THOROUGHLY disheartened and disgusted, and (if I must honestlyconfess it) thoroughly frightened too, I whispered to Mrs.Macallan, "I was wrong, and you were right. Let us go."

The ears of Miserrimus Dexter must have been as sensitive as theears of a dog. He heard me say, "Let us go."

"No!" he called out. "Bring Eustace Macallan's second wife inhere. I am a gentleman--I must apologize to her. I am a studentof human character--I wish to see her."

The whole man appeared to have undergone a completetransformation. He spoke in the gentlest of voices, and he sighedhysterically when he had done, like a woman recovering from aburst of tears. Was it reviving courage or reviving curiosity?When Mrs. Macallan said to me, "The fit is over now; do you stillwish to go away?" I answered, "No; I am ready to go in."

"Have you recovered your belief in him already?" asked mymother-in-law, in her mercilessly satirical way.

"I have recovered from my terror of him," I replied.

"I am sorry I terrified you," said the soft voice at thefire-place. "Some people think I am a little mad at times. Youcame, I suppose, at one of the times--if some people are right. Iadmit that I am a visionary. My imagination runs away with me,and I say and do strange things. On those occasions, anybody whoreminds me of that horrible Trial throws me back again into thepast, and causes me unutterable nervous suffering. I am a verytender-hearted man. As the necessary consequence (in such a worldas this), I am a miserable wretch. Accept my excuses. Come in,both of you. Come in and pity me."

A child would not have been frightened of him now. A child wouldhave gone in and pitied him.

The room was getting darker and darker. We could just see thecrouching figure of Miserrimus Dexter at the expiring fire--andthat was all.

"Are we to have no light?" asked Mrs. Macallan. "And is this ladyto see you, when the light comes, out of your chair?"

He lifted something bright and metallic, hanging round his neck,and blew on it a series of shrill, trilling, bird-like notes.After an interval he was answered by a similar series of notessounding faintly in some distant region of the house.

"Ariel is coming," he said. "Compose yourself, Mamma Macallan;Ariel with make me presentable to a lady's eyes."

He hopped away on his hands into the darkness at the end of theroom. "Wait a little, said Mrs. Macallan, "and you will haveanother surprise--you will see the 'delicate Ariel.'"

We heard heavy footsteps in the circular room.

"Ariel!" sighed Miserrimus Dexter out of the darkness, in hissoftest notes.

To my astonishment the coarse, masculine voice of the cousin inthe man's hat--the Caliban's, rather than the Ariel'svoice--answered, "Here!"

"My chair, Ariel!"

The person thus strangely misnamed drew aside the tapestry, so asto let in more light; then entered the room, pushing the wheeledchair before her. She stooped and lifted Miserrimus Dexter fromthe floor, like a child. Before she could put him into the chair,he sprang out of her arms with a little gleeful cry, and alightedon his seat, like a bird alighting on its perch!

"The lamp," said Miserrimus Dexter, "and thelooking-glass.--Pardon me," he added, addressing us, "for turningmy back on you. You mustn't see me until my hair is set torights.--Ariel! the brush, the comb, and the perfumes!"

Carrying the lamp in one hand, the looking-glass in the other,and the brush (with the comb stuck in it) between her teeth,Ariel the Second, otherwise Dexter's cousin, presented herselfplainly before me for the first time. I could now see the girl'sround, fleshy, inexpressive face, her rayless and colorless eyes,her coarse nose and heavy chin. A creature half alive; animperfectly developed animal in shapeless form clad in a man'spilot jacket, and treading in a man's heavy laced boots, withnothing but an old red-flannel petticoat, and a broken comb inher frowzy flaxen hair, to tell us that she was a woman--such wasthe inhospitable person who had received us in the darkness whenwe first entered the house.

This wonderful valet, collecting her materials for dressing herstill more wonderful master's hair, gave him the looking-glass (ahand -mirror), and addressed herself to her work.

She combed, she brushed, she oiled, she perfumed the flowinglocks and the long silky beard of Miserrimus Dexter with thestrangest mixture of dullness and dexterity that I ever saw. Donein brute silence, with a lumpish look and a clumsy gait, the workwas perfectly well done nevertheless. The imp in the chairsuperintended the whole proceeding critically by means of hishand-mirror. He was too deeply interested in this occupation tospeak until some of the concluding touches to his beard broughtthe misnamed Ariel in front of him, and so turned her full facetoward the part of the room in which Mrs. Macallan and I werestanding. Then he addressed us, taking especial care, however,not to turn his head our way while his toilet was stillincomplete.

"Mamma Macallan," he said, "what is the Christian name of yourson's second wife?"

"Why do you want to know?" asked my mother-in-law.

"I want to know because I can't address her as 'Mrs. EustaceMacallan.'"

"Why not?"

"It recalls _the other_ Mrs. Eustace Macallan. If I am remindedof those horrible days at Gleninch my fortitude will give way--Ishall burst out screaming again."

Hearing this, I hastened to interpose.

"My name is Valeria," I said.

"A Roman name," remarked Miserrimus Dexter. "I like it. My mindis cast in the Roman mold. My bodily build would have been Romanif I had been born with legs. I shall call you Mrs. Valeria,unless you disapprove of it."

I hastened to say that I was far from disapproving of it.

"Very good," said Miserrimus Dexter "Mrs. Valeria, do you see theface of this creature in front of me?"

He pointed with the hand-mirror to his cousin as unconcernedly ashe might have pointed to a dog. His cousin, on her side, took nomore notice than a dog would have taken of the contemptuousphrase by which he had designated her. She went on combing andoiling his beard as composedly as ever.

"It is the face of an idiot, isn't it?" pursued MiserrimusDexter! "Look at her! She is a mere vegetable. A cabbage in agarden has as much life and expression in it as that girlexhibits at the present moment. Would you believe there waslatent intelligence, affection, pride, fidelity, in such ahalf-developed being as this?"

I was really ashamed to answer him. Quite needlessly! Theimpenetrable young woman went on with her master's beard. Amachine could not have taken less notice of the life and the talkaround it than this incomprehensible creature.

"_I_ have got at that latent affection, pride, fidelity, and therest of it," resumed Miserrimus Dexter. "_I_ hold the key to thatdormant Intelligence. Grand thought! Now look at her when Ispeak. (I named her, poor wretch, in one of my ironical moments.She has got to like her name, just as a dog gets to like hiscollar.) Now, Mrs. Valeria, look and listen.--Ariel!"

The girl's dull face began to brighten. The girl's mechanicallymoving hand stopped, and held the comb in suspense.

"Ariel! you have learned to dress my hair and anoint my beard,haven't you?"

Her face still brightened. "Yes! yes! yes!" she answered,eagerly. "And you say I have learned to do it well, don't you?"

"I say that. Would you like to let anybody else do it for you?"

Her eyes melted softly into light and life. Her strange unwomanlyvoice sank to the gentlest tones that I had heard from her yet.

"Nobody else shall do it for me," she said at once proudly andtenderly. "Nobody, as long as I live, shall touch you but me."

"Not even the lady there?" asked Miserrimus Dexter, pointingbackward with his hand-mirror to the place at which I wasstanding.

Her eyes suddenly flashed, her hand suddenly shook the comb atme, in a burst of jealous rage.

"Let her try!" cried the poor creature, raising her voice againto its hoarsest notes. "Let her touch you if she dares!"

Dexter laughed at the childish outbreak. "That will do, mydelicate Ariel," he said. "I dismiss your Intelligence for thepresent. Relapse into your former self. Finish my beard."

She passively resumed her work. The new light in her eyes, thenew expression in her face, faded little by little and died out.In another minute the face was as vacant and as lumpish asbefore; the hands did their work again with the lifelessdexterity which had so painfully impressed me when she first tookup the brush. Miserrimus Dexter appeared to be perfectlysatisfied with these results.

"I thought my little experiment might interest you," he said."You see how it is? The dormant intelligence of my curious cousinis like the dormant sound in a musical instrument. I play uponit--and it answers to my touch. She likes being played upon. Buther great delight is to hear me tell a story. I puzzle her to theverge of distraction; and the more I confuse her the better shelikes the story. It is the greatest fun; you really must see itsome day." He indulged himself in a last look at the mirror."Ha!" he said, complacently; "now I shall do. Vanish, Ariel!"

She tramped out of the room in her heavy boots, with the muteobedience of a trained animal. I said "Good-night" as she passedme. She neither returned the salutation nor looked at me: thewords simply produced no effect on her dull senses. The one voicethat could reach her was silent. She had relapsed once more intothe vacant inanimate creature who had opened the gate to us,until it pleased Miserrimus Dexter to speak to her again.

"Valeria!" said my mother-in-law. "Our modest host is waiting tosee what you think of him."

While my attention was fixed on his cousin he had wheeled hischair around so as to face me. with the light of the lamp fallingfull on him. In mentioning his appearance as a witness at theTrial, I find I have borrowed (without meaning to do so) from myexperience of him at this later time. I saw plainly now thebright intelligent face and the large clear blue eyes, thelustrous waving hair of a light chestnut color, the long delicatewhite hands, and the magnificent throat and chest which I haveelsewhere described. The deformity which degraded and destroyedthe manly beauty of his head and breast was hidden from view byan Oriental robe of many colors, thrown over the chair like acoverlet. He was clothed in a jacket of black velvet, fastenedloosely across his chest with large malachite buttons; and hewore lace ruffles at the ends of his sleeves, in the fashion ofthe last century. It may well have been due to want of perceptionon my part--but I could see nothing mad in him, nothing in anyway repelling, as he now looked at me. The one defect that Icould discover in his face was at the outer corners of his eyes,just under the temple. Here when he laughed, and in a lesserdegree when he smiled, the skin contracted into quaint littlewrinkles and folds, which looked strangely out of harmony withthe almost youthful appearance of the rest of his face. As to hisother features, the mouth, so far as his beard and mustachepermitted me to see it, was small and delicately formed; thenose--perfectly shaped on the straight Grecian model--was perhapsa little too thin, judged by comparison with the full cheeks andthe high massive forehead. Looking at him as a whole (andspeaking of him, of course, from a woman's, not a physiognomist'spoint of view), I can only describe him as being an unusuallyhandsome man. A painter would have reveled in him as a model forSt. John. And a young girl, ignorant of what the Oriental robehid from view, would have said to herself, the instant she lookedat him, "Here is the hero of my dreams!"

His blue eyes--large as the eyes of a woman, clear as the eyes ofa child--rested on me the moment I turned toward him, with astrangely varying play of expression, which at once interestedand perplexed me.

Now there was doubt--uneasy, painful doubt--in the look; and nowagain it changed brightly to approval, so open and unrestrainedthat a vain woman might have fancied she had made a conquest ofhim at first sight. Suddenly a new emotion seemed to takepossession of him. His eyes sank, his head drooped; he lifted hishands with a gesture of regret. He muttered and murmured tohimself; pursuing some secret and melancholy train of thought,which seemed to lead him further and further away from presentobjects of interest, and to plunge him deeper and deeper introubled recollections of the past. Here and there I caught someof the words. Little by little I found myself trying to fathomwhat was darkly passing in this strange man's mind.

"A far more charming face," I heard him say. "But no--not a morebeautiful figure. What figure was ever more beautiful than hers?Something--but not all--of her enchanting grace. Where is theresemblance which has brought her back to me? In the pose of thefigure, perhaps. In the movement of the figure, perhaps. Poormartyred angel! What a life! And what a death! what a death!"

Was he comparing me with the victim of the poison--with myhusband's first wife? His words seemed to justify the conclusion.If I were right, the dead woman had evidently been a favoritewith him. There was no misinterpreting the broken tones of hisvoice when he spoke of her: he had admired her, living; hemourned her, dead. Supposing that I could prevail upon myself toadmit this extraordinary person into my confidence, what would bethe result? Should I be the gainer or the loser by theresemblance which he fancied he had discovered? Would the sightof me console him or pain him? I waited eagerly to hear more onthe subject of the first wife. Not a word more escaped his lips.A new change came over him. He lifted his head with a start, andlooked about him as a weary man might look if he was suddenlydisturbed in a deep sleep.

"What have I done?" he said. "Have I been letting my mind driftagain?" He shuddered and sighed. "Oh, that house of Gleninch!" hemurmured, sadly, to himself. "Shall I never get away from it inmy thoughts? Oh, that house of Gleninch!"

To my infinite disappointment, Mrs. Macallan checked the furtherrevelation of what was passing in his mind.

Something in the tone and manner of his allusion to her son'scountry-house seemed to have offended her. She interposed sharplyand decisively.

"Gently, my friend, gently!" she said. "I don't think you quiteknow what you are talking about."

His great blue eyes flashed at her fiercely. With one turn of hishand he brought his chair close at her side. The next instant hecaught her by the arm, and forced her to bend to him, until hecould whisper in her ear. He was violently agitated. His whisperwas loud enough to make itself heard where I was sitting at thetime.

"I don't know what I am talking about?" he repeated, with hiseyes fixed attentively, not on my mother-in-law, but on me. "Youshortsighted old woman! where are your spectacles? Look at her!Do you see no resemblance--the figure, not the face!--do you seeno resemblance there to Eustace's first wife?"

"Pure fancy!" rejoined Mrs. Macallan. "I see nothing of thesort."

He shook her impatiently.

"Not so loud!" he whispered. "She will hear you."

"I have heard you both," I said. "You need have no fear, Mr.Dexter, of speaking before me. I know that my husband had a firstwife, and I know how miserably she died. I have read the Trial."

"You have read the life and death of a martyr!" cried MiserrimusDexter. He suddenly wheeled his chair my way; he bent over me;his eyes filled with tears. "Nobody appreciated her at her truevalue," he said, "but me. Nobody but me! nobody but me!"

Mrs. Macallan walked away impatiently to the end of the room.

"When you are ready, Valeria, I am," she said. "We cannot keepthe servants and the horses waiting much longer in this bleakplace."

I was too deeply interested in leading Miserrimus Dexter topursue the subject on which he had touched to be willing to leavehim at that moment. I pretended not to have heard Mrs. Macallan.I laid my hand, as if by accident, on the wheel-chair to keep himnear me.

"You showed me how highly you esteemed that poor lady in yourevidence at the Trial," I said. "I believe, Mr. Dexter, you haveideas of your own about the mystery of her death?"

He had been looking at my hand, resting on the arm of his chair,until I ventured on my question. At that he suddenly raised hiseyes, and fixed them with a frowning and furtive suspicion on myface.

"How do you know I have ideas of my own?" he asked, sternly.

"I know it from reading the Trial," I answered. "The lawyer whocross-examined you spoke almost in the very words which I havejust used. I had no intention of offending you, Mr. Dexter."

His face cleared as rapidly as it had clouded. He smiled, andlaid his hand on mine. His touch struck me cold. I felt everynerve in me shivering under it; I drew my hand away quickly.

"I beg your pardon," he said, "if I have misunderstood you. I_have_ ideas of my own about that unhappy lady. "He paused andlooked at me in silence very earnestly. "Have _you_ any ideas?"he asked. "Ideas about her life? or about her death?"

I was deeply interested; I was burning to hear more. It mightencourage him to speak if I were candid with him. I answered,"Yes."

"Ideas which you have mentioned to any one?" he went on.

"To no living creature," I replied--"as yet."

"This very strange!" he said, still earnestly reading my face."What interest can _you_ have in a dead woman whom you neverknew? Why did you ask me that question just now? Have you anymotive in coming here to see me?"

I boldly acknowledged the truth. I said, "I have a motive."

"Is it connected with Eustace Macallan's first wife?"

"It is."

"With anything that happened in her lifetime?"

"No."

"With her death?"

"Yes."

He suddenly clasped his hands with a wild gesture of despair, andthen pressed them both on his head, as if he were struck by somesudden pain.

"I can't hear it to-night!" he said. "I would give worlds to hearit, but I daren't. I should lose all hold over myself in thestate I am in now. I am not equal to raking up the horror and themystery of the past; I have not courage enough to open the graveof the martyred dead. Did you hear me when you came here? I havean immense imagination. It runs riot at times. It makes an actorof me. I play the parts of all the heroes that ever lived. I feeltheir characters. I merge myself in their individualities. Forthe time I _am_ the man I fancy myself to be. I can't help it. Iam obliged to do it. If I restrained my imagination when the fitis on me, I should go mad. I let myself loose. It lasts forhours. It leaves me with my energies worn out, with mysensibilities frightfully acute. Rouse any melancholy or terribleassociations in me at such times, and I am capable of hysterics,I am capable of screaming. You heard me scream. You shall _not_see me in hysterics. No, Mrs. Valeria--no, you innocentreflection of the dead and gone--I would not frighten you for theworld. Will you come here to-morrow in the daytime? I have got achaise and a pony. Ariel, my delicate Ariel, can drive. She shallcall at Mamma Macallan's and fetch you. We will talk to-morrow,when I am fit for it. I am dying to hear you. I will be fit foryou in the morning. I will be civil, intelligent, communicative,in the morning. No more of it now. Away with the subject--the tooexciting, the too interesting subject! I must compose myself ormy brains will explode in my head. Music is the true narcotic forexcitable brains. My harp! my harp!"

He rushed away in his chair to the far end of the room, passingMrs. Macallan as she returned to me, bent on hastening ourdeparture.

"Come!" said the old lady, irritably. "You have seen him, and hehas made a good show of himself. More of him might be tiresome.Come away."

The chair returned to us more slowly. Miserrimus Dexter wasworking it with one hand only. In the other he held a harp of apattern which I had hitherto only seen in pictures. The stringswere few in number, and the instrument was so small that I couldhave held it easily on my lap. It was the ancient harp of thepictured Muses and the legendary Welsh bards.

"Good-night, Dexter," said Mrs. Macallan.

He held up one hand imperatively.

"Wait!" he said. "Let her hear me sing." He turned to me. "Idecline to be indebted to other people for my poetry and mymusic," he went on. "I compose my own poetry and my own music. Iimprovise. Give me a moment to think. I will improvise for You."

He closed his eyes and rested his head on the frame of the harp.His fingers gently touched the strings while he was thinking. Ina few minutes he lifted his head, looked at me, and struck thefirst notes--the prelude to the song. It was wild, barbaric,monotonous music, utterly unlike any modern composition.Sometimes it suggested a slow and undulating Oriental dance.Sometimes it modulated into tones which reminded me of theseverer harmonies of the old Gregorian chants. The words, whenthey followed the prelude, were as wild, as recklessly free fromall restraint of critical rules, as the music. They wereassuredly inspired by the occasion; I was the theme of thestrange song. And thus--in one of the finest tenor voices I everheard--my poet sang of me:

"Why does she come? She reminds me of the lost; She reminds meof the dead: In her form like the other, In her walk like theother: Why does she come?

"Does Destiny bring her? Shall we range together The mazes of thepast? Shall we search together The secrets of the past? Shall weinterchange thoughts, surmises, suspicions? Does Destiny bringher?

"The Future will show. Let the night pass; Let the day come. Ishall see into Her mind: She will look into Mine. The Future willshow."

His voice sank, his fingers touched the strings more and morefeebly as he approached the last lines. The overwrought brainneeded and took its reanimating repose. At the final words hiseyes slowly closed. His head lay back on the chair. He slept withhis arms around his harp, as a child sleeps hugging its last newtoy.

We stole out of the room on tiptoe, and left MiserrimusDexter--poet, composer, and madman--in his peaceful sleep.