The Jewel of Seven Stars by Bram Stoker (books to read in your 20s TXT) 📕

the last few days. At first they all crowded in upon me in a

jumbled mass; but again the habit of mind of my working life prevailed,

and they took order. I found it now easier to control myself; for there

was something to grasp, some work to be done; though it was of a sorry

kind, for it was or might be antagonistic to Margaret. But Margaret was

herself at stake! I was thinking of her and fighting for her; and yet

if I were to work in the dark, I might be even harmful to her. My first

weapon in her defence was truth. I must know and understand; I might

then be able to act. Certainly, I could not act beneficently without a

just conception and recognition of the facts. Arranged in order these

were as follows:

 

Firstly: the strange likeness of Queen Tera to Margaret who had been

born in another country a thousand miles away, where her mother could

not possibly have had even a passing knowledge of her appearance.

 

Secondly: the disappearance of Van Huyn’s book when I had read up to

the description of the Star Ruby.

 

Thirdly: the finding of the lamps in the boudoir. Tera with her astral

body could have unlocked the door of Corbeck’s room in the hotel, and

have locked it again after her exit with the lamps. She could in the

same way have opened the window, and put the lamps in the boudoir. It

need not have been that Margaret in her own person should have had any

hand in this; but—but it was at least strange.

 

Fourthly: here the suspicions of the Detective and the Doctor came back

to me with renewed force, and with a larger understanding.

 

Fifthly: there were the occasions on which Margaret foretold with

accuracy the coming occasions of quietude, as though she had some

conviction or knowledge of the intentions of the astral-bodied Queen.

 

Sixthly: there was her suggestion of the finding of the Ruby which her

father had lost. As I thought now afresh over this episode in the light

of suspicion in which her own powers were involved, the only conclusion

I could come to was—always supposing that the theory of the Queen’s

astral power was correct—that Queen Tera being anxious that all should

go well in the movement from London to Kyllion had in her own way taken

the Jewel from Mr. Trelawny’s pocket-book, finding it of some use in her

supernatural guardianship of the journey. Then in some mysterious way

she had, through Margaret, made the suggestion of its loss and finding.

 

Seventhly, and lastly, was the strange dual existence which Margaret

seemed of late to be leading; and which in some way seemed a consequence

or corollary of all that had gone before.

 

The dual existence! This was indeed the conclusion which overcame all

difficulties and reconciled opposites. If indeed Margaret were not in

all ways a free agent, but could be compelled to speak or act as she

might be instructed; or if her whole being could be changed for another

without the possibility of any one noticing the doing of it, then all

things were possible. All would depend on the spirit of the

individuality by which she could be so compelled. If this individuality

were just and kind and clean, all might be well. But if not! … The

thought was too awful for words. I ground my teeth with futile rage, as

the ideas of horrible possibilities swept through me.

 

Up to this morning Margaret’s lapses into her new self had been few and

hardly noticeable, save when once or twice her attitude towards myself

had been marked by a bearing strange to me. But today the contrary was

the case; and the change presaged badly. It might be that that other

individuality was of the lower, not of the better sort! Now that I

thought of it I had reason to fear. In the history of the mummy, from

the time of Van Huyn’s breaking into the tomb, the record of deaths that

we knew of, presumably effected by her will and agency, was a startling

one. The Arab who had stolen the hand from the mummy; and the one who

had taken it from his body. The Arab chief who had tried to steal the

Jewel from Van Huyn, and whose throat bore the marks of seven fingers.

The two men found dead on the first night of Trelawny’s taking away the

sarcophagus; and the three on the return to the tomb. The Arab who had

opened the secret serdab. Nine dead men, one of them slain manifestly

by the Queen’s own hand! And beyond this again the several savage

attacks on Mr. Trelawny in his own room, in which, aided by her

Familiar, she had tried to open the safe and to extract the Talisman

jewel. His device of fastening the key to his wrist by a steel bangle,

though successful in the end, had wellnigh cost him his life.

 

If then the Queen, intent on her resurrection under her own conditions

had, so to speak, waded to it through blood, what might she not do were

her purpose thwarted? What terrible step might she not take to effect

her wishes? Nay, what were her wishes; what was her ultimate purpose?

As yet we had had only Margaret’s statement of them, given in all the

glorious enthusiasm of her lofty soul. In her record there was no

expression of love to be sought or found. All we knew for certain was

that she had set before her the object of resurrection, and that in it

the North which she had manifestly loved was to have a special part.

But that the resurrection was to be accomplished in the lonely tomb in

the Valley of the Sorcerer was apparent. All preparations had been

carefully made for accomplishment from within, and for her ultimate exit

in her new and living form. The sarcophagus was unlidded. The oil jars,

though hermetically sealed, were to be easily opened by hand; and in

them provision was made for shrinkage through a vast period of time.

Even flint and steel were provided for the production of flame. The

Mummy Pit was left open in violation of usage; and beside the stone door

on the cliff side was fixed an imperishable chain by which she might in

safety descend to earth. But as to what her after intentions were we had

no clue. If it was that she meant to begin life again as a humble

individual, there was something so noble in the thought that it even

warmed my heart to her and turned my wishes to her success.

 

The very idea seemed to endorse Margaret’s magnificent tribute to her

purpose, and helped to calm my troubled spirit.

 

Then and there, with this feeling strong upon me, I determined to warn

Margaret and her father of dire possibilities; and to await, as well

content as I could in my ignorance, the development of things over which

I had no power.

 

I returned to the house in a different frame of mind to that in which I

had left it; and was enchanted to find Margaret—the old Margaret—

waiting for me.

 

After dinner, when I was alone for a time with the father and daughter,

I opened the subject, though with considerable hesitation:

 

“Would it not be well to take every possible precaution, in case the

Queen may not wish what we are doing, with regard to what may occur

before the Experiment; and at or after her waking, if it comes off?”

Margaret’s answer came back quickly; so quickly that I was convinced she

must have had it ready for some one:

 

“But she does approve! Surely it cannot be otherwise. Father is doing,

with all his brains and all his energy and all his great courage, just

exactly what the great Queen had arranged!”

 

“But,” I answered, “that can hardly be. All that she arranged was in a

tomb high up in a rock, in a desert solitude, shut away from the world

by every conceivable means. She seems to have depended on this isolation

to insure against accident. Surely, here in another country and age,

with quite different conditions, she may in her anxiety make mistakes

and treat any of you—of us—as she did those others in times gone past.

Nine men that we know of have been slain by her own hand or by her

instigation. She can be remorseless if she will.” It did not strike me

till afterwards when I was thinking over this conversation, how

thoroughly I had accepted the living and conscious condition of Queen

Tera as a fact. Before I spoke, I had feared I might offend Mr.

Trelawny; but to my pleasant surprise he smiled quite genially as he

answered me:

 

“My dear fellow, in a way you are quite right. The Queen did

undoubtedly intend isolation; and, all told, it would be best that her

experiment should be made as she arranged it. But just think, that

became impossible when once the Dutch explorer had broken into her tomb.

That was not my doing. I am innocent of it, though it was the cause of

my setting out to rediscover the sepulchre. Mind, I do not say for a

moment that I would not have done just the same as Van Huyn. I went

into the tomb from curiosity; and I took away what I did, being fired

with the zeal of acquisitiveness which animates the collector. But,

remember also, that at this time I did not know of the Queen’s intention

of resurrection; I had no idea of the completeness of her preparations.

All that came long afterwards. But when it did come, I have done all

that I could to carry out her wishes to the full. My only fear is that

I may have misinterpreted some of her cryptic instructions, or have

omitted or overlooked something. But of this I am certain; I have left

undone nothing that I can imagine right to be done; and I have done

nothing that I know of to clash with Queen Tera’s arrangement. I want

her Great Experiment to succeed. To this end I have not spared labour

or time or money—or myself. I have endured hardship, and braved danger.

All my brains; all my knowledge and learning, such as they are; all my

endeavours such as they can be, have been, are, and shall be devoted to

this end, till we either win or lose the great stake that we play for.”

 

“The great stake?” I repeated; “the resurrection of the woman, and the

woman’s life? The proof that resurrection can be accomplished; by

magical powers; by scientific knowledge; or by use of some force which

at present the world does not know?”

 

Then Mr. Trelawny spoke out the hopes of his heart which up to now he

had indicated rather than expressed. Once or twice I had heard Corbeck

speak of the fiery energy of his youth; but, save for the noble words of

Margaret when she had spoken of Queen Tera’s hope—which coming from his

daughter made possible a belief that her power was in some sense due to

heredity—I had seen no marked sign of it. But now his words, sweeping

before them like a torrent all antagonistic thought, gave me a new idea

of the man.

 

“‘A woman’s life!’ What is a woman’s life in the scale with what we

hope for! Why, we are risking already a woman’s life; the dearest life

to me in all the world, and that grows more dear with every hour that

passes. We are risking as well the lives of four men; yours and my own,

as well as those two