The Mystery of the Green Ray

“Good heavens!” I exclaimed. “Green again! Can you make anything of it at all, Garnesk? I’m sorry I’m such a duffer as to faint at the critical moment, when I might have been of some assistance to you. What in God’s name can it all mean?”

“I’m no further on,” he replied bitterly; “in fact, I’m further back.”

“Further back!” I cried. “How? I don’t see how you can be.”

“I’ll tell you what my theory was about all this affair, and it struck me as a good one – strange, of course, but then, this is a strange business.”

“It is, indeed,” I agreed ruefully. “Well, go on.”

“I had an idea, Ewart, that we should find some sort of wireless telegraphy at the bottom of this business. I had almost made up my mind that we had stumbled across the path of some inventor who was working with a new form of wireless transmission. I felt that in that way we might account for Miss McLeod’s blindness and the blindness of the dog. It also seemed to hold good as to the disappearance of Sholto. The inventor hears of the extraordinary effect of his invention, and is afraid he will get into a mess if it is found out. The yacht to experiment from fitted in beautifully. But now all that’s knocked on the head.”

“Why?” I asked. “It seems to me, Garnesk, that you are doing all the thinking in this affair, as if you had been used to it all your life. Your only trouble is that you’re too modest. I take it that because you didn’t see the yacht when you noticed the green flash you are taking it for granted you were wrong to expect it. I must say, old chap, I think you’ve done thundering well, as the General would put it, and even if you are prepared to admit your theory has been knocked on the head I’m not – at any rate, not until I have a jolly good reason. Yet it doesn’t seem to matter much what I say or do if I’m going to faint like a girl at the first sign of danger. If you hadn’t come to my rescue I might still be lying there waiting to come round, or something,” I finished in disgust.

My companion looked at me thoughtfully.

“Ewart,” he said, and solemnly shook his head, “you have brought me to the very thing that made me say my theory was exploded.”

“What thing?” I asked. “Surely my fainting can’t have made any difference to conclusions you had already come to?”

“But then you see,” my friend replied, “you didn’t faint. And if I had not seen you were in difficulties you would probably never have recovered.”

“Didn’t faint?” I exclaimed. “Well, I don’t know what the medical term for it is, and I daresay there are several technical phrases for the girlish business I went through. That idea of being dumb was simply imagination, but I assure you it was just what I should call a fainting fit.”

“I don’t want to alarm you if you’re not feeling well,” he began apologetically.

“Go on,” I urged. “I’m as fit as I ever was.”

“Well,” the young specialist responded, in a serious tone, “if you want to know the truth, Ewart, you were suffocated.”

“Suffocated!” I shouted, jumping to my feet. “What in heaven’s name do you mean?”

“I can’t tell you exactly what I mean because I don’t know, but yours was certainly not an ordinary fainting fit. To put the whole thing in non-medical terms, you were practically drowned on dry land!”

I sat down again – heavily at that. Should we never come to an end of these mysterious attacks which were hurled at us in broad daylight from nowhere at all?

“I’m not sure that you hadn’t better rest before we go into this fully, Ewart,” Garnesk remarked doubtfully. “You’re not by any means as fit as you’ve ever been, in spite of your emphatic assurance.”

“Tell me what you think, why you think it, and what you feel we ought to do. Why, man, Myra might have been here alone, with no one to rescue her and – and – ”

“Quite so,” said Ewart sympathetically. “So you must comfort yourself with the knowledge that it may be a great blessing that she has temporarily lost her sight. Now, I say you didn’t faint, because, medically, I know you didn’t. For the same reason I say you were suffocating as surely as if you had been drowning. Hang it, my dear chap, it’s my line of business, you know. I can’t account for it, but there is the naked fact for you.”

“How does this affect your previous conclusions?” I asked. “Before you tell me what you think brought on this suffocation I should like to hear why you give up your theory.”

“Simply because no wireless, or other electric current, could have that effect upon you. If you had had an electric shock in any of its many curious forms I could have said it bore me out; but, you see, it’s impossible. And, as I refuse to believe that we are continually bumping into new mysteries which have no connection with each other, it follows that if this suffocation was not caused by the supposed wireless experiments, the other can’t have been either.”

“I’m not making the slightest imputation on your medical knowledge,” I ventured, “but are you absolutely certain that you are not mistaken?”

“My dear fellow,” he laughed, “for goodness sake don’t be so apologetic. I can quite see that you find it difficult to believe. But I am prepared to swear to it all the same. For one thing, the symptoms were unmistakable; for another, it seems impossible that we should both faint at exactly the same time and place for no reason at all.”

“You didn’t faint too, surely?” I cried.

“No,” he admitted, “but we might very easily have been suffocated together – smothered as surely as the princes in the Tower. When I saw you were in difficulties I shouted to you. Obviously you didn’t hear me. I naturally didn’t wait to see what would happen to you; I cleared down the cliff, and sprinted to you as fast as I could. When I came to within about twenty yards of you I found a difficulty in breathing. I went on for a couple of paces, and realised that the air was almost as heavy as water. So I rushed back, undid my collar, took a deep breath; and bolted in to you, picked you up, and carted you here. Voilà! But I very nearly joined you on the ground, and then we would never have regained consciousness, either of us. I applied the simplest form of artificial respiration to you, dowsed your head, and now you’re all right. On the whole, Ewart, we can consider ourselves very well out of this latest adventure.”

“What you’re really telling me,” I pointed out gratefully, “is that you saved my life at the risk of your own. I’m no good at making speeches, or anything of that sort, Garnesk, but I thank you, if you know what that means. And Myra will – ”

“Not a word to her, Ewart,” my companion interrupted eagerly. “Whatever you do, don’t on any account worry that poor girl with this new complication. Anything on earth but that.”

“No,” I agreed; “you’re right there. Myra must be kept in the dark.”

“Yes,” he replied, with a look of relief. “It might have a serious effect on her chances of recovery if she had this additional worry. And I don’t think it would be advisable to tell the old man either. I think we had better keep it to ourselves absolutely. Tell no one, Ewart, except your friend when he comes.”

“Very well,” I answered, for I was very anxious to spare both Myra and her father from the knowledge of any further trouble. “I’ll tell Dennis when he comes, but otherwise it is our secret.”

“Good,” said Garnesk. “Now put your coat on, old chap, and we’ll stroll back to the house.”

I got up and buttoned my collar, retied my bow, and slipped into my jacket. I was rather uncomfortably damp, and I felt a bit shaky and queer, and decided that I could do with a complete rest from the mysteries of the green ray. But the subject remained uppermost in my mind, and my tired brain still strove to unravel the tangled threads of the puzzle.

“By the way,” I said, as we walked slowly up to the house, “you have not yet explained what there was in my remark about the sunlight that made you think of the yacht.”

“Well,” he replied, “you see I had an idea that perhaps they might come here when the gorge, through which the river flows, was flooded with light, so that they could see if any strange effects were produced. But that suffocation was not brought about by any electrical experiment, and I am beginning to be afraid that, after all, we may be up against some strange natural phenomena, some terrible combination of the forces of Nature, which has not yet been observed, or at any rate recorded.”

“Why afraid?” I asked, for although I had been glad to believe that we were faced with a problem which would prove to have a human solution, the revulsion had come, and I should have welcomed the knowledge that some weird, freakish application of natural power might be held accountable.

“Afraid?” queried Garnesk, with a note of surprise. “I am very often afraid of Nature. She is a devoted slave, but a cruel mistress. I don’t think that I should ever be very much scared by a human being, even in his most fiendish aspect, but Nature – I tell you, Ewart, there are things in Nature that make me shudder!”

“Yes,” I agreed heavily, “you’re right, of course. That’s how I have felt for the past twenty-four hours. It was a tremendous relief to me to feel that we were men looking for men. But the last few minutes I have had an idea that it would be comforting to explain it all out of a text-book of physics. Still, you’re right. It is better far to be men fighting men than to be puny molecules tossed in the maëlstrom of immutable power which created the world, and may one day destroy it.”

“I’m glad you agree,” he said simply. “You see you could not possibly live for a second in electrically produced atmosphere which was so thick that you couldn’t hear yourself speak. Death would be instantaneous. It couldn’t have been our unknown professor’s wireless experiments after all. Yet it seems impossible that a sudden new power should crop up suddenly at one spot like this. Imagine what would happen if this had occurred in a city, in a crowded street. Hundreds would have been stricken blind, then hundreds would have been suffocated. Vehicles would have run amok, and the result would have been an indescribable chaos of the maimed, mangled and distraught. A flash like this green ray (which blinded Miss McLeod and her dog, deluded the General, and nearly suffocated us) at the mouth of a harbour, say, the entrance to a great port – Liverpool, London, or Glasgow – would be responsible for untold loss of life. If this terrible phenomenon spread, Ewart, it would paralyse the industry of the world in twenty-four hours. If it spread still farther the face of the globe would become the playing-fields of Bedlam in a moment. Think of the result of this everywhere! Some suffocated, some blinded, and millions probably mad and sightless, stumbling over the bodies of the dead to cut each other’s throats in the frenzy of sudden imbecility.”

“Don’t, Garnesk,” I begged. “It won’t bear thinking about. We have enough troubles here to deal with without that!”

“Yes,” my companion admitted, “we need not add to them by any idle conjectures of still more hideous horrors to come. But it is an interesting, if terrible speculation. And it means one thing to us, Ewart, of the very greatest importance. We must solve the riddle somehow.”

“You mean,” I cried, as I realised the tremendous import of his words – “you mean that the sanity of the universe may rest with us! You mean that if we can solve this riddle we, or others, may be able to devise some means of prevention, or at least protection? You mean that we are in duty bound to keep at this night and day until we find out what it is?”

“That is just what I do mean,” he replied seriously. “It is a solemn duty; who knows, it may be a holy trust. Ewart, we agree to get to the bottom of this? We have agreed once, but are we still prepared to go on with this now that we know we may be crushed in the machinery that controls the solar system and lights the very sun?”

“I shall certainly go on,” I replied eagerly. “But we can hardly expect you to run risks on our behalf.”

“It may be in the interests of civilisation,” he answered, “and in that case it is our duty. Now look here, Ewart, this will have to be a secret. It is essential that we should not get ourselves laughed at because, for one thing, the scoffers may get into serious trouble if they start investigating our assertions in a spirit of levity. You and I must keep this to ourselves entirely. What about your friend?”

“I can trust him,” I replied simply.

“Then tell him everything,” Garnesk advised. “If you know you can rely upon him he may be of great assistance to us.”

“What about Hilderman?” I asked. “He knows a good deal already.”

“There is no need for him to know any more. He may be of some use to us. I had thought he might be of the greatest use, but he may be able to help us still. We should decrease, rather than augment, his usefulness by telling him these new complications.”

“How do you mean?” I asked.

“Well, for instance, he might think we are mad, although he’s a very shrewd fellow.”

“Yes,” I agreed, “I think he’s pretty cute. Funny that Americans so often are. Anyway, he’s been cute enough to make sufficient to retire on at a fairly early age, and retire comfortably too.”

“H’m,” was my companion’s only comment.

After dinner that evening we discussed all sorts of subjects, mainly the war, of course, and went to bed early.

“Now, Ron,” exclaimed Myra, as we said good-night, “if Mr. Garnesk is really going to leave us on Monday, you mustn’t let him worry about things to-morrow. Do let him have one day’s holiday while he is with us, anyway.”

“I will,” I agreed. “We’ll have a real holiday to-morrow. Suppose we all go up Loch Hourn in the motor-boat in the afternoon?”

So it was arranged that we should have an afternoon on the sea and a morning’s fishing on the loch. Garnesk fell in with the idea readily.

“It will do you good,” he declared. “You won’t be feeling too frisky in the morning after your adventure this afternoon.”

As it turned out he was quite right, for I awoke in the morning with a slight headache and a tendency to ache all over. So we fished the loch in a very leisurely fashion for an hour or two, and after lunch the four of us went up to Kinlochbourn. We took a tea-basket with us, and very nearly succeeded in banishing the green ray altogether from our minds. I had taken my Kodak with me, and we ran in shore, and otherwise altered our course occasionally in order to enable me to record some choice peep of the magnificent scenery. When we got back to the lodge we were all feeling much the better for the outing. After dinner Myra, who had taken the greatest interest in the photographs, although, poor child, she could not see what I had taken, and would not be able to see the result either, was anxious to know how they had turned out.

“I should love to know if the snapshots are good,” she said, “particularly the one at Caolas Mor. Develop them in the morning, Ronnie, won’t you? If you don’t you’ll probably take them away, and forget all about them.”

Garnesk looked at me. He was always on the qui vive for any opportunity to give Myra a little pleasure. He felt very strongly that she must be kept from worrying at all costs.

“Why not develop them now, Ewart?” he suggested.

“Certainly,” I said, “if everybody will excuse me.”

“Dad’s in the library,” Myra replied, “but everybody else will come with you if you ask us nicely. Besides, I shall have to tell you where everything is. There’s plenty of room for us all.”

“Right you are,” I agreed readily, and went out to get a small folding armchair from the verandah. We went up to the dark-room at the top of the house, and Myra sat in the corner, giving me instructions as to the position of the bottles, etc. I prepared the developer while Garnesk busied himself with the fixing acid.

“Now we’re ready,” I announced, as I made sure that the light-tight door was closed, and lowered the ruby glass over the orange on Myra’s imposing dark-room lamp; she believed in doing things comfortably; no messing about with an old-fashioned “hock-bottle” for her. I took the spool from my pocket and began to develop them en bloc.

“How are they coming along?” Myra asked, leaning forward interestedly.

“They’re beginning to show up,” I replied; “they look rather promising.”

“It’s rather warm in here,” said the girl presently; “do you think it would matter if I removed my shade, Mr. Garnesk?”

“Not if you put it on again before we put the light up,” the specialist answered. Myra took off the shade and the heavy bandage with a sigh of relief, and leaned her elbow on the table beside her.

“There’s a glass beaker just by your arm, dear,” I said; “just a minute and I’ll put it out of reach.”

“All right,” said Garnesk, moving forward, “I’ll move it; don’t you worry.”

But before he could reach the table there was a crash. The beaker went smashing to the floor. I turned with a laugh, which died on my lips. Myra was standing up with her hand to her head.

“What is it, darling?” I cried, dropping the length of film on the floor. Garnesk made a grab for the shade. Myra gave a short, shrill little laugh, which had a slightly ominous, hysterical note in it.

“Don’t be alarmed, dear,” she said quietly, in a curiously tense voice, “I can see!”

CHAPTER XII.

WHO IS HILDERMAN?

I must admit that I was so delighted to find that Myra had recovered her sight that I very nearly made what might have been a very serious mistake. I gave a loud shout of triumph and made a dive for the light, intending to switch it on. This might, of course, have had a very bad effect upon my darling’s eyes, but fortunately Garnesk darted across the room and knocked up my arm in the nick of time.

“Not yet, Ewart, not yet,” he warned me. “We must run no risks until we are quite sure.”

“But, Ronnie, I can see quite well,” Myra declared delightedly. “I see everything just as easily as I usually can by the light of the dark-room lamp.”

“Still, we won’t expose you to the glare of white light just at present, Miss McLeod,” said Garnesk solemnly. “We must be very careful. Tell me, how did your sight return, gradually or suddenly?”

“Suddenly, I think,” the girl replied. “I took off the shade and laid it down, and then when I looked up I could distinctly see the lamp.”

“Immediately the shade was removed?”

“No,” she answered, “not just immediately. You see, I was looking at the floor, which is so dark, of course, that you couldn’t see it in the ordinary way. Then as soon as I looked up I could see the lamp. For a moment I thought it was my imagination, but when I found I could see Ron stooping over the developing-dish I knew that I was all right again.”

“This is very extraordinary, you know,” said Garnesk. “Can you count the bottles on the middle shelf?”

“Oh, yes!” laughed Myra, “I can make them out distinctly. Of course, I know pretty well what they are, but in any case I could easily describe them to you if I’d never seen them before.”

“What have I got in my hand?” the specialist queried, holding his arm out.

“A pair of nail-clippers,” Myra declared emphatically, and Garnesk laughed.

“Well,” he said, “you can obviously see it pretty well; but, as a matter of fact, it’s a cigar-cutter.”

“Oh! well, you see,” the girl explained airily, “I always put necessity before luxury!”

So then the oculist made her sit down again and questioned and cross-questioned her at considerable length.

“I’m puzzled, but delighted,” he admitted finally. “It’s strange, but it is at the same time decidedly hopeful.”

“I suppose it means that she will always be able to see in a red light at any rate?” I suggested.

“Probably it does,” he agreed, “and, of course, her sight may be completely restored. There is also a middle course; she may be able to see perfectly after a course of treatment in red light. I will get her a pair of red glasses made at once. We can see how that goes. But I feel that it would be advisable to introduce her to daylight in gradual stages, in case of any risk.”

“Oh, if we could only find poor old Sholto!” Myra exclaimed eagerly. Garnesk turned to her with a look of frank admiration.

“You’re a lucky young dog, Ewart,” he whispered to me, “by Jove you are!”

So Myra graciously, but a little regretfully I think, placed herself in the hands of the young specialist and replaced her shade. Then we left the dark-room, allowing the films to develop out on the floor, and went downstairs. We took her out on to the verandah and removed the shade for a moment, but the chill air of the highland night made her eyes smart after their unaccustomed imprisonment, and we gave up the experiment for that night.

As Garnesk and I bathed together in the morning we were both brighter and more cheerful than we had been since his arrival.

“I shall catch the train from Mallaig,” he declared. “Can you take me in and meet your friend without having long to wait?”

“If you insist on going,” I replied, “I can get you there in time to meet him and you will have an hour or more to wait for your train.”

“Oh, so much the better! We can tell him everything and give him all the news in the interval.”

“Are you still determined to go?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said, “I must go. It will be necessary for me to make one or two inquiries and get a pair of glasses made for Miss McLeod.”

“I shall be very sorry to lose you, Garnesk,” I said earnestly. “Don’t you think you could write or wire for the glasses? You see, if we have come to the conclusion that this green ray is some chemical production of Nature unassisted there isn’t the same reason for you to leave us.”

“No, that’s true,” he agreed, “but we were both a bit scared yesterday, old chap, and the more I think of this dog business the less I like it. It was mere conceit on my part that made me say it was bound to be some natural phenomenon merely because I couldn’t understand how the effect could have been humanly produced.”

“Perhaps,” I suggested, “our best course would be to keep an open mind about the whole thing.”

“Yes,” he replied, “I’m with you entirely. And in that case my going away is not going to aggravate the effects of a natural phenomenon, while it may restrain the human agency by removing the necessity for further activity.”

“Well, that’s sound enough,” I acquiesced; “but I shall hear from you, I hope?”

“Of course, my dear fellow,” he laughed, “we’re in this thing together. You’ll hear from me as often as you want, and who knows what else besides. I have no intention of dropping this for a minute, Ewart. But I think I can do more if I am not on the spot. We’re agreed that my presence here may be a source of danger to you all.”

“Yes,” I said, “I think yours is the best plan. What do you propose to do?”

“Well, to begin with, I shall devote an hour or two to knocking our panic theory on the head.”

“You mean the natural phenomenon idea?”

“Precisely,” said he. “I don’t think that it will be able to exist very long in the light of physical knowledge – not that that is a very powerful light, but it should be strong enough for our purpose. As soon as I have convinced myself that our enemy is a mere human being I shall take such steps as I may think necessary at the time. Then, of course, I shall acquaint you with the steps that I have taken, and we shall work together and round up our man, and, figuratively speaking, make him swallow his hideous green ray.”

“What sort of steps do you mean?” I asked.

“Well, that all depends,” my friend answered, “on what sort of man we have to deal with. But it will certainly include providing ourselves with the necessary means of self-defence, and may run to calling in the assistance of the authorities.”

“I’m not sure that the presence of the police in a quiet spot like this might not have a disastrous effect on our plans,” I pointed out.

“I shouldn’t worry about the police,” he laughed. “I should make for the naval chaps. I’m rather pally with them just now; I’m booked up to do some work of various descriptions for the period of the war, and I think if I can give them the promise of a little fun and excitement they would be willing to help.”

“Which indeed they could,” I agreed readily. “Any attempt our enemy might make to get away from us would probably mean a bolt for the open sea, and a few dozen dreadnoughts would be cheerful companionship.”