The Mystery of Cloomber Read online

  CHAPTER IX. NARRATIVE OF JOHN EASTERLING, F.R.C.P.EDIN.

  Having given the statement of Israel Stakes _in extenso_, I shall appenda short memorandum from Dr. Easterling, now practising at Stranraer.It is true that the doctor was only once within the walls of Cloomberduring its tenancy by General Heatherstone, but there were somecircumstances connected with this visit which made it valuable,especially when considered as a supplement to the experiences which Ihave just submitted to the reader.

  The doctor has found time amid the calls of a busy country practiceto jot down his recollections, and I feel that I cannot do better thansubjoin them exactly as they stand.

  I have very much pleasure in furnishing Mr. Fothergill West with anaccount of my solitary visit to Cloomber Hall, not only on accountof the esteem which I have formed for that gentleman ever since hisresidence at Branksome, but also because it is my conviction that thefacts in the case of General Heatherstone are of such a singular naturethat it is of the highest importance that they should be placed beforethe public in a trustworthy manner.

  It was about the beginning of September of last year that I receiveda note from Mrs. Heatherstone, of Cloomber Hall, desiring me to make aprofessional call upon her husband, whose health, she said, had been forsome time in a very unsatisfactory state.

  I had heard something of the Heatherstones and of the strange seclusionin which they lived, so that I was very much pleased at this opportunityof making their closer acquaintance, and lost no time in complying withher request.

  I had known the Hall in the old days of Mr. McVittie, the originalproprietor, and I was astonished on arriving at the avenue gate toobserve the changes which had taken place.

  The gate itself, which used to yawn so hospitably upon the road, wasnow barred and locked, and a high wooden fence, with nails upon thetop, encircled the whole grounds. The drive itself was leaf-strewn anduncared-for, and the whole place had a depressing air of neglect anddecay.

  I had to knock twice before a servant-maid opened the door and showed methrough a dingy hall into a small room, where sat an elderly, carewornlady, who introduced herself as Mrs. Heatherstone. With her pale face,her grey hair, her sad, colourless eyes, and her faded silk dress, shewas in perfect keeping with her melancholy surroundings.

  "You find us in much trouble, doctor," she said, in a quiet, refinedvoice. "My poor husband has had a great deal to worry him, and hisnervous system for a long time has been in a very weak state. We came tothis part of the country in the hope that the bracing air and the quietwould have a good effect upon him. Instead of improving, however, hehas seemed to grow weaker, and this morning he is in a high fever and alittle inclined to be delirious. The children and I were so frightenedthat we sent for you at once. If you will follow me I will take you tothe general's bedroom."

  She led the way down a series of corridors to the chamber of the sickman, which was situated in the extreme wing of the building.

  It was a carpetless, bleak-looking room, scantily furnished with a smalltruckle bed, a campaigning chair, and a plain deal table, on which werescattered numerous papers and books. In the centre of this table therestood a large object of irregular outline, which was covered over with asheet of linen.

  All round the walls and in the corners were arranged a very choice andvaried collection of arms, principally swords, some of which were ofthe straight pattern in common use in the British Army, while amongthe others were scimitars, tulwars, cuchurries, and a score of otherspecimens of Oriental workmanship. Many of these were richly mounted,with inlaid sheaths and hilts sparkling with precious stones, so thatthere was a piquant contrast between the simplicity of the apartment andthe wealth which glittered on the walls.

  I had little time, however, to observe the general's collection, sincethe general himself lay upon the couch and was evidently in sore need ofmy services.

  He was lying with his head turned half away from us. Breathing heavily,and apparently unconscious of our presence. His bright, staring eyes andthe deep, hectic flush upon his cheek showed that his fever was at itsheight.

  I advanced to the bedside, and, stooping over him, I placed my fingersupon his pulse, when immediately he sprang up into the sitting positionand struck at me frenziedly with his clenched hands. I have never seensuch intensity of fear and horror stamped upon a human face as appearedupon that which was now glaring up at me.

  "Bloodhound!" he yelled; "let me go--let me go, I say! Keep your handsoff me! Is it not enough that my life has been ruined? When is it all toend? How long am I to endure it?"

  "Hush, dear, hush!" said his wife in a soothing voice, passing hercool hand over his heated forehead. "This is Doctor Easterling, fromStranraer. He has not come to harm you, but to do you good."

  The general dropped wearily back upon his pillow, and I could see by thechanged expression of his face that his delirium had left him, and thathe understood what had been said.

  I slipped my clinical thermometer into his armpit and counted his pulserate. It amounted to 120 per minute, and his temperature proved to be104 degrees. Clearly it was a case of remittent fever, such as occurs inmen who have spent a great part of their lives in the tropics.

  "There is no danger," I remarked. "With a little quinine and arsenic weshall very soon overcome the attack and restore his health."

  "No danger, eh?" he said. "There never is any danger for me. I am ashard to kill as the Wandering Jew. I am quite clear in the head now,Mary; so you may leave me with the doctor."

  Mrs. Heatherstone left the room--rather unwillingly, as I thought--andI sat down by the bedside to listen to anything which my patient mighthave to communicate.

  "I want you to examine my liver," he said when the door was closed. "Iused to have an abscess there, and Brodie, the staff-surgeon, said thatit was ten to one that it would carry me off. I have not felt much of itsince I left the East. This is where it used to be, just under the angleof the ribs."

  "I can find the place," said I, after making a careful examination;"but I am happy to tell you that the abscess has either been entirelyabsorbed, or has turned calcareous, as these solitary abscesses will.There is no fear of its doing you any harm now."

  He seemed to be by no means overjoyed at the intelligence.

  "Things always happen so with me," he said moodily. "Now, if anotherfellow was feverish and delirious he would surely be in some danger, andyet you will tell me that I am in none. Look at this, now." He baredhis chest and showed me a puckered wound over the region of the heart."That's where the jezail bullet of a Hillman went in. You would thinkthat was in the right spot to settle a man, and yet what does it do butglance upon a rib, and go clean round and out at the back, without somuch as penetrating what you medicos call the pleura. Did ever you hearof such a thing?"

  "You were certainly born under a lucky star," I observed, with a smile.

  "That's a matter of opinion," he answered, shaking his head. "Deathhas no terrors for me, if it will but come in some familiar form, but Iconfess that the anticipation of some strange, some preternatural formof death is very terrible and unnerving."

  "You mean," said I, rather puzzled at his remark, "that you would prefera natural death to a death by violence?"

  "No, I don't mean that exactly," he answered. "I am too familiar withcold steel and lead to be afraid of either. Do you know anything aboutodyllic force, doctor?"

  "No, I do not," I replied, glancing sharply at him to see if there wereany signs of his delirium returning. His expression was intelligent,however, and the feverish flush had faded from his cheeks.

  "Ah, you Western scientific men are very much behind the day in somethings," he remarked. "In all that is material and conducive to thecomfort of the body you are pre-eminent, but in what concerns the subtleforces of Nature and the latent powers of the human spirit your bestmen are centuries behind the humblest coolies of India. Countlessgenerations of beef-eating, comfort loving ancestors have given ouranimal instincts the command over our spiritual ones. The body,
whichshould have been a mere tool for the use of the soul, has now become adegrading prison in which it is confined. The Oriental soul and body arenot so welded together as ours are, and there is far less wrench whenthey part in death."

  "They do not appear to derive much benefit from this peculiarity intheir organisation," I remarked incredulously.

  "Merely the benefit of superior knowledge," the general answered. "Ifyou were to go to India, probably the very first thing you would see inthe way of amusement would be a native doing what is called the mangotrick. Of course you have heard or read of it. The fellow plants a mangoseed, and makes passes over it until it sprouts and bears leaves andfruit--all in the space of half-an-hour. It is not really a trick--itis a power. These men know more than your Tyndalls or Huxleys do aboutNature's processes, and they can accelerate or retard her workingsby subtle means of which we have no conception. These low-casteconjurers--as they are called--are mere vulgar dabblers, but the men whohave trod the higher path are as far superior to us in knowledge as weare to the Hottentots or Patagonians."

  "You speak as if you were well acquainted with them," I remarked.

  "To my cost, I am," he answered. "I have been brought in contact withthem in a way in which I trust no other poor chap ever will be. But,really, as regards odyllic force, you ought to know something of it,for it has a great future before it in your profession. You should readReichenbach's 'Researches on Magnetism and Vital Force,' and Gregory's'Letters on Animal Magnetism.' These, supplemented by the twenty-sevenAphorisms of Mesmer, and the works of Dr. Justinus Kerner, of Weinsberg,would enlarge your ideas."

  I did not particularly relish having a course of reading prescribed forme on a subject connected with my own profession, so I made no comment,but rose to take my departure. Before doing so I felt his pulse oncemore, and found that the fever had entirely left him in the sudden,unaccountable fashion which is peculiar to these malarious types ofdisease.

  I turned my face towards him to congratulate him upon his improvement,and stretched out my hand at the same time to pick my gloves from thetable, with the result that I raised not only my own property, but alsothe linen cloth which was arranged over some object in the centre.

  I might not have noticed what I had done had I not seen an angry lookupon the invalid's face and heard him utter an impatient exclamation.I at once turned, and replaced the cloth so promptly that I shouldhave been unable to say what was underneath it, beyond having a generalimpression that it looked like a bride-cake.

  "All right, doctor," the general said good-humouredly, perceiving howentirely accidental the incident was. "There is no reason why you shouldnot see it," and stretching out his hand, he pulled away the linencovering for the second time.

  I then perceived that what I had taken for a bride-cake was really anadmirably executed model of a lofty range of mountains, whose snow-cladpeaks were not unlike the familiar sugar pinnacles and minarets.

  "These are the Himalayas, or at least the Surinam branch of them," heremarked, "showing the principal passes between India and Afghanistan.It is an excellent model. This ground has a special interest for me,because it is the scene of my first campaign. There is the pass oppositeKalabagh and the Thul valley, where I was engaged during the summerof 1841 in protecting the convoys and keeping the Afridis in order. Itwasn't a sinecure, I promise you."

  "And this," said I, indicating a blood-red spot which had been markedon one side of the pass which he had pointed out--"this is the scene ofsome fight in which you were engaged."

  "Yes, we had a skirmish there," he answered, leaning forward and lookingat the red mark. "We were attacked by--"

  At this moment he fell back upon his pillow as if he had been shot,while the same look of horror came over his face which I had observedwhen I first entered the room. At the same instant there came,apparently from the air immediately above his bed, a sharp, ringing,tinkling sound, which I can only compare with the noise made by abicycle alarm, though it differed from this in having a distinctlythrobbing character. I have never, before or since, heard any soundwhich could be confounded with it.

  I stared round in astonishment, wondering where it could have come from,but without perceiving anything to which it could be ascribed.

  "It's all right, doctor," the general said with a ghastly smile. "It'sonly my private gong. Perhaps you had better step downstairs and writemy prescription in the dining-room."

  He was evidently anxious to get rid of me, so I was forced to take mydeparture, though I would gladly have stayed a little longer, in thehope of learning something as to the origin of the mysterious sound.

  I drove away from the house with the full determination of calling againupon my interesting patient, and endeavouring to elicit some furtherparticulars as to his past life and his present circumstances. I wasdestined, however, to be disappointed, for I received that very eveninga note from the general himself, enclosing a handsome fee for my singlevisit, and informing me that my treatment had done him so much good thathe considered himself to be convalescent, and would not trouble me tosee him again.

  This was the last and only communication which I ever received from thetenant of Cloomber.

  I have been asked frequently by neighbours and others who wereinterested in the matter whether he gave me the impression of insanity.To this I must unhesitatingly answer in the negative. On the contrary,his remarks gave me the idea of a man who had both read and thoughtdeeply.

  I observed, however, during our single interview, that his reflexeswere feeble, his arcus senilis well marked, and his arteriesatheromatous--all signs that his constitution was in an unsatisfactorycondition, and that a sudden crisis might be apprehended.