II
The table, a small, round rosewood one, stood, bare of any cloth, upon the hearthrug. The two ladies sat, motionless statues once more, upon the side furthest from the fire, with their hands resting lightly upon the surface. Laurie sat on one side and the medium on the other. Mr.
Vincent had received his paper and pencil almost immediately, and now sat resting his right hand with the pencil upon the paper as if to write, his left hand upon his knee as he sat, turned away slightly from the center.
Laurie looked at him closely....
And now he began to be aware of a certain quite indefinable change in the face at which he looked. The eyes were open--no, it was not in them that the change lay, nor in the lines about the mouth, so far as he could see them, nor in any detail, anywhere. Neither was it the face of a dreamer or a sleepwalker, or of the dead, when the lines disappear and life retires. It was a living, conscious face, yet it was changed. The lips were slightly parted, and the breath came evenly between them. It was more like the face of one lost in deep, absorbed, introspective thought. Laurie decided that this was the explanation.
He looked at the hand on the paper--well shaped, brownish, capable--perfectly motionless, the pencil held lightly between the finger and thumb.
Then he glanced up at the two ladies.
They too were perfectly motionless, but there was no change in them.
The eyes of both were downcast, fixed steadily upon the paper. And as he looked he saw Lady Laura begin to lift her lids slowly as if to glance at him. He looked himself upon the paper and the motionless fingers.
He was astonished at the speed with which the situation had developed.
Five minutes ago he had been listening to talk, and joining in it.
The clergyman had been here; he himself had been sitting a yard further back. Now they sat here as if they had sat for an hour. It seemed that the progress of events had stopped....
Then he began to listen for the sounds of the world outside, for within here it seemed as if a silence of a very strange quality had suddenly descended and enveloped them. It was as if a section--that place in which he sat--had been cut out of time and s.p.a.ce. It was apart here, it was different altogether....
He began to be intensely and minutely conscious of the world outside--so entirely conscious that he lost all perception of that at which he stared; whether it was the paper, or the strong, motionless hand, or the introspective face, he was afterwards unaware. But he heard all the quiet roar of the London evening, and was able to distinguish even the note of each instrument that helped to make up that untiring, inconclusive orchestra. Far away to the northwards sounded a great thoroughfare, the rolling of wheels, a myriad hoofs, the pulse of motor vehicles, and the cries of street boys; upon all these his attention dwelt as they came up through the outward windows into that dead silent, lamp-lit room of which he had lost consciousness. Again a hansom came up the street, with the rap of hoofs, the swish of a whip, the wintry jingle of bells....
He began gently to consider these things, to perceive, rather than to form, little inward pictures of what they signified; he saw the lighted omnibus, the little swirl of faces round a news-board.
Then he began to consider what had brought him here; it seemed that he saw himself, coming in his dark suit across the park, turning into the thoroughfare and across it. He began to consider Amy; and it seemed to him that in this intense and living silence he was conscious of her for the first time without sorrow since ten days ago. He began to consider.
Something brought him back in an instant to the room and his perception of it, but he had not an idea what this was, whether a movement or a sound. But on considering it afterwards he remembered that it was as that sound is that wakes a man at the very instant of his falling asleep, a sharp momentary tick, as of a clock. Yet he had not been in the least sleepy.
On the contrary, he perceived now with an extreme and alert attention the hand on the paper; he even turned his head slightly to see if the pencil had moved. It was as motionless as at the beginning. He glanced up, with a touch of surprise, at his hostess"s face, and caught her in the very act of turning her eyes from his. There was no impatience in her movement: rather her face was of one absorbed, listening intently, not like the bearded face opposite, introspective and intuitive, but eagerly, though motionlessly, observant of the objective world. He looked at Mrs. Stapleton. She too bore the same expression of intent regarding thought on her usually rather tiresome face.
Then once again the silence began to come down, like a long, noiseless hush.
This time, however, his progress was swifter and more sure. He pa.s.sed with the speed of thought through those processes that had been measurable before, faintly conscious of the words spoken before the sitting began--
"... If possible, the silence of thought."
He thought he understood now what this signified, and that he was experiencing it. No longer did he dwell upon, or consider, with any voluntary activity, the images that pa.s.sed before him. Rather they moved past him while he simply regarded them without understanding.
His perception ran swiftly outwards, as through concentric circles, yet he was not sure whether it were outwards or inwards that he went.
The roar of London, with its flight of ocular visions, sank behind him, and without any further sense of mental travel, he found himself perceiving his own home, whether in memory, imagination, or fact he did not know. But he perceived his mother, in the familiar lamp-lit room, over her needlework, and Maggie--Maggie looking at him with a strange, almost terrified expression in her great eyes. Then these too were gone; and he was out in some warm silence, filled with a single presence--that which he desired; and there he stopped.
He was not in the least aware of how long this lasted. But he found himself at a certain moment in time, looking steadily at the white paper on the table, from which the hand had gone, again conscious of the sudden pa.s.sing of some clear sound that left no echo--as sharp as the crack of a whip. Oh! the paper--that was the important point! He bent a little closer, and was aware of a sharp disappointment as he saw it was stainless of writing. Then he was astonished that the hand and pencil had gone from it, and looked up quickly.
Mr. Vincent was looking at him with a strange expression.
At first he thought he might have interrupted, and wondered with dismay whether this were so. But there was no sign of anger in those eyes--nothing but a curious and kindly interest.
"Nothing happened?" he exclaimed hastily. "You have written nothing?"
He looked at the ladies.
Lady Laura too was looking at him with the same strange interest as the medium. Mrs. Stapleton, he noticed, was just folding up, in an un.o.btrusive manner, several sheets of paper that he had not noticed before.
He felt a little stiff, and moved as if to stand up but, to his astonishment, the big man was up in an instant, laying his hands on his shoulders.
"Just sit still quietly for a few minutes," said the kindly voice. "Just sit still."
"Why--why--" began Laurie, bewildered.
"Yes, just sit still quietly," went on the voice; "you feel a little tired."
"Just a little," said Laurie. "But--"
"Yes, yes; just sit still. No; don"t speak."
Then a silence fell again.
Laurie began to wonder what this was all about. Certainly he felt tired, yet strangely elated. But he felt no inclination to move; and sat back, pa.s.sive, looking at his own hands on his knees. But he was disappointed that nothing had happened.
Then the thought of time came into his mind. He supposed that it would be about ten minutes past six. The sitting had begun a little before six. He glanced up at the clock on the mantelpiece; but it was one of those bulgy-faced Empire gilt affairs that display everything except the hour. He still waited a moment, feeling all this to be very unusual and unconventional. Why should he sit here like an invalid, and why should these three sit here and watch him so closely?
He shifted a little in his chair, feeling that an effort was due from him. The question of the time of day struck him as a suitably conventional remark with which to break the embarra.s.sing silence.
"What is the time?" he said. "I am afraid I ought to be--"
"There is plenty of time," said the grave voice across the table.
With a sudden movement Laurie was on his feet, peering at the clock, knowing that something was wrong somewhere. Then he turned to the company bewildered and suspicious.
"Why, it is nearly eight," he cried.
Mr. Vincent smiled rea.s.suringly.
"It is about that," he said. "Please sit down again, Mr. Baxter."
"But--but--" began Laurie.
"Please sit down again, Mr. Baxter," repeated the voice, with a touch of imperiousness that there was no resisting.
Laurie sat down again; but he was alert, suspicious, and intensely puzzled.
"Will you kindly tell me what has happened?" he asked sharply.
"You feel tired?"