"What a great thing it is, if one could get hold of it and use it--the collective spirit of a community! It"s utilizable--or ought to be--like water power....
"There was a woman in town then, a "mental healer," she called herself.
I"d run across her more than once and she interested me very much. She was a clever woman--sensible, too, which doesn"t always follow, you know. So far as I could tell, she never handled a case she wasn"t able to attend to, which may seem an odd thing for me to say, but happens to be so. I know of a dozen nervous, hysterical women--emotional spend-thrifts--that she bullied into shape and got so they could stand up without her behind them, too. They were cured, and they stayed cured. More than that, I sent more than one to her, myself!
""Mrs. Mears," I said, "there"s nothing the matter with these women that I can see but pure, piggish, bone-idle selfishness. I haven"t got the courage to tell "em so; if you have, and the long words you use disguise the fact sufficiently, go ahead and cure "em, and G.o.d bless you!"
""Thank you, doctor," she said, and she cured "em. They had no use for me after that. No, indeed--they told my wife they"d found a higher law and that calomel was sinful. But the poor old calomel wasn"t so bad for "em, after all, maybe.
"Well, I met her on my rounds one day and I stopped and asked her if she was satisfied with her house--I knew the neighbourhood was rather running down, there--the darkies were creeping up. She admitted she wasn"t particularly, and, to make a long story short, I offered her this house of mine for two-thirds the regular rental.
""I want a good steady tenant, Mrs. Mears," I said, "and people may as well get used to bringing their headaches over there--I may move out there sometime."
"So she moved in and I never gave the matter another thought--I knew she wouldn"t run off with anybody! No, she"d had her lesson, I take it. No blue-eyed woman gets as sensible as that woman was without a good, solid reason. And the reason is pretty certain to wear trousers.
"Well, sir, in a month she came to see me. I can see her now: a firm, stocky woman, long body and short legs and big head--the efficient type. She had the smooth pink cheeks and smooth forehead and straight eyes those healer-women have when they"re first cla.s.s of their kind--oh, there"s a lot in it--a lot! We fight "em and get the law on "em and absorb "em, finally, as we"ve fought every advance in medicine.
It seems to be the only way in this world...
"She always looked so clean and taut, that woman, never a loose end anywhere.
""Doctor," says she, "you must get a new tenant. I"m leaving to-morrow. How much will it cost me, giving no notice?"
""Why, what"s the matter?" I began. "Anything I can attend to?"
""Not a thing," she answered promptly, "and we won"t discuss it, if you please. The van is there, by this time."
""Why, see here, Mrs. Mears," I said seriously. "This--this is hardly professional, it seems to me. If there"s anything wrong with my property, I want to know it. Of course I know your theories--G.o.d"s in his heaven and all"s right with the world, and if you discuss it, the devil may creep in--I"ve read Emerson"s Essays, myself. I know what you think about medicine and surgery and hygiene--you think Emerson!
And that"s all right, as far as it goes. But just for ten minutes, between you and me, what"s the matter? You can keep on being serene, after that, all you want. Come now--as man to man!"
"She flattened her lips a little and tried not to scowl.
""Put it that I don"t like old houses, doctor," she said finally.
""Ah! House haunted?" I suggested, to tease her a little.
"She turned on me.
""You said it, not I," she answered, "but it is true. The house is haunted, doctor, and if I lived there a day longer, I couldn"t do my work. I didn"t wish to discuss it--you know we don"t believe in that--but you meant to do me a service. It"s a crime to rent that house. It"s slimy. It crawls."
""Slimy!" I cried. "Why the agent told me that the cellar was new cemented, all whitewashed, every room new papered, fresh matting, hard wood on the lower floor, and I attended to the plumbing myself! It was gone over thoroughly three years ago--there must have been a thousand dollars put into it. It hadn"t been lived in for years before that.
Slimy!"
""You don"t understand me," she said quietly.
""For heaven"s sake, what haunts it, then? Who"s the ghost?" I cried testily.
""Evil," she said slowly, "evil thought, evil lives ... you breathe it in ... it tangles you ... another night there ... I should have no more power, absolutely--I could help n.o.body. I must ask you not to refer to it again, please. I should not have mentioned it. How much do I owe you?"
""You owe me nothing, of course," I said shortly. "I"ll return you the amount of your cheque this afternoon. I"ll move into that house, myself."
""You will be making a mistake," she said very placidly, and left the office.
"It took me about forty-eight hours to make my arrangements. It was hot summer weather, fortunately, and I sent my wife off to the mountains, started in to have my own house renovated and decorated, as an excuse, left the housekeeper in charge there and moved my office paraphernalia into that old house with the evergreen hedge. My wife was a Southern woman and we always had darky servants. I took the waitress with me, a quiet little mulatto we"d had for more than a year, and sent for her mother, a very capable woman that I"d often used as nurse in cases where they couldn"t pay a professional. She could do anything, the way those Southern darkies can, and she would cook and look after things generally.
"Well, in three days it seemed as if I"d always been there. You know how quickly a man manages a change like that; it"s hard to see where the women generate all the friction they make out of a move of that sort. Althea was frying chicken contentedly and Mynie was sweeping and dusting as quietly as she always did.
"She was a slender, oval-faced little yellow girl with almost straight hair, parted and drawn down like a madonna"s, very low voiced and capable, with only one fault; she was almost too shy and always timid that she"d make some blunder--which she seldom if ever did. She was devoted to her mother, who had brought her up particularly well, and delighted to be living with her. The patients all liked her and she was especially tactful with children.
"One day, after I"d been there a week, I strolled out in the kitchen.
""This strikes me as being a pretty good house, eh, Althea?" I said.
"New and clean. Everything all right?"
""Yes, Dr. Stanchon, thank you, seh, it seems like a very good house, seh," she answered respectfully.
""It"s right surprisin" Mrs. Mears didn"t like it!" says Mynie with a little giggle.
"It struck me then that I had never known Mynie to speak, in her life, without being spoken to, and even so, when I had occasion to speak to her, she started and looked a little scared. I supposed living with her mother had given her more confidence and felt rather glad of it.
"It might have been a week later one morning, as I leaned out of one of the office windows to knock my pipe clean, I heard a low laughing and murmuring on the side porch, and glancing carelessly in that direction, what should I see but Mynie twisting the lapel of a young man"s coat; his arm was around her waist. It occurred to me that he was pretty well dressed for any beau she"d be likely to have, and as he turned his face partly, I realised with a disgusted surprise that it was George, my colored office-man. It would be hard to make you feel the way I did then, and you"ll probably smile when I tell you that I couldn"t have been more shocked and startled if it had been any one of you--but it"s the truth.
"You see, George was a most exceptional fellow. Everybody in--in the city I"m telling about--knew him and respected him. Everybody among my patients knew that except for his colour he"d have been my regular office a.s.sistant long ago. As it was, he knew more medicine than many a lad with his gilt shingle up, and his English was perfect--he"d been in school till he was eighteen and was a great reader. He"d come to me as a coachman, but I soon saw his value and promoted him to the office, where he took all the telephoning, received the patients, got out the bills and kept all my accounts, personal and professional. He"d helped me more than once in operations, and had a perfect genius for administering anaesthetics. n.o.body but our two selves knew what his salary was, but I never grudged a penny of it. Why, the fellow read French and German almost as well as I did, and tact--Lord, I wished every day of my life I had George"s tact and resource! My wife was tremendously fond of him, and lent him all her books, and they used to have great discussions on political economy and theosophy and prison reform--oh, everything!
"He had lots of white blood, of course, and his wife you"d never guess to be anything but pure American, she was so white. One of the children, though, was black as my hat. The other had almost golden hair and deep blue eyes--a beautiful little girl, brought up like a d.u.c.h.ess, too. They lived in a nice little house on the extreme edge of the negro district, and we all understood that when the little girl was fifteen or sixteen, she and her mother were going to move to Paris and train her voice; then if everything went well, George and the boy would join them and never come back--he was specialising in dentistry, mind you, in his spare time. It"s different, of course, abroad.
"I"m telling you all this, so you can see how I felt; I"d had George nine years, and we"d always had darky servants, and--oh, well, to find him with that yellow streak in him after all, nearly floored me. I could have sworn he wasn"t that sort of pup, and when he came in for his orders I talked to him like a Dutch uncle.
""You"ve got to stop this, George," I said directly, "I can"t have any such performances here. To tell you the truth, I never thought it of you! The idea--a quiet little thing like Mynie! She"s as timid as a kitten and as innocent. Now I want your word of honour before you leave this office and I want it quick!"
"He opened his mouth once or twice in a confused sort of way, looked at me curiously, and then gave his word quietly. So far as I knew, he had never broken it.
"But I wasn"t satisfied with that and I spoke to her mother.
""You"d better keep an eye on Mynie, Althea," I said carelessly.
"She"s a pretty girl, you know, and men aren"t always too careful what they say to a girl as pretty as Mynie."
""Yes, seh, I"ll look out," she said, "I"ll look out, doctor--ef I kin.
Seems like I may have trouble, though. Is Mis" Stanchon comin" back soon, seh?"
""Probably not," I said. "It"s too hot for her here. Why, what"s the matter? Anything wrong?"
""I guess not, seh," she answered, hesitating. "I try to do my best, doctor. But I will sholy be glad when she comes back. And would you mind to speak to Mynie yo"self, seh?" and she slipped away.
"Well, I did speak to her. I spoke when I ran across her, strolling with George in a deserted walk of an old park. I called her right into the office the next morning.
""Mynie," I said sharply, "what were you doing yesterday afternoon?
Out with it!"
"She opened her eyes and looked full at me for a second--something she had never done.