Flames. Robert Hichens

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ doctor, Valentine sit up erect, open his eyes and gaze upon his two friends with a grave, staring scrutiny.

      "Valentine, Valentine, how you frightened me! How you terrified me!" Julian at last found a voice to exclaim. "Thank God, thank God! you are alive. Oh, Valentine, you are alive; you are not dead."

      Valentine's lips smiled slowly.

      "Dead," he answered. "No; I am not dead."

      And again he smiled quietly, as a man smiles at some secret thought which tickles him or whips the sense of humour in him till, like an obeying dog, it dances.

      Dr. Levillier, having regained his feet, stood silently looking at Valentine, all his professional instinct wide awake to note this apparent resurrection from the dead.

      "You here, doctor!" said Valentine. "Why, what does this all mean?"

      "I want you to tell me that," Levillier said. "And you," he added, now turning towards Julian.

      But Julian was too much excited to answer. His eyes were blazing with joy and with emotion. And Valentine seemed still to be informed with a curious, serpentine lassitude. The life seemed to be only very gently running again over his body, creeping from the centre, from the heart, to the extremities, gradually growing in the eyes, stronger and stronger, a dawn of life in a full-grown man. Dr. Levillier had never seen anything quite like it before. There was something violently unnatural about it, he thought, yet he could not say what. He could only stand by the broad couch, fascinated by the spectacle under his gaze. Once he had read a tale of the revivifying of a mummy in a museum. That might have been like this; or the raising of Lazarus. The streams of strength almost visibly trickled through Valentine's veins. And this new life was so vigorous, so alert. It was as if during his strange sleep Valentine had been carpentering his energies, polishing his powers, setting the temple of his soul in order, gaining almost a ruthlessness from rest. He stretched his limbs now as an athlete might stretch them to win the full consciousness of their muscular force. When the doctor took hold of his hand to feel his pulse the hand was hard and tense like iron, the fingers gripped for a moment like thin bands of steel, and the life in the blue eyes bounded, raced, swirled as water swirls in a mill-stream. Indeed, Dr. Levillier felt as if there was too much life in them, as if the cup had been filled with wine until the wine ran over. He put his fingers on the pulse. It was strong and rapid and did not fluctuate, but beat steadily. He felt the heart. That, too, throbbed strongly. And while he made his examination Valentine smiled at him.

      "I'm all right, you see," Valentine said.

      "All right," the doctor echoed, still possessed by the feeling that there lurked almost a danger in this apparently abounding health.

      "What was it all?" Julian asked eagerly. "Was it a trance?"

      "A trance?" Valentine said. "Yes, I suppose so."

      He put his feet to the floor, stood up, and again stretched all his limbs. His eyes fell upon Rip, who was still in the corner, huddled up, his teeth showing, his eyes almost starting out of his head.

      "Rip," he said, holding out his hand and slapping his knee, "come here!

       Come along! Rip! Rip! What's the matter with him?"

      "He thought you were dead," said Julian. "Poor little chap. Rip, it's all right. Come!"

      But the dog refused to be pacified, and still displayed every symptom of angry fear. At last Valentine, weary of calling the dog, went towards it and stooped to pick it up. At the downward movement of its master the dog shrank back, gathered itself together, then suddenly sprang forward with a harsh snarl and tried to fasten its teeth in his face. Valentine jumped back just in time.

      "He must have gone mad," he exclaimed. "Julian, see what you can do with him."

      Curiously enough, Rip welcomed Julian's advances with avidity, nestled into his arms, but when he walked toward Valentine, struggled to escape and trembled in every limb.

      "How extraordinary!" Julian said. "Since your trance he seems to have taken a violent dislike to you. What can it mean?"

      "Oh, nothing probably. He will get over it. Put him into the other room."

      Julian did so and returned.

      Doctor Levillier was now sitting in an arm-chair. His light, kind eyes were fixed on Valentine with a scrutiny so intense as to render the expression of his usually gentle face almost stern. But Valentine appeared quite unconscious of his gaze and mainly attentive to all that Julian said and did. All this time the doctor had not said a word. Now he spoke.

      "You spoke of a trance?" he said, interrogatively.

      Julian looked as guilty as a cribbing schoolboy discovered in his dingy act.

      "Doctor, Val and I have to crawl to you for forgiveness," he said.

      "To me—why?"

      "We have disobeyed you."

      "But I should never give you an order."

      "Your advice is a command to those who know you, doctor," said Valentine, with a sudden laugh.

      "And what advice of mine have you put in the corner with its face to the wall?"

      "We have been table-turning again."

      "Ah!"

      Doctor Levillier formed his lips into the shape assumed by one whistling.

      "And this has been the result?"

      "Yes," Julian cried. "Never, as long as I live, will I sit again. Val, if you go down on your knees to me—"

      "I shall not do that," Valentine quietly interposed. "I have no desire to sit again now."

      "You both seem set against such dangerous folly at last," said the doctor. "Give me your solemn promise to stick to what you have said."

      And the two young men gave it, Julian with a strong gravity, Valentine with a light smile. Julian had by no means recovered his usual gaiety. The events of the night had seriously affected him. He was excited and emotional, and now he grasped Valentine by the arm as he exclaimed:

      "Valentine, tell me, what made you give that strange cry just before you went into your trance? Were you frightened? or did something—that hand—touch you? Or what was it?"

      "A cry?"

      "Yes."

      "It was not I."

      "Didn't you hear it?"

      "No."

      Julian turned to the doctor.

      "It was an unearthly sound," he said. "Like nothing I have ever heard or imagined. And, doctor, just afterward I saw something, something that made me believe Valentine was really dead."

      "What was it?"

      Julian hesitated. Then he avoided directly replying to the question.

      "Doctor," he said, "of course I needn't ask you if you СКАЧАТЬ