AFTER TWENTY YEARS
‘How I reached the open air I cannot tell you,--I do not know. I have
a confused recollection of rushing through vaulted passages, through
endless corridors, of trampling over people who tried to arrest my
passage,--and the rest is blank.
‘When I again came to myself I was lying in the house of an American
missionary named Clements. I had been found, at early dawn, stark
naked, in a Cairo street, and picked up for dead. Judging from
appearances I must have wandered for miles, all through the night.
Whence I had come, or whither I was going, none could tell,--I could
not tell myself. For weeks I hovered between life and death. The
kindness of Mr and Mrs Clements was not to be measured by words. I was
brought to their house a penniless, helpless, battered stranger, and
they gave me all they had to offer, without money and without
price,--with no expectation of an earthly reward. Let no one pretend
that there is no Christian charity under the sun. The debt I owed that
man and woman I was never able to repay. Before I was properly myself
again, and in a position to offer some adequate testimony of the
gratitude I felt, Mrs Clements was dead, drowned during an excursion on
the Nile, and her husband had departed on a missionary expedition into
Central Africa, from which he never returned.
‘Although, in a measure, my physical health returned, for months after
I had left the roof of my hospitable hosts, I was in a state of
semi-imbecility. I suffered from a species of aphasia. For days
together I was speechless, and could remember nothing,--not even my own
name. And, when that stage had passed, and I began to move more freely
among my fellows, for years I was but a wreck of my former self. I was
visited, at all hours of the day and night, by frightful--I know not
whether to call them visions, they were real enough to me, but since
they were visible to no one but myself, perhaps that is the word which
best describes them. Their presence invariably plunged me into a state
of abject terror, against which I was unable to even make a show of
fighting. To such an extent did they embitter my existence, that I
voluntarily placed myself under the treatment of an expert in mental
pathology. For a considerable period of time I was under his constant
supervision, but the visitations were as inexplicable to him as they
were to me.
‘By degrees, however, they became rarer and rarer, until at last I
flattered myself that I had once more become as other men. After an
interval, to make sure, I devoted myself to politics. Thenceforward I
have lived, as they phrase it, in the public eye. Private life, in any
peculiar sense of the term, I have had none.’
Mr Lessingham ceased. His tale was not uninteresting, and, to say the
least of it, was curious. But I still was at a loss to understand what
it had to do with me, or what was the purport of his presence in my
room. Since he remained silent, as if the matter, so far as he was
concerned, was at an end, I told him so.
‘I presume, Mr Lessingham, that all this is but a prelude to the play.
At present I do not see where it is that I come in.’
Still for some seconds he was silent. When he spoke his voice was grave
and sombre, as if he were burdened by a weight of woe.
‘Unfortunately, as you put it, all this has been but a prelude to the
play. Were it not so I should not now stand in such pressing want of
the services of a confidential agent,--that is, of an experienced man
of the world, who has been endowed by nature with phenomenal perceptive
faculties, and in whose capacity and honour I can place the completest
confidence.’
I smiled,--the compliment was a pointed one.
‘I hope your estimate of me is not too high.’
‘I hope not,--for my sake, as well as for your own. I have heard great
things of you. If ever man stood in need of all that human skill and
acumen can do for him, I certainly am he.’
His words aroused my curiosity. I was conscious of feeling more
interested than heretofore.
‘I will do my best for you. Man can do no more. Only give my best a
trial.’
‘I will. At once.’
He looked at me long and earnestly. Then, leaning forward, he said,
lowering his voice perhaps unconsciously,
‘The fact is, Mr Champnell, that quite recently events have happened
which threaten to bridge the chasm of twenty years, and to place me
face to face with that plague spot of the past. At this moment I stand
in imminent peril of becoming again the wretched thing I was when I
fled from that den of all the devils. It is to guard me against this
that I have come to you. I want you to unravel the tangled thread which
threatens to drag me to my doom,--and, when unravelled to sunder
it--for ever, if God wills!--in twain.’
‘Explain.’
To be frank, for the moment I thought him mad. He went on.
‘Three weeks ago, when I returned late one night from a sitting in the
House of Commons, I found, on my study table, a sheet of paper on which
there was a representation--marvellously like!--of the creature into
which, as it seemed to me, the woman of the songs was transformed as I
clutched her throat between my hands. The mere sight of it brought back
one of those visitations of which I have told you, and which I thought
I had done with for ever,--I was convulsed by an agony of fear, thrown
into a state approximating to a paralysis both of mind and body.’
‘But why?’
‘I cannot tell you. I only know that I have never dared to allow my
thoughts to recur to that last dread scene, lest the mere recurrence
should drive me mad.’
‘What was this you found upon your study table,--merely a drawing?’
‘It was a representation, produced by what process I cannot say, which
was so wonderfully, so diabolically, like the original, that for a
moment I thought the thing itself was on my table.’
‘Who put it there?’
‘That is precisely what I wish you to find out,--what I wish you to
make it your instant business to ascertain. I have found the thing,
under similar circumstances, on three separate occasions, on my study
table,--and each time it has had on me the same hideous effect.’
‘Each time after you have returned from a late sitting in the House of
Commons?’
‘Exactly.’
‘Where are these--what shall I call them--delineations?’
‘That, again, I cannot tell you.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say. Each time, when I recovered, the thing had vanished.’
‘Sheet of paper and all?’
‘Apparently,--though on that point I could not be positive. You will
understand that my study table is apt to be littered with sheets of
paper, and I could not absolutely determine that the thing had not
stared at me from one of those. The delineation itself, to use your
word, certainly had vanished.’
I began to suspect that this was a case rather for a doctor than for a
man of my profession. And hinted as much.
‘Don’t you think it is possible, Mr Lessingham, that you have been
overworking yourself--that you have been driving your brain too hard,
and that you have been the victim of an optical delusion?’
‘I thought so myself; I may say that I almost hoped so. But wait till I
have finished. You will find that there is no loophole in that
direction.’
He appeared to be recalling events in their due order. His manner was
studiously cold,--as if he were endeavouring, despite the strangeness
of his story, to impress me with the literal accuracy of each syllable
he uttered.
‘The night before last, on returning home, I found in my study a
stranger.’
‘A stranger?’
‘Yes.--In other words, a burglar.’
‘A burglar?--I see.--Go on.’
He had paused. His demeanour was becoming odder and odder.
‘On my entry he was engaged in forcing an entry into my bureau. I need
hardly say that I advanced to seize him. But--I could not.’
‘You could not?--How do you mean you could not?’
‘I mean simply what I say. You must understand that this was no
ordinary felon. Of what nationality he was I cannot tell you. He only
uttered two words, and they were certainly in English, but apart from
that he was dumb. He wore no covering on his head or feet. Indeed, his
only garment was a long dark flowing cloak which, as it fluttered about
him, revealed that his limbs were bare.’
‘An unique costume for a burglar.’
‘The instant I saw him I realised that he was in some way connected
with that adventure in the Rue de Rabagas. What he said and did, proved
it to the hilt.’
‘What did he say and do?’
‘As I approached to effect his capture, he pronounced aloud two words
which recalled that awful scene the recollection of which always
lingers in my brain, and of which I never dare to permit myself to
think. Their very utterance threw me into a sort of convulsion.’
‘What were the words?’
Mr Lessingham opened his mouth,--and shut it. A marked change took
place in the expression of his countenance. His eyes became fixed and
staring,--resembling the glassy orbs of the somnambulist. For a moment
I feared that he was going to give me an object lesson in the
‘visitations’ of which I had heard so much. I rose, with a view of
offering him assistance. He motioned me back.
‘Thank you.--It will pass away.’
His voice was dry and husky,--unlike his usual silvern tones. After an
uncomfortable interval he managed to continue.
‘You see for yourself, Mr Champnell, what a miserable weakling, when
this subject is broached, I still remain. I cannot utter the words the
stranger uttered, I cannot even write them down. For some inscrutable
reason they have on me an effect similar to that which spells and
incantations had on people in tales of witchcraft.’
‘I suppose, Mr Lessingham, that there is no doubt that this mysterious
stranger was not himself an optical delusion?’
‘Scarcely. There is the evidence of my servants to prove the contrary.’
‘Did your servants see him?’
‘Some of them,--yes. Then there is the evidence of the bureau. The
fellow had smashed the top right in two. When I came to examine the
contents I learned that a packet of letters was missing. They were
letters which I had received from Miss Lindon, a lady whom I hope to
make my wife. This, also, I state to you in confidence.’
‘What use would he be likely to make of them?’
‘If matters stand as I fear they do, he might make a very serious
misuse of them. If the object of these wretches, after all these years,
is a wild revenge, they would be capable, having discovered what she is
to me, of working Miss Lindon a fatal mischief,--or, at the very least,
of poisoning her mind.’
‘I see.--How did the thief escape,--did he, like the delineation,
vanish into air?’
‘He escaped by the much more prosaic method of dashing through the
drawing-room window, and clambering down from the verandah into the
street, where he ran right into someone’s arms.’
‘Into whose arms,--a constable’s?’
‘No; into Mr Atherton’s,--Sydney Atherton’s.’
‘The inventor?’
‘The same.--Do you know him?’
‘I do. Sydney Atherton and I are friends of a good many years’
standing.--But Atherton must have seen where he came from;--and,
anyhow, if he was in the state of undress which you have described, why
didn’t he stop him?’
‘Mr Atherton’s reasons were his own. He did not stop him, and, so far
as I can learn, he did not attempt to stop him. Instead, he knocked at
my hall door to inform me that he had seen a man climb out of my
window.’
‘I happen to know that, at certain seasons, Atherton is a queer
fish,--but that sounds very queer indeed.’
‘The truth is, Mr Champnell, that, if it were not for Mr Atherton, I
doubt if I should have troubled you even now. The accident of his being
an acquaintance of yours makes my task easier.’
He drew his chair closer to me with an air of briskness which had been
foreign to him before. For some reason, which I was unable to fathom,
the introduction of Atherton’s name seemed to have enlivened him.
However, I was not long to remain in darkness. In half a dozen
sentences he threw more light on the real cause of his visit to me than
he had done in all that had gone before. His bearing, too, was more
businesslike and to the point. For the first time I had some
glimmerings of the politician,--alert, keen, eager,--as he is known to
all the world.
‘Mr Atherton, like myself, has been a postulant for Miss Lindon’s hand.
Because I have succeeded where he has failed, he has chosen to be
angry. It seems that he has had dealings, either with my visitor of
Tuesday night, or with some other his acquaintance, and he proposes to
use what he has gleaned from him to the disadvantage of my character. I
have just come from Mr Atherton. From hints he dropped I conclude that,
probably during the last few hours, he has had an interview with
someone who was connected in some way with that lurid patch in my
career; that this person made so-called revelations, which were nothing
but a series of monstrous lies; and these so-called revelations Mr
Atherton has threatened, in so many words, to place before Miss Lindon.
That is an eventuality which I wish to avoid. My own conviction is that
there is at this moment in London an emissary from that den in the
whilom Rue de Rabagas--for all I know it may be the Woman of the Songs
herself. Whether the sole purport of this individual’s presence is to
do me injury, I am, as yet, in no position to say, but that it is
proposed to work me mischief, at any rate, by the way, is plain. I
believe that Mr Atherton knows more about this person’s individuality
and whereabouts than he has been willing, so far, to admit. I want you,
therefore, to ascertain these things on my behalf; to find out what,
and where, this person is, to drag her!--or him;--out into the light of
day. In short, I want you to effectually protect me from the terrorism
which threatens once more to overwhelm my mental and my physical
powers,--which bids fair to destroy my intellect, my career, my life,
my all.’
‘What reason have you for suspecting that Mr Atherton has seen this
individual of whom you speak,--has he told you so?’
‘Practically,--yes.’
‘I know Atherton well. In his not infrequent moments of excitement he
is apt to use strong language, but it goes no further. I believe him to
be the last person in the world to do anyone an intentional injustice,
under any circumstances whatever. If I go to him, armed with
credentials from you, when he understands the real gravity of the
situation,--which it will be my business to make him do, I believe
that, spontaneously, of his own accord, he will tell me as much about
this mysterious individual as he knows himself.’
‘Then go to him at once.’
‘Good. I will. The result I will communicate to you.’
I rose from my seat. As I did so, someone rushed into the outer office
with a din and a clatter. Andrews’ voice, and another, became
distinctly audible,--Andrews’ apparently raised in vigorous
expostulation. Raised, seemingly, in vain, for presently the door of my
own particular sanctum was thrown open with a crash, and Mr Sydney
Atherton himself came dashing in,--evidently conspicuously under the
influence of one of those not infrequent ‘moments of excitement’ of
which I had just been speaking.