Читать книгу Who Goes There? - B. K. Benson - Страница 9

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"There shall never be one lost good! What was, shall live as before;

The evil is null, is naught, is silence implying sound;

What was good, shall be good, with, for evil, so much good more;

On the earth the broken arcs; in the heaven, a perfect round."

--BROWNING.

The next morning Lydia was missing from the breakfast table. The Doctor said that she had gone to her room--which was at a friend's house in Georgetown--to rest. She had brought from Willis a request that I should come to see him.

"You are getting back to your normal condition," said the Doctor, "and if you do not object I shall drive you down."

On the way, the Doctor told me that alarm as to the safety of the capital had subsided. The army was reorganizing on the Virginia hills and was intrenching rapidly. Reënforcements were being hurried to Washington, and a new call for volunteers would at once be made. General McClellan would arrive in a few days; much was expected of his ability to create and discipline an army.

"You need be in no hurry to report to your company," said Dr. Khayme; "it is true that you are almost fit for duty, but you have practically a leave of absence for a week or more, and I am sure that rest will do you good. By the way, President Lincoln will visit the troops at Arlington to-day; if you like, I shall be glad to take you over."

I declined, saying that I must see Willis, and expressing my desire to return to my post of duty as soon as possible.

We found Willis cheerful. The Doctor asked him a few questions and then passed into the office.

Willis pressed my hand. "Old man," said he, "but for you I should be a prisoner. Count on Jake Willis whenever you need a friend, or when it is in his power to do you a service."

"Sergeant," said I, "I shall go back to duty in a day or two. What shall I say to the boys for you?"

"Tell 'em old Jake is a-comin' too. My leg feels better already. The surgeon promises to put me on my feet in a month, or six weeks at the outside. Have you learned how our company came out?"

"The papers say there were four killed," I said; "but I have not seen their names, and I hope they are only missing. There were a good many wounded. The regiment's headquarters are over the river, and I have not seen a man of the company except you. I am very anxious."

"So am I," said the sergeant; "your friend Dr. Khayme told me it will be some days before we learn the whole truth. He is a queer man, Jones; I believe he knows what I think. Was that his daughter who came in here last night?"

"Yes," I answered; "she left me your message this morning."

"Say, Jones, you remember that poplar log?"

"I don't think I can ever forget it," I replied. The next moment I thought of my bygone mental peculiarity, and wondered if I should ever again be subjected to loss of memory. I decided to speak to Dr. Khayme once more about this matter. Although he had advised me in Charleston never to speak of it or think of it, he had only last night, referred to it himself.

"I must go now, Sergeant," said I; "can I do anything for you?"

"No, I think not."

"You are able to write your own letters?"

"Oh, yes; the nurse gives me a bed-table."

"Well, good-by."

"Say, Jones, you remember them straw stacks? Good-by, Jones. I'll be with the boys again before long."

In the afternoon I returned to the little camp and found the Doctor and Lydia. The Doctor was busy--writing. I reminded Lydia of her promise to tell me something about her life in the East.

"Where shall I begin?" she asked,

"Begin at the beginning," I said; "begin at the time I left Charleston."

"I don't know," she said, "that Father had at that time any thought of going. One morning he surprised me by telling me to get ready for a long journey."

"When was that?" I asked.

"I am not certain, but I know it was one day in the vacation, and a good while after you left."

"It must have been in September, then."

"Yes, I am almost sure it was in September."

"I suppose you were very glad to go."

"Yes, I was; but Father's intention was made known to me so suddenly that I had no time to say good-by to anybody, and that grieved me."

"You wanted to say good-by to somebody?"

"The Sisters, you know--and my schoolmates."

"Yes--of course; did your old servant go too?"

"Yes; she died while we were in India."

"I remember her very well. So you went to India?"

"Not directly; we sailed first to Liverpool; then we went on to Paris--strange, we went right through London, and were there not more than an hour or two."

"How long did you stay in Paris?"

"Father had some business there--I don't know what--that kept us for two or three weeks. Then we went to Havre, and took a ship for Bombay."

"And so you were in India most of the time while you were abroad?"

"Yes; we lived in India nearly three years."

"In Bombay?"

"I was in Bombay, but Father was absent a good deal of the time."

"Did you go to school?"

"Yes," she said, smiling.

Dinner was ready. After dinner the Doctor and I sat under the trees. I told him of my wish to return to my company.

"Perhaps it is just as well," said he.

"I think I am fit for duty," said I.

"Yes, you are strong enough," said he.

"Then why are you reluctant?"

"Because I am not quite sure that your health is safe; you ran a narrower risk than your condition now would show."

"And you think there is danger in my reporting for duty?"

"Ordinary bodily exertion will not injure you; exposure might; the weather is very warm."

"There will be nothing for me to do--at least, nothing very hard on me."

"Danger seems at present averted," said Dr. Khayme. "Your depression has gone; if you are not worse to-morrow, I shall not oppose your going."

I plunged into the subject most interesting to me: "Doctor, do you remember telling me, some ten years ago, that you did not think it advisable for me to tell you of my experiences?"

"Yes," he replied.

"And that it was best, perhaps, that I should not think of them?"

"Yes," he replied,

"Yet you referred last night to what you called my peculiar powers."

"Yes, and said that it is possible to make great use of them."

"Doctor, do you know that after I left you in Charleston I had a recurrence of my trouble?"

"I had at least suspected it."

"Why do you call my infirmity a peculiar power?" I asked.

"Why do you call your peculiar power an infirmity?" he retorted. Then, with the utmost seriousness, he went on to say: "Everything is relative; your memory, taking it generally, is better than that of some, and poorer than that of others; as it is affected by your peculiar periods, it is in some features far stronger than the average memory, and in other features it is weaker; have you not known this?"

"Yes; I can recall any object that I have seen; its image is definite, if it has been formed in a lapse."

"But in respect to other matters than objects?"

"You mean as to thought?"

"Yes--speculation."

"In a lapse I seem to forget any mere opinion, or speculation, that is, anything not an established fact."

"Suppose, for instance, that you should to-day read an article written to show that the moon is inhabited; would you remember it in one of your 'states'?"

"Not at all," said I.

"Suppose you should hear a discussion of the tariff question; would you remember it?"

"No, sir."

"Suppose you should hear a discussion upon the right to coerce a seceded State, and should to-day reach a conclusion as to the truth of the controversy; now, would you to-morrow, in one of your 'states,' remember the discussion?"

"No; certainly not."

"Not even if the discussion had occurred previously to the period affected by your memory?"

"I don't exactly catch, your meaning, Doctor."

"I mean to ask what attitude your mind has, in one of your 'states,' toward unsettled questions."

"No attitude whatever; I know nothing of such, one way or the other."

"How, then, could you ever form an opinion upon a disputed question?"

"I don't know, Doctor; I suppose that if I should ever form an opinion upon anything merely speculative, I should have to do it from new material, or repeated material, of thought."

"But now let us reverse this supposition: suppose that to-morrow you are in one of your 'states,' and you hear a discussion and draw a conclusion; will this conclusion remain with you next week when you have recovered the chain of your memory?"

"Yes."

"And your mind would hold to its former decision?"

"Oh, no; not necessarily. I mean that my memory would retain the fact that I had formerly decided the matter."

"And in your recovered state you might reverse a decision made while in a lapse?"

"Certainly."

"But the undoubted truths, or material facts, as some people call them, would still be undoubted?"

"Yes."

"And objects seen while in a 'state' will be remembered by you when you recover?"

"Vividly; if I could draw, I could draw them as well as if they were present."

"It would not be wrong, then, to say that what you lose in one period you gain in another? that what you lose in things doubtful you gain in intensity of fact?"

"Certainly not wrong, though I cannot say that the loss of one causes the gain of the other."

"That is not important; yet I suspect it is true that your faculty is quickened in one function, by relaxation in another. You know that the hearing of the blind is very acute."

"Yes, but I don't see how all this shows my case to be a good thing."

"You can imagine situations in which, hearing is of greater value than sight?"

"Yes."

"A blind scout might be more valuable on a dark night than one who could see."

"Yes, but I cannot see how this affects me; I am neither blind nor deaf, nor am I a scout."

"But it can be said that a good memory may be of greater value at one time than another."

"Oh, yes; I suppose so."

"Now," said Dr. Khayme, "I do not wish you to believe for a moment that there is at present any occasion for you to turn scout; I have merely instanced a possible case in which hearing is more valuable than sight, and we have agreed that memory is worth, more at times than at other times. I should like to relieve you, moreover, of any fears that you, may have in regard to the continuance of your infirmity--as you insist on thinking it. Cases like yours always recover."

"Dr. Abbott once told me that my case was not entirely unique," said I; "but I thought he said it only to comfort me."

"There is nothing new under the sun," said Dr. Khayme; "we have such cases in the records of more than, one ancient writer. Averroes himself clearly refers to such a case."

"He must have lived a long time ago," said I, "judging from the sound of his name; and I doubt that he would have compared well with, our people."

"But more remarkable things are told by the prophets--even your own prophets. The mental changes undergone by Saul of Tarsus, by John on Patmos, by Nabuchodonosor, and by many others, are not less wonderful than, yours."

"They were miracles," said I.

"What is miracle?" asked the Doctor, but continued without waiting for me to reply; "more wonderful changes have happened and do happen every year to men's minds than this which has happened to yours; men lose their minds utterly for a time, and then recover their faculties entirely; men lose their identity, so to speak; men can be changed in an hour, by the use of a drug, into different creatures, if we are to judge by the record their own consciousness gives them."

"I cannot doubt my own senses," said I; "my changes come upon me without a drug and in a moment."

"If you will read Sir William Hamilton, you will find authentic records which will forever relieve you of the belief that your condition is unparalleled. It may be unique in that phase of it which I hope will prove valuable; but as to its being the one only case of the general--"

"I do not dispute there having been cases as strange as mine," I interrupted; "your word for that is enough; but you ought to tell me why you insist on the possibility of a cure and the usefulness of the condition at the same time. If the condition may prove useful, why change it?"

"There are many things in nature," said the Doctor, seriously, "there are many things in nature which show their greatest worth only at the moment of their extinction. Your seeming imperfection of memory is, I repeat, but a relaxation of one of its functions in order that another function may be strengthened--and all for a purpose."

"What is that purpose?"

"I cannot tell you."

"Why can you not?"

"Because," said he, "the manner in which you will prove the usefulness of your power is yet to be developed. Generally, I might say, in order to encourage you, that it will probably be given to you to serve your country in, a remarkable way; but as to the how and when, you must leave it to the future to show."

"And you think that such a service will be at the end of my trouble?"

"I think so," said he; "the laws of the mental world, in my judgment, require that your recovery should follow the period concerning which your factitious memory is brightest."

"But how can a private soldier serve his country in a remarkable way?" I said, wondering.

"Wait," said he.

The Doctor filled his pipe and became silent. Lydia was not on duty this night. She had listened gravely to what had been said. Now she looked up with a faint smile, which I thought meant that she was willing for me to talk to her and yet reluctant to be the first to speak, not knowing whether I had need of silence. I had begun to have a high opinion of Lydia's character.

"And you went to school in Bombay?"

"Yes, at first."

I was not willing to show a bald curiosity concerning her, and I suppose my hesitation was expressed in my face, for she presently continued.

"I studied and worked in the British hospital; you must know that I am a nurse with some training. Father was very willing for me to become a nurse, for he said that there would be war in America, and that nurses would be needed."

Then, turning to the Doctor, she said, "Father, Mr. Berwick asked me to-day when it was that we sailed from Charleston, and I was unable to tell him."

"The third of September, 1857," said the Doctor.

I remembered that this was my sister's birthday and also the very day on which I had written to Dr. Khayme that I should not return to Charleston. The coincidence and its bearing on my affliction disturbed me so that I could not readily continue my part of the conversation, and Lydia soon retired.

"Doctor," said I, "to-morrow morning I shall be ready to report to my company."

"Very well, Jones," he said, "act according to your conscience; I shall see you frequently. There will be no more battles in this part of the country for a long time, and it will not be difficult for you to get leave of absence when you wish to see us. Besides, I am thinking of moving our camp nearer to you."