Thursday's Serial: "The Brass Bottle" by F. Anstey (in English) - VI

CHAPTER XII - THE MESSENGER OF HOPE

Jessie, the neat and pretty parlour-maid, opened the door with a smile of welcome which Horace found reassuring. No girl, he thought, whose master had suddenly been transformed into a mule could possibly smile like that. The Professor, she told him, was not at home, which again was comforting. For a savant, however careless about his personal appearance, would scarcely venture to brave public opinion in the semblance of a quadruped.

"Is the Professor out?" he inquired, to make sure.

"Not exactly out, sir," said the maid, "but particularly engaged, working hard in his study, and not to be disturbed on no account."

This was encouraging, too, since a mule could hardly engage in literary labour of any kind. Evidently the Jinnee must either have overrated his supernatural powers, or else have been deliberately amusing himself at Horace's expense.

"Then I will see Miss Futvoye," he said.

"Miss Sylvia is with the master, sir," said the girl; "but if you'll come into the drawing-room I'll let Mrs. Futvoye know you are here."

He had not been in the drawing-room long before Mrs. Futvoye appeared, and one glance at her face confirmed Ventimore's worst fears. Outwardly she was calm enough, but it was only too obvious that her calmness was the result of severe self-repression; her eyes, usually so shrewdly and placidly observant, had a haggard and hunted look; her ears seemed on the strain to catch some distant sound.

"I hardly thought we should see you to-day," she began, in a tone of studied reserve; "but perhaps you came to offer some explanation of the extraordinary manner in which you thought fit to entertain us last night? If so—"

"The fact is," said Horace, looking into his hat, "I came because I was rather anxious about the Professor.

"About my husband?" said the poor lady, with a really heroic effort to appear surprised. "He is—as well as could be expected. Why should you suppose otherwise?" she asked, with a flash of suspicion.

"I fancied perhaps that—that he mightn't be quite himself to-day," said Horace, with his eyes on the carpet.

"I see," said Mrs. Futvoye, regaining her composure; "you were afraid that all those foreign dishes might not have agreed with him. But—except that he is a little irritable this afternoon—he is much as usual."

"I'm delighted to hear it," said Horace, with reviving hope. "Do you think he would see me for a moment?"

"Great heavens, no!" cried Mrs. Futvoye, with an irrepressible start; "I mean," she explained, "that, after what took place last night, Anthony—my husband—very properly feels that an interview would be too painful."

"But when we parted he was perfectly friendly."

"I can only say," replied the courageous woman, "that you would find him considerably altered now."

Horace had no difficulty in believing it.

"At least, I may see Sylvia?" he pleaded.

"No," said Mrs. Futvoye; "I really can't have Sylvia disturbed just now. She is very busy, helping her father. Anthony has to read a paper at one of his societies to-morrow night, and she is writing it out from his dictation."

If any departure from strict truth can ever be excusable, this surely was one; unfortunately, just then Sylvia herself burst into the room.

"Mother," she cried, without seeing Horace in her agitation, "do come to papa, quick! He has just begun kicking again, and I can't manage him alone... Oh, you here?" she broke off, as she saw who was in the room. "Why do you come here now, Horace? Please, please go away! Papa is rather unwell—nothing serious, only—oh, do go away!"

"Darling!" said Horace, going to her and taking both her hands, "I know all—do you understand?—all!"

"Mamma!" cried Sylvia, reproachfully, "have you told him—already? When we settled that even Horace wasn't to know till—till papa recovers!"

"I have told him nothing, my dear," replied her mother. "He can't possibly know, unless—but no, that isn't possible. And, after all," she added, with a warning glance at her daughter, "I don't know why we should make any mystery about a mere attack of gout. But I had better go and see if your father wants anything." And she hurried out of the room.

Sylvia sat down and gazed silently into the fire. "I dare say you don't know how dreadfully people kick when they've got gout," she remarked presently.

"Oh yes, I do," said Horace, sympathetically; "at least, I can guess."

"Especially when it's in both legs," continued Sylvia.

"Or," said Horace gently, "in all four."

"Ah, you do know!" cried Sylvia. "Then it's all the more horrid of you to come!"

"Dearest," said Horace, "is not this just the time when my place should be near you—and him?"

"Not near papa, Horace!" she put in anxiously; "it wouldn't be at all safe."

"Do you really think I have any fear for myself?"

"Are you sure you quite know—what he is like now?"

"I understand," said Horace, trying to put it as considerately as possible, "that a casual observer, who didn't know your father, might mistake him, at first sight, for—for some sort of quadruped."

"He's a mule," sobbed Sylvia, breaking down entirely. "I could bear it better if he had been a nice mule.... B—but he isn't!"

"Whatever he may be," declared Horace, as he knelt by her chair endeavouring to comfort her, "nothing can alter my profound respect for him. And you must let me see him, Sylvia; because I fully believe I shall be able to cheer him up."

"If you imagine you can persuade him to—to laugh it off!" said Sylvia, tearfully.

"I wasn't proposing to try to make him see the humorous side of his situation," Horace mildly explained. "I trust I have more tact than that. But he may be glad to know that, at the worst, it is only a temporary inconvenience. I'll take care that he's all right again before very long."

She started up and looked at him, her eyes widened with dawning dread and mistrust.

"If you can speak like that," she said, "it must have been you who—no, I can't believe it—that would be too horrible!"

"I who did what, Sylvia? Weren't you there when—when it happened?"

"No," she replied. "I was only told of it afterwards. Mother heard papa talking loudly in his study this morning, as if he was angry with somebody, and at last she grew so uneasy she couldn't bear it any longer, and went in to see what was the matter with him. Dad was quite alone and looked as usual, only a little excited; and then, without the slightest warning, just as she entered the room, he—he changed slowly into a mule before her eyes! Anybody but mamma would have lost her head and roused the whole house."

"Thank Heaven she didn't!" said Horace, fervently. "That was what I was most afraid of."

"Then—oh, Horace, it was you! It's no use denying it. I feel more certain of it every moment!"

"Now, Sylvia!" he protested, still anxious, if possible, to keep the worst from her, "what could have put such an idea as that into your head?"

"I don't know," she said slowly. "Several things last night. No one who was really nice, and like everybody else, would live in such queer rooms like those, and dine on cushions, with dreadful black slaves, and—and dancing-girls and things. You pretended you were quite poor."

"So I am, darling. And as for my rooms, and—and the rest, they're all gone, Sylvia. If you went to Vincent Square to-day, you wouldn't find a trace of them!"

"That only shows!" said Sylvia. "But why should you play such a cruel, and—and ungentlemanly trick on poor dad? If you had ever really loved me—!"

"But I do, Sylvia, you can't really believe me capable of such an outrage! Look at me and tell me so."

"No, Horace," said Sylvia frankly. "I don't believe you did it. But I believe you know who did. And you had better tell me at once!"

"If you're quite sure you can stand it," he replied, "I'll tell you everything." And, as briefly as possible, he told her how he had unsealed the brass bottle, and all that had come of it.

She bore it, on the whole, better than he had expected; perhaps, being a woman, it was some consolation to her to remind him that she had foretold something of this kind from the very first.

"But, of course, I never really thought it would be so awful as this!" she said. "Horace, how could you be so careless as to let a great wicked thing like that escape out of its bottle?"

"I had a notion it was a manuscript," said Horace—"till he came out. But he isn't a great wicked thing, Sylvia. He's an amiable old Jinnee enough. And he'd do anything for me. Nobody could be more grateful and generous than he has been."

"Do you call it generous to change the poor, dear dad into a mule?" inquired Sylvia, with a little curl of her upper lip.

"That was an oversight," said Horace; "he meant no harm by it. In Arabia they do these things—or used to in his day. Not that that's much excuse for him. Still, he's not so young as he was, and besides, being bottled up for all those centuries must have narrowed him rather. You must try and make allowances for him, darling."

"I shan't," said Sylvia, "unless he apologises to poor father, and puts him right at once."

"Why, of course, he'll do that," Horace answered confidently. "I'll see that he does. I don't mean to stand any more of his nonsense. I'm afraid I've been just a little too slack for fear of hurting his feelings; but this time he's gone too far, and I shall talk to him like a Dutch uncle. He's always ready to do the right thing when he's once shown where he has gone wrong—only he takes such a lot of showing, poor old chap!"

"But when do you think he'll—do the right thing?"

"Oh, as soon as I see him again."

"Yes; but when will you see him again?"

"That's more than I can say. He's away just now—in China, or Peru, or somewhere."

"Horace! Then he won't be back for months and months!"

"Oh yes, he will. He can do the whole trip, aller et retour, you know, in a few hours. He's an active old beggar for his age. In the meantime, dearest, the chief thing is to keep up your father's spirits. So I think I'd better— I was just telling Sylvia, Mrs. Futvoye," he said, as that lady re-entered the room, "that I should like to see the Professor at once."

"It's quite, quite impossible!" was the nervous reply. "He's in such a state that he's unable to see any one. You don't know how fractious gout makes him!"

"Dear Mrs. Futvoye," said Horace, "believe me, I know more than you suppose."

"Yes, mother, dear," put in Sylvia, "he knows everything—really everything. And perhaps it might do dad good to see him."

Mrs. Futvoye sank helplessly down on a settee. "Oh, dear me!" she said. "I don't know what to say. I really don't. If you had seen him plunge at the mere suggestion of a doctor!"

Privately, though naturally he could not say so, Horace thought a vet. might be more appropriate, but eventually he persuaded Mrs. Futvoye to conduct him to her husband's study.

"Anthony, love," she said, as she knocked gently at the door, "I've brought Horace Ventimore to see you for a few moments, if he may."

It seemed from the sounds of furious snorting and stamping within, that the Professor resented this intrusion on his privacy. "My dear Anthony," said his devoted wife, as she unlocked the door and turned the key on the inside after admitting Horace, "try to be calm. Think of the servants downstairs. Horace is so anxious to help."

As for Ventimore, he was speechless—so inexpressibly shocked was he by the alteration in the Professor's appearance. He had never seen a mule in sorrier condition or in so vicious a temper. Most of the lighter furniture had been already reduced to matchwood; the glass doors of the bookcase were starred or shivered; precious Egyptian pottery and glass were strewn in fragments on the carpets, and even the mummy, though it still smiled with the same enigmatic cheerfulness, seemed to have suffered severely from the Professorial hoofs.

Horace instinctively felt that any words of conventional sympathy would jar here; indeed, the Professor's attitude and expression reminded him irresistibly of a certain "Blondin Donkey" he had seen enacted by music-hall artists, at the point where it becomes sullen and defiant. Only, he had laughed helplessly at the Blondin Donkey, and somehow he felt no inclination to laugh now.

"Believe me, sir," he began, "I would not disturb you like this unless—steady there, for Heaven's sake Professor, don't kick till you've heard me out!" For, the mule, in a clumsy, shambling way which betrayed the novice, was slowly revolving on his own axis so as to bring his hind-quarters into action, while still keeping his only serviceable eye upon his unwelcome visitor.

"Listen to me, sir," said Horace, manœuvring in his turn. "I'm not to blame for this, and if you brain me, as you seem to be endeavouring to do, you'll simply destroy the only living man who can get you out of this."

The mule appeared impressed by this, and backed cumbrously into a corner, from which he regarded Horace with a mistrustful, but attentive, eye. "If, as I imagine, sir," continued Horace, "you are, though temporarily deprived of speech, perfectly capable of following an argument, will you kindly signify it by raising your right ear?" The mule's right ear rose with a sharp twitch.

"Now we can get on," said Horace. "First let me tell you that I repudiate all responsibility for the proceedings of that infernal Jinnee.... I wouldn't stamp like that—you might go through the floor, you know.... Now, if you will only exercise a little patience—"

At this the exasperated animal made a sudden run at him with his mouth open, which obliged Horace to shelter himself behind a large leather arm-chair. "You really must keep cool, sir," he remonstrated; "your nerves are naturally upset. If I might suggest a little champagne—you could manage it in—in a bucket, and it would help you to pull yourself together. A whisk of your—er—tail would imply consent." The Professor's tail instantly swept some rare Arabian glass lamps and vases from a shelf at his rear, whereupon Mrs. Futvoye went out, and returned presently with a bottle of champagne and a large china jardinière, as the best substitute she could find for a bucket.

When the mule had drained the flower-pot greedily and appeared refreshed, Horace proceeded: "I have every hope, sir," he said, "that before many hours you will be smiling—pray don't prance like that, I mean what I say—smiling over what now seems to you, very justly, a most annoying and serious catastrophe. I shall speak seriously to Fakrash (the Jinnee, you know), and I am sure that, as soon as he realises what a frightful blunder he has made, he will be the first to offer you every reparation in his power. For, old foozle as he is, he's thoroughly good-hearted."

The Professor drooped his ears at this, and shook his head with a doleful incredulity that made him look more like the Pantomime Donkey than ever.

"I think I understand him fairly well by this time, sir," said Horace, "and I'll answer for it that there's no real harm in him. I give you my word of honour that, if you'll only remain quiet and leave everything to me, you shall very soon be released from this absurd position. That's all I came to tell you, and now I won't trouble you any longer. If you could bring yourself, as a sign that you bear me no ill-feeling, to give me your—your off-foreleg at parting, I—"

But the Professor turned his back in so pointed and ominous a manner that Horace judged it better to withdraw without insisting further. "I'm afraid," he said to Mrs. Futvoye, after they had rejoined Sylvia in the drawing-room—"I'm afraid your husband is still a little sore with me about this miserable business."

"I don't know what else you can expect," replied the lady, rather tartly; "he can't help feeling—as we all must and do, after what you said just now—that, but for you, this would never have happened!"

"If you mean it was all through my attending that sale," said Horace, "you might remember that I only went there at the Professor's request. You know that, Sylvia."

"Yes, Horace," said Sylvia; "but papa never asked you to buy a hideous brass bottle with a nasty Genius in it. And any one with ordinary common sense would have kept it properly corked!"

"What, you against me too, Sylvia!" cried Horace, cut to the quick.

"No, Horace, never against you. I didn't mean to say what I did. Only it is such a relief to put the blame on somebody. I know, I know you feel it almost as much as we do. But so long as poor, dear papa remains as he is, we can never be anything to one another. You must see that, Horace!"

"Yes, I see that," he said; "but trust me, Sylvia, he shall not remain as he is. I swear he shall not. In another day or two, at the outside, you will see him his own self once more. And then—oh, darling, darling, you won't let anything or anybody separate us? Promise me that!"

He would have held her in his arms, but she kept him at a distance. "When papa is himself again," she said, "I shall know better what to say. I can't promise anything now, Horace."

Horace recognised that no appeal would draw a more definite answer from her just then; so he took his leave, with the feeling that, after all, matters must improve before very long, and in the meantime he must bear the suspense with patience.

He got through dinner as well as he could in his own rooms, for he did not like to go to his club lest the Jinnee should suddenly return during his absence.

"If he wants me he'd be quite equal to coming on to the club after me," he reflected, "for he has about as much sense of the fitness of things as Mary's lamb. I shouldn't care about seeing him suddenly bursting through the floor of the smoking-room. Nor would the committee."

He sat up late, in the hope that Fakrash would appear; but the Jinnee made no sign, and Horace began to get uneasy. "I wish there was some way of ringing him up," he thought. "If he were only the slave of a ring or a lamp, I'd rub it; but it wouldn't be any use to rub that bottle—and, besides, he isn't a slave. Probably he has a suspicion that he has not exactly distinguished himself over his latest feat, and thinks it prudent to keep out of my way for the present. But if he fancies he'll make things any better for himself by that he'll find himself mistaken."

It was maddening to think of the unhappy Professor still fretting away hour after hour in the uncongenial form of a mule, waiting impatiently for the relief that never came. If it lingered much longer, he might actually starve, unless his family thought of getting in some oats for him, and he could be prevailed upon to touch them. And how much longer could they succeed in concealing the nature of his affliction? How long before all Kensington, and the whole civilised world, would know that one of the leading Orientalists in Europe was restlessly prancing on four legs around his study in Cottesmore Gardens?

Racked by speculations such as these, Ventimore lay awake till well into the small hours, when he dropped off into troubled dreams that, wild as they were, could not be more grotesquely fantastic than the realities to which they were the alternative.

CHAPTER XIII - A CHOICE OF EVILS

Not even his morning tub could brace Ventimore's spirits to their usual cheerfulness. After sending away his breakfast almost untasted he stood at his window, looking drearily out over the crude green turf of Vincent Square at the indigo masses of the Abbey and the Victoria Tower and the huge gasometers to the right which loomed faintly through a dun-coloured haze.

He felt a positive loathing for his office, to which he had gone with such high hopes and enthusiasm of late. There was no work for him to do there any longer, and the sight of his drawing-table and materials would, he knew, be intolerable in their mute mockery.

Nor could he with any decency present himself again at Cottesmore Gardens while the situation still remained unchanged, as it must do until he had seen Fakrash.

When would the Jinnee return, or—horrible suspicion!—did he never intend to return at all?

"Fakrash!" he groaned aloud, "you can't really mean to leave me in such a regular deuce of a hole as this?"

"At thy service!" said a well-known voice behind him, and he turned to see the Jinnee standing smiling on the hearthrug—and at this accomplishment of his dearest desire all his indignation surged back.

"Oh, there you are!" he said irritably. "Where on earth have you been all this time?"

"Nowhere on earth," was the bland reply; "but in the regions of the air, seeking to promote thy welfare."

"If you have been as brilliantly successful up there as you have down here," retorted Horace, "I have much to thank you for."

"I am more than repaid," answered the Jinnee, who, like many highly estimable persons, was almost impervious to irony, "by such assurances of thy gratitude."

"I'm not grateful," said Horace, fuming. "I'm devilish annoyed!"

"Well hath it been written," replied the Jinnee:—

"'Be disregardful of thine affairs, and commit them to the course of Fate,

For often a thing that enrages thee may eventually be to thee pleasing.'"

"I don't see the remotest chance of that, in my case," said Horace.

"Why is thy countenance thus troubled, and what new complaint hast thou against me?"

"What the devil do you mean by turning a distinguished and perfectly inoffensive scholar into a wall-eyed mule?" Horace broke out. "If that is your idea of a practical joke—!"

"It is one of the easiest affairs possible," said the Jinnee, complacently running his fingers through the thin strands of his beard. "I have accomplished such transformations on several occasions."

"Then you ought to be ashamed of yourself, that's all. The question is now—how do you propose to restore him again?"

"Far from undoing be that which is accomplished!" was the sententious answer.

"What?" cried Horace, hardly believing his ears; "you surely don't mean to allow that unhappy Professor to remain like that for ever, do you?"

"None can alter what is predestined."

"Very likely not. But it wasn't decreed that a learned man should be suddenly degraded to a beastly mule for the rest of his life. Destiny wouldn't be such a fool!"

"Despise not mules, for they are useful and valuable animals in the household."

"But, confound it all, have you no imagination? Can't you enter at all into the feelings of a man—a man of wide learning and reputation—suddenly plunged into such a humiliating condition?"

"Upon his own head be it," said Fakrash, coldly. "For he hath brought this fate upon himself."

"Well, how do you suppose that you have helped me by this performance? Will it make him any the more disposed to consent to my marrying his daughter? Is that all you know of the world?"

"It is not my intention that thou shouldst take his daughter to wife."

"Whether you approve or not, it's my intention to marry her."

"Assuredly she will not marry thee so long as her father remaineth a mule."

"There I agree with you. But is that your notion of doing me a good turn?"

"I did not consider thy interest in this matter."

"Then will you be good enough to consider it now? I have pledged my word that he shall be restored to his original form. Not only my happiness is at stake, but my honour."

"By failure to perform the impossible none can lose honour. And this is a thing that cannot be undone."

"Cannot be undone?" repeated Horace, feeling a cold clutch at his heart. "Why?"

"Because," said the Jinnee, sullenly, "I have forgotten the way."

"Nonsense!" retorted Horace; "I don't believe it. Why," he urged, descending to flattery, "you're such a clever old Johnny—I beg your pardon, I meant such a clever old Jinnee—you can do anything, if you only give your mind to it. Just look at the way you changed this house back again to what it was. Marvellous!"

"That was the veriest trifle," said Fakrash, though he was obviously pleased by this tribute to his talent; "this would be a different affair altogether."

"But child's play to you!" insinuated Horace. "Come, you know very well you can do it if you only choose."

"It may be as thou sayest. But I do not choose."

"Then I think," said Horace, "that, considering the obligation you admit yourself you are under to me, I have a right to know the reason—the real reason—why you refuse."

"Thy claim is not without justice," answered the Jinnee, after a pause, "nor can I decline to gratify thee."

"That's right," cried Horace; "I knew you'd see it in the proper light when it was once put to you. Now, don't lose any more time, but restore that unfortunate man at once, as you've promised."

"Not so," said the Jinnee; "I promised thee a reason for my refusal—and that thou shalt have. Know then, O my son, that this indiscreet one had, by some vile and unhallowed arts, divined the hidden meaning of what was written upon the seal of the bottle wherein I was confined, and was preparing to reveal the same unto all men."

"What would it matter to you if he did?"

"Much—for the writing contained a false and lying record of my actions."

"If it is all lies, it can't do you any harm. Why not treat them with the contempt they deserve?"

"They are not all lies," the Jinnee admitted reluctantly.

"Well, never mind. Whatever you've done, you've expiated it by this time."

"Now that Suleyman is no more, it is my desire to seek out my kinsmen of the Green Jinn, and live out my days in amity and honour. How can that be if they hear my name execrated by all mortals?"

"Nobody would think of execrating you about an affair three thousand years old. It's too stale a scandal."

"Thou speakest without understanding. I tell thee that if men knew but the half of my misdoings," said Fakrash, in a tone not altogether free from a kind of sombre complacency, "the noise of them would rise even unto the uppermost regions, and scorn and loathing would be my portion."

"Oh, it's not so bad as all that," said Horace, who had a private impression that the Jinnee's "past" would probably turn out to be chiefly made up of peccadilloes. "But, anyway, I'm sure the Professor will readily agree to keep silence about it; and, as you have of course, got the seal in your own possession again—"

"Nay; the seal is still in his possession, and it is naught to me where it is deposited," said Fakrash, "since the only mortal who hath deciphered it is now a dumb animal."

"Not at all," said Horace. "There are several friends of his who could decipher that inscription quite as easily as he did."

"Is this the truth?" said the Jinnee, in visible alarm.

"Certainly," said Horace. "Within the last quarter of a century archæology has made great strides. Our learned men can now read Babylonian bricks and Chaldean tablets as easily as if they were advertisements on galvanised iron. You may think you've been extremely clever in turning the Professor into an animal, but you'll probably find you've only made another mistake."

"How so?" inquired Fakrash.

"Well," said Horace, seeing his advantage, and pushing it unscrupulously, "now, that, in your infinite wisdom, you have ordained that he should be a mule, he naturally can't possess property. Therefore all his effects will have to be sold, and amongst them will be that seal of yours, which, like many other things in his collection, will probably be bought up by the British Museum, where it will be examined and commented upon by every Orientalist in Europe. I suppose you've thought of all that?"

"O young man of marvellous sagacity!" said the Jinnee; "truly I had omitted to consider these things, and thou hast opened my eyes in time. For I will present myself unto this man-mule and adjure him to reveal where he hath bestowed this seal, so that I may regain it."

"He can't do that, you know, so long as he remains a mule."

"I will endow him with speech for the purpose."

"Let me tell you this," said Horace: "he's in a very nasty temper just now, naturally enough, and you won't get anything out of him until you have restored him to human form. If you do that, he'll agree to anything."

"Whether I restore him or not will depend not on me, but on the damsel who is his daughter, and to whom thou art contracted in marriage. For first of all I must speak with her."

"So long as I am present and you promise not to play any tricks," said Horace, "I've no objection, for I believe, if you once saw her and heard her plead for her poor father, you wouldn't have the heart to hold out any longer. But you must give me your word that you'll behave yourself."

"Thou hast it," said the Jinnee; "I do but desire to see her on thine account."

"Very well," agreed Horace; "but I really can't introduce you in that turban—she'd be terrified. Couldn't you contrive to get yourself up in commonplace English clothes, just for once—something that wouldn't attract so much attention?"

"Will this satisfy thee?" inquired the Jinnee, as his green turban and flowing robes suddenly resolved themselves into the conventional chimney-pot hat, frock-coat, and trousers of modern civilisation.

He bore a painful resemblance in them to the kind of elderly gentleman who comes on in the harlequinade to be bonneted by the clown; but Horace was in no mood to be critical just then.

"That's better," he said encouragingly; "much better. Now," he added, as he led the way to the hall and put on his own hat and overcoat, "we'll go out and find a hansom and be at Kensington in less than twenty minutes."

"We shall be there in less than twenty seconds," said the Jinnee, seizing him by the arm above the elbow; and Horace found himself suddenly carried up into the air and set down, gasping with surprise and want of breath, on the pavement opposite the Futvoyes' door.

"I should just like to observe," he said, as soon as he could speak, "that if we've been seen, we shall probably cause a sensation. Londoners are not accustomed to seeing people skimming over the chimney-pots like amateur rooks."

"Trouble not for that," said Fakrash, "for no mortal eyes are capable of following our flight."

"I hope not," said Horace, "or I shall lose any reputation I have left. I think," he added, "I'd better go in alone first and prepare them, if you don't mind waiting outside. I'll come to the window and wave my pocket-handkerchief when they're ready. And do come in by the door like an ordinary person, and ask the maidservant if you may see me."

"I will bear it in mind," answered the Jinnee, and suddenly sank, or seemed to sink, through a chink in the pavement.

Horace, after ringing at the Futvoyes' door, was admitted and shown into the drawing-room, where Sylvia presently came to him, looking as lovely as ever, in spite of the pallor due to sleeplessness and anxiety. "It is kind of you to call and inquire," she said, with the unnatural calm of suppressed hysteria. "Dad is much the same this morning. He had a fairly good night, and was able to take part of a carrot for breakfast—but I'm afraid he has just remembered that he has to read a paper on 'Oriental Occultism' before the Asiatic Society this evening, and it's worrying him a little.... Oh, Horace," she broke out, unexpectedly, "how perfectly awful all this is! How are we to bear it?"

"Don't give way, darling!" said Horace; "you will not have to bear it much longer."

"It's all very well, Horace, but unless something is done soon it will be too late. We can't go on keeping a mule in the study without the servants suspecting something, and where are we to put poor, dear papa? It's too ghastly to think of his having to be sent away to—to a Home of Rest for Horses—and yet what is to be done with him?... Why do you come if you can't do anything?"

"I shouldn't be here unless I could bring you good news. You remember what I told you about the Jinnee?"

"Remember!" cried Sylvia. "As if I could forget! Has he really come back, Horace?"

"Yes. I think I have brought him to see that he has made a foolish mistake in enchanting your unfortunate father, and he seems willing to undo it on certain conditions. He is somewhere within call at this moment, and will come in whenever I give the signal. But he wishes to speak to you first."

"To me? Oh, no, Horace!" exclaimed Sylvia, recoiling. "I'd so much rather not. I don't like things that have come out of brass bottles. I shouldn't know what to say, and it would frighten me horribly."

"You must be brave, darling!" said Horace. "Remember that it depends on you whether the Professor is to be restored or not. And there's nothing alarming about old Fakrash, either, I've got him to put on ordinary things, and he really doesn't look so bad in them. He's quite a mild, amiable old noodle, and he'll do anything for you, if you'll only stroke him down the right way. You will see him, won't you, for your father's sake?"

"If I must," said Sylvia, with a shudder, "I—I'll be as nice to him as I can."

Horace went to the window and gave the signal, though there was no one in sight. However, it was evidently seen, for the next moment there was a resounding blow at the front door, and a little later Jessie, the parlour-maid, announced "Mr. Fatrasher Larmash—to see Mr. Ventimore," and the Jinnee stalked gravely in, with his tall hat on his head.

"You are probably not aware of it, sir," said Horace, "but it is the custom here to uncover in the presence of a lady." The Jinnee removed his hat with both hands, and stood silent and impassive.

"Let me present you to Miss Sylvia Futvoye," Ventimore continued, "the lady whose name you have already heard."

There was a momentary gleam in Fakrash's odd, slanting eyes as they lighted on Sylvia's shrinking figure, but he made no acknowledgment of the introduction.

"The damsel is not without comeliness," he remarked to Horace; "but there are lovelier far than she."

"I didn't ask you for either criticisms or comparisons," said Ventimore, sharply; "there is nobody in the world equal to Miss Futvoye, in my opinion, and you will be good enough to remember that fact. She is exceedingly distressed (as any dutiful daughter would be) by the cruel and senseless trick you have played her father, and she begs that you will rectify it at once. Don't you, Sylvia?"

"Yes, indeed!" said Sylvia, almost in a whisper, "if—if it isn't troubling you too much!"

"I have been turning over thy words in my mind," said Fakrash to Horace, still ignoring Sylvia, "and I am convinced that thou art right. Even if the contents of the seal were known of all men, they would raise no clamour about affairs that concern them not. Therefore it is nothing to me in whose hands the seal may be. Dost thou not agree with me in this?"

"Of course I do," said Horace. "And it naturally follows that—"

"It naturally follows, as thou sayest," said the Jinnee, with a cunning assumption of indifference, "that I have naught to gain by demanding back the seal as the price of restoring this damsel's father to his original form. Wherefore, so far as I am concerned, let him remain a mule for ever; unless, indeed, thou art ready to comply with my conditions."

"Conditions!" cried Horace, utterly unprepared for this conclusion. "What can you possibly want from me? But state them. I'll agree to anything, in reason!"

"I demand that thou shouldst renounce the hand of this damsel."

"That's out of all reason," said Horace, "and you know it. I will never give her up, so long as she is willing to keep me."

"Maiden," said the Jinnee, addressing Sylvia for the first time, "the matter rests with thee. Wilt thou release this my son from his contract, since thou art no fit wife for such as he?"

"How can I," cried Sylvia, "when I love him and he loves me? What a wicked tyrannical old thing you must be to expect it! I can't give him up."

"It is but giving up what can never be thine," said Fakrash. "And be not anxious for him, for I will reward and console him a thousandfold for the loss of thy society. A little while, and he shall remember thee no more."

"Don't believe him, darling," said Horace; "you know me better than that."

"Remember," said the Jinnee, "that by thy refusal thou wilt condemn thy parent to remain a mule throughout all his days. Art thou so unnatural and hard-hearted a daughter as to do this thing?"

"Oh, I couldn't!" cried Sylvia. "I can't let poor father remain a mule all his life when one word—and yet what am I to do? Horace, what shall I say? Advise me.... Advise me!"

"Heaven help us both!" groaned Ventimore. "If I could only see the right thing to do. Look here, Mr. Fakrash," he added, "this is a matter that requires consideration. Will you relieve us of your presence for a short time, while we talk it over?"

"With all my heart," said the Jinnee, in the most obliging manner in the world, and vanished instantly.

"Now, darling," began Horace, after he had gone, "if that unspeakable old scoundrel is really in earnest, there's no denying that he's got us in an extremely tight place. But I can't bring myself to believe that he does mean it. I fancy he's only trying us. And what I want you to do is not to consider me in the matter at all."

"How can I help it?" said poor Sylvia. "Horace, you—you don't want to be released, do you?"

"I?" said Horace, "when you are all I have in the world! That's so likely, Sylvia! But we are bound to look facts in the face. To begin with, even if this hadn't happened, your people wouldn't let our engagement continue. For my prospects have changed again, dearest. I'm even worse off than when we first met, for that confounded Jinnee has contrived to lose my first and only client for me—the one thing worth having he ever gave me." And he told her the story of the mushroom palace and Mr. Wackerbath's withdrawal. "So you see, darling," he concluded, "I haven't even a home to offer you; and if I had, it would be miserably uncomfortable for you with that old Marplot continually dropping in on us—especially if, as I'm afraid he has, he's taken some unreasonable dislike to you."

"But surely you can talk him over?" said Sylvia; "you said you could do anything you liked with him."

"I'm beginning to find," he replied, ruefully enough, "that he's not so easily managed as I thought. And for the present, I'm afraid, if we are to get the Professor out of this, that there's nothing for it but to humour old Fakrash."

"Then you actually advise me to—to break it off?" she cried; "I never thought you would do that!"

"For your own sake," said Horace; "for your father's sake. If you won't, Sylvia, I must. And you will spare me that? Let us both agree to part and—and trust that we shall be united some day."

"Don't try to deceive me or yourself, Horace," she said; "if we part now, it will be for ever."

He had a dismal conviction that she was right. "We must hope for the best," he said drearily; "Fakrash may have some motive in all this we don't understand. Or he may relent. But part we must, for the present."

"Very well," she said. "If he restores dad, I will give you up. But not unless."

"Hath the damsel decided?" asked the Jinnee, suddenly re-appearing; "for the period of deliberation is past."

"Miss Futvoye and I," Horace answered for her, "are willing to consider our engagement at an end, until you approve of its renewal, on condition that you restore her father at once."

"Agreed!" said Fakrash. "Conduct me to him, and we will arrange the matter without delay."

Outside they met Mrs. Futvoye on her way from the study. "You here, Horace?" she exclaimed. "And who is this—gentleman?"

"This," said Horace, "is the—er—author of the Professor's misfortunes, and he had come here at my request to undo his work."

"It would be so kind of him!" exclaimed the distressed lady, who was by this time far beyond either surprise or resentment. "I'm sure, if he knew all we have gone through—!" and she led the way to her husband's room.

As soon as the door was opened the Professor seemed to recognise his tormentor in spite of his changed raiment, and was so powerfully agitated that he actually reeled on his four legs, and "stood over" in a lamentable fashion.

"O man of distinguished attainments!" began the Jinnee, "whom I have caused, for reasons that are known unto thee, to assume the shape of a mule, speak, I adjure thee, and tell me where thou hast deposited the inscribed seal which is in thy possession."

The Professor spoke; and the effect of articulate speech proceeding from the mouth of what was to all outward seeming an ordinary mule was strange beyond description. "I'll see you damned first," he said sullenly. "You can't do worse to me than you've done already!"

"As thou wilt," said Fakrash; "but unless I regain it, I will not restore thee to what thou wast."

"Well, then," said the mule, savagely, "you'll find it in the top right-hand drawer of my writing-table: the key is in that diorite bowl on the mantelpiece."

The Jinnee unlocked the drawer, and took out the metal cap, which he placed in the breast pocket of his incongruous frock-coat. "So far, well," he said; "next thou must deliver up to me the transcription thou hast made, and swear to preserve an inviolable secrecy regarding the meaning thereof."

"Do you know what you're asking, sir?" said the mule, laying back his ears viciously. "Do you think that to oblige you I'm going to suppress one of the most remarkable discoveries of my whole scientific career? Never, sir—never!"

"Since if thou refusest I shall assuredly deprive thee of speech once more and leave thee a mule, as thou art now, of hideous appearance," said the Jinnee, "thou art like to gain little by a discovery which thou wilt be unable to impart. However, the choice rests with thee."

The mule rolled his one eye, and showed all his teeth in a vicious snarl. "You've got the whip-hand of me," he said, "and I may as well give in. There's a transcript inside my blotting-case—it's the only copy I've made."

Fakrash found the paper, which he rubbed into invisibility between his palms, as any ordinary conjurer might do.

"Now raise thy right forefoot," he said, "and swear by all thou holdest sacred never to divulge what thou hast learnt"—which oath the Professor, in the vilest of tempers, took, clumsily enough.

"Good," said the Jinnee, with a grim smile. "Now let one of thy women bring me a cup of fair water."

Sylvia went out, and came back with a cup of water. "It's filtered," she said anxiously; "I don't know if that will do?"

"It will suffice," said Fakrash. "Let both the women withdraw."

"Surely," remonstrated Mrs. Futvoye, "you don't mean to turn his wife and daughter out of the room at such a moment as this? We shall be perfectly quiet, and we may even be of some help."

"Do as you're told, my dear!" snapped the ungrateful mule; "do as you're told. You'll only be in the way here. Do you suppose he doesn't know his own beastly business?"

They left accordingly; whereupon Fakrash took the cup—an ordinary breakfast cup with a Greek key-border pattern in pale blue round the top—and, drenching the mule with the contents, exclaimed, "Quit this form and return to the form in which thou wast!"

For a dreadful moment or two it seemed as if no effect was to be produced; the animal simply stood and shivered, and Ventimore began to feel an agonising suspicion that the Jinnee really had, as he had first asserted, forgotten how to perform this particular incantation.

All at once the mule reared, and began to beat the air frantically with his fore-hoofs; after which he fell heavily backward into the nearest armchair (which was, fortunately, a solid and capacious piece of furniture) with his fore-legs hanging limply at his side, in a semi-human fashion. There was a brief convulsion, and then, by some gradual process unspeakably impressive to witness, the man seemed to break through the mule, the mule became merged in the man—and Professor Futvoye, restored to his own natural form and habit, sat gasping and trembling in the chair before them.