Horacio Quiroga: El conductor del rápido

Desde 1905 hasta 1925 han ingresado en el Hospicio de las Mercedes 108 maquinistas atacados de alienación mental

Cierta mañana llegó al manicomio un hombre escuálido, de rostro macilento, que se tenía malamente en pie. Estaba cubierto de andrajos y articulaba tan mal sus palabras que era necesario descubrir lo que decía. Y, sin embargo, según afirmaba con cierto alarde su mujer al internarlo, ese maquinista había guiado su máquina hasta pocas horas antes.

En un momento dado de aquel lapso de tiempo, un señalero y un cambista alienados trabajaban en la misma línea y al mismo tiempo que dos conductores, también alienados.

Es hora, pues, dados los copiosos hechos apuntados, de meditar ante las actitudes fácilmente imaginables en que podría incurrir un maquinista alienado que conduce un tren.

Tal es lo que leo en una revista de criminología, psiquiatría y medicina legal, que tengo bajo mis ojos mientras me desayuno.

Perfecto. Yo soy uno de esos maquinistas. Más aun: soy conductor del rápido del Continental. Leo, pues, el anterior estudio con una atención también fácilmente imaginable.

Hombres, mujeres, niños, niñitos, presidentes y estabiloques: desconfiad de los psiquiatras como de toda policía. Ellos ejercen el contralor mental de la humanidad, y ganan con ello: ¡ojo! Yo no conozco las estadísticas de alienación en el personal de los hospicios; pero no cambio los posibles trastornos que mi locomotora con un loco a horcajadas pudiera discurrir por los caminos, con los de cualquier deprimido psiquiatra al frente de un manicomio.

D.H. Lawrence: The Rocking-Horse Winner

There was a woman who was beautiful, who started with all the advantages, yet she had no luck. She married for love, and the love turned to dust. She had bonny children, yet she felt they had been thrust upon her, and she could not love them. They looked at her coldly, as if they were finding fault with her. And hurriedly she felt she must cover up some fault in herself. Yet what it was that she must cover up she never knew. Nevertheless, when her children were present, she always felt the centre of her heart go hard. This troubled her, and in her manner she was all the more gentle and anxious for her children, as if she loved them very much. Only she herself knew that at the centre of her heart was a hard little place that could not feel love, no, not for anybody. Everybody else said of her: "She is such a good mother. She adores her children." Only she herself, and her children themselves, knew it was not so. They read it in each other's eyes.

There were a boy and two little girls. They lived in a pleasant house, with a garden, and they had discreet servants, and felt themselves superior to anyone in the neighbourhood.

Although they lived in style, they felt always an anxiety in the house. There was never enough money. The mother had a small income, and the father had a small income, but not nearly enough for the social position which they had to keep up. The father went in to town to some office. But though he had good prospects, these prospects never materialized. There was always the grinding sense of the shortage of money, though the style was always kept up.

At last the mother said: "I will see if I can't make something." But she did not know where to begin. She racked her brains, and tried this thing and the other, but could not find anything successful. The failure made deep lines come into her face. Her children were growing up, they would have to go to school. There must be more money, there must be more money. The father, who was always very handsome and expensive in his tastes, seemed as if he never would be able to do anything worth doing. And the mother, who had a great belief in herself, did not succeed any better, and her tastes were just as expensive.

José de la Colina: La ley de la herencia

Durante más de diez años habíamos vivido sin problemas en este edificio habitado por empleados gubernamentales o profesores de escuela como yo hasta que un día en el terreno baldío que se ve desde la ventana de nuestro piso apareció una vieja y esquelética mendiga despiojándose al sol y como nos dios lástima le llevábamos por las noches mi mujer o yo las sobras de nuestra comida a aquel lugar de muebles despanzurrados y maquinarias paralíticas y latas herrumbrosas y ratas furtivas y la mendiga se arrojaba al plato de cartón apenas lo poníamos en el suelo y devoraba el contenido lanzando temerosas miradas a un lado y a otro como si alguien fuese a robarla pero al poco tiempo ya no se resignaba a esperarnos y poco después de caer la noche la oíamos subir la escalera con sus pies pesados y tocaba a nuestra puerta y gemía larga y rítmicamente si tardábamos en abrir y presentarle lo que sin duda ya consideraba un obligado tributo y así una noche tras otra y a veces nos hundíamos en la habitación más retirada conteniendo el aliento y mi mujer apretándose temblorosa contra mi pecho mientras la mendiga permanecía allá junto a la puerta del departamento lloriqueando sin pausa y mecánicamente de modo que como temíamos el escándalo de los vecinos, terminábamos saliendo y dándole la pitanza bajando los ojos ante los suyos resentidos o irónicos y ella se alejaba envolviendo el plato en su raída y remendada y sucia capa bajo cuyo peso se inclinaba y así inexorablemente por no sabemos cuánto tiempo hasta que los vecinos que ya se quejaban mucho ante nosotros hicieron que la policía se llevara a la mendiga y con algun remordimiento nos sentimos exentos de aquella servidumbre sin prever que una semana después se presentaría un hombre con aspecto de pulcro burócrata que decía venir de cierta Sociedad y nos entregó una caja con unos sucios andrajos que fácilmente reconocimos sobretodo por la remendada caja y nos hizo firmar un recibo informándonos de que éramos depositarios de esos bienes y no lo entendimos del todo sino hasta unos días después cuando mi mujer se asomó a la ventana y lanzó un grito y empezó a llorar y yo me asomé y allí en el terreno baldío había otra mendiga tal vez menos vieja y menos flaca enteramente desnuda y rascándose las costras y mirando hacia nuestra ventana y entonces comprendimos que había que bajar llevando mi mujer el plato de sobras y yo la caja con los andrajos y que no serviría de nada cambiarse de casa ni de colonia ni de ciudad ni tal vez de país.

Gerald Kersh: Men without Bones

We were loading bananas into the Claire Dodge at Puerto Pobre, when a feverish little fellow came aboard. Everyone stepped aside to let him pass—even the soldiers who guard the port with nickel-plated Remington rifles, and who go barefoot but wear polished leather leggings. They stood back from him because they believed that he was afflicted-of-God, mad; harmless but dangerous; best left alone.

All the time the naphtha flares were hissing, and from the hold came the reverberation of the roaring voice of the foreman of the gang down below crying: "Fruta! Fruta! FRUTA!" The leader of the dock gang bellowed the same cry, throwing down stem after stem of brilliant green bananas. The occasion would be memorable for this, if for nothing else—the magnificence of the night, the bronze of the Negro foreman shining under the flares, the jade green of that fruit, and the mixed odors of the waterfront. Out of one stem of bananas ran a hairy grey spider, which frightened the crew and broke the banana-chain, until a Nicaraguan boy, with a laugh, killed it with his foot. It was harmless, he said.

It was about then that the madman came aboard, unhindered, and asked me: "Bound for where?"

He spoke quietly and in a carefully modulated voice; but there was a certain blank, lost look in his eyes that suggested to me that I keep within ducking distance of his restless hands which, now that I think of them, put me in mind of that gray, hairy, bird-eating spider.

"Mobile, Alabama," I said.

"Take me along?" he asked.

"None of my affair. Sorry. Passenger myself," I said. "The skipper's ashore. Better wait for him on the wharf. He's the boss."

"Would you happen, by any chance, to have a drink about you?"

Giving him some rum, I asked: "How come they let you aboard?"

Hernan Casciari: Ropa sucia

Ya de entrada caí mal parado. Vine al mundo justo el año en que todos éramos más pobres que de costumbre, cuando hasta los ricos y los catinga estaban también con hambre. A esa época después la iban a bautizar como el tiempo del quita y pon. Nací justo el año que el Gobierno mantuvo a la gente ocupada con el azadón para evitar los alborotos. Todos hacían trabajo inútil: los cabeza de familia, sus mujeres, y los hijos de ocho en adelante. Yo no hacía esos trabajos porque estaba recién nacido.

Mi papá y mis hermanos grandes, junto con otra mucha gente, salían por la mañana a poner baldosones de pasto en la plaza: le pagaban a cada uno cien sanmartines la media jornada. Cien sanmartines era el pan del día, o quince bambú sin filtro. Por la tarde, las mujeres y los críos estaban empleados para quitar de la plaza el pasto que habían puesto los hombres; debían echarlos en los canastos, a cincuenta sanmartines por tarde. Eran los mismos terrones manoseados que la otra mitad del pueblo colocaría de nuevo desde el día siguiente. Así una y otra vez.

El hermano que venía antes que yo iba a llamarse Gracián Galíndez, porque ya estaba planeado que llegase un 12 de agosto, que es san Gracián; pero nació muerto. Entonces me pusieron a mí el nombre, aunque nací el 3 de noviembre del otro año, y debí de haberme llamado Galindo Galíndez, que es mucho más sonoro. De todas maneras, Gracián o Galindo, el destino ya quería que todos me conocieran como el Rengo, por el problema que tengo en el talón.

Esa época de los terrones de pasto duró un año largo. El Gobierno no quería dar subsidios ni entregar los puros alimentos básicos porque temía que los más pobres, sin trabajo fijo ni actividad del cuerpo, se dieran al vino o a la insurrección. Por eso se crearon aquellos oficios de quita y pon, que así se llamaron, y que dieron que hablar mucho en la época que nací.

Mi mamá quiso que al menos dos de sus muchos hijos supieran leer y escribir, y ni el toto sabe los esfuerzos que hizo para mandarnos a clases, a la Eugenia y a mí. Su sacrificio no fue de dinero, puesto que la educación todavía era liberada, sino porque nosotros nos escondíamos para escaparle a la milonga de la escuela. Yo no sé por qué mi hermana fue tan retobada para ir a clases; mi desapego era a causa de las bromas de los otros. Eso de Rengo Galíndez me lo pusieron allí, y tuvieron que pasar muchos años, y una peste, para que me sonara afectuoso.

Ray Bradbury: The lake

The wave shut me off from the world, from the birds in the sky, the children on the beach, my mother on the shore. There was a moment of green silence. Then the wave gave me back to the sky, the sand, the children yelling. I came out of the lake and the world was waiting for me, having hardly moved since I went away.

I ran up on the beach.

Mama swabbed me with a furry towel. "Stand there and dry," she said.

I stood there, watching the sun take away the water beads on my arms. I replaced them with goose-pimples.

"My, there's a wind," said Mama. "Put on your sweater."

"Wait'll I watch my goose-bumps," I said.

"Harold," said Mama.

I put the sweater on and watched the waves come up and fall down on the beach. But not clumsily. On purpose, with a green sort of elegance. Even a drunken man could not collapse with such elegance as those waves.

It was September. In the last days when things are getting sad for no reason. The beach was so long and lonely with only about six people on it. The kids quit bouncing the ball because somehow the wind made them sad, too, whistling the way it did, and the kids sat down and felt autumn come along the endless shore.

All of the hot-dog stands were boarded up with strips of golden planking, sealing in all the mustard, onion, meat odors of the long, joyful summer. It was like nailing summer into a series of coffins. One by one the places slammed their covers down, padlocked their doors, and the wind came and touched the sand, blowing away all of the million footprints of July and August. It got so that now, in September, there was nothing but the mark of my rubber tennis shoes and Donald and Delaus Arnold's feet, down by the water curve.

Salomé Guadalupe Ingelmo: In vitro

La jaula está llena de sangre. Los cuerpos descuartizados, inmóviles, se desperdigan aquí y allá sobre el heno. Aún conservan el calor de cuando estaban vivos. Pero esa ficción no durará mucho tiempo. El pequeño Ray contempla horrorizado la monstruosa escena.

–Muchos roedores se comen a sus crías nada más nacer. Es la naturaleza, cariño –trata de consolarle su madre.

Pero él no está dispuesto a aceptarlo. Él no se conforma con acatar sumiso como la mayoría de sus compañeros. Y entonces surge en su mente la idea de hacer justicia, de vengar a esas pequeñas vidas mutiladas; de pervertir las normas tan arbitrariamente impuestas. De dar forma a otro mundo con el que compensar las carencias y errores de éste.

Ten cuidado con lo que deseas. O con lo que imaginas, advierte inútilmente la voz de su instinto.

“Para el siguiente número necesitaré un voluntario. Y ahora mi ayudante y yo, ante sus atónitos ojos, haremos desaparecer este elefante.”

“De mayor serás un estupendo ilusionista”, le felicita Blackstone tras el espectáculo. “Toma, te mereces un regalo. Se llama Tilly”. De regreso a casa, con la hermosa coneja blanca entre los brazos, el pequeño Ray comprende que su destino finalmente le ha encontrado.

En un momento de debilidad, los recuerdos de la infancia han distraído su atención. Pero la risa sofocada y el ruido amortiguado del cuerpo menudo gateando sobre la moqueta lo devuelven a la realidad. Él lo espera agazapado aún en algún lugar de la casa. Como siempre. Un padre no puede abandonar a sus hijos. Aunque un día éstos acaben comiéndoselo. El escritor está cansado; desde hace algún tiempo no puede prescindir de la silla de ruedas. Y aun así va en su busca. Sabe que será su último encuentro. En ese enfrentamiento, sólo puede quedar uno.

Ambrose Bierce: A Wireless Message

In the summer of 1896 Mr. William Holt, a wealthy manufacturer of Chicago, was living temporarily in a little town of central New York, the name of which the writer’s memory has not retained. Mr. Holt had had “trouble with his wife,” from whom he had parted a year before. Whether the trouble was anything more serious than “incompatibility of temper,” he is probably the only living person that knows: he is not addicted to the vice of confidences. Yet he has related the incident herein set down to at least one person without exacting a pledge of secrecy. He is now living in Europe.

One evening he had left the house of a brother whom he was visiting, for a stroll in the country. It may be assumed - whatever the value of the assumption in connection with what is said to have occurred - that his mind was occupied with reflections on his domestic infelicities and the distressing changes that they had wrought in his life.

Whatever may have been his thoughts, they so possessed him that he observed neither the lapse of time nor whither his feet were carrying him; he knew only that he had passed far beyond the town limits and was traversing a lonely region by a road that bore no resemblance to the one by which he had left the village. In brief, he was “lost.”

Realizing his mischance, he smiled; central New York is not a region of perils, nor does one long remain lost in it. He turned about and went back the way that he had come. Before he had gone far he observed that the landscape was growing more distinct - was brightening. Everything was suffused with a soft, red glow in which he saw his shadow projected in the road before him. “The moon is rising,” he said to himself. Then he remembered that it was about the time of the new moon, and if that tricksy orb was in one of its stages of visibility it had set long before. He stopped and faced about, seeking the source of the rapidly broadening light. As he did so, his shadow turned and lay along the road in front of him as before. The light still came from behind him. That was surprising; he could not understand. Again he turned, and again, facing successively to every point of the horizon. Always the shadow was before - always the light behind, “a still and awful red.”

Fernando Iwasaki: Ya no quiero a mi hermano

«Carlitos está aquí», dijo la médium con su voz de drácula, y de pronto se transformó y puso cara de buena. Entonces mamá le hizo muchas preguntas y el espíritu respondía a través de la señora. Seguro que era Carlitos porque sabía dónde estaba el robot y cuántas monedas había en su alcancía, dijo cuál era su postre favorito y también los nombres de sus amigos.

Cuando la médium nos miró haciendo las muecas de Carlitos papá empezó a llorar y mamá le pidió por favor, por favor que no se fuera. Las luces se apagaban y encendían, los cuadros se caían de las paredes y los vasos temblaban sobre la mesa. Me acuerdo que la señora se desmayó y que una luz atravesó a mamá como en las películas. «Carlitos está aquí», dijo con cara de felicidad.

Desde entonces hemos vuelto a compartir el cuarto y los juguetes, el ordenador y la Play-Station, pero la bicicleta no. Mamá quiere que sea bueno con Carlitos aunque me dé miedo. No me gusta su voz de drácula. Y además huele a vieja.

Irvin S. Cobb: Fishhead

IT GOES past the powers of my pen to try to describe Reelfoot Lake for you so that you, reading this, will get the picture of it in your mind as I have it in mine.

For Reelfoot Lake is like no other lake that I know anything about. It is an after-thought of Creation.

The rest of this continent was made and had dried in the sun for thousands of years-millions of years, for all I know-before Reelfoot came to be. It's the newest big thing in nature on this hemisphere, probably, for it was formed by the great earthquake of 1811.

That earthquake of 1811 surely altered the face of the earth on the then far frontier of this country.

It changed the course of rivers, it converted hills into what are now the sunk lands of three states, and it turned the solid ground to jelly and made it roll in waves like the sea.

And in the midst of the retching of the land and the vomiting of the waters it depressed to varying depths a section of the earth crust sixty miles long, taking it down -- trees, hills, hollows, and all, and a crack broke through to the Mississippi River so that for three days the river ran up stream, filling the hole.

The result was the largest lake south of the Ohio, lying mostly in Tennessee, but extending up across what is now the Kentucky line, and taking its name from a fancied resemblance in its outline to the splay, reeled foot of a cornfield negro. Niggerwool Swamp, not so far away, may have got its name from the same man who christened Reelfoot: at least so it sounds.

Reelfoot is, and has always been, a lake of mystery.

In places it is bottomless. Other places the skeletons of the cypress-trees that went down when the earth sank, still stand upright so that if the sun shines from the right quarter, and the water is less muddy than common, a man, peering face downward into its depths, sees, or thinks he sees, down below him the bare top-limbs upstretching like drowned men's fingers, all coated with the mud of years and bandaged with pennons of the green lake slime.

Verónica Murguía: El ángel de Nicolás

(Y Jacob llamó aquél lugar Panuel o sea
Cara de Dios, pues dijo:"He visto a Dios
cara a cara y aún estoy vivo."
(Génesis 32,31)

Mi vida ha sido agitada. Fui testigo de cómo el cielo de Constantinopla se oscureció a mediodía cuando la madre del emperador, Irene la ateniense, ordenó cegarlo en la habitación misma en la que lo había parido. El sol se ocultó entonces en un súbito anochecer. En la ciudad se escuchó un grande y amargo clamor. Hombres y mujeres se postraron y mientras se desgarraban las ropas y se arrancaban los cabellos, suplicaban llorando al Señor que tuviera piedad de Constantinopla. Tal vez esas mismas palabras pronunciaba en ese momento el emperador en su palacio, mientras de hinojos, rogaba a su madre que no le pusiera la espada ardiente sobre los párpados.

En los cuarteles los soldados encendieron las antorchas con manos trémulas; en los templos los monjes oraban de bruces en el suelo y observaban de reojo los cirios para ver de cuántas horas de luz disponían. Pero la oscuridad duró poco.

Las campanas de la iglesia de los Santos Apóstoles repicaron agradecidas cuando el sol salió de nuevo. El emperador Constantino no volvió a ver la luz.

Hay quien dice que ese día las naves de todas las naciones equivocaron su rumbo; el Mármara se convirtió —mientras duró esa noche breve y terrible—en una charca descomunal de pez negra. Creo que es verdad, y que Irene, confundida por las turbias razones que el eunuco Estoraquio derramaba en su oído, creyó que la suma de su eunuco y ella misma igualarían la fuerza de un hombre y adoptó el título de basileus.

Si Estoraquio no hubiese sido un eunuco, los soldados lo habríamos seguido hasta el trono.

Luché al lado de sus hombres en Macedonia, y demostró ser un general valeroso y despiadado.

Pero era incompleto.

En la Pascua del año del gracia de 799, fui a buscar a una siciliana de la que me había encaprichado a un burdel cercano al palacio. Habíamos bebido muchas copas de vino especiado y el ruido del cortejo nos despertó apenas. Como en un sueño me asomé a la ventana y vi, iluminada por la luz azul de alba, a la madre del emperador en un carro de oro cuyas ruedas opacaba el polvo amarillo que los cascos de su cuadriga levantaba. La seguían sus soldados, los hombres de Estoraquio y una multitud que gritaba y lloraba. Ella misma conducía la cuadriga imperial, formada por caballos blancos. Salí a mirarla, incrédulo. Irene cumplía con el rito imperial como si hubiera nacido varón en lugar de mujer: vestía de púrpura y arrojaba las monedas de oro adornadas con su perfil a los pobres.

Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu: Mr. Justice Harbottle

PROLOGUE

ON this case Doctor Hesselius has inscribed nothing more than the words, "Harman's Report," and a simple reference to his own extraordinary Essay on "The Interior Sense, and the Conditions of the Opening thereof."

The reference is to Vol. I, Section 317, Note Za. The note to which reference is thus made, simply says: "There are two accounts of the remarkable case of the Honourable Mr. Justice Harbottle, one furnished to me by Mrs. Trimmer, of Tunbridge Wells (June, 1805); the other at a much later date, by Anthony Harman, Esq. I much prefer the former; in the first place, because it is minute and detailed, and written, it seems to me, with more caution and knowledge; and in the next, because the letters from Dr. Hedstone, which are embodied in it, furnish matter of the highest value to a right apprehension of the nature of the case. It was one of the best declared cases of an opening of the interior sense which I have met with. It was affected too by the phenomenon which occurs so frequently as to indicate a law of these eccentric conditions; that is to say, it exhibited what I may term the contagious character of this sort of intrusion of the spirit-world upon the proper domain of matter. So soon as the spirit-action has established itself in the case of one patient, its developed energy begins to radiate, more or less effectually, upon others. The interior vision of the child was opened; as was, also, that of its mother, Mrs. Pyneweck; and both the interior vision and hearing of the scullery-maid were opened on the same occasion. After-appearances are the result of the law explained in Vol. II, Sections 17 to 49. The common centre of association, simultaneously recalled, unites, or reunites, as the case may be, for a period measured, as we see, in Section 37. The maximum will extend to days, the minimum is little more than a second. We see the operation of this principle perfectly displayed, in certain cases of lunacy, of epilepsy, of catalepsy, and of mania, of a peculiar and painful character, though unattended by incapacity of business."

The memorandum of the case of Judge Harbottle, which was written by Mrs. Trimmer, of Tunbridge Wells, which Doctor Hesselius thought the better of the two, I have been unable to discover among his papers. I found in his escritoire a note to the effect that he had lent the Report of Judge Harbottle's case, written by Mrs. Trimmer, to Dr. F. Heyne. To that learned and able gentleman accordingly I wrote, and received from him, in his reply, which was full of alarms and regrets, on account of the uncertain safety of that "valuable MS.," a line written long since by Dr. Hesselius, which completely exonerated him, inasmuch as it acknowledged the safe return of the papers. The narrative of Mr. Harman is, therefore, the only one available for this collection. The late Dr. Hesselius, in another passage of the note that I have cited, says, "As to the facts (non-medical) of the case, the narrative of Mr. Harman exactly tallies with that furnished by Mrs. Trimmer." The strictly scientific view of the case would scarcely interest the popular reader; and, possibly, for the purposes of this selection, I should, even had I both papers to choose between, have referred that of Mr. Harman, which is given in full in the following pages.

María Teresa Andruetto: La mujer del moñito

Hacía poco tiempo que Longobardo había ganado la batalla de Silecia, cuando los príncipes de Isabela decidieron organizar un baile de disfraces en su honor.

El baile se haría la noche de Pentecostés, en las terrazas del Palacio Púrpura, y a él serían invitadas todas las mujeres del reino.

Longobardo decidió disfrazarse de corsario para no verse obligado a ocultar su voluntad intrépida y salvaje.

Con unas calzas verdes y una camisa de seda blanca que dejaba ver en parte el pecho victorioso, atravesó las colinas. Iba montando en una potra negra de corazón palpitante como el suyo.

Fue uno de los primeros en llegar. Como corresponde a un pirata, llevaba el ojo izquierdo cubierto por un parche. Con el ojo que le quedaba libre de tapujos, se dispuso a mirar a las jóvenes que llegaban ocultas tras los disfraces.

Entró una ninfa envuelta en gasas.

Entró una gitana morena.

Entró una mendiga cubierta de harapos.

Entró una campesina.

Entró una cortesana que tenía un vestido de terciopelo rojo apretado hasta la cintura y una falda levantada con enaguas de almidón.

Al pasar junto a Longobardo, le hizo una leve inclinación a manera de saludo. Eso fue suficiente para que él se decidiera a invitarla a bailar.

La cortesana era joven y hermosa. Y a diferencia de las otras mujeres, no llevaba joyas sino apenas una cinta negra que remataba en un moño en mitad del cuello.

Risas.

Confidencias.

Mazurcas.

Algernon Blackwood: The goblin's collection

Dutton accepted the invitation for the feeble reason that he was not quick enough at the moment to find a graceful excuse. He had none of that facile brilliance which is so useful at week-end parties; he was a big, shy, awkward man. Moreover, he disliked these great houses. They swallowed him. The solemn, formidable butlers oppressed him. He left on Sunday night when possible. This time, arriving with an hour to dress, he went upstairs to an enormous room, so full of precious things that he felt like an insignificant item in a museum corridor. He smiled disconsolately as the underling who brought up his bag began to fumble with the lock. But, instead of the sepulchral utterance he dreaded, a delicious human voice with an unmistakable brogue proceeded from the stooping figure. It was positively comforting. “It ‘all be locked, sorr, but maybe ye have the key?” And they bent together over the disreputable kit-bag, looking like a pair of ants knitting antennae on the floor of some great cave. The giant four-poster watched them contemptuously; mahogany cupboards wore an air of grave surprise; the gaping, open fireplace alone could have swallowed all his easels -almost, indeed, his little studio. This human, Irish presence was distinctly consoling - some extra hand or other, thought Dutton, probably.

He talked a little with the lad; then, lighting a cigarette, he watched him put the clothes away in the capacious cupboards, noticing in particular how neat and careful he was with the little things. Nail-scissors, silver stud-box, metal shoe-horn, and safety razor, even the bright cigar-cutter and pencil-sharpener collected loose from the bottom of the bag - all these he placed in a row upon the dressing-table with the glass top, and seemed never to have done with it. He kept coming back to rearrange and put a final touch, lingering over them absurdly. Dutton watched him with amusement, then surprise, finally with exasperation. Would he never go? “Thank you,” he said at last; “that will do. I’ll dress now. What time is dinner?” The lad told him, but still lingered, evidently anxious to say more. “Everything’s out, I think,” repeated Dutton impatiently; “all the loose things, I mean?” The face at once turned eagerly. What mischievous Irish eyes he had, to be sure! “I’ve put him all together in a row, sorr, so that ye'll not be missing anny-thing at all,” was the quick reply, as he pointed to the ridiculous collection of little articles, and even darted back to finger them again. He counted them one by one. And then suddenly he added, with a touch of personal interest that was not familiarity, “It’s so easy, ye see, sorr, to lose thim small bright things in this great room.” And he was gone.