She
[2] The Kallikrates here referred to by my friend was a Spartan,
spoken of by Herodotus (Herod. ix. 72) as being remarkable for his
beauty. He fell at the glorious battle of Platæa (September 22, B.C.
479), when the Lacedæmonians and Athenians under Pausanias routed the
Persians, putting nearly 300,000 of them to the sword. The following
is a translation of the passage, “For Kallikrates died out of the
battle, he came to the army the most beautiful man of the Greeks of
that day—not only of the Lacedæmonians themselves, but of the other
Greeks also. He when Pausanias was sacrificing was wounded in the side
by an arrow; and then they fought, but on being carried off he
regretted his death, and said to Arimnestus, a Platæan, that he did
not grieve at dying for Greece, but at not having struck a blow, or,
although he desired so to do, performed any deed worthy of himself.”
This Kallikrates, who appears to have been as brave as he was
beautiful, is subsequently mentioned by Herodotus as having been
buried among the ἰρένες‚ (young commanders), apart from the other
Spartans and the Helots.—L. H. H.
He paused a while, his head sunk upon his hand, and then
continued—
“My marriage had diverted me from a project which I cannot enter
into now. I have no time, Holly—I have no time! One day, if you
accept my trust, you will learn all about it. After my wife’s
death I turned my mind to it again. But first it was necessary,
or, at least, I conceived that it was necessary, that I should
attain to a perfect knowledge of Eastern dialects, especially
Arabic. It was to facilitate my studies that I came here. Very
soon, however, my disease developed itself, and now there is an
end of me.” And as though to emphasise his words he burst into
another terrible fit of coughing.
I gave him some more whisky, and after resting he went on—
“I have never seen my boy, Leo, since he was a tiny baby. I never
could bear to see him, but they tell me that he is a quick and
handsome child. In this envelope,” and he produced a letter from
his pocket addressed to myself, “I have jotted down the course I
wish followed in the boy’s education. It is a somewhat peculiar
one. At any rate, I could not entrust it to a stranger. Once
more, will you undertake it?”
“I must first know what I am to undertake,” I answered.
“You are to undertake to have the boy, Leo, to live with you till
he is twenty-five years of age—not to send him to school,
remember. On his twenty-fifth birthday your guardianship will
end, and you will then, with the keys that I give you now” (and
he placed them on the table) “open the iron box, and let him see
and read the contents, and say whether or no he is willing to
undertake the quest. There is no obligation on him to do so. Now,
as regards terms. My present income is two thousand two hundred a
year. Half of that income I have secured to you by will for life,
contingently on your undertaking the guardianship—that is, one
thousand a year remuneration to yourself, for you will have to
give up your life to it, and one hundred a year to pay for the
board of the boy. The rest is to accumulate till Leo is
twenty-five, so that there may be a sum in hand should he wish to
undertake the quest of which I spoke.”
“And suppose I were to die?” I asked.
“Then the boy must become a ward of Chancery and take his chance.
Only be careful that the iron chest is passed on to him by your
will. Listen, Holly, don’t refuse me. Believe me, this is to your
advantage. You are not fit to mix with the world—it would only
embitter you. In a few weeks you will become a Fellow of your
College, and the income that you will derive from that combined
with what I have left you will enable you to live a life of
learned leisure, alternated with the sport of which you are so
fond, such as will exactly suit you.”
He paused and looked at me anxiously, but I still hesitated. The
charge seemed so very strange.
“For my sake, Holly. We have been good friends, and I have no
time to make other arrangements.”
“Very well,” I said, “I will do it, provided there is nothing in
this paper to make me change my mind,” and I touched the envelope
he had put upon the table by the keys.
“Thank you, Holly, thank you. There is nothing at all. Swear to
me by God that you will be a father to the boy, and follow my
directions to the letter.”
“I swear it,” I answered solemnly.
“Very well, remember that perhaps one day I shall ask for the
account of your oath, for though I am dead and forgotten, yet I
shall live. There is no such thing as death, Holly, only a
change, and, as you may perhaps learn in time to come, I believe
that even that change could under certain circumstances be
indefinitely postponed,” and again he broke into one of his
dreadful fits of coughing.
“There,” he said, “I must go, you have the chest, and my will
will be found among my papers, under the authority of which the
child will be handed over to you. You will be well paid, Holly,
and I know that you are honest, but if you betray my trust, by
Heaven, I will haunt you.”
I said nothing, being, indeed, too bewildered to speak.
He held up the candle, and looked at his own face in the glass.
It had been a beautiful face, but disease had wrecked it. “Food
for the worms,” he said. “Curious to think that in a few hours I
shall be stiff and cold—the journey done, the little game played
out. Ah me, Holly! life is not worth the trouble of life, except
when one is in love—at least, mine has not been; but the boy
Leo’s may be if he has the courage and the faith. Good-bye, my
friend!” and with a sudden access of tenderness he flung his arm
about me and kissed me on the forehead, and then turned to go.
“Look here, Vincey,” I said, “if you are as ill as you think, you
had better let me fetch a doctor.”
“No, no,” he said earnestly. “Promise me that you won’t. I am
going to die, and, like a poisoned rat, I wish to die alone.”
“I don’t believe that you are going to do anything of the sort,”
I answered. He smiled, and, with the word “Remember” on his lips,
was gone. As for myself, I sat down and rubbed my eyes, wondering
if I had been asleep. As this supposition would not bear
investigation I gave it up and began to think that Vincey must
have been drinking. I knew that he was, and had been, very ill,
but still it seemed impossible that he could be in such a
condition as to be able to know for certain that he would not
outlive the night. Had he been so near dissolution surely he
would scarcely have been able to walk, and carry a heavy iron box
with him. The whole story, on reflection, seemed to me utterly
incredible, for I was not then old enough to be aware how many
things happen in this world that the common sense of the average
man would set down as so improbable as to be absolutely
impossible. This is a fact that I have only recently mastered.
Was it likely that a man would have a son five years of age whom
he had never seen since he was a tiny infant? No. Was it likely
that he could foretell his own death so accurately? No. Was it
likely that he could trace his pedigree for more than three
centuries before Christ, or that he would suddenly confide the
absolute guardianship of his child, and leave half his fortune,
to a college friend? Most certainly not. Clearly Vincey was
either drunk or mad. That being so, what did it mean? and what
was in the sealed iron chest?
The whole thing baffled and puzzled me to such an extent that at
last I could stand it no longer, and determined to sleep over it.
So I jumped up, and having put the keys and the letter that
Vincey had left away into my despatch-box, and stowed the iron
chest in a large portmanteau, I turned in, and was soon fast
asleep.
As it seemed to me, I had only been asleep for a few minutes when
I was awakened by somebody calling me. I sat up and rubbed my
eyes; it was broad daylight—eight o’clock, in fact.
“Why, what is the matter with you, John?” I asked of the gyp who
waited on Vincey and myself. “You look as though you had seen a
ghost!”
“Yes, sir, and so I have,” he answered, “leastways I’ve seen a
corpse, which is worse. I’ve been in to call Mr. Vincey, as
usual, and there he lies stark and dead!”
II.
THE YEARS ROLL BY
As might be expected, poor Vincey’s sudden death created a great
stir in the College; but, as he was known to be very ill, and a
satisfactory doctor’s certificate was forthcoming, there was no
inquest. They were not so particular about inquests in those days
as they are now; indeed, they were generally disliked, because of
the scandal. Under all these circumstances, being asked no
questions, I did not feel called upon to volunteer any
information about our interview on the night of Vincey’s decease,
beyond saying that he had come into my rooms to see me, as he
often did. On the day of the funeral a lawyer came down from
London and followed my poor friend’s remains to the grave, and
then went back with his papers and effects, except, of course,
the iron chest which had been left in my keeping. For a week
after this I heard no more of the matter, and, indeed, my
attention was amply occupied in other ways, for I was up for my
Fellowship, a fact that had prevented me from attending the
funeral or seeing the lawyer. At last, however, the examination
was over, and I came back to my rooms and sank into an easy chair
with a happy consciousness that I had got through it very fairly.
Soon, however, my thoughts, relieved of the pressure that had
crushed them into a single groove during the last few days,
turned to the events of the night of poor Vincey’s death, and
again I asked myself what it all meant, and wondered if I should
hear anything more of the matter, and if I did not, what it would
be my duty to do with the curious iron chest. I sat there and
thought and thought till I began to grow quite disturbed over the
whole occurrence: the mysterious midnight visit, the prophecy of
death so shortly to be fulfilled, the solemn oath that I had
taken, and which Vincey had called on me to answer to in another
world than this. Had the man committed suicide? It looked like
it. And what was the quest of which he spoke? The circumstances
were uncanny, so much so that, though I am by no means nervous,
or apt to be alarmed at anything that may seem to cross the
bounds of the natural, I grew afraid, and began to wish I had
nothing to do with them. How much more do I wish it now, over
twenty years afterwards!
As I sat and thought, there came a knock at the door, and a
letter, in a big blue envelope, was brought in to me. I saw at a
glance that it was a lawyer’s letter, and an instinct told me
that it was connected with my trust. The letter, which I still
have, runs thus:—