The Blind Spot, Homer Eon Flint and Austin Hall [books to read for 13 year olds txt] 📗

for this sudden return to health, of the vigour he had known before he began to wear the ring. He lay back pondering.

Presently he fell to examining his clothes. There were two garments made of a silk-like textile, rather heavy as to weight, but exceedingly soft as to touch. They were slightly darker than the bed clothing. In a way they were much like pyjamas, except that both were designed to be merely slipped into place, without buttons or draw-strings. That is, they were tailored to fit snugly over the shoulders and waist, while loose enough elsewhere.

Then he noticed the walls of the room. They were after a simple, symmetrical style; coved—to use an architectural expression—or curved, where the corner would come with a radius much larger than common, amounting to four or five feet; so that a person of ordinary height could not stand close to the wall without stooping. Where the coved portion flowed into the perpendicular of the wall there was a broad moulding, like a plate rail, which acted as a support for the hanging pictures.

Watson counted four of these pictures. Instinctively he felt that they might give him a valuable clue as to his whereabouts. For, while his mind had cleared enough for him to feel sure that he had truly come through the Spot, he knew nothing more. Where was he? What would the pictures tell?

The first was directly before his eyes. In size perhaps two by three feet, with its greater length horizontal, it was more of a landscape than a portrait. And Watson's eagerness for the subject itself made him forget to note whether the work was mechanically or manually executed.

For it revealed a girl—about ten or twelve—very slightly draped, enjoying a wild romp with a most extraordinary creature. It was this animal that made the picture amazing; there was no subtle significance in the scene—there was nothing remarkable about the technique. The whole interest, for Watson, was in the animal.

It was a deer; perfect and beautiful, but cast in a Lilliputian mould. It stood barely a foot high, the most delicate thing he had ever looked upon. Mature in every detail of its proportion, the dainty hoofs, the fragile legs, smooth-coated body, and small, wide-antlered head—a miniature eight-pointer—made such a vision as might come to the dreams of a hunter.

Chick rose up in bed, in order to examine it more closely. Immediately he fell back again slightly dizzy. He closed his eyes.

Shortly he began examining the other pictures. Two of these were simple flower studies. Watson scarcely knew which puzzled him most; the blossoms or their containers. For the vases were like large-sized loving cups, broad as to body, and provided with a handle on either side. Their colours were unfamiliar. As for the blossoms—in one study the blooms were a half-dozen in number, and more like Shasta daisies than anything else. But their colour was totally unlike, while they possessed wide, striped stamens that gave the flowers an identity all their own. In the other vase were several varieties, and every one absolutely unrecognisable.

On the opposite side of the room was something fairly familiar. At first glance it seemed a simple basket of kittens, done in black and white—something like crayon, and yet resembling sepia. Alongside the basket, however, was a spoon, one end resting on the edge of a saucer. And it was the size of the spoon that commanded Chick's attention; rather, the size of the kittens, any one of which could have curled up comfortably in the bowl of the spoon! Judging relatively, if it were an ordinary tablespoon, then the kittens were smaller than the smallest of mice.

Chick gave it up. Presently he began speculating about the time. He decided that, whatever the hour might be, it was still daylight. In one wall of the room was a large, oval window, of a material which may as well be called glass, frosted, so as to permit no view of what might lie outside. But it allowed plenty of light to enter.

Cut in the opposite wall was a doorway, hung with a curtain instead of a door. This curtain was a gauzy material, but its maroonlike shade completely hid all view of whatever lay beyond.

Chick waited and listened. Hitherto he had not heard a sound. There was not even that subtle, mixed hum from the distance that we are accustomed to associate with silence. He felt certain that he was inside the Blind Spot; but as to just where that locality might lie, he knew as little as before. He knew only that he in a building of some sort. Where, and what, was the building?

Just then he noticed a cord dangling from the ceiling. It came down to within six inches of his head. He gave it a pull.

Whereupon he heard a faint, musical jangling in the distance. He tried to analyse the sound. It was not bell-like; perhaps the word “tinkling” would serve better. Provisionally, Chick placed the key at middle D.

A moment later he heard steps outside the curtain. They were very soft and light and deliberate; and almost at the same instant a delicate white hand moved the curtain aside.

It was a woman. Chick lay back and wondered. Although not beautiful she was very good to look at, with large blue eyes of a deep tenderness and sympathy, even features, and a wonderful fold of rich brown hair held in place by a satiny net.

She started when she saw Chick's wide open eyes; then smiled, a motherly smile and compassionate. She was dressed in a manner at once becoming and odd, to one unaccustomed, in a gown that draped the entire figure, yet left the right arm and shoulder bare. Chick noticed that arm especially; it was white as marble, moulded full, and laced with fine blue veins. He had never seen an arm like that. Nor such a woman. She might have been forty.

She came over to the bed and placed a hand on Chick's forehead. Again she smiled, and nodded.

“How do you feel?” she asked.

Now this is a strange thing; Watson could not account for it. For, although she did not speak English, yet he could understand her quite well. At the moment it seemed perfectly obvious; afterward, the fact became amazing.

He answered in the same way, his thoughts directing his lips. And he found that as long as he made no conscious attempt to select the words for his thought, he could speak unhesitatingly.

“Where am I?”

She smiled indulgently, but did not answer.

“Is this the—Blind Spot?”

“The Blind Spot! I do not understand.”

“Who are you?”

“Your nurse. Perhaps,” soothingly, “you would like to talk to the Rhamda.”

“The Rhamda!”

“Yes. The Rhamda Geos.”