Part 45

She began to make eccentric movements with both her hands before our eyes, and what followed was as a dream. I was conscious of a peculiar sense of languor stealing over me that was far from unpleasant. Presently I saw the woman snatch the burning torch from the niche in the rock and extinguish it, and we were plunged in Cimmerian gloom. A few minutes, as it seemed to me, passed, when a startling and peculiar light permeated the cavern. It proceeded from the brazier, from which rose a slender blue column of vapour that gave off apparently a phosphorescent glow. Anita was still standing, the snake was hanging from her neck, its head darting backwards and forwards viciously as if it were attacking its prey, while the woman with her long skinny arms described figures in the air. The blue, flowing column of smoke or vapour rose slowly, for it was dense and spread out mushroom shape until it filled every corner and crevice, and I seemed at last to be gazing through the medium of blue glass at a rolling prairieland over which the sun was shining brightly. The woman, the snake, the brazier, had faded away now, and only that vast stretch of sun-scorched prairie was visible. But presently, afar off, I saw two people on horseback. They gradually came nearer, and I recognised my sweet wife and Jocelino. Juliette was laughing merrily and seemed blithe and happy. They halted in the shadow of a rock, and hobbling their horses partook of their midday meal. That finished, and after a short siesta, they mounted their steeds and rode at a gallop towards a belt of virgin forest which they entered and were lost to my view. Presently they emerged, each bearing a mass of a peculiar orchid with flowers of the most brilliant colours. They dismounted again and knelt down on the ground to arrange the flowers in a more convenient way for carrying. From out of the forest, and all unobserved by them, a tall, powerful Indian hunter stole, and crept stealthily towards them. I wanted to cry out, to warn them, but I couldn’t; I was spellbound. The Indian reached them, and with an extraordinarily rapid sweep of his arm he plunged a long knife into my loved one’s bosom. Jocelino half started up, but before he could offer resistance the arm swept round and the knife was plunged into his breast. With a grim sardonic grin on his features, the murderer wiped his dripping blade, and returned to the forest, reappearing after some lapse of time grasping a writhing coral snake, which he suddenly flung high into the air, and when it fell with a dull thud at his feet he struck it on the head with the handle of his knife.

He next dropped upon his knees and seemed to go through some form of incantation, throwing dirt upon his head, bowing his forehead to the ground, and raising his hand to heaven alternately, until at last he rose, laid the bodies side by side on their backs, and placed the snake at full length between them. Then the whole scene faded, and there was a blank.

Once more the same scene came before my eyes, but this time it was moonlight. The soft silver light threw a mysterious sheen over the landscape. I saw a man come out of the forest. It was the murderer. His face was filled with a look of concentrated horror, and he began to move slowly across the prairie, glancing about him in a nervous, agitated way. I became conscious at last that he was coming towards me, and I was filled with a fierce joy at the thought that when he came within reach I could strangle him where he stood. The strangeness of it all is I could not move; I appeared to be rooted to the spot, but the Indian ever approached nearer to me, drawn by some power which he tried to resist, but against which he was helpless. And so nearer and nearer he came, and all the while that expression of concentrated horror was on his face. Although I could not move from the spot where I seemed to be rooted, fiercer and fiercer grew my joy, and I waved my hands about in expectant eagerness at the thought of being able at last to crush the worthless life out of the murderer of my sainted wife. On he came. I got frantic, I tugged and strained, but could not break away from the power that held me; my eyes ached with the strain put upon them, my pulses beat with a loud, audible noise, so it seemed to me; there was a burring and buzzing in my ears, an awful burning sensation was in my brain. I felt as if I were going mad with the horror of suspense.

At length the murderer came within my reach. I flung out my hands to seize him, when suddenly the moonlight faded, and there was total darkness. How long this darkness lasted I know not, but gradually light began to spread over the landscape again; the moon shone full once more. At my feet the Indian lay on his back. One knee was drawn up; one arm was bent under his body, the other was raised up as if he were appealing to Heaven; his face was twisted and contorted with agony. He made no motion; he was stark and dead. Some strange irresistible fascination caused me to fix my gaze upon him, and as I watched I saw the face wither, the eyes fall into the sockets. Then the flesh of the arm turned green, and blue, and yellow, and gradually dropped rotten from the bones. Next the rest of the body began to rot away leaving the bones bare. Loathsome crawling things fed upon the decaying flesh, and cobras twisted themselves round his legs and arms.

The maddening, ghastly, gruesome horror of the scene was more than human brain could stand; and when a huge vulture suddenly descended and tore out the entrails and began to gorge upon them the climax was reached. With a mighty effort I burst the spell that enthralled me; uttered a great cry, and fell prone upon the ground.

What happened after that I know not. What I do know is I seemed suddenly to awake from a deep sleep. Above me the stars and moon were shining. From somewhere, far below, came the sound of falling water. The air was deliciously cool. I was covered with the skin of an animal, and squatted near me was Anita waving a palm leaf to keep the insects from my face. I glanced round and recognised that I was lying at the entrance to the cave.

‘What does all this mean?’ I asked.

‘You have dreamed dreams,’ she answered. ‘You have seen that which is. Seek to know no more. But sleep, sleep, sleep.’ She repeated the word ‘sleep’ with a sort of drowsy croon that seemed to lull and soothe me.

There was another blank. When I next awoke it was broad daylight and the sun was already high. I was lying on a bed of skins at the entrance to the cave. I sat up, and the sound of the falling water far below in the ravine sounded pleasantly. I called ‘Anita, Anita!’ but there was no response. Presently I saw a figure crawling from the cavern. It was Torquato. He suddenly flung himself upon me, and wept and moaned like one distraught.

‘Oh, master, master, what horrors!’ he cried.

‘Of what do you speak?’ I asked. ‘Tell me all.’

Gradually he regained control of himself. Then he recited to me all he had witnessed. It was identical with what I had seen. The murder, the mystery of the snake, the rotting corpse, the loathsome maggots, the vulture gnawing the entrails. Again I called Anita, but there was no response. I bade Torquato go into the cave and seek her, but he flatly refused. I struggled to my feet. I felt strangely ill and weak, and every now and then I shuddered as a remembrance of the horror came back. Still I was anxious to see Anita again and question her. I entered the cavern, but all was dark and silent. I groped my way forward for some distance and called once more. Only the echoes answered me. It was all so solemn, so awe-inspiring, so mysterious that I was glad to return to the fresh air again and to hear the voice of my companion. It was evident Anita did not intend to come to us, and so we slowly made our way down the mountain and reached the station at midday. And I had resolved by that time to make another visit to Anita. For several days, however, I had to keep my bed as I was feverish and ill. Then I summoned Torquato. He had also been ill, and when I asked him if he would go with me to Anita once more, he said, ‘No, not for a ton of gold’; so I sent to the little town for a notary. When he came I requested Torquato to tell the notary his marvellous experience and what he had seen. The notary wrote it down; Torquato signed it, and I appended a note over my own signature to the effect that I had witnessed the same scene. We next went before the Mayor of Paraúna and testified on oath to the correctness of our narrative, and that done, the strange document was deposited in the municipal archives of the town, where no doubt it can still be seen by the curious. My next step was to send out a party of trained hunters to the place where the bodies had been found, with instructions to search for miles round for any indications of a human skeleton. They returned after many days, and reported that two leagues or so from the spot where the crime was committed, in a sandy sun-smitten waste, where only a few cacti grew, they came across the bleached skeleton of a man. The bones were falling apart, but it seemed as if one leg had been drawn up, one arm bent under the body, the other raised. Beside the body lay a long, rusty knife. Who the man was we never discovered. Even the knife was unlike those in use in that part of the country. That the skeleton was the skeleton of my wife’s murderer I haven’t a shadow of a doubt. Why he murdered her must remain a mystery until the secrets of all hearts be known. Who Anita was, and by what marvellous power she was able to show me the horrors she did, I have no knowledge. There are mysteries of the earth which the human brain cannot comprehend. It is given to only a few to see as I have seen and live.

For many years I have kept the awful secrets to myself, but the sands of my life are running low, and I resolved to give to the world the story of my strange experiences. To those who may be inclined to scoff I would repeat, ‘There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’

* * * * *

NOTE TO ‘THE MYSTIC SPELL.’--Although Signor Roderick, who supplies the material for the foregoing remarkable story, suggests no theory for the murder of his wife and her attendant, anyone who has travelled in the interior of Brazil will have no difficulty in doing so. The Indians are exceedingly superstitious, resentful, and blood-thirsty, as they are in many parts of Mexico. In the case of the Brazilians who inhabit the wild parts of the country, they regard certain parts of the virgin forests as their own special domains. As mentioned in the story, it is very unusual for a lady of good social position to be seen abroad, and the freedom which Juliette enjoyed in this respect was an innovation. Now if the vision that Signor Roderick saw, and which was conjured up by the mystic power of the witch-woman, was an accurate representation of the crime, it is easy to understand that some savage Indian, who had seen Juliette and Joceline enter the forest and carry off the orchid bloom, resented it. Moreover, he may have regarded Juliette as an unnatural being, for probably he had never seen a white woman before. No women--save Indian women, and they but rarely--ever entered those deadly forests, the haunts and homes of the most venomous reptiles and the most savage animals, where there are plants exuding so virulent a poison that if but one drop falls on the flesh gangrene ensues; where loathsome insects fall upon the intruder from the trees and eat their way into his body; where the very air is deadly to those who breathe it, other than the native born. Juliette’s presence, therefore, in such a place must have filled the Indian with dire alarm, and inflamed him with a desire to slay her. To him, no doubt, the crime would appear as a justifiable one. Anyway, with the stealth and cunning of his kind he crept after her, and his cruel knife drank her blood, and having killed her, it followed as a matter of course that he should kill her companion.

Now these Indians worship strange gods and sacrifice to them, and snake sacrifice is common, not only in the interior of Brazil, but in Mexico. The slaying of the coral snake was therefore a sacrifice on the part of the murderer. How he met his own death must ever remain a mystery. Probably he himself perished from snake-bite, for though these Indians show an extraordinary fearlessness of poisonous reptiles, and will catch them and handle them in a way that makes a stranger shudder, they are not proof against their bites, although they boast that they possess infallible antidotes against the venom of the serpent. This, however, may be regarded as no more than a boast. In the forests of Brazil are to be found some of the most horrible snakes the world produces. Apart from the Cobra coral, or to give it its scientific name, Elaps maregravii, rattle snakes of the most virulent kind are found, and then there is the hideous Cascavel. It is said that death follows the bite of this snake almost immediately. The victim goes suddenly blind, and the flesh commences to peel off his bones through gangrene even before the breath is out of his body. The annual death roll from snake-bite in all parts of South America is appalling; and, as might be supposed, the Indians who roam the forests and prairies, either as animal or orchid hunters, furnish a large percentage of the victims. It is a feasible theory, therefore, that the cruel murderer of Juliette and Joceline lost his life through snake-bite, probably the bite of the Cascavel.

As regards Anita, one can only suppose that she was possessed of some strange mesmeric or hypnotic power; but even if that were so, one is puzzled to understand how she was able to show her subjects the scene and incidents of the crime unless she herself knew them. The theory that suggests itself here is that during the three days’ interval between Signor Roderick consulting her and his second visit, she had learned the story of the crime from some of the wandering Indians. She herself was an Indian and would be regarded by her tribe as ‘a wise woman.’ But whatever theory one likes to accept, it is a well-known fact attested over and over again by travellers that some of the Indian women of South America, especially in the neighbourhood of the Amazon, are gifted with the power of second sight and of forecasting the future. Such women are held in veneration by their own people, but Christians believe that they have an unholy alliance with the common enemy of mankind.

THE DOOMED MAN

FROM THE PAPERS OF THE LATE MR. RICHARD JOHN GIBLING, MERCHANT, OF THE CITY OF LONDON

As to whether this story shall or shall not see the light of publicity I leave to the discretion of my executor. I am resolved that in my time it shall remain my own secret. I am partly actuated to this course by a peculiar and constitutional sensitiveness to anything like ridicule; while for a man in my position, a sober, prosaic merchant, engaged in trade in London, to confess to belief in the supernatural, would not only subject me to a good deal of chaff, but might possibly, indeed I think it is highly probable that it would, do me a good deal of injury in my business. City life is a hard, stern struggle for existence. The City man is governed by immutable conventional laws, and woe betide anyone who transgresses them. Men engaged in business generally become slaves to custom. You must don a tall hat and frock coat; you must assume a smug respectability; you must go to church on Sunday; your name must appear occasionally in charitable lists; you must speak deferentially of your mayor and corporation; you must conform to all the traditions and customs of the City, as prescribed by the unwritten laws; you must periodically be seen at Guild dinners; your holidays must be taken at a fixed time, and be of a specified duration. In a word, ‘must’ may be said to be the text of your life. You must do this and mustn’t do that. And if you have the hardihood and boldness to set your face against the stern and fast rules to which you tacitly bind yourself when you become a City man, well then, all the worse for you. Now with a knowledge of these facts, which cannot be gainsaid, it will be understood why I have been so reluctant to make known the extraordinary incidents which I here note down for the interest of those who are curious in such things. But extraordinary as they are, I set them forth as matter of hard, solid, undeniable truth. Throughout my life I have taken ‘Truth’ as my watchword, as my father and grandfather did before me. It has been my proud boast, warranted by facts, that my word has been as good as my bond. And in all my dealings with men of many complexions of mind, no one could or would have thought of impugning my honour, my bona fides, or my veracity. The business in which I was brought up, after a course at a public school, and to which I succeeded on the death of my esteemed father, was a very old-established one, having been founded by my paternal grandfather and his brother at the beginning of the seventeenth century.

It was in the year 1847, as our business and trade were spreading, that I opened a branch of our London house in Cuba, and placed a trusted and experienced manager in charge. Unfortunately this gentleman died in 1850, after a few days’ illness, of yellow fever, and it became imperatively necessary that I should proceed at once to Cuba to look into matters, and appoint a successor to the deceased manager. A City friend recommended me to take passage in a rather noted sailing vessel called the Pride of the Ocean, belonging to a Liverpool firm, and then loading in the Liverpool docks, being chartered to proceed direct to Cuba. I thereupon applied to the owners, and being informed by them that the ship would be ready to sail in a week at the latest, I engaged my passage in her. She was a full-rigged ship of about a thousand tons, and was reputed to be able to sail with a fair wind seventeen knots an hour, being clipper built.

I arrived in Liverpool on the very day that the ship was advertised to sail. I was informed that she would warp out of the dock at midnight, when it would be high-water, and that two tugs would at once take hold of her and tow her beyond Holyhead. I did not reach Liverpool until the evening, and drove at once from the railway station to the vessel and went on board. Of course, everything was in the wildest confusion, and the noise and hubbub deafening; so, on receiving an assurance from the mate that I still had three or four hours at my disposal, I drove to the Adelphi Hotel, dined, played a game of billiards with a London gentleman with whom I had a passing acquaintance, and at eleven o’clock once more drove down to the docks and got on board the ship as the dock gates were being opened. Being very tired I went straight to bed, and the next morning, as the sea was very rough, I could not get up, as I am a poor sailor, and generally ill for three or four days at the commencement of a voyage. On this occasion I was a full week before I found my sea legs and sea stomach, and one morning I took my place at the breakfast table for the first time, and was welcomed and greeted by the captain, whom I had not seen before. We were a very small party, as there were only three passengers beside myself, one being a Spanish lady who had been transacting some business in England on behalf of her husband, who was a Cuban planter.

The captain’s name was Jubal Tredegar, a native of Cornwall, as I gathered. He was about fifty years of age, and had been at sea for over thirty. He had a swarthy sunburnt face, very dark hair, and black eyes, with a full, rounded beard, but clean-shaven upper lip. In every respect he was a typical sailor, save in one thing--he was the most melancholy seaman I have ever come across. It is proverbial of sailors that they are a rollicking, jovial set; but this man was the exception to the rule, and he at once gave me the impression that he had something on his mind. My sympathies were in consequence of this aroused, and I mentally resolved that I would endeavour to win his confidence, in the hope that I might be of use to him.

At first, however, I found that he was inclined to be taciturn, and resent any attempt to draw him out; but I learnt from the mate that Tredegar had commanded the ship for three voyages, and was highly respected by the owners. He was a thoroughly experienced navigator, and studied his owners’ interests. There was one thing I could not fail to note; he showed a disposition to talk more to me than to anyone else, and discovering that he played a good game at cribbage--a game I was particularly partial to--I got into closer touch with him, as one evening he accepted my invitation to a game, and after that we played whenever opportunity offered. But still he became neither communicative nor talkative, and no subject I could start appeared to have any interest for him.

We were playing, as was now our wont, one night in the cuddy after supper, when I noticed that he seemed more than usually depressed, and kept examining the barometer and casting an anxious eye up through the skylight.

‘What does the glass say, captain?’ I asked at last.

‘Well,’ he answered, ‘I think we are going to have a blow. There is dirty weather about somewhere.’

When four bells (ten o’clock) struck we finished our game and he went into his cabin, while I mounted the companion-way to the poop, intending to smoke my usual cigar before turning in. I had run short of cigars, and the captain had promised to let me have a box of good Havanas, but not until I reached the deck did I remember that I had not a single weed in my case, so I went below again, and to the skipper’s room, intending to ask him for the cigars. Getting no response to my knock I pushed the door open and was surprised to see him seated at his table, so absorbed in gazing at the photograph of a lady that he had not heard my knock. On perceiving me, he hastily thrust the photograph into a drawer and jumped up. I noticed him pass his hands over his eyes and turn away as if ashamed, pretending to search for something on the top of a chest of drawers. I thought it was an opportunity not to be lost so I said to him: