Toppleton's Client; Or, A Spirit in Exile Read online

  CHAPTER VI.

  THE SPIRIT UNFOLDS A HORRID TALE.

  "IF ever a man had a right to swoon away, Hopkins," continued thespirit, his voice dropping to a whisper, "I was that man, and I presumeI should have done so but for the everlasting spirit of compromise in mybreast. The proper thing to do under the circumstances was manifestly toflop down on the carpet insensate, just as you did when I announcedmyself to you; and I assure you I had greater reason for so doing thanyou had, for my visitor had absolutely no limitations whatsoever in theline of the horrible. He was an affront to every sense, and not, likemyself, trying only to the ear. To the sense of sight was he mosthorrible, and I would have given anything I possessed to be able toremove my eyes from his dreadful personality, with the long bony clawswhere you and I have fingers; with tight-drawn cheeks so transparentthat through them could be seen his hideous jaws; with eyes which staredeven when the lids closed over them; and, worst of all, his throbbingbrain was visible as it worked inside his skull; and so bloodless ofaspect was he withal, that the mind instinctively likened him to afasting vampire."

  "Excuse me!" groaned Hopkins, throwing himself down on the couch andburying his face in the pillow. "This is awful. I've crossed the oceaneight times, Sallie, and until now I have never known sea-sickness, butthis--this vampire of yours is mightier than Neptune; just hand me thewhiskey."

  "I'm sorry it affects you that way, Hopkins," said the spirit, "and I'dgladly give you the whiskey if I could, but you know how circumscribedmy abilities are. I haven't any hand to hand it with."

  "Never mind," said Hopkins, the colour returning to his cheeks, "I feelbetter now. It was only a sudden turn I had; only, my friend, go slow onthe horrible, will you?"

  "I wish I could," replied the spirit sadly, "but the cause of truthrequires that I tell you precisely what happened, omitting no singledetail of the sickening totality. Perhaps, before I proceed, you hadbetter take a dozen grains of quinine, and have the whiskey withinreach."

  "That is a good suggestion," said Hopkins, rising and gulping down thepills, and grasping the neck of the square-cut bottle containing thetreasured fluid, with his trembling hand. "Go ahead," he said, as heresumed his recumbent position on the couch.

  "To the olfactories," resumed the spirit, "the visitant was stifling. Agross of sulphur matches let off all at once would be a weak imitationof the atmospheric condition of this room after he had been here twominutes, and yet I did not dare to turn from him to open the window. Myonly weapon of defence was my eye, under the tense gaze of which heseemed uneasy, and I was fearful of what might happen were I to permitit to waver for one instant. His colour was simply deadly. I shoulddescribe it best, perhaps, as of a pallid green in which there was asuggestion of yellow that heightened the general effect to the pointwhere it became ghastly."

  Here Hopkins' eyelids fluttered, and the bottle was raised to his lips.When the draught had been taken the bottle dropped from his nervelessfingers to the floor, and shivered into countless slivers of browncrystal.

  "Jove!" ejaculated the spirit. "That was very unfortunate, Hop--"

  "No matter," interrupted Hopkins, "it was empty. Go on. Did this privateview you and the Nile-green apparition were having of each other lastfor ever?"

  "No," returned the spirit, "it did not. It probably lasted less than aminute, although it seemed a century. I tried half a dozen times tospeak, but my words were frozen on my lips."

  "Why didn't you break them off and throw them at him?" suggestedToppleton, hysterical to the point of flippancy.

  "Because I did not possess the genius of the Yankee who is inventivewhere the Briton is only enduring," retorted the spirit, somewhatdisgusted at Toppleton's airy treatment of his awful situation. "Finallymy visitor spoke, and for an instant I wished he hadn't, his voice wasso abominably harsh, so jangling to every nerve in my body, howevercallous."

  "'You don't appear to be glad to see me,' he said.

  "'Well, to tell you the truth,' I replied, 'I am not. I am not acollector of optical delusions, nor am I a lover of the horrible andmysterious.'

  "'But I am your friend,' remonstrated my visitor.

  "'I should dislike to be judged by my friends, if that is so,' Ireturned, throwing as much withering contempt into my glance as Ipossibly could. 'I think,' I resumed, 'if I were to be seen walking downPiccadilly with you, I should be cut by every self-respectingacquaintance I have.'

  "'You are an ungrateful wretch,' said the intruder. 'Here I havetravelled myriads of miles to help you, and the minute I put in anappearance you cast worse slurs upon me than you would if I were yourworst enemy.'

  "'I do not wish to be ungrateful,' I answered coolly, 'but you mustadmit that it is difficult for a purely mortal being like myself toreceive a supernatural being like yourself with any degree ofcordiality.'

  "'Granted,' returned the spectre with a grin, which was more terrifyingto me than anything I had yet seen, 'but when I tell you that I havecome to befriend you--'

  "'I don't call it friendly to scare a man to death; I don't call itfriendly to steal invisibly into a man's office and choke him nearly tosuffocation. It seems to me you might use some other style of cologne toadvantage when you go calling on your friends, and if I had cheeksthrough which my whole molar system was visible to the outside world,I'd grow whiskers.'"

  "My admiration for you has increased eighty-seven per cent.," put inToppleton, "that is, it has if all you say you said to the spook istrue."

  "I'd swear to it," returned the spirit, the tone of his voice showingthe gratification he felt at Toppleton's words. "I talked up to him allthe time, though I was quaking inwardly from the start. He noticed ittoo, for he said practically what you have just remarked.

  "'You command my highest admiration,' were his words. 'If you were asspunky as this all the time, you would not need my assistance, but youare not, and so I have come. _You must not compromise that case._'

  "Here the deadly green thing rose from the chair and approached me,"continued the spirit, "and as he approached my terror increased, so itis no wonder that, when he got so near that I could feel his wretchedsoul-chilling breath upon my cheek, his luminous body towering above meas a giant towers over a dwarf, and repeated the words, '_you must notcompromise that case_,' I should shrink back into a heap at the side ofmy desk, and reply, 'Certainly _not_.'"

  "'You have a splendid fighting chance,' he added, 'but it will be abitter fight,--a fight, the winning of which will make you famous, butwhich you, by yourself, with all the law in Christendom on your side,could no more win than you could batter down the Tower of London withballs of putty.'

  "'Then,' said I, 'I _must_ compromise.'

  "'No,' returned my visitor, 'for I am here to win the case for you.'

  "'You will never be retained,' I retorted. 'You are a degree too foggyto be acceptable either to my client or to myself.'

  "'I do not ask to be retained; but you must provide me with the means toappear in court. _You must leave your body and let me put it on._'"

  "That must have been a staggerer," said Hopkins. "Were you fool enoughto give it to him without getting a receipt?"

  "I was not fool enough to yield without persuasion," rejoined the spiritsadly, "but when he brought all the infernal power at his command intoplay to lure me on, I weakened, and when I weaken I am done for.Toppleton, that messenger of Satan promised me everything that was dearto my soul. The temptation of Faust was nowhere alongside of that whichwas placed before me as mine if I but chose to take it, and no price wasasked save that one little privilege of being permitted to do thethings which should make me rich, powerful and happy in the guise whichI was to put off that the apparition might put it on. From my boyhooddays I had wished to be rich and powerful, and from the hour in which Ireached man's estate had I been in love, but hopelessly, since she Iloved was ambitious, and would not consent to be mine until I had mademy mark.

  "'Alone,' said my visitor, 'you will never make your name illustrious.With my help yo
u may--and consider what it means. Refuse my offer, andyou will lead the dull, monotonous life of him who knows no success, towhose ears the plaudits of the world shall never come; you will livealone and uncared for, for she whom you love cannot become the wife of afailure. Accept my offer, and in a month you are famous, in a year youare rich, in an instant you are happy, for the heart you yearn towardwill beat responsive to your own.'

  "'But your motive!' I cried. 'Why should you do all this for me who knowyou not, and without a price?'

  "'My reason,' returned that perjured instrument of malign fate, 'is myweakness. I love the world. I love the sensation of living. I love tohear the praises of man ringing in my ears. I am a lover of earth andearthly ways, with no hope of tasting the joys of earth save in youracquiescence. I am the soul of one departed. I have put off against mywill the mortal habitation in which I dwelt for many happy years. I havesolved the rebus of existence and have put on omniscience. All things Ican accomplish once I have the means. I ask you for them, with littlehope that you will grant my request, however, because you are theembodiment of all that is uncertain. Had you lived among the Olympiangods, they would have made you the Deity of Indecision; but beforerefusing my offer remember this, you have now the grand opportunity oflife, such an opportunity as has never been offered to any mortal beingsince the time of Shakespeare--'

  "'Did Shakespeare have this opportunity?' I asked eagerly.

  "'My son,' returned the apparition, with a meaning look, 'do not seek toknow too much about the mystery of William Shakespeare. You know whencehe sprang, how he lived and what he achieved; let my unguarded words ofa moment since be the seed of suggestion which planted in the soil ofyour brain may sprout and blossom forth into the flowers of certainknowledge. It is not for me to let a mortal like you into the confidenceof the Fates; suffice it that _I_ offer you immortality and presenthappiness. Think it over: I will return to-morrow.'

  "Before I could reply," continued the spirit, "he had vanished. Thelight of my lamp returned of its own volition, and but for the odour ofsulphur which still clung to the hangings of the room I should havesupposed that I had been dreaming.

  "Utterly wearied by the excitement of my strange experience, I threwmyself down upon my couch, and fell into a deep sleep from which I didnot awake for sixteen hours, in consequence of which a whole day waspractically gone out of my life.

  "Darkness was closing in upon me as I opened my eyes, and as it grewmore dense I could see taking shape in the chair by my table my visitorof the night before, more pallid and sulphurous than ever.

  "'Well?' he said, as I opened my eyes.

  "'No!' I answered shortly, 'I am not well. I might be much better ifyou'd confine yourself to the cemetery to which you belong.'

  "'Reparteedious as ever!' he retorted.

  "'I don't know the word,' I replied; 'it belongs to neither a dead nor alive language.'

  "'But it's a good word, nevertheless,' observed the ghost quietly,' andI advise you to think of it whenever you are inclined to indulge instupid repartee. It may help you in your career,--but I have come for ananswer to my proposition.'"

  "He was right about reparteedious," said Hopkins, interrupting thespirit's story; "that's a good word, and unless you have it copyrightedI think I'll open the doors of my vocabulary and admit it to the charmedcircle of my verbiage."

  "No, I have no copyright on it," replied the spirit, gazing at Hopkinswith as sad an expression as could possibly be assumed, considering theimperturbability of Aunt Sallie's countenance. "You may have it for yourvocabulary, Hopkins, but if you will take a little well-meant advice youhad better be very careful about your word collection. Your frequent andflippant interruptions of my sad story lead me to fear that you areoverworking your vocabulary, which is a very dangerous thing for a youngman of your age and intelligence to do.

  "But to resume my tale," continued the spirit, after waiting a momentfor Hopkins to reply to his suggestion, which Hopkins seemed not tohear, so busy was he looking for his memorandum book on his table,--atable so littered up with papers and silver paraphernalia for writingthat no portion of its polished surface was visible. "I told myunwelcome guest that I had no answer to give him; that, as I was not abeliever in the supernatural, I did not intend to waste my time inparleying with a figment of my brain.

  "'You are cautious enough to have been a policeman,' he said in responseto this. 'But caution in this instance is a vice.'

  "'Caution is not a vice when a spirit of your evil aspect enters one'soffice in the dead of night, and asks for the loan of one's body,' Ianswered. 'I should be more justified in lending my diamond-stud to asneak thief to wear to a lawn-tennis party at the Duke of Devonshire's,than in acquiescing in your scheme.'

  "'Then you do not care to become a great man, to assure yourself of afortune beyond your wildest dreams, to put yourself in such a positionthat she whom you love will be unable to resist your proposal ofmarriage?'

  "'I am not untruthful enough to make any such pretence as that,' Ianswered. 'I do want to be everything you say, to have everything thatyou promise, but if I know the young woman upon whom my affections arelavishing themselves, she would object strenuously to my making abargain with a transparent offshoot of the infernal regions likeyourself. How do I know that, after I am married and have settled downto a life of honourable ease, you will not come along and insist upon aninvitation to dinner; or obtrude yourself into the home circle at timeswhen it will be extremely inconvenient to receive you? What guaranteehave I that, when I have suddenly developed from my present obscurityinto the promised distinction, you will not appear to some of my rivalsand let them into the secret of my success; and, more important still,how do I know that after Miss Hicksworthy-Johnstone has become my wifeyou will not go to her and destroy my happiness by revealing to her thetrue state of affairs?'

  "'I can only give you my word that I will be faithful,' returned myvisitor.

  "'Well, if your word is no better than reparteedious, it is not the kindof word upon which I should place any reliance whatsoever,' I retorted;'so you may as well take yourself off; I am not lending myself thesedays.'"

  "That was very well said," observed Toppleton, "only I wish you had hadwitnesses. Your sudden development of back-bone under the circumstancewas so extraordinarily extraordinary that it is almost beyond credence.Did the fiend depart as you spoke those words?"

  "No," returned the exiled spirit, "he did not. He began operations,deceiving me grossly. He rose from the rocking-chair and said he fanciedit was time for him to be off. When he got to the door he turned andkissed his right collection of claws to me, and asked if there was anyplace in the neighbourhood where he could get a drink. Well, of course,unpleasant as he was to look at, he had injured me in no respect, andsave for my instinctive suspicions I had no real reason for believingthat he was actuated by any but the best of motives. So I replied thatthe best place I knew of for him to get a drink was right here in thisroom, and that if he would wait a second I would join him in a glass. Hehesitated an instant, and then said that seeing it was I who asked him,he thought he would; so I got out my little stone jug and poured out tworather stiff doses of brandy. Now it had been my habit to take my liquidrefreshment undiluted, and taking my glass in hand I held it aloft andobserved, 'Here's to you.'

  "My visitor placed his claws on my arm.

  "'You do not mean to say,' he said, 'that you take this fiery stuffwithout water?'

  "'That is my custom,' I answered. 'I think it a positive wrong to spoilgood brandy with the rather inferior brand of water we get here inLondon, nor do I deem it proper to take so pure a fluid as water anddestroy its innocence by introducing this liquid into it.'

  "'As you please,' was my visitor's response. 'I was foolish enough to dothat myself when I was fortunate enough to have a physique. In fact itwas just that thing that finally laid me by the heels. But let me have alittle water with mine please.'

  "I laid my glass down beside his on the table, and, taking th
e pitcher,left the room for an instant to fill it at the water-cooler."

  "That was a fine thing to do," said Toppleton. "Your idiocy cropped outthen in great shape. How did you know he wouldn't rob you?"

  "I wish he had robbed me and gone about his business," returned thespirit. "If that was all he did, I'd have been all right to this day. Iwas gone about two minutes, and when I returned he was standing by thewindow, whistling the most obnoxious tune I ever heard. What it was Idon't know, but it gave me a chill. As I entered the room he stoppedwhistling and turned to greet me, took the pitcher from my hand, filledhis glass to the brim with water and quaffed its contents. I drank mydose raw. As the brandy coursed down my throat into my stomach I fairlygroaned with pain, it burned me so.

  "'What the devil have you been doing with that brandy?' I cried, turningupon my visitor.

  "'Swallowing it; why?' he asked innocently. 'You meant that I shoulddrink it, didn't you?'

  "'You can't put me off that way,' I groaned in my agony; for if I hadswallowed a hot coal I could not have suffered more, that infernal stuffscorched me so. 'You have drugged my brandy.'

  "'Have I?' he asked, with a menacing gesture and a frown that wrinkledup his hideous forehead, until his brains, still visible through thetransparent flesh and bone, were reduced to a spongy mass no bigger thana walnut--"

  "He was concentrating his mind, I suppose?" suggested Hopkins.

  "It looked that way," said the spirit, "and it was an awful sight.

  "'Have I?' he repeated, and then he added, 'well, if I have, it is onlyto save you from yourself, for by this means alone can you ever fulfilyour destiny.'

  "As these words issued forth from his white lips, I became unconscious.How long I remained so, I do not know; but when I came to once more, Iwas as I am now--a spirit having no visible shape; while seated in mychair, writing with my pen and in perfect imitation of my chirography, Isaw what had been my body now occupied by another."