Chapter V: The Greater Discipline (2)

“Yes! it is as I thought,” he exclaimed, joyfully; “the blood has _not_ coagulated. It is a simple case of drowning, and, to all intents and purposes, our friend here is no better and no worse off than if he had been asphyxiated by water only a few hours ago. Mr. Burnham, I congratulate you,” taking that gentleman by the hand and shaking it with the utmost enthusiasm, “upon being instrumental in providing a subject for resuscitation--for resuscitate him I do not doubt that I shall, now that I have direct evidence that the blood has undergone no chemical change--a subject, compared with which a mere, ordinary case of drowning sinks into the most infinitesimal insignificance; for--who can tell?--perhaps this man has lain in this condition for hundreds, aye, for thousands of years; perhaps he belongs to a remote prehistoric age, for ice, the great embalmer, knows neither time nor seasons, and a thousand years are to it but as one hour. Whatever our friend here is, or has been, he will presently be one of us; he will open his mouth and unlock the secrets of the past. He will tell us how he came to be in his present plight. He will add another page to the world’s history.”

I felt myself catching all the doctor’s enthusiasm, and now hung upon everything that he did with breathless interest.

“The next step,” said the doctor, “is to stimulate the heart’s action and restore the circulation. To do this will require our united efforts. You, Mr. Burnham, will take charge of the battery and apply the electrodes; our friend here”--signifying myself--“will assist in inflating the lungs; I will attend to the circulation. Your battery is ready, is it not, Mr. Burnham?”

The battery, with its auxiliary apparatus for intensifying the current, was brought round and placed on a table close by. Dr. Dunne then made an incision in the breast so as to expose the breast-bone, or sternum, and another in the back, in the region of the third vertebra. To the former of these the negative pole of the battery was applied, and to the latter the positive electrode.

“Where is that phial, I wonder?” interjected the doctor, looking over his medicine-chest, and taking out bottle after bottle; “ah, here it is,” he said, at last, “here is the substance on which I rely to restore the action of the heart and give new life to our friend here. It has only lately been introduced into the pharmacopœia; but since its introduction it has done wonders in cardiac affections. It is distilled from a plant which grows only in East Africa. Its name is _strephanthus_, and its effect is to accelerate the action of the heart. It is now my purpose to inject a portion of this powerful stimulant into the median vein, which I have just opened, in our friend’s arm, whence it will be conveyed to the heart. Meanwhile, you, Mr. Burnham, and our friend here will induce artificial respiration in the lungs, so that the blood may be oxygenated after it has been expelled from the heart by the spasmodic valvular action which the _strephanthus_ will excite in that organ. Now, let us each attend closely to his allotted duty.”

My part consisted in inflating the lungs by means of a tiny bellows, the nozzle of which had been introduced into the larynx, till such time as the breathing should become automatic and the rise and fall of the lungs regular. At a given signal from the doctor, Burnham turned on the current, the electrodes having been previously placed in position, and, at the same instant, the chest expanded. I plied my bellows as the breast rose, and a second afterward it collapsed, the discharged air rushing back through the larynx with a whistling sound. Three seconds afterward the chest rose automatically again, and again I assisted its rise by inflating the lungs as before. This was kept up for some dozen or more respirations, occupying in all about two minutes.

Meantime, the doctor was intently engaged with a syringe and graduating glass at the left arm of the body. So absorbed was he in his occupation that he seemed oblivious to everything else. Suddenly he sprang to his feet, with an exclamation which startled us.

“We have won!” he shouted; “see! the blood is circulating.”

I looked down at the arm, and, sure enough, blood was spurting in a thin jet from the lower extremity of the vein which the doctor had severed. In my excitement I had withdrawn the bellows from the mouth, but there was no further use for artificial respiration, as the chest was now rising and falling automatically and in regular cadence. The doctor now tied up the severed vein, sewed up the incision in the arm, and, after dressing the patient--for such he must now be called--in a suit of Burnham’s underwear, we lifted him into the bureau-bed that had been prepared at the side of the studio next the fire.

“There is nothing more to be done,” said the doctor, simply; “he will wake by and by of his own accord, and will then need some nourishment. Soup and stimulants will be the proper thing to administer at first.”

Burnham went out and returned presently with a tray containing the desired refreshments. We now waited anxiously for the awakening, which must sooner or later come. The breathing, which had hitherto been labored and stertorous, was becoming easier, the color was returning to the cheeks, and the occasional twitching of the muscles showed that our strange patient was on the point of awaking. At length he turned on his side, opened his eyes, stared fixedly at us, and then uttered an exclamation in some foreign tongue. Burnham got up, wheeled a table to the side of the bed, set the tray of refreshments upon it, and motioned him to help himself, at the same time pouring out a glass of wine. Here Dr. Dunne interposed.

“No,” he said, smiling; “after a fast of so many thousand years I certainly must prescribe hot water as an initiative. It is absolutely necessary for the stomach to begin with.”

The hot water was brought, and our patient, evidently comprehending that he was under medical treatment, shifted his position in bed so as to recline upon his elbow, took the tumbler which was handed him, and, after eying it critically, raised it to his lips and tasted the contents. A shade of surprise and faint protest passed across his features as he elevated his eyebrows, shrugged his shoulders, and swallowed the potion.

“Now let him attack the viands if he wants to,” said the doctor, as our guest’s eye roved somewhat greedily, I thought, over the table. Burnham pushed the tray a little nearer, no second invitation being necessary, and the bowl of soup that had been brought, together with a couple of glasses of old Madeira, speedily disappeared. This duty having been performed, our guest became voluble. He gesticulated and spoke, and, to judge by the inflexions of his voice and the character of his gestures, he was, I should say, appealing to us for an explanation of his presence there and of the strange objects which met his gaze. It need scarcely be said that we could not understand one word of what he was saying, though the voice was clear and mellow and the syllables of his words as distinct and sonorous as ancient Greek, though they bore no other resemblance to that language.

“Suppose we bring him pen and ink and see if he can write,” suggested Burnham, and the idea struck us as a peculiarly happy one.

Pen, ink, and paper were accordingly set upon the table. Our patient eyed the articles curiously for a moment or two, took up the pen, and examined the steel nib with an expression of critical approval, then took up a sheet of paper, examined its texture, and smiled, at the same time spreading it out before him. It was evident that he comprehended what was required of him, for he dipped the pen into the ink and wrote a few words upon the paper, guiding the pen, however, from right to left, according to Oriental usage. The characters partook more of the Chaldaic, or ancient Sanscrit, than any other type. As it was, none of us could make them out. Our guest watched our efforts at deciphering with an amused smile, but when one of our daily papers was handed him by Burnham, this quickly changed to an expression of rapt attention and intense interest. He did not, however, handle the sheet like a savage, but like one who knew the object of it, examining the words and letters with the closest attention, evidently to see whether he could gain any clew to their meaning. After a minute or two he gave up the task, and then, tapping his forehead with a tired expression, smiled at us, lay back on his pillow, and was soon fast asleep.

“He will be all right by evening,” remarked the doctor; “and then,” turning to Burnham, “what will you do with him? Introduce him to the Academy of Sciences, I suppose?”

“Not just yet,” returned Burnham; “I have no objection to some inkling of our wonderful prize getting out--our friend here,” alluding to me, “will, no doubt, attend to that--but I certainly shall not bring him before the public in any way, nor even introduce him to our scientific men, till I have educated him to some little knowledge of our language. There will, I think, be no difficulty about that. He is evidently a man of superior intelligence, and I shall go right to work in the same way as if he was any ordinary foreigner cast upon our shores with no knowledge of our language and I myself equally ignorant of his. It is merely giving names of objects, he learning my name for the object, I his. In that manner we shall speedily arrive at a solution of the all-absorbing question who this remarkable being is whom we have rescued from the jaws of death, and who, to all intents and purposes, has been dead for--who can tell?--how many ages past.”

The events I have here detailed occurred on the ninth of August last. Since that time, my friend Burnham has been enthusiastically engaged in carrying out the project which he mapped out on the day of the resuscitation of his remarkable patient and guest. His tailor was called in, and, when Mr. Kourban Balanok, as the stranger calls himself, left Burnham’s studio three days after, he did so as a nineteenth-century gentleman, and is now installed in Burnham’s house as one of the family. People may have noticed the young, handsome, and distinguished stranger to be seen occasionally walking arm-in-arm with Burnham on Kearny or Market Street, but none would guess that he had lain in the North Polar ice in the neighborhood of ten thousand years. Such is the case, however, and, as he is fast acquiring an intimate knowledge of the English language, we may confidently look forward to the appearance, in the near future, of a detailed account of the economy of the prehistoric world, and of the vast cataclysm which swamped it and left Mr. Kourban Balanok embedded in the ice.

LEAVES ON THE RIVER PASIG

By W. O. McGeehan

The Boulong _casco_ lay on the Quiapo Market, which is on the left bank of the Pasig, just below the suspension-bridge. The Chinese junk--tradition says--was modeled after a whimsical emperor’s shoe, consequently the _cascos_ of the Philippines, being really junks without sails, are not very dainty bits of naval architecture. As a rule, they are not accorded the dignity of a name; but this one was known as the “Boulong casco,” because it was owned and manned by members of one family. Santiago Boulong was steersman, his three sons were polemen, and Simplicia, the daughter, was _el capitan_--her father said, affectionately. Their permanent home was a little _nipa_-thatch shelter at the stern of the vessel.

The men had gone ashore shortly after the mooring--the father on business, the sons on pleasure bent--and Simplicia, much to her disgust, was left on board. She was a Tagalo girl, of the light-complexioned type, pretty even when judged by our standards, of which fact she was aware.

“The river, the river,” she said to herself, petulantly, “always the river. I was born on the river, and I have been going up and down the river all my life. When we come to Manila I may go ashore for a few hours only, and then the river again--and the lake. And Ramon is a fool!”

It was a clear, warm night, and the rippling water of the Pasig glistened in the moonlight, so that she could see the leaves rush by in clusters. Ramon had said: “Think of me when you see the leaves on the river--the bright green leaves from the dear lake country. It seems sad to think that they must float down past the city where the water is fouled, and then out--far out--to be lost on the big salt sea.” But Ramon was always saying queer things that she could not understand.

The murmur of drowsy voices came from the crowded huts of the market-place. Oh, how long till morning! She wanted to buy some bits of finery there, and then to stroll through the city, especially along the Escolta, where there were stores that exhibited splendors from all countries. She hoped that one of her brothers would hire a _carametta_ the next evening, and take her to the Lunetta, where the wealthy of Manila congregated to enjoy the cool night air and the concert. A band of Americanos played there every evening.

They were wonderful men, these Americano soldiers, much taller than Filipinos or Spaniards, and many of them had blue eyes and hair of the color of gold. The pride of kings was in their stride, and they looked as though they feared nothing.

Farther on down the river at the Alhambra Café, where the Spanish officers once gathered to hear the music of Spain, the orchestra played a new air that delighted her. There was a burst of cheering. The music was “Dixie,” and the demonstration was made by some Tennessee volunteers, who always gave something reminiscent of the old “rebel yell” whenever they heard it. From the Cuartel Infanteria, across the river, the American bugles began to shrill a “tattoo.” Their music was wonderful--everything pertaining to these big, bold men was wonderful, she thought.

Something bumped against a side of the _casco_, and Simplicia hurried over to order away a supposed ladrone. She leaned over the side with such abruptness that the wooden comb slipped from her heavy mass of black hair. It fell a dusky curtain, and brushed the upturned face of a man. He was not a little brown Filipino, but a tall Americano, fair and yellow-haired. He laughed a soft, pleasant laugh. She drew herself backward with a frightened cry, but his eyes held hers. The man was standing in a small canoe, steadying his craft by holding on to the _casco_.

“_Buenas noches_,” he said, smiling. He spoke Spanish, but not like a Spaniard or a Tagalo. Simplicia smiled, faintly. She knew that she should go into the _nipa_ cabin, but this handsome man looked so kind and--Ramon was a fool. And her father and brothers were selfish, and----

So Simplicia returned the salutation, and stood leaning over the bulwark tasting the delirious delight of her first flirtation. The man--he was a college boy until the United States Government gave him a suit of khaki and the right to bear the former designation--thrilled with joy at the delicious novelty of the situation. He was in a city that was at once the tropics and the Orient, and over which hung the glamour of departed mediæval days. For several hundred years guitars had tinkled on that river, and voices had been lifted to laticed windows. The air was laden with ghosts of everything but common sense and scruples.

A bugle across the river caused the man to recollect that he was under certain restraint. “I must go,” he said, but he did not release his hold on the _casco_.

Simplicia’s eyes were big and bright in the moonlight. He stretched out one arm and drew her face toward him. She tore herself away, and stood breathing hurriedly through parted lips.

“_Mañana por la noche_,” said the soldier. He plied the paddle vigorously, and the canoe glided away. But he looked back, longingly, for Simplicia’s lips were very soft and warm.

She stood gazing after him till the canoe vanished into the shadow of the Cuartel Infanteria. The unseen bugle softly wailed “taps,” the call that bids the soldier rest. It is also sounded over graves.

* * * * *

The sun beat down fiercely on the Pasig. Canoes toiled up and skimmed down the river. Lumbering _cascos_, their crews naked to their waists, were poled painfully along. The Quiapo Market was astir with a babble of tongues, the barking of dogs, and the incessant challenge of hundreds of game-cocks. The little brown people bought, sold, and bargained with the full strength of their lungs.

Simplicia, as purser of the _casco_, was in the market purchasing provisions, but she spent most of her time near the stall of a Chinese vender of fabrics. After much haggling, she became the possessor of a dainty bodice of silk and piña cloth.

Most of the girls who visited the market-place seemed to be drawn to that spot, for there Simplicia met a friend who had left the lake country a little later than herself.

“Ramon will come down the river to-night,” said the friend, breathlessly, delighted to carry a message of that sort. “He has written something that he thinks they may print in _La Libertad_. Isn’t that wonderful? You must feel so proud of him. For a man to be able to write at all is wonderful--but for the papers!”

Apparently there were no words in the Tagalo dialect strong enough to express the girl’s admiration. Simplicia tossed her head, loosening the hair, a frequent happening. She caught the heavy tresses quickly, and almost forgot for an instant everything but the last time they had fallen.

“Are you not pleased?” asked the other girl, in astonishment. She was dark, and not pretty from any point of view.

“Oh, yes,” drawled Simplicia, “but Ramon is very tedious sometimes, and the lake country is very dreary. We will go into the city this afternoon and see the Americanos.”

They saw many Americanos--State volunteers clad in blue shirts and khaki trousers. The city was full of them. They occupied all the barracks formerly the quarters of the Spanish soldiers, and they crowded the drinking-resorts. Along the Calle Real they came upon companies drilling, and on the Lunetta they saw an entire regiment on dress-parade.

Simplicia, though she scanned every soldier’s face, did not see the stranger of the previous night, nor did she see a face that seemed nearly as handsome.

“They say,” mused the other girl, “that the men of Aguinaldo will drive these Americanos out of Manila if they do not go of their own accord soon.”

Simplicia laughed scornfully, and pointed toward the troops. The men were in battalion front, standing at “present,” and the sun glistened on a thousand bayonets.

“But there are only a few Americanos and there are many thousands of Filipinos,” said the girl.

“The Americanos will take what they want and nothing can stop them,” announced Simplicia, decisively. “Let us go to our _cascos_.”

* * * * *

The twilight gathered on the river. In the north the sky was lit by continuous flashes of lightning. Myriads of stars were overhead, and the Southern Cross was viceroy of the heavens, for the moon had not yet come into her kingdom. The water noisily gurgled by, and Simplicia waited. Which would come first, the tedious Filipino school-master lover or the stranger? Would the Americano come again?

She watched every canoe that passed, but they were all going up or down. The moon appeared and clearly revealed the river’s surface. Simplicia fixed her eyes on the shadow of the Cuartel Infanteria. Something emerged from it and glided rapidly through the stream. It was a canoe, and it was being paddled with strong, sure strokes toward her. Her heart beat tumultuously, and she almost cried out in her delight.

He came, and, fastening his canoe, swung himself aboard the _casco_. Her arms were about his neck in an instant, and her beautiful tresses escaped the comb again.

They sat in the shade of the _nipa_ thatch talking in low tones. His arm was round her waist. Her head rested on his shoulder. He puffed with deep breaths of enjoyment a cigarette that she had daintily lit for him. The intoxication of the country was in his brain--the devil that whispers, “There is nothing but pleasure, and no time but now.”

The _plunk-plunk_ of a guitar close by startled them both. Simplicia trembled violently.

“It is a foolish man who is always singing to me,” she explained.

A clear, musical voice rose in a song, and the soldier checked a question to listen, for the voice and the song charmed him from the first note. The song was in Spanish, and, though he was by no means perfect in the language, he caught the meaning and spirit of it. It ran something to this effect:

Bright are the leaves and the blossoms that grow in the
beautiful lake country,

They fill the place with brilliance of things celestial.

Some of them drop or are thrown to the river,

Helpless they drift on its swift running surface.

Down past the city through sliminess foul,

Out they are whirled to waters eternal

Lost and forgotten forever and ever.

Blossom I cherish; I’ll hold thee.

Never shalt thou leave the lake country.

But my heart, it is sad for the leaves on the Pasig.

The last words died on the air like the sob or the faint cry of a passing spirit. The soldier sat mute, like one bewitched by fairy music. Simplicia’s lips, pressed against his cheek, brought him back to her.

“I do not care for him. On my soul, I do not!” she whispered. She was pretty, and her arm tightened coaxingly about his neck. His better nature was conquered, and the devil in his blood reigned supreme. The situation suddenly seemed highly amusing, and he laughed a suppressed laugh of recklessness. To be serenaded by a native poet while the arm of the troubadour’s lady-love encircled his neck--verily he would have a great tale to tell some day.

There was a faint sound of a footfall on the deck of the _casco_. The soldier disengaged himself. A face peeped in through an opening in the thatch, and the American struck it a sharp blow with his fist. He would have rushed after the intruder, but Simplicia held him.

“It is only a foolish man,” she said, “do not follow him. It would make trouble.”

“I would not bring you any trouble,” he said. “What is the matter? You tremble.”

“It is nothing,” she replied. “I love you.”

The soldier’s conscience smote him. He swore that he loved her, and tried to believe that it was true. She seemed almost happy again.

“To-morrow the _casco_ goes up to the lake again, and we will be gone three days. Oh, that is so long!”

“Very long,” he assented.

“But you will wait and think of me always.”

“Yes, I will watch the leaves on the river----”

She shuddered.

“No! no! Do not speak of them. _Madre de Dios!_ I hate the river, and I hate the leaves it drags along. I think I hate everything but you.”

The soldier was young, and this was his first experience with hysteria and woman, which combination often disturbs even wiser heads. It disturbed him exceedingly, but he soothed her finally with the wildest vows and many kisses. He kissed a tress of her long hair as he stepped from the _casco’s_ poling platform into his canoe.

For the second time she watched the canoe till it glided into the shadows. Then she shivered violently, chilled to the bone.

* * * * *

A sergeant of a certain regiment of United States volunteers was prowling along the brink of the Pasig, outside the Cuartel Infanteria’s walls, looking for a pet monkey that had disappeared. Something in the long grass caught his eye, and he stopped. He stepped back quickly and hurried around the corner of the wall, returning with four soldiers.

He parted the grass with his arms, and they saw the dead body of a Filipino girl. Her face was concealed by a disordered mass of black hair, and, pinned to her breast by a rudely fashioned knife that was buried to the hilt, was a miniature insurgent flag.

They tenderly bore the body to the pathway, and the hair fell from the face. One of the soldiers let go his hold and tottered to the ground.

“Harrison’s a softy,” grunted one of the men. “Take hold, sergeant. He’s fainted, I guess.”

The form was placed in an unused storeroom. When the news went round the men came to view it, not out of curiosity, but to show respect such as they would pay to their own dead.

“This is the way I make it out,” said the sergeant, sagely. “The girl was killed by Aguinaldo’s gang, and it must have been because she spoke a good word for our people.”

“And we’ll take it out of their hides when the time comes,” said one of the soldiers, snapping his jaws together, which resolution the regiment unanimously adopted. Even the chaplain refrained from chiding when he heard of it. He knew his flock.

There being no way of finding out anything about the girl, a fund was quickly collected and arrangements made for the funeral. Several hundred soldiers followed the hearse to the cemetery at El Paco.

The regimental chaplain read the regulation burial service, while the men stood with bared heads. They placed at the head of the freshly made mound a plain board that read:

FOUND IN THE PASIG.

After the last soldier had gone, a cowering thing walked unsteadily up to the grave, and, kneeling beside it, laid down a cluster of green leaves.

“By God! I did love her. I did,” he muttered, continuously. He drew a pencil from his pocket and scratched her name on the board: “Simplicia.”

And his youth was buried there.

THE GREAT EUCHRE BOOM

By Charles Fleming Embree

To Euchretown, Los Angeles County, came Mr. Stoker and his wife. He bought ranches, and, strikingly dressed, drove about in the rubber-tired buggies of real-estate agents; while Mrs. Stoker, a handsome young woman, sniffed the social air. Just what should she do to win, with _éclat_, the commanding place in the local feminine view? For her no slow progress to social supremacy! Rather the Napoleonic sweeping away of rivals.

At that stage of its rise from a desert to a paradise Euchretown was belied by its name. A sombreness hovered over the thought of the place; the method of life was Puritanic. Euchre? One would have thought there was never a deck in the town.

“I don’t want to be un-Christian,” snapped the wife of Reverend Hummel; “but I wish that Mrs. Stoker had never stuck her foot in this town.”

Mrs. Hummel was out of place linked to a preacher. Fairly well had she clothed her mind in the prevalent Puritanic mood; but in her heart she was different. As for social leaders, she was the one, and she knew it.

“Why, Jennie,” complained the Reverend Hummel, a pale gentleman with eyes that ever bespoke a receptive surprise at his debts; “your words ring evil. And then the term you employed--stuck. How, pray, could Mrs. Stoker stick her foot?”

At this moment the maid (employed despite the mortgaged condition of Hummel’s real estate) ushered in Mrs. Banker Wheelock.

“And _have_ you heard the news about Mrs. Stoker!” cried Mrs. Wheelock, as Mr. Hummel, wandering away, hummed “Throw Out the Life Line” in a fumbling voice. “Oh, haven’t you got an invitation?”

“What is it?” said Mrs. Hummel, darkly.

“A euchre-party! Everybody!”

Mrs. Hummel’s arms dropped limp.

“But, of course,” she said, “nobody will go.”

“They’re all wild about it!” ejaculated Mrs. Wheelock; “Mrs. Stoker is said to have struck the psychological moment.”

Mrs. Hummel started up.

“There hasn’t been a card-party for years!” cried she; “where’ll she get her decks? Does she carry around a trunk full? Or will she clean out the saloons? But----” and the tears leaped up to her lashes, “I wouldn’t be un-Christian about it.”

Mrs. Wheelock arose and laid her hands on Mrs. Hummel’s arm.

“Of course, dear, you know the only reason you wouldn’t be invited is that you’re the preacher’s wife,” soothed she; and then, with a puzzled air: “That _must_ be the reason.”

Now the maid brought in an envelope. It was Mr. and Mrs. Hummel’s invitation to Mrs. Stoker’s euchre-party. The eye of Jennie met that of Mrs. Wheelock, as a partial relief made its way into the breast of the preacher’s wife.

“Did you ever hear of such impudence?” she breathed.

* * * * *

Mrs. Stoker had a new green cottage with nine Corinthian pillars (capitals enormously ornate) along her front porch. Within, electric lights, white-pine woodwork, brilliant floral tributes of Axminster carpets, and bird’s-eye maple furniture combined to produce an effect luxurious, irrefutable.

“Oh, yes,” natty Stoker was saying to the men, “I gave him three thousand for his ten acres. Wheelock, run over to the city with me to-morrow and look at the Pasadena Villa Tract. I’ve a mind to pick up a bunch of those lots.”

“O _Mrs._ Hummel!” came Mrs. Stoker’s winning voice, and everybody listened. There was the purple-draped hostess flowing toward the preacher’s wife. “I was dreadfully afraid you wouldn’t come! I’m _so_” (powerful kiss) “glad you did! And dear Mr. Hummel?”

“To-night he works on his sermon,” said Mrs. Hummel, beaming about on the faces of the alert and delightfully surprised company. “I persuaded him to run in for me later; for I just came to look on. Of course,” here she turned the sweet lips toward Mrs. Stoker, “you couldn’t expect us to play.”

Mrs. Stoker put new fuel in her smile to Mrs. Hummel; and Mrs. Hummel did likewise further fire up her smile to Mrs. Stoker; and the edified company sat down.

The games went on with a vim that made it seem some hungry gambling spirit, dormant in the town, rose up and reveled. Mrs. Stoker had risked it all on her belief in the psychological moment--and won! The town was ready for sin.

“And that little statue is the prize,” now said Mrs. Stoker, moving about. “Mrs. Hummel, would you hold it up?”

All eyes came round in sneaking way toward Mrs. Hummel, who grew pallid. There, on the mantel, near her hand as she stood to watch, was the statuette--a nude Greek maid.

“Would you mind holding it up? They can’t see,” repeated Mrs. Stoker, louder, fires in her eyes.

Hypnotized, Mrs. Hummel lifted it and saw a price tag, $7.50.

“Why,” said she, forcing into her voice the daring experiment of a note of censure, “I didn’t know there was to be a prize!”

“Oh,” echoed Mrs. Wheelock from a distance, instilling into her tones a strain of triumph, “I didn’t know there was to be a prize!”

“No!” chimed all the women, in mutually sanctioning delight, “we didn’t know there was to be a prize!”

“Just a cheap little thing,” said Mrs. Stoker.

A new brightening of eyes fastened on euchre decks. The games went on with strange excitement; for, lo! all the women had suddenly resolved to win or ruin their nerves in the fight.

“Would you punch--while I look to the sherbet?” whispered Mrs. Stoker to Mrs. Hummel, with new, bald patronage.

The preacher’s wife stared round. The fascination of the game was influencing her. She felt her footing go; she saw the Stoker triumph, the reins gone from her hand. Desperately did she leap at this only chance to cling to the victorious vehicle of pleasure which her rival from this night on was to drive headlong through the Puritanic mood of Euchretown.

Mrs. Hummel punched the cards.

More fierce became the spirit of gaming, until, with final shriek of delight, Mrs. Wheelock won the statue. Followed by jealous eyes she took it.

“Splendid!” she cried, examining the tag and seeing $7.50. Then she passed it round. “Beautiful!” said the women, seeing $7.50.

And the corruption of Euchretown was accomplished.

We pass hastily to the strange fury in its later vigor. From the night of the initiative prize an extraordinary inflation went on apace. Scarcely had a week elapsed (full of gossip at the Stoker’s indubitable success) when Mrs. Wheelock gave a second euchre-party. And when the guests flocked to the banker’s two-story house in the mission style (on the fifty-foot lot which he bought for $1,400 of Jeffreys Sassy), they were yet more morally poisoned to observe, on the cut-glass dish which she awarded to shrieking Mrs. Botts, the half-extinguished price-mark, $9.65.

For six days, $9.65 was a sort of tag to the town’s mental status; when, to the thrilling of all, Mrs. George Botts did suddenly cast out invitations; and at Mrs. Bott’s brilliant affair, Mrs. Stoker, after a dashing race neck-and-neck with six women who all but beat her, won a clock on the bottom of which, mysteriously blurred, the figures $13.75 could, after careful scrutiny, be distinguished.

The value of the prize at the fourth party was $15; at the sixth, $19; at the ninth, $25.50. Agape, the town stared ahead at its coming dizzy course. Then Mrs. Samuel Lethwait, taciturn woman, stupefied the inhabitants of the place by making one flying leap from $25 to $50. Out of the ranks, out of the number of the unfeared had Mrs. Lethwait made her daring rise.

There was an instant’s recoil. Could Mrs. Stoker, Mrs. Wheelock, Mrs. Botts pause now? Their shoulders were at the wheel, their hands on the flying plow which tore up such amazing furrows in the social field. The recoil was but momentary. At the very hour when Mrs. Botts was putting on her hat, sworn to buy a prize worth $60, there fell into her agitated hand an invitation. Mrs. Stoker had sprung to the breach.

A scramble for the cottage of the nine pillars. And behold on the golden lamp there displayed as prize, were the shameless figures, $75.00.

Now had the insanity taken general root. He who fails to understand knows not California. The dangerous mania once contracted, no matter what its form, must continue till the collapse. If the gold fury of ’49, and the equally furious land boom of ’87, are not object-lessons enough, let the sociologist recall the Belgian hares. And if yet he doubts the historical verity of such a cast in the California mind, let him give this euchre boom his careful consideration. As men bid for twenty-five foot lots in San Diego in the insane days of ’87, so did women now bid, under the thin disguise of euchre prizes, for choice positions in the social field of Euchretown. It was the old disease.

In two more leaps the prizes had advanced to a hundred. And, most significant of all, seldom was the price of a prize now paid down. The credit system had saved the day. The people of Euchretown were not millionaires. Few felt able to toss out a hundred with this rapid periodicity. So small first payments, contracts, “the rest in six and twelve,” became the rule.

In the rear dust of this race, panting, tagged Mrs. Hummel. Again and again, contrary to the will of pained Mr. Hummel (who to himself sang “Throw Out the Life Line” in despair), did she attend, punch cards, look on with jealous eye; yet she did not play. She was a buffer whom the sinners held between their gaming and their consciences. Oh, how she longed to give a party that would stagger the general mind!

Now for a fatal three weeks Mr. Hummel was in Oregon. Two sleepless nights his wife spent tossing, then arose feverish, stood on the high pinnacle of temptation, and plunged down.

First she went for a prize. The price had risen to a hundred and forty; she must act quick; now!--lest she be ruined, for the boom waited for no man. At a furniture store she asked information on the contract system. The dealer (who had furnished prizes) was confused; he could not accept the Hummel’s contract. Why? she gasped. Oh, he hastened, it was not for doubts of the Hummel honesty; it was for doubts of the honesty of the community. In the present furious state he did not believe the Hummels would get their salary! Infinitely sorry, infinitely polite was he; and she went away dazed.

But she would do it or die. One more hour of suffering brought her back.

“I’ll mortgage our household goods,” said she, dry-eyed, “till Hummel returns.” And he agreed.

So, Mrs. Stoker’s old slain rival rose up astonishing over the horizon. The chill that ran through the community with Mrs. Hummel’s invitations, gave way to white heat, and everybody, euchre mad, now rushed to the preacher’s home.

Mrs. Hummel’s struggles had been heroic; the house was decorated as never before, the refreshments were beyond any that Mrs. Stoker had conceived. And on the portières (given as a prize) the mark one hundred and fifty dollars stook forth a challenge.

Mrs. Stoker, playing recklessly, lost; and her drawn face suggested nervous collapse and thoughts criminal. But a crisis in the social life of Euchretown was now imminent. There was yet another element to Mrs. Hummel’s victory; a murmur went round of the coming ruin of Stoker. As ladies moved to tables they eyed Mrs. Stoker, and whispered gossip; as men sat down they hinted at revelations, speaking in one another’s ears.

“What is it?” whispered Mrs. Hummel, huskily, to Mrs. Wheelock.

“They say that Stoker is found out; that he gave false title to some land!”

At that moment Stoker’s wild, unnatural laugh was heard.

In the final neck-and-neck sprint to the goal, Mrs. Stoker, gone to pieces, wretched, was distanced; Mrs. Botts carried off the portières; the party broke up, and Mrs. Hummel’s night of sinful conquering passed into history.

When Hummel returned, the news emaciated him. He went to bed and lay ill for a week, and nobody threw out the life line to him. Nay, even the bed he lay on came near to being snatched from under him. And now, with the boom trembling on the verge of collapse, with everybody’s contracts coming due, bills began to rain upon the preacher’s head.

“Jennie,” groaned he, “you have ruined me. See, they haven’t paid my salary, and the furniture man is mad. We will be cast into the street!”

Then there fell into Mrs. Hummel’s hands an envelope--“Mrs. Stoker--at home--Friday night--euchre!”

“Why,” cried Mrs. Wheelock, bursting in with Mrs. Botts, “everybody knows that the Stokers are on the brink of ruin. They say he is fighting like mad to keep his head up--maybe to keep out of jail! This is their final fling. And everybody has learned about her prize. Guess what it is!”

“And guess what it cost!” shouted Mrs. Botts.

“I wouldn’t be un-Christian about it,” declared Jennie, “but I do think swindlers had better hide their heads. What is the thing, then, and what does it cost?”

There was an impressive hush.

“A bedroom set worth two hundred! And she’s let everybody know that she paid cash down for it.”

They all gazed at one another, the fire of gaming in their eyes.

“She is making one last grand play,” said they.

One day of gloom did Mrs. Hummel pass in Hummel’s bedroom, arguing, pleading. To Hummel, he and the whole town were gone to the devil.

“No! Never!” cried he, receiving more duns, and shaken.

But at last toward night he arose and, haunted, went to the furniture store. In the window was the bedroom set, and over it a sign, “The prize for Mrs. Stoker’s euchre-party.” Staring, the emaciated Hummel lost his soul.

“Would it cover the bill,” he whispered, hoarsely, in the dealer’s back room, “if we won it?”

“About,” mused the dealer; “Hummel, since it’s you. I’d call it square.”

And Hummel returned, unsteady on his feet.

* * * * *

Once again the cottage of the Corinthian pillars shone with the brilliancy of a euchre evening. Stoker was making a high play to-night to keep his footing with the men. Mrs. Stoker had rouged to hide the pallor of her cheeks. The house distanced all previous efforts in its decorations, the refreshments were beyond the experience of the most high-rolling citizen of the town.

Behold, in came Mrs. Hummel, her blood up.

“And dear Mr. Hummel?” asked Mrs. Stoker, taking Mrs. Hummel’s hand in both of hers.

“Hummel’s in bed,” said Jennie, tersely; “Mrs. Stoker, I’ll play to-night.”

A moment’s silence, as of a solitude; then a great hubbub, the guests making for tables.

“So glad!” cried Mrs. Stoker; “we’ve always hoped you would!”

“So glad!” shrieked all the women into Mrs. Hummel’s ear; and the games began.

Why dwell on the mad scramble? That night was the culmination. Disgraceful as was the thing in itself, it pales before the disgrace incident to a mood of reckless confession which seized the company. Somebody blurted out that she’d win that two hundred or die. Then a nigh insane man in a corner shouted across the room, to the shocking of all: “Let’s make it poker!”

The laugh that greeted this was spasmodic; and all at once right before Mrs. Hummel on the central table, Mr. Stoker, as though he had lost his mind, and grown wild and cynical, began to deal out--ten-dollar bills from his deck. These Mr. Wheelock snatched up and shook aloft with fearful merriment under the chandelier.

In that instant the boom collapsed. Who could predict the psychological moment? The sight of the ten-dollar bills was too much. Shame rushed into every breast; the reaction began; and henceforth in the hands of everybody but Mrs. Hummel (who, brain on fire, had failed to catch the significance of the moment), euchre fell a limp and lifeless thing.

And that alone is why the preacher’s wife, who scarcely knew her bowers, won the bedroom set.

A sudden, fierce knocking at the door, and in burst an officer.

“I have a warrant for the arrest of John Stoker,” said he.

“I’m here,” said Stoker, sneering and white; and Mrs. Stoker fainted.

Everybody stared; all seized hats; like rats the euchre players slunk away; the Corinthian cottage, like a bedizened but deserted courtesan, stood gaudily shining in the night, alone.

Later the town awoke, as the high-roller awakes next morning with a suffering and repentant head, and the readjustment began. Everybody owed somebody for prizes, as, in ’88, everybody owed somebody for lots. Everybody was a buffer to everybody. The thing let itself down and evened itself up, and nobody was hard on anybody. And thus the euchre boom passed into history.

Now the church people began to rehabilitate their consciences. And Banker Wheelock hit upon a scheme. As financier of the bankrupt soul, Wheelock will ever stand out a genius.

“Why,” said he to Botts, “we did it to help Hummel.”

“True,” said Botts, dazzled; “let’s go and tell him.”

And on a Saturday evening a score of citizens came to Hummel’s house.

Hummel was lying pallid on a lounge.

“We’ve come,” said Wheelock, blandly, “to felicitate you. We couldn’t bear to see you carry that debt, Hummel. We fixed the little thing in what was, I agree, an unprecedented way. But when we schemed beforehand with Mrs. Stoker to give a party and pass the victory on to your wife--Hummel, my friend, our hearts went with it!”

And Hummel, seeing this astonishing loophole for them all, arose to greet the general smile.

“Kind friends,” said he, in trembling relief, “more blessed is it to give than to receive.”

THE SORCERY OF ASENATH

By Maria Roberts

People often ask me why I gave up a promising business career and devoted myself to traveling, in which I find no pleasure; exploring, for which I have no taste; and archæology, which is to me the most tiring of pursuits. The question has never been answered, save by the statement that there is no reason to give, which involves the telling of an incredible story.

There are two or three to whom I would like to tell it. If they survive me, they shall know--to that end, these pages.

It is my conviction that whatever intelligent man has known, he has tried to record in some way--that living truths, new to us, may be gleaned from the stone tablets of races extinct for ages. For such a truth, I am searching. One man found it, but he is dead. His spirit I have called up, as the woman at Endor called up Samuel, and questioned it. He told me that the knowledge had sent it to the world of shades before its time, and had put power into the hands of an evil one, who had bidden it never in any place to reveal to any mortal what it knew.

“Even yet I must obey her,” said the spirit of Paul Glen; “but what you seek is written.”

As yet, I have not read. Many strange things have I unearthed, but never this that I seek.

Now, I will write my story. You who read it may believe or not, as you see fit. I know that it is true.

It is many years now since I went South to visit my sister Helen. I had not seen her since the day of her marriage, three years before, till she met me at the door of her own home and welcomed me in her old sweet and quiet manner. It seemed to me, at the first glance, that her face had aged too much, and that a certain once fine expression--a suggestion of latent determination--had overdeveloped, and marked her with stern lines. From the first moment, too, I feared the existence of a trouble in her life, of which her letters had given no hint.

She seemed, though, cheerful enough. She led the way into a great room that was shaded and cool and full of the scent of lilacs. With a motion of her hand, she dismissed three or four black maids, whom she had been assisting or instructing at some sewing work, and they went out, courtesying and showing their white, even teeth at the door.

A fourth did not leave, but retired to a far end of the room and went on with the sewing. I noticed what a tiny garment she was making, and what a sharply cut silhouette her face made against the white curtain of the window by which she sat.

Helen chatted away, apologizing for her husband’s absence, asking a host of questions, and planning some pleasure for every one of the days of my stay with her. I lay back in my chair, with a feeling of languid content, and listened. When Helen suggested sleep and refreshment, I declined both, feeling no need of anything but her presence and that delicious room, the atmosphere of which was laden with rest as with the scent of the lilacs.

The black woman sat directly in the line of my vision, and I remember now that my gaze never strayed from her. I noticed, idly at first, then with interest, the regularity of her features and the grand proportions of her head and bust. Her hair, brownish in color, with dull copper tints, was as straight as my own, and she had a hand and arm so perfectly molded that, except for their black skin, they might have been those of a lady of high degree. But it was the pride, speaking from every line of that dark face, that most attracted my notice. There was in it, too, an exultant sense of power, and it was the most resolute face, black or white, that I ever saw.

Presently I began to feel that it required an effort to keep the thread of what Helen said, and to reply. Her voice seemed to get faint, then to come in snatches, with an indistinct murmur between them; at last, not at all, though I knew she was still speaking.

I was not unconscious, but perception was contracted and concentrated upon one abnormal effort. From me a narrow path of light stretched down the room to the black woman. She seemed to expand and to grow luminous; a vapor exhaled from her, floated to the middle of the pathway, and there assumed her own form, almost nude, perfect like her face in its every line, motionless as if carved from ebony, but with fierce, impure eyes that looked straight into mine and from which there seemed to be no escape.

Their gaze begot an overwhelming sense of disgust. My soul shuddered, but my body could not move. The evil face smiled. A cloud floated over the form of ebony, slowly passed away, revealing one like polished ivory, but the eyes changed not.

How long their gaze held me motionless and helpless I do not know. Suddenly, something white shut out the vision, and my sister’s voice, now harsh and loud, struck upon my hearing like a lash. Instantly the room assumed its ordinary appearance, the scent of the lilacs greeted me as if I had newly come into the atmosphere, and Helen, in her white dress, stood before me, trembling.

The negress at the window looked at us both with insolent amusement. It was to her that Helen spoke.

“How dared you!” she exclaimed; “oh, that I could punish you as you deserve!”

The girl smiled and slowly drew her needle through the cloth in her lap.

“Go out to Lucas,” commanded Helen. “Go!”

The girl drew herself up, and her face took on an expression of sullen defiance. It seemed for an instant that she would not obey. She clenched her hands, and I heard her teeth grate together. But she hesitated only a moment, then went slowly out of the room. Presently she passed by the window, pushing a heavy barrow full of earth. Lucas, the gardener, followed, carrying a long gad. In a minute or two they passed again, going in the same direction, and afterward again and again. The girl was pushing the barrow around and around the house.

“That is the heaviest and most menial employment I can devise for her,” said Helen; “I wish there were something worse. She grows more impudent every day, but this is the first time she has dared to exert her snaky power upon a white person in my presence. How did you feel while you were under that spell?”

“Now, Helen, for heaven’s sake don’t imagine----”

“I imagine nothing,” she interrupted, in a low voice. “I know that girl. She can do strange things. If ever a human creature was possessed of a devil, she is.”

“Why, Helen!”

She went on without heeding my astonishment. “Every negro on the plantation, except Lucas, is mortally afraid of her. My birds cower in a corner of their cage if she approaches them, the gentlest horse we have will rear and kick at sight of her, and if she goes into the poultry-yard the hens cover up their chicks as if night had come. She has affected others as she did you. She has done worse. When I first came here, she was given to me for a maid; but, not liking her, I took a little mulatto girl who was bright and smart then, but who is now idiotic through fear of Asenath.”

I did not think it best to dispute with Helen, knowing her well enough to be sure that any argument I could adduce against her belief she had already weighed and found wanting. She was not a superstitious woman, nor a hasty one, but one whose very mistakes deserved respect, since she always took that course of action which she believed to be wisest and best, even if it were to her own disadvantage. I simply asked: “Why do you not get rid of her?”

“I have tried, but something frustrates every effort of that kind. Robert objects to sale--it is unusual on this plantation. We once offered her her freedom if she would go away; but she only looked as if she scorned the freedom we could give, and laughed in a way that chilled my blood.”

“She seems very insolent.”

“Insolent--that is a weak word! I sometimes think she is birth-marked with impudence as she is with straight hair.”

“That hair, then, is a birth-mark? I thought it must be a wig.”

“She was born with it and with an insane craving to be white. When a child, she used to scream and shriek over her blackness for hours at a time. Mother Glen whipped that out of her.”