Page:Weird Tales Volume 4 Number 2 (1924-05-07).djvu/69

Rh of cringing. Perhaps you noticed that poor Will cringed, too."

"Yes," I said. "Will Hoist was not a strong character."

"Peter and he were as different as the day and night. They were born a few months after their father had been killed in an accident. Mrs. Hoist was alone and without funds so my father permitted me to nurse her and be with her when her hour came.

"I remember the night well. There was a storm and far off rolls of thunder. The doctor we had called in a hurry, was fussy and inefficient. He made me very nervous. Will was born first and Mrs. Hoist, her heart failing, was almost gone. Peter was yet to be born. I saw that in a moment it would be too late. I took Mrs. Hoist's cold hand in mine, and with all my strength. I called her back. It was part of my father's training. She came through the black door reluctantly for she had been given a glimpse of what was on the other side and it had been fair to her.

ETER was born while she lingered between the land of the living and the dead, just as I am lingering now. We, the doctor and I, had to work strenuously to keep Peter alive. At first we thought he was born dead. His little body was blue and cold. The doctor and I swung him around in the air and at last succeeded in bringing the flush of life into his body. He gave a faint cry. As we laid him down beside his mother and brother we found that Mrs. Hoist had slipped through the black door and had closed it forever behind her.

"I did not want to see the children taken to a charity institution, so I prevailed upon my father to let me take them home and care for them. My father was a man of means and I was ready to strike out for myself in the world. I had already conversed with the dead.

"The twins were, from the start, the queerest children I have ever known. They were deeply interesting studies. Will was the clinging kind just like his mother. Peter was absolutely independent. He led Will about by the nose. Will was glad to be led. He followed Peter like a dog and tried his best to obey Peter in everything. Will could never be depended upon, however, for his weakness always got the better of him during crucial moments and Peter would have to step in an do the thing himself.

"As children, they played strange games down near the river that flowed through the dark woods at the rear of my father's estate. They were not popular with other children so they played alone. Peter would invent the strange games and Will would play with him, half the time not understanding, yet he was not a stupid boy. I often watched them playing there, in those dark woods beside that sluggish river, and I never heard them laugh.

"A great deal of their queerness was my fault. I was too serious with them. My adventures in the spirit world were unconsciously conveyed to them. Peter was fond of asking questions and often I found him with my father in precocious conversation. My father was amused by him and told me that the boy was clever, and, with proper training, would make a brilliant medium. Father called him Spirit Peter because he had been born while his mother lingered in the doorway.

"I foolishly told Peter how I had called his mother back just long enough to give him birth. That filled him with wonder and uncanny amusement.

I was born while mother was as good as dead.' I often heard him telling Will and you can't imagine how terrible it sounded and how sorry I felt because I had told him. Will would stare at him in horror and he would go on to explain that auntie Lorna could call people back from the dead. His eyes would grow round and pale green like cat's eyes. Will's would, too. My, how they used to frighten me. They were so peculiar looking with pale skins, white eyebrows and lashes, and straw colored hair. They made me think of plants growing in a cellar away from sunlight.

"Peter developed early the artistic talent that later made him so famous. He found, near that dark river, a red clay that was fine for molding and with it he would shape the figures of his mind. When only eleven years old he brought to me his conception of his mother as a spirit that so pleased my father that he made arrangements to send him to an art school when he became older.

HE next year my father died and left most of his money to a research society that he had founded. I took the twins into the city and rented a hall where I began my life's work. I carried out my father's plans and sent Peter to the best art school I could find. At sixteen he won the first prize for a bust of his brother Will. During this time Will was developing along literary lines. You remember he was a contributor to a socialistic periodical at the time of the Gladys Rogers murder. He admired Peter and still looked up to him and still leaned on his judgment.

"One night when Peter was away sketching in the country, I was awakened from sleep by his voice calling to me, and I felt his long fingers clutching my arm.

What do you want, Peter?' I asked. 'Are you in need of me?'

"His voice answered me distinctly. 'Call me back, auntie Lorna. Call me back as you did my mother when I was born.'

"I worked myself into a trance and called him back not knowing into what harm he had fallen.

Three days later he returned looking even paler than usual and wearing dark purple shadows under his eyes. He explained that he had been in an automobile accident and had been nearly killed. He said that if I had not come to his rescue that he would not have lived. He limped when he walked. He kissed me and explained that he would not have minded passing had he not a great gift to give to the world. He was constantly talking about that great gift, my poor Peter.

"They were kind and thoughtful boys, those two queer ones. Will loved me most and it is only of late that I have learned how real and unselfish his love was. Ah, if I had only known sooner. My poor brave Will."

Here she paused and closed her eyes. A deep sigh escaped her. I saw her wasted form, under the covers, spasmodically quiver and then relax.

"Miss Blanchard, not yet," I cried.

She faintly smiled and opened her eyes.

"No, not yet, but very soon. The door is heavy. I must close it soon. Do you recollect the ruthless attack upon my religion a few years ago, when the fakers were exposed and we, who were sincere, were forced to fly from the storm of ridicule? Well, I was one of those who fled. I came to this place and have been here ever since.

"Will lived with me for a time and then moved uptown. Peter had a gloomy studio on Grant street. The two boys came to see me often and I was not unhappy.

"Peter first met Gladys Rogers at a friend's studio where she was doing the cleaning. He gave her his studio work to do, more as an act of pity than anything else. I cannot see what Will found in her. She was plain and unattractive. You know that from her pictures. She had no brains either. But yet he lost his heart over her. As it often happens,