from a natural shell resplendent with mother-of-pearl; it has an
earthenware lining and silver cap. Another is a pipe of glass--not
more brittle perhaps than a clay "churchwarden," but rather too
expensive to risk between the teeth, for it is a fine example of that
beautiful Venetian-glass work which is not excelled throughout the
world.
A third Italian pipe is like the fur seal, in that the most valuable
part of it is its skin, or case, made of finely-perforated silver. It
will be noted that the pipe is too long for the case, an intentional
peculiarity, in order that it may be smoked while encased in its
handsome covering.
[Illustration: PERFORATED SILVER PIPE CASE.]
[Illustration:
THIS PIPE IS SMOKED IN THE CASE.
]
Turkey offers a great variety of pipes, from the humble red clay to
the lordly hookah or hubble-bubble--a device of Persian origin for
allowing the smoke to be drawn through water in order to purify it
before reaching the mouth. Another pipe, with which the hookah is
often mistakenly identified, is the "Narghile." This word is a native
Indian one for a cocoa-nut, and the pipes are either made of an
actual nut, as shown in our illustration, or have a receptacle for the
nicotine of similar shape and character. A gourd pipe, with a gourd
twelve inches in diameter, is not unknown.
[Illustration: INDIAN COCOA-NUT PIPE.]
[Illustration]
THE FACE AT THE DOOR.
THE DRAMA OF A GHASTLY DELUSION.
BY WALTER D. DOBELL.
_Illustrated by S. H. Vedder._
A STORY IN TWO LETTERS FROM THOMAS CAMPBELL, OF LONDON, TO HIS
BROTHER, DR. JOHN CAMPBELL, IN BOMBAY.
DEAR JACK, Jan. 3rd., 1898.
What the Psychical Research Society really wants is an authentic
record of any supernatural or inexplicable event in the life of a
"healthy subject" with nerves of iron, and a hearty contempt for all
forms of superstition.
Therefore I have not the slightest intention of following your advice
and laying this story before that most learned and conscientious
tribunal, because I fear that I cannot claim for John Barton, the
principal actor in this little drama, either remarkably good health or
a complete freedom from superstition. But as you ask for the details
you shall have them.
I first met Barton some two years ago in the rooms of a friend of
mine. We had been playing whist, and after the departure of the fourth
player he and I stayed on talking with our host till the early hours
of the morning.
The conversation ran chiefly on vampires, wehr-wolves, and other
subjects of an equally light and cheerful nature, and Barton, I
remember, showed himself to be an adept at the art of making the flesh
creep. He walked part of the way home with me, and we discovered that
we had quite a large number of friends and interests in common.
I came across him constantly after this, and one day when he was
dining with me--in September, '95, I think it was? he told me that he
was engaged to be married, and a few days afterwards introduced me to
the lady. I was much struck by her beauty and the wonderful power that
was expressed both in her face and by her speech and bearing.
Her age, if a poor bachelor is any judge, was about twenty-eight, and
she was, I believe, of Russian extraction. She was living with friends
in Paris, the Russian heaven, and naturally Barton spent most of his
time in the same city, so that though I heard of him and from him from
time to time, we never actually met again till January of this year.
Mickleham asked me to come and dine with him for the purpose of
meeting Barton, who would, he said, leave England again in a couple of
days. I gladly accepted the invitation, and a very pleasant dinner
we had at the Travellers' Club, adjourning afterwards to Mickleham's
rooms, where we sat and talked for two or three hours.
I noticed at dinner that Barton was not looking well, and afterwards,
though he talked as much and as brilliantly as usual, he studiously
avoided supernatural subjects, once his favourite topic, and displayed
marked uneasiness whenever the talk strayed in that direction. I don't
think Mickleham noticed anything--he never was exactly a Sherlock
Holmes, you remember--and in fact there was only one trivial
indication of the state of Barton's nerves that was particularly
remarkable. He seemed to have acquired a habit, even in the middle
of some of his best stories, of continually glancing in a sidelong
fashion at the door. Once, indeed, he rose and went towards it as if
to close it; but seeing, as I then supposed, that it was shut, he went
back to his seat.
We both left at about one o'clock, and as he was sleeping at the
Métropole we parted at the corner of St. James' Street, and I said
good-bye and wished him a pleasant crossing, thinking, of course, that
I should not see him again before he left England. You can judge of my
surprise when after walking home I found Barton already in my rooms.
He apologised, saying that he had remembered something which he had
meant to tell me, and had driven back to do it, passing me, I suppose,
on the way. It was some time before I could get him to tell me what
it was that he had forgotten. I was rather riled, as I wanted to go
to bed, but when at last he did begin his story, I can tell you there
wasn't much sleepiness left in me. He told it as no one else could
have told it, and it's a solid fact that he made me feel like a
frightened child, and you know I'm not a particularly imaginative man.
He began by asking me if I had observed his continual glances at the
door in Mickleham's room--he was keeping his eye on my door, by the
way, all the time he was telling the story. I said I had observed
this, and he then gave me the reason for his conduct, and, by George,
old boy, when I heard what he was always seeing when he did look at
the aforesaid door, I admired the poor devil for his pluck as much as
I pitied him for his delusion. I'm quite certain I couldn't stand it
for half a minute, and he had been bearing it for more than a year.
He said that the door of any and every room in which he was always
appeared to be ajar, and round the edge of the door--I declare it
frightens me even to think of it--round the corner, as it were, just
coming into the room, he always saw the hand and half the face of a
man--never more, and never less. The hand was grasping the door about
a foot above the handle, and the face was peering round it, with one
eye--he couldn't see the other--always fixed on him. Cheerful, wasn't
it? He could see the nose, which was very large and fleshy, and all
the left side of the face, which was a sort of dirty white. The
hair was black and rather long, he thought, and there was a large
abrasion--"something between a cut and a bruise" was his phrase--on
the temple.
He had been receiving this delightful visitor daily ever since the
autumn of '95--a pleasant year he must have had of it, poor chap. I
told him to go to a doctor, but he said that he had tried that without
any success--had told the doctor that he was suffering from delusions,
and had implicitly followed his instructions, but still the white face
kept turning up at the door.
He seemed chiefly distressed about it because of his approaching
marriage; he had, as I told you, become engaged in September, '95.
He spoke very nicely of his future wife, of whom he seemed extremely
fond, and asked my advice as to telling her all about it. I thought he
had better not, and advised him to go in for hard exercise and early
hours--but really I did not know what to say to him. "Paternosters
were peas in plates to his sorrows."
He seemed rather more cheerful before he left, and we tried an
interesting, though to me a somewhat alarming, experiment. Keeping his
eyes fixed on the door, Barton walked slowly towards it, and laid
his hand upon the handle. Directly he did this the face, he said,
disappeared, but the hand remained. While he was turning the handle,
however, the hand, which he said was large and dirty, followed the
example of the head, and it became instantly clear to Barton that the
door was not really ajar, but tightly closed. This was the invariable
programme, he told me.
I saw him off, wished him well rid of his encumbrance, and promised to
say nothing about it; then, taking my life and my candle in my hands,
I rushed frantically up to bed.
I didn't meet Barton again until his wedding, which took place last
month. He was looking nervous and harassed, but not more so than most
men in his unhappy plight--it was a regular church affair. Naturally
I had no opportunity for a quiet talk with him, even if I had been
particularly anxious to have one--which I was not.
The happy pair started for Italy to spend their honeymoon, and I gave
them a day's law before following. I had promised to join Robinson in
Florence, and was already overdue. I hadn't the slightest intention
of meeting the Bartons, and therefore of course they were almost the
first English people that I came across in the streets of Florence. We
exchanged a few fatuous remarks, and I then hurried away. It was too
early in the honeymoon for them to be longing, like the couple in
_Punch_, "for some friend to turn up, or even some enemy." That very
evening, however, Barton came round to see me. I introduced him to
Robinson, and we all talked for a bit in the hotel verandah, but it
was so obvious that Barton had something to say to me in private that
Robinson soon left us.
"Campbell," said Barton immediately, "it's getting worse than ever."
"What is?" I asked, though I knew.
"That infernal man at the door: I can see nearly all his face round
the corner now, and I tell you I'm losing my nerve. And there's a new
development: he doesn't always look at me now. I've noticed sometimes
that his eyes--I can see both are fixed on Helene, my wife; and it's
that, I think, that has shaken me."
"You haven't told her, I suppose?" said I.
"Of course not: but I think she sees that there's something wrong.
I've seen her look at me very curiously at times, though she doesn't
say anything. You don't think I ought to tell her?"
"Certainly not," I said; "but for goodness' sake go to a decent doctor
when you get home, and tell him everything. I'm very sorry for you, my
dear fellow, but that's really all I can advise; and if I were you I
wouldn't put it off too long."
[Illustration: "SHE WAS A RUSSIAN, AND I WAS MUCH STRUCK BY HER
BEAUTY."]
"We're going home next week," he said, and we parted. I really don't
see what I could have said that could have done the slightest good. It
was in his liver or his eyes that the fault lay, I thought--I'm not so
sure about that now--and I'm no doctor.
Well, two days after this interview, while Robinson and I were at
dinner, a waiter came to me and said that there was a lady in our
private room who insisted on seeing me immediately. I went up, of
course, and there found Mrs. Barton in a state of terrible excitement
and anxiety.
"You must come with me, Mr. Campbell," she cried, on seeing me; "my
husband has met with a terrible accident," and she literally dragged
me out of the hotel into her carriage.
"He is in a doctor's house," she said, as we rattled furiously down
the street; "the accident happened at the very door, and he was
carried in. He has been asking continually for you."
I thought she seemed to resent this, and perhaps it was only natural.
"How did it happen?" I asked.
"He had been buying some old armour and two old Florentine daggers,
and was carrying them home when he slipped and fell, and one of the
daggers ran into his leg. It was all my fault, I ought to have helped
him to carry the things; his hands were full, and he couldn't save
himself."
"Oh, it will be all right, Mrs. Barton," said I; "a cut in the leg is
not very serious."
"Not serious!" she replied, angrily; "the doctor said himself that
in ten seconds more he would have bled to death. Here is the house; I
shall take you straight to him." She hurried me through the open door
of a somewhat mean little dwelling--we had driven into a rather low
quarter of the town. I didn't know Florence well enough to be sure
exactly where we were, and during my drive I had been too much
occupied to look out of the window. We went into a small bedroom on
the ground floor. Two little men in black coats were standing by the
bed, and on it lay Barton, with a face of the most ghastly pallor and
wildly glaring eyes.
"Thank God you've come, Campbell," he gasped. "I'm too weak--too
weak--you must keep him out," and then his head fell back and he
fainted. Restoratives were applied without avail, and the two men in
black exchanged whispers in Italian which I could not catch.
"Speak English," said Mrs. Barton, furiously--she looked like a
madwoman--"Speak English. What are you going to do?"
I thought it improbable that either of the men would know the
language, but I was wrong.
"We are agreed," said the taller of the two, speaking with a very
slight accent, "my brother and I, that one thing only can be done.
Your husband is dying from want of blood: we must give him more blood.
How much will you pay?"
"There's no question of that," I said, as I grasped his meaning; "you
can bleed me, I'm willing. Be quick, there's no time to lose."
"No, no," said the doctor, "you are not strong enough; it might not
save him; it would certainly lose--that is, kill you. But we are
fortunate; there is in our house what you call a lodger, he is
strong and his blood will serve. He will not refuse me, he is of the
Religion; but you must pay."
"Of the Religion?" I said. "Oh, I see, you are a Jew. Well, I will
guarantee you five hundred pounds; divide it as you choose, only make
haste."
"That will be sufficient," said the shorter of the brothers, "but you
and the lady must not be here. The room is small; I will take you
to another, and bring down our guest, and I will tell you when it is
finished, that you may thank him."
So saying, he led us into a room facing the door of the bedroom and
locked us in. I heard him go upstairs; heard voices: then his steps
coming down, followed by someone with a much heavier tread; heard them
enter the bedroom and close the door. Mrs. Barton was lying back in
her chair in a sort of stupor, and I was examining the room by the
light of one candle--it was now nearly half-past nine--when I heard a
sudden outbreak of noise, the bedroom door opened, the key of our door
was turned, and the taller of the two brothers looked in.
"The gentleman must come, please," he said, and I hurried out. "He is
calling for you," he said, closing the door, "and will not keep still;
we can do nothing if he will not keep still."
We went into the bedroom. Barton was tossing wildly about on the bed;
the little doctor was trying to keep him down while a tall dark man of
an unmistakably Jewish type was holding the injured leg as still as
he was able. I went up and took Barton's hands in mine: instantly he
became perfectly quiet, and his eyes closed.
"Keep him away. Campbell, I trust to you," he said, and lapsed into
unconsciousness.
"We must be quick," said the little doctor. "If the gentleman holds
the right hand all will be well; we will operate on the left arm.
Come, Israel," to the stranger, "stand here."
Barton was lying perfectly still, but when the man Israel approached
the head of the bed an extraordinary shudder ran through his body, his
eyes opened and glared at me, and his lips moved as if to speak; but
apparently the sight of me sitting by the bed soothed him, for the
panic died out of his eyes and his head fell back again on the pillow.
The operation commenced. I'm not doctor enough to give you the
details, and I could not see very clearly, but apparently the
doctors--for both the brothers appeared to be medical men--had
established, by means of a sort of a pipe, a connection between the
circulatory system of the big Jew and the poor fellow on the bed, so
that the blood of the former poured into the veins of the latter.
[Illustration: "'MY HUSBAND HAS MET WITH A TERRIBLE ACCIDENT,' SHE
CRIED."]
As this idea came home to me, I glanced anxiously at the stranger to
see if he was fitted to bear such a strain, and I was satisfied. A
fine full-blooded fellow he looked, six feet high and well built,
with black hair and ruddy cheeks, which seemed to me to be gradually
growing paler, but perhaps this may have been due to the failing light
of the little lamp by whose feeble rays this difficult operation was
being performed.
It seemed to me that this wonderful lending or selling of life, as it
were, had been going on for a long time, when I heard a slight noise
behind me, and, glancing round, I saw Mrs. Barton at the end of the
room near the door. Her eyes were fixed in a stare of terror on the
face, not of her husband on the bed, but on the stranger who was
saving that husband's life. The operation was almost over apparently.
Barton's face was in shadow, and I could see no change in its
appearance, but the smaller of the two doctors was bringing forward
instruments and bandages with a view apparently to the necessary
stoppage of the flow of blood when the connecting pipe should be
removed. I motioned to Mrs. Barton to keep back and be silent. I
suppose the big Jew Israel noticed my gesture, for his eyes turned
towards the door. I saw his face, which was now very pale, suddenly
stiffen as it were, and in another moment he gave a terrible cry, and
leaped back from the bed.
The smaller doctor, with the most admirable presence of mind,
instantly commenced operations on Barton's arm, while his brother
seized hold of his lodger round the waist. Mrs. Barton, her eyes still
fixed on the big Jew, was crouching down at the end of the room, and
I hurried round the bed only just in time to stop the man Israel, who
rushed towards her, dragging the doctor after him, and yelling out
some perfectly unintelligible gibberish. It was obvious, however, that
he meant murder, and I collared him in front while the doctor hung
on gallantly behind. Israel was enormously strong, and, seizing the
little man by the neck, he simply tore him off and flung him away into
a corner of the room. In doing this, however, he threw all his weight
on to his left foot, which I promptly kicked from under him, and we
came down together, knocking over the table and rolling wildly about
on the floor.
He seemed to be growing weaker, and at last I got my knee on his
chest, when I suddenly remembered that his arm had never been attended
to, that he must be bleeding to death. I could see nothing; for in our
fall his head had struck the table and upset the lamp--thank goodness
it was filled with colza, not paraffin--so I yelled to the doctors
to strike a light and lend a hand. The little man, who had quietly
finished Barton's arm while we were waltzing about all over the floor,
relighted the lamp, and I don't think I shall ever forget the scene
that the feeble light displayed to me.
Barton was sitting up on the bed looking anxiously in my direction;
one doctor was just getting on to his feet, the other was hurrying
towards me, and in the corner by the door was huddled Mrs. Barton,
still wildly staring round, but perfectly motionless. I looked down at
the man on the floor, and saw to my horror that he was on the point of
death--in fact, before the little doctor could reach him, and put the
lamp down, his jaw had dropped and his head fell back with a thud on
the bare boards.
"He is dead," said the little man, quietly; "that blow on the head
would perhaps have sufficed, but the cause of death was loss of blood;
perhaps the gentleman would prefer to make the fee seven hundred
pounds and he shall not be troubled with any too curious questions. As
the gentleman's carriage is at the door, the gentleman had better be
removed; it will not hurt him. Is there anything the matter with the
lady?"
Mrs. Barton had risen, and now came slowly forward. "No," she said,
"I am well. That man--I was afraid--I thought he was going to--to hurt
me."
"It was so, without doubt," said the little man, calmly; "he was
angry. Is the gentleman ready to be moved?"
"All right," said Barton, speaking in quite his ordinary voice, "all
right, I can walk."
"He must be carried," said the doctors together; "the other gentleman
will help us, and then he will perhaps arrange about the money."
We picked Barton up amongst us, his wife going first to prepare the
carriage for his reception, and carried him to the door.
"Stop a minute!" said Barton, suddenly, "let me see the poor fellow
who is dead."
"It is right that the gentleman should see him," said the smaller
brother, "he saved the gentleman's life."
We had propped the corpse up in a sitting position against the end of
the bed, and Barton looked long into the ghastly face.
"Good God! how strange!" he whispered at last. "He has saved my life,
and I feared him--how I feared him!"
"The gentleman knew Israel Hoffmann then?" said the taller of the two
doctors.
"No," said Barton, "I have never met him before. Go on," and we
carried him to the carriage where his wife was waiting us. I got in
with them, telling the doctors I would return immediately, and they
allowed me to depart without protest, somewhat to my surprise. I saw
Barton safely in bed, and was hurrying from the room when he called me
back and asked his wife to leave us for a moment.
"Campbell," he said, when she had gone, "do you know who that man
was?"
"No," said I, "he was a lodger in the house. I know no more than that,
but I can find out if you like."
"I don't mean that," he said; "that man's face was the face that had
peered at me round the door for more than a year; the face I had told
you about, the face I had grown to fear as I never feared anything in
my life before; and yet that man has saved my life. It was good, not
evil, that the vision meant, Campbell--good, not evil, and it was
nearly driving me mad. Go back to that house; you can leave me safely,
I am happier and better than I ever was before. I thought the thing
was evil, and I find it to be good."
I left him repeating these words over and over again, told his wife,
and hurried back to my rooms. Then, having procured the money, I
drove to the doctor's house. I settled with the two little men in the
sitting-room, and then asked if I might see the body.
"It is upstairs," they said. "We will arrange everything; he is of the
Religion. But you may see him."
I went upstairs, and there on a bed in a tiny room lay the body of
my late antagonist, wrapped in a sheet. The face was exposed, and I
examined it with interest. It was deathly pale and somewhat fallen
away, the thick, curving nose standing forward prominently. On the
left temple and on the forehead was a terrible bruise, caused,
I suppose, by the edge of the table on which the lamp had stood.
Certainly the face tallied marvellously with Barton's description of
his visionary visitor. I went back to my rooms and tried to puzzle
the thing out, but I can't say that I succeeded. The connection that
seemed to exist between the dead man and Mrs. Barton only complicated
matters instead of simplifying them.
Robinson and I are still staying on here, but the Bartons left
yesterday, Barton having recovered in a perfectly marvellous manner.
I've written a very long letter, old boy, but as you seem excited by
the remarks I let fall in my last epistle to you about the subject, I
thought I had better give you the full details. I'm afraid I must ask
you not to repeat the story--you will yourself see the reasons against
so doing. I don't know if you will be able to form any theory about
it--I shall be glad to hear it if you can. Hoping to get a letter from
you soon, and that you are quite fit,
I am
Your loving brother,
TOM.
* * * * *
April 14, 1898.
DEAR JACK,
I will give you, since you desire it, full details of the whole
terrible business, but I must repeat the caution of my last letter.
Don't make this public just yet. Of course many of the facts are
known, but still I should prefer you not to repeat what I am going to
tell you. I am taking legal advice on the subject.
In my letter to you, last summer, I told you, I think, all about
Barton's strange delusion and the extraordinary episode of the
transfusion of blood from the very man whose wraith he was always
seeing into Barton's own veins. The Bartons had been in England for
some time before I returned to find an invitation awaiting me to dine
at their house in town. I accepted, as I was anxious to see how Barton
was getting on, and whether he had got rid of his horrible delusion.
[Illustration: "WE FELL DOWN TOGETHER, AND I GOT MY KNEE ON HIS
CHEST."]