The Beetle, Richard Marsh [general ebook reader .txt] 📗

her half out of her senses. As I looked at Lessingham, I seemed to see her at his side, as I had seen her not long ago, with her white, drawn face, and staring eyes, dumb with an agony of fear. Her life was bidding fair to be knit with his⁠—what Upas tree of horror was rooted in his very bones? The thought that her sweet purity was likely to be engulfed in a devil’s slough in which he was wallowing was not to be endured. As I realised that the man was more than my match at the game which I was playing⁠—in which such vital interests were at stake!⁠—my hands itched to clutch him by the throat, and try another way.

Doubtless my face revealed my feelings, because, presently, he said,

“Are you aware how strangely you are looking at me, Atherton? Were my countenance a mirror I think you would be surprised to see in it your own.”

I drew back from him⁠—I daresay, sullenly.

“Not so surprised as, yesterday morning, you would have been to have seen yours⁠—at the mere sight of a pictured scarab.”

“How easily you quarrel.”

“I do not quarrel.”

“Then perhaps it’s I. If that is so, then, at once, the quarrel’s ended⁠—pouf! it’s done. Mr. Lindon, I fear, because, politically, we differ, regards me as anathema. Has he put some of his spirit into you?⁠—You are a wiser man.”

“I am aware that you are an adept with words. But this is a case in which words only will not serve.”

“Then what will serve?”

“I am myself beginning to wonder.”

“And I.”

“As you so courteously suggest, I believe I am wiser than Lindon. I do not care for your politics, or for what you call your politics, one fig. I do not care if you are as other men are, as I am⁠—not unspotted from the world! But I do care if you are leprous. And I believe you are.”

“Atherton!”

“Ever since I have known you I have been conscious of there being something about you which I found it difficult to diagnose;⁠—in an unwholesome sense, something out of the common, non-natural; an atmosphere of your own. Events, so far as you are concerned, have, during the last few days moved quickly. They have thrown an uncomfortably lurid light on that peculiarity of yours which I have noticed. Unless you can explain them to my satisfaction, you will withdraw your pretensions to Miss Lindon’s hand, or I shall place certain facts before that lady, and, if necessary, publish them to the world.”

He grew visibly paler but he smiled⁠—facially.

“You have your own way of conducting a conversation, Mr. Atherton.⁠—What are the events to whose rapid transit you are alluding?”

“Who was the individual, practically stark naked, who came out of your house, in such singular fashion, at dead of night?”

“Is that one of the facts with which you propose to tickle the public ear?”

“Is that the only explanation which you have to offer?”

“Proceed, for the present, with your indictment.”

“I am not so unobservant as you appear to imagine. There were features about the episode which struck me forcibly at the time, and which have struck me more forcibly since. To suggest, as you did yesterday morning, that it was an ordinary case of burglary, or that the man was a lunatic, is an absurdity.”

“Pardon me⁠—I did nothing of the kind.”

“Then what do you suggest?”

“I suggested, and do suggest, nothing. All the suggestions come from you.”

“You went very much out of your way to beg me to keep the matter quiet. There is an appearance of suggestion about that.”

“You take a jaundiced view of all my actions, Mr. Atherton. Nothing, to me, could seem more natural.⁠—However⁠—proceed.”

He had his hands behind his back, and rested them on the edge of the table against which he was leaning. He was undoubtedly ill at ease; but so far I had not made the impression on him, either mentally or morally, which I desired.

“Who is your Oriental friend?”

“I do not follow you.”

“Are you sure?”

“I am certain. Repeat your question.”

“Who is your Oriental friend?”

“I was not aware that I had one.”

“Do you swear that?”

He laughed, a strange laugh.

“Do you seek to catch me tripping? You conduct your case with too much animus. You must allow me to grasp the exact purport of your inquiry before I can undertake to reply to it on oath.”

“Are you not aware that at present there is in London an individual who claims to have had a very close, and a very curious, acquaintance with you in the East?”

“I am not.”

“That you swear?”

“That I do swear.”

“That is singular.”

“Why is it singular?”

“Because I fancy that that individual haunts you.”

“Haunts me?”

“Haunts you.”

“You jest.”

“You think so?⁠—You remember that picture of the scarabaeus which, yesterday morning, frightened you into a state of semi-idiocy.”

“You use strong language.⁠—I know what you allude to.”

“Do you mean to say that you don’t know that you were indebted for that to your Oriental friend?”

“I don’t understand you.”

“Are you sure?”

“Certainly I am sure.⁠—It occurs to me, Mr. Atherton, that an explanation is demanded from you rather than from me. Are you aware that the purport of my presence here is to ask you how that picture found its way into your room?”

“It was projected by the Lord of the Beetle.”

The words were chance ones⁠—but they struck a mark.

“The Lord⁠—” He faltered⁠—and stopped. He showed signs of discomposure. “I will be frank with you⁠—since frankness is what you ask.” His smile, that time, was obviously forced. “Recently I have been the victim of delusions;” there was a pause before the word, “of a singular kind. I have feared that they were the result of mental overstrain. Is it possible that you can enlighten me as to their source?”

I was silent. He was putting a great strain upon himself, but the twitching of his lips betrayed him. A little more, and I should reach the other side of Mr. Lessingham⁠—the side which he kept hidden from the world.

“Who is this⁠—individual whom you speak of as my⁠—Oriental friend?”

“Being your friend, you should know