CHAPTER XXI.
ANOTHER SCENE AT THE CRAWFORDS'--JOE HARRIS PLAYING THE DETECTIVE, WITHMUSICAL ACCOMPANIMENTS--A STRANGE CONVERSATION, AND A STRANGE VISIT TO ASTRANGE DOCTOR.
Some chapters back in this narration, we saw Colonel Egbert Crawfordplaying volunteer physician to his invalid cousin Richard, and applyinga certain bandage more or less suspicious in its character, whileJosephine Harris held a very ambiguous position behind the parlor-doorand drew certain deductions not complimentary to the character orintentions of the gallant Colonel. To take up the dropped thread ofrelation at that point--the Colonel left in a few moments afterwards,and Joe, from her position in the room up-stairs, watched his departure.By that time, the fearful agitation which had at first oppressed her,had somewhat moderated, and she was much more capable than before ofthinking with clearness and acting with decision. "A perfect littlefool" in many of her first confidences (as some of her friends paid herthe doubtful compliment of calling her), Josephine Harris had yet a veinof distrust in her character, not difficult to touch; and when thatvein was touched there was not "poppy or mandragora" enough in the worldto lull to sleep her suspicions, until they were either proved true orfairly exploded.
Frank and generous natures will sometimes discern more clearly thansubtle and designing ones, just as the naked eye will sometimes take inparticulars in any scene more readily than when assisted by the glass.The power of discernment may be aided, in some degree, by the fact thatthey are not guarded against as some are because they bear the look orreputation of being dangerous. Many a man has taken off the outer garbof his soul and gone in his mental shirtsleeves (so to speak) from theimpression on his mind that he was in the company of the confiding andthe unobservant; and many a bad man has found detection and ruin in theexperiment.
Josephine Harris had seen something in the eyes of Colonel EgbertCrawford, when directed towards his invalid cousin, which said: "I hateyou, and I would put you out of the way if I could!" She had remarkedthe terrible agitation of Richard Crawford when she made her randomobservation to that effect. Now she had overheard enough to put her inpossession of the conflict of interests; and she had at the same timewitnessed the application to the body of the invalid, of a preparationthat was expressly ordered to be kept from the knowledge of thephysician. Taking all these things together, and jumping at a conclusionwith a rash haste which such people will sometimes exhibit--away down inthe depths of her mind she whispered the word "_poison_!" She mightnever have thought of the existence of an outward poison dangerous tohuman life, but she had read Mrs. Ann S. Stephens' touching story of"The Pillow of Roses," and remembered how the life of the first lover ofMary Stuart had been sacrificed by the introduction of a deadly baneinto the silken pillow--the very gift of love on which he so confidinglylaid his head. Might not this be something of the same kind--a murderouspractice unknown to the great body of people, and yet in the knowledgeof some peculiarly instructed? What more likely than that a lawyer whoseline of business led him into the company of criminals and made himacquainted with their secret confessions, should have arrived at aknowledge so dangerous and resolved to apply it for his own benefit andthe removal of a rival?
Such were the reflections of Josephine Harris, when her blood had alittle cooled down from the terrible fever of fright and anxiety intowhich she had been thrown at the first discovery; and how nearly rightshe was in the most important particular--the fact of an attemptedpoisoning by outward application--all will recognize who remember theinterview between the lawyer and the Obi woman of Thomas Street, withthe _dark paste_ which he brought away with him as the result of thatvisit.
At all events, the young girl felt that she had seen enough to removeany doubt of the propriety of making farther researches, and to do awaywith any shame that she had originally felt in playing the part of a spyand listener. Ardent natures like hers may possibly be blamed foradopting so readily the maxim that "the end justifies the means," andfor plunging so determinedly into what cannot be considered their ownbusiness; but let those blame them who will, the good they accomplishmay well be made a set-off for any evil they unwittingly cause; and theparable of the man who "fell among thieves," and the heartless wretcheswho "passed by on the other side," should make us a little slow inblaming the "good Samaritans" who work so enthusiastically even ifuninvited and unskilfully.
The plain English of all which is, that Josephine Harris had determinedto fathom the whole of the mystery lying between Richard Crawford andhis cousin, no matter what deceptions she might be called upon to pursuein carrying out her plan, or what amount of time and trouble might benecessary for that purpose. She might have applied the rules of EgbertCrawford's own profession to him, in expressing this determination, andsaid that enough had been proved against the suspected person, to puthim on his trial before a fair and impartial jury--that jury beingherself in the first instance. Herself and herself only. For once JoeHarris determined to suppress her propensity for talking everywhere andto everybody, and to admit no confidant whatever into a knowledge ofher suspicions. What else she intended to do, will in due time developitself in action.
As a first step, she smoothed down her face with her hands, under somekind of impression that she could in that way remove the redness fromher cheeks and the startled look from her eyes. Then she ran into Bell'schamber, assuming all the nonchalance she could pick up on the way, toascertain whether that young lady was likely to remain away from theparlor for a brief period longer. She found her very busy among amiscellaneous heap of dresses and millinery (this was before the visitto the sorceress, which gave her something else to think about--let itbe remembered,) and in that occupation she was safe to remain for anindefinite period. No visitors coming in, then, she was likely to havethe field below-stairs to herself for a short time at least, and thattime must be used vigorously.
She ran lightly down-stairs and into the empty parlor. There was nosound whatever coming out of the little room of the invalid--he was nodoubt still alone. With the same care which she had before taken, shestepped to the glass doors, slid them apart as before, and lookedthrough. Richard Crawford was yet lying on the sofa, and he was_buttoning up his vest_. A very simple and natural movement, and one notat all noticeable under ordinary circumstances; but to Josephine Harris,at that moment, it seemed very significant. There _was_ poison; thatpoison lay in the bandage; he _had_ suspected his cousin, allowed him tochange and replace that bandage, and the moment he believed himselfalone and unobserved, had _taken it off_! To say that Joe Harris's eyessparkled at this proof of her suspicions, would be quiteinsufficient--they flashed, danced and radiated with delight, in such amanner as made it very fortunate for the peace of mind of the whole malesex that she happened to be alone.
Richard Crawford had taken off that bandage, and that bandage must comeinto her possession at once, while the preparation was fresh. But howwas it to be obtained? Where had he put it? From the fact that he hadbeen re-arranging his clothes while yet in a recumbent position, thechances seemed to be that he had taken off the bandage, if at all,without getting up, and that he then had it somewhere about him,intending to lock it up or put it away when he rose to go to thebed-room. He was very neat in his personal habits, as well as somewhatnervous in disposition; and on the score of cleanliness he was notlikely to have put it into one of his pockets, while if he indeed feltit to be poison he would have been quite as unlikely to retain it sonear his person. Joe felt that if removed, that bandage must besomewhere about the sofa. How to get it, even then? He would not be atall likely to go to bed, leaving it there; besides, she wanted it _atonce_! He must be got suddenly out of the room, and he was too weak andsuffering to remove often or on small provocation. The piano!--ah, yes,she would try the piano!
Joe's musical performances were always pyrotechnic; except on particularoccasions when the sad soul that underlay the merriment came uppermost,and then they were mournful enough to tempt suicide. To say that sheknew nothing about music, would be untrue of any one taught a
t the sametrouble and expense; but to say that she understood it, taking theknowledge of other people as a standard, would be equally incorrect.When studying music under an excellent teacher, it had been foundimpossible to confine her to any set rules, and quite as impossible tomake her execute her lessons properly. When she should have beenperforming that routine duty, her eolian piano at home was half the timeturned into a banjo or a harp, tinkling a serenade, or into an organ,playing some ponderous old anthem or sobbing out some dirge of a brokenheart. These were all well enough, in their way, but they were notstudying the piano. As a result, she could produce all those effectsupon the instrument, that no one else would ever have thought ofattempting; the only penalty being, that what any one else could havedone, she could not do at all. This did not suit some people, but itsuited Miss Joe, exactly; and as she was pleased, perhaps no one elsehad a right to complain. If any one _did_ complain he or she was likelyto be at once treated to one of the lugubrious compositions beforementioned, producing the "dumps" for a month after.
On this occasion Joe threw open the lid of the piano with such dexterityas to tangle the cover inextricably with the lid, set up the stool witha whirl, and dashed into the midst of a composition that might have beenconceived by a mad musician and wailed out on an instrument possessed,like Paganini's fiddle, one night when the demons of the storm wereplaying at hide-and-seek among the Hartz Mountains of Germany. It wentfrom the top to the bottom of the scale, in such moanings, and wailings,and sobbings, intermingled with such fiendish dashes of exultation andlaughter, that the nerves of a strong man might have been thrown intopermanent disorder by it, while those of a sick one could not dootherwise than suffer the most exquisite torture.
"I think that will do!" said Miss Joe to herself, pausing for an instantand then going on again. She was right, for at the next partial pauseshe heard the voice of Dick Crawford, from the back-room, yelling outwith more energy than the man himself had before thought that hepossessed:
"Sto-o-o-op!"
She did stop--ran to the sliding-doors and opened them at once, to findCrawford sitting upon the sofa, with his hands to both ears.
"Eh? what's the matter, Dick? Does the music disturb you?" she asked, asnaturally as if she had not before been aware of the fact.
"Disturb me? It _murders_ me--you know it does, you torment!" was thereply of Crawford.
"I am so sorry," said Joe, with the least perceptible pout on her lip."I suppose that I must go home, then, and play."
"No," said Crawford, who had no idea of being guilty of the ungallantryof driving a lady out of his house, especially dear, delicious,tormenting Joe. "No, don't go home. But if you must play, why not playsomething Christian and respectable--something that a man can listen towithout gritting his teeth and stopping his ears more than half thetime?"
"Well, that _is_ complimentary!" sighed Josey. "Just when I was doingthe very best that I could! Besides, I wasn't playing for _you_. Youwere not in the room, but stuck away off there in a corner. I'll tellyou what I will do, Mr. Dick Crawford. Let me help you out here to asofa in _this_ room--the air will not hurt you, but do you good,--and Ipromise to play for you the very tunes you wish. If not--"
"Oh, you need not mention the alternative," said Crawford, rememberingthe preceding performance and afraid of a repetition. "Come here, giveme your arm, and I _will_ come out for a few minutes."
"Bravo!" thought wild Joe, but she did not say it. Very gently andtenderly she assisted the invalid from his sofa and to a standingposition, and then quite as tenderly through the door and to the sofathat stood nearly opposite the piano. Then she ran back and _closed thesliding-doors_ again, for fear, as she said, that there might be toomuch draught of air on the invalid. So far, so good! Richard Crawfordhad been coaxed out of his room and into the parlor that he scarcelyentered once a month. What next?
"Play me a wreath of Scottish melodies," said Crawford, with the feelingof the old blood coming up within him. "And be sure that you throw in'Roy's Wife' and 'Annie Laurie.' Will you?--That's a good girl?" Dickspoke more cheerfully than had been his late habit, and settled himselfto an easy position on the sofa with more the air of a man ready toenjoy, than he had for some time manifested.
"Has there been an incubus suddenly lifted from his breast?" Joe Harrisasked herself, noticing the change.
If there was anything that she really _could_ play on the piano, herforte lay in those very Scottish airs, which she certainly rendered withexquisite feeling and with skill enough for the moderate demands of thatclass of music. And on this occasion she felt bound to exert herself, torepay the obligation of Crawford's coming out to hear her, though herbrain was all in a whirl for fear something might occur to drive thepatient back into his room, and her fingers, as they touched the whitekeys, itched to be busying themselves about the cushions of theinvalid's sofa. For a few moments, while "Within a Mile of Edinboro'Town," "Roy's Wife," "Charlie is My Darling," "Bonnie Doon" and half adozen others of the Scottish wreath were dripping from her fingers, andwhile Richard Crawford was enjoying his favorite music better than hehad before enjoyed anything for many a week,--for this few moments JoeHarris was nonplussed. How should she get out of the room? Oh! Suddenlyshe remembered that there was some music on one of the tables up-stairs,and she acted upon that excuse for absence.
"Oh, Dick, please lie still a moment. There is a piece up-stairs that Imust bring down and play for you. I know you will like it. One ofGottschalk's--'Las Ojos Criollos.'" She had caught sight of thatcomposition lying at the top of the heap of music near her, and withoutbeing observed by Crawford she caught the sheet, rolled it up in herhand, and was out of the room in a moment.
"Tut! tut! what a pity that that girl _never_ can be still a moment anddo exactly what any one asks her to do!" was the mental comment of thatgentleman as her flying skirts disappeared through the door.
Of course Josephine Harris did not go up stairs. She had no real errandwhatever in that direction. There was a door opening from Richard'slittle bed-room, adjoining his study, into the hall; and her hope was tofind that door unlocked. If not, some other excuse must be made to getinto his room, to invent which she must play a few more tunes, and run alittle more risk of being interrupted. She stepped very lightly to thedoor, with a repetition of that cat-step which seemed that day suddenlyto have come to her. She turned the knob--it _was_ unlocked--it opened.One dart through the other door and to the sofa. The cushion was amoveable one, as she knew, and very likely to be made a temporaryhiding-place for any small article, by one lying upon it. She lifted theedge of the cushion, her heart beating at trip-hammers again, and herwhole being almost as much excited as it had been half an hour before.Human life is full of blunders, but happily there are some movementsthat are _not_ blunders; and this was one of them. A small, round rollof linen, three or four inches wide, was stuck a little distance underthe edge. She drew it out, hastily unrolled it until she saw that a darkplaster lay in the middle, then, with a "Whew!" of triumph, quite ashastily rolled it up again and thrust it into her pocket. Half a minutemore, and she had softly ascended a dozen steps of the stairs, anddescended again with plenty of noise, springing down with a decided bumpon the landing. Then she burst into the parlor with her _piece ofmusic_, and sat down once more to the piano.
"Excuse my running away, Dick. Haven't been long--have I?"
"No, not very long," answered Crawford, whose impressions of Joe'ssteadiness were not enthusiastic. "You know I should not have beensurprised if you had not come back in a week."
"Fie! fie! Dick Crawford! I have half a mind not to play for you at all,after that insult." But she did attempt to play, and to play "Las OjosCriollos." If she ever could have played that most brilliant anddifficult of all Gottschalk's pieces, which was very doubtful, shecertainly was not capable of doing it when her fingers were in such atremor, and with the mysterious package in her pocket; and though it maybe an ungallant and improper thing to say of a lady's performance, she"made a mess of it."
> "Pshaw!" she said, as naturally as if really vexed. "That piece is verydifficult. I thought that I had mastered it, a dozen times, yet here itis bothering me again. Never mind!--I know what I _can_ play--somethingthat you like, or if you do not, you should!" And very much toCrawford's delight, for she did not often sing, though she frequently_hummed_,--she broke out with voice and instrument into that finest,though worst-hackneyed, of modern love-ballads--"Ever of Thee." Thereare unaccountable fancies, in music as well as in personal regard, andone piece will sometimes make itself the very key-note of a human heart,without being in itself so pre-eminently beautiful as to command thatdistinction. Crawford had before many times heard Josephine Harrishumming that air, or touching it lightly on the keys of the piano, buthe had never before heard her _sing_ it. Before half of the first stanzawas finished, he knew that it supplied to her a need in music that allthe compositions of all the great masters would fail to fill; and beforeshe had finished the last, he believed that some painful secret of heryoung life must be bound up in it. He was the more painfully confirmedin that belief, when he saw her rise from the piano the moment after shehad concluded the song, and dash her hand to her eyes with theunmistakeable gesture of wiping away a tear.
"Joe--dear Joe," he said, "come here a moment."
She crossed the room at once and stood beside him. He held out his handto her, and she took it as a sister might have taken that of a dearlybeloved brother. There was nothing of heat or tremor in the touch,though there was everything of kindness. Absorbed in something else,both had for the moment forgotten the feeling before predominant--Crawfordhis sickness and crippled condition, and Joe Harris her anxieties andher plans with reference to him.
"Josephine Harris," he said, very kindly, almost tenderly, "answer meone question, as candidly as it is asked. Will you?"
"You could not ask me an improper question," she replied, "and so Icould have no reason for refusing to answer you. I will."
"You have been singing 'Ever of Thee,'" he went on. "Your whole heartwas in it when you sung, and when you stopped your voice was broken andyour eyes were full of tears. Tell me--is there a sad secret of yourlife connected with that song? Consider me your brother, and do not beafraid or ashamed to answer me."
"Richard Crawford, I _do_ consider you as a brother," the young girlreplied--"a _dear_ brother, in whom I would confide as in one of my ownblood. I mean to prove to you, some day, what a true sister I am. I amneither afraid or ashamed to answer your question. I have no grief orsad memory connected with 'Ever of Thee,' any more than with any othersadly beautiful piece of music with words of the same character."
"Indeed!--I thought otherwise!" said Crawford, with something ofdisappointment in his tone. "And yet it moves your light heart verystrangely."
"It does," said Josephine Harris. "I never sing it or hear it sungwithout the tears gathering in my eyes, even if they do not fall."
"And you can give no reason for this peculiar feeling?"
"Oh yes," answered the young girl, "though no doubt you will laugh at myreason when you hear it."
"I think not," said Crawford. "Tell me."
"You think me very gay and merry," said Josephine. "So I am, but Isuppose that I have something deeper in my nature, that 'crops out'occasionally, as the geologists say. I suppose that I am a visionary insome respects and among my visions is a love worthily fixed and fullyreturned. So few seem to find this, that I fear I shall miss it--eithermiss it altogether or find it too late. The thought is a sad one, andthat song seems insensibly to blend with it. When I am singing 'Ever ofThee,' I am singing to my ideal love that may be escaping beyond thereach of my fingers forever."
True woman of the golden heart!--God in heaven grant that to you andsuch as you this vision may be no dim unreality! God grant you truehearts against which your own may beat, and faithful arms upon which youmay lean when the day of your probation is accomplished I And failingthis fruition, the same God of love and peace grant you a truer and moreenduring union with hearts that pulsate truly to your own, in that landwhere the sad wail of "Too Late!" is never heard and where no bindinglink fetters the limbs or galls the spirit!
"I understand you now," said Richard Crawford. "And yet yours is astrange fancy and would be a dangerous one in many minds. But you are abrave girl, I believe, and that makes all the difference. Besides, youhave health and strength, and most of the time high spirits. Aninvalid--a miserable cripple like myself, housed and shut away, canscarcely hope to understand or appreciate anything that comes freshly inout of God's sunshine!" The old sad and repining spirit had once morecome over Richard Crawford, perhaps invoked by something in the younggirl's words; and she saw the shadow almost as soon as he felt it. Fromthat moment she was the rattle-pate again, and he caught no moreglimpses into the sanctuary of her inner heart. He was to catch no more,forever; for the next time they spoke together in private was aftercertain events already related had occurred--after her hand had lain inanother, in so significant a pressure that no time or change could evertake away the tingle of the blood which it communicated--after her eyesbegan to open on a new phase of destiny--and after "Ever of Thee" ceasedto be a sad abstraction.
Just now she rattled on, as she assisted the invalid back to his room,endeavoring to rouse his once-more sinking spirits, with all her oldgayety and abandon.
"You call me brave, do you?" she said. "Dick Crawford, if I was not alittle ashamed of you for allowing yourself to have these fits of lowspirits, I would tell you something to prove how 'brave' I am! Well, I_will_ tell you, because I know that it is exceedingly improper and Iought not to do so. Two or three weeks ago, spending an evening at Mrs.R----'s, her daughters showed me a suit of clothes belonging to astripling brother, just gone away to the war. One of them bantered me toput on the suit and go down-stairs among the gentlemen. I thought itwould be a good joke, and I tried it. The girls said that I made a veryhandsome boy--hem! and I suppose that I did. At all events, I wentdown-stairs and opened the parlor-door, bold as a sheep, when--what doyou think happened? Why, I thought, all at once, that all the clotheswere sticking tight to my limbs; and when one of the gentlemen cametowards me, I grabbed the cloth from the centre-table for a cloak, andplayed hob with some Bohemian glassware and a few Parisian ornaments,finishing by skedaddling up-stairs a good deal more rapidly than I camedown. Was not _there_ 'courage' for you?"
"No want of it, certainly," said Crawford, who had been laughing alittle, spite of his low spirits, at the naivete of the relation. "Itwas modesty and not want of personal courage that drove you out of thatvery funny position."
"Think so?" said the wild girl. "Then as I _am_ a coward and mean to beknown for what I am, I must tell you another story. A few weeks ago Iwent into a menagerie, and one of the lions made a rush at the bars ofhis cage--probably because he saw _me_. There was about as much dangerof his getting out, I suppose, as there would have been of _my_ doing soin the same circumstances; but of course I made a fool of myself, gotfrightened, yelled, and had all the visitors in the menagerie looking atme. How was _that_? No want of courage? Eh?"
"That," said Richard Crawford, sententiously, "that was the _woman_."
"Humph!" said Joe, as she once more assisted the invalid to disposehimself comfortably on his usual couch. "Now you will not agree to myestimate of _myself_, perhaps you will think better of my estimate of_you_."
"Perhaps so," said Crawford. "Try me."
"Well, then, I have been watching you half the afternoon, and I havemade up my mind about you more nearly than ever before."
"And what am I?" asked Crawford, with just a dash of impatience in histone.
"A hypochondriac!" said Joe. "You are a little sick, and you thinkyourself much worse. You look better and feel better within the lasthour--"
"Eh, what?" said the invalid, startled apparently by some sudden thoughtconnected with the words.
"I say that you look better and feel better, within the last hour, thanyou have done for weeks. You are getting bet
ter, and you have neitherthe honesty to acknowledge it or the grace to thank God for it! DickCrawford, if you ever die--and I suppose you will, some time--you willcommit suicide by taking an over-dose of low spirits!"
How flippantly the wild girl spoke!--and yet she was right, and DickCrawford felt that she was right. The supplying cause of his maladyremoved, such a lecture, from such ready lips, was precisely the thingthat he needed, to break up the habit of despondency--the habit of_enjoying and nursing suffering_ (that phrase may express the fact aswell as another) which settles so often like a murky cloud upon theminds of those who have been kept for weeks or months as confirmedinvalids, after lives of previous activity. She was right, too, as tothe suicide of low spirits. The red devils of Pandemonium may beterrible, fresh from the flames of the pit; but they are nothing totheir brothers in blue, who people the air, overcloud the eyes and setup torture-chambers in the brain. Bunyan, in that ever-living "Pilgrim'sProgress," paints no tyrant so terrible as "Giant Despair," and noobstruction to the way so fatally impassable as the "Slough of Despond."And we have never read over the sorrowful conclusion of the "Bride ofLammermoor" without believing that the young master of Ravenswood, onthat sombre November morning, sunk the sooner and the more fatally inthe quicksands of the Kelpie's Flow, from the weight of the leaden hearthe carried in his bosom.
Suddenly, and before Richard Crawford had quite decided how to answerher last remark, Josephine Harris said, as if the thought had only thatinstant come to her:
"Oh, Dick, I am going to ask a favor, in return for my good opinion. Thecarriage is in, I believe. May I ring for it, for an hour?"
"Certainly," said Crawford. Josephine rung the bell, and the order wasgiven.
"It is dusk, you see," said the young girl, apologetically, "and I_must_ go down the Avenue before I go home. Many thanks. Be a good boyand take care of yourself, till I see you again. John will set me downat home when my little errand is over. Good night!" and her kiss fellwarm and soft upon his forehead--a sister's kiss, pure andunimpassioned, even if there was no tie of blood between them.
Bell Crawford came down stairs and sat by her brother's side when sheheard the carriage roll away with her friend. And whither did thatcarriage roll? Richard Crawford had no idea that Joe's "little errand"could possibly have any connection with himself; and yet it had--a mostintimate and important connection, as will be perceived.
The coachman, at her request, drove out to Fifth Avenue, then down thatavenue to Tenth Street, where he opened the door and set her down,receiving orders to wait there for her return. The young girl tripped upfrom the corner, a few doors on the left hand side, past a church, andentered the front-yard railing of one of two or three unpretendingthree-story brick-houses standing together. It was now past dusk and thestreet-lamps were lighted; and looking in at the basement windows ofthis house, Joe saw that no curtains were drawn, that the gas wasburning within, over a table and under a shade; and that at the tablesat a man with head bent down and fingers busy at some kind ofmechanical contrivance.
"That will do," she muttered to herself. "The Doctor _is_ in, as Ibelieved he might be at this hour, and I shall have no occasion todisturb the people up-stairs."
Passing under the steps she reached the closed door, and instead ofringing, banged half a dozen times against the panels with her hand,very slowly and tragically, as the ghost in "Don Giovanni" might ask tobe admitted, provided it had any occasion for using the door.Immediately there was a shuffle inside, and directly the door opened anda tall figure stood in the doorway. There was enough light from thestreet-lamp to make the young girl's face and figure pretty plainlyvisible, and the moment he saw her the occupant said:
"I thought so--mischief! I thought I knew that knock! No one else evertakes such liberties with my office-door. What do you want now? But comein, before you forget it!" and seizing both her hands with a playfulgesture, he dragged her within the door, closed it, pulled her throughthe side-door into the front basement which formed the office, drew up aclumsy cushioned operating-chair near the table, sat her down in it,then cast himself into a chair immediately in front of her, threw oneleg over the other and his hands behind his head, and said:
"Now I am resigned and prepared. Out with it!"
Had Josephine Harris not been familiar with the place and its occupant,as it was quite evident that she _was_, she would have looked twice atthe one and several times at the other. That little basement-room wasnot only the office in which Doctor LaTurque received professionalcalls, but it was also the sanctum in which were prepared most of theoddly-trenchant articles in the _Scimetar_, a quarterly medical andcritical publication with a habit cutting as its name and a reputationdangerous enough to suit the most sensational fancy. Few personsconnected with the practice of medicine in or about the great city, whohad not first or last suffered some incision from the trenchant blade ofthe _Scimetar_, wielded by the wiry arm of the Doctor; and few humbugsbut he had pricked and exposed, by the same means or in personalconversation, while he was himself the greatest humbug of all. Othershabitually humbugged others: he humbugged himself, or tried to do so,insisting to himself that he was a hard man, an iron man, a brute, askeptic, and everything that was ugly and detestable; while in fact hehad the warm heart of an unspoiled child, and a faith in everythinggood, that was really part of his being--all combined with the vigor ofthe experienced surgeon and the close study of the untiring student. Heused hard words--rough ones, sometimes, and tried to make himselfbelieve that they were the emanations of a hard disposition; while everyrough word was really made under protest from his nature, and few men onthe whole earth were more ready to do an act of genuine kindness. It isnot for us to say that there was not some intentional affectation ofsingularity underlying his manner; for he evidently loved notice if notnotoriety; and other means than the white coat and disarranged trowsersof the Tribune Philosopher have sometimes been adopted to secure thesame end.
Certainly Dr. LaTurque was not remarkably choice in the style of his"den," if he _had_ handsomely furnished apartments in the house above,and if his windows _did_ look out on Fifth Avenue. The ceilings werelow, the walls plain, the furniture was very common, and yet a littleodd, as became the place. The floor was oil-clothed; a table coveredwith dark cloth stood in the middle of the room; an old-fashionedsecretary, with books piled on either end, stood against the wall on theright as the visitor entered, with a globe half hidden behind it; on thewall opposite hung the print of a muscular Apollo (muscular, because itwas drawn anatomically, with no flesh covering the integuments); oneither end of the mantel stood a small statue; in the centre was animpudent placard of bronze on japanned tin, announcing that nocomplimentary visits could possibly be received in that room, while theoccupant, if there, was ready to falsify the announcement at any moment;on a small table between the windows, under a glass globe, lay the castin plaster of a marvellously handsome male Italian face; two or threesmall pictures, commonly framed, hung over secretary and mantel; in thecorner between the mantel and the window stood a stuffed eagle on a lowtable covered with the suggestive appliances of a fractured leg; andjust behind it, on a bit of rug, nestled a disabled pigeon from his petflock on the roof, that had come down, with excellent judgment, to benursed and tended by the surgeon.
In the midst of this odd assemblage Dr. LaTurque was himself not by anymeans the least remarkable object. He was certainly a singular-lookingman, and had a fancy (or pretended to have a fancy) that he was a veryhomely one. He was not so, however, to any eye of taste--only striking.In figure he was tall and rather thin, but the same epithet we haveapplied to his arm may be used for the whole man--_wiry_. He seemedcapable of strong nervous effort and of great endurance; and one couldsee that something more than fifty years had not diminished thelocomotive will or power. In the too large and too aquiline nose(literally a beak)--in the iron-gray moustache, imperial, and heavybrown hair--in the thin cheeks and keen gray eye,--there was amarvellous reminder of the portraits of Louis Napoleon, and at th
e sametime another and a stronger suggestion. There is no close observer ofphysiognomy but has remarked bird, beast and even reptile reproduced inthe faces of different men--one being a human lion, another a humanbear, a third a human hyena, and still a fourth a human serpent. Itscarcely seemed that it could have been by chance that the gray eaglestood stuffed in the corner; for the observer just as naturally detectedthe eagle in that human face, as he could ever have detected either ofthe others named, in different physiognomies, and the dead bird seemedthe _totem_ of the living man.
"Well, battle and murder and sudden death!" said the medical LaurenceBoythorn, when he had forced the young girl down into a seat. "What isit you want? Who is married or dead, or whom do you intend to kill, orwhat is it?"
"Are you sober?" asked the young girl, looking into his eyes verygravely.
"Why, you impudent demon in petticoats!" said the Doctor, with a greatappearance of indignation. "What do you mean? You know that I am neverotherwise than sober."
"From the effects of liquor, of course not," was the reply. "But yourhot head, like mine, has the capacity of becoming intoxicated sometimeswithout any thanks to liquor; and I want to know whether you are cooland clear, or whether you have been puzzling over some bad case, ortalking with some man with a stupid skull, until your head is allmuddled?"
"Clear as one of the mountain springs that you are some day going withme to see," said the Doctor. "Now out with it."
"Well," said Joe, "I know that you hate chemistry, but in spite of thatyou _must_ give me a little chemical judgment. I want you to tell me,"and she took out the surreptitiously-obtained roll of linen, unrolled itand laid it upon the table, under the full light of the burner--"I wantyou to tell me what is that dark substance which looks like black paste,whether it is animal, vegetable, or mineral, and what you think itsproperties."
"And after I _do_ tell you, if I can," said the Doctor, eyeing thesuspicious-looking mass, "I suppose that I am to be told why you wish toknow?"
"Not one word," said Joe. "At least, not at present. All your reward isto be the honor of conversing with _me_ on the subject."
"Bravo, Empress; I rather like _that_!" said the Doctor, who _did_ likeit, nevertheless, to judge by the jolly expression of his face. "You area refreshing young woman, and some day I expect to see you stretch outyour arm with imperial dignity and clear off all the pigmies from theface of the earth with a 'Go away, small people! I have had enough ofyou! You may leave!'"
"Very likely," said Joe. "But meanwhile I have not quite done with_you_. Please examine that stuff, for I am in a hurry."
"As usual!" commented the Doctor, going on to smell, inspect, and eventaste the dark compound on the cloth.
"Take care!" cried the young girl, in alarm, when she saw him apply histongue to the substance.
"Pshaw!" said the Doctor. "Don't be alarmed. I am so full of dangerousingredients myself, that the most virulent of poisons could not produceany effect on me."
"I should not like to see you trust it too far--that is, not if I caredfor you!" said the lady, as if _she_ had been the chemist and he theneophyte.
"Well," said the Doctor, after a moment's pause and a still closerinspection, "you will give me no particulars, and so I shall give _you_none. I suppose the main fact is what you want to know. The substance isa little dried, and consequently it has lost some of its aroma. But myimpression is that it is a very powerful vegetable poison, compoundedfrom certain simples that grow along running streams in the tropics, andespecially in some of the West Indies."
"I thought so!" said Joe, almost involuntarily, and an unmistakeablegleam of pleasure lighting up her face. "But would that poison produceany effect if applied outwardly?"
"I should think so," replied the Doctor, "though, as you say, I hatechemistry. I should think that substance, applied to any vital part ofthe body, and kept there continuously, would produce racking pains andweakness, and be very likely to result in a disease resemblinginflammatory rheumatism, or possibly paralysis, and death."
"Thank you--thank you a dozen times," said Joe, springing up andgrasping the Doctor very warmly by the hand. "You do not know how muchgood you may be doing by this examination; but you _shall_ know,sometime--I will tell you all about it. And now good-night!" rolling upthe package and putting it back into her pocket. "My time is up, Motherwill be worried about me, and I have a borrowed carriage waiting at thecorner."
"Allow me to see you to it," said the Doctor, rising with quickcourtesy.
"No farther than the gate, for the world," said the young girl. "Forcertain reasons, which you shall know some time, I must not be seen inyour company to-night, even by the coachman."
She tripped away instantly, the Doctor accompanying her to thegate,--and rolled away homeward at once. What a day that had been toher! And in what a whirl was her brain when she reflected on all she haddiscovered and tried to arrange in her own mind the details of what sheyet felt it necessary to do! It was within forty-eight hours after, andwhen her mind had not become at all calmed from the thoughts of thecrime surrounding her and those she loved, that the visit to thesorceress was made, as before recorded. How much of additionalinformation she may really have expected to gain from the sorceress, itis impossible to say,--or whether this matter of the attempted poisoningwas really the matter which sent her to that questionable fountain ofintelligence; but it is not at all strange that she should have blendedthe terrors of the real and the imaginary together, and been powerfullyimpressed by the events of that day which marked so important an era inher existence.
It may be said here, that two days after the events just narrated, whenBell accompanied her to the sorceress, she did not see Richard Crawford.Thereafter, for many days, she did not visit the house at all, forreasons that will soon make themselves manifest; and consequently theawkwardness of any meeting with the invalid, which might have involvedquestions she did not care to answer at that moment, was avoided. JoeHarris felt that for once in her life she had a "mission"--something todo, and to do in her own way; and until that work was done, or she hadutterly failed in the attempt, she did not mean to let that chatteringtongue of hers say one word that could give a clue to her thoughts orintentions. We shall see, presently, how nearly and in what manner herplans were carried out.
Shoulder-Straps: A Novel of New York and the Army, 1862 Page 22
