resolution to immediately dispose of the bottle. He was tired and did
not care to walk to the river. Nor did he wish to ride there and
alight, spending two car fares to get home. So postponing until the
morrow the casting into the Chicago River of the unhappy genii who had
once reposed on the bottom of the Persian Gulf, he boarded a car for
home.
The bulk and weight of the bottle sagging down his pocket and
threatening to injure the set of his coat, Mr. Middleton held his
acquisition on his knee. A tall, serious-looking individual was his
seat mate, who after regarding the bottle intently for some time,
addressed him in a low, but earnest voice.
"Pray pardon my curiosity, but I am going to ask you what that queer
receptacle is."
"It is the prison-house of a wicked genii, who was shut therein by
King Solomon, the magic influence of whose seal on the plug in the
mouth retains him within, for what resistance could the physical force
of those copper walls oppose to the strength of that mighty demon?"
Of these words did Mr. Middleton deliver himself, though he knew they
must sound passing strange, but on the spur of the moment he could not
think what else to say and he hoped that the belief he would create
that his mind was affected would relieve him of further questioning,
for if put to it and pinned down, what could he say, what plausible
account could he give of the bottle? To his surprise, the stranger
gave no evidence of other than a complete acceptance of his statement
and continuing to make inquiries in a most respectful and courteous
way, Mr. Middleton felt he could not be less mannerly himself, and so
he related all he knew of the bottle, avowing his belief that it
contained some dangerous chemical, such as that devilish corroding
stuff known as Greek fire, or some deadly gas.
"Your theory sounds reasonable," said the stranger; "and yet who
knows? That inscription certainly is Hebrew. At least, it is neither
English nor German. When one has studied psychic phenomena as long as
I have, he comes to a point where he is very chary of saying what is
not credible. Do I not, time and again, materialize the dead, calling
from the winds, the waters, and the earth the dispersed particles of
the corporeal frame to reclothe for a little time the spiritual
essence? Could not the great Solomon do as much? Is it not possible
that that great moral ensamplar, guide, saint, and prophet has
imprisoned in that bottle some one of the Pre-Adamite demons? I am not
afraid to open the bottle, on the contrary, would be glad to do so. I
am a clairvoyant and trance-medium, with materialization as a
specialty. My name is Jefferson P. Smitz. Here is my card. I have a
seance to-morrow night. Bring your bottle then, and I will open it.
The price of admission is," he said, with a glance of tentative
scrutiny, "one dollar," at which information Mr. Middleton, looking
unresponsive, uninterested, not to say sulky, he continued: "but as
you will bring such an important and interesting contribution to the
subject of inquiry for the evening, we will make the admission for you
only fifty cents, fifty cents."
On the following evening, Mr. Middleton and his bottle sat among a
circle of some thirty persons who were gathered in the gloomy,
lofty-ceiled parlor of Mr. Smitz. Before forming the circle, Mr. Smitz
had addressed the company in a few well-chosen words, saying that a
like purpose had brought all there that night, that as votaries of
science and devotees of truth and persons of culture and refinement,
mutual acquaintance could not but be pleasant as well as helpful,
enabling those who sat together while witnessing the astounding and
edifying phenomena they were soon to behold, to discuss these
phenomena with reciprocal benefit--in view of all this, he hoped
everybody would consider themselves introduced to everybody else.
Mr. Middleton, quickly inspecting the assemblage, whom he doubtless
with great injustice denominated a crowd of sober dubs and solemn
stiffs, so maneuvered that when all had drawn their chairs into a
circle, a man deaf in the right ear sat at his left, while at his
right sat a tall young lady, who though slightly pale was of an
interesting appearance, notwithstanding. The somewhat tragic cast of
her large and classic features was intensified by a pair of great
mournful eyes and a wistful mouth, the whole framed in luxuriant
masses of black hair, and altogether she was a girl whom one would
give a second and third glance anywhere.
It developing in their very first exchange of remarks that she had
never been present at a seance and that she could not look forward to
what they were about to witness without great trepidation, Mr.
Middleton offered to afford her every moral support and such physical
protection as one mortal can assure another when facing the unknown
powers of another world. At the extinguishment of the gas, he took her
left hand, and finding it give a faint tremor, he took the other and
was pleased to note that, so far as her hands gave evidence, thereupon
her fears were quite allayed.
A breeze, chill and dank as the breath of a tomb, blew upon the
company, and from the deep darkness into which they all stared with
straining, unseeing eyes, came the solemn sound of Mr. Smitz, speaking
hurriedly in somber tones in some sonorous unknown tongue, and low
rustlings and whirrs and soft footfalls and faint rattlings that grew
stronger, louder, each moment, swelling up into the stamp of a mailed
heel and the clangor of arms as Mr. Smitz scratched a match and the
light of a gas jet glanced upon helmet, corslet, shield, and greaves
of a brazen-armored Greek warrior, standing in the middle of the
circle, alive, in full corporeal presence!
"Leonidas, hero of Thermopylae!" shouted Mr. Smitz, and then continued
at a conversational pitch, "if any of you wish to speak to him in his
own language, you have full permission to do so."
Those present lacking either the desire to accost the dread presence,
or a command of the ancient Greek, after a bit Mr. Smitz turned off
the gas and the noises that had heralded the visitant's appearance
began in reverse order, and at their cease, the gas being turned on
again, there was the circle quite bare of any evidence that a Greek
warrior in full panoply had but now stood there.
At these prodigies, the young lady trembled, but you could have
applied all sorts of surgical devices for measuring nerve reaction to
Mr. Middleton from the crown of his head to where his parallel feet
held between them the copper bottle, and not have detected a tremor.
Mr. Smitz was reaching up to extinguish the gas once more, when a big,
athletic blonde man, whose appearance and garb proclaimed him an
Englishman, interrupted him.
"I am going to request you to materialize the spirit with whom I wish
to converse, the next time. I have to catch a train at eleven and
there are a number of things I would like to do before that.
Yesterday, you promised me that you would materialize him first
thing."
"Yesterday," said Mr. Smitz with a slight hauteur, "I could not look
forward and see that I was to have such a large and cultivated
gathering. You cannot, sir, ask to have your own mere personal
business, for business it is with you, take precedence of the
scientific quests of all these other ladies and gentlemen. I have
planned to materialize men of many nations, with whom all may converse
if they please; Confucius, the great Chinese; Caesar, the great Roman;
Mohammed, the great Turk; Powhattan, the great Indian, and others.
Your business must wait."
"My friends," said the Englishman, appealing to the assemblage, "I
throw myself upon your good nature. My grandfather was the owner of a
small estate in Ireland. In a rebellion, the Irish burned every
building on the place and it has since been deserted. He had buried a
sum of money before he fled during the rebellion and we have a chart
telling where it was buried. But the chart referred to buildings and
trees that were subsequently utterly destroyed. We have no marks to
guide us. I am sadly in need of money. My grandfather's ghost could
tell me where the treasure is. I shall suffer financial detriment if I
do not catch the train at eleven and must attend to several matters
before that. You have heard my case. May I not ask you all to grant me
the indulgence of having my affair disposed of now?"
Mr. Middleton and several others were about to endorse the justice of
the Englishman's request, when Mr. Smitz hastily forestalled them by
saying that all should be heard from and turning to four personages
who sat together at a point where the line of chairs of the circle
passed before a large and mysterious cabinet set in the corner of the
wall, and asking their opinion, they all four in one voice began to
object to any alteration of the program of the evening, adverting
somewhat to the Boer War, the oppressions in Ireland, and to the
Revolution and the War of 1812. When they had done, there was no one
who cared to say a word for the Englishman or an Englishman, and Mr.
Smitz announced that Confucius would be the next materialization and
that all might address him in his native tongue. Of this permission, a
small red-head gentleman, whose demeanor advertised him to be in a
somewhat advanced state of intoxication, availed himself and remarked
slowly:
"Hello, John. Washee, washee? Sabe how washee? Wlanter be Melican
man?"
To this the great sage vouchsafed no reply save a contemptuous stare,
and the red-headed gentleman observed that doubtless the Chinese
language had changed a good deal in two thousand years. All languages
did.
From out the darkness under whose cover the Chinaman was modestly
divesting himself of his body, came the voice of Mr. Smitz, rich,
unctuous, saying:
"The next visitant will be from that great race we all admire so much,
the noble race which has done so much to build up this country, which
in every field of American endeavor has been a guiding star to us all.
It gives me great pleasure to tell you that our next visitant from the
world beyond is that great soldier, statesman, and patriot, King Brian
Boru."
"Who the devil wants to see that or any other paddy?" exclaimed the
voice of the Englishman, choleric, savage. "Let me out of this
blarsted, cheating hole. Who wants to see one of that race of
quarrelsome, thieving, wretched rapscallions?"
Whack! Smash! Bang! Crash! The assemblage was thrown into a pitiable
state of terror by a most extraordinary combat and tumult taking place
somewhere in the circle. The remonstrances of Mr. Smitz and the oaths
of the Englishman rose against the general din of the expostulations
of the men and cries of the women. Match after match was struck by the
men, only to be blown out by some mysterious agency, after giving
momentary glimpses of the Englishman astride of a man on the floor,
pummelling him lustily, while Mr. Smitz pulled at the Englishman's
shoulders. At length the noise died away, the sound of some one
remonstrating, "let me at him oncet, let me at the spalpeen, he got me
foul," coming back from some remote region of the atmosphere, as under
the compelling force of the will of the great Smitz, the bodily
envelope of the Irish hero was dissipated and his soul went back to
the beyond.
Then did a match reach the gas without being blown out. Beneath the
chandelier stood Mr. Smitz and the four personages who had sat before
the cabinet and had views on the Boer War.
"What an awful, sacrilegious thing you have done," exclaimed Mr.
Smitz. "You have struck the dead."
"He hit me first."
"Your remarks about the Irish angered him. He could not restrain
himself."
"Well, he couldn't whip me. Next time you materialize him, he'll show
a black eye. Let me out of here, you cheat, you imposter, you and your
pals, or I'll fix you as I did Brian Boru."
Though the company did not take the Englishman's view, they were all
anxious to go. They were quite unstrung by what had occurred, this
combat between the living and the dead. They looked with horrified awe
at the spot where it had taken place. There stood the living
combatant, still full of the fire of battle. Him whom he had fought
was gone on the winds to the voiceless abodes of the departed, a
breath, a shadow, a sudden chill on the cheek and nothing more. For a
brief space resuming his old fleshly habitude, with it had come the
cholers and hatreds of the flesh and once more he avenged his
country's wrongs.
"Say," said the Englishman, with a malign look on his face, as he
paused in the door, "if you've got that mick patched up any down in
the kitchen, I'll give him another chance, if he wishes. Tell him to
pick a smaller man next time."
To this, Mr. Smitz made no reply, but flashed a look that would have
frozen any one less insolent and truculent than the Englishman.
All this time Mr. Middleton had been very agreeably employed in a
corner of the room, for the young lady in an access of terror had
thrown herself into his arms and there she had remained during the
whole affrighting performance. To forerun any possible apprehension
that he was going to extricate himself and leave her, he held her with
considerable firmness, whispering encouragement into her ear the
while. Preparing to accompany her home, he had almost left the room
before he bethought him of the copper bottle, which he had abandoned
when springing up to get the young lady out of the circle and away
from danger. He soon found it lying against the wall, whither it had
rolled or been kicked during the melee.
The young lady continuing to be in a somewhat prostrated state after
her late experience, on the way home Mr. Middleton supported her by
his right arm about her waist, while she found further stay by resting
her left arm across his shoulders, she being a tall young lady. Their
remaining hands met in a clasp of cheer and encouragement on his part,
of trusting dependence on hers. Arriving at her door in this fashion,
it was but natural for Mr. Middleton--who was a very natural young
man--to clasp her in a good-night embrace, but upon essaying to put
the touch of completion to these joys which a kiss would give, she
drew away her head, saying:
"Why, how dare you, sir! I never met you before. Why, I haven't even
been formally introduced to you."
Mr. Middleton humbly pleading for the salute, she continued to express
her surprise that he should prefer such a request upon no acquaintance
at all, that he should even faintly expect her to grant it, and so on,
all the while leaning languishing upon his breast with all her weight.
Whereupon Mr. Middleton lost patience and with incisive sarcasm he
began:
"One would think that you who refuse this kiss were not the girl who
stands here within my arms, my lips saying this into her ears, her
cheek almost touching mine. Doubtless it is some one else. Pray tell
me, what great difference is there between kissing a stranger and
hugging him."
At these brutal, downright words, leaving the poor young thing nothing
to say, no little pretence even to herself that she had guarded the
proprieties, had comported herself circumspectly, leaving her with not
even a little rag of a claim that she had conducted herself with
seemly decorum, she sprang from him and began to cry. Whatever the
cause, Mr. Middleton could not look upon feminine unhappiness with
composure and here where he was himself responsible, he was indeed
smitten with keen remorse and hastening to comfort her, gathered her
into his arms and there he was abasing and condemning himself and
telling her what a dear, nice girl she was--and kissing away her
tears.
"Let me give you a piece of advice," he said, fifteen minutes later,
as he was about to release her and depart. "It is not best ever to let
a man hug you. Never," he said, pausing to imprint a lingering kiss
upon the girl's yielding lips, "never let a man kiss you again until
that moment when you shall become his affianced wife."
Mr. Middleton departed in that serene state of mind which the
consciousness of virtue bestows, for he had given the young woman
valuable advice that would doubtless be of advantage to her in the
future and he reflected upon this in much satisfaction as he fared
away with the eyes of the young woman watching him from where she
looked out of the parlor window.
Reaching into his right coat pocket to transfer the copper bottle to
the opposite pocket, in order that his coat might not be pulled out of
shape, as he grasped the neck, one of his fingers went right into the
mouth! The seal of Solomon was gone! A less resolute and quick-witted
person might have been alarmed, but reasoning that the seal must have
been knocked off during the fight at Mr. Smitz's and nothing had
happened since, he boldly examined the bottle. He could see a white
substance as he looked into it, and by the aid of a stick he fished
out a wad of wool tightly stuffed in the neck. A metallic chinking
followed the removal of the wadding and set his heart thumping
rapidly. He looked up and down the street. No one in sight. He tilted
the bottle up to the light of a street lamp and saw a yellow gleam. He
shook it and into his hands flowed a stream of gold sequins! He could
not sufficiently admire the ruse of Prince Houssein. Money on the
first messenger there had been none.
In a center more given to numismatics, or had he been willing to wait
and sell the coins gradually, Mr. Middleton might have secured more
than he did for the gold pieces, all coined at Bagdad in the early
caliphates and very valuable. But he disposed of them in a lump to a
French gentleman on La Salle Street for fourteen hundred and
twenty-five dollars.
Calling on the young lady of Englewood within the next few days, he
made no reference to these events, though she asked him several times
during the evening what he had been doing lately. He did, however,
hint at having profited by a certain fortunate "deal," as he called
it, but not a word did he say concerning the mournful girl or anything
remotely connected with her.
Hesitating to hurt the emir's feelings by exposing the obtuseness of
his ancestor Noureddin and the foolish superstition of his descendants
ever since, Mr. Middleton said nothing of these transactions when once
more he sat in the presence of the urbane and accomplished prince of
the tribe of Al-Yam. Having handed him a bowl of delicately flavored
sherbet, the emir began the narration of The Pleasant Adventures of
Dr. McDill.
_The Pleasant Adventures of Dr. McDill._
It was twelve o'clock on a blustery winter night and Dr. James McDill
was where a married man of forty ought to be at such an hour in that
season, sleeping soundly by the side of his beloved wife. But his wife
was not sleeping. At the stroke of the hour, she had suddenly awoke
from refreshing slumber and become aware of sounds as of persons
moving softly about the room, and after a little, seeing against the
windows faintly illuminated by a distant street light, two dark
figures, she perceived her ears had not deceived her. Shaking her
husband unavailingly for a considerable time, in her terror she
finally cast discretion to the winds and shouted:
"Burglars, Jim, burglars!"
Hardly had these words ceased, when the electric lights were turned on
and Dr. McDill sat up in bed to find himself staring into the muzzles
of three revolvers, held by two masked men, who stood looking over the
footboard. Bidding them move at their peril, the man with two
revolvers remained to guard the doctor and his wife, while the other
began to ransack the room. As he did so, he carried on an easy, if not
eloquent, dissertation upon the rights of man and the iniquitous
conditions which made it necessary for the poor and oppressed to
obtain by force, if they obtained at all, any share in the privileges
and riches of the wealthy. As he discoursed, at times carried away by
his theme, he gave over his search and paused to enforce his points
with earnest gestures. This caused the other robber some disquietude
and he cursed his compatriot and the doctor and his wife with a use of
epithets that will not bear repeating and which showed him to be none
other than a low ruffian. At last all the treasure in the room being
taken and the doctor being forced to accompany them and disclose the
repository of other valuables, the robbers took their departure.
Some weeks after this, two persons suspected of being responsible for
certain robberies were taken into custody and the doctor called into
court to identify them if possible.
"I noticed," said he, "that the shorter of the two masked men was
prone to gesticulation and that he had a fashion of holding his arms
close to his body, as if tied at the elbows, and with hands fully
open, fingers apart, thumbs extended, and palms upward, waving his
forearms----"
At this juncture, the smile on the face of the defendant's counsel,
occasioned by thus putting his client upon his guard, was dispelled by
an angry exclamation from the person in question, and denying with
some loquacity and even more vociferation that he ever made such a
gesture, at the close of his statement, behold, he made the gesture!
By the doctor's testimony was a chain of incriminating evidence
established that led to a sentence of ten years' imprisonment being
imposed upon the robbers. When he had heard the sentence, he of the
gestures turned fiercely toward the doctor and cried:
"You'll be killed for this, like other dogs before you for the same
cause. If you're not killed before I am discharged or escape, I'll
kill you. But I am only one of many, a tried band who avenge;" and
hereupon he smote the rail in front of him, "Knock, knock--knock;
knock, knock--knock." And from several parts of the silent room came
answers, faint, but distinct, two quick taps, a pause, and a third,
then all repeated. "Tap, tap--tap; tap, tap--tap."
The evidence of confederates, the quick response to the appeal of
their comrade, the taps that came from everywhere and nowhere,
manifestation of the desperate men surrounding him, might well have
daunted the soul of any man. Three sentences had been pronounced that
day, a term of years upon Jerry McGuire and Barry O'Toole, but death
upon James McDill. You may depend upon it that the doctor was none the
more reassured when on the morrow he learned that McGuire and O'Toole
had escaped. With their anger and resentment yet hot within them,
these men would doubtless at once set about to encompass his
destruction, and he knew that when once one of these societies had
decreed the death of a person who balked or incensed them, every
endeavor was used to put the decree into effect. But, after a little,
he took courage from the very fact that was most threatening. If these
men, these desperate and despicable scoundrels, could escape from the
barriers of stone and steel and the guardians that surrounded them,
why might not he fight for his life and win in the struggle which both
reason and instinct told him was inevitable?
That those he loved most might not be involved in the perils he felt
certain he was about to encounter and that his resolution and his
movements might not be hampered by their presence and their fears, he
found means to persuade his wife to take the children for a visit to
their grandfather, and setting his affairs in order and providing
himself with two revolvers, a bowie knife, and an Italian stiletto, he
even began to look forward to the approaching struggle with something
of that pleasure which man experiences in the anticipation of any
contest; and there is indeed a certain keen zest in playing the game
where one's stake is one's life.