Seen and Unseen Part 9

In the very midst of their brick building and train starting, a terrible catastrophe occurred, which spoilt the rest of the evening for the poor child. Granny had evidently forgotten that her time was limited, by conditions of which we are still profoundly ignorant.

Quite suddenly, and without a word of warning, she disappeared, not into the cabinet at her back, but right through the carpet under our feet, and well within a yard of the said feet, and this with two or three gas-jets burning over our heads!

There was no mistake about it. Dr Covernton and I were sitting next to the father and mother, whilst the child and his grandmother played at our feet. One moment she was there; the next she had disappeared like a flash into a mere cloud of mist, and even this was quickly withdrawn, apparently through the floor. No trap-door theory could account for this, because the _woman_ had disappeared, and only the wisp of ethereal garments remained, before the latter were also dissipated. We must, moreover, note the difficulty of working a trap door immediately under the feet of a sceptical young physician, who at once investigated the carpet, hoping in vain to find in it some solution of the mystery!

I have already mentioned that the whole incident took place, in light sufficiently good to read a book without straining the eyes.

The poor little boy was terribly upset, and sobbed bitterly. His parents said they had brought him many times before, and such a _fiasco_ had never before taken place. Mrs Stoddart Gray was very indignant about it.

"Too bad! She ought to have _known_ she was staying too long, and risking a fright for the child. If she had only gone back into the cabinet he would not have been frightened. But she stayed too long and had not enough strength to get back."

The child was too thoroughly frightened and upset to admit of any consolation, and the parents were obliged to take him away, still sobbing, and asking _why_ Granny had gone away like that and given him such a fright.

A year later, in London, I took Dr Covernton--by appointment--to see Dr Carl Hansen, who was then giving hypnotic treatment, and also doing some work in demonstrations for the Society for Psychical Research. Dr Hansen tried in vain to put either Dr Theodore Covernton or myself under the influence, so was obliged to have recourse to his wife. Naturally this was considered a "_most suspicious circ.u.mstance_" by my companion; but I noticed that he was very much interested in his conversation with her--from the medical point of view--and he was sufficiently honest to admit that he could not explain what happened in his presence, upon any normal hypothesis.

CHAPTER V

INDIA, 1890-1891

In the month of November 1890 I started with a young friend for my first visit to India.

My companion was still at the age when social India was naturally more interesting to her than either the historical or mystical aspects of the country. And, for myself, I went there in those days rather to see the glorious buildings of a magnificent Past, than with any view of wresting occult secrets from the Fakirs and Yogis of the Present.

It was well perhaps that one's ambitions were so limited by the Possible, for I am very much inclined to think that Mystic India is and must remain a sealed book for the English.

We must always remember the natural prejudices of a conquered race towards the conqueror. In addition to this, the Hindoostanees consider (and who shall say without ample cause?) that Englishmen are hopelessly "_borne_" and sunk in materialism, incapable of exercising an imagination which they don't possess; with a top dressing of conventional orthodoxy, so far as their own special religion is concerned, but with nothing but ridicule or thinly veiled contempt for the religious channels through which other races may be taking their spiritual food. We have given them only too much reason for these conclusions.

As a consequence of this state of things, Englishmen and women are looked upon as "quite impossible" from the Indian point of view, and a devout and educated Hindoo would no more think of discussing his transcendental ideas with such people than we should think of discussing delicate questions of Art--in its various branches--with the first village yokel we happened to meet in the road. I was confirmed in these ideas by noticing the difference in the welcome accorded to a charming young Swedish lady, whom we met at Benares on her wedding tour. She had brought excellent native introductions from her own country, where certain Rajahs and Maharajahs had been entertained by her King, and thanks to these, and, as she said, "_to the fact of my not being English_," she had access to many interesting places, and took part in interesting functions, from which the rest of us were debarred.

I am hoping to pay a third visit to India some day, with the special object in view of occult investigation. It remains to be seen whether, by any fortunate accident, I may then be more successful in encountering anything more interesting than the ordinary clever conjurers, who sometimes pose as Fakirs, and may be found by the tourist on every hotel veranda in India.

Meanwhile I am limited by the t.i.tle of my book to personal incidents, as to which I find one or two notes in my Indian diary.

Making the usual tour, but including Lah.o.r.e--where my brother had lived at Government House for several years as Military Secretary to Sir Robert Egerton (who was in _his_ day), Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab--we came in due course to Delhi.

Our first day there was devoted to tracing Mutiny relics of all kinds, and about four P.M. in the afternoon we drove out to the famous Ridge to see the Mutiny Memorial. This, as most people nowadays know, is a red standstone tower, with staircase of rough stone inside, and small windows pierced through at varying intervals. It stands upon an extensive marble flooring, which is inscribed with the names of the various regiments--officers and men--who took part in the renowned siege, and died for their country in consequence.

As we drove towards the Memorial, the whole place seemed to be in a flutter of excitement. Hundreds of coolies were flocking round, and we both remarked how much more interested they appeared to be in these monuments of past events than the corresponding cla.s.s of English labourers would have been. But on arrival we found there was no question of intelligent historical interest. The fact was that a poor coolie--who had just climbed up the Memorial Tower by the inner staircase--had fallen out of one of the windows described, and was lying on the marble floor below, at the far side from us, crushed and dying. We were told that an Englishman had, fortunately, been present, and had driven off at once for a doctor. So nothing could be done for the poor man until the latter arrived.

Meanwhile our native servant--Bobajee--had, of course, rushed off to see what was to be seen of the tragedy, and, rather to my horror, my girl friend seemed about to follow his example! It was terrible to think of the poor man lying there in his death agony; but he was already surrounded by natives, and no real help could be given without fear of doing more harm than good before the doctor was brought to the spot.

Therefore merely to go and look on, without being able to succour, seemed to me an added horror to the tragedy, and I turned round rather sharply on my young friend, and expostulated with her. As a matter of fact, she did _not_ go; but I am obliged to mention the incident as accounting for a certain momentary excitement and annoyance on my part, which proved to be factors in the story about to be related.

Allowing for difference of time between Delhi and London, a very old friend of mine, Lady Wincote (who was then living in London, where I was in the habit of visiting her constantly when in town), was lying in bed, resting after a disturbed night, at the very hour of our visit to the Mutiny Memorial.

It was about noon in England; she was fully awake, and had been reading.

Looking at her watch she realised it was time to make a move if she meant to come down for luncheon. Suddenly the door opened, and _I_ walked into her bedroom, and right round the bed, until I stood between her and the window, which was to her left as she lay in bed.

I was dressed in ordinary outdoor attire, and seemed much excited and annoyed about something. I was talking continuously, as it seemed to her; but she could not make out any connected sentences, and "wondered what had upset me" so much. She spoke to me, asking what had happened; but I took no notice of her questions, standing with my face to the window and my back to her for a few moments. Then I turned round, and deliberately retraced my steps, past the ottoman, skirting round the bed, and was just disappearing through the door, when she made a final effort to attract my attention, asking a very practical question:

"Emmie! Do tell me before you go, what number you are staying at in Oxford Terrace" (the part of town where I always stayed at that time).

Lady Wincote said: "You made no answer at all, but whisked out of the door in a great hurry, and then for the first time I remembered _that you were in India_. It had all seemed so natural, as you had often been in my bedroom, that I only thought at the moment that you must have returned unexpectedly to London from the country. My one anxiety was to know which number on the Terrace would find you, in case you had changed your address there."

Now all this was, fortunately, written out to me by my friend on the very day that it happened--_i.e._ 8th January 1891--and _crossed my letter to her telling her of the incident_. My letter was written a day or two later I think; but I was keeping a strict diary at the time, and under date of 8th January have the record of the event, corresponding with the date of Lady Wincote's letter to me.[3]

[3] Both my diary and Lady Wincote's letter were shown to Mr Myers on my return to England, also my letter which crossed the one from Lady Wincote to me. He was greatly interested in the account.

Probably in any case I should have written to tell this friend of the incident, on account of a conversation I had with Bobajee when he returned from his ghastly entertainment. I had looked inside the Memorial, and had seen that the stone steps were crumbling away and looked very unsafe, so when he came back and said: "_Something bad inside there, Lady Sahib_," I concluded naturally that he was referring to the state of the staircase, and attributing the poor coolie's fall to some such cause.

But he denied this strenuously: "_No! no! Lady Sahib--some bad debil inside there. He threw coolie over!_" Then he went on to tell us that on one special night in the year no native man, woman, or child in the whole city could be induced to pa.s.s the Mutiny Memorial at midnight. The few daring souls who _had_ pa.s.sed there, had found the tower all lighted up inside, and the Sepoys and the British soldiers had come back, and were fighting their battles over again! The man spoke in simple good faith, and a.s.sured me that all Delhi people knew this to be a fact, and gave the place a wide berth on that anniversary.

The idea of the "bad debil" throwing the poor coolie down from the top of the tower, followed by this curious legend, interested me as a bit of folk-lore, but my companion was drastic in her remarks. "Silly nonsense, Bobajee!" was her reception of the story; and this made me feel intensely sorry for the moment, that Lady Wincote, who would have been as much interested as myself, should not have been present. Did this moment of intense desire for her, project itself into the appearance she saw in her room? Who can say? Certainly it was a curious coincidence that she should see me in an annoyed and excited state just when I was feeling annoyed and excited--so many thousand miles away.

Delhi seems to have been specially favourable to psychic experiences, for I find another one recorded on the very day succeeding the last event.

My friend, having some slight ailment, I had driven out alone with our native servant, and we made a long tour, returning about six P.M. past Ludlow Castle, of famous Mutiny memory, and still--in the year 1891--a Government bungalow.

The present Czar of Russia was travelling through India at the time as Czarewitch, with his cousin, Prince George of Greece, and they were expected to arrive in Delhi that same evening. The Royal party and suite were to be lodged at Ludlow Castle, and were expected within an hour.

Bobajee jumped off the box of my carriage, and urged me to "go look, see!"

"No, Bobajee! Drive on--can't go look see--they no let me in."

"Yes, yes, Lady Sahib," he said eagerly--"everything ready--all gone away--n.o.body in there yet."

With our English notions this seems inconceivable, but it proved to be absolutely true. I went in, expecting to be turned back ignominiously before I had crossed the hall, but there was positively no one there!

The place was like a City of the Dead. Yet within an hour, a banquet arranged for about seventy people was to take place! I made the best of my opportunity, ranged through the numerous bedrooms--with hanging j.a.panese blinds shutting them off and each one inscribed with the card of the special Russian or Greek general who formed part of the suite. At length I strolled into the dining-room--a long, narrow room--arranged for the coming festivity (at least sixty to seventy covers were laid), the flowers arranged on the tablecloth in the pretty, artistic Indian fas.h.i.+on, all the beautiful gla.s.s and silver placed in readiness.

Nothing was wanting but the presence of the guests for whom all this preparation had been made.

The short Indian twilight was already upon us as I stood there for a moment, contrasting the dead and almost eerie silence, with the lights and laughter that would so quickly replace it.

A fireplace was close to me as I stood at the far end of the room, looking down the whole length of the table. Glancing up, I realised that the only picture in the room was hung over this fireplace. The picture in question had no artistic value--the painting was flat and poor; even the subject did not strike me for the first moment as anything very remarkable. It was the portrait of a man in the prime of life--about thirty-five, I should have supposed--with the long whiskers and rather prim pose of a portrait made by an evidently poor artist, probably thirty or forty years previous to my visit.

But as I looked again, a curious sensation came over me. In spite of the painter's failure to convey anything more like a living man than a dead pressed rose is like a living rose, there was something in the eyes of the portrait that held me, something that rose triumphant above the artist's limitations. At the same moment I was conscious of a Presence behind my back; of _somebody who was looking at the picture with me_; of somebody who was saying to me (not with the outer, but an inner voice): "_That is a picture of me, but I am not there--I am here, close to you; behind your shoulder--I am looking at it with you._"

The impression was so strong that it seemed almost as if a hand were pressing on my shoulder. I turned round involuntarily, but no one was there. Then I looked at the picture again, and always with the same weird sensation that the man whom the picture represented had been strong enough to make me feel his actual presence in the room, although I could see nothing. There was no name on the picture of either subject or artist, no possible clue to ident.i.ty, and looked at as a picture alone, there was nothing in the flat, conventional presentment of the features to account for my experience. This made it the more remarkable.

I could scarcely tear myself away from the almost overwhelming sense of the presence of some strong and strangely magnetic personality, but the fast fading twilight warned me not to risk an ignominious retreat. So I went hurriedly through the large and handsome drawing-room, which was filled with portraits, chiefly of deceased governors and generals, many of them admirably painted, and a striking contrast to the one poor and commonplace picture already seen.

The absolute incongruity between the impression received and the object which roused it, led me to make inquiries, in spite of my friend's jokes over my powers of imagination.

"Anyway, I am going to clear this up," I said with determination; and in a few days my perseverance was rewarded, and my impression amply justified, by finding that I had been looking at the portrait--feeble and poor as it was--of _Brigadier-General Nicholson_.

None of my readers need to be told that if any dead man could impress himself upon the living, this would be the man capable of such a feat.

Even to this day there is a small religious sect in India called the _Nicholasain_, who have handed down the memory of this "G.o.d rather than man," who had to dismount from his horse occasionally, to thrash his would-be wors.h.i.+ppers, and put a stop to their inconvenient adoration!