Helen Vardon's confession
Then Miss Morgan began to speak.
“I seem to be passing through the country--swiftly--very swiftly; past
great, wide fields and woods. They are strange-looking woods. The
trees are all in lines--in straight lines… But wait! Are they trees?
No, they can’t be; they are too small. No--they are plants growing up
poles--they must be vines. It is a vineyard--and yet they don’t look
quite like vines. No, no! Of course, I see now; they are hops. It is a
hop-garden. And now I am passing another. Now I have come out on to a
road on the top of a hill. There are hills all round, and in the
hollow there seems to be a town… and I seem to see water in the town…
yes, it is water. It is a river… But I don’t see any ships… only some
red things… Oh, yes! I see; the red things are sails--red sails. I
thought sails were always white.”
She paused; and in the intense silence I leaned forward, listening
eagerly. All my indifference and boredom had vanished. This was quite
a different affair from the card-guessing and planchette-reading. She
had described Maidstone vividly, accurately--or at least so it seemed
to me; Maidstone as it would appear to one approaching the bridge from
the west. Of course it might be mere guessing; but----
“I seem,” Miss Morgan resumed, “to be descending a hill by a broad
street… What is that in front of me? Is it--yes, I see; it is a
bridge. Yes, I see it plainly now. I am coming towards it. But what on
earth is this thing on my left hand? It seems to be a mass of gold…
and yet… and yet it looks like an elephant. That’s ridiculous, of
course. It can’t be… But it certainly looks like gold… and yet it… it
really does look like an elephant! Well, I can make nothing of it. And
now it is gone and I am on the bridge.”
Again she paused, and I sat gazing at her in blank astonishment. There
could now be no question as to the reality of the visions, unless the
whole exhibition was a fraud. The idea of skilful guessing could not
be entertained for a moment. The description did not merely fit
Maidstone; the detail of the golden elephant on the brewery by the
bridge fixed the identity of the place beyond the possibility of
doubt. It was either a genuine--and most amazing--psychical phenomenon
or an outrageous imposture. But an imposture, to which Lilith must
have been a party, was more incredible than the “super-normal” itself.
As these thoughts passed swiftly through my mind, Miss Morgan resumed
her description.
“I am standing on the bridge, but it is beginning to grow indistinct.
By the riverside I can just see a great house, an old, old house,
which seems to stand by the water’s edge, and beyond it trees and a
church tower. Now it is gone and I can see nothing. Is this all?… No;
I see, very, very faintly, a small crowd of people. They seem to be in
a field. And I make out a number of white objects in the field. They
look rather like sheep, but they are very still. Oh! they are not
sheep at all; they are tombstones. And I see now that the people are
all in black and that they are standing round an open grave. It must
be a funeral… Yes; there is the clergyman in his surplice… But it is
beginning to fade… Now I can only just see the dark shapes of the
people… and now they are gone too. This must be all, I think.” She
paused for a few moments and then exclaimed: “No, it isn’t. Something
else is coming. It is very dim, but it looks like a man sitting at a
table. Yes… But I can’t see what he is doing. He is not writing… He
has something in his right hand, and keeps moving it up and down. Oh,
I see now: it is a hammer. He seems to be hammering some bright
object--a piece of metal, I think… Yes, it is quite clear now. But it
isn’t a man at all; it is a woman. I saw her distinctly for a moment,
but she has grown dim again… Now she has gone and I can see nothing… I
think that is all… Yes, that is all. Nothing else seems to come.”
She removed the handkerchief from her forehead and held it out towards
Mr. Quecks, who took it from her and tip-toed round to where I was
sitting.
“Thank you, Mrs. Otway,” he whispered. “It seemed a very successful
experiment; but you can judge better than I can.”
“It was, indeed, most successful,” I replied, as he gave me back my
handkerchief. “I am positively amazed at the detailed accuracy of the
description.”
“You think the correspondence is closer than could be accounted for by
coincidence or chance guessing?” he asked.
“There can be no question of chance,” I replied. “The descriptions
were much too detailed and circumstantial.”
“That is most interesting,” said he. “For there can be no other
explanation but that of genuine psychometric faculty. Miss Morgan is a
stranger to you, and, moreover, she did not know whose handkerchief it
was. The remarkable success of this experiment seems to support Miss
Blake’s estimate of your unusual psychic gifts. You evidently have the
power of imprinting your personality on inanimate objects in an
exceptional degree. I should almost think it likely that you would be
a successful scryer. Have you made any experiments with the crystal?”
“Yes. But they are all complete failures. I could see nothing.”
“That is not unusual in early experiments,” said he. “There is a
difficulty in concentrating. I wonder if you would care to make a
trial now under my guidance. I think I could help you to visualize
some simple scene. Will you try?”
The astonishing success of Miss Morgan’s experiment had revived all my
former curiosity, and I assented readily. Much to Mr. Quecks’
satisfaction. The nature of the new experiment was explained to the
company, and the necessary preparations made. An easy chair was placed
for me in the middle of the room, and the chairs for the others
arranged behind it, so that I should not have my attention distracted
by seeing them. As I passed Lilith on my way to the chair, I greeted
her with a smile, and was a little surprised at the lack of response
on her part. I thought she would be gratified to see me taking so
active a part in the proceedings; but apparently she was not; indeed,
I had never seen her look so ungenial.
When I had taken my seat, Mr. Quecks directed me to lean back and
adopt a position of complete physical rest. A black, velvet cushion
was then placed in my lap and on the cushion was laid the crystal
globe, itself almost black in the dim twilight save for a single spark
where it reflected the light of the one electric lamp.
“You will look fixedly at the bright spot of light,” said Mr. Quecks,
who had seated himself beside me; “concentrate your attention on it
and think of nothing else. Don’t let your mind wander, and don’t move
your eyes. Think of the bright spot and look at it. Soon a mist will
come before your eyes; then you will feel a sort of drowsiness. You
will grow more and more drowsy, but your eyes will keep open and you
will still see the mist. You are seeing it now” (this was quite
correct); “it grows denser; now you are beginning to feel drowsy--just
a little drowsy--but your eyes are wide open; still you are getting
drowsy--rather more drowsy----”
He seemed to repeat these words over and over and over again like a
sort of chant; and his voice, which had been at first soft and
confidential, took on a peculiar sing-song quality, and at the same
time began to grow more and more distant until it came to me thin and
small like the voices that are borne from far-away ships on a calm day
across the water of a quiet anchorage. And, meanwhile, a strange
somnolence fell upon me. I felt as if I were in a dream. Yet my eyes
were wide open, and before them floated the mist, out of which shone
the single spark of light. And the little, thin voice went on chanting
far away, but I could no longer make out what it said. Nor was I
attending to it. I was gazing into the mist at the tiny spark--gazing
fixedly, unwinkingly, without effort.
Presently the mist seemed to clear a little, and the spot of light
began to grow larger. Now it looked like a hole in the shutter of a
dark room; and now it was as though I were looking through an opera
glass or a telescope; but I could make out nothing save a confused
blur of light, in the middle of which was a vague, dark shape. But
still the area of light grew larger, and now I could see that there
were other shapes, all dim, vague and shadowy. Then in an instant it
cleared up, as a magic-lantern picture sharpens when the lens is
focussed. The dark shape was Mr. Otway. He stood, stooping forward,
gazing at something on the floor--something that lay by the fireplace,
motionless, with upturned waxen face. It was horribly distinct. I
could see my father’s face settling into the rigidity of death; I
could see the crimson streak on his temple; I could even see the
sparkle of the silver knob on the stick that Mr. Otway grasped.
The vision lasted, as it seemed, but for a few seconds. Then it grew
dim and confused and quickly faded away into blank darkness; and I
found myself sitting up in the chair, wide awake, but bewildered and a
little frightened. The lights were full on, and the visitors were all
gathered around my chair gazing at me with a very odd intentness.
“Did you see anything in the crystal?” Mr. Quecks asked, suavely.
“Yes,” I answered, not quite so suavely. “How long have I been
asleep?”
Mr. Quecks looked at his watch. “Just five and twenty minutes,” he
replied.
I got up from the chair, and, addressing Peggy, who was looking at me
a little anxiously, asked: “What has been happening, Peggy? Have I
been talking nonsense?”
“No,” she answered. “You’ve been asleep, and you’ve been guessing
cards and doing most extraordinary sums--multiplying and dividing
fractions and all sorts of things. That’s all. But,” she added in a
lower tone, “he’d no business to hypnotize you without your
permission. You didn’t give him permission, did you?”
“No, I didn’t,” I replied.
At this moment Lilith came up to us and put the same question.
“No,” I answered. “I didn’t understand that I was to be hypnotised.”
“I thought not,” said she in a tone of evident vexation. “It doesn’t
happen to matter as things have turned out, but it was quite improper.
I shall speak to Mr. Quecks about it when you are gone.”
“Aren’t you coming with us, then?” asked Peggy.
“No,” replied Lilith. “I have some matters to talk over with him, so I
must stay a little while; but I shall follow you in about half an
hour.”
Shortly after this the meeting broke up, and Peggy and I took our
departure. As we sat in the train, I tried to extract from my
companion some details of what had happened, but I found her curiously
unwilling to pursue the topic. I gathered, however, that, as soon as
the hypnotic trance was completely established, Mr. Quecks suggested
to me that I should have a distinct vision of some scene that I had
witnessed “in the old town that Miss Morgan had seen and shortly
before the funeral that she had described.” Then, after an interval,
he had put a number of problems in multiplication and division of
large numbers and fractions, which I had solved with extraordinary
ease and rapidity. As to the nature of my vision, Peggy displayed no
interest, but turned the conversation on to subjects quite unconnected
with Mr. Quecks or psychical science.
When we arrived home she followed me to my room and suggested that we
should wait there for Lilith, which was what I had intended to do. And
here again she showed a marked tendency to avoid the subject of Mr.
Quecks and his experiments. But, as she sat in my chair gossiping, I
caught her eye, from time to time, travelling almost furtively towards
the clock on the mantelpiece, and I wondered if she was feeling
anxious about Lilith, who had to make her way alone through the rather