第 一 章 · THE REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS
. THE REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS
I
“Ne raillons pas les fous; leur folie dure plus longtemps que la
nôtre.... Voila toute la différence.”
Toward the end of the year 1920 the Government of the United States had
practically completed the programme, adopted during the last months
of President Winthrop’s administration. The country was apparently
tranquil. Everybody knows how the Tariff and Labour questions were
settled. The war with Germany, incident on that country’s seizure of
the Samoan Islands, had left no visible scars upon the republic, and
the temporary occupation of Norfolk by the invading army had been
forgotten in the joy over repeated naval victories, and the subsequent
ridiculous plight of General Von Gartenlaube’s forces in the State of
New Jersey. The Cuban and Hawaiian investments had paid one hundred per
cent and the territory of Samoa was well worth its cost as a coaling
station. The country was in a superb state of defence. Every coast
city had been well supplied with land fortifications; the army under
the parental eye of the General Staff, organized according to the
Prussian system, had been increased to 300,000 men, with a territorial
reserve of a million; and six magnificent squadrons of cruisers and
battle-ships patrolled the six stations of the navigable seas, leaving
a steam reserve amply fitted to control home waters. The gentlemen from
the West had at last been constrained to acknowledge that a college
for the training of diplomats was as necessary as law schools are for
the training of barristers; consequently we were no longer represented
abroad by incompetent patriots. The nation was prosperous; Chicago, for
a moment paralyzed after a second great fire, had risen from its ruins,
white and imperial, and more beautiful than the white city which had
been built for its plaything in 1893. Everywhere good architecture was
replacing bad, and even in New York, a sudden craving for decency had
swept away a great portion of the existing horrors. Streets had been
widened, properly paved and lighted, trees had been planted, squares
laid out, elevated structures demolished and underground roads built to
replace them. The new government buildings and barracks were fine bits
of architecture, and the long system of stone quays which completely
surrounded the island had been turned into parks which proved a
god-send to the population. The subsidizing of the state theatre and
state opera brought its own reward. The United States National Academy
of Design was much like European institutions of the same kind. Nobody
envied the Secretary of Fine Arts, either his cabinet position or his
portfolio. The Secretary of Forestry and Game Preservation had a much
easier time, thanks to the new system of National Mounted Police. We
had profited well by the latest treaties with France and England; the
exclusion of foreign-born Jews as a measure of self-preservation, the
settlement of the new independent negro state of Suanee, the checking
of immigration, the new laws concerning naturalization, and the gradual
centralization of power in the executive all contributed to national
calm and prosperity. When the Government solved the Indian problem and
squadrons of Indian cavalry scouts in native costume were substituted
for the pitiable organizations tacked on to the tail of skeletonized
regiments by a former Secretary of War, the nation drew a long sigh of
relief. When, after the colossal Congress of Religions, bigotry and
intolerance were laid in their graves and kindness and charity began to
draw warring sects together, many thought the millennium had arrived,
at least in the new world which after all is a world by itself.
But self-preservation is the first law, and the United States had to
look on in helpless sorrow as Germany, Italy, Spain and Belgium writhed
in the throes of Anarchy, while Russia, watching from the Caucasus,
stooped and bound them one by one.
In the city of New York the summer of 1899 was signalized by the
dismantling of the Elevated Railroads. The summer of 1900 will live in
the memories of New York people for many a cycle; the Dodge Statue was
removed in that year. In the following winter began that agitation for
the repeal of the laws prohibiting suicide which bore its final fruit
in the month of April, 1920, when the first Government Lethal Chamber
was opened on Washington Square.
I had walked down that day from Dr. Archer’s house on Madison Avenue,
where I had been as a mere formality. Ever since that fall from my
horse, four years before, I had been troubled at times with pains in
the back of my head and neck, but now for months they had been absent,
and the doctor sent me away that day saying there was nothing more to
be cured in me. It was hardly worth his fee to be told that; I knew
it myself. Still I did not grudge him the money. What I minded was
the mistake which he made at first. When they picked me up from the
pavement where I lay unconscious, and somebody had mercifully sent a
bullet through my horse’s head, I was carried to Dr. Archer, and he,
pronouncing my brain affected, placed me in his private asylum where I
was obliged to endure treatment for insanity. At last he decided that I
was well, and I, knowing that my mind had always been as sound as his,
if not sounder, “paid my tuition” as he jokingly called it, and left.
I told him, smiling, that I would get even with him for his mistake,
and he laughed heartily, and asked me to call once in a while. I did
so, hoping for a chance to even up accounts, but he gave me none, and I
told him I would wait.
The fall from my horse had fortunately left no evil results; on the
contrary it had changed my whole character for the better. From a lazy
young man about town, I had become active, energetic, temperate, and
above all—oh, above all else—ambitious. There was only one thing
which troubled me, I laughed at my own uneasiness, and yet it troubled
me.
During my convalescence I had bought and read for the first time, _The
King in Yellow_. I remember after finishing the first act that it
occurred to me that I had better stop. I started up and flung the book
into the fireplace; the volume struck the barred grate and fell open
on the hearth in the firelight. If I had not caught a glimpse of the
opening words in the second act I should never have finished it, but
as I stooped to pick it up, my eyes became riveted to the open page,
and with a cry of terror, or perhaps it was of joy so poignant that
I suffered in every nerve, I snatched the thing out of the coals and
crept shaking to my bedroom, where I read it and reread it, and wept
and laughed and trembled with a horror which at times assails me yet.
This is the thing that troubles me, for I cannot forget Carcosa where
black stars hang in the heavens; where the shadows of men’s thoughts
lengthen in the afternoon, when the twin suns sink into the lake of
Hali; and my mind will bear for ever the memory of the Pallid Mask.
I pray God will curse the writer, as the writer has cursed the world
with this beautiful, stupendous creation, terrible in its simplicity,
irresistible in its truth—a world which now trembles before the King
in Yellow. When the French Government seized the translated copies
which had just arrived in Paris, London, of course, became eager to
read it. It is well known how the book spread like an infectious
disease, from city to city, from continent to continent, barred out
here, confiscated there, denounced by Press and pulpit, censured even
by the most advanced of literary anarchists. No definite principles
had been violated in those wicked pages, no doctrine promulgated, no
convictions outraged. It could not be judged by any known standard,
yet, although it was acknowledged that the supreme note of art had been
struck in _The King in Yellow_, all felt that human nature could not
bear the strain, nor thrive on words in which the essence of purest
poison lurked. The very banality and innocence of the first act only
allowed the blow to fall afterward with more awful effect.
It was, I remember, the 13th day of April, 1920, that the first
Government Lethal Chamber was established on the south side of
Washington Square, between Wooster Street and South Fifth Avenue. The
block which had formerly consisted of a lot of shabby old buildings,
used as cafés and restaurants for foreigners, had been acquired by
the Government in the winter of 1898. The French and Italian cafés
and restaurants were torn down; the whole block was enclosed by a
gilded iron railing, and converted into a lovely garden with lawns,
flowers and fountains. In the centre of the garden stood a small,
white building, severely classical in architecture, and surrounded by
thickets of flowers. Six Ionic columns supported the roof, and the
single door was of bronze. A splendid marble group of the “Fates” stood
before the door, the work of a young American sculptor, Boris Yvain,
who had died in Paris when only twenty-three years old.
The inauguration ceremonies were in progress as I crossed University
Place and entered the square. I threaded my way through the silent
throng of spectators, but was stopped at Fourth Street by a cordon of
police. A regiment of United States lancers were drawn up in a hollow
square round the Lethal Chamber. On a raised tribune facing Washington
Park stood the Governor of New York, and behind him were grouped the
Mayor of New York and Brooklyn, the Inspector-General of Police, the
Commandant of the state troops, Colonel Livingston, military aid to
the President of the United States, General Blount, commanding at
Governor’s Island, Major-General Hamilton, commanding the garrison of
New York and Brooklyn, Admiral Buffby of the fleet in the North River,
Surgeon-General Lanceford, the staff of the National Free Hospital,
Senators Wyse and Franklin of New York, and the Commissioner of Public
Works. The tribune was surrounded by a squadron of hussars of the
National Guard.
The Governor was finishing his reply to the short speech of the
Surgeon-General. I heard him say: “The laws prohibiting suicide and
providing punishment for any attempt at self-destruction have been
repealed. The Government has seen fit to acknowledge the right of man
to end an existence which may have become intolerable to him, through
physical suffering or mental despair. It is believed that the community
will be benefited by the removal of such people from their midst. Since
the passage of this law, the number of suicides in the United States
has not increased. Now the Government has determined to establish a
Lethal Chamber in every city, town and village in the country, it
remains to be seen whether or not that class of human creatures from
whose desponding ranks new victims of self-destruction fall daily
will accept the relief thus provided.” He paused, and turned to the
white Lethal Chamber. The silence in the street was absolute. “There a
painless death awaits him who can no longer bear the sorrows of this
life. If death is welcome let him seek it there.” Then quickly turning
to the military aid of the President’s household, he said, “I declare
the Lethal Chamber open,” and again facing the vast crowd he cried in a
clear voice: “Citizens of New York and of the United States of America,
through me the Government declares the Lethal Chamber to be open.”
The solemn hush was broken by a sharp cry of command, the squadron of
hussars filed after the Governor’s carriage, the lancers wheeled and
formed along Fifth Avenue to wait for the commandant of the garrison,
and the mounted police followed them. I left the crowd to gape and
stare at the white marble Death Chamber, and, crossing South Fifth
Avenue, walked along the western side of that thoroughfare to Bleecker
Street. Then I turned to the right and stopped before a dingy shop
which bore the sign:
HAWBERK, ARMOURER.
I glanced in at the doorway and saw Hawberk busy in his little shop
at the end of the hall. He looked up, and catching sight of me cried
in his deep, hearty voice, “Come in, Mr. Castaigne!” Constance, his
daughter, rose to meet me as I crossed the threshold, and held out her
pretty hand, but I saw the blush of disappointment on her cheeks, and
knew that it was another Castaigne she had expected, my cousin Louis.
I smiled at her confusion and complimented her on the banner she was
embroidering from a coloured plate. Old Hawberk sat riveting the worn
greaves of some ancient suit of armour, and the ting! ting! ting! of
his little hammer sounded pleasantly in the quaint shop. Presently he
dropped his hammer, and fussed about for a moment with a tiny wrench.
The soft clash of the mail sent a thrill of pleasure through me. I
loved to hear the music of steel brushing against steel, the mellow
shock of the mallet on thigh pieces, and the jingle of chain armour.
That was the only reason I went to see Hawberk. He had never interested
me personally, nor did Constance, except for the fact of her being
in love with Louis. This did occupy my attention, and sometimes even
kept me awake at night. But I knew in my heart that all would come
right, and that I should arrange their future as I expected to arrange
that of my kind doctor, John Archer. However, I should never have
troubled myself about visiting them just then, had it not been, as
I say, that the music of the tinkling hammer had for me this strong
fascination. I would sit for hours, listening and listening, and when
a stray sunbeam struck the inlaid steel, the sensation it gave me was
almost too keen to endure. My eyes would become fixed, dilating with
a pleasure that stretched every nerve almost to breaking, until some
movement of the old armourer cut off the ray of sunlight, then, still
thrilling secretly, I leaned back and listened again to the sound of
the polishing rag, swish! swish! rubbing rust from the rivets.
Constance worked with the embroidery over her knees, now and then
pausing to examine more closely the pattern in the coloured plate from
the Metropolitan Museum.
“Who is this for?” I asked.
Hawberk explained, that in addition to the treasures of armour in the
Metropolitan Museum of which he had been appointed armourer, he also
had charge of several collections belonging to rich amateurs. This was
the missing greave of a famous suit which a client of his had traced to
a little shop in Paris on the Quai d’Orsay. He, Hawberk, had negotiated
for and secured the greave, and now the suit was complete. He laid down
his hammer and read me the history of the suit, traced since 1450 from
owner to owner until it was acquired by Thomas Stainbridge. When his
superb collection was sold, this client of Hawberk’s bought the suit,
and since then the search for the missing greave had been pushed until
it was, almost by accident, located in Paris.
“Did you continue the search so persistently without any certainty of
the greave being still in existence?” I demanded.
“Of course,” he replied coolly.
Then for the first time I took a personal interest in Hawberk.
“It was worth something to you,” I ventured.
“No,” he replied, laughing, “my pleasure in finding it was my reward.”
“Have you no ambition to be rich?” I asked, smiling.
“My one ambition is to be the best armourer in the world,” he answered
gravely.
Constance asked me if I had seen the ceremonies at the Lethal Chamber.
She herself had noticed cavalry passing up Broadway that morning, and
had wished to see the inauguration, but her father wanted the banner
finished, and she had stayed at his request.
“Did you see your cousin, Mr. Castaigne, there?” she asked, with the
slightest tremor of her soft eyelashes.
“No,” I replied carelessly. “Louis’ regiment is manœuvring out in
Westchester County.” I rose and picked up my hat and cane.
“Are you going upstairs to see the lunatic again?” laughed old Hawberk.
If Hawberk knew how I loathe that word “lunatic,” he would never use
it in my presence. It rouses certain feelings within me which I do not
care to explain. However, I answered him quietly: “I think I shall drop
in and see Mr. Wilde for a moment or two.”
“Poor fellow,” said Constance, with a shake of the head, “it must be
hard to live alone year after year poor, crippled and almost demented.
It is very good of you, Mr. Castaigne, to visit him as often as you do.”
“I think he is vicious,” observed Hawberk, beginning again with his
hammer. I listened to the golden tinkle on the greave plates; when he
had finished I replied:
“No, he is not vicious, nor is he in the least demented. His mind is
a wonder chamber, from which he can extract treasures that you and I
would give years of our lives to acquire.”
Hawberk laughed.
I continued a little impatiently: “He knows history as no one else
could know it. Nothing, however trivial, escapes his search, and his
memory is so absolute, so precise in details, that were it known in New
York that such a man existed, the people could not honour him enough.”
“Nonsense,” muttered Hawberk, searching on the floor for a fallen rivet.
“Is it nonsense,” I asked, managing to suppress what I felt, “is it
nonsense when he says that the tassets and cuissards of the enamelled
suit of armour commonly known as the ‘Prince’s Emblazoned’ can be
found among a mass of rusty theatrical properties, broken stoves and
ragpicker’s refuse in a garret in Pell Street?”
Hawberk’s hammer fell to the ground, but he picked it up and asked,
with a great deal of calm, how I knew that the tassets and left
cuissard were missing from the “Prince’s Emblazoned.”
“I did not know until Mr. Wilde mentioned it to me the other day. He
said they were in the garret of 998 Pell Street.”
“Nonsense,” he cried, but I noticed his hand trembling under his
leathern apron.
“Is this nonsense too?” I asked pleasantly, “is it nonsense when Mr.
Wilde continually speaks of you as the Marquis of Avonshire and of Miss
Constance—”
I did not finish, for Constance had started to her feet with terror
written on every feature. Hawberk looked at me and slowly smoothed his
leathern apron.
“That is impossible,” he observed, “Mr. Wilde may know a great many
things—”
“About armour, for instance, and the ‘Prince’s Emblazoned,’” I
interposed, smiling.
“Yes,” he continued, slowly, “about armour also—may be—but he is
wrong in regard to the Marquis of Avonshire, who, as you know, killed
his wife’s traducer years ago, and went to Australia where he did not
long survive his wife.”
“Mr. Wilde is wrong,” murmured Constance. Her lips were blanched, but
her voice was sweet and calm.
“Let us agree, if you please, that in this one circumstance Mr. Wilde
is wrong,” I said.
II
I climbed the three dilapidated flights of stairs, which I had so often
climbed before, and knocked at a small door at the end of the corridor.
Mr. Wilde opened the door and I walked in.
When he had double-locked the door and pushed a heavy chest against
it, he came and sat down beside me, peering up into my face with his
little light-coloured eyes. Half a dozen new scratches covered his
nose and cheeks, and the silver wires which supported his artificial
ears had become displaced. I thought I had never seen him so hideously
fascinating. He had no ears. The artificial ones, which now stood out
at an angle from the fine wire, were his one weakness. They were made
of wax and painted a shell pink, but the rest of his face was yellow.
He might better have revelled in the luxury of some artificial fingers
for his left hand, which was absolutely fingerless, but it seemed to
cause him no inconvenience, and he was satisfied with his wax ears.
He was very small, scarcely higher than a child of ten, but his arms
were magnificently developed, and his thighs as thick as any athlete’s.
Still, the most remarkable thing about Mr. Wilde was that a man of his
marvellous intelligence and knowledge should have such a head. It was
flat and pointed, like the heads of many of those unfortunates whom
people imprison in asylums for the weak-minded. Many called him insane,
but I knew him to be as sane as I was.
I do not deny that he was eccentric; the mania he had for keeping
that cat and teasing her until she flew at his face like a demon, was
certainly eccentric. I never could understand why he kept the creature,
nor what pleasure he found in shutting himself up in his room with this
surly, vicious beast. I remember once, glancing up from the manuscript
I was studying by the light of some tallow dips, and seeing Mr. Wilde
squatting motionless on his high chair, his eyes fairly blazing with
excitement, while the cat, which had risen from her place before the
stove, came creeping across the floor right at him. Before I could
move she flattened her belly to the ground, crouched, trembled, and
sprang into his face. Howling and foaming they rolled over and over
on the floor, scratching and clawing, until the cat screamed and fled
under the cabinet, and Mr. Wilde turned over on his back, his limbs
contracting and curling up like the legs of a dying spider. He _was_
eccentric.
Mr. Wilde had climbed into his high chair, and, after studying my face,
picked up a dog’s-eared ledger and opened it.
“Henry B. Matthews,” he read, “book-keeper with Whysot Whysot and
Company, dealers in church ornaments. Called April 3rd. Reputation
damaged on the race-track. Known as a welcher. Reputation to be
repaired by August 1st. Retainer Five Dollars.” He turned the page and
ran his fingerless knuckles down the closely-written columns.
“P. Greene Dusenberry, Minister of the Gospel, Fairbeach, New Jersey.
Reputation damaged in the Bowery. To be repaired as soon as possible.
Retainer $100.”
He coughed and added, “Called, April 6th.”
“Then you are not in need of money, Mr. Wilde,” I inquired.
“Listen,” he coughed again.
“Mrs. C. Hamilton Chester, of Chester Park, New York City. Called April
7th. Reputation damaged at Dieppe, France. To be repaired by October
1st Retainer $500.
“Note.—C. Hamilton Chester, Captain U.S.S. ‘Avalanche’, ordered home
from South Sea Squadron October 1st.”
“Well,” I said, “the profession of a Repairer of Reputations is
lucrative.”
His colourless eyes sought mine, “I only wanted to demonstrate that I
was correct. You said it was impossible to succeed as a Repairer of
Reputations; that even if I did succeed in certain cases it would cost
me more than I would gain by it. To-day I have five hundred men in my
employ, who are poorly paid, but who pursue the work with an enthusiasm
which possibly may be born of fear. These men enter every shade and
grade of society; some even are pillars of the most exclusive social
temples; others are the prop and pride of the financial world; still
others, hold undisputed sway among the ‘Fancy and the Talent.’ I choose
them at my leisure from those who reply to my advertisements. It is
easy enough, they are all cowards. I could treble the number in twenty
days if I wished. So you see, those who have in their keeping the
reputations of their fellow-citizens, I have in my pay.”
“They may turn on you,” I suggested.
He rubbed his thumb over his cropped ears, and adjusted the wax
substitutes. “I think not,” he murmured thoughtfully, “I seldom have to
apply the whip, and then only once. Besides they like their wages.”
“How do you apply the whip?” I demanded.
His face for a moment was awful to look upon. His eyes dwindled to a
pair of green sparks.
“I invite them to come and have a little chat with me,” he said in a
soft voice.
A knock at the door interrupted him, and his face resumed its amiable
expression.
“Who is it?” he inquired.
“Mr. Steylette,” was the answer.
“Come to-morrow,” replied Mr. Wilde.
“Impossible,” began the other, but was silenced by a sort of bark from
Mr. Wilde.
“Come to-morrow,” he repeated.
We heard somebody move away from the door and turn the corner by the
stairway.
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Arnold Steylette, Owner and Editor in Chief of the great New York
daily.”
He drummed on the ledger with his fingerless hand adding: “I pay him
very badly, but he thinks it a good bargain.”
“Arnold Steylette!” I repeated amazed.
“Yes,” said Mr. Wilde, with a self-satisfied cough.
The cat, which had entered the room as he spoke, hesitated, looked up
at him and snarled. He climbed down from the chair and squatting on the
floor, took the creature into his arms and caressed her. The cat ceased
snarling and presently began a loud purring which seemed to increase in
timbre as he stroked her. “Where are the notes?” I asked. He pointed
to the table, and for the hundredth time I picked up the bundle of
manuscript entitled—
“THE IMPERIAL DYNASTY OF AMERICA.”
One by one I studied the well-worn pages, worn only by my own handling,
and although I knew all by heart, from the beginning, “When from
Carcosa, the Hyades, Hastur, and Aldebaran,” to “Castaigne, Louis de
Calvados, born December 19th, 1877,” I read it with an eager, rapt
attention, pausing to repeat parts of it aloud, and dwelling especially
on “Hildred de Calvados, only son of Hildred Castaigne and Edythe
Landes Castaigne, first in succession,” etc., etc.
When I finished, Mr. Wilde nodded and coughed.
“Speaking of your legitimate ambition,” he said, “how do Constance and
Louis get along?”
“She loves him,” I replied simply.
The cat on his knee suddenly turned and struck at his eyes, and he
flung her off and climbed on to the chair opposite me.
“And Dr. Archer! But that’s a matter you can settle any time you wish,”
he added.
“Yes,” I replied, “Dr. Archer can wait, but it is time I saw my cousin
Louis.”
“It is time,” he repeated. Then he took another ledger from the table
and ran over the leaves rapidly. “We are now in communication with
ten thousand men,” he muttered. “We can count on one hundred thousand
within the first twenty-eight hours, and in forty-eight hours the state
will rise _en masse_. The country follows the state, and the portion
that will not, I mean California and the Northwest, might better never
have been inhabited. I shall not send them the Yellow Sign.”
The blood rushed to my head, but I only answered, “A new broom sweeps
clean.”
“The ambition of Caesar and of Napoleon pales before that which could
not rest until it had seized the minds of men and controlled even their
unborn thoughts,” said Mr. Wilde.
“You are speaking of the King in Yellow,” I groaned, with a shudder.
“He is a king whom emperors have served.”
“I am content to serve him,” I replied.
Mr. Wilde sat rubbing his ears with his crippled hand. “Perhaps
Constance does not love him,” he suggested.
I started to reply, but a sudden burst of military music from the
street below drowned my voice. The twentieth dragoon regiment, formerly
in garrison at Mount St. Vincent, was returning from the manœuvres in
Westchester County, to its new barracks on East Washington Square. It
was my cousin’s regiment. They were a fine lot of fellows, in their
pale blue, tight-fitting jackets, jaunty busbys and white riding
breeches with the double yellow stripe, into which their limbs seemed
moulded. Every other squadron was armed with lances, from the metal
points of which fluttered yellow and white pennons. The band passed,
playing the regimental march, then came the colonel and staff, the
horses crowding and trampling, while their heads bobbed in unison, and
the pennons fluttered from their lance points. The troopers, who rode
with the beautiful English seat, looked brown as berries from their
bloodless campaign among the farms of Westchester, and the music of
their sabres against the stirrups, and the jingle of spurs and carbines
was delightful to me. I saw Louis riding with his squadron. He was as
handsome an officer as I have ever seen. Mr. Wilde, who had mounted a
chair by the window, saw him too, but said nothing. Louis turned and
looked straight at Hawberk’s shop as he passed, and I could see the
flush on his brown cheeks. I think Constance must have been at the
window. When the last troopers had clattered by, and the last pennons
vanished into South Fifth Avenue, Mr. Wilde clambered out of his chair
and dragged the chest away from the door.
“Yes,” he said, “it is time that you saw your cousin Louis.”
He unlocked the door and I picked up my hat and stick and stepped into
the corridor. The stairs were dark. Groping about, I set my foot on
something soft, which snarled and spit, and I aimed a murderous blow at
the cat, but my cane shivered to splinters against the balustrade, and
the beast scurried back into Mr. Wilde’s room.
Passing Hawberk’s door again I saw him still at work on the armour,
but I did not stop, and stepping out into Bleecker Street, I followed
it to Wooster, skirted the grounds of the Lethal Chamber, and crossing
Washington Park went straight to my rooms in the Benedick. Here I
lunched comfortably, read the _Herald_ and the _Meteor_, and finally
went to the steel safe in my bedroom and set the time combination. The
three and three-quarter minutes which it is necessary to wait, while
the time lock is opening, are to me golden moments. From the instant
I set the combination to the moment when I grasp the knobs and swing
back the solid steel doors, I live in an ecstasy of expectation. Those
moments must be like moments passed in Paradise. I know what I am to
find at the end of the time limit. I know what the massive safe holds
secure for me, for me alone, and the exquisite pleasure of waiting is
hardly enhanced when the safe opens and I lift, from its velvet crown,
a diadem of purest gold, blazing with diamonds. I do this every day,
and yet the joy of waiting and at last touching again the diadem, only
seems to increase as the days pass. It is a diadem fit for a King among
kings, an Emperor among emperors. The King in Yellow might scorn it,
but it shall be worn by his royal servant.
I held it in my arms until the alarm in the safe rang harshly, and then
tenderly, proudly, I replaced it and shut the steel doors. I walked
slowly back into my study, which faces Washington Square, and leaned
on the window sill. The afternoon sun poured into my windows, and a
gentle breeze stirred the branches of the elms and maples in the park,
now covered with buds and tender foliage. A flock of pigeons circled
about the tower of the Memorial Church; sometimes alighting on the
purple tiled roof, sometimes wheeling downward to the lotos fountain
in front of the marble arch. The gardeners were busy with the flower
beds around the fountain, and the freshly turned earth smelled sweet
and spicy. A lawn mower, drawn by a fat white horse, clinked across
the green sward, and watering-carts poured showers of spray over the
asphalt drives. Around the statue of Peter Stuyvesant, which in 1897
had replaced the monstrosity supposed to represent Garibaldi, children
played in the spring sunshine, and nurse girls wheeled elaborate baby
carriages with a reckless disregard for the pasty-faced occupants,
which could probably be explained by the presence of half a dozen trim
dragoon troopers languidly lolling on the benches. Through the trees,
the Washington Memorial Arch glistened like silver in the sunshine, and
beyond, on the eastern extremity of the square the grey stone barracks
of the dragoons, and the white granite artillery stables were alive
with colour and motion.
I looked at the Lethal Chamber on the corner of the square opposite. A
few curious people still lingered about the gilded iron railing, but
inside the grounds the paths were deserted. I watched the fountains
ripple and sparkle; the sparrows had already found this new bathing
nook, and the basins were covered with the dusty-feathered little
things. Two or three white peacocks picked their way across the lawns,
and a drab coloured pigeon sat so motionless on the arm of one of the
“Fates,” that it seemed to be a part of the sculptured stone.
As I was turning carelessly away, a slight commotion in the group of
curious loiterers around the gates attracted my attention. A young man
had entered, and was advancing with nervous strides along the gravel
path which leads to the bronze doors of the Lethal Chamber. He paused
a moment before the “Fates,” and as he raised his head to those three
mysterious faces, the pigeon rose from its sculptured perch, circled
about for a moment and wheeled to the east. The young man pressed his
hand to his face, and then with an undefinable gesture sprang up the
marble steps, the bronze doors closed behind him, and half an hour
later the loiterers slouched away, and the frightened pigeon returned
to its perch in the arms of Fate.
I put on my hat and went out into the park for a little walk before
dinner. As I crossed the central driveway a group of officers passed,
and one of them called out, “Hello, Hildred,” and came back to shake
hands with me. It was my cousin Louis, who stood smiling and tapping
his spurred heels with his riding-whip.
“Just back from Westchester,” he said; “been doing the bucolic; milk
and curds, you know, dairy-maids in sunbonnets, who say ‘haeow’ and ‘I
don’t think’ when you tell them they are pretty. I’m nearly dead for a
square meal at Delmonico’s. What’s the news?”
“There is none,” I replied pleasantly. “I saw your regiment coming in
this morning.”
“Did you? I didn’t see you. Where were you?”
“In Mr. Wilde’s window.”
“Oh, hell!” he began impatiently, “that man is stark mad! I don’t
understand why you—”
He saw how annoyed I felt by this outburst, and begged my pardon.
“Really, old chap,” he said, “I don’t mean to run down a man you
like, but for the life of me I can’t see what the deuce you find in
common with Mr. Wilde. He’s not well bred, to put it generously; he is
hideously deformed; his head is the head of a criminally insane person.
You know yourself he’s been in an asylum—”
“So have I,” I interrupted calmly.
Louis looked startled and confused for a moment, but recovered and
slapped me heartily on the shoulder. “You were completely cured,” he
began; but I stopped him again.
“I suppose you mean that I was simply acknowledged never to have been
insane.”
“Of course that—that’s what I meant,” he laughed.
I disliked his laugh because I knew it was forced, but I nodded gaily
and asked him where he was going. Louis looked after his brother
officers who had now almost reached Broadway.
“We had intended to sample a Brunswick cocktail, but to tell you the
truth I was anxious for an excuse to go and see Hawberk instead. Come
along, I’ll make you my excuse.”
We found old Hawberk, neatly attired in a fresh spring suit, standing
at the door of his shop and sniffing the air.
“I had just decided to take Constance for a little stroll before
dinner,” he replied to the impetuous volley of questions from Louis.
“We thought of walking on the park terrace along the North River.”
At that moment Constance appeared and grew pale and rosy by turns as
Louis bent over her small gloved fingers. I tried to excuse myself,
alleging an engagement uptown, but Louis and Constance would not
listen, and I saw I was expected to remain and engage old Hawberk’s
attention. After all it would be just as well if I kept my eye on
Louis, I thought, and when they hailed a Spring Street horse-car, I got
in after them and took my seat beside the armourer.
The beautiful line of parks and granite terraces overlooking the
wharves along the North River, which were built in 1910 and finished
in the autumn of 1917, had become one of the most popular promenades
in the metropolis. They extended from the battery to 190th Street,
overlooking the noble river and affording a fine view of the Jersey
shore and the Highlands opposite. Cafés and restaurants were scattered
here and there among the trees, and twice a week military bands from
the garrison played in the kiosques on the parapets.
We sat down in the sunshine on the bench at the foot of the equestrian
statue of General Sheridan. Constance tipped her sunshade to shield
her eyes, and she and Louis began a murmuring conversation which was
impossible to catch. Old Hawberk, leaning on his ivory headed cane,
lighted an excellent cigar, the mate to which I politely refused, and
smiled at vacancy. The sun hung low above the Staten Island woods, and
the bay was dyed with golden hues reflected from the sun-warmed sails
of the shipping in the harbour.
Brigs, schooners, yachts, clumsy ferry-boats, their decks swarming
with people, railroad transports carrying lines of brown, blue and
white freight cars, stately sound steamers, déclassé tramp steamers,
coasters, dredgers, scows, and everywhere pervading the entire bay
impudent little tugs puffing and whistling officiously;—these were the
craft which churned the sunlight waters as far as the eye could reach.
In calm contrast to the hurry of sailing vessel and steamer a silent
fleet of white warships lay motionless in midstream.
Constance’s merry laugh aroused me from my reverie.
“What _are_ you staring at?” she inquired.
“Nothing—the fleet,” I smiled.
Then Louis told us what the vessels were, pointing out each by its
relative position to the old Red Fort on Governor’s Island.
“That little cigar shaped thing is a torpedo boat,” he explained;
“there are four more lying close together. They are the _Tarpon_, the
_Falcon_, the _Sea Fox_, and the _Octopus_. The gun-boats just above
are the _Princeton_, the _Champlain_, the _Still Water_ and the _Erie_.
Next to them lie the cruisers _Faragut_ and _Los Angeles_, and above
them the battle ships _California_, and _Dakota_, and the _Washington_
which is the flag ship. Those two squatty looking chunks of metal which
are anchored there off Castle William are the double turreted monitors
_Terrible_ and _Magnificent_; behind them lies the ram, _Osceola_.”
Constance looked at him with deep approval in her beautiful eyes. “What
loads of things you know for a soldier,” she said, and we all joined in
the laugh which followed.
Presently Louis rose with a nod to us and offered his arm to Constance,
and they strolled away along the river wall. Hawberk watched them for a
moment and then turned to me.
“Mr. Wilde was right,” he said. “I have found the missing tassets and
left cuissard of the ‘Prince’s Emblazoned,’ in a vile old junk garret
in Pell Street.”
“998?” I inquired, with a smile.
“Yes.”
“Mr. Wilde is a very intelligent man,” I observed.
“I want to give him the credit of this most important discovery,”
continued Hawberk. “And I intend it shall be known that he is entitled
to the fame of it.”
“He won’t thank you for that,” I answered sharply; “please say nothing
about it.”
“Do you know what it is worth?” said Hawberk.
“No, fifty dollars, perhaps.”
“It is valued at five hundred, but the owner of the ‘Prince’s
Emblazoned’ will give two thousand dollars to the person who completes
his suit; that reward also belongs to Mr. Wilde.”
“He doesn’t want it! He refuses it!” I answered angrily. “What do you
know about Mr. Wilde? He doesn’t need the money. He is rich—or will
be—richer than any living man except myself. What will we care for
money then—what will we care, he and I, when—when—”
“When what?” demanded Hawberk, astonished.
“You will see,” I replied, on my guard again.
He looked at me narrowly, much as Doctor Archer used to, and I knew he
thought I was mentally unsound. Perhaps it was fortunate for him that
he did not use the word lunatic just then.
“No,” I replied to his unspoken thought, “I am not mentally weak; my
mind is as healthy as Mr. Wilde’s. I do not care to explain just yet
what I have on hand, but it is an investment which will pay more than
mere gold, silver and precious stones. It will secure the happiness and
prosperity of a continent—yes, a hemisphere!”
“Oh,” said Hawberk.
“And eventually,” I continued more quietly, “it will secure the
happiness of the whole world.”
“And incidentally your own happiness and prosperity as well as Mr.
Wilde’s?”
“Exactly,” I smiled. But I could have throttled him for taking that
tone.
He looked at me in silence for a while and then said very gently, “Why
don’t you give up your books and studies, Mr. Castaigne, and take a
tramp among the mountains somewhere or other? You used to be fond of
fishing. Take a cast or two at the trout in the Rangelys.”
“I don’t care for fishing any more,” I answered, without a shade of
annoyance in my voice.
“You used to be fond of everything,” he continued; “athletics,
yachting, shooting, riding—”
“I have never cared to ride since my fall,” I said quietly.
“Ah, yes, your fall,” he repeated, looking away from me.
I thought this nonsense had gone far enough, so I brought the
conversation back to Mr. Wilde; but he was scanning my face again in a
manner highly offensive to me.
“Mr. Wilde,” he repeated, “do you know what he did this afternoon? He
came downstairs and nailed a sign over the hall door next to mine; it
read:
“MR. WILDE,
REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS.
Third Bell.”
“Do you know what a Repairer of Reputations can be?”
“I do,” I replied, suppressing the rage within.
“Oh,” he said again.
Louis and Constance came strolling by and stopped to ask if we would
join them. Hawberk looked at his watch. At the same moment a puff of
smoke shot from the casemates of Castle William, and the boom of the
sunset gun rolled across the water and was re-echoed from the Highlands
opposite. The flag came running down from the flag-pole, the bugles
sounded on the white decks of the warships, and the first electric
light sparkled out from the Jersey shore.
As I turned into the city with Hawberk I heard Constance murmur
something to Louis which I did not understand; but Louis whispered “My
darling,” in reply; and again, walking ahead with Hawberk through the
square I heard a murmur of “sweetheart,” and “my own Constance,” and
I knew the time had nearly arrived when I should speak of important
matters with my cousin Louis.
III
One morning early in May I stood before the steel safe in my bedroom,
trying on the golden jewelled crown. The diamonds flashed fire as I
turned to the mirror, and the heavy beaten gold burned like a halo
about my head. I remembered Camilla’s agonized scream and the awful
words echoing through the dim streets of Carcosa. They were the last
lines in the first act, and I dared not think of what followed—dared
not, even in the spring sunshine, there in my own room, surrounded
with familiar objects, reassured by the bustle from the street and the
voices of the servants in the hallway outside. For those poisoned words
had dropped slowly into my heart, as death-sweat drops upon a bed-sheet
and is absorbed. Trembling, I put the diadem from my head and wiped my
forehead, but I thought of Hastur and of my own rightful ambition, and
I remembered Mr. Wilde as I had last left him, his face all torn and
bloody from the claws of that devil’s creature, and what he said—ah,
what he said. The alarm bell in the safe began to whirr harshly, and
I knew my time was up; but I would not heed it, and replacing the
flashing circlet upon my head I turned defiantly to the mirror. I stood
for a long time absorbed in the changing expression of my own eyes.
The mirror reflected a face which was like my own, but whiter, and so
thin that I hardly recognized it. And all the time I kept repeating
between my clenched teeth, “The day has come! the day has come!” while
the alarm in the safe whirred and clamoured, and the diamonds sparkled
and flamed above my brow. I heard a door open but did not heed it. It
was only when I saw two faces in the mirror:—it was only when another
face rose over my shoulder, and two other eyes met mine. I wheeled
like a flash and seized a long knife from my dressing-table, and my
cousin sprang back very pale, crying: “Hildred! for God’s sake!” then
as my hand fell, he said: “It is I, Louis, don’t you know me?” I stood
silent. I could not have spoken for my life. He walked up to me and
took the knife from my hand.
“What is all this?” he inquired, in a gentle voice. “Are you ill?”
“No,” I replied. But I doubt if he heard me.
“Come, come, old fellow,” he cried, “take off that brass crown and
toddle into the study. Are you going to a masquerade? What’s all this
theatrical tinsel anyway?”
I was glad he thought the crown was made of brass and paste, yet I
didn’t like him any the better for thinking so. I let him take it from
my hand, knowing it was best to humour him. He tossed the splendid
diadem in the air, and catching it, turned to me smiling.
“It’s dear at fifty cents,” he said. “What’s it for?”
I did not answer, but took the circlet from his hands, and placing it
in the safe shut the massive steel door. The alarm ceased its infernal
din at once. He watched me curiously, but did not seem to notice the
sudden ceasing of the alarm. He did, however, speak of the safe as a
biscuit box. Fearing lest he might examine the combination I led the
way into my study. Louis threw himself on the sofa and flicked at flies
with his eternal riding-whip. He wore his fatigue uniform with the
braided jacket and jaunty cap, and I noticed that his riding-boots were
all splashed with red mud.
“Where have you been?” I inquired.
“Jumping mud creeks in Jersey,” he said. “I haven’t had time to change
yet; I was rather in a hurry to see you. Haven’t you got a glass of
something? I’m dead tired; been in the saddle twenty-four hours.”
I gave him some brandy from my medicinal store, which he drank with a
grimace.
“Damned bad stuff,” he observed. “I’ll give you an address where they
sell brandy that is brandy.”
“It’s good enough for my needs,” I said indifferently. “I use it to rub
my chest with.” He stared and flicked at another fly.
“See here, old fellow,” he began, “I’ve got something to suggest to
you. It’s four years now that you’ve shut yourself up here like an owl,
never going anywhere, never taking any healthy exercise, never doing a
damn thing but poring over those books up there on the mantelpiece.”
He glanced along the row of shelves. “Napoleon, Napoleon, Napoleon!” he
read. “For heaven’s sake, have you nothing but Napoleons there?”
“I wish they were bound in gold,” I said. “But wait, yes, there is
another book, _The King in Yellow_.” I looked him steadily in the eye.
“Have you never read it?” I asked.
“I? No, thank God! I don’t want to be driven crazy.”
I saw he regretted his speech as soon as he had uttered it. There is
only one word which I loathe more than I do lunatic and that word is
crazy. But I controlled myself and asked him why he thought _The King
in Yellow_ dangerous.
“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, hastily. “I only remember the excitement
it created and the denunciations from pulpit and Press. I believe the
author shot himself after bringing forth this monstrosity, didn’t he?”
“I understand he is still alive,” I answered.
“That’s probably true,” he muttered; “bullets couldn’t kill a fiend
like that.”
“It is a book of great truths,” I said.
“Yes,” he replied, “of ‘truths’ which send men frantic and blast their
lives. I don’t care if the thing is, as they say, the very supreme
essence of art. It’s a crime to have written it, and I for one shall
never open its pages.”
“Is that what you have come to tell me?” I asked.
“No,” he said, “I came to tell you that I am going to be married.”
I believe for a moment my heart ceased to beat, but I kept my eyes on
his face.
“Yes,” he continued, smiling happily, “married to the sweetest girl on
earth.”
“Constance Hawberk,” I said mechanically.
“How did you know?” he cried, astonished. “I didn’t know it myself
until that evening last April, when we strolled down to the embankment
before dinner.”
“When is it to be?” I asked.
“It was to have been next September, but an hour ago a despatch came
ordering our regiment to the Presidio, San Francisco. We leave at noon
to-morrow. To-morrow,” he repeated. “Just think, Hildred, to-morrow I
shall be the happiest fellow that ever drew breath in this jolly world,
for Constance will go with me.”
I offered him my hand in congratulation, and he seized and shook it
like the good-natured fool he was—or pretended to be.
“I am going to get my squadron as a wedding present,” he rattled on.
“Captain and Mrs. Louis Castaigne, eh, Hildred?”
Then he told me where it was to be and who were to be there, and made
me promise to come and be best man. I set my teeth and listened to his
boyish chatter without showing what I felt, but—
I was getting to the limit of my endurance, and when he jumped up,
and, switching his spurs till they jingled, said he must go, I did not
detain him.
“There’s one thing I want to ask of you,” I said quietly.
“Out with it, it’s promised,” he laughed.
“I want you to meet me for a quarter of an hour’s talk to-night.”
“Of course, if you wish,” he said, somewhat puzzled. “Where?”
“Anywhere, in the park there.”
“What time, Hildred?”
“Midnight.”
“What in the name of—” he began, but checked himself and laughingly
assented. I watched him go down the stairs and hurry away, his sabre
banging at every stride. He turned into Bleecker Street, and I knew he
was going to see Constance. I gave him ten minutes to disappear and
then followed in his footsteps, taking with me the jewelled crown and
the silken robe embroidered with the Yellow Sign. When I turned into
Bleecker Street, and entered the doorway which bore the sign—
MR. WILDE,
REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS.
Third Bell.
I saw old Hawberk moving about in his shop, and imagined I heard
Constance’s voice in the parlour; but I avoided them both and hurried
up the trembling stairways to Mr. Wilde’s apartment. I knocked and
entered without ceremony. Mr. Wilde lay groaning on the floor, his face
covered with blood, his clothes torn to shreds. Drops of blood were
scattered about over the carpet, which had also been ripped and frayed
in the evidently recent struggle.
“It’s that cursed cat,” he said, ceasing his groans, and turning his
colourless eyes to me; “she attacked me while I was asleep. I believe
she will kill me yet.”
This was too much, so I went into the kitchen, and, seizing a hatchet
from the pantry, started to find the infernal beast and settle her then
and there. My search was fruitless, and after a while I gave it up and
came back to find Mr. Wilde squatting on his high chair by the table.
He had washed his face and changed his clothes. The great furrows
which the cat’s claws had ploughed up in his face he had filled with
collodion, and a rag hid the wound in his throat. I told him I should
kill the cat when I came across her, but he only shook his head and
turned to the open ledger before him. He read name after name of the
people who had come to him in regard to their reputation, and the sums
he had amassed were startling.
“I put on the screws now and then,” he explained.
“One day or other some of these people will assassinate you,” I
insisted.
“Do you think so?” he said, rubbing his mutilated ears.
It was useless to argue with him, so I took down the manuscript
entitled Imperial Dynasty of America, for the last time I should
ever take it down in Mr. Wilde’s study. I read it through, thrilling
and trembling with pleasure. When I had finished Mr. Wilde took the
manuscript and, turning to the dark passage which leads from his study
to his bed-chamber, called out in a loud voice, “Vance.” Then for the
first time, I noticed a man crouching there in the shadow. How I had
overlooked him during my search for the cat, I cannot imagine.
“Vance, come in,” cried Mr. Wilde.
The figure rose and crept towards us, and I shall never forget the face
that he raised to mine, as the light from the window illuminated it.
“Vance, this is Mr. Castaigne,” said Mr. Wilde. Before he had finished
speaking, the man threw himself on the ground before the table, crying
and grasping, “Oh, God! Oh, my God! Help me! Forgive me! Oh, Mr.
Castaigne, keep that man away. You cannot, you cannot mean it! You are
different—save me! I am broken down—I was in a madhouse and now—when
all was coming right—when I had forgotten the King—the King in Yellow
and—but I shall go mad again—I shall go mad—”
His voice died into a choking rattle, for Mr. Wilde had leapt on him
and his right hand encircled the man’s throat. When Vance fell in a
heap on the floor, Mr. Wilde clambered nimbly into his chair again, and
rubbing his mangled ears with the stump of his hand, turned to me and
asked me for the ledger. I reached it down from the shelf and he opened
it. After a moment’s searching among the beautifully written pages, he
coughed complacently, and pointed to the name Vance.
“Vance,” he read aloud, “Osgood Oswald Vance.” At the sound of his
name, the man on the floor raised his head and turned a convulsed face
to Mr. Wilde. His eyes were injected with blood, his lips tumefied.
“Called April 28th,” continued Mr. Wilde. “Occupation, cashier in the
Seaforth National Bank; has served a term of forgery at Sing Sing,
from whence he was transferred to the Asylum for the Criminal Insane.
Pardoned by the Governor of New York, and discharged from the Asylum,
January 19, 1918. Reputation damaged at Sheepshead Bay. Rumours that he
lives beyond his income. Reputation to be repaired at once. Retainer
$1,500.
“Note.—Has embezzled sums amounting to $30,000 since March 20,
1919, excellent family, and secured present position through uncle’s
influence. Father, President of Seaforth Bank.”
I looked at the man on the floor.
“Get up, Vance,” said Mr. Wilde in a gentle voice. Vance rose as if
hypnotized. “He will do as we suggest now,” observed Mr. Wilde, and
opening the manuscript, he read the entire history of the Imperial
Dynasty of America. Then in a kind and soothing murmur he ran over
the important points with Vance, who stood like one stunned. His eyes
were so blank and vacant that I imagined he had become half-witted,
and remarked it to Mr. Wilde who replied that it was of no consequence
anyway. Very patiently we pointed out to Vance what his share in
the affair would be, and he seemed to understand after a while. Mr.
Wilde explained the manuscript, using several volumes on Heraldry,
to substantiate the result of his researches. He mentioned the
establishment of the Dynasty in Carcosa, the lakes which connected
Hastur, Aldebaran and the mystery of the Hyades. He spoke of Cassilda
and Camilla, and sounded the cloudy depths of Demhe, and the Lake of
Hali. “The scolloped tatters of the King in Yellow must hide Yhtill
forever,” he muttered, but I do not believe Vance heard him. Then by
degrees he led Vance along the ramifications of the Imperial family,
to Uoht and Thale, from Naotalba and Phantom of Truth, to Aldones, and
then tossing aside his manuscript and notes, he began the wonderful
story of the Last King. Fascinated and thrilled I watched him. He threw
up his head, his long arms were stretched out in a magnificent gesture
of pride and power, and his eyes blazed deep in their sockets like two
emeralds. Vance listened stupefied. As for me, when at last Mr. Wilde
had finished, and pointing to me, cried, “The cousin of the King!” my
head swam with excitement.
Controlling myself with a superhuman effort, I explained to Vance why
I alone was worthy of the crown and why my cousin must be exiled or
die. I made him understand that my cousin must never marry, even after
renouncing all his claims, and how that least of all he should marry
the daughter of the Marquis of Avonshire and bring England into the
question. I showed him a list of thousands of names which Mr. Wilde had
drawn up; every man whose name was there had received the Yellow Sign
which no living human being dared disregard. The city, the state, the
whole land, were ready to rise and tremble before the Pallid Mask.
The time had come, the people should know the son of Hastur, and the
whole world bow to the black stars which hang in the sky over Carcosa.
Vance leaned on the table, his head buried in his hands. Mr. Wilde drew
a rough sketch on the margin of yesterday’s _Herald_ with a bit of lead
pencil. It was a plan of Hawberk’s rooms. Then he wrote out the order
and affixed the seal, and shaking like a palsied man I signed my first
writ of execution with my name Hildred-Rex.
Mr. Wilde clambered to the floor and unlocking the cabinet, took a
long square box from the first shelf. This he brought to the table and
opened. A new knife lay in the tissue paper inside and I picked it up
and handed it to Vance, along with the order and the plan of Hawberk’s
apartment. Then Mr. Wilde told Vance he could go; and he went,
shambling like an outcast of the slums.
I sat for a while watching the daylight fade behind the square tower of
the Judson Memorial Church, and finally, gathering up the manuscript
and notes, took my hat and started for the door.
Mr. Wilde watched me in silence. When I had stepped into the hall I
looked back. Mr. Wilde’s small eyes were still fixed on me. Behind him,
the shadows gathered in the fading light. Then I closed the door behind
me and went out into the darkening streets.
I had eaten nothing since breakfast, but I was not hungry. A wretched,
half-starved creature, who stood looking across the street at the
Lethal Chamber, noticed me and came up to tell me a tale of misery. I
gave him money, I don’t know why, and he went away without thanking me.
An hour later another outcast approached and whined his story. I had a
blank bit of paper in my pocket, on which was traced the Yellow Sign,
and I handed it to him. He looked at it stupidly for a moment, and
then with an uncertain glance at me, folded it with what seemed to me
exaggerated care and placed it in his bosom.
The electric lights were sparkling among the trees, and the new moon
shone in the sky above the Lethal Chamber. It was tiresome waiting in
the square; I wandered from the Marble Arch to the artillery stables
and back again to the lotos fountain. The flowers and grass exhaled
a fragrance which troubled me. The jet of the fountain played in
the moonlight, and the musical splash of falling drops reminded me
of the tinkle of chained mail in Hawberk’s shop. But it was not so
fascinating, and the dull sparkle of the moonlight on the water brought
no such sensations of exquisite pleasure, as when the sunshine played
over the polished steel of a corselet on Hawberk’s knee. I watched the
bats darting and turning above the water plants in the fountain basin,
but their rapid, jerky flight set my nerves on edge, and I went away
again to walk aimlessly to and fro among the trees.
The artillery stables were dark, but in the cavalry barracks the
officers’ windows were brilliantly lighted, and the sallyport was
constantly filled with troopers in fatigue, carrying straw and harness
and baskets filled with tin dishes.
Twice the mounted sentry at the gates was changed while I wandered up
and down the asphalt walk. I looked at my watch. It was nearly time.
The lights in the barracks went out one by one, the barred gate was
closed, and every minute or two an officer passed in through the side
wicket, leaving a rattle of accoutrements and a jingle of spurs on
the night air. The square had become very silent. The last homeless
loiterer had been driven away by the grey-coated park policeman, the
car tracks along Wooster Street were deserted, and the only sound which
broke the stillness was the stamping of the sentry’s horse and the ring
of his sabre against the saddle pommel. In the barracks, the officers’
quarters were still lighted, and military servants passed and repassed
before the bay windows. Twelve o’clock sounded from the new spire of
St. Francis Xavier, and at the last stroke of the sad-toned bell a
figure passed through the wicket beside the portcullis, returned the
salute of the sentry, and crossing the street entered the square and
advanced toward the Benedick apartment house.
“Louis,” I called.
The man pivoted on his spurred heels and came straight toward me.
“Is that you, Hildred?”
“Yes, you are on time.”
I took his offered hand, and we strolled toward the Lethal Chamber.
He rattled on about his wedding and the graces of Constance, and
their future prospects, calling my attention to his captain’s
shoulder-straps, and the triple gold arabesque on his sleeve and
fatigue cap. I believe I listened as much to the music of his spurs
and sabre as I did to his boyish babble, and at last we stood under
the elms on the Fourth Street corner of the square opposite the
Lethal Chamber. Then he laughed and asked me what I wanted with him.
I motioned him to a seat on a bench under the electric light, and sat
down beside him. He looked at me curiously, with that same searching
glance which I hate and fear so in doctors. I felt the insult of his
look, but he did not know it, and I carefully concealed my feelings.
“Well, old chap,” he inquired, “what can I do for you?”
I drew from my pocket the manuscript and notes of the Imperial Dynasty
of America, and looking him in the eye said:
“I will tell you. On your word as a soldier, promise me to read this
manuscript from beginning to end, without asking me a question. Promise
me to read these notes in the same way, and promise me to listen to
what I have to tell later.”
“I promise, if you wish it,” he said pleasantly. “Give me the paper,
Hildred.”
He began to read, raising his eyebrows with a puzzled, whimsical air,
which made me tremble with suppressed anger. As he advanced, his
eyebrows contracted, and his lips seemed to form the word “rubbish.”
Then he looked slightly bored, but apparently for my sake read, with an
attempt at interest, which presently ceased to be an effort. He started
when in the closely written pages he came to his own name, and when
he came to mine he lowered the paper, and looked sharply at me for a
moment. But he kept his word, and resumed his reading, and I let the
half-formed question die on his lips unanswered. When he came to the
end and read the signature of Mr. Wilde, he folded the paper carefully
and returned it to me. I handed him the notes, and he settled back,
pushing his fatigue cap up to his forehead, with a boyish gesture,
which I remembered so well in school. I watched his face as he read,
and when he finished I took the notes with the manuscript, and placed
them in my pocket. Then I unfolded a scroll marked with the Yellow
Sign. He saw the sign, but he did not seem to recognize it, and I
called his attention to it somewhat sharply.
“Well,” he said, “I see it. What is it?”
“It is the Yellow Sign,” I said angrily.
“Oh, that’s it, is it?” said Louis, in that flattering voice, which
Doctor Archer used to employ with me, and would probably have employed
again, had I not settled his affair for him.
I kept my rage down and answered as steadily as possible, “Listen, you
have engaged your word?”
“I am listening, old chap,” he replied soothingly.
I began to speak very calmly.
“Dr. Archer, having by some means become possessed of the secret of the
Imperial Succession, attempted to deprive me of my right, alleging that
because of a fall from my horse four years ago, I had become mentally
deficient. He presumed to place me under restraint in his own house in
hopes of either driving me insane or poisoning me. I have not forgotten
it. I visited him last night and the interview was final.”
Louis turned quite pale, but did not move. I resumed triumphantly,
“There are yet three people to be interviewed in the interests of
Mr. Wilde and myself. They are my cousin Louis, Mr. Hawberk, and his
daughter Constance.”
Louis sprang to his feet and I arose also, and flung the paper marked
with the Yellow Sign to the ground.
“Oh, I don’t need that to tell you what I have to say,” I cried, with a
laugh of triumph. “You must renounce the crown to me, do you hear, to
_me_.”
Louis looked at me with a startled air, but recovering himself said
kindly, “Of course I renounce the—what is it I must renounce?”
“The crown,” I said angrily.
“Of course,” he answered, “I renounce it. Come, old chap, I’ll walk
back to your rooms with you.”
“Don’t try any of your doctor’s tricks on me,” I cried, trembling with
fury. “Don’t act as if you think I am insane.”
“What nonsense,” he replied. “Come, it’s getting late, Hildred.”
“No,” I shouted, “you must listen. You cannot marry, I forbid it. Do
you hear? I forbid it. You shall renounce the crown, and in reward I
grant you exile, but if you refuse you shall die.”
He tried to calm me, but I was roused at last, and drawing my long
knife barred his way.
Then I told him how they would find Dr. Archer in the cellar with his
throat open, and I laughed in his face when I thought of Vance and his
knife, and the order signed by me.
“Ah, you are the King,” I cried, “but I shall be King. Who are you to
keep me from Empire over all the habitable earth! I was born the cousin
of a king, but I shall be King!”
Louis stood white and rigid before me. Suddenly a man came running up
Fourth Street, entered the gate of the Lethal Temple, traversed the
path to the bronze doors at full speed, and plunged into the death
chamber with the cry of one demented, and I laughed until I wept tears,
for I had recognized Vance, and knew that Hawberk and his daughter were
no longer in my way.
“Go,” I cried to Louis, “you have ceased to be a menace. You will never
marry Constance now, and if you marry any one else in your exile, I
will visit you as I did my doctor last night. Mr. Wilde takes charge of
you to-morrow.” Then I turned and darted into South Fifth Avenue, and
with a cry of terror Louis dropped his belt and sabre and followed me
like the wind. I heard him close behind me at the corner of Bleecker
Street, and I dashed into the doorway under Hawberk’s sign. He cried,
“Halt, or I fire!” but when he saw that I flew up the stairs leaving
Hawberk’s shop below, he left me, and I heard him hammering and
shouting at their door as though it were possible to arouse the dead.
Mr. Wilde’s door was open, and I entered crying, “It is done, it is
done! Let the nations rise and look upon their King!” but I could not
find Mr. Wilde, so I went to the cabinet and took the splendid diadem
from its case. Then I drew on the white silk robe, embroidered with the
Yellow Sign, and placed the crown upon my head. At last I was King,
King by my right in Hastur, King because I knew the mystery of the
Hyades, and my mind had sounded the depths of the Lake of Hali. I was
King! The first grey pencillings of dawn would raise a tempest which
would shake two hemispheres. Then as I stood, my every nerve pitched to
the highest tension, faint with the joy and splendour of my thought,
without, in the dark passage, a man groaned.
I seized the tallow dip and sprang to the door. The cat passed me like
a demon, and the tallow dip went out, but my long knife flew swifter
than she, and I heard her screech, and I knew that my knife had found
her. For a moment I listened to her tumbling and thumping about in the
darkness, and then when her frenzy ceased, I lighted a lamp and raised
it over my head. Mr. Wilde lay on the floor with his throat torn open.
At first I thought he was dead, but as I looked, a green sparkle came
into his sunken eyes, his mutilated hand trembled, and then a spasm
stretched his mouth from ear to ear. For a moment my terror and despair
gave place to hope, but as I bent over him his eyeballs rolled clean
around in his head, and he died. Then while I stood, transfixed with
rage and despair, seeing my crown, my empire, every hope and every
ambition, my very life, lying prostrate there with the dead master,
_they_ came, seized me from behind, and bound me until my veins stood
out like cords, and my voice failed with the paroxysms of my frenzied
screams. But I still raged, bleeding and infuriated among them, and
more than one policeman felt my sharp teeth. Then when I could no
longer move they came nearer; I saw old Hawberk, and behind him my
cousin Louis’ ghastly face, and farther away, in the corner, a woman,
Constance, weeping softly.
“Ah! I see it now!” I shrieked. “You have seized the throne and the
empire. Woe! woe to you who are crowned with the crown of the King in
Yellow!”
[EDITOR’S NOTE.—Mr. Castaigne died yesterday in the Asylum for
Criminal Insane.]