THE STORYTELLER.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 60, 6 July 1907, Page 4

THE STORYTELLER.

v THE FINANCIER. / —o A clerk brought me up for signature eleven. The meeting of the directors a number of cheques already drawn. The clock on the mantelpiece pointed to of the Deep Hand Mines was to be at twelve. Sly private office opened out of the Board Room. This den of mine was plainly but solidly furnished. I had made scarcely any change during the thirty years I had occupied it. The American ticker, it is true, had been replaced by a valuable Empire timepiece— I had a passion for objets d'art, and this was crowded out of my house for positive want of Bpace. But the shabby upholstery and dingy appurtenances had grown to have a dear familiarity—they were part of the history that had been made in this room. For here was the centre of a web which spread its intricacies to the farthest part of the earth—a spider's web, my enemies called it Infinite ramifications of wire ran from this nucleus through air and under the sea, bearing the autocratic message of my will—a system of nerves responsive to my least dictation. So multiple were my interests, and so vast my resources, thft it was no exaggeration to say that I could control empires. A loan from me made war possible; by refusing financial aid I brought about the downfall of nations. And since all my deals had been planned and negotiated from this room, its very furniture came to be associated in my mind with the triumphs of my career. I would not even let the cheap looking-glass lie removed which reflected my face when I first came to the office—a smart, dapper, pretty self-satisfied youngster of

twenty-fire, the discoverer and sole proprietor of Hermaphrode, that Mexican earth now ao largely used to cheapen various manufactures, which had been the foundation of my fortune?. A man in my position is bound to ban bitter enemies: success creates jealousy. As I advanced in power there was not wanting busybodies eager to rake over the ashes of the past. It was hinted that I had gone behind, and finally rqined the German company whose interesfa I was supposed to have in Mexico. It was suggested that I had obtained my eooceaaions through false representation, that the eviction of the native* from the land were carried out with Bimeeeaaaiy cruelty, and that the conditions of labor I employed was a disgrace to civilisation. Now every trade and profession has its own code of honor, and it is absurd to apply to the pammeniftl code a standard that belongs to mediaeval chivalry. The aim of commerce is not philanthropy, though in increasing the scope of employment it goes far beyond philanthropy. Commerce is at once antocratic; it succeeds best where huge interests are pursued with ruthless determination, unhampered by ikkiy sentiment or flabby altruism. The law of nature works through commerce as through life; the weakest goes to the wall; the cripple falls behind in the race. The outsider, prejudiced, li- I mited in his experience, could not measure the stupendous difficulties that had encumbered my operation! i it then 111 been any cruelties in my administration they had been necessary and inevitable cruelties; if people chose to make ducks and drakes of their money, their ignorant greed waa the primary cause of their nlta * ' Hermaphrode gave me the means of entering the finanical arena. My instinct was sure and whatever I touched proved fortunate. There were at the moment few speculations on the market with which I was not directly or indirectly connected. The biggest of all was the Deep Rand Mines—it was controlled by a ring of some ten of us, who kept the complete holding in our hands, and year after year the concern yielded over one hundred per cent. Unfortunately we | had been obliged to admit among us one or two representatives of rival firms, who had threatened blackmail and exposure; there were, as a matter of fact, circumstances connected with our negotiations that were not intended to become public; but gorged with plunder, these doubtful elements were easy enough to handle, and at the Board meetings our whilom competitors generally remained dumb with admiration at the ingenuity of our devices. I went over to the looking-glass in the corner, arranged my tfe, and looked at myself critically. I showed my fifty-five years, though I was not lnlj. and my black hair was only beginning to torn grey. My face was heavy in type, and the skin somewhat coarse in texture, scored with deep lines. My eyes, overhung with bushy eyebrows, had a very useful power of making people quail; my nose gave token of my somewhat remote Jewish origin, but my physiognomy showed no trace of my German aneestryj I wu Use son of a German farmer, and was born at Elbinjerode, In the Ilarz Mountains. It was half-past eleven. I returned to my desk, and continued signing the cheques. - j) Suddenly I heard a distant earillon ol bells, faint and liquid, seeming to conn: nearer: a run of notes, the phrase ol some melody repeated over dnd ovei again, more compelling with each itera tion. I saw the cheques before me, thi

familiar room, and was aware that thin gonad was wholly and entirely in mv mind, heard, not by the physical ear. hut by wme aubtler organ. Aud carried on the round, came a poignant sense of freshness, ot pure nir and mountain space*; and hosts of old memories seemed pressing at the door of consciousnc-s. asking for recognition. Then for a while I lost myself. The next thing I remember wa* the clock striking the quarter, and a feeble face with sandy-colored hair—the face of one of my clerks—bending close to ' mine. There was a loud sound of voices in the adjoining room. "Should I send for the doctor?" gasped the clerk. '•What have you seen! Have you told them anything!" X whimpered hoarsely. "I came in—to say they were waiting —and found yon sitting—like as if you were In a daze—" he stuttered, "quite still and queer-Uke." "Now understand this," I said emphatically, "I had a had night last nlclit- and

took some sleeping stuff that disagreed with me. And mind you hold your iongue about it/ 1 I added harshly, '"or out of this place you go. bag and Impgage. "I'm not going to have anv sneaking gossiping behind my back. 'And let me tell you if that happens 111 take care that yon don't find it easy to get another bod of roses to repose ou." I pushed past (lie fellow, who went quite white. I was quite safe with him. My snbordinates had a whole- I some terror of me. and my word was law. It would never do for rumors to get abroad—people might say I had had a stroke; and confidence in my ventures rested Solely on the people'* confidence in me. My association with any business enterprise was regarded :h giving it the hall-mark of success, and If I ceased to l>e looked upon > - a kinil of financial Atlas, T should *>on !»■ buried in the mini of my own undertakings. T pulled myself together a = test I could, and went into the Board

Boom, showing little trace of the strange possesion that hud overcome me. That evening in my smoking room I considered the matter in all its bearings. It seemed to me a ease of some abnormal recrudescence of memory. I had been brought up on my father's farm until the age of fifteen, and had spent much of my boyhood wandering among the hills, picking up here, there and everywhere the legends with which the countryside teems. It is practically a pastoral country: the cows are led out in herds to graze along the rich riversides, and on the mountain meadows. As in the Alpine pastures, each cow has a bell at it 3 neck, so that the herd moves to a faint unending dash of music, which in the distance runs into reiterated memory. But why should this trivial recollection of the sound of eattle-beiis, which had lain dormant for so many years, suddenly recur with such overwhelming persistence? I traced out the reason for this, too. My little boy, the only creature on earth I cared for, had died some months before. When he lay there, ill and white and patient, he asked me to tell him some stories; and searching about in the forgotten [arts of my mind, I found they were full of such absurdities as :i , child delights in—legends of gnblins and , pixies, and r-nonies working in the bow- . els of the earth—tales of the Rhine ( Maidens, and dwarfs and dagons guard- . fng elfin gold. lore of the witches who j danr-ed on the Hcxemnnzplalz, and held | wild revel on the Rrocken. Every ] oquare ineli of my native country is r crammed with fairy history, ami all tin- c known to myself this was stored in the recesses of my mind, whence there came r to amuse my little siek child an unend- f ing host of lovely and grotesque crea- j tures; and while I talked to him the A cattle-bells seemed to be chiming all the | | while through my words, as they had been the continuous accompaniment of a my walks In the old days.

neii, me uoy was aeaa, ana tne door u closed on that love and that suffering. But It would be a hard thing if this one T1 weakness of mine were to prove the ruin , v of my career—if in admitting this one softness into my nature I had opened the j way to all manner of incongruous distractions and flimsy sentimentalities, to (' a whole army of false realisms and bom- Sl l*«tic heroics, suitable enough to the „ ages of childhood and boyhood, but abso- c ] lutely fatal to the clear judgment and a , unswerving decision essential to a man in my position. For this obsession, which after that qi day came upon me frequently, was undoubtedly accompanied by a slackening n of fibre. The music of the bells became n at one# detested and desired: detested, q as a positive symptom of nerve disease « that complicated the simplicity of my ti way by suggesting all manner of ridicu- ti lous hesitations and scruples—desired, as n a mental Intoxication, a kind of crystal n exhiliaration, inducing a wide sense of 0; purities and freshnesses, as unreal, aa f, impossible, as paralysing as the dreams of the opium-eater. c. My fear was so great that these illu- j sions might become known—illusions 0 damning in their childishness—that for a time I refrained from consulting a specialist. When at last I sought him out a I took every precaution that my visit j, should remain secret, though of course I was too well known to conceal my c identity from the doctor himself. His keen questioning defined to me my j |condition more clearly than before. Ho elicited that the music of the bells was J only a vehicle carrying on it a whole tide of sensation. At times the sounds called up scenes of undimniable brightness— ' green and sunny tracts of mountain, J valleys hoarding shadowy sweetness, ' grave smooth cattle coming down lanes ' in grave twilight and separating to their 1 several byres; faces, whether of man or ' fairy I knew not, wrinkled with elfin ' humor and with elfin melody—always ' that same repeated phrase—moods of ex- ' .illation, of reckless adventure, of splen- | did sacrifice. 1 Xext I explained the havoc that this obsession was playing in my career: howit would take me at the most critical moments, once even in an important 1 meeting of shareholders: how it cloudi"l my judgment and unsettled my convictions, and how I was willing to do everything in reason toward effecting a cure—even to the taking of a short rest, or going a sea voyage. The specialist asked me if I had rea.l Professor William James. He said that a certain school of psychologists were inclined to regard these so-called illu sions as realities. In my case, he add ed, a suppressed and yet vital part of my nature seemed to be bodying itself forth in the first mental images that came to hand. These moods that I described, of heroism, of sacrifice, suggest ed capabilities still inherent in my be ing. I had assured him there was ud artificial stimulant at work—no alcohol, no drugs, no undue brainwork even. I told him that recently I had been through a crisis of excessive sentimcn tality He nodded. "I saw about that in tip papers—}\,ur little son; but after all, the pain you suffered was natural emotion, purging and salutiry—an emotion which would «> doubt "n'.orge your , sympathy, and give you an increase of ■ fellow-feeling." . I thought I detected . a note of sarcasm in his voice. "I'm I al'rald we doctors cannot be of inucH use , to you.'' he added; ''it's a question of

the aneient fight Mween two antagonistic constituents of character —the constituents that wore uppermost, in youth, and the constituents that are upper most now " '■I)o you mean to imply that tills illusion is a reality—do you suggest that I hear the actual bells that tinkled forty years ago?" f asked indignantly. "The olises-ioi. as you fall il. merely clothes itself in the sound of liells, lie cause you are a modern Herman horn in the llarz Mountains. If you were a mediaeval monk it would clothe itself perhaps in the voice of fit. Michael. 1 1;! particular inmgo is varied and uniirpor tant. All that matters is the spirit animating it. Sir Thomas Browne as serts, you remember, that any misc-el laneous dust will -riv ( -od to bi.ild nj tlur body on the day of the resurref tion." lie was playing with ine. of cuirsr trying to make me feci,my Iro-k of eul ture. mockli.g at my nationality, wl:k:l is supposed to love metaphysical Si.btlc

ies. and making a flank attack en niv ommercial mcllkhl-. '"Since you choose o clothe your diagnosis in theological terms." I said, "1 gather that yoi imply that these two antagonistic elcntrnlß represent what are known theologically n the principle? of good and evil. I might perhaps ask you to wnifll periol of my life you assign (he supremacy of the good prinr-'pie, anil to whir h period the supremacy of the evil.'' ll.' shrugged his shoulders. ''lnfo that it is not for me to enter. ( can only point out that yov ,"*re unified filferiiat'ly l>y l»'o entire';,' different •»<» of aim= and ideals, one having manifested itself in youth and the other in man hood: and tha 1 the elimination of either ~f the-,' is outside the domain of science. Kit her vour life wi'l continue to the end .1 ronlli. t between two principles, or hy -oi!n- violent means, some terrible strug- >*]<•. von will succeed in killing out one or oilier of thc-e principles. It is for you to consider which of them you deem the more worthy of preservation." This I thought gross Insolence, con-

sideriug the object of my visit. ''That. is all you have to say I" I asked. "That is all." The memory of this conversation was bitter to me. 1 had been a fool to go to the man—a fool to unveil my secrets to him—and all to no purpose. Recent newspaper attacks I had not mindedmere pinprick criticisms on technical points; but this wholesale condemnation of my business career as evil—for such I took to be the tenor of his observations —a condemnation based on assumption, without evidence, unjust, untrue, did grievous hurt to my pride, to my confidence, to my sense of commercial honor. The man was evidently a fanatic, selfbewildered in line-drawn metaphysical subtleties—an idealist dazzling by the shimmer of his bubble-blowing, and lacking the most primary knowledge of life. Anything more inept than bis definition 'ri my obsession as a reality, as a gilding principle fighting for recognition, could not well be imagined. He evidently wished me to turn into another Don Quixote, obedient to the phantoms of my own brain. If it had been possible, without revealing our connection, to expose him as a dangerous enemy to society, who on the plea of curing nervous diseases drove his patients straight into the madhouse, I should have considered it a public duty to do so. ■ But in the cicumstances this satisfaction was out of the question. I must rely upon myself—must make large draughts on my will-power to clear my way of obstacles and justify my career by still further successes in the eyes nf the world. Next to the haunting bells whose music continued and even inceased in

requency anil persistency after my visit to the specialist—the Deep Rand Mines were my chief anxiety. I had >pen obliged to miss one board meeting, nving to this wretched infirmity of mine, mil I had heard that a good deal of disontent had shown its head, with a very igly look. I recognised that my pvepnee on thesr occasions was vital just low, if my stupendous undertakings fere to weather the time of crisis. After some months of continued labor, allowed myself to accept an invitation o a week's end shooting in Wales. On he Sunday, after an excellent day's port, I was just preparing about midlight to go to bed, when a confidential lerk brought me a letter from the manning director of the Deep Rand Mines, nforming me that certain cablegrams rom the mines, involving serious consciences, had necessitated the immediate ailing of a special meeting in London at 0 a.m. The letter stated that some ugly umors had got into the Sunday press, lonsulting the time-table, I found there ras a train leaving TJangwydyr Junoion at 4.30 a.m. There wt.s no local rain service at that hour, but as Llangmlyr Junction was only a little over linety miles off, I could catch the train asily by motor car. Tt was essential or me to be at that board. I drove myself, and went alone, as no hauffeur was immediately available. [Tie roads were in a bad condition, and in the way X had a break-down. Providentially it was a matter I could atend to myself, but it caused me nearly in hour's delay. This made me exceedngly tight for time, and I knew I could inly just catch the train if I drove the ar for all it was worth. The moon was down, and the world lark before dawn. I had just whizzed last a village when I bumped over soniehing. It might have been a 6aek of Hour on the road, or a sheep—it was unlikely lliat any child should be abroad so early. Hie impetus of the car carried me along, and it hardly occurred to me to stop. J What was done was done—l would make enquiries to-morrow, and put all right; the train must be caught—if I were not :it the meeting everything would collapse and bring wholesale ruin. So the car continued its mad career, swooping down the roads like a flying demon, and filling my ears with the noise of lis rush. Then suddenly there jangled through my brain the sound as if all the bells in the world hndbeen struck at once—a discord piercing, maddening, terrifying, mingled with cries and shrieks. I felt as if a phantom hand were placed upon mv hand to turn the car, and as if the whole air was alive with shuddering whispers, bidding me go lack. But my will was fierce to pursue its goal unhampered by unnecessary compunctions, and as-I drove I seemed to be mowing the way for the car through a host of intangible presences moving whitenesses, like tile mists of morning, whn..i Hung themselves in the path, moaning and with wringing hands. And through the din the cattle bells sounded ill Utile snatches of melody, infinitely peaceful, calling me away, away, out of all this turmoil. The car was really slackening in speed. The phantom voices and bells were gaining direction over my movements. I was driving like one who is drunk, swaying the car from side to aide, as if in some confused dream trying to turn her. What did the train matter? What did the Deop Mines matter? If I turned, T should ride straight back into a new

country—into the Country of Youth—into Fairyland. v One faintest swerve more at the crossroads Would have brought the cur rouml, (| and made of lue a hopeless dreamer, a ( futile altruist. But the instincts, the habits of forty years were not to be j lightly set aside. Til quick revulsion ( there fiashed across my iuind the reck- . less folly of sacrificing enormous interests to some problematical pig or sack ] ot - o ats—a folly unaccompanied by such i associations that it verged on ? insanity. Reason suddenly assumed sway over my delirious fancy—hard | common sense, showing me the duty of i commercial obligations, pointing out the ( i only road it was possible for me to take. ; 1 was the pilot entrusted with a galleon 1 J of incalculable riches, and J must be at the helm, The ear steadied: a fierce determination • kept it to its course. The clang of bells ' and sounds of weeping were left behind I* in the distance. At last 1 was being jostled over the streets of a waking town. Tile clocks '• chimed the half hour. The train steamed '' into the station. f '' 1 caught the train. 1 attended the

board meeting and managed to pull i'vcrything into shape again. Tin 1 Ueep Kami Mint's wmtimw to pay over luO per font. It was a cliilil 1 had run over and injured. lie died a few days later. Jhe pour little brat had been sent out to feed some pigs that had been forgotten. I iiad the relatives well compensated, lail. it did not jirove necessary to make niyseU known, as 1 was aide to keep the thin;: out of the papers. Strangely enough, the night worked a complel e change in me. f suppose that headlong dash through the air had a salulory ell'eet upon my nerves, f never again lieard any remotest sound of the cattle bells with their accompanying illusions. and thence forward I was aids to pursue the path I had marked out for myself without hindrance or disturbance of any kind. So I have n-.ched a calm and vener able old age; trusted by my colleagues and enjoying that universal respec' which pre-eminent success always com manda. , '•