Occasionally a pa.s.ser-by would nod to Ah Ben, who returned the salute familiarly, as if in recognition of an old friend; but no one stopped to talk.
"And you know some of these people!" cried Paul in astonishment.
"Some of them." But a look of intense sadness had settled upon the old man"s face, quite different from anything Henley had seen. For a moment neither spoke, and then Ah Ben, pa.s.sing the back of his hand across his forehead, said: "Yes, Mr. Henley, I know them, but I am not of them; and as you see, they shun me."
"I can not understand why that should be," answered Paul, who was conscious of a growing attachment for his guide.
"I can not explain; but some day, perhaps, you may know. Let us continue our walk."
Looking up at the marvelous examples of architecture that surrounded them, Paul observed that many of the houses had no windows, and inquired the reason.
"Windows and doors are here only a matter of taste, and not of necessity," answered the elder man; "the denizens of Levachan enter their houses wherever they please without experiencing the slightest obstruction. Likewise light and air are not here confined to special material and apertures for their admission. We are only just beginning to discover some of the possibilities of matter upon our plane of existence. Here these things are understood; for matter and spirit are one, their apparent difference lying in us."
"Yes," said Paul, "and I perceive that the inhabitants move from place to place through the upper atmosphere in defiance of all law!"
"Law, Mr. Henley, is the operation of man"s will. Where man through uncounted eons of time has believed himself the slave of matter, it becomes his master. I mean that the belief enslaves him, and not until he has worked his way out of the false belief, will he become free."
They continued their walk through gardens of bewitching beauty, and amid lights so far transcending any previous experience of Henley"s that he no longer even tried to comprehend Ah Ben"s labored explanations. At last his guide, turning, abruptly said:
"Come, let us return; the time is growing short!"
"Time!" said Henley, with an amused expression. "I thought you told me that time was only a mental condition!"
"True, I did," said Ah Ben, with a return of the same inexpressibly sad look; "but did I tell you that it had ceased to belong to me?"
There was no intimation of reproof, no endeavor to evade the remark; but Paul could not but observe the change in the man"s manner as they retraced their steps. Indeed, he was conscious of an overpowering sadness himself, as he turned his back upon the strange scene.
"Come!" said Ah Ben, with authority, leading the way.
They pa.s.sed up the grand stairway to the terrace, entering the room at the same window by which they had left it, and Ah Ben closed the sash and drew the curtains behind them.
A moment later Paul went to the window and looked out. There was an old moon, and the forest beneath lay bathed in its mellow light. The sudden transition to his former state was no less astounding than the first.
"Which, think you, is the most real," asked the old man, "the scene before us now, or the one we have left behind?"
Paul could not answer. He was revolving in his mind the marvels he had just witnessed. He could not understand how hypnotism could have created such a world as he had just beheld. It was not a whit less tangible, visible, or audible than that in which he had always lived, and he could not help looking upon Ah Ben as a creature far removed from his own sphere of life. How had the man acquired such powers?
These and other thoughts were rushing through his mind. Presently his host touched him lightly upon the shoulder, and said:
"Come, let us descend into the hall again, and finish our pipes."
And so they wandered back through the silent house to the old pew by the fire; and Ah Ben, stirring up the embers and adding fresh fuel, said:
"Although it is late, Mr. Henley, I do not feel inclined for bed; and if you are of the same mind, should be glad of your company."
Paul was glad of an excuse to sit up, and so settled himself upon the sofa, absorbed in meditation. The firelight flickered over their faces and the strange pictures on the wall, and the head of Tsong Kapa shone more plainly than ever before. The portraits on the stairs were as weird and incomprehensible as they had appeared on the first night of his arrival; and the old man and the girl, and their strange life, seemed even more deeply involved in mystery than they had upon that occasion. Paul was now beset with conflicting emotions. The gloom of the house was more oppressive than before; and were it not for his sudden and unaccountable affection for Dorothy, he might have left it at once, had it not again been for the vision of splendor and happiness just faded from his sight. He could not bear the thought of losing forever the sensation of life and power and ecstasy just beginning to dawn upon him, when so cruelly s.n.a.t.c.hed away; and but for Ah Ben he knew he should hope in vain for its return. Naturally, his emotions were strong and tearing him in opposite directions. The old man perceiving the depression of spirits into which his guest had fallen, reminded him gently of his warning regarding the shock of occult manifestation to those who were unprepared.
"It is not that so much," answered Paul, "as the regret I feel at having left it all behind. When a man has only just begun to experience the sensation of life--_of real life_--to find himself suddenly plunged back into a dungeon with chains upon his shoulders, you must admit the shock is terrible."
"Do I not know it?" answered the old man feelingly. "The return is far more to be dreaded than the escape into that life which you were at first inclined to call unreal; and yet, Mr. Henley, you must admit that it is difficult to decide the question of reality between the two worlds."
"True," answered Paul; "and yet I know that what I have just seen can be nothing else than a hypnotic vision; it is impossible it should be otherwise, for it has gone--and beyond my power to recall. What amazes me to the point of stupefaction is the marvelous impression of truth with which hypnotism can fill one. I had always imagined the effect was more in the nature of a dream, but this was vivid, sharp, and perfect as the everyday life about me. I am more bewildered than I have words to express."
"And yet," answered Ah Ben, "you still insist that the things you saw were unreal, because, as you say, they were the result of hypnotism.
It seems difficult to convince you of what I have already told you, that hypnotism is not a cause of hallucination, but of fact. You insist that because the minority of men only are subjected to hypnotic tests, the impressions produced must be false. You will not admit that a minority has any claim to a hearing, although their evidence is based upon precisely the same testimony as that of the majority--namely, the five senses. You have no better right to a.s.sume that your present surroundings are any more truthfully reported by your senses than those of your recent experience. You see, you hear and touch; did you not do the same in Levachan?"
"I did, indeed," answered Paul, "and with a clearness that makes it the more difficult to comprehend; still, of course, I know that the vision of Levachan was a deception, while this is real!"
"And because you are convinced that a majority of men would see this as you see it. What if it should be proved that you are wrong?"
"That would be impossible," answered Paul.
"You think so, indeed," answered the old man with a strange look in his eyes; "and yet, if you will look above you and about you, you will see for the first time the way in which this old house looks to the great majority of mankind--indeed, to such a vast majority, Mr.
Henley--that your individual testimony to the contrary would be regarded as the ravings of a madman. Look!"
Paul lifted his eyes. The roof was gone, and the stars shone down upon him through the open s.p.a.ce. About him were rough walls of crumbling stone, rapidly falling to decay; there were no pictures, there were no stairs with their uncanny portraits, there was no great open fire-place with the blazing logs, nor hanging lamp, nor cheery pew--all--all was gone--and nothing but ruin and decay remained, save some bunches of ivy which had climbed above the edge of the tottering wall, outlined dimly in the moonlight. The floor had rotted away, and dank gra.s.s and bushes and heaps of stone had filled its place. A pool of water in a distant corner reflected the sky and a star or two, and the dismal croaking of a frog was the only sound he heard. Through the open cas.e.m.e.nts wild vines and stunted trees had thrust their boughs, and beyond were the pines and hemlocks. Paul stood erect, and stared around him in blank amazement. Where was Ah Ben? He too had departed with the rest. Dazed and wondering, Henley sauntered toward the door, or rather to where the door had once stood, now only an open portal of crumbling stone, from the crevices of which grew bushes and a tangled network of vines. Climbing down over a ma.s.s of fallen bricks, he wandered out into the grounds. The lawn was buried beneath a confused jumble of rubbish and weeds, and the forest encroached upon its rights. The graveled road was no longer visible, wild gra.s.s, moss, and piles of fallen stone having covered it far below. As he looked above, the moon shone through the cas.e.m.e.nt of a ruined window, and an owl hooted dismally from the open belfry. The old house was a wreck, a tottering ruin, from whatever point he looked; and no room above or below seemed habitable. He walked around to see if the blank wall which guarded the secret chamber was still intact. Yes, there it was; it alone remained untouched by the ravages of time or war. The portraits and human remains were probably safe in their hiding place, and Paul shuddered at the thought. What hand had bound them up in that strange old corner to be hid forever from the eyes of men? He had heard no human word, nor was there apparently any shelter where man or woman could live. Presently amid the deep shadows of the forest something moved. It came nearer, and then from beneath the trees walked out into the moonlight. Paul started; but at the same moment a familiar voice spoke to him. It was Ah Ben"s.
"Do not let what you see alarm you, Mr. Henley, for it is the first time in which you have perceived Guir House in what you would call its normal state. As you now behold it, the majority of men would see it."
"Then I have been duped ever since my arrival!" exclaimed Paul in a slightly irritated tone.
"Not at all," answered the elder man complacently. "I have simply presented the house to you as it stood a hundred years ago. The impression you have had of it is quite as truthful as the one now before you. Indeed, it is as truthful as the view you now have of yonder star," he pointed to a twinkling luminary in the north; "for time has put out its fires more than a thousand years ago, so that you now behold it as it then was, and not as it is to-night."
"This hypnotism of yours is quite undoing me," answered Paul, pa.s.sing his hand across his eyes.
"And yet what you now behold is not hypnotism at all, but fact, as the world would call it. It is what the vast majority of all men would see if here to-night. But I perceive that it is troubling you.
Let us return to our old place by the fire, and the house as it was a century ago. In that state of the past I think you will find more comfort than in the melancholy ruin before us."
They climbed back over the fallen piles of bricks, stone, and mortar; and then Ah Ben lifted his withered hand, and touching Henley lightly upon the forehead, said:
"And now we are back in our old seats, just as they used to be in the days of yore!"
Paul looked about him. The fire was burning brightly. The pictures had been restored to their places on the walls. The old lamp and the strangely decorated staircase were all restored, just as he had left them a few minutes before. He gazed long and earnestly at the scene around him, and then fixing his eyes upon Ah Ben, helplessly, said:
"If then I am to understand that this is no longer real, but that the old ruin just beheld is the existing fact, might I ask in what part of the wreck you and Miss Guir have been able to fix your abode, for I saw nothing but crumbling walls--a roofless ruin?"
"The question you ask involves a story, and if you care to listen I will tell it to you, although the hour is late and the night far gone."
"I should enjoy nothing more," said Paul.
And the men filled and lighted their pipes, and Henley listened while Ah Ben told him the following:
9
"In the early settlement of this State, an Englishman by the name of Guir pre-empted a large body of land, near the center of which he erected this house. Although his intention in coming from the old country was to make his permanent home in the colony, his reasons for doing so were quite different from those which usually induce immigration. Guir was an artist, and a man of some means; and his object in colonizing was not so much to cultivate the soil, or to trade with the Indians, or engage in any business enterprise, as to gratify a craving for nature and surround himself with such scenery as he loved to paint. It would be folly to pretend that Guir was a man of ordinary tastes and disposition; for had he been such, he would never have undertaken a journey, with a family of girls, into such a wilderness as Virginia was at that time. No; from the very circ.u.mstances of his birth and education, he was unfitted to live with his countrymen; hence his early adoption of the colony as a home for himself, wife, and daughters. This happened a hundred and fifty years ago."