LITMIR.BIZ

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"the Conjuror is dying!"

      "For which reason, I suppose, you are all trying to smother him!" said my father angrily. "Mistress Cobbe, I beg you will not trouble yourself to pour that brandy down the man's throat. He has no more power to swallow it than my stick. Basil, open the window, and help me to loosen these things about his throat. Good people, all, I must request you to leave the room. This man's life is in peril, and I can do nothing while you remain. Go home--go home. You will see no more conjuring to-night."

      My father was peremptory, and the crowd unwillingly dispersed. One by one they left the room and gathered discontentedly in the passage. When it came to the last two or three, he took them by the shoulders, closed the door upon them, and turned the key.

      Only the landlady, and elderly woman-servant, and myself remained.

      The first thing my father did was to examine the pupil of the patient's eye, and lay his hand upon his heart. It still fluttered feebly, but the action of the lungs was suspended, and his hands and feet were cold as death.

      My father shook his head.

      "This man must be bled," said he, "but I have little hope of saving him."

      He was bled, and, though still unconscious, became less rigid They then poured a little wine down his throat, and he fell into a passive but painless condition, more inanimate than sleep, but less positive than a state of trance.

      A fire was then lighted, a mattress brought down, and the patient laid upon it, wrapped in many blankets. My father announced his intention of sitting up with him all night. In vain I begged for leave to share his vigil. He would hear of no such thing, but turned me out as he had turned out the others, bade me a brief "Good-night," and desired me to run home as quickly as I could.

      At that stage of my history, to hear was to obey; so I took my way quietly through the bar of the hotel, and had just reached the door when a touch on my sleeve arrested me. It was Mr. Cobbe, the landlord--a portly, red-whiskered Boniface of the old English type.

      "Good-evening, Mr. Basil," said he. "Going home, sir?"

      "Yes, Mr. Cobbe," I replied. "I can be of no further use here."

      "Well, sir, you've been of more use this evening than anybody--let alone the Doctor--that I must say for you," observed Mr. Cobbe, approvingly. "I never see such presence o' mind in so young a gen'leman before. Never, sir. Have a glass of grog and a cigar, sir, before you turn out."

      Much as I felt flattered by the supposition that I smoked (which was more than I could have done to save my life), I declined Mr. Cobbe's obliging offer and wished him good-night. But the landlord of the Red Lion was in a gossiping humor, and would not let me go.

      "If you won't take spirits, Mr. Basil," said he, "you must have a glass of negus. I couldn't let you go out without something warm--particular after the excitement you've gone through. Why, bless you, sir, when they ran out and told me, I shook like a leaf--and I don't look like a very nervous subject, do I? And so sudden as it was, too, poor little gentleman!"

      "Very sudden, indeed," I replied, mechanically.

      "Does Doctor Arbuthnot think he'll get the better of it, Mr. Basil?"

      "I fear he has little hope."

      Mr. Cobbe sighed, and shook his head, and smoked in silence.

      "To be struck down just when he was playing such tricks as them conjuring dodges, do seem uncommon awful," said he, after a time. "What was he after at the minute?--making a pudding, wasn't he, in some gentleman's hat?"

      I uttered a sudden ejaculation, and set down my glass of negus untasted. Till that moment I had not once thought of my watch.

      "Oh, Mr. Cobbe!" I cried, "he was pounding my watch in the mortar!"

      "Your watch, Mr. Basil?"

      "Yes, mine--and I have not seen it since. What can have become of it? What shall I do?"

      "Do!" echoed the landlord, seizing a candle; "why, go and look for it, to be sure, Mr. Basil. That's safe enough, you may be sure!"

      I followed him to the room where the performance had taken place. It showed darkly and drearily by the light of one feeble candle. The benches and chairs were all in disorder. The wand lay where it had fallen from the hand of the Wizard. The mortar still stood on the table, with the pestle beside it. It contained only some fragments of broken glass.

      Mr. Cobbe laughed triumphantly.

      "Come, sir," said he, "the watch is safe enough, anyhow. Mounseer only made believe to pound it up, and now all that concerns us is to find it."

      That was indeed all--not only all, but too much. We searched everything. We looked in all the jars and under all the moveables. We took the cover off the chair; we cleared the table; but without success. My watch had totally disappeared, and we at length decided that it must be concealed about the conjuror's person. Mr. Cobbe was my consoling angel.

      "Bless you, sir," said he, "don't never be cast down. My wife shall look for the watch to-morrow morning, and I'll promise you we'll find out every pocket he has about him."

      "And my father--you won't tell my father?" I said, dolefully.

      Mr. Cobbe replied by a mute but expressive piece of pantomime and took me back to the bar, where the good landlady ratified all that her husband had promised in her name.

      The stars shone brightly as I went home, and there was no moon. The town was intensely silent, and the road intensely solitary. I met no one on my way; let myself quietly in, and stole up to my bed-room in the dark.

      It was already late; but I was restless and weary--too restless to sleep, and too weary to read. I could not detach myself from the impressions of the day; and I longed for the morning, that I might learn the fate of my watch, and the condition of the Chevalier.

      At length, after some hours of wakefulness, I dropped into a profound and dreamless sleep.

CHAPTER IV.

       Table of Contents

THE CHEVALIER MAKES HIS LAST EXIT.

       Table of Contents

      All the world's a stage,

       And all the men and women merely players:

       They have their exits and their entrances.

       As You Like It.

      I was waked by my father's voice calling to me from the garden, and so started up with that strange and sudden sense of trouble which most of us have experienced at some time or other in our lives.

      "Nine o'clock, Basil," cried my father. "Nine o'clock--come down directly, sir!"

      I sprang out of bed, and for some seconds could remember nothing of what had happened; but when I looked out of the window and saw my father in his dressing-gown and slippers walking up and down the sunny path with his hands behind his back and his eyes fixed on the ground, it all flashed suddenly upon me. To plunge into my bath, dress, run down, and join him in the garden, was the work of but a few minutes.

      "Good-morning, sir," I said, breathlessly.

      He stopped short in his walk, and looked at me from head to foot.

      "Humph!" said he, "you have dressed quickly. … "

      "Yes, sir; I was startled to find myself so late."

      "So quickly," he continued, "that you have forgotten your watch."

      I felt my face burn. I had not a word to answer.

      "I suppose,"

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