| I had a letter from Arthur, written on Sunday,... 109 |
[Jan. 31st, 2010|02:45 am] |
I had a letter from Arthur, written on Sunday, and from it I gather that he is bearing up wonderfully wellQuincey Morris is with him, and that is much of a help, for he himself is a bubbling well of good spiritsQuincey wrote me a line too, and from him I hear that Arthur is beginning to recover something of his old buoyancy, so as to them all my mind is at restAs for myself, I was settling down to my work with the enthusiasm which I used to have for it, so that I might fairly have said that the wound which poor Lucy left on me was becoming cicatrised
Everything is, however, now reopened, and what is to be the end God only knowsI have an idea that Van Helsing thinks he knows, too, but he will only let out enough at a time to whet curiosityHe went to Exeter yesterday, and stayed there all nightToday he came back, and almost bounded into the room at about half-past five o'clock, and thrust last night's "Westminster Gazette" into my hand
"What do you think of that?" he asked as he stood back and folded his arms
I looked over the paper, for I really did not know what he meant, but he took it from me and pointed out a paragraph about children being decoyed away at HampsteadIt did not convey much to me, until I reached a passage where it described small puncture wounds on their throatsAn idea struck me, and I looked up
"It is like poor Lucy's
"And what do you make of it?"
"Simply that there is some cause in commonWhatever it was that injured her has injured them I did not quite understand his answer
"That is true indirectly, but not directly
"How do you mean, Professor?" I askedI was a little inclined to take his seriousness lightly, for, after all, four days of rest and freedom from burning, harrowing, anxiety does help to restore one's spirits, but when I saw his face, it sobered meNever, even in the midst of our despair about poor Lucy, had he looked more stern
"Tell me!" I said"I can hazard no opinionI do not know what to think, and I have no data on which to found a conjecture
"Do you mean to tell me, friend John, that you have no suspicion as to what poor Lucy died of, not after all the hints given, not only by events, but by me?"
"Of nervous prostration following a great loss or waste of blood
"And how was the blood lost or wasted?" I shook my head
He stepped over and sat down beside me, and went on, "You are a clever man, friend JohnYou reason well, and your wit is bold, but you are too prejudicedYou do not let your eyes see nor your ears hear, and that which is outside your daily life is not of account to youDo you not think that there are things which you cannot understand, and yet which are, that some people see things that others cannot? But there are things old and new which must not be contemplated by men's eyes, because they know, or think they know, some things which other men have told themAh, it is the fault of our science that it wants to explain all, and if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to explainBut yet we see around us every day the growth of new beliefs, which think themselves new, and which are yet but the old, which pretend to be young, like the fine ladies at the operaI suppose now you do not believe in corporeal transferenceNo? Nor in materializationNo? Nor in astral bodiesNo? Nor in the reading of thoughtNo? Nor in hypnotism?"
"Yes," I said"Charcot has proved that pretty well
He smiled as he went on, "Then you are satisfied as to itYes? And of course then you understand how it act, and can follow the mind of the great Charcot, alas that he is no more, into the very soul of the patient that he influenceNo? Then, friend John, am I to take it that you simply accept fact, and are satisfied to let from premise to conclusion be a blank? No? Then tell me, for I am a student of the brain, how you accept hypnotism and reject the thought |
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