Jewel Weed. Alice Ames Winter
the body of the young friend who sits beside you. I could show you—even you, whose eyes are covered with a film—I could show you! But no! It is too petty to demonstrate by a show.”
He moved a step backward and looked in a half-questioning way at the silent group in front.
“Perhaps,” he murmured hesitatingly, “perhaps it is by childish methods that one must teach the child.”
He muttered a few unknown words with his eyes still fixed on guilty Dick Percival, then he turned to Mr. Early.
“My kind host,” he said with a courteous gesture, “will you permit that I show to the unbelieving young gentleman an astral body?”
He turned and strode away toward dimness dimmer than that of the great hall, in the direction of that wing where rooms had been assigned him. A little rustle of pleased anticipation ran through the petticoats of the room. Interest ceased to be perfunctory and became genuine. This was more fun than doctrine, after all. Who wouldn’t be gratified at the chance of meeting an astral body—at least in a crowd? Alone, in a dark room, at midnight, it might prove less enjoyable.
Presently the Hindu returned, carrying in his hand a strangely twisted retort and something that looked like a primitive brazier.
“Look,” he said, “let us take some simple thing. I shall destroy the body of flesh and show you the body of shadow. I see roses in the strange jar yonder. You call them American beauties? Yes. Very well, I shall show you the ghost of an American beauty. Perhaps the unbelieving young gentleman will pluck one for me.”
Dick rose, pulled one of the flowers from among its fellows and handed it across heads to the Swami, who took it gravely.
“Even this simple form of life,” he explained, “has its astral existence. With seeing eyes it would be visible to you now, hidden inside the flesh of the flower. In order to make it the plainer, I shall destroy the body of the blossom and leave its spirit. That spirit you shall see. Look, I lay this beautiful rose upon this metal plate and cover it that the heat may be more intense. I consume it with the flame until the fire devours its shape and leaves only its ashes.”
A tense silence fell upon the waiting room, as Ram Juna thrust the covered rose into the brazier. At last he lifted the cover and displayed a little gray shapeless heap.
“The rose is dead,” he observed quietly. He turned now toward the glass phial, in the bottom of which lay a few grains of pinkish dust. Into this he poured the ashes of the burned flower. He lifted it high in air and surveyed it.
“The rose is dead,” he repeated, “but under the right conditions you shall see what we may call its ghost. See. A gentle warmth. I hold it not too close to the devouring flame. A gentle warmth.”
Those at the back of the room were rising now to peer over the hats of the more fortunate in front, but the hush remained unbroken. The dark eyes of the Hindu were bent on the glass before him, and a mystical smile played about his mouth.
In the bottom of the retort, in the bluish heap, began a movement, as though something alive were striving to free itself from bonds and rise. It heaved and struggled in the dusty mass, grew stronger, and instead of a shapeless writhing there came an upshooting pyramid, which gradually took upon itself form. A ghostly apparition of stem, of leaves, of a dusky red rose, grew more and more distinct until it glowed from its prison of glass, and Ram Juna smiled.
“The rose is dead!” he said for the third time.
A gasp of appreciation and awe passed through the room. The Swami turned to Dick Percival.
“That which I know, I speak,” he said simply.
Then with a sudden abrupt movement he shook the phial away from the warmth and held it up.
“Now only the poor body of ashes is within,” he went on. “The spirit is truly fled, until it shall find itself another incarnation, and we say that the flower is for ever dead. What then is this death with which we play and which plays with us? But I weary you with my too long discourse. Give me your pardon. I shall no more.”
There rose the sound of moving skirts and loosening tongues. The spell of oriental mysticism was broken and this became but one of many entertaining things to be chattered about in moods that varied from credulity to amusement. The ordinary reception atmosphere took possession, and the tinkle of animated feminine voices filled the air.
On the outskirts of the throng, which pressed forward to greet the host and to press the fingers of the seer, lingered the two young men, one of whom had stirred the unstirrable. Norris looked vaguely around as at unknown faces, and Dick nodded in this or that direction in that offhand manner which invites people to keep their distance rather than to seek further intercourse, but the woman who was handsome and thirty refused to be held at arm’s length.
“How-do, Mr. Percival? Glad to see you back. You have the genius of distinction, even in small things. How natural that the Swami should single you out for notice and so announce your home-coming to the world!”
“Is this the world?”
“Our little world,” Mrs. Appleton laughed; and as she spoke she peered curiously at Norris with the air of a naturalist who needs as many specimens of young men as possible for her collection. Dick smiled, whether with amusement or with cordiality it would be impossible to say.
“Mrs. Appleton, may I introduce Mr. Norris, who has come here as a new citizen. Apart from other considerations, we are grateful to anybody that swells the census, aren’t we?”
“So glad!” she murmured. “Mr. Percival must bring you to my lawn-party next week.”
But even while Norris expressed his thanks, Dick’s eyes wandered, until, with a cheerful start, he caught his companion’s arm.
“There she is, Ellery,” he said. “This way.”
Norris knew in his heart that he was waiting for that summons, and he turned and followed as Percival began a slow progress through the crowd toward that uncompromising stiff-lined bench of the kind that Mr. Early affected, where sat the girl like a cameo, beside a woman somewhat older than herself.
The younger woman lifted her eyes and caught from afar the greeting of the advancing men. That there should be no sudden illumination, no swift blush in her nod of recognition, gave Dick a slight feeling of irritation. He had regarded a little polite display of delight as in some way his right. But if she was undemonstrative, she had the virtues of her failing, for there was a certain serenity even in the broad curve with which her hair clung to her temples, and in the over-crowded room her smile was as refreshing as a draft from a cool spring. Both of these women were marked by a repose of manner which distinguished them from the eager crowd that was pushing toward the latest new apostle. It was the elder who put out a welcoming hand.
“Ah, Dick,” she said, “you are at home at last. How good it is to see you! When did you come?”
“Last night. Mother sent me over here to-day with the promise that I should see you—and Madeline.” His eyes traveled to the girl beyond. “And this, Mrs. Lenox, Miss Elton, is my good friend, Norris. You already know that we were lovely together in college, and in life we hope not to be divided. You’ll be good to him, won’t you?”
In Mrs. Lenox’s greeting there was that mixture of kindliness with shrewd instant analysis that becomes a habit with women of the world, and Norris stiffened with fresh realization that he was raw and unaccustomed to her suave atmosphere. He would have liked to be his best self before Percival’s friends, and he felt like an oyster. Even the gentle eyes of Miss Elton seemed to measure him. Fortunately they thought chiefly of Dick, and when did Dick’s facile tongue fail him?
“Of course this would be the first spot on which to reappear. No one but Mr. Early would dare to give a reception in July,” Mrs. Lenox exclaimed.
“And the absurd thing,” Dick retorted, “is that you all come—back into town, leaving birds and waters—at