El-Râmi met his gaze with a compassionate glance in his own eyes.

“You are narrow, my friend,”--he observed--“as narrow of outward and

onward conception as most scientists are. I grant you the human brain

has limits; but the human Soul has none! There is no ‘pitiless

infinity’ to the Soul’s aspirations,--it is never contented,--but

eternally ambitious, eternally inquiring, eternally young, it is ready

to scale heights and depths without end, unconscious of fatigue or

satiety. What of a million million Universes? I--even I--can

contemplate them without dismay,--the brain may totter and reel at the

multiplicity of them,--but the Soul would absorb them all and yet

seek space for more!”

His rich, deep, tranquil voice had the effect of calming Kremlin’s

excited nerves. He paused in his uneasy rocking to and fro, and

listened as though he heard music.

“You are a bold man, El-Râmi,” he said slowly--“I have always said

it,--bold even to rashness. Yet with all your large ideas I find you

inconsistent; for example, you talk of the Soul now, as if you

believed in it,--but there are times when you declare yourself

doubtful of its existence.”

“It is necessary to split hairs of argument with you, I see”--returned

El-Râmi with a slight smile,--“Can you not understand that I may

_believe_ in the Soul without being sure of it? It is the natural

instinct of every man to credit himself with immortality, because this

life is so short and unsatisfactory,--the notion may be a fault of

heritage perhaps, still it is implanted in us all the same. And I do

believe in the Soul,--but I require certainty to make my mere belief

an undeniable fact. And the whole business of my life is to establish

that fact provably, and beyond any sort of doubt whatever,--what

inconsistency do you find there?”

“None--none--” said Kremlin hastily--“But you will not succeed,--yours

is too daring an attempt,--too arrogant and audacious a demand upon

the unknown forces.”

“And what of the daring and arrogance displayed here?” asked El-Râmi,

with a wave of his hand towards the glittering disc in front of them.

Kremlin jumped up excitedly.

“No, no!--you cannot call the mere scientific investigation of natural

objects arrogant,” he said--“Besides, the whole thing is so very

simple after all. It is well known that every star in the heavens

sends forth perpetual radiations of light; which radiations in a given

number of minutes, days, months, or years, reach our Earth. It depends

of course on the distance between the particular star and our planet,

as to how long these light-vibrations take to arrive here. One ray

from some stars will occupy thousands of years in its course,--in

fact, the original planet from which it fell may be swept out of

existence before it has time to penetrate our atmosphere. All this is

in the lesson-books of children, and is familiar to every beginner in

the rudiments of astronomy. But apart from time and distance, there is

_no cessation_ to these light-beats or vibrations; they keep on

arriving for ever, without an instant’s pause. Now my great idea was,

as you know, to catch these reflexes on a mirror or dial of magnetic

spar,--and you see for yourself that this thing, which seemed

impossible, is to a certain extent done. Magnetic spar is not a new

substance to you, any more than it was to the Egyptian priests of

old--and the quality it has, of attracting light in its exact lines

wherever light falls, is no surprise to you, though it might seem a

marvel to the ignorant. Every little zigzag or circular flash on that

disc is a vibration of light from some star,--but what puzzles and

confounds my skill is this;--That there is a meaning in those lines--a

distinct meaning which asks to be interpreted,--a picture which is

ever on the point of declaring itself, and is never declared. Mine is

the torture of a Tantalus watching night after night that mystic

dial!”

He went close up to the disc, and pointed out one particular spot on

its surface where at that moment there was a glittering tangle of

little prismatic tints.

“Observe this with me--” he said, and El-Râmi approached him--“Here

is a perfect cluster of light-vibrations,--in two minutes by my watch

they will be here no longer,--and a year or more may pass before they

appear again. From what stars they fall, and why they have deeper

colours than most of the reflexes, I cannot tell. There--see!” and he

looked round with an air of melancholy triumph, mingled with wonder,

as the little spot of brilliant colour suddenly disappeared like the

moisture of breath from a mirror--“They are gone! I have seen them

four times only since the disc was balanced twelve years ago,--and I

have tried in every way to trace their origin--in vain--all, all in

vain! If I could only decipher the meaning!--for as sure as God lives

there is a meaning there.”

El-Râmi was silent, and Dr. Kremlin went on.

“The air is a conveyer of Sound--” he said meditatively--“The light is

a conveyer of Scenes. Mark that well. The light may be said to create

landscape and generate Colour. Reflexes of light make

pictures,--witness the instantaneous flash, which, with the aid of

chemistry, will give you a photograph in a second. I firmly believe

that all reflexes of light are so many letters of a marvellous

alphabet, which, if we could only read it, would enable us to grasp

the highest secrets of creation. The seven tones of music, for

example, are in Nature;--in any ordinary storm, where there is wind

and rain and the rustle of leaves, you can hear the complete scale on

which every atom of musical composition has ever been written. Yet

what ages it took us to reduce that scale to a visible tangible

form,--and even now we have not mastered the _quarter-tones_ heard in

the songs of birds. And just as the whole realm of music is in seven

tones of natural Sound, so the whole realm of light is in a pictured

language of Design, Colour, and Method, with an intention and a

message, which _we_--we human beings--are intended to discover. Yet,

with all these great mysteries waiting to be solved, the most of us

are content to eat and drink and sleep and breed and die, like the

lowest cattle, in brutish ignorance of more than half our intellectual

privileges. I tell you, El-Râmi, if I could only find out and place

correctly _one_ of those light-vibrations, the rest might be easy.”

He heaved a profound sigh,--and the great disc, circling steadily with

its grave monotonous hum, might have passed for the wheel of Fate

which he, poor mortal, was powerless to stop though it should grind

him to atoms.

El-Râmi watched him with interest and something of compassion for a

minute or two,--then he touched his arm gently.

“Kremlin, is it not time for you to rest?” he asked kindly--“You have

not slept well for many nights,--you are tired out,--why not sleep

now, and gather strength for future labours?”

The old man started, and a slight shiver ran through him.

“You mean----?” he began.

“I mean to do for you what I promised--” replied El-Râmi, “You asked

me for this--” and he held up the gold-stoppered flask he had brought

in with him from the next room--“It is all ready prepared for

you--drink it, and to-morrow you will find yourself a new man.”

Dr. Kremlin looked at him suspiciously--and then began to laugh with a

sort of hysterical nervousness.

“I believe--” he murmured indistinctly and with affected

jocularity--“I believe that you want to poison me! Yes--yes!--to

poison me and take all my discoveries for yourself! You want to solve

the great Star-problem and take all the glory and rob me--yes, rob me

of my hard-earned fame!--yes--it is poison--poison!”

And he chuckled feebly, and hid his face between his hands.

El-Râmi heard him with an expression of pain and pity in his fine

eyes.

“My poor old friend--” he said gently--“You are wearied to death--so I

pardon you your sudden distrust of me. As for poison--see!” and he

lifted the flask he held to his lips and drank a few drops--“Have no

fear! Your Star-problem is your own,--and I desire that you should

live long enough to read its great mystery. As for me, I have other

labours;--to me stars, solar systems, ay! whole universes are

nothing,--my business is with the Spirit that dominates Matter--not

with Matter itself. Enough;--will you live or will you die? It rests

with yourself to choose--for you are ill, Kremlin--very ill,--your

brain is fagged and weak--you cannot go on much longer like this. Why

did you send for me if you do not believe in me?”

The old Doctor tottered to the window-bench and sat down,--then

looking up, he forced a smile.

“Don’t you see for yourself what a coward I have become?” he said--“I

tell you I am afraid of everything;--of you--of myself--and worst of

all, of _that_--” and he pointed to the disc--“which lately seems to

have grown stronger than I am.” He paused a moment--then went on with

an effort--“I had a strange idea the other night,--I thought, suppose

God, in the beginning, created the universe simply to divert

Himself--just as I created my dial there;--and suppose it had happened

that instead of being His servant, as He originally intended, it had

become His master?--that He actually had no more power over it?

Suppose He were _dead_? We see that the works of men live ages after

their death,--why not the works of God? Horrible--horrible! Death is

horrible! I do not want to die, El-Râmi!” and his faint voice rose to

a querulous wail, “Not yet--not yet! I cannot!--I must finish my

work--I must know--I must live----”

“You shall live,” interrupted El-Râmi. “Trust me--there is no death

in _this_!”

He held up the mysterious flask again. Kremlin stared at it, shaking

all over with nervousness--then on a sudden impulse clutched it.

“Am I to drink it all?” he asked faintly.

El-Râmi bent his head in assent.

Kremlin hesitated a moment longer--then, with the air of one who takes

a sudden desperate resolve, he gave one eager yearning look at the

huge revolving disc, and, putting the flask to his lips, drained its

contents. He had scarcely swallowed the last drop, when he sprang to

his feet, uttered a smothered cry, staggered, and fell on the floor

motionless. El-Râmi caught him up at once, and lifted him easily in

his strong arms on to the window-seat, where he laid him down gently,

placing coverings over him and a pillow under his head. The old man’s

face was white and rigid as the face of a corpse, but he breathed

easily and quietly, and El-Râmi, knowing the action of the draught he

had administered, saw there was no cause for anxiety in his condition.

He himself leaned on the sill of the great open window and looked out

at the starlit sky for some minutes, and listened to the sonorous

plashing of the waves on the shore below. Now and then he glanced back

over his shoulder at the great dial and its shining star-patterns.

“Only Lilith could decipher the meaning of it all,” he mused.

“Perhaps,--some day--it might be possible to ask her. But then, do I

in truth believe what she tells me?--would _he_ believe? The

transcendentally uplifted soul of a woman!--ought we to credit the

message obtained through so ethereal a means? I doubt it. We men are

composed of such stuff that we must convince ourselves of a fact by

every known test before we finally accept it,--like St. Thomas, unless

we put our rough hand into the wounded side of Christ, and thrust our

fingers into the nail-prints, we will not believe. And I shall never

resolve myself as to which is the wisest course,--to accept everything

with the faith of a child, or dispute everything with the arguments of

a controversialist. The child is happiest; but then the question

arises--Were we meant to be happy? I think not,--since there is

nothing that can make us so for long.”

His brow clouded and he stood absorbed, looking at the stars, yet

scarcely conscious of beholding them. Happiness! It had a sweet

sound,--an exquisite suggestion; and his thoughts clung round it

persistently as bees round honey. Happiness!--What could engender it?

The answer came unbidden to his brain--“Love!” He gave an involuntary

gesture of irritation, as though some one had spoken the word in his

ear.

“Love!” he exclaimed half aloud. “There is no such thing--not on

earth. There is Desire,--the animal attraction of one body for

another, which ends in disgust and satiety. Love should have no touch

of coarseness in it,--and can anything be coarser than the

marriage-tie?--the bond which compels a man and woman to live together

in daily partnership of bed and board, and reproduce their kind like

pigs, or other common cattle. To call that _love_ is a sacrilege to

the very name,--for Love is a divine emotion, and demands divinest

comprehension.”

He went up to where Kremlin lay reclined,--the old man slept

profoundly and peacefully,--his face had gained colour and seemed less

pinched and meagre in outline. El-Râmi felt his pulse,--it beat

regularly and calmly. Satisfied with his examination, he wheeled away

the great telescope into a corner, and shut the window against the

night air,--then he lay down himself on the floor, with his coat

rolled under him for a pillow, and composed himself to sleep till

morning.

XI.

The next day dawned in brilliant sunshine; the sea was as smooth as

a lake, and the air pleasantly warm and still. Dr. Kremlin’s servant

Karl got up in a very excellent humour,--he had slept well, and he

awoke with the comfortable certainty of finding his eccentric master

in better health and spirits, as this was always the case after one of

El-Râmi’s rare visits. And Karl, though he did not much appreciate

learning, especially when the pursuit of it induced people, as he

said, to starve themselves for the sake of acquiring wisdom, did feel

in his own heart that there was something about El-Râmi that was not

precisely like other men, and he had accordingly for him not only a

great attraction, but a profound respect.

“If anybody can do the Herr Doctor good, he can--” he thought, as he

laid the breakfast-table in the little dining-room whose French

windows opened out to a tiny green lawn fronting the sea,--“Certainly

one can never cure old age,--that is an ailment for which there is no

remedy; but however old we are bound to get, I don’t see why we should

not be merry over it and enjoy our meals to the last. Now let me

see--what have I to get ready--” and he enumerated on his

fingers--“Coffee--toast--rolls,--butter--eggs--fish,--I think that

will do;--and if I just put these few roses in the middle of the table

to tempt the eye a bit,”--and he suited the action to the word--“There

now!--if the Herr Doctor can be pleased at all----”

“Breakfast, Karl! breakfast!” interrupted a clear cheerful voice, the

sound of which made Karl start with nervous astonishment. “Make haste,

my good fellow! My friend here has to catch an early train.”

Karl turned round, stared, and stood motionless, open-mouthed, and

struck dumb with sheer surprise. Could it be the old Doctor who spoke?

Was it his master at all,--this hale, upright, fresh-faced individual

who stood before him, smiling pleasantly and giving his orders with

such a brisk air of authority? Bewildered and half afraid, he cast a

desperate glance at El-Râmi, who had also entered the room, and who,

seeing his confusion, made him a secret sign.

“Yes--be as quick as you can, Karl,” he said. “Your master has had a

good night, and is much better, as you see. We shall be glad of our

breakfast; I told you we should, last night. Don’t keep us waiting!”

“Yes, sir--no, sir!” stammered Karl, trying to collect his scattered

senses and staring again at Dr. Kremlin,--then, scarcely knowing

whether he was on his head or his heels, he scrambled out of the room

into the passage, where he stood for a minute stupefied and inert.

“It must be devils’ work!” he ejaculated amazedly. “Who but the devil

could make a man look twenty years younger in a single night?

Yes--twenty years younger,--he looks that if he looks a day. God have

mercy on us!--what will happen next--what sort of a service have I got

into?--Oh, my poor mother!”

This last was Karl’s supremest adjuration,--when he could find nothing

else to say, the phrase “Oh, my poor mother!” came as naturally to his

lips as the familiar “D----n it!” from the mouth of an old swaggerer

in the army or navy. He meant nothing by it, except perhaps a vague

allusion to the innocent days of his childhood, when he was ignorant

of the wicked ways of the wicked world, and when “Oh, my poor mother!”

had not the most distant idea as to what was going to become of her

hopeful first-born.

Meantime, while he went down into the kitchen and bustled about there,

getting the coffee, frying the fish, boiling the eggs, and cogitating

with his own surprised and half-terrified self, Dr. Kremlin and his

guest had stepped out into the little garden together, and they now

stood there on the grass-plot surveying the glittering wide expanse of

ocean before them. They spoke not a word for some minutes,--then, all

at once, Kremlin turned round and caught both El-Râmi’s hands in his

own and pressed them fervently--there were tears in his eyes.

“What can I say to you?” he murmured in a voice broken by strong

emotion--“How can I thank you? You have been as a god to me;--I live

again,--I breathe again,--this morning the world seems new to my

eyes,--as new as though I had never seen it before. I have left a

whole cycle of years, with all their suffering and bitterness, behind

me, and I am ready now to commence life afresh.”

“That is well!” said El-Râmi gently, cordially returning the pressure

of his hands. “That is as it should be. To see your strength and

vitality thus renewed is more than enough reward for me.”

“And do I really _look_ younger?--am I actually changed in

appearance?” asked Kremlin eagerly.

El-Râmi smiled. “Well, you saw poor Karl’s amazement”--he replied.

“He was afraid of you, I think--and also of me. Yes, you are changed,

though not miraculously so. Your hair is as gray as ever,--the same

furrows of thought are on your face;--all that has occurred is the

simple renewal of the tissues, and revivifying of the blood,--and this

gives you the look of vigour and heartiness you have this morning.”

“But will it last?--will it last?” queried Kremlin anxiously.

“If you follow my instructions, of course it will--” returned

El-Râmi--“I will see to that. I have left with you a certain quantity

of the vital fluid,--all you have to do is to take ten drops every

third night, or inject it into your veins if you prefer that

method;--then,--as I told you,--you cannot die, except by violence.”

“And no violence comes here”--said Kremlin with a smile, glancing

round at the barren yet picturesque scene--“I am as lonely as an

unmated eagle on a rock,--and the greater my solitude the happier I

am. The world is very beautiful--that I grant,--but the beings that

inhabit it spoil it for me, albeit I am one of them. And so I cannot

die, except by violence? Almost I touch immortality! Marvellous

El-Râmi! You should be a king of nations!”

“Too low a destiny!” replied El-Râmi--“I’d rather be a ruler of

planets.”

“Ah, there is your stumbling-block!” said Kremlin, with sudden

seriousness,--“You soar too high--you are never contented.”

“Content is impossible to the Soul”--returned El-Râmi,--“Nothing is

too high or too low for its investigation. And whatever _can_ be done,

_should_ be done, in order that the whole gamut of life may be

properly understood by those who are forced to live it.”

“And do not you understand it?”

“In part--yes. But not wholly. It is not sufficient to have traced the

ripple of a brain-wave through the air and followed its action and

result with exactitude,--nor is it entirely satisfactory to have all

the secrets of physical and mental magnetism, and attraction between

bodies and minds, made clear and easy without knowing the _reason_ of

these things. It is like the light vibrations on your disc,--they

come--and go; but one needs to know why and whence they come and go. I

know much--but I would fain know more.”

“But is not the pursuit of knowledge infinite?”

“It may be--_if_ infinity exists. Infinity is possible--and I believe

in it,--all the same I must prove it.”

“You will need a thousand lifetimes to fulfil such works as you

attempt!” exclaimed Kremlin.

“And I will live them all;”--responded El-Râmi composedly--“I have

sworn to let nothing baffle me, and nothing shall!”

Dr. Kremlin looked at him in vague awe,--the dark, haughty, handsome

face spoke more resolvedly than words.

“Pardon me, El-Râmi”--he said with a little diffidence--“It seems a

very personal question to put, and possibly you may resent it, still I

have often thought of asking it. You are a very handsome and very

fascinating man--you would be a fool if you were not perfectly aware

of your own attractiveness,--well, now tell me--have you never loved

anybody?--any woman?”

The sleepy brilliancy of El-Râmi’s fine eyes lightened with sudden

laughter.

“Loved a woman?--_I_?” he exclaimed--“The Fates forbid! What should I

do with the gazelles and kittens and toys of life, such as women are?

Of all animals on earth, they have the least attraction for me. I

would rather stroke a bird’s wings than a woman’s hair, and the

fragrance of a rose pressed against my lips is sweeter and more

sincere than any woman’s kisses. As the females of the race, women are

useful in their way, but not interesting at any time--at least, not to

me.”

“Do you not believe in love then?” asked Kremlin.

“No. Do you?”

“Yes,”--and Kremlin’s voice was very tender and impressive--“I believe

it is the only thing of God in an almost godless world.”

El-Râmi shrugged his shoulders.

“You talk like a poet. I, who am not poetical, cannot so idealise the

physical attraction between male and female, which is nothing but a

law of nature, and is shared by us in common with the beasts of the

field.”

“I think your wisdom is in error there”--said Kremlin

slowly--“Physical attraction there is, no doubt--but there is

something else--something more subtle and delicate, which escapes the

analysis of both philosopher and scientist. Moreover it is an

imperative spiritual sense, as well as a material craving,--the soul

can no more be satisfied without love than the body.”

“That is your opinion--” and El-Râmi smiled again,--“But you see a

contradiction of it in me. _I_ am satisfied to be without love,--and

certainly I never look upon the ordinary woman of the day without the

disagreeable consciousness that I am beholding the living essence of

sensualism and folly.”

“You are very bitter,” said Kremlin wonderingly--“Of course no

‘ordinary’ woman could impress you,--but there are remarkable

women,--women of power and genius and lofty ambition.”

“Les femmes incomprises--oh yes, I know!” laughed

El-Râmi--“Troublesome creatures all, both to themselves and others.

Why do you talk on these subjects, my dear Kremlin?--Is it the effect

of your rejuvenated condition? I am sure there are many more

interesting matters worthy of discussion. I shall never love--not in

this planet; in some other state of existence I may experience the

‘divine’ emotion. But the meannesses, vanities, contemptible

jealousies, and low spites of women such as inhabit this earth fill me

with disgust and repulsion,--besides, women are treacherous,--and I

loathe treachery.”

At that moment Karl appeared at the dining-room window as a sign that

breakfast was served, and they turned to go indoors.

“All the same, El-Râmi--” persisted Kremlin, laying one hand on his

friend’s arm--“Do not count on being able to escape the fate to which

all humanity must succumb----”

“Death?” interposed El-Râmi lightly--“I have almost conquered that!”

“Ay, but you cannot conquer Love!” said Kremlin impressively--“Love is

stronger than Death.”

El-Râmi made no answer,--and they went in to breakfast. They did full

justice to the meal, much to Karl’s satisfaction, though he could not

help stealing covert glances at his master’s changed countenance,

which had become so much fresher and younger since the previous day.

How such a change had been effected he could not imagine, but on the

whole he was disposed to be content with the evident improvement.

“Even if he is the devil himself--” he considered, his thoughts

reverting to El-Râmi--“I am bound to say that the devil is a

kind-hearted fellow. There’s no doubt about that. I suppose I am an

abandoned sinner only fit for the burning--but if God insists on

making us old and sick and miserable, and the devil is able to make us

young and strong and jolly, why let us be friends with the devil, say

I! Oh, my poor mother!”

With such curious emotions as these in his mind, it was rather

difficult to maintain a composed face, and wait upon the two gentlemen

with that grave deportment which it is the duty of every well-trained

attendant to assume,--however, he managed fairly well, and got

accustomed at last to hand his master a cup of coffee without staring

at him till his eyes almost projected out of his head.

El-Râmi took his departure soon after breakfast, with a few

recommendations to his friend not to work too hard on the problems

suggested by the disc.

“Ah, but I have now found a new clue,” said Kremlin triumphantly--“I

found it in sleep. I shall work it out in the course of a few weeks, I

daresay--and I will let you know if the result is successful. You see,

thanks to you, my friend, I have time now,--there is no need to toil

with feverish haste and anxiety--death, that seemed so near, is thrust

back in the distance----”

“Even so!” said El-Râmi with a strange smile--“In the far, far

distance,--baffled and kept at bay. Oddly enough, there are some who

say there is no death----”

“But there is--there must be!--” exclaimed Kremlin quickly.

El-Râmi raised his hand with a slight commanding gesture.

“It is not a certainty--” he said--“inasmuch as there is no

certainty. And there is no ‘Must-be,’--there is only the Soul’s

‘Shall-be’!”

And with these somewhat enigmatical words he bade his friend farewell,

and went his way.

XII.

It was yet early in the afternoon when he arrived back in London. He

went straight home to his own house, letting himself in as usual with

his latch-key. In the hall he paused, listening. He half expected to

hear Féraz playing one of his delicious dreamy improvisations,--but

there was not a sound anywhere, and the deep silence touched him with

an odd sense of disappointment and vague foreboding. His study door

stood slightly ajar,--he pushed it wider open very noiselessly and

looked in. His young brother was there, seated in a chair near the

window, reading. El-Râmi gazed at him dubiously, with a slowly

dawning sense that there was some alteration in his appearance which

he could not all at once comprehend. Presently he realised that Féraz

had evidently yielded to some overwhelming suggestion of personal

vanity, which had induced him to put on more brilliant attire. He had

changed his plain white linen garb for one of richer material,

composed in the same Eastern fashion,--he wore a finely-chased gold

belt, from which a gold-sheathed dagger depended,--and a few gold

ornaments gleamed here and there among the drawn silken folds of his

upper vest. He looked handsome enough for a new Agathon as he sat

there apparently absorbed in study,--the big volume he perused resting

partly on his knee,--but El-Râmi’s brow contracted with sudden anger

as he observed him from the half-open doorway where he stood, himself

unseen,--and his dark face grew very pale. He threw the door back on

its hinges with a clattering sound and entered the room.

“Féraz!”

Féraz looked up, lifting his eyelids indifferently and smiling

coldly.

“What, El-Râmi! Back so early? I did not expect you till nightfall.”

“Did you not?” said his brother, advancing slowly--“Pray how was that?

You know I generally return after a night’s absence early in the next

day. Where is your usual word of welcome? What ails you? You seem in a

very odd humour!”

“Do I?”--and Féraz stretched himself a little,--rose, yawning, and

laid down the volume he held on the table--“I am not aware of it

myself, I assure you. How did you find your old madman? And did you

tell him you were nearly as mad as he?”

El-Râmi’s eyes flashed indignant amazement and wrath.

“Féraz!--What do you mean?”

With a fierce impulsive movement Féraz turned and fully faced

him,--all his forced and feigned calmness gone to the winds,--a

glowing picture of youth and beauty and rage commingled.

“What do I mean?” he cried--“I mean this! That I am tired of being

your slave--your ‘subject’ for conjurer’s tricks of mesmerism,--that

from henceforth I resist your power,--that I will not serve you--will

not obey you--will not yield--no!--not an inch of my liberty--to your

influence,--that I am a free man, as you are, and that I will have the

full rights of both my freedom and manhood. You shall play no more

with me; I refuse to be your dupe as I have been. This is what I

mean!--and as I will have no deception or subterfuge between us,--for

I scorn a lie,--hear the truth from me at once;--I know your secret--I

have seen Her!”

El-Râmi stood erect,--immovable;--he was very pale; his breath came

and went quickly--once his hand clenched, but he said nothing.

“I have seen Her!” cried Féraz again, flinging up his arms with an

ecstatic wild gesture--“A creature fairer than any vision!--and

you--you have the heart to bind her fast in darkness and in

nothingness,--you it is who have shut her sight to the world,--you

have made for her, through your horrible skill, a living death in

which she knows nothing, feels nothing, sees nothing, loves nothing! I

tell you it is a cursed deed you are doing,--a deed worse than

murder--I would not have believed it of you! I thought your

experiments were all for good,--I never would have deemed you capable

of cruelty to a helpless woman! But I will release her from your

spells,--she is too beautiful to be made her own living

monument,--Zaroba is right--she needs life--joy--love!--she shall have

them all;--through _me_!”

He paused, out of breath with the heat and violence of his own

emotions;--El-Râmi stood, still immovably regarding him.

“You may be as angered as you please”--went on Féraz with sullen

passion--“I care nothing now. It was Zaroba who bade me go up yonder

and see her where she slept; ... it was Zaroba----”

“‘The woman tempted me and I did eat--’” quoted El-Râmi coldly,--“Of

course it was Zaroba. No other than a woman could thus break a sworn

word. Naturally it was Zaroba,--the paid and kept slave of my service,

who owes to me her very existence,--who persuaded my brother to

dishonour.”

“Dishonour!” and Féraz laid his hand with a quick, almost savage

gesture on the hilt of the dagger at his belt. El-Râmi’s dark eyes

blazed upon him scornfully.

“So soon a braggart of the knife?” he said. “What theatrical show is

this? You--you--the poet, the dreamer, the musician--the gentle lad

whose life was one of peaceful and innocent reverie--are you so soon

changed to the mere swaggering puppy of manhood who pranks himself out

in gaudy clothing, and thinks by vulgar threatening to overawe his

betters? If so, ’tis a pity--but I shall not waste time in deploring

it. Hear me, Féraz--I said ‘dishonour,’--swallow the word as best you

may, it is the only one that fits the act of prying into secrets not

your own. But I am not angered,--the mischief wrought is not beyond

remedy, and if it were there would be still less use in bewailing it.

What is done cannot be undone. Now tell me,--you say you have seen

Her. _Whom_ have you seen?”

Féraz regarded him amazedly.

“Whom have I seen?” he echoed--“Whom should I see, if not the girl you

keep locked in those upper rooms,--a beautiful maiden, sleeping her

life away, in cruel darkness and ignorance of all things true and

fair!”

“An enchanted princess, to your fancy--” said El-Râmi derisively.

“Well, if you thought so, and if you believed yourself to be a new

sort of Prince Charming, why, if she were only sleeping, did you not

wake her?”

“Wake her?” exclaimed Féraz excitedly.--“Oh, I would have given my

life to see those fringed lids uplift and show the wonders of the eyes

beneath! I called her by every endearing name--I took her hands and

warmed them in my own--I would have kissed her lips----”

“You dared not!” cried El-Râmi, fired beyond his own control, and

making a fierce bound towards him--“You dared not pollute her by your

touch!”

Féraz recoiled,--a sudden chill ran through his blood. His brother

was transformed with the passion that surged through him,--his eyes

flashed--his lips quivered--his very form seemed to tower up and

tremble and dilate with rage.

“El-Râmi!” he stammered nervously, feeling all his newly-born

defiance and bravado oozing away under the terrible magnetism of this

man, whose fury was nearly as electric as that of a sudden

thunderstorm,--“El-Râmi, I did no harm,--Zaroba was there beside

me----”

“Zaroba!” echoed El-Râmi furiously--“Zaroba would stand by and see an

angel violated, and think it the greatest happiness that could befall

her sanctity! To be of common clay, with household joys and kitchen

griefs, is Zaroba’s idea of noble living. Oh rash unhappy Féraz! you

say you know my secret--you do not know it--you cannot guess it!

Foolish, ignorant boy!--did you think yourself a new Christ with power

to raise the Dead?”

“The dead?” muttered Féraz, with white lips--“The dead? She--the girl

I saw--lives and breathes ...”

“By _my_ will alone!” said El-Râmi--“By my force--by my knowledge--by

my constant watchful care,--by my control over the subtle threads that

connect Spirit with Matter. Otherwise, according to all the laws of

ordinary nature, that girl is _dead_--she died in the Syrian desert

six years ago!”

XIII.

At these words, pronounced slowly and with emphatic distinctness,

Féraz staggered back dizzily and sank into a chair,--drops of

perspiration bedewed his forehead, and a sick faint feeling overcame

him. He said nothing,--he could find no words in which to express his

mingled horror and amazement. El-Râmi watched him keenly,--and

presently Féraz, looking up, caught the calm, full, and fiery regard

of his brother’s eyes. With a smothered cry, he raised his hands as

though to shield himself from a blow.

“I will not have it;”--he muttered faintly--“You shall not force my

thoughts,--I will believe nothing against my own will. You shall no

longer delude my eyes and ears--I have read--I know,--I know how such

trickery is done!”

El-Râmi uttered an impatient exclamation, and paced once or twice up

and down the room.

“See here, Féraz;”--he said, suddenly stopping before the chair in

which his brother sat,--“I swear to you that I am not exercising one

iota of my influence upon you. When I do, I will tell you that you may

be prepared to resist me if you choose. I am using no power of any

kind upon you--be satisfied of that. But, as you have forced your way

into the difficult labyrinth of my life’s work, it is as well that you

should have an explanation of what seems to you full of mysterious

evil and black magic. You accuse me of wickedness,--you tell me I am

guilty of a deed worse than murder. Now this is mere rant and

nonsense,--you speak in such utter ignorance of the facts that I

forgive you, as one is bound to forgive all faults committed through

sheer want of instruction. I do not think I am a wicked man”--he

paused, with an earnest, almost pathetic expression on his face--“at

least I strive not to be. I am ambitious and sceptical--and I am not

altogether convinced of there being any real intention of ultimate

good in the arrangements of this world as they at present exist,--but

I work without any malicious intention; and without undue boasting I

believe I am as honest and conscientious as the best of my kind. But

that is neither here nor there,--as I said before, you have broken

into a secret not intended for your knowledge--and, that you may not

misunderstand me yet more thoroughly than you seem to do, I will tell

you what I never wished to bother your brains with. For you have been

very happy till now, Féraz--happy in the beautiful simplicity of the

life you led--the life of a poet and dreamer,--the happiest life in

the world!”

He broke off, with a short sigh of mingled vexation and regret--then

he seated himself immediately opposite his brother and went on--

“You were too young to understand the loss it was to us both when our

parents died,--or to know the immense reputation our father Nadir

Zarânos had won throughout the East for his marvellous skill in

natural science and medicine. He died in the prime of his life,--our

mother followed him within a month,--and you were left to my

charge,--you a child then, and I almost a man. Our father’s small but

rare library came into my possession, together with his own

manuscripts treating of the scientific and spiritual organisation of

Nature in all its branches,--and these opened such extraordinary

vistas of possibility to me, as to what might be done if such and such

theories could be practically carried out and acted upon, that I

became fired with the ardour of discovery. The more I studied, the

more convinced and eager I became in the pursuit of such knowledge as

is generally deemed supernatural, and beyond the reach of all human

inquiry. One or two delicate experiments in chemistry of a rare and

subtle nature were entirely successful,--and by and by I began to look

about for a subject on whom I could practise the power I had attained.

There was no one whom I could personally watch and surround with my

hourly influence except yourself,--therefore I made my first great

trial upon _you_.”

Féraz moved uneasily in his chair,--his face wore a doubtful,

half-sullen expression, but he listened to El-Râmi’s every word with

vivid and almost painful interest.

“At that time you were a mere boy--” pursued El-Râmi--“but strong and

vigorous, and full of the mischievous pranks and sports customary to

healthy boyhood. I began by slow degrees to educate you--not with the

aid of schools or tutors--but simply by my Will. You had a singularly

unretentive brain,--you were never fond of music--you would never

read,--you had no taste for study. Your delight was to ride--to swim

like a fish,--to handle a gun--to race, to leap,--to play practical

jokes on other boys of your own age and fight them if they resented

it;--all very amusing performances no doubt, but totally devoid of

intelligence. Judging you dispassionately, I found that you were a

very charming gamesome animal,--physically perfect--with a Mind

somewhere if one could only discover it, and a Soul or Spirit behind

the Mind--if one could only discover that also. I set myself the task

of finding out both these hidden portions of your composition--and of

not only finding them, but moulding and influencing them according to

my desire and plan.”

A faint tremor shook the younger man’s frame--but he said nothing.

“You are attending to me closely, I hope?” said El-Râmi

pointedly--“because you must distinctly understand that this

conversation is the first and last we shall have on the matter. After

to-day, the subject must drop between us for ever, and I shall refuse

to answer any more questions. You hear?”

Féraz bent his head.

“I hear--” he answered with an effort--“And what I hear seems strange

and terrible!”

“Strange and terrible?” echoed El-Râmi. “How so? What is there

strange or terrible in the pursuit of Wisdom? Yet--perhaps you are

right, and the blank ignorance of a young child is best,--for there

_is_ something appalling in the infinitude of knowledge--an infinitude

which must remain infinite, if it be true that there is a God who is

for ever thinking, and whose thoughts become realities.”

He paused, with a rapt look,--then resumed in the same even tone,--

“When I had made up my mind to experimentalise upon you, I lost no

time in commencing my work. One of my chief desires was to avoid the

least risk of endangering your health--your physical condition was

admirable, and I resolved to keep it so. In this I succeeded. I made

life a joy to you--the mere act of breathing a pleasure--you grew up

before my eyes like the vigorous sapling of an oak that rejoices in

the mere expansion of its leaves to the fresh air. The other and more

subtle task was harder,--it needed all my patience--all my skill,--but

I was at last rewarded. Through my concentrated influence, which

surrounded you as with an atmosphere in which you moved, and slept,

and woke again, and which forced every fibre of your brain to respond

to mine, the animal faculties, which were strongest in you, became

subdued and tamed,--and the mental slowly asserted themselves. I

resolved you should be a poet and musician--you became both; you

developed an ardent love of study, and every few months that passed

gave richer promise of your ripening intelligence. Moreover, you were

happy,--happy in everything--happiest perhaps in your music, which

became your leading passion. Having thus, unconsciously to yourself,

fostered your mind by the silent workings of my own, and trained it to

grow up like a dower to the light, I thought I might make my next

attempt, which was to probe for that subtle essence we call the

Soul--the large wings that are hidden in the moth’s chrysalis;--and

influence that too;--but there--there, by some inexplicable opposition

of forces, I was baffled.”

Féraz raised himself half out of his chair, his lips parted in

breathless eagerness--his eyes dilated and sparkling.

“Baffled?” he repeated hurriedly--“How do you mean?--in what way?”

“Oh, in various ways--” replied El-Râmi, looking at him with a

somewhat melancholy expression--“Ways that I myself am not able to

comprehend. I found I could influence your Inner Self to obey me,--but

only to a very limited extent, and in mere trifles,--for example, as

you yourself know, I could compel you to come to me from a certain

distance in response to my thought,--but in higher things you escaped

me. You became subject to long trances,--this I was prepared for, as

it was partially my work,--and, during these times of physical

unconsciousness, it was evident that your Soul enjoyed a life and

liberty superior to anything these earth-regions can offer. But you

could never remember all you saw in these absences,--indeed, the only

suggestions you seem to have brought away from that other state of

existence are the strange melodies you play sometimes, and that idea

you have about your native Star.”

A curious expression flitted across Féraz’s face as he heard--and his

lips parted in a slight smile, but he said nothing.

“Therefore,”--pursued his brother meditatively--“as I could get no

clear exposition of other worlds from you, as I had hoped to do, I

knew I had failed to command you in a spiritual sense. But my

dominance over your mind continued; it continues still,--nay, my good

Féraz!”--this, as Féraz seemed about to utter some impetuous

word--“Pray that you may never be able to shake off my force

entirely,--for, if you do, you will lose what the people of a grander

and poetic day called Genius--and what the miserable Dry-as-Dusts of

our modern era call Madness--the only gift of the gods that has ever

served to enlighten and purify the world. But _your_ genius, Féraz,

belongs to _me_;--I gave it to you, and I can take it back again if I

so choose;--and leave you as you originally were--a handsome animal

with no more true conception of art or beauty than my Lord Melthorpe,

or his spendthrift young cousin Vaughan.”

Féraz had listened thus far in silence--but now he sprang out of his

chair with a reckless gesture.

“I cannot bear it!” he said--“I cannot bear it! El-Râmi, I cannot--I

will not!”

“Cannot bear what?” inquired his brother with a touch of satire in his

tone--“Pray be calm!--there is no necessity for such melodramatic

excitement. Cannot bear what?”

“I will not owe everything to you!” went on Féraz passionately--“How

can I endure to know that my very thoughts are not my own, but emanate

from you?--that my music has been instilled into me by you?--that you

possess me by your power, body and brain,--great Heaven! it is

awful--intolerable--impossible!”

El-Râmi rose and laid one hand gently on his shoulder--he recoiled

shudderingly--and the elder man sighed heavily.

“You tremble at my touch,--” he said sadly--“the touch of a hand that

has never wilfully wrought you harm, but has always striven to make

life beautiful to you? Well!--be it so!--you have only to say the

word, Féraz, and you shall owe me nothing. I will undo all I have

done,--and you shall reassume the existence for which Nature

originally made you--an idle voluptuous wasting of time in sensualism

and folly. And even _that_ form of life you must owe to Some

One,--even that you must account for--to God!”

The young man’s head drooped,--a faint sense of shame stirred in him,

but he was still resentful and sullen.

“What have I done to you,” went on El-Râmi, “that you should turn

from me thus, all because you have seen a dead woman’s face for an

hour? I have made your thoughts harmonious--I have given you pleasure

such as the world’s ways cannot give--your mind has been as a clear

mirror in which only the fairest visions of life were reflected. You

would alter this?--then do so, if you decide thereon,--but weigh the

matter well and long, before you shake off my touch, my tenderness, my

care.”

His voice faltered a little--but he quickly controlled his emotion,

and continued--

“I must ask you to sit down again and hear me out patiently to the end

of my story. At present I have only told you what concerns

yourself--and how the failure of my experiment upon the spiritual part

of your nature obliged me to seek for another subject on whom to

continue my investigations. As far as you are personally concerned, no

failure is apparent--for your spirit is allowed frequent intervals of

supernatural freedom, in which you have experiences that give you

peculiar pleasure, though you are unable to impart them to me with

positive lucidity. You visit a Star--so you say--with which you really

seem to have some home connection--but you never get beyond this, so

that it would appear that any higher insight is denied you. Now what I

needed to obtain was not only a higher insight, but the highest

knowledge that could possibly be procured through a mingled

combination of material and spiritual essences, and it was many a long

and weary day before I found what I sought. At last my hour came--as

it comes to all who have the patience and fortitude to wait for it.”

He paused a moment--then went on more quickly--

“You remember of course that occasion on which we chanced upon a party

of Arab wanderers who were journeying across the Syrian desert?--all

poor and ailing, and almost destitute of food or water?”

“I remember it perfectly!” and Féraz, seating himself opposite his

brother again, listened with renewed interest and attention.

“They had two dying persons with them,” continued El-Râmi--“An

elderly woman--a widow, known as Zaroba,--the other an orphan girl of

about twelve years of age named Lilith. Both were perishing of fever

and famine. I came to the rescue. I saved Zaroba,--and she, with the

passionate impulsiveness of her race, threw herself in gratitude at my

feet, and swore by all her most sacred beliefs that she would be my

slave from henceforth as long as she lived. All her people were dead,

she told me--she was alone in the world--she prayed me to let her be

my faithful servant. And truly, her fidelity has never failed--till

now. But of that hereafter. The child Lilith, more fragile of frame

and weakened to the last extremity of exhaustion--in spite of my

unremitting care--died. Do you thoroughly understand me--she _died_.”

“She died!” repeated Féraz slowly--“Well--what then?”

“I was supporting her in my arms”--said El-Râmi, the ardour of his

description growing upon him, and his black eyes dilating and burning

like great jewels under the darkness of his brows--“when she drew her

last breath and sank back--a corpse. But before her flesh had time to

stiffen,--before the warmth had gone out of her blood,--an idea, wild

and daring, flashed across my mind. ‘If this child has a Soul,’ I said

to myself--‘I will stay it in its flight from hence! It shall become

the new Ariel of my wish and will--and not till it has performed my

bidding to the utmost extent will I, like another Prospero, give it

its true liberty. And I will preserve the body, its mortal shell, by

artificial means, that through its medium I may receive the messages

of the Spirit in mortal language such as I am able to understand.’ No

sooner had I conceived my bold project than I proceeded to carry it

into execution. I injected into the still warm veins of the dead girl

a certain fluid whose properties I alone know the working of--and then

I sought and readily obtained permission from the Arabs to bury her in

the desert, while they went on their way. They were in haste to

continue their journey, and were grateful to me for taking this office

off their hands. That very day--the day the girl died--I sent _you_

from me, as you know, bidding you make all possible speed, on an

errand which I easily invented, to the Brethren of the Cross in the

Island of Cyprus,--you went obediently enough,--surprised perhaps, but

suspecting nothing. That same evening, when the heats abated and the

moon rose, the caravan resumed its pilgrimage, leaving Lilith’s dead

body with me, and also the woman Zaroba, who volunteered to remain and

serve me in my tent, an offer which I accepted, seeing that it was her

own desire, and that she would be useful to me. She, poor silly soul,

took me then for a sort of god, because she was unable to understand

the miracle of her own recovery from imminent death, and I felt

certain I could rely upon her fidelity. Part of my plan I told

her,--she heard with mingled fear and reverence,--the magic of the

East was in her blood, however, and she had a superstitious belief

that a truly ‘wise man’ could do anything. So, for several days we

stayed encamped in the desert--I passing all my hours beside the dead

Lilith,--dead, but to a certain extent living through artificial

means. As soon as I received proof positive that my experiment was

likely to be successful, I procured means to continue my journey on to

Alexandria, and thence to England. To all inquirers I said the girl

was a patient of mine who was suffering from epileptic trances, and

the presence of Zaroba, who filled her post admirably as nurse and

attendant, was sufficient to stop the mouths of would-be

scandal-mongers. I chose my residence in London, because it is the

largest city in the world, and the one most suited to pursue a course

of study in, without one’s motives becoming generally known. One can

be more alone in London than in a desert if one chooses. Now, you know

all. You have seen the dead Lilith,--the human chrysalis of the

moth,--but there is a living Lilith too--the Soul of Lilith, which is

partly free and partly captive, but in both conditions is always the

servant of my Will!”

Féraz looked at him in mingled awe and fear.

“El-Râmi,”--he said tremulously--“What you tell me is

wonderful--terrible--almost beyond belief,--but, I know something of

your power and I must believe you. Only--surely you are in error when

you say that Lilith is dead? How can she be dead, if you have given

her life?”

“Can you call that life which sleeps perpetually and will not wake?”

demanded El-Râmi.

“Would you have her wake?” asked Féraz, his heart beating quickly.

El-Râmi bent his burning gaze upon him.

“Not so,--for if she wakes, in the usual sense of waking--she dies a

second death from which there can be no recall. There is the terror of

the thing. Zaroba’s foolish teaching, and your misguided yielding to

her temptation, might have resulted in the fatal end to my life’s best

and grandest work. But--I forgive you;--you did not know,--and

she--she did not wake.”

“She did not wake,” echoed Féraz softly. “No--but--she smiled!”

El-Râmi still kept his eyes fixed upon him,--there was an odd sense

of irritation in his usually calm and coldly balanced organisation--a

feeling he strove in vain to subdue. She smiled!--the exquisite

Lilith--the life-in-death Lilith smiled, because Féraz had called her

by some endearing name! Surely it could not be!--and, smothering his

annoyance, he turned towards the writing-table and feigned to arrange

some books and papers there.

“El-Râmi--” murmured Féraz again, but timidly--“If she was a child

when she died as you say--how is it she has grown to womanhood?”

“By artificial vitality,”--said El-Râmi--“As a flower is forced under

a hothouse,--and with no more trouble, and less consciousness of

effort than a rose under a glass dome.”

“Then she lives,--” declared Féraz impetuously. “She

lives,--artificial or natural, she _has_ vitality. Through your power

she exists, and if you chose, oh, if you chose, El-Râmi, you could

wake her to the fullest life--to perfect consciousness,--to joy--to

love!--Oh, she is in a blessed trance--you cannot call her _dead_!”

El-Râmi turned upon him abruptly.

“Be silent!” he said sternly--“I read your thoughts,--control them, if

you are wise! You echo Zaroba’s prating--Zaroba’s teaching. Lilith is

dead, I tell you,--dead to you,--and, in the sense _you_ mean--dead to

me.”

XIV.

After this, a long silence fell between them. Féraz sat moodily in

his chair, conscious of a certain faint sense of shame. He was sorry

that he had wilfully trespassed upon his brother’s great secret,--and

yet there was an angry pride in him,--a vague resentment at having

been kept so long in ignorance of this wonderful story of

Lilith,--which made him reluctant to acknowledge himself in the wrong.

Moreover, his mind was possessed and haunted by Lilith’s face,--the

radiant face that looked like that of an angel sleeping,--and,

perplexedly thinking over all he had heard, he wondered if he would

ever again have the opportunity of beholding what had seemed to him

the incarnation of ideal loveliness. Surely yes!--Zaroba would be his

friend,--Zaroba would let him gaze his fill on that exquisite

form--would let him touch that little, ethereally delicate hand, as

soft as velvet and as white as snow! Absorbed in these reflections, he

scarcely noticed that El-Râmi had moved away from him to the

writing-table, and that he now sat there in his ebony chair, turning

over the leaves of the curious Arabic volume which Féraz had had such

trouble in deciphering on the previous day. The silence in the room

continued; outside there was the perpetual sullen roar of raging

restless London,--now and again the sharp chirruping of contentious

sparrows, arguing over a crumb of food as parliamentary agitators

chatter over a crumb of difference, stirred the quiet air. Féraz

stretched himself and yawned,--he was getting sleepy, and as he

realised this fact he nervously attributed it to his brother’s

influence, and sprang up abruptly, rubbing his eyes and pushing his

thick hair from his brows. At this hasty movement, El-Râmi turned

slowly towards him with a grave yet kindly smile.

“Well, Féraz”--he said--“Do you still think me ‘wicked’ now you know

all? Speak frankly--do not be afraid.”

Féraz paused, irresolute.

“I do not know what to think--” he answered hesitatingly,--“Your

experiment is of course wonderful,--but--as I said before--to me, it

seems terrible.”

“Life is terrible--” said El-Râmi--“Death is terrible,--Love is

terrible,--God is terrible. All Nature’s pulses beat to the note of

Terror,--terror of the Unknown that May Be,--terror of the Known that

Is!”

His deep voice rang with impressive solemnity through the room,--his

eyes were full of that strange lurid gleam which gave them the

appearance of having a flame behind them.

“Come here, Féraz,” he continued--“Why do you stand at so cautious a

distance from me? With that brave show-dagger at your belt, are you a

coward? Silly lad!--I swear to you my influence shall not touch you

unless I warn you of it beforehand. Come!”

Féraz obeyed, but slowly and with an uncertain step. His brother

looked at him attentively as he came,--then, with a gesture indicating

the volume before him, he said--

“You found this book on my table yesterday, and tried to read it,--is

it not so?”

“I did.”

“Well, and have you learnt anything from it?” pursued El-Râmi with a

strange smile.

“Yes. I learnt how the senses may be deceived by trickery--” retorted

Féraz with some heat and quickness--“and how a clever

magnetiser--like yourself--may fool the eye and delude the ear with

sights and sounds that have no existence.”

“Precisely. Listen to this passage;”--and El-Râmi read aloud--“‘The

King, when he had any affair, assembled the Priests without the City

Memphis, and the People met together in the streets of the said City.

Then they (the Priests) made their entrance one after another in

order, the drum beating before them to bring the people together; and

every one made some miraculous discovery of his Magick and Wisdom. One

had, _to their thinking who looked on him_, his face surrounded with a

light like that of the Sun, so that none could look earnestly upon

him. Another seemed clad with a Robe beset with precious stones of

divers colours, green, red, or yellow, or wrought with gold. Another

came mounted on a Lion compassed with Serpents like Girdles. Another

came in covered with a canopy or pavilion of Light. Another appeared

surrounded with Fire turning about him, so as that nobody durst come

near him. Another was seen with dreadful birds perching about his head

and shaking their wings like black eagles and vultures. In fine, every

one did what was taught him;--_yet all was but Apparition and Illusion

without any reality_, insomuch that when they came up to the King they

spake thus to him:--_You imagined that it was so and so,--but the

truth is that it was such or such a thing_.’[2] The A B C of

magnetism is contained in the last words--” continued El-Râmi,

lifting his eyes from the book,--“The merest tyro in the science knows

that; and also realises that the Imagination is the centre of both

physical and bodily health or disease. And did you learn nothing

more?”

Féraz made a half-angry gesture in the negative.

“What a pity!”--and his brother surveyed him with good-humoured

compassion--“To know how a ‘miracle’ is done is one thing--but to do

it is quite another matter. Now let me recall to your mind what I

previously told you--that from this day henceforth I forbid you to

make any allusion to the subject of my work. I forbid you to mention

the name of Lilith,--and I forbid you to approach or to enter the room

where her body lies. You understand me?--I forbid you!”

Féraz’s eyes flashed angry opposition, and he drew himself up with a

haughty self-assertiveness.

“You forbid me!” he echoed proudly--“What right have you to forbid me

anything? And how if I refuse to obey?”

El-Râmi rose and confronted him, one hand resting on the big Arabic

volume.

“You will not refuse--” he said--“because I will take no refusal. You

will obey, because I exact your obedience. Moreover, you will swear by

the Most Holy Name of God, that you will never, either to me, or to

any other living soul, speak a syllable concerning my life’s greatest

experiment,--you will swear that the name of Lilith shall never pass

your lips----”

But here Féraz interrupted him.

“El-Râmi, I will _not_ swear!” he cried desperately--“The name of

Lilith is sweet to me!--why should I not utter it,--why should I not

sing of it--why should I not even remember it in my prayers?”

A terrible look darkened El-Râmi’s countenance; his brows contracted

darkly, and his lips drew together in a close resolute line.

“There are a thousand reasons why--” he said in low fierce

accents,--“One is, that the soul of Lilith and the body of Lilith are

_mine_, and that you have no share in their possession. She does not

need your songs--still less has she need of your prayers. Rash

fool!--you shall forget the name of Lilith--and you _shall_ swear, as

I command you. Resist my will if you can,--now!--I warn you in time!”

He seemed to grow in height as he spoke,--his eyes blazed ominously,

and Féraz, meeting that lightning-like glance, knew how hopeless it

would be for him to attempt to oppose such an intense force as was

contained in this man’s mysterious organisation. He tried his

best,--but in vain,--with every second he felt his strength oozing out

of him--his power of resistance growing less and less.

“Swear!” said El-Râmi imperatively--“Swear in God’s Name to keep my

secret--swear by Christ’s Death!--swear on _this_!”

And he held out a small golden crucifix.

Mechanically, but still devoutly, Féraz instantly dropped on one

knee, and kissed the holy emblem.

“I swear!” he said--but, as he spoke, the rising tears were in his

throat, and he murmured--“Forget the name of Lilith!--never!”

“In God’s Name!” said El-Râmi.

“In God’s Name!”

“By Christ’s Death!”

Féraz trembled. In the particular form of religion professed by

himself and his brother, this was the most solemn and binding vow that

could be taken. And his voice was faint and unsteady as he repeated

it--

“By Christ’s Death!”

El-Râmi put aside the crucifix.

“That is well;--” he said, in mild accents which contrasted agreeably

with his previous angry tone--“Such oaths are chronicled in heaven,

remember,--and whoever breaks his sworn word is accursed of the gods.

But you,--you will keep your vow, Féraz,--and ... you will also

forget the name of Lilith,--if I choose!”

Féraz stood mute and motionless,--he would have said something, but

somehow words failed him to express what was in his mind. He was

angry, he said to himself,--he had sworn a foolish oath against his

will, and he had every right to be angry--very angry,--but with whom?

Surely not with his brother--his friend,--his protector for so many

years? As he thought of this, shame and penitence and old affection

grew stronger and welled up in his heart, and he moved slowly towards

El-Râmi, with hands outstretched.

“Forgive me;”--he said humbly. “I have offended you--I am sorry. I

will show my repentance in whatever way you please,--but do not,

El-Râmi--do not ask me, do not force me to forget the name of

Lilith,--it is like a note in music, and it cannot do you harm that I

should think of it sometimes. For the rest I will obey you

faithfully,--and, for what is past, I ask your pardon.”

El-Râmi took his hands and pressed them affectionately in his own.

“No sooner asked than granted--” he said--“You are young, Féraz,--and

I am not so harsh as you perhaps imagine. The impulsiveness of youth

should always be quickly pardoned--seeing how gracious a thing youth

is, and how short a time it lasts. Keep your poetic dreams and

fancies--take the sweetness of thought without its bitterness,--and,

if you are content to have it so, let me still help to guide your

fate. If not, why, nothing is easier than to part company,--part as

good friends and brethren always,--you on your chosen road and I on

mine,--who knows but that after all you might n be happier so?”

Féraz lifted his dark eyes, heavy with unshed tears.

“Would you send me from you?” he asked falteringly.

“Not I! I would not send you,--but you might wish to go.”

“Never!” said Féraz resolutely--“I feel that I must stay with

you--till the end.”

He uttered the last words with a sigh, and El-Râmi looked at him

curiously.

“Till the end?”--he repeated--“What end?”

“Oh, the end of life or death or anything;” replied Féraz with forced

lightness--“There must surely be an end somewhere, as there was a

beginning.”

“That is rather a doubtful problem!” said El-Râmi--“The great

question is, was there ever a Beginning? and will there ever be an

End?”

Féraz gave a languid gesture.

“You inquire too far,”--he said wearily--“I always think you inquire

too far. I cannot follow you--I am tired. Do you want anything?--can I

do anything? or may I go to my room? I want to be alone for a little

while, just to consider quietly what my life is, and what I can make

of it.”

“A truly wise and philosophical subject of meditation!” observed

El-Râmi, and he smiled kindly and held out his hand. Féraz laid his

own slender fingers somewhat listlessly in that firm warm

palm;--then--with a sudden start, looked eagerly around him. The air

seemed to have grown denser,--there was a delicious scent of roses in

the room, and hush! ... What entrancing voices were those that sang in

the distance? He listened absorbed;--the harmonies were very sweet and

perfect--almost he thought he could distinguish words. Loosening his

hand from his brother’s clasp, the melody seemed to grow fainter and

fainter,--recognising this, he roused himself with a quick movement,

his eyes flashing with a sudden gleam of defiance.

“More magic music!” he said--“I hear the sound of singing, and you

_know_ that I hear it! I understand!--it is _imagined_ music--your

work, El-Râmi,--your skill. It is wonderful, beautiful,--and you are

the most marvellous man on earth!--you should have been a priest of

old Egypt! Yes--I am tired--I will rest;--I will accept the dreams you

offer me for what they are worth,--but I must remember that there are

realities as well as dreams,--and I shall not forget the name

of--Lilith!”

He smiled audaciously, looking as graceful as a pictured Adonis in the

careless yet proud attitude he had unconsciously assumed,--then with a

playful yet affectionate salutation he moved to the doorway.

“Call me if you want me,” he said.

“I shall not want you;”--replied his brother, regarding him steadily.

The door opened and closed again,--Féraz was gone.

Shutting up the great volume in front of him, El-Râmi rested his arms

upon it, and stared into vacancy with darkly-knitted brows.

“What premonition of evil is there in the air?” he muttered--“What

restless emotion is at work within me? Are the Fates turning against

me?--and am I after all nothing but the merest composition of vulgar

matter--a weak human wretch capable of being swayed by changeful

passions? What is it? What am I that I should vex my spirit thus--all

because Lilith smiled at the sound of a voice that was not mine?”

XV.

Just then there came a light tap at his door. He opened it,--and

Zaroba stood before him. No repentance for her fault of disobedience

and betrayal of trust clouded that withered old face of hers,--her

deep-set dark eyes glittered with triumph, and her whole aspect was

one of commanding, and almost imperious, dignity. In fact, she made

such an ostentatious show of her own self-importance in her look and

manner that El-Râmi stared at her for a moment in haughty amazement

at what he considered her effrontery in thus boldly facing him after

her direct violation of his commands. He eyed her up and down--she

returned him glance for glance unquailingly.

“Let me come in--” she said in her strong harsh voice--“I make no

doubt but that the poor lad Féraz has told you his story--now, as God

liveth, you must hear mine.”

El-Râmi turned upon his heel with a contemptuous movement, and went

back to his own chair by the writing-table. Zaroba, paying no heed to

the wrath conveyed by this mute action, stalked in also, and, shutting

the door after her, came and stood close beside him.

“Write down what you think of me--” she said, pointing with her yellow

forefinger at the pens and paper--“Write the worst. I have betrayed my

trust. That is true. I have disobeyed your commands after keeping them

for six long years. True again. What else?”

El-Râmi fixed his eyes upon her, a world of indignation and reproach

in their brilliant depths, and snatching up a pencil he wrote on a

slip of paper rapidly--

“Nothing else--nothing more than treachery! You are unworthy of your

sacred task--you are false to your sworn fidelity.”

Zaroba read the lines as quickly as he wrote them, but when she came

to the last words she made a swift gesture of denial, and drew herself

up haughtily.

“No--not false!” she said passionately--“Not false to _you_, El-Râmi,

I swear! I would slay myself rather than do you wrong. You saved my

life, though my life was not worth saving, and for that gentle deed I

would pour out every drop of my blood to requite you. No, no! Zaroba

is not false--she is true!”

She tossed up her arms wildly,--then suddenly folding them tight

across her chest, she dropped her voice to a gentler and more

appealing tone.

“Hear me, El-Râmi!--Hear me, wise man and Master of the magic of the

East!--I have done well for you;--well! I have disobeyed you for your

own sake,--I have betrayed my trust that you may discover how and

where you may find your best reward. I have sinned with the resolved

intent to make you happy,--as God liveth, I speak truth from my heart

and soul!”

El-Râmi turned towards her, his face expressing curiosity in spite of

himself. He was very pale, and outwardly he was calm enough--but his

nerves were on the rack of suspense--he wondered what sudden frenzied

idea had possessed this woman that she should comport herself as

though she held some strange secret of which the very utterance might

move heaven and earth to wonderment. Controlling his feelings with an

effort he wrote again--

“There exists no reason for disloyalty. Your excuses avail

nothing--let me hear no more of them. Tell me of Lilith--what news?”

“News!” repeated Zaroba scornfully--“What news should there be? She

breathes and sleeps as she has breathed and slept always--she has not

stirred. There is no harm done by my bidding Féraz look on her,--no

change is wrought except in _you_, El-Râmi!--except in you!”

Half springing from his chair he confronted her--then recollecting her

deafness, he bit his lips angrily and sank back again with an assumed

air of indifference.

“You have heard Féraz--” pursued Zaroba, with that indescribable

triumph of hers lighting up her strong old face--“You must now hear

me. I thank the gods that my ears are closed to the sound of human

voices, and that neither reproach nor curse can move me to dismay. And

I am ignorant of _your_ magic, El-Râmi,--the magic that chills the

blood and sends the spirit flitting through the land of dreams,--the

only magic _I_ know is the magic of the heart--of the passions,--a

natural witchcraft that conquers the world!”

She waved her arms to and fro--then crossing them on her bosom, she

made a profound half-mocking salutation.

“Wise El-Râmi Zarânos!” she said. “Proud ruler of the arts and

sciences that govern Nature,--have you ever, with all your learning,

taken the measure of your own passions, and slain them so utterly that

they shall never rise up again? They sleep at times, like the serpents

of the desert, coiled up in many a secret place,--but at the touch of

some unwary heel, some casual falling pebble, they unwind their

lengths--they raise their glittering heads, and sting! I, Zaroba, have

felt them here”--and she pressed her hands more closely on her

breast--“I have felt their poison in my blood--sweet poison, sweeter

than life!--their stings have given me all the joy my days have ever

known. But it is not of myself that I should speak--it is of you--of

you, whose life is lonely, and for whom the coming years hold forth no

prospect of delight. When I lay dying in the desert and you restored

me to strength again, I swore to serve you with fidelity. As God

liveth, El-Râmi, I have kept my vow,--and in return for the life you

gave me I bid you take what is yours to claim--the love of Lilith!”

El-Râmi rose out of his chair, white to the lips, and his hand shook.

If he could have concentrated his inward forces at that moment, he

would have struck Zaroba dumb by one effort of his will, and so put an

end to her undesired eloquence,--but something, he knew not what,

disturbed the centre of his self-control, and his thoughts were in a

whirl. He despised himself for the unusual emotion which seized

him--inwardly he was furious with the garrulous old woman,--but

outwardly he could only make her an angry imperative sign to be

silent.

“Nay, I will not cease from speaking--” said Zaroba

imperturbably--“for all has to be said now, or never. The love of

Lilith! imagine it, El-Râmi!--the clinging of her young white

arms--the kisses of her sweet red mouth,--the open glances of her

innocent eyes--all this is yours, if you but say the word. Listen! For

six and more long years I have watched her,--and I have watched _you_.

She has slept the sleep of death-in-life, for you have willed it

so,--and in that sleep she has imperceptibly passed from childhood to

womanhood. You--cold as a man of bronze or marble,--have made of her

nothing but a ‘subject’ for your science,--and never a breath of love

or longing on your part, or even admiration for her beauty, has

stirred the virgin-trance in which she lies. And I have marvelled at

it--I have thought--and I have prayed;--the gods have answered me, and

now I know!”

She clapped her hands ecstatically, and then went on.

“The child Lilith died,--but you, El-Râmi, you caused her to live

again. And she lives still--yes, though it may suit your fancy to

declare her dead. She is a woman--you are a man;--you dare not keep

her longer in that living death--you dare not doom her to perpetual

darkness!--the gods would curse you for such cruelty, and who may

abide their curse? I, Zaroba, have sworn it--Lilith shall know the

joys of love!--and you, El-Râmi Zarânos, shall be her lover!--and

for this holy end I have employed the talisman which alone sets fire

to the sleeping passions...” and she craned her neck forward and

almost hissed the word in his ear--“Jealousy!”

El-Râmi smiled--a cold derisive smile, which implied the most utter

contempt for the whole of Zaroba’s wild harangue. She, however, went

on undismayed, and with increasing excitement--

“Jealousy!” she cried--“The little asp is in your soul already, proud

El-Râmi Zarânos, and why? Because another’s eyes have looked on

Lilith! This was my work! It was I who led Féraz into her

chamber,--it was I who bade him kneel beside her as she slept,--it was

I who let him touch her hand,--and though I could not hear his voice I

know he called upon her to awaken. In vain!--he might as well have

called the dead--I knew she would not stir for him--her very breath

belongs to you. But I--I let him gaze upon her beauty and worship

it,--all his young soul was in his eyes--he looked and looked again

and _loved_ what he beheld! And mark me yet further, El-Râmi,--I saw

her smile when Féraz took her hand,--so, though she did not move, she

_felt_; she felt a touch that was not yours,--not yours, El-Râmi!--as

God liveth, she is not quite so much your own as once she was!”

As she said this and laughed in that triumphant way, El-Râmi advanced

one step towards her with a fierce movement as though he would have

thrust her from the room,--checking himself, however, he seized the

pencil again and wrote--

“I have listened to you with more patience than you deserve. You are

an ignorant woman and foolish--your fancies have no foundation

whatever in fact. Your disobedience might have ruined my life’s

work,--as it is, I daresay some mischief has been done. Return to your

duties, and take heed how you trespass against my command in future.

If you dare to speak to me on this subject again I will have you

shipped back to your own land and left there, as friendless and as

unprovided for as you were when I saved you from death by famine.

Go--and let me hear no more foolishness.”

Zaroba read, and her face darkened and grew weary--but the pride and

obstinacy of her own convictions remained written on every line of her

features. She bowed her head resignedly, however, and said in slow

even tones--

“El-Râmi Zarânos is wise,--El-Râmi Zarânos is master. But let him

remember the words of Zaroba. Zaroba is also skilled in the ways and

the arts of the East,--and the voice of Fate speaks sometimes to the

lowest as well as to the highest. There are the laws of Life and the

laws of Death--but there are also the laws of Love. Without the laws

of Love, the Universe would cease to be,--it is for El-Râmi Zarânos

to prove himself stronger than the Universe,--if he can!”

She made the usual obsequious “salaam” common to Eastern races, and

then with a swift, silent movement left the room, closing the door

noiselessly behind her. El-Râmi stood where she had left him, idly

tearing up the scraps of paper on which he had written his part of the

conversation,--he was hardly conscious of thought, so great were his

emotions of surprise and self-contempt.

“‘O what a rogue and peasant-slave am I!’” he muttered, quoting his

favourite _Hamlet_--“Why did I not paralyse her tongue before she

spoke? Where had fled my force,--what became of my skill? Surely I

could have struck her down before me with the speed of a

lightning-flash--only--she is a woman--and old. Strange how these

feminine animals always harp on the subject of love, as though it were

the Be-all and End-all of everything. The love of Lilith! Oh fool! The

love of a corpse kept breathing by artificial means! And what of the

Soul of Lilith? Can It love? Can It hate? Can It even feel? Surely

not. It is an ethereal transparency,--a delicate film which takes upon

itself the reflex of all existing things without experiencing personal

emotion. Such is the Soul, as I believe in it--an immortal Essence, in

itself formless, yet capable of taking all forms,--ignorant of the

joys or pains of feeling, yet reflecting all shades of sensation as a

crystal reflects all colours in the prism. This, and no more.”

He paced up and down the room--and a deep involuntary sigh escaped

him.

“No--” he murmured, as though answering some inward query--“No, I will

not go to her now--not till the appointed time. I resolved on an

absence of forty-eight hours, and forty-eight hours it shall be. Then

I will go,--and she will tell me all--I shall know the full extent of

the mischief done. And so Féraz ‘looked and looked again, and _loved_

what he beheld!’ Love! The very word seems like a desecrating blot on

the virgin soul of Lilith!”

XVI.

Féraz meanwhile was fast asleep in his own room. He had sought to

be alone for the purpose of thinking quietly and connectedly over all

he had heard,--but no sooner had he obtained the desired solitude than

a sudden and heavy drowsiness overcame him, such as he was unable to

resist, and, throwing himself on his bed, he dropped into a profound

slumber, which deepened as the minutes crept on. The afternoon wore

slowly away,--sunset came and passed,--the coming shadows lengthened,

and just as the first faint star peeped out in the darkening skies he

awoke, startled to find it so late. He sprang from his couch,

bewildered and vexed with himself,--it was time for supper, he

thought, and El-Râmi must be waiting. He hastened to the study, and

there he found his brother conversing with a gentleman,--no other than

Lord Melthorpe, who was talking in a loud cheerful voice, which

contrasted oddly with El-Râmi’s slow musical accents, that ever had a

note of sadness in them. When Féraz made his hurried entrance, his

eyes humid with sleep, yet dewily brilliant,--his thick dark hair

tangled in rough curls above his brows, Lord Melthorpe stared at him

in honestly undisguised admiration, and then glanced at El-Râmi

inquiringly.

“My brother, Féraz Zarânos”--said El-Râmi, readily performing the

ceremony of introduction--“Féraz, this is Lord Melthorpe,--you have

heard me speak of him.”

Féraz bowed with his usual perfect grace, and Lord Melthorpe shook

hands with him.

“Upon my word!” he said good-humouredly, “this young gentleman reminds

one of the _Arabian Nights_, El-Râmi! He looks like one of those

amazing fellows who always had remarkable adventures; Prince Ahmed, or

the son of a king, or something--don’t you know?”

El-Râmi smiled gravely.

“The Eastern dress is responsible for that idea in your mind, no

doubt--” he replied--“Féraz wears it in the house, because he moves

more easily and is more comfortable in it than in the regulation

British attire, which really is the most hideous mode of garb in the

world. Englishmen are among the finest types of the human race, but

their dress does them scant justice.”

“You are right--we’re all on the same tailor’s pattern--and a

frightful pattern it is!” and his lordship put up his eyeglass to

survey Féraz once more, the while he thought--“Devilish handsome

fellow!--would make quite a sensation in the room--new sort of craze

for my lady.” Aloud he said--“Pray bring your brother with you on

Tuesday evening--my wife will be charmed.”

“Féraz never goes into society--” replied El-Râmi--“But of course,

if you insist----”

“Oh, I never insist--” declared Lord Melthorpe, laughing, “_You_ are

the man for insisting, not I. But I shall take it as a favour if he

will accompany you.”

“You hear, Féraz--” and El-Râmi looked at his brother

inquiringly--“Lord Melthorpe invites you to a great reception next

Tuesday evening. Would you like to go?”

Féraz glanced from one to the other half smilingly, half doubtfully.

“Yes, I should like it,” he said at last.

“Then we shall expect you,--” and Lord Melthorpe rose to take his

leave,--“It’s a sort of diplomatic and official affair--fellows will

look in either before or after the Foreign Office crush, which is on

the same evening, and orders and decorations will be in full force, I

believe. Oh, by the way, Lady Melthorpe begged me to ask you most

particularly to wear Oriental dress.”

“I shall obey her ladyship;”--and El-Râmi smiled a little

satirically--the character of the lady in question was one that always

vaguely amused him.

“And your brother will do the same, I hope?”

“Assuredly!” and El-Râmi shook hands with his visitor, bidding Féraz

escort him to the door. When he had gone, Féraz sprang into the study

again with all the eager impetuosity of a boy.

“What is it like--a reception in England?” he asked--“And why does

Lord Melthorpe ask me?”

“I cannot imagine!” returned his brother drily--“Why do you want to

go?”

“I should like to see life;”--said Féraz.

“See life!” echoed El-Râmi somewhat disdainfully--“What do you mean?

Don’t you ‘see life’ as it is?”

“No!” answered Féraz quickly--“I see men and women--but I don’t know

how they live, and I don’t know what they do.”

“They live in a perpetual effort to out-reach and injure one

another”--said El-Râmi, “and all their forces are concentrated on

bringing themselves into notice. That is how they live,--that is what

they do. It is not a dignified or noble way of living, but it is all

they care about. You will see illustrations of this at Lord

Melthorpe’s reception. You will find the woman with the most diamonds

giving herself peacock-like airs over the woman who has fewest,--you

will see the snob-millionaire treated with greater consideration by

every one than the born gentleman who happens to have little of this

world’s wealth. You will find that no one thinks of putting himself

out to give personal pleasure to another,--you will hear the same

commonplace observations from every mouth,--you will discover a lack

of wit, a dearth of kindness, a scarcity of cheerfulness, and a most

desperate want of tact in every member of the whole fashionable

assemblage. And so you shall ‘see life’--if you think you can discern

it there. Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof!--meanwhile let

us have supper,--time flies, and I have work to do to-night that must

be done.”

Féraz busied himself nimbly about his usual duties--the frugal meal

was soon prepared and soon dispensed with, and, at its close, the

brothers sat in silence, El-Râmi watching Féraz with a curious

intentness, because he felt for the first time in his life that he was

not quite master of the young man’s thoughts. Did he still remember

the name of Lilith? El-Râmi had willed that every trace of it should

vanish from his memory during that long afternoon sleep in which the

lad had indulged himself unresistingly,--but the question was now--Had

that force of will gained the victory? He, El-Râmi, could not

tell--not yet--but he turned the problem over and over in his mind

with sombre irritation and restlessness. Presently Féraz broke the

silence. Drawing from his vest pocket a small manuscript book, and

raising his eyes, he said--

“Do you mind hearing something I wrote last night? I don’t quite know

how it came to me--I think I must have been dreaming----”

“Read on;”--said El-Râmi--“If it be poesy, then its origin cannot be

explained. Were you able to explain it, it would become prose.”

“I daresay the lines are not very good,”--went on Féraz

diffidently--“yet they are the true expression of a thought that is in

me. And whether I owe it to you, or to my own temperament, I have

visions now and then--visions not only of love, but of fame--strange

glories that I almost realise, yet cannot grasp. And there is a

sadness and futility in it all that grieves me ... everything is so

vague and swift and fleeting. Yet if love, as you say, be a mere

chimera,--surely there is such a thing as Fame?”

“There is--” and El-Râmi’s eyes flashed, then darkened again--“There

is the applause of this world, which may mean the derision of the

next. Read on!”

Féraz obeyed. “I call it for the present ‘The Star of Destiny’”--he

said; and then his mellifluous voice, rich and well modulated, gave

flowing musical enunciation to the following lines:

“The soft low plash of waves upon the shore,

Mariners’ voices singing out at sea,

The sighing of the wind that evermore

Chants to my spirit mystic melody,--

These are the mingling sounds I vaguely hear

As o’er the darkening misty main I gaze,

Where one fair planet, warmly bright and clear,

Pours from its heart a rain of silver rays.

“O patient Star of Love! in yon pale sky

What absolute serenity is thine!

Beneath thy steadfast, half-reproachful eye

Large Ocean chafes,--and, white with bitter brine,

Heaves restlessly, and ripples from the light

To darker shadows,--ev’n as noble thought

Recoils from human passion, to a night

Of splendid gloom by its own mystery wrought.”

“What made you think of the sea?” interrupted El-Râmi.

Féraz looked up dreamily.

“I don’t know,”--he said.

“Well!--go on!”

Féraz continued,--

“O searching Star, I bring my grief to thee,--

Regard it, Thou, as pitying angels may

Regard a tortured saint,--and, down to me

Send one bright glance, one heart-assuring ray

From that high throne where thou in sheeny state

Dost hang, thought-pensive, ’twixt the heaven and earth;

Thou, sure, dost know the secret of my Fate,

For thou didst shine upon my hour of birth.

“O Star, from whom the clouds asunder roll,

Tell this poor spirit pent in dying flesh,

This fighting, working, praying, prisoned soul,

Why it is trapped and strangled in the mesh

Of foolish Life and Time? Its wild young voice

Calls for release, unanswered and unstilled,--

It sought not out this world,--it had no choice

Of other worlds where glory is fulfilled.

“How hard to live at all, if living be

The thing it seems to us!--the few brief years

Made up of toil and sorrow, where we see

No joy without companionship of tears,--

What is the artist’s fame?--the golden chords

Of rapt musician? or the poet’s themes?

All incomplete!--the nailed-down coffin boards

Are mocking sequels to the grandest dreams.”

“That is not your creed,”--said El-Râmi with a searching look.

Féraz sighed. “No--it is not my actual creed--but it is my frequent

thought.”

“A thought unworthy of you,”--said his brother--“There is nothing left

‘incomplete’ in the whole Universe--and there is no sequel possible to

Creation.”

“Perhaps not,--but again perhaps there may be a sequel beyond all

imagination or comprehension. And surely you must admit that some

things are left distressingly incomplete. Shelley’s ‘Fragments’ for

instance, Keats’s ‘Hyperion’--Schubert’s ‘Unfinished’ Symphony----”

“Incomplete _here_--yes--;” agreed El-Râmi--“But--finished elsewhere,

as surely as day is day, and night is night. There is nothing

lost,--no, not so much as the lightest flicker of a thought in a man’s

brain,--nothing wasted or forgotten,--not even so much as an idle

word. _We_ forget--but the forces of Nature are non-oblivious. All is

chronicled and registered--all is scientifically set down in plain

figures that no mistake may be made in the final reckoning.”

“You really think that?--you really believe that?” asked Féraz, his

eyes dilating eagerly.

“I do, most positively;”--said El-Râmi--“It is a fact which Nature

most potently sets forth, and insists upon. But is there no more of

your verse?”

“Yes--” and Féraz read on--

“O, we are sorrowful, my Soul and I:

We war together fondly--yet we pray

For separate roads,--the Body fain would die

And sleep i’ the ground, low-hidden from the day--

The Soul erect, its large wings cramped for room,

Doth pantingly and passionately rebel,

Against this strange, uncomprehended doom

Called Life, where nothing is, or shall be well.”

“Good!”--murmured El-Râmi softly--“Good--and true!”

“Hear me, my Star!--star of my natal hour,

Thou calm unmovëd one amid all clouds!

Give me my birth-right,--the imperial sway

Of Thought supreme above the common crowds,--

O let me feel thy swift compelling beam

Drawing me upwards to a goal divine;

Fulfil thy promise, O thou glittering Dream,

And let one crown of victory be mine.

“Let me behold this world recede and pass

Like shifting mist upon a stormy coast

Or vision in a necromancer’s glass;--

For I, ’mid perishable earth can boast

Of proven Immortality,--can reach

Glories ungrasped by minds of lower tone;--

Thus, in a silence vaster than all speech,

I follow thee, my Star of Love, alone!”

He ceased. El-Râmi, who had listened attentively, resting his head on

one hand, now lifted his eyes and looked at his young brother with an

expression of mingled curiosity and compassion.

“The verses are good;”--he said at last--“good and perfectly

rhythmical, but surely they have a touch of arrogance?--

“‘I, ’mid perishable earth can boast

Of proven Immortality.’

What do you mean by ‘proven’ Immortality? Where are your proofs?”

“I have them in my inner consciousness;” replied Féraz slowly--“But

to put them into the limited language spoken by mortals is impossible.

There are existing emotions--existing facts, which can never be

rendered into common speech. God is a Fact--but He cannot be explained

or described.”

El-Râmi was silent,--a slight frown contracted his dark even brows.

“You are beginning to think too much,”--he observed, rising from his

chair as he spoke--“Do not analyse yourself, Féraz, ... self-analysis

is the temper of the age, but it engenders distrust and sorrow. Your

poem is excellent, but it breathes of sadness,--I prefer your ‘star’

songs which are so full of joy. To be wise is to be happy,--to be

happy is to be wise----”

A loud rat-tat at the street door interrupted him. Féraz sprang up to

answer the imperative summons, and returned with a telegram. El-Râmi

opened and read it with astonished eyes, his face growing suddenly

pale.

“He will be here to-morrow night!” he ejaculated in a

whisper--“To-morrow night! He, the saint--the king--here to-morrow

night! Why should he come?--What would he have with me?”

His expression was one of dazed bewilderment, and Féraz looked at him

inquiringly.

“Any bad news?” he asked--“Who is it that is coming?”

El-Râmi recollected himself, and, folding up the telegram, thrust it

in his breast pocket.

“A poor monk who is travelling hither on a secret mission solicits my

hospitality for the night”--he replied hurriedly--“That is all. He

will be here to-morrow.”

Féraz stood silent, an incredulous smile in his fine eyes.

“Why should you stoop to deceive me, El-Râmi, my brother?” he said

gently at last--“Surely it is not one of your ways to perfection? Why

try to disguise the truth from me?--I am not of a treacherous nature.

If I guess rightly, this ‘poor monk’ is the Supreme Head of the

Brethren of the Cross, from whose mystic band you were dismissed for a

breach of discipline. What harm is there in my knowing of this?”

El-Râmi’s hand clenched, and his eyes had that dark and terrible look

in them that Féraz had learned to fear, but his voice was very calm.

“Who told you?” he asked.

“One of the monks at Cyprus long ago, when I went on your

errand”--replied Féraz; “He spoke of your wisdom, your power, your

brilliant faculties, in genuine regret that, all for some slight

matter in which you would not bend your pride, you had lost touch with

their various centres of action in all parts of the globe. He said no

more than this,--and no more than this I know.”

“You know quite enough,”--said El-Râmi quietly--“If I _have_ lost

touch with their modes of work, I have gained insight beyond their

reach. And,--I am sorry I did not at once say the truth to you--it

_is_ their chief leader who comes here to-morrow. No doubt,”--and he

smiled with a sense of triumph--“no doubt he seeks for fresh

knowledge, such as I alone can give him.”

“I thought,” said Féraz in a low half-awed tone,--“that he was one of

those who are wise with the wisdom of the angels?”