The Garden at No. 19/Chapter 9

NLY a statue of Pan?" I said with some relief.

"Only? You should just see it,  and you wouldn't say 'only.'  I tell you, it's  terrible."

"But Pan—Pan was a god of the shepherds and guardian of their flocks,  a beneficent god,  as well as the god of the wild woods." "I think that it was as god of the woods that he was terrible," she said thoughtfully.

"But if it is so terrible, I wonder you weren't afraid to dance before it—alone and at night."

"But if the Greek girls did, why shouldn't I? And uncle assured me that they did.  Once,  when he was in a talkative humor, I asked him  about the statue, and he told me that times and  again a Greek girl must have danced before  it in the moonlight,  a girl who wanted a lover, or  a man she loved to fall in love with her.  And  I wanted to see if anything would happen if I      danced before  it, and I wasn't very frightened."

"And did anything happen?" I said.

"Nothing the first two or three times I danced before it. But I liked doing it. And last night  and the time before I had a curious fancy, once  or twice, that eyes were on me."

"My eyes certainly were," I said.

"No, not your eyes—much nearer eyes—among the trees. Once  I even fancied that  there were creatures on the lawn, and twice  I  fancied that the statue itself was looking at  me—it's terribly alive."

"You might fancy anything, alone, at night, and expecting something to happen.  But whatever you do, don't go and raise Pan.  You know  that the sight of Pan drove people mad."

"Oh, yes; I know that. But there's no fear of my doing that."

"Who knows? If Pan would rise for anyone, he would rise for you,"  I said smiling. "But whom did you want him to make fall in love  with you?"

"I didn't want anyone to fall in love with me!" she cried, blushing.

"That's all right," I said. "I don't want anyone to fall in love with you either."

We were silent a while; then she said: "If you're really going to help me try to learn the secrets, you'll let me watch the next celebration of the rites with you, won't you?"

"No, no; not that," I said quickly. "In any research of your own I'll help you. But the  ritual of the Abyss is dangerous.  I don't know  whether it's owing to the people who celebrate  it, or what the cause is, but I do know it's dangerous.  It produced an emotional upheaval of  my being which just racked my nerves.  I  couldn't work all next day.  I'm afraid of it for  you; I am, really. And I should so like to let  you have your own way in a matter in which  you are so keen.  You know I should."

"It's the shortest way to the secrets," she said with a sigh.

We said no more about it that evening.

The more I considered this new fact I had learned, that under the cupola was a statue of  Pan, the more I wondered at it. Pan did not seem to me the god to hold the chief place in  the ritual of the Abyss. For though the early conception of the devil was probably drawn  from Pan, I could not think that Woodfell and  his friends would be at all affected by that. I wondered whether  I ought not to change my  view of the creatures of the Abyss invoked in  the rites. Marks had let fall a phrase about the forces of nature. Were these creatures of the Abyss nature gods and not devils? It seemed probable. Yet among them was Moloch—I had heard him invoked—and surely Moloch was a devil. I was puzzled.

The days passed quietly. It was a good thing that I had acquired the power of keeping  my life in two separate compartments. At home, and on my journies to and fro in the  tube between Hertford Park and my office, I  pondered continually the ritual of the Abyss  and the strange things I had heard, or seen,  or fancied. They interfered with my reading. But once in my office I could put all thoughts of them away; and I did my work, dull or interesting, with no increase of effort. In fact, I was doing my work much better; the coming  of Pamela into my life, broadening and enriching  it, seemed to have stimulated also my  intelligence.

I gave no little thought to the matter of helping and protecting Pamela in her quest of a  revelation. I did not believe that she would gain her end; but she was so eager to gain  it that I had not the heart to discourage her. I could not indeed find a way of helping her, and I was chiefly concerned with protecting her in her quest. It was all very well for me to assure myself, and her, that the whole business was a matter of excited fancy; the terrors which had stricken both of us, more than  once, were real indeed. Casting about for methods of protecting her, I thought, naturally,  of amulets. If there were malefic powers, then there might be some grounds for the world  wide belief that amulets were a protection  against them.

At the next meeting of the New Bohemians, therefore, when, thanks to a happy effort of  Gibson, the general conversation was proceeding in an infuriated roar on the subject of Socialism, I drew Marks into a quiet backwater  out of the roaring stream of talk by a question  about amulets.

At once he displayed his frequent mood of a doubter who would fain believe, and declared  that his mind was quite open on the matter. Amulets and talismans might work, and they might not. He had known talismans which, to all seeming, had worked admirably; he had  known them fail utterly. For his part, he held that the true talisman was of the nature of a  sacrament; it was an affirmation of a man's will, his protective will, just as sticking pins  into the wax figure of an enemy, to destroy  him, was an affirmation of his malefic will. If his will to destroy were strong enough, that  action might, in some way which passed our  understanding, work injury. If a man's will to protect were strong enough, the affirmation  of  it, the crystallization of  it, as  it were, in the  making of a talisman might work good. In themselves the wax figure and the talisman  were nothing; as vehicles of the will they might be potent. It must, moreover, be borne in mind that the belief that the talisman was guarding  you was very strengthening.

"I understand," I said. "And it seems to me a very interesting theory. In fact, I believe it's the truth of the matter.  Besides,  there may be these malefic powers of the underworld, though  I always try to assure myself  that they don't exist."

"I always try to assure myself that they do," said Marks dryly.

"Well, if they do, they work in a way obscure to us, and there  is no reason why the  talisman should not also work in an obscure  way.  I suppose you know how to make talismans."

"Oh, yes."

"Well, will you make me a talisman that will protect the wearer against the lords of the Abyss? I don't want it for myself.  I want it  for Miss Woodfell. After all, if she does come  to any harm from her uncle's tampering with  the forbidden things, you will be a sharer in  the responsibility."

"That's an  excellent  suggestion,"  said  Marks warmly. "As you have guessed, I am uneasy that Miss Woodfell is living at No. 19,  and I will certainly make her the approved  talisman.  I do share the responsibility, and  you may be sure that it will be a strong affirmation of my will. What is her Christian name?"

I told him that it was Pamela, and I thanked him.

Three days later I received a letter from him, enclosing two smaller envelopes,  sealed, Pamela's name on the one, mine on the other. His letter ran:

I was really glad to have the talisman for Pamela. It sounds silly, doubtless, even barbarous. It will probably seem absurd to most men to be glad, in the twentieth century, to have a talisman. But then all the crude scientific notions, which are a part of the unconscious  equipment of the twentieth century mind, had  in my case been severely shaken. Even supposing, as I was trying to believe, that the beast in the garden and the figures on the lawn at the end of the rites of the Abyss had been mere  hallucinations of a disordered fancy, the talisman would be of service to me if it rendered  any such disordered fancy in the future less  discomfiting.

Pamela was far more pleased than I to have the talisman, as was only natural since she entertained no belief at all that she had been the   victim of hallucinations. I was therefore as sured that in any case it would be useful to  her; her utter belief in its efficacy was a shield; at the least, she was fortified against fancies  by a fancy.

A week before the full moon she gave me a very unpleasant surprise.

We were sitting on our bank in Kew Gardens, and I had been wondering why a smile of great content now and again flitted across  her face. At last she said, "I'm going to watch the rites in the garden after all, Heine."

"You are? How?" I cried.

"I have another key to my bedroom door," she said. "I took the lock off it with a screwdriver and took it to Wharton, the ironmonger in High street.  He's made me another key.  And I've been practicing turning the key round  and pushing it out of the lock, so that if uncle  does leave it in the door when he locks me in,  that won't matter."

She told me this in a tone of triumph, smiling.

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! You are a willful child. I do beg of you not to run into this danger."

She shook her head and said: "Oh, I must see them—I must, Heine.  I do so want to. If  you were to ask me to do anything else, I  would do it.  But this I can't."

I sat considering the matter for a while before I spoke; then I said: "Well, well; there's no help for it. A willful woman will have her  way.  Since you must watch them, you had better come and watch them with me."

"Oh, yes!" she cried. "I should like that better than anything!"

"Very well, that's settled, then. You'll certainly be much safer in my house. I'll help you  over the partition wall, and we'll watch it from  my back room."

"I've been thinking about it," she said gravely. "Why shouldn't we watch it from your garden?  If I had those clippers of yours,  I could cut away some of the branches on my  side, and you could cut away the branches on  yours.  We could leave just a screen like we  have to talk through at the bottom of the garden, and stand on a table up against your hedge  and see everything."

"Good heavens, no!" I cried. "Up on the third floor in my house is every inch as near those rites as I want to be. It would be the  very most foolhardy recklessness."

"Very well, if you think not," she said submissively; then, smiling mischievously,  she  added, "Ah, you believe ever so much more in the lords of the Abyss than you admit."

"Be sure you don't forget to have your talisman with you," I said quickly.

"I shan't forget it," she said, laughing mischievously.