Dr. Mabuse, master of mystery a novel
morning.”
“What has happened?” said Wenk to himself. “What is up?” He felt
disappointed and angry as he took his seat in the car again.
* * * * *
At seven o’clock that evening the Countess drove to the Privy
Councillor’s mansion. She found the same company assembled there as
on the last occasion, and this time, too, she saw as little of them.
Around her and Dr. Mabuse, her partner at the supper-table, the
conversation rose and fell, isolating them from the rest. Her neighbour
was more silent than on the previous occasion, but everything he said
was spoken with an impressive intent, directed towards a goal which was
unrecognizable.
The Countess was divided in her own mind as to whether she should
relate her experience in the prison to him, should tell him that she
had come in contact with the soul of a woman, strong and fearless as
the figures in his own recitals; yea, even stronger, since it was a
woman, experienced in renunciation, and carrying on her conflict in
resistance and defence.
In imagination she had entered so thoroughly into the struggle, and
her encounter with this criminal seemed to open up such unusual
circumstances, that the power of the man at her side insensibly seemed
to lessen, and this second meeting with him appeared to yield nothing
that her passionate anticipation had longed for. The man seemed to
decline before her.
She noticed that while he uttered his imperious sentences, both at
their first meeting and on this occasion, he kept his eyes fixed on
her with a compelling look. They were grey eyes, and their glance was
a steely one. She grew somewhat frightened, and in her anxiety yearned
for some human being who could warm her breast with his sympathy and
afford her troubled spirit peace.
She looked across at her husband. He was sitting near the medium,
engaging her in talk, and it seemed as if his words were the mere play
of his graceful fingers, on one of which the ring was flashing, as
if dominating the whole. Then the woman’s heart was overcome with a
strange sad feeling, stilling the fever in her breast--a feeling of
lofty womanly sympathy. He seemed such a child, she said to herself.
“Without me he would be defenceless. He is like a hoop rolling down the
street, its course determined by the obstacles and unevennesses in its
path.”
With this feeling upon her, she experienced a renewed glow as she
thought of her encounter with the dancer; she was lifted out of her
everyday existence, borne onward as in a mighty rush of passion, then
again becoming cool and collected as at the contact with something
cold and forbidding. It seemed to her then that she was struggling to
reach her husband and ever as she approached him she was driven back,
encountering the inflexible and steely glance of the man beside her.
Mabuse grew more and more silent. He ate nothing, and he took no pains
to conceal his taciturnity. On the contrary, he seemed, as it were, to
strive to impress it upon the whole company, just as a mighty African
potentate might exercise his tyranny on his patient and long-suffering
followers, and the very actions of the others served to accentuate this
attitude of adoration of a superior force.
Count Told alone seemed to trifle with graceful gestures about the
medium, who, black-haired and deadly pale, kept her unwieldy form
pressed close to his side, seeming to have eyes for no other. Then the
Countess felt that she hated the man who sat beside her in his sullen
mood while her husband’s attitude was thus bordering on the ridiculous.
And yet it was not hate she felt, but the inward conflict between the
desire to yield herself to the domination of a self-sufficing and
stronger heart and brain and resistance to the impulse of subjugation.
The supper-table was cleared and the company stood around talking for
a while. Mabuse had left his table-companion and sought the society of
Count Told. He engaged him in a discourse on the psychological aspect
of gambling.
“I am a born gambler,” said the Count. “When I am losing, I remain as
cold as ice, but when I am winning my brain lights up and my phantasies
are redoubled.”
Then Mabuse said: “Games of chance are the oldest form, the strongest
and most widespread form, in which a man who is not gifted with
artistic expression may yet feel himself an artist.”
“That is an interesting idea,” said the Count; “pray follow it up a
little further.”
“It is because in a game of chance every man feels that he can
force himself to a creative act. Creation, through the principle
which underlies all life, draws its force from the parallel powers
of volition and accident. By accident we must understand all that
is untried, immeasurable, strange, and impossible of expression in
itself. This is, too, the mental process of creative work, to which
nature has lent a portion of primal force, the work of the artist!
Between the poles of volition and accident this power is wielded as in
a state of trance. Goethe confessed that to be the case with himself
when he was composing his poems. In games of chance there is a like
synthesis. Accident gives the player his material--it may be trifling
and insignificant, or it may be of dominating power. The player sets
his will to work to accomplish a creation of his own from his material.”
“You are a poet yourself, Doctor?”
“Oh, no, I am a physician practising psychotherapy.”
“Such people are our most modern poets. For they give our knowledge of
the unconscious, or rather the subconscious, its perceptible form, and
the subconscious world, which is now firmly established, produces our
psychic existence. We will have a game of baccarat afterwards, shall we
not?”
“Agreed!”
The hypnotic subject was about to begin her test. A doctor led her
forward and threw her into a hypnosis in which she would recall her
wonderful recollections. On the first evening, as Count Told informed
Mabuse in an awestruck whisper, she had related her mental experiences
during her first attempts to walk.
While the Count was speaking he felt an unnatural warmth stealing over
the back of his head. He turned round, but there was nothing behind him
save the tapestried wall, upon which pictures of the old school, to
which he was quite indifferent, were hanging.
The patient did not respond to the hypnotist’s suggestions. She did
indeed fall into a state of trance, but all the spectators could see
that gradually the expression of her eyes indicated that she was
returning from a far-off view, until suddenly they looked straight
ahead and were wide awake again, awake and indignant.
“Someone is tormenting me,” she said.
“No one is tormenting you,” said the hypnotist in a monotonous
and measured tone. “We are guiding you to the early home of your
youth--one, two, three ... you are sleeping--one, two ... you are
sleeping!”
He passed his hand slowly and lightly over her forehead, continuing to
count, “Three ... one ... two ... where are you now?--how old are you?”
“I am ten months and three days old.”
“What did your mother do this morning when she took you out of the
cradle?”
“She unwrapped me and hurt me and ... and ...” She breathed a deep
sigh, then awoke suddenly and said, “There is someone here who ought to
go away. Who is tormenting me?”
“We can obtain no results to-day. There are some disturbing influences
which I do not recognize and therefore cannot remove,” said the
hypnotist.
The Privy Councillor approached Mabuse. “How would it be, Doctor, if
_you_ were to make an attempt? After the tests of your power which
I have already seen, I think we can promise to get rid of these
disturbing influences,” he said.
Mabuse declared himself willing to try, at any rate, though he could
not vouch for the result, as he was suffering from a slight chill which
affected his head. He at once took a short step towards the medium,
however, and they saw that she moved slightly in his direction as if
attracted by a magnet. Mabuse did not utter a word, but he let his
glance wander over part of her body. The girl became even paler than
before, if possible, and although she made no movement, it was easy to
see that she struggled against something invisible, that her resistance
grew quickly weaker and that her eyes fell before him.
Then Mabuse said in a rapid and violent tone: “You are lying in
swaddling clothes. Your arms are bound fast to your side. You are six
months’ old. It is evening, and you are crying. Why are you crying?”
And from the heavy body of this girl, sleeping with wide-open eyes,
there came a piping, fretful voice: “I have a pain in my stomach.”
“That is only wind. You’ve had too much to drink. Who gave it you?”
“I got it from the breast of a woman,” answered the baby voice.
“Do you love that breast?”
Then the girl grew deathly white, and into the childish voice there
crept a piercing and angry note, “No.”
“What did you want to do?”
“I wanted to bite it with my gums!”
“Why?”
Then the girl was seized with trembling, which passed over her whole
body, and Mabuse said, “Every minute that prolongs this endangers her
life. I must bring the experiment to an end!”
He laid the girl down on a sofa, and with reassuring movements he
released her from sleep and bathed her face, and when she came to
herself again recommended her being put to bed.
The conversation now turned upon Mabuse’s experiment, and everyone was
asking questions, speculating on what she would have said.
“That was a fairy-tale,” said Told; “a fable of the preconscious
existence! Doctor, you are a genius. But what did she want to say that
made her tremble so?”
A lady came forward with the same question on her lips, but Mabuse’s
eyes sought the Countess, and she, too, came forward to ask. Then
Mabuse answered, “She wanted to say, ‘Because I hated her so!’”
The Countess shrank back and the others were silent, painfully
affected. Then the Countess leaned forward, saying coldly, “A baby
cannot hate!”
“How do you know that?” asked Mabuse roughly.
“I know it ... of myself,” she replied.
“Then you can rejoice over yourself, for you are not only a genius
at recollection, but also an angel in disposition!” retorted Mabuse
sarcastically.
Conversation broke the company up into little groups. Count Told alone
remained silent. There was still that unnatural warmth at the back of
his head. He looked behind him, and he felt his head; there was nothing
there. He went to a mirror, but nothing was to be seen. He sat down
again and it seemed as if he were falling asleep, yet he saw them all
and heard everything. He wanted to say something, but it seemed as if
the words were plucked from his mouth like ripened fruit ready to fall.
After a short time had passed thus, he rose and went to the group
wherein Dr. Mabuse was standing, saying, “We were going to play
baccarat!”
“So we were!” answered Mabuse. “Shall we be likely to find enough
players?”
Then Told grew wide awake and eager. “It will be fine, playing baccarat
with you. Herr Wendel, will you join us, eh?”
“I must attend to my social duties among the ladies,” answered the
Privy Councillor, “but you will soon be able to find partners!”
Six gentlemen quickly gathered round the card-table which stood in
a part of the room leading to the conservatory. The lamp with its
enormous shade hung low over the table, leaving the rest of the room
in the half-light. In the conservatory, to which a glass door led, the
ghostly branches of foreign palms could be seen outlined against the
glass, and in the moonlight they looked like stiff forms stretching
their dark limbs heavenwards.
They cut the cards to see who should be the first to hold the stakes.
The visitors crowded round the card-table and Countess Told stood in