He had been amply repaid for all the hours he had spent in the close sale-room. His luck had turned at last: he was going to succeed; he felt it in the air, as if he were already fanned by Fortune"s pinions.
Still thinking of Sylvia, he let himself into the semi-detached, old-fashioned house on the north side of Vincent Square, where he had lodged for some years. It was nearly twelve o"clock, and his landlady, Mrs. Rapkin, and her husband had already gone to bed.
Ventimore went up to his sitting-room, a comfortable apartment with two long windows opening on to a trellised verandah and balcony--a room which, as he had furnished and decorated it himself to suit his own tastes, had none of the depressing ugliness of typical lodgings.
It was quite dark, for the season was too mild for a fire, and he had to grope for the matches before he could light his lamp. After he had done so and turned up the wicks, the first object he saw was the bulbous, long-necked jar which he had bought that afternoon, and which now stood on the stained boards near the mantelpiece. It had been delivered with unusual prompt.i.tude!
Somehow he felt a sort of repulsion at the sight of it. "It"s a beastlier-looking object than I thought," he said to himself disgustedly. "A chimney-pot would be about as decorative and appropriate in my room. What a thundering a.s.s I was to waste a guinea on it! I wonder if there really is anything inside it. It is so infernally ugly that it _ought_ to be useful. The Professor seemed to fancy it might hold doc.u.ments, and he ought to know. Anyway, I"ll find out before I turn in."
He grasped it by its long, thick neck, and tried to twist the cap off; but it remained firm, which was not surprising, seeing that it was thickly coated with a lava-like crust.
"I must get some of that off first, and then try again," he decided; and after foraging downstairs, he returned with a hammer and chisel, with which he chipped away the crust till the line of the cap was revealed, and an uncouth metal k.n.o.b that seemed to be a catch.
This he tapped sharply for some time, and again attempted to wrench off the lid. Then he gripped the vessel between his knees and put forth all his strength, while the bottle seemed to rock and heave under him in sympathy. The cap was beginning to give way, very slightly; one last wrench--and it came off in his hand with such suddenness that he was flung violently backwards, and hit the back of his head smartly against an angle of the wainscot.
He had a vague impression of the bottle lying on its side, with dense volumes of hissing, black smoke pouring out of its mouth and towering up in a gigantic column to the ceiling; he was conscious, too, of a pungent and peculiarly overpowering perfume. "I"ve got hold of some sort of infernal machine," he thought, "and I shall be all over the square in less than a second!" And, just as he arrived at this cheerful conclusion, he lost consciousness altogether.
He could not have been unconscious for more than a few seconds, for when he opened his eyes the room was still thick with smoke, through which he dimly discerned the figure of a stranger, who seemed of abnormal and almost colossal height. But this must have been an optical illusion caused by the magnifying effects of the smoke; for, as it cleared, his visitor proved to be of no more than ordinary stature. He was elderly, and, indeed, venerable of appearance, and wore an Eastern robe and head-dress of a dark-green hue. He stood there with uplifted hands, uttering something in a loud tone and a language unknown to Horace.
Ventimore, being still somewhat dazed, felt no surprise at seeing him.
Mrs. Rapkin must have let her second floor at last--to some Oriental. He would have preferred an Englishman as a fellow-lodger, but this foreigner must have noticed the smoke and rushed in to offer a.s.sistance, which was both neighbourly and plucky of him.
"Awfully good of you to come in, sir," he said, as he scrambled to his feet. "I don"t know what"s happened exactly, but there"s no harm done.
I"m only a trifle shaken, that"s all. By the way, I suppose you can speak English?"
"a.s.suredly I can speak so as to be understood by all whom I address,"
answered the stranger.
"Dost thou not understand my speech?"
"Perfectly, now," said Horace. "But you made a remark just now which I didn"t follow--would you mind repeating it?"
"I said: "Repentance, O Prophet of G.o.d! I will not return to the like conduct ever.""
"Ah," said Horace. "I dare say you _were_ rather startled. So was I when I opened that bottle."
"Tell me--was it indeed thy hand that removed the seal, O young man of kindness and good works?"
"I certainly did open it," said Ventimore, "though I don"t know where the kindness comes in--for I"ve no notion what was inside the thing."
"I was inside it," said the stranger, calmly.
CHAPTER IV
AT LARGE
"So _you_ were inside that bottle, were you?" said Horace, blandly. "How singular!" He began to realise that he had to deal with an Oriental lunatic, and must humour him to some extent. Fortunately he did not seem at all dangerous, though undeniably eccentric-looking. His hair fell in disorderly profusion from under his high turban about his cheeks, which were of a uniform pale rhubarb tint; his grey beard streamed out in three thin strands, and his long, narrow eyes, opal in hue, and set rather wide apart and at a slight angle, had a curious expression, part slyness and part childlike simplicity.
"Dost thou doubt that I speak truth? I tell thee that I have been confined in that accursed vessel for countless centuries--how long, I know not, for it is beyond calculation."
"I should hardly have thought from your appearance, sir, that you had been so many years in bottle as all that," said Horace, politely, "but it"s certainly time you had a change. May I, if it isn"t indiscreet, ask how you came into such a very uncomfortable position? But probably you have forgotten by this time."
"Forgotten!" said the other, with a sombre red glow in his opal eyes.
"Wisely was it written: "Let him that desireth oblivion confer benefits--but the memory of an injury endureth for ever." _I_ forget neither benefits nor injuries."
"An old gentleman with a grievance," thought Ventimore. "And mad into the bargain. Nice person to have staying in the same house with one!"
"Know, O best of mankind," continued the stranger, "that he who now addresses thee is Fakrash-el-Aamash, one of the Green Jinn. And I dwelt in the Palace of the Mountain of the Clouds above the City of Babel in the Garden of Irem, which thou doubtless knowest by repute?"
"I fancy I _have_ heard of it," said Horace, as if it were an address in the Court Directory. "Delightful neighbourhood."
"I had a kinswoman, Bedeea-el-Jemal, who possessed incomparable beauty and manifold accomplishments. And seeing that, though a Jinneeyeh, she was of the believing Jinn, I despatched messengers to Suleyman the Great, the son of Daood, offering him her hand in marriage. But a certain Jarjarees, the son of Rejmoos, the son of Iblees--may he be for ever accursed!--looked with favour upon the maiden, and, going secretly unto Suleyman, persuaded him that I was preparing a crafty snare for the King"s undoing."
"And, of course, _you_ never thought of such a thing?" said Ventimore.
"By a venomous tongue the fairest motives may be rendered foul," was the somewhat evasive reply. "Thus it came to pa.s.s that Suleyman--on whom be peace!--listened unto the voice of Jarjarees and refused to receive the maiden. Moreover, he commanded that I should be seized and imprisoned in a bottle of bra.s.s and cast into the Sea of El-Karkar, there to abide the Day of Doom."
"Too bad--really too bad!" murmured Horace, in a tone that he could only hope was sufficiently sympathetic.
"But now, by thy means, O thou of n.o.ble ancestors and gentle disposition, my deliverance hath been accomplished; and if I were to serve thee for a thousand years, regarding nothing else, even thus could I not requite thee, and my so doing would be a small thing according to thy desserts!"
"Pray don"t mention it," said Horace; "only too pleased if I"ve been of any use to you."
"In the sky it is written upon the pages of the air: "He who doth kind actions shall experience the like." Am I not an Efreet of the Jinn?
Demand, therefore, and thou shalt receive."
"Poor old chap!" thought Horace, "he"s very cracked indeed. He"ll be wanting to give me a present of some sort soon--and of course I can"t have that.... My dear Mr. Fakrash," he said aloud, "I"ve done nothing--nothing at all--and if I had, I couldn"t possibly accept any reward for it."
"What are thy names, and what calling dost thou follow?"
"I ought to have introduced myself before--let me give you my card;" and Ventimore gave him one, which the other took and placed in his girdle.
"That"s my business address. I"m an architect, if you know what that is--a man who builds houses and churches--mosques, you know--in fact, anything, when he can get it to build."
"A useful calling indeed--and one to be rewarded with fine gold."
"In my case," Horace confessed, "the reward has been too fine to be perceived. In other words, I"ve never _been_ rewarded, because I"ve never yet had the luck to get a client."
"And what is this client of whom thou speakest?"
"Oh, well, some well-to-do merchant who wants a house built for him and doesn"t care how much he spends on it. There must be lots of them about--but they never seem to come in _my_ direction."
"Grant me a period of delay, and, if it be possible, I will procure thee such a client."
Horace could not help thinking that any recommendation from such a quarter would hardly carry much weight; but, as the poor old man evidently imagined himself under an obligation, which he was anxious to discharge, it would have been unkind to throw cold water on his good intentions.