The problem of Cell 13
me when I awoke one morning, four weeks ago.
"It was eight or nine o'clock, I suppose. I was in a room. I knew
instantly it was a hotel, but had not the faintest idea of how I got
there, or of ever having seen the room before. I didn't even know my
own clothing when I started to dress. I glanced out of my window; the
scene was wholly strange to me.
"For half an hour or so I remained in my room, dressing and wondering
what it meant. Then, suddenly, in the midst of my other worries, it
came home to me that I didn't know my own name, the place where I
lived nor anything about myself. I didn't know what hotel I was in. In
terror I looked into a mirror. The face reflected at me was not one I
knew. It didn't seem to be the face of a stranger; it was merely not a
face that I knew.
"The thing was unbelievable. Then I began a search of my clothing for
some trace of my identity. I found nothing whatever that would
enlighten me--not a scrap of paper of any kind, no personal or
business card."
"Have a watch?" asked The Thinking Machine.
"Any money?"
"Yes, money," said the stranger. "There was a bundle of more than ten
thousand dollars in my pocket, in one-hundred-dollar bills. Whose it
is or where it came from I don't know. I have been living on it since,
and shall continue to do so, but I don't know if it is mine. I knew it
was money when I saw it, but did not recollect ever having seen any
previously."
"Any jewelry?"
"These cuff buttons," and the stranger exhibited a pair which he drew
from his pocket.
"Go on."
"I finally finished dressing and went down to the office. It was my
purpose to find out the name of the hotel and who I was. I knew I
could learn some of this from the hotel register without attracting
any attention or making anyone think I was insane. I had noted the
number of my room. It was twenty-seven.
"I looked over the hotel register casually. I saw I was at the Hotel
Yarmouth in Boston. I looked carefully down the pages until I came to
the number of my room. Opposite this number was a name--John Doane,
but where the name of the city should have been there was only a
dash."
"You realize that it is perfectly possible that John Doane is your
name?" asked The Thinking Machine.
"Certainly," was the reply. "But I have no recollection of ever having
heard it before. This register showed that I had arrived at the hotel
the night before--or rather that John Doane had arrived and been
assigned to Room 27, and I was the John Doane, presumably. From that
moment to this the hotel people have known me as John Doane, as have
other people whom I have met during the four weeks since I awoke."
"Did the handwriting recall nothing?"
"Nothing whatever."
"Is it anything like the handwriting you write now?"
"Identical, so far as I can see."
"Did you have any baggage or checks for baggage?"
"No. All I had was the money and this clothing I stand in. Of course,
since then I have bought necessities."
Both were silent for a long time and finally the
stranger--Doane--arose and began pacing nervously again.
"That a tailor-made suit?" asked the scientist.
"Yes," said Doane, quickly. "I know what you mean. Tailor-made
garments have linen strips sewed inside the pockets on which are the
names of the manufacturers and the name of the man for whom the
clothes were made, together with the date. I looked for those. They
had been removed, cut out."
"Ah!" exclaimed The Thinking Machine suddenly. "No laundry marks on
your linen either, I suppose?"
"No. It was all perfectly new."
"Name of the maker on it?"
"No. That had been cut out, too."
Doane was pacing back and forth across the reception room; the
scientist lay back in his chair.
"Do you know the circumstances of your arrival at the hotel?" he asked
at last.
"Yes. I asked, guardedly enough, you may be sure, hinting to the clerk
that I had been drunk so as not to make him think I was insane. He
said I came in about eleven o'clock at night, without any baggage,
paid for my room with a one-hundred-dollar bill, which he changed,
registered and went upstairs. I said nothing that he recalls beyond
making a request for a room."
"The name Doane is not familiar to you?"
"No."
"You can't recall a wife or children?"
"Do you speak any foreign language?"
"Is your mind clear now? Do you remember things?"
"I remember perfectly every incident since I awoke in the hotel," said
Doane. "I seem to remember with remarkable clearness, and somehow I
attach the gravest importance to the most trivial incidents."
The Thinking Machine arose and motioned to Doane to sit down. He
dropped back into a seat wearily. Then the scientist's long, slender
fingers ran lightly, deftly through the abundant black hair of his
visitor. Finally they passed down from the hair and along the firm
jaws; thence they went to the arms, where they pressed upon good,
substantial muscles. At last the hands, well shaped and white,
were examined minutely. A magnifying glass was used to facilitate
this examination. Finally The Thinking Machine stared into the
quick-moving, nervous eyes of the stranger.
"Any marks at all on your body?" he asked at last.
"No," Doane responded. "I had thought of that and sought for an hour
for some sort of mark. There's nothing--nothing." The eyes glittered
a little and finally, in a burst of nervousness, he struggled to his
feet. "My God!" he exclaimed. "Is there nothing you can do? What is it
all, anyway?"
"Seems to be a remarkable form of aphasia," replied The Thinking
Machine. "That's not an uncommon disease among people whose minds and
nerves are overwrought. You've simply lost yourself--lost your
identity. If it is aphasia, you will recover in time. When, I don't
know."
"And meantime?"
"Let me see the money you found."
With trembling hands Doane produced a large roll of bills, principally
hundreds, many of them perfectly new. The Thinking Machine examined
them minutely, and finally made some memoranda on a slip of paper. The
money was then returned to Doane.
"Now, what shall I do?" asked the latter.
"Don't worry," advised the scientist. "I'll do what I can."
"And--tell me who and what I am?"
"Oh, I can find that out all right," remarked The Thinking Machine.
"But there's a possibility that you wouldn't recall even if I told you
all about yourself."
II.
When John Doane of Nowhere--to all practical purposes--left the home
of The Thinking Machine he bore instructions of divers kinds. First he
was to get a large map of the United States and study it closely,
reading over and pronouncing aloud the name of every city, town and
village he found. After an hour of this he was to take a city
directory and read over the names, pronouncing them aloud as he did
so. Then he was to make out a list of the various professions and
higher commercial pursuits, and pronounce these. All these things were
calculated, obviously, to arouse the sleeping brain. After Doane had
gone The Thinking Machine called up Hutchinson Hatch, reporter, on the
'phone.
"Come up immediately," he requested. "There's something that will
interest you."
"A mystery?" Hatch inquired, eagerly.
"One of the most engaging problems that has ever come to my
attention," replied the scientist.
It was only a question of a few minutes before Hatch was ushered in.
He was a living interrogation point, and repressed a rush of questions
with a distinct effort. The Thinking Machine finally told what he
knew.
"Now it seems to be," said The Thinking Machine, and he emphasized the
"seems," The man simply doesn't know himself. I examined him closely.
I went over his head for a sign of a possible depression, or
abnormality. It didn't appear. I examined his muscles. He has biceps
of great power, is evidently now or has been athletic. His hands are
white, well cared for and have no marks on them. They are not the
hands of a man who has ever done physical work. The money in his
pocket tends to confirm the fact that he is not of that sphere.
"Then what is he? Lawyer? Banker? Financier? What? He might be either,
yet he impressed me as being rather of the business than the
professional school. He has a good, square-cut jaw--the jaw of a
fighting man--and his poise gives one the impression that whatever he
has been doing he has been foremost in it. Being foremost in it, he
would naturally drift to a city, a big city. He is typically a city
man.
"Now, please, to aid me, communicate with your correspondents in the
large cities and find if such a name as John Doane appears in any
directory. Is he at home now? Has he a family? All about him."
"Do you believe that John Doane is his name?" asked the reporter.
"No reason why it shouldn't be," said The Thinking Machine. "Yet it
might not be."
"How about inquiries in this city?"
"He can't well be a local man," was the reply. "He has been wandering
about the streets for four weeks, and if he had lived here he would
have met some one who knew him."
"But the money?"
"I'll probably be able to locate him through that," said The Thinking
Machine. "The matter is not at all clear to me now, but it occurs to
me that he is a man of consequence, and that it was possibly necessary
for some one to get rid of him for a time."
"Well, if it's plain aphasia, as you say," the reporter put in, "it
seems rather difficult to imagine that the attack came at a moment
when it was necessary to get rid of him."
"I say it _seems_ like aphasia," said the scientist, crustily. "There
are known drugs which will produce the identical effect if properly
administered."
"Oh," said Hatch. He was beginning to see.
"There is one drug particularly, made in India, and not unlike
hasheesh. In a case of this kind anything is possible. To-morrow I
shall ask you to take Mr. Doane down through the financial district,
as an experiment. When you go there I want you particularly to get him
to the sound of the 'ticker.' It will be an interesting experiment."
The reporter went away and The Thinking Machine sent a telegram to the
Blank National Bank of Butte, Montana:
"To whom did you issue hundred-dollar bills, series B, numbering
846380 to 846395 inclusive? Please answer."
It was ten o'clock next day when Hatch called on The Thinking Machine.
There he was introduced to John Doane, the man who was lost. The
Thinking Machine was asking questions of Mr. Doane when Hatch was
ushered in.
"Did the map recall nothing?"
"Nothing."
"Montana, Montana, Montana," the scientist repeated monotonously;
"think of it. Butte, Montana."
Doane shook his head hopelessly, sadly.
"Cowboy, cowboy. Did you ever see a cowboy?" Again the head shake.
"Coyote--something like a wolf--coyote. Don't you recall ever having
seen one?"
"I'm afraid it's hopeless," remarked the other.
There was a note of more than ordinary irritation in The Thinking
Machine's voice when he turned to Hatch.
"Mr. Hatch, will you walk through the financial district with Mr.
Doane?" he asked. "Please go to the places I suggested."
So it came to pass that the reporter and Doane went out together,
walking through the crowded, hurrying, bustling financial district.
The first place visited was a private room where market quotations
were displayed on a blackboard. Mr. Doane was interested, but the
scene seemed to suggest nothing.
He looked upon it all as any stranger might have done. After a time
they passed out. Suddenly a man came running toward them--evidently a
broker.
"What's the matter?" asked another.
"Montana copper's gone to smash," was the reply.
"_Copper!_ _Copper!_" gasped Doane suddenly.
Hatch looked around quickly at his companion. Doane's face was a
study. On it was half realization and a deep perplexed wrinkle, a