Hesba Stretton - The Ultimate Christmas Library - 100+ Authors, 200 Novels, Novellas, Stories, Poems and Carols

With his hand on the handle of the sitting-room door, he paused.

"I suppose you—er—feel quite able to forgive poor old Ronnie, now?" he asked.

The yearning anguish in Helen's eyes made answer enough.

They crossed the hall together; but—as they passed down the corridor leading to the studio—they stopped simultaneously, and their eyes sought one another in silent surprise and uncertainty.

The deep full tones of a 'cello, reached them where they stood; tones so rich, so plaintively sweet, so full of passion and melody, that, to the anxious listeners in the dimly lighted corridor, they gave the sense of something weird, something altogether uncanny in its power, unearthly in its beauty.

They each spoke at the same moment.

"It cannot be Ronnie," they said.

"It must be Ronnie," amended Helen. "There is no one else in the house."

" You go in," whispered Dick. "I will wait here. Call, if you want me. Don't startle him. Go in very softly. Be very—er— you know?"

Helen moved forward alone.

She laid her hand upon the handle of the studio door.

She wished the weird music within would cease for one moment, that she might feel more able to enter.

Cold shivers ran down her spine.

Try as she would, she could not connect that music with Ronnie.

Somebody else was also in the studio, of that she felt quite certain.

She nearly went back to Dick.

Then—rating herself for cowardice—she turned the handle of the door and passed in.

Dick saw her disappear.

Almost at that moment the 'cello-playing ceased; there was a crash, a cry from Helen, a silence, and then—a wild shriek from Helen, a sound holding so much of fear and of horror, that Dick shouted in reply as he dashed forward.

He found himself in a low room, oak-panelled, lighted only by the uncertain flame a log-fire. The door by which Dick had centered was to the left of the fireplace. On the wall at the farther end of the room, opposite both door and fireplace, hung an immense mirror in a massive gilt frame.

On the floor in the centre of the room lay Ronnie, unconscious, on his back. The chair upon which he had been sitting and which had gone over backwards with him, lay broken beneath him. His 'cello rested on his chest. He gripped it there, with both his hands. They fell away from it, as Dick looked at him.

Ronnie's wife knelt on the floor beside him, but she was not looking at Ronnie. She was staring, with white face and starting eyes, into the mirror. Her left arm, stretched out before her, was rigid with horror, from the shoulder to the tip of the pointing finger.

"Look, Dick!" she shrieked. "Oh, heavens! Look!"

Dick flashed up the electric light; then looked into the mirror.

He saw himself loom large, dishevelled, grimy, travel-stained. Then he saw Ronnie and the Infant in a dark heap on the floor, and the white face of Ronnie's wife, kneeling beside him with outstretched arm and eyes upon the mirror. On the other side of Ronnie, in the very centre of the scene, stood a queer old chair of Italian workmanship, the heads of lions completing its curved arms, on its carved back the fleur-de-lis of Florence, its seat of padded leather, embossed in crimson and gold.

This was all Dick saw, excepting the leaping flames of the fire beyond.

And even as he looked, Helen's arm fell to her side; he saw her turn, lift the Infant off Ronnie's breast; and, bending over him, draw his head on to her lap.

Dick turned from the mirror. The scene in the room was identical with the reflection, in all points save one. The Florentine chair was under Ronnie. It had fallen with him. Its back was broken. Not until he had lifted his friend from the floor did Dr. Dick see the panelled fleur-de-lis of Florence, nor the crimson and gold of the embossed leather seat.

As he and Helen together loosed Ronnie's collar and tie, she whispered: "Did— you —see?"

"This is no time for staring into mirrors," said Dr. Dick, crossly. "I saw that I need a good wash; and you , some sal-volatile! But we shall have plenty to do for Ronnie before we can find leisure to think of ourselves. Send a couple of men here; sturdy fellows whom you can trust. Order that car to the door; then bring me a pencil, a sheet of note-paper and an envelope. There is just one man in the world who can help us now, and we must have him here with as little delay as possible."

When Helen had left the room, Dick glanced furtively over his shoulder into the mirror.

The Italian chair, in the reflection, now lay broken on the floor!

"Hum!" said Dr. Dick. "Not bad, that—for an Infant! Precocious, I call it. We must have that 'cello re-christened the ' Demon of Prague'!"

Ronnie had walked from his wife's sitting-room, along the corridor and into the studio, in a state of stunned stupefaction.

He carried his 'cello in one hand, its case and bow, which he had picked up in the hall, in the other; but he had for the moment completely forgotten the Infant.

He leaned it against a chair, laid down the case, closed the studio door; then walked to the fireplace.

He stood looking at the great crackling logs, and into the glowing heart of the fire beneath them.

"Utterly, preposterously, altogether, selfish," he repeated slowly. "That is what my wife considers me; that is as I appear to Helen. Utterly—preposterously—altogether—selfish. She is so lovely—she is so perfect! I—I have longed for her so! But I am utterly, preposterously, altogether, selfish!"

He put his arms upon the mantel-piece and dropped his head upon them. He felt a queer contraction in his throat, a stinging beneath his eyelids, such as he had not experienced since the days of childish mortifications and sorrows. But the instinctive manliness of him, held back the actual tears. He was debarred, even in solitude, from that form of relief.

Presently he lifted his head, took out his pocket-book, and wrote down the words, spelling each with a capital letter.

He looked long at them; then suddenly exclaimed: "U, P, A, S! Why, it is the Upas tree; the deadly, mysterious, poisonous Upas tree! I found it in the jungle. I felt ill the night I camped beneath it. I have never felt quite well since. The nightmares began on that night; and the nightmares have followed me home. This is the worst of all. Helen calls me the Upas tree—the poisoner of her content. Utterly, preposterously, altogether, selfish!"

He turned on the electric lights, and walked up and down the room, with desperate, restless tread.

"Poisoning all it touches," he said. "Blasting the life of all who pass beneath its deadly foliage—U,P,A,S—Upas."

He paused before the great mirror, gazing at his own reflection.

He put his face quite close to the glass, staring into his burning eyes.

Then he struck at the reflection with his clenched fist. "Upas tree!" he snarled. "Take that, and be damned!"

He had hurt his knuckles. He walked back to the fire, rubbing them carefully with his left hand.

"Poor old chap," he said. "It is hard lines! You meant well; but all the while you were a Upas tree. ' I, Helen, take thee, Upas, to be my wedded husband .' Poor lovely Helen! What a bargain!"

He sat down in a deep basket-chair, lighted a cigarette, pushed another chair into position, exactly in front of him, with his foot; then filling it, one by one, with friends of his own and Helen's, held conversation with them.

"Quite right, my dear Mrs. Dalmain! You need not now confine yourself to looking your disapproval; you can say exactly what you think. You see, Helen herself has told me the worst truth of all. I am a Upas tree. She sums me up thus: U, P, A, S! You can hardly beat that, Mrs. Dalmain. In fact, you look distressed. I can see that your kind heart is sorry for me. Helen said you were a wonderful person to turn to in trouble. There is no one in the world quite like you. Well, now's your chance to prove it; for surely nobody ever came to you in more desperate trouble. If you wish to be really kind and comforting, talk to me of my wife. Say how sweet and lovely she is. Say that her arms are tender, her eyes gentle and kind. I am the thirsty traveller in the desert, who sights pure water, hastens eagerly forward, and finds—a mirage! But a deadly stream flows from the roots of the Upas—Hullo! Here comes Aubrey Treherne. Look out, Mrs. Dalmain! He owes you a grudge. Hey, presto! Vanish from the chair, or Helen's cousin will lean over, with a bleeding face, threatening to kill you with both hands!…