To those of my readers who may seek with Julius Faber to explore,
through intelligible causes, solutions of the marvels I narrate,
Margrave’s confession may serve to explain away much that my own
superstitious beliefs had obscured. To them Margrave is evidently
the son of Louis Grayle. The elixir of life is reduced to some simple
restorative, owing much of its effect to the faith of a credulous
patient: youth is so soon restored to its joy in the sun, with or
without an elixir. To them Margrave’s arts of enchantment are reduced
to those idiosyncrasies of temperament on which the disciples of Mesmer
build up their theories,--exaggerated, in much, by my own superstitions;
aided, in part, by such natural, purely physical magic as, explored by
the ancient priest-crafts, is despised by the modern philosophies, and
only remains occult because Science delights no more in the slides of
the lantern which fascinated her childhood with simulated phantoms. To
them Margrave is, perhaps, an enthusiast, but, because an enthusiast,
not less an impostor. “L’Homme se pique,” says Charron. Man cogs the
dice for himself ere he rattles the box for his dupes. Was there
ever successful impostor who did not commence by a fraud on his own
understanding? Cradled in Orient Fableland, what though Margrave
believes in its legends; in a wand, an elixir; in sorcerers or Afrites?
That belief in itself makes him keen to detect, and skilful to profit
by, the latent but kindred credulities of others. In all illustrations
of Duper and Duped through the records of superstition--from the guile
of a Cromwell, a Mahomet, down to the cheats of a gypsy--professional
visionaries are amongst the astutest observers. The knowledge that
Margrave had gained of my abode, of my affliction, or of the innermost
thoughts in my mind, it surely demanded no preternatural aids to
acquire. An Old Bailey attorney could have got at the one, and any
quick student of human hearts have readily mastered the other. In fine,
Margrave, thus rationally criticised, is no other prodigy (save in
degree and concurrence of attributes simple, though not very common)
than may be found in each alley that harbours a fortune-teller who has
just faith enough in the stars or the cards to bubble himself while he
swindles his victims; earnest, indeed, in the self-conviction that he
is really a seer, but reading the looks of his listeners, divining
the thoughts that induce them to listen, and acquiring by practice
a startling ability to judge what the listeners will deem it most
seer-like to read in the cards or divine from the stars.
I leave this interpretation unassailed. It is that which is the most
probable; it is clearly that which, in a case not my own, I should have
accepted; and yet I revolved and dismissed it. The moment we deal
with things beyond our comprehension, and in which our own senses are
appealed to and baffled, we revolt from the Probable, as it seems to
the senses of those who have not experienced what we have. And the same
principle of Wonder that led our philosophy up from inert ignorance into
restless knowledge, now winding back into shadow land, reverses its
rule by the way, and, at last, leaves us lost in the maze, our knowledge
inert, and our ignorance restless.
And putting aside all other reasons for hesitating to believe that
Margrave was the son of Louis Grayle,--reasons which his own narrative
might suggest,--was it not strange that Sir Philip Derval, who had
instituted inquiries so minute, and reported them in his memoir with so
faithful a care, should not have discovered that a youth, attended by
the same woman who had attended Grayle, had disappeared from the town
on the same night as Grayle himself disappeared? But Derval had related
truthfully, according to Margrave’s account, the flight of Ayesha and
her Indian servant, yet not alluded to the flight, not even to the
existence of the boy, who must have been of no mean importance in the
suite of Louis Grayle, if he were, indeed, the son whom Grayle had made
his constant companion, and constituted his principal heir. Not many
minutes did I give myself up to the cloud of reflections through which
no sunbeam of light forced its way. One thought overmastered all;
Margrave had threatened death to my Lilian, and warned me of what I
should learn from the lips of Faber, “the sage of the college.” I stood,
shuddering, at the door of my home; I did not dare to enter.
“Allen,” said a voice, in which my ear detected the unwonted tremulous
faltering, “be firm,--be calm. I keep my promise. The hour is come in
which you may again see the Lilian of old, mind to mind, soul to soul.”
Faber’s hand took mine, and led me into the house.
“You do, then, fear that this interview will be too much for her
strength?” said I, whisperingly.
“I cannot say; but she demands the interview, and I dare not refuse it.”