{"docstore/data": {"2124c308-64aa-4790-abd1-3fa58ea34223": {"__data__": {"id_": "2124c308-64aa-4790-abd1-3fa58ea34223", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "028c475552885ecd008a6b8705c0ef1ce657ec912b6eefb442c08e773160230f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this\n file which includes the original illustrations.\n See 19451-h.htm or 19451-h.zip:\n (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/9/4/5/19451/19451-h/19451-h.htm)\n or\n (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/9/4/5/19451/19451-h.zip)\n\n\n\n\n\nDOUBLE TROUBLE\nOr, Every Hero His Own Villain\n\nby\n\nHERBERT QUICK\n\nAuthor of Aladdin & Co., In the Fairyland of America\n\nWith Illustrations by Orson Lowell\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Frontispiece: Instantly he was aware of the descent upon him of a\nfiery comet of femininity]\n\n\n\n\n Pervasive Woman! In our hours of ease,\n Our cloud-dispeller, tempering storm to breeze!\n But when our dual selves the pot sets bubbling,\n Our cares providing, and our doubles troubling!\n --_Secret Ritual of the A.O.C.M._\n\n\n\n\nIndianapolis\nThe Bobbs-Merrill Company\nPublishers\nCopyright 1906\nThe Bobbs-Merrill Company\nJanuary\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nCHAPTER\n\n I A SLEEP AND A FORGETTING\n II THE RIDDLE OF RAIMENT AND DATES\n III ANY PORT IN A STORM\n IV AN ADVENTURE IN BENARES\n V SUBLIMINAL ENGINEERING\n VI THE JONES PLANE OF MENTALITY\n VII ENTER THE LEGAL MIND\n VIII POISING FOR THE PLUNGE\n IX IN DARKEST PENNSYLVANIA\n X THE WRONG HOUSE\n XI THE FIRST BATTLE, AND DEFEAT\n XII ON THE FIRM GROUND OF BUSINESS\n XIII THE MARTYRDOM OF MR. STEVENS\n XIV THE TREASON OF ISEGRIM THE WOLF\n XV THE TURPITUDE OF BRASSFIELD\n XVI THE OFFICE GOES IN QUEST OF THE MAX\n XVII THE HONOR NEARS ITS QUARRY\n XVIII A GLORIOUS VICTORY\n XIX THE ENTRAPPING OF MR. BRASSFIELD\n XX THE STRAWBERRY BLONDE\n XXI SOME ALTERNATIONS IN THE CURRENT\n XXII A REVIVAL OF BELSHAZZAR\n XXIII THE MOVING FINGER WRITES\n\n\n\n\nILLUSTRATIONS\n\nInstantly he was aware of the descent upon him of a fiery comet of\nfemininity . . . . . . _Frontispiece_\n\nShe seemed to emanate from the tiger-skin as a butterfly from the\nchrysalis\n\nA new thrill ran through the man and a new light came into his eyes.\n\nVast and complete was the system of notes built up by the professor and\nthe judge\n\nThere she sits so attentive to her book that his entrance has not\nattracted her notice\n\nSoon their heads were close together over plans\n\n\"Those red ones,\" said the judge, \"are the very devil for showing on\nblack!\"\n\n\"I am taking Miss Waldron home,\" said Mr. Amidon\n\n\n\n\n_The Persons of the Story_:", "start_char_idx": 12, "end_char_idx": 2368, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea": {"__data__": {"id_": "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2124c308-64aa-4790-abd1-3fa58ea34223", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7a657281328608455034f184f0b47edb4485fae62a54e668941d6c683a1109bb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "97c6854c8841e681383a9be67113e502793972a117e2be7ece561c02fad686ae", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "_The Persons of the Story_:\n\n\nFLORIAN AMIDON, a respectable young banker of literary and artistic\ntastes.\n\nEUGENE BRASSFIELD, for a description of whose peculiarities the reader\nis referred to the text.\n\nELIZABETH WALDRON, a young woman just out of school.\n\nJUDGE BLODGETT, an elderly lawyer.\n\nMADAME LE CLAIRE, a professional occultist.\n\nPROFESSOR BLATHERWICK, her father, a German scientist.\n\nDAISY SCARLETT, a young woman of fervid complexion and a character to\nmatch.\n\nEDGINGTON AND COX, lawyers.\n\nALVORD, a man about a small town.\n\nAARON, a Sudanese serving-man.\n\n MRS. PUMPHREY, )\n MISS SMITH, )\n DOCTOR JULIA BROWN, ) Members of the elite of Bellevale.\n MRS. ALVORD, )\n MRS. MEYER, )\n\nMRS. HUNTER, of Hazelhurst.\n\n MR. SLATER, )\n MR. BULLIWINKLE, ) Prominent male residents of Bellevale.\n MR. STEVENS, )\n MR. KNAGGS, )\n\n SHEEHAN, ) Labor leaders.\n ZALINSKY, )\n\nCONLON, a contractor.\n\nCLERKS, STENOGRAPHERS, SERVANTS, POLITICIANS, WAITERS, MEMBERS OF THE\nA. O. C. M., PORTERS, AND CITIZENS ON FOOT AND IN CARRIAGES.\n\nSCENE: In Hazelhurst, Wisconsin; New York City, and Bellevale,\nPennsylvania. [N. B.--It might be anywhere else in these states, east\nor west.]\n\nTIME: From June, 1896, to March, 1901--but this is not insisted upon.\n\n\n\n\nDOUBLE TROUBLE\n\n\nI\n\nA SLEEP AND A FORGETTING\n\n Deep in the Well where blushing hides the shrinking\n and Naked Truth,\n I have dived, and dared to fetch ensnared this Fragment\n of tested Sooth;\n And one of the purblind Race of Men peered with a curious Eye\n Over the Curb as I fetched it forth, and besought me\n to drop that Lie:\n But all ye who long for Certitude, and who yearn for the\n Ultimate Fact,\n Who know the Truth and in spite of Ruth tear piecemeal\n the Inexact,\n Come list to my Lay that I sing to-day, and choose betwixt\n him and me,\n And choosing show that ye always know the Lie from the Veritee!\n --_The Rime of the Sheeted Spoorn_.\n\n\"Baggs,\" said Mr. Amidon, \"take things entirely into your own hands.\nI'm off.\"\n\n\"All right,\" said Baggs. \"It's only a day's run to Canada; but in case\nI should prove honest, and need to hear from you, you'll leave your\naddress?\"\n\nMr. Amidon[1] frowned and made a gesture expressive of nervousness.\n\n\"No,\" said he, in a high-pitched and querulous tone. \"No! I want to\nsee if this business owns me, or if I own it. Why should you need to\ncommunicate with me? Whenever I'm off a day you always sign\neverything; and I shall be gone but a day on any given date this time;\nso it's only the usual thing, after all. I shall not leave any\naddress; and don't look for me until I step in at that door! Good-by.\"\n\nAnd he walked out of the bank, went home, and began looking over for\nthe last time his cameras, films, tripods and the other paraphernalia\nof his fad.\n\n\"This habit of running off alone, Florian,\" said Mrs. Baggs, his\nsister, housekeeper, general manager, and the wife of Baggs--his\nconfidential clerk and silent partner--\"gives me an uneasy feeling. If\nyou had only done as I wanted you to do, you'd have had some one----\"\n\n\"Now, Jennie,\" said he, \"we have settled that question a dozen times,\nand we can't go over it again if I am to catch the 4:48 train. Keep\nyour eye on the men, and keep Baggs up in the collar, and see that\nWilkes and Ranger get their just dues.", "start_char_idx": 2341, "end_char_idx": 5760, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4": {"__data__": {"id_": "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "ed711a9773d3ecd7b6f368bab44aa19aa904eb4d127e2d5ad8fa49c20b42c8e5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8910913d3055e3c31d20a6aa1786381868a273018b51e8b263d45c92afe37fa5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I must have rest, Jennie; and\nas for the wife, why, there'll be more some day for this purely\nspeculative family of yours if we---- By the way, there's the whistle\nat Anderson's crossing. Good-by, my dear!\"\n\nOn the 4:48 train, at least until it had aged into the 7:30 or 8:00,\nMr. Florian Amidon, banker, and most attractive unmarried man of\nHazelhurst, was not permitted to forget that his going away was an\nimportant event. The fact that he was rich, from the viewpoint of the\nlittle mid-western town, unmarried and attractive, easily made his\ndoings important, had nothing remarkable followed. But he had\nexceptional points as a person of consequence, aside from these. His\nfather had been a scholar, and his mother so much of a _grande dame_ as\nto have old worm-eaten silks and laces with histories. The Daughters\nof the American Revolution always went to the Amidons for ancient\ntoggery for their eighteenth-century costumes--and checks for their\ndeficits. The family even had a printed genealogy. Moreover, Florian\nhad been at the head of his class in the high school, had gone through\nthe family _alma mater_ in New England, and been finished in Germany.\nHazelhurst, therefore, looked on him as a possession, and thought it\nknew him.\n\nWe, however, may confide to the world that Hazelhurst knew only his\nouter husk, and that Mr. Amidon was inwardly proud of his psychological\nhinterland whereof his townsmen knew nothing. To Hazelhurst his\ncelibacy was the banker's caution, waiting for something of value in\nthe matrimonial market: to him it was a bashful and palpitant--almost\nmaidenly--expectancy of the approach of some radiant companion of his\nsoul, like those which spoke to him from the pages of his favorite\npoets.\n\nThis was silly in a mere business man! If found out it would have\njustified a run on the bank.\n\nTo Hazelhurst he was a fixed and integral part of their society: to\nhimself he was a galley-slave chained to the sweep of percentages,\ninterest-tables, cash-balances, and lines of credit, to whom there came\ndaily the vision of a native Arcadia of art, letters and travel. It\nwas good business to allow Hazelhurst to harbor its illusions; it was\nexcellent pastime and good spiritual nourishment for Amidon to harbor\nhis; and one can see how it may have been with some quixotic sense of\nseeking adventure that he boarded the train.\n\nWhat followed was so extraordinary that everything he said or did was\nremembered, and the record is tolerably complete. He talked with\nSimeon Woolaver, one of his tenants, about the delinquent rent, and\ngave Simeon a note to Baggs relative to taking some steers in\nsettlement. This was before 5:17, at which time Mr. Woolaver got off\nat Duxbury.\n\n\"He was entirely normal,\" said Simeon during the course of his\nexamination--\"more normal than I ever seen him; an' figgered the shrink\non them steers most correct from his standp'int, on a business card\nwith a indelible pencil. He done me out of about eight dollars an' a\nhalf. He was exceedin'ly normal--up to 5:17!\"\n\nMr. Amidon also encountered Mrs. Hunter and Miss Hunter in the\nparlor-car, immediately after leaving Duxbury. Miss Hunter was on her\nway to the Maine summer resorts with the Senator Fowlers, to whom Mrs.\nHunter was taking her. Mrs. Hunter noticed nothing peculiar in his\nbehavior, except the pointed manner in which he passed the chair by\nMinnie's side, and took the one by herself. This seemed abnormal to\nMrs. Hunter, whose egotism had its center in her daughter; but those\nwho remembered the respectful terror with which he regarded women\nbetween the ages of eighteen and thirty-five failed to see exceptional\nconduct in this. His lawyer, Judge Blodgett, with whom he went into\nthe buffet at about seven, found him in conversation with these two\nladies.\n\n\"He seemed embarrassed,\" said the judge, \"and was blushing. Mrs.", "start_char_idx": 5762, "end_char_idx": 9627, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3": {"__data__": {"id_": "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "9b442b0066cf16aad4d7c05c1154d7e8f7728af71316eadfbecf95d71633b8fc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9a6246d31e144b8d6fcb1000ddbe27239e757f5ab964816a91d4126cccc66bee", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"He seemed embarrassed,\" said the judge, \"and was blushing. Mrs.\nHunter was explaining the new style in ladies' figures, and asking him\nif he didn't think Minnie was getting much plumper. As soon as he saw\nme he yelled: 'Hello, Blodgett! Come into the buffet! I want to see\nyou about some legal matters.' He excused himself to the ladies, and\nwe went into the buffet.\"\n\n\"What legal matters did he place before you?\" said his interlocutor.\n\n\"Two bottles of beer,\" said the judge, \"and a box of cigars. Then he\ntalked Browning to me until 9:03, when he got off at Elm Springs\nJunction, to take the Limited north. He was wrong on Browning, but\notherwise all right.\"\n\nIt was, therefore, at 9:03, or 9:05 (for the engineer's report showed\nthe train two minutes late out of Elm Springs Junction), that Florian\nAmidon became the sole occupant of this remote country railway\nplatform. He sat on a trunkful of photographer's supplies, with a\nsuit-case and a leather bag at his back. It was the evening of June\ntwenty-seventh, 1896. All about the lonely station the trees crowded\ndown to the right of way, and rustled in a gentle evening breeze.\nSomewhere off in the wood, his ear discerned the faint hoot of an owl.\nAcross the track in a pool under the shadow of the semaphore, he heard\nthe full orchestra of the frogs, and saw reflected in the water the\nlast exquisite glories of expiring day lamped by one bright star.\nLeaning back, he partly closed his eyelids, and wondered why so many\nrays came from the star--with the vague wonder of drowsiness, which\ncomes because it has been in the habit of coming from one's earliest\nchildhood. The star divided into two, and all its beams swam about\nwhile his gaze remained fixed, and nothing seemed quite in the focus of\nhis vision.\n\nPutting out his hand, presently, he touched a window, damp with vapor\nand very cold. On the other side he felt a coarse curtain, and where\nthe semaphore stood, appeared a perpendicular bar of dim light. A\nvibratory sound somewhere near made him think that the owls and frogs\nhad begun snoring. He heard horrible hissings and the distant clangor\nof a bell; and then all the platform heaved and quaked under him as if\nit were being dragged off into the woods. He sprang upward, received a\nblow upon his head, rolled off to the floor, and----\n\nStood in the middle of a sleeping-car, clad only in pajamas; and a\nscholarly-looking negro porter looked down in his face, laying gentle\nhands upon him, and addressing him in soothing tones.\n\n\"Huht yo' haid, Mr. Brassfield? Kind o' dreamin', wasn't yo', suh?\"\nsaid the porter. \"Bettah tuhn in again, suh. I'll wake yo' fo'\nN'Yohk. Yo' kin sleep late on account of the snow holdin' us back.\nJes' lay down, Mr. Brassfield; it's only 3:35.\"\n\nA lady's eye peeped forth from the curtain of a near-by berth, and\nvanished instantly. Mr. Amidon, seeing it, plunged back into the\nshelter from which he had tumbled, and lay there trembling--trembling,\nforsooth, because, instead of summer, it seemed winter; for Elm Springs\nJunction, it appeared to be a moving train on some unknown road, going\nGod knew where; and for Florian Amidon, in his outing suit, it had the\nappearance of a somnambulistic wretch in his night-clothes, who was\naddressed by the unfamiliar porter as Mr. Brassfield!", "start_char_idx": 9562, "end_char_idx": 12870, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91": {"__data__": {"id_": "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0fea4fec6b20c0b4ee47a00a769a8a8f780df83fad3fea12e58ad7d2ef33702d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6099d2b1a86d2e1652859d95d7167b6499956e45de1bdca0087394b283893870", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Brassfield!\n\n\n\n[1] Editorial Note: As reflecting light on the personal characteristics\nof Mr. Florian Amidon, whose remarkable history is the turning-point of\nthis narrative, we append a brief note by his college classmate and\nlifelong acquaintance, the well-known Doctor J. Galen Urquhart, of\nHazelhurst, Wisconsin. The note follows:\n\n\"At the time when the following story opens, Mr. Florian Amidon was\nabout thirty years of age. Height, five feet ten and three-quarters\ninches; weight, one hundred and seventy-eight pounds. For general\nconstitutional and pathological facts, see Sheets 2 to 7, inclusive,\nattached hereto. Subject well educated, having achieved distinction in\nlinguistic, philological and literary studies in his university. (See\nSheet 1, attached.) Neurologically considered, family history of\nsubject (see Sheets 8 and 10) shows nothing abnormal, except that his\nfather, a chemist, wrote an essay opposing the atomic theory, and a\ncousin is an epileptic. I regard these facts as significant.\nVolitional and inhibitory faculties largely developed; may be said to\nbe a man of strong will-power end self-control. The following facts\nmay be noted as possibly symptomatic of neurasthenia; fondness for the\npoetry of Whitman and Browning (see Nordau); tendency to dabble in\nirregular systems of medical practice; pronounced nervous and emotional\nirritability during adolescence; aversion to young women in society;\nstubborn clinging to celibacy. In posture, gait and general movements,\nthe following may be noted: vivacious in conversation; possessed of\ngreat mobility of facial expression; anteroposterior sway marked and\noccasionally anterosinistral, and greatly augmented so as to approach\nRomberg symptom on closure of eyes, but no ataxic evidences in\nlocomotion. Taking the external malleolus as the datum, the vertical\nand lateral pedal oscillation----\"\n\nThe editor regrets to say that space forbids any further incorporation\nof Doctor Urquhart's very illuminating note at this place. It may\nappear at some time as a separate essay or volume.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nTHE RIDDLE OF RAIMENT AND DATES\n\n From his eyne did the glamour of Faerie pass\n And the Rymour lay on Eildon grass.\n He lay in the heather on Eildon Hill;\n He gazed on the dour Scots sky his fill.\n His staff beside him was brash with rot;\n The weed grew rank in his unthatch'd cot:\n \"Syne gloaming yestreen, my shepherd kind,\n What hath happ'd this cot we ruin'd find?\"\n \"Syne gloaming yestreen, and years twice three,\n Hath wind and rain therein made free;\n Ye sure will a stranger to Eildon be,\n And ye know not the Rymour's in Faerie!\"\n --_The Trewe Tale of Trewe Thomas_.\n\nAs Mr. Amidon sensed the forward movement of the train in which he so\nstrangely found himself, he had fits of impulse to leap out and take\nthe next train back. But, back where? He had the assurance of his\ncolored friend and brother that forward was New York. Backward was the\nvoid conjectural. Slowly the dawn whitened at the window. He raised\nthe curtain and saw the rocks and fences and snow of a winter's\nlandscape--saw them with a shock which, lying prone as he was, gave him\nthe sensation of staggering. It was true, then: the thing he had still\nsuspected as a nightmare was true. Where were all the weeks of summer\nand autumn? And (question of some pertinency!) where was Florian\nAmidon?\n\nHe groped about for his clothes. They were strange in color and\ntexture, but, in such judgment as he could form while dressing in his\nberth, they fitted. He never could bear to go half-dressed to the\ntoilet-room as most men do, and stepped out of his berth fully\nappareled--in a natty business sack-suit of Scots-gray, a high\nturn-down collar, fine enamel shoes and a rather noticeable tie.\nFlorian Amidon had always worn a decent buttoned-up frock and a\npolka-dot cravat of modest blue, which his haberdasher kept in stock\nespecially for him.", "start_char_idx": 12859, "end_char_idx": 16789, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50": {"__data__": {"id_": "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "060bcc3bd22a080ec6750c6483a8c64083ff319e2c927e65afad7d5bb4842339", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c30fa7d5daf063f10d8119268b93228060f37916c3182db197202f9e8ac3f75a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He felt as if, in getting lost, he had got into\nthe clothes of some other man--and that other one of much less quiet\nand old-fashioned tastes in dress. It made him feel as if it were he\nwho had made the run to Canada with the bank's funds--furtive,\ndisguised, slinking.\n\nHe looked in the pockets of the coat like an amateur pickpocket, and\nfound some letters. He gazed at them askance, turning them over and\nover, wondering if he ought to peep at their contents. Then he put\nthem back, and went into the smoking-room, where, finding himself\nalone, he turned up his vest as if it had been worn by somebody else\nwhom he was afraid of disturbing, and looked at the initials on the\nshirt-front. They were not \"F. A.,\" as they ought to have been, but\n\"E. B.\"! He wondered which of the bags were his. Pressing the button,\nhe summoned the porter.\n\n\"George,\" said he, \"bring my luggage in here.\"\n\nAnd then he wondered at his addressing the porter in that drummer-like\nway--he was already acting up to the smart suit--or down; he was in\ndoubt as to which it was.\n\nThe bags, when produced, showed those metal slides, sometimes seen,\nconcealing the owner's name. Sweat stood on Florian's brow as he\nslipped the plate back and found the name of Eugene Brassfield,\nBellevale, Pennsylvania! A card-case, his pocketbook, all his linen\nand his hat--all articles of expensive and gentlemanly quality, but\nstrange to him--disclosed the same name or initials, none of them his\nown. In the valise he found some business letterheads, finely\nengraved, of the Brassfield Oil Company, and Eugene Brassfield's name\nwas there set forth as president and general manager.\n\n\"Great heaven!\" exclaimed Florian, \"am I insane? Am I a robber and a\nmurderer? During this time which has dropped out of my life, have I\ndestroyed and despoiled this gentleman, and--and run off in his\nclothes? I must denounce myself!\"\n\nThe porter came, and, by way of denouncing himself, Mr. Amidon clapped\nhis waistcoat shut and buttoned it, snapped the catches of the bags,\nand pretended to busy himself with the letters in his pockets; and in\ndoing so, he found in an inside vest-pocket a long thin pocket-book\nfilled with hundred-dollar bills, and a dainty-looking letter. It was\naddressed to Mr. Eugene Brassfield, was unstamped, and marked, \"To be\nRead En Route.\"\n\nThere was invitation, there was allurement, in the very superscription.\nClearly, it seemed, he ought to open and examine these letters. They\nmight serve to clear up this mystery. He would begin with this.\n\n\"My darling!\" it began, without any other form of address--and was not\nthis enough, beloved?--", "start_char_idx": 16791, "end_char_idx": 19423, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe": {"__data__": {"id_": "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "e239cadff7b464ca772a65161856f9518b06c71405a6480926d839e5f8eddc71", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "31bbb2f243cdeedae8861e1f242abc2cbfeeb78b2b3f25e70f43cba12047c982", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "it began, without any other form of address--and was not\nthis enough, beloved?--\n\n\n\"My own darling! I write this so that you may have something of me,\nwhich you can see and touch and kiss as you are borne farther and\nfarther from me. Distance unbridged is such a terrible thing--any long\ndistance; and more than our hands may reach and clasp across is\ninterstellar space to me. You said last night that all beauty, all\nsweetness, all things delectable and enticing and fair, all things\nwhich allure and enrapture, are so bound up in little me, that surely\nthe very giants of steam and steel would be drawn back to me, instead\nof bearing you away. Ah, my Eugene! You wondered why I put my hands\nbehind me, and would not see your out-stretched arms! Now that you are\ngone, and will not return for so long--until so near the day when I may\nbe all that I am capable of becoming to you, let me tell you--I was\nafraid!\n\n\"Not of you, dearest, not of you--for with all your ardor of wooing\n(and no girl ever had a more perfect lover--I shall always thank God\nfor that mixture of Lancelot and Sir Galahad in you which makes every\nmoment in your presence a delight), I always knew that you could leave\nme like a sensible boy, and, while longing for me, stay away. But\nI--whom you have sometimes complained of a little for my coldness--had\nI not looked above your eyes, and put my hands behind me, I should have\nclung to you, dear, I was afraid, and never have allowed you to go as\nyou are now going, and made you feel that I am not the perfect woman\nthat you describe to me, as me. Even now, I fear that this letter will\ndo me harm in your heart; but all the lover in me--and girls inherit\nfrom their fathers as well as from their mothers--cries out in me to\nwoo you; and you must forget this, only at such times of tenderness as\nyou will sometimes have while you are gone, when one embrace would be\nworth a world. Then read or remember this, as my return-clasp for such\nthoughts.\n\n\"Besides, may I not, now that you are away from me, give you a glimpse\nof that side of my soul which a girl is taught to hide? This was the\n'swan's nest among the reeds' which Little Ellie meant to show to that\nlover who, maybe, never came. Ah, Mrs. Browning was a woman, and knew!\n(Mind, dear, it's Mrs. Browning I speak of!)\n\n\"Sometimes, when the Knight has come, and the wife wishes to show the\nglories of her soul, 'the wild swan has deserted, and a rat has gnawed\nthe reed.' Let the wild and flowery little pool of womanhood which is\nyours--yours, dearest--grow somewhat less strange to you than it would\nhave been--last evening--so that when you see me again you will see it\nas a part of me, and, without a word or look from me, know me, even\nmore than you now do,\n\n\"Yours,\n\n\"Elizabeth.\"", "start_char_idx": 19343, "end_char_idx": 22120, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e": {"__data__": {"id_": "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "4f86d154ef3b22570db5c851d6561712c6b2389146cac2fd160a2dee3aa6caf6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "046b059c3a62e59f3474dea2a57906d379ab0438e4db428f9d75e61c3de5fe59", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Florian read it again and again. Sometimes he blushed--not with shame,\nbut with the embarrassment of a girl--at the fervid eloquence. And\nthen he would feel a twinge of envy for this Eugene Brassfield who\ncould be to such a girl \"a perfect lover.\"\n\n\"From one soon to be a bride,\" said he to himself, \"to the man she\nloves: it's the sweetest letter ever written. I wonder how long ago\nshe wrote it! Here's the date: 7th January, 1901. Odd, that she\nshould mistake the year! But it was the 7th, no doubt. By the way, I\ndon't know the day of the week or month, or what month it is! Here,\nboy! Is that the morning paper?\"\n\nHe seized the paper feverishly, held it crushed in his hand until the\nboy left him, and then spread it out, looking for the date. It was\nJanuary the 8th, 1901! The letter had been written the preceding\nevening. Whatever had happened to this man Brassfield, had occurred\nwithin the past sixteen hours. And, great God! where had Florian\nAmidon been since June, 1896? All was dark; and, in sympathy with it,\nblackness came over his eyes, and he rode into New York in a dead faint.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nANY PORT IN A STORM\n\n _Cosimo_: Join us, Ludovico! Our plans are ripe,\n Our enterprise as fairly lamped with promise\n As yon steep headland, based, 'tis true, with cliff,\n But crowned with waving palms, and holding high\n Its beaconing light, as holds its jewel up,\n Your lady's tolling finger! Come, the stage\n Is set, your cue is spoke.\n\n _Ludovico_: And all the lines\n Are stranger to my lips, and alien quite\n To car and eye and mind. I tell thee, Cosimo,\n This play of thine is one in which no man\n Should swagger on, trusting the prompter's voice;\n For mountains tipped with fire back up the scene,\n Out of the coppice roars the tiger's voice:\n The lightning's touch is death; the thunder rends\n The very rocks whereon its anger lights,\n The paths are mined with gins; and giants wait\n To slay me should I speak with faltering tongue\n Their crafty shibboleth! Most dearest coz,\n This part you offer bids me play with death!\n I'll none of it.\n --_Vision of Cosimo_.\n\n\"Comin' round all right, now, suh?\" said the learned-looking porter.\n\"Will you go to the Calumet House, as usual, suh? Ca'iage waitin', if\nyou feel well enough to move, suh.\"\n\n\"I'm quite well,\" said Mr. Amidon, though he did not look it, \"and will\ngo to the--what hotel did you say?\"\n\n\"Calumet, suh; I know you make it yo' headquahtahs thah.\"\n\n\"Quite right,\" said Mr. Amidon; \"of course. Where's the carriage and\nmy grips?\"\n\nHe had never heard of the Calumet; but he wanted, more than anything\nelse then, privacy in which he might collect his faculties and get\nhimself in hand, for his whole being was in something like chaos. On\nthe way, he stopped the cab several times to buy papers. All showed\nthe fatal date. He arrived at the palatial hotel in a cab filled with\npapers, from which his bewildered countenance peered forth like that of\na canary-bird in the nesting-season. He was scarcely within the door,\nwhen obsequious servants seized his luggage, and vied with one another\nfor the privilege of waiting on him.\n\n\"Why, how do you do?\" said the clerk, in a manner eloquent of delighted\nrecognition. \"Your old room, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Yes, I think so,\" said Mr. Amidon.\n\nThe clerk whirled the register around, and pointing with his pen, said:\n\n\"Right there, Mr. Brassfield.\"\n\nMr. Amidon's pen stopped midway in the downward stroke of a capital F.\n\n\"I think,\" said he, \"that I'll not register at present.", "start_char_idx": 22123, "end_char_idx": 25663, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa": {"__data__": {"id_": "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "591e4dd4d9557af780abea1a49fb67de1174145fd379e9778cebf393137777c1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3e43ca7296e6f956dcd7836a162b4dbb84960acbc4b61c5e91258d61c3c1f82d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I think,\" said he, \"that I'll not register at present. Let me have\nchecks for my luggage, please--I may not stay more than an hour or so.\"\n\n\"As you please,\" said the clerk. \"But the room is entirely at your\nservice, always, you know. Here are some telegrams, sir. Came this\nmorning.\"\n\nHe took and eyed the yellow envelopes with \"E. Brassfield\" scrawled on\nthem, as if they had been infernal machines; but he made no movement\ntoward opening them. Something in the clerk's look admonished him that\nhis own was extraordinary. He felt that he must seek solitude. To be\ncalled by this new and strange name; to have thrust on him the acting\nof a part in which he knew none of the lines and dared not refuse the\ncharacter; and all these circumstances made dark and sinister by the\nmysterious maladjustment of time and place; the possession of another\nman's property; the haunting fear that in it somewhere were crime and\nperil--these things, he thought, would drive him out of his senses,\nunless he could be alone.\n\n\"I think I'll take the room,\" said he.\n\n\"If any one calls?\" queried the clerk.\n\n\"I'm not in,\" said Amidon, gathering up the telegrams. \"I do not wish\nto be disturbed on any account.\"\n\nFive years! What did it mean? There must be some mistake. But the\nbreak in the endless chain of time, the change from summer to winter,\nand from the dropping to sleep at Elm Springs Junction to the awakening\nin the car--there could be no mistake about these. He sat in the room\nto which he had been shown, buried in the immense pile in the strange\ncity, as quiet as a heron in a pool, perhaps the most solitary man on\nearth, these thoughts running in a bewildering circle through his mind.\nThe dates of the papers--might they not have been changed by some silly\ntrick of new journalism, some straining for effect, like the agreement\nof all the people in the world (as fancied by Doctor Holmes) to say\n\"Boo!\" all at once to the moon? He ran his eyes over the news columns\nand found them full of matter which was real news, indeed, to him.\nPresident Kruger was reported as about to visit President McKinley for\nthe purpose of securing mediation in some South African war; and\nSenator Lodge had made a speech asking for an army of one hundred\nthousand men in, of all places, the Philippine Islands. The twentieth\ncentury, and with it some wonderful events, had stolen on him as he\nslept--if, indeed, he had slept--there could be no doubt of that.\n\nHe found his hands trembling again, and, fearing another collapse,\nthrew himself upon the bed. Then, as drowsiness stole on him, he\nthought of the five years gone since last he had yielded to that\nfeeling, and started up, afraid to sleep. He saw lying on the table\nthe unopened telegrams, and tore them open. Some referred to sales of\noil, and other business transactions; one was to inform Brassfield that\na man named Alvord would not meet him in New York as promised, and one\nwas in cipher, and signed \"Stevens.\"\n\nHe took from his pocket the letters of Brassfield, and read them. One\nor two were invitations to social functions in Bellevale. One was a\nbill for dues in a boating-club; another contained the tabulated\npedigree of a horse owned in Kentucky. A very brief one was in the\nsame handwriting as the missive he had first read, was signed \"E. W.,\"\nand merely said that she would be at home in the evening. But most of\nthem related to the business of the Brassfield Oil Company, and\nreferred to transactions in oil.\n\nHe lay back on the bed again, and thought, thought, thought, beginning\nwith the furthest stretch of memory, and coming down carefully and\nconsecutively--to the yawning chasm which had opened in his life and\nswallowed up five years. Time and again, he worked down to this abyss,\nand was forced to stop. He had heard of loss of memory from illness,\nbut this was nothing of the sort. He had been tired and nervous that\nnight at Elm Springs Junction, but not ill; and now he was in robust\nhealth.", "start_char_idx": 25608, "end_char_idx": 29588, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621": {"__data__": {"id_": "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "f022c35c5632b38fa85a5201765fe27dd81427a68ce38953bd688c16c11d2164", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b56a5d6db6b69c6a96cff78fc6996c97c1574a37bc15b9807da1c2c91633ce42", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Perhaps some great fit of passion had torn that obliterating\nfurrow through his mind. Perhaps in those five years he had become\nchanged from the man of strict integrity who had so well managed the\nHazelhurst Bank, into the monster who had robbed Eugene Brassfield\nof--his clothes, his property, the most dearly personal of his\npossessions--these, certainly (for Amidon knew the rule of evidence\nwhich brands as a thief the possessor of stolen goods); and who could\ntell of what else? Letters, bags, purses, money--these any vulgar\ncriminal might have, and bear no deeper guilt than that of theft; but,\nthe clothes! Mr. Amidon shuddered as his logic carried him on from\ndeduction to reduction--to murder, and the ghastly putting away of\nmurder's fruit. Imagination threw its limelight over the horrid\nscene--the deep pool or tarn sending up oilily its bubbles of\naccusation; the shadowy wood with its bulging mound of earth and leaves\nswept by revealing rains and winds; the moldy vat of corrosive liquid\neating away the damning evidence; the box with its accursed stains,\nshipped anywhere away from the fatal spot, by boat or ship, to be\nrelentlessly traced back--and he shivered in fearful wonder as to how\nthe crime had been committed. In some way, he felt sure, Eugene\nBrassfield's body must have been removed from those natty clothes of\nhis, before Florian Amidon could have put them on, and with them donned\nthe personality of their former owner.\n\nAnd here entered a mystery deeper still--the strange deception he\nseemed to impose on the dead man's acquaintances. And this filled him,\nsomehow, with the most abject dread and fear. Brassfield seemed to\nhave been a well-known man; for porters and clerks in New York do not\ncall the obscure countryman by name. To step out on the street was,\nperhaps, to run into the very arms of some one who would penetrate the\ndisguise. Yet he could not long remain in this room; his very\nretirement--any extraordinary behavior (and how did he know\nBrassfield's ordinary courses?)--would soon advertise his presence.\nAmidon walked to the window and peered down into the street. His eyes\ntraveled to the opposite windows, and finally in the blind stare of\nabsent-mindedness became fixed on a gold-and-black sign which he began\nstupidly spelling out, over and over. \"Madame le Claire,\" it read,\n\"Clairvoyant and Occultist.\" Not an idea was associated in his mind\nwith the sign until the word \"mystery,\" \"mystery,\" began sounding in\nhis ears--naturally enough, one would say, in the circumstances. Then\nthe letters of the word floated before his eyes; and finally he\nconsciously saw the full sign stretching across two windows: \"Madame le\nClaire, Clairvoyant and Occultist. All Mysteries Solved.\"\n\nFlorian stared at this sign, until he became conscious of deep\nweariness at so long standing on his feet. Then he saw, blossoming,\nthe multiplying lights of an early winter's dusk--so numbly had the\ntime slipped by. And in the gruesome close of this dreadful day, the\ndesperate and perplexed man stole timidly down the stairways--avoiding\nthe elevator--and across the street to the place of the occultist.", "start_char_idx": 29590, "end_char_idx": 32745, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1": {"__data__": {"id_": "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0a21a0760c68ec980310112818603f66db95ecd5d28fe27f70a5c38171bdbbcf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4c3842a4d64c9176db8c0e3b0b53554cae178f4ecfb6b2a430656d4d1a0ef7d6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "IV\n\nAN ADVENTURE IN BENARES\n\n The silly world shrieks madly after Fact,\n Thinking, forsooth, to find therein the Truth;\n But we, my love, will leave our brains unracked,\n And glean our learning from these dreams of youth:\n Should any charge us with a childish act\n And bid us track out knowledge like a sleuth,\n We'll lightly laugh to scorn the wraiths of History,\n And, hand in hand, seek certitude in Mystery.\n --_When the Halcyon Broods_.\n\nThe house of the occultist was one of a long row, all alike, which\nreminds the observer of an exercise in perspective, as one glances down\nthe stretch of balustraded piazzas. Amidon walked straight across the\nstreet from the hotel, and counted the flights of stairs up to the\nfourth floor. There was no elevator. The denizens of the place gave\nhim a vague impression of being engaged in the fine arts. A glimpse of\nan interior hung with Navajo blankets, Pueblo pottery, Dakota beadwork,\nand barbaric arms; the sound of a soprano practising Marchesi\nexercises; an easel seen through an open door and flanked by a Grand\nRapids folding-bed with a plaster bust atop; and a pervasive scent of\ncigarettes, accounted for, and may or may not have justified, the\nimpression. On the fourth floor the scent shaded off toward\nsandalwood, the sounds toward silence, Bohemia toward Benares. He\nwalked in twilight, on inch-deep nap, to a door on which glowed in\nsoft, purple, self-emitted radiance, the words:\n\n MADAME Le CLAIRE\n ENTER\n\n\nThe invitation was plain, and he opened the door. As he did so, the\ndeep, mellow note of a gong filled the place with a gentle alarum. It\nwas sound with noise eliminated, and matched, to the ear, the velvet of\nthe carpet.\n\nThe room into which he looked was dark, save for light reflected from a\nmarble ball set in a high recess in the ceiling. None of the lamps,\nwhose rays illuminated the ball, could be seen, and the white globe\nitself was hung so high in the recess that none of its direct rays\nreached the corners of the apartment. A Persian rug lay in the center,\nand took the fullest light. There were no sharp edges of shadow, but\ninstead there was a softly graduated penumbra, deepening into murk.\nStraight across was a doorway with a porti\u00c3\u00a8re, beyond was another, and\nstill farther, a third, all made visible in silhouette by the light in\na fourth room, seen as at the end of a tunnel.\n\nAcross this gossamer-barred arch of light, a black figure was\nprojected, and swelled as it neared in silent approach. It came\nthrough the last porti\u00c3\u00a8re, on into the circle of light, and stood, a\nturbaned negro, bowing low toward the visitor.\n\n\"Madame le Claire,\" said Amidon feebly, \"may I speak with her?\"\n\nThere was no reply, unless a respectful scrutiny might be taken for\none. Then the dumb Sudanese, carrying with him the atmosphere of a\nBedouin tent, disappeared, lingered, reappeared, and beckoned Amidon to\nfollow. As they passed the first porti\u00c3\u00a8re, that mellow and gentle\ngong-note welled softly again from some remote distance. At the second\narchway, it sounded nearer, if not louder. At the third, as Amidon\nstepped into the lighted room, it filled the air with a golden\nvibrancy. It was as if invisible ministers had gone before to announce\nhim.\n\nAmidon took one long look at the scene in the fourth room, and a great\nwave of unbelief rolled across his mind. Through this long day of\nshocks and surprises, he had reached that stage of amazedness where the\nevidential value of sensory impressions is destroyed. He covered his\neyes with his hands, expecting that the phantasms before him might pass\nwith vision, and that with vision's return might come the dear,\nfamiliar commonplaces of his commonplace life.\n\nThe room seemed to have no windows, and the roar of the New York street\noutside was gone, or faint as the hum of a hive.", "start_char_idx": 32750, "end_char_idx": 36611, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9": {"__data__": {"id_": "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "84ff5a86e6dc67367928a47bb2368f5af7e731793f4e5dd6b072de46b91755ac", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ae8553869ad926575be2e7578d4d179e495d1f8d1b1fcc739da94108b1ece341", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The walls were hung\nwith fabrics of wool or silk, in dull greens and reds, and the floor\nwas spread with rugs. With mouth redly ravening at him, and eyes\nemitting opalescent gleams, lay a great tiger-skin rug, upon which, on\na kind of dais, sat a woman--a woman whose eyes sought his in a steady\nregard which flashed a thrill through his whole body as he gazed. For\nshe seemed to emanate from the tiger-skin, as a butterfly from the\nchrysalis.\n\n[Illustration: She seemed to emanate from the tiger-skin, as a\nbutterfly from the chrysalis.]\n\nHer dress was of some combination of black and yellow which carried\nupward the tones of the great rug. Her bare arms--long, and tapering\nto lithe wrists and hands--were clasped by dull-gold bracelets of\ntwisted serpents. Over shapely shoulders, the flesh of which looked\nwhite and young, there was thrown a wrap like feathery snow, from under\nwhich drooped down over the girlish bosom a necklace that seemed of\npearl. The face was fair, its pallor tinged with red at lips, and rose\non cheeks. The eyes, luminous and steady, shone out through heavy dark\nlashes, from under brows of black, and seemed, at that first glance, of\noriental darkness. A great mass of dark-brown hair encircled the\nrather small face, and even in his first look, he noted at the temples\ntwin strands of golden-blond which, carried out like rays in the fluffy\nhalo about her brow, reappeared in all the twistings and turnings of\nthe involved pile which crowned the graceful head. The\nyellow-and-black of the tiger appeared thus, from head to foot. It was\nafterward that he found out something of the secret of the peculiar\nfascination in the great dark eyes. One of them was gray, with that\ngreenish tinge which has been regarded as the token of genius. The\nother was of a mottled golden-brown, with lights like those in the\ntiger's eye. In both, in any but strong light, the velvet-black pupils\nspread out, and pushed the iris back to a thin margin; and thus they\nvaried, from gray or brown, to that liquid night, which Amidon now saw\nin them, as he stepped within the doorway, and looked so long on her,\nas she sat like a model for the Queen of the Jungle, that under other\ncircumstances the gaze would have seemed rude. Some sense of this,\nbreaking through his bewilderment, made him bow.\n\n\"Madame le Claire?\" said he.\n\n\"The same,\" said she. \"How can I serve you, sir?\"\n\nThe voice, a soft contralto, was the complement of the steady regard of\nthe eyes. As she spoke, she rose and stepped toward him, down from the\nlittle dais to the rug. She rose, not with the effort which marks the\nact in most, but lightly, as a flower rises from the touch of a breeze.\nShe was tall and lithe, and all the curves of her figure were long and\nlow--once more suggesting the soft strength of the tigress. But when\nspeech parted the lips, the smile which overspread her face won him.\n\n\"How can I serve you, my friend?\" she repeated.\n\n\"I am in great trouble,\" said he.\n\n\"Yes,\" she purred.\n\n\"I saw your sign,\" he went on. \"And I want you to tell me where I have\nbeen since June, 1896--and who is Eugene Brassfield? Did I kill\nhim--or only rob him? And who is Elizabeth?\"\n\nShe had stepped close to him now, as if to catch the scent of some\ndisturbing influence which might account for such incoherence; but\nAmidon's breath was innocent of taint.\n\n\"Yes!\" said she, \"I think we shall be able to tell you all. But, are\nyou well?\"\n\n\"I have had no breakfast,\" said he. \"When I found that I had lost five\nyears--I forgot. And--once--I fainted. I'm not quite--well, I'm\nafraid!\"\n\nMadame le Claire stepped to the wall and pushed a button. The turbaned\nSudanese reappeared at once.", "start_char_idx": 36613, "end_char_idx": 40304, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f": {"__data__": {"id_": "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "1e6f7505e2a8e9ba0c6b65ab4bf62c7b3d6dbee41319dae6c1a8accbbb490c9b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "483d42fe2d546ccee1347e21de68c6cfbd00d0c33b637131e5cf3d8e1c174e36", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The turbaned\nSudanese reappeared at once.\n\n\"Aaron,\" said she, \"tell Professor Blatherwick that Mr.--Mr.----\"\n\n\"Amidon,\" said Florian hastily--\"Amidon is my name.\"\n\n\"--Amidon will dine with us,\" Madame le Clair continued smoothly. \"He\nhas some very interesting things for us to look into. And have dinner\nserved at once.\"\n\nAaron! and dinner! and Blatherwick! The delicious vulgarity of the\nnames was sweet music. For be it remembered that Florian was a banker,\nand a man of position; and sandalwood, Sudanese, Bedouins and illusions\nwere ill for the green wound of his mystery--which, in all conscience,\nwas bad enough in and of itself! Some confidence in the realities of\nthings returned to him, but he followed Madame le Claire like a\nfaithful hound.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\nSUBLIMINAL ENGINEERING\n\n Now, Red-Neck Johnson's right hand never knew his left hand's game;\n And most diverse were the meanings of the gestures of the same.\n For, benedictions to send forth, his left hand seemed to strive,\n While his right hand rested lightly on his ready forty-five.\n \"Mr. Chairman and Committee,\" Mr. Johnson said, said he,\n \"It is true, I'm tangled up some with this person's property;\n It is true that growin' out therefrom and therewith to arrive,\n Was some most egregious shootin' with this harmless forty-five:\n But list to my defense, and weep for my disease,\" said he;\n \"I am double,\" half-sobbed Red-Neck, \"in my personality!\"\n --_The Affliction of Red-Neck Johnson_.\n\nMadame le Claire led Mr. Amidon to the next room, turned him over to\nAaron (now wonderfully healed of his dumbness) with a gesture of\ndismissal; and he was ushered by the negro into a most modern-looking\nchamber, in which was a brass bedstead with a snowy counterpane.\n\n\"Dinner will be suhved in ten minutes, suh,\" said Aaron.\n\nThey were waiting for him in the little dining-room, when he was wafted\nthrough the door by Aaron's obsequious bow. The tigrine Le Claire\nadvanced from a bay-window, bringing a slender man with stooped\nshoulders.\n\n\"Papa,\" she said, \"this is Mr. Amidon, whom I have induced to dine with\nus; Mr. Amidon, Professor Blatherwick.\"\n\nProfessor Blatherwick was bent, and much bleached, faded and wrinkled.\nHis eyes seemed both enormous in size and sunk almost to his occiput,\nby reason of being seen through the thickest of glasses. His lank,\ngrayish hair, of no particular color, but resembling autumnal roadside\ngrasses, hung thinly from a high and asymmetrical head, and straggled\ndejectedly down into a wisp of beard on chin and lip--a beard which any\nabsent-minded man might well be supposed to have failed to observe, and\ntherefore to have neglected to shave. When Madame le Claire stopped in\nleading him forward, he halted, and feeling blindly forward into the\nair as if for Amidon's hand, though quite ten feet from him, he\nmurmured:\n\n\"I am bleaced to meet you, sir.\"\n\n\"Evidently German,\" thought Amidon.\n\n\"I understandt,\" said the professor, opening the conversation, as\nMadame le Claire poured the tea, \"that you haf hadt some interesding\nexperiences in te realm of te supliminal.\"\n\nAmidon's tension of mind, which had left him under the compulsion of\nthe woman's mastery of him, returned at the professor's remark.\n\n\"I have been dead,\" said he, \"since the twenty-seventh of June, 1896!\"\n\nMadame le Claire stared at him in unconcealed amazement. The professor\ncalmly dipped toast in his tea.\n\n\"So!\" said he. \"Fife years. Goot! Dis case vill estaplish some\nimportant brinciples. Vill you be so kindt as to dell us te\nsaircumstances?\"\n\n\"Oh, papa!\" broke in the lady. \"You must wait until after dinner. I\nsaw Mr. Amidon was weak and disturbed, and, I thought--hungry. So I\nasked him to stay.\"\n\n\"I have eaten nothing but this,\" said Mr.", "start_char_idx": 40263, "end_char_idx": 44018, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1": {"__data__": {"id_": "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c8813ee4c88dcf7bec3004d76d171e95286b16d7bfeda720c073fb12c934a747", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d18965f67c2bb2f505ebb1a8de2f2eafcfc155ff82b5c0c393e266324b957382", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "So I\nasked him to stay.\"\n\n\"I have eaten nothing but this,\" said Mr. Amidon, \"since June\ntwenty-seventh, 1896----\"\n\n\"So,\" said the professor calmly. \"Dis vill brofe an important case.\"\n\n\"I saw the sign,\" said Amidon, \"'All Mysteries Solved,' and I came\nhere----\"\n\n\"De sign,\" said the professor, \"iss our goncession to te spirit of\ngommercialism, and te gompetitife system. It vas Clara's itea. But\nsome mysteries ve do not attempt. In te realm of te supliminal,\nhowefer, ve go up against almost any broposition. I am Cheneral\nSuperintendent of Supliminal Enchineering; Clara is te executant. I\nmake blance, and Clara does as she bleaces aboudt following dem. You\nvill, at your gonfenience, dell us all you can of your case. I vill\nanalyze, glassify, and tiagnose; she vill unrafel.\"\n\nIt was late in the evening when the professor was through with his\ndiagnosis. He made copious notes of Amidon's story. Several times his\ndaughter called him away from some book in which he had lost himself\nwhile on an excursion in search of parallel cases. At last he paused,\nhis face expressing the triumph of a naturalist at the discovery of a\nnew beetle.\n\n\"You are not in te least insane!\" said he, with the air of telling\nFlorian something hard to believe; \"ant you haf none of te stigmata of\ntecheneration. I vould say that you are not a griminal--not much of a\ngriminal anyhow, ant bropaply not at all!\"\n\n\"Thank you! Oh, thank you!\" fervently exclaimed Amidon.\n\n\"It iss a case,\" went on the professor, \"of dual pairsonality. For\nfife years you haf bropaply been absent from Hazelhurst. You haf been\nsomeveres!\"\n\n\"Where, where?\" cried Amidon.\n\n\"Do not fear,\" said Madame le Claire, laying her hand on his arm. \"If\nit is a case of dual personality, we shall soon find out all about it.\nYou have mysteriously disappeared. Many men do. There was Lieutenant\nRogers, of the navy; and Ansel Burns, of Ohio, who woke up in Kentucky\nin his own store, under the name of Brooks--Brooks' store, you know.\"\n\n\"And Ellis, of Bergen,\" said the professor, \"who vas lost for a year,\nant tiscofered himself in te pairson of a cook in a lumber-gamp in\nMinnesota, unter te name of Chamison. Oh, dere are many such! Te\nsupchectife mind, te operations of vich are normally below te threshold\nof gonsciousness, suddenly dakes gontrol. Pouf! you are anodder man!\nYou haf been Smidt; you are now Chones. As Chones you remember notting\nof Smidt. You go on, guided by instinct, ant te preacquired\nsemi-intellichence of auto-hypnotismus----\"\n\n\"Oh, papa!\" said the tiger-lady, \"those are awful words--for a sick\nman!\"\n\n\"Vell,\" resumed Blatherwick, dropping into what he regarded as the\nvernacular, \"you go on as Chones, all right all right. Some day,\nsomeveres--in dis case in a sleeping-car--you vake as Smidt again. You\nnow do not remember Chones or te Chones life. You are all vorked\nup--vat you call it--flabbergasted. You come to Madame le Claire. Vat\ndoes she do? She calls te supchectife mind up abofe te threshold of\ngonsciousness, ant you are restored to te Chones blane of mentality.\nHypnotismus, hypnotismus: that is vat does it!\"\n\n\"And shall I stay--Jones?\"\n\n\"No, no!\" said Madame le Claire. \"I will restore you. But while you\nare--Jones--I shall find out all you want to know about\nthe--Jones--life, and I will tell you when you become yourself again.\nYou will learn all about Bellevale, and Brassfield, and----\"\n\n\"And Elizabeth?\" asked Amidon.\n\nMadame le Claire paused.", "start_char_idx": 43951, "end_char_idx": 47424, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e": {"__data__": {"id_": "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7bc534f153a1fa0c5ba17219198dfad98a8e6e1fe0deeced3d292c55fb7f1450", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dd620ca8d8e3dcc1471cecfc022a1ded5266e24a451e350717814e371309eb23", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "asked Amidon.\n\nMadame le Claire paused.\n\n\"Yes,\" said she, with much less cordiality, \"I suppose so, if you want\nto know--about Elizabeth.\"\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\nTHE JONES PLANE OF MENTALITY\n\n My lady's eyes\n Ensphere the skies,\n Abound in lovely mysteries:\n Behind their bars\n Are pent the stars,\n Warm Venus' glow, the shafts of Mars.\n\n Once, murky night\n Shut in my sight:\n One glance revealed the source of light!\n Now, to be wise\n Or gay, I rise,\n By gazing in my lady's eyes!\n --_Song from The Oculist_.\n\nThe process of bringing the \"Jones plane of mentality\" uppermost in Mr.\nAmidon would not have been regarded by the masculine reader of the\nunregenerate sort (though to such far be it from me to appeal!) as an\noperation at all painful. But Mr. Amidon, I must declare, was not of\nthe unregenerate sort.\n\n\"Now,\" said Madame le Claire, \"sit down in the arm-chair, and in a few\nminutes you will feel a sensation of drowsiness. Soon you will sleep.\nThink with all your power that you are to sleep.\"\n\nShe was sitting in a very high chair, he in a low one, so that her eyes\nwere above his. The professor was blent with the shadows of some\ncorner, in silent self-effacement, with a note-book in his hand.\n\nAmidon tried to think with all his power that he was to sleep; but the\nlights and shadows and depths of the woman's eyes drew all thoughts to\nthem. Uncle Toby, looking for the mote in the eye of the Widow Wadman,\nmust have felt as did our wandering Florian. Never before had he noted\nfor more than a fleeting glance the light that lies in woman's eyes.\nNow those limpid orbs met his in a regard, kindly, steady, eloquent of\nunutterable things. He noted the dark, arched, ebon sweep of the\neyebrow, the long dark lashes curved daintily upward, the shining\nwhiteness in the corners, and the wondrous irises. The one which was\ngray was dark like a moonlit sky; the other, like the same sky necked\nwith clouds, and filled with the golden smoke of some far-off\nconflagration; and at the inner margin of both, the black of the\ndilated pupils seemed to spread out into the iris in rays of feathery\nblackness. They seemed to him like twin worlds--great, capacious,\nmysterious, alluring, absorbing. Behind the feathery curtains of those\nirises lay all the lovely things of which he had ever thought or\ndreamed--the things which sculptors and poets and painters see, and\nseek to express. And without changing his gaze, he saw below the eyes\nthe downy cheek, and the red lips so sweetly curved. A new thrill ran\nthrough the man, and a new light came into his eyes. Madame le Claire\nblushed.\n\n[Illustration: A new thrill ran through the man and a new light came\ninto his eyes]\n\n\"Are you thinking of going to sleep?\"\n\n\"I beg your pardon,\" said he; \"I was thinking--I am afraid I was not!\"\n\n\"Try again,\" said she; \"and please control your thoughts. Think that\nyou--are--going--to sleep. To sleep----Sleep! Sleep!----\nSlee--ee--eep!\"\n\nNow Amidon's eyes sought hers again, and held there; and the twin\nworlds, sphered in some slowly-turning orbit, seemed swinging in their\nnative space. Now the cheeks and hair and mouth came out in their\nplaces, returning to distinctness like features of a face on a screen.\nNow the eyes became twin stars again, casting on him once more the\neffulgence of their binary glow.\n\nAnd now eyes and face and hair, and Madame le Claire--all passed away;\nand Florian Amidon became as naught, and the tigrine lady and the faded\nprofessor played with the thing which had been he, as upon a machine.", "start_char_idx": 47385, "end_char_idx": 50940, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90": {"__data__": {"id_": "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c48e26a275b5b9a4c595cd1a62be17a9a7a9bab4fa06ff4b7a4397240508c2b1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ab02c7c04205de6d109adb63c8af2b754f77357aefb56a16a55e1c04fad79cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The pillar of Hazelhurst society, the banker now five years lost, the\nbewildered wretch of the sleeping-car, was now, by his own act, given\nover as passively as some inert instrument, body and soul, to the\nguidance and manipulation of this shady occultist, not four hours known\nto him--while outside droned the muffled roar of the human cyclone\nwhich sweeps and whirls and eddies through Manhattan. So stripped of\nstability was the pillar, that he was now a mere feather of humanity,\nself-abandoned to the clasp of the storm of the modern Babylon. Madame\nle Claire questioned, Amidon answered (or Something answered for him),\nand Professor Blatherwick wrote in his book--wrote the data, of \"te\nChones blane of mentality.\"\n\n\"Dis iss enough,\" said the professor, \"for vunce. Pring him to!\"\n\nMadame le Claire leaned back, gave her subject a long look, and then,\nwalking to him, took his head tenderly in her hands. With the left,\nshe held his forehead; the fingers of the right crept insinuatingly\namong the curls resting on his neck, swept thence over to his brow, and\ndown across his eyelids, closing them; and Amidon sat, senseless as a\nstatue, and almost as still.\n\n\"Right!\" said Madame le Claire sharply. \"Wake!\"\n\nAmidon opened his eyes wearily.\n\n\"When are you going to begin?\" said he.\n\n\"Ve are t'rough,\" said the professor. \"Ve know it all.\"\n\n\"And Brassfield? Did I----?\"\n\n\"You have done him notting,\" said the professor. \"You are all recht.\nYou need not fear----\"\n\n\"And the lady--Elizabeth?\" suggested Amidon, as passing to the thing of\nnext importance.\n\n\"It is near morning,\" said Madame le Claire, \"and you are prostrated.\nWe are all very tired. Aaron must take you to your hotel. You must\nsleep. Never fear, no harm is coming to you. When you wake, come to\nme, and I will tell you all about it--'All Mysteries Solved,' you know.\nGood night. You will sleep late in the morning.\"\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\nENTER THE LEGAL MIND\n\n The need of lucre never looms so large\n As when 'tis gotten in some devious way:\n It mitigates the blackness of the charge\n That every nether level yielded pay.\n\n The man who dares e'en to the prison's marge\n Should bring back what he went for--or should stay!\n The need of lucre never looms so large\n As when 'tis gotten in some devious way.\n\n Men can o'erlook the stain upon the targe,\n If from its boss the jewel shoots its ray;\n Or blood upon the pirate's sable barge\n Covered by silks' and satins' bright array--\n The need of lucre never looms so large\n As when 'tis gotten in some devious way.\n --_Rondels of the Curb_.\n\nMorning passed to noon, and the day aged into afternoon, before Amidon\nrose from the deep sleep which (according to Le Claire's prediction)\nfollowed his evening with her and the professor. With that odd sense\nof bewilderment which the early riser feels at this violation of habit,\nhe went into the caf\u00c3\u00a9 for his belated breakfast. Impatient to finish\nthe meal so that he might haste to the promised interview, he studied\nthe menu, and with his eye scouted the room for a waiter--failing to\nbestow even the slightest glance on a man seated opposite. This fact,\nhowever, did not prevent the stranger from scrutinizing Amidon's face,\nhis dress, and even his hands, as if each minutest detail were vitally\nimportant. He even dropped his napkin so as to make an excuse for\nlooking under the table, and thus getting a good view of Florian's\nboots. Finally he spoke, as if continuing a broken-off conversation.\n\n\"As I said a while ago,\" he remarked, \"Browning falls short of being a\npoet, just as a marble-cutter falls short of being a sculptor.", "start_char_idx": 50941, "end_char_idx": 54581, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170": {"__data__": {"id_": "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "911f7744c84963b99f8829bef766fbfac5eb80ff766aba4997a576f3df14a3cd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "988d187d3e9b85b982c51e8a4a1d81eb8a503f846adf46a6ba3a9c7894d6d6a6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "You\nwere quoting _Love Among the Ruins_, as the train stopped at Elm\nSprings Junction; or was it _Evelyn_----\"\n\nAmidon's eyes, during this apparently aimless disquisition, had been\ndrawn from his meal to the speaker. He saw an elderly gentleman,\nclothed in the black frock-coat and black tie of the rural lawyer of\nthe old school. His eyes shot keen and kindly glances from the deep\nambush of great white brows, and his mouth was hidden under a snowy\nmustache. His features made up for a somewhat marked poverty of shape\nby a luxuriance of ruddy color, the culminating point of which was\nto be found in the broad and fleshy nose. His voice, soft and gentle\nwhen he began, swelled out, as he spoke, into something of the\norator's orotund. When Amidon looked at him, the speaker returned\nthe gaze in full measure, and leaning across the table, pointed his\nfinger at his auditor, and slowly uttered the words, \"--as--the\ntrain--stopped--at--Elm Springs Junction!\"\n\n\"Why, Judge Blodgett!\" exclaimed Amidon, \"can this be you?\"\n\n\"Can it be I?\" exclaimed the judge. \"Can it be me! No difficulty\nabout that. Never mind the handshaking just yet--after a while, maybe.\nWhen it comes to the can-it-be part, how about you? How about the past\nfive years, and Jennie Baggs keeping a place for you every meal for all\nthis time, up to the present hour? I tell you, Florian, letting me\ndown in that case of Amidon versus Cattermole, without a scrap of\nevidence, and getting me licked by a young practitioner who studied in\nmy office, was bad--was damnable; but an only sister, Florian! and not\none word in five years!\"\n\n\"She's well, then, Jennie is?\"\n\n\"She's as well, Florian, as a woman with the sorrow you've brought to\nher, and the mother of two infants, can be. But why do you ask?--why\ndo you ask?--why is it necessary to go through the work of surplusage\nof asking?\"\n\n\"Children, eh?\" said Florian. \"Good for Jennie! And how's Baggs?\"\n\n\"Oh, Baggs, yes--why, Baggs has come through it all with his health\nabout unimpaired, Baggs has! But no Baggs court of inquiry is going to\nswitch me off the examination I'm now conducting; and I tell you, Mr.\nAmidon, you can't dodge me. What double life took you away from home,\nand property, and everything?\"\n\n\"Judge Blodgett,\" said Mr. Amidon, in that low voice which, with the\nEnglish language as the medium of communication, is known as the\ndanger-signal the world over, \"the term 'double life' has a meaning\nwhich is insulting. Don't use it again.\"\n\n\"Well, well, Florian,\" said the judge, evidently pleased, \"sustaining\nthe motion to strike that out, the question remains. You aren't\nobliged to answer, you know; but you know, too, what not answering it\nmeans.\"\n\n\"Judge,\" said Amidon, after a long pause, \"to say that I don't know\nwhere I have been, or what I have been doing, since June\ntwenty-seventh, 1896, until yesterday morning when I came to my senses\nin a moving sleeping-car, won't satisfy you; but it's the truth.\"\n\nThe judge looked off toward the ceiling in the manner of a jurist\nconsidering some complex argument, but was silent.\n\n\"Now I have found a way,\" said Amidon, \"of having all this explained.\nCome with me, and let's find out. There may be complications; I may\nneed your help. You are the one man in all the world that I was just\nwishing for.\"\n\n\"Complications, eh?\" said the judge. \"Well, well! Let us see!\"\n\nAnd now he dropped into the old manner so well known to his companion\nas his office style. Piece by piece, he drew from Amidon his story.\nHe dropped back to previous parts of the narrative, and elicited\nrepetitions. He slurred over crucial points as if he did not see their\nbearing, and then artfully assumed minute variations of the tale, but\nwas always corrected.", "start_char_idx": 54583, "end_char_idx": 58330, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e": {"__data__": {"id_": "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "5658b7fe6693dc804dbf91cd94a4be28ab6f1a6a3b66dee0f76059a9248430d8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b669ceed61c44af2bb802ed84d7e518eee7006d61ee5083abcd6522ad86f088a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"The prosecution is obliged to rest its case,\" said he, at last.\n\"You're not crazy, or all my studies in diseases of the mind have done\nme no good. Your story hangs together as no fiction could. To believe\nyou, brands us both as lunatics. Come on and let's see what your\nmesmerist frauds have to say. As a specialist in facts, I'm a drowning\nman catching at a straw. Come on: mesmerism, or astrology, or Moqui\nsnake-dance, it's all one to me!\"\n\nUp the stairs again, this time with Judge Blodgett, warily snuffing the\nair, and shy of both Bohemia and Benares. Into the presence of Madame\nle Claire, now gowned appropriately for the morning, and\nlooking--extraordinary, it is true, with her party-colored hair and\nluminous eyes--but not so jungly as when she greeted the despairing\nsight of Amidon the night before.\n\n\"Madame, and sir,\" said the judge, \"as Mr. Amidon's friend and legal\nadviser, I am here to protect his interests.\"\n\n\"So! Goot!\" said the professor. \"Bud te matter under gonsideration is\npsychical, nod beguniary. Howefer, if you are interested in te realm\nof te supliminal, if you care for mental science----\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said the judge, \"I may almost claim to be a specialist (so far\nas a country practitioner is permitted to specialize) in senile and\nparetic dementia, since I had the honor to represent the proponents in\nthe will case of Snoke versus Snoke. But it's only fair to say that I\nregard hypnotism as humbug--only fair.\"\n\n\"Goot, goot!\" said the professor delightedly. \"To temonstrate to an\nhonest ant indellichent skeptic, is te rarest of brifileches. Ve vill\nnow broceed to temonstrate. Here is our friendt Herr Amidon avokened\nin a car after fife years of lostness; he has anodder man's dotes,\nanodder man's dicket, letters--unt all. He gomes to Madame le Claire\nant Blatherwick. He is hypnotized out of te Amidon blane of being, ant\ninto anodder. He is mate to gife himself avay. Now ve vill broceed to\ndell aboudt his life since he vas lost--is it a dest, no?\"\n\n\"Huh!\" snorted the judge.\n\n\"Go on,\" cried Amidon; \"tell me the story!\"\n\n\"Vell,\" said the professor, \"for four veeks after you left Elm Springs\nChunction, you vandered--not, Clara?\"\n\n\"Wandered,\" said Clara, \"and to so many places that I can't remember\nthem. Then you found oil, or traces of it--I can't get that very\nplainly--on a farm at Bunn's Ferry, Pennsylvania; and bought an option\non the farm. Then you opened an office in Bellevale, and have been\nthere in the oil business ever since.\n\n\"How's he been doin' financially?\" interjected the judge.\n\n\"He has made a fortune,\" said Clara. \"I believe him to be one of the\nprincipal men of the town, socially and in a business way. He didn't\ntell me this, but we think the circumstances seem to indicate it.\"\n\n\"Te saircumstances,\" said the professor, filling a pause, \"show it.\"\n\n\"How is it,\" said the judge, \"that no one has ever heard of his\nBellevale career out in Hazelhurst, if he's so prominent? We read, out\nthere, and once in a while one of us goes outside the corporation.\"\n\n\"His name,\" said Madame le Claire, \"in Bellevale is not Florian Amidon.\"\n\n\"What is it?\" cried Amidon. \"Tell it to me!\"\n\nMadame le Claire restrained him with a calm glance.\n\n\"It is Eugene Brassfield,\" said she.\n\n\"It is your own dotes,\" cried the professor gleefully, \"your own\ndicket, your own gorrespondence!\"\n\nAmidon was feeling in his breast-pocket for something. He withdrew his\nhand, holding in it a letter, and looked from it to Madame le Claire\nquestioningly.\n\n\"Oh, yes!\" said she, not quite in her usual manner, \"it's yours.", "start_char_idx": 58332, "end_char_idx": 61908, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d": {"__data__": {"id_": "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "258864160b468c3a752f6de0aac65b6d0bc3e370c7f4eb10cae10f0fd05f97bc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5ef986d193575a602cc6414581481881d8088cd2c90efd8f66d7a6f67c373189", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "said she, not quite in her usual manner, \"it's yours. It's\nfrom Miss Elizabeth Waldron, of Bellevale, your affianced wife.\"\n\n\"Aha!\" said the judge. \"Now will you get mad when I speak of a double\nlife? Engaged, hey?\"\n\n\"I never saw the--the lady in my life,\" was the reply; \"so how can I\nbe--can I be--engaged to her?\"\n\n\"In te Amidon blane of gonsciousness,\" said the professor, \"you are\nstranchers. In te Brassfield pairsonality, you are:--_Gott im Himmel_,\nyou are stuck on her, stuck on her--not, Clara? Vas he not gracey?\nOnly Clara cut it short in te temonstration; but as a luffer, in te\nBrassfield blane, you are vot you call hot stuff.\"\n\n\"You had better read the gentlemen your notes,\" said Madame le Claire\ncoldly. \"And please excuse me. I hope to see you both again.\" And\nwith a sinuous bow, she swept from the room.\n\nBlodgett, keenly analytical, lost no word of the professor's notes.\nFlorian sat with the letter from Miss Waldron in his hand, lost in\nthought. Sometimes his face burned with blushes, sometimes it paled\nwith anxiety. His eyes ran over the letter full of sweet ardors; and\nwhen he thought of replying to them--or leaving them unanswered--his\nbrow went moist and his heart sick. What should he do? What could he\ndo?\n\nWhen they returned to the hotel, the judge was in a fever of excitement.\n\n\"I tell you, Florian,\" said he, \"I believe the professor is right about\nthis. It seems that there are precedents, you know--cases on all-fours\nwith yours. When I went to the telephone, up there, I called up Stacy\nand Stacy's and asked 'em to get me Dun's and Bradstreet's report on\nyour Bellevale business. It ought to be up here pretty soon. There\nmay be something down there worth looking after, and needing attention.\"\n\n\"Perhaps,\" groaned Amidon. \"Do you know that I'm engaged----\"\n\n\"One of the things I referred to,\" said the judge.\n\n\"--to a lady, down there, whom I shouldn't know if I were to meet her\nout in the hall? If I go back to Hazelhurst, she is put under a cloud\nas a deserted woman--to say nothing of her feelings. And if I go back\nto Bellevale--my God, Judge, how can I go back, and take my place in a\nsociety where every one knows me, and I know nobody; and be a lover to\na girl who may be--anything, you know; but who has the highest sort of\nclaims on me, and a nature, I'm sure, capable of the keenest suffering\nor pleasure--how can I?\"\n\n\"Message, sir, from Stacy and Stacy,\" said a messenger boy at the door.\n\nJudge Blodgett tore open the envelope, and read the telegraphic reports.\n\n\"M--m--m----Y--e--es,\" said he. \"It'll take diplomacy, Florian,\ndiplomacy. But, if these reports are to be trusted, and I guess they\nare, you've got about ten times as much at Bellevale as you have at\nHazelhurst. And, as you say, the lady has claims. As an honorable\nman--an engaged man, who has received the plighted troth of a pure\nyoung heart--and a good financier, this Bellevale life demands\nresumption at your hands. Prepare, fellow citizen, to meet the\ndifficulties of the situation.\"\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nPOISING FOR THE PLUNGE\n\n Yea, all her words are sweet and fair,\n And so, mayhap, is she;\n But words are naught but molded air,\n And air and molds are free.\n Belike, the youth in charm\u00c3\u00a8d hall\n Some fardels sore might miss,\n Scanning his Beauty's household all,\n Or ere he gave the kiss!\n --_The Knyghte's Discourse to his Page_.\n\nNow it happened that at Bellevale, the young woman whom we--with the\nsweet familiarity of art--have had the joy to know as Elizabeth, moved\nabout in unconsciousness, mostly blissful, of the annihilation of Eugene\nBrassfield.", "start_char_idx": 61855, "end_char_idx": 65482, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181": {"__data__": {"id_": "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "2d25ed8dabcc01965561018c0ae596a8b19a2218cb1597ad7f5a348eabd3d1b6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "316ec7bc83b520c3596385a26754abed7e060897b3e7cb24fcd47c4329adf6c7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The mails might take to Mrs. Baggs at Hazelhurst vague\nletters from Judge Blodgett hinting at clues and traces of Florian,\npreparatory to the restoration of the lost brother; but Brassfield, never\nanything but a wraith from the mysterious caves of the subconsciousness,\nwas non-existent for evermore, except through the magic of Le Claire.\nBut Elizabeth Waldron, just home from college, full of the wise unwisdom\nof Smith and twenty-three, and palpitating with the shock which had\nbroken the cables by which she had so long, long ago moored herself in\nthe safe and deep waters of the harbor of a literary and intellectual\ncelibacy, still dreamed of the bubble personality which had vanished,\nalthough at times waves of anxious unrest swept across her bosom.\n\nFor one thing, that epistle of hers, made for his reading on the\ntrain--how could she have written it! Elizabeth's cheeks burned when she\nremembered it. Then she thought of the weeks of chaste dalliance between\nher acceptance of him and his departure, and of the _\u00c3\u00a9lan_ with which he\nhad entered that safe harbor of hers, and swept her from those moorings;\nand the letter seemed slight return for the rites of adoration he had\nperformed before her.\n\nBut (and now the cheeks burned once more) why, why had he not written to\nher as soon as he reached New York? Was he one with whom it was out of\nsight, out of mind? Or was he one of those business men who can not\nplace anything more delicate than price-quotations on paper? Or--and\nhere the cheeks paled--was he suddenly ill? She wished, after all, that\nshe had not written it!\n\nAnd one day, when a special-delivery letter came and surprised her, she\nran out in the winter sun to the summer-house where she had sat so much\nwith him, and read it in quiet. Whereupon the unrest increased, because\nthe letter seemed as unlike Eugene as if he had copied it from some\n_Complete Letter Writer_.\n\nFlorian had agonized over this letter--had even tried the experiment of\nwriting one while in the \"Chones blane\" under the influence of Madame le\nClaire; but it was too incoherent for any use--and he had done the best\nhe could. Professor Blatherwick and Judge Blodgett were working out a\ncode of behavior for Mr. Amidon when he should return to Bellevale. They\nkept him in the Brassfield personality for hours every day; but such a\nmatter as this letter to Elizabeth, he could not intrust to them. Every\nday, though, he looked into the varicolored eyes of Clara and willed to\nsleep; and every day the operation grew less and less painful to him.\n\nVast and complex was the system of notes built up by the professor and\nthe judge. They told him all about his various properties and holdings\nof stock; they listed the clubs and social organizations to which he\nbelonged, and the offices he held in each. They made a directory of\nnames mentioned by him in his abnormal state, and compiled facts about\neach person. It must have been very much like the copious information\nthat we think we have about historical characters--elaborate, and the\nbest thing possible in the absence of the real facts; but only the\nreflection of these people in the mind of some one else, after all.\nFinally the judge brought the whole to his friend, neatly typewritten,\nparagraphs numbered, facts tabulated, and all provided with a splendid\nindex and system of elaborate cross-references.\n\n[Illustration: Vast and complete was the system of notes built up by the\nprofessor and the judge]\n\n\"You see, my boy,\" said Judge Blodgett, \"all any one really needs to know\nof his surroundings is actually very little. Otherwise, most people\nnever could get along at all. Neander couldn't find his way to\nmarket--the greatest philosopher of his time. Now these notes tell you\nmore--actually more--of your Bellevale life, than some folks ever find\nout about themselves--with a little filling in, on the spot, you know,\nwhy, they'll do first rate. For instance, under 'S' we have a man named\nStevens, 'Old Stevens' you playfully call him. I figure him out to be an\nelderly man in some position of authority--he seems to sort of govern\nthings, even you.", "start_char_idx": 65484, "end_char_idx": 69613, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312": {"__data__": {"id_": "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "81d45e4429251788517ce6327b240eec4e75155de5877ab57c4b8141058e0fae", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f04f73d1703eaf349503dcfab58619f6765be29a0fb8cf4fc0915c7f0cd23b65", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The professor thinks he's your banker, but his\nintellectual domination leads me to the conclusion that he's your lawyer.\nThere is a Miss Strong, evidently an important person. I venture the\nassertion that she's a literary woman, as you speak about asking her to\n'look at her notes.' I shouldn't wonder if she's a rival of Miss\nWaldron's, eh, Professor?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Amidon impatiently, \"who else?\"\n\n\"Oh, lots of 'em,\" answered the judge. \"Here's 'A' for instance, and\nunder it a man named Alvord--a close friend of yours----\"\n\n\"The one this telegram is from,\" said Amidon. \"And I suppose this one in\ncipher is from Stevens, the lawyer or banker. It must be important.\"\n\n\"I shouldn't wonder,\" said Judge Blodgett; \"and this Mr. Alvord I take to\nbe a minister, for you connect him with some topic relating to 'Christian\nMartyrs' and 'rituals.' He must be a close friend, for you sometimes\ncall him 'Jim,' in strict privacy, I presume. Oh, there's a regular\ndirectory of 'em here. I've even discovered that you have a little\nfriend, a child of say seven or eight years--tell by the tone, you\nknow--that you call 'Daisy' and 'Daise' and sometimes 'Strawberry.'\nThese fondnesses for children and clergymen prove to me, Florian, that an\nAmidon is good goods on any confounded plane of consciousness you can\nthrow 'em into--conservative, respectable, and all that, you know.\"\n\nAmidon looked suspiciously at the notes, unappeased by this flattery.\nWhat justification there was for suspicion we shall be better able to say\nwhen we meet these Bellevale acquaintances of his.\n\n\"Is this the guide by which I am to regulate my conduct in Bellevale?\"\nasked he, after looking it over.\n\n\"Well,\" said the judge, \"it may not be quite like remembering all about\nthings; but anyhow it will help some, won't it?\"\n\n\"I suppose I'm to carry it with me, and when an acquaintance accosts me\non the street, I'm to look him up in the index and find out who he is,\nbefore I decide whether to shake hands with him or cut him, am I?\"\n\n\"Not exactly that way,\" said the judge; \"that wouldn't be practicable,\nyou know; but it's ten to one you'll find his name there. I tell you,\nthat compilation----\"\n\n\"Te tifision into gategories,\" broke in the professor, \"according to te\nbrinciples of lotchik was te chutche's itea. A vonderfully inchenious\nblan. It vill enaple you----\"\n\n\"Has it any plan of reference,\" interrupted Amidon, \"by which I shall be\nenabled to find out about a man when I don't know who he is?\"\n\n\"N--no.\"\n\n\"Or, in such a case, to give me knowledge of my past relations with him,\nor whether I like him or hate him?\"\n\n\"Of course,\" said the judge, \"we only try to do the possible. The law\nrequires no man to do more.\"\n\n\"Does this thing,\" said Amidon, shaking it in evident disgust, \"tell\nwhere I live in Bellevale, whether in lodgings or at a hotel, or in my\nown house? Could I take it and find my home?\"\n\n\"Damn it, Florian!\" said the judge, \"I'm not here to be jumped on, am I?\nNo one can remember everything all the time. We'll get those things and\nput them into a supplement, you know.\"\n\n\"Not for me,\" said Florian. \"I've made up my mind definitely about this.\nI'll not depend on it. If I go back to Bellevale, I must have at hand at\nall times the means of connecting things as I find them with the life of\nthis Brassfield. I must take with me the bridge which spans the chasm\nbetween Brassfield and Amidon--I mean our friend Clara. Without her, I\nshall never go back. I haven't the nerve. I should soon find myself in\na tangle of mistakes from which I could never extricate myself--I've\nthought it all out. The Cretan Labyrinth would be like going home from\nschool, in comparison.\"\n\n\"Pshaw!\"", "start_char_idx": 69615, "end_char_idx": 73311, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce": {"__data__": {"id_": "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "fa5b9a3031f43ed784f53ba6e11d7adf965101b66860e3b94ab4fe3a31515676", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bd2d1ef9372bc4124567e90dfe913a9174f8b0cad2554dbbed78dd9b3d8d24fd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Pshaw!\" said the judge, looking lovingly at Blodgett's _Notes on the\nCompiled Statements of Brassfield_, \"you could feel your way along very\nwell--with these.\"\n\n\"Would you go into the trial of a case,\" said Florian, \"no matter how\nsimple, in which not only your own future, but the happiness of others,\nmight be involved, without even a speaking acquaintance with any of the\nparties, or one of the witnesses? I tell you, Judge, we must have Madame\nle Claire.\"\n\nThe judge rolled up the notes and snapped a rubber band about the roll.\nHe said no more until evening.\n\n\"Then,\" said he, as if he had only just made up his mind to concede the\npoint, \"let's see if it can be arranged at once. Come over to the\nBlatherwicks' with me.\"\n\n\"I think,\" said Amidon slowly, \"that I'll see her alone.\"\n\n\"Alone, yes--yes!\" said the judge, changing an interjection into an\nassent. \"By all means; by all means. Only don't you think there may be\nthings down there needing attention, Florian--money matters--and--and\nother things, you know, my boy--and that we ought to be moving in the\nmatter? I would respectfully urge,\" he concluded, using his orator's\nchest-tones to drown Amidon's protest against his joking, \"that no time\nbe lost in deciding on our course.\"\n\nThe judge had noted the increasing dependence of his client on the fair\nhypnotist, and the growing interest that she seemed to feel in him, and\ntherefore showed some coolness toward the proposal to take her to\nBellevale. The eyes inured to the perusal of dusty commentaries and\nreports were still sharp enough to see the mutual tenderness exchanged in\nthe unwavering, eye-to-eye encounters whereby Amidon was converted into\nBrassfield, and to note the softness of the feline strokings by which\nFlorian's catalepsy was induced or dispelled. He rather favored dropping\nthe Blatherwick acquaintance: but he could not answer Amidon's arguments\nas to their need for its continuance.\n\nSo it was that, about the time when Elizabeth Waldron sat in the\nsummer-house at Bellevale, with tears of disappointment in her pretty\neyes, holding poor Florian's best-he-could-do but ineffective letter all\ncrumpled up in her hand, the tigrine Le Claire rested her elbows upon a\nwindow-ledge in the attitude of gazing into the street (it was all\nattitude, for she saw nothing), and was disturbed by Aaron, who brought\nin Mr. Florian Amidon's penciled card. She gave a few pokes to her hair,\nof course, turned once or twice about before her mirror, and went into\nthe parlor.\n\n\"The judge and your father,\" said Amidon, \"have got up a wonderful guide\nfrom notes of this man Brassfield's talk.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said she with a smile; \"they are wonderful.\"\n\n\"And perfectly useless,\" he continued, \"so far as my steering by them in\nBellevale is concerned.\"\n\n\"As useless,\" she admitted, \"as can be.\"\n\n\"You knew that?\" he inquired. \"Then why did you let them go on with it?\"\n\n\"That's good,\" said she. \"I like that! I was nicely situated to mention\nit, wasn't I?\"\n\n\"The fact is, Clara,\" said he, \"as you can see, that I've got to have you\nat Bellevale. I shall not go down there without you. I can't do it.\nI've thought it all out----\"\n\n\"So have I,\" said she. \"I knew that you'd have to have me--for a little\nwhile; knew it all the time. I was just thinking about it as you came\nup.\"\n\n\"Then can you--will you go?\"\n\n\"Can I stay, Florian?\" she inquired steadily. \"Can I leave you like a\njust-cured blind and deaf man, and my work for you only begun? I must\ngo! We were just talking about our going to Bellevale, as you came in,\npapa. Mr. Amidon will need us for a while when he first gets there.\"\n\n\"Surely, surely,\" said the professor. \"Te most inderesting phaces of dis\ncase vill arise in Bellevale.", "start_char_idx": 73303, "end_char_idx": 77029, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a": {"__data__": {"id_": "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8240dc2f05a899db693fc28fccde25c3c0ab8d56c7d0c256597acb40c1497b6c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3c4a6dbef24d4759b2e19dae31b9fb8c0f073d08d7ba7ad47547cb8a956846b7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Te most inderesting phaces of dis\ncase vill arise in Bellevale. I grave te brifiletche of geeping you\nunter my opsairfation until--until to last dog is hunk! Let us despatch\nChutche Blotchett to spy out te landt. In a day or two he can tiscofer\nvere dis man Brassfield lifes, vere te fair Fraulein Elizabeth resides,\nand chenerally get on to te logal skitivation. He vill meet up with us\nat te train, and see that ve don't put our foots in it. Ve vill dus be\nsafed te mortification of hafing Alderman Brassfield, chairman of te\nstreet committee, asking te boliceman te vay to his lotchings; or te\nfianc\u00c3\u00a9 of Miss Valdering bassing her on te street vit a coldt, coldt\nstare of unrecognition or embracing her young laty friendt py mistake.\nGoot! Let te chutche dake his tebarture fortwith. Clara and I vill be\ncharmed and habby, my friendt, to aggompany you. Supliminally\ngonsidered, it vill be great stuff!\"\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\nIN DARKEST PENNSYLVANIA\n\n The good God gave hands, left and right,\n To deal with divers foes in fight;\n And eyes He gave all sights to hold;\n And limbs for pacings manifold;\n Gave tongue to taste both sour and sweet,\n Gave gust for salad, fish and meat;\n But, Christian Sir, whoe'er thou art,\n Trust not thy many-chambered heart!\n Give not one bow'r to Blonde, and yet\n Retain a room for the Brunette:\n Whoever gave each other part,\n The devil planned and built the heart!\n --_In a Double Locket_.\n\nClara, Amidon and Blatherwick were on their way to Bellevale. The\nprofessor was in the smoking-car, his daughter and Florian in the\nparlor-car. Amidon, his nerves strained to the point of agony, sat\ndreading the end of the journey, as one falling from an air-ship might\nshrink from the termination of his. Madame le Claire brooded over him\nmaternally.\n\n\"Of course,\" said Amidon, \"this Brassfield must have adopted some\ncourse of behavior toward Miss Waldron, when----\"\n\n\"You must call her Elizabeth,\" said Madame le Claire, \"and----\"\n\n\"And what?\" he inquired, as she failed to break the pause. \"Have you\nfound out--much--about it--from him?\"\n\n\"Not so very much,\" she replied, \"only she'll expect such things as\n'dearest' and 'darling' at times. And occasionally 'pet' and\n'sweetheart'--and 'dearie.' I can't give them all; you must\nextemporize a little, can't you?\"\n\n\"Merciful heaven!\" groaned Amidon; \"I can't do it!\"\n\n\"You have,\" said Madame le Claire; \"and more--a good deal more.\"\n\n\"It was that scoundrel Brassfield,\" said he, in perfect seriousness.\n\"More? What do you mean by 'more'?\"\n\n\"Well, sometimes you----\"\n\n\"He, not I!\"\n\n\"You, I think we had better say--sometimes, when you were alone, your\narm went about her waist; her head was drawn down upon your bosom; and\nwith your hand, you turned her face to yours, and----\"\n\n\"Clara, stop!\" Amidon's bashful being was wrung to the sweating-point\nas he uttered the cry. \"I never could have done it! And do you mean\nto say I must now act up to a record of that kind--and with a strange\nwoman? She--she won't permit it---- Oh, you must be mistaken! How do\nyou know this?\"\n\nMadame le Claire blushed, and seemed to want words for a reply. Amidon\nrepeated the question.\n\n\"I want to know if you are sure,\" said he. \"To make a mistake in that\ndirection would be worse than the other, you know.\"\n\n\"Ah, would it?\" said Clara; \"I didn't know that!\"\n\n\"Oh! I think we may take that for granted.\"\n\n\"You really don't get a grain of good from your Brassfield experience,\"\nsaid she, \"or you'd know better.\"", "start_char_idx": 76965, "end_char_idx": 80470, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95": {"__data__": {"id_": "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "d43b3bff69488e643e103007e8d7b36b6bff5aadfe3409aa69fea9add398fab4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2b40b763bd06269da245e23ead377db505da9c8582076c8e000a7ecaf946c2c0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Here ensued a long silence, during\nwhich Amidon appeared to be pondering on her extraordinary remark.\n\n\"But, as to the fact,\" urged he at last, \"how can you guess out any\nsuch state of things as you describe?\"\n\n\"Can't _you_ guess a little bit more once in a while? I know about it,\nfrom Mr. Brassfield's treatment--of--of me--when I made him think--that\nI--was Elizabeth! Oh, don't you see that I had to do it, so as to\nknow, and tell you? Oh, I wish I had never, never begun this! I do, I\ndo!\"\n\nA parlor-car has no conveniences whatever for heroics, hysterics or\nweeping, so miserably are our American railways managed; and Clara\nwinked back into her eyes the tears which filled them, and Amidon\nlooked at her tenderly.\n\n\"Did I, really,\" said he confusedly--\"to you?\"\n\n\"M'h'm,\" said Madame le Claire, nodding affirmatively; \"I couldn't stop\nyou!\"\n\n\"It must have been dreadful--for you,\" said Amidon.\n\n\"Awful,\" said she; \"but the work had to be done, you know.\"\n\n\"Oh, if it were you, now,\" said he, laying his hand on hers, \"I could\ndo it, if you didn't mind. I--I should like to, you know.\"\n\n\"Now see here,\" said Clara; \"if you're just practising this, as a sort\nof rehearsal, you must go further and faster than a public place like\nthis allows, or you'll seem cold by comparison with what has passed.\nIf you mean what you say, let me remind you that you're engaged!\"\n\nMr. Amidon swore softly, but sincerely. Somehow, the pitiful case of\nthe girl who had written that letter with which he had fallen in love,\nhad less and less of appeal to him as the days drifted by. And now,\nwhile the duty of which he had assured himself still impelled him to\nher side, he confessed that this other girl with the variegated hair\nand eyes, and the power to annihilate and restore him, the occultist\nwith the thrilling gaze and the strong, supple figure, was calling more\nand more to the aboriginal man within him. So, while he took\nElizabeth's letters from his pocket and read them, to get, if possible,\nsome new light on her character, it was Clara's face that his eyes\nsought, as he glanced over the top of the sheet. Ah, Florian, with one\ngirl's love-letter in your hands, and the face of another held in that\navid gaze, can you be the bashful banker-bachelor who could not discuss\nthe new style of ladies' figures with Mrs. Hunter! And as we thus\nmoralize, the train sweeps on and on, and into Bellevale, where Judge\nBlodgett waits upon the platform for our arrival.\n\nThe judge stood by the steps to seize upon Amidon as he alighted. That\ngentleman and Madame le Claire, however, perversely got off at the\nother end of the car. As they walked down the platform, Florian met\nhis first test, in the salutation of a young woman in a tailor-made\ngown, who nodded and smiled to him from a smart trap at a short\ndistance from the station, where she seemed to be waiting for some one.\n\n\"Any baggage, Mr. Brassfield?\" said a drayman.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Amidon; \"take the checks.\"\n\n\"Do these go to the hotel, or----\" The man waited for directions.\n\n\"I don't--that is,\" said the poor fellow, \"I really---- Just wait a\nminute! Judge,\" this in a whisper to his friend, who had reached his\nside, \"this is terrible! Where do I want to go?--and for the love of\nHeaven, where does this hound take my luggage?\"\n\n\"Your lodgings at the Bellevale House!\" returned the judge.\n\n\"To my lodgings at the Bellevale House,\" announced Amidon.\n\n\"And say,\" said the judge, \"don't look that way; but the young woman in\nthe one-horse trap across the way is your intended.\"\n\n\"No!\" said Amidon. \"I lifted my hat to her--she nodded to me, you\nknow!\"\n\n\"The devil!\" said the judge; \"I'll bet you didn't put any more warmth\nthan a clam into your manner.", "start_char_idx": 80472, "end_char_idx": 84188, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29": {"__data__": {"id_": "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "3c2dc4e84217dbdddac9557085690cf84646b9e5c2083f5742e7aafa092ada91", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "abb99cd85ff69ed66c3db2a77546020ade00d3d67e3cd501cd1c21a2893c2198", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Well, you'll have to go over, and she'll\ntake you up-town, I suppose. Don't stay with her long, if you can help\nit, and come to me at the hotel as soon as you can. She's been driving\nover to see who got off every New York train ever since I came. Go to\nher, and may the Lord be merciful to you! Here are these notes, if you\nthink they'll help you any--I've added some to 'em since I got down\nhere.\"\n\nAmidon waved a contemptuous rejection of the notes, and, casting a\ndespairing glance at Madame le Claire, walked over toward his fate. He\ncould have envied the lot of the bull-fighter advancing into the\nfearful radius of action of a pair of gory horns. He would gladly have\nchanged places with the gladiator who hears the gnashing of bared teeth\nbehind the slowly-opening cage doors. To walk up to the mouths of a\nbattery of hostile Gatlings would have seemed easy, as compared with\nthis present act of his, which was nothing more than stepping to the\nside of a carriage in which sat a girl, for a place near whom any\nunattached young man in Bellevale would willingly have placed his\neternal welfare in jeopardy.\n\nPoint by point, the girl's outward seeming met Amidon's eyes as he\nneared her. From the platform, it was an impressionistic view of a\nwell-kept trap and horse, and a young woman wearing a picture-hat with\na sweeping plume, habited in a gown of modish tailoring, and holding\nthe reins in well-gauntleted hands. As he reached the middle of the\nstreet-crossing, the face, surmounted by dark hair, began to show its\nsalient features--great dark eyes, strongly-marked brows, and a strong,\nsweet mouth with vivid lips. Then came the impression of a form held\nerect, with the strong shoulders and arms which come from athletics,\nand the roundnesses which denote that superb animal, the well-developed\nwoman. But it was only as he stood by the side of the carriage that he\nsaw and felt the mingled dignity and frankness, the sureness and\nlightness of touch, with which she acted or refrained from acting; the\nlack of haste, the temperateness of gesture and intonation, which\nbespoke in a moment that type of woman which is society's finished\nproduct.\n\nHer lips were parted in a half-smile; the great dark eyes sought his in\nthe calling glance which seeks its companion; and in the face and voice\nthere was something tremulous, vibrant and pleadingly anxious. Yet she\ndid and said only commonplaces. She gave him her hand, and threw over\nthe lap-robe as an invitation for him to take the seat beside her.\n\n\"I am glad to see you back, dear,\" said she, \"and a little surprised.\"\n\n\"I hardly expected to come on this train,\" he answered, \"until the very\nhour of starting. I can--hardly say--how glad I am--to be here.\"\n\nShe was silent, as she drove among the drays and omnibuses, out into\nthe open street. He looked searchingly, though furtively, at her, and\nblushed as if he had been detected in staring at a girl in the street\nas she suddenly looked him straight in the face.\n\n\"Have you been ill, Eugene?\" said she. \"You look so worn and tired.\"\n\n\"I have had a very hard time of it since I left,\" said he; \"and have\nbeen far from well.\"\n\nShe patted him lightly with her glove.\n\n\"You must be careful of yourself,\" said she, and paused as if to let\nhim supply her reasons for so saying. \"I hope your trouble is over,\ndear.\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" said he. \"I am sure that after a few hours in my rooms, I\nshall be quite refreshed. Will you please put me down at the Bellevale\nHouse? I shall beg the privilege of calling soon.\"\n\n\"Why!\" She looked swiftly at him, looked at the horse, and again at\nhim. \"Soon?\" she went on, as if astonished. \"I shall be alone this\nevening--if you care about it!\"\n\n\"Oh, yes!\" said he confusedly, \"this evening, yes! I meant sooner--in\na few minutes, you know!\"", "start_char_idx": 84190, "end_char_idx": 87997, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb": {"__data__": {"id_": "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "6989d0d99ef44335daed6df39bf4298594bc117b143fb4d916e2c57d845b2e68", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5e4ab89e43d6fb054b62af2fce40458873e097f79630897c1f41296dacaca007", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I meant sooner--in\na few minutes, you know!\"\n\n\"No,\" said she, in that tone which surely denotes the raising of the\ndrawbridge of pique; \"you must rest until this evening. Who is the old\ngentleman who has been waiting two or three days to see you?\"\n\n\"Judge Blodgett, an old friend,\" said he, relieved to find some matter\nwith reference to which he could tell the truth.\n\n\"And the queer-looking lady--do you know her?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes!\" said Amidon; \"she is a good friend, too.\"\n\n\"Ah!\" the girl answered, in a tone which said almost anything, but was\nnot by any means without significance. \"And who is she?\"\n\n\"Her professional name is Madame le Claire; in private life, she is\nMiss Blatherwick.\"\n\n\"I didn't see the rest of the troupe,\" said Miss Waldron icily; \"or\nperhaps she's an elocutionist.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Amidon, \"she's an occultist--a sort of--well, a hypnotist.\"\n\nThere was a long pause here, during which they drew near to the big\nbrick building on the side of which Amidon saw the sign of the\nBellevale House.\n\n\"Also an old friend?\" inquired Miss Waldron.\n\n\"Oh, no!\" said Florian; \"I met her only a week or two ago.\"\n\n\"She must be very charming,\" said Elizabeth, \"to have inspired so much\nfriendship in so short a time. Here we are at the hotel. Do you\nreally think you'll call this evening? _Au revoir_, then.\"\n\nEven the unsophisticated Amidon could perceive, now, that the\ndrawbridge was up, the portcullis down, and all the bars and shutters\nof the castle in place. Moreover, in the outer darkness in which he\nmoved, he imagined there roamed lions and wolves and ravening\nbeasts--and he with no guide but Judge Blodgett, who stands there in\nthe lobby, so wildly beckoning to him.\n\n\n\n\nX\n\nTHE WRONG HOUSE\n\n When Adam strayed\n In Eden's bow'rs,\n One little maid\n Amused his hours.\n He fell! But, friend,\n I leave to you\n Where he'd have dropped\n Had there been two!\n --_Paradise Rehypothecated_.\n\n\"Now, Florian,\" said Judge Blodgett, as they sat in Amidon's rooms,\n\"search yourself, and see if you don't feel a dreamy sense of\nfamiliarity here in these rooms--the feeling that the long-lost heir\nhas when he crawls down the chimney as a sweep and finds himself in his\nancestral halls, you know.\"\n\n\"Never saw a thing here before,\" said Amidon, \"and have no feeling\nexcept surprise at the elegance about me, and a sneaking fear that\nBrassfield may come in at any time and eject us. The fellow had taste,\nanyhow!\"\n\n\"Didn't you recognize anything,\" went on the judge, \"in the streets or\nbuildings or the general landscape?\"\n\n\"Nothing.\"\n\n\"Nor in the young lady? Wasn't there a sort of--of music in her voice,\nlike long-forgotten melodies, you understand--like what the said heir\nnotices in after years when his mother blunders on to him?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Florian, \"her voice is musical, if that's what you\nmean--musical and low, and reminds one of the sounds made by a great\nmaster playing his heart out in the lowest notes of the flute; but it\nis so far from being familiar to me that I'm quite sure I never heard a\nvoice like it before.\"\n\nThe judge strode up and down the room perturbedly.\n\n\"Why,\" said he, \"it's enough to make a man's hair stand!\"\n\n\"It does,\" said Amidon. \"What can I say to her?\"\n\n\"You haven't a piece of property here,\" said the judge, going on with\nthe matters uppermost in his mind, \"that you could successfully\nmaintain replevin for, if anybody converted it. They'd ask you on\ncross-examination if it was yours, and you'd have to say you didn't\nknow! And there's a world of property, I find. They could take it all\naway from you without your knowing it, if they only knew. Have you any\ncourse mapped out--any plans?\"\n\n\"To a certain extent, yes,\" said Florian. \"I shall call on her this\nevening.\"", "start_char_idx": 87953, "end_char_idx": 91708, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9": {"__data__": {"id_": "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "27dfa9c722affb066e0315688d5d9db6b17df667a6c1d3c47ec769e4eec288d1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "da6a54fe9bb02f0a1dcc1a971e47e1d9bdcbfa32209b225f7d2fa9cb6b9669c4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I shall call on her this\nevening.\"\n\n\"For help, yes,\" said the judge. \"She must bring Brassfield up, so\nthat we can find out about some property matters.\"\n\n\"I don't mean that,\" said Amidon. \"I must call on Miss\nWaldron--Elizabeth.\"\n\n\"And neglect----\" began the judge.\n\n\"Everything,\" said Florian firmly. \"This is something that concerns my\nhonor as a gentleman. While it remains in its present state, I can't\nbother with these property matters. Have I an office?\"\n\n\"Have you!\" said the judge. \"Well, just wait until you see them.\"\n\n\"And an office force?\"\n\n\"Confidential manager named Stevens, as per the notes,\"; said Judge\nBlodgett. \"Bookkeeper, assistant bookkeeper and stenographer. Tried\nto pump 'em and got frozen out. Yes, you've got an office force.\"\n\n\"Well, then,\" said Amidon, \"we'll go down there in the morning, and\nI'll tell this man Stevens--is that what you call him?--to show you all\nthrough the books and things--going to buy or take a partnership, or\nsomething. Then we can go through the business together. We can do it\nthat way, without being suspected, can't we?\"\n\n\"Maybe,\" meditatively, \"maybe we can. Take a sort of invoice, hey?\nBut don't you think we'd better have Brassfield on the witness-stand\nfor a while this evening? A sort of cramming--coaching--review, on the\neve of trial, you know?\"\n\n\"No, no!\" answered Florian. \"No more of that, if it can be avoided.\"\n\nThe judge stroked his mustache in silence for a time.\n\n\"See here,\" asked he finally, \"what did we bring madame and the\nprofessor down here for, anyway, I'd like to know?\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Amidon, \"but, somehow, I feel like getting along without\nit if I can. As little of her--of their--services as possible, Judge,\nfrom now on.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said the judge, in a tone of one who suddenly sees the situation;\n\"all right, Florian, all right. Maybe it's best, maybe it's best.\nAbnormal condition, as the professor says, and all that; effect on the\nmind, and one thing and another. Yes--yes--yes!\"\n\n\"If I have any duties to perform here, Judge, you must help me to keep\nstraight. I've never had much tendency to go wrong, you know, but that\nwas for lack of temptation, don't you think, Blodgett?\"\n\n\"Well, well, Florian, I can't say as to that; can't say. Yes--and say!\nYou'll want to go over to the Waldron residence this evening. I'll\ntake you out and show you the house. By George! It must seem\nextraordinarily odd to walk about among things you are supposed to know\nlike a book, and to be, in fact, a perfect stranger. Dante could have\nused that idea, if it had occurred to him.\"\n\n\"An idea for Dante, indeed!\" thought Amidon, as he walked toward the\nhouse, which, from afar, the judge had pointed out to him. \"For the\n_Inferno_: a soul thrown into a realm full of its friends and enemies,\nits loves and hates, shorn of memory, of all sense of familiarity, of\nall its habits, stripped of all the protection of habitude. For the\n_Inferno_, indeed!--Now this must be the house, with the white columns\nrunning up to the top of the second story; crossing the ravine and\nlosing sight of it for a few minutes makes even the house look\ndifferent. Outside, I can get accustomed to it, in this five-minute\ninspection. But, inside--oh, to be invisible while I get used to it!\nWell, here goes!\"\n\n\"Ding-a-ling-ting-ting!\" rang the bell somewhere back in the recesses\nof the house, and the footsteps of a man approached the door. Amidon\nwas frightened. He had expected either Elizabeth herself, or a maid to\ntake his card, and was prepared for such an encounter only. A little\ndark, bright-eyed man opened the door and seized his hand.\n\n\"Why, Brassfield, how are you?\" he exclaimed. \"Heard you'd got back.\nSorry I couldn't meet you in New York. Got my telegram, I suppose?\"", "start_char_idx": 91673, "end_char_idx": 95444, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c": {"__data__": {"id_": "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "98d2c91c37dcf9528e1c3dfda2b3d29f186140ef24e6b6fe8274dc06d773f940", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5c950ca6364c1bb50a0e5ff8fc324bb68739170d31805878ccf8b3f32043cd92", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Sorry I couldn't meet you in New York. Got my telegram, I suppose?\"\n\n\"I just called,\" said Amidon, \"to see Miss Waldron.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes!\" said the little man; \"nothing but her, now. But she isn't\nhere. Hasn't been for over a week. Nobody here but me. Can't you\nstay a while? Say, 'Gene, we put Slater through the lodge while you\nwere gone, and he knows he's in, all right enough. Bulliwinkle took\nthat part of yours in the catacombs scene, and you ought to have heard\nthe bones of the early Christians rattle when he bellered out the\nlecture. 'Here, among the eternal shades of the deep caves of death,\nwalked once the great exemplars of our Ancient Order!' Why, it would\nraise the hair on a bronze statue. And when, in the second, they\ncondemned him to the Tarpeian Rock, and swung him off into space in the\nChest of the Clanking Chains, he howled so that the Sovereign Pontiff\nmade 'em saw off on it, and take him out--and he could hardly stand to\nreceive the Grand and Awful Secret. Limp as a rag! But impressed?\nWell, he said it was the greatest piece of ritualistic work he ever\nsaw, and he's seen most of 'em. Go to any lodges in New York?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Amidon, who had never joined a secret order in his life,\n\"and do you think we ought to talk these things out here?\"\n\n\"No, maybe not,\" said the Joiner; \"but nobody's about, you know. Come\nin, can't you?\"\n\n\"No, I must really go, thank you. By the way,\" said Florian, \"where\ndoes Miss--er--I must go, at once, I think!\"\n\n\"Oh, I know how it is,\" went on his unknown intimate; \"nothing but\nBess, now. Might as well bid you good-by, and give you a dimit from\nall the clubs and lodges, until six months after the wedding. You'll\nbe back by that time, thirstier than ever. By the way, that reminds\nme: the gang's going to give you a blow-out at the club. Kind of an\n_Auld lang syne_ business, 'champagny-vather an' cracked ice,' chimes\nat midnight, won't go home till morning, all good fellows and the rest\nof it. Edgington spoke to you about it, I s'pose?\"\n\n\"Only in a general way,\" replied Amidon, wondering who and what\nEdgington would turn out to be. \"I don't know yet how my engagements\nwill be----\"\n\n\"Oh, nothing must stand in the way of that, you know,\" the little man\nwent on. \"Why, gad! the tenderest feelings of brotherly---- Oh, you\ndon't mean it! But I mustn't keep you. Bessie told me that the plans\nfor your house have come. She's got 'em over there, now. I say, old\nman, I envy you your evening. Like two birds arranging the nest.\nSorry you can't come in; but, good night. And, say! Your little\nstrawberry blonde is in town! Wouldn't that jar you?\"\n\n\"Heavens!\" ejaculated Amidon. \"How am I ever to get through with this?\"\n\nThe genuine agony in Florian's tones fixed the attention of the little\nman, and seemed to arouse some terrible suspicion.\n\n\"Why, 'Gene,\" said he, \"you don't mean that there's anything in this\nblonde matter, do you, that will---- By George! And she's a sister of\none of the most prominent A. O. C. M.'s of Pittsburg--and you remember\nour solemn obligation!\"\n\n\"No,\" said Amidon, \"I don't!\"\n\n\"What! You don't!\"\n\n\"No!\" said Florian. \"I've forgotten it!\"\n\n\"Forgotten it!\" said his questioner, recoiling as if in horror.\n\"Forgotten it! And with the sister of the Past Sovereign Pontiff of\nPittsburg Lodge No. 863! I tell you, Brassfield, I don't believe it.\nI prefer to think you're bughouse! Cracked! Out of your head!", "start_char_idx": 95376, "end_char_idx": 98815, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232": {"__data__": {"id_": "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "09e8fccab9e280dddc45dcfb3b816034691eba5429b6cb520177b193c10d2a6f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5b1ebb53169df80fee43855d76a182ac717eceae046ffa09b3fe6c935aa23e5c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Cracked! Out of your head! But,\n'Gene,\" added his unknown brother, in a stage-whisper, \"if there has\nbeen anything between you and anything comes up, you know, Jim Alvord,\nfor one, knowing and understanding your temptations--for the strawberry\nblondes are the very devil--will stand by you until the frost gathers\nsix inches deep on the very hinges of---- Say, Mary's coming in at the\nside door. Good night! Keep a stiff upper lip; stay by Bess, and I'll\nstay by you, obligation or no obligation. 'F. D. and B.', you know:\ndeath, perhaps, but no desertion! So long! See you to-morrow.\"\n\nAnd Amidon walked from the house of his unfamiliar chum, knowing that\nhis sweetheart but once seen was waiting in her unknown home for him to\ncome to her, and had as a basis for conversation the plans for their\nhouse. He could imagine her with the blue-prints unrolled, examining\nthem with all a woman's interest in such things, and himself discussing\nwith her this house in which she expected him to place her as mistress.\nAnd the position she thought she held in his heart--vacant, or---- He\nleaned against a fence, in bewilderment approaching despair. His mind\ndwelt with horror on the woman whom he could think of only under the\ncoarse appellation of the strawberry blonde. Was there a real crime\nhere to take the place of the imagined putting away of Brassfield?\nBrassfield! The very name sickened him. \"Strawberry blondes, indeed!\"\nthought Florian; and \"Brassfield, the perjured villain!\" Certain names\nused by the little man in the wrong house came to him as having been\nmentioned in the notes of the professor and the judge. Alvord, the\nslangy little chap who took so familiar an attitude toward him--this\nwas the judge's \"ministerial\" friend! Yet, had there not been mention\nof \"ritualistic work\" and \"Early Christians\" in his conversation? And\nthis woman of whom he spoke,--it took no great keenness of perception\nto see that the \"strawberry blonde\" must be the \"child of six or eight\nyears\" whom he had called \"Daisy,\" and sometimes \"Strawberry!\" Here\nwas confirmation of Alvord's suspicion, if his allusion to the\nviolation of an \"obligation\" expressed suspicion. Here was a situation\nfrom which every fiber of Amidon's nature revolted, seen from any\nangle, whether the viewpoint of the careful banker and pillar of\nsociety, or that of the poetic dreamer waiting for his predestined mate.\n\nIn a paroxysm of dread, he started for the hotel. Then he walked down\nthe street toward the railway station, with the thought of boarding the\nfirst train out of town. This resolve, however, he changed, and I am\nglad to say that it was not the thought of the fortune of which Judge\nBlodgett had spoken that altered his resolution, but that of the letter\nwhich greeted his return to consciousness as Florian Amidon, and the\nimage of the dark-eyed girl with the low voice and the strong figure,\nwho had written it, and who waited for him, somewhere, with the roll of\nplans. So he began searching again for the house with the white\ncolumns; and found it on the next corner beyond the one he had first\ntried.\n\nElizabeth sat in a fit of depression at the strangeness of Mr.\nBrassfield's conduct--a depression which deepened as the evening wore\non with no visit from him. She sprang to her feet and pressed both\nhands to her bosom, at the ring of the door-bell, ran lightly to the\ndoor and listened as the servant greeted Mr. Brassfield, and then\nhurried back to her seat by the grate, and became so absorbed in her\nbook that she was oblivious of his being shown into the room, until the\nmaid had retired, leaving him standing at gaze, his brow beaded with\nsweat, his face pale and his hands unsteady. The early Christian had\nentered on his martyrdom.", "start_char_idx": 98788, "end_char_idx": 102546, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d": {"__data__": {"id_": "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "1ac9d0ad93bb58cbfbb1b2a6ce147226fde9ca016d59d2a15ff065774f3ae7bf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ac0091548df13a0ae71b0e6e5d60d2a8f2c5207899e1251ceff52fc7a2616ce5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The early Christian had\nentered on his martyrdom.\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\nTHE FIRST BATTLE, AND DEFEAT\n\n From Camelot to Cameliard\n The way by bright pavilions starred,\n In arms and armor all unmarred,\n To Guinevere rode Lancelot to claim for Arthur\n his reward.\n\n Down from her window look't the maid\n To see her bridegroom, half afraid--\n In him saw kingliness arrayed:\n And summoned by the herald Love to yield, her woman's\n heart obeyed.\n\n From Cameliard to Camelot\n Rode Guinevere and Lancelot--\n Ye bright pavilions, babble not!\n The king she took, she keeps for king, in spite of\n shame, in spite of blot!\n --_From Cameliard to Camelot_.\n\nIt is a disagreeable duty (one, however, which you and I, madam,\ndischarge with a conscientiousness which the unthinking are sometimes\nunable to distinguish from zeal) to criticize one's friends. The task\nis doubly hard when the animadversion is committed to paper, with a\nmore or less definite idea of ultimate publication. I trust, beloved,\nthat we may call Mr. Florian Amidon a friend. He is an honest fellow\nas the world goes, in spite of the testimony of Simeon Woolaver\nregarding the steers; and he wishes to do the right thing. In a matter\nof business, now, or on any question of films, plates or lenses, we\nshould find him full of decision, just and prompt in action. But (and\nthe disagreeable duty of censure comes in here) there he stands like a\nStoughton-bottle in a most abject state of woe, because, forsooth, he\npossesses the love of that budding Juno over there by the grate, and\nknows not what to do with it! What if he _doesn't_ feel as if he had\nthe slightest personal acquaintance with her? What if the image of\nanother, and the thought----? But look with me, for a moment, at the\nsituation.\n\nThere she sits, so attentive to her book (is it the _Rubaiyat_? Yes!)\nthat his entrance has not attracted her notice--not at all! One\nshapely patent-leather is stretched out to the fender, and the creamy\nsilk of the gown happens to be drawn back so as to show the slender\nankle, and a glimpse of black above the leather. The desire for\nexactness alone compels a reference to the fact that the boundary lines\nof this silhouetted black area diverge perceptibly as they recede from\nthe shoe. It is only a detail, but even Florian notices it, and thinks\nabout it afterward. Her face is turned toward the shadows up there\nby the window, her eyes looking at space, as if in quest of Iram and\nhis Rose, or Jamshyd and his Sev'n-ring'd Cup, or the solution of\nthe Master-knot of Human Fate. The unconscious pose showing the\nincurved spine, and the arms and shoulders glimpsing through falls\nof lace at sleeve and corsage, would make the fortune of the\nphotographer-in-ordinary to a professional beauty. And yet that man\nAmidon stands there like a graven image, and fears to rush in where an\nangel has folded her wings for him and rests!\n\n[Illustration: There she sits so attentive to her book that his\nentrance has not attracted her notice]\n\nHe knows that he is expected to claim some of the privileges of the\nlong-absent lover. He has some information as to their nature. His\neyes ought to apprise him (as they do us, my boy!) of their\npreciousness. He is not without knowledge concerning past conduct of\nthat type which, beginning in hard-won privileges, ripens into\npriceless duties, not to discharge which is insult all the more bitter\nbecause it is not to be mentioned. It is not to be denied that the\ntableau appeals to him; and because another woman has lately touched\nhim in a similar way, he stands there and condemns himself for that!\nThere is small excuse for him, I admit, sir. Her first token of his\npresence should have been a kiss on the snowy shoulder. You suggest\nthe hair?", "start_char_idx": 102497, "end_char_idx": 106280, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef": {"__data__": {"id_": "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "cf4ded05d139244f91108b047b19e5b3da6959f79fa8dfd01242ef1f6f363208", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "886f1abacd4afc15db51ef6b368fc958347c1a7152c6087f24095376db212d35", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "You suggest\nthe hair? Well, the hair, then, though for my part, I have always\nfelt---- But never mind! Had it been you or I in his place----\n\nYes, my dear, this digression is becoming tedious. Let us proceed with\nthe story.\n\nElizabeth rose with a little start of surprise, a little flutter of the\nbosom, and came forward with extended hands. He took them with a\ntrembling grasp which might well have passed as evidence of fervor.\n\n\"Ah, Eugene,\" said she, holding him away, \"it has seemed an age!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said he truthfully, \"an eternity, almost.\"\n\n\"Sit down by the fire,\" said she, in that low voice which means so\nmuch. \"You are cold.\"\n\n\"I am a little cold,\" he replied. \"I must have remained outside too\nlong.\"\n\n\"Y-e-s?\" she returned; and after a long pause: \"It doesn't seem to take\nlong--sometimes. And the wind is in the east.\"\n\nNow, when a bride-elect begins to deal in double meanings of this sort\nwith her fianc\u00c3\u00a9, the course of true love is likely to be entering on a\npiece of rough road-bed.\n\n\"How did you find Estelle when you called?\"\n\nEstelle? Estelle? Estelle! Nothing in Blodgett and Blatherwick's\nnotes about Estelle. \"A whole directory of names,\" as Judge Blodgett\nhad said, but no Estelle. The world full of useless people--a billion\nand a half of them--and not an Estelle at poor Amidon's call in this\ntime of need. Hence this long hiatus in the conversation.\n\n\"Really, Miss--er--a--my dear, I haven't had time to call on any one.\"\n\n\"It will be a little hard to explain,\" said she after a silence, \"to my\nprospective bridesmaid and dearest friend, that you were so long in New\nYork and could not call. It is not quite like you, Eugene.\"\n\nHe was sitting where he could see her well, and because she looked into\nthe fire a good deal, he found himself gazing fixedly at her. Her\nmanifold perfections filled him with the same feeling of astonishment\nexperienced by that beggar who awoke in the prince's chamber, clothed\nin splendor, and with a royal domain in fee.\n\n(Personally, I regard the domain which spread itself before Amidon, as\nimperial.)\n\nAs she pronounced her gentle reproof, her eyes turned to his, and he\nstarted guiltily.\n\n\"No,\" he confessed, \"it was not the right thing. You must forgive me,\nwon't you?\"\n\n\"I hope,\" said she, smiling, \"I may be able to do more than that: maybe\nI shall be so fortunate as to get you Estelle's forgiveness.\"\n\n\"Thank you,\" he said; and then seeking for safer ground: \"Haven't you\nsomething for us to look over--some plans or something?\"\n\n\"'Or something'!\" she repeated with a ripple of laughter.\n\nIt was the first time he had heard this laugh; and Marot's lines ran\nthrough his mind:\n\n \"Good God! 'twould make the very streets and ways\n Through which she passes, burst into a pleasure!\n * * * * * *\n No spell were wanting from the dead to raise me,\n But only that sweet laugh wherewith she slays me!\"\n\n\n\"'Or something!'\" she repeated, I say; \"it might just as well be the\nprofiles of a new pipe-line survey, for all the interest you take in\nit. I oughtn't to look at them with you; but come, they're over here\non the table.\"\n\nSomehow, this lady's air required the deferential offer of his arm; and\nsomehow, the deference seemed to please her. So he felt that the\ntension was lessened as she turned over the blue-prints. Moreover, in\nmatters of architecture he felt at home--if he could only steer clear\nof any discussion of the grounds. He had no idea of the location of\nthese.\n\nSoon their heads were close together over the plans. A dozen times her\nhair brushed his lips, two or three times his fingers touched the satin\nskin of her arms and shoulders, and all the time he felt himself within\nthe magic atmosphere which enwraps so divine a maiden, as odorous\nbreezes clothe the shores of Ceylon.", "start_char_idx": 106259, "end_char_idx": 110074, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff": {"__data__": {"id_": "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8941645267bf4ce0d7bdd11e8564ee6c47f23b60445f5c793a2578fa52fe9b2b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f649abd99d8a669f7bff49e320409997ddb75d8822c6590b4f772e4d53705853", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her breath, the faint sweet\nperfume in her hair, the soft frou-frou of her skirts, the appealing\nlowness of her voice--all these wrought strongly on Florian; and when\nshe leaned lightly upon him as she reached past him for one of the\nsheets, he felt (I record it to his credit) as if he must take her to\nhis arms, and complete the embrace she had involuntarily half begun.\nBut the feeling that she was, after all, a strange young girl, and was\nrevealing herself to him altogether under a mistake as to his identity,\nrestrained him.\n\n[Illustration: Soon their heads were close together over the plans]\n\nShe did not lean against him any more. There were some little\nimprovements in the plans which had occurred to Elizabeth, especially\nin the arrangement of kitchen, pantry and laundry.\n\n\"I'll have the architect come and see you about these,\" said Amidon.\n\n\"What!\" said she, in apparent astonishment--\"from Boston?\"\n\n\"Ah--well,\" he stammered, \"I didn't know--that is---- Yes, from\nBoston! We want these matters as you want them, you know, if it were\nfrom Paris or Calcutta. And I think there should be some provision for\nprism-glass to light up the library. It could be cut in right there on\nthat north exposure; don't you think so?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes, and what an improvement it will be!\" she replied. \"And may I\nhave all the editions of Browning I want, even if I couldn't explain\nwhat _Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came_ means?\"\n\n\"Oh, does that point puzzle you?\" exclaimed Florian, greeting the\nallusion to Browning as the war-horse welcomes the battle. \"Then you\nhave never chanced to run across the first edition of Child's _Scottish\nBallads_. You get the story there, of Childe Roland following up the\nquest for his sister, shut up by enchantment in the Dark Tower, in\nsearching for which his brothers--Cuthbert and Giles, you remember, and\nthe rest of 'The Band'--had been lost. He must blow a certain horn\nbefore it, in a certain way--you know how it goes, 'Dauntless the\nslug-horn to my lips I set!' It's quite obvious when you know the\nstory, and not a bit of an enigma. The line in _Lear_ shows that the\nverses must have been commonly sung in Shakespeare's time----\"\n\nThe girl was looking at him with something like amazement; but her\nanswer referred to the matter of his discourse.\n\n\"Yes,\" said she, \"I can see now how the 'Dark Tower' lightens up. I\nmust read it again in the light of this explanation of yours. Shall we\nread it together, soon?\"\n\n\"Oh, by all means!\" said he. \"Only I warn you I never tire when I find\nany one who will study Browning with me. I tried to read _The Ring and\nthe Book_ with a dear friend once, and reading my favorite part,\n'Giuseppe Caponsacchi,' as I raised my eyes after that heartbreaking\nfinale, 'O, great, just, good God! Miserable me!' I saw she was\ndozing. Since then, I read Browning with his lovers only----\"\n\n\"Yes, you are right in that. But, Eugene,\" she exclaimed, \"you said to\nme many times that his verse was rot, that Nordau ought to have\nincluded him in his gallery of degenerates, that he is muddy, and that\nthere isn't a line of poetry in his works so far as you have been able\nto dig into them. And you cited _Childe Roland_ as proof of all of\nthis! And you never would listen to any of Browning, even when we\nalmost quarreled about it! Now, if that was because---- Why, it\nwas----!\"\n\nShe paused as if afraid she might say too much. Florian, who had\nrallied in his literary enthusiasm, collapsed into his chronic state of\nterror. Even in so impersonal a thing as Browning, the man who does\nnot know what his habits are takes every step at his peril.\n\n\"Oh, _that_ that I said!\" he stammered. \"Yes--yes. Well, there _are_\nobscurities, you know. Even Mr.", "start_char_idx": 110076, "end_char_idx": 113812, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90": {"__data__": {"id_": "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "f925dce6022f858fef1b8d684e040dd345db0a2536617967964e2bae0229758d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a28ead8ee653d1ea57fe3a911e5d0ac5b4917d2ca5116f163c1d9caea79e1118", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Well, there _are_\nobscurities, you know. Even Mr. Birrell admits that. But on the\nwhole, don't you agree with me?\"\n\n\"Quite,\" said she dryly; \"if I understand you.\"\n\nThere was an implied doubt as to her understanding of his position, and\nthe only thing made clear was that the drawbridge was up again. So\nFlorian began talking of the plans. He grew eloquent on ventilators,\nbath-rooms, and plumbing. He drew fine and learned distinctions\nbetween styles.\n\n\"The colonial,\" said he, \"is not good unless indulged in in great\nmoderation. Now, what I like about this is the way in which\nultra-colonialism is held in check, and modified in the direction of\nthe Greek ideal. Those columns, supporting the broad portico, hark\nback to the Parthenon, don't they? I like that taste and flavor of the\nclassic.\"\n\nShe listened in much the same wondering way in which she had regarded\nhim at the beginning of his outburst on Browning. Was it possible\nthat, after all, this lover of hers, whose antecedents were so little\nknown, but whose five years of successful life in Bellevale had won for\nhim that confidence of his townsmen in which she had partaken, was,\nafter all, possessed of some of those tastes in art and literature, the\nabsence of which had been the one thing lacking in his character, as it\nappeared to her? It would seem so. And yet, why had he concealed\nthese things from her, who so passionately longed for intellectual\ncompanionship? Somehow, resentment crept into her heart as she looked\nat him, and there was something in his attitude which was not frank and\nbold, as she liked to see a man--but this would not do. He was so\nlovely in his provision for the future, and surely his conversation\ndisclosed that he had those tastes and that knowledge!\n\n\"I think the moon must be letting me look at its other side to-night,\"\nsaid she. \"Have you been saving up the artist and poet in you, to show\nthem to me now?\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" said he, \"not at all--why, any one knows these little things.\nNow let's go through the arrangement of the chambers; shall we?\"\n\n\"Not to-night, if you please. Let us sit by the fire again. It will\nbe a grand house, dear. Sometimes I think, too grand for Bellevale;\nand quite often I feel, too grand, too elegant--for me.\"\n\n\"Who then,\" answered Florian, who saw his conversational duty, a\ndead-sure thing, and went for it there and then, \"who then could have\nsuch a house, or ought to have it, if not you?\"\n\nThe girl looked questioningly, pathetically at him, as if she missed\nsomething of the convincing in his words.\n\n\"To deny that you feel so--felt so about it when you gave orders for\nthe building, would be foolish,\" said she at last. \"And it was very\ndear of you to do it. But once a man, having a little gem which he\nthought of perfect water, placed it in a setting so large and so\ncunningly wrought that nobody ever saw the little stone, unless it was\npointed out to them.\"\n\n\"He saw it,\" said Florian, \"whenever he wanted to--and no setting can\nbe too beautiful for a moon-stone.\"\n\nHe felt that he was rallying nobly.\n\n\"Really,\" he thought, \"I am getting quite ardent. And under different\ncircumstances, I could be so in the utmost good faith; for I know she's\nas good and true as she is queenly and beautiful. But after all, it is\nduty, only, and----\"\n\n\"In such a house,\" she went on, \"people may live a little closer than\nacquaintances, or not quite so close, as the case may be, with their\nlives diluted by their many possessions.\"\n\n\"Yes?\" said he expectantly.\n\n\"Before it comes to that,\" she burst forth, her eyes wide and her hands\nclasped in her lap, \"I want to die!", "start_char_idx": 113762, "end_char_idx": 117383, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f": {"__data__": {"id_": "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "146ce6fce2062cfee8b6015a7b7e398e165bbcbeb054778d92a74736f788c310", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "93fd33162c8f6c828a580faeac0e9b0538dc5496fbdd9c1b2b09fb2c64760b89", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I could gather the fagots for the\nfire, and cuddle down by it on a heap of straw by the roadside, with\nthe man I love; and if I knew he loved me, he might beat me, and I\nwould bear it, and be happy in his strength--far happier than in those\nchambers you spoke of a moment ago, with an acquaintance who merely\nhappened to be called a husband! I would rather walk the streets than\nthat!\"\n\nNow, a lovers' quarrel requires lovers on both sides. Had Amidon\nreally been one, this crisis would have passed naturally on to\nprotestation, counter-protestation, tears, kisses, embraces,\nreconciliation. But all these things take place through the interplay\nof instincts, none of which was awakened in Florian. So he sat\nforlorn, and said nothing.\n\n\"I am going to let you go home, now,\" said she, rising. \"I gave out\nthe date of the wedding, as you requested, the day after you went away.\nIf it were not for that, I should ask you to wait a while--until the\nhouse is finished--or even longer. As it is, you mustn't be surprised\nif I say something surprising to you soon.\"\n\n\"I--I assure you----\" began Amidon. \"Good night, my----\"\n\nHe had schooled himself for this farewell, and remembering what Madame\nle Claire had told him, had decided on a course of action. The two had\nwalked out into the hall and he had put on his top-coat. Now he went\nbravely up to her and stooped to kiss her.\n\nShe raised her face to his, and again the feeling that this man was\nonly a mere acquaintance passed into her being, as she looked into his\neyes. She turned her lips away. But Florian, as the feeling of\nstrangeness impressed her, lost it himself in the contemplation, brief\nbut irresistible, of the upturned lips with their momentary invitation\nso soon withdrawn. The primal man in him awoke. His arm tightened\nabout the lissome waist; the divine form in the creamy silk, on which\nhe had only now almost feared to look, he drew to him so tightly as\nalmost to crush her; and with one palm he raised the averted face to\nhis, and made deliberate conquest of the lips of vivid red. Once,\ntwice, three times--and then she put her hands against his shoulders\nand pushed him away. Her face flamed.\n\n\"Eugene!\" she exclaimed, \"how----\"\n\n\"Good night!\" he answered, \"my dearest, my darling, good night!\"\n\nAnd he ran down the street, in such a conflict of emotions that he\nhardly knew whither he went.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\nON THE FIRM GROUND OF BUSINESS\n\n O merry it was in the good greenwood when the goblin and\n sprite ranged free,\n When the kelpie haunted the shadowed flood, and the dryad\n dwelt in the tree;\n But merrier far is the trolley-car as it routs the witch from\n the wold,\n And the din of the hammer and the cartridges' clamor as\n they banish the swart kobold!\n O, a sovran cure for psychic dizziness\n Is a breath of the air of the world of business!\n --_Idyls of a Sky-Scraper_.\n\nIt is recorded in the last chapter that Mr. Amidon ran from Miss\nWaldron's presence in such a state of agitation that he hardly knew\nwhither he went. To the reader who wonders why he was agitated, I have\nonly to hint that he was wretchedly inexperienced. And as it was, he\nsoon got his bearings and walked briskly toward his hotel; still,\nhowever, in a state of mind entirely new to him.\n\nGradually he lessened his gait, absorbed in mental reconstructions of\nhis parting with Elizabeth. The pet lion which, while affectionately\nlicking the hand which caresses it, brings the blood, and at the taste\nreverts instantly to its normal savagery, is acted on by impulses much\nlike those of Amidon. His thoughts were successions of moving pictures\nof the splendid girl whom he had held in his arms and kissed. He saw\nher sitting by the fire as he entered. His mind's eye dwelt on the\nimage of the strong, full figure and the lovely head and wondrous eyes.", "start_char_idx": 117385, "end_char_idx": 121235, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971": {"__data__": {"id_": "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "4f38c98007aaa664ee4b6e4028a4d50ebd067786624a533253248b50c3fa30a6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f4e92cd3f1e8290df3c70e810e32d290aa8060b9748a7eb119909b982bcc11bf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He felt her lean against him as they stood by the table, and his arms\nfairly ached with the thrill of that parting embrace. His lips\nthrobbed still with the half-ravished kisses, and he stopped with an\ninsane impulse to return and repeat the tender robbery. Then,\nwondering at the turbulence of his thoughts, he walked on.\n\nDuring this pause, he was dimly conscious that a person whom he had\nseen approaching had neared the point of meeting, and after a moment's\nhalt, had passed on. As he resumed his walk, he heard rapid steps\nbehind him, and was passed by a man who strongly resembled the\npassenger whom he had just met. This figure turned a corner a few rods\nin advance of Florian, and almost immediately re\u00c3\u00abmerged; having turned,\napparently, for the purpose of encountering Amidon once more. This\ntime, he walked up, and halted, facing Amidon.\n\n\"You'll be at the office in the morning, I suppose, Mr. Brassfield?\"\nsaid the man.\n\n\"At the office?\" said Amidon. \"My office? Yes.\"\n\n\"Well,\" this new acquaintance proceeded, in tones which indicated a\nprofound sense of personal injury, \"you'd better come prepared to fill\nmy place in the establishment as soon as possible.\"\n\nThis statement was followed by a pause of the sort usually adopted for\nthe purpose of noting the effect of some startling utterance. Amidon\nwas feeling in his pocket for Elizabeth's first-found letter, and the\naffairs of the Brassfield Oil Company had little interest for him. Yet\nhe dimly realized that some one was resigning something.\n\n\"Let me see,\" said he musingly; \"what--what do you do?\"\n\nThe man gave a sort of hop, of the kind we have been taught to expect\nof the stag when the bullet strikes him.\n\n\"Do?\" he snorted. \"What do I _do_? What do _I_ do? Do you mean\nto---- I'll tell what I do! I get together options for you and send\nyou cipher telegrams about 'em, and don't get any answers! I attend\nstock-holders' meetings and get whipsawed by minorities because you are\ndead to the world off there in New York, or the Lord knows where, and\ndon't furnish me with proxies! I stay here and try to protect your\ninterests when you desert 'em, and you send some white-headed old\nreprobate of a Pinkerton man to shadow me for a week and try to pry\ninto my work! And when you get home you never show up at the\ncounting-room, though you know what a pickle things are in; and when I\nmeet you on the street, I get cut dead: that's what I do! And I stand\nit, do I? Ha, ha, ha! Not if J. B. Stevens knows himself, I don't!\nGood night, Mr. Brassfield. Come round in the morning, and I'll _show_\nyou what I do!\"\n\nAfter the speaker had rushed away, which he incontinently did following\nthis outburst, Amidon's mind reverted to Elizabeth; and not until he\nhad reached his room did his thoughts return to his encounter in the\nstreet; and then it was only to wonder if this man Stevens was really\nof any importance, and if a breach with him was a matter of any\nconsequence.\n\nHis mind soon drifted off from this, however, and he got out of bed to\nturn on the lights and read the above-mentioned letter. And as he read\nit, he grew ashamed. That embrace, those kisses, now seemed an outrage\nto him. Was this his return for the sweet confidences, the revelations\nof hidden things, with which she had honored him? \"You must forget\nthis,\" she had written, \"only at such times of tenderness as you will\nsometimes have when you are gone,\" and: \"When you see me again, . . .\nwithout a word or look from me, know me, even more than you now do,\nyours.\" And after this, he had permitted her allurement to fly to his\nbrain, and had given her reason to think that because she had lowered\nher guard, he had struck her a dastard's blow. His eyes grew soft with\npity, and they moistened, as he repeated to himself, \"Poor little girl!\npoor little girl!\"\n\nOh, yes!", "start_char_idx": 121236, "end_char_idx": 125074, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a": {"__data__": {"id_": "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "ff72db2c5c847798612b70511543bed3d30c762603cf2649df513450fbf8a7bb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "47bb06f10c1781ec774482d758347818fb136cea28e328b4ba050f3093eb1fcc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "poor little girl!\"\n\nOh, yes! doubtless it was silly of him; but please to remember that he\nwas quite as far from being blas\u00c3\u00a9 as--as we used to be; and that he was\njust now becoming really in love with Elizabeth. And love is much\nnearer kin to pity than pity is to love. So he lay there and pitied\nElizabeth, and wondered when the wedding was to be. He must have Clara\nfind this out from Brassfield. And he thought regretfully of Madame le\nClaire. His reflections thus touched on the two most unhappy women in\nBellevale.\n\nTo the hypnotist he had become so much more than a \"case,\" merely, that\na revulsion of feeling was setting in against bringing him here to be\nturned over to a woman for whom he cared nothing. It was a shame, she\nthought. It was something which no one had a right to expect of any\ngirl.\n\nAnd Elizabeth Waldron still sat by the dying fire, her heart full of a\nfighting which would not let her sleep. She felt humbled and insulted,\nand her face burned as did her heart. But all the time she felt angry\nwith herself for her inconsistency. She had longed for Eugene's\nletters, and when they came, so few and cold, she was grieved. She had\nexpected a dozen little caresses, even before he left her carriage; and\nshe was saddened because she missed them. She had thought of his\ncoming in on her in a manner quite different from that in which he had\nactually crept into her presence--and when he had only pressed her\nhands, she had felt defrauded and robbed. And when at parting he had\ndone (somewhat forcibly, it is true) what she had many times allowed,\nand what she had all the time wanted of him, she felt outraged and\noffended!\n\nThese thoughts kept her long by the fire, and accompanied her to her\nchamber. \"Elizabeth Waldron,\" said she to her mirror, \"you are going\ninsane! Aren't you ashamed that now, when he has shown his love and\nunderstanding of the things you love and try to understand, and\nsurprised you by the possession of the very qualities you have felt\nsecretly regretful on account of his not having--that you feel--that\nway? What ails you, that you begin to feel toward the dearest man in\nall the world as if he were a stranger?--Ah, but you do, you do! And\nyou'll never be happy with him, nor even make him happy!--And, oh, that\nletter, that letter! That awful letter for him to read on the cars!\nIf you had never written that!\"\n\n\n\"What's my manager's name--Stevens?\" asked Mr. Amidon of Judge\nBlodgett. \"Yes? Well, I'm going to have trouble with him! I won't be\nbullied by my clerks. And who is the next man?\"\n\n\"Alderson,\" said the judge. \"It's all in the notes, you know.\"\n\n\"And very convenient, too,\" said Amidon. \"And who is the stenographer?\"\n\n\"Miss Strong,\" answered the judge.\n\n\"Strong, Strong,\" said Amidon musingly. \"The author, I believe, by the\nnotes?\"\n\n\"I never said she was!\" protested the judge. \"Not positively, but\nonly----\"\n\n\"Well, let's go down--or perhaps I had better go alone,\" said Florian.\n\"Please come down in an hour or so, won't you?\"\n\nThe judge noted for the first time the decision of returning confidence\nin Amidon's manner. Two things contributed to this: the first was the\nsense of something tangible and intelligible in this going down to\nbusiness in the morning like an ordinary American; and the other was\nrising anger at the attack made on him by this man Stevens in the\nstreet last night. What sort of discipline can there be in the\nbusiness, thought he, when an employee dares use such language toward\nhis employer? A good towering passion is a great steadier of the\nnerves, sometimes. He walked into the counting-room, saw his name and\nthe word \"Private\" on the glass of a certain door, went boldly beyond\nit, and was followed by a young woman with a note-book and pencil.\nPresently, in came Mr. Stevens without knocking.\n\n\"Here's another pretty how-de-do!\"", "start_char_idx": 125046, "end_char_idx": 128907, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7": {"__data__": {"id_": "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8ad7053deda407a14702c006a2acf4f883752fcdf20f9ebd5f43901313321604", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1609d021ad9d29ab05de351a8a627b32740810936ad5dc9e46b647f52589debd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Stevens without knocking.\n\n\"Here's another pretty how-de-do!\" he exclaimed, without any greeting\nexcept an angry snort. \"You promised to sign that contract for the\noutput of the Bunn's Ferry wells while you were in New York, and\ndidn't! The papers are back with a notice that the deal is off except\nat a lower price. How'm I to make anything of this business, I'd like\nto know, if you----\"\n\nAmidon was surprised that Stevens was ignoring his threat to resign;\nbut he was firm in his resolution to enforce discipline. The fact that\nhe himself had been so long in a state of fear and under control, made\nthe luxury of assuming the attitude of command an irresistible\ntemptation.\n\n\"Mr. Stevens,\" said he sternly, \"have the kindness to read what is\npainted on that door!\"\n\nThough he had no need, Mr. Stevens gazed in astonishment at the word\n\"Private.\"\n\n\"Kindly ask Mr. Alderson to step here a moment,\" went on Mr. Amidon.\n\nStevens stood mute, but Alderson overheard and came.\n\n\"You may draw Mr. Stevens a salary check to date, and a month in\nadvance, in lieu of notice,\" said Mr. Amidon. \"Mr. Stevens, you are no\nlonger in the employ of this concern. Mr. Alderson, you may take\ncharge until a successor to Mr. Stevens is found. I should now regard\nit as a favor if I might have my private office to myself and my\nstenographer!\"\n\nAlderson took the paralyzed Stevens by the shoulders and walked him out\ninto the main office. Amidon's spirits rose, as he waited for the\ncheck to come in for his signature. He stabbed his letters with the\npaper-knife, and felt in a blissful state of general insurrection. The\nsubjection of the past fortnight seemed to fall from him. After he had\nsigned the check, he turned to Miss Strong.\n\n\"If you please,\" said he, in a voice of tense stridency, \"I will give\nyou a few letters.\"\n\nThe stenographer, who seemed to regard the events of the past few\nminutes as nothing short of a cataclysm, flutteringly leafed over her\nbook, and just as Amidon began wondering what he could think of to put\ninto a letter, she burst into tears. Amidon closed his desk with a\nbang, and giving Alderson orders covering his absence, walked out into\nthe streets, full of the joy of gratified destructiveness. He met\nAlvord, and temerariously agreed to go with him to the lodge that\nevening. He finally found Blodgett, and informed him of what had been\nthe result of his first morning in the office.\n\n\"Well, it's your business, Florian,\" said he, \"but you'll need somebody\nwho knows something about your affairs. And if you go on attending\nlodge meetings where you don't know the passwords, and nosing into\nhouses where you don't intend to go, and discharging all the trusted\nmen in your employ, you'll soon have more things to attend to than a\ncouple of mesmerists and an elderly lawyer can take care of! But it's\nyour affair; I've known you too long to try to turn you when you get\none of your tantrums on. The smash-up ought to be worth seeing,\nanyhow!\"\n\n\n\n\nXIII\n\nTHE MARTYRDOM OF MR. STEVENS\n\n _Pietro_: Th' offense, it seemeth me,\n Is one that by mercy's extremest stretch\n Might be o'erpassed.\n\n _Cosimo_: Never, Pietro, never!\n The Brotherhood's honour untouchable\n Is touch'd thereby. We build our labyrinth\n Of sacred words and potent spells, and all\n The deep-involv\u00c3\u00a8d horrors of our craft--\n Its entrance hedg'd about with dreadful oaths,\n And every step in thridding it made dank\n By dripping terror and out-seeping awe.\n Shall it be said that e'en Ludovico\n May break our faith and live? Never, say I!\n --_Vision of Cosimo_.\n\nThe Bellevale lodge of the Ancient Order of Christian Martyrs held its\nmeetings in the upper story of a tall building. Mr.", "start_char_idx": 128846, "end_char_idx": 132566, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53": {"__data__": {"id_": "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "cae9e6cfe374d2343de38b64b161785ec30bd7e07ebabc0de9adfdeeeda8e8e1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "63a5971d81cae189b66f701fe73cfdb848f532400f7e831852c0fa217711d54b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mr. Alvord called for\nAmidon at eight, and took him up, all his boldness in the world of\nbusiness replaced by wariness in the atmosphere of mystery. As he and\nhis companion went into an anteroom and were given broad collars from\nwhich were suspended metal badges called \"jewels,\" he felt a good deal\nlike a spy. They walked into the lodgeroom where twenty-five or thirty\nmen with similar \"jewels\" sat smoking and chatting. All seemed to know\nhim, but (much to his relief) before he could be included in the\nconversation, the gavel fell; certain ones with more elaborate \"jewels\"\nand more ornate collars than the rest took higher-backed and more\nhighly upholstered chairs at the four sides of the room, another stood\nat the door; and still another, in complete uniform, with sword and\nbelt, began hustling the members to seats.\n\n\"The Deacon Militant,\" said the wielder of the gavel, \"will report if\nall present are known and tested members of our Dread and Mystic\nConclave.\"\n\n\"All, Most Sovereign Pontiff,\" responded the Deacon Militant, who\nproved to be the man in the uniform, \"save certain strangers who appear\nwithin the confines of our sacred basilica.\"\n\n\"Let them be tested,\" commanded the Sovereign Pontiff, \"and, if\nbrethren, welcomed; if spies, executed!\"\n\nAmidon started, and looked about for aid or avenue of escape. Seeing\nnone, he warily watched the Deacon Militant. That officer, walking in\nthe military fashion which, as patristic literature teaches, was\nadopted by the early Christians, and turning square corners as was the\nhabit of St. Paul and the Apostles, received whispered passwords from\nthe two or three strangers, and, with a military salute, announced that\nall present had been put to the test and welcomed. Then, for the first\ntime remembering that he was not among the strangers, so far as known\nto the lodge, Amidon breathed freely, and rather regretted the absence\nof executions.\n\n\"Bring forth the Mystic Symbols of the Order!\" was the next command.\nThe Mystic Symbols were placed on a stand in the middle of the room,\nand turned out to be a gilt fish about the size of a four-pound bass, a\njar of human bones, and a rolled-up scroll said to contain the Gospels.\nThe fish, as explained by the Deacon Militant, typified a great many\nthings connected with early Christianity, and served always as a\nreminder of the password of the order. The relics in the jar were the\nbones of martyrs. The scroll was the Book of the Law. Amidon was\nbecoming impressed: the solemn and ornate ritual and the dreadful\nsymbols sent shivers down his inexperienced and unfraternal spine.\nBreaking in with uninitiated eyes, as he had done, now seemed more and\nmore a crime.\n\nThere was an \"Opening Ode\" which was so badly sung as to mitigate the\nawe; and an \"order of business\" solemnly gone through. Under the head\n\"Good of the Order\" the visiting brethren spoke as if it were a\nclass-meeting and they giving \"testimony,\" one of them very volubly\nreminding the assembly of the great principles of the order, and the\nmighty work it had already accomplished in ameliorating the condition\nof a lost and wandering world. Amidon felt that he must have been very\nblind in failing to note this work until it was thus forced on his\nnotice; but he made a mental apology.\n\n\"By the way, Brassfield,\" said Mr. Slater during a recess preceding the\ninitiation of candidates, \"you want to give Stevens the best you've got\nin the Catacombs scene. Will you make it just straight ritual, or\nthrow in some of those specialties of yours?\"\n\n\"Stevens! Catacombs!\" gasped Amidon, \"specialties! I----\"\n\n\"I wish you could have been here when I was put through,\" went on Mr.\nSlater. \"I don't see how any one but a professional actor, or a person\nwith your dramatic gifts, can do that part at all--it's so sort of\nripping and--and intense, you know. I look forward to your rendition\nof it with a good deal of pleasurable anticipation.\"\n\n\"You don't expect me to do it, do you?\" asked Amidon.\n\n\"Why, who else?\"", "start_char_idx": 132563, "end_char_idx": 136565, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db": {"__data__": {"id_": "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "314efe97deb6c24c2855fbc507e26a115c0977d14392fbf0f2063ce7b0d7aac1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7a9acbe7d2cc20b534f519e913a68f7dcaea23cb4a7e45ed33ca65af17521259", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "asked Amidon.\n\n\"Why, who else?\" was the counter-question. \"We can't be expected to\nplay on the bench the best man in Pennsylvania in that part, can we?\"\n\n\"Come, Brassfield,\" said the Sovereign Pontiff, \"get on your regalia\nfor the Catacombs. We are about to begin.\"\n\n\"Oh, say, now!\" said Amidon, trying to be off-hand about it, \"you must\nget somebody else.\"\n\n\"What's that! Some one else? Very likely we shall! Very likely!\"\nthus the Sovereign Pontiff with fine scorn. \"Come, the regalia, and no\nnonsense!\"\n\n\"I--I may be called out at any moment,\" urged Amidon, amidst an outcry\nthat seemed to indicate a breach with the Martyrs then and there.\n\"There are reasons why----\"\n\nEdgington took him aside. \"Is there any truth in this story,\" said he,\n\"that you have had some trouble with Stevens, and discharged him?\"\n\n\"Oh, that Stevens!\" gasped Amidon, as if the whole discussion had\nhinged on picking out the right one among an army of Stevenses. \"Yes,\nit's true, and I can't help confer this----\"\n\nEdgington whispered to the Sovereign Pontiff; and the announcement was\nmade that in the Catacombs scene Brother Brassfield would be excused\nand Brother Bulliwinkle substituted.\n\n\"I know I never, in any plane of consciousness, saw any of this, or\nknew any of these things,\" thought Florian. \"It is incredible!\"\n\nConviction, however, was forced on him by the fact that he was now made\nto don a black domino and mask, and to march, carrying a tin-headed\nspear, with a file of similar figures to examine the candidate, who\nturned out to be the discharged Stevens, sitting in an anteroom,\nfoolish and apprehensive, and looking withal much as he had done in the\ncounting-room. He was now asked by the leader of the file, in a\nsepulchral tone, several formal questions, among others whether he\nbelieved in a Supreme Being. Stevens gulped, and said \"Yes.\" He was\nthen asked if he was prepared to endure any ordeal to which he might be\nsubjected, and warned that unless he possessed nerves of steel, he had\nbetter turn back--for which measure there was yet time. Stevens, in a\nfaint voice, indicated that he was ready for the worst, and desired to\ngo on. Then all (except Amidon) in awesome accents intoned, \"Be brave\nand obedient, and all may yet be well!\" and they passed back into the\nlodge-room. Amidon was now thoroughly impressed, and wondered whether\nStevens would be able to endure the terrible trials hinted at.\n\nClad in a white robe \"typifying innocence,\" and marching to minor music\nplayed upon a piano, Stevens was escorted several times around the\ndarkened room, stopping from time to time at the station of some\nofficer, to receive highly improving lectures. Every time he was asked\nif he were willing to do anything, or believed anything, he said \"Yes.\"\nFinally, with the Scroll of the Law in one hand, and with the other\nresting on the Bones of Martyrs, surrounded by the brethren whose drawn\nswords and leveled spears threatened death, he repeated an obligation\nwhich bound him not to do a great many things, and to keep the secrets\nof the order. To Amidon it seemed really awful--albeit somewhat florid\nin style; and when Alvord nudged him at one passage in the obligation,\nhe resented it as an irreverence. Then he noted that it was a pledge\nto maintain the sanctity of the family circle of brother Martyrs, and\nAlvord's reference of the night before to the obligation as affecting\nhis association with the \"strawberry blonde\" took on new and fearful\nmeaning.\n\nStevens seemed to be vibrating between fright and a tendency to laugh,\nas the voice of some well-known fellow citizen rumbled out from behind\na deadly weapon. He was marched out, to the same minor music, and the\nfirst act was ended.\n\nThe really esoteric part of it, Amidon felt, was to come, as he could\nsee no reason for making a secret of these very solemn and edifying\nmatters.", "start_char_idx": 136534, "end_char_idx": 140398, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de": {"__data__": {"id_": "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "e2b731bcff14d569f481839013875172f24a661192147fae9b1747163b440e1c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6193617d3c8d7ba026e9bbf2a123882ce591ca5202b63fb5b8896088eba97fa0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Stevens felt very much the same way about it, and was full of\nexpectancy when informed that the next degree would test his obedience.\nHe highly resolved to obey to the letter.\n\nThe next act disclosed Stevens hoodwinked, and the room light. He was\ninformed that he was in the Catacombs, familiar to the early\nChristians, and must make his way alone and in darkness, following the\nClue of Faith which was placed in his hands. This Clue was a white\ncord similar to the sort used by masons (in the building-trades). He\ngroped his way along by it to the station of the next officer, who\nwarned him of the deadly consequences of disobedience. Thence he made\nhis way onward, holding to the Clue of Faith--until he touched a\ntrigger of some sort, which let down upon him an avalanche of tinware\nand such light and noisy articles, which frightened him so that he\nstarted to run, and was dexterously tripped by the Deacon Militant and\na spearman, and caught in a net held by two others. A titter ran about\nthe room.\n\n\"Obey,\" thundered the Vice-Pontiff, \"and all will be well!\"\n\nStevens resumed the Clue. At the station of the next officer to whom\nit brought him, the nature of faith was explained to him, and he was\ngiven the password, \"Ichthus,\" whispered so that all in that part of\nthe room could hear the interdicted syllables. But he was adjured\nnever, never to utter it, unless to the Guardian of the Portal on\nentering the lodge, to the Deacon Militant on the opening thereof, or\nto a member, when he, Stevens, should become Sovereign Pontiff. Then\nhe was faced toward the Vice-Pontiff, and told to answer loudly and\ndistinctly the questions asked him.\n\n\"What is the lesson inculcated in this Degree?\" asked the Vice-Pontiff\nfrom the other end of the room.\n\n\"Obedience!\" shouted Stevens in reply.\n\n\"What is the password of this Degree?\"\n\n\"Ichthus!\" responded Stevens.\n\nA roll of stage-thunder sounded deafeningly over his head. The piano\nwas swept by a storm of bass passion; and deep cries of \"Treason!\nTreason!\" echoed from every side. Poor Stevens tottered, and fell into\na chair placed by the Deacon Militant. He saw the enormity of the deed\nof shame he had committed. He had told the password!\n\n\"You have all heard this treason,\" said the Sovereign Pontiff, in the\ndeepest of chest-tones--\"a treason unknown in all the centuries of the\npast! What is the will of the conclave?\"\n\n\"I would imprecate on the traitor's head,\" said a voice from one of the\nhigh-backed chairs, \"the ancient doom of the Law!\"\n\n\"Doom, doom!\" said all in unison, holding the \"oo\" in a most\nblood-curdling way. \"Pronounce doom!\"\n\n\"One fate, and one alone,\" pronounced the Sovereign Pontiff, \"can be\nyours. Brethren, let him forthwith be encased in the Chest of the\nClanking Chains, and hurled from the Tarpeian Rock, to be dashed in\nfragments at its stony base!\"\n\nAmidon's horror was modified by the evidences of repressed glee with\nwhich this sentence was received. Yet he felt a good deal of concern\nas they brought out a great chest, threw the struggling Stevens into\nit, slammed down the ponderous lid and locked it. Stevens kicked at\nthe lid, but said nothing. The members leaped with joy. A great chain\nwas brought and wrapped clankingly about the chest.\n\n\"Let me out,\" now yelled the Christian Martyr. \"Let me out, damn you!\"\n\n\"Doom, do-o-o-oom!\" roared the voices; and said the Sovereign Pontiff\nin impressive tones, \"Proceed with the execution!\"\n\nNow the chest was slung up to a hook in the ceiling, and gradually\ndrawn back by a pulley until it was far above the heads of the men, the\nchains meanwhile clanking continually against the receptacle, from\nwhich came forth a stream of smothered profanity.\n\n\"Hurl him down to the traitor's death!\" shouted the Sovereign Pontiff.", "start_char_idx": 140400, "end_char_idx": 144177, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7": {"__data__": {"id_": "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7752554cda3aa942876abd5e79212361ad06b95eb6686719709f2ec5ba1c3e80", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6d92c30960e29748d6100e7367d51f93132efdd19da7ada7843f0ce7d14efb1d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Hurl him down to the traitor's death!\" shouted the Sovereign Pontiff.\nThe chest was loosed, and swung like a pendulum lengthwise of the room,\ndown almost to the floor and up nearly to the ceiling. The profanity\nnow turned into a yell of terror. The Martyrs slapped one another's\nbacks and grew blue in the face with laughter. At a signal, a light\nbox was placed where the chest would crush it (which it did with a\nsound like a small railway collision); the chest was stopped and the\nlid raised.\n\n\"Let the body receive Christian burial,\" said the Sovereign Pontiff.\n\"Our vengeance ceases with death.\"\n\nThis truly Christian sentiment was received with universal approval.\nDeath seemed to all a good place at which to stop.\n\n\"Brethren,\" said the Deacon Militant, as he struggled with the\nresurgent Stevens, \"there seems some life here! Methinks the heart\nbeats, and----\"\n\nThe remainder of the passage from the ritual was lost to Amidon by\nreason of the fact that Stevens had placed one foot against the\nDeacon's stomach and hurled that august officer violently to the floor.\n\n\"Let every test of life be applied,\" said the Sovereign Pontiff.\n\"Perchance some higher will than ours decrees his preservation. Take\nthe body hence for a time; if possible, restore him to life, and we\nwill consider his fate.\"\n\nThe recess which followed was clearly necessary to afford an\nopportunity for the calming of the risibilities of the Martyrs. The\nstage, too, had to be reset. Amidon's ethnological studies had not\nequaled his reading in _belles-lettres_, and he was unable to see the\ndeep significance of these rites from an historical standpoint, and\nthat here was a survival of those orgies to which our painted and\nskin-clad ancestors devoted themselves in spasms of religious frenzy,\ngazed at by the cave-bear and the mammoth. The uninstructed Amidon\nregarded them as inconceivable horse-play. While thus he mused,\nStevens, who was still hoodwinked and being greatly belectured on the\nvirtue of Faith and the duty of Obedience, re\u00c3\u00abntered on his ordeal.\n\nHe was now informed by the officer at the other end of the room, that\nevery man must ascend into the Mountains of Temptation and be tested,\nbefore he could be pronounced fit for companionship with Martyrs.\nTherefore, a weary climb heavenward was before him, and a great trial\nof his fidelity. On his patience, daring and fortitude depended all\nhis future in the Order. He was marched to a ladder and bidden to\nascend.\n\n\"I,\" said the Deacon Militant, \"upon this companion stair will\naccompany you.\"\n\nBut there was no other ladder and the Deacon Militant had to stand upon\na chair.\n\nUp the ladder labored Stevens, but, though he climbed manfully, he\nremained less than a foot above the floor. The ladder went down like a\ntreadmill, as Stevens climbed--it was an endless ladder rolled down on\nStevens' side and up on the other. The Deacon Militant, from his perch\non the chair, encouraged Stevens to climb faster so as not to be\nout-stripped. With labored breath and straining muscles he climbed,\nthe Martyrs rolling on the floor in merriment all the more violent\nbecause silent. Amidon himself laughed to see this strenuous climb, so\nstrikingly like human endeavor, which puts the climber out of breath,\nand raises him not a whit--except in temperature. At the end of\nperhaps five minutes, when Stevens might well have believed himself a\nhundred feet above the roof, he had achieved a dizzy height of perhaps\nsix feet, on the summit of a stage-property mountain, where he stood\nbeside the Deacon Militant, his view of the surrounding plain cut off\nby papier-m\u00c3\u00a2ch\u00c3\u00a9 clouds, and facing a foul fiend to whom the Deacon\nMilitant confided that here was a candidate to be tested and qualified.\nWhereupon the foul fiend remarked \"Ha, ha!\" and bade them bind him to\nthe Plutonian Thunderbolt and hurl him down to the nether world. The\nthunderbolt was a sort of toboggan on rollers, for which there was a\nslide running down presumably to the nether world, above mentioned.", "start_char_idx": 144107, "end_char_idx": 148129, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029": {"__data__": {"id_": "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "82e4e29b5ff7e1f9563569bab8e9b3fa3fd15ca7ca4e12752e7078018daad4ba", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "fd543e53e63d6b0e24f8d01d92588ee839c3c0c1c3ecd8f98ba8423692391b37", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The hoodwink was removed, and Stevens looked about him, treading\nwarily, like one on the top of a tower; the great height of the\nmountain made him giddy. Obediently he lay face downward on the\nthunderbolt, and yielded up his wrists and ankles to fastenings\nprovided for them.\n\n\"They're not going to lower him with those cords, are they?\"\n\nIt was a stage-whisper from the darkness which spake thus.\n\n\"Oh, I guess it's safe enough!\" said another, in the same sort of\nagitated whisper.\n\n\"Safe!\" was the reply. \"I tell you, it's sure to break! Some one stop\n'em----\"\n\nTo the heart of the martyred Stevens these words struck panic. But as\nhe opened his mouth to protest, the catastrophe occurred. There was a\nsnap, and the toboggan shot downward. Bound as he was, the victim\ncould see below him a brick wall right across the path of his descent.\nHe was helpless to move; it was useless to cry out. For all that, as\nhe felt in imagination the crushing shock of his head driven like a\nbattering-ram against this wall, he uttered a roar such as from\nAchilles might have roused armed nations to battle. And even as he did\nso, his head touched the wall, there was a crash, and Stevens lay safe\non a mattress after his ten-foot slide, surrounded by fragments of\nred-and-white paper which had lately been a wall. He was pale and\nagitated, and generally done for; but tremendously relieved when he had\nassured himself of the integrity of his cranium. This he did by\nrepeatedly feeling of his head, and looking at his fingers for\nsanguinary results. As Amidon looked at him, he repented of what he\nhad done to this thoroughly maltreated fellow man. After the Catacombs\nscene, which was supposed to be impressive, and some more of the\n\"secret\" work, everybody crowded about Stevens, now invested with the\ncollar and \"jewel\" of Martyrhood, and laughed, and congratulated him as\non some great achievement, while he looked half-pleased and half-bored.\nAmidon with the rest greeted him, and told him that after his vacation\nwas over, he hoped to see him back at the office.\n\n\"That was a fine exemplification of the principles of the Order,\" said\nAlvord as they went home.\n\n\"What was?\" asked Amidon.\n\n\"Hiring old Stevens back,\" answered Alvord. \"You've got to live your\nprinciples, or they don't amount to much.\"\n\n\"Suppose some fellow should get into a lodge,\" asked Amidon, \"who had\nnever been initiated?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Alvord, \"there isn't much chance of that. I shouldn't\ndare to say. You can't tell what the fellows would do when such sacred\nthings were profaned, you know. You couldn't tell what they might do!\"\n\n\n\n\nXIV\n\nTHE TREASON OF ISEGRIM THE WOLF\n\n Then up and spake Reynard, the Fox, King Leo's throne before:\n \"My clients, haled before you, Sire, deserve not frown nor roar!\n These flocks and herds and sties, dread lord, should thanks\n give for our care--\n The care of Isegrim the Wolf, and Bruin strong, the Bear!\n Its usefulness, its innocence, our Syndicate protests.\n We crave the Court's support for our legitimate interests!\"\n --_An Appeal to King Leo_.\n\n The sifting of St. Peter\n Seems quite credible to me,\n When I see what's done to absentees\n At our Society!\n --_Annals of Sorosis_.\n\nAny business man will be able to appreciate the difficulties which\nbeset the president of the Brassfield Oil Company, on the discharge of\nMr. Stevens. On the morning after the lodge meeting, behold Mr. Amidon\nat his desk, contemplating a rising pile of unanswered letters. His\ncountenance expresses defeat, despair and aversion. His politeness\ntoward Miss Strong is never-failing; but that he is not himself grows\nmore and more apparent to that clear-headed young woman.\n\n\"Here's the third letter from the Bayonne refinery,\" she said. \"An\nimmediate reply is demanded.\"\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" said Amidon; \"certainly; that has gone too long!", "start_char_idx": 148131, "end_char_idx": 152010, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930": {"__data__": {"id_": "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "4e8ea0131aba89f3c355172842406c0eeec73528fd846a402df0a4e069465cbe", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f96c728f3d058cd97be4ee76fa2b3436cc6137ea3afda9656ca4f74b7d4e4fce", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Oh, yes,\" said Amidon; \"certainly; that has gone too long! We must\nget at that matter at once: let me see the contracts and\ncorrespondence.\"\n\n\"That is the business,\" said Miss Strong, \"which they claim to have\narranged with you in a conversation over the long-distance 'phone.\nThat's what seems to be the matter with them--they want to make a\nrecord of it.\"\n\n\"I don't remember---- Well,\" said Amidon, \"lay that by for a moment.\nAnd this piece of business with the A. B. & C. Railway. Who knows\nanything about this claim for demurrage?\"\n\n\"Mr. Stevens,\" said Miss Strong, \"had that in hand, and said he told\nyou all about it before you went away, and that you were going to see\nabout it in----\"\n\n\"In New York, I suppose!\" exclaimed Amidon. \"Well, I didn't. Can't\nyou and Mr. Alderson take up this pile of letters and bring 'em to me\nwith the correspondence, and--and papers--and things? I've been too\nlax in the past, in not referring to the records. I must have the\nrecords, Miss Strong, in every case.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" said Miss Strong; \"but since we adopted that new system of\nfiling, I don't see how the records can be made any fuller, or how you\ncan be more fully acquainted with them than you now are----\"\n\n\"Not at all,\" asseverated Mr. Amidon. \"I find myself uncertain as to a\ngreat many things. Let's have the records constantly.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir, but these are cases where there isn't anything. Nobody but\nyou and Mr. Stevens knows anything about them.\"\n\n\"Well, I can't answer them now,\" protested Mr. Amidon. \"I've a\nheadache! My--my mind isn't clear--is confused on some of these\nthings; and they'll all have to wait a while. Who's that tapping? Oh,\nit's you, is it, Mr. Alderson--you startled me so that I---- Mr.\nEdgington here? Well, why don't you show him in? After luncheon, Miss\nStrong, you may come in again.\"\n\nMr. Edgington had a tightly-curled mustache, a pink flush on his\ncheeks, wore an obviously new sack suit, had a carnation in his\nbuttonhole, came in with an air of marked hurry, and carried a roll of\npapers.\n\n\"I thought I must have a talk with you,\" said he, \"on the evidence in\nthat Bunn's Ferry land case. The time for taking evidence is rapidly\npassing, and the court warned us that it wouldn't be extended again.\nThat proof you must furnish, or we shall be beaten.\"\n\n\"Yes--yes, I see,\" said Amidon, who knew absolutely nothing about the\nmatter. \"We should feel really annoyed by such a termination!\"\n\n\"Annoyed!\" exclaimed the lawyer. \"Say, Brassfield, that reminds me of\nArtemus Ward's statement that he was 'ashamed' when some one died!\nYou'd lose the best wells you've got. And it would involve those\ntransfers to the Waldrons, and might carry them down.\"\n\n\"The Waldrons!\" exclaimed Florian.\n\n\"Why, I mean Miss Bessie and her aunt,\" said Edgington. \"I mean\nbankruptcy---- But we've gone all over that before.\"\n\nAmidon nodded, with an air of knowing all about the matter.\n\n\"Lots of times,\" said he. \"And this evidence is----? Please give me\nthe exact requirements--er, again.\"\n\n\"The exact requirements,\" said Edgington, \"as I have frequently shown\nyou, and without its doing much good, are to prove that some time in\nMarch, 1896, you did not make a partnership agreement with this man\nCorkery by which you were to share with him the proceeds of your\noil-prospecting, and under which he went into possession of this tract\nof land. He has a line of testimony which shows that you did. Proving\na negative is rather unusual, but about the only thing which will save\nyou is an alibi. Now you must pardon the expression, but you've always\nevaded my questions as to your whereabouts prior to June of that year.", "start_char_idx": 151951, "end_char_idx": 155607, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa": {"__data__": {"id_": "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "fd2fa9f2ffb2523d78695a5e5b6ffce340506ff7e312308b81ff7150e05152bd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c4137e7f71a5e66971c352b6a83f7e8f288f268fdb56375d2e6ee21cc45d9bef", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "You've never flatly denied Corkery's story, but if it weren't for the\ninherent improbability of it, I'd have given up the fight long ago, for\nyou have not helped as a client should. You haven't confided----\"\n\n\"But I will!\" said Amidon energetically. \"The man's a perjurer, and\nI'll prove it! All that time I was in Wisconsin. I was--I'll prove\nwhere I was----\"\n\n\"Good!\" cried Edgington, noting a tendency to falter. \"And now for the\nnames and addresses of a few witnesses, and we'll go after them!\"\n\n\"Witnesses--yes, yes--we shall need witnesses, won't we?\" faltered\nAmidon. \"Say, Mr. Edgington, I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll turn you\nover to Blodgett.\"\n\n\"The old gentleman at the hotel?\"\n\n\"The same,\" replied Amidon. \"He was my lawyer, years ago. I'll send\nhim to you directly this afternoon.\"\n\nEdgington made some notes in a book.\n\n\"Very well,\" said he. \"I'm glad that puzzle is in process of solution.\nAnd now one thing further, and I am done. This is a question of local\npolitics. You know the talks we've had with the fellows about this\ntrolley franchise, and the advisability of making you mayor. We all\nagree that your interests and mine and those of all our crowd demand\nyour election to the place----\"\n\n\"Me mayor!\" shouted Amidon. \"Me run for office! Why, Mr. Edgington,\nyou must be crazy!\"\n\n\"Well, this--certainly--is refreshing!\" expostulated Edgington, in\napparent amazement. \"When can anything be supposed to be settled,\nbetween gentlemen, if that isn't? Why, confound it, didn't we make up\nthe complete slate, including control of the Common Council? And\naren't we to have an exclusive franchise on all the streets, with your\nsignature as mayor? Of course, you're joking now. Why, we're right on\nthe eve of the caucuses, and with Conlon in line everything will go as\nit ought. I mean Barney Conlon, the labor leader. Since you've come\nback from this trip of yours, everything seems to be going in\nunexpected ways--and somehow you've given offense to Conlon. Do you\nknow what it was?\"\n\n\"No,\" answered Amidon, with some heat. \"I don't know what it was! I\ndon't know Conlon, and I don't know anything about this business except\nthis: that if you think I'm going to sneak into office for the purpose\nof stealing the streets of this town, you don't know Florian Amidon,\nthat's all!\"\n\n\"Don't know what? Don't know whom?\"\n\n\"Don't know Flo--ah--me! Me!\"\n\n\"Then you won't see Barney Conlon?\"\n\n\"I won't foul my hands with the dirty mess! I won't----\"\n\n\"Dirty mess, indeed!\" retorted Edgington, \"when the best business\nmen---- Oh, well, if that's the way you feel---- Why didn't you say\nso, instead of---- I think we'd best not discuss the thing any\nfurther, Mr. Brassfield; and returning to legal matters, where we are\nhappily at one, let me remind you that you are to send Judge Blodgett\nup to see me regarding the Corkery case this afternoon. Good day, Mr.\nBrassfield!\"\n\nMr. Edgington went forth from Amidon's presence in a state of mind\nwhich can be appreciated by no one but some \"good\" citizen who has\nperfected all the preliminaries for securing a particularly fat\nfinancial prize by the cheap and simple device of a popular vote, and\nfinds the man on whom he relies going off into a fanciful ism induced\nby some maggot of so-called conscientiousness. Any one ought to be\nable to see that there is nothing wrong in accepting gifts from those\nable to give: and who is more able than the public? Everybody would be\nbetter off for the arrangement contemplated, and no one the worse. So\nreasoned Mr.", "start_char_idx": 155608, "end_char_idx": 159150, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679": {"__data__": {"id_": "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "52b5c85b23048f361ce58872bf1818ad09ba934141839b4efcfacb941a8e66f0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8d2c29b3261a098bda2b1672d316d4260ff5cfe2abe91e5a74f3d0abc4a7577f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "So\nreasoned Mr. Edgington as he saw with chagrin the Bellevale franchise\nslipping away, and with it the core of their ambitious project of\ninterurban lines connecting half a dozen cities. Bellevale, with its\nwater-power, was the hub of it; and to lose here by such a sudden\nexhibition of so-called \"civic patriotism\"--Edgington knew the patter\nof these reformers--was disgusting, and all the more so from the fact\nthat the one to blame was Brassfield, whose ethical attitude had always\nbeen so \"safe and sane\" in business matters.\n\nHe must find some way of re-forming the lines, and adjusting the action\nof the machine--now engaged in grinding out Brassfield's nomination--so\nas to produce other grist just as good, if that were possible. It was\nticklish business, but it must be done. The time was short, but before\nthe caucuses met a new candidate must be found, and the word passed\ndown the line that the dear people had changed their minds over night\non the subject of the next mayor.\n\nTo decide, with Mr. Edgington (who fancied that he resembled the first\nNapoleon), was to act, and almost instantly, his forces, hastily\nmobilized, began an enveloping movement for the purpose of surrounding\nand bringing into camp a proper candidate for the local chief\nmagistracy.\n\nMr. Amidon was flushed after this encounter. Mr. Edgington's cool\nmanner of approaching him with this questionable and shady political\njob had generated some heat in Florian--a man always possessed of\nstrong convictions concerning civic purity. He was offended; yet he\nknew that it was to the turpitude of Brassfield that he owed this,\nrather than to any fault of Edgington's.\n\n\"How could such a fellow as Brassfield reap such success!\" was Amidon's\nmental ejaculation. \"Ready to rob the community, he enjoys the\nconfidence of all; full of the propensities of Don Juan, he wins the\nrespect and love of Elizabeth Waldron! Shameful commentary upon\nsociety, and---- Yes, Miss Strong, who is there? Judge Blodgett: send\nhim right in. . . . Judge, I'm glad you came in. I'm very glad! I\nneed your advice and aid.\"\n\n\"All right,\" said the judge, biting a cigar. \"What's up, Florian?\"\n\n\"You've seen a Mr. Edgington?\"\n\n\"Your lawyer,\" replied the judge. \"The _Notes_ tell all about him.\"\n\n\"Well,\" resumed Amidon, \"he's been here, and I learn that there is some\nvery important litigation pending, which we've got to win, because it\ninvolves others--Miss Waldron and her aunt--and this man Brassfield\nnever could give Edgington the evidence he needed in order to win.\"\n\n\"Why couldn't he?\"\n\n\"Because,\" said Amidon, with the air of a man uttering something of the\ndeepest significance, \"it involves matters happening before June, 1896,\nand Brassfield was not in existence until the twenty-seventh of June!\nI've promised Edgington that you will get him the evidence he wants.\"\n\n\"What's the nub of the case?\" asked the judge.\n\n\"A man claims I gave him some rights--or that Brassfield did--you\nunderstand?--\"\n\n\"I see.\"\n\n\"--in March, 1896.\"\n\n\"H'm!\" exclaimed the judge contemptuously. \"March, eh? Why, we can\nsubpoena the whole town of Hazelhurst, and show that you were at that\ntime acting as a pillar of society there, every day in that year, up to\nJune twenty-seventh!\"\n\n\"But don't you see,\" said Amidon, \"that proving this makes my whole\nstory public?\"\n\nJudge Blodgett thoughtfully gazed into space.\n\n\"Yes, it would appear that way,\" said he, at last; \"but is it\nnecessarily so? You can testify that you were in Hazelhurst at that\ntime, and legally, that's the same thing as saying that Brassfield\nwas--I guess; and I'll swear to it, too; and if they aren't too\nsearching on cross-examination, we may slide through--but there'll be\nsome ticklish spots. I'll see Mr. Edgington, and find out just how\nstrong a fabric of perjury we've got to go against.", "start_char_idx": 159135, "end_char_idx": 162961, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13": {"__data__": {"id_": "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "1060da8202d0eb40653e230e831f1e933f3c187a690f1149dcaa9873c858906e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7b706b6de87f9ec8ec8d3fd833f5392c0fe3ed8e48fd8c6c7bdfd4eeae04a502", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "We may have to get\nmore witnesses--and that'll be thin ice, too. I'll look in again this\nafternoon.\"\n\n\"Please do so,\" replied Mr. Amidon. \"Look at these letters! Do you\nsuppose your _Notes_ would shed any light on what they're driving at?\"\n\nThe judge looked them over.\n\n\"I don't remember anything in the _Notes_,\" said he, \"regarding these\nmatters. But you could take 'em up to the hotel, and Madame le Claire\ncould put you to sleep and talk it out of you in five minutes.\"\n\n\"I'll do it!\" said Amidon. \"I'll get Brassfield's views on them,\nconfound him. I'll do this while you're with Edgington. Good-by until\nafter luncheon.\"\n\n\nMadame le Claire was examining Mr. Brassfield with reference to the\nunanswered letters. Professor Blatherwick was engaged in taking down\nhis answers. In a disastrous moment, Mr. Alderson knocked at the door,\nand, following his knocking, delivered a breathless message to\nBrassfield that an important telegram demanded instant attention.\n\n\"All right,\" replied Mr. Brassfield cheerily, \"I'll toddle right down\nto the office with you, my boy. Excuse me, Madame; you may rely on my\nseeking a resumption of this pleasant interview at the earliest\npossible moment. _Au revoir_!\"\n\nMadame le Claire was perplexed. Should she allow him to go out in this\nhypnotic state? Could she exercise her art in Alderson's presence?\nWhile she debated, Mr. Brassfield airily bowed himself out, and was\ngone!\n\n\nBrassfield was gone, that was clear: but no system of Subliminal\nEngineering had any rule for calculating the results of his escape back\ninto the world from which he had for a fortnight or so been absent.\nWhat would he be, and what would he do? Would he return the same\nhard-headed man of business who had won riches in five short years? Or\nwould he be changed by the return to the normal--his equilibrium made\nunstable by the tendency to revert to his older self? How would he\nadjust himself to the things done by Amidon? How would the change\naffect his relations with Miss Waldron and this bright-haired inamorata\nso balefully nearing the foreground, like an approaching comet? How\nwould the professor and Judge Blodgett stand with this new factor in\nthe problem? Would he continue to care for her, his rescuer? Owing to\nsome things which had taken place in the Brassfield intervals, her\nheart fluttered at the thought of a possibly permanent Eugene.\n\nFor be it remembered, that many things had taken place in these days of\nBellevale life. The situation had, of course, been changing daily by\nsubsurface mutations which the intelligent student of this history will\nnot need to have explained to him. For instance (and herein the\nexplanation of that fluttering of Madame le Claire's heart) such things\nas these:\n\nBellevale is not so large a place that neighbors' affairs are not\nobserved of neighbor. Prior to the elaboration of the law of\nthought-transference, there was no way of accounting for the\nuniversality of knowledge of other people's affairs which certain\nBellevale circles enjoyed. The good gossiping housewives along the\nhighways leading into the town are often able to tell the exact\ncontents of the packages brought home by their neighbors, under the\nseats of their buggies and farm-wagons and late at night; but this is a\nphenomenon not at all unusual. Neither is it in the least strange\nthat, in town or country, John and Sarah could not sit out an evening\ntogether in the parlor or settin'-room without all that occurred being\ntalked over, with perfect certainty as to facts, in the next day's\nmeeting of the Missionary Society or the Monday Club. But what Phyllis\nthought, what were the plans of Thestylis, and how Jane felt when\nWilliam jilted her, and why William did it--all of which difficult\ncircumstances were canvassed with equal certitude--are things, the\nknowledge of which, as I said above, was not to be accounted for on any\ntheory at all consistent with respect for the people possessing it,\nuntil thought-transference came into fashion.", "start_char_idx": 162963, "end_char_idx": 166975, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383": {"__data__": {"id_": "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "2c3a12b2aa4f47fd4b34096b33c09258ef2caccc7d91530e6ac4d2c878b7c8e4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "25aee2a016f8c2eb21c6fe1234874884ce90d8b84e1326a71caf8e98f9879c8d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Now all is clear, and\nour debt to science is increased by another large item.\n\nMr. Brassfield and his affairs were as a city set upon a hill, and\ncould not be hid. There was a maid in Elizabeth's home, and a maiden\naunt who had confidential friends. A stenographer and bookkeepers were\nemployed in the counting-room of the Brassfield Oil Company, and the\nstenographer had a friend in the milliner's shop, and an admirer who\nwas a clerk in one of the banks. There were clubs and other\norganizations, social, religious and literary; and the people in all of\nthem had tongues wherewith to talk, and ears for hearing.\n\nHence:\n\nAt the meeting of the Society for Ethical Research, Mrs. Meyer read an\nessay on \"What _Parsifal_ Has Taught Me,\" during the reading of which\nMrs. Alvord described Miss Waldron's trousseau to Miss Finch and Doctor\nJulia Brown. Because of the conversation among these three, the\npresident asked Doctor Brown, first of all, to discuss the paper. And\nDoctor Julia, who talked bass and had coquettish fluffy blond bangs and\na greatly overtaxed corsage, said that she fully agreed with the many\nand deeply beautiful thoughts expressed in the paper.\n\n\"I'm sincerely glad _Parsifal_ taught her something!\" said the fair\nM.D. to her companions, as she resumed her seat. Mrs. Meyer was the\nonly woman in the town who had ever been to Bayreuth, she added\nshort-windedly in explanation of her remarks, and had lobbied herself\ninto a place on the program on the strength of that fact.\n\n\"Does Bess know,\" asked Miss Finch, \"about this mesmerist person?\"\n\n\"Oh, there isn't anything there,\" said Doctor Brown, \"I feel sure.\nThough his inti--ah, friendship with this Le Claire woman is, just at\nthis time, in bad taste. But all men are natural polygamists, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"They say,\" said the voice of a member from across the room, \"that it\nwill be quite a palace--throw everything else in Bellevale in the\nshade--entirely so.\"\n\n\"They are all talking of it,\" said Mrs. Alvord. \"Jim says it seems odd\nto have this Mr. Blodgett looking into the Brassfield business. But\neverything is odd, now--the hypnotist and Mr. Blodgett, and Daisy\nScarlett; she's still here.\"\n\n\"O----o!\" said Doctor Brown, in a sinuous barytone circumflex.\n\n\"Really,\" said Miss Finch, who wore her dress high about the neck, and\nwhose form was a symphony in angles, \"such promiscuous associations may\nbe shocking, but as to surprise--who knows anything of his life before\nhe came here?\"\n\n\"Judge Blodgett,\" said Doctor Brown, \"told a friend of mine that he had\nknown Brassfield from infancy.\"\n\n\"The first light Bellevale has ever received on a dark past,\" said Miss\nFinch, \"if it is light. And how strangely he acts! Everybody notices\nit. Always so chatty and almost voluble before, and now--why, he's\ndreadfully boorish. You know how he treated you, Miss Brown!\"\n\n\"Yes, and he knows how I treated him for it!\" said Doctor Brown. \"I\npropose to call people down when they act so with me!\"\n\n\"Quite right,\" said Mrs. Alvord, \"quite correct, Doctor. Oh, what a\nchange! And who has changed for the worse lately more than Bessie\nWaldron? Pale, silent and clearly unhappy. I can't attach any\nimportance to that affair of the strange woman with the striped hair;\nbut that Miss Scarlett matter--that's quite different. Jim and I saw\nthe beginning of that up in the mountains last summer. Daisy Scarlett\nis a queer girl, so wild and hoidenish--but the people who know her in\nAllentown just think the world of her, the same as do the people in\nBellevale--and her appearance here right after the announcement of the\nengagement means something. Poor Bess! Hush! There she comes. Oh,\nBessie, it's so sweet of you to come, even if you are late! Everybody\nhas been saying such sweet things of you!\"", "start_char_idx": 166977, "end_char_idx": 170757, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3": {"__data__": {"id_": "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7fcb39019d9a750b786733d6c7c345a401383e495a55fef6c4834890cb52f4a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6bdc0274f4cd546593839b271723c3ac479e4f718a367c85baf8adada9d2b1a4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Everybody\nhas been saying such sweet things of you!\"\n\n\"How kind of them!\" said Elizabeth. \"Has _Parsifal_ received any\nattention?\"\n\n\nAt the club, of course, no such gossip as that uttered at the meeting\nof the Society for Ethical Research was heard. Men are above such\nthings. To be sure Alvord and Slater and Edgington and the rest of the\n\"the gang\" did exchange views on some matters involving the welfare of\nthe club--and in the course of duty.\n\n\"I tell you,\" said Slater, \"Brass has been practising that French\ndoctrine about hunting for the woman--a little too industriously.\nThey're getting to be something--something----\"\n\n\"Fierce,\" suggested Alvord.\n\n\"Well, that isn't quite what I meant to say,\" said Slater, \"but pretty\nnear. 'Terrible as an army with banners,' you know, and condemned near\nas numerous.\"\n\n\"It's changed Brassfield like a coat of paint, this engagement,\" said\nEdgington. \"I saw something last week that showed me more than you\ncould print in a book as big as the Annual Digest. You see, he went\nsort of gravitating down by where the sewer gang was at work, like a\nman in a strange country full of hostiles, and although he must have\nbeen conscious of the fact that he's slated for mayor in the spring, he\nnever showed that he knew of the presence of a human being, to say\nnothing of a voter, in the whole gang, and Barney Conlon's gang, too.\nWhy, he'd better have done anything than ignore 'em! He'd better a\ndarn sight have stood and sung _Drill, Ye Tarriers, Drill!_ as a\npolitical move. Now that shows a revolution in his nature. It's\nuncanny, and it'll play the very deuce with the slate if it goes on.\"\n\n\"Well, you all know what took place at his counting-room,\" asked\nSlater, \"the day after he got back from New York? Old Stevens\nresigned, on the street the night before, and Brass didn't seem to know\nany more than to accept his resignation. Hired him back since, I've\nheard, but he ought not to have noticed it. He certainly has gone off\nbadly.\"\n\n\"I knew a fellow once,\" said Edgington, \"who went sort of crazy on the\ngirl question--batty. D'ye s'pose this engagement----\"\n\n\"They change to their lady friends,\" said Slater, \"sometimes. But\nhe--why, he passed me a dozen times with a cold stare!\"\n\n\"Me, too,\" said Edgington, \"and he didn't seem to know Flossie Smith\nwhen he met her, and Doctor Julia Brown gave him a calling-down on the\nstreet--a public lecture on etiquette. Colonel McCorkle claims to have\nbeen insulted by him, and won't serve any longer on the same committees\nwith him in the Commercial Association. And he stays at the hotel all\nthe time, and seems afraid to leave this old judge, and collogues with\nthe German professor and the occultist--and, let me say, I've seen\ncripples in the hospital that were worse-looking than she is!--and what\nin thunder it means beats me.\"\n\n\"He wants the judge and the professor at our supper next week,\" added\nSlater.\n\n\"I've sent 'em invitations,\" said Alvord. \"Anything to please the\npatient. I could tell you a good deal about this, fellows; but 'Gene\nand I are brothers and closer than brothers; and F. D. and B. goes with\nme; but it won't hurt anything for you to know that he's got carloads\nof trouble, and you haven't any of you come within a mile of the mark.\nHe told me all about it the night he got back from New York. I think\nit will blow over if things can be kept from blowing up instead, for a\nfew days--slumbering volcano--woman scorned--hell's fury, you know;\ndon't ask me any more. But this hiding out won't do.\"\n\n\"Well, I should think not,\" said Slater. \"We've got to get him going\nabout as usual or there'll be questions asked and publicity--those\nred-headed women are pretty vivacious conversationalists when they get\nmad, and you can't tell what may be pulled off, even if he acts as\nnatural as life.\"\n\n\"This supper ought to help some,\" said Edgington.", "start_char_idx": 170705, "end_char_idx": 174584, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b": {"__data__": {"id_": "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "48635f902df1b90ec230edf49d9a2d811c1ca7404ba5372204b941c99b7cbc65", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a51c8cd281be23d237cf9c4adf0334697b7f5fcc117cf64f323452f3a207bbea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"This supper ought to help some,\" said Edgington.\n\n\"It will,\" said Alvord. \"We must make it a hum-dinger. And we must\nsee that he shows himself of tenor at the club and lodge meetings and\nhops. Why, it's shameful, the way we've let him drop out.\"\n\nAnd men being above gossip, at this point the meeting dissolved.\n\n\nAt the hotel, conference after conference had taken place in the parlor\nof Professor Blatherwick, and Blodgett and Blatherwick's _Notes_ had\nbeen studied out most assiduously. Judge Blodgett and Florian Amidon\nhad spent their days at the counting-house, and an increased force of\nclerks worked ceaselessly in making up statements and balances showing\nthe condition of the business. Amidon could now draw checks in the\nname of Brassfield with no more than a dim sense of committing forgery.\nThe banks, however, refused to honor them at first, and the tellers\nnoted the fact that after his return from New York Mr. Brassfield\nadopted a new style of signature, and wondered at it. Some noticed a\nchange in all his handwriting, but in these days of the typewriter such\na thing makes little difference. His abstention from bowling (to the\nplaying of which Brassfield had been devoted), and his absolute failure\nat billiards, were discussed in sporting circles, and accounted for on\nthe theory that he had \"gone stale\" since this love-affair had become\nthe absorbing business of his life. No one understood, however, his\nsudden interest in photography, and his marvelous skill in it. He\nseemed to be altogether a transformed man.\n\n\"I am beginning to see through this,\" said Amidon, referring to the\nbusiness.\n\n\"Yes,\" said the judge, \"this side of the affair is assuming a pretty\nsatisfactory aspect. But your reputation is suffering by the sort of\nconstraint you've been under. These things are important. A man's\nbehavior is worth money to him. Many a man gets credit at the bank on\nthe strength of the safe and conservative vices he practises. Business\nrequires you to act more like Brassfield. A man who uses a good deal\nof money must be like other people who use a good deal of money. He\nmustn't have isms, and he mustn't be for any reforms except impractical\nones, and he mustn't have the reputation of being 'queer.' Isn't that\nso, Professor?\"\n\n\"Kvite uncontrofertible,\" said the professor. \"You must minkle up vit\nmore beople.\"\n\n\"And in other matters besides business,\" said the judge; \"boxes of\nflowers every few minutes are all right, but some things require\npersonal attention.\"\n\nAmidon blushed.\n\n\"You see,\" said he, \"if every one were not so strange; if part of the\npeople were as familiar to me as I am to them, it wouldn't be so\ntrying. I suppose these receptions, and other functions to follow, I\nmust attend alone. But you two are going to that banquet with me?\"\n\n\"Oh, certainly,\" said the judge. \"I want to see just what sort of a\ngang you've been forgathering with here. The folks at Hazelhurst----\"\n\n\"Must never know, Judge! And you, Professor?\"\n\n\"I shall be more tan bleaced. Supliminally gonsidered, I rekard it as\nte shance of a lifetime.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Amidon, \"you are very good, and I am glad that's settled.\nNow I want you to grant me another favor--or Clara, rather. I should\nbe more than glad if she would ask Brassfield about some things that\nthere's no need for you people to hear. It's nothing about the\nbusiness. Won't you see if she will give me a--a--demonstration?\"\n\nThe judge and the professor disappeared, and soon word came that Madame\nle Claire would give him audience. Amidon's heart beat stiflingly as\nhe came into her presence. For this man's conscience was a most\ninsubordinate conscience, and held as wrong the things felt and\nthought, as well as things said and done; and his remorse was as that\nof an abandoned but repentant jilt. But when he saw how cheerfully she\nsmiled, he grew easier in his mind. The women always have such a\nmatter fully under control--I mean the other party's mind.\n\n\"Well?\"", "start_char_idx": 174535, "end_char_idx": 178518, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966": {"__data__": {"id_": "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "ef54d9c71568c9538277e3ecff6c406e82d15e9e6570175c05fe5365c86f5f59", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f5809cd8a6ff5991ba2fc271e457b02a609cbe13b99a3a8ca41864f150dd61ac", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Well?\" said she interrogatively--\"at last? I have been wondering why\nI was brought down here?\"\n\n\"It must have been very dull and lonesome----\"\n\n\"Oh, no!\" she answered. \"I am a business woman, you know, and I\nhaven't been idle. And now, there is something you need, my friend?\nLet us begin at once.\"\n\nThere were definite repudiation of claims to tenderness, clear denial\nof resentment, in her tone. Amidon brightened and reddened. He\nstammered like a boy teased by reference to his first love-affair.\n\n\"You are wonderfully kind,\" he said. \"I wanted to ask you to have this\nBrassfield tell you all he will about the wedding--the date, and\neverything you can get out of the fellow. And have him act as\nnaturally as you can, so as to see more clearly how he carries himself.\nYou see what I want, don't you?\"\n\n\"I think so,\" she returned. \"Conversation must be a little difficult,\nisn't it? You remembered some of the things I told you about?\"\n\n\"Difficult?\" he exclaimed. \"Oh, Clara, it's impossible! It's so much\nso, that I hardly dare go back any more. I'm sending flowers and notes\nand doing the best I can; but it won't do at all: I must call\noftener--must! And I'm afraid I have spoiled everything.\"\n\n\"Then you find the lady quite--quite endurable?\"\n\n\"She's adorable,\" went on Florian, with the gush which comes at the\nfirst opportunity to discuss the dear one with a sympathetic third\nparty. \"She's perfectly exquisite! I have thought of nothing, dreamed\nof nothing, since I left her, except, except----\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Clara, \"the situation must be perfectly lovely--for\nyou--both---- And I'm sure you got along nicely.\"\n\n\"No, no! I spoiled everything, I know I did. But bring this fellow up\nand ask him those things, please; and also about a Miss Scarlett----\nNo, leave that out. Just about the wedding, and about--I was going to\nask about our house; but the judge found that out, where it is, and\nall. Just about the--the things between her and me, a little more, you\nknow!\"\n\nThe hypnotic subject yields to control more and more readily by\nrepeated surrender. So there was little of gazing into the\nparty-colored eyes now.\n\n\"You will soon sleep,\" said Madame le Claire, in that dominating way of\nhers; \"and when you wake you will be Eugene Brassfield just as he used\nto be, and the room and all the surroundings, and myself--all will seem\nfamiliar, and you will be quite at home with me. Sleep, sleep!\"\n\nHer hand swept down and closed his eyes, and he lay back in his chair\nentranced. Madame le Claire sat long and looked at him yearningly.\nShe smoothed back the hair from his brow with many soft touches, and\nstooped and softly kissed his forehead. Then she lightly tapped his\nwrist, and sharply said, \"Wake!\"\n\nEugene Brassfield opened his eyes with a smile. There was something\nstill faintly suggestive of tenderness in the look with which Madame le\nClaire regarded him, and he returned it with the air of a man to whom\nsuch looks are neither unusual nor repugnant.\n\n\"We were just talking,\" said she, with the air of reminding him of a\ntopic from which he had wandered, \"about your wedding. When is it to\nbe?\"\n\n\"The appointed date,\" said he, \"is April the fifth; but, of course, I\nshall move for an earlier one if possible.\"\n\n\"I should think,\" remarked Madame le Claire, \"that the date fixed would\ngive Miss Waldron all too short a time for preparation.\"\n\n\"From a woman's standpoint,\" said Mr. Brassfield, \"it probably seems\nso. But you and I can surely find matters of more mutual interest to\ntalk about, can't we?\"\n\n\"Perhaps,\" said the girl, \"but I don't think of anything just now. Do\nyou?\"\n\n\"Well, for one thing,\" said he, \"I have just found out what makes your\neyes so beautiful.\"\n\n\"Wouldn't it be just as well to cease discovering things of that kind?\nIt's so short a time to the fifth of April, you know.\"", "start_char_idx": 178511, "end_char_idx": 182354, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa": {"__data__": {"id_": "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0bcdcd70d0e9c96df83a2cb8d00c1f4168443d0dfbf93e3a481926a3ae24ac83", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "86b8bc94a4b1c9abad91965223d8f63ddd24ee74de79e6fbfe2077cb90c34269", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It's so short a time to the fifth of April, you know.\"\n\n\"I've made all my money,\" said Brassfield, \"by never quitting\ndiscovering. I like it. And this last find especially.\"\n\n\"I think there are other lines of investigation,\" said she, \"which\ndemand your time and attention.\"\n\n\"Oh, pshaw!\" said he. \"Don't be so prudish. You know that your eyes\nare beautiful, and you are not really offended when I tell you so.\nSuch eyes are the books in which I like to read--I can understand them\nbetter than Browning, or the old Persian soak. It's not unpleasant to\nget a volume you understand--at times.\"\n\n\"Why, Mr. Amidon--Brassfield, I mean--aren't you ashamed of yourself!\"\n\n\"A little,\" said he; \"not much, though. And who is this 'Mr. Amman,'\nor whatever the name is, that is so much in your mind that you call me\nby his name when you speak without thinking?\"\n\n\"A dear friend of mine!\"\n\n\"Well, now, if you should happen to see something agreeable in me, and\nshould let me know about it, I shouldn't throw your Mr. Amden, or\nAmidon, at your head. Why not forget about the rest of the world for a\nwhile? We can be in only one place at a time, and so, really, our\nwhole world just now has only us two. You oughtn't to repel the only\nperson in the wide, wide world; you won't, will you?\"\n\n\"Don't be foolish!\"\n\n\"Don't be wasteful! This may be the only world of this kind we shall\nbe allowed to have. Come over and sit by me and be nice to me, won't\nyou?\"\n\n\"I certainly shall do nothing of the kind!\"\n\n\"No? Ah, how wasteful of opportunity! Well, then, I shall have to\ncome to you!\"\n\nOh, the depravity of society in these days, and oh, the unpleasantness\nof setting these things down! But, on the other hand, what a comfort\nit is to think that men as base as Brassfield are so rare that you and\nI, my boy, have probably never met a specimen. And if you ever find,\nmy love, that any person in whom you have any tender interest has ever\nbehaved in a way similar to the conduct of Brassfield, you should give\nthe prisoner the benefit of every doubt, and accord full weight to the\nprecedent contained in this history, and to the fact that it was\nBrassfield and not Amidon who did this. A man can not be blamed for\nlapsing into the Brassfield state. A man should be acquitted--eh?\nDefending some one? Why, certainly not! And how long this paragraph\nis growing! Yes, I feel sure Clara Blatherwick repulsed these advances\nas she should, and that Brassfield, being fully under \"control,\" did\nnot--why, of course not, as you say!\n\nBut I am going no further with the matter now; except to say that in\nsomething like an hour Mr. Amidon departed much perturbed by the\nprospect of the nearness of his happiness, fully convinced of his\nunworthiness, and quakingly uncertain as to many things, but most of\nall, just then, as to his clothes!\n\n\"This man Brassfield,\" said he to himself, \"seems to have been a good\ndeal of a dude, and Elizabeth--the darling!--will expect me to be fully\nup to vogue in this regard--as she will be in all things. And I don't\nbelieve a thing has been done about clothes.\"\n\nMeantime, Madame le Claire walked up and down in a locked chamber,\nstruggling with her grief.\n\n\"Oh, it is hopeless, hopeless!\" said the poor girl to herself, over and\nover again. \"Florian, my darling Florian, whom I found blind and\nwandering in the wilderness, and took by the hand and guided to the\nlight--Florian has gone from me! She has taken him, just as she took\nhim before. But the man she thinks loves her--her Eugene--I'm sure\nhe's coming to love me; and to be tired of her! And I could keep him\nBrassfield, if I chose--if I chose! I wonder--I wonder if it would be\nwrong? What would she do if she had my power?", "start_char_idx": 182300, "end_char_idx": 186017, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f": {"__data__": {"id_": "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "f6084532a3ee649fe7456785d5c90f2ef5b1ad0d019990b8cb3b2f9e7002e359", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1ecab2a9400c0c58c7828eb4c2b4ce9cbf40a4cd1ba17484ec5d380148675509", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "What would she do if she had my power? Twice I had to try,\nbefore I could restore him. I could! I could!\"\n\n\nSmall wonder, therefore, that Madame le Claire sat wild-eyed and\nexcited, and flew fearfully to Judge Blodgett and the professor, when\nMr. Brassfield went free, with Alderson at heel. And all the time, as\nthe crew of a ship carry on the routine of drill while the torpedo is\nspeeding for her hull, these social amenities went on all unconscious\nof the explosion now imminent.\n\n\n\n\nXV\n\nTHE TURPITUDE OF BRASSFIELD\n\n Man to black Misfortune beckons\n When upon himself he reckons,\n Marshals Faith among his assets,\n Blinks his nature's many facets.\n This dull gem is an ascetic,\n Bloodless, pulseless, apathetic:\n Shift the light--a trifling matter--\n Fra Anselmo turns a satyr!\n --_The Kaleidoscope_.\n\nAirily, Mr. Brassfield preceded his clerk down the stairway, and out\ninto the street. There, something in the air--the balm of advancing\nspring; a faint chill, the Parthian shot of retreating winter; some\npsychic apprehension of the rising sap; the slight northing of the sun;\nor some subconscious clutch at knowledge of minute alterations in the\nlandscape--apprised Mr. Brassfield's strangely circumscribed mind of\nthe maladjustment with time resulting from the reign of Amidon. But\nhowever bewildered Florian's mentality might become at such things, it\nwas different with Brassfield. The plane of consciousness in which he\nhad so long moved, with a memory running back five years and there\nending in a blank wall of nescience, had made him cunning and\nshifty--necessarily so. The struggle for existence had had its\ninevitable effect--the faculty paralyzed had been compensated for by\nthe development of others. So he was not at all at a loss now, when\nthis little hiatus in time struck on his mind in the form of a\nsuspicion. He turned to Alderson with a smile.\n\n\"Do you remember what date this is, my boy?\" he inquired.\n\nAlderson named the date. Brassfield nodded, as if he were pleased to\nfind Alderson correct in his exercises.\n\n\"Of course you know what we've arranged for to-day, don't you?\" he went\non.\n\n\"The deferred annual meeting of the Construction Company?\" asked\nAlderson. \"If that's it, it's all attended to. I took the proxies to\nMr. Smith yesterday.\"\n\n\"Good!\" was Brassfield's hearty response. \"You'll do for an animated\n'office tickler' if you continue to improve. You used to forget all\nthese things.\"\n\nThey had now come to a certain turning, down which Brassfield gazed, to\na place where the highway was torn up and excavated. A center line of\nbowed backs, fringed by flying dirt. Indicated that the work was still\nin progress.\n\n\"You may go on to the office,\" said Brassfield, \"and I'll be up\nimmediately. I'm going down to see Barney Conlon a moment.\"\n\nHe walked down among the men, nodding to the busy ones, and stopping\nfor a handshake or a joke with others.\n\n\"Hello, Barney,\" he shouted to the man who seemed to be in charge.\n\"How long are you going to keep people jumping sideways to prevent\nthemselves from being buried alive? You old Fenian!\"\n\nConlon looked at him for a moment with an air of distinct disfavor.\n\n\"Look out there!\" he shouted to a teamster who was unloading pipe.\n\"D'ye want to kill the min in the trinch? Ah, is thot you, Mr.\nBrassfield?\"\n\n\"What's left of me,\" replied Brassfield, quickly aware of the coolness\nof the reception--the politician's sensitiveness to danger. \"By the\nway, Conlon, can't you come up to the office soon? I've got some\nspecifications I want you to see. Pipe-line. Can you do that sort of\nwork?\"\n\n\"Do it!\" gushed Conlon, thawing. \"Do it! Ah, Mr. Brassfield, d'ye ask\nme thot, whin ye mind 'twas me thot done the Rogers job!\"", "start_char_idx": 185979, "end_char_idx": 189722, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d": {"__data__": {"id_": "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c758a2d178b525e16dbe6376f9d2e4ff93621a38de9e1fef1595558dbb3f7c84", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "356ebbccf69e55bb2ddcec83c514f14e2bfc11d3e6ef46dbe0c29c483f6fffa9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Oh, yes, I remember now, you did have that,\" said Brassfield. \"Well,\nthat was fairly well done. Come up and figure with me, and I believe\nwe can make a deal.\"\n\n\"Thank ye kindly, Mr. Brassfield,\" said Conlon, all his obsequiousness\nreturning. \"Thank ye! Annything new in politics, Mr. Brassfield?\"\n\n\"I don't know a thing,\" said Brassfield. \"I'm so busy with other\nthings, you know----\"\n\n\"It'll be a great honor,\" said Conlon, \"or so I should take it, to be\nthe mare of the city, an' the master of the fine new house an' all\nthat'll be in it, all this same spring!\"\n\n\"Yes, Conlon, yes--but as to the office--I don't know about that.\"\n\n\"They can't bate you,\" asseverated Conlon promptly.\n\n\"Oh, I don't know,\" demurred Brassfield. \"You can't always tell.\"\n\n\"We're wid ye, to a man,\" asserted Conlon unhesitatingly, growing\nwarmer. \"The common people are wid ye!\"\n\n\"I'm glad to hear that,\" said Brassfield, \"very glad. But business\nfirst; and this pipe-line is business. Of course, if the people demand\nit----\"\n\n\"They will!\"\n\n\"--why, I may---- I'll see, Conlon. Anyhow, I appreciate your\nfriendship. Come up and see me.\"\n\nAnd the candidate for mayor walked away, wondering how he could have\noffended Conlon, and rejoiced that he had \"fixed\" him in time.\n\n\"Where's the telegram?\" he asked, as he entered his private office.\n\"Why, Stevens might have attended to this. Where's Mr. Stevens? Miss\nStrong, send Mr. Stevens in!\"\n\n\"Mr. Stevens!\" gasped Miss Strong. \"Mr. Stevens--why----\"\n\n\"Oh, I mean where does he live now? I heard he was moving. And by\nsending him in, I mean, if you happen to meet him,\" hastily amended Mr.\nBrassfield, noting some error. \"I want to see him. And show me his\naccount, please; and kindly ring for a boy to take this message.\"\n\nThe books showed the discharge of Mr. Stevens, and the closing of his\naccount. Brassfield frowned over it, but resumed his smile at Miss\nStrong's re-entrance.\n\n\"Let's see,\" said he. \"What have we for this afternoon? These\nunanswered--Why, Miss Strong, these must be attended to at once!\nPlease take some letters for me.\"\n\nHe had dropped into his rut. For an hour or more Miss Strong's fingers\nflew as she noted down his dictation, and at the end of that time the\nletters were answered, and the communications which had so perplexed\nAmidon were filed away among other things done. The office force\nbreathed freely once more, with the freedom of returning efficiency in\nmanagement.\n\nThe man who had brought this relief to his employees now looked at his\nwatch, rose, went out, and walking briskly down the main street,\nnodding to an acquaintance here, and speaking to another there, made\nhis way out among the homes of the town.\n\nHere his brisk walk gradually slowed down to a saunter. He was\nstrolling toward the house with the white columns. Suddenly coming\ninto view, as she turned a corner and walked on before him, appeared a\nyoung lady. Not much ability in the detective line would be necessary\nfor the recognition of her by any of this girl's acquaintances, within\nany ordinary range of vision. If there were no certain revelation in\nthe short, smartly-attired, quick-moving figure, there could be no\nmistake concerning the vividly brilliant hair, which glowed under the\nsaucily-turned fabric of felt, feathers and velvet which crowned it,\nlike a brilliant cloud display over a red sunset. Mr. Brassfield\nseemed to recognize her, for he quickened his pace so as to overtake\nher before she could come to a gateway, into which her glance and\nmovements indicated that she was about to turn. He walked up by her\nside, and manifested to her his presence by falling into step and\nlightly pinching her shapely elbow.\n\n\"How-de-do, Daisy-daise!\" said he, with the utmost assurance.", "start_char_idx": 189724, "end_char_idx": 193482, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d": {"__data__": {"id_": "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "952921f941cadb40410ce814c3d38ec28c4beb99bc182002b852f470b22f00f9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "30269df92faf1c2da31b50df2b95fb542d281949b24a34d0a3926d4b2f9925d0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"How-de-do, Daisy-daise!\" said he, with the utmost assurance. \"When\ndid you bring the town the blessing of your presence?\"\n\nThe lady gave a little scream.\n\n\"'Gene Brassfield!\" she ejaculated; and then, with a little quivering\nemphasis, \"You! How you frightened me!\"\n\n\"I know, I know!\" replied Brassfield, peeping under the big hat into\nher eyes. \"Almost scared to death, as is quite proper. But, to my\nquestion: how long, how long hast been here?\"\n\n\"Oh, several days--before you came back. Aunty wanted me to be here\nwhen her sister, my Aunt Hunter from Hazelhurst--that's up in\nWisconsin--visits her. There's to be a reception. Of course you'll be\nthere, and----\"\n\n\"Of course,\" responded Brassfield. \"Did I ever absent myself from any\nsocial affair in which your charming aunt, Mrs. Pumphrey, is\ninterested? Nay, nay; but don't dodge. Why this throw-down? Why\ndidn't you let me know----\"\n\n\"'Gene,\" said the girl, \"you can't deceive me. I'm ashamed that I\nwrote the note, and your telling a fib about getting it won't make it\nany better. But it was wicked of you not to answer. I only wanted you\nto come to me and--and talk it all over, and say good-by for ever. It\nwasn't necessary to----\"\n\n\"I have never received any note,\" said Brassfield, totally unconscious\nof the missive which Amidon had promptly waste-basketed. \"What was it?\"\n\n\"Really? Didn't you?\" she queried, pouting her red lips most kissably.\n\"A little note, unsigned, with some--some verses? No? Then I'll\nforgive you--for that. But--go on, 'Gene, up to the house yonder--go\non!\"\n\n\"You oughtn't to be permitted to run at large,\" said he, \"with that\nhat, and those lips. I wonder if any one's looking?\"\n\n\"You mustn't talk that way,\" she said, \"nor look at me like that! Go\non, or I shall cry--or something quite as bad! Or, maybe you'll come\nin? Billy Cox is in there waiting for me, and watching, I dare say.\"\n\n\"Some other time,\" replied Brassfield, \"I shall be delighted. But Miss\nWaldron has just been driven out into the street, and if she comes this\nway, I must exhibit myself to her, and maybe she'll pick me up. She's\nturning this way---- Billy, eh? Happy Billy; nice boy, too, since he\nstopped drinking. By-by, Daisy-daise!\"\n\nElizabeth came driving down the road, and walking up it came Aaron,\nsable messenger of the anxious Madame le Claire, who had enlisted Aaron\nin her service to bring Brassfield again within her magic realm. He\nreached the object of his search before the carriage passed, and\ndelivered a note.\n\n\"Tell Madame le Claire,\" said Brassfield, whose ideas with reference to\nthat person must have been very hazy, \"that such an invitation is a\ncommand. I'll be with her immediately.\"\n\nHe stood smiling, hat in hand, at the crossing, as Elizabeth drove by.\nShe halted, and looked questioningly at him. This smile, this\nconfident aspect--all these were so different from his recent bearing\nthat she was surprised, and not more than half pleased. The element of\nassurance in his attitude toward the other girl was not seen in his\ntreatment of Elizabeth, to whom it would have been offensive. Perhaps\nthe cunning of the consciously abnormal intellect was the cause of\nthis; or it may have been some emanation of dignity from the woman\nherself acting on a mind in a state chronically hypnotic. Be the cause\nwhat it may, to Elizabeth, with all his confidence and ardor, he was\nmost deferential and correct in manners, and, to her, these manners had\nundergone no change. Confidently, as if no shadow had ever come over\ntheir relations, he put his foot upon the step of the carriage.\n\n\"Won't you give me a lift,\" said he, \"and put me down at my home?\"\n\nShe made room for him with scarcely more than a word.", "start_char_idx": 193421, "end_char_idx": 197141, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912": {"__data__": {"id_": "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "1625322315c53d37158acc09922ea60902e32f3be49a5bc79ddd4952aa5f5835", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b01e439077b346458ab45e00f0b9349f08a3589242d6dc29637855b2ad26fdfa", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She made room for him with scarcely more than a word. \"To the\nBellevale House,\" said she to the coachman.\n\nBrassfield looked at her, so grave, so _distingu\u00c3\u00a9e_, so coolly sweet,\nand forgot apparently that there was any one else in the world. He\nslipped his hand under the lap-robe, and gave hers a gentle pressure.\n\n\"Dearest!\" he half-whispered, caring very little whether he was\noverheard or not.\n\nShe returned the caress by the slightest possible compression, and put\nher hand outside the robe. Whether the one action was incited by a\ndesire to avoid complete unresponsiveness, and from a sense of duty\nonly, the other left undecided.\n\nThe circumscribed mind of Brassfield which, with the intensity of\nobservation rendered necessary and inevitable by its narrow field, had\nnoted, as he stepped out in the street, the intangible shifting of\nrelations in his surroundings incident to the mere passage of time in\nthe few days of his obliteration, now felt, as a blind man feels the\nmountain in his approach, or as the steersman in a Newfoundland fog\napprehends the nearing of the iceberg, some subtle alteration in the\nattitude toward him of the young woman by his side. Instantly he was\non guard and keenly alert.\n\n\"This is a case,\" said he, \"of the prophet coming to the mountain. I\nwas on my way to you, and lo, I met you coming my way--let me hope\ncoming to me--after seeing me!\"\n\n\"The mountain is at liberty to draw his own conclusions,\" said Miss\nWaldron. \"One may be reasonably charged with the design of meeting\nevery one in Bellevale when one goes out.\"\n\n\"The mountain, then,\" said he, \"must be content with its place as a\nportion of the landscape--happy if it pleases the prophet's eye.\"\n\n\"The prophet did not foresee--but let's have mercy on the poor hunted\nfigure. I was about to say that your occupation--or preoccupation--as\nI drove down the street brought to my attention a new phase of our\nscenery--a brilliant one. Is this the girl I used to know as Daisy\nScarlett?\"\n\n\"It must be,\" said Brassfield, \"and it surprises me that you speak of\nknowing her as of the past. How does it happen?\"\n\n\"The exile of school,\" she answered, \"and the fact that her visits to\nBellevale have not been during such vacations as the girls would let me\nspend with Auntie. It's my loss--I have lived too tame a life.\"\n\n\"I, too; let's take the trail for sensations.\"\n\n\"Let me begin with a mild one,\" said Elizabeth. \"Estelle writes me\nthat she has been away from New York for the past month. So you are\nnot a convicted criminal, at least.\"\n\nBrassfield scanned her face to get the revelation of every turn of\nexpression, as an aid to this mysterious reference to Estelle as\nrelated to his visit to New York.\n\n\"That's good,\" said he promptly, and with marvelous luck, \"even a\nverdict of 'not proven' is a glad surprise on returning from New York.\nBy the way, Bessie dear, won't you drive over by that gang of men? The\nforeman seems to want to speak to me.\"\n\nEntirely oblivious of this dexterous turn, Miss Waldron complied, and\ndrew up to the place where Barney Conlon's gang still labored in the\ntrench.\n\n\"What is it, Conlon?\" asked Brassfield.\n\n\"I was wonderin', sir,\" said Conlon, hat in hand, \"if I could see you\nat your office in a half-hour or so. I'd not ask it, sir, if it wasn't\nimportant. It's about the business you was speakin' to me about this\nmarnin'.\"\n\n\"Ah, yes: the pipe-line,\" said Brassfield. \"Be at the office in half\nan hour, Conlon. Drive to the top of the hill, William. So goes our\nsearch for new thrills--road runs slap into pipe-lines and business,\ndearie.\"\n\n\"Well, we mustn't find fault with it for that,\" said she. \"I've wanted\nto say to you--since the other evening--that I can see widening vistas\nshowing oceans of good things I never reckoned on in the least.", "start_char_idx": 197088, "end_char_idx": 200885, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8": {"__data__": {"id_": "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7446c131fb4443f464f1cea7d7be402cb8e1e42379c5877ca11997ec020d162f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0080cccf9d6d9bf5bef4f81aea46d3b64d4507e8ae54774b9d9a3e72f183adb8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "And\nwhen I get unreasonable and generally brutal and abusive, I am not\nreally and fundamentally so any more than I am now!\"\n\n\"I know, dearest; I know, Bessie. And, now, don't give yourself a\nminute's uneasiness about anything that took place. I apologize for\neverything out of the proper which I said----\"\n\n\"Which you _said_?\"\n\n\"Yes--yes! You were quite right, and I never loved you more than\nthen--except now. Let's not allude to it again, but just go on as\nbefore.\"\n\n\"Not quite as before,\" said she. \"I'll not ask you why you kept back\nso many of your--your _my_--qualities from me--_must_ you get down here\nat this old counting-room?--and I'll only ask you two questions--cramp\nthe carriage a little more, William! One is, where can I get a copy of\nthe first edition of Child's _Scottish Ballads_--wasn't that the name\nof the 'Dark Tower' book?\"\n\n\"You may search me, Bessie,\" said he, standing by the curb in front of\nhis office. \"Don't think I ever heard of it.\"\n\n\"Oh, Eugene!\" cried Elizabeth, \"don't take that attitude again! But\nbring it up to me when you come to begin our readings in _Pippa\nPasses_!\"\n\n\"Ah! Now you are joking! Good-by, Bess. Unless I'm run over between\nnow and eight-thirty, you may look for me. By-by!\"\n\nNot quite so fortunate, this last five minutes of conversation. But\nall unaware of that fact, Brassfield went back into the private office,\nand found Conlon awaiting him. Brassfield opened a drawer and drew out\na roll of drawings and typewritten specifications.\n\n\"Now as to this contract, Conlon----\" he began.\n\n\"Ixcuse me, Misther Brassfield,\" interrupted Conlon, \"but the contract\nmay wait: some things won't. What's the matther with Edgington?\"\n\n\"Edgington? The matter? What do you mean?\"\n\nConlon leaned over the shelf of the roll-top desk, and pressed upon a\npaper-weight with his knobby thumb.\n\n\"Thin ye don't know,\" said he impressively, \"that he's out pluggin' up\na dale to bate you an' nominate McCorkle!\"\n\nBrassfield faced him smilingly.\n\n\"Oh, that notion of Edgington's!\" said he. \"That amounts to nothing!\nIf you and my other strong friends stay by me, there's nothing to fear.\nI'm glad you know of that little whim of Edgington's. But about this\ncontract. Now, I usually look after these things myself, and do them\nby days' work. But if I am forced to take this office of mayor, I\nsha'n't be able to do this--won't have the time; and I'll want you to\ndo it. Perhaps I'd better give you a check on account now--say on the\nterms of the Rogers' job? All right, there's five hundred. That\nsettles the contract. Now with that off our minds, let's talk of the\npolitical situation. You can see that, being forced into this, I don't\nwant to be skinned. Now, what can you do, Conlon?\"\n\n\"Do?\" said Conlon. \"Ask anny of the byes that've got things in the\npast! Wait till the carkuses an' ye'll see. But mind, Misther\nBrassfield, don't be too unconscious. Edgington an' McCorkle, startin'\nin on the run the day of carkuses, may have good cards. Watch thim!\"\n\n\n\n\nXVI\n\nTHE OFFICE GOES IN QUEST OF THE MAN\n\n Victory brings peace without;\n Amity conquers within.\n How can my thought hide a doubt?\n Doubt in the mighty is sin!\n Yet, as I watch from my height,\n Rearing his spears like a wood,\n On swarms the dun Muscovite--\n Slavish, inebriate, rude!\n Dim-seen, within the profound,\n Shapeless, insensate, malign,\n Fold within dragon-fold wound,\n Opes the dread Mongol his eyne!\n _One waking, one in the field--\n Foe after foe still I see.", "start_char_idx": 200887, "end_char_idx": 204418, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048": {"__data__": {"id_": "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "6c33a0dee38e1a6505b6995cfd01a063c1c9202500257c16e59bb58884b2fec7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "84f897ba6aed1e155d4a5599e113769d5bd9620083be033b2b0afe8a12c0315e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "_One waking, one in the field--\n Foe after foe still I see.\n Last of them all, half-revealed\n Prophecy's eye rests on--Me!_\n --_A Racial Reverie_.\n\nMr. Brassfield sat alone, listening to Barney Conlon's retreating\nfootsteps. A few years ago I could have described the solitude of the\ndeserted counting-house, and made a really effective scene of it. Now,\nhowever, telephones exist to deny us the boon. No sooner do we find\nourselves a moment alone, than we think of some one to whom we imagine\nwe have something to say, and call him up over the wire; or,\nconversely, he thinks of us with like results. Conlon's back was\nscarcely turned before Brassfield took down the receiver and asked for\nAlvord's residence.\n\n\"Jim,\" said he, \"I've just found out that Sheol is popping about\ntown. . . . Yes, it's Edgington. Conlon tells me he's out for\nMcCorkle and against me. . . . Well, maybe not, but Conlon generally\nknows. You must go out and run it down. We can't have McCorkle\nnominated--you can see why. . . . All right. I'll wait for you\nsomewhere out of sight. . . . In the Turkish room at Tony's? . . .\nVery well: I had another engagement, but I must call that off. Thanks,\nold man. I shall rely on you! Good-by!\"\n\nUp went the receiver, and then, almost at once was lifted to\nBrassfield's ear again as he sent in a call for Miss Waldron's\nresidence.\n\n\"Is this 758? Is Miss Waldron at home? . . . Yes, if you\nplease. . . . This you, Bess? Well, I'm in the hardest of hard luck.\nThings have come up which will keep me cooped up all the evening. . . .\nYou're awfully good to say so! Good night, dearest!\"\n\nThe lock clicked behind him, and he was out on the street once more.\nCame into view a figure which was clearly that of a stranger to\nBellevale, and yet had an oddly familiar air to Brassfield, as it moved\nuncertainly along the darkening highway. It came to the point of\nmeeting and halted, facing Brassfield squarely.\n\n\"I peg bardon,\" it said, \"but haf I the honor of attressing Herr\nBrassfield, or Herr Amidon?\"\n\n\"My name is Brassfield,\" was the reply. \"What can I do for you?\"\n\n\"I am stopping at the Bellevale House,\" said the professor.\n\"Blatherwick is my name. I hat hoped that you might rekonice me,\nas----\"\n\n\"I am sorry to dispel your hope,\" said Brassfield. \"What do you want\nwith me?\"\n\n\"I should pe klad to haf you aggompany me to my rooms,\" said the\nprofessor, \"vere I shouldt esdeem it a brifiliche to bresent you to my\ndaughter, and show you some dests in occult phenomena. As the shief\ncitizen of the city----\"\n\n\"My good man,\" said Brassfield, \"whatever would be my attitude\nordinarily toward your very kind, if rather unlooked-for, invitation,\npermit me now to decline on account of pressure of business.\nOrdinarily I should be curious to know just what kind of game you've\ngot, as I haven't enough in my pockets to be worth your while to\nflimflam me. Pardon me, if I seem abrupt.\"\n\nAnd he hurried down the street, leaving the professor drifting\naimlessly in his wake, vibrating between anger and perplexity.\n\n\"I wonder where I've seen that man?\" thought Brassfield. Dim\nreminiscences of such a figure sitting in shadowy background, while a\nglorious tigrine woman ruled over some realm only half-cognized, vexed\nthe crepuscular and terror-breeding reaches of his mind. He met a\npoliceman, who respectfully saluted him. Brassfield stopped as if for\na chat with the officer.\n\n\"A fine evening, Mallory,\" said he.\n\n\"Fine, indeed, sir,\" said the officer.", "start_char_idx": 204354, "end_char_idx": 207872, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529": {"__data__": {"id_": "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "3aef3f06c522b3948f02109eff08f0af2d80d96357b0d08a12573e7980c01257", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a0d2fcfd10bd88233fb285685ebbc9a7f336829a43dd3d169dd0d558c11b5b90", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Fine, indeed, sir,\" said the officer.\n\n\"Who is the old gentleman whom you just passed?\" asked Brassfield.\n\"The one with the glasses.\"\n\n\"That?\" asked the policeman. \"Why, didn't you recognize him? That's\nyour friend the hypnotist, up at the hotel--Professor Blatherwick.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Brassfield as he walked on, \"I didn't know him in the dusk.\nWe'll have to have better street lighting, eh, Mallory?\"\n\n\"No bad idea!\" said Mallory. \"Well, it'll be for you to say, I'm\nthinking.\"\n\n\"You don't think there's anything in this new movement, do you?\" asked\nBrassfield.\n\n\"Oh, no, sir,\" said the officer. \"And yet, in politics you never know.\nBut I feel sure it'll be all right. They can't do much this evening\nand to-morrow. Time's too short.\"\n\nBrassfield hurried on with an air of anxiety. The policeman's words\nwere not reassuring. He turned down a side street and entered a\nrestaurant, the proprietor of which at once placed himself and his\nestablishment at Mr. Brassfield's command.\n\n\"Give me the Turkish room, Tony,\" said Brassfield.\n\n\"Yes, sir, the Turkish room: and Charles to wait?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Brassfield. \"Cook me a tenderloin; and don't let any one\ncome into the room.\"\n\n\"Certainly, Mr. Brassfield! The Turkish room, and a steak, and no one\nadmitted----\"\n\n\"Except such people as Mr. Alvord may bring. We shall want some good\ncigars, and a few bottles of that blue seal.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" said Tony. \"Will you speak to this gentleman before you go\nup, sir?\"\n\nBrassfield turned and confronted an elderly man of florid countenance,\nwhose white mustache and frock-coat presented a most respectable\nappearance. Mr. Brassfield bent on him a piercing look, and strove\nmentally to account for the impression that he had met this man before,\nwondering again at that hazy association with the mystical, dreamy\nregion of the woman in yellow and black. It was as if he saw\neverything that evening through some medium capable of imparting this\nmystic coloring. The stranger faced him steadily.\n\n\"I presume you remember me, Mr. Brassfield,\" said he. \"Blodgett of\nHazelhurst.\"\n\n\"Of course it's unpardonable in me,\" said Brassfield, \"but I don't\nremember you, and I fear I've never heard of the place.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Judge Blodgett, \"it's entirely immaterial. I merely\nwanted to say that I've some matters of very great importance to\ncommunicate to you, if you'll just step up to my rooms at the Bellevale\nHouse.\"\n\n\"I can hardly conceive of anything you may have to say,\" said\nBrassfield guardedly, \"which can not be as well said here. We are\nquite alone.\"\n\n\"I--the fact is,\" said the judge, floundering, \"what I have to say must\nbe communicated in the presence of a person who is there, a person----\"\n\n\"May I ask whom?\"\n\n\"A lady--Madame--Miss Blatherwick.\"\n\nThe cunning of mental limitation again served Brassfield. He\nrecognized the name as the one mentioned by the professor on the\nstreet. Why this conspiracy to bring him to this strange woman at the\nhotel? Was it a plot? Was it blackmail or political trickery, or what?\n\n\"I am very much engaged to-night,\" said he. \"Whatever you have to say,\nsay here, and at once.\"\n\nThe judge felt like seizing his man forcibly, and taking him to Madame\nle Claire for restoration. The Brassfield cunning was an impenetrable\ndefense. Bellevale's chief business man seemed to be himself again, a\nkeen, cool man of affairs, to whom Judge Blodgett, Professor\nBlatherwick and Clara were, except for the brief and troubled intervals\nduring which the Amidon personality had been brought uppermost,\nstrangers,--until she could once more bring him within the magic ring\nof her occult power. Brought within it he must be, but how? The judge\nfelt beaten and baffled. Yet he would try one more device.", "start_char_idx": 207834, "end_char_idx": 211575, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce": {"__data__": {"id_": "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "25a25d905a87f5d39b3ea92e90658a1cdf7f28201f603110db2191d6ba353fc6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "757e6f62715afec3706b128c1a65dce599eb9e8881f4ff116d9a03966753bbf2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The judge\nfelt beaten and baffled. Yet he would try one more device.\n\n\"The matter can hardly be discussed here,\" said he, \"but I may say that\nit relates to the evidence you lack in the Bunn's Ferry well cases. I\nhappen to know of your desire for proof of certain facts in the spring\nof 1896, and----\"\n\nMr. Brassfield started and changed color.\n\n\"You know--this woman knows,\" he said, \"something to my advantage in\nthe matter?\"\n\nJudge Blodgett nodded. Brassfield looked at his watch, paced back and\nforth, and made as if to follow Blodgett to the door. Blodgett's heart\nbeat stiflingly.\n\n\"You are coming?\" said he.\n\nSomething in the tone betrayed his anxiety. Again suspicion rose to\ndominance in the mind of Brassfield; and entering at the door came Jim\nAlvord, and one or two hulking, mustachioed citizens of the ward-heeler\ntype. He turned on the judge.\n\n\"No,\" said he, \"it is impossible for me to go now. But I am much\ninterested in what you say, and to-morrow---- No, not to-morrow, for I\nshall be very busy; but the day after we will take it up with you, if\nquite convenient to you. In the meantime, if you will be so kind as to\ncall on my lawyer, Mr. Edgington, I shall be very glad. He is\nauthorized to make terms--anything reasonable, you know. Good night,\nMr. Blodgett. I hope we shall meet again!\"\n\n\"Your old friend Blodgett seems agitated to-night,\" said Alvord, as\nthey sat alone in the Turkish room. \"He's got to be quite a fellow\nhere on the strength of your friendship. Wish he was a voter. We\ncould use him. Maybe he can help in a quiet, way. Anything wrong with\nhim? Seemed worked up.\"\n\nSmilingly, as if Alvord's remarks had been as plain to him as they were\ncharged with mystery, Brassfield replied that so far as he knew\nBlodgett was all right, and that he might be of use further along in\nthe campaign.\n\n\"And now,\" said he, \"tell me what on earth has sent Edgington off on\nthis tangent. He's the man who first suggested to me that I ought to\nrun. It was his scheme. He's my lawyer and my friend. What does it\nmean?\"\n\n\"Well, I saw Edge, and he's got a list of reasons longer'n an\nanaconda's dream. He says that since your return from your New York\ntrip you've seemed different. I don't mind saying that there's others\nsay the same thing.\"\n\n\"Different?\" said Brassfield, in an anxiety rendered painful by the\nmissing time and these strangers whom he was accused of knowing, but\nwho behaved as strangers to him. \"How?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Alvord, \"kind of not the same in manner--offish with the\ngang, an' sort of addicted to the professor and the hypnotist--no kick\nfrom me, old chap, you understand, but I'm filing a kind of bill of\nexceptions, an' these things go in.\"\n\n\"I see,\" said Brassfield. \"Go on!\"\n\n\"Then you'll have to own you've done some funny stunts,\" continued\nAlvord. \"You've fired old Stevens, and you've been going over your\nbooks with this man Blodgett, and talking of selling him an\ninterest----\"\n\n\"Talking of what?\" exclaimed Brassfield.\n\n\"Oh, it's your own business, you know, but a sort of shock to the\nfeelings and finances of the community all the same. Not that it\naffects me, or that many know of it, but the inner circle is\ndisturbed--and, mind, I'm leading up to Edgington's flop.\"\n\n\"I see,\" said Brassfield. \"Go on!\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Alvord, \"the mystery comes in right here. He says he went\nup to see you and you flew up and took a high moral attitude and said\nit was a dirty mess, and you wouldn't touch it.", "start_char_idx": 211506, "end_char_idx": 214983, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0": {"__data__": {"id_": "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "aedca39ade5f968853fc461d4d2af5b419c2d3318629538d0bfcfd4f55e539f5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cb25317349b10acc944b10ea3cffd112e387a0a9ca55185febb24aa77699f1f4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He thought it was some\nof Bess's isms that she brought home from college--civic purity, and\nall that impractical rot that these intellectual women get, and he says\nhe began hunting for some one to run in to fill the vacancy caused by\nthe declination of E. Brassfield. He was knocked numb when he found\nout that you were out for the place. You must have said _something_ to\nhim, you know. Now what in the name of Dodd was it?\"\n\nBrassfield walked up and down the room for a few moments, wringing his\nhands and alternately hardening and relaxing the muscles of his arms as\nif engaged in some physical culture exercise, but saying never a word.\nThis blank Cimmeria of his past, into which he had stared vainly for\nfive years, seemed about to deliver up its secret, or a part of it.\nAlready, it was clear, it had disgorged this man Blodgett, and these\nother questionable characters at the inn. But they would find him\nready for them. This man that was looking over his books would\ndiscover that what Eugene Brassfield wanted he took, and what he took\nhe held. They were after his money, no doubt. Well, he would see.\nAnd in the meantime, Edgington's defection should not be allowed to\ndisarrange matters. The business interests involved were too great.\nWhen he turned to answer Alvord, he was pale as death, but calm as ever.\n\n\"Oh, Edgington misconstrued entirely what I said,\" he answered. \"I\ncan't just repeat it--we had some talk along the lines he mentioned,\nbut I never said anything that he ought to have understood in that way.\nIs he on the square, do you think?\"\n\n\"On the dead square,\" said Alvord. \"I'll stake my life on that.\"\n\n\"Well, what has he done?\"\n\n\"He's got McCorkle out for the nomination.\"\n\n\"To stay?\" asked Brassfield. \"Can't we give Mac something else, later?\"\n\n\"No, Edgington says not: you see, the colonel has wanted to be mayor a\nlong time. Edgington can't pull him off, and as long as he sticks,\nEdge's got to stick by him. Edgington's for you as hard as ever after\nthe caucuses--if you win.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Brassfield, \"most everybody will be. You've run your eye\nover the line-up: can we win?\"\n\n\"It depends,\" said Alvord, \"on the two men down in the\nrestaurant--Sheehan and Zalinsky. You know their following, and what\nthey want. Our crowd stands in with the better element. McCorkle\ncan't hold more than half his own church, and we're as strong as\nhorseradish with the other gospel plants. The A. O. C. M. gang\nEdgington won't try to split, but will leave to us, and through them\nwe'll get the liberal element in line--the saloons, and the seamy side\ngenerally, I mean, of course. The labor vote we need help with, and\nI've brought in Sheehan and Zalinsky to sort of arrange a line of\npolicy that'll round 'em up. With their help we'll control the\ncaucuses. After the caucuses, it's plain sailing.\"\n\nBrassfield made a few figures on a card, and handed it to Alvord, who\nlooked at it attentively and nodded approvingly.\n\n\"That ought to be an elegant sufficiency,\" said he.\n\n\"All right,\" said Brassfield, \"you handle that end of it, and I'll\ndiscuss the interests of labor. We'll show Colonel McCorkle what a\nfight without interests means in this town. Are the wine and cigars\nhere? Then go down and bring the patriots up, Jim.\"\n\n\n\n\nXVII\n\nTHE HONOR NEARS ITS QUARRY\n\n And every man, and woman, too, was forged at Birmingham,\n And mounted all in batteries, each on a separate cam;\n And when one showed, in love or war or politics or fever,\n A sign of maladjustment, why you just pulled on his lever,\n And upside down and inside out and front side back he stood;\n And the Inspector saw which one was evil, which was good.\n\n Chorus:\n\n On the other side!\n On the other side!\n Oh, you must somehow see the other side!", "start_char_idx": 214985, "end_char_idx": 218762, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899": {"__data__": {"id_": "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "3088a45e5cbd31a3a034775138d7d9404c6eeaffbbde5145816b59bf10e0ccfe", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "eb7d2339d9fa4334c14ab7ce2b758feb97e10d88370c1113aedae28169f314ce", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "On the other side!\n Oh, you must somehow see the other side!\n If you'd repair or clean\n This delicate old machine,\n You must have a way to see the other side!\n --_The Inventor's Song in, \"Bedlam.\"_\n\nMessrs. Sheehan and Zalinsky, before being ushered into the Turkish\nroom where Mr. Brassfield sat awaiting them, were told by Mr. Alvord\nthat, should Mr. Brassfield's position on the labor question be found\nsatisfactory to them, he would like to have their good offices in the\nmatter of getting a fair attendance at the caucuses the next evening.\nAs this is always an expensive thing for the patriot who engages to do\nit, he, Mr. Alvord, would beg to place at their disposal funds in an\namount named by him, for use in the transportation of distant and\nenfeebled voters and for such refreshment as might be thought necessary.\n\n\"Weh-ull,\" said Sheehan, \"Fr th' carkuses only it may do. What say,\nZalinsky?\"\n\nMr. Zalinsky, his eyes gleaming with gratification, thought the sum\nnamed might possibly suffice.\n\n\"Good!\" said Alvord. \"And now come up and see the next mayor.\"\n\n\"What's de use?\" asked Zalinsky. \"Don't we know him all right? Ain't\nit all fixed? I want to git busy wit me end of deliverin' de goods.\"\n\n\"Mr. Brassfield's views on labor----\" began Alvord, but Sheehan\ninterrupted him.\n\n\"Your word goes wid us!\" said he. \"Ye've convinced us Brassfield's the\nlaborin' man's frind. What say, Zalinsky?\"\n\n\"So!\" said Zalinsky. \"Ve better git to work over in de fourt' ward.\"\n\n\"They didn't come up,\" said Alvord, returning to the Turkish room.\n\"The figures on that card seemed to convince 'em. Now for the saloons\nand their end of the vote.\"\n\n\"What do _they_ want?\" asked Brassfield.\n\n\"Why,\" said Alvord, \"it's the policy of the office more'n anything else\nthey want assurances on. I've sent for Fatty Pierson and his fellow\nmembers of the retail liquor dealers' association, and they'll be here\nby the time we dispose of this steak. I must be counted in on the\ndinner--I forgot mine.\"\n\nWhile Alvord, greatly rejoiced at the sudden restoration of his friend\nto the possession of those qualities which made him so useful and\nreliable in all business projects, and promised so well for the future\nof Bellevale under his wise, conservative and liberal administration as\nmayor, was cozily discussing the dinner in the Turkish room at Tony's,\nawaiting the arrival of Mr. Fatty Pierson and his committee, there was\na council of the hypnotic board of strategy at the Bellevale House.\nThe board consisted of Judge Blodgett, Professor Blatherwick, and\nMadame le Claire. The matter under consideration was how to return\nBrassfield to his much-to-be-desired nihility: how to recover Amidon\nfrom his relapse into occultation.\n\n\"I can never forgive myself for allowing it!\" cried Madame le Claire.\n\"And yet, how could I help it? His clerk came running in with a\ntelegram, or something of the sort, and Mr. Amidon rushed away with\nhim. What would this man have thought and said, if I had subjected his\nemployer to the treatment necessary to restore him--put him into the\ncataleptic state, and then into the normal, by passes and\nmanipulations!\"\n\n\"Just now,\" answered the judge, \"when he seems to be doing the meteor\nact in local politics, such an occurrence in public might be\nmisconstrued in non-hypnotic circles, and commented on. Passes and\nmanipulations are not thoroughly understood in politics--except in a\ndifferent sense! I guess you had to let him go. How to get him back,\nis the question. He's certainly off the map as Amidon: turned me down\nwhen I tried to get him up here, with the air of a bank president\ndealing with a check-raiser; and yet, the way he rose to the lure of\ngetting evidence in this lawsuit of his shows that he's as sharp as\never in business.", "start_char_idx": 218699, "end_char_idx": 222500, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe": {"__data__": {"id_": "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "5010e3fe86f740de5b84a624d7db0905a5f51600eefe50e42821101a817f8832", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "fbd01e8c8174ca22c43f0ab1c9a0f4b56bb85670e59177501232ce2bea5a7a41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "What's likely to be the result if he's allowed to go\nin this way, Professor?\"\n\n\"Nopody gan say,\" said the professor. \"He may go on as Brassfield for\nanodder fife years or more. He may vake up as Amidon to-morrow\nmorning. Propoply he vill geep on intefinitely, aggumulating\nspondulix, and smashing hearts, unless ve gan pinch him some vay.\"\n\n\"Oh, we must get him back!\" said Madame le Claire. \"We _must_!\"\n\n\"In te interests off science,\" said the professor, \"id vould pe\ntesiraple to allow him to go on as Brassfield ant note results. Ve haf\nalreaty optained some faluaple data in the fact of his attempt to buy\nthe destimony of our frient the chutche, and his gontemptuous treatment\nof me as a con man. He didn't seem to remember us at all. Should ve\nnot allow de gase to go on a vile? Supliminally gonsidered, it vill be\ngreat stuff!\"\n\n\"No!\" exclaimed the judge. \"It ain't safe. He'll be running for\nmayor, and doing a lot of things to make him trouble when he does come\nto. We've got to surround him somehow; and he's a wary bird.\"\n\n\"Anyway,\" said the professor, \"I should like to opsairve the result of\na meeting with Clara. In his short Brassfield states he saw her, ant\nher only. Vill he remember her clearly, or how? How vill dis mind of\nhis coordinate te tisgonnected views of her, with te rest of his vorld?\nIt ought to pe vorked out.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the judge, \"I don't owe science much. I'm against any\nexperiments. Can't some one suggest something to do? Is it feasible\nto kidnap him?\"\n\n\"Let me suggest something,\" said Madame le Claire hesitatingly. \"In\nhis Brassfield state he seemed to--to like me very much. In affairs\nconcerning--that is, affairs relating to women--he seems less wary, to\nuse Judge Blodgett's word, than he is on other lines. Maybe I\ncould--could induce him to come. It seems a sort of--of questionable\nthing to do; but----\"\n\n\"Questionable!\" cried the judge, \"questionable! Why, not at all. We\nmust try it. I'll risk it!\"\n\n\"If ve are to gif up te itea of vorking out the gase,\" acquiesced the\nprofessor, \"vy I agree vith the chutche.\"\n\n\"That is,\" said the girl, \"like the judge, you'll 'risk it.' Very\nbrave of you both to 'risk' so much! As for me, I must ask for time to\nthink over my own proposal, before I undertake to entrap this prominent\nbusiness man at my apartments. I'm not so sure that I'll 'risk' it.\nAnd yet it seems the only way!\"\n\n\nSpeaking of traps: The emissaries of the retail liquor dealers'\nassociation were engaged in a trapping enterprise of their own in the\nTurkish room at Tony's, at this very crucial moment. Fatty Pierson,\nand two fellow retailers, gentlemen of smooth-shaven face, ample girth,\nand that peculiar physiognomy which seems fitted to no artistic setting\nexcept a background of mirrors and glasses, and a plain foreground of\npolished wood, were arranging for a police policy to their liking,\nduring the Brassfield administration.\n\n\"Colonel McCorkle,\" said Fatty, \"is a mighty good man, and, while a\nchurch member, seems to be liberal. On the other hand, you're well\nknown to be broad in your views, and you do things\"--here Fatty's arm\ntook in the bottles and the cigars with a sweeping gesture--\"that he\ndon't. You've got property rented for saloon purposes. We know you're\na good man, Mr. Brassfield, but in such matters we saloon men have\nlearned to be careful. A police force can make our business profitable\nor put us all dead losers, just as they're steered by the mayor. Now,\nwhat would be your policy?\"\n\n\"I should expect,\" said Mr.", "start_char_idx": 222502, "end_char_idx": 226044, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f": {"__data__": {"id_": "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "b3bdaabad6773aa9b3ddb4baf8a63fe9ac3da9d08da229b70648e25e24b55102", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7caafdcea28facb337e7ef7e73ec7fdc78c93d4c94769eb8e98884ec4fa694c4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Now,\nwhat would be your policy?\"\n\n\"I should expect,\" said Mr. Brassfield, \"to give the city a good,\nconservative, business administration, and to make my oath of office my\nguide.\"\n\n\"Good!\" said Fatty. \"But we've all heard that before. Colonel\nMcCorkle, or the Reverend Absalom McCosh, would say _that_.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Brassfield, \"now, definitely, what do you want? Anything\nreasonable and not contrary to law, you have only to ask for.\"\n\nI wonder if burglars, in arranging their business, stipulate that\nnothing \"contrary to law\" is to be done!\n\n\"Exactly,\" replied Fatty. \"But now as to reasonableness: when the hour\nfor closing comes, our customers bein' gathered for social purposes, it\nseems abrupt to fire 'em all out when the clock strikes. Now, when a\npoliceman comes along after hours an' finds one of us with a roomful of\ncustomers discussin' public questions, we don't want to turn up in\ncourt next morning. See?\"\n\n\"I see,\" said Brassfield. \"My view of the function of the saloon is\nthat it is a sort of club for those too poor to belong to the more\nexclusive organizations. As long as they are performing these\nfunctions in an orderly way, why inquire as to the hour?\"\n\n\"That seems reasonable,\" said Fatty. \"And about how long ought a man\nto have to slow up an' stop performin' functions, do you think?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Mr. Brassfield, \"there isn't much doing in the way of\nbusiness, say from two to five A. M., is there?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Mr. Pierson, \"not much. But on special occasions----?\"\n\n\"I shall do the right thing,\" said Brassfield.\n\n\"An' you wouldn't feel obliged,\" queried Pierson, \"to start any\ndetectives out spyin' upon the uses we put our second stories to, or\nthe kind of tenants we have?\"\n\n\"Not at all,\" said Brassfield. \"I shan't disturb things. Alvord can\ntell you that. What I want is the policy that is best for the property\nowners; and things as they are are good enough for me. Is that\nsatisfactory?\"\n\n\"Well, I should smile!\" said Mr. Pierson. \"And now, gentlemen, before\nwe go an' begin work for the caucuses to-morrow, in the interests of\nour friend here, I propose a toast to Mr. Eugene Brassfield, who will\nbe the best mayor Bellevale ever had!\"\n\n\"You've got to give me a bed to-night,\" said Brassfield, as the last of\nthe delegations Alvord had brought to the Turkish room retired in\napparent satisfaction. \"I don't care to go to my rooms--there are too\nmany folks up there at the hotel who seem anxious to see me. And I\nwant to be where I can talk the situation over with you.\"\n\n\"Glad to have you,\" said Alvord. \"Come on, and we'll turn in. As for\nthe situation, how can you improve it? If Conlon and Sheehan and\nZalinsky can't control these caucuses, I'm mistaken. Put them along\nwith the saloons and the others that depend on police permission for\nexistence, and you've got a dead open-and-shut.\"\n\nAs they walked along the street they noticed a motley crowd emerging\nfrom a public house and moving in a body to another, seemingly under\nthe leadership of a little man with Jewish features. Alvord took\nBrassfield's arm and hurried him on.\n\n\"You see what Edgington's up to?\" asked Brassfield. \"He's got Abe\nMeyer out taking the crowd down the line in McCorkle's interest. I\nwonder if they won't turn things over somewhat.\"\n\n\"Turn nothing!\" said Alvord. \"They'll make the noise to-night; we'll\nhave the votes to-morrow night. The boys'll rake in McCorkle's money\nnow, and in the morning the word will be passed that the best interests\nof the town require every one to boost for you. They won't know what\nhit 'em!\"\n\n\"I hope you're right,\" answered Brassfield, \"but Edgington's no fool.\nI wouldn't have him for my lawyer if he was.\"", "start_char_idx": 225983, "end_char_idx": 229673, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f": {"__data__": {"id_": "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "38a67a7a56fb4b98aea1144caf1ebf4a144752f3f0a703262899866a435d7129", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dccd0c798c7a5cfd865be115ccc6883c3e2e6cea65a0e576890765063e221ccb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I wouldn't have him for my lawyer if he was.\"\n\n\"Of course he's no fool,\" was Alvord's reply, \"but he's handicapped by\nthe personality of his man. Edge's doing pretty well, considering. He\nprobably is wise to the situation. He didn't expect anything like a\ncontest, you know, owing to that confounded blunder one of you two\nmade. Now he's doing the best he can; but his man's been too strong in\nthe God-and-morality way in years gone by to wipe out the stain by one\nevening of free booze. On the other hand, your life has been\nperfect--always careful and sound in business, no isms or reform\nsentiments on any line, a free spender, a paying attendant of the\nrichest church, but not a member, and no wife full of wild ideas for\nthe uplifting of folks that don't want to be uplifted. Why, Mrs.\nMcCorkle's advanced ideas alone are enough to make him lose out.\"\n\n\"I don't know about that,\" said Brassfield. \"McCorkle and his wife are\nnot the same in these affairs.\"\n\n\"Well, don't you fall down and forget it,\" said Alvord, \"that the\nfellows on the seamy side won't see it your way. They've got good\nimaginations, and they can see the colonel on one side of the table and\nhis wife, the president of the Social Purity League, pouring tea on the\nother, and they can see the position it would put the mayor in to do\nthe right thing along liberal lines--and he sort of strict in habits\nhimself. No, sir, my boy, you go to bed and sleep sweetly. You are\nabout to reap the reward of living the right kind of a life.\"\n\nAnd sweetly Mr. Brassfield slept, with none of the anxiety felt by\nJudge Blodgett as to whether he would awake as Brassfield or Amidon.\n\n\n\n\nXVIII\n\nA GLORIOUS VICTORY\n\n Narcissus saw his image, and fell in love with it,\n But jilted pretty Echo, who wailed and never quit.\n This beauteous youth was far less kind than I,\n my friend, or you:\n For we adore our own good looks and love our echoes, too.\n --_Adventures in Egoism_.\n\nI really shrink from giving an account of the result of the Bellevale\ncaucuses next evening, for fear of imparting to the general reader--who\nis, of course, a violent patriot--the idea that I am narrating facts\nshowing an exceptionally bad condition in municipal affairs, in the\ntriumph of one or the other of two bad men. This impression I should\nbe loath to give. Colonel McCorkle, whom we know by hearsay only,\nseems to be so good a citizen that his belated attempt to be \"broad\"\nand \"liberal\" excites laughter in some quarters. As for Mr.\nBrassfield, there are at least nine chances in ten that he is the man\nwho would have received the support of the gentle reader had it been\nhis own city's campaign.\n\nIn fact, Mr. Brassfield is psychologically incapable of deviating much\nfrom the course marked out by the average ethics of his surroundings.\nThis subconscious mind which--as Professor Blatherwick so clearly\nexplained to us--normally operates below the plane of consciousness,\nhappens, in his case, to be abnormally acting consciously; but it is\nstill controlled by suggestion. The money-making mania being in all\nminds, he becomes a money-maker. The usual attitude of society toward\nall things--including, let us say, women, poetry, politics and public\nduty--is the one into which the Brassfield mind inevitably fell. The\nmen on whom any age bestows the accolade of greatness, are those who\nembody the qualities--virtues and vices--of that age. Your popular\nstatesman and hero is merely the incarnate Now. Every president is to\nhis supporters \"fit to rank with Washington and Lincoln.\" Future ages\nmay accord to him only respectable mediocrity; but the generation which\nsees itself reflected in him, sees beauty and greatness in the\nreflection. Bellevale was psychically reflected in Brassfield.\nTherefore Bellevale raised him on the shield of popularity.", "start_char_idx": 229628, "end_char_idx": 233463, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a": {"__data__": {"id_": "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "e8aa3f89d285df509fcbef34bd3d313825ac4154c9bb3acd224fc63f7486dcf1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b7e7a246e98c191083b94bfee9fc0f6141ed8861cb805b48d17c14c9f0e7224d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Therefore Bellevale raised him on the shield of popularity. One may\nsee this reflected in the conversation of Major Pumphrey, one of\nBellevale's solid citizens, with Mr. Smith, who owned the department\nstore, on the morning after the caucuses.\n\n\"Rather lively times, I hear,\" said Major Pumphrey, catching step with\nMr. Smith on their walk down town. \"Rather lively times at the\ncaucuses last evening.\"\n\n\"Really,\" answered Mr. Smith, \"I don't know. I never attend caucuses.\nEvery one has his friends, you know, and by not taking sides one saves\nmany enmities.\"\n\n\"I don't agree with you,\" said the major. \"Every one should attend his\nparty primaries, as a matter of duty.\"\n\n\"You were out last night?\" said the merchant interrogatively.\n\n\"Why, no,\" said the major, \"not last night. The fact is, Colonel\nMcCorkle and I served in the same regiment, and belong to the post\nhere, and he expected me to support him. At the same time, the\nnomination of Mr. Brassfield appeared to be the only right thing from\nthe standpoint of party expediency or business wisdom. Brassfield can\nbe elected. He is strong in business circles. His integrity is\nunquestioned, and there'll be no graft or shady deals under him. He\nstands well in society, too. I just saw Doctor Bulkon, who expressed\nhimself as thoroughly delighted with the nomination of so good a man as\nBrassfield, and intends to preach next Sunday on 'The Christian's\nVote,' handling the subject in such a way as to point to Brassfield as\nthe right man. I couldn't consistently oppose Brassfield, and so I\nstayed at home.\"\n\n\"Oh, you're quite right!\" exclaimed Mr. Smith. \"My attendance would\nnot have made any difference in the result. Colonel McCorkle is a good\nman, but after Mr. Brassfield made us a present of the money to pay off\nour church debt recently none of us could decently have gone out and\nworked against him even for the colonel. They say that McCorkle is a\ngood deal chagrined by the small showing he made--claims that the\nsaloons and the lower classes ran the caucuses, and that the decent\nelement stayed away altogether.\"\n\n\"Pooh!\" scoffed Mr. Pumphrey. \"A little sore is all--soon get over it.\nI only hope Brassfield will be able to get us that trolley line he\npromises. That would bring Bellevale abreast of the times.\"\n\n\"That's certainly true,\" was Mr. Smith's answer. \"Mr. Brassfield is an\nenterprising citizen, broad and liberal, safe and sane, and fully in\ntouch with the great business interests of the country. His nomination\nwill reflect credit on Bellevale.\"\n\nInasmuch as such citizens as Conlon, Pierson, Sheehan and Zalinsky were\nequally well contented, no one, it would seem, ought to have been\ndissatisfied. The fact that Mr. Brassfield's success meant the giving\naway of Bellevale's streets to Brassfield's interurban trolley line\nmust be considered in connection with the fact that Bellevale seemed\nonly too anxious to give them away.\n\nOne must look at such things from all sides, if one is to come to a\nsatisfactory conclusion. Miss Waldron, having a keenly personal\ninterest in the matter, and being a member of the cultured and leisure\nclass, endeavored to do this. Her conclusions, both personal and\npolitical, seem to be fully set forth in a letter which she wrote to\nher friend Estelle in New York.\n\n\"You know I always was a queer little beast,\" said this letter, after a\nfew pages in which such words as \"chiffon,\" \"corsage,\" \"lingerie,\"\n\"full ritual,\" and similar expressions occur with some frequency, but\nthe contents of which are quite obscure in their bearing on the course\nof this history--\"and was ever finding happiness where others saw\nmisery, and _vice versa_. Well, I am doing something of the same sort\nnow in turning over and over in my mind the question as to whether I\nshould ever marry any one or not.", "start_char_idx": 233404, "end_char_idx": 237225, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222": {"__data__": {"id_": "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0efe1a2541f5e5281b0a23d7f2a5d40bd12fed81938d43b90c5520c33dd08963", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0e69751c701ed1ec61fbb104d8317c93c4042604a713394c97f2e81719279efd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I know perfectly well that no one\ncan ever be the One for me if Eugene is not--but is there a One? Don't\nsay that I am a little--goose, but listen and ponder.\n\n\"You remember the sort of literary friendship I had with George L----?\nWell, of course George was a veritable Miss Nancy, and perfectly\nabsurd, but there was something basically likeable about him. Now, I\nalways have thought that if one could grind George and Eugene to a pulp\nand mix them, the compromise would be my ideal. I like men who do\nthings, and Eugene is the most forceful man I ever knew. Owing to your\nabsence when he was in New York you missed seeing him, but his pictures\nmust have shown you how handsome and strong and masterly he is. Well,\nthis phase of a man must please any girl.\n\n\"Is it possible for such qualities to subsist in the same personality\nwith those I loved (there's no use denying it--in a platonic sense) in\nGeorge? In other words, can one reasonably expect to find a man who\ncan win battles in the world's life of this twentieth century, who will\nnot stare at one in utter lack of comprehension when he finds one\ndropping tears on the pages of _Charmides_, or _McAndrew's Prayer_, or\nOmar, and perhaps try to comfort one--at the moment when the divine\ndespair wrought by poignant beauty fills one with divine happiness?\nIt's horribly clumsy as I put it; but you'll know.\n\n\"He's just as good and kind and considerate as a man can be, and as\nlittle spoiled by the fierce battles which he has fought--_and\nwon!_--as could possibly be expected--in fact, not at all spoiled.\nEven this suspicion of a lack of the gift of seeing that the violet\n'neath a mossy stone is a good deal more than that--the chief good\nquality George had--around which I have been writing in these pages,\nseems to be more a suspicion than a reality; for recently he has once\nor twice ventured on discussions of such matters with a confidence and\nan insight which put me--me, who have plumed myself on my mental St.\nSimeon's tower, like a detestable intellectual cockatoo (you must\nuntwist the metaphors!)--at his feet in the attitude of a humble\nlearner. It took some of the conceit out of me; and yet, with true\nElizabethan inconsistency I turned this new view of his character\nagainst him, and because he--well, it doesn't matter what--I gave him a\npre-nuptial instalment of 'cruel and inhuman treatment.'\n\n\"Then he became timid and over-respectful, and not at all like himself,\nand I all the time just longing to make up to him all the arrears of\nkindness which were due. It seemed as if I had a new lover, one who\nneeded encouragement, one who made a goddess of me, in the place of the\nalmost too bold gallant who had been mine; and lo! when he suddenly\ncomes on me with all his pristine assurance and seeming contempt for\nthe weepful things I mentioned above, I don't like it at all. I feel\nas if two men in the same mask are courting me, and I without\ndiscernment enough to tell one from the other.\n\n\"Now, if I am so shilly-shallying as this before marriage, what shall I\nbe after? Can I go on with so much of doubt in my own mind?\n\n\"Oh, if I could only be sure of the Eugene I think I sometimes see,\nstrong to do, tender to feel, and with the uplift of insight----\n\n\"To show how thoroughly insane my state of mind is, I have only to say\nto you that by the exercise of the most tremendous pressure on the part\nof our very best men, Eugene, much against his will, has been put in\nnomination for mayor. He will purify the civic life of our town, and,\nI am assured, will, if he will enter public life to that extent, be\nsent to Washington.\n\n\"I have always thought that I'd like Washington society----\"\n\nHere Elizabeth's letter came to an end. She read it over carefully,\ntore it up, threw the fragments in the grate, and wrote her friend\nanother and maybe a wiser one. Then she wrote to Mr. Brassfield a note\nwhich Mr. Amidon found in his room when he returned to being.", "start_char_idx": 237227, "end_char_idx": 241175, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe": {"__data__": {"id_": "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c04f57e6ff411c4b0419c4a779a468470863ad59a28a3871da28caf6011cdd3b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6e300f5b347db62b97076c908c8d8603eeeda3e2bcab91a2baf5d17f470e44e3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Amidon found in his room when he returned to being.\n\n\nOne can easily see from that which has gone before, what happened to\nColonel McCorkle. Edgington and Alvord and Brassfield talked it over\nin the Turkish room at Tony's after the caucuses.\n\n\"Of course you've made an ass of yourself, Edgington,\" said Mr.\nBrassfield, \"but you've gone through with it consistently, and it's all\nright. I could have explained all that idiotic talk of mine about not\nrunning--but why go over that now? Fill your glasses, and let's forget\nit!\"\n\n\"That's the talk!\" said Alvord. \"Forget it and all pull together in\nthis campaign you've made me the manager of.\"\n\n\"Well, as for forgetting it and pulling together,\" said Edgington, \"I,\nas the originator of the Brassfield idea, am not likely to hang back in\nthe harness. So, here's to success! But----\"\n\n\"There's no 'but' in this,\" said Alvord. \"The 'buts' are postponed\nuntil after election.\"\n\n\"There's nothing to the election,\" said Edgington. \"You have things\nlined up----\"\n\n\"_We_ have things lined up----\" suggested Alvord.\n\n\"Yes, that's right,\" acquiesced Edgington. \"It's '_we_,' with all my\nheart since the decision. I was saying that the way you have the\ndifferent interests working together is perfectly ideal, the wets and\nthe drys, the wide-opens and the closed-lids, the saloons and the dives\nand the churches--all shouting for Brassfield; and each class thinks\nhe's for its policy. The other man has about as much show--well, the\nnext is on me. Would you mind pressing the button, Jim?\"\n\nThe waiter came, bringing a penciled note to Mr. Brassfield.\n\n\"One of your constituents,\" it read, \"would like a moment's\nconversation with you in the lobby.\"\n\nBrassfield drew the waiter aside.\n\n\"Who is this, George?\" asked he, tapping the note. \"A woman?\"\n\n\"A young lady, suh,\" was the answer. \"A mahty hahnsome young lady,\nsuh.\"\n\n\"Bright auburn hair?\" asked Brassfield, \"and short?\"\n\n\"Er--no, suh,\" answered the waiter, \"sutn'y not that kin' o' haiah; an'\ntall, suh.\"\n\n\"Make mine the same,\" said Brassfield, \"and excuse me a moment, boys.\nI'll be right back.\"\n\nThe note had said in the lobby, but the waiter guided him to a private\nroom. Brassfield, cautious as usual, by a gesture commanded the waiter\nto precede him into the room, and himself halted at the entrance,\nlooking about the room for the young woman. She sat near the window,\nand rose to greet him as he entered--a tall and graceful girl with\nwonderful eyes and variegated hair.\n\n\"I could not wait to give you my congratulations,\" said she, offering\nhim her hand, \"until you came home. We at the hotel are wondering why\nwe have lost you. Let me rejoice with you in your great triumph.\"\n\nBrassfield's eyes sought hers. His soul recognized this as the queen\nof those hazy recollections which he could scarcely believe more than\ndreams, and felt her dominance.\n\n\"Thank you, ever so much,\" said he. \"I was just coming up to see you.\"\n\n\"How nice of you,\" said she. \"And in that case, why not go up with me\nand join me at my supper, which will be served in ten minutes?\"\n\n\"Why not, indeed!\" said Brassfield. \"George, tell Mr. Alvord and Mr.\nEdgington that I'll see them in the morning!\"\n\n\n\n\nXIX\n\nTHE ENTRAPPING OF MR. BRASSFIELD\n\n Ol' Mistah Wolf is a smaht ol' man,\n An' a raght smaht man is he;\n He take all the meat fum the trap an' he eat\n Not a mossel dat poisoned be!\n He laff at the snaiah, an' he nevah caiah\n When de niggah wake fum his nap;\n _But he foller the trail o' little Miss Wolf\n Raght inter the jaws o' the trap!", "start_char_idx": 241124, "end_char_idx": 244688, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359": {"__data__": {"id_": "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "07976b82dd6155f482918081f318acae75cac3df94c39ae11423cf2dbb6212ab", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1e9e6fcab455f35678485eea92dd12ad1bedced807c423d6eec53209e04126d0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But he foller the scent o' little Miss Wolf\n Kerslap in the deadfall trap!_\n --_\"Hidin'-Out\" Songs_.\n\nFrom a room adjoining that in which Madame le Claire had won her\nseeming victory over Mr. Brassfield's caution, emerged hastily that\nyoung woman's accomplices--her father and Judge Blodgett--who had\nshamelessly listened to the whole conversation. With more of haste\nthan seemliness they sped before Le Claire and her captive, and by\nvigorous expletives put the patient Aaron into unwonted motion in the\nprocuring of the \"little supper\" which they had heard Clara promise to\nthe candidate for mayor. Then, in a chamber farthest from the door,\nand well sheltered by draperies, they sat them down and waited for\ntheir prey.\n\n\"He's hooked!\" said the judge, \"hooked well; and I'll gamble she lands\nhim. She's a brick, Professor.\"\n\n\"So!\" answered the other. \"Ant now, if she vill only--what you call:\nreel him, blay him--until ve can get the data ve vant----\"\n\n\"To blazes with the data!\" exclaimed the judge. \"I'm for getting him\nback into the Amidon state and respectability, data or no data, before\nsome one else tolls him off into the poisonous swamp of popularity.\nWhy, I tell you, Professor--hark! There they come! Lay low, now!\"\n\nThe professor grasped his note-book, the judge the arms of his chair,\nas the door opened, and in the front room they heard Madame le Claire's\nvoice joining in companionable chat with that of Brassfield.\n\n\"Oh, how slow Aaron is!\" she said. \"And I'm so hungry. Aren't you?\"\n\n\"Not so much so as I was,\" said he. \"Sweets take away the appetite.\nI'd rather call the supper off, and exclude Abraham--or whatever his\nname is: much rather.\"\n\n\"Selfish!\" she reproved very severely. \"And I just in from a two\nhours' walk. _I_ haven't eaten any sweets----\"\n\n\"Nor I,\" said he. \"May I have just a little taste?\"\n\n\"Mr. Brassfield! Don't make me sorry I invited you here! Aaron's\nlikely to come in at any moment. Do you know when you were here last?\"\n\nBrassfield's brow wrinkled, as he looked about him.\n\n\"Ye-e-es,\" said he slowly, as if in doubt; and then in his ordinary\nmanner: \"Well, I should think I did. The day that donkey, Alderson,\ncame with the telegram. My faith, and so much has happened in the two\nor three days since! But to suggest that I could forget!\"\n\n\"Why not?\" said she, slipping close to him as he sat in a broad-armed\neasy chair. \"I'll wager anything you say you can't remember half the\ntimes you've been in my presence. Come now, the first time!\"\n\n\"Pshaw!\" said he, \"I'm not going into ancient history, further than to\nsay it was in a room with hangings like these, and a roar of traffic in\nthe street below. Come, dear, let's not talk of that----\"\n\nHer hand, straying near his hair, he took in his, and, crushing it to\nhis lips, kissed it passionately. She sank down on the side of his\nchair, and his arm crept insinuatingly about her waist. Her arms went\nround his neck, and she drew his head to her breast, softly, tenderly,\nand her lips met his--so many times that for years she blushed when the\nmemory returned to her.\n\n\"Darling!\" he whispered, \"do you love me?\"\n\n\"Love you?\" said she. \"Look in my eyes and see!\"\n\nSlowly, with her left hand in the curls on his neck, she drew her face\nfrom his, and, as if fascinated, his eyes sought hers in a long, long,\nhungry look.\n\n\"You do!\" he began gaspingly. \"Yes----\"\n\nThe slender fingers moved upward over his head, the commanding eyes\nheld his, the other hand, as if for a caress, swept his eyes shut, and\nhe lay back in the chair, inert as a corpse.", "start_char_idx": 244697, "end_char_idx": 248280, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614": {"__data__": {"id_": "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a1a04337581ec4b22474f88e9d24a39634b3f6bcc0f0e4199af61930682f4f41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a300951f0725c5f2ef4c0e66d88d00ae245fabf9964146cf6a7d6a326c7db474", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Madame le Claire untwined\nhis arms from her waist, and knelt on the floor before him, her hands\nclasped on his knees, her head pillowed in his senseless lap.\n\nTheir unseen auditors heard no more conversation, and the judge moved\nsoftly out to a place where he could see. Clara was sobbing as she\ngroveled at the feet of the man she had obliterated, rescued and\nrestored, and as she sobbed she pressed his hands to her lips. Judge\nBlodgett went back to the window, lifted it noisily and lowered it with\na crash. Then he walked into the front room, and found Madame le\nClaire sitting in a chair across the room from her subject, smilingly\nand triumphantly regarding the result of the exercise of her mystic\npower.\n\n\"Is he all right?\" queried the judge, looking at the inert form.\nMadame waved her hand at their prisoner, in answer.\n\n\"Cataleptic,\" said the professor, peering at him through his glasses.\n\"Bulse feeble, preath imberceptible. Yes, he is reeled in.\"\n\n\"Well, give him the gaff,\" said Blodgett. \"In other words, fetch him\nto.\"\n\nMadame le Claire stretched vibrant hands toward the entranced man, and\nagain uttered the sharp command, \"Awake!\"\n\nAmidon smilingly opened his eyes, and looked about him.\n\n\"Where are the letters?\" said he, looking about for those vexing\ncommunications, to find the meaning of which had been the object of the\ninquiry from which Alderson had drawn him with the telegram. \"Did you\nnote on them the information we wanted? Why, is it night? How long\nhave you had me under the influence? Is anything the matter, Clara?\"\n\n\"Not now,\" said Le Claire.\n\n\"Now eferyding is recht,\" added the professor.\n\n\"But you have given us the devil's own chase,\" said the judge.\n\n\"It is nearly midnight,\" said Mr. Amidon. \"Have I been out all the\nafternoon?\"\n\n\"All the afternoon!\" exclaimed Blodgett. \"Yes, and all day, and all\nyesterday, and the day before, and other days! You've been raising\nmerry Ned, Florian, in your Brassfield capacity. Do you want to know\nwhat you've done?\"\n\n\"_Do_ I?\" he cried. \"Tell me all at once!\"\n\n\"Well, for one thing,\" said the old lawyer, \"Edgington's long-incubated\nscheme has hatched, and you've been through a strenuous mayoralty\ncontest with Colonel McCorkle, and have swept the board. Your friends\ninsisted on it, you know, and you couldn't decline.\"\n\n\"Friends!\" sneered Amidon. \"I tell you, the whole thing is hypocrisy\nand graft. That villain Brassfield has a scheme for stealing the\nstreets. I told Edgington I wouldn't----\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the judge, \"and he took you at your word and trotted\nMcCorkle out, and you trimmed them up. But it's all made up with him,\nnow, and you and he and Alvord are as thick as thieves. You've got a\njewel of a campaign manager in that man Alvord----\"\n\n\"Judge,\" cried Amidon, \"I want you to get up a letter of\nwithdrawal--you have watched the miserable business, and know more of\nit than I do--one that will make me as little ridiculous as possible,\nyou know. I don't care for the people in general, but there are some\nwhose good opinion I prize----\"\n\n\"I know, Florian,\" said the judge. \"I know. But you can't expect to\ncut a very good figure, you know.\"\n\n\"Well, manage it as well as you can, and--I suppose you've watched me?\"\nhe continued. \"Why did you let me go this way! Have I been up to Miss\nWaldron's?\"\n\n\"Once or twice for a few minutes,\" answered Madame le Claire. \"You\nhave been very busy indeed; and yesterday Miss Waldron went out of\ntown.\"\n\n\"I think,\" said Judge Blodgett, \"that you will find a letter from her\nin your room. Alderson brought it up from the counting-house.\"\n\n\"Well, you must excuse me,\" said Mr. Amidon. \"I want to talk this all\nover with you early in the morning; but I must go to my room now.", "start_char_idx": 248282, "end_char_idx": 252015, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778": {"__data__": {"id_": "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c576d64b754d8403865d62b42c3a84a72e09b4bcd8c1739f6ee9823bd0cb0d7d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "22858b2818284df8c809fb1260d25c9ed3754aa169ac586f053f7f24a75afe80", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "No,\nthank you, Clara, I really can not stay to your supper. To-morrow you\nmust tell me how you kidnapped me--I never can repay you for your\nfaithful service to me. Good night!\"\n\nThe discerning reader has already anticipated that Mr. Amidon went\nstraight to the letter and opened it.\n\n\n\"Dearest Eugene,\" it said, \"I want to give you a word to say that I am\nproud of the love and confidence which every one has for you, and to\nsay that I do not regard the place to which you are to be elected as\nunimportant, or one which you should decline. Of all men you are best\nable to protect our town against corruption, and to lift its civic life\nto a higher plane. I wish I might help your fellow townsmen to confer\n_you_ upon _it_. Maybe I can help in cheering you along the way after\nthis is done.\n\n\"I have all sorts of pride in and ambition for you. Hitherto, you have\nconfined yourself too closely to the practical and productively\nutilitarian. I shall watch with all the interest you can desire me to\nfeel, this new career of yours, beginning so modestly and so much\nagainst your will; but reaching, I feel sure, to the state and national\ncapitals.\n\n\"Do you know, I have always imagined myself capable of founding\nPrimrose Leagues, and becoming a real political force? Spend the\nafternoon with me Sunday, and we'll talk it over--come early.\n\n\"Yours in loving partizanship,\n\n\"Elizabeth.\"", "start_char_idx": 252017, "end_char_idx": 253406, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0": {"__data__": {"id_": "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "42918ab1704d31757d5101ca9c3ffc324ad0c6f452cd202fda0c680fc43c8fee", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "fe5ab862ba0eb91e6c48d67128bf327937840149c96d3bbd67f374f414d54b92", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Florian sat for a long time pondering over this letter. It was the\nthing about which his thought centered the next morning. When the\njudge said that he was at work on the letter of withdrawal, Amidon\nremarked that there was no hurry, as he should not use the letter until\nafter a conference with Miss Waldron. Then he went to spend his Sunday\nafternoon with his fianc\u00c3\u00a9e, according to her invitation.\n\nThe \"dear Eugene,\" and the tone of co-proprietorship in this new\n\"career\" of his which seemed so deliciously intimate in her letter,\nfaded from his memory as he faced her in her home, so stately, so kind,\nso far from fond. Her rebellion from those mad kisses of his on his\nfirst visit had thoroughly intimidated him. He felt, now, that he must\nwin his way to such blisses by slow degrees, as if the Brassfield life\nhad never been for her more than for him. So they talked over the cool\nand sensible things they might have discussed had she been his\ngrandmother; among others, the campaign.\n\nShe had tremendously good ideas as to city government. Amidon had long\nentertained similar notions, and that their unity of sentiment might\nappear, each wrote answers to a list of questions which they made up,\nand Amidon was hugely delighted to find that they agreed precisely.\n\n\"Why not make it your platform?\" she asked.\n\n\"You mean, a public manifesto?\" he queried.\n\n\"Surely,\" said she. \"The people ought to know what we represent.\nPrint it, so all may be well informed.\"\n\n\"But that would be an acceptance of the nomination,\" said he.\n\n\"Hardly,\" she replied. \"We have already accepted, and that's settled.\nBut it will raise the contest to one of principle. The best elements\nof society are with you--Doctor Bulkon might as well have mentioned\nyour name as he described the ideal candidate to-day--and such a noble\ndeclaration from you will fill them with joy. Oh, don't you think so?\"\n\n\"Elizabeth,\" said he, \"if I take this office, it will be for your sake.\nI shall withdraw, or run on your platform.\"\n\n\"Oh, you can't withdraw,\" she asseverated. \"Not now!\"\n\nThe adoring glances, in which she constantly surprised him, mitigated\nsomewhat the pique which his ceremoniously respectful parting raised in\nher heart. She stood looking at the hand he had kissed, and wondering\nif this was the Eugene of days gone by, but was not quite able to think\nhim cold to her. This was true at all events, she thought, the\noffensiveness--half-reserve, half-familiarity--the curious impression\nof strangeness which so nearly caused a breach between them on his\nreturn from New York--that was gone, at least. This new attitude of\nhis--well, that was to be considered. In some respects, the change had\nits element of piquancy--like a love affair with an innocent boy where\nthe wiles of experience had been expected.\n\n\nIn the meantime, Mr. Alvord was happy. He had opened \"Brassfield\nHeadquarters,\" over which he presided with a force of clerks who were\nbusy with poll-books and other clerkly-looking properties. \"But,\" said\nhe to Slater, who called to see him about funds for putting in order\nthe links of the Bellevale Golf and Boating Club against the coming of\nspring, \"there's nothing to it. With the preachers exhorting for us\nand the wet-goods push and sports plugging enthusiastically, and not a\ndrop of water spilling from either shoulder, the outlook couldn't be\nbetter. Of course, we have to go through the form of a contest, but\nthere's no real fight in it.\"\n\n\"I don't see how there can be,\" said Mr. Slater. \"But what's all this\nwork for?\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Alvord, \"we've got to keep up the organization, and so we\npoll the town. It gives some men employment for a few days that would\nbe sore if they didn't get it. Then we have to send out the _pi\u00c3\u00a8ce de\nresistance_ for keg parties of evenings. The way the petitions come in\nfor kegs is surprising.", "start_char_idx": 253409, "end_char_idx": 257266, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53": {"__data__": {"id_": "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "4ff7148a1cbfb3deb894f6734ed2ba1fd29c995fd89a3c6bb7baa4cb8ed4c4a7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "50002c852ee0b1e8aa3097e6c910e2184578dad51fffaec3d728118d02698e55", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The way the petitions come in\nfor kegs is surprising. A man calls and says his name's Pat Burke, or\nKarl Schmidt, and that they've organized a club for the study of public\nquestions, meeting every night at Jones' Coke Ovens or Webber's Chicken\nHouse, and they expect to have up the mayoralty question for debate\nto-night--only he generally calls it the 'morality' question--and could\nwe send them a barrel of beer? We know that there's only a corporal's\nguard, mostly aliens, but we send 'em a pony. Another puts up a spiel\nthat he's been spending his own money electioneering for Brassfield--he\nnever had over fifty cents in the world, but he's spent forty\ndollars--and he can't stand the financial strain any longer. He's\npalpitating with love for Brassfield. He knows where there's\ntwenty-five votes he can get, if he can have say ten dollars for\nbooze--he'll leave it entirely to us. We know he's a fake, of course,\nbut we give him a V. We've got to spend Brass's roll somehow.\"\n\n\"Where's he keeping himself?\" asked Slater. \"I haven't seen him since\nSaturday. Isn't he out shaking hands?\"\n\n\"No,\" was the answer. \"He'd rather buy what he wants, and not do any\ncanvassing. It isn't necessary, anyhow. That supper we arranged for\nbefore he was put up will bring him into contact with some of the\nstrongest lines of influence, and will finish the reconciliation with\nEdgington. Then Mrs. Pumphrey's reception and some other affairs will\nbe all the publicity we'll need. No noise for ours, anyhow. The\ngum-shoe is our emblem, and we don't let our right hand know what our\nleft wing is driving at. 'Gene leaves it all to me, and don't ever\nshow up here. That girl business--the strawberry blonde, you\nknow--seems all lost sight of, and there ain't a cloud in the sky.\"\n\nA clerk entered and informed Alvord that a man named Amidon wanted to\nspeak to him at the telephone.\n\n\"Another debating society wants irrigating, I s'pose,\" said he.\n\"Hello! This is headquarters. . . Yes, it's Alvord speaking to\nyou. . . . Oh, is it you, Brass? They said it was a man named Amidon.\nWire's crossed, I s'pose. Worst telephone service I ever saw. All\nright, go ahead.\"\n\nHere followed a long pause broken occasionally by \"yes,\" and \"I know,\"\nand \"no,\" from Alvord. At last, in tones of amazement, he broke forth\nin a storm of protest.\n\n\"What! Publish a platform?\" he shouted. \"Are you crazy? No, I most\nemphatically don't think so. Why--now listen a moment, 'Gene,--I've\ngot the best still hunt framed up you ever saw. We're winning in a\nwalk. . . . Well, if you want to make your position clear, I know I\ncan trust you to make your manifesto the right thing. But mind, I\nadvise against it! . . . Yes, sure, as many things as you want to talk\nabout, old man. . . . Yes, I've heard about the idea; but never saw it\nindorsed by any practical people. . . . Yes. . . . No. No! . . .\n_No!_ . . . I tell you NO! . . . Why, you know we've spent sums that\nwe couldn't possibly publish. What have you been drinking, 'Gene?\nHere, damn you, this is all a josh! Come down here and I'll buy. . . .\nWhat's that? You really want to publish a schedule of your election\nexpenses? Well, I'll keep the schedule, and you can print 'em if you\nwant to. Come up to headquarters, and I'll show 'em to you. Good-by!\"\n\nAlvord hung up the receiver, and went back to his inner office.", "start_char_idx": 257213, "end_char_idx": 260594, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e": {"__data__": {"id_": "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "7bc8049d605ce2220e9879fc149e285502a92a34cadec4bdd35fe94227612755", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ecb95fa4add2aa2ee6a58157b06ea6e4d1ac95ea55d9a67b7eaf8d088c5083af", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Good-by!\"\n\nAlvord hung up the receiver, and went back to his inner office.\n\n\"By George, Slater,\" said he, \"Brassfield is absolutely the most\ndeceptive josher I ever saw. He had me going just now by pretending\nthat he was about to publish a platform of principles, and a statement\nof campaign disbursements. So blooming solemn it gave me the shivers\nfor a minute. List of disbursements: think of it, Slater! And a\nplatform, in our kind of politics!\"", "start_char_idx": 260520, "end_char_idx": 260972, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c": {"__data__": {"id_": "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "80309e1a97461ddf451b2d92a8a86a1fdfca61bb1b605a587d1cb0ca1c1bc507", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5cdce0041a319d58584ca5503e4a54766a4ab71a6e0b941229a2455d99286f4b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "And a\nplatform, in our kind of politics!\"\n\n\n\n\nXX\n\nTHE STRAWBERRY BLONDE\n\n The year will all be summer weather\n When speech and action go together;\n When Aucassin's sage words are met\n In all his deeds with Nicolette;\n And though fair Daphne's words be free,\n Look not too soon her swain to be:\n The year will all be summer weather,\n When speech and action go together.\n --_Song from The Monarch of Nil_.\n\nThe reader of this history may have been conscious, from time to time,\nof a mysterious glow--now baleful, now rather cheerful, like the light\nfrom the tap-room of an inn--which has illuminated the horizon of the\nnarrative. It appeared in certain allusions found in Mr. Alvord's\nconversation with Mr. Amidon during the episode of the Wrong House, and\nso terrified him as to give him thoughts of flight from Bellevale. It\nglared more brightly in the chat at the Club. It flamed concretely on\nour sight when Mr. Brassfield met its source on the street that day he\nmade his fatal escape. Mr. Alvord slangily called it \"the Strawberry\nBlonde.\" Mr. Brassfield very improperly pinched its elbow, and called\nit \"Daise.\" It is high time that we put on our smoked glasses and look\nit in the face in such a formal introduction as will enable us to do it\ntardy justice--for we may have been guilty of misjudgment!\n\nMiss Daisy Scarlett, sitting on a piano-stool, with one foot curled up\nunder her, was entertaining Doctor Julia Brown and Miss Flossie Smith,\nwho had called on her at the home of Major Pumphrey, her uncle. Miss\nScarlett was well and shiveringly known in Bellevale, where she visited\noften, and was generally esteemed for her many good qualities of heart\nand mind, and for the infinite variety of her contributions to the\nsensations of a not over-turbulent social swim. Her entertainment in\nthis instance consisted in readings from a certain book which must be\nregarded as an early literary imprudence of a most estimable and\nindustrious, as well as improving writer--_Poems of Passion_. The\nparticular selection rendered by Miss Scarlett was the one (unknown, I\npresume, to my readers--no, my dear, we haven't it) which informs us\nwhat the first person singular feminine, being invited into Paradise,\nwould do if the third person singular masculine, down in the regions\ninfernal, should open his beautiful arms and smile. Miss Scarlett read\nill sentiments very well, and Miss Smith laid violent hands on herself\nand looked shocked.\n\n\"Oh, Daisy!\" she exclaimed, \"don't, please don't!\"\n\n\"Oh, Flossie!\" said Miss Daisy imitatively, \"don't pretend! That poem\nis simply great!\"\n\nDoctor Brown laughed, quite in the manner of the bass villain in the\ncomic opera.\n\n\"The dissecting table,\" said she, \"brings all these beautiful arms and\nbrows to the same dead level of tissue--unpoetical, but real.\"\n\nMiss Scarlett liberated her foot, spun about, and dashed into a stormy\nprelude, modulating into the accompaniment to the refrain of Sullivan's\n_Once Again_, which she sang with much fervor.\n\nShe was about the height of a well-grown girl of twelve or thirteen,\nand had appealing eyes of delf blue, and a round face of peachy\nsoftness. Her hair was undeniably red, of a shade which put to shame\nsuch verbal mitigations as \"auburn\" or \"golden,\" and was of tropic\nluxuriance and anarchistic disposition. It curled and uncurled and\nstrayed all about her brow and neck like an explosion of spun lava.\nFor the rest, had she really been a little girl of twelve, one would\nfeel free to describe her as fat and roly-poly; but in the case of a\nyoung spinster of somewhere in her third decade, well-gowned and stayed\nand otherwise in physical subjection to the modiste, and singing of\nlove like a diva, what can one say? No more than this, perhaps, that\nthe fortunate man who carries her off the field a prize, will realize\nbefore he has got very far that he has captured something.\n\n \"Love, once again, meet me once again!\n Old love is waking; shall it wake in vain!\"", "start_char_idx": 260931, "end_char_idx": 264922, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd": {"__data__": {"id_": "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "bf2d80e2297f20cabc1d18fabd0128e253059ec6eb1032f11c12076750ab374d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "921682458329865983efb54da73112cd75ed72aa761c5d8ea440cceadbd18cfe", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Thus sang Miss Scarlett, ending with a fervid trill. Then she turned\nabout, sitting with her feet very wide apart, and faced Doctor Brown.\n\n\"Dissecting table, indeed!\" she burst forth. \"I tell you, it's\nblasphemy to speak of making such use of a nice man! But, if I could\npick 'em out, so as to be sure the right ones were dissected, I don't\nknow but I'd agree.\"\n\nFlossie Smith said that some of them ought to be put to _some_ use; and\nDoctor Brown, having reminded the company of her profession, merely\nlaughed again.\n\n\"Here I am down from Allentown,\" Miss Scarlett proceeded, \"on purpose\nto be stayed with flagons and comforted with apples, as I have been\nhere in the past. I wanted to have a good sort of lackadaisical time\nwith the nice boys here, and I've had to stay--I don't know how\nlong--on a famine diet of women and girls, with Ella Wheeler for sauce.\nIt makes me swearing mad!\"\n\n\"I like that now!\" said Flossie. \"I really like that!\"\n\n\"Well, I don't,\" Miss Scarlett went on. \"I'm not used to it. To be\nleft alone--oh, of course Billy Cox has been trying to butt in, but\nwhat good is he? My Hercules, my Roman Antony, who won my trusting\nheart last summer, at a time when I had just got it back from what I\nhad thought a final and total loss--I find him away, and when he gets\nback, because, forsooth, he happens to be newly engaged, he's so\nwrapped up in a little thing like that, that he might as well have\nstayed in New York. He doesn't respond when I ring up his office on\nthe telephone; he doesn't see me on the street---or, at least, only\nonce--he seems scared. I've a good mind to give him something to _be_\nscared about!\"\n\n\"Your condition,\" said the doctor, \"is verging on the pathological.\"\n\n\"I don't know what path it's verging on,\" was the reply, \"but it isn't\nthe primrose path of dalliance. There's some mystery in it.\"\n\n\"Go to Madame What's-Her-Name down at the hotel,\" said Flossie. \"She\nhas solved almost all the mysteries we used to have--for a\nconsideration. And she is said to have superior facilities for\nobserving this Great Brassfield Mystery of yours.\"\n\n\"I must!\" replied Miss Scarlett, looking out of the window. \"There's\nBilly Cox just going into his house! What a pity for a bachelor to\nhave such a big house all to himself--it has filled me with sighs for\nthe past week, that thought! Oh, girls, I've an idea! Let's call him\nover and have him take us down to her! Central! Give me 432, please.\nIs that you, Billy? This is Daisy. Don't you want to do something for\nme?--Oh, you behave, now! We want you to take us somewhere down town,\nso don't take off your coat. We'll explain when you come over.\nGood-by!\"\n\n\"Well, of all things!\" exclaimed Flossie. \"_I_ don't care about Mr.\nCox, nor his big house! And the doctor and I have just started----\"\n\n\"Oh, we can't go,\" said the doctor, \"but that won't break Daisy's\nheart; she didn't expect we would, did you?\"\n\n\"Well, I shall be sorry not to have you go, of course,\" said Miss\nScarlett. \"But if you must go, how would it do for you to slip away\nbefore Billy, comes in, so as to leave him to me? I may be able to\nmake something of Billy, if I'm allowed to have my way with him.\n_Must_ you go? So glad you called. Of course, we shall meet at our\nreception? Good-by!\"\n\n\nMadame le Claire looked amusedly down on Miss Scarlett. The\nbright-haired one was questioning her concerning her mystic art.\n\nCould she see into the future?\n\nSometimes, when the conditions were right.\n\nCould she read thoughts?\n\nLet the lady judge, on the statement that two men, one with brown and\nthe other with gray eyes, had been much in the lady's thoughts lately.\n\nMarvelous!", "start_char_idx": 264925, "end_char_idx": 268587, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e": {"__data__": {"id_": "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "42ffa0c78a3c1de977d4aa55fad1fbbf427f56faae61961bfaa94afc3de3320e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cb7ca8433288a392984f2a9eee0717bf6d57aa64bc6e8048c5b47212cc4402f6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Marvelous! And could she tell what her thoughts in that connection had\nbeen? Well, never mind about that! Did she know about palmistry? And\ncould she _really_ put people under her influence so that they must do\nas she willed? How nice that must be! And would she and the professor\ncome up to the Pumphreys' reception and arrange to give a program of\noccult feats for the entertainment of the guests? Surely; they should\nbe very glad; that was a part of their profession.\n\nDuring these negotiations Mr. Cox waited outside, and Florian Amidon,\nmeeting him in the lobby and being accosted as 'Gene, stopped for a\ntalk, fearing to slight some dear but unknown friend. The word \"'Gene\"\nwas becoming a sort of round shot across the bows in his Bellevale\ncruises. The parley (concerning wells and tanks) he cut as short as\npossible, and, passing on, started up the stairway.\n\nHalf-way up there was a broad landing, and as Florian turned on this,\nhe saw at the head of the flight the blast-furnace of hair, the\nstriking hat and the pleasantly rounded figure of Clara's visitor--a\nperson to him quite unknown. Fate, however, seemed to have in store\nfor him an extraordinary introduction, for instantly he was aware of\nthe descent upon him of a fiery comet of femininity. The lady seemed\nto be falling down stairs. With a little cry she descended, partly\nflying, partly falling, partly sliding flown the baluster--a whirl of\nsuperheated hair, swirling skirts, and wide, appealing eyes of delf\nblue. Amidon caught her in his arms, and sought to place her gently on\nher feet: but in the pure chance and accident of the encounter, her\narms had fallen about his neck, and she hung upon him in something like\na hug.\n\n\"Oh! oh!\" said she, \"the idea of your flying to me like that! But it's\nnice of you!\"\n\nAmidon bowed distantly, and in evident embarrassment. Miss Scarlett\ndrew herself up, as at an undeserved rebuke.\n\n\"I am very glad,\" said he, \"to have been of any service, even at the\nrisk of seeming familiarity, in saving you from a fall. I hope you\nwill pardon me, a stranger, for so far----\"\n\n\"A stranger!\" she ejaculated; \"oh, heavens! Leave me, 'Gene! Go away!\"\n\nThe \"Go away\" was pronounced as Mr. Cox appeared at the foot of the\nstairs. Amidon passed on, now fully aware of having committed a _faux\npas_. Looking back, he saw Miss Scarlett leaning against a newel-post\nas if in agitation; saw Mr. Cox come up and lead her down; and as she\ndisappeared, leaning weakly on her escort's arm, the mop of rumpled\nhair faded from his sight like a receding fire-ship. Who could she be?\nSuddenly Alvord's whispered caution flashed on his mind, and he knew\nthat he had encountered, embraced and repudiated the Strawberry Blonde.\nHe paused for a moment to think over the situation--considerations of\npolicy were coming more and more to appeal to him as guides, and he\nfound himself feeling vulpine and furtive. But here, thought he, would\nit not really have been best to temporize with the situation, and not\nto have terminated all relations with Miss Scarlett in this public way?\nWould it not----\n\nThen rolled over his heart the consciousness of the manifold glories of\nhis Elizabeth's womanhood. Temporize with another woman? The very\nthought repelled him. He involuntarily brushed his coat where it had\nsupported and encircled Miss Scarlett. He felt a sense of unworthiness\nin having, even of necessity and for a proper purpose, embraced this\nother girl. Looking up, he saw Judge Blodgett regarding him like a\nportly accusing angel from the head of the stairway. He made a feint\nat assisting Amidon in brushing his coat.\n\n\"Those red ones,\" said he, \"are the very devil for showing on black!\nI'd carry a whisk-broom, if I were you!\"\n\n[Illustration: \"Those red ones,\" said the judge, \"are the very devil\nfor showing on black!\"]", "start_char_idx": 268577, "end_char_idx": 272416, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9": {"__data__": {"id_": "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0667d6684eecfa97c6d8e5d5e540d8c0ca037f1342e7034e5c4a7247defc8245", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d1f18005292213e3a31e19fe809df8402ae784b1106453689fb90c446be6f684", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Blodgett,\" said Amidon, \"I don't care to be chaffed about an accident\nof that sort.\"\n\n\"Oh, certainly not!\" said the judge. \"But pick off the ringlets all\nthe same. And say, Florian, of course I don't count, but there was\nanother fellow at the foot of the stairs, the junior in the firm of\nFuller and Cox, my fellow practitioners; and in accidents of this sort\none sometimes does as much damage as a regular cloud of witnesses. And\nremember, if you won't use the letter of withdrawal, you're to be a\ngood deal in the public eye, now.\"\n\nAmidon moved on in disgust. And the poor faithful fellow, that his\nspiritual tone might be restored, sat down and read once more his\nBible--the letter superscribed in the large, scrawly hand, \"To be Read\nEn Route.\"\n\n\n\n\nXXI\n\nSOME ALTERNATIONS IN THE CURRENT\n\n One made himself a name for skill to trace\n To its last hiding-place,\n Each secret Mother Earth engaged to save,\n Of jungle, sea or cave.\n No path so devious but he mastered it;\n And, bit by bit,\n From off the face of mystery, he tore\n The veil she wore;\n Then, turning inward all his skill in seeing,\n To solve the knot of Being,\n In the deep crypts of Self fordone he lay,\n Quite cast away.\n --_Adventures in Egoism_.\n\nEvery morning, now, a box of flowers went up to Elizabeth, at the house\nwith the white columns; and every evening Mr. Amidon bravely followed.\nThe terror he felt of women was overpowered by the greater terror of\nlosing this woman, and the fortitude and resolution he possessed in all\nother fields of action were returning to him. His violets and\ncarnations she always wore for him, and all the roses except the red\nones, which she put in vases and kept near her, but did not wear. She\nwas ineffably kind and sweet, in a high and pure and far-off way fit\nfor Olympus, but all the intimate little coquetries and tricks of charm\nwith which she had at first received and disconcerted him were gone.\nShe talked to him in that low voice of hers, but oftener she sat\nsilent, and seemed to desire him to talk to her.\n\nSince that first night, he could not bring himself to act a part,\nfurther than to assume the name and place of Eugene Brassfield. He\nstood afar off, looked at his divinity and worshiped. He read to her\nher favorite books, and ventured somewhat, out of his exceptional\nknowledge, to expound them--whereat she looked away and listened with\nsomething of the astonishment with which she had received his\ndisquisitions on poetry and art on that first unlucky evening. For the\nmost part, however, he, too, was inclined to silences, in which he\nlooked at Elizabeth in the happiness of a lover's wretchedness. The\nlove she had given to Brassfield seemed to him based on the deceitful\npretensions of that wretch, and in any case it was not his, and he felt\nrepelled from accepting it. He yearned to show her the soul of Florian\nAmidon, purified, adorned, and dedicated to her.\n\nOnce or twice she had hinted at something fateful which she wanted to\nsay to him; but he had begged her to wait. After a few days of this\nslavish devotion of his, she seemed less aloof, not quite so much the\nunattainable goddess.\n\nShe gave him her hand, as usual, one evening at parting.\n\n\"I shall not expect to see you to-morrow,\" said she, \"until we meet at\nthe Pumphreys' reception. Until then, good-by.\"\n\n\"I thought,\" said he, \"that if you would permit, I should like to call\nin the afternoon--say at three or four. May I?\"\n\nHe looked so pleadingly at her, holding the little hand in both of his,\nthat it is no wonder her color rose. It was like the worshipful\ninception of a new courtship.\n\n\"I shall be invisible,\" said she, \"all day--so you must wait. You\nhaven't any time to bother with me, anyhow. Haven't you your platform\nto complete?", "start_char_idx": 272418, "end_char_idx": 276209, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf": {"__data__": {"id_": "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "6d8663fd12bd4613dc948b158317c13372d2962f391d07f348e5bbb2ad5aa18e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e409f1634c61c19822f43417aeef8d524c1b7025718d2825f9f39fb51daffe88", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Haven't you your platform\nto complete? A public man must attend to public matters first, and,\nanyhow, I shall be denied to all my friends, and you must wait with the\nrest!\"\n\n\"It is hard to wait,\" he answered, \"when you are so near.\"\n\n\"I shall try to make amends,\" said she, \"by endeavoring to be as\nbeautiful as--as you used to describe me--at the reception. Good\nnight! Good night!\"\n\nHe once more violated the Brassfield traditions; he simply raised her\nhand to his lips and kissed it. To do more, he felt, would spoil all.\nShe went in, more nearly happy than at any time since his return, but\nsorely puzzled. \"I shall never understand him,\" she thought.\n\nMrs. Major Pumphrey, standing in line with Miss Scarlett and Mrs.\nPumphrey's sister from Wisconsin; a procession of people coming in by\ntwos and threes, and steered by attendants into rooms for doffing\nwraps; a chain of de-wrapped human beings circulating past the\nreceiving line and listening to Mrs. Pumphrey's assurances that she was\ndelighted to welcome them that she might have the pleasure of\nintroducing them to her sister--and of course they knew Miss Scarlett;\nan Italian harper who played ceaselessly among palms; a punch-bowl\npresided over by Flossie Smith and Mrs. Alvord; a m\u00c3\u00a9lange of black\ncoats, pretty frocks and white arms and shoulders; a glare of lights; a\nhum like a hive's--in short, a reception. Such was the function to\nwhich Florian made his way, waiting until he could arrive concomitantly\nwith the Waldron carriage so that he might hand the ladies therefrom,\nand receive from his divinity a little, uncertain pressure of the hand.\nThen came his respects to Mrs. Pumphrey. Amidon started as he\nrecognized in the bright-haired second person in line his fairy of the\nbalustrade.\n\n\"So delighted to see you here, Mr. Brassfield!\" said Mrs. Pumphrey.\n\"It gives me the opportunity of presenting you to--why, Daisy, where's\nyour auntie gone? She was here just now!\"\n\n\"She was called away for a few moments,\" said Miss Scarlett. \"Yes, I\nbelieve Mr. Brassfield and I have met\"--this with an icy bow--\"and\nplease, Mr. Cox, don't go, until I have told you the end of the story!\"\nAnd she went on vivaciously chatting to Billy Cox, who had moored\nhimself as close to her as the tide of guests sweeping by her would\npermit. Which current swept Mr. Amidon onward as he was in the act of\nassuring his hostess of his sense of loss in her sister's\nabsence--until an eddy left him in a quiet corner, where he found\nabsorbing occupation in trying to imagine again as vividly as possible\nthat pressure of the hand. Was it meant as an evidence of\naffection?--or did her foot slip, so that she clung to his hand to\nprevent a fall? This question seemed of the most transcendent\nimportance to him, and he debated it mentally all the evening, as he\ntalked the set conversation of such an occasion. He knew no one; but\nevery one knew him; yet he had no difficulty in getting on, because\nthere was no sense in any of the conversation. He could answer all the\nremarks regarding his new role of political leader without committing\nhimself to anything serious. Bright eyes flashed meaning and soulful\nglances into his, as sweet lips said things which he could answer quite\nas well as if the context of the conversation had been as familiar to\nhim as it was supposed to be. Platitudes, generalities, inanities; and\ninanities, platitudes and generalities in reply. Amidon looked the\npart of Brassfield perfectly, and on occasions of this sort, to look\nthe part is quite enough.\n\nHe found Elizabeth again, surrounded by a circle of admirers--men and\nwomen--an oasis of intelligence, it seemed to him as he listened, in a\ndesert of twaddle.", "start_char_idx": 276171, "end_char_idx": 279876, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d": {"__data__": {"id_": "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "2fbdb425b648fd5b67b154ac6656d292d9c577be7a01b0c437cd738d9f3b47bf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bb2bab3c8bf36120dbbfddf9d437b0aeeecdfe63cd0f19da93fce80762fcc3ac", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She smiled at him with her eyes, as he looked at\nher through the press, and just as he had won to a place by her side,\nthe tide was sent flooding into a large room where, it was announced,\nProfessor Blatherwick and Madame le Claire were doing feats of\noccultism.\n\n\"Laties ant shentlemen,\"--it was the professor who spoke, \"you are at\nliperty, of gourse, to adopt any t'eory vich seems to you goot to\neggsblain dese phenomena. Madame le Claire offers none. Ven she hass\nbroduced te phenomena, she iss--she iss all in! If dey seem to you to\nbe de vork of tisempodied spirits, fery well--goot! Somedimes it seems\nso to her. If you rekard letchertemain as a sufficient vorking\nhypot'esis, vy, letchertemain goes, and upon dat hypot'esis ve vill\ngontinue to vork de miracles ant de public. Id iss kvite de same to\nMadame le Claire. It iss only fair to say, howefer, dat she hass nefer\nyet detected herself in any fraut. Bud she offers no eggsblanation;\nshe chust gifes dese tests for your gonsiteration.\"\n\nA ripple of laughter and a buzz of interested comment ran through the\nroom.\n\n\"But how was it possible for her to get her hands loose?\" said one.\n\n\"I assure you,\" said Mrs. Meyer, she of the _Parsifal_ impressions, and\nthe wife of the Hebrew leader of the Gentile mob who went \"down the\nline\" for McCorkle the night before the caucuses, \"I assure you that\nwhat she told me was unknown not only to every one else, but to me\nalso; but it turned out true. It's uncanny!\"\n\n\"It's humbug,\" said the bass voice of Doctor Brown, \"and until you show\nme the source of this 'occult' energy, I shall so contend. Animal\nmagnetism and sleight-of-hand! What do you think, Mrs. Hunter?\"\n\nAmidon looked across and saw--Mrs. Hunter, of Hazelhurst! It was she\nand her daughter from whom he had bashfully flown to the buffet, just\nbefore he alighted from the train at Elm Springs Junction. As he\nlooked at her all the old life returned to him! He saw himself sitting\nwith her and Minnie in the car, as she talked fashions to him and\nchattered her anticipations of the lovely time Minnie was to have with\nthe family of Senator Fowler on the Maine coast. He saw Blodgett come\nin, and himself seize the opportunity to escape with his lawyer to the\nbuffet. Then he saw the rural railway platform, the fading glory of\nthe west--and then the waking in the sleeping-car! Could it all be\npossible?\n\n\"Do you know the lady talking with Doctor Brown?\" he asked of Miss\nWaldron.\n\n\"Mrs. Hunter?\" said Elizabeth questioningly. \"Why, didn't you meet her\nwhen you came in? She is Mrs. Pumphrey's sister, of Hazelhurst,\nWisconsin. She receives with Mrs. Pumphrey to-night.\"\n\n\"I thought it was Mrs. Hunter, as soon as I saw her,\" answered Amidon;\n\"she is an old acquaintance of mine.\"\n\nAnd it was some little time, so far had he forgotten his peculiar\nposition, before the baleful possibilities of this innocent and\ntruthful remark occurred to him. When he thought of it, any observing\nfriend might well have inquired after his health, so gray with pallor\nand moist with sweat had his face become. Not that he felt hanging\nover him any such danger as he had feared when he found himself in the\nshoes of another man, with that other man unaccounted for. He really\ncared very little about _that_, now. The people of Bellevale, and\nHazelhurst, too, might think what they pleased about this mystery of\ndisappearance and reappearance: he was independent of them all, and\nthose he really cared about would understand.\n\nBut Elizabeth! Everything now revolved about her.", "start_char_idx": 279878, "end_char_idx": 283427, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315": {"__data__": {"id_": "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "ef7ec1960f94f552d681de5c0df49c57d5209de0819e4846023d53db205862a7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "35cc86d30f633290cb4062c3b44b4a325d9905893518bfca23dfd50985ca80bd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But Elizabeth! Everything now revolved about her. Now that she had\ngrown so dear--that she had come to smile on him in his new\ncharacter--how could he let her know that this Eugene Brassfield whom\nshe so admired and loved, was no more for ever; and that Florian Amidon\nhad never seen her, never loved her, never wooed her until these past\nfew days! Would she ever see him again? Could she regard him as\nanything else than an interloper and an impostor? His right to\nBrassfield's clothes and Brassfield's fortune might be as clear as\nJudge Blodgett said; but would not Elizabeth feel that as to her he had\nattempted the very deed of which he had first suspected himself--fraud\nand robbery? And her \"perfect lover,\" whom Amidon habitually thought\nof as \"that fellow Brassfield\"--all the perfections which Elizabeth had\nlearned to attribute to him, would no longer be credited to Amidon. It\nwas tragic!\n\nAs a matter of fact, beloved, any man would have been a perfect lover,\nor none at all, to Elizabeth. A perfect lover is the noblest work of\nwoman.\n\n\"Te autience,\" went on the professor, \"vill haf te eggstreme gourtesy\nto assist in a temonstration of Madame le Claire's power as a\nhypnotist. Not effery vun gan pe hypnoticed te fairst dime; bud ve\nvill try. Vill te autience bleace suchest te name of a laty or\nshentleman as a supchect?\"\n\n\"Doctor Brown!\" said many voices. \"Alvord!\" said others, but most of\nthe votes appeared to be for Brassfield--a name which the professor\nhailed joyfully as insuring against failure. It is not often that the\naudience will hit on the only practised sensitive in the room.\n\nMadame le Claire started, as there was thus presented to her the\nthought of bringing her power to bear on Amidon. The serious results\nof her last exercise of it came vividly to her mind. Yet, here she was\nopenly hypnotizing him. Here she could keep him under control. She\ncould limit his Brassfield state as to time, or she could keep him in a\nstate of automatism.\n\n\"Mr. Brassfield vill greatly obliche by goming forvart,\" said the\nprofessor; and, as he had learned to do, Amidon obeyed his request.\n\nElizabeth, standing near Mrs. Hunter, heard an agitated exclamation\nfrom that lady as Mr. Amidon went forward.\n\n\"For heaven's sake,\" said she, \"it's Florian Amidon!\"\n\n\"Who?\" inquired Mrs. Pumphrey, \"that? Why, that's our chief citizen,\nsoon to be our chief magistrate, Mr. Eugene Brassfield.\"\n\nElizabeth heard no more, but in spite of perplexity at what she\nregarded as Mrs. Hunter's recognition of her lover's face and\nforgetfulness of his name, she could not help noticing her excited talk\nto her sister, and the meaning glances finally directed toward her,\nElizabeth. Whereat, to hide a little rosy flush, Miss Waldron turned\nmore completely toward the place of the hypnotist.\n\nMadame le Claire stood in the little curtained alcove, empty save for\nthe great tiger-skin rug, the dais, and a chair or two. She was gowned\nonce more in the yellow and black, and stood in tigrine splendor\ncap-a-pie. Amidon felt her old power over him, as he approached her\nand looked into those mysterious eyes, and knew that he should do her\nbidding. She looked at his troubled countenance, and pitied him for\nhis long evening of mental strain. She had seen his devotion to\nElizabeth, and, be it confessed, was jealous in spite of herself. Pity\nand jealousy inspired the resolution which now formed in her mind: she\nwould for an interval--an interval definitely limited--restore Eugene\nBrassfield to this company in which he was so completely at home, and\nlay the troubled ghost, Amidon. He would appear to better advantage\naltogether and do himself more credit; he would, in fact, be more\nconvincingly Bellevale's \"chief citizen.\"\n\nShe bowed deeply and waved him to the chair.", "start_char_idx": 283377, "end_char_idx": 287172, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371": {"__data__": {"id_": "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "9e32790a878812f22f5c59c7830d461bcf24dc1a1312be8363c5a8788254bf42", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8fd4d5921d99bea1c1a6fd173efd6f87a200300b01d2798d4ead1d1e12753910", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She bowed deeply and waved him to the chair. Then she performed the\ncharm of \"woven paces and of waving arms,\" and he slept, \"lost to life\nand use and name and fame.\"\n\n\"When he opens his eyes,\" said she, \"he will know nothing, think\nnothing, do nothing, except what I suggest.\"\n\n\"Make him dance with the broom,\" suggested Cox.\n\n\"Let's have his inaugural address,\" petitioned Edgington.\n\n\"Give him this,\" said Alvord, offering a coin, \"and make him think it's\nhot. People in this neighborhood would go farther to see Brassfield\ndrop a piece of money, than to interview a live dinosaur!\"\n\nThe laughter at this sally was lost on Madame le Claire. She was\nlooking down on the unconscious Amidon, and wondering how any one could\nthink of making him the instrument of buffoonery.\n\n\"I will perform only one simple, yet very difficult, lest,\" said she.\n\"This gentleman will soon wake as Mr. Brassfield, and will be his old\nand usual self among you until a certain hour, which I will write on\nthis card, and seal up in this envelope, so that no one will know, and\ninform Mr. Brassfield by suggestion. When that particular moment\narrives, wherever he may be, whatever he may be doing, he will enter\nthe cataleptic state. The test is regarded as a severe and perfect\none. The card will remain in the possession of Major Pumphrey until it\nsucceeds or fails, and the envelope will then be opened.\"\n\nKneeling on the dais, she seemed whispering in the subject's ear.\nThen, tapping his wrist, she said, decisively, \"Wake!\"\n\nIt was Eugene Brassfield who opened his eyes on a circle of his\nfriends, associates and cronies. He rose lightly and confidently, and\nlaughed at the chaffing of his friends. He bowed to Madame le Claire,\nand moved across the room to Elizabeth's side, with an air of incipient\nproprietorship.\n\n\"No true lover of carnations,\" he confided to her, \"could wish you to\nwear them as you do to-night.\"\n\n\"Really? I suppose I ought to ask why?\"\n\n\"It isn't fair to the flowers,\" said he. \"Flowers have rights, you\nknow, and to be outdone in sweetness---- Ah, Jim! Go away, and don't\nbother me! Don't you see I'm very busy?\"\n\n\"Old man,\" said Alvord, answering to the name of \"Jim,\" \"it's good to\nsee you as you are to-night--your old self. You'll make a hit, my boy.\nThis will make it more than ever a cinch!\"\n\nSelf-possessed, masterful, Mr. Brassfield moved through the assembly\nlike a conqueror. Those who, a short time ago, found him dull and\nmoody, rejoiced now in his confident persiflage pitched safely in the\nrestful key of mediocrity, but possessed withal of a species of\nbrilliancy, like the skilful playing of scales. Elizabeth noted the\nreturn of that dash and abandon which she had lately so missed--but for\nthe first time the Brassfield music had a hollow ring in her ears. The\nsubtler melody of last night--after all, it was best!\n\nMadame le Claire, immensely popular, gave readings in palmistry. Miss\nSmith was to have a husband with dark eyes. Mr. Brassfield offered to\ncross her palm with any gold coin she might name, if she would promise\nhim a sweetheart with party-colored eyes, who would meet him for a long\ntalk next day. Madame le Claire blushed and dropped the hand.\n\nMr. Brassfield adroitly overtook Miss Scarlett, who seemed endeavoring\nto retreat. He stood by her, chatting lightly, using two voices, a\ndistinct and conversational tone, and one so low as to be for her ear\nalone.\n\n\"Oh, isn't it a crush?\" said he. \"(_Daise, what's the matter?_) A\nperfect evening, though. (_Are you running away from me?_) And such\ndelightful people! (_The east room in ten minutes; is it yes?_)\"\n\nMiss Scarlett nodded, and Brassfield moved on. Mrs. Pumphrey, Mrs.\nHunter and Elizabeth Waldron were sipping punch.\n\n\"May I have some?\" said he.", "start_char_idx": 287128, "end_char_idx": 290903, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e": {"__data__": {"id_": "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8430fdbe935fd42eb767d0279999c95ec096ce3553912931faaaf3904a93e8b6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "08838233522165cedbf6b189056083aa1332f894b413f039e887c2df4fd6d934", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"May I have some?\" said he. \"And, please, Mrs. Pumphrey, may I be\npresented to the guest of the evening?\"\n\nMrs. Hunter received the introduction with a gasp.\n\n\"Is it possible,\" said she, \"that you don't know me? Can the possessor\nof that voice and face be any one but Florian Amidon?\"\n\n\"Amidon, Amidon?\" he repeated. \"Pardon me, but some one else spoke\nthat name to me lately, and I was trying to recall the circumstances.\nIt is in every way on my part to be regretted, as the fact has deprived\nme of the happiness of knowing you, that I am not Mr. Amidon. Am I so\nlike him?\"\n\n\"Oh, it isn't a matter of resemblance, but of identity!\" replied Mrs.\nHunter. \"Were you never in Hazelhurst, Wisconsin?\"\n\n\"Never,\" said Mr. Brassfield; \"but I am beginning to see its beauties\nas a place of residence. And I hope to know more of this other Dromio\nbefore the evening is past.\"\n\nMrs. Hunter bowed in acknowledgment of the compliment, and Mr.\nBrassfield took himself gracefully from their presence. In the fashion\nof one pressed for time, he moved on.\n\nElizabeth had grown suddenly very grave. What did this conduct of her\nlover mean? A little while ago he had recognized Mrs. Hunter, at a\ndistance, as an old acquaintance. Now he had audaciously outfaced her,\nand denied that he ever knew her. Could this be the man she had\ntrusted with her all? Again her doubts and fears and scruples\nrose--rose instantly in full strength. The new impressions she had\nlately received of him vanished, and all the subtle suggestions of\nsordid lightness which the diplomacy of Brassfield, even, had not\nentirely kept from her mind, came back with multiplied distinctness.\nThese transformations of character, these curious duplicities, and now\nthis lie. She must think it over: it impressed her, and she must act.\n\n\"Auntie,\" said she, \"let us go.\"\n\nAs down the stairway they came, robed for departure, they were\nconscious of a hum of excitement running through the assembly.\n\n\"Where is he? The envelope has been opened and the time is up! Where\nis he?\" were the cries. \"It's eleven: it's a minute past eleven!\nWhere's Mr. Brassfield?\"\n\nAt this moment, a scream, a soprano scream, high, long-drawn and\npiercing, the scream of a woman in terror, came echoing from the\ndeserted east room. A body of guests rushed through the porti\u00c3\u00a8res,\nMadame le Claire, pale with fright, at their head, and Elizabeth borne\nwith them, all looking to see what violence had provoked that scream.\nThey saw Mr. Brassfield, seated on a sofa in a shadowy corner, holding\nboth Miss Scarlett's hands in his; saw the girl frantically, but in\nvain, trying to take them from his grasp. He sat like a statue, with\nhis eyes set wide and unwinking like a corpse's, every limb and muscle\nrigid, his body tense and immovable as a stone image. The sight was\nterrible. It was as if the living man had been transformed in an\ninstant into a ghastly trap, to catch those soft, warm, pretty hands!\nShe ceased her efforts to break away, but stood white and almost\nfainting, and begging hysterically for help.\n\nMadame le Claire leaped forward like a tigress, so light was her step,\nand passed her hand over his eyes, so as to close them. Then, bending\nher gaze one moment piercingly on his face, she sharply tapped his\nwrist and uttered the single word, \"Wake!\"\n\nFlorian Amidon opened his eyes. He saw that something extraordinary\nwas taking place, for, in the act of opening his eyes, he had seen Miss\nScarlett fall back into the arms of Mr. Cox, and knew that she was\nbeing conveyed rapidly away.\n\n\"It iss now,\" said the professor, \"vun minute past eleven. Te test,\nyou vill atmit, hass peen a gomplete success.", "start_char_idx": 290876, "end_char_idx": 294542, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca": {"__data__": {"id_": "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "fff51d3df6cc13d9e3a432b67663100e77bb36be4ceef11c3508e36959179cf0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3130829575851d6b0614eeb82e06be874c8b6b28712dd782fe2d5ac12d4164d6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Te test,\nyou vill atmit, hass peen a gomplete success. Dis sairgumsdance vill\npe noted as exdablishing to a sairtain eggstent an important brinciple,\nant hass peen in effery vay bleasant ant a success: not?\"\n\nA laugh or two was heard, then more laughter, then a little hum of\nreviving talk, and one could observe that the affair was to be passed\noff as one of the mysteries of occultism.\n\n\"Well,\" said Mr. Amidon, \"if I have contributed my share to the gaiety\nof the occasion, I shall beg now to be permitted to depart.\"\n\nThe Waldrons were waiting for their carriage as he came down.\n\n\"There will be plenty of assistance,\" said the aunty \"and we shall not\nneed to detain you.\"\n\n\"Oh, auntie, auntie!\" wept Elizabeth, when they were safely alone,\n\"there was a spell upon him, as you say, there in the east room, but\nthe spell that took him there was none of the hypnotist's working! I\nam shamed, and humiliated, and robbed of all I have to live for! He\nwent there, auntie, of his own accord, _and left me_!\"\n\nMr. Alvord passed the thing off more lightly.\n\n\"Confound it!\" said he, \"I wish they were in Hades with their mesmeric\nstunts! I shan't tell Brass what happened, for it won't do any good;\nand the less notice there's taken of it the better. But carrying\nthings before him as he was--it was hard luck to have that occur. Puts\nhim in an undignified position, to say the least. I wish I could think\nthere was nothing more to it!\"\n\n\n\n\nXXII\n\nA REVIVAL OF BELSHAZZAR\n\n We are but Sitters at the Table, Guests,\n Where each drinks more, the more that he protests,\n Sees, One by One, his Fellows slip from Sight,\n And then himself beneath the Table rests.\n * * * * * *\n Some walk the Sinuous Crack for Test, and Some\n Judge by the throbbing Fullness of the Thumb--\n But lo! the Fool continues till the Guests\n Are changed to Pairs of Twins as in they come!\n --_Imitations of Immorality_.\n\nBarring the somewhat equivocal episode of the east room at Major\nPumphrey's, everything had gone to Mr. Alvord's liking since Mr.\nBrassfield had placed the campaign in his hands. And, as a matter of\nfact, that affair was so susceptible of plausible explanation, and so\nfenced about by the sanctities of private hospitality, that Alvord was\nreassured after a day or two had passed with no public scandal. Amidon\nstayed away from headquarters, and Alvord, acting under the unlimited\nauthority granted by Brassfield, took all responsibility and proceeded\nmost effectively in his own way. Amidon's instructions by telephone,\nto prepare a statement of disbursements to be made public, he regarded\nas one of Brassfield's jokes. His suggestion that he meant to stand on\na platform of principles seemed equally humorous. To propose such\nridiculous things in a perfectly serious way, and laugh at the victim's\ncredulity in \"biting\" on the hoax, was quite in harmony with the\nrelations among the members of the set to which they belonged, where\npractical jokes, merciless chaffing and perpetual efforts to get the\nbest of one another had given the group a more than local celebrity.\n\nHaving, therefore, no suspicion that his candidate's platform of\nprinciples was in the hands of the reporters, and would appear in the\nnext morning's papers, Alvord took his way to the annual supper of the\nA. O. C. M. feeling that all was well in the world, and that here, at\nleast, his candidate would acquit himself well.\n\nMessrs. Bulliwinkle and Cox were absent when the time came for sitting\ndown to supper, and Mr. Simpson, the Master of the Revels, decreed that\nno one was to be waited for. So the chairs of the absentees were\nshoved up, and reminded Mr.", "start_char_idx": 294488, "end_char_idx": 298175, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b": {"__data__": {"id_": "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "b3f827e99978827644c46aa46e44371e61be309738d1e8e7d2080f20ddaa4928", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "16745d2d8635433dfc8443ec7695e9da76f0af218026f88acb1e3e7a6ceb6037", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "So the chairs of the absentees were\nshoved up, and reminded Mr. Slater, who was quite high in spirits, of\n_The Vacant Chair_, which he sang to the bass of Judge Blodgett, and a\nhumming accompaniment by Alvord and Edgington. Professor Blatherwick\nlistened with rapt attention and was much affected.\n\n\"Dis iss Heidelberg unt stutent tays,\" said he. \"Strong and luffing\nhearts, ant veak hets ant stomachs! Oh, te svorts ant steins ant songs\nant scraps! It iss brotuctife of tears ant schmiles!\"\n\n\"Especially smiles,\" said Mr. Simpson; \"and right in that connection,\nthese cocktails are supposed to go in ahead of the refection.\nGentlemen, a good time to all!\"\n\nNow, after some courses of soup and fish and _entr\u00c3\u00a9es_, Mr. Alvord\nnoted the cocktails and the unconsumed glasses of wine at the plates of\nBulliwinkle and Cox, and with a sense of equity truly Anglo-Saxon, he\nraised the point that it was an injustice to those who had been prompt,\nto have these two fresh competitors come in late and entirely sober in\nthe middle of the feast.\n\n\"Point seems to be well taken,\" said Judge Blodgett. \"I move, your\nHonor, that the wet goods apportionable to our absent friends be set\naside for them.\"\n\n\"Sustained!\" roared Simpson. \"Let the booze of Bulliwinkle and Cox be\nfiled away for future reference, in the sideboard!\"\n\nSo their glasses stood in two rows, lengthening course by course,\nawaiting the coming of the absentees. And thus it was that when Mr.\nBulliwinkle, fat, bald, and rubicund, made his appearance, the\nproceedings were suspended until he had imbibed his share, glass by\nglass, beginning with the cocktails and ending temporarily with\nMadeira. Then Mr. Bulliwinkle suddenly became profoundly grave, and\nwas soon detected by Alvord in the act of stealthily endeavoring to\nplace his finger accurately upon certain small round spots in the\ntable-cloth. Whereupon, Mr. Bulliwinkle, to show how entirely he had\nhimself in hand, proposed a toast in verse beginning,\n\n \"Now here's to the girl with the auburn hair,\n And the shoulders whiter than snow,\"\n\nand drank it off in a bumper. All seemed to forget Bulliwinkle at this\nand transferred their attention to Amidon, and pounded on the table and\ncalled for a response from him. Blodgett nodded for him to yield, and\nin order that he might be fully in character, Florian began by saying\nthat they, who knew him so well were quite well aware that he could\nrespond to a toast in honor of the girl with the auburn hair----\n\n\"Or any other old color!\" shouted Edgington.\n\n\"Or all colors at once!\" roared a nameless wight at the foot of the\ntable.\n\nAt which gaucherie, the nameless wight was the recipient of nudges and\nscowls in the direction of the professor (who was probably unaware of\nthe color of the hair on his own head, to say nothing of his\ndaughter's) and Edgington filled the gap caused by the unexpected\ncollapse of Amidon's response by charging that Cox was absent because\nof his having recently taken passage upon the water-wagon, and was\ntraitorously staying away. Alvord proposed that a messenger be sent\nfor him, and when the A. D. T. boy came, a written summons was penned\non a menu card, on which progress to date was checked, and instructions\ngiven that the document be presented to Cox at his home every twenty\nminutes until he came--Cox to pay the charges; and the messenger to\nreturn between trips to report, and to have the menu checked up so that\nCox might note the forward movement of events, and see how far he was\nbehind.\n\nWhen Mr. Simpson rose to make a few general observations ushering in\nthat part of the program usually devoted to speech-making, Mr.\nBulliwinkle, whose vision was slightly impaired, took him for the tardy\nCox and some friend whom Cox had brought, and greeted them with a\nstrident \"How-de-do!\" After this blunder, of course, Mr.", "start_char_idx": 298112, "end_char_idx": 301950, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402": {"__data__": {"id_": "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8c6df1ce2e2223ba90395aea9b91e88687daa3b2c497dad636b18fa06bf2fadb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "83dfe6ff424f54045805053932bed6fca500692a7c803bf5f4bd1ef0f61d0f0e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "After this blunder, of course, Mr. Bulliwinkle\nwas logically bound to show that the exclamation was uttered by virtue\nof a deliberate plan, and so he repeated it from time to time all the\nevening, until the ordeal of mixed drinks, to which his late arrival\nhad subjected him, proved too much for his endurance and robbed him of\nspeech. But this is anticipating.\n\nA dozen matches were burning and a dozen Havanas sending forth their\nfirst cloudlets of blue over the sparkling glasses of champagne, as Mr.\nSimpson began his remarks.\n\n\"To most of those present,\" he said, \"I don't need to say that this is\na sort of annual affair. To our new friends I will explain that this\nclub is an institution of Bellevale Lodge, Number 689, of the Ancient\nOrder of Christian Martyrs, of which noble fraternity we are all\ndevoted members. Present company are members, ex or incumbent, of the\nBoard of Control, and a system of fines for absence at board meetings\naccumulates a fund which has to be spent, and we are now engaged in\nspending it. Beyond the logic of the situation, which points\nunerringly to the blowing-in of this fund, the impending happy event in\nthe life of our treasurer, Brother Brassfield, together with the public\nhonors already and about to be conferred on him, render it fitting that\nthis banquet be in his honor. What the devil is that racket? Oh, the\nboy----! Let the wandering caitiff enter! What says the recreant\ninvader of our Mystic Circle?\"\n\n\"He said he'd hev' me 'rested 'f I came there any more, an' the whole\nbunch pulled,\" said the boy. \"An' he chucked the paper out o' the\nwinder.\"\n\n\"Let another scroll be prepared,\" roared Simpson, \"and go back to him\nas per schedule.\"\n\n\"But,\" said the boy, \"he said----\"\n\n\"We hold the police force in the hollow of our hands!\" shouted Simpson.\n\"We will protect you.\"\n\n\"I should say we would!\" \"You trust us!\" \"To the death!\" chorused the\nroisterers.\n\n\"I'll collect damages from him for your death!\" said Judge Blodgett.\n\"Whom do you want 'em paid to?\"\n\n\"D'vide the boodle,\" said the boy, \"among my grandchildren--ekally. Do\nI go back?\"\n\n\"You do,\" said Simpson, \"as soon as another Exhibit A is prepared.\"\n\n\"It's ready, most noble Potentate,\" said Edgington ritualistically.\n\n\"Then let the messenger depart. Where's that menu I had? Hang it,\nyou've used it for the kid, and it had my remarks on it. As I was\nsaying, this is Brassfield's night. Everybody tells a story, sings a\nsong or dances.\"\n\nEdgington told a story which, he said, was \"on Brassfield,\" and showed\nwhat regular devil that gentleman had been. It seemed that he and\n\"Brass\" were at one time fly-fishing in the mountains, and Eugene had\nso wrought on the fancy of the schoolmistress that she had let school\nout at three, and gone to learn casting of Brassfield.\n\n\"And when they came to the house at suppertime,\" he went on, \"the whole\nfamily were laying for them. 'Ketch anything?' said the old lady,\n'anythin' more'n a bullhead?' 'I c'n see,' said the hired man, 'that\nshe's been castin' purty hard, by the way her dress is kinder pressed\naround the waist. It allers fixes mine that way!'\"\n\nAnd so on, to the narration of the outbreak of hostilities with the\nhired man, and the flight of Brassfield and Edgington. At every point\nAmidon winced, as he got views of Brassfield's character which\nhypnotism could not yield, and the assembly roared the louder at his\nembarrassment.\n\nThe messenger boy returned again by this time, still unsuccessful, and\nwas provided with a bunch of cannon fire-crackers to be exploded in\nCox's front yard so that the invitation to the banquet might not be\noverlooked. Then Slater told of Mr.", "start_char_idx": 301916, "end_char_idx": 305579, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584": {"__data__": {"id_": "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "205cefbcc9635c89cc098d3b55880b563167e6dccb6c82109f4af62b5a868442", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "99f4f2d72961bc7a7b16401bc52d06e3f8481a4dd9f730c70b4e1040b361907e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Then Slater told of Mr. Brassfield's adventures at the\nMardi Gras, the story consisting mostly of the account of Eugene's\nwonderful series of winnings at the race course, where he adopted the\nsystem of always finding what horse was given the longest odds, and\nplaying him.\n\n\"Our friend,\" said Slater, \"on that last day, was too full of\nmint-juleps and enthusiasm to tell the field from the judges' stand.\nSaid he never saw the judges' stand run with the horses before\n(laughter); thought it was a good idea--judges could always tell\nwhether the riding was fair (cheers); and put his money on Azim at\nabout one hundred to one; and when Azim romped in a winner, they\nstuffed all his pockets full of money, and the reporters came with\ncameras to get shots at the northern millionaire who had such a\nthundering run of luck, and you ought to have seen 'Gene when he saw\nthe papers in the morning! Had to take him to Pass Christian next day.\nIt was too strenuous for your humble servant at New Orleans. All the\nsports knew him by this time, and wanted to run into him so as to touch\nhim for luck, and 'Gene wanted to fight every guy that touched him, and\nabout half the time was getting accommodated and taking second money in\nevery fight!\" (Great laughter and applause.)\n\nAmidon was unable to tell as to the absolute truth of these tales, but\nthey had such verisimilitude that they impressed and shocked him. He\nwas doubly astounded at the evident enjoyment with which they were\nreceived by his friends, and especially at the fact of the hearty and\nunrestrained manner in which Blodgett and even Blatherwick joined in\nthe applause. Every shot from the quiver of horse-play (except those\naimed at the luckless Cox) seemed directed at him, Amidon the\ndignified. Here, it seemed, he was known to have been guilty of\ngambling, drunkenness and libertinism--the three vices that he most\ndetested. His face burned with shame. How had Elizabeth ever cared\nfor such a man as that villain Brassfield? Where was the Sir Galahad,\nor Lancelot either, in this life? He must somehow, some time, find a\nway to tell her that it was Brassfield, not Amidon, who had done these\nthings, and that he, Amidon, reared by a doting mother and cared for by\na solicitous sister, and all his life the model of the moral town of\nHazelhurst, was as innocent of these things as she was.\n\nThese thoughts so filled his mind that he heard very little of Judge\nBlodgett's dialect story. Professor Blatherwick began a German song\nfull of trilled r's, achs and hochs; but became offended at\nBulliwinkle's strident \"How-de-do!\" at the end of the first stanza, and\nquit. Whereupon Bulliwinkle, for the first time sensing the fact that\nsomething was wrong, in the goodness of his heart began singing, _Dot's\nHow Poor Yacob Found It Oudt_, in seeming compliment to the nationality\nof the professor; but, owing to the subtlety of the reasoning, the\nprofessor failed to take it as such. He took mortal umbrage instead,\nand hurled his card down on the table with a bang, at which Bulliwinkle\nslipped under the mahogany,\n\n \"Gently as a skylark settles down\n Upon the clustered treasures of her nest.\"\n\n\nMeantime, Mr. Simpson had called on Mr. Knaggs to do a dance, as he\nalleged himself unable to do anything else. Mr. Knaggs responded, and\ndid pretty well considering the lateness of the hour, but insisted that\nhe ought to have a better surface than the carpet. Amidon dimly\nresented as an impropriety Mr. Knaggs' brilliant proof of the\ncorrectness of his position regarding the carpet, by a tumultuously\nsuccessful clog-dance on the table.\n\nBy this time, it being past the hour for retiring, according to the\nhabit of most, several of the guests were asleep, and most of the rest\nwere indulging in monologues under the impression that they were\nconversing with their neighbors.", "start_char_idx": 305556, "end_char_idx": 309402, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874": {"__data__": {"id_": "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "d97c0c082a0390b5952f9bddd20acede6061da24d2e5163430de0b1d80bdab27", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e4f6640cf7dff1185f7a579847298888f6571fe928c58e827583974463f3ebd7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Edgington was on his feet proposing a\nseries of interrogatories in strictly legal form requiring Amidon to\nsay how he got the support of Barney Conlon, what there was in his\nlabor record to win the support of Sheehan and Zalinsky, and various\nother matters. At Alvord's request, Judge Blodgett was moving that\nthese be \"struck out,\" while Slater insisted that it ought to be a\n\"base on balls.\" It was a new experience for Amidon. He was surprised\nto find a something in it which he enjoyed. The very hubbub was\ninteresting.\n\nNo wonder, such being the conditions, that the A. D. T. boy rapped long\nand was not heard. No wonder that the ultimate opening of the door was\nunnoted by those present, or that no one observed the tall man with\nwhisker extensions to a mustache naturally too large, who came in after\nthe messenger. Observed or not, however, he entered and walked heavily\ndown the banqueting-hall.\n\n\"Brassfield, a summons for you,\" said he fiercely. \"Here's the copy;\nthis is the 'rig'nal. Waive the readin', I s'pose? Sorry to\ninterrupt. So long.\"\n\nAmidon looked at the stiff document as if it had been a Gila monster on\ntoast. He saw such words as \"State of Pennsylvania, County of Rockoil,\nss,\" and \"Default will be taken against you, and judgment rendered\nthereon,\" and sundry dates and figures. Instinctively he turned to\nJudge Blodgett, saying:\n\n\"What's this, Blodgett?\"\n\nA tremor of panic seized on Amidon, and a wave of sobriety passed over\nthe guests. Much the same thing must have marked the breaking up of\nthe feast of Belshazzar. The roisterers gazed at the paper, or began\ntheir preparations for departure.\n\n\"What is it?\" asked Amidon.\n\n\"I don't know enough about the practice here,\" said the judge slowly,\n\"to be able to say whether it's good or not--seems to have been hastily\nand rather slovenly gotten up----\"\n\n\"But what is the damned thing?\" shouted Alvord; \"cut it short and tell\nus.\"\n\n\"Seems perfectly regular, though,\" went on the judge deliberately.\n\"It's a summons in the case of Daisy Scarlett versus Eugene Brassfield\nin a suit for twenty-five thousand dollars for breach of promise of\nmarriage.\"\n\nAmidon sank back in a collapse which was almost a faint. The little\nnervous Alvord rose to command.\n\n\"Now,\" said he, standing in his place, \"I want to say a few words\nbefore a man leaves this room. I know something of this case, and I\nwant you to take my word that there's no more foundation for it than\nthere would be if it were brought against any one of us. And\nfurthermore, there must be nothing said about this. These papers are\nnot on record yet, and I believe something can be done. Why, confound\nit, something shall be done! Every man must pledge me his word that he\nwon't breathe a word of this, and will deny it if asked about it.\"\n\n\"We promise!\" came the unanimous shout.\n\nAlvord walked toward the guest of honor, tripping over the legs of\nBulliwinkle as he went, and offered his hand to Amidon.\n\n\"I say, old man, I warned you that you were carrying on a little\nstrong; and now here's a--\"\n\n\"How-de-do!\" said Bulliwinkle.\n\n_In vino veritas_! Truly, most bibulous Bulliwinkle, thou hast\nsupplied the very word to convey the meaning for which we at this\nmoment desire expression! Here's a how-de-do indeed! Just as our\nfriend Amidon has made a successful lodgment in the outworks of Port\nWaldron--a citadel which he had taken by stratagem, abandoned for\nconscience' sake, and re-invested on lines of fairer warfare, to say\nnothing of the investment of the mayoralty--the hope of victory is\nswallowed up in a sea of disasters. The meeting on the stairway, the\nrepudiation of Mrs.", "start_char_idx": 309404, "end_char_idx": 313045, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd": {"__data__": {"id_": "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "f7f11c146219a841dc6ff0f158af78a9482e81c5c4cb27e21b413ca53d45b061", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c01362d76d321dd44298c3838b0cca28608920b815e7dee14912a1a9ace74740", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The meeting on the stairway, the\nrepudiation of Mrs. Hunter, the arrested flirtation in the east room:\nall these--any of these--were enough: but what hope for us remains,\nafter this sensational summons, served in the small hours of a\nbacchanalian revel, in a breach-of-promise action at the suit of the\ndreadful \"Strawberry Blonde\"? Verily, Bulliwinkle, here is indeed a\nhow-de-do!\n\n\"Old man,\" said Mr. Alvord, in private communication to Mr. Amidon at\nparting, \"we're none of us in condition to discuss this calmly now; but\ndon't give up. It's a blow, but with our pull with the press, and our\npersonal relations with Cox, can be squelched, I believe. Until after\nelection----\"\n\n\"Until when?\" asked Amidon dazedly.\n\n\"After election,\" answered Alvord. \"After that, while it will be a\nblow, of course, it won't wreck things quite so completely, you know.\nAnd even if it does sort of leak out, it's one of those mix-ups that\nlots of voters'll rather admire you for, you know. It may react in\nyour favor, if we can----\"\n\n\"Mr. Alvord,\" said Amidon, \"please to understand that I don't care a\nrush, one way or the other, about this election!\"\n\n\"Now, now, don't say that!\" said Alvord soothingly. \"I can see how you\nfeel, 'Gene--pride, and affection, and Bessie, and the wedding coming\non--but, pshaw, we lots of us have things kind of tangle up on us\ncoming in on the home stretch of a pretty swift heat! Go home, and\ndon't worry too much. I'm with you, and we'll win. F. D. and B., you\nknow. Keep the other strings pulling right--it's only a day or so now.\nGood night, old man, and brace up! See you to-morrow.\"\n\nOne rather likes the optimistic fighter--purely as a fighter--of the\nAlvord stripe. He was so occupied with plans for the next day's battle\nthat the dubious features of the contest were already clearing up in\nhis mind with the forming of plans for attacking the situation. A few\nhours of sleep, and he was up and at them. His telephone called up the\neditors of the town with the morning star. Long before the enemy could\nhave known of the breach in his works, his trusty troops were busy\nfilling it up. He was almost happy again, when Edgington rushed into\nhis presence with a newspaper crushed in his clenched fist, and all\nsorts of disaster depicted in his expression.\n\n\"Jim,\" he cried, \"have you seen this?\"\n\n\"No,\" answered Alvord. \"It ain't that Scarlett business? I thought\nI'd got that----\"\n\n\"No, no! It isn't that!\" groaned Edgington. \"But we're done, all the\nsame! Done to a finish! You might as well close the headquarters and\ngo home, for if we win, on this platform, we lose, and all the money\nwe've put in is lost! I tell you, Jim, 'Gene Brassfield is either\ninsane--and I believe it's that--or he's the damnedest traitor and\nsneak and two-faced hound that ever stepped, and I'll have it out with\nhim! Some way, if I wait ten years, I'll have it out with him, if I\nhave to do it with a gun! His business leaves my office at once. Why,\nthere aren't words fit for me to use, to describe the miserable, false,\nlying----\"\n\n\"See here, Edge!\" said Alvord. \"We may be done, as you say, but Eugene\nBrassfield has made you, and he's my friend, and you'd better not go on\nlike that, here! Let me see that paper!\"\n\nEdgington threw it to him. In heavy type he saw the fateful platform\nsummarized in a black-bordered panel on the first page:", "start_char_idx": 312993, "end_char_idx": 316370, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273": {"__data__": {"id_": "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "d85db182f83318a320924e6ad07be4de6d48794d91524e2055d1d8505a7e792a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "59c9baf24a768c9b5e3d36b5e2a1ee84d452d446bc1abe129fb3e863db8f8514", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "BRASSFIELD'S PLATFORM\n\n1. Strict enforcement of early closing regulations for saloons.\n\n2. No franchises except on public bidding, and ample provision for\nsubsequent acquisition by the city.\n\n3. Gambling laws to be strictly enforced.\n\n4. Segregation of vice.\n\n5. Vote of the people on all important measures.\n\n6. Appointments non-partizan on the merit system.\n\n7. Publication of all items of campaign expenses.\n\n\nAlvord fell back in utter dismay. Then he read in full the manifesto\nwhich Amidon and Elizabeth had prepared; and, folding up the paper, he\nstuck it in a drawer, which he locked, as if thereby to seal up the\ndireful news. For a moment he felt betrayed and utterly defeated.\nThen he straightened himself for a resumption of the battle.\n\n\"See here, Edge,\" he said insinuatingly, \"this is pretty bad, I admit.\nI think, myself, that Brass is off his head. He 'phoned me once about\nthis, but he's such a josher, and it was such wild-eyed lunacy that I\nthought he was kidding. You'd have thought so, too, in my place. But\nwe can pull through yet. We can convince the sports that this\nhigh-moral business is only for the church people, and the civic purity\npush. Why, Brassfield himself couldn't make Fatty Pierson believe he\nstands for this stuff. It's so out of reason,--the safe and sane life\nhe's lived. And I'll undertake to keep the God-and-morality folks\nlined up, because these are really the things they say they want. This\nain't going to be so very bad, after all, Edge!\"\n\n\"Bad!\" ejaculated Edgington. \"Why, Alvord, you're so wrapped up in\nBrassfield that you're ready to go crazy with him!\"\n\n\"Well, I want to say right here,\" shouted Alvord, \"that if you think\nI'm going to quit on a man I've eaten with and slept with and sworn to\nstay by--By gad, I won't!\"\n\n\"Well, stay by him, then!\" cried Edgington. \"Go on and butt your\nbrains out on this stone wall of ism, and see where you come out.\nYou're already beaten. The other side knew about this last night, and\nyou'll be blown out of water before to-morrow morning. Doctor Bulkon\nand his crowd are already lined up against you: the doctor will take\nthe position that Brassfield's proposal to segregate vice is a\ncompromise with sin, and that that's the paramount issue. Why,\nPumphrey and Johnson and the Williams set are all among his best-paying\nparishioners, and they've put the screws to Bulkon--who doesn't see the\npoint, anyhow. I tell you that there are too many pillars of the\nchurch with downtown property to rent, for you to keep either them or\ntheir pastors in line. They'll find moral issues to fight the ten\ncommandments on, if they have to. You ought to know this, Jim.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Alvord, \"let the Pharisees oppose us! I'll appeal to the\nliberal element. I'll convince 'em that Brassfield don't mean this\nstuff. They like him, and they'll stick!\"\n\n\"Stick!\" sneered Edgington. \"Like him! You make me tired, Jim! How\nlong will they 'stick' against the influence of their landlords and\nbankers? Why, they've all read this platform, and the story has gone\ndown the line that Brassfield is so infatuated with Miss Waldron that\nhe's allowing her to write his platform, and that she'll be the mayor.\nDon't you think that that won't cut the ground from under you, either!\nA saloon man or gambler fears a good woman's influence as a wolf fears\nfire. Why, Jim, when this 'advanced thought' platform of yours comes\nto be voted on, there won't be any one for it except thick-and-thin\nparty men who 'never scratch.' Now I'm not going down with any such\nsinking scow. I shall make terms for my financial interests with the\nother side.\"\n\n\"Go, then!\" shouted Alvord, \"and find you've hopped out of the frying\npan into the fire! By George, I tell you we've got the money to buy\nthis election!\"", "start_char_idx": 316373, "end_char_idx": 320162, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6": {"__data__": {"id_": "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "0d6994cece2ddf75ce272b5a59ae844e4bca895185470de603ed66f88c8ad9f7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c722ad4e1d8137529d34169d272bcfa1f8a58dc2f543487e460c3bddc61868e6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "By George, I tell you we've got the money to buy\nthis election!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Edgington, \"_have_ you! And how about your publishing an\nitemized account of campaign expenses?\"\n\nAlvord, his last card played, fell back beaten, every vestige of\noptimistic pugnacity gone from his face. Edgington laid his hand on\nthe other's shoulder, in sympathy.\n\n\"I tell you, Jim,\" said he, as he departed, \"this is no place nor time\nto run a reform campaign. Brassfield isn't the candidate for it, and\nyou're not the manager. You're simply fish trying to fly. Come with\nme and we'll get into our natural element.\"\n\n\"Not by a good deal,\" said Alvord stubbornly. \"I don't know anything\nin this but Brassfield, and to him I'll stick!\"\n\n\"As you please,\" said Edgington. \"But keep the lid on the Scarlett\nbusiness!\"\n\nAlvord made no reply. But when Edgington was gone he took up his work\nwith a groan of real distress.\n\n\n\n\nXXIII\n\nTHE MOVING FINGER WRITES\n\n To the Queen came the guard full of zeal:\n Haled in bonds the Pretender:\n \"Shall it be noose or knout, rack or wheel?\"\n But her proud face grew tender.\n Down she stepped from her throne--made him free;\n \"Love,\" she said, with a sigh,\n \"What is rank? You are you, we are we, I am I!\"\n --_The Cheating of Zenobia_.\n\nI should like to write, just here, a little disquisition on Crises. I\nshould show how all nature moves ever on and on toward certain\ncataclysmic events, each of which marks a point of departure for new\nascents in progression. I should begin, of course, with the Nebular\nHypothesis, its crash of suns, followed by the evolution of the star\nand its system of planets, its life, cooling, death, and a fresh crisis\nforming a new nebula. I should end with either Revolutions or Malaria,\ndepending on whether I should last consider the subject in its relation\nto sociology or to pathology; but in any case, somewhere along in the\nlatter third of the work, I should treat of Love and Marriage, and\ntherein of the Crisis and Catastrophe in Romance.\n\nI have a good mind to do it!\n\nBut, no; crises in general must wait, seeing that our particular one\nstands clamoring for solution. The concrete bids away with the\nabstraction. None of our friends of this history could be brought just\nnow, for a single moment, to seek solace in philosophy, unless it might\nbe Professor Blatherwick--and he is entirely oblivious of the fact of\nthe crisis having made its appearance.\n\nNot so, for instance, with the professor's extraordinary daughter,\nwhose feelings were so lacerated by the culminating proof of the\nfickleness of Brassfield at the Pumphreys' reception that she wondered\nhow she could ever have thought of keeping him in that perfidious plane\nof consciousness in the hope that therein he would cleave to her only.\nBetter a good friend in Amidon, said she, than a false lover in\nBrassfield. Howbeit, she isolated herself and mourned, thinking much\nof the wrong her deed of the reception had done to Amidon, and\nwondering how it might be remedied.\n\nNor with Mr. Amidon, who, while ignorant of the full extent of his\nmisfortune in the eyes of Elizabeth, yet knew that he was deep, deep in\ndisgrace with her, and found so many plausible reasons for it that the\nepisode at the reception seemed the least of them. He knew enough of\nBrassfield to believe him guilty on any charge which might be brought\nagainst him. The only doubt he allowed himself was as to how far he,\nFlorian Amidon, was morally responsible for Brassfield's wrong-doings.\nHe had no doubt that Miss Scarlett had a real grievance against\nBrassfield, and, in an extremity of woe, made up his mind that Amidon\nmust hold himself to the sorry trade of answering a debt he never\ncontracted. He knew from a brief interview with Alvord that the\npolitical situation was bad, but for this he had scarcely a thought\nsince the tragic breaking-up of their little Belshazzar's Feast.", "start_char_idx": 320098, "end_char_idx": 324008, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55": {"__data__": {"id_": "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "4f2294ebced134750302238d26397173aa4ca2f9b57b11a4797ddbd69fbaf607", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0c527de2bb555d1d1c483e80abe5b66d38a015d45137ea85ec96bf7dde62b979", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It\nwas his relations with Miss Waldron and Miss Scarlett which placed him\nbeyond the reach of philosophy.\n\nSo also is Judge Blodgett, who has been busy since the banquet, some of\nthe time with a towel about his brow, searching through Edgington's\nlibrary, to which his connection with the Bunn's Ferry well case gave\nhim the _entr\u00c3\u00a9e_, for the law of breach of promise of marriage as\ndefined by the Pennsylvania decisions. Edgington himself was\napparently always from his office. Blodgett's call on Fuller and Cox\nwas most unsatisfactory, Mr. Fuller with some acerbity disclaiming all\nknowledge of any such case as Scarlett versus Brassfield, and Mr. Cox\nbeing invisible.\n\n\"They act,\" said he to Florian, \"like people who are out for revenge,\nor a vindication, or something besides money. I don't consider their\nattitude favorable to a compromise.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Amidon, \"that does not surprise me at all.\"\n\n\"It doesn't, eh?\" went on the judge. \"Well, I can't say that anything\nsurprises me; though I was a little taken off my feet by a rumor that\nsomething took place between you and the plaintiff at that party the\nother night. How was that?\"\n\n\"There may have been something,\" said Amidon calmly, \"but you must get\nparticulars from some one else--Clara, perhaps. You see, she was\ngiving tests, and put me into that--Brassfield state, (why, I can't\nunderstand)--and I don't know what occurred; but there was something.\"\n\n\"I'd like to know about that,\" said the judge contemplatively, \"I'd\nlike to know. That stairway episode--that collision, you remember--may\nnot count for much on the trial; but with a few corroborative\ncircumstances, eh, my boy? Farmer jury; pretty girl; blighted\naffection; damned villain, you know. But say! she's got something to\nprove if she wins, under the authorities here, and there are more cases\nin this state than there ought to be in the whole world; but a\nsummer-resort engagement, girl of mature years, a little bit swift down\nthe quarter-stretch and all that--cheer up, Florian, we'll win, or\nwe'll make it a great case----\"\n\n\"Blodgett,\" answered Amidon, who heard with horror the lawyer's\nforecast of the trial, \"she may not have to prove anything. There may\nnot be any trial. I must know these facts! I may owe her reparation.\nI may--anything! I must know; and no one but Madame le Claire can help\nus, and she must act through that accursed scoundrel who has got us\ninto all this--Brassfield! Go to her, Blodgett, and tell her that she\nmust see us. I have asked for an interview a dozen times since that\nreception but she won't see any one. Get an interview for this\nafternoon; and you must be present and hear her bring out of him a full\nconfession; not as my attorney, but as my friend, as a gentleman. If\nyou find out the worst, as I believe, I shall offer----\"\n\nJudge Blodgett gave Amidon's hand a warm grasp.\n\n\"That's like you, Florian,\" he exclaimed, \"and it's the part of a man!\nBut I'd see her in Halifax first! Why, you may be called to give\nup--have you considered--Miss Wald----\"\n\n\"No no!\" said Amidon, \"that--_she_ is no longer a factor in the case.\nIt's all over with her anyhow, if---- I can't talk of that; but can't\nyou see that this other matter must be cleared up--before I can even\ncome into her presence? Can't you see----\"\n\n\"I'll see the madame,\" said the judge. \"Yes--I'll see her! I'll see\nher at once. I guess you're right about it, Florian.\"\n\nMadame le Claire was keenly conscious of the converging lines of fate,\nthe meeting of which was so rich in baleful promise. She was\nprostrated at the result of her work at the reception. She had seen\nFlorian in a position of utter humiliation.", "start_char_idx": 324010, "end_char_idx": 327683, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c": {"__data__": {"id_": "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "9a8d41c080b3d53dbe2596109f795230e44cc169a1655b9baa49748e689424c4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2f13c4cbbdf9cdefd9655c27b82ec3949088ff7acaea49a59695c5665c66c2f7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She had seen\nFlorian in a position of utter humiliation. She had observed the gray\npallor in Elizabeth's face as she walked from the room, and felt on her\nconscience the murder of their happiness. She had seen--and this hurt\nher more than she would to herself admit--she had seen Brassfield walk\nfrom a whispered conversation with herself--an amorous, wooing\nconversation--to a secret meeting with Daisy Scarlett; so that she felt\ndespoiled of the hold she had had on the affections of even Amidon's\nfalse second self, Brassfield. For all this she blamed herself because\nof the little jealous spite, to gratify which she had made Brassfield\nwalk his disastrous hour on the stage. What should she do? What could\nshe do? She secluded herself and pondered. On this second day, she\nmade her resolve: she would see Miss Waldron, and if possible explain\nas much of the mystery as might serve to satisfy her with reference to\nthe affair of the East Room. Accordingly, a note went up to the house\nwith the white columns, asking for a meeting. And as the messenger\ndeparted, the card of Judge Blodgett came in.\n\n\"No!\" said Madame le Claire, to his request, \"no, I must be excused! I\ncan not conscientiously put him in that state again. If you could have\nseen him when last----\"\n\n\"Exactly!\" said the judge, filling in the pause. \"And as I didn't see\nthat reception affair, you must tell me about it. It's important for\nme to know.\"\n\nWhen he had been told, the judge walked back and forth in evident\nperturbation, fingering over the leaves of a little square book which\nhe took from his pocket.\n\n\"Did you ever,\" said he at last, \"happen to hear what was the rule laid\ndown in the breach of promise case of Hall versus Maguire?\"\n\n\"Breach of promise!\" ejaculated the young woman, inferring a volume\nfrom the words. \"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"These facts of which you inform me,\" said he, \"bring Mr. Amidon's case\nwithin the rule in Hall versus Maguire, square as a die! Oh, I forgot\nto tell you! Mr. Amidon, doing business under the name and style of\nEugene Brassfield, has been sued by Miss Daisy Scarlett, for breach of\npromise. No publicity, as yet, but----\"\n\n\"Oh, it must be stopped!\" exclaimed the occultist; \"it shall be\nstopped! He is not guilty. He was irresponsible--ask papa about it;\nhe will tell you so. This girl is coming to see me here to-day: I'll\ntell her how wrong----\"\n\n\"No, no, my dear!\" said the judge in a fatherly manner. \"That would\nnever do, never! You may have given a hint as to this matter of\nirresponsibility, worth considering. Promise of marriage--civil\ncontract; abnormal state--irresponsibility: it looks pretty well! You\nshould have been a lawyer. But this thing of having dealings with Miss\nScarlett except in the presence of and through her legal advisers,\nMessrs. Fuller and Cox--not for a moment to be thought of by an\nhonorable practitioner: not for a moment!\"\n\nMadame le Claire regarded him with a lofty scorn meant for these\nantiquated scruples of his; but before she could find words, the knock\nof the bell-boy called her attention to the door.\n\n\"Miss Waldron is below!\" said she. \"Judge, you may bring Mr. Amidon up\nin half an hour. I shall then be at liberty, and may grant his\nrequest. Please leave me, now; I have asked Miss Waldron to be shown\nup, and must see her alone.\"\n\n\nElizabeth Waldron, in this plexus of disasters, found nowhere a gleam\nof comfort. Her fine chagrin at the thought of such things as she\nfeared might be censurable as overfree self-revelation to her lover in\nsuch things as letters and the sweet concessions of the new\nbetrothal--all this was past, now. Tragedy has this of comfort in it:\nits fateful lightnings burn out of the atmosphere of life all the\nnoisome littlenesses which have seemed worthy of concern.", "start_char_idx": 327627, "end_char_idx": 331421, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45": {"__data__": {"id_": "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "c6320febb902a1f9d24736e8bd40a0182b4cb4047dfde831c915d36ea1c07e47", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d216e8569a34a7ca75ba563d65e7f38cfc0dce55184d19b541de082734c794e4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "So it was\nwith Elizabeth, as she now faced the very annihilation of all for which\nshe had lived--centered in that \"perfect lover,\" who was now worse than\nannihilated in this descent to a plane which made every act of homage\nto her so mean and common that she would have felt his status uplifted\nby some proof of great guilt on his part. And she could see no way of\nacquitting him. There was mystery in it, but no exculpation.\nMystery----\n\nWith the idea of mystery came in the image of the strange girl with the\nfascinating glance and the party-colored hair. Could it be possible\nthat the occult power possessed by her might somehow furnish an\nexplanation of her lover's strangely base behavior? More and more did\nthis fixed thought engross her mind. She felt that she must know--must\nsee this woman and her colorless father. Desire grew to resolve;\nresolve bred inquiry as to ways of compassing an interview; and in the\nmidst of the inquiry, came Madame le Claire's messenger. Her answer\nwas the putting on of her cloak for a visit to the occultist's parlors.\n\nThe two women faced each other like hostile champions in a truce.\nElizabeth's first aversion to the other had been swept away in the\nflood of righteous jealousy created by the Scarlett episode. Madame le\nClaire's unreasoning feeling of injury had been mitigated by the same\nbaleful affair, and her sense of justice fought for Elizabeth; but no\ntwo women loving the same man ever met without antagonism.\n\n\"I thank you,\" said Miss Waldron, \"for this invitation. I think you\nowe me the benefit of such light as you can give on some--some\nthings--which are dark to me.\"\n\nA little angry flush rose to Madame le Claire's cheek at the tone in\nwhich the first part of this speech was uttered. It passed away, and\nwas replaced by a gentler expression at the doleful and faltering\nconclusion.\n\n\"I owe you,\" she answered, \"more in the way of knowledge than you\nimagine. I expect other visitors. Will you step into this little rear\nroom? I may be called away from you for a while, but I shall return.\"\n\n\"I need not tell you,\" said Elizabeth, \"how vitally important it is to\nme to know whether there was anything in your mesmeric influence\nover--Mr. Brassfield--which would cause him to do--things unworthy of\nhim--as he did. Did you impose any such thing on him by your\npower?--could you have been so cruel?\"\n\n\"Before I answer that,\" replied Clara, \"there are many things to tell.\nWhen did you first meet Mr. Amidon.--Brassfield, I mean?\"\n\n\"Why do you call him by that name?\" cried Elizabeth. \"That is what\nMrs. Hunter called him! One moment he told me he knew her; the next,\nhe denied it to her face. What is there in this matter of names?\"\n\nMadame le Claire looked with a fixed and unwavering calmness at Miss\nWaldron, and answered in a tone of perfect reassurance.\n\n\"There is nothing in it which can't be easily explained. You have\nknown Mr. Brassfield a long time?\"\n\n\"Since I was seventeen. He did my aunt and me a great favor, which\nlifted us out of poverty--about some land we had, and oil\ndiscoveries--I went away soon after this, but he has always been very\nkind and good--until--until this----\"\n\nElizabeth walked to the window and looked out for a long time, during\nwhich Madame le Claire regarded her fixedly and tried not to hate her.\n\n\"Did he tell you much of his past?\"\n\n\"No, he said it was a very ordinary past, and that he would tell us all\nabout it some time; and then the subject never came up again. I never\nreally cared!\"\n\n\"Let me tell it to you,\" said Madame le Claire. \"He was, all his life,\na man of wealth and standing. He was a scholar and a student of the\nfine arts and letters. He was the pride of his town and his\nuniversity. Then, all at once, nearly six years ago, came on him one\nof those strange experiences of which I, through my profession, am able\nto speak to you as one having knowledge. He became another man.", "start_char_idx": 331423, "end_char_idx": 335342, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951": {"__data__": {"id_": "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "8ceda25b699046ba1b50627e091078e06eabb337457e3bc008da5f6da4173293", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e8858adb138c054c988f1e5e89093f16f5f28572dc6e4896f1eebee3e629d5ea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He became another man. His\nmind had drawn across it a dead line cutting off everything back of a\ncertain date. He did not tell you of his life, _because he did not\nremember it himself_.\"\n\nElizabeth gasped, and turned pale.\n\n\"This life of his----\" she began.\n\n\"--was a life which was in every way better--which will add to your\npride in him. But you must be prepared for some strange and unexpected\nthings. Now, for instance, a name--a name seems important; but what is\nit? This loss of personality--of self-consciousness relating to the\npast--it was loss of name, of mode of life, of all memory, except\ncertain blind, unconscious reflexes, in which the brain had no part.\nHow the name of Brassfield was suggested to this new-born personality\nof his, no one can tell, he least of all. But----\"\n\n\"Then his name--his name is--is not----\"\n\nNow here was a situation for a diplomat. To say that Brassfield was an\nassumed name, an alias, was to shock the girl's womanish conservatism\nto its very base. Madame le Claire proved herself a diplomat.\n\n\"Why,\" said she, as if the matter were, after all, of no importance,\n\"the name of Brassfield is his, legally, Judge Blodgett says, and\nmorally. These business names, as distinguished from others, are quite\ncommon now, I am told--take mine, for instance. Eugene Brassfield was\nnot his name until five years ago, when this happened. He is really\nFlorian Amidon, son of the chemist Wilford Amidon, of whom, I have no\ndoubt, you have read.\"\n\nThe fact that the name of Wilford Amidon had never reached her ears,\ndid not occur to Elizabeth. Madame le Claire's choice of expression\nsounded like the announcement that Florian was a prince just throwing\noff his incognito. The subtle sophistry of this way of putting it\nfound grateful harborage in Elizabeth's hungry soul. For a moment she\nfelt comforted. Then came back the thought that, after all, she had\nfound out nothing of the matters she had come to search out.\n\n\"It is very strange,\" said she, \"but, after all, it only adds to the\nmystery. Why did he do those things? Did you make him do them? And\nwhy did he say that he knew Mrs. Hunter, and then deny it? And if he\nknew about his past when he said he knew her, did he not know it as\nwell afterward? I can not be blinded to these matters by a statement\nof things merely mysterious and strange. I must have----\"\n\n\"My friend,\" said Madame le Claire, \"all these things will be\nexplained, trust me. The person tapping at the outer door is Judge\nBlodgett with Mr. Am----with your future husband. Things will occur of\nwhich you should know, and which can not take place if they know you\nare here. It will be most honorable for you to stay. Remain here and\nnote well what happens, and you will get much light on your troubles,\nand on his--of some of which you do not yet know, which I do not\nunderstand, but which will be cleared up. You will say nothing, but\nwatch and listen.\"\n\nBefore Miss Waldron could protest, the other woman was gone. Florian\nand Judge Blodgett were brought into the middle room, and seated with\ntheir faces from the porti\u00c3\u00a8re, behind which Elizabeth waited, wondering\nwhat she should do, feeling that she had the right to know, and\nobedient to the mesmerist's commands. Mr. Amidon began _in medias\nres_, too full of grim determination for any circumlocution.\n\n\"Madame le Claire,\" said he, \"recently, as I sat at supper, I was\nnotified that this Miss Scarlett has begun suit against me for breach\nof promise.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Madame le Claire, \"I have heard of it. It is most unjust.\"\n\nElizabeth, astounded at Amidon's statement, heard her new friend's\nreply as some far-off note of succor in doubtful and deadly battle.\nShe sat close, now, and listened.", "start_char_idx": 335320, "end_char_idx": 339056, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889": {"__data__": {"id_": "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "920f41f595e36fa4bad25bfe5d0773fe7aaf7e945b78dfa20e2d862b68e2e6b8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "44a9231f6f4666c83658f4ddb7177ee8c7b4d857466b4f6a949e914a9101b2bb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She sat close, now, and listened.\n\n\"Ever since I came to myself,\" went on Amidon, \"and through your\nwonderful power found out about this life of mine here in Bellevale,\nthe name of Miss Scarlett has come up from time to time as connected\nwith it. I have always shrunk from having you find out just what\nour--relations--have been, and the whole thing has been dark to\nme--dark and forbidding. What wrong I--this man Brassfield--may have\ndone her, I can not know without your aid. I must know this, now. If\nshe has been wronged, she shall have reparation, as full as I can give.\"\n\n\"What do you mean,\" said Madame le Claire--and Elizabeth held her\nbreath--\"by full reparation?\"\n\n\"First let us know the wrong! If that exists, the reparation will be\nfor Miss Scarlett and her advisers to name.\"\n\n\"But they may name the keeping of the promise they say you have made!\"\n\n\"I have thought that all over.\"\n\n\"But your engagement to----\"\n\n\"The lady you are about to mention,\" said Amidon, \"must have ceased to\ncare much for me, after what I am told took place the other night; and\nwhen she learns of this other disgrace, as she must before she sees me\nagain--if she ever does--it will be all over--for ever--except the\nwrong to her--for which reparation can never be made. I----\"\n\n\"Oh, it is too dreadful!\" cried Madame le Claire. \"And for that worst\nthing--the other night--I only am to blame! I put into you the\ncharacter in which you have become weak and drawn aside by suggestions\nnot natural to your own character. Can you ever forgive me?\"\n\n\"I have never thought of blaming you!\" he protested. \"You? Why, no\none ever had so good a friend; all the chance I have had to win\nhappiness here, you gave me. I have lost that--by misfortune. Now\nhelp me to make things as near right as I can. Put me back into the\nworld of Brassfield, and let me know the worst that I--he--has done.\"\n\n\"Coom een!\" said the voice of the professor in the corridor. \"Coom\neen! Clara iss not here now: den she must be someveres. Pe bleaced to\nsit vile I look. Anyhow, she vill soon return. Ach, Herr Cox, ve\nmissed you creatly at our supper--eatings of reasons and sdreams of\nsouls! Ach! Here iss our friendt te chutche, ant Herr\nAmidon--Brassfield, I mean!\"\n\nMadame le Claire appeared in the archway.\n\n\"Ah, Miss Scarlett,\" said she, \"you are early. May I ask you to\nreturn, in----\"\n\n\"No!\" It was the voice of Miss Scarlett which replied. \"No, I'm not\ngoing! And if 'Gene Brassfield is in there, Billy Cox has something to\nsay to him. Here, Mr. Alvord, you come in, too; he's out there hunting\nfor 'Gene. Billy, do your duty now!\"\n\n\"Pardon me,\" said Mr. Cox, advancing into the next room, followed by\nMiss Scarlett. \"Pardon me, Judge Blodgett, I have a few words for you\nand your client. Miss Scarlett has made me agree to apologize to Mr.\nBrassfield about that summons; and if 'Gene Brassfield thinks I owe him\nany apology for putting it on to him a little before his out-of-town\nfriends, I'll make it. But here are the facts, and he knows it: for\nfour years he's been rawhiding me at every chance with his practical\njokes. He had me arrested and detained for a whole day on fake\ntelegrams at Wilkesbarre, only last fall; and just before that he got\neverybody at the Springs to thinking I was Tascott, and induced a rural\nconstable to take me into custody. Why, Alvord here in his worst\nestate hasn't been as bad as he's been. If he's lost any opportunity,\nI don't remember it; and, of course, I've got back once in a while, and\nmay be about even. But everything has been good-natured and brotherly,\nas ought to be between members of the gang.", "start_char_idx": 339023, "end_char_idx": 342665, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702": {"__data__": {"id_": "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "2f17341e953223b6537c222e80f201561efc7a19fa000a73b7024bc8f4aa60ef", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7a62d5750295023f898ab4b09ee2dbb419792f91a118aab38d522f9d70a1fa71", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "_And_, of course, when the\ncannon-crackers began to go off that night, I knew he was doing it. I\nwas over in Major Pumphrey's parlor, where Daisy had invited me, during\nthe eruption, and I told her about these things, and wished for some\nway of getting even, and--and some one spoke of this breach of promise\nsuit, and we--that is, I--got up the summons, and I told Ed Tootle to\nserve it on you at your orgy--you had no business to expect me to enter\nany free-for-all inebriates' competition--you know that, 'Gene! It may\nhave been a little extreme as a joke; but if you'd laughed it off as\nyou always do, nobody would have thought anything of it except to chaff\nyou about it. But what do you do? You make as serious a thing of it\nas if you hadn't been trotting with our crowd for five years or so.\nYou set this old--my learned friend from the West--briefing it up, and\nyou make a fool of me. Worse than that, you place Daisy in a most\nobjectionable position; and, by George, 'Gene, I claim the apology is\ndue from you, to me and Daisy!\"\n\nThat he, Florian Amidon, had ever been guilty of playing such pranks as\nthe ones described by Mr. Cox, seemed incredible; but his sense of\nrelief at the way his burden rolled away in the light of Cox's\nindignant apology overcame all other sensations. He sprang forward to\noffer his hand cordially to Mr. Cox.\n\n\"I agree with you!\" said he. \"I do owe you an apology, and I freely\noffer it. As for the offense I have given Miss Scarlett, I can only\nsay that I have had a very strange mental experience lately, of which\nmy friends here can tell you, or I should never have--never have taken\nthe matter--as I did. I beg you both to forgive me!\"\n\n\"'Gene,\" said Miss Scarlett, offering her hand, \"I'm too game a sport\nto go mourning because I lost out, and you ought to have known--I\ndeclare, I believe you've been crazy! I told Billy--Billy and I are\nengaged, now, and are really going to be married--I told Billy how,\nwhen we were at the watering-place, I insisted that it seemed a shame\nnot to be engaged, and how we fixed it to be engaged for a week, and it\nmade him furious! But as good a fellow as I've been, the way you took\nour joke was shabby. You people may know some good excuse, but----\"\n\nMadame le Claire was not only a diplomat: she was a strategist. Now,\nshe saw, was the supreme moment in which to complete for Florian the\ngood work she had begun.\n\n\"Please excuse Mr. Brassfield,\" said sha. \"He is wanted in the back\nparlor; come, Mr. Brassfield, give me your arm!\"\n\nThrough the porti\u00c3\u00a8re she swept, bearing Amidon as on wings. There sat\nElizabeth, her face bowed down upon her arms, on the back of a sofa.\nShe rose as they entered.\n\n\"Elizabeth!\" cried Florian. \"My darling!\"\n\nHe stretched out his hands pleadingly, and walked toward her. She\nshrank back; and Madame le Claire retreated, knowing that the struggle\nof Amidon's life was before him.\n\nYet, gentle reader, why should not Amidon win? To us, a thousand\nthings might seem to need explanation; but to Elizabeth, all this\nseparation of Amidon from Brassfield was so new, so little realized,\nthat her love bridged the chasm, and nothing was required except the\nclearing up of a week or two of curious happenings, most of which had\nalready been so glozed over by Madame le Claire's generous plea, that\nwhat girl in love would require any greater price in humble wooing than\nFlorian yearned to pay? Why, mesmerism alone covers all sorts of odd\nand suspicious doings. The case, for instance, of---- But that is\nbeside the point. The point is, that with half of Brassfield's skill,\nAmidon will win handsomely. Some scenes ought not to be painted--in\nthis plain and flippant prose.", "start_char_idx": 342667, "end_char_idx": 346370, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5": {"__data__": {"id_": "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "806cfbca8800ba2c9eb065c95d84577e5227d38869385420e691792192d05c97", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "832cf04757105a1f2fdc3f94f2a3b4378e39d8f59a5356015a7c8fb4a68961bb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Some scenes ought not to be painted--in\nthis plain and flippant prose. Let us wait, therefore, until the\narrival of the voices of Florian and Elizabeth at the pitch of ordinary\nconversation admonishes us that the prose writer's psychological moment\nhas arrived. Then we may take and transcribe some notes.\n\n\"Of course,\" Florian said, \"he must have had some redeeming\ntraits--superficially, or you would never have cared for him----\"\n\n\"Oh, don't say such things!\" she protested. \"Your real, real self came\nuppermost, I am sure, in your behavior to me. You were perfectly\nlovely, even if you didn't understand me as I wanted you to do--as you\ndo now.\"\n\n\"Dearest!\" he whispered. \"You never loved him as you do me, did you?\"\n\nThat little laugh that first charmed him filled the pause.\n\n\"Don't say 'him!'\" she commanded. \"Think of the original absurdity of\nbeing jealous of a rival, and that rival yourself! And remember that\n'he' was my sweetheart, and for my own sake, don't abuse him. Why, it\nwas you all the time; and I always felt, even at the worst, that hidden\nin the Brassfield personality was the one man for me in all the world.\nIt was this woman's instinct, that men never believe in, and the girl's\neyesight. I look at you, and I know you are the same. Don't slander\nyourself as you appeared in your other mental clothes. I won't have\nit--but don't change back, dear!\"\n\n\n\"But really,\" said Elizabeth, \"is it necessary for us to live in\nBellevale?\"\n\n\"Would you go away--with me?\"\n\nThere was a silence here, during which something seemed to take place\nwhich removed the necessity of answer; for surely, Elizabeth would not\nhave allowed this question to go unanswered otherwise.\n\n\"Oh,\" said she, \"there are more places I want to go, and more things I\nwant to see and study--you never would believe it! It will take years\nand years.\"\n\n\"Well, why not?\" answered Florian. \"'Whether in Naishapur or Babylon',\nI want to go to every one of those places myself--and always have. We\nwon't build that house. We'll have Blodgett stay and look after the\nclosing up of the business here by Stevens. We'll run out home so I\ncan say hail and farewell to Jennie and greet my new nephews and nieces\nthere, and then, ho! for Japan and India and the East, on our way to\nthose high places where you want to erect your idolatrous altars.\nElizabeth! Do you realize what a Paradise we're planning?\"\n\n\"There!\" she said quaveringly. \"I knew it was too perfect to be true,\nand that we'd find some obstacle, and I've found it! That miserable\noffice you'll have to fill!\"\n\nChillingly the wet blanket descended on their fervid joy, and they\nlooked at each other in consternation. This public call on Mr.\nBrassfield now became an incubus to Mr. Amidon, pinning him to earth as\nhe essayed to rise and fly. Gradually, as he looked fondly in his\nlady-love's face, the hope dawned in his heart that perhaps her desire\nthat he should have a \"career\" might not be much greater than his.\n\n\"Dear,\" said he at last, \"would you feel very sorely disappointed if we\nwere to give it up--the state and national capital life, and all that?\"\n\n\"I disappointed!\" exclaimed she. \"Why, could you bring yourself to\ngive them up? I hate to say it--but--I just detest the whole thing!\"\n\n\"So do I!\" said Amidon.\n\nThey wondered in the next room what could have excited so much hilarity.\n\n\"What a beginning!\" said Elizabeth. \"To start out in our life with\nsuch a mutual deception! But I wanted to have a part in your life,\nwhatever it might be; and I could organize Primrose Leagues, and\nsucceed in them, if it were necessary to help in any ambition of yours.\nSo there! Oh, it was silly to write in that way--but you really seemed\nat that time----\"\n\n\"I never did, my dear!", "start_char_idx": 346300, "end_char_idx": 350047, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd": {"__data__": {"id_": "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "f103dcfc42680e4deb97cf8b162bdf0a04f6a4547bb003e26f50c6a36cec7106", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1d63a7edbd1ffe29ebcdaec6c98c405c06c89da17689103b808f44036e170a09", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was that Brassfield; and when I was caught\nand restored by Madame le Claire, I should have declined if it hadn't\nbeen for the--the Washington career, you know----\"\n\n\"Oh, please don't say any more----\"\n\n\"And I had Blodgett get up a letter of withdrawal----\"\n\n\"Do you suppose he has it yet?\" she cried.\n\n\"'Letter of withdrawal!' It sounds so sort of parliamentary and\ncorrect and comforting!\"\n\n\"It does,\" agreed Amidon, \"especially in view of the fact that I\nbelieve I'm beaten anyhow. Judge Blodgett thinks I am, and Mr.\nAlvord----\"\n\n\"Poor Jim Alvord!\" interposed Elizabeth. \"His wife says he would\ndesert his family for you.\"\n\n\"For Brassfield, she means,\" said Amidon. \"It is really not the same\nthing, dear. But I was saying that even he half confesses defeat.\nI've made an awful mess of this thing, Elizabeth, on account of not\nreally knowing anything of the people or their opinions or desires.\nEven that platform of ours couldn't pull us through. No wisdom--and I\nhaven't much--could keep a man from making blunders when he went out to\ndo things for himself, knowing nothing of the situation except what he\ngot from his inner consciousness, and from what he was told. A\npolitical situation is too delicately balanced for that. If I had done\nnothing, I should have remained undeservedly popular and reaped the\nreward of Brassfield's cunning and hypocrisy--don't stop me, please!\nBut you and I tried to impose righteousness on the people from the\noutside and above. It never comes in that way, but always from the\ninside and below, like lilies from the mud. I'm really a most\nunpopular man, opposed by most of the 'good citizens' and all of the\nbad except a few who still believe me dishonest, and will desert me as\nsoon as their fellows can convince them that I'm sincere--isn't it a\npretty plot! Facing defeat because of my advocacy of principles\neverybody concedes to be right, because I'm suspected of an actual\nintention to act according to my platform pledge; when that man\nBrassfield, who was preparing to carry out a policy of selfish\nspoliation, could have carried every precinct!\"\n\n\"It does me so much good,\" she said, \"to see you in such a glow of\nindignation, that I allowed you to go on with that unjust condemnation\nof my Eugene. Well, then, it seems my noble platform actually ruined\nyou. How nasty of the people! Can't we elope--run away--and never\ncome back, or look at a paper or think of it again? Or shall we use\nJudge Blodgett's letter of withdrawal--bless him!\"\n\nSomething--perhaps it was the elopement proposal--induced eventualities\nwhich delayed the conversation again for some minutes.\n\n\"Let's go out,\" said she, \"and ask him to--to do whatever they do with\nletters of withdrawal--at once!\"\n\nThe room into which Amidon led the shy Elizabeth had been a\nclearing-house of confused ideas during their long t\u00c3\u00aate-\u00c3\u00a0-t\u00c3\u00aate. Madame\nle Claire had explained the mystery of dual personality as well as it\ncan be explained, with some comment on the fact that such things happen\nto people occasionally, no one knows why. Alvord and Judge Blodgett\nagreed that the candidate for mayor should be withdrawn. Alvord even\nraised the question as to whether, the nomination papers being issued\nto Brassfield, Amidon could be legally elected. Judge Blodgett said it\nraised the finest legal question he ever had encountered, and if\ncarried up would be a case of first impression in the world's\njurisprudence. Alvord assented to this without argument.\n\nThen Le Claire told them of Amidon's life in his old home as she had\nlearned of it, of his bewildered application to her in New York, and\nhow he had been helped. She was a long time telling it, and all the\nwhile she was thinking of the tender things happening in the next room.\nShe heard the murmuring of their voices, as full of meaning as the\nflutings of mating birds. And she faltered and stopped.\n\n\"Papa, papa!\" she cried, \"help me out! Tell them the rest.\"", "start_char_idx": 350049, "end_char_idx": 353995, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28": {"__data__": {"id_": "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "9d3a5ef431ca2baf5255a4d2924e78964a1193c2817067c410b71d67320491fa", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dd2c94786f6a4c2266665b7b346c49a838ec61c093d77f202a89582545086b0a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "she cried, \"help me out! Tell them the rest.\"\n\n\"You vill vonder, berhaps,\" said the professor, \"at sairtain\negsentricities of gonduct of our friendt, in his later Brassfield\nphace, in vitch he has shown de kvality of sportiness--or sportif--vat\niss de vort?\"\n\n\"Sportiness,\" said Miss Scarlett, \"is the word.\"\n\n\"T'anks!\" said the professor. \"Vell, de egsblanation is dus: te\nBrassfield state vas vun of gontinuous self-hypnotismus. It iss\napnormal. Its shief garacteristic is suchestibility. Now, if ve find\ndat te supchect hass been frown into de society of people of--vat you\ngall?--sporty tendencies, he vould gradually yield to te suchestion of\ndese tendencies. He vould----\"\n\n\"I am glad I heard that,\" said Elizabeth. \"We must not allow you to\nreturn to this abnormal state!\"\n\n\"Mr. Cox,\" said Judge Blodgett, \"do we need a detective to run this\nsporty influence down? or shall we look among the Christian Martyrs?\"\n\n\"It will relieve me,\" said Miss Scarlett, hugging Mr. Cox's arm, \"if\nyou won't look. I'm afraid to be searched!\"\n\nElizabeth and Florian appeared in the archway. Her eyes were shining\nwith the soft radiance which, like the flush of dawn, comes only once\nin the day's journey, and never returns. His sought her face in a\nworship that she would never have seen had Eugene Brassfield looked out\nfrom them.\n\n\"I am taking Miss Waldron home,\" said Mr. Amidon. \"Matters have just\ntaken such a turn that I shall leave soon for my former home in\nWisconsin, where I have large interests, and I may not be able to\nreturn. Such being the case, we do not feel that it would be just to\nthe people of this city to continue in the position of a candidate for\npublic office, and--pshaw! why not be honest? We're beaten, and we\ndon't want the office, anyhow. Judge, have you that letter of\nwithdrawal convenient?\"\n\n[Illustration: \"I am taking Miss Waldron home,\" said Mr. Amidon.]\n\n\"I have,\" said the judge. \"I figured all the time that you'd need it.\"\n\n\"Thanks!\" said Amidon. \"Take it, Mr. Alvord, and give it to the world\nat large. You understand, do you not, the peculiar change of\npersonality which makes it improper----?\"\n\n\"Sure,\" said Alvord. \"The man who put out that platform of ours can't\nafford to be caught short-changing the public by switching candidates\non them on the eve of election. And right here let me say, that be it\nAmidon or Brassfield, the ties of brotherhood still hold with Jim\nAlvord, in F. D. and B., and I hate to use this letter. I believe\nstill we could pull through, with proper management from now on, and,\nconfound it! I'd rather be licked with you than to win with any other\nman on earth!\"\n\n\"In all phases of my life,\" said Amidon, grasping the little man's hand\nwarmly, \"I'm going to take the liberty of holding you as my friend. I\nknow faithfulness and unselfishness when I see it, no matter if I don't\nquite fall in with its methods.\"\n\nAlvord's eyes filled, as his emotions rose with the parting. Yet he\ncould not allow his methods to be questioned even by implication.\n\n\"Well, now, as to methods,\" he began, \"theoretically you may be right\nabout publicity and that platform, but practically--well, let's forget\nit! But, 'Gene--or whatever your damned name is!--don't forget me!\nGood-by!\"\n\nThe judge, the professor, Miss Scarlett, and all the rest had gone on\ntheir various ways, and Madame le Claire was in one of the inner rooms\nattended by Aaron, whom she had summoned.\n\n\"I'm not going to adopt poor Jim's language yet,\" said Elizabeth, when\nshe and Florian were again left alone. \"'Florian, Florian!'--I like\nthat name. But think how hard it was to learn to call you 'Eugene.'", "start_char_idx": 353949, "end_char_idx": 357594, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa": {"__data__": {"id_": "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "19451", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "a731976aaaa2a61469d20669aed4ebc2025b7fe074f92099eb0bbdb9f402466e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "1309dccb8cb8f46669d83cb73b7d975dca906d8ec3a84bb5c0fe54f6c75a2540", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "75154d4f3c2514f12581c930d8a4ab7a96ac9066aab171127420d02a1b5bc638", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But think how hard it was to learn to call you 'Eugene.'\nDo you remember where we were when I first called you that?\"\n\n\"Don't you realize, dearie,\" said he, \"that I know nothing of all that?\nAnd except for your sweet letter, I knew nothing of you before that day\nwhen I came from New York?\"\n\n\"O----h!\" she cried. \"And all the lovely things you did to win me----\nOh, dear, I never thought of that. And you remember nothing--nothing\nat all? Oh, it is dreadful, dreadful! No wonder I almost hated you\nthat night!\"\n\nHe put his arm about her and kissed her lingeringly.\n\n\"Dearest! Sweetheart!\" he said. \"The loss is all mine! And to make\nup for it, you must let me do them all over again--every one, a\nthousand times. Come, let us go!\"\n\nAt the door, she stopped and turned back.\n\n\"I must see Madame le Claire,\" said she.\n\nAlready the rooms were filled with the disorder of packing, and Aaron\nwas busy preparing for one of their Arab-like flittings. Madame le\nClaire stood looking down into the street.\n\n\"Are you leaving Bellevale?\" said Miss Waldron.\n\n\"On the next train,\" answered the hypnotist. \"Our tour has been a long\ntime delayed.\"\n\n\"I hope,\" said Elizabeth, \"that we shall see you again some time.\"\n\n\"It is quite probable,\" said Clara. \"We are wanderers, and public\ncharacters. Almost everybody sees us from time to time--if they\ndesire.\"\n\n\"I'm not going to leave you this way,\" said Elizabeth, with hurried\nobscurity of expression. \"You have done for me more--much\nmore--than--than I can say; but you know, you know!\"\n\n\"I know you would do as much for me!\"\n\n\"No, no!\" exclaimed Elizabeth. \"I never would. I'm not good enough.\nI'm going away now, to be very, very happy, and I want you to see--to\nknow--how I feel toward you--oh, oh, I can't say what I mean! But some\ntime, when you get settled down from the agitations we've had, after a\nlong time, write and tell me that you're happy, won't you?\"\n\nShe had put her arm around the slender waist, and faced Madame le\nClaire, gazing at her intently. Le Claire kissed her forehead, and\nlooked long, with the varicolored eyes, into those of Elizabeth. She\nseemed to speak in that way, as an easier mode of communication at this\ntime than by the words which would not come in any adequate form. So\nthe two girls stood as Professor Blatherwick came in and noticed the\nlabors of Aaron.\n\n\"Packing, Clara?\" said he. \"Vell, vere shall ve vork te hypot'esis ant\nte bublic next? I shall pe glad vunce more to hit te pike. Dis gase,\nvile supliminally great stuff, is pretty vell vorked out: not?\"\n\n\"Quite worked out,\" said Clara, \"to the end; indeed, indeed, it is\ncompletely worked out!\"\n\nElizabeth's arm tightened about her waist, and Elizabeth's breath was\ncaught in a quick little sigh. Madame le Claire replied to these\ninarticulate expressions of sympathy as if they had been words.\n\n\"Don't think that!\" said she, looking Elizabeth again steadily in the\nface. \"Don't let that haunt your mind in this new life of yours; for\nit will not be so. Let us be friends though we never meet. Yes, I\nwill write to you; but it will not be necessary. Whenever you think of\nme, this is what you will think, because I command it: 'She is busy\nwith her wandering life. New things are dimming the memory of me--and\nmine. She has found the love her soul covets. She is happy!'\"", "start_char_idx": 357538, "end_char_idx": 360872, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94": {"__data__": {"id_": "f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}, "hash": "86758a5ddfd937ef0830d7b6336bd83a5e3bbc97e9c9bf091e59e7c6fa3cac68", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0bf956e8469876b3ccddeec3b5742374c113f71138e902266e200b83f6d9903f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The Invader\n\n A NOVEL\n\n\n\n By\n\n Margaret L. Woods\n\n\n\n\n\n New York and London\n\n Harper & Brothers Publishers\n\n 1907\n\n\n\n\n Copyright, 1907, by HARPER & BROTHERS.\n\n Published May, 1907.\n\n * * * * *\n\n\n\n\nTO\n\nHilda Greaves\n\nAND THE DUMB COMPANIONS OF TAN-YR-ALLT\nTHIS BOOK IS DEDICATED BY THEIR\nGRATEFUL AND AFFECTIONATE\nFRIEND\n\n * * * * *\n\n\n\n\nTHE INVADER\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\nDinner was over and the ladies had just risen, when the Professor had\nbegged to introduce them to the new-comer on his walls. The Invader, it\nmight almost have been called, this full-length, life-size portrait,\nwhich, in the illumination of a lamp turned full upon it, seemed to take\npossession of the small room, to dominate at the end of the polished-oak\ntable, where the light of shaded candles fell on old blue plates, old\nVenetian glass, a bit of old Italian brocade, and chrysanthemums in a\nchina bowl coveted by collectors. Every detail spoke of the\nconnoisseurship, the refined and personal taste characteristic of Oxford\nin the eighties. The authority on art put up his eye-glasses and\nfingered his tiny forked beard uneasily.\n\n\"There's no doubt it's a good thing, Fletcher,\" he said, presently--\"really\nquite good. But it's too like Romney to be Raeburn, and too like Raeburn to\nbe Romney. You ought to be able to find out the painter, if, as you say,\nit's a portrait of your own great-grandmother--\"\n\n\"He did say so!\" broke in Sanderson, exultantly. \"He said it was an\nancestress. Fletcher, you're a vulgar fraud. You've got no ancestress.\nYou bought her. There's a sale-ticket still on the frame under the\nprojection at the right-hand lower corner. I saw it.\"\n\nSanderson was a small man and walked about perpetually, except when\ntaking food: sometimes then. He was a licensed insulter of his friends,\nand now stood before the picture in a belligerent attitude. The\nProfessor stroked his amber beard and smiled down on Sanderson.\n\n\"True, O Sanderson; and at the same time untrue. I did buy the picture,\nand the lady was my great-grandmother once, but she did not like the\nposition and soon gave it up. This picture must have been done after she\nhad given it up.\"\n\n\"Is this a conundrum or blather, invented to hide your ignominy in a\ncloud of words?\" asked Sanderson.\n\n\"It's a _hors d'oeuvre_ before the story,\" interposed Ian Stewart,\nthrowing back his tall dark head and looking up at the picture through\nhis eye-glasses, his handsome face alive with interest. \"'Tak' awa' the\nkickshaws,' Fletcher, 'and bring us the cauf.'\"\n\nThe Professor gathered his full beard in one hand and smiled\ndeprecatingly.\n\n\"I don't know how the ladies will like my ex-great-grandmother's story.\nIt was a bit of a scandal at the time.\"\n\n\"Never mind, Mr. Fletcher,\" cried a young married woman, with a face\nlike a seraph, \"we're all educated now, and scandal about a lady with\nher waist under her arms becomes simply classical.\"\n\n\"Not so bad as that, Mrs. Shaw, I assure you,\" returned the Professor;\n\"but I dare say you all know as much as I do about my great-grandmother,\nfor she was the well-known Lady Hammerton.\"\n\nThere were sounds of interest and surprise, for most of the party knew\nher name, and were curious to learn how she came to be Professor\nFletcher's great-grandmother. Mr. Fletcher explained:\n\n\"My great-grandfather was a distinguished professor in Edinburgh a\nhundred years ago. When he was a widower of forty with a family, he was\nsilly enough to fall in love with a little miss of sixteen. He taught\nher Latin and Greek--which was all very well--and married her, which was\ndistinctly unwise. She had one son--my grandfather--and then ran away\nwith an actor from London.", "start_char_idx": 46, "end_char_idx": 3955, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81": {"__data__": {"id_": "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0446d417f006261cbba742edcf51a5a770b7955f33462f9140f9a34167353c77", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0c031ebf376e45975e0df866bfed45a9a0717db8b06476ca0c0e7c996d72cc39", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She had one son--my grandfather--and then ran away\nwith an actor from London. After that she made a certain sensation on\nthe stage, but I suspect she was clever enough to see that her real\nsuccesses were personal ones; at all events, she made a good marriage as\nsoon as ever she got the chance. The Hammerton family naturally\nobjected. You'll find all about it in those papers which have come out\nlately. I believe, ladies, they were almost as much scandalized by her\nlearning as by her morals.\"\n\n\"She told Sydney Smith years after, I think,\" observed Stewart, \"that\nshe had to be a wit lest people should find out she was a blue. There's\na good deal about her in the Englefield _Memoirs_. She travelled\nextraordinarily for a woman in those days, and most of the real\ntreasures at Hammerton House come from her collections.\"\n\n\"I thought they were nearly all burned in a great fire, and she was\nburned trying to save them,\" said Mrs. Shaw.\n\n\"A good many were saved,\" returned Fletcher; \"she had rushed back to\nfetch a favorite bronze, was seen hurling it out of the window--and was\nnever seen again.\"\n\n\"She must have been a very remarkable woman,\" commented Stewart,\nmeditatively, his eyes still fixed on the picture.\n\n\"Know nothing about her myself,\" remarked Sanderson; \"Stewart knows\nsomething about everybody. It's sickening the way he spends his time\nreading gossip and calling it history.\"\n\n\"Gossip's like many common things, interesting when fossilized,\"\nsqueaked a little, white-haired, pink-faced old gentleman, like an\nelderly cherub in dress-clothes. He had remained at the other end of the\nroom because he did not care for pictures. Now he toddled a little\nnearer and every one made way for him with a peculiar respect, for he\nwas the Master of Durham, whose name was great in Oxford and also in the\nworld outside it. He looked up first at the pictured face and then at\nMilly Flaxman, a young cousin of Fletcher's and a scholar of Ascham\nHall, who had taken her First in Mods, and was hoping to get one in\nGreats. The Master liked young girls, but they had to be clever as well\nas pleasing in appearance to attract his attention.\n\n\"It's very like Miss Flaxman,\" he squeaked.\n\nEvery one turned their eyes from the picture to Milly, whose pale cheeks\nblushed a bright pink. The blush emphasized her resemblance to her\nancestress, whose brilliant complexion, however, hinted at rouge.\nMilly's soft hair was amber-colored, like that of the lady in the\npicture, but it was strained back from her face and twisted in a minute\nknot on the nape of her neck. That was the way in which her aunt Lady\nThomson, whose example she desired to follow in all things, did her\nhair. The long, clearly drawn eyebrows, dark in comparison with the\namber hair, the turquoise blue eyes, the mouth of the pictured lady were\ncuriously reproduced in Milly Flaxman. Possibly her figure may have been\ndesigned by nature to be as slight and supple, yet rounded, as that of\nthe white-robed, gray-scarfed lady above there. But something or some\none had intervened, and Milly looked stiff and shapeless in a green\nvelveteen frock, scooped out vaguely around her white young throat and\ngathered in clumsy folds under a liberty silk sash.\n\nMrs. Shaw cried out enraptured at the interesting resemblance which had\nescaped them all, to be instantly caught by the elderly cherub in the\nbackground, who did not care about art, while the Professor explained\nthat both Milly's parents were, like himself, great-grandchildren of\nLady Hammerton. The seraph now fell upon Milly, too shy to resist, had\nout her hair-pins in a trice and fingered the fluffy hair till it made\nan aureole around her face. Then by some conjuring trick producing a\ngauzy white scarf, Mrs. Shaw twisted it about the girl's head, in\nimitation of the lady on the wall, who had just such a scarf, but with a\ntiny embroidered border of scarlet, twisted turban-wise and floating\nbehind.\n\n\"There!\"", "start_char_idx": 3878, "end_char_idx": 7811, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916": {"__data__": {"id_": "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "204e09eba3f32df1595d42f111fe0035cfbd64c435377835607597a22293102b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "937ab02a65dd56b8c6b7d7ba9585bd592bc97ead91b01d68fc17e212b952258b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"There!\" she cried, pushing the feebly protesting Milly into the full\nlight of the lamp the Professor was holding, \"allow me to present to you\nthe new Lady Hammerton!\"\n\nThere was a moment of wondering silence. Milly's pulses beat, for she\nfelt Ian Stewart's eyes upon her. Neither he nor any one else there had\never quite realized before what capacities for beauty lay hid in the\nsubdued young face of Milly Flaxman. She had nothing indeed of the\ncharm, at once subtle and challenging, of the lady above there. She,\nwith one hand on the gold head of a tall cane, looking back, seemed to\ndare unseen adorers to follow her into a magic, perhaps a fatal\nfairyland of mountain and waterfall and cloud; a land whose dim mists\nand silver gleams seemed to echo the gray and the white of her floating\ngarments, its autumn leaves to catch a faint reflection from her hair,\nwhile far off its sky showed a thin line of sunset, red like the border\nof her veil. Milly's soft cheeks and lips were flushed, her eyes bright\nwith a mixture of very innocent emotions, as she stood with every one's\neyes, including Ian Stewart's, upon her.\n\nBut in a minute the Master took up Mrs. Shaw's remark.\n\n\"No,\" he said, emphatically; \"not a new Lady Hammerton; only a rather\nnew Miss Flaxman; and that, I assure you, is something very preferable.\"\n\n\"I'm quite sure the Master knows something dreadful about your\ngreat-grandmother, Mr. Fletcher,\" laughed Mrs. Shaw.\n\n\"I think we'd better go before he tells it,\" interposed Mrs. Fletcher,\nwho saw that Milly was feeling shy.\n\nWhen the ladies had left, the men reseated themselves at the table and\nthere was a pause. Everyone waited for the Master, who seemed meditating\nspeech.\n\n\"My mother,\" he said--and somehow they all felt startled to learn the\nfact that the Master had had a mother--\"my mother knew Lady Hammerton in\nthe twenties. She was often at Bath.\"\n\nThe thin, staccato voice broke off abruptly, and three out of the five\nother men present being the Master's pupils, remained silent, knowing he\nhad not finished. But Mr. Toovey, a young don overflowing with mild\nintelligence, exclaimed, deferentially:\n\n\"Really, Master! Really! How extremely interesting! Now do please tell\nus a great deal about Lady Hammerton.\"\n\nThe Master took no notice whatever of Toovey. He sat about a minute\nlonger in his familiar posture, looking before him, his little round\nhands on his little round knees. Then he said:\n\n\"She was a raddled woman.\"\n\nAnd his pupils knew he had finished speaking. What he had said was\ndisappointingly little, but uttered in that strange high voice of his,\nit contained an infinite deal more than appeared on the face of it. A\nwhole discreditable past seemed to emerge from that one word \"raddled.\"\nIan Stewart, to whose imagination the woman in the picture made a\nstrange appeal, now broke a lance with the Master on her account.\n\n\"She may have been raddled, Master,\" he said, \"but she must have been\nvery remarkable and charming too. Hammerton himself was no fool, yet he\nadored her to the last.\"\n\nThe Master seemed to hope some one else would speak; but finding that no\none did, he uttered again:\n\n\"Men often adore bad wives. That does not make them good ones.\"\n\nStewart tossed a rebel lock of raven black hair back from his forehead.\n\n\"Pardon me, Master, it does make them good wives for those men.\"\n\n\"Oh, surely not good for their higher natures!\" protested Toovey,\nfervently.\n\nThe Master took three deliberate sips of port wine.\n\n\"I think, Stewart, we are discussing matters we know very little about,\"\nhe said, in a particularly high, dry voice; and every one felt that the\ndiscussion was closed. Then he turned to Sanderson and made some remark\nabout a house which Sanderson's College, of which he was junior bursar,\nwas selling to Durham.\n\nFletcher, the only married man present, mourned inwardly over his own\nmasculine stupidity.", "start_char_idx": 7803, "end_char_idx": 11682, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155": {"__data__": {"id_": "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "514da80aea4e2fe255251526bb9801701324383b39ffd7389a90e7ede3fb017a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "77274b02709476ba3d1dc1277441f71c3a27e9fa8403fdf84260423f260cec89", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He felt sure that if his wife had been there she\nwould have gently led Stewart's mind through these paradoxical\nmatrimonial fancies, to dwell on another picture; a picture of marriage\nwith a nice girl almost as pretty as Lady Hammerton, a good girl who\nshared his tastes, and, above all, who adored him. David Fletcher felt\nhimself pitiably unequal to the task, although he was as anxious as his\nwife was that Stewart should marry Milly. Did not all their friends wish\nit? It seemed to them that there could not be a more suitable couple. If\nMilly was working so terribly hard to get her First in Greats, it was\nlargely because Mr. Stewart was one of her tutors and she knew he\nthought a good deal of success in the Schools.\n\nThere could be no doubt about Milly Flaxman's goodness; in fact, some of\nthe girls at Ascham complained that it \"slopped over.\" Her clothes were\nmade on hygienic principles which she treated as a branch of morals, and\nshe often refused to offer the small change of polite society because it\nweighed somewhat light in the scales of truth. But these were foibles\nthat the young people's friends were sure Ian Stewart would never\nnotice. As to him, although only four and thirty, he was already a\ndistinguished man. A scholar, a philosopher, and an arch\u00e6ologist, he had\nalso imagination and a sense of style. He had written a brilliant book\non Greek life at a particular period, which had brought him a reputation\namong the learned and also found readers in the educated public. His\ndisposition was sweet, his character unusually high, judged even by the\nstandard of the academic world, which has a higher standard than most.\nObviously he would make an excellent husband; and equally obviously, as\nhe had no near relations and his health was delicate, it would be a\ncapital thing for him to have a home of his own and a devoted wife to\nlook after him. Their income would be small, but not smaller than that\nof most young couples in Oxford, who contrived, nevertheless, to live\nrefined and pleasant lives and to be well-considered in a society where\nmoney positively did not count.\n\nBut if Fletcher did not succeed in forwarding this matrimonial scheme in\nthe dining-room, his wife succeeded no better when the gentlemen came\ninto the drawing-room. She rose from a sofa in the corner, leaving Milly\nseated there; but Mr. Toovey made his way straight to Miss Flaxman,\nwithout a glance to right or left, and bending over her before he seated\nhimself at her side, fixed upon her a patronizing, a possessive smile\nwhich would have made some girls long for a barbarous freedom in the\nmatter of face-slapping. But Milly Flaxman was meek. She took Archibald\nToovey's seriousness for depth, and as his attentions had become\nunmistakable, had several times lain awake at night tormenting herself\nas to whether her behavior towards him was or was not right. Accordingly\nshe submitted to being monopolized by Mr. Toovey, while Ian Stewart\nturned away and made himself pleasant to an unattractive lady-visitor of\nthe Fletchers', who looked shy and left-alone. When Mrs. Fletcher tried\nto effect a change of partners, Ian explained that he found himself\nunexpectedly obliged to attend a College meeting at ten o'clock. In a\nplace where there are no offices to close and business engagements are\nliable to crop up at any time in the evening, there was no need for\nextravagance of apology for this early departure.\n\nHe changed his shoes in the narrow hall and put on his seedy-looking\ndark overcoat, quite unconscious that Mrs. Fletcher had had the collar\nmended since he had taken it off. Then he went out into the damp\nNovember night, unlit by moon or star. But to Stewart the darkness of\nnight, on whatever corner of earth he might chance to find it descended,\nremained always a romantic, mysterious thing, setting his imagination\nfree among visionary possibilities, without form, but not for that void.", "start_char_idx": 11683, "end_char_idx": 15596, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb": {"__data__": {"id_": "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "dd115ecfef0e51e70533077c135d9b40bb34815960a860fbdd26ee19be7ee9e0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "036a92c62fc02b60119a84907e35c5c5e964a5af1b6d5663914527cb6c9afe56", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The road between the railing of the parks and the row of old lopped\nelms, was ill-lighted by the meagre flame of a few gas-lamps and hardly\ncheered by the smothered glow of the small prison-like windows of Keble,\nglimmering through the bare trees. There was not a sound near, except\nthe occasional drip of slow-collecting dews from the branches of the old\nelms. Afar, too, many would have said there was not a sound; but there\nwas, and Ian's ear was attuned to catch it. The immense inarticulate\nwhisper of night came to him. It came to him from the deserted parks,\nfrom the distant Cherwell flowing through its willow-roots and\nosier-islands, from the flat meadow-country beyond, stretching away to\nthe coppices of the low boundary hills. It was a voice made up of many\nwhispers, each imperceptible, or almost imperceptible in itself; whisper\nof water and dry reeds, of broken twigs and dry leaves fluttering to the\nground, of heaped dead leaves or coarse winter grass, stirring in some\nslight movement of the air. It seemed to his imagination as though under\nthe darkness, in the loneliness of night, the man-mastered world must be\nsecretly transformed, returned to its primal freedom; and that could he\ngo forth into it alone, he would find it quite different from anything\nfamiliar to him, and might meet with something, he knew not what,\nsecret, strange, and perhaps terrible.\n\nSuch fancies, though less crystallized than they must needs be by words,\nfloated in the penumbra of his mind, coming to him perhaps with the\nblood of remote Highland ancestors, children of mountains and mist. His\nreasonable self was perfectly aware that should he go, he would find\nnothing in the open fields at that hour except a sleeping cow or two,\nand would return wet as to the legs, and developing a severe cold for\nthe morning. But he heard these far-off whisperings of the night\nplaying, as it were, a mysterious \"ground\" to his thoughts of Milly\nFlaxman. The least fatuous of men, he had yet been obliged to see that\nhis friends in general and the Fletchers in particular, wished him to\nmarry Milly, and that the girl herself hung upon his words with a\ntremulous sensitivity even greater than the enthusiastic female student\nusually exhibits towards those of her lecturer. In the abstract he\nintended to marry; for he did not desire to be left an old bachelor in\ncollege. He had been waiting for the great experience of falling in\nlove, and somehow it had never come to him. There were probably numbers\nof people to whom it never did come. Should he now give up all hope of\nit, and make a marriage of reason and of obligingness, such as his\nmarriage with Miss Flaxman would assuredly be? Thank Heaven! as her\ntutor he could not possibly propose to her till she had got through the\nSchools, so there were more than six months in which to consider the\nquestion.\n\nAnd while he communed thus with himself, the mysterious whispers of the\nnight came nearer to him, in the blackness of garden trees, ancient\ntrees of College gardens brooding alone, whispering alone through the\ndark hours, of that current of young life which is still flowing past\nthem; how for hundreds of years it has always been flowing, and always\npassing, passing, passing so quickly to the great silent sea of death\nand oblivion, to the dark night whose silence is only sometimes stirred\nby vague whispers, anxious yet faint, dying upon the ear before the\nsense can seize them.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n\nParties in Oxford always break up early, and Milly had a good excuse for\ncarrying her aching, disappointed heart back to Ascham at ten o'clock,\nfor every one knew she was working hard. Too hard, Mr. Fletcher said,\nlooking concernedly at her heavy eyes, mottled complexion, and the\nlittle crumples which were beginning to come in her low white forehead.\nHer cousins, however, had more than a suspicion that these marks of care\nand woe were not altogether due to her work, but that Ian Stewart was\naccountable for most of them.", "start_char_idx": 15597, "end_char_idx": 19575, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201": {"__data__": {"id_": "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0af26762d5d3633f6d0874f7c6908c88af8ed20b23c16afcee3ef43ee5f133a6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e9dd23e44164904dbbe77cbdcd62ab6fa41c8d7487f3632ef44c06362592992e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The Professor escorted her to the gates of the Ladies' College; but she\nwalked down the dark drive alone, mindful of familiar puddles, and\nhearing nothing of those mysterious whispers of night which in Ian\nStewart's ears had breathed a \"ground\" to his troubled thoughts of her.\n\nShe mounted the stairs to her room at the top of the house. It was an\nextremely neat room, and by day, when the bed was disguised as a sofa,\nand the washstand closed, there was nothing to reveal that it served as\na bedroom, although a tarnished old mirror hung in a dark corner. The\noak table and pair of brass candlesticks upon it were kept in shining\norder by Milly's own zealous hands.\n\nMilly found her books open at the right place and her writing materials\nready to hand. In a very few minutes her outer garments and simple\nornaments were put away, and clothed in a clean but shrunk and faded\nblue dressing-gown, she sat down to work. The work was Aristotle's\n_Ethics_, and she was going through it for the second time, amplifying\nher notes. But this second time the Greek seemed more difficult, the\nphilosophic argument more intricate than ever. She had had very little\nsleep for weeks, and her head ached in a queer way as though something\ninside it were strained very tight. It was plain that she had come to\nthe end of her powers of work for the present--and she had calculated\nthat only by not wasting a day, except for a week's holiday at Easter,\ncould she get through all that had to be done before the Schools!\n\nShe put Aristotle away and opened Mommsen, but even to that she could\nnot give her attention. Her thoughts returned to the bitter\ndisappointment which the evening had brought. Ian Stewart had been next\nher at dinner, but even then he had talked to her rather less than to\nMrs. Shaw. Afterwards--well, perhaps it was only what she deserved for\nnot making it plain to poor Mr. Toovey that she could never return his\nfeelings. And now the First, which she had looked to as a thing that\nwould set her nearer the level of her idol, was dropping below the\nhorizon of the possible. Aunt Beatrice always said--and she was\nright--that tears were not, as people pretended, a help and solace in\ntrouble. They merely took the starch out of you and left you a poor\nsoaked, limp creature, unfit to face the hard facts of life. But\nsometimes tears will lie heavy and scalding as molten lead in the brain,\nuntil at length they force their way through to the light. And Milly\nafter blowing her nose a good deal, as she mechanically turned the pages\nof Mommsen, at length laid her arms on the book and transferred her\nhandkerchief to her eyes. But she tried to look as though she were\nreading when Flora Timson came in.\n\n\"At it again, M.! You know you're simply working yourself stupid.\"\n\nThus speaking, Miss Timson, known to her intimates at Ascham as \"Tims,\"\nwagged sagely her very peculiar head. A crimson silk handkerchief was\ntied around it, turban-wise, and no vestige of hair escaped from\nbeneath. There was in fact none to escape. Tims's sallow, comic little\nface had neither eyebrows nor eyelashes on it, and her small figure was\nnot of a quality to triumph over the obvious disadvantages of a tight\nblack cloth dress with bright buttons, reminiscent of a page's suit.\n\nMilly pushed the candles farther away and looked up.\n\n\"I was wanting to see you, Tims. Do tell me whether you managed to get\nout of Miss Walker what Mr. Stewart said about my chances of a First.\"\n\nTims pushed her silk turban still higher up on her forehead.\n\n\"I can always humbug Miss Walker and make her say lots of indiscreet\nthings,\" Tims returned, with labored diplomacy. \"But I don't repeat\nthem--at least, not invariably.\"\n\nThere was a further argument on the point, which ended by Milly shedding\ntears and imploring to be told the worst.\n\nTims yielded.\n\n\"Stewart said your scholarship was A 1, but he was afraid you wouldn't\nget your First in Greats.", "start_char_idx": 19577, "end_char_idx": 23499, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3": {"__data__": {"id_": "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "8f964ecbaf9d7503694d7ced833195fb3e5a3374e91d38dac03a006d6b343354", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "36a148387c83bb9e764bfca9019f4c344d472bb8b833699c374457d00a4289df", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He said you had a lot of difficulty in\nexpressing yourself and didn't seem to get the lead of their philosophy\nand stuff--and--and generally wanted cleverness.\"\n\n\"He said that?\" asked Milly, in a low, sombre voice, speaking as though\nto herself. \"Well, I suppose it's better for me to know--not to go on\nhoping, and hoping, and hoping. It means less misery in the end, no\ndoubt.\"\n\nThere was such a depth of despair in her face and voice that Tims was\nappalled at the consequence of her own revelation. She paced the room in\nagitation, alternately uttering incoherent abuse of her friend's folly\nand suggesting that she should at once abandon the ungrateful School of\n_Liter\u00e6 Humaniores_ and devote herself like Tims, to the joys of\nexperimental chemistry and the pleasures of practical anatomy.\n\nMeantime, Milly sat silent, one hand supporting her chin, the other\nplaying with a pencil.\n\nAt length Tims, taking hold of Milly under the arms, advised her to \"go\nto bed and sleep it off.\"\n\nMilly rose dully and sat on the edge of her bed, while Tims awkwardly\nremoved the hair-pins which Mrs. Shaw had so deftly put in. But as she\nwas laying them on the little dressing-table, Milly suddenly flung\nherself down on the bed and lay there a twisted heap of blue flannel,\nher face buried in the pillows, her whole body shaken by a paroxysm of\nsobs. Tims supposed that this might be a good thing for Milly; but for\nherself it created an awkward situation. Her soothing remarks fell flat,\nwhile to go away and leave her friend in this condition would seem\nbrutal. She sat down to \"wait till the clouds rolled by,\" as she phrased\nit. But twenty minutes passed and still the clouds did not roll by.\n\n\"Look here, M.\" she said, argumentatively, standing by the bed. \"You're\nin hysterics. That's what's the matter with you.\"\n\n\"I know I am,\" came in tones of muffled despair from the pillow.\n\n\"Well!\" Tims was very stern and accented her words heavily,\n\"then--pull--yourself--together--dear girl. Sit up!\"\n\nMilly sat up, pressed her handkerchief over her face, and held her\nbreath. For a minute all was quiet; then another violent sob forced a\npassage.\n\n\"It's no use, Tims,\" she gasped. \"I cannot--cannot--stop. Oh, what\nwould--!\" She was going to say, \"What would Aunt Beatrice think of me if\nshe knew how I was giving way!\" but a fresh flood of tears suppressed\nher speech. \"My head's so bad! Such a splitting headache!\"\n\nTims tried scolding, slapping, a cold sponge, every remedy inexperience\ncould suggest, but the hysterical weeping could not be checked.\n\n\"Look here, old girl,\" she said at length, \"I know how I can stop you,\nbut I don't believe you'll let me do it.\"\n\n\"No, not that, Tims! You know Miss Burt doesn't--\"\n\n\"Doesn't approve. Of course not. Perhaps you think old B. would approve\nof the way you're going on now. Ha! Would she!\"\n\nThe sarcasm caused a new and alarming outburst. But finally, past all\nrespect for Miss Burt, and even for Lady Thomson herself, Milly\nconsented to submit to any remedy that Tims might choose to try.\n\nShe was assisted hurriedly to undress and put to bed. Tims knew the\nwhereabouts of the prize-medal which Milly had won at school, and\nplacing the bright silver disk in her hand, directed her to fix her eyes\nupon it. Seated on her heels on the patient's bed, her crimson turban\nlow on her forehead, her face screwed into intent wrinkles, Tims began\npassing her slight hands slowly before Milly's face.\n\nThe long slender fingers played about the girl's fair head, sometimes\npressed lightly upon her forehead, sometimes passed through her fluffy\nhair, as it lay spread on the pillow about her like an amber cloud.\n\n\"Don't cry, M.,\" Tims began repeating in a soft, monotonous voice.\n\"You've got nothing to cry about; your head doesn't ache now.", "start_char_idx": 23500, "end_char_idx": 27273, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d": {"__data__": {"id_": "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "73400b63c17ee33ee8963d4e64cd33aa58a1afeccf9081c84732974f00c28126", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9caf91b497cab66d10f51e5664235f53f445e3c97cc10f198a0b70127a7632e7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"You've got nothing to cry about; your head doesn't ache now. Don't\ncry.\"\n\nAt first it was only by a strong effort that Milly could keep her\ntear-blinded eyes fixed on the bright medal before her; but soon they\nbecame chained to it, as by some attractive force. The shining disk\nseemed to grow smaller, brighter, to recede imperceptibly till it was a\npoint of light somewhere a long way off, and with it all the sorrows and\nagitations of her mind seemed also to recede into a dim distance, where\nshe was still aware of them, yet as though they were some one else's\nsorrows and agitations, hardly at all concerning her. The aching tension\nof her brain was relaxed and she felt as though she were drowning\nwithout pain or struggle, gently floating down, down through a green\nabyss of water, always seeing that distant light, showing as the sun\nmight show, seen from the depths of the sea.\n\nBefore a quarter of an hour had passed, her sobs ceased in sighing\nbreaths, the breaths became regular and normal, the whole face slackened\nand smoothed itself out. Tims changed the burden of her song.\n\n\"Go to sleep, Milly. What you want is a good long sleep. Go to sleep,\nMilly.\"\n\nMilly was sinking down upon the pillow, breathing the calm breath of\ndeep, refreshing slumber. Tims still crouched upon the bed, chanting her\nmonotonous song and contemplating her work. At length she slipped off,\nconscious of pins-and-needles in her legs, and as she withdrew, Milly\nwith a sudden motion stretched her body out in the white bed, as\nstraight and still almost as that of the dead. The movement was\nmechanical, but it gave a momentary check to Tims's triumph. She leaned\nover her patient and began once more the crooning song.\n\n\"Go to sleep, M.! What you want is a good long sleep. Go to sleep,\nMilly!\"\n\nBut presently she ceased her song, for it was evident that Milly Flaxman\nhad indeed gone very sound asleep.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\n\nTims was proud of the combined style and economy of her dress. She was\nconstantly discovering and revealing to an unappreciative world the\nexistence of superb tailors who made amazingly cheap dresses. For two\nyears she had been vainly advising her friends to go to the man who had\nmade her the frock she still wore for morning; a skirt and coat of tweed\nwith a large green check in it, a green waistcoat with gilt buttons, and\ngreen gaiters to match. In this costume and coiffed with a man's wig, of\nthe vague color peculiar to such articles, Tims came down at her usual\nhour, prepared to ask Milly what she thought of hypnotism now. But there\nwas no Milly over whom to enjoy this petty triumph. She climbed to the\ntop story as soon as breakfast was over, and entering Milly's room,\nfound her patient still sleeping soundly, low and straight in the bed,\njust as she had been the preceding night. She was breathing regularly\nand her face looked peaceful, although her eyes were still stained with\ntears. The servant came in as Tims was looking at her.\n\n\"I've tried to wake Miss Flaxman, miss,\" she said. \"She's always very\nparticular as I should wake her, but she was that sound asleep this\nmorning, I 'adn't the 'eart to go on talking. Poor young lady! I expect\nshe's pretty well wore out, working away at her books, early and late,\nthe way she does.\"\n\n\"Better leave her alone, Emma,\" agreed Tims. \"I'll let Miss Burt know\nabout it.\"\n\nMiss Burt was glad to hear Milly Flaxman was oversleeping herself. She\nhad not been satisfied with the girl's appearance of late, and feared\nMilly worked too hard and had bad nights.\n\nTims had to go out at ten o'clock and did not return until\nluncheon-time. She went up to Milly's room and knocked at the door. As\nbefore, there was no answer. She went in and saw the girl still sound\nasleep, straight and motionless in the bed.", "start_char_idx": 27212, "end_char_idx": 30987, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb": {"__data__": {"id_": "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "b221851aeb160ee6bf261c557e83f26a44b21e12e0f4220798d6dfb5f622f883", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8909e434b3ffc1475f02f5575ef41a9cbfbdd932c9b909bc961a1bd8a31db02f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her appearance was so\nhealthy and natural that it was absurd to feel uneasy at the length of\nher slumber, yet remembering the triumph of hypnotism, Tims did feel a\nlittle uneasy. She spoke to Miss Burt again about Milly's prolonged\nsleep, but Miss Burt was not inclined to be anxious. She had strictly\nforbidden Tims to hypnotize--or as she called it, mesmerize--any one in\nthe house, so that Tims said no more on the subject. She was working at\nthe Museum in the early part of the afternoon, only leaving it when the\nlight began to fail. But after work she went straight back to Ascham.\nMilly was still asleep, but she had slightly shifted her position, and\naltogether there was something about her aspect which suggested a\nslumber less profound than before. Tims leaned over her and spoke\nsoftly:\n\n\"Wake up, M., wake up! You've been asleep quite long enough.\"\n\nMilly's body twitched a little. A responsive flicker which was almost a\nconvulsion, passed over her face; but she did not awake. It was evident,\nhowever, that her spirit was gradually floating up to the surface from\nthe depths of oblivion in which it had been submerged. Tims took off her\nTam-o'-Shanter and ulster, and revealed in the simple elegance of the\ntweed frock with green waistcoat and gaiters, put the kettle on the\nfire. Then she went down-stairs to fetch some bread and butter and an\negg, wherewith to feed the patient when she awoke.\n\nShe had not long left the room when the slumberer's eyes opened\ngradually and stared with the fixity of semi-consciousness at a stem of\nblossoming jessamine in the wall-paper. Then she slowly stretched her\narms above her head until some inches of wrist, slight and round and\nwhite, emerged from the strictly plain night-gown sleeve. So she lay,\ntill suddenly, almost with a start, she pulled herself up and looked\nabout her. The gaze of her wide-open eyes travelled questioningly around\nthe quiet-toned room which two windows at right angles to each other\nstill kept light with the reflection of a yellow winter sunset. She\npushed the bedclothes down, dropped first one bare white foot, then the\nother to the ground and looked doubtfully at a pair of worn felt\nslippers which were placed beside the bed, before slipping her feet into\nthem. With the same air as of one assuming garments which do not belong\nto her, she put on the faded blue flannel dressing-gown. Then she walked\nto the southern window. None of the glories of Oxford were visible from\nit; only the bare branches of trees through which appeared a huddle of\nsomewhat sordid looking roofs and the unimposing spire of St. Aloysius.\nWith the same air, questioning yet as in a dream, she turned to the\nwestern window, which was open. Below, in its wintry dulness, lay the\ngarden of the College, bounded by an old gray wall which divided it from\nthe straggling street; beyond that, a mass of slate roofs. But a certain\nglory was on the slate roofs and all the garden that was not in shadow.\nFor away over Wytham, where the blue vapor floated in the folds of the\nhills, blending imperceptibly with the deep brown of the leafless woods,\nsunset had lifted a wide curtain of cloud and showed between the gloom\nof heaven and earth, a long straight pool of yellow light.\n\nShe leaned out of the window. A mild fresh air which seemed to be\npouring over the earth through that rift in heaven which the sunset had\nmade, breathed freshly on her face and the yellow light shone on her\namber hair, which lay on her shoulders about the length of the hair of\nan angel in some old Florentine picture.\n\nMiss Burt in galoshes and with a wrap over her head was coming up the\ngarden. She caught sight of that vision of gold and pale blue in the\nwindow and smiled and waved her hand to Milly Flaxman. The vision\nwithdrew, trembling slightly as though with cold, and closed the\nwindow.\n\nTims came in, carrying a boiled egg and a plate of bread and butter.", "start_char_idx": 30988, "end_char_idx": 34892, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf": {"__data__": {"id_": "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f5a690395d4d90f13ceb1d26d803c766c19f82626c401debc1f785fbcd24cec2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c694fb90ca95ac4b4ade9ad998e29be66fe2db506ea3af76bddbd0cca75ff0bc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Tims came in, carrying a boiled egg and a plate of bread and butter.\nTims put down the egg-cup and the plate on the table before she relaxed\nthe wrinkle of carefulness and grinned triumphantly at her patient.\n\n\"Well, old girl,\" she asked; \"what do you say to hypnotism now? Put\n_you_ to sleep, right enough, anyhow. Know what time it is?\"\n\nThe awakened sleeper made a few steps forward, leaned her hands on the\ntable, on the other side of which Tims stood, and gazed upon her with\nstartling intentness. Then she began to speak in a rapid, urgent voice.\nHer words were in themselves ordinary and distinct, yet what she said\nwas entirely incomprehensible, a nightmare of speech, as though some\ntalking-machine had gone wrong and was pouring out a miscellaneous stock\nof verbs, nouns, adjectives and the rest without meaning or cohesion.\nCertain words reappeared with frequency, but Tims had a feeling that the\nspeaker did not attach their usual meaning to them. This travesty of\nlanguage went on for what appeared to the transfixed and terrified\nlistener quite a long time. At length the serious, almost tragic,\nbabbler, meeting with no response save the staring horror of Tims's too\nexpressive countenance, ended with a supplicating smile and a glance\nwhich contrived to be charged at once with pathos and coquetry. This\nsmile, this look, were so totally unlike any expression which Tims had\never seen on Milly's countenance that they heightened her feeling of\nnightmare. But she pulled herself together and determined to show\npresence of mind. She had already placed a basket-chair by the fire\nready for her patient, and now gently but firmly led Milly to it.\n\n\"Sit down, Milly,\" she said--and the use of her friend's proper name\nshowed that she felt the occasion to be serious--\"and don't speak again\ntill you've had some tea. Your head will be clearer presently, it's a\nbit confused now, you know.\"\n\nThe stranger Milly, still so unlike the Milly of Tims's intimacy, far\nfrom exerting the unnatural strength of a maniac, passively permitted\nherself to be placed in the chair and listened to what Tims was saying\nwith the puzzled intentness of a child or a foreigner, trying to\nunderstand. She laid her head back in its little cloud of amber hair,\nand looked up at Tims, who, frowning portentously, once more with lifted\nfinger enjoined silence. Tims then concealing her agitation behind a\ncupboard-door, reached down the tea-things. By some strange accident the\nmethodical Milly's teapot was absent from its place; a phenomenon for\nwhich Tims was thankful, as it imposed upon her the necessity of leaving\nher patient for a few minutes. Shaking her finger again at Milly still\nmore emphatically, she went out, and locked the door behind her. After a\nmoment's thought, she reluctantly decided to report the matter to Miss\nBurt. But Miss Burt was closeted with the treasurer and an architect\nfrom London, and was on no account to be disturbed. So Tims went up to\nher own room and rapidly revolved the situation. She was certain that\nMilly was not physically ill; on the contrary, she looked much better\nthan she had looked on the previous day. This curious affection of the\nspeech-memory might be hysterical, as her sobbing the night before had\nbeen, or it might be connected with some little failure of circulation\nin the brain; an explanation, perhaps, pointed to by the extraordinary\nlength of her sleep. Anyhow, Tims felt sceptical as to a doctor being of\nany use.\n\nShe went to her cupboard to take out her own teapot, and her eye fell\nupon a small medicine bottle marked \"Brandy.\" Milly was a convinced\nteetotaller; all the more reason, thought Tims, why a dose of alcohol\nshould give her nerves and circulation a fillip, only she must not know\nof it, or she would certainly refuse the remedy.\n\nPocketing the bottle and flourishing the teapot, Tims mounted again to\nMilly's room.", "start_char_idx": 34824, "end_char_idx": 38706, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37": {"__data__": {"id_": "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "91c174664d24c1f599a76c0976438e095ed7d51a77b3e4375bde79431eea539e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "107694d041873dfe5dbd872ef692a53f61d8b42faeb7224b4e8c3ee076f1c527", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her patient, who had spent the time wandering about the\nroom and examining everything in it, as well as she could in the\nfast-falling twilight, resumed her position in the chair as soon as she\nheard a step in the passage, and greeted her returning keeper with an\nattractive smile. Tims uttering words of commendation, slyly poured some\nbrandy into one of the large teacups before lighting the candles.\n\n\"Now, my girl,\" she said, when she had made the tea, \"drink this, and\nyou'll feel better.\"\n\nMilly leaned forward, her round chin on her hand, and looked intently at\nthe tea-service and at the proffered cup. Then she suddenly raised her\nhead, clapped her hands softly, and cried in a tone of delighted\ndiscovery, \"Tea!\"\n\n\"Excuse me,\" she added, taking the cup with a little bow; and in two\nseconds had helped herself to three lumps of sugar. Tims was surprised,\nfor Milly never took sugar in her tea.\n\n\"That's right, M., you're going along well!\" cried Tims, standing on the\nhearth-rug, with one hand under her short coat-tails, while she gulped\nher own tea, and ate two pieces of bread and butter put together. Milly\nate hers and drank her tea daintily, looking meanwhile at her companion\nwith wonder which gradually gave way to amusement. At length leaning\nforward with a dimpling smile, she interrogated very politely and quite\nlucidly.\n\n\"Pardon me, sir, you are--? Ah, the doctor, no doubt! My poor head, you\nsee!\" and she drew her fingers across her forehead.\n\nTims started, and grabbed her wig, as was her wont in moments of\nagitation. She stood transfixed, the teacup at a dangerous angle in her\nextended hand.\n\n\"Good God!\" she ejaculated. \"You are mad and no mistake, my poor old\ngirl.\"\n\nThe \"old girl\" made a supreme effort to contain herself, and then burst\ninto a pretty, rippling laugh in which there was nothing familiar to\nTims's ear. She rose from her chair vivaciously and took the cup from\nTims's hand, to deposit it in safety on the chimney piece.\n\n\"How silly I was!\" she cried, regarding Tims sparklingly. \"Do you know I\nwas not quite sure whether you were a man or a woman. Of course I see\nnow, and I'm so glad. I do like men, you know, so much better than\nwomen.\"\n\n\"Milly,\" retorted Tims, sternly, settling her wig. \"You are mad, you\nneed not be bad as well. But it's my own fault for giving you that\nbrandy. You know as well as I do that I hate men--nasty, selfish,\nguzzling, conceited, guffawing brutes! I never wanted to speak to a man\nin my life, except in the way of business.\"\n\nMilly waved her amber head gracefully for a moment as though at a loss,\nthen returned playfully, \"That must be because the women spoil you so.\"\n\nTims smiled sardonically; but regaining her sense of the situation, out\nof which she had been momentarily shocked, applied herself to the\nproblem of calling back poor Milly's wandering mind.\n\n\"Sit down, my girl,\" she said, abruptly, putting her arm around Milly's\nbody, so soft and slender in the scanty folds of the blue dressing-gown.\nMilly obeyed precipitately. Then drawing a small chair close to her,\nTims said in gentle tones which could hardly have been recognized as\nhers:\n\n\"M., darling, do you know where you are?\"\n\nMilly turned on her a face from which the unnatural vivacity had fallen\nlike a mask; the appealing face of a poor lost child.\n\n\"Am I--am I--in a _maison de sant\u00e9_?\" she asked tremulously, fixing her\nblue eyes on Tims, full of piteous anxiety.\n\n\"A lunatic asylum? Certainly not,\" replied Tims. \"Now don't begin\ncrying again, old girl. That's how the trouble began.\"\n\n\"Was it?\" asked Milly, dreamily. \"I thought it was--\" she paused,\nfrowning before her in the air, as though trying to pursue with her\nbodily vision some recollection which had flickered across her\nconsciousness only to disappear.", "start_char_idx": 38707, "end_char_idx": 42479, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18": {"__data__": {"id_": "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "bce8de3ac5753570fcf0333db54fd436d3413bf716665938598b9ce66d8ac82e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "609569f9cee1294219508f14afe4e7a82010e9256c32a7db95933737bdd8e525", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Well, never mind that now,\" said Tims, hastily; \"get your bearings\nright first. You're in Ascham College.\"\n\n\"A College!\" repeated Milly vaguely, but in a moment her face\nbrightened, \"I know. A place of learning where they have professors and\nthings. Are you a professor?\"\n\n\"No, I'm a student. So are you.\"\n\nMilly looked fixedly at Tims, then smiled a melancholy smile. \"I see,\"\nshe said, \"we're both studying--medicine--medicine for the mind.\" She\nstood up, locked her hands behind her head in her soft hair and wailed\nmiserably. \"Oh, why won't some kind person come and tell me where I am,\nand what I was before I came here?\"\n\nTears of wounded feelings sprang to Tims's eyes. \"Milly, my beauty!\" she\ncried despairingly, \"I'm trying to be kind to you and tell you\neverything you want to know. Your name is Mildred Flaxman and you used\nto live in Oxford here, but now all your people have gone to Australia\nbecause your father's got a deanery there.\"\n\n\"Have they left me here, mad and by myself?\" asked Milly; \"have I no one\nto look after me, no one to give me a home?\"\n\n\"I suppose Lady Thomson or the Fletchers would,\" returned Tims, \"but you\nhaven't wanted one. You've been quite happy at Ascham. Do try and\nremember. Can't you remember getting your First in Mods. and how you've\nbeen working to get one in Greats? Your brain's been right enough until\nto-day, old girl, and it will be again. I expect it's a case of collapse\nof memory from overwork. Things will come back to you soon and I'll help\nyou all I can. Do try and recollect me--Tims.\" There was an unmistakable\nchoke in Tims's voice. \"We have been such chums. The others are all\npretty nasty to me sometimes--they seem to think I'm a grinning, wooden\nAunt Sally, stuck up for them to shy jokes at. But you've never once\nbeen nasty to me, M., and there's precious few things I wouldn't do to\nhelp you. So don't go talking to me as though there weren't any one in\nthe world who cared a brass farthing about you.\"\n\n\"I'm sure I'm most thankful to find I have got some one here who cares\nabout me,\" returned Milly, meekly, passing her hand across her eyes for\nlack of a handkerchief. \"You see, it's dreadful for me to be like this.\nI seem to know what things are, and yet I don't know. A little while ago\nit seemed to me I was just going to remember something--something\ndifferent from what you've told me. But now it's all gone again. Oh,\nplease give me a handkerchief!\"\n\nTims opened one of Milly's tidy drawers and sought for a handkerchief.\nWhen she had found it, Milly was standing before the high\nchimney-piece, over which hung a long, low mirror about a foot wide and\ndivided into three parts by miniature pilasters of tarnished gilt. The\nmirror, too, was tarnished here and there, but it had been a good glass\nand showed undistorted the blue Delft jars on the mantel-shelf, glimpses\nof flickering firelight in the room, amber hair and the tear-bedewed\nroses of a flushed young face. Suddenly Milly thrust the jars aside,\nseized the candle from the table, and, holding it near her face, looked\nintently, anxiously in the glass. The anxiety vanished in a moment, but\nnot the intentness. She went on looking. Tims had always perceived\nMilly's beauty--which had an odd way of slipping through the world\nunobserved--but had never seen her look so lovely as now, her eyes wide\nand brilliant, and her upper lip curved rosily over a shining glimpse of\nher white teeth.\n\nBeauty had an extraordinary fascination for Tims, poor step-child of\nnature!", "start_char_idx": 42481, "end_char_idx": 45983, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45": {"__data__": {"id_": "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "23011c130d6d305be86bf1f16ad83dcb78536d784f4e59a91b0552022ff36694", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "55e9d1f30702dca41594ae6d15844c913773a48f633ef625059a024a6bd924a8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Beauty had an extraordinary fascination for Tims, poor step-child of\nnature! Now she stood looking at the reflection of Milly without\nnoticing how in the background her own strange, wizened face peered dim\nand grotesque from the tarnished mirror, like the picture of a witch or\na goblin behind the fair semblance of some princess in a fairy tale.\n\n\"I do remember myself partly,\" said Milly, doubtfully; \"and yet--somehow\nnot quite. I suppose I shall remember you and this queer place soon, if\nthey don't put me into a mad-house at once.\"\n\n\"They sha'n't,\" said Tims, decisively. \"Trust to me, M., and I'll see\nyou through. But I'm afraid you'll have to give up all thought of your\nFirst.\"\n\n\"My what,\" asked Milly, turning round inquiringly.\n\n\"Your First Class, your place, you know, in the Final Honors School,\nLit. Hum., the biggest examination of the lot.\"\n\n\"Do I want it very much, my First?\"\n\n\"Want it? I should just think you do want it!\"\n\nMilly stared at the fire for a minute, warming one foot before she spoke\nagain. Then:\n\n\"How funny of me!\" she observed, meditatively.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n\nTims's programme happened to be full on the following day, so that it\nwas half-past twelve before she knocked at Milly's door and was\nadmitted. Milly stood in the middle of the room in an attitude of\nenergy, with her small wardrobe lying about her on the floor in\nignominious heaps.\n\n\"Tell me, Tims,\" said Milly, after the first inquiries, \"are those\npositively all the clothes I possess?\"\n\n\"Of course they are, M. What do you want with more?\"\n\n\"Are they in the fashion?\" asked Milly, anxiously.\n\nTims stared.\n\n\"Fashion! Good Lord, M.! What does it matter whether you look the same\nas every fool in the street or not?\"\n\n\"Oh, Tims!\" cried Milly, laughing that pretty rippling laugh so strange\nin Tims's ears. \"I was quite right when I made a mistake, you're just\nlike a man. All the better. But you can't expect me not to care a bit\nabout my clothes like you, you really can't.\"\n\nTims drew herself up.\n\n\"You're wrong, my girl, I'm a deal fonder of frocks than you are. I\nalways think,\" she added, looking before her dreamily, \"that I was\nmeant to be a very good dresser, only I was brought up too economical.\"\nGenerally speaking, when Tims had uttered one of her deepest and truest\nfeelings, she would glance around, suddenly alert and suspicious to\nsurprise the twinkle in her auditor's eye. But in the clear blue of\nMilly Flaxman's quiet eyes, she had ceased to look for that tormenting\ntwinkle, that spark which seemed destined to dance about her from the\ncradle to the grave.\n\nPresently she found herself hanging up Milly's clothes while Milly paid\nno attention; for she alternately stood before the glass in the dark\ncorner, and kneeled on the hearth-rug, curling-tongs in hand. And the\nhair, the silky soft amber hair, which could be twisted into a tiny ball\nor fluffed into a golden fleece at will, was being tossed up and pulled\ndown, combed here and brushed there, altogether handled with a zeal and\npatience to which it had been a stranger since the days when it had been\nthe pride of the nursery. Tims the untidy, as one in a dream, went on\ntidying the room she was accustomed to see so immaculate.\n\n\"There!\" cried Milly, turning, \"that's how I wear it, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Good Lord, no!\" exclaimed Tims, contemplating the transformed Milly.\n\"It suits you, M., in a way, but it looks queer too. The others will all\nbe hooting if you go down-stairs like that.\"\n\nMilly plumped into a chair irritably.\n\n\"How ever am I to know how I did my hair if I can't remember? Please do\nit for me.\"\n\nTims smiled sardonically.\n\n\"I'll lend you my hair,\" she said; \"the second best. But _do_ your hair!\nYou really are as mad as a hatter.\"\n\nMilly shrugged her shoulders.\n\n\"You can't?", "start_char_idx": 45907, "end_char_idx": 49670, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414": {"__data__": {"id_": "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "dc2303b75a5e5a763ff5c3da67ec9c8fdf4dd2449ff006f0d91ddc239204526a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8998b989ad0d0756083381a168bad675a8f2aa88eae5142e81dda674eb30c753", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Milly shrugged her shoulders.\n\n\"You can't? Then I keep it like this,\" she said.\n\nAn argument ensued. Tims left the room to try and find a photograph of\nMilly as she had been.\n\nWhen she returned she found her friend standing in absorbed\ncontemplation of a book in her hand.\n\n\"This is Greek, isn't it?\" she asked, holding it up. Her face wore a\nlittle frown as of strained attention.\n\n\"Right you are,\" shrieked Tims in accents of relief. \"Greek it is. Can\nyou read it?\"\n\n\"Not yet,\" replied Milly, flushing with excitement, \"but I shall soon, I\nknow I shall. Last night I couldn't make head or tail of the books. Now\nI understand right enough what they are, and I know some are in Greek\nand some in English. I can't read either yet, but it's all coming back\ngradually, like the daylight coming in at the window this morning.\"\n\n\"Hooray! Hooray!\" shouted Tims. \"You'll be reading as hard as ever in a\nweek if I don't look after you. But see here, my girl, you've given me a\nnasty jar, and I'm not going to let you break your heart or crack your\nbrain in a wild-goose chase. You can't get that First, you know; you're\non a fairly good Second Class level, and you'd better make up your mind\nto stay there.\"\n\n\"A fairly good Second Class level!\" repeated Milly, still turning the\nleaves of the book. \"That doesn't sound very exhilarating--and I rather\nthink I shall do as I like about staying there.\"\n\nTims began to heat.\n\n\"Well, that's what Stewart said about you. I don't believe I told you\nhalf plain enough what Stewart did say, for fear of hurting your\nfeelings. He said you are a good scholar, but barring that, you weren't\nat all clever.\"\n\nMilly looked up from her book; but she was not tearful. There was a curl\nin her lip and the light of battle in her eye.\n\n\"Stewart said that, did he? Now if I were a gentleman I should\nsay--'damn his impudence'--and 'who the devil is Stewart'; but then I'm\nnot. You can say it.\"\n\nTims stared. \"Oh, come, I say!\" she exclaimed. \"I don't swear, I only\nquote. But my goodness, when you remember who Stewart is, you'll\nbe--well, pained to think of the language you're using about him.\"\n\n\"Why?\" asked Milly, her head riding disdainfully on her slender neck.\n\n\"Because he's your tutor and lecturer--and a regular tiptop man at Greek\nand all that--and you--you respect him most awfully.\"\n\n\"Do I?\" cried Milly--\"did perhaps in my salad days. I've no respect\nwhatever for professors now, my good Tims. I know what they're like.\nHere's Stewart for you.\"\n\nShe took up a pen and a scrap of paper and dashed off a clever ludicrous\nsketch of a man with long hair, an immense brow, and spectacles.\n\n\"Nonsense!\" said Tims; \"that's not a bit like him.\"\n\nShe held the paper in her hand and looked fixedly at it. Milly had been\nwont seriously to grieve over her hopeless lack of artistic talent and\nshe had never attempted to caricature. Tims was thinking of a young\nfellow of a college who had lately died of brain disease. In the earlier\nstages of his insanity, it had been remarked that he had an originality\nwhich had not been his when in a normal state. What if her friend were\ndeveloping the same terrible disease? If it were so, it was no use\nfussing, since there was no remedy. Still, she felt a desperate need to\ntake some sort of precaution.\n\n\"If I were you, M.,\" she said, \"I'd go to bed and keep very quiet for a\nday or two. You're so--so odd, and excited, they'd notice it if you went\ndown-stairs.\"\n\n\"Would they?\" asked Milly, suddenly sobered. \"Would they say I was mad?\"\nAn expression of fear came into her face, and its strangely luminous\neyes travelled around the room with a look as of some trapped creature\nseeking escape.", "start_char_idx": 49628, "end_char_idx": 53287, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923": {"__data__": {"id_": "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3407f08bb285fdc1691d78e5bf44a939700800d4a164e6dc4f9c18045ca0ebfb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "62cace30e796e515f6810c6a9ffeda0f43dac3f6d5f2f1076f2f2e63f8c95ab7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There was an awkward pause.\n\n\"I'm not mad,\" affirmed Milly, swallowing with a dry throat. \"I'm\nperfectly sensible, but any one would be odd and excited too who\nwas--was as I am--with a number of words and ideas floating in my mind\nwithout my having the least idea where they spring from. Please, Tims\ndear, tell me how I am to behave. I should so hate to be thought queer,\nwanting in any way.\"\n\nTims considered.\n\n\"For one thing, you mustn't talk such a lot. You never have been one for\nchattering; and lately, of course, with your overwork, you've been\nparticularly quiet. Don't talk, M., that's my advice.\"\n\n\"Very well,\" replied Milly, gloomily.\n\nTims hesitated and went on:\n\n\"But I don't see how you're going to hide up this business about your\nmemory. I wish you'd let me tell old B., anyhow.\"\n\n\"I won't have any one told,\" cried Milly. \"Not a creature. If only\nyou'll help me, dear, dear Tims--you will help me, won't you?--I shall\nsoon be all right, and no one except you will ever know. No one will be\nable to shrug their shoulders and say, whatever I do, 'Of course she's\ncrazy.' I should hate it so! I know I can get on if I try. I'm much\ncleverer than you and that silly old Stewart think. Promise me, promise\nme, darling Tims, you won't betray me!\"\n\nTims was not weak-minded, but she was very tender-hearted and\nexceedingly susceptible to personal charms. She ought not, she knew she\nought not, to have yielded, but she did. She promised. Yet in her\nfriend's own interest, she contended that Milly must confess to a\ncertain failure of memory from over-fatigue, if only as a pretext for\ndropping her work for a while. It was agreed that Milly should remain in\nbed for several days, and she did so; less bored than might have been\nexpected, because she had the constant excitement of this or that bit of\nknowledge filtering back into her mind. But this knowledge was purely\nintellectual. With Tims's help she had recovered her reading powers, and\nalthough she felt at first only a vague recognition of something\nfamiliar in the sense of what she read, it was evident that she was fast\nregaining the use of the treasures stored in her brain by years of\ndogged and methodical work. But the facts and personalities which had\nmade her own life seemed to have vanished, leaving \"not a wrack behind.\"\n\nTims, having primed her well beforehand, brought in the more important\ngirls to see her, and by dint of a cautious reserve she passed very well\nwith them, as with Miss Burt and Miss Walker. Tims seemed to feel much\nmore nervous than Milly herself did when she joined the other students\nas usual.\n\nThere were moments when Tims gasped with the certainty that the\nrevelation of her friend's blank ignorance of the place and people was\nabout to be made. Then Mildred--for so, despising the soft diminutive,\nshe now desired to be called--by some extraordinary exertion of tact and\ningenuity, would evade the inevitable and appear on the other side of\nit, a little elated, but otherwise serene. It was generally marked that\nMiss Flaxman was a different creature since she had given up worrying\nabout her Schools, and that no one would have believed how much prettier\nshe could make herself by doing her hair a different way.\n\nMiss Burt, however, was somewhat puzzled and uneasy. Although Milly was\nlooking unusually well, it was evident that all was not quite right with\nher, for she complained of a failure of memory, a mental fatigue which\nmade it impossible for her to go to lectures, and she seemed to have\nlost all interest in the Schools, which had so lately been for her the\n\"be-all\" as well as the \"end-all here.\" Miss Burt knew Milly's only near\nrelation in England, Lady Thomson, intimately; and for that reason\nhesitated to write to her. She knew that Beatrice Thomson had no\npatience with the talk--often silly enough--about girls overworking\ntheir brains.", "start_char_idx": 53289, "end_char_idx": 57155, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca": {"__data__": {"id_": "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "eb7f47b3e037740026d54958f2b17b6740ce30c57ea82f0c10275f0bb4d4581f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0fb798ed05ce478c6e942914ab72b5b7504dfe5a0a693ecf6211efd49a98aa28", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She herself had never been laid up in her life, except\nwhen her leg was broken, and her views on the subject of ill-health were\nmarked. She regarded the catching of scarlet-fever or influenza as an\nact of cowardice, consumption or any organic disease as scarcely, if at\nall, less disgraceful than drunkenness or fraud, while the countless\nlittle ailments to which feminine flesh seems more particularly heir she\ncondemned as the most deplorable of female failings, except the love of\ndress.\n\nEventually Miss Burt did write to Lady Thomson, cautiously. Lady Thomson\nreplied that she was coming up to town on Thursday, and could so arrange\nher journey as to have an hour and a half in Oxford. She would be at\nAscham at three-thirty. Mildred rushed to Tims with the agitating news\nand both were greatly upset by it. However, Aunt Beatrice had got to be\nfaced sometime or other and Mildred's spirit rose to the encounter.\n\nShe had by this time provided herself with another dress, encouraged to\ndo so by the money in hand left by the frugal Milly the First. She had\ngot a plain tailor-made coat and skirt, in a becoming shade of brown;\nand with the unbecoming hard collar _de rigueur_ in those days, she wore\na turquoise blue tie, which seemed to reflect the color of her eyes. And\nin spite of Tims's dissuasions, she put on the new dress on Thursday,\nand declined to screw her hair up in the old way, as advised.\n\nAccordingly on Thursday at twenty-five minutes to four, Mildred\nappeared, in answer to a summons, in the quiet-colored, pleasant\ndrawing-room at Ascham, with its French windows giving on to the lawn,\nwhere some of the girls were playing hockey, not without cries. Her\nfirst view of Aunt Beatrice was a pleasant surprise. A tall, upstanding\nfigure, draped in a long, soft cloak trimmed with fur, a handsome face\nwith marked features, marked eyebrows, a fine complexion and bright\nbrown eyes under a wide-brimmed felt hat.\n\nHaving exchanged the customary peck, she waited in silence till Mildred\nhad seated herself. Then surveying her niece with satisfaction:\n\n\"Come, Milly,\" said she, in a full, pleasant voice; \"I don't see much\nsigns of the nervous invalid about you. Really, Polly,\" turning to Miss\nBurt, \"she has not looked so well for a long time.\"\n\n\"She's been much better since she dropped her work,\" replied Miss Burt.\n\n\"Taking plenty of fresh air and exercise, I suppose\"--Aunt Beatrice\nsmiled kindly on her niece--\"I'm afraid I've kept you from your hockey\nthis afternoon, Milly.\"\n\n\"Oh no, Aunt Beatrice, certainly not,\" replied Milly, with the extreme\ncourtesy of nervousness. \"I never play hockey now.\"\n\nLady Thomson turned to the Head with a shade of triumph in her\nsatisfaction.\n\n\"There, Polly! What did I tell you? I was sure there was something else\nat the bottom of it. Steady work, methodically done, never hurt anybody.\nBut of course if she's given up exercise, her liver or something was\nbound to get out of order.\"\n\n\"No, really, I take lots of exercise,\" interposed Milly; \"only I don't\ncare for hockey, it's such a horrid, rough, dirty game; don't you think\nso? And Miss Walker got a front tooth broken last winter.\"\n\nLady Thomson looked at her in a surprised way.\n\n\"Well, if you've not been playing hockey, what exercise have you been\ntaking?\"\n\n\"Walks,\" replied Milly, feebly, feeling herself on the wrong track; \"I\ngo walks with Ti--with Flora Timson when she has time.\"\n\nAunt Beatrice looked at the matter judicially.\n\n\"Of course, games are best for the physique. Look at men. Still, walking\nwill do, if one takes proper walks. I hope Flora Timson takes you good\nlong walks.\"\n\n\"Indeed she does!\" cried Milly. \"Immense! She walks a dreadful pace, and\nwe get over stiles and things.\"\n\n\"Immense is a little vague. How far do you go on an average?\"\n\nMildred's notions of distance were vague. \"Quite two miles, I'm sure,\"\nshe responded, cheerfully.\n\nAunt Beatrice made no comment.", "start_char_idx": 57156, "end_char_idx": 61066, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c": {"__data__": {"id_": "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "b1c628aecf0e70a0abfae42d067583396a8c191ef238bedcc9d70dc788e7ab23", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "67faeacb8629c2aedb04f316ae04c01ef950395c407dad516f391a84defafc21", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Aunt Beatrice made no comment. She looked steadily and scrutinizingly\nat her niece, and in a kind but deepened voice told her to go up to her\nroom, whither she, Lady Thomson, would follow in a few minutes, just to\nsee how the Mantegnas looked now they were framed.\n\nAs soon as the door had closed behind Mildred, she turned to Miss Burt.\n\"You're right, in a way, Polly, after all. There is something odd about\nMilly, but I think it's affectation. Did you hear her answer? Two miles!\nWhen to my knowledge she can easily walk ten.\"\n\nMeantime, Mildred mounted slowly to her room. She had tidied it under\nTims's instructions and had nothing to do but to sit down and think\nuntil Lady Thomson's masculine step was heard outside her door.\n\nAunt Beatrice came in and laid aside her hat and cloak, showing a dress\nof rough gray tweed, and short--so far a tribute to the practical--but\notherwise made on some awkward artistic or hygienic principle. Her\nglossy brown hair was brushed back and twisted tight, as Milly's used to\nbe, but with different effect, because of its heaviness and length.\n\n\"Why have you crammed up one of your windows with a dressing-glass?\"\nasked Aunt Beatrice, putting a picture straight.\n\n\"Because I can't see myself in that dark corner,\" returned Mildred,\ndemurely meek, but waiting her opportunity.\n\n\"See yourself! My dear child, you hardly ever want to see yourself, if\nyou are habitually neat and dressed sensibly. I see you've adopted the\nmannish style. That's a phase of vanity. You'll come back to the\nbeautiful and natural before long.\"\n\nMildred leaned back in her chair and clasped her hands behind her head.\n\n\"I don't think so, Aunt Beatrice. I've settled the dress question once\nand for all. I've found a clean, tidy, convenient style of dress and I\ncan't waste time thinking about altering it again.\"\n\n\"You don't seem to mind wasting it on doing your hair,\" returned Aunt\nBeatrice, smiling, but not grimly, for she enjoyed logical fencing, even\nto her opponent's fair hits.\n\n\"If I had beautiful hair like yours, I shouldn't need to,\" replied\nMildred. \"But you know how endy and untidy mine always was.\"\n\nAunt Beatrice, embarrassed by the compliment, looked at her watch. \"It\nseems as if we women can't escape our fate,\" she said. \"Here we are\ngabbling about dress when we've plenty of important things to talk over.\nMiss Burt wrote to me that you were overworked, run down, nerves out of\norder, and all the usual nonsense. I'm thankful to find you looking\nremarkably well. I should like to know what this humbug about not being\nable to work means.\"\n\n\"It means that--well, I simply can't,\" returned Mildred, earnestly this\ntime. \"I can't remember things.\"\n\n\"You must be able to remember; unless your brain's diseased, which is\nmost improbable. But I ought to take you to a brain specialist, I\nsuppose.\"\n\nMilly changed color. \"Please, oh please, Aunt Beatrice, don't do that!\"\n\nLady Thomson, in fact, hardly meant it; for her niece's appearance was\nunmistakably healthy. However, the threat told.\n\n\"I shall if you don't improve. I can't understand you. Either you're\nhysterical or you've got one of those abominable fits of frivolity which\ncome on women like drink on men, and destroy their careers. I thought we\nhad both set our hearts on your getting another First.\"\n\n\"But, Aunt Beatrice, they say I can't. They say I'm not clever enough.\"\n\n\"Oh, that's what they say, is it?\" Lady Thomson smiled in calm but deep\ncontempt. \"How do they explain the idiots who have got Firsts? Archibald\nToovey, for instance?\" Her eyes met her niece's, and both smiled.\n\n\"Ah, yes! Mr. Toovey,\" returned Milly, who had met Archibald Toovey at\nthe Fletchers', and converted his patronizing courtship into imbecile\nraptures.\n\n\"But that quite explains your losing an interest in your work.", "start_char_idx": 61036, "end_char_idx": 64831, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334": {"__data__": {"id_": "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "282346809ea2fae8c10272d20a94501684bef28d1b6e31f56e0ccba253e997dd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3376470952ce94eaf0b90613af2af340a3f8e996184014af9189f9354583647c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"But that quite explains your losing an interest in your work. Just for\nonce, I should like to take you away before the end of term. We would go\nstraight to Rome next Monday. We shall meet the Breretons there, and go\nfully over the new excavations and discoveries, besides the old things,\nwhich will be new, of course, to you. Then we will go on to Naples, do\nthe galleries and Pompeii, and come back by Florence and Paris before\nChristmas. By that time you will be ready to settle down to your work\nsteadily again and forget all this nonsense.\"\n\nMildred's face had lighted up momentarily at the word \"Rome.\" Then she\nsucked her under lip and looked at the fire. When Lady Thomson's\nprogramme was ended, she made a pause before she said, slowly:\n\n\"Thank you so much, dear Aunt Beatrice. I should love to go, but--I\ndon't think--no, I don't think I'd better. You see, there's the\nexpense.\"\n\n\"Of course I don't expect you to pay for yourself. I take you.\"\n\n\"How very kind and sweet of you! But--well, do you know, you've\nencouraged me so about that. First, I feel now as though I could sit\ndown and get it straight away. I will get it, Aunt Beatrice, if only to\nmake that old Professor look foolish.\"\n\nLady Thomson, though disappointed in a way, felt that Milly Flaxman was\ndoing credit to her principles, showing a spirit worthy of her family.\nShe did not urge the Roman plan; but content with a victory over \"nerves\nand the usual nonsense,\" withdrew triumphant to the railway station.\n\nTims came in when she was gone and heard about the Roman offer.\n\n\"You refused, when Aunt Beatrice was going to plank down the dollars?\nM., you are a fool!\"\n\n\"No, Tims,\" Mildred answered, deliberately; \"you see, I don't feel sure\nyet whether I can manage Aunt Beatrice.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\n\nOxford is beautiful at all times, beautiful even now, in spite of the\ncruel disfigurement inflicted upon her by the march of modern vulgarity,\nbut she has three high festivals which clothe her with a special glory\nand crown her with their several crowns. One is the Festival of May,\nwhen her hoary walls and ancient enclosures overflow with emerald and\nwhite, rose-color and purple and gold, a foam of leafage and blossom,\nbreaking spray-like over edges of stone, gray as sea-worn rocks. And all\nabout the city the green meadows and groves burn with many tones of\ncolor, brilliant as enamels or as precious stones, yet of a texture\nsofter and richer, more full of delicate shadows than any velvet mantle\nthat ever was woven for a queen.\n\nAnother Festival comes with that strayed bacchanal October, who hangs\nher scarlet and wine-colored garlands on cloister and pinnacle, on wall\nand tower. And gradually the foliage of grove and garden, turns through\nshade of bluish metallic green, to the mingled splendor of pale gold and\nbeaten bronze and deepest copper, half glowing and half drowned in the\nlow, mellow sunlight, and purple mist of autumn.\n\nLast comes the Festival of Mid-winter, the Festival of the Frost. The\nrime comes, or the snow, and the long lines of the buildings, the\nfret-work of stone, the battlements, carved pinnacles and images of\nsaints or devils, stand up with clear glittering outlines, or clustered\nabout and overhung with fantasies of ice and snow. Behind, the deep-blue\nsky itself seems to glitter too. The frozen floods glitter in the\nmeadows, and every little twig on the bare trees. There is no color in\nthe earth, but the atmosphere of the river valley clothes distant hills\nand trees and hedges with ultramarine vapor. Towards evening the mist\nclimbs, faintly veiling the tall groves of elms and the piled masses of\nthe city itself. The sunset begins to burn red behind Magdalen Tower,\nall the towers and aery pinnacles rise blue yet distinct against it. And\nthis festival is not only one of nature.", "start_char_idx": 64769, "end_char_idx": 68570, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988": {"__data__": {"id_": "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "5e6a432349a66b88e8c98618d192dfa868e190469843314db153c55c4f3a6bbf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "940263d7d722c68027e836fc5d132b61e1864867a766a1e267559aa9244a4f5f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "And\nthis festival is not only one of nature. The glittering ice is spread\nover the meadows, and, everywhere from morning till moonlight, the\nrhythmical ring of the skate and the sound of voices sonorous with the\njoy of living, travel far on the frosty air. Sometimes the very rivers\nare frozen, and the broad, bare highway of the Thames and the\ntree-sheltered path of the Cherwell are alive with black figures,\nheel-winged like Mercury, flying swiftly on no errand, but for the mere\ndelight of flying.\n\nIt was early on such a shining festival morning that Mildred, a willowy,\nbrown-clad figure, came down to a piece of ice in an outlying meadow.\nHer shadow moved beside her in the sunshine, blue on the whiteness of\nthe snow, which crunched crisp and thin under her feet. She carried a\nblack bag in her hand--sign of the serious skater, and her face was\nserious, even apprehensive. She saw with relief that except the sweepers\nthere was no one on the ice. A row of shivering men, buttoned up to the\nchin in seedy coats, rose from the chairs where they awaited their\nappointed prey, and all yelled to her at once. She crowned the hopes of\none by occupying his seat, but the important task of putting on the\nbladed boots she could depute to none. Tims, whom no appeal of\nfriendship could induce to shiver on the ice, had told her that Milly\nwas an expert skater. She was, in fact, correct and accomplished, but\nthere was a stiffness and sense of effort about her style, a want of\nthat appearance of free and daring abandonment to the stroke of the\nblade once launched, that makes the beauty of skating. Mildred knew only\nthat she had to live up to the reputation of a mighty skater, and was\nnot sure whether she could even stand on these knifelike edges. She\nlaced one boot, happy in the belief that at any rate there would be no\nwitness to her voyage of discovery. But a renewed yelling among the men\nmade her lift her head, and there, striding swiftly over the crisp snow,\ncame a tall, handsome young man, with a pointed, silky black beard and\nfine, short-sighted black eyes, aglow with the pleasure of the frosty\nsun.\n\nIt was Ian Stewart. The young lady whom he discovered to be Miss Flaxman\njust as he reached the chairs, was much more annoyed than he at the\nencounter. Here was an acquaintance, it seemed, and one provided with\nthe bag and orange which Tims had warned her was the mark of the\nserious skater. They exchanged remarks on the weather and she went on\nlacing her other boot in great trepidation. The moment was come. She did\nnot recoil from the insult of being seized under her elbows by two men\nand carefully planted on her feet as though she were most likely to\ntumble down. So far as she knew, she was likely to. But, lo! no sooner\nwas she up than muscles and nerves, recking nothing of the brain's blind\ndenial, asserted their own acquaintance with the art of balance and\nmotion. Wondering, and for a few minutes still apprehensive, but\npresently lost in the pleasure of the thing, Mildred began to fly over\nthe ice. And the dark, handsome man who had taken off his cap to her\nbecame supremely unimportant. Unluckily the piece of flood-ice was not\nendless and she had to come back. He was circling around an orange, and\nshe, throwing herself instinctively on to the outside edge, came down\ntowards him in great, sweeping curves, absorbed in the delight of this\nmotion, so new yet so perfectly under her control. Ian Stewart,\nperceiving that the girl was absolutely unconscious of his presence,\nblushed in his soul to think that he had been induced to believe himself\nto be of importance in her eyes.\n\n\"Miss Flaxman,\" he said, skating up to her, \"I see you have no orange.\nCan't we skate a figure together around mine?\"\n\n\"I've forgotten all about figures,\" replied Mildred, with truth.\n\n\"Try some simple turns,\" he urged. \"There are plenty here,\" and he held\nup a book in his hand like the one she had found in her own black bag.", "start_char_idx": 68526, "end_char_idx": 72472, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e": {"__data__": {"id_": "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "488f34d49f501225de1c288394b4d171d7f12964cb59245a85e701f8aca7808f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c0dcc3de0d47cfae03eb3b42df23fe000d90753a2e993ae68674203ed0e4dbc6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But it had \"Ian Stewart, Durham College,\" written clearly on the\noutside.\n\n\"So that's Stewart!\" thought Milly; and she could not help laughing at\nher own thoughts, which had created him in a different image.\n\nStewart did not know why she laughed, but he found the sound and sight\nof the laugh new and charming.\n\n\"It's awfully kind of you to undertake my education in another branch,\nMr. Stewart,\" she answered, pouting, \"in spite of having found out that\nI'm not at all clever.\"\n\nShe smiled at him mutinously, sweeping towards the orange with head\nthrown back over her left shoulder. Momentarily the poise of her head\nrecalled the attitude of the portrait of Lady Hammerton, beckoning her\nunseen companions to that far-off mysterious mountain country, where the\ntorrents shine so whitely through the mist and the red line of sunset\nspeaks of coming night.\n\nStewart colored, slightly confused. This brutal statement did not seem\nto him to represent the just and candid account he had given Miss Walker\nof Miss Flaxman's abilities.\n\n\"Some one's been misreporting me, I see,\" he returned. \"But anyhow, on\nthe ice, Miss Flaxman, it's you who are the Professor; I who am the\npupil. So I offer you a fair revenge.\"\n\nAccordingly, Mildred soon found herself placed at a due distance from\nthe orange, with Stewart equally distant from it on the other side.\nAfter a few minutes of extreme uneasiness, she discovered that although\nshe had to halt at each fresh call, she had a kind of mechanical\nfamiliarity with the simple figures which he gave her.\n\nStewart, though learned, was human; and to sweep now at the opposite\npole to his companion, now with a swing of clasping hands at the centre\nof their delightful dance, his eyes always perforce on his charming\npartner, and her eyes on him, undeniably raised the pleasure of skating\nto a higher power than if he had circled the orange in company with mere\nman.\n\nSo they fleeted the too-short time in the sparkling blue and white\nworld, drinking the air like celestial wine.\n\nThe Festival of the Frost had fallen in the Christmas Vacation, and\nOxford society in vacation is essentially different from that of\nTerm-time, when it is overflowed by men who are but birds of passage,\ncoming no one inquires whence, and flitting few know whither. The party\nthat picnicked, played hockey, danced and figured on their skates\nthrough the weeks of the frost, was in those days almost like a family\nparty. So it happened that Ian Stewart met the new Miss Flaxman in an\natmosphere of friendly ease that years of term-time society would not\nhave afforded him. How new she was he did not guess, but supposed the\nchange to be in his own eyes. Other people, however, saw it. Her very\nskating was different. It had gained in grace and vigor, but she was\nseldom seen wooing the serious and lonely orange around which Milly had\nacquired the skill that Mildred now enjoyed. On the contrary, she\ninitiated an epidemic of frivolity on the ice in the shape of waltzing\nand hand-in-hand figures in general.\n\nIan Stewart, too, neglected the orange and went in for hand-in-hand\nfigures that season. Other things, too, he neglected; work, which he had\nnever before allowed to suffer measurably from causes within his\ncontrol; and far from blushing for his idleness, he rejoiced in it, as\nthe surest sign of all that for him the Festival of Spring had come in\nthe time of nature's frost.\n\nIt was not only the crisp air, the frequent sun, the joyous flights over\nthe ringing ice that made his blood run faster through his veins and\nlaughter come more easily to his lips; that aroused him in the morning\nwith a strange sense of delight, as though some spirit had awakened him\nwith a glad reveille at the window of his soul. He, too, was in Arcady.\nThat in itself should be sufficient joy; he knew he must restrain his\nimpatience for more. Not till the summer, when the lady of his heart had\nceased to be also his pupil, must he make avowal of his love.\n\nMildred on her part found Stewart the most attractive of the men with\nwhom she was acquainted.", "start_char_idx": 72473, "end_char_idx": 76529, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b": {"__data__": {"id_": "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "a13b698708cc50d054c176f8bb6e751ea199aeed114c5dcfaf97257dc4de7914", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "143d4ea409638dd9364f66a8e922dae9fef590c67892af4576416d3d0fdb6bb3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "As yet in this new existence of hers, she had\nnot moved outside the Oxford circle--a circle exceptional in England,\nbecause in it intellectual eminence, not always recognized, when\nrecognized receives as much honor as is accorded to a great fortune or\na great name in ordinary society. Stewart's abilities were of a kind to\nbe recognized by the Academic world. He was already known in the\nUniversities of the Continent and America. Oxford was proud of him; and\nalthough Mildred had no desire to marry as yet, it gratified her taste\nand her vanity to win him for a lover.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\n\nMildred had had no desire to spend her vacations with Lady Thomson, and\non the ground of her reading for the Schools, had been allowed to spend\nthem in Oxford. Tims, who had no relations, remained with her. She had\nfor Mildred a sentiment almost like that of a parent, besides an\nadmiration for which she was slightly ashamed, feeling it to be\nsomething of a slur on the memory of Milly, her first and kindest\nfriend.\n\nMildred had recovered her memory for most things, but the facts of her\nformer life were still a blank to her. She had begun to work for her\nFirst in order to evade Aunt Beatrice; but the fever of it grew upon\nher, either from the ambient air of the University or from a native\npassion to excel in all she did. Her teachers were bewildered by the\nmental change in Miss Flaxman. The qualities of intellectual swiftness,\nvigor, pliancy, whose absence they had once noted in her, became, on the\ncontrary, conspicuously hers. Once initiated into the tricks of the\n\"Great Essay\" style, she could use it with a dexterity strangely in\ncontrast with the flat and fumbling manner in which poor Milly had been\nwont to express her ideas. But in the region of actual knowledge, she\nnow and again perpetrated some immense and childish blunder, which made\nthe teachers, who nursed and trained her like a jockey or a race-horse,\ntremble for the results of the Greats Examination.\n\nAll too swiftly the date of the Schools loomed on the horizon; drew\nnear; was come. The June weather was glorious on the river, but in the\ntown, above all in the Examination Schools, it was very hot. The sun\nglared pitilessly in through the great windows of the big T-shaped room,\ntill the temperature was that of a greenhouse. The young men in their\nblack coats and white ties looked enviously at the girl candidate, the\nonly one, in her white waist and light skirt. They envied her, too, her\napparent indifference to a crisis that paled the masculine cheek. In\nfact, Mildred was nervous, but her nerves were strung up to so high a\npitch that she was sensitive neither to temperature nor to fatigue, nor\nto want of sleep. And at the service of her quick intelligence and ready\npen lay all the stored knowledge of Milly the First.\n\nOn the last day, when the last paper was over, Tims came and found her\nin the big hall, planting the pins in her hat with an almost feverish\nenergy. Although it was five o'clock, she said she wanted air, not tea.\nThe last men had trooped listlessly down the steps of the Schools and\nthe two girls stood there while Mildred drew on her gloves. The sun\nwearing to the northwest, shone down that curve of the High Street which\nall Europe cannot match. The slanting gold illumined the gray face of\nthe University and the wide pavement, where the black-gowned victims of\nthe Schools threaded their sombre way through groups of joyous youths in\nflannels and ladies in summer attire. On the opposite side cool shadows\nwere beginning to invade the sunshine, to slant across the old houses,\nstraight-roofed or gabled, the paladian pile of Queen's, the medi\u00e6val\nfront of All Souls, with its single and perfect green tree, leading up\nto the consummation of the great spire of St. Mary's.\n\nAlready, from the tall bulk of the nave, a shadow fell broad across the\npavement. But still the heat of the day reverberated from the stones\nabout them.", "start_char_idx": 76530, "end_char_idx": 80464, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd": {"__data__": {"id_": "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "8ff4d83b58038c7f045a3247b589f58e06cb42c3af6f39a66453d6f07627c22a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b51657cf06b95596daffc5726e941442232e659d1763bc9f348b9334fa49b605", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But still the heat of the day reverberated from the stones\nabout them. They turned down to the Botanical Gardens and paced that\ngray enclosure, full of the pride of branches and the glory of flowers\nand overhung by the soaring vision of Magdalen Tower. Mildred was\nwalking fast and talking volubly about the Examination and everything\nelse.\n\n\"Look here, old girl,\" said Tims at last, when they reached for the\nsecond time the seat under the willow trellis, \"I'm going to sit down\nhere, unless you'll come to tea at Boffin's.\"\n\n\"I don't want to sit down,\" returned Mildred, seating herself; \"or to\nhave tea or anything. I want to be just going, going, going. I feel as\nthough if I stop for a minute something horrid will happen.\"\n\nTims wrinkled her whole face anxiously.\n\n\"Don't do that, Tims,\" cried Mildred, sharply. \"You look hideous.\"\n\nTims colored, rose and walked away. She suddenly thought, with tears in\nher eyes, of the old Milly who would never have spoken to her like\nthat. By the time she had reached the little basin in the middle of the\ngarden, where the irises grew, Mildred had caught her up.\n\n\"Tims, dear old Tims! What a wretch I am! I couldn't help letting off\nsteam on something--you don't know what I feel like.\"\n\nTims allowed herself to be pacified, but in her heart there remained a\nyearning for her earlier and gentler friend--that Milly Flaxman who was\ncertainly not dead, yet as certainly gone out of existence.\n\nIt was towards the end of the last week of Term, and the gayeties of\nCommemoration had already begun. Mildred threw herself into them with\nfeverish enjoyment. She seemed to grudge even the hours that must be\nlost in the unconsciousness of sleep. The Iretons, cousins from India,\nwho had never known the former Milly, took a house in Oxford for a week.\nShe went with them to three College balls and a Masonic, and spent the\ndays in a carnival of luncheon and boating-parties. She attracted plenty\nof admiration, and enjoyed herself wildly, yet also purposefully;\nbecause she was trying to get rid of that haunting feeling that if she\nstopped a minute \"something horrid would happen.\"\n\nStewart meantime was finding love not so entirely beautiful and\ndelightful a thing as he had at first imagined it. In his dreamy way he\nhad overlooked the fact of Commemoration, and planned when Term was over\nto find Mildred constantly at the Fletchers' and to be able to arrange\nquiet days on the river. But if he found her there, she was always in\ncompany, and though she made herself as charming to him as usual, she\nshowed no disposition to forsake all others and cleave only to him. He\nwas not a dancing man, and suffered cruelly on the evenings when he knew\nher to be at balls, and fancied all her partners in love with her.\n\nBut on the Thursday after Commemoration, the Fletchers gave a strawberry\ntea at Wytham, as a farewell festivity to their cousins. And Ian Stewart\nwas there. With Mrs. Fletcher's connivance, he took Mildred home alone\nin a canoe, by the deep and devious stream which runs under Wytham\nwoods. She went on talking with a vivacious gayety which was almost\nfoolish. He saw that it was unreal and that her nerves were at high\ntension. His own were also. He did not intend to propose to her that\nday; but he could no longer restrain himself, and he began to speak to\nher of his love.\n\n\"Hush!\" she cried, with a vehement gesture. \"Not to-day! oh, not to-day!\nI can't bear it!\" She put her head on her knee and moaned again, \"Not\nto-day, I'm too tired, I really am. I can't bear it.\"\n\nThis was all the answer he could get, and her manner left him in\ncomplete uncertainty as to whether she meant to accept or to refuse him.\n\nTims had been at the strawberry tea too, and came into Mildred's room in\nthe evening, curious to know what had happened.", "start_char_idx": 80394, "end_char_idx": 84183, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b": {"__data__": {"id_": "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c269605dcb1fb6231d9e222c197622b410950316d31de241c445c66a53a08018", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ba14bd475d1aa5ddb26cecd8d6dc5f95a940965e6b1f56578829d63442874a55", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She found Mildred\nwithout a light, sitting, or rather lying in a wicker chair. When the\ncandle was lighted she saw that Mildred was very pale and shivering.\n\n\"You're overtired, my girl,\" she said. \"That's what's the matter with\nyou.\"\n\n\"Oh, Tims,\" moaned Mildred. \"I feel so ill and so frightened. I know\nsomething horrid's going to happen--I know it is.\"\n\n\"Don't be a donkey,\" returned Tims. \"I'll help you undress and then you\nturn in. You'll be as jolly as a sandboy to-morrow.\"\n\nBut Mildred was crying tremulously. \"Oh, Tims, how dreadful it would be\nto die!\"\n\n\"Idiot!\" cried Tims, and shook Mildred with all her might. Mildred's\ntiny sobs turned into a shriek of laughter.\n\n\"My goodness!\" ejaculated Tims; \"you're in hysterics!\"\n\n\"I know I am,\" gasped Mildred. \"I was laughing to think of what Aunt\nBeatrice would say.\" And she giggled amid her tears.\n\nTims insisted on her rising from the chair, undressing, and getting into\nbed. Then she sat by her in the half-dark, waiting for the miserable\ntears to leave off.\n\n\"Don't cry, old girl, don't cry. Go to sleep and forget all about it,\"\nshe kept repeating, almost mechanically.\n\nAt length leaning over the bed she saw that Mildred was asleep, lying\nstraight on her bed with her feet crossed and her hands laid on her\nbosom.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\nAbout noon on Friday Milly Flaxman awoke. She lay very quiet, sleepy and\ncomfortable, her eyes fixed idly on a curve in the jessamine-pattern\npaper opposite her bed. The windows were wide open, the blinds down and\nevery now and again flapping softly, as a capricious little breeze went\nby, whispering through the leafy trees outside. There seemed nothing\nunusual in that; she always slept with her windows open. But as her\nsenses emerged from those mists which lie on the surface of the river of\nsleep, she was conscious of a balmy warmth in the room, of an impression\nof bright sunshine behind the dark blinds, and of noises from the\nstreets reaching her with a kind of sharpness associated with sunshine.\nShe sat up, looked at her watch, and was shocked to find how late she\nhad slept. She must have missed a lecture. Then the recollection of the\ndinner-party at the Fletchers', the verdict of Mr. Stewart on her chance\nof a First, and her own hysterical outburst returned to her,\noverpowering all outward impressions. She felt calm and well now, but\nunhappy and ashamed of herself. She put her feet out of bed and looked\nround mechanically for her dressing-gown and slippers. Their absence was\nunimportant, for no sense of chill struck through her thin night-gown\nto her warm body, and going to the window, she drew up the blind.\n\nThe high June sun struck full upon her, hot and dazzling, but not so\ndazzling that she could not see the row of garden trees through whose\nbare branches she had yesterday descried the squalid roofs of the town.\nThey were spreading now in a thick screen of fresh green leaves. She\nleaned out, as though further investigation might explain the\nphenomenon, and saw a red standard rose in full flower under her window.\nThe thing was exactly like a dream, and she tried to wake up but could\nnot. She was panic-stricken and trembling. Had she been very, very ill?\nWas it possible to be unconscious for six months? She looked at herself\nin a dressing-glass near the window, which she had never placed there,\nand saw that she was pale and had dark marks under her eyes, but not\nmore so than had been the case in that yesterday so strangely and\nmysteriously removed in time. Her slender white arms and throat were as\nrounded as usual. And if she had been ill, why was she left alone like\nthis? She found a dressing-gown not her own, and went on a voyage of\ndiscovery. But the other rooms on her floor were dismantled and\ntenantless. The girls were gone and the servants were \"cleaning\" in a\ndistant part of the College.", "start_char_idx": 84184, "end_char_idx": 88024, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e": {"__data__": {"id_": "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "a6bc6a4dbe5ead23b27bd8e4cf7d40841329333f2c41a2ddd153d99ec83d3ce0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d7c692756a72fe6af57848bd0ab251fd1b6aadc4134653d5454cb9c0fe2ddca4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She felt incapable of getting into bed\nagain and waiting for some one to come, so she began dressing herself\nwith trembling hands. Every detail increased the sense of strangeness.\nThere were a number of strange clothes, ball-dresses and others,\nhanging in her cupboard, strange odds and ends thrust confusedly into\nher bureau. She found at length a blue cotton frock of her own, which\nseemed just home from the wash. She had twisted up her hair and was\nputting on the blue frock, when she heard a step on the stairs, and\npaused with beating heart. Who was coming? How would the mystery be\nresolved? The door opened and Tims came in--the old Tims, wrinkled face,\nwig, and old straw hat on one side as usual.\n\n\"Tims!\" cried Milly, flying towards her and speaking with pale lips.\n\"Please, please tell me--what has happened? Have I been very ill?\" And\nshe stared in Tims's face with a tragic mask of terror and anxiety.\n\n\"Now take it easy--take it easy, M., my girl!\" cried Tims, giving her a\ngreat squeeze and a clap on the shoulder. \"I'm jolly glad to see you\nback. But don't let's have any more of your hysterics. No, never no\nmore!\"\n\n\"Have I been away?\" asked Milly, her lips still trembling.\n\n\"I should think you had!\" exclaimed Tims. \"But nobody knows it except\nme. Don't forget that. Here's a note for you from old B. Read it first\nor we shall both forget all about it. She had to go away early this\nmorning.\"\n\nMilly opened the note and read:\n\n \"DEAR MILLY,--I am sorry not to say good-bye, but glad you\n are sleeping off your fatigue. I want to tell you, between\n ourselves, not to go on worrying about the results of the\n Schools, as I think you are doing, in spite of your\n pretences to the contrary. I hear you have done at least one\n brilliant paper, and although I, of course, know nothing\n certain, I believe you and the College will have reason to\n rejoice when the list comes out.\n\n \"Yours affectionately,\n\n \"MARY BURT.\"\n\n\"What does it mean?--oh, what can it mean?\" faltered Milly, holding out\nthe missive to Tims.\n\n\"It means you've been in for Greats, my girl, and done first-rate. But\nthe strain's been a bit too much for you, and you've had another\ncollapse of memory. You had one in the end of November. You've been\nuncommonly well ever since, and worked like a Trojan, but you've not\nbeen quite your usual self, and I'm glad you've come right again, old\ngirl. Let me tell you the whole business.\"\n\nTims did so. She wanted social tact, but she had the tact of the heart\nwhich made her hide from Milly how very different, how much more\nbrilliant and attractive Milly the Second had been than her normal self.\nShe only made her friend feel that the curious episode had entailed no\ndisgrace, but that somehow in her abnormal condition she had done well\nin the Schools, and probably touched the top of her ambition.\n\n\"But I don't feel as though it had been quite straightforward to hide it\nup so,\" said Milly. \"I shall write and tell Miss Burt and Aunt Beatrice,\nand tell the Fletchers when I go to them.\"\n\n\"You'll do nothing of the kind, you stupid,\" snapped Tims. \"You'll be\nsimply giving me away if you do. What is the good? It won't happen\nagain unless you're idiot enough to overwork yourself again. Very likely\nnot then; for, as an open-minded, scientific woman, I believe it to have\nbeen a case of hypnotism, and in France and the United States they'd\nhave thought it a very interesting one. But in England people are so\nprejudiced they'd say you'd simply been out of your mind; although that\nwouldn't prevent them from blaming me for hypnotizing you.\"\n\nWhile Tims spoke thus, there was a knocking without, and a maid\ndelivered a note for Miss Flaxman. Milly held it in her hands and\nstudied it musingly before opening the envelope.", "start_char_idx": 88025, "end_char_idx": 91816, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0": {"__data__": {"id_": "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f0515cec9491ce889b07cc738beaafd8fe5ff2713924cda7d059c1946e22cfd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7de1c27489baa670d136c912e70ef0758ffa235b916ecd1cebc11c910e80880b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her pale, troubled face\ncolored and grew more serious. Tims had not mentioned Ian Stewart, but\nMilly had not forgotten him or his handwriting. Tims knew it too. She\nrestrained her excitement while Milly turned her back and stood by the\nwindow reading the note. She must have read them several times over, the\ntwo sides of the sheet inscribed with Stewart's small, scholarly\nhandwriting, before she turned her transfigured face towards the\nanxiously expectant Tims.\n\n\"Tims, dear,\" she said at length, smiling tremulously, and laying\ntremulous hands on Tims's two thin shoulders--\"dear old Tims, why didn't\nyou tell me?\"\n\n\"Tell you what?\" asked Tims, grinning delightedly. Milly threw her arms\nround her friend's neck and hid her happy tears and blushes between\nTims's ear and shoulder.\n\n\"Mr. Stewart--it seems too good to be true--he loves me, he really does.\nHe wants me to be his wife.\"\n\nMost girls would have hugged and kissed Milly, and Tims did hug her, but\ninstead of kissing her, she banged and slapped her back and shoulders\nhard all over, shaking the while with deep internal chuckles. It hurt,\nbut Milly did not mind, for it was sympathy. Presently she drew herself\naway, and wiping her damp eyes, said, smiling shyly:\n\n\"He's never guessed how much I care about him. I'm so glad. He says he\ndoesn't wonder at my hesitation and talks about others more worthy to\nlove me. But you know there isn't any one except Mr. Toovey. Poor Mr.\nToovey! I do hope I haven't behaved very badly to him.\"\n\n\"Never mind Toovey,\" chuckled Tims. \"Anyhow, Milly, I've got a good load\noff my mind. I didn't half like having put that other girl into your\nboots. However, you've come back, and everything's going to be all\nright.\"\n\n\"All right!\" breathed Milly. \"Why, Tims, darling, I never thought any\none in the world could be half so happy as I am.\"\n\nAnd Tims left Milly to write the answer for which Ian Stewart was so\nanxiously waiting.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe engagement proceeded after the manner of engagements. No one was\nsurprised at it and every one was pleased. The little whirlpool of talk\nthat it created prevented Milly's ignorance of the events of the past\nsix or seven months from coming to the surface. She lay awake at night,\ndevising means of telling Ian about this strange blank in her life. But\nshe shrank from saying things that might make him suspect her of an\nunsound mind. She had plainly been sane enough in her abnormal state,\nand there was no doubt of her sanity now. She told him she had had since\nthe autumn, and still had, strange collapses of memory; and he said that\nquite explained some peculiarities of her work. She tried to talk to him\nabout French experiments in hypnotism, and how it was said sometimes to\nbring to light unsuspected sides of a personality. But he laughed at\nhypnotism as a mixture of fraud and hysteria. So with many searchings of\nheart, she dropped the subject.\n\nShe was staying at the Fletchers' and saw Ian every day. He was all that\nshe could wish as a lover, and it never occurred to her to ask whether\nhe felt all that he himself could have wished as such. He was very fond\nof Milly and quite content with her, but not perfectly content with\nhimself. He supposed he must at bottom be one of those ordinary and\nrather contemptible men who care more for the excitement of the chase\nthan for the object of it. But he felt sure he was really a very lucky\nfellow, and determined not to give way to the self-analysis which is\nalways said to be the worst enemy of happiness.\n\nMiss Flaxman had been the only woman in for Greats, and as a favor she\nwas taken first in _viva voce_. The questions were directed to probing\nher actual knowledge in places where she had made one or two amazing\nblunders.", "start_char_idx": 91817, "end_char_idx": 95574, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699": {"__data__": {"id_": "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c7bd0fb2f4c8ae6a2765a1bb312fc40533e24a4f1aaa4140aa06e64d5d0aa6a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9e4e1e413da993c52a144cb366f3d7ce5fc4c1b5eff510a5ca1567419164ab45", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But she emerged triumphant, and went in good spirits to\nClewes, Aunt Beatrice's country home in the North, whither Ian Stewart\nshortly followed her. Beyond the fact that she wore perforce and with\nshame, not having money to buy others, frocks which Lady Thomson\ndisapproved, she was once more the adoring niece to whom her aunt was\naccustomed. And Lady Thomson liked Ian. She never expected men to share\nher fads.\n\nIn due time came the announcement of the First, bringing almost as many\ncongratulatory letters as the engagement. And on August 2d Milly sailed\nfor Australia, where she was to spend two or three months with her\nfamily.\n\nIn October the newspapers announced that the marriage of Miss Mildred\nBeatrice Flaxman, eldest daughter of the Dean of Stirling, South\nAustralia, with Mr. Ian Stewart, Fellow of Durham College, Oxford, would\ntake place at Oxford in the second week in December.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\n\n\"Madame dort toujours!\" The dark-eyed, cherry cheeked, white-capped\nchamber-maid of the H\u00f4tel du Chalet made the statement to the manager,\nwho occupied a glass case in the hall. \"She must have been very tired\nyesterday, pauvre petite!\"\n\nThe manager answered phlegmatically in French with a German accent:\n\n\"So much the better if she sleeps. She does not eat. When the gentleman\nwent out he wanted sanveeches to put in his pocket. One does not want\nsanveeches when one sleeps.\"\n\n\"All the same, I wish she would wake up. It's so odd to see her sleeping\nlike that,\" returned the cherry-cheeked one; and passed about her\nduties.\n\nThe _d\u00e9jeuner_ was over, and those guests who had not already gone out\nfor the day, were tramping about the bare, wooden passages and\nstaircase, putting on knitted gloves and shouting for their companions\nand toboggans. But it was not till all had gone out and their voices had\ndied away on the clear, cold air, that the sleeper in No. 19 awoke. For\na while she lay with open eyes as still as though she were yet sleeping.\nBut suddenly she started up in bed and looked around her with frowning,\nstartled attention. She was in a rather large, bare bedroom with\nvarnished green wood-work and furniture and a green pottery stove. There\nwas an odd, thick paper on the wall, of no particular color, and a\npainted geometrical pattern in the centre of the ceiling. It was a neat\nroom, on the whole, but on the bed beside her own a man's waistcoat had\nbeen thrown, and in the middle of the floor a pair of long, shabby\nslippers lay a yard apart from each other and upside down. There were\nother little signs of masculine occupation. A startled movement brought\nher sitting up on the bedside.\n\n\"Married!\" she whispered to herself. \"How perfectly awful!\"\n\nA fiery wave of anger that was almost hate swept through her veins,\nanger against the unknown husband and against that other one who had the\npower thus to dispose of her destiny, while she lay helpless in some\nunfathomed deep between life and death. Swifter than light her thoughts\nflew back to the last hours of consciousness which had preceded that\nstrange and terrible engulfment of her being. She remembered that Mr.\nStewart had tried to propose to her on the river and that she had not\nallowed him to do so. Probably he had taken this as a refusal. She knew\nnothing of any love of Milly's for him; only was sure that he had not\nbeen in love with her, Mildred, when she first knew him; therefore had\nnot cared for her other personality. Who else was possible? With an\naudible cry she sprang to her feet.\n\n\"Toovey! Archibald Toovey!\"\n\nThe idea was monstrous, it was also grotesque; and even while she\nplunged despairing fingers in her hair, she laughed so loud that she\nmight have been heard in the corridor.\n\n\"Mrs. Archibald Toovey! Good Heavens! But that girl was perfectly\ncapable of it.\"\n\nThen she became more than serious and buried her face in her hands,\nthinking.\n\n\"If it is Mr. Toovey,\" she thought, \"I must go away at once, wherever I\nam.", "start_char_idx": 95575, "end_char_idx": 99512, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7": {"__data__": {"id_": "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2aa6f68931252dccaf144ba62f1b7472a5cce33b30127d4de1e4493795b13eb7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e585a6e89eadf1094b94482dc84f59b151530e2080548b461f30f3858c0164b0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I can't have been married long. I am sure to have some money\nsomewhere. I'll go to Tims. Oh, that brute! That idiot!\"--she was\nthinking of Milly--\"How I should like to strangle her!\"\n\nShe clinched her hands till the nails hurt her palms. Two photographs,\npropped up on the top of a chest of drawers, caught her eye. She\nsnatched them. One was a wedding group, but there was no bridegroom;\nonly six bridesmaids. It was as bad as such things always are, and it\nwas evident that the dresses were ill-fitting, the hats absurd. Tims was\nprominent among the bridesmaids, looking particularly ugly. The other\nphotograph might have seemed pretty to a less prejudiced eye. It was\nthat of a slight, innocent-looking girl in a white satin gown, \"ungirt\nfrom throat to hem,\" and holding a sheaf of lilies in her hand. Her hair\nwas loose upon her shoulders, crowned with a fragile garland and covered\nwith a veil of fine lace.\n\n\"What a Judy!\" commented Mildred, throwing the photograph fiercely away\nfrom her. \"Fancy my being married in a dressing-gown and having Tims\nfor a bridesmaid! Sickening!\"\n\nBut her anxiety with regard to the bridegroom dominated even this just\nindignation. Somehow, after seeing the photographs, she was convinced he\nmust be Archibald Toovey. She determined to fly at once. The question\nwas, where was she? Not in England, she fancied. The stove had been\nthrice-heated by the benevolent cherry-cheeked one, and the atmosphere\nof the room was stifling. This, together with the cold outside, had\ncombined to throw a gray veil across the window-panes. She hastily put\non a blue Pyrenean wool dressing-gown, flung open a casement and leaned\nout into the wide sunshine, the iced-champagne air. The window was only\non the first floor, and she saw just beneath a narrow, snowy strip of\nground, on either side and below it snow-sprinkled pinewoods falling,\nfalling steeply, as it were, into space. But far below the blue air\ndeepened into a sapphire that must be a lake, and beyond that gray\ncliffs, remote yet fairly clear in the sunshine, rose streaked with the\nblue shadows of their own buttresses. Above the cliffs, white and sharp\nand fantastic in their outline, snowy mountain summits showed clear\nagainst the deep blue sky. Between them, imperceptibly moving on its\nsecular way, hung the glacier, a track of vivid ultramarine and green,\nlooking like a giant pathway to the stars. Mildred guessed she was in\nSwitzerland. She knew that it should be easy to get back to England, yet\nfor her with her peculiar inexperience of life, it would not be easy. At\nany rate, she would dash herself down some gray-precipice into that\nlake below rather than remain here as the bride of Archibald Toovey.\nJust as she was registering a desperate vow to that effect a man came\nclimbing up the woodland way to the left, a long-legged man in a\nknickerbocker suit and gaiters. He stepped briskly out of the pinewood\non to the snowy platform below, and seeing her at the window, looked up,\nsmiling, and waved his cap, with a cry of \"Hullo, Milly!\" And it was not\nArchibald Toovey.\n\nMildred, relieved from the worst of fears, leaned from the window\ntowards him. A slanting ray caught the floating cloud of her amber hair,\nher face glowed rosily, her eyes beamed on the new-comer, and she broke\ninto such an enchanting ripple of laughter as he had never heard from\nthose soft lips since it had been his privilege to kiss them. Then\nsomething happened within him. Upon his lonely walk he had been overcome\nby a depression against which he had every day been struggling. He had\nbeen disappointed in his marriage, now some weeks old--disappointed,\nthat is, with himself, because of his own incapacity for rapturous\nhappiness.", "start_char_idx": 99513, "end_char_idx": 103225, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8": {"__data__": {"id_": "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f50e5c75ff6c7ea4ce729e165ecbaaf8f6b81c1d7daba1be28b707555bbcc521", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "92e12c71f21c72fbb70421a97c86cbc22d7dee9b595101541f7eae36216f4845", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Yet a year ago on the ice at Oxford, six months ago in the\nfalling summer twilight on the river, under Wytham Woods, he had thought\nhimself as capable as any man of feeling the joys and pains of love. In\nthe sequel it had seemed that he was not; and just as he had lost all\nhope of finding once again that buried treasure of his heart, it had\nreturned to him in one delightful moment, when he stood as it were on\nthe top of the world in the crisp, joyous Alpine air, and his eyes met\nthe eyes of his young wife, who leaned towards him into the sunshine and\nlaughed. He could not possibly have told how long the golden vision\nendured; only that suddenly, precipitately, it withdrew. A \"spirit in\nhis feet\" sent him bounding up the bare, shallow hotel stairs, two steps\nat a time, dropping on every step a cake of snow from his boots, to melt\nand make pools on the polished wood. The manager, who respected none of\nhis guests except those who bullied him, called out a reprimand, but\nreceived no apology.\n\nStewart strode with echoing tread down the corridor towards No. 19,\neager to hold that slender, girlish wife of his in his arms and to press\nkisses on the lips that had laughed at him so sweetly from above. The\nwalls of the hotel were thin, and as he approached the door he heard a\nquick, soft scurry across the room on the other side, and in his swift\nthought saw Milly flying to meet him, just relieved from one absurd\nanxiety about his safety and indulging another on the subject of his wet\nfeet. A smile of tender amusement visited his lips as he took hold of\nthe door-handle. Exactly as he touched it, the key on the other side\nturned. The lock had been stiff, but it had shot out in the nick of\ntime, and he found himself brought up short in his impulsive career and\nhurtling against a solid barrier. He knocked, but no one answered. He\ncould have fancied he heard panting breaths on the other side of the\nill-fitting door.\n\n\"Mayn't I come in, darling?\" he asked, gently, but with a shade of\nreproach in his voice.\n\n\"No, you can't,\" returned Milly's voice; hers, but with an accent of\ncoldness and decision in it which struck strangely on his ear. He\npaused, bewildered. Then he remembered how often he had read that women\nwere capricious, unaccountable creatures. Milly had made him forget\nthat. Her attitude towards him had been one of unvarying gentleness and\ndevotion. Vaguely he felt that there was a kind of feminine charm in\nthis sudden burst of coldness, almost indifference.\n\n\"Is anything the matter, dear?\" he asked. \"Aren't you well?\"\n\n\"Quite well, thank you,\" came the curt voice through the door. Then\nafter a minute's hesitation: \"What do you want?\"\n\nIan smiled to himself as he answered:\n\n\"My feet are wet. I want to change.\"\n\nHe was a delicate man, and if he had a foible which Milly could be said\nto execrate, it was that of \"sitting in wet feet.\" He expected the door\nto fly open; but it did nothing of the kind. There was not a trace of\nanxiety in the grudging voice which replied, after a pause:\n\n\"I suppose you want dry shoes and stockings. I'll give them to you if\nyou'll wait.\"\n\nHe stood bewildered, a little pained, not noticing the noisy opening and\nshutting of several ill-fitting drawers in the room. Yet Milly always\nput away his things for him and should have known where to find them.\nThe door opened a chink and the shoes and stockings came flying through\non to the passage floor. He had a natural impulse to use his masculine\nstrength, to push the door open before she could lock it again, but\nfortunately he restrained it. He went down-stairs slowly, shoes and\nstockings in hand; threw them down behind the big green stove in the\nsmoking-room and lighted a meditative pipe. It was evidently a fact that\nwomen were difficult to understand; even Milly was. He had been\nuniformly kind and tender to her, and so far she had seemed more than\ncontent with him as a husband.", "start_char_idx": 103226, "end_char_idx": 107136, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312": {"__data__": {"id_": "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "be23fcda952b1352cdfea9105c36f1db5727cf03363a81b673179a4923ed3572", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4f3c90b79a5aa81ddbfa5b3f5b0a41645c23f4fc0c4a0503c49d67b9e0db798d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But beneath this apparent happiness of\nhers had some instinct, incomprehensible to him, been whispering to her\nthat he did not love her as many men, perhaps most, loved their young\nwives? That he had felt for her no ardor, no worship? If so, then the\ncrisis had come at the right moment; at the moment when, by one of those\ntricks of nature which make us half acquiesce in the belief that our\npersonality is an illusion, that we are but cosmic automata, the power\nof love had been granted to him again. Yet for all that--very\nfortunately, seeing that the crisis was more acute than he was aware--he\ndid not fancy that his way lay plain before him. He began to perceive\nthat the cementing of a close union between a man and woman, two beings\nwith so abundant a capacity for misunderstanding each other, is a\ncomplex and delicate affair. That to marry is to be a kind of Odysseus\nadvancing into the palace of a Circe, nobler and more humane than the\nenchantress of old, yet capable also of working strange and terrible\ntransformations. That many go in there carrying in their hands blossoms\nwhich they believe to be moly; but the true moly is not easy to\ndistinguish. And he hoped that he and Milly, in their different ways,\nhad found and were both wearing the milk-white flower. Yet he knew that\nthis was a matter which must be left to the arbitrament of time.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n\nOn their return to Oxford the young couple were f\u00eated beyond the common.\nPeople who had known Milly Flaxman in earlier days were surprised to\nthink how little they had noticed her beauty or guessed what a fund of\nhumor, what an extraordinary charm, had lurked beneath the surface of\nher former quiet, grave manner. The Master of Durham alone refused to be\nsurprised. He merely affirmed in his short squeak that he had always\nadmired Mrs. Stewart very much. She was now frequently to be found in\nthe place of honor at those dinners of his, where distinguished visitors\nfrom London brought the stir and color of the great world into the\naustere groves, the rarefied atmosphere of Academe.\n\nWherever she appeared, the vivid personality of Mrs. Stewart made a kind\nof effervescence which that indescribable entity, a vivid personality,\nis sure to keep fizzing about it. She was devoutly admired, fiercely\ncriticised, and asked everywhere. It is true she had quite given up her\nmusic, but she drew caricatures which were irresistibly funny, and was a\ntremendous success in charades. Everything was still very new to her,\neverything interesting and amusing. She was enchanted with her house,\nalthough Milly and Lady Thomson had chosen it, preferring to a villa in\nthe Parks an old gray house of the kind that are every day recklessly\ndestroyed by the march of modern vulgarity. She approved of the few and\ngood pieces of old furniture with which they had provided it; although\nLady Thomson could not entirely approve of the frivolity and\nextravagance of the chintzes with which she helped the sunshine to\nbrighten the low, panelled rooms. But Aunt Beatrice, girt with\nprinciples major and minor, armed with so Procrustean a measure for most\nof her acquaintance, accepted Mildred's deviations with an astonishing\nease. The secret of personal magnetism is not yet discovered. It may be\nthat the _aura_ surrounding each of us is no mystic vision of the\nNeo-Buddhists, but a physical fact; that Mildred's personality acted by\na power not moral but physical on the nerves of those who approached\nher, exciting those of some, of the majority, pleasurably, filling\nothers with a nameless uneasiness, to account for which they must accuse\nher manners or her character.\n\nTo Ian Stewart the old panelled house with the walled garden behind,\nwhere snowdrops and crocuses pushed up under budding orchard boughs, was\na paradise beyond any he had imagined. He found Mildred the most\nadorable of wives, the most interesting of companions. Her defects as a\nhousekeeper, which Aunt Beatrice noted in silence but with surprise,\nwere nothing to him.", "start_char_idx": 107137, "end_char_idx": 111138, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a": {"__data__": {"id_": "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "d0ed591d4b122d0ee0c2c2f6609ecf64220aeb35b1a4a14e463ca90baa3b5eb6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c94ec60384f9e310500158aa38e9a61c0b545a56d0b3024d1f1a4c8c70fab4f1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He could not help pausing sometimes even in the\nmidst of his work, to wonder at his own good fortune and to reflect\nthat whatever the future might have in store, he would have no right to\ncomplain, since it had been given to him to know the taste of perfect\nhappiness.\n\nSince his marriage he had been obliged to take more routine work, and\nthe Long Vacation had become more valuable to him than ever. As soon as\nhe had finished an Examination he had undertaken, he meant to devote the\ntime to the preparation of a new book which he had in his mind. Mildred,\nseemingly as eager as himself that the book should be done, had at first\nagreed. Then some of her numerous friends had described the pleasures of\nDieppe, and she was seized with the idea that they too might go there.\nIan, she said, could work as well at Dieppe as at Oxford or in the\ncountry. Ian knew better; besides, his funds were low and Dieppe would\ncost too much. For the first time he opposed Mildred's wishes, and to\nher surprise she found him perfectly firm. There was no quarrel, but\nalthough she was silent he felt that she did not yield her opinion and\nwas displeased with him.\n\nLate at night as he sat over Examination papers, his sensitive\nimagination framed the accusations of selfishness, pedantry,\nscrupulosity, which his wife might be bringing against him in the\n\"sessions of silent thought;\" although it was clearly to her advantage\nas much as to his own that he should keep out of money difficulties and\ndo work which counted. She had no fixed habits, and he flung down pipe\nand pen, hoping to find her still awake. But she was already sound\nasleep. The room was dark, but he saw her by the illumination of\ndistant lightning, playing on the edge of a dark and sultry world. His\nappointed task was not yet done and he returned to the study, a long,\nlow, dark-panelled room, looking on the garden. The windows were wide\nopen on the hushed, warm, almost sulphurous darkness, from which frail\nwhite-winged moths came floating in towards the shaded lamp on his\nwriting-table. He sat down to his papers and by an effort of will\nconcentrated his mind upon them. Habit had made such concentration easy\nto him as a rule, but to-night, after half an hour of steady work, he\nwas mastered by an invading restlessness of mind and body. The cause was\nnot far to seek; he could hear all the time he worked the dull, almost\ncontinuous, roar of distant thunder. All else was very still, it was\nlong past midnight and the town was asleep.\n\nHe got up and paced the room once or twice, grasping his extinguished\npipe absently in his hand. Suddenly a blast seemed to spring out of\nnowhere and rush madly round the enclosed garden, tossing the gnarled\nand leafy branches of the old orchard trees and dragging at the long\ntrails of creepers on wall and trellis. It blew in at the windows, hot\nas from the heart of the thunder-cloud, and waved the curtains before\nit. It rushed into the very midst of the old house with its cavernous\nchimneys, deep cellars, and enormous unexplored walls, filling it with\nstrange, whispering sounds, as of half articulate voices, here menacing,\nthere struggling to reveal some sinister and vital secret. The blast\ndied away, but it seemed to have left those voices still muttering and\nsighing through the walls that had sheltered so many generations, such\nvarious lives of men. Ian was used to the creaking and groaning of the\nwood-work; he knew how on the staircase the rising of the boards, which\nhad been pressed down in the day, simulated ghostly footsteps in the\nnight. He was in his mental self the most rational of mortals, but at\ntimes the Highland strain in his blood, call it sensitive or\nsuperstitious, spoke faintly to his nerves--never before so strongly, so\nover-masteringly as to-night. A blue blaze of crooked lightning\nzigzagged down the outer darkness and seemed to strike the earth but a\nlittle beyond the garden wall. Following on its heels a tremendous clap\nof thunder burst, as it were, on the very chimneys. The solid house\nshook to its foundations.", "start_char_idx": 111139, "end_char_idx": 115198, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61": {"__data__": {"id_": "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "17cf087b6a09a5cdf543a5aa389c254ab50532094e9b4371c15dcdceab7560ec", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f6bd2ec904265771e40f958742a1d65ccfa802d94729a0d249e07afaaa48c350", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The solid house\nshook to its foundations. But the tide of horrible, irrational fear\nwhich swept over Ian's whole being was not caused by this mere\nexaggerated commonplace of nature. He could give no guess what it was\nthat caused it; he only knew that it was agony. He knew what it meant to\nfeel the hair lift on his head; he knew what the Psalmist meant when he\nsaid, \"My bones are turned to water.\" And as he stood unable to move,\nafraid to turn his head, abject and ashamed of his abjectness, he was\nlistening, listening for he knew not what.\n\nAt length it came. He heard the stairs creak and a soft padding footstep\ncoming slowly down them; with it the brush of a light garment and\nintermittently a faint human sound between a sigh and a sob. He did not\nreflect that he could not really have heard such slight sounds through a\nthick stone wall and a closed door. He heard them. The steps stopped at\nthe door; a hand seemed feeling to open it, and again there was a\npainful sigh. The physical terror had not passed from him, but the\nsudden though that it was his wife and that she was frightened or ill,\nmade him able to master it. He seized the lamp, because he knew the\nlight in the hall was extinguished, rushed to the door, opened it and\nlooked out. There was no one there. He made a hasty but sufficient\nsearch and returned to the study.\n\nThe extremity of his fear was now passed, but an unpleasantly eery\nfeeling still lingered about him and he had a very definite desire to\nfind himself in some warm, human neighborhood. He had left the door open\nand was arranging the papers on his writing-table, when once again he\nheard those soft padding feet on the stairs; but this time they were\nmuch heavier, more hurried, and stumbled a little. He stood bent over\nthe table, a bundle of papers in his hand, no longer overcome by mortal\nterror, yet somehow reluctant once more to look out and to see once\nmore--nothing. There was a sound outside the door, louder, hoarser than\nthe faint sob or sigh which he had heard before, and he seized the lamp\nand turned towards it. Before he had made a step forward, the door was\npushed violently back and his wife came in, leaning upon it as though\nshe needed support. She was barefooted and dressed only in a long\nnight-gown, white, yet hardly whiter than her face. Her eyes did not\nturn towards him, they stared in front of her, not with the fixed gaze\nof an ordinary sleep-walker, but with purpose and intensity. She seemed\nto see something, to pursue something, with starting eyes and\nout-stretched arms; something she hated even more than she feared it,\nfor her lips were blanched and tightened over her teeth as though with\nfury, and her smooth white forehead gathered in a frown. Again she\nuttered that low, fierce sound, like that he had heard outside the door.\nThen, loosing the handle on which she had leaned, she half sprung, half\nstaggered, with uplifted hand, towards an open window, beyond which the\nrush of the thunder shower was just visible, sloping pallidly across the\ndarkness. She leaned out into it and uttered to the night a hoarse,\nconfused voice, words inchoate, incomprehensible, yet with a terrible\naccent of rage, of malediction. This transformation of his wife, so\nrefined, so self-contained, into a creature possessed by an almost\nanimal fury, struck Ian with horror, although he accepted it as a\nphenomenon of somnambulism. He approached but did not touch her, for he\nhad heard that it was dangerous to awaken a somnambulist. Her voice sank\nrapidly to a loud whisper and he heard her articulate--\"My husband!\nMine! Mine!\"--but in no tone of tenderness, rather pronouncing the words\nas a passionate claim to his possession. Then suddenly she drooped, half\nkneeling on the deep window-seat, half fallen across the sill. He sprang\nto catch her, but not before her forehead had come down sharply on the\nstone edge of the outer window.", "start_char_idx": 115157, "end_char_idx": 119058, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58": {"__data__": {"id_": "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3626f8e24ecde312696654ac389b0450097014c6ff694272cfbc8b20a7eb800b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "31bb83dd8a5e8cd2b4a452c3088c5bbe8e459e5114062842953e7f87c68f16c1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He kneeled upon the window-seat and\ngathered her gently in his arms, where she lay quiet, but moaning and\nshuddering.\n\n\"My husband!\" she wailed, no longer furious now but despairing. \"Ian! My\nlove! Ian! My life!--my life! My own husband!\"\n\nEven in this moment it thrilled him to hear such words from her lips. He\nhad not thought she loved him so passionately. He lifted her on to a\ndeep old sofa at the end of the room, wrapped her in a warm Oriental\ncoverlet which hung there, and held her to his heart, murmuring love and\ncomfort in her cold little ear. It seemed gradually to soothe her,\nalthough he did not think she really awoke. Then he put her down,\nlighted the lamp outside, and, not without difficulty, carried her up to\nbed. Her eyes were half closed when he laid her down and drew the\nbedclothes over her; and a minute or two later, when he looked in from\nhis dressing-room, she was evidently asleep.\n\nWhen he got into bed she did not stir, and while he lay awake for\nanother hour, she remained motionless and breathing regularly. He\nassured himself that the whole curious occurrence could be explained by\nthe electrical state of the atmosphere, which had affected his own\nnerves in a way he would never humiliate himself by confessing to any\none. Those mysterious footsteps on the stairs which he had heard,\nfootsteps like his wife's yet not hers; that hand upon the door, that\nvoice of sighs, were the creation of his own excited brain. In time he\nwould doubtless come to believe his own assurances on the point, but\nthat night at the bottom of his heart he did not believe them.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n\nNext morning, if Ian himself slept late, Milly slept later still. The\nstrained and troubled look which he had seen upon her face even in sleep\nthe night before, had passed away in the morning, but she lay almost\nalarmingly still and white. He was reassured by remembering that once\nwhen they were in Switzerland she had slept about sixteen hours and\nawakened in perfect health. He remained in the house watching over her,\nand about four o'clock she woke up. But she was very pale and very\nquiet; exhausted, he thought, by her strange mental and physical\nexertions of the night before.\n\nShe came down to tea with her pretty hair unbecomingly twisted up, and\ndressed in a brownish-yellow tea-gown, which he fancied he remembered\nhearing her denounce as only fit to be turned into a table-cloth. He did\nnot precisely criticise these details, but they helped in the impression\nof lifelessness and gloom that hung about her. It was a faint, gleamy\nafternoon, and such sun as there was did not shine into the study. The\ndark panelling looked darker than usual, and as she sat silent and\nlistless in a corner of the old sofa, her hair and face stood out\nagainst it almost startling in their blondness and whiteness. She was\nstrangely unlike herself, but Stewart comforted himself by remembering\nthat she had been odd in her manner and behavior, though in a different\nway, after her long sleep in Switzerland. After he had given her tea, he\nsuggested that they should walk in the garden, as the rain was over.\n\n\"Not yet, Ian,\" she said. \"I want to try and tell you something. I can\ndo it better here.\"\n\nHer mouth quivered. He sat down by her on the sofa.\n\n\"Must you tell me now?\" he asked, smiling. \"Do you really think it\nmatters?\"\n\n\"Yes--it does matter,\" she answered, tremulously, pressing her folded\nhands against her breast. \"It's something I ought to have told you\nbefore you married me--but indeed, indeed I didn't know how dreadful it\nwas--I didn't think it would happen again.\"\n\nHe was puzzled a moment, then spoke, still smiling:\n\n\"I suppose you mean the sleep-walking. Well, darling, it is a bit\ncreepy, I admit, but I shall get used to it, if you won't do it too\noften.\"\n\n\"Did I really walk?\" she asked--and a look of horror was growing on her\nface. \"Ah! I wasn't sure.", "start_char_idx": 119059, "end_char_idx": 122941, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e": {"__data__": {"id_": "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c7099bd2b14cc6b819413cf95b8d7c1d1fba8190658f673803799dd006cd01d8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "fbf2d189bdc7f2263c30b0f0390d68d43f678b30d15507d97ab97f41465b263e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Ah! I wasn't sure. No--it's not that--it is--oh, don't think me\nmad, Ian!\"\n\n\"Tell me, dearest. I promise I won't.\"\n\n\"I've not been here at all since you've been living in this house. I've\nnot seen you, my own precious husband, since I went to sleep in\nSwitzerland, at the H\u00f4tel du Chalet--don't you remember--when we had\nbeen that long walk up to the glacier and I was so tired?\"\n\nStewart was exceedingly startled. He paused, and then said, very gently\nbut very firmly:\n\n\"That's nonsense, dearest. You have been here, you've been with me all\nthe time.\"\n\n\"Ah! You think so, but it was not _I_--no, don't interrupt me--I mean to\ntell you, I must, but I can't if you interrupt me. It was awfully wrong\nof me not to tell you before; but I tried to, and then I saw you\nwouldn't believe me. Do you remember a dinner-party at the Fletchers',\nthe autumn before we were engaged--when Cousin David had just bought\nthat picture?\"\n\n\"That portrait of Lady Hammerton, which is so like you? Yes, I remember\nit perfectly.\"\n\n\"You know I wanted my First so much and I had been working too hard, and\nthen I was told that evening that you had said I couldn't get it--\"\n\n\"Silly me!\"\n\n\"And I felt certain you didn't love me--\"\n\n\"Silly you!\"\n\n\"Don't interrupt me, please. And I wasn't well, and I cried and cried\nand I couldn't leave off, and then I allowed Tims to hypnotize me. We\nboth knew she had no business to do it, it was wrong of us, of course,\nbut we couldn't possibly guess what would happen. I went to sleep, and\nso far as I knew I never woke again for more than six months, not till\nthe Schools were over.\"\n\n\"But, my darling, I skated with you constantly in the Christmas\nVacation, and took your work through the Term. I assure you that you\nwere quite awake then.\"\n\n\"I remember nothing about it. All I know is that some one got my First\nfor me.\"\n\n\"But, Mildred--\"\n\n\"Why do you call me Mildred? That's what they called me when I woke up\nlast time; but my own name's Milly.\"\n\nStewart rose and paced the room, then came back.\n\n\"It's simply a case of collapse of memory, dear. It's very trying, but\ndon't let's be fanciful about it.\"\n\n\"I thought it was only that--I told you, didn't I, something of that\nsort? But I didn't know then, nobody told me, that I wasn't like myself\nat all those months I couldn't remember. Last night in my sleep I\nknew--I knew that some one else, something else--I can't describe it,\nit's impossible--was struggling hard with me in my own brain, my own\nbody, trying to hold me down, to push me back again into the place,\nwhatever it was, I came out of. But I got stronger and stronger till I\nwas quite myself and the thing couldn't really stop me. I dare say it\nonly lasted a few seconds, then I felt quite free--free from the\nstruggle, the pressure; and I saw myself standing in the room, with some\nkind of white floating stuff over my head and about me, and I saw myself\nopen the door and go out of the room. I wasn't a bit surprised, but I\njust lay there quiet and peaceful. Then suddenly it came to me that I\ncouldn't have seen myself, that the person, the figure I had seen go\nout of the door was the other one, the creature I had been struggling\nwith, who had stolen my shape; and it came to me that she was gone to\nsteal you--to steal your heart from me and take you away; and you\nwouldn't know, you would think it was I, and you would follow her and\nlove her and never know it was not your own wife you were loving. And I\nwas mad with anger; I never knew before what it meant, Ian, to be as\nangry as that.", "start_char_idx": 122922, "end_char_idx": 126450, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8": {"__data__": {"id_": "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "ab7f1ab15bb1c2a803eb73a6067d4938f2941af7e7acdbcf59d94fcdcdf93655", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "42ae3bcc93154c831b6b902a90ee81a5241403fd904e6efb23c1c97f1b87b4ea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I struggled hard to get up, and at last I managed it, and\nI came down-stairs after her, but I couldn't find her, and I was sure\nthat she had gone and had taken you away with her. And you say I really\ndid come down-stairs.\"\n\n\"Yes, darling, and if you had been awake instead of asleep, as you\nobviously were, you would have seen that this nightmare of yours was\nnothing but a nightmare. You would have seen that I was alone here,\nquietly arranging my papers before going to bed. You gave me a fright\ncoming down as you did, for there was a tremendous thunderstorm going\non, and I am ashamed to say how queer my own nerves were. The electrical\nstate of the atmosphere and a very loud clap of thunder just overhead,\naccount for the whole business, which probably lasted only a few seconds\nfrom beginning to end. Be reasonable, little woman, you are generally\nthe most reasonable person I know--except when you talk about going to\nDieppe.\"\n\nMilly gave him a strange look.\n\n\"Why am I not reasonable when I talk about going to Dieppe?\"\n\nHe drew her to him and kissed her hair.\n\n\"Never mind why. We aren't going to excite ourselves to-day or do\nanything but make love and forget nightmares and everything\ndisagreeable.\"\n\nShe drew herself away a little and looked with frightened eyes in his.\n\n\"But I can't forget, Ian, that I don't remember anything that has\nhappened since we were on our honeymoon in Switzerland. And now we are\nin Oxford, and I can see it's quite late in the summer. How can I forget\nthat somehow I am being robbed of myself--robbed of my life with you?\"\n\n\"Wait till to-morrow and you'll remember everything right enough.\"\n\nBut Milly was not to be convinced. She was willing to submit on the\nquestion of last night's experiences, but she assured him that Tims\nwould bear her out in the assertion that she had never recovered her\nrecollection of the months preceding her engagement. Ian ceased trying\nto convince her that she was mistaken on this point; but he argued that\nthe memory was of all functions of the brain the most uncertain, that\nthere was no limit to its vagaries, which were mere matters of nerves\nand circulation, and that Dr. Norton-Smith, the nerve and brain\nspecialist to whom he would take her, would probably turn out to have a\ndozen patients subject to the same affliction as herself. One never\nhears of half the ills that flesh is heir to until the inheritance falls\nto one's own lot.\n\nMilly was a common-sense young woman, and his explanation, especially as\nit was his, pacified her for the time. The clouds had been rolling away\nwhile they talked, the space of deep blue sky overhead growing larger,\nthe sunshine fuller. There was a busy twittering and shaking of little\nwings in the tall pear-tree near the house, where the tomtits in their\nvaried liveries loved to congregate. July was not far advanced and the\nsun had still some hours in which to shine. Ian and Milly went out and\nwalked in the Parks. The tennis-club lawns were almost deserted, but\nthey met a few acquaintances taking their constitutional, like\nthemselves, and an exchange of ordinary remarks with people who took her\nnormality for granted, helped Milly to believe in it herself. So long as\nthe blank in her memory continued, she could not be free from care; but\nshe went to sleep that night in Ian's arms, feeling herself protected by\nthem not only from bodily harm, but from all those dreadful fears and\nevil fantasies that \"do assault and hurt the soul.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\n\nIan had been so busy persuading Milly to view her own case as a simple\none, and so busy comforting her with an almost feminine intuition of\nwhat would really afford her comfort, that it was only in the watches of\nthe night that certain disquieting recollections forced their way into\nhis mind. It was of course now part of his creed that he had loved Milly\nFlaxman from the first--only he had never known her well till that\nChristmas Vacation when they had skated so much together. Later on, such\ndisturbing events as engagement and marriage had seemed to him enough to\nexplain any changes he had observed in her.", "start_char_idx": 126451, "end_char_idx": 130545, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6": {"__data__": {"id_": "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0adae36b7e02f8c57930c71c1fa27e751075d95a39e92461ada8fe94947c4061", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a3d93953dd67f57d60286ff604dccffc64c27262e6b3d1da8b7ca944c83f1338", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Later still, he had been too\nmuch in love to think about her at all, in the true sense of the word.\nShe had been to him \"all a wonder and a wild desire.\"\n\nNow, taking the dates of her collapses of memory, he made, despite\nhimself, certain notes on those changes. It is to be feared he did not\noften want to see Miss Timson; but on the day after Milly's return to\nthe world, he cycled out to visit her friend. Tims was spending the\nsummer on the wild and beautiful ridge which has since become a suburb\nof Oxford. It was doubtful whether he would find her in, as she was\nherself a mighty cyclist, making most of her journeys on the wheel,\nhappy in the belief that she was saving money at the expense of the\nrailway companies.\n\nThe time of flowers, the freshness of trees, and the glory of gorse and\nbroom was over. It was the season of full summer when the midlands,\nclothed with their rich but sheenless mantle of green, wear a\nself-satisfied air, as of dull people conscious of deserved prosperity.\nBut just as the sea or a mountain or an adventurous soul will always\nlend an element of the surprising and romantic to the commonest corner\nof earth, so the sky will perpetually transfigure large spaces of level\ncountry, valley or plain, laid open to its capricious influences. Boars\nHill looks over the wide valley of the narrow Og to the downs, and up to\nwhere that merges into the valley of the Upper Thames. By the sandy\ntrack which Ian followed, the tree still stood, though no longer alone,\nwhence the poet of _Thyrsis_ looking northward, saw the \"fair city with\nher dreaming spires\"; less fair indeed to-day than when he looked upon\nit, but still \"lovely all times,\" in all its fleeting shades, whether\nblond and sharp-cut in the sunshine or dimly gray among its veiling\ntrees. The blue waving line of the downs, crowned here and there by\nclumps of trees, ran far along the southwestern horizon, melting\nvaporously in the distance above \"the Vale, the three lone weirs, the\nyouthful Thames.\" Over the downs and over the wide valley of ripening\ncornfields, of indigo hedgerow-elms and greener willow and woodland, of\nred-roofed homesteads and towered churches, moved slowly the broad\nshadows of rolling clouds that journeyed through the intense blue above.\nSome shadows were like veils of pale gray gauze, through which the world\nshowed a delicately softened face; others were dark, with a rich,\nindefinable hue of their own, and as they moved, the earth seemed to\nburst into a deeper glow of color behind them. Close by, the broken\nhill-side was set here and there with oak and thorn, was everywhere deep\nin bracken, on whose large fronds lay the bluish bloom of their\nmaturity. It all gained a definiteness of form, an air of meaning by its\ndetachment from the wide background floating behind.\n\nFollowing steep and circuitous lanes, Ian arrived at the lodging-house\nand found Tims on the porch preparing to start on her bicycle. But\nflattered and surprised by his visit, she ordered tea in the bright\nlittle sitting-room she was inhabiting. He was shy of approaching the\nreal object of his visit. They marked time awhile till the thunderstorm\nbecame their theme. Then he told something of Milly's sleep-walking, her\ncollapse of memory; and watched Tims meantime, hoping to see in her face\nmerely surprise and concern. But there was no surprise, hardly concern\nin the queer little face. There was excitement, and at last a flash of\npositive pleasure.\n\n\"Good old M.!\" she observed. \"I'm glad she has got back; though I'm a\nbit proud of the other one too. I expect you feel much the same, old\nboy, don't you?\"\n\nThe speech was the reverse of soothing, even to its detail of \"old boy.\"\nHe looked at his teacup and drew his black brows together.\n\n\"I'm afraid I don't understand, Miss Timson. I suppose you think it a\njoke, but to me it seems rather a serious matter.\"\n\n\"Of course it is; uncommon serious,\" returned Tims, too much interested\nin her subject to consider the husband's feelings. \"Bless you!", "start_char_idx": 130546, "end_char_idx": 134551, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd": {"__data__": {"id_": "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3f921d966e6d2d67f51a064ac782e0815bd8720dec82deb9899054f3c33e3794", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5a2bdb7641a1f4d601874d799a8257e6631a96c6f431a2a54312936a80375a88", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Bless you! _I_ don't\nwant to be responsible for it. At first I thought it was a simple case\nof a personality evolved by hypnotism; but if so it would have depended\non the hypnotist, and you see it didn't after the first.\"\n\n\"I don't think we need bother about hypnotism\"--there was a note of\nimpatience in Ian's voice--\"it's just a case of collapse of memory. But\nas you were with her the first time it happened, I want to know exactly\nhow far the collapse went. There were signs of it every now and then in\nher work, but on the whole it improved.\"\n\n\"You never can tell what will happen in these cases,\" said Tims. \"She\nremembered her book-learning pretty well, but she forgot her own name,\nand as to people and things that had happened, she was like a new-born\nbabe. If I hadn't nursed her through she'd have been sent to a lunatic\nasylum. But it wasn't that, after all, that made it so exciting. It was\nthe difference between Milly's two personalities. You don't mean to say,\nold chap, you've lived with her for seven months and can't see the\ndifference?\"\n\nTims looked at him. She held strong theoretical views as to the\nstupidity of the male, but circumstances had seldom before allowed her\nto put them to the test. Behold them more than justified; for Ian was\nfar above the average in intelligence. He, for a fraction of a minute,\npaused, deliberately closing the shutter of his mind against an\nunpleasant search-light that shot back on the experiences of his\ncourtship and marriage.\n\n\"Well, I suppose I'm not imaginative,\" he returned, with a dry laugh. \"I\nonly see certain facts about her memory and want more of them, to tell\nNorton-Smith when I take her up to see him.\"\n\n\"Norton-Smith!\" exclaimed Tims. \"What is the good? Englishmen are all\nright when it's a question of filling up the map of Africa, but they're\nno good on the dark continent of ourselves. They're cowards. That's\nwhat's the matter with them. Don't go to Norton-Smith.\"\n\nStewart made an effectual effort to overcome his irritation. He ought to\nhave known better than to turn to an oddity like Tims for advice and\nsympathy.\n\n\"Whom ought I to go to, then?\" he asked, good-humoredly, and looking\nparticularly long as he rose from the depths of the low wicker chair. \"A\nmedicine-man with horns and a rattle?\"\n\n\"Well,\" returned Tims with deliberation, pulling on a pair of thread\ngloves, \"I dare say he could teach Norton-Smith a thing or two. Mind\nyou, I'm not talking spiritualistic rot; I'm talking scientific facts,\nwhich every one knows except the English scientific men, who keep on\nclapping their glass to the blind eye like a lot of clock-work Nelsons.\nThe effects of hypnotism are as much facts as the effects of a bottle of\nwhiskey. But Milly's case is different. In my opinion she's developed an\nindependent double personality. It's an inconvenient state of things,\nbut I don't suppose it'll last forever. One or the other will get\nstronger and 'hold the fort.' But it's rather a bad business anyhow.\"\nTims paused and sighed, drawing on the other glove. \"I'm--I'm fond of\nthem both myself, and I expect you'll feel the same, when you see the\ndifference.\"\n\nIan laughed awkwardly, his brown eyes fixed scrutinizingly upon her.\n\n\"So long as the fort holds somebody, I sha'n't worry,\" he said, lightly.\n\nThey went out, and as he led his own bicycle towards the upper track,\nTims spun down the steep drive, and, turning into the lane, kissed her\nhand to him in farewell from under the brim of her perennially crooked\nhat.\n\n\"That Timson girl's more than queer,\" he mused to himself, going on.\n\"There's a streak of real insanity in her. I'm afraid it's not been good\nfor a highly strung creature like Mildred to see so much of her; and why\non earth did she?\"", "start_char_idx": 134540, "end_char_idx": 138272, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd": {"__data__": {"id_": "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "1f5de298390b12cd3722de8f78240812c7030944d8dc9747e274ac9abe627a8f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "82f50b30ba9284fa16e0795e29f80fdf10edb9e6b4fd4d79c5f3ab027a83cc6a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He tried to clear his mind of Tims's fantastic suggestions; of\neverything, indeed, except the freshness of the air rushing past him,\nthe beauty of the wide view, steeped in the romance of distance. But\nmemory, that strange, recalcitrant, mechanical slave of ours, kept\ndiving, without connivance of his, into the recesses of the past twenty\nmonths of his life, and presenting to him unsolicited, circumstances,\nexperiences, which he had thrust away unclassified--his own surprise,\nalmost perplexity, when Mildred had brought him work for the first time\nafter her illness that autumn Term before last; his disappointment and\neven boredom in his engagement and the first three weeks of his\nmarriage; then the change in his own feelings after her long sleep at\nthe H\u00f4tel du Chalet; besides a score of disquieting trifles which meant\nnothing till they were strung on a thread. He felt himself beginning to\nbe infected with Flora Timson's mania against his will, against his\nsober judgment; and he spun down Bagley Hill at a runaway speed, only\nsaved by a miracle from collision with a cart which emerged from\nHincksey Lane at the jolting pace with which the rustic pursues his\nundeviating course.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\n\nMilly, too, had not been without a sharp reminder that the leaves in her\nlife so blank to her, had been fully inscribed by another. She hardly\nyet felt mistress of the house, but it was pleasant to rest and read in\nthe low, white-panelled drawing-room, which lowered awnings kept cool,\nalthough the afternoon sun struck a golden shaft across the flowering\nwindow-boxes of its large and deeply recessed bow-window. The whole room\nwas lighter and more feminine than Milly would have made it, but at\nbottom the taste that reigned there was more severe than her own. The\nonly pictures on the panels were a few eighteenth century colored\nprints, already charming, soon to be valuable, and one or two framed\npieces of needlework which harmonized with them.\n\nPresently the door-bell rang and a Mr. Fitzroy was announced by the\nparlor-maid, in a tone which implied that she was accustomed to his\nname. He looked about the age of an undergraduate and was\nextraordinarily well-groomed, in spite of, or perhaps because of, being\nin a riding-dress. His sleek dark hair was neatly parted in the middle\nand he was clean shaven, when to be so smacked of the stage; but his\nmanners and expression smacked of nothing of the kind.\n\n\"I'm awfully glad to find you at home, Mrs. Stewart,\" he said. \"I've\nbeen lunching at the Morrisons', and, you know, I'm afraid there's going\nto be a row.\"\n\nThe Morrisons? They lived outside Oxford, and Milly knew them by sight,\nthat was all.\n\n\"What about?\" she asked, kindly, thinking the young man had come for\nhelp, or at least sympathy, in some embarrassment of his own.\n\n\"Why, about your acting Galatea. Jim Morrison's been a regular fool\nabout it. He'd no business to take it for granted that that was the part\nI wanted Mrs. Shaw for. Now it appears she's telling every one that\nshe's been asked to play the lead at the Besselsfield theatricals; and,\nby Jove, he says she is to, too!\"\n\nMilly went rather pale and then quite pink.\n\n\"Then of course I couldn't think of taking the part,\" she said, gasping\nwith relief at this providential escape.\n\nMr. Fitzroy in his turn flushed. He had an obstinate chin and the cares\nof stage-management had already traced a line right across his smooth\nforehead. It deepened to a furrow as he leaned forward out of his low\nwicker chair, clutching the pair of dogskin gloves which he held in his\nhand.\n\n\"Oh, come, I say now, Mrs. Stewart!\" and his voice and eye were\nsurprisingly stern for one so young. \"That's not playing fair. You\npromised me you'd see me through this show, and you know as well as I\ndo, Mrs. Shaw can no more act than those fire-irons.\"", "start_char_idx": 138274, "end_char_idx": 142095, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7": {"__data__": {"id_": "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "91cbad7404cdc00700bc34ef8410759efdf7efa21a0c79584af29c0f809a6351", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "88f7638b6f79eacd5b07da65d520936f8b657a2dba53ab8ebcb1ccb0db672f34", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Shaw can no more act than those fire-irons.\"\n\n\"But I--\" Milly was about to say \"I've never acted in my life\"--when she\nremembered that she knew less than any one in her acquaintance what she\nhad or had not done in that recent life which was not hers. \"I shouldn't\nact Galatea at all well,\" she substituted lamely; \"and I shouldn't look\nthe part nearly as well as Mrs. Shaw will.\"\n\n\"Excuse me, Mrs. Stewart, but I'm certain you're simply cut out for it\nall round, and you told me the other day you were particularly anxious\nto play it. You promised you'd stick to me through thick and thin and\nnot care a twopenny--I mean a straw--what Jim Morrison and Mrs. Shaw--\"\n\nIn the stress of conversation they had neither of them noticed the\ntinkle of the front-door bell. Now the door of the room, narrow and in\nthe thickness of an enormous wall, was thrown open and Mrs. Shaw was\nannounced.\n\nFitzroy, forgetful of manners in his excitement, stooped forward and\ngripping Milly's arm almost hissed:\n\n\"Remember! You've promised me.\"\n\nThe words filled Milly with misery. That any one should be able to\naccuse her of breaking a promise, however unreal her responsibility for\nit, was horrible to her.\n\nMrs. Shaw entered, no longer the seraph of twenty months ago. She had\nlatterly put off the \u00e6sthetic raiment she had worn with such peculiar\ngrace, and her dress and coiffure were quite in the fashion of the\nhour. The transformation somewhat shocked Milly, who could never help\nfeeling a slight austere prejudice against fashionably dressed woman.\nThen, considering how little she knew Mrs. Shaw, it was embarrassing to\nbe kissed by her.\n\n\"It's odd I should find you here, Mr. Fitzroy,\" said Mrs. Shaw, settling\nher rustling skirts on a chintzy chair. \"I've just come to talk to Mrs.\nStewart about the acting. I'm so sorry there's been a misunderstanding\nabout it.\"\n\nHer tone was civil but determined, and there was a fighting look in her\neye.\n\n\"So am I, Mrs. Shaw, most uncommonly sorry,\" returned Fitzroy, patting\nhis sleek hair and feeling that his will was adamant, however pretty\nMrs. Shaw might be.\n\n\"Of course, I shouldn't have thought of taking the part away from Mrs.\nStewart,\" she resumed, glancing at Milly, not without meaning, \"but Mr.\nMorrison asked me to take it quite a fortnight ago. I've learned most of\nit and rehearsed two scenes already with him. He says they go capitally,\nand we both think it seems rather a pity to waste all that labor and\nchange the part now.\"\n\nFitzroy cast a look at Mrs. Stewart which was meant to call up\nreinforcements from that quarter; but as she sat there quite silent, he\ncleared his throat and begun:\n\n\"It's an awful bore, of course, but I fancy it's about three weeks or a\nmonth since I first asked Mrs. Stewart to play the lead--isn't it, Mrs.\nStewart?\"\n\nMilly muttered assent, horribly suspecting a lie. A flash of indignant\nscorn from Mrs. Shaw confirmed the suspicion.\n\n\"Mrs. Stewart said something quite different when I spoke to her about\nit at tennis on Friday. Didn't you, Mildred?\" she asked.\n\nMilly crimsoned.\n\n\"Did I?\" she stammered. \"I'm afraid I've got a dreadfully bad\nmemory--for--for dates of that kind.\"\n\nMrs. Shaw smiled coldly. Mr. Fitzroy felt himself deceived in Mrs.\nStewart as an ally. He had counted on her promised support, on her wit\nand spirit to carry him through, and her conduct was simply cowardly.\n\n\"The fact is, Mrs. Shaw,\" he said, \"Jim Morrison's not bossing this show\nat all. That's where the mistake has come in. My aunt, Lady Wolvercote,\nis a bit of an autocrat, don't you know, and she doesn't like us fellows\nto arrange things on our own account.", "start_char_idx": 142051, "end_char_idx": 145677, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8": {"__data__": {"id_": "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "ec25ca216008e0b64b96124b0071908e05b1c05fc3b59634e8d618e7eb08fb60", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "070dd2d2d8bae3f540aa571b38e0e5a8ae3f3ee620feeae020dca266d7fd0606", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "If she knew you I'm sure she'd see\nwhat a splendid Galatea you'd make, but as it is she's set her heart on\ngetting Mrs. Stewart from the very first.\"\n\nHad he stopped here his position would have been good, but an indignant\ninstinct, urging him to push the reluctant Mrs. Stewart into the proper\nplace of woman--that natural shield of man against all the social\ndisagreeables he brings on himself--made Fitzroy rush into the fatal\ndetail.\n\n\"My aunt told you so at the Masonic; didn't she, Mrs. Stewart?\"\n\nMilly, under the young man's imperious eye, assented feebly, but Mrs.\nShaw laughed. She perfectly remembered Mildred having mentioned on that\nvery occasion that she did not know Lady Wolvercote by sight.\n\n\"I'm afraid I've come just a few minutes too soon,\" she said, dryly.\n\"You and Mr. Fitzroy don't seem to have talked things over quite\nenough.\"\n\nThe saying was dark and yet too clear. Milly, the meticulously truthful,\nsaw herself convicted of some horrible falsehood. She blushed violently,\ngasped, and rolled her handkerchief into a tight ball. Mr. Fitzroy\nignoring the insinuation, changed his line.\n\n\"The part we really wanted you to take, Mrs. Shaw, was that of a nymph\nin an Elizabethan masque which Lumley has written, with music by Stephen\nBampton. It's to be played in the rose garden and there's a chorus of\nnymphs who sing and dance. We want them to look perfectly lovely, don't\nyou know, and as there can't be any make-up to speak of, it's awfully\ndifficult to find the right people.\"\n\nMrs. Shaw disdained the lure and mentally condemned his anxiously civil\nmanner as \"soapy.\"\n\n\"I shall ask Mr. Morrison to go to Lady Wolvercote at once,\" she said,\n\"and see whether she really wishes me to give up the part. Time's\ngetting on, and he says he won't be able to have many more rehearsals.\"\n\nThere was a sound as of a carriage stopping in the street below, the\njingling of bits, and a high female voice giving an order. Fitzroy,\ninwardly exasperated by Mrs. Shaw's resistance and the abject conduct of\nhis ally, sprang to his feet.\n\n\"I believe that's my aunt!\" he exclaimed. \"She wants me to call at\nBlenheim on the way home, and I suppose the Morrisons told her where I\nwas.\"\n\nHe managed to slip his head out between the edge of an awning and the\nmignonette and geraniums of a window-box.\n\n\"It's my aunt, right enough. May I fetch her up, Mrs. Stewart?\" He was\ndown the stairs in a moment and voluble in low-voiced colloquy with the\nlady in the barouche.\n\nLady Wolvercote was organizing the great fancy fair for the benefit of\nthe County Cottage Hospitals, and had left the dramatic part of the\nprogramme to her nephew to arrange. She was a tall, slight woman, of the\nusual age for aunts, and pleasant to every one; but she took it for\ngranted that every one would do as she wished--naturally, since they\nalways did in her neighborhood. As she stumbled up the stairs after\nCharlie Fitzroy--it was a dark staircase and narrow in proportion to its\nmassive oak balusters--she felt faintly annoyed with him for dragging\nher into the quarrels of his middle-class friends, but confident that\nshe could manage them without the least trouble.\n\nMilly was relieved at the return of Mr. Fitzroy with his aunt. She had\nhad an unhappy five minutes with Mrs. Shaw, who had been saying cryptic\nbut unpleasant things and calling her \"Mildred\"; whereas she did not so\nmuch as know Mrs. Shaw's Christian name.\n\nSeeing Mrs. Shaw, beautiful, animated, well-dressed, and Milly neatly\nclothed, since her clothes were not of her own choosing, but with her\nhair unbecomingly knotted, the brightness of her eyes, complexion, and\nexpression in eclipse, Lady Wolvercote wondered at her nephew's choice.\nBut that was his affair.", "start_char_idx": 145678, "end_char_idx": 149394, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536": {"__data__": {"id_": "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "e0b7e220cf7e886ddc1a6be10383b976d18f9720d5c6e51244ee60fc3a136983", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6e23627c8ad9cb71953c35991c246475db1d2b774ad21602ede1c27460b7c5a3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "But that was his affair. She began to talk in a rather high-pitched\nvoice and continuously, like one whose business it is to talk; so that\nit was difficult to interrupt without rudeness.\n\n\"So you're going to be kind enough to act Galatea for us at our fancy\nfair, Mrs. Stewart? We want it to be a great success, and Lord\nWolvercote and I have heard so much about your acting. My nephew said\nthe part of Galatea would suit you exactly; didn't you, Charlie?\"\n\n\"Down to the ground,\" interpolated, or rather accompanied, Fitzroy. \"We\nshall have the placards out on Wednesday, and people are looking forward\nalready to seeing Mrs. Stewart. There'll be a splendid audience.\"\n\n\"Every one has promised to fill their houses for the fair,\" Lady\nWolvercote was continuing, \"and the Duke thinks he may be able to get\ndown ----,\" she mentioned a royalty. \"You're going to help us too,\naren't you, Mrs. Shaw? It's so very kind of you. We've got such a pretty\npart for you in a musical affair which Lenny Lumley wrote with somebody\nor other for the Duchess of Ulster's Elizabethan bazaar. There's a\nchorus of fairies--nymphs, Charlie? Yes, nymphs, and we want them all\nto be very pretty and able to sing, and there's a charming dance for\nthem. I'm afraid that silly boy, Jim Morrison, made some mistake about\nit, and told you we wanted you to act Galatea. But of course we couldn't\npossibly do without you in the other thing, and Mrs. Stewart seems quite\npointed out for that Galatea part. Jim's such a dear, isn't he? And such\na splendid actor, every one says he really ought to go on the stage. But\nwe none of us pay the least attention to anything the dear boy says, for\nhe always does manage to get things wrong.\"\n\nMrs. Shaw had been making little movements preparatory to going. She had\nno gift for the stage except beauty, but that produces an illusion of\nsuccess, and she took her acting with the seriousness of a Duse.\n\n\"I'm sorry I didn't know Mr. Morrison's habits better,\" she replied.\n\"I've been studying the part of Galatea a good deal and rehearsing it\nwith him as well. Of course, I don't for a moment wish to prevent Mrs.\nStewart from taking it, but I've spent a good deal of time upon it and\nI'm afraid I can't undertake anything else. Of course, it's very\ninconvenient stopping in Oxford in August, and I shouldn't care to do it\nexcept for the sake of a part which I felt gave me a real opportunity--\"\n\n\"But it's a very pretty part we've got for you,\" resumed Lady\nWolvercote, perplexed. \"And we were hoping to see you over at\nBesselsfield a good deal for rehearsals--\"\n\nIt seemed to her a \"part of nature's holy plan\" that the prospect of\nBesselsfield should prove irresistibly attractive to the wives of\nprofessional men.\n\n\"Thanks, so much, but I'm sure you and Mr. Fitzroy must know plenty of\ngirls who would do for that sort of part,\" returned Mrs. Shaw.\n\nMilly here broke in eagerly:\n\n\"Please, Lady Wolvercote, do persuade Mrs. Shaw to take Galatea; I'm\nsure I sha'n't be able to do it a bit; and I would try and take the\nnymph. I should love the music, and I know I could do the singing,\nanyhow.\"\n\nShe rose because Mrs. Shaw had risen and was looking for her parasol and\nshaking out her plumes. But why did Mr. Fitzroy and Mrs. Shaw both stare\nat her in an unvarnished surprise, touched with ridicule on the lady's\nside?\n\n\"No, no, Mrs. Stewart, that won't do!\" cried he, in obvious dismay. At\nthe same moment Mrs. Shaw ejaculated, ironically:\n\n\"That's very brave of you Mildred! I thought you hated music and were\nnever going to try to sing again.\"", "start_char_idx": 149370, "end_char_idx": 152927, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965": {"__data__": {"id_": "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "1ca576d97a217aa61732f884b967241b4951991d4f275d620f3819f481dcda3c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1e5148d3b980f3c3966c5198d2171b2fb4ddb3d0314e751818729dba6846bc2a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I thought you hated music and were\nnever going to try to sing again.\"\n\nShe and Fitzroy had both been present on an occasion when Mildred, urged\non by Milly's musical reputation, had committed herself to an experiment\nin song which had not been successful.\n\n\"Thank you very much,\" Mrs. Shaw went on, \"for offering to change, but\nof course Lady Wolvercote must arrange things as she likes; and, to\nspeak frankly, I'm not particularly sorry to give the acting up, as my\nhusband was rather upset at my not being able to go to Switzerland with\nhim on the 28th. No, please don't trouble; I can let myself out.\nGood-bye, Lady Wolvercote; I hope the fair and the theatricals will be a\ngreat success. Good-bye, Mr. Fitzroy, good-bye.\"\n\nLady Wolvercote's faint remonstrances were drowned in the adieus, and\nMrs. Shaw sailed out with flying colors, while Milly sank back abjectly\ninto the seat from which she had risen. Every minute she was realizing\nwith a more awful clearness that she, whose one appearance on the stage\nhad been short and disastrous, was cast to play the leading part in a\npublic play before a large and brilliant audience. She hardly heard\nFitzroy's bitter remarks on Mrs. Shaw--not forgetting Jim Morrison--or\nLady Wolvercote exclaiming in a voice almost dreamy with amazement:\n\n\"Really it's too extraordinary!\"\n\n\"I'm very sorry Mrs. Shaw won't take the part,\" said Milly, clasping and\nunclasping her slender fingers, \"for I know I can't do it myself.\"\n\nFitzroy was protesting, but she forced herself to continue: \"You don't\nknow what I'm like when I'm nervous. When we had _tableaux vivants_ at\nAscham I was supposed to be Charlotte putting a wreath on Werther's urn,\nand I trembled so much that I knocked the urn down. It was only\ncard-board, so it didn't break, but every one laughed and the tableau\nwas spoiled.\"\n\nFitzroy and his aunt cried out that that was nothing, a first\nappearance; any one could see she had got over that now. Pale, with\nterrified eyes, she looked from one to the other of her tormentors, who\ncontinued to sing the praises of her past prowess on the boards and to\nforetell the unprecedented harvest of laurels she would reap at\nBesselsfield. The higher their enthusiasm rose, the more profound became\nher dejection. There seemed no loop-hole for escape, unless the earth\nwould open and swallow her, which however much to be desired was hardly\nto be expected.\n\nThe ting of a bicycle-bell below did not seem to promise assistance, for\ncyclists affected the quiet street. But it happened that this bicycle\nbore Ian to the door. He did not notice the coronet on the carriage\nwhich stood before it, and assumed it to belong to one of the three or\nfour ladies in Oxford who kept such equipages. Yet in the blank state of\nMilly's memory, he was sorry she had not denied herself to visitors,\nwhich Mildred had already learned to do with a freedom only possible to\nwomen who are assured social success. Commonly the sight of a carriage\nwould have sent him tiptoeing past the drawing-room, but now, vaguely\nuneasy, he came straight in. He looked particularly tall in the frame of\nthe doorway, so low that his black hair almost touched the lintel;\nparticularly handsome in the shaded, white-panelled room, into which the\ndark glow of his sunburned skin and brown eyes, bright with exercise,\nseemed to bring the light and warmth of the summer earth and sky.\n\nMilly sprang to meet him. Lady Wolvercote was surprised to learn that\nthis was Mrs. Stewart's husband. She had no idea a Don could be so\nyoung and good-looking. Judging of Dons solely by the slight and\nslighting references of her undergraduate relatives, she had imagined\nthem to be weird-looking men, within various measurable distances of the\ngrave.\n\n\"Lady Wolvercote and Mr. Fitzroy want me to act Galatea at the\nBesselsfield theatricals,\" said Milly, clinging to his sleeve and\nlooking up at him with appealing eyes. \"Please tell them I can't\npossibly do it.", "start_char_idx": 152858, "end_char_idx": 156805, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6": {"__data__": {"id_": "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "34817cb683fc2cbda90c0ea14a1d0ac942c980ff91890301a1dee4427c492c74", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5a8a3c96868f9b840589a2f66547a7e5b0d20f307e9fa605e679ca09c020d9f9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Please tell them I can't\npossibly do it. I'm--I'm not well enough--am I?\"\n\n\"We're within three weeks of the performance, sir,\" put in Fitzroy.\n\"Mrs. Stewart promised she'd do it, and we shall be in a regular fix now\nif she gives it up. Mrs. Shaw's chucked us already.\"\n\n\"Yes, and every one says how splendidly Mrs. Stewart acts,\" pleaded Lady\nWolvercote.\n\nStewart had half forgotten the matter; but now he remembered that\nMildred had been keen to have the part only a week ago, and a little\npettish because he had advised her to leave it alone, on account of Mrs.\nShaw. Now she was hanging on him with desperate eyes and that worried\nbrow which he had not seen once since he had married her.\n\n\"I'm extremely sorry, Lady Wolvercote,\" he said, \"but my wife's had a\nnervous break-down lately and I can't allow her to act. She's not fit\nfor it.\"\n\n\"Ah, I see--I quite understand!\" returned Lady Wolvercote. \"But we'd\ntake great care of her, Mr. Stewart. She could come and stay at\nBesselsfield.\"\n\nFitzroy's gloom lifted. His aunt was a trump. Surely an invitation to\nBesselsfield must do the job. But Stewart, though apologetic, was\ninflexible. He had forbidden his wife to act and there was an end of it.\nThe perception of the differences between the two personalities of Milly\nwhich had been thrust to-day on his unwilling mind, made him grasp the\nmeaning of her frantic appeals for protection. He relieved her of all\nresponsibility for her refusal to act.\n\nLady Wolvercote observed, as she and her nephew went sadly on their way,\nthat Mr. Stewart seemed a very, very odd man in spite of his presentable\nmanners and appearance; and Fitzroy replied gloomily that of course he\nwas a beast. Dons always were beasts.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\n\nThe diplomatic incident of the theatricals was not the only minor\ntrouble which Milly found awaiting her. The cook's nerves were upset by\na development of rigid economy on the part of her mistress, and she gave\nnotice; the house parlor-maid followed suit. No one seemed to have kept\nIan's desk tidy, his papers in order, or his clothes properly mended. It\nwas a joy to her to put everything belonging to him right.\n\nWhen all was arranged to her satisfaction: \"Ian,\" she said, sitting on\nhis knee with her head on his shoulder, \"I can't bear to think how\nwretched you must have been all the time I was away.\"\n\nIan was silent a minute.\n\n\"But you haven't been away, and I don't like you to talk as though you\nhad.\"\n\nWretched? It would have been absurd to think of himself as wretched now;\nyet compared with the wonderful happiness that had been his for more\nthan half a year, what was this \"house swept and garnished\"? An empty\nthing. Words of Tims's which he had thought irritating and absurd at the\ntime, haunted him now. \"_You don't mean to say you haven't seen the\ndifference?_\" He might not have seen it, but he had felt it. He felt it\nnow.\n\nThere was at any rate no longer any question of Dieppe. They took\nlodgings at Sheringham and he made good progress with his book. Yet not\nquite so good as he had hoped. Milly was indefatigable in looking up\npoints and references, in preventing him from slipping into the small\ninaccuracies to which he was prone; but he missed the stimulus of\nMildred's alert mind, so quick to hit a blot in logic or in taste, so\nvivid in appreciation.\n\nMilly meantime guessed nothing of his dissatisfaction. She adored her\nhusband more every day, and her happiness would have been perfect had it\nnot been for the haunting horror of the possible \"change\" which might be\nlurking for her round the corner of any night--that \"change,\" which\nother people might call what they liked, but which meant for her the\nrobbery of her life, her young happy life with Ian. He had taken her\ntwice to Norton-Smith before the great man went for his holiday.", "start_char_idx": 156764, "end_char_idx": 160561, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e": {"__data__": {"id_": "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3949cb6a32bde8385a521a81abf957f7e0d674ad800f095fed2e6ae355980a3d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e17486468db56b2b374d1b90d0fef1246097a7f1a7d9ff5c7d210fdb207d98a1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He had taken her\ntwice to Norton-Smith before the great man went for his holiday.\nNorton-Smith had pronounced it a peculiar but not unprecedented case of\ncollapse of memory, caused by overwork; and had spent most of the\nconsultation time in condemning the higher education of women. Time,\nrest, and the fulfilment of woman's proper function of maternity would,\nhe affirmed, bring all right, since there was no sign of disease in Mrs.\nStewart, who appeared to him, on the contrary, a perfectly healthy young\nwoman. When Ian, alone with him, began tentatively to bring to the\ndoctor's notice the changes in character and intelligence that had\naccompanied the losses of memory, he found his remarks set aside like\nthe chatter of a foolish child.\n\nIf maternity would indeed exorcise the Invader, Milly had lost no time\nin beginning the exorcism. And she did believe that somehow it would;\nnot because the doctor said so, but because she could not believe God\nwould let a child's mother be changed in that way, at any rate while she\nwas bearing it. To do so would be to make it more motherless than any\nlittle living thing on earth. Milly had always been quietly but deeply\nreligious, and she struggled hard against the feeling of peculiar\ninjustice in this strange affliction that had been sent to her. She\nprayed earnestly to God every night to help and protect her and her\nchild, and the period of six or seven months, at which the \"change\" had\ncome before, passed without a sign of it. In April a little boy was\nborn. They called him Antonio, after a learned Italian, a friend and\nteacher of Ian's.\n\nThe advent of the child did something to explain the comparative\nseclusion into which Mrs. Stewart had retired, and the curious dulling\nof that brilliant personality of hers. The Master of Durham was among\nthe few of Mrs. Stewart's admirers who declined to recognize the change\nin her. He had been attracted by the girl Milly Flaxman, by her gentle,\nshy manners and pretty face, combined with her reputation for\nscholarship; the brilliant Invader had continued to attract him in\nanother way. The difference between the two, if faced, would have been\ndisagreeably mysterious. He preferred to say and think that there was\nnone; Mrs. Stewart was probably not very well.\n\nMilly's shyness made it peculiarly awkward for her to find herself in\npossession of a number of friends whom she would not have chosen\nherself, and of whose doings and belongings she was in complete\nignorance. However, if she gave offence she was unconscious of it, and\nit came very naturally to her to shrink back into the shadow of her\nhousehold gods. Ian and the baby were almost sufficient in themselves to\nfill her life. There was just room on the outskirts of it for a few\nrelations and old friends, and Aunt Beatrice still held her honored\nplace. But it was through Aunt Beatrice that she was first to learn the\nfeel of a certain dull heartache which was destined to grow upon her\nlike some fell disease, a thing of ceaseless pain.\n\nShe was especially anxious to get Aunt Beatrice, who had been in America\nall the Summer Vacation, to stay with them in the Autumn Term as Lady\nThomson had been with them in May, and Milly did not like to think of\nthe number of things, all wrong, which she was sure to have noticed in\nthe house. Besides, what with theatricals and other engagements, it was\nevident that a good many people had been \"in and out\" in the Summer\nTerm--a condition of life which Lady Thomson always denounced. Milly was\nanxious for her to see that that phase was past and that her favorite\nniece had settled down into the quiet, well-ordered existence of which\nshe approved.\n\nAunt Beatrice came; but oh, disappointment! If it had been possible to\nsay of Lady Thomson, whose moods were under almost perfect control,\nthat she was out of temper, Milly would have said it. She volunteered no\nopinion, but when asked, she compared Milly's new cook unfavorably with\nher former one. When her praise was anxiously sought, she observed that\nit was undesirable to be careless in one's housekeeping, but less\ndisagreeable than to be fussy and house-proud.", "start_char_idx": 160480, "end_char_idx": 164608, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5": {"__data__": {"id_": "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "a671acbb266cde88686ef7fb1fbfe244257185410b4baf44a81c6261568b663b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ac53f2d742562a8b5b3ac350c2db91e2f3d4b90ed6b6f16a3028569919e0cad7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She added that\nMilly--whom she called Mildred--must be on her guard against relaxing\ninto domestic dulness, when she could be so extremely clever and\ncharming if she liked. Milly was bewildered and distressed. She felt\nsure that she had passed through a phase of which Aunt Beatrice ought to\nhave disapproved. She had evidently been frivolous and neglectful of her\nduties; yet it seemed as though her aunt had been better pleased with\nher when she was like that. What could have made Aunt Beatrice, of all\nwomen, unkind and unjust?\n\nIn this way more than a year went by. The baby grew and was\nshort-coated; the October Term came round once more, and still Milly\nremained the same Milly. To have wished it otherwise would have seemed\nlike wishing for her death.\n\nBut at times a great longing for another, quite another, came over Ian.\nIt was like a longing for the beloved dead. Of course it was mad--mad!\nHe struggled against the feeling, and generally succeeded in getting\nback to the point of view that the change had been more in himself, in\nhis own emotional moods, than in Milly.\n\nOctober, the golden month, passed by and November came in, soft and\ndim; a merry month for the hunting men beside the coverts, where the\nred-brown leaves still hung on the oak-trees and brushwood, and among\nthe grassy lanes, the wide fresh fields and open hill-sides. No ill\nmonth either for those who love to light the lamp early and open their\nbooks beside a cheerful fire. But then the rain came, a persistent,\nsoaking rain. Milly always went to her district on Tuesdays, no matter\nwhat the weather, and this time she caught a cold. Ian urged her to stop\nin bed next morning. He himself had to be in College early, and could\nnot come home till the afternoon.\n\nIt was still raining and the early falling twilight was murky and brown.\nThe dull yellow glare of the street-lamps was faintly reflected in the\nmuddy wetness of pavements and streets. He was carrying a great armful\nof books and papers under his dripping mackintosh and umbrella. As he\nwalked homeward as fast as his inconvenient load allowed, he became\nacutely conscious of a depression of spirits which had been growing upon\nhim all day. It was the weather, he argued, affecting his nerves or\ndigestion. The vision of a warm, cosey house, a devoted wife awaiting\nhim, ought to have cheered him, but it did not. He hoped he would not\nfeel irritable when Milly rushed into the hall as soon as his key was\nheard in the front door, to feel him all over and take every damp thread\ntragically. Poor dear Milly! What a discontented brute of a husband she\nhad got! The fault was no doubt with himself, and he would not really be\nhappy even if some miracle did set him down on a sunny Mediterranean\nshore, with enough money to live upon and nothing to think of but his\nbook. Mildred used to say that she always went to a big dinner at Durham\nin the unquenchable hope of meeting and fascinating some millionaire who\nhad sense enough to see how much better it would be to endow writers of\ngood books than readers of silly ones.\n\nWith the recollection there rang in the ears of his mind the sound of a\nlaugh which he had not heard for seventeen months. Something seemed to\ntighten about his heart. Yes, he could be quite happy without the\nmillionaire, without the sunny skies, without even the pretty,\ncomfortable home at whose door he stood, if somewhere, anywhere, he\ncould hope to hear that laugh again, to hold again in his arms the\nstrange bright bride who had melted from them like snow in\nspring-time--but that way madness lay. He thrust the involuntary longing\nfrom him almost with horror, and turned the latch-key in his door.\n\nThe hall lamp was burning low and the house seemed very chilly and\nquiet. He put his books down on the oak table, threw his streaming\nmackintosh upon the large chest, and went up to his dressing-room, to\nchange whatever was still damp about him before seeking Milly, who\npresumably was nursing her cold before the study fire.", "start_char_idx": 164609, "end_char_idx": 168609, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29": {"__data__": {"id_": "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "4328d311e271bb026108662e996199cca602d53d39ea1185a09a178a339abda8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7f68aed0c8a18e84f8eef0e408d3ac0576f3e0bb544b7b5208825eb9a6f41d09", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "When he had\nthrown off his shoes, he noticed that the door leading to his wife's\nroom was ajar and a faint red glow of firelight showed invitingly\nthrough the chink. A fire! It was irresistible. He went in quickly and\nstirred the coals to a roaring blaze. The dancing flames lit up the\nlong, low room with its few pieces of furniture, its high white\nwainscoting, and paper patterned with birds and trellised leaves. They\nlit up the low white bed and the white figure of his sleeping wife. Till\nthen he had thought the room was empty. She lay there so deathly still\nand straight that he was smitten with a sudden fear; but leaning over\nher he heard her quiet, regular breathing and saw that if somewhat pale,\nshe was normal in color. He touched her hand. It was withdrawn by a\nmechanical movement, but not before he had felt that it was warm.\n\nA wild excitement thrilled him; it would have been truer to say a wild\njoy, only that it held a pang of remorse for itself. So she had lain at\nthe H\u00f4tel du Chalet when he had left her for that long walk over the\ncrisp mountain snow. And when he had returned, she--what She? No, his\nbrain did not reel on the verge of madness; it merely accepted under the\ncompulsion of knowledge a truth of those truths that are too profound to\nadmit of mere external proof. For our reason plays at the edge of the\nuniverse as a little child plays at the edge of the sea, gathering from\nits fringes the flotsam and jetsam of its mighty life. But miles and\nmiles beyond the ken of the eager eye, beyond the reach of the alert\nhand, lies the whole great secret life of the sea. And if it were all\nlaid bare and spread at the child's feet, how could the little hand\nsuffice to gather its vast treasures, the inexperienced eye to perceive\nand classify them?\n\nAlone in the firelit, silent room, with this tranced form before him,\nIan Stewart knew that the woman who would arise from that bed would be a\ndifferent woman from the one who had lain down upon it. By what\nmysterious alchemy of nature transmuted he could not understand, any\nmore than he could understand the greater part of the workings of that\ncosmic energy which he was compelled to recognize, although he might be\ncheated with words into believing that he understood them. Another woman\nwould arise and she his Love. She had been gone so long; his heart had\nhungered for her so long, in silence even to himself. She had been dead\nand now she was about to be raised from the dead. He lighted the\ncandles, locked the doors, and paced softly up and down, stopping to\nlook at the figure on the bed from time to time. Far around him, close\nabout him, life was moving at its usual jog-trot pace. People were going\nback to their College rooms or domestic hearths, grumbling about the\nweather or their digestions or their colds, thinking of their work for\nthe evening or of their dinner engagements--and suddenly a door had shut\nbetween him and all that outside world. He was no longer moving in the\ndriven herd. He was alone, above them in an upper chamber, awaiting the\nmiracle of resurrection.\n\nIn the visions that passed before his mind's eye the face of Milly,\npale, with pleading eyes, was not absent; but with a strange hardness\nwhich he had never felt before, he thrust the sighing phantom from him.\nShe had had her turn of happiness, a long one; it was only fair that\nnow they two, he and that Other, should have their chance, should put\ntheir lips to the full cup of life. The figure on the bed stirred,\nturned on one side, and slipped a hand under the pure curve of the young\ncheek. He was by the bed in a moment; but it still slept, though less\nprofoundly, without that tranced look, as though the flame of life\nitself burned low within.\n\nHow would she first greet him?", "start_char_idx": 168610, "end_char_idx": 172369, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814": {"__data__": {"id_": "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "cf06da1d603d10edfa84e6d42a0d6d3ac5a51b3e5e529484288081ac5cfa1139", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "35335b9d40fb91f90d1976854047a9c86175d93d67c8f424f78a0f34700a236d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "How would she first greet him? Last time she had leaned into the clear\nsunshine and laughed to him from the cloud of her amber hair; and a\nspirit in his blood had leaped to the music of her laugh, even while the\nrational self knew not it was the lady of his love. But however she came\nback it would be she, the Beloved. He felt exultantly how little, after\nall, the frame mattered. Last time he had found her, his love had been\nset in the sunshine and the splendor of the Alpine snows, with nothing\nto jar, nothing to distract it from itself. And that was good. To-day,\nit was opening, a sudden and wonderful bloom, in the midst of the murky\ndiscomfort of an English November, the droning hum of the machinery of\nhis daily work. And this, too, was good.\n\nYes, it was better because of the contrast between the wonder and its\nenvironment, better because he himself was more conscious of his joy. He\nsat on the bed a while watching her impatiently. In his eyes she was\nalready filled with a new loveliness, but he wanted her hair, her amber\nhair. It was brushed back and imprisoned tightly in a little plait tied\nwith a white ribbon--Milly's way. With fingers clumsy, yet gentle, he\ntook off the ribbon and cautiously undid the plait. Then he took a comb\nand spread out the silk-soft hair more as he liked to see it, pleased\nwith his own skill in the unaccustomed task. She stirred again, but\nstill she did not wake. He was pacing up and down the room when she\nraised herself a little on her pillow and looked fixedly at the opposite\nwall. Ian held his breath. He stood perfectly still and watched her.\nPresently she sat up and looked about her, looked at him with a faint,\nvague smile, like that of a baby. He sat down at the foot of the bed and\ntook her hand. She smiled at him again, this time with more definite\nmeaning.\n\n\"Do you know who it is, sweetheart?\" he said in a low voice. She nodded\nslightly and went on smiling, as though quietly happy.\n\n\"Ian,\" she breathed, at length.\n\n\"Yes, darling.\"\n\n\"I've been away a long, long time. How long?\"\n\nHe told her.\n\nShe uttered a little \"Ah!\" and frowned; lay quiet awhile, then drew her\nhand from Ian's and sat up still more.\n\n\"I sha'n't lie here any longer,\" she said, in a stronger voice. \"It's\njust waste of time.\" She pushed back the clothes and swung her feet out\nof bed. \"Oh, how glad I am to be back again! Are you glad I'm back, Ian?\nSay you are, do say you are!\"\n\nAnd Ian on his knees before her, said that he was.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\n\nIan was leaning against the high mantel-piece of his study. Above it,\nlet into the panelling, was an eighteenth-century painting of the Bridge\nand Castle of St. Angelo, browned by time. He was wondering how to tell\nMildred about the child, and whether she would resent its presence. She,\ntoo, was meditating, chin on hand. At length she looked up with a sudden\nsmile.\n\n\"What about the baby, Ian? Don't you take any notice of it yet?\"\n\nHe was surprised.\n\n\"How do you know about him?\"\n\nShe frowned thoughtfully.\n\n\"I seem to know things that have happened in a kind of way--rather as\nthough I had seen them in a dream. But they haven't happened to me, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"Was it the same last time?\"\n\n\"No; but the first time I came, and especially just at first, I seemed\nto remember all kinds of things--\" She paused as though trying in vain\nto revive her impressions--\"Odd things, not a bit like anything in\nOxford. I can't recall them now, but sometimes in London I fancy I've\nseen places before.\"\n\n\"Of course you have, dear.\"\n\n\"And the first time I saw that old picture there I knew it was Rome, and\nI had a notion that I'd been there and seen just that view.\"\n\n\"You've been seeing pictures and reading books and hearing talk all your\nlife, and in the peculiar state of your memory, I suppose you can't\ndistinguish between the impressions made on it by facts and by ideas.\"", "start_char_idx": 172339, "end_char_idx": 176196, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f": {"__data__": {"id_": "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "e01203b3d983f756637f6a661e7f561ccf1e7fb5a140525dd08d41ee5fa60a79", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2a91b4c7337d2ee26ec03c4329bcd27a4474d6f75fec5b55f179edd1abbffb95", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mildred was silent; but it was not the silence of conviction. Then she\njumped up.\n\n\"I'm going to see Baby. You needn't come if you don't want.\"\n\nHe hesitated.\n\n\"I'm afraid it's too late. Milly doesn't like--\" He broke off with a\nwild laugh. \"What am I talking about!\"\n\n\"I suppose you were going to say, Milly doesn't like people taking a\ncandle into the room when Baby is shut up for the night. I don't care\nwhat Milly likes. He's my baby now, and he's sure to look a duck when\nhe's asleep. Come along!\"\n\nShe put her arm through his and together they climbed the steep\nstaircase to the nursery.\n\nMildred had returned to the world in such excellent spirits at merely\nbeing there, that she took those awkward situations which Milly had\ninevitably bequeathed to her, as capital jokes. The partial and external\nacquaintance with Milly's doings and points of view which she had\nbrought back with her, made everything easier than before; but her\nderisive dislike of her absent rival was intensified. It pained Ian if\nshe dropped a hint of it. Tims was the only person to whom she could\nhave the comfort of expressing herself; and even Tims made faces and\ngroaned faintly, as though she did not enjoy Mildred's wit when Milly\nwas the subject of it. She gave Milly's cook notice at once, but most\nthings she found in a satisfactory state--particularly the family\nfinances. More negatively satisfactory was the state of her wardrobe,\nsince so little had been bought. Mildred still shuddered at the\nrecollection of the trousseau frocks.\n\nOnce more Mrs. Stewart, whose social career had been like that of the\nproverbial rocket shot up into the zenith. But a life of mere amusement\nwas not the fashion in the circle in which she lived, and her active\nbrain and easily aroused sympathies made her quick to take up more\nserious interests.\n\nIt seemed wiser, too, to make no sudden break with Milly's habits.\nStill, Emma, the nurse, opined that Baby got on all the better since\nMrs. Stewart had become \"more used to him like\"--wasn't always changing\nhis food, taking his temperature, wanting him to have bandages and\nmedicine, forbidding him to be talked to or sung to, and pulling his\nlittle, curling-up limbs straight when he was going to sleep. He was a\nhealthy little fellow and already pretty, with his soft dark\nhair--softer than anything in the world except a baby's hair--his\ndelicate eyebrows and bright dark eyes. Mildred loved playing with him.\nSometimes when Ian heard the tiny shrieks of baby laughter, he used to\nthink with a smile and yet with a pang of pity, how shocked poor Milly\nwould have been at this titillation of the infant brain. But he did not\nwant thoughts of Milly--so far as he could he shut the door of his mind\nagainst them. She would come back, no doubt, sooner or later; and her\ncoming back would mean that Mildred would be robbed of her life, his own\nlife robbed of its joy.\n\nAt the end of Term the Master of Durham sent a note to bid the Stewarts\nto dine with him and meet Sir Henry Milwood, the rich Australian, and\nMaxwell Davison, the traveller and Orientalist. Ian remarked that\nDavison was a cousin, although they had not met since he was a boy.\nMaxwell Davison had gone to the East originally as agent for some big\nfirm, and had spent there nearly twenty years. He was an accomplished\nPersian and Arabic scholar, and gossip related that he had run off with\na fair Persian from a Constantinople harem and lived with her in Persia\nuntil her death. But that was years ago.\n\nWhen the Stewarts entered the Master's bare bachelor drawing-room, they\nfound besides the Milwoods, only familiar faces. Maxwell Davison was\nstill awaited, and with interest. He came, and that interest did not\nappear to be mutual, judging from the Oriental impassivity of his long,\nbrown face, with its narrow, inscrutable eyes.", "start_char_idx": 176198, "end_char_idx": 180022, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee": {"__data__": {"id_": "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0a3b69a316d6f5c9a0e477de291d8f74b3ebb73423979713cc54c575cb83e2be", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d691d50f06c37e95a78e2c26092e256fd7d87129393a77bba4a32bbca08d63a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He was tall, slight,\nsinewy as a Bedouin, his age uncertain, since his dry leanness and the\ndash of silver at his temples might be the effect of burning desert\nsuns.\n\nMildred was delighted at first at being sent into dinner with him, but\nshe found him disappointingly taciturn. In truth, he had acquired\nOriental habits and views with regard to women. If a foolish Occidental\ncustom demanded that they should sit at meat with the lords of creation,\nhe, Maxwell Davison, would not pretend to acquiesce in it. Mildred, to\nwhom it was unthinkable that any man should not wish to talk to her,\nmerely pitied his shyness and determined to break it down; but Davison's\nattitude was unbending.\n\nAfter dinner the Master, his mortar-board cap on his head, opened the\ndrawing-room door and invited them to come across to the College Library\nto see some bronzes and a few other things that Mr. Davison had\ntemporarily deposited there. He had divined that Maxwell Davison would\nbe willing to sell, and in his guileful soul the little Master may have\nhad schemes of persuading his wealthy friend Milwood to purchase any\nbronzes that might be of value to the College or the University. Of the\nladies, only Mildred and Miss Moore, the arch\u00e6ologist, braved the chill\nof the medi\u00e6val Library to inspect the collection. Davison professed to\nno artistic or antiquarian knowledge of the bronzes. They had come to\nhim in the way of trade and had all been dug up in Asia Minor--no, not\nall, for one he had picked up in England. Nevertheless he had succeeded\nin getting a pretty clear notion of the relative value of his\nbronzes--the Oriental curios with them it was his business to\nunderstand. He could not help observing the sure instinct with which\nMrs. Stewart selected what was best among all these different objects.\nShe had the _flair_ of the born collector. The learned arch\u00e6ologists\npresent leaned over the collection discussing and disputing, and took no\nnotice of her remarks as she rapidly handled each article. But Davison\ndid, and when at length she took up a small figure of Augustus--the\nbronze that had not come from Asia Minor--and looked at it with a\npeculiar doubtful intentness, he began to feel uncomfortable.\n\n\"Anything wrong with that?\" he asked, in spite of himself.\n\nShe laughed nervously.\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Davison, please ask some one who knows! I don't. Only I--I seem\nto have seen something like it before, that's all.\"\n\nSanderson, roaming around the professed arch\u00e6ologists, took the bronze\nfrom her hands.\n\n\"I'll tell you where you've seen it, Mrs. Stewart. It's engraved in\nEgerton's _Private Collections of Great Britain_. I picked that up the\nother day--first edition, 1818. I dare say the book's here. We'll see.\"\n\nSanderson took a candle and went glimmering away down the long, dark\nroom.\n\n\"What can this be?\" asked Mildred, taking up what looked like a glass\nball.\n\n\"Please stand over here and look into it for five minutes,\" returned\nDavison, evasively. \"Perhaps you'll see what it is then.\"\n\nHe somehow wanted to get rid of Mildred's appraisal of his goods.\n\n\"Mr. Davison, your glass ball has gone quite cloudy!\" she exclaimed, in\na minute or two.\n\n\"That's all right. Go on looking and you'll see something more,\" he\nreturned.\n\nPresently she said:\n\n\"It's so curious. I see the whole room reflected in the glass now, but\nit's much lighter than it really is, and the windows seem larger. It all\nlooks so different. There is some one down there in white.\"\n\nSanderson came up the room carrying a large quarto, open.\n\n\"Here's your bronze, right enough,\" he said, putting the book down on\nthe table. \"It's under the heading, _Hammerton Collection_.\"\n\nHe pointed to a small engraving inscribed, \"Bronze statuette of\nAugustus. _Very rare._\"\n\n\"But some fellow's been scribbling something here,\" continued Sanderson,\nturning the book around to read a note written along the margin.", "start_char_idx": 180023, "end_char_idx": 183902, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279": {"__data__": {"id_": "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c4d40daa4e94eeaa5ae8b1b044144ba49180557dae8e6a6a8d28e8d65409e6ed", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "883b82b2e0adc309b40835cd94472612acc06bf46e6b9bce6467b8cfaceb96c6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He read\nout: \"'A forgery. Sold by Lady Hammerton to Mr. Solomons, 1819. See case\nSolomons _versus_ Hammerton, 1820.'\"\n\nThe turning of the book showed Mildred a full-page engraving entitled,\n\"The Gallery, Hammerton House.\" It represented a long room somewhat like\nthe one in which they stood, but still more like the room she had seen\nin the crystal; and in the middle distance there was a slightly sketched\nfigure of a woman in a light dress. Half incredulous, half frightened,\nshe pored over the engraving which reproduced so strangely the image she\nhad seen in Maxwell Davison's mysterious ball.\n\n\"How funny!\" she almost whispered.\n\n\"You may call it funny, of course, that Lady Hammerton succeeded in\ncheating a Jew, which is what it looks like,\" rejoined Sanderson, bent\non hunting down his quarry; \"but it was pretty discreditable to her\ntoo.\"\n\n\"Not at all,\" Maxwell Davison's harsh voice broke in. \"That was\nSolomons's look out. I sha'n't bring a lawsuit against the fellow who\nsold me that Augustus, if it is a forgery. A man's a fool to deal in\nthings he doesn't understand.\"\n\n\"What is this glass ball, Mr. Davison?\" asked Miss Moore, in her turn\ntaking up the uncanny thing Mildred had laid down.\n\n\"It's a divining-crystal. In the East certain people, mostly boys, look\nin these crystals and see all sorts of things, present, past, and to\ncome.\"\n\nMiss Moore laughed.\n\n\"Or pretend they do!\"\n\n\"Who knows? It isn't of any interest, really. The things that have\nhappened have happened, and the things that are to happen will happen\njust as surely, whether we foresee them or not.\"\n\nMiss Moore turned to the Master.\n\n\"Look, Master--this is a divining-crystal, and Mr. Davison's trying to\npersuade me that in the East people really see visions in it.\"\n\nThe Master smiled.\n\n\"Mr. Davison has a poor opinion of ladies' intelligence, I'm afraid. He\nthinks they are children, who will believe any fairy tale.\"\n\nDavison had drawn near to Mildred as the Master spoke; his eyes met hers\nand the impassive face wore a faint, ironical smile.\n\n\"The Wisdom of the West speaks!\" he exclaimed, in a low voice. \"I'd\nalmost forgotten the sound of it.\"\n\nThen scrutinizing her pale face: \"I'm afraid you've had a scare. What\ndid you see?\"\n\n\"I saw--well, I fancy I saw the Gallery at Hammerton House and my\nancestress, Lady Hammerton. It was burned, you know, and she was burned\nwith it, trying to save her collections. I expect she condescended to\ngive me a glimpse of them because I've inherited her mania. I'd be a\ncollector, too, if I had the money.\"\n\nShe laughed nervously.\n\n\"You should take Ian to the East,\" returned Davison. \"You could make\nmoney there and learn things--the Wisdom of the East, for instance.\"\n\nMildred, recovering her equanimity, smiled at him.\n\n\"No, never! The Wisdom of the West engrosses us; but you'll come and\ntell us about the other, won't you?\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\n\nMaxwell Davison settled in Oxford for six months, in order to see his\ngreat book on Persian Literature through the press. His advent had been\nlooked forward to as promising a welcome variety, bringing a splash of\nvivid color into a somewhat quiet-hued, monotonous world. But there was\ndoomed to be some disappointment. Mr. Davison went rather freely to\nCollege dinners but seldom into general society. It came to be\nunderstood that he disliked meeting women; Mrs. Stewart, however, he\nappeared to except from his condemnation or rule. Ian was his cousin,\nwhich made a pretext at first for going to the Stewarts' house; but he\nwent because he found the couple interesting in their respective ways.\nSome Dons, unable to believe that a man without a University education\ncould teach them anything, would lecture him out of their little\npocketful of knowledge about Oriental life and literature.", "start_char_idx": 183903, "end_char_idx": 187671, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607": {"__data__": {"id_": "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "1ac62d37784de55a3e0e73086746c0c882873eb8740dca45ea75e3446a601b2e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "81d7ab3a0d382fc838b4bf891d70dc2656319e9ef7f29d1636d9af748d60ed17", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Ian, on the\ncontrary, was an admirable producer of all that was interesting in\nothers; and in Davison that all was much. At first he had tried to keep\nMrs. Stewart in what he conceived to be her proper place; but as time\nwent on he found himself dropping in at the old house with surprising\nfrequency, and often when he knew Ian to be in College or too busy to\nattend to him.\n\nHe had brought horses with him and offered to give Mildred a mount\nwhenever she liked. Milly had learned the rudiments of the art, but she\nwas too timid to care for riding. Mildred, on the other hand, delighted\nin the swift motion through the air, the sensation of the strong\nbounding life almost incorporated with her own, and if she had moments\nof terror she had more of ecstatic daring. She and Davison ended by\nriding together once or twice a week.\n\nInteresting as Mildred found Maxwell Davison's companionship, it did not\naltogether conduce to her happiness. She who had been so content to be\nmerely alive, began now to chafe at the narrow limits of her existence.\nHe opened the wide horizons of the world before her, and her soul seemed\nnative to them. One April afternoon they rode to Wytham together. The\nwoods of Wytham clothe a long ridge of hill around which the young\nThames sweeps in a strong curve and through them a grass ride runs\nunbroken for a mile and a half. Now side by side, now passing and\nrepassing each other, they had \"kept the great pace\" along the track,\nthe horses slackening their speed somewhat as they went down the dip,\nonly to spring forward with fresh impetus, lifting their hind-quarters\ngallantly to the rise; then given their heads for the last burst along\nthe straight bit to the drop of the hill, away they went in passionate\ncompetition, foam-flecked and sending the clods flying from their\nhurrying hoofs.\n\nA mile and a half of galloping only serves to whet the appetite of a\nwell-girt horse, and the foaming rivals hardly allowed themselves to be\npulled up at the edge of a steep grassy slope, where already here and\nthere a yellow cowslip bud was beginning to break its pale silken\nsheath. At length their impatient dancing was over, and they stood\nquiet, resigned to the will of the incomprehensible beings who\ncontrolled them. But Mildred's blood was dancing still and she abandoned\nherself to the pleasure of it, undistracted by speech. Beyond the\nshining Thames, wide-curving through its broad green meadows, and the\ngray bridge and tower of Eynsham, that great landscape, undulating,\nclothed in the mystery of moving cloud-shadows, gave her an agreeable\nimpression of being a view into a strange country, hundreds of miles\naway from Oxford and the beaten track. But Maxwell's eyes were fixed\nupon her.\n\nThe wood about them was just breaking into the various beauty of spring\nfoliage, emerald and gold and red; a few trees still holding up naked\ngray branches among it; here and there a white cloud of cherry blossom,\nshining in a clearing or floating mistily amid bursting tree-tops below\nthem. They turned to the right, down a narrow ride, mossy and winding,\nwhere perforce they trod on flowers as they went; for the path and the\nwood about it were carpeted with blue dog-violets and the pale soft\nblossoms of primroses, opening in clusters amid their thick fresh\nfoliage and the brown of last year's fallen leaves. The sky above wore\nthe intense blue in which dark clouds are seen floating, and as the\ngleams of travelling sunshine passed over the wooded hill, its colors\nalso glowed with a peculiar intensity. The horses, no longer excited by\na vista of turf, were walking side by side. But the beauty of earth and\nsky were nothing to Maxwell, whose whole being was intent on the beauty\nof the woman in the saddle beside him; the rose and the gold of cheek\nand hair, the lithe grace of the body, lightly moving to the motion of\nher horse.\n\nShe turned to him with a sudden bright smile.\n\n\"How perfectly delightful riding is! I owe all the pleasure of it to\nyou.\"\n\n\"Do you?\" he asked, smiling too, but slightly and gravely, narrowing on\nher his inscrutable eyes.", "start_char_idx": 187672, "end_char_idx": 191761, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e": {"__data__": {"id_": "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f098d61c746068ab843d199413ca21f6cecbae92588f922c6f3f4a30714567a4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2b66b72f3195349dbf34cd5f05ae5192c1426177003c8cd690acd38cc784b7b4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Well, then, will you do what I want?\"\n\n\"I thought you were a fatalist and never wanted anything. But if you\ncondescend to want me to do something, your slave obeys. You see I'm\nlearning the proper way for a woman to talk.\"\n\n\"I want you to remove the preposterous black pot with which you've\ncovered up your hair. I'll carry it for you.\"\n\n\"Oh, Max! What would people think if they met me riding without my hat?\nFancy Miss Cayley! What she'd say! And the Warden of Canterbury! What\nhe'd feel!\"\n\nShe laughed delightedly.\n\n\"They never ride this way. It's the 'primrose path,' you see, and\nthey're afraid of the 'everlasting bonfire.' I'm not; you're not. You're\nnot afraid of anything.\"\n\n\"I am. I'm afraid of old maids and--most butlers.\"\n\nMaxwell laughed, but his laugh was a harsh one.\n\n\"Humbug! If you really wanted to do anything you'd do it. I know you\nbetter than you know yourself. If you won't take your hat off it's\nbecause you don't really want to do what I want; and when you say pretty\nthings to me about your gratitude for the pleasure I'm giving you,\nyou're only telling the same old lies women tell all the world over.\"\n\n\"There! Catch my reins!\" cried Mildred, leaning over and holding them\nout to him. \"How do you suppose I can take my hat off if you don't?\"\n\nHe obeyed and drew up to her, stooping near, a hand on the mane of her\nhorse. The horses nosed together and fidgeted, while she balanced\nherself in the saddle with lifted arms, busy with hat-pins. The task\naccomplished, she handed the hat to him and they cantered on. Presently\nshe turned towards him, brightening.\n\n\"You were quite right about the hat, Max. It's ever so much nicer\nwithout it; one feels freer, and what I love about riding is the free\nfeeling. It's as though one had got out of a cage; as though one could\njump over all the barriers of life; as though there were nobody and\nnothing to hinder one from galloping right out into the sky if one\nchose. But I can't explain what I mean.\"\n\n\"Of course you don't mean the sky,\" he answered. \"What you really mean\nis the desert. There's space, there's color, glorious, infinite, with an\nair purer than earthly. Such a life, Mildred! The utter freedom of it!\nNone of this weary, dreary slavery you call civilization. That would be\nthe life for you.\"\n\nIt was true that Mildred's was an essentially nomadic and adventurous\nsoul. Whether the desert was precisely the most suitable sphere for her\nwanderings was open to doubt, but for the moment as typifying freedom,\ntravel, and motion--all that really was as the breath of life to her--it\nfascinated her imagination. Maxwell, closely watching that\nsunshine-gilded head, saw her eyes widen, her whole expression at once\nexcited and meditative, as though she beheld a vision. But in a moment\nshe had turned to him with a challenging smile.\n\n\"I thought slavery was the only proper thing for women.\"\n\n\"So it is--for ordinary women. It makes them happier and less\nmischievous. But I don't fall into the mistake--which causes such a deal\nof unnecessary misery and waste in the world--the mistake of supposing\nthat you can ever make a rule which it's good for every one to obey.\nYou've got to make your rule for the average person. Therefore it's\nbound not to fit the man or woman who is not average, and it's folly to\nwish them to distort themselves to fit it.\"\n\n\"And I'm not average? I needn't be a slave? Oh, thank you, Max! I am so\nglad.\"\n\n\"Confound it, Mildred, I'm not joking. You are a born queen and you\noughtn't to be a slave; but you are one, all the same. You're a slave to\nthe 'daily round, the common task,' which were never meant for such as\nyou; you're a slave to the conventional idiocy of your neighbors.", "start_char_idx": 191762, "end_char_idx": 195453, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7": {"__data__": {"id_": "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "407a7976c8913fc875575f8ca8c1d471ba30f534e79375ec02cec67d58657517", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4fc15b000d60cbacf56448148a9ce49f6de3fada9d9808cf0534722f776e45d8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "You\ndaren't even take your hat off till I make you; and now you see how nice\nit is to ride with your hat off.\"\n\nThey had been slowly descending the steep, stony road which leads to\nWytham Village, but as he spoke they were turning off into a large field\nto the right, across which a turfy track led gradually up to the woods\nfrom which they had come. The track lay smooth before them, and the\nhorses began to sidle and dance directly their hoofs touched it. Mildred\ndid not answer his remarks, except by a reference to the hat.\n\n\"Don't lose it, that's all!\" she shouted, looking back and laughing, as\nshe shot up the track ahead of him. He fancied she was trying to show\nhim that she could run away from him if she chose; and with a quiet\nsmile on his lips and a firm hand on his tugging horse, he kept behind\nher until she was a good way up the field. Then he gave his horse its\nhead and it sprang forward. She heard the eager thud of the heavy hoofs\ndrawing up behind, and in a few seconds he was level with her. For a\nminute they galloped neck and neck, though at a little distance from\neach other. Then she saw him ahead, riding with a seat looser than most\nEnglishmen's, yet with an assurance, a grace of its own, the\nhind-quarters of his big horse lifting powerfully under him, as it sped\nwith great bounds over the flying turf. Her own mare saw it, too, and\nvented her annoyance in a series of kicks, which, it must be confessed,\nseriously disturbed Mildred's equilibrium. Then settling to business,\nshe sprang after her companion. Maxwell heard her following him up the\nlong grass slope towards the gate which opens into the main ride by\nwhich they had started. He fancied he had the improvised race well in\nhand, but suddenly the hoofs behind him hurried their beat; Mildred flew\npast him at top speed and flung her mare back on its haunches at the\ngate.\n\n\"I've won! Hurrah! I've won!\" she shouted, breathlessly, and waved her\nwhip at him.\n\nMaxwell was swearing beneath his breath, in a spasm of anger and\nanxiety.\n\n\"Don't play the fool!\" he cried, savagely, as he drew rein close to her.\n\"You might have thrown the mare down or mixed her in with the gate,\npulling her up short like that. It's a wonder you didn't come off\nyourself, for though you're a devil to go, you know as well as I do\nyou're a poor horse-woman.\"\n\nHe was violently angry, partly at Mildred's ignorant rashness, partly\nbecause, after all, she had beaten him. She, taking her hat from his\nhand and fastening it on again, uttered apologies, but from the lips\nonly; for she had never seen a man furious before, and she was keenly\ninterested in the spectacle. Maxwell's eyes were not inscrutable now;\nthey glittered with manifest rage. His harsh voice was still harsher,\nhis hard jaw clinched, the muscles of his lean face, which was as pale\nas its brownness allowed it to be, stood out like cords, and the hand\nthat grasped her reins shook. Mildred felt somewhat as she imagined a\nlion-tamer might feel; just the least bit alarmed, but mistress of the\nbrute, on the whole, and enjoying the contact with anything so natural\nand fierce and primitive. The feeling had not had time to pall on her,\nwhen going through the gate, they were joined by two other members of\nthe little clan of Wytham riders, and all rode back to Oxford together,\nthrough flying scuds of rain.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\n\nThere is a proverbial rule against playing with fire, but it is one\nwhich, as Davison would have said, was evidently made by average people,\nwho would in fact rather play with something else. There are others to\nwhom fire is the only really amusing plaything; and though the\nby-stander may hold his breath, nine times out of ten they will come out\nof the game as unscathed as the professional fire-eater.", "start_char_idx": 195454, "end_char_idx": 199219, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20": {"__data__": {"id_": "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "325ce82e4597ca1540aecb10bc4192116a0fbbfe9ed2eb99c987fc606e0b242d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "817d2440b66dc5826456727de7a8aac0a624db69a7ef35ab5c1a5a0e941b4647", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "This was not\nprecisely true of Mildred, who had still a wide taste in playthings; but\nin the absence of anything new and exciting in her environment, she\nfound an immense fascination in playing with the fiery elements in\nMaxwell Davison's nature, in amusing her imagination with visions of a\nfree wandering life, led under a burning Oriental sky, which he\nconstantly suggested to her. Yet dangerously alluring as these visions\nmight appear, appealing to all the hidden nomad heart of her, her good\nsense was never really silenced. It told her that freedom from the\nshackles of civilization might become wearisome in time, besides\ninvolving heavier, more intolerable forms of bondage; although she did\nnot perceive that Maxwell Davison's dislike to her being a slave was\nonly a dislike to her being somebody else's slave. He was a despot at\nheart and had accustomed himself to a frank despotism over women.\nMildred's power over him, the uncertainty of his power over her,\nmaddened him. But Mildred did not know what love meant. At one time she\nhad fancied her affection for Ian might be love; now she wondered\nwhether her strange interest in the society of a man for whom she had no\naffection, could be that. She did not feel towards Ian as an ordinary\nwife might have done, yet his feelings and interests weighed much with\nher. Milly, too, she must necessarily consider, but she did that in a\ndifferent, an almost vengeful spirit.\n\nOne evening Ian, looking up from his work, asked her what she was\nsmiling at so quietly to herself. And she could not tell him, because it\nwas at a horrible practical joke suggested to her by an impish spirit\nwithin. What if she should prepare a little surprise for the returning\nMilly? Let her find herself planted in Araby the Blest with Maxwell\nDavison? Mildred chuckled, wondering to herself which would be in the\nbiggest rage, Milly or Max; for however Tims might affirm the contrary,\nMildred had a fixed impression that Milly could be in a rage.\n\nThe fire-game was hastening to its close; but before Mildred could prove\nherself a real mistress of the dangerous element, the sleep fell upon\nher.\n\nExcept a sensation of fatigue, for which it was easy to find a reason,\nthere was no warning of the coming change. But Ian had dreams in the\nnight and opened his eyes in the morning with a feeling of uneasiness\nand depression. Mildred could never sleep late without causing him\nanxiety, and on this morning his first glance at her filled him with a\ndread certainty. She was sleeping what was to her in a measure the sleep\nof death. He had a violent impulse to awaken her forcibly; but he feared\nit would be dangerous. With his arm around her and his head close to\nhers on the pillow, he whispered her name over and over again. The\ncalmness of her face gradually gave way to an expression of struggle\napproaching convulsion, and he dared not continue. He could only await\nthe inevitable in a misery which from its very nature could find no\nexpression and no comforter.\n\nMilly, unlike Mildred, did not return to the world in a rapture of\nsatisfaction with it. The realization of the terrible robbery of life of\nwhich she had again been the victim, was in itself enough to account for\na certain sadness even in her love for Ian and for her child. The\nhygiene of the nursery had been neglected according to her ideas, yet\nBaby was bonny enough to delight any mother's heart, however heavy it\nmight be. Ian, she said, wanted feeding up and taking care of; and he\nsubmitted to the process with a gentle, melancholy smile. Just one\nrequest he made; that she would not spoil her pretty hair by screwing it\nup in her usual unbecoming manner. She understood, studying a certain\nphotograph in a drawer--what drawer was safe from Milly's tidyings?--and\ndressed her hair as like it as she knew how, with a secret bitterness of\nheart.\n\nMildred had found a diary, methodically kept by Milly, of great use to\nher, and although incapable herself of keeping one regularly, she had\ncontinued it in a desultory manner, noting down whatever she thought\nmight be useful for Milly's guidance.", "start_char_idx": 199220, "end_char_idx": 203322, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c": {"__data__": {"id_": "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3ec935724355cb8f2521881f8d1dcd758fe4bc5cd4f0bfc73de793213be338c0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "56ae7c093039ada685514bc8629c29ee36726fbe6fe506fcc509fd6b28a11b83", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "For whatever the feelings of the\ntwo personalities towards each other, there was a terrible closeness of\nunion between them. Their indivisibility in the eyes of the world made\ntheir external interests inevitably one. New friends and acquaintances\nMildred had noted down, with useful remarks upon them. She was not\nconfidential on the subject of Maxwell Davison, but she gave the bare\nnecessary information.\n\nIt was now late in the Summer Term and her bedroom chimney-piece was\nrichly decorated with invitation cards. Among others there was an\ninvitation to a garden-party at Lady Margaret Hall. Milly put on a fresh\nflowered muslin dress, apparently unworn, that she found hanging in one\nof the deep wall-cupboards of the old house, and a coarse burnt-straw\nhat, trimmed with roses and black ribbon, which became her marvellously\nwell. All the scruples of an apostle of hygienic dress, all the\nuneasiness of an economist at the prospect of unpaid bills, disappeared\nbefore the pleasure of a young woman face to face with an extremely\npretty reflection in a pier-glass. That glass, an oval in a light\nmahogany frame, of the Regency period, if not earlier, was one of\nMildred's finds in the slums of St. Ebbes.\n\nShe walked across the Parks, where the Cricket Match of the season was\ndrawing a crowd, meaning to come out by a gate below Lady Margaret Hall,\nthe gardens and buildings of which did not then extend to the Cherwell.\nIn their place were a few tennis-grounds and a path leading to a\nboat-house, shared by a score or more of persons. While she was still\ncoming across the grass of the Parks, a man in flannels, very white in\nthe sun, came towards her from the gate for which she was making. He\nmust have recognized her from a long way off. He was a striking-looking\nman of middle age, walking with a free yet indolent stride that carried\nhim along much faster than it appeared to do.\n\nMilly had no idea who the stranger was, but he greeted her with: \"Here\nyou are at last, Mildred! Do you know how much behind time you are?\"--he\ntook out his watch--\"Exactly thirty-five minutes. I should have given\nyou up if I hadn't known that breaking your promise is not among your\nnumerous vices, and unpunctuality is.\"\n\nWho on earth was he? And why did he call her by her Christian name?\nMilly went a beautiful pink with embarrassment.\n\n\"I'm so sorry. I thought the party would have just begun,\" she replied.\n\n\"You don't mean to say you want to keep me kicking my heels while you go\nto a confounded party? I thought you knew I was off to Paris to-night,\nafter that Firdusi manuscript, and I think of taking the Continental\nExpress to Constantinople next week. I don't know when I shall be back.\nSurely, Mildred, it's not a great deal to ask you to spare half an hour\nfrom a wretched party to come on the river with me before I go?\" It\nstruck Maxwell as he ended that he was falling into the whining of the\nOccidental lover. He was determined that he would clear the situation\nthis afternoon; the more determined because he was conscious of a\nfeeling odiously resembling fear which had before now held him back from\nplain dealing with Mildred. Afraid of a woman? It was too ridiculous.\n\nMilly, meanwhile, felt herself on firmer ground. This must be Ian's\ncousin, Maxwell Davison, the Orientalist. But there was nothing nomadic\nin her heart to thrill to the idea of being on the Cherwell this\nafternoon, in London this evening, in Paris next morning, in\nConstantinople next week.\n\n\"Of course I'll come on the river with you,\" she said. \"I'm sorry I'm\nlate. I'm afraid I--I'd forgotten.\"\n\nForgotten! How simply she said it! Yet it was surely the veriest\nimpudence of coquetry. He looked at her slowly from the hat downward, as\nhe lounged leisurely at her side.\n\n\"War-paint, I see!\" he remarked. \"Armed from head to heel with all the\ntrue and tried female weapons.", "start_char_idx": 203323, "end_char_idx": 207179, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439": {"__data__": {"id_": "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "817b4a4f0c849bce382047d8fa647693d2c1a49bd8c75f59f51191c7c5fa23b3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "34da2603464e0560a4f70c1f7c03d365f78cfc9d0bcd18fba58210ff5df8efe5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Armed from head to heel with all the\ntrue and tried female weapons. They're just the same all the world\nover--'plus \u00e7a change, plus c'est la m\u00eame chose,'--though no doubt you\nfancy they're different. Who's the frock put on for, Mildred? For the\nparty, or--for me?\"\n\nMilly was conscious of such an extreme absence of intention so far as\nMaxwell was concerned, that it would have been rude to express it. She\nwent very pink again, and lifting forget-me-not blue eyes to his\ninscrutable ones, articulated slowly:\n\n\"I'm sure I don't know.\"\n\nHer eyes were like a child's and a shy smile curved her pink lips\nadorably as she spoke. Such mere simplicity would not in itself have\ncast a spell over Maxwell, but it came to him as a new, surprising phase\nof the eternal feminine in her; and it had the additional charm that it\ncaused that subjugated feeling resembling fear, with which Mildred could\ninspire him, to disappear entirely. He was once more in the proper\ndominant attitude of Man. He felt the courage now to make her do what he\nbelieved she wished to do in her heart; the courage, too, to punish her\nfor the humiliation she had inflicted upon him. Six months ago he would\nhave had nothing but a hearty contempt for the man who could beat thirty\nyards of gravel-path for half an hour, watch in hand, in a misery of\nimpatience, waiting on the good pleasure of a capricious woman.\n\nMeantime he laughed good-humoredly at Milly's answer and began to talk\nof neutral matters. If her tongue did not move as nimbly as usual, he\nflattered himself it was because she knew that the hour of her surrender\nwas at hand.\n\nMilly knew the boat-house well, the pleasant dimness of it on hot summer\ndays; how the varnished boats lay side by side all down its length, and\nhow the light canoes rested against the walls as it were on shelves.\nHow, when the big doors were opened on to the raft and the slowly\nmoving river without, bright circles of sunlight, reflected from the\nrunning water, would fly in and dance on wall and roof. She stood there\nin the dimness, while Maxwell lifted down a large canoe and, opening one\nof the barred doors, took it out to the water. Mildred would have felt a\nhalf-conscious \u00e6sthetic pleasure in watching his movements,\nsuperficially indolent but instinct with strength. Milly had not the\nsame \u00e6sthetic sensibilities, and she was still disagreeably embarrassed\nat finding herself on such a familiar footing with a man whom she had\nnever seen before. Then, although she followed Aunt Beatrice's golden\nrule of never allowing a question of feminine dress to interfere with\nmasculine plans, she could not but feel anxious as to the fate of her\nfresh muslin and ribbons packed into a canoe. Maxwell, however, had\nlearned canoeing years ago on the Canadian lakes, and did not splash.\nHis lean, muscular brown arms and supple wrists took the canoe rapidly\nthrough the water, with little apparent effort.\n\nIt was the prime of June and the winding willow-shaded Cherwell was in\nits beauty. White water-lilies were only just beginning to open silver\nbuds, floating serenely on their broad green and red pads; but prodigal\nmasses of wild roses, delicately rich in scent and various in color,\noverhung the river in brave arching bowers or starred bushes and\nhedgerows so closely that the green briers were hardly visible. Beds of\nthe large blue water forget-me-not floated beside the banks, and above\nthem creamy meadow-sweet lifted its tall plumes among the reeds and\ngrasses. Small water-rats swam busily from bank to bank or played on the\nroots of the willows, and bright wings of birds and insects fluttered\nand skimmed over the shining stream.\n\nThe Cherwell, though not then the crowded waterway it has since become,\nwas usually popular with boaters on such an afternoon. But there must\nhave been strong counter-attractions elsewhere, for Milly and Davison\npassed only one, a party of children working very independent oars, on\ntheir way to the little gray house above the ferry, where an old\nFrenchman dispensed tea in arbors.", "start_char_idx": 207111, "end_char_idx": 211149, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5": {"__data__": {"id_": "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "b604e64a675b3e16edb5b7795e1294e011379d3c42b9d6dd8620073f8ccadf98", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2412d0b9e457f57faedaa0d6d75ad9bdc7b5a03b686d116c51a32271c408e2f4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There was a kind of hypnotic charm in the gliding motion of the canoe\nand the water running by. Milly was further dazed by Maxwell's talk. It\nwas full of mysterious references and couched in the masterful tone of a\nperson who had rights over her--a tone which before he had been more\nwilling than able to adopt; but now the bit was between his teeth.\nPerhaps absorbed in his own intent, he hardly noticed how little she\nanswered; but he did notice every point of her beauty as she leaned back\non the cushions in the light shade of her parasol, from the soft\nbrightness of her hair to the glimpse of delicate white skin which\nshowed through the open-work stocking on her slender foot.\n\nWhen they were in the straight watery avenue between green willow walls,\nwhich leads up to the ferry, he slackened the pace.\n\n\"And what are you going to do next week?\" he asked, as one of a series\nof ironical questions.\n\n\"A great deal; much more than I care to do. I'm going up to town to see\nthe new Savoy opera, and I'm going to a dance, and to several\ngarden-parties, and to dine with the Master of Durham.\"\n\n\"Quite enough for some people; but not for you, Mildred. Think of\nit--year after year, always the same old run. October Term, Lent Term,\nSummer Term! A little change in Vacations, say a month abroad, when you\ncan afford it. You aren't meant for it, you know you're not, any more\nthan a swallow's meant for the little hopping, pecketing life of a\nLondon sparrow.\"\n\n\"Indeed, I don't see the likeness either way. I'm quite happy as I am.\"\n\nHe smiled mockingly.\n\n\"Quite happy! As it's very proper you should be, of course. Come,\nMildred, no humbug! Think how you'd feel if you knew that instead of\ngoing to all those idiotic parties next week you were going to\nConstantinople.\"\n\n\"Isn't it dreadfully hot at this time of year?\"\n\n\"I like it hot. But at any rate one can always find some cool place in\nthe hottest weather. How would you like to go in a caravan from Cairo to\nDamascus next autumn?\"\n\n\"I dare say it would be delightful, if the country one passed through\nwere not too wild and dangerous. But Ian would never be able to leave\nhis work for an expedition like that.\"\n\nMaxwell smiled grimly.\n\n\"I'd no idea you'd want him. I shouldn't. Do be serious. If you fancy\nI'm the sort of man you can go on playing with forever, you're most\nconfoundedly mistaken.\"\n\nMilly was both offended and alarmed. Was this strange man mad? And she\nalone with him on the river!\n\n\"I don't know what you mean,\" she said, coldly.\n\n\"Don't you?\" he returned, and he still wore his ironic smile--\"Well, I\nknow what you mean all the time. You say I only know Oriental women,\nbut, by Allah, there's not a pin to choose between the lot of you,\nexcept that there's less humbug about them, and over here you're a set\nof trained, accomplished hypocrites!\"\n\nIndignation overcame fear in Milly's bosom.\n\n\"We are nothing of the kind,\" she said. \"How can you talk such\nnonsense?\"\n\n\"Nonsense? I suppose being a woman you can't really be logical, although\nyou generally pretend to be so. Why have you pranked yourself out, spent\nan hour I dare say in making yourself pretty to-day? For what possible\nreason except to attract the eyes of a crowd of men, young fools or\ndoddering old ones--\"\n\nMilly uttered an expression of vehement denial, but he continued:\n\n\"Or else to whet my appetite for forbidden fruit. But there's no 'or'\nabout it, is there? Most likely you had both of those desirable objects\nin view.\"\n\nMilly was not a coward when her indignation was aroused. She took hold\nof the sides of the canoe and began raising herself.\n\n\"I don't know whether you mean to be insulting,\" she said; \"but I don't\nwish to hear any more of this sort of thing. I'd rather you put me out,\nplease.\"\n\n\"Sit down,\" he said, with authority--the canoe was rocking\nviolently--\"unless you're anxious to be drowned.", "start_char_idx": 211151, "end_char_idx": 215008, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8": {"__data__": {"id_": "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "9418b09696fc3300b942371e47673e3077dee438a14a8ad361ba689fa14f499f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "278fa94932e8c453f94fe40d89af4bdc39c6e74b1747617a10c1a5b0e1067b6b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I warn you I'm a very\npoor swimmer, and if we upset there's not a ghost of a chance of my\nbeing able to save you.\"\n\nMilly was a poor swimmer, too, and felt by no means competent to save\nherself; neither was she anxious to be drowned. So she sat down again.\n\n\"Put me out at the ferry, please,\" she repeated, haughtily.\n\nThey were reaching the end of the willow avenue, just where the wire\nrope crosses the river. On the right was a small wooden landing-stage,\nand high above it the green, steep river-bank, with the gray house and\nthe arbors on the top. The old Frenchman stood before the house in his\nshirt-sleeves, watching sadly for his accustomed prey, which for some\ninexplicable reason did not come. He took off his cap expectantly to\nMaxwell Davison, whom he knew; but the canoe glided swiftly under the\nrope and on.\n\n\"No, I sha'n't put you out, Mildred,\" Maxwell answered with decision,\nafter a pause. \"I'm sorry if I've offended you. I've forgotten my\nmanners, no doubt, and must seem a bit of a brute to you. I didn't bring\nyou here just to quarrel, or to play a practical joke upon you, and send\nyou on a field-walk in that smart frock and shoes--\" he smiled at her,\nand this time she was obliged to feel a certain fascination in his\nsmile--\"nor yet to go on with the game you've been playing with me all\nthese months. You forget; I've been used to Nature for so many years\nthat I find it hard to realize how natural the most artificial\nconditions of life appear to you. I'll try to remember; but you must\nremember, too, that the most civilized beings on earth have got to come\nright up against the hard facts of Nature sometimes. They've got to be\nstripped of their top layer and see it stripped off other people, and to\nrecognize the fact that every one has got a core of Primitive Man or of\nPrimitive Woman in them; a perfectly unalterable, indestructible core.\nAnd the people who refuse to recognize that aren't elevated and refined,\nbut simply stupid and obstinate and no good.\"\n\nMilly, if she would have no compromise with principles, was always quick\nto accept an apology. She did not follow the line of Maxwell's argument,\nbut she remembered it was noted in a certain deplorably irregular Diary,\nthat he had lived for many years in the East and was quite Orientalized\nin many of his ways and ideas. With gentle dignity she signified that in\nher opinion civilized European manners and views were to be commended in\nopposition to barbarous and Oriental ones. Maxwell, his face bent\ntowards the turning paddle, hardly heard what she was saying. He was\npaddling fast and considering many things.\n\nThey came to where the river ran under a narrow grass field, rising in\na steep bank and shut off from the world by a tall hedge and a row of\nelms, that threw long shadows down the grass and were reflected in the\nwater. A path led through it, but it was little frequented. On the other\nside was a wide, green meadow, where the long grass was ripening under\nrose-blossoming hedges, and far beyond was the blueness of distant hills\nand woods. Maxwell ran the bow of the canoe into a thick bed of\nforget-me-nots, growing not far from the bank. He laid the dripping\npaddle aside, and, resting his elbows on his knees, held his head in his\nhands for a minute or more. When he turned his face towards her it was\ncharged with passion, but most of all with a grave masterfulness. He had\nbeen sitting on a low seat, but now he kneeled so as to come nearer to\nher, and, stretching out his long arms, laid a hand, brown,\nlong-fingered, smooth, on her two slight, gray-gloved ones.\n\n\"Mildred,\" he said, and his voice seemed to have lost its harshness,\n\"I've brought you here to make you decide what you are going to do with\nme and with yourself. I want you--you know I want you, but I don't come\nbegging for you as an alms.", "start_char_idx": 215009, "end_char_idx": 218830, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3": {"__data__": {"id_": "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "d3cbe16fa9749ba0d4b2b16ffc4bd20a2666052d101d6f84a9134f023154fd61", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "856264fed12534345400b1e1c17fe06c25198930b2dbe0cd7183f8462fb81e6b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I say, just compare the life, the free,\nglorious life I can give you, and the wretched, petty round of existence\nhere. Come with me, won't you? Don't be afraid I shall treat you like a\nslave; I follow Nature, and Nature made you a queen. Come with me\nto-night, come to Paris, to Constantinople, to all the East! Never mind\nabout love yet, we won't talk about that, for I don't really flatter\nmyself you love me; I'm only sure you don't love Ian--\"\n\nMilly had listened to him so far, drawing herself back to the farthest\nend of the canoe, half petrified with amazement, half dominated by his\npowerful personality. At these words her pallor gave way to a scarlet\nflush.\n\n\"How dare you!\" she cried, in a voice tremulous with indignation. \"How\ndare you talk to me like this? How dare you name my husband? You brought\nme out here on purpose to say such things to me? Oh, it's abominable,\nit's disgraceful!\"\n\nThere was no room for doubt as to the sincerity of her indignation.\nMaxwell drew back and his face changed. There were patches of dull red\non his cheeks, almost as though he had been struck, and his narrow eyes\nglittered. Looking at him, Milly felt physical fear; she thought once\nmore of insanity. There was a silence; then she spoke again.\n\n\"Put me on to the bank here, please. I'll walk back.\"\n\n\"I shall let you go when I choose,\" returned he, in a grating voice. \"I\nhave something to say to you first.\"\n\nHe paused and his frown darkened upon her. \"You asked me how I 'dared.'\nDare! Do you take me for a dog, to be chained up and tantalized with\nnice bits, and hardly allowed to whine for them? I say, how dare you\nentice me with your beauty--it's decked out now for me--entice me with\nall your beguiling ways, your pretence of longing to go away and to live\nthe free life in the East as I live it? Now, when you've made me want\nyou--what else have you been aiming at? You pretend to be surprised, you\npretend even to yourself, to be dreadfully shocked. What damned humbug!\nWith us only the dancing-girls venture to play such tricks as you do,\nand they daren't go too far, because the men are men and wear knives.\nBut here you proper women, with your weakness unnaturally protected, you\ngo about pretending you don't know there's such a thing in the world as\ndesire--oh, of course not!--and all the while you're deliberately\nexciting it and playing upon it.\"\n\nMildred had been right in saying that the gentle Milly could be in a\nrage; though it was a thing that had happened to her only once or twice\nbefore since her childhood. It happened now. Anger, burning anger,\nextinguished the fear that had held her silent while he was speaking.\n\n\"It's false!\" she cried, with burning face and blazing eyes. \"It's\ndisgraceful of you to say such things--it's degrading for me to have to\nhear them. I will get away from you, if I have to jump into the river.\"\n\nShe started forward, but Maxwell, with his tall, lithe body and long\narms, had a great reach. He leaned forward and his iron hands were upon\nher shoulders, forcing her back.\n\n\"Don't be a fool,\" he said, still fierce in eye and voice.\n\nHer lips trembled with fury so that she could hardly speak.\n\n\"Do you consider yourself a gentleman?\"\n\nHe laughed scornfully.\n\n\"I don't consider the question at all. I am a man; you are a woman, and\nyou have presumed to make a plaything of me. You thought you could do it\nwith impunity because we are civilized, because you are a lady; for\nbar-maids and servant-girls do get their throats cut sometimes still.\nDon't be frightened, I'm not going to kill you, but I mean to make you\nunderstand for once that these privileges of weakness are humbug, that\nthey're not in nature. I mean to teach you that a man is a better\nanimal--\"\n\nHe suddenly withdrew his hands from her with a sharp exclamation.", "start_char_idx": 218831, "end_char_idx": 222616, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309": {"__data__": {"id_": "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2892056d1b58e65c0343c7b6d34300e47fa41ebcdc491e7ead425450ff8dcc29", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8f761aa08b330d860e683979e7c65786095d0e81ff7a9cb8a4079ff3f8651590", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Milly's teeth were pearly white and rather small, but they were pointed,\nand they had met in the flesh of the right hand which rested so firmly\non her shoulder. He fell back and put his hand to his mouth. A boat-hook\nlay within her reach, and her end of the canoe had drifted near enough\nto the river-bank for her to be able to catch hold with the hook and to\npull it farther in. Braced to the uttermost by rage and fear, she\nbounded to her feet without upsetting the canoe. It lurched violently,\nbut righted itself, swinging out once more into the stream. Maxwell\nlooked up and saw her standing on the river-bank above him. She did not\nstay to parley, but with lifted skirt hurried up the steep meadow,\nthrough the sun-flecked shadows of the elm-trees, towards the path. When\nshe was half-way up a harsh, sardonic laugh sounded behind her, and\ninstinctively she looked back. Maxwell held up his wounded hand:\n\n\"Primitive woman at last, Mildred!\" he shouted. \"Don't apologize, I\nsha'n't.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII\n\n\nIan only came home just in time to scramble into his evening dress-suit\nfor a dinner at the Fletchers'. He needed not to fear delay either from\nthat shirt-button at the back, refractory or on the last thread, or from\nany other and more insidious trap for the hurrying male. Milly looked\nafter him in a way which, if the makers of traditions concerning wives\nwere not up to their necks in falsehood, must have inspired devotion in\nthe heart of any husband alive. She had already observed that he had\nbeen allowed to lose most of the pocket-handkerchiefs she had marked for\nhim in linen thread. That trifles such as this should cause bitterness\nwill seem as absurd to sensible persons as it would to be told that our\nlives are made up of mere to-morrows--if Shakespeare had not happened to\nput that in his own memorable way. For it takes a vast deal of\nimagination to embrace the ordinary facts of life and human nature. But\neven the most sensible will understand that it was annoying for Milly\nregularly to find her own and the family purse reduced to a state that\ndemanded rigid economy. The Invader, stirring in that limbo where she\nlay, might have answered that rigid economy was Milly's forte and real\ndelight, and that it was well she should have nothing to spend in\nridiculously disguising the fair body they were condemned to share.\nMildred certainly left behind her social advantages which both Ian and\nMilly enjoyed without exactly realizing their source, while her\nbric-\u00e0-brac purchases, from an eighteenth-century print to a Chinese\nivory, were always sure to be rising investments. But all such minor\nmiseries as her invasion might multiply for Milly, were forgotten in the\nhorror of the abyss that had now opened under her feet. For long after\nthat second return of hers, on the night of the thunderstorm, a shadow,\na dreadful haunting thought, had hovered in the back of her mind.\nGradually it had faded with the fading of a memory; but to-night the\ncolors of that memory revived, the thought startled into a more vivid\nexistence.\n\nIn the press and hurry of life, not less in Oxford than in other modern\ntowns, the Stewarts and Fletchers did not meet so often and intimately\nas to make inevitable the discovery of Mildred Stewart's dual\npersonality by her cousins. They said she had developed moods; but with\nthe conservatism of relations, saw nothing in her that they had not seen\nin her nursery days.\n\nIan and Milly walked home from dinner, according to Oxford custom, but a\nDurham man walked with them, talking over a College question with Ian,\nand they did not find themselves alone until they were within the\nwainscoted walls of the old house. Milly had looked so pale all the\nevening that Ian expected her to go to bed at once; but she followed\nhim into the study, where the lamp was shedding its circle of light on\nthe heaped books and papers of his writing-table. Making some\nperfunctory remarks which she barely answered, he sat down to work at an\naddress which he was to deliver at the meeting of a learned society in\nLondon.\n\nMilly threw off her white shawl and seated herself on the old,\nhigh-backed sofa.", "start_char_idx": 222617, "end_char_idx": 226755, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9": {"__data__": {"id_": "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "06cb526defe3124bee7fe4f4bb5db5d11df52bbc3254c1b49c7502625e3c5e89", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b10a6cf357fe95370842ac6e03d5f84ca3c507a045abaa88eecf6b11ed8b8e31", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Milly threw off her white shawl and seated herself on the old,\nhigh-backed sofa. Her dress was of some gauzy material of indeterminate\ntone, interwoven with gold tinsel, and a scarf of gauze embroidered with\ngold disguised what had seemed to her an over-liberal display of\ndazzling shoulders. Ian, absorbed in his work, hardly noticed his wife\nsitting in the penumbra, chin on hand, staring before her into\nnothingness, like some Cassandra of the hearth, who listens to the\ninevitable approaching footsteps of a tragic destiny. At last she said:\n\n\"I've got something awful to tell you.\"\n\nIan startled, dropped his pen and swung himself around in his pivot\nchair.\n\n\"What about? Tony?\"--for it was to this diminutive that Mildred had\nreduced the flowing syllables of Antonio.\n\n\"No, your cousin, Maxwell Davison.\"\n\nNow, Ian liked his cousin well enough, but by no means as well as he\nliked Tony.\n\n\"About Max!\" he exclaimed, relieved. \"What's happened to him?\"\n\n\"Nothing--but oh, Ian! I--hate even to speak of such a thing--\"\n\n\"Never mind. Just tell me what it is.\"\n\n\"I was on the river with him this afternoon, and he--he made love to\nme.\"\n\nThe lines of Ian's face suddenly hardened.\n\n\"Did he?\" he returned, significantly, playing with a paper-knife. Then,\nafter a pause: \"I'm awfully sorry, Milly. I'd no idea he was such a\ncad.\"\n\n\"He--he wanted me to run away with him.\"\n\nIan's face became of an almost inhuman severity.\n\n\"I shall let Maxwell Davison know my opinion of him,\" he said.\n\n\"But it's worse--it's even more horrible than that. He was expecting me.\nI--_I_ of course knew nothing about it; I only knew about the\ngarden-party at Lady Margaret. But he said I'd promised to come; he said\nall kinds of shocking, horrid things about my having dressed myself up\nfor him--\"\n\n\"Please don't tell me what he said, Milly,\" Ian interrupted, still\ncoldly, but with a slight expression of disgust. \"I'd rather you didn't.\nI suppose I ought to have taken better care of you, my poor little girl,\nbut really here in Oxford one never thinks of anything so outrageous\nhappening.\"\n\n\"I must tell you one thing,\" she resumed, almost obstinately. \"He said\nhe knew I didn't love you--that _I_ didn't love _you_, my own darling\nhusband. Some one, some one--must be responsible for his thinking that.\nHow do I know what happens when--when I'm away. My poor Ian! Left with a\ncreature who doesn't love you!\"\n\nIan rose. His face was cold and hard still, but there was a faint flush\non his cheek, the mark of a frown between his black brows. He walked to\na window and looked out into the moonlit garden, where the gnarled\napple-trees threw weird black shadows on grass and wall, like shapes of\ngrotesque animals, or half-hidden spectres, lurking, listening, waiting.\n\n\"We're getting on to a dangerous subject,\" he answered, at length.\n\"Don't give me pain by imagining evil about--about yourself. You could\nnever, under any aspect, be anything but innocent and loyal and all that\na man could wish his wife to be.\"\n\nHe smoothed his brow with an effort, went up to her, and taking her soft\nface between his hands kissed her forehead.\n\n\"There!\" he exclaimed, with a forced smile. \"Don't let's talk about it\nany more, darling. Go to bed and forget all about it. It won't seem so\nbad to-morrow morning.\"\n\nBut Milly did not respond. When he released her head she threw it back\nagainst her own clasped hands, closing her eyes. She was ghastly pale.\n\n\"No,\" she moaned, \"I can't bear it by myself. It's too, too awful. It's\nnot Me; it's something that takes my place. I saw it once. It's an evil\nspirit. O God, what have I done that such a thing should happen to me!\nI've always tried to be good.\"\n\nThere was a clash of pity and anger in Ian's breast.", "start_char_idx": 226675, "end_char_idx": 230395, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade": {"__data__": {"id_": "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "9bd9b65724f380fdbfce797cffa7b5dd42859390285fbf28d47da7287f1c9681", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "490b853e9cd32fb620acf2843fcc3b59a03e87bfbd25a8e6bb1e4048a65f6c58", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There was a clash of pity and anger in Ian's breast. Pity for Milly's\ncase, anger on account of her whom his inmost being recognized as\nanother, whatever his rational self might say to the matter. He sat\ndown beside his wife and uttered soothing nothings. But she turned upon\nhim eyes of wild despair, the more tragic because it broke through a\nnature fitted only for the quietest commonplaces of life. She flung\nherself upon him, clutching him tight, hiding her face upon him.\n\n\"What have I done?\" she moaned again. \"You know I always believed in\nGod, in God's love. I wouldn't have disbelieved even if He'd taken you\naway from me. But now I can't believe in anything. There must be wicked\nspirits, but there can't be a good God if He allows them to take\npossession of a poor girl like me, who's never done any one any harm. O\nIan, I've tried to pray, and I can't. I don't believe in anything now.\"\n\nIan was deeply perplexed. He himself believed neither in a God nor in\nevil spirits, and he knew not how to approach Milly's mind. At length he\nsaid, quietly:\n\n\"I should have expected you, dear, to have reasoned about this a little\nmore. What's the use of being educated if we give way to superstition,\nlike savages, directly something happens that we don't quite understand?\nSome day an eclipse of conscious personality, like yours, will come to\nbe understood as well as an eclipse of the moon. Don't let's make it\nworse by conjuring up superstitious terrors.\"\n\n\"At first I thought it was like that--an eclipse of memory. But now I\nfeel more and more it's a different person that's here, it's not I.\nTo-night Cousin David said that sometimes when he met me he expected to\nfind when he got home that his Lady Hammerton had walked away out of the\nframe. And, Ian, I looked up at that portrait, and suddenly I was\nreminded of--that fearful night when I came back and saw--something. I\nam descended from that woman, and you know how wicked she was.\"\n\nAgain the strange irritation stirred in the midst of Ian's pity.\n\n\"Wicked, darling! That's an absurd word to use.\"\n\n\"She left her husband. And it's awful that I, who can't understand how\nany woman could be so wicked as to do that, should be so terribly like\nher. I feel as though it had something to do with this appalling thing\nhappening to me. Perhaps her sins are being visited on me.\" She held the\nlapels of his coat and looked tenderly, yearningly, in his face. \"And I\ncould bear it better if--But oh, my Ian! I can't bear to think of you\nleft with something wicked, with some one who doesn't love you, who\ndeceives you, and--\"\n\n\"Milly,\" he broke in, \"I won't have you say things like that. They are\nabsolutely untrue, and I won't have them said.\"\n\nThere was a note of sternness in his voice that Milly had never heard\nbefore, and she saw a hard look come into his averted face which was new\nto her. When she spoke it was in a gasp.\n\n\"You love her? You love that wicked, bad woman so much you won't let me\ntell you what she is?\"\n\nHe drew himself away from her with a gesture, and in a minute answered\nwith cold deliberation:\n\n\"I cannot cease to love my own wife because--because she's not always\nexactly the same.\"\n\nThey sat silent beside each other. At length Milly rose from the sofa.\nThe tinselled scarf, that other woman's delicate finery, had slipped\nfrom the white beauty of her shoulders. She drew it around her again\nslowly, and slowly with bowed head left the room.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\n\nBetween noon and one o'clock on a bright June morning there is no place\nin the world quite so full of sunshine and summer as the quadrangle of\nan Oxford College. Not Age but Youth of centuries smiles from gray walls\nand aery pinnacles upon the joyous children of To-day.", "start_char_idx": 230343, "end_char_idx": 234061, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d": {"__data__": {"id_": "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "bc5c76093a792ad48cb0d7afe7b04966bbe94e79481284233361f61724aac45f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d0884853a5ad5f7a24269303a911092bce1b8cc93ad7d15e7c81e2fc370d8c55", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Youth, in a\nbright-haired, black-winged-butterfly swarm, streams out of every dark\ndoorway, from the austere shade of study, to disport itself, two by two,\nor in larger eddying groups, upon the worn gravel, even venturously\nflits across the sacred green of the turf. There is an effervescence of\nlife in the clear air, and the sun-steeped walls of stone are resonant\nwith the cheerful noise of young voices. Here and there men already in\nflannels pass towards the gate; Dons draped in the black folds of the\nstately gown, stand chatting with their books under their arms; and\nsince the season of festivity has begun, scouts hurry cautiously to and\nfro from buttery and kitchen, bearing brimming silver cups crowned with\nblue borage and floating straws, or trays of decorated viands. The\nscouts are grave and careworn, but from every one else a kind of\nphysical joy and contentment seems to breathe as perfume breathes from\nblossoms and even leaves, in the good season of the year.\n\nIan Stewart did not quite resist this atmosphere of physical\ncontentment. He stood in the sunshine exchanging a few words with\npassing pupils; yet at the back of his mind there was a deep distress.\nHe had been brought up in the moral refinement, the honorable strictness\nof principle with regard to moral law, common to his academic class,\nand, besides, he had an innate delicacy and sensibility of feeling. If\nhis intelligence perceived that there are qualities, individualities\nwhich claim exemption from ordinary rules, he had no desire to claim any\nsuch exemption for himself. Yet he found himself occupying the position\nof a man torn on the rack between a jealous wife for whom he has\naffection and esteem, and a mistress who compels his love. Only here was\nnot alone a struggle but a mystery, and the knot admitted of no\nseverance.\n\nHe looked around upon his pupils, upon the distant figures of his fellow\nDons, robed in the same garb, seemingly living the same life as himself.\nWhere was fact, where was reality? In yonder phantasmagoric procession\nof Oxford life, forever repeating itself, or in this strange\ntragi-comedy of souls, one in two and two in one, passing behind the\nthick walls of that old house in the street nearby? There he stood among\nthe rest, part and parcel apparently of an existence as ordinary, as\npeaceful, as monotonous as the Victorian era could produce. Yet if he\nwere to tell any one within sight the plain truth concerning his life,\nit would be regarded as a fairy tale, the fantastic invention of an\noverwrought brain.\n\nThere is something in college life which fosters a reticence that is\nalmost secretiveness; and this becomes a code, a religion; yet Stewart\nfound himself seized with an intense longing to confide in someone. And\nat that moment, from under the wide archway leading into the quadrangle,\nappeared the Master of Durham. The Master was in cap and gown, and\ncarried some large papers under his arm; he walked slowly, as he had\ntaken to walking of late, his odd, trotting gait transformed almost to a\nhobble. Meditative, he looked straight before him with unseeing eyes. No\nartist was ever able to seize the inner and the outer verity of that\nround, pink baby face, filled with the power of a weighty personality\nand a penetrating mind. Stewart marked him in that minute, sagacity and\nbenevolence, as it were, silently radiating from him; and the younger\nman in his need turned to the wise Master, the paternal friend whose\ncounsels had done so much to set his young feet in the way of success.\n\nWhen Stewart found himself in the Master's study, the study so familiar\nto his youth, with its windows looking out on the garden quadrangle, and\nsaw the great little man himself seated before him at the writing-table,\nhe marvelled at the temerity that had brought him there to speak on such\na theme. But the cup was poured and had to be drunk. The Master left him\nto begin. He sat with a plump hand on each plump knee, and regarded his\nold pupil with silent benevolence.", "start_char_idx": 234062, "end_char_idx": 238060, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2": {"__data__": {"id_": "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "b6f8e1dbe2f740fa000ba0e17cc2862f504456fb2e7d84584ab7fcb6b71bcbb8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "863d0f6845e8424626034d41642c3a089e0d161f60a64e1af8c5cb4ff3a89786", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I've come to see you, Master,\" said Stewart, \"because I feel very\nbewildered, very helpless, in a matter which touches my wife even more\nthan myself. You were so kind about my marriage, and you have always\nbeen good to her as well as to me.\"\n\n\"Miss Flaxman was a nice young lady,\" squeaked the Master. \"I knew you\nmarried wisely.\"\n\n\"Something happened shortly before we were engaged which she--we didn't\nquite grasp--its importance, I mean,\" Stewart began. He then spoke of\nthose periodical lapses of memory in his wife which he had come to see\ninvolved real and extraordinary variations in her character--a change,\nin fact, of personality. He mentioned their futile visits to\nNorton-Smith, the brain and nerve specialist. The Master heard him\nwithout either moving or interrupting. When he had done there was a\nsilence. At length the Master said:\n\n\"I suspect we don't understand women.\"\n\n\"Perhaps not. But, Master, haven't you yourself noticed a great\ndifference in my wife at various times?\"\n\n\"Not more than I feel in myself--not of another character, that is. We\nlive among men; we live among men who, generally speaking, know nothing\nabout women. That's why women appear to us strange and unnatural. Your\nwife's quite normal, really.\"\n\n\"But the memory alone, surely--\"\n\n\"That's made you nervous; but I've known cases not far different. You\nremember meeting Sir Henry Milwood here? When I knew him he was a young\nclergyman. He had an illness; forgot all about his clerical life, and\nwent sheep-farming in Australia, where he made his fortune.\"\n\n\"But his personality?\" asked Stewart, with anxiety. \"Was that changed?\"\n\n\"Certainly. A colonial sheep-farmer is a different person from a young\nDon just in orders.\"\n\n\"I don't mean that, Master. I mean did he rise from his bed with ideas,\nwith feelings quite opposite to those which had possessed him when he\nlay down upon it? Did he ever have a return of the clerical phase,\nduring which he forgot how he became a sheep-farmer and wished to take\nup his old work again?\"\n\n\"No--no.\"\n\nThere was a pause. The Master played with his gold spectacles and sucked\nhis under lip. Then:\n\n\"Take a good holiday, Stewart,\" he said.\n\nStewart's clear-cut face hardened and flushed momentarily. \"These are\nnot fancies of my own, Master. Cases occur in which two, sometimes more\nthan two, entirely different personalities alternate in the same\nindividual. The spontaneous cases are rare, of course, but hypnotism\nseems to develop them pretty freely. The facts are there, but English\nscientists prefer to say nothing about them.\"\n\nThe Master rose and trotted restlessly about.\n\n\"They're quite right,\" he returned, at length. \"Such ideas can lead to\nnothing but mischief.\"\n\n\"Surely that is the orthodox theologian's usual objection to scientific\nfact.\"\n\nThe Master lifted his head and looked at his rebel disciple. For\nalthough he was an officiating clergyman, he and the orthodox\ntheologians were at daggers drawn.\n\n\"Views, statements of this kind are not knowledge,\" he said, after a\nwhile, and continued moving uneasily about without looking at Stewart.\n\nStewart did not reply; it seemed useless to go on talking. He recognized\nthat the Master's attitude was what his own had been before the iron of\nfact had entered into his flesh and spirit. Yet somehow he had hoped\nthat his Master's large and keen perception of human things, his\njudicial mind, would have lifted him above the prejudices of Reason. He\nsat there cheerless, his college cap between his knees; and was seeking\nthe moment to say good-bye when the Master suddenly sat down beside him.\nTo any one looking in at the window, the two seated side by side on the\nhard sofa would have seemed an oddly assorted pair. Stewart's length of\nframe, the raven black of his hair and beard, the marble pallor of his\ndelicate features, made the little Master look smaller, pinker, plumper\nthan usual; but his face, radiating wisdom and affection, was more than\nbeautiful in the eyes of his old disciple.\n\n\"I took a great interest in your marriage, Stewart,\" he said. \"I always\nthink of you and your wife as two very dear young friends.", "start_char_idx": 238062, "end_char_idx": 242178, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2": {"__data__": {"id_": "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "e6316d101f47b2b0c11051061528e9edc5400d23662d0eb1e3801ac915a850d4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d15199f7405b832803a3aa6eb2124b5c5a0078ede3498d3595849fb5e0645c71", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I always\nthink of you and your wife as two very dear young friends. You must let\nme speak to you now as a father might--and probably wouldn't.\"\n\nStewart assented with affectionate reverence.\n\n\"You are young, but your wife is much younger. A man marries a girl\nmany years younger than himself and has not the same feeling of\nresponsibility towards her as he would have towards a young man of the\nsame age. He seldom considers her youth. Yet his responsibility is much\ngreater towards her than towards a pupil of the same age; she needs more\nhelp, she will accept more in forming her mind and character. Now you\nhave married a young lady who is very intelligent, very pleasing; but\nshe has a delicate nervous system, and it has been overstrained. She\nlets this peculiar weakness of her memory get on her nerves. You have\nnerves yourself, you have imagination, and you let your mind give way to\nhers. That's not wise; it's not right. Let her feel that these moods do\nnot affect you; be sure that they do not. What matters mainly is that\nyour mutual love should remain unchanged. When your wife finds that her\nhappiness, her real happiness, is quite untouched by these changes of\nmood, she will leave off attributing an exaggerated importance to them.\nSo will you, Stewart. You will see them in their right proportion; you\nwill see the great evil and danger of giving way to imagination, of\naccepting perverse psychological hypotheses as guides in life. Reason\nand Religion are the only true guides.\"\n\nThe Master did not utter these sayings continuously. There were pauses\nwhich Stewart might have filled, but he did not offer to do so. The\nspell of his old teacher's mind and aspect was upon him. His spirit was,\nas it were, bowed before his Master in a kind of humility.\n\nHe walked home with a lightened heart, feeling somewhat as a devout\nsinner might feel to whom his confessor had given absolution. For about\ntwenty-four hours this mood lasted. Then he confronted the fact that the\nbeloved Master's advice had been largely, though not altogether, futile,\nbecause it had not dealt with actuality. And Ian Stewart saw himself to\nbe moving in the plain, ordinary world of men as solitary as a ghost\nwhich vainly endeavors to make its presence and its needs recognized.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\n\nTims had ceased to be an inhabitant of Oxford. She was studying\nphysiology in London and luxuriating in the extraordinary cheapness of\nlife in Cranham Chambers. Not that she had any special need of\ncheapness; but the spinster aunt who brought her up had, together with a\ncomfortable competence, left her the habit of parsimony. If, however,\nshe did not know how to enjoy her own income, she allowed many women\npoorer than herself to benefit by it.\n\nShe was no correspondent; and an examination, followed by the serious\nillness of her next-door neighbor--Mr. Fitzalan, a solitary man with a\nsmall post in the British Museum--had prevented her from visiting Oxford\nduring Mildred's last invasion. She had imagined Milly Stewart to have\nbeen leading for two undisturbed years the busily tranquil life proper\nto her; adoring Ian and the baby, managing her house, and going\nsometimes to church and sometimes to committees, without wholly\nneglecting the cultivation of the mind. A letter from Milly, in which\nshe scented trouble, made her call herself sternly to account for her\nlong neglect of her friend.\n\nIt was now the Long Vacation, but Miss Burt was still at Ascham and\nLady Thomson was spending a week with her. She had stayed with the\nStewarts in the spring, and resolutely keeping a blind eye turned\ntowards whatever she ought to have disapproved in Mildred, had lauded\nher return to bodily vigor, and also to good sense, in ceasing to fuss\nabout the health of Ian and the baby. Aunt Beatrice would have blushed\nto own a husband and child whose health required care. This time when\nshe dined with the Stewarts she had found Milly reprehensibly pale and\ndispirited. One day shortly afterwards she came in to tea. The nurse\nhappened to be out, and Tony, now a beautiful child of fifteen months,\nwas sitting on the drawing-room floor.", "start_char_idx": 242110, "end_char_idx": 246230, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935": {"__data__": {"id_": "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "77bc118f67f742a26c26b1271b253966722ab05f4a2b159a2e40741bc3734b8f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b3e5c182dc2621d981230f5853dc442d0e203af4064fd3f010c3cbed523d2771", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The two women were discussing plans for raising money to build a\ngymnasium at Ascham, but Tony was not interested in the subject. He kept\nworking his way along the floor to his mother, partly on an elbow and a\nknee, but mostly on his stomach. Arrived at his goal he would pull her\nskirt, indicate as well as he could a little box lying by his neglected\npicture-book, and grunt with much expression. A monkey lived inside the\nbox, and Tony, whose memory was retentive, persevered in expecting to\nhear that monkey summoned by wild tattoos and subterranean growls until\nit jumped up with a bang--a splendidly terrible thing of white bristles,\nand scarlet snout--to dance the fandango to a lively if unmusical tune.\nThen Tony, be sure, would laugh until he rolled from side to side. Mummy\nnever responded to his wishes now, but Daddy had pleaded for the\nJack-in-the-box to be spared, and sometimes when quite alone with Tony,\nwould play the monkey-game in his inferior paternal style, pleased with\nsuch modified appreciation as the young critic might bestow upon him.\n\n\"I'm sorry Baby's so troublesome,\" apologized the distressed Milly, for\nthe third time lifting Tony up and replacing him in a sitting posture,\nwith his picture-book. \"I'm trying to teach him to sit quiet, but I'm\nafraid he's been played with a great deal more than he should have\nbeen.\"\n\n\"To tell the truth, I thought so the last time I was here,\" replied Aunt\nBeatrice. \"But he's still young enough to be properly trained. It's such\nwaste of a reasonable person's time to spend it making idiotic noises at\na small baby. And it's a thousand times better for the child's brain and\nnerves for it to be left entirely to itself.\"\n\nTony said nothing, but his face began to work in a threatening manner.\n\n\"I perfectly agree with you, Aunt Beatrice,\" responded Milly, eagerly.\n\nLady Thomson continued:\n\n\"Children should be spoken to as little as possible until they are from\ntwo to two and a half years old; then they should be taught to speak\ncorrectly.\"\n\nMilly chimed in: \"Yes, that's always been my own view. I do feel it so\nimportant that their very first impressions should be the right ones,\nthat the first pictures they see should be good, that they should never\nbe sung to out of tune and in general--\"\n\nApparently this programme for babies did not commend itself to Tony;\ncertainly the first item, enjoining silent development, did not. His\nface had by this time worked the right number of minutes to produce a\nroar, and it came. Milly picked him up, but the wounds of his spirit\nwere not to be immediately healed, and the roar continued. Finally he\nhad to be handed over to the parlor-maid, and so came to great happiness\nin the kitchen, where there were no rules against infantile\nconversation. Milly was flushed and disturbed.\n\n\"Baby has not been properly brought up,\" she said. \"He's been allowed\nhis own way too much.\"\n\n\"Since you say so, Milly, I must confess I noticed in the spring that\nyou seemed to be bringing the child up in an easy-going, old-fashioned\nway I should hardly have expected of you. I hope you will begin now to\nstudy the theory of education. A mother should take her vocation\nseriously. I own I don't altogether understand the taste for frivolities\nwhich you have developed since you married. It's harmless, no doubt, but\nit doesn't seem quite natural in a young woman who has taken a First in\nGreats.\"\n\nMilly's hands grasped the arms of her chair convulsively. She looked at\nher aunt with desolation in her dark-ringed eyes. The last thing she had\never intended was to mention the mysterious and disastrous fate that had\nbefallen her; yet she did it.\n\n\"The person you saw here last spring wasn't I. Oh, Aunt Beatrice! Can't\nyou see the difference?\"\n\nLady Thomson looked at her in surprise:\n\n\"What do you mean? I was speaking of my visit to you in March.\"\n\n\"And don't you see the difference? Oh, how hateful you must have found\nme!\"\n\n\"Really, Mildred, I saw nothing hateful about you.", "start_char_idx": 246232, "end_char_idx": 250209, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b": {"__data__": {"id_": "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "9d7e93e6eaf0ed08c5a51a3a8816ec33e97c37b9628aaa96ac1fcafe3630735c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "da177ee46a8ef6856e14b780a0e66f7e4cc9949dc99967746f7f15b92578d78d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Really, Mildred, I saw nothing hateful about you. On the contrary, if\nyou want the plain truth, I greatly prefer you in a cheerful,\ncommon-sense mood, as you were then, even if your high spirits do lead\nyou into a little too much frivolity. I think it a more wholesome, and\ntherefore ultimately a more useful, frame of mind than this causeless\ndepression, which leads you to take such a morbid, exaggerated view of\nthings.\"\n\nEvery word pierced Milly's heart with a double pang.\n\n\"You liked her better than me?\" she asked, piteously. \"Yet I've always\ntried to be just what you wanted me to be, Aunt Beatrice, to do\neverything you thought right, and she--Oh, it's too awful!\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Mildred?\"\n\n\"I mean that the person you prefer to me as I am now, the person who was\nhere in March, wasn't I at all.\"\n\nThe fine healthy carnation of Lady Thomson's cheek paled. In her calm,\nrapid way she at once found the explanation of Milly's unhealthy,\ndepressed appearance and manner. Poor Mildred Stewart was insane. Beyond\nthe paling of her cheek, however, Lady Thomson allowed no sign of shock\nto be visible in her.\n\n\"That's an exaggerated way of talking,\" she replied. \"I suppose you mean\nyour mood was different.\"\n\nMilly was looking straight in front of her with haggard eyes.\n\n\"No; it simply wasn't I at all. You believe in the Bible, don't you?\"\n\n\"Not in verbal inspiration, of course, but in a general way, yes,\"\nreturned Lady Thomson, puzzled but guarded.\n\n\"Do you believe in the demoniacs? In possession by evil spirits?\"\n\nMilly was not looking at vacancy now. Her desperate hands clutched the\narms of her chair, as she leaned forward and fixed her aunt with hollow\neyes, awaiting her reply.\n\n\"Certainly not! Most certainly not! They were obviously cases of\nepilepsy and insanity, misinterpreted by an ignorant age.\"\n\n\"No--it's all true, quite literally true. Three times, and for six\nmonths or more each time, I have been possessed by a spirit that cannot\nbe good. I know it's not. It takes my body, it takes the love of people\nI care for, away from me--\" Milly's voice broke and she pressed her\nhandkerchief over her face. \"You all think her--But she's bad, and some\nday she'll do something wicked--something that will break my heart, and\nyou'll all insist it was I who did it, and you'll believe I'm a wicked\nwoman.\"\n\nLady Thomson looked very grave.\n\n\"Mildred, dear,\" she said, \"try and collect yourself. It is really\nwicked of you to give way to such terrible fancies. Would God permit\nsuch a thing to happen to one of His children? We feel sure He would\nnot.\"\n\nMilly shook her head, but the struggle with her hysterical sobs kept her\nsilent. Lady Thomson walked to the window, feeling more \"upset\" than she\nhad ever felt in her life. The window was open, but an awning shut out\nthe view of the street. From the window-boxes, filled with pink\ngeraniums and white stocks, a sweet, warm scent floated into the room,\nand the rattle of the milkman's cart, the chink of his cans, fell upon\nLady Thomson's unheeding ears. So did voices in colloquy, but she did\nnot particularly note a female one of a thin, chirpy quality, addressing\nthe parlor-maid with a familiarity probably little appreciated by that\nelegantly decorous damsel.\n\nMilly had scarcely mastered her tears and Lady Thomson had just begun to\naddress her in quiet, firm tones, when Tims burst unannounced into the\nroom. Her hat was incredibly on one side, and her sallow face almost\ncrimson with heat, but bright with pleasure at finding herself once more\nin Oxford.\n\n\"Hullo, old girl!\" she cried, blind to the serious scene into which she\nwas precipitated. \"How are you? Now don't kiss me\"--throwing herself\ninto an attitude of violent defence against an embrace not yet\noffered--\"I'm too hot. Carried my bag myself all the way from the\nstation and saved the omnibus.\"", "start_char_idx": 250159, "end_char_idx": 253997, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2": {"__data__": {"id_": "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2ced7b6ddef4e20211e70213e7663dfd9d5b043eade4407758bb98099adbaa9f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3a8352d7a21e4e26dafe8543595682906374f64e1b8c4c2cf45c711cdd40b86c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Carried my bag myself all the way from the\nstation and saved the omnibus.\"\n\nLady Thomson fixed Tims with a look of more than usually cold\ndisapproval. Milly proffered a constrained greeting.\n\n\"Anything gone wrong?\" asked Tims, after a minute, peering at Milly's\ntear-stained eyes with her own short-sighted ones.\n\nMilly answered with a forced self-restraint which appeared like cold\ndeliberation.\n\n\"Aunt Beatrice thinks I'm mad because I say I'm not the same person she\nfound in my place last March. I want you to tell her that it's not just\nmy fancy, but that you know that sometimes a quite different person\ntakes my place, and I'm not responsible for anything she says or does.\"\n\n\"Yes, that's a solemn Gospel fact, right enough,\" affirmed Tims.\n\nLady Thomson could hardly control her indignation, but she did, although\nshe spoke sternly to Tims.\n\n\"Do I understand you to say, Miss Timson, that it's a 'solemn Gospel\nfact'--Gospel! Good Heavens--that Milly is possessed by a devil?\"\n\nTims plumped down on the sofa and stared at Lady Thomson.\n\n\"Possessed by a devil? Good Lord, no! What do you mean?\"\n\n\"Mildred believes herself to be possessed by an evil spirit.\"\n\nTims turned to Milly in consternation.\n\n\"Milly, old girl! Come! Poor old Milly! I never thought you were so\nsuperstitious as all that. Besides, I know more about it than you do,\nand I tell you straight, you mayn't be quite such a good sort when\nyou're in your other phase, but as to there being a devil in it--well,\ndevil's all nonsense, but if that were so, I should like to have a devil\nmyself, and the more the merrier.\"\n\nMilly turned on her a face pale with horror and indignation. Her eyes\nflashed and she raised a remonstrating hand.\n\n\"Hush!\" she cried. \"Hush! You don't know what dreadful things you're\nsaying. I don't know exactly what this spirit is that robs me of my\nlife; I'm only sure it's not Me and it's not good.\"\n\n\"Whatever may be the matter with you, Mildred,\" said Lady Thomson, \"it\ncan't possibly be that. I suppose you have suffered from loss of memory\nagain and it's upset your nerves. Why will people have nerves? I should\nadvise you to go to Norton-Smith at once.\"\n\nMilly's tears were flowing again but she managed to reply:\n\n\"I've been to Dr. Norton-Smith, Aunt Beatrice. He doesn't seem to\nunderstand.\"\n\n\"He doesn't want to,\" interjected Tims, scornfully. \"You don't suppose a\nrespectable English nerve-doctor wants to know anything about\npsychology? They'd be interested in the case in France, or in the United\nStates, but they wouldn't be able to keep down Milly Number Two.\"\n\n\"Then what use would they be to me?\" asked Milly, despairingly. \"I can\nonly trust in God; and He seems to have forsaken me.\"\n\n\"No, no, my dear child!\" cried Lady Thomson. \"Don't talk in this painful\nway. I can't imagine what you mean, Miss Timson. It all sounds\ndreadfully mad.\"\n\n\"I can explain the whole case to you perfectly,\" stated Tims, with eager\nconfidence.\n\n\"I'd better go away,\" gasped Milly between her convulsive sobs. \"I can't\nbear any more. But Aunt Beatrice must know now. Tell her what you like,\nonly--only it isn't true.\"\n\nMilly fled to her bedroom; the long, low room, so perfect in its\nsimplicity, its windows looking away into the sunshine over the pleasant\nboughs of orchards and garden-plots and the gray shingled roofs of old\nhouses--the room from which on that November evening Milly's spirit had\nbeen absent while Ian, the lover whom she had never known, had watched\nhis Beloved, the Desire of his soul and sense, returning to him from the\nunimagined limbo to which she had again withdrawn.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\n\nWhen Ian came back from the Bodleian Library, where he was working, he\nheard voices talking in raised tones before he entered the drawing-room.", "start_char_idx": 253923, "end_char_idx": 257669, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337": {"__data__": {"id_": "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "554fe203b265ecc70ab445d29dadf261d3376d89fe6bcb69204fbd501c06f092", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bdc09d3c777e6e31c0b2ecca13819d5885281a80368e5c8b829ec89c168dd378", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He found no Milly there, but Lady Thomson and Miss Timson seated at the\nextreme ends of the same sofa and engaged in a heated discussion.\n\n\"It can't be true,\" Lady Thomson was stating firmly. \"If it were, what\nbecomes of Personal Immortality?\"\n\nMiss Timson had just time to convey the fact that Personal Immortality\nwas not the affair of a woman of science, before she rose to greet Ian,\nwhich she did effusively.\n\n\"Hullo!\" he remarked, cheerfully, when her effusion was over. \"No Milly\nand no tea!\"\n\n\"We don't want either just yet,\" returned Lady Thomson. \"I'm terribly\nanxious about Mildred, Ian, and Miss Timson has not said anything to\nmake me less so. I want a sound, sensible opinion on the state of\nher--her nerves.\"\n\nIan's brow clouded.\n\n\"Tell me frankly, do you notice so great a difference in her from time\nto time, as to account for the positively insane delusion she has got\ninto her head?\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Aunt Beatrice?\" asked Ian, shortly, sternly eying\nTims, whom he imagined to have let out the secret.\n\n\"Mildred has made an extraordinary statement to me about not being the\nsame person now as she was in March. Of course I see she--well, she is\nnot so full of life as she was then. Yes, I do admit she is in a very\ndifferent mood. But do you know the poor unfortunate child has got it\ninto her head that she is possessed by an evil spirit? I can't think how\nyou could have allowed her to come to that state of--of mental\naberration, without doing anything.\"\n\nIan was silent. He looked gaunt and sombrely dark in the low,\nawning-shaded room, with its heavy beams and floor of wavelike\nunevenness.\n\n\"You'll have to put her under care next, if you don't take some steps.\nSend her for a sea-voyage.\"\n\n\"I'd take her myself if I thought it would do her any good,\" said Tims.\n\"But I'll lay my bottom dollar it wouldn't.\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I think Miss Timson's view of the matter as insane as\nMilly's,\" returned Lady Thomson, tartly.\n\nIan lifted his bowed head and addressed Tims:\n\n\"I should like to know exactly what your view of the matter is, Miss\nTimson. We need not discuss poor Milly's; it's too absurd and also too\npainful.\"\n\n\"It's no doubt a case of disintegration of personality,\" replied Tims,\nafter a pause. \"Somewhere inside our brains must be a nerve-centre\nwhich co-ordinates most of our mental, our sensory and motor processes,\nin such a manner as to produce consciousness, volition, what we call\npersonality. But after all there are always plenty of activities within\nus going on independent of it. Your heart beats, your stomach\ndigests--even your memory works apart from your consciousness sometimes.\nNow suppose some shock or strain enfeebles your centre of consciousness,\nso that it ceases to be able to co-ordinate all the mental processes it\nhas been accustomed to superintend. What you call your personality is\nthe outcome of your memory and all your other faculties and tendencies\nworking together, checking and balancing each other. Suppose your centre\nof consciousness so enfeebled; suppose at the same time an enfeeblement\nof memory, causing you to completely forget external facts: certain of\nyour faculties and tendencies are left working and they are co-ordinated\nwithout an important part of the memory, without many other faculties\nand tendencies which checked and balanced them. Naturally you appear to\nyourself and to every one else a totally different person; but it's not\na new personality really, it's only a bit of the old one which goes on\nits own hook, while the rest is quiescent.\"\n\n\"This is the most abominably materialistic theory of the human mind I\never heard,\" exclaimed Lady Thomson, indignantly. \"The most degrading to\nour spiritual natures.\"\n\nIan leaned against the high, carved mantel-piece and pushed back the\nblack hair from his forehead.\n\n\"I'm not concerned with that,\" he replied, deliberately, discussing\nthis case so vitally near to him with an almost terrible calmness. \"But\nI can't feel that this disintegration theory altogether covers the\nground.", "start_char_idx": 257670, "end_char_idx": 261686, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75": {"__data__": {"id_": "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "1a9184ef959074e6e66c3174d9cc6317399c4e20fddad68e620149727e38147e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9edac91676c180c152ca8d7b12f49402b2163e4d9e3720d962c4ede2e0e36a6f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"But\nI can't feel that this disintegration theory altogether covers the\nground. There is no development of characteristics previously to be\nfound in Milly; on the contrary, the qualities of mind and character\nwhich she exhibits when--when the change comes over her, are precisely\nthe opposite of those she exhibits in what I presume we ought to call\nher normal state.\"\n\n\"There must be some reason for it, old chap, you know,\" returned Tims;\n\"and it seems to me that's the line you've got to move along, unless\nyou're an idiot and go in for devils or spiritualistic nonsense.\"\n\n\"I believe I've followed what you've been saying, Miss Timson,\" said\nLady Thomson, in her fullest tones; \"and I can assure you I feel under\nno necessity to become either a materialist or an idiot in consequence.\"\n\nIan spoke again.\n\n\"I don't profess to be scientific, but I do seem to see another possible\nline, running parallel with yours, but not quite the same. It's evident\nwe can inherit faculties, characteristics, from our ancestors which\nnever become active in us; but we know they must have been present in us\nin a quiescent state, because we can transmit them to children in whom\nthey become active. Mildred's father and mother, for example, are not\nscholars, although her grandfather and great-grandfather were; yet in\none of her parents at least there must be a germ of the scholar's\nfaculty which has never been developed, because Mildred has inherited\nit. Now why can't we develop all the faculties, the germs of which lie\nwithin our borders? Perhaps because we have each only a certain amount\nof what I'll call vital current. If the Nile could overflow the whole\ndesert it would all be fertilized, and perhaps if we had sufficient\nvital force we could develop all the faculties whose germs we inherit.\nSuppose by some accident, owing to a shock or strain, as you say, the\nflow of this vital current of ours is stopped in the direction in which\nit usually flows most strongly; its course is diverted and it fertilizes\ntracts of our brain and nervous system which before have been lying\nquiescent, sterile. If we lose the memory of our former lives, and if at\nthe same time hereditary faculties and tendencies, of the existence of\nwhich we were unaware, suddenly become active in us, we are practically\nnew personalities. Then say the vital current resumes its old course; we\nregain our memories, our old faculties, while the newly developed ones\nsink again into quiescence. We are once more our old selves. No doubt\nthis is all very unscientific, but so far Science seems to have nothing\nto say on the question.\"\n\n\"It certainly has not,\" commented Lady Thomson, decisively. \"I ought to\nknow what Science is, considering how often I've met Mr. Darwin and\nProfessor Huxley. Hypnotism and this kind of unpleasant talk is not\nScience. It's only a new variety of the hocus-pocus that's been imposing\non human weakness ever since the world began. I'd sooner believe with\npoor Milly that she's possessed by a devil. It's less silly to accept\ninherited superstitions than to invent brand-new ones.\"\n\n\"But we've got to account somehow for the extraordinary changes which\ntake place in Milly,\" sighed Ian, wearily.\n\nThe light lines across his forehead were showing as furrows, and Tims's\nwhole face was corrugated.\n\n\"No hocus-pocus about them, anyway,\" she said.\n\n\"There's a great deal of fancy about them,\" retorted Lady Thomson. \"A\nnervous, imaginative man like you, Ian, ought to be on your guard\nagainst allowing such notions to get hold of you. It's so easy to fancy\nthings are as you're afraid they may be, and then you influence Milly\nand she goes from bad to worse. I think I may claim to understand her if\nany one does, and all I see is that she gives way to moods. At first I\nthought it was a steady development of character; but I admit that when\nshe is unwell and out of spirits, she becomes just her old timid,\nover-conscientious self again. She's always been very easily influenced,\nvery dependent, and now--I hardly like to say such a thing of my own\nniece--but I fear there's a touch of hysteria about her.", "start_char_idx": 261607, "end_char_idx": 265709, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a": {"__data__": {"id_": "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3088c6f2a150ac6ad561306f654ed354020321fd8a4def2fc96def6cb9946318", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f4e02ee5707eef3e02cbed9c4d57cf48023d2e525f101e2f7747116f0d41013a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I've always\nheard that hysterical people, even when they've been perfectly frank and\ntruthful before, become deceitful and act parts till it's impossible to\ntell fact from falsehood with regard to them. I would suggest your\nletting Mildred come to me for a month or two, Ian. I feel sure I should\nsend her back to you quite cured of all this nonsense.\"\n\nAt this point Milly came in. Ian stretched out his hand towards her with\nprotective tenderness; but even at the moment when his whole soul was\nmoved by an impulse of compassion so strong that it seemed almost love,\na spirit within him arose and mocked at all hypotheses, telling him that\nthis poor stricken wife of his, seemingly one with the lady of his\nheart, was not she, but another.\n\n\"Aunt Beatrice was just saying you ought to get away from domestic cares\nfor a month or two, Milly,\" he said, as cheerfully as he could.\n\nLady Thomson explained.\n\n\"What you want is a complete change; though I don't know what people\nmean when they talk about 'domestic cares.' I should like to have you up\nat Clewes for the rest of the Long. Ian can look after the baby.\"\n\nMilly smiled at her sweetly, but rather as though she were talking\nnonsense.\n\n\"It's very kind of you, Aunt Beatrice, but Ian and I have never been\nparted for a day since we were married; I mean not when--and I don't\nfeel as though I could spare a minute of his company. And poor Baby,\ntoo! Oh no! But of course it's very good of you to think of it.\"\n\n\"Then you must all come to Clewes,\" decided Aunt Beatrice, after some\nremonstrance. \"That'll settle it.\"\n\n\"But my work!\" ejaculated Ian in dismay. \"How am I to get on at Clewes,\naway from the libraries?\"\n\n\"There are some things in life more important than books, Ian,\" returned\nLady Thomson.\n\n\"But it won't do a penn'orth of good,\" broke in Tims, argumentatively.\n\"I don't pretend to have more than a working hypothesis, but whoever\nelse may prove to be right, Lady Thomson's on the wrong line.\"\n\nLady Thomson surveyed her in silence; Ian took no notice of her remark.\nHe was looking before him with a sadness incomprehensible to the\nuncreative man--to the man who has never dreamed dreams and seen\nvisions; with the sadness of one who just as the cloudy emanations of\nhis mind are beginning to take form and substance sees them scattered,\nperhaps never again to reunite, by some cold breath from the relentless\noutside world of circumstance. He made his renunciation in silence;\nthen, with a quiet smile, he turned to Lady Thomson and answered her.\n\n\"You're very kind, Aunt Beatrice, and quite right. There are things in\nlife much more important than books.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\n\nSo the summer went by; a hot summer, passed brightly enough to all\nappearance in the spacious rooms and gardens of Clewes and in\nexpeditions among the neighboring fells. But to Ian it seemed rather an\nanxious pause in life. His work was at a stand-still, yet whatever the\noptimistic Aunt Beatrice might affirm, he could not feel that the shadow\nwas lifting from his wife's mind. To others she appeared cheerful in the\nquiet, serious way that had always been hers, but he saw that her whole\nattitude towards life, especially in her wistful, yearning tenderness\ntowards himself and Tony, was that of a woman who feels the stamp of\ndeath to be set upon her. At night, lying upon his breast, she would\nsometimes cling to him in an agony of desperate love, adjuring him to\ntell her the truth as to that Other: whether he did not see that she was\ndifferent from his own Milly, whether it were possible that he could\nlove that mysterious being as he loved her, his true, loving wife. Ian,\nwho had been wont to hold stern doctrines as to the paramount obligation\nof truthfulness, perjured himself again and again, and hoped the\nRecording Angel dropped the customary tear. But, however deep the\nperjury, before long he was sure to find himself obliged to renew it.\n\nTo a man of his sensitive and punctilious nature the situation was\nalmost intolerable.", "start_char_idx": 265710, "end_char_idx": 269697, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03": {"__data__": {"id_": "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "50dca6f52af1ac9836d4ef97ebe3c002ffea88e78d0b01a0cd924c14630074eb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "49d6669b6c58e9e91ddc3a8bacf8efbd9f2cb3e2d032100d7e715fe3d7913b65", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "To a man of his sensitive and punctilious nature the situation was\nalmost intolerable. The pity of this tender, innocent life, his care,\nwhich seemed like some little inland bird, torn by the tempest from its\nnative fields and tossed out to be the plaything of an immense and\nterrible ocean whose deeps no man has sounded! The pity of that other\nlife, so winged for shining flight, so armed for triumphant battle, yet\nheld down helpless in those cold ocean depths, and for pity's sake not\nto be helped by so much as a thought! Yet from the thorns of his hidden\nlife he plucked one flower of comfort which to him, the philosopher, the\nman of Abstract Thought, was as refreshing as a pious reflection would\nbe to a man of Religion. He had once been somewhat shaken by the dicta\nof the modern philosophers who relegate human love to the plane of an\nillness or an appetite. But where was the physical difference between\nthe woman he so passionately loved and the one for whom he had never\nfelt more than affection and pity? If from the strange adventure of his\nmarriage he had lost some certainties concerning the human soul, he had\ngained the certainty that Love at least appertains to it.\n\nOne hot afternoon Milly was writing her Australian letter under a\nspreading ilex-tree on the lawn. Lady Thomson and Ian were sitting there\nalso; he reading the latest French novel, she making notes for a speech\nshe had to deliver shortly at the opening of a Girls' High School.\n\nIt is sometimes difficult to find the right news for people who have\nbeen for some years out of England, and Milly, in the languor of her\nmelancholy, had relaxed the excellent habit formed under Aunt Beatrice\nof always keeping her mind to the subject in hand. She sat at the table\nwith one hand propping her chin, gazing dreamily at the bright\nflower-beds on the lawn and the big, square, homely house, brightened by\nits striped awnings. At length Aunt Beatrice looked up from her notes.\n\n\"Mooning, Milly!\" she exclaimed, in her full, agreeable voice. \"Now I\nsuppose you'll be telling your father you havn't time to write him a\nlong letter.\"\n\n\"Milly's not mooning; she's making notes, like you,\" Ian replied, for\nhis wife.\n\nMilly looked around at him in surprise, and then at her right hand. It\nheld a stylograph and had been resting on some scattered sheets of\nfoolscap that Ian had left there in the morning. She had certainly been\nscrawling on it a little, but she was not aware of having written\nanything. Yet the scrawl, partly on one sheet and partly on another, was\nwriting, very bad and broken, but still with a resemblance to her own\nhandwriting. She pored over it; then looked Ian in the eyes, her own\neyes large with a bewilderment touched with fear.\n\n\"I--I don't know what it means,\" she said, in a low, anxious tone.\n\n\"What's that?\" queried Aunt Beatrice. \"Can't read what you've written?\nYou remind me of our old writing-master at school, who used to say\ntragically that he couldn't understand how it was that when that\nhappened to a man he didn't just take a gun and shoot himself. I\nrecommend you the pond, Mildred. It's more feminine.\"\n\n\"Please don't talk to Milly like that,\" retorted Ian, not quite lightly.\n\"She always follows your advice, you know. It--it's only scrabbles.\"\n\nHe had left his chair and was leaning over the table, completely\npuzzled, first by Milly's terrified expression, then by what she had\nwritten, illegibly enough, across the two sheets of foolscap. He made\nout: \"You are only miserab ...\"--the words were interspersed with really\nillegible scrawls--\"... Go ... go ... Let me ... I want to live, I want\nto ... Mild ...\"\n\nMilly now wrote in her usual clear hand: \"Who wrote that?\"\n\nHe scribbled with his pencil: \"You.\"\n\nShe replied in writing: \"No. I know nothing about it.\"\n\nLady Thomson had taken up the newspaper, a thing she never did except at\nodd minutes, although she contrived to read everything in it that was\nreally worth reading.", "start_char_idx": 269611, "end_char_idx": 273560, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071": {"__data__": {"id_": "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "253ee8a91d94347932560afb1fecb76a36c69d567676d225f643ee39f0672045", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ae4c54575a9c64de9d2de3a3d39eeeb7af7d6c695428a5e315bdb1fbc9731d67", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Folding it up and looking at her watch, she\nexclaimed:\n\n\"A quarter of an hour before the carriage is round! Now don't go\ndawdling there, young people, and keep it standing in the sun.\"\n\nMilly stood up and gathered her writing-materials together. Aunt\nBeatrice's tall figure, its stalwart handsomeness disguised in uncouth\ngarments, passed with its usual vigorous gait across the burning\nsunlight on the lawn and broad gravel walk, to disappear under the\nawning of a French window. Milly, very pale, had closed her eyes and her\nhands were clasped. She trembled, but her voice and expression were calm\nand even resolute.\n\n\"The evil spirit is trying to get possession of me in another way now,\"\nshe said. \"But with God's help I shall be able to resist it.\"\n\nIan too was pale and disturbed. It was to him as though he had suddenly\nheard a beloved voice calling faintly for help.\n\n\"It's only automatic writing, dear,\" he replied. \"You may not have been\naware you were writing, but it probably reflects something in your\nthoughts.\"\n\n\"It does not,\" returned she, firmly. \"However miserable I may sometimes\nbe, I could never wish to give up a moment of my life with you, my own\nhusband, or to leave you and our child to the influence of this--this\nbeing.\"\n\nShe stretched out her arms to him.\n\n\"Please hold me, Ian, and will as I do, that I may resist this horrible\ninvasion. I have a feeling that you can help me.\"\n\nHe hesitated. \"I, darling? But I don't believe--\"\n\nShe approached him, and took hold of him urgently, looking him in the\neyes.\n\n\"Won't you do it, husband dear? Please, for my sake, even if you don't\nbelieve, promise you'll will to keep me here. Will it, with all your\nmight!\"\n\nWhat madness it was, this fantastic scene upon the well-kept lawn, under\nthe square windows of the sober, opulent North Country house! And the\nmaddest part of it all was the horrible reluctance he felt to comply\nwith his wife's wish. He seemed to himself to pause noticeably before\nanswering her with a meaningless half-laugh:\n\n\"Of course I'll promise anything you like, dear.\"\n\nHe put his arms around her and rested his face upon her golden head.\n\n\"Will!\" she whispered, and the voice was one of command rather than of\nappeal. \"Will! You have promised.\"\n\nHe willed as she commanded him.\n\nThe triple madness of it! He did not believe--and yet it seemed to him\nthat the being he loved best in all the world was struggling up from\nbelow, calling to him for help from her tomb; and he was helping her\nenemy to hold down the sepulchral stone above her. He put his hand to\nhis brow, and the sweat stood upon it.\n\nAunt Beatrice's masculine foot crunched the gravel. She stood there\ndressed and ready for the drive, beckoning them with her parasol. They\ncame across the lawn holding each other by the hand, and Milly's face\nwas calm, even happy. Aunt Beatrice smiled at them broadly with her\nlarge, handsome mouth and bright brown eyes.\n\n\"What, not had enough of spooning yet, you foolish young people! The\ncarriage will be round in one minute, and Milly won't be ready.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\n\nThere is a joy in the return of every season, though the return of\nspring is felt and celebrated beyond the rest. The gay flame dancing on\nthe hearth where lately all was blackness, the sense of immunity from\nthe \"wrongs and arrows\" of the skies and their confederate earth, the\nconcentration of the sense upon the intimate charms which four walls can\ncontain, bring to civilized man consolation for the loss of summer's\nlavish warmth and beauty. Children are always sensible of these opening\nfestivals of the seasons, but many mature people enjoy without realizing\nthem.\n\nTo Mildred the world was again new, and she looked upon its most\nfamiliar objects with the delighted eyes of a traveller returning to a\nfavorite foreign country. So she did not complain because when she had\nleft the earth it had been hurrying towards the height of June, and she\nhad returned to find the golden boughs of October already stripped by\ndevastating winds.", "start_char_idx": 273561, "end_char_idx": 277570, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4": {"__data__": {"id_": "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "1f376164715126559d7422b87b1a870f38202c164cd286f8c30421b7981242d4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "12511921e2906197d72f492ae30a6674fc480539a30441778b2050bf826f4f9f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The flames leaped merrily under the great carved\nmantel-piece in her white-panelled drawing-room, showing the date 1661,\nand the initials of the man who had put it there, and on its narrow\nshelf a row of Chelsea figures which she had picked up in various\ncorners of Oxford. The chintz curtains were drawn around the bay-window\nand a bright brass _scaldino_ stood in it, filled with the yellows and\nred-browns, the silvery pinks and mauves of chrysanthemums. The ancient\ncharm, the delicate harmony of the room, in which every piece of\nfurniture, every picture, every ornament, had been chosen with an\nexactness of taste seldom found in the young, made it more pleasurable\nto a cultivated eye than the gilded show drawing-rooms into which wealth\ntoo commonly crowds a medley of incongruous treasures and costly\nnullities.\n\nIt was a free evening for Ian, and as it was but the second since the\nDesire of his Eyes had returned to him, his gaze followed her movements\nin a contented silence, as she wandered about the room in her slight\ngrace, the whiteness of her skin showing through the transparency of a\nblack dress, which, although it was old, Milly would have thought\nunsuitable for a domestic evening. When everything was just where it\nshould be, she returned to the fire and sank into a chair thoughtfully.\n\n\"How I should like some rides,\" she said; \"but I suppose I can't have\nthem, not unless Maxwell Davison's still in Oxford.\"\n\nIan's face clouded.\n\n\"He's not,\" he returned, shortly; and knocked the ashes out of his pipe,\nhesitating as to how he should put what he had to say about Maxwell\nDavison.\n\nMildred put her hand over her eyes and leaned back in her chair.\nSuddenly the silence was broken by a burst of rippling laughter. Ian\nstarted; his own thoughts had not been so diverting.\n\n\"What's the joke, Mildred?\"\n\n\"Oh, Ian, don't you know? Max made love to Milly and she--she bit him!\nWasn't it frightfully funny?\" She laughed again, with a more inward\nenjoyment.\n\n\"I didn't know you bit him, although he richly deserved it; but of\ncourse I knew he made love to you. How do you know?\"\n\n\"It came to me just now in a sort of flash. I seemed to see him--to see\nher, floundering out of the canoe; and both of them in such a towering\nrage. It really was too funny.\"\n\nIan's face hardened.\n\n\"I am afraid I can't see the joke of a man making love to my wife.\"\n\n\"You old stupid! He'd never have dared to behave like that to me; but\nMilly's such an ass.\"\n\n\"Milly was frightened, shocked, as any decent woman would be to whom\nsuch a thing happened. She certainly didn't encourage Maxwell; but she\nfound an appointment already made for her to go on the river with him.\nNo doubt she took an exaggerated view of her--of your--good God,\nMildred, what am I to say?--well, of your relations with him.\"\n\nMildred had closed her eyes. A strange knowledge of things that had\npassed during her suppression was coming to her in glimpses.\n\n\"I know,\" she returned, in a kind of wonder at her own knowledge.\n\"Absurd! But Max did behave abominably. I couldn't have believed it of\nhim, even with that silly little baa-lamb. Of course she couldn't manage\nhim. She won't be able to manage Tony long.\"\n\n\"Please don't speak of--of your other self in that way, Mildred. You're\nvery innocent of the world in both your selves, and you must have been\nindiscreet or it would never have occurred to Maxwell to make love to\nyou.\"\n\nIan was actually frowning, his lips were tight and hard, the clear\npallor of his cheek faintly streaked with red. Mildred, leaning forward,\nlooked at him, interested, her round chin on her hands.\n\n\"Are you angry, Ian? I really believe you are. Is it with me?\"\n\n\"No, not with you. But of course I'm angry when I think of a fellow like\nthat, my own cousin, a man who has been a guest in my house over and\nover again, being cad enough to make love to my wife.\"", "start_char_idx": 277571, "end_char_idx": 281431, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f": {"__data__": {"id_": "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "68d7d63f55908c5b249e2a6856cfe57ba96e731fb78a2f9e616d1b4b9fcc017e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "873bdc1cb48a255cfee6609f1ba5d75b2c932f300817495eb3c98e3711c1e751", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mildred was smiling quietly to herself.\n\n\"How primitive you are, Ian!\" she said. \"I suppose men are primitive\nwhen they're angry. I don't mind, but it does seem funny _you_ should\nbe.\"\n\nHe looked at her, surprised.\n\n\"Primitive? What do you mean?\"\n\n\"What difference does it make, Max being your cousin, you silly old boy?\nYou'd hardly ever seen him till last winter. Clans aren't any use to us\nnow, are they? And when a man's got a house of his own, as Max had, or\neven a hotel, why should he be so grateful as all that for a few decent\nmeals? He's not in the desert, depending on you for food and protection.\nAnyhow, it seems curious to expect him to weigh little things like that\nin the balance against what is always said to be such a very strong\nfeeling as a man's love for a woman.\"\n\nMen often deplore that they have failed in their attempts fundamentally\nto civilize Woman. They would use stronger language if Woman often made\nattempts fundamentally to civilize them.\n\n\"Please don't look at me like that,\" Mildred said, tremulously, after a\npause. And the tears rushed to her eyes.\n\nIan's face softened, as leaning against the tall white mantel-piece he\nlooked down and met the tear-bright gaze of his beloved.\n\n\"Poor sweetheart!\" he exclaimed. \"You're just a child for all your\ncleverness, and you don't half understand what you're talking about. But\nlisten to me--\" He kneeled before her, bringing their heads almost on a\nlevel. \"I won't have any more affairs like this of Maxwell's. I dare say\nit was as much my fault as yours, but it mustn't happen again.\"\n\nShe dabbed away two tears that hung on her eyelashes, and looked at him\nwith such a bright alluring yet elusive smile as might have flitted\nacross the face of Ariel.\n\n\"How can I help it if Milly flirts? I don't believe I can help it if I\ndo myself. But I can tell you this, Ian--yes, really--\" Her soft white\narms went about his neck. \"I've never seen a man yet who was a patch\nupon you for cleverness and handsomeness and goodness and\naltogetherness. No! You really are the very nicest man I ever saw!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\n\nIn spite of the deepening dislike between the two egos which struggled\nfor the possession of Mildred Stewart's bodily personality, they had a\ncommon interest in disguising the fact of their dual existence. Yet the\ntransformation never occurred without producing its little harvest of\ninconveniences, and the difficulty of disguising the difference between\nthe two was the greater because of the number of old acquaintances and\nfriends of Milly Flaxman living in Oxford.\n\nThis was one reason why, when Ian was offered the headship of the\nMerchants' Guild College in London, Mildred encouraged him to take it.\nThe income, too, seemed large in comparison to their Oxford one; and the\ngreat capital, with its ever-roaring surge of life, drew her with a\nnatural magnetism. The old Foundation was being reconstructed, and was\nambitious of adorning itself with a name so distinguished as Ian\nStewart's, while at the same time obtaining the services of a man with\nso many of his best years still before him. Stewart, although he could\ndo fairly well in practical administration, if he gave his mind to it,\nhad won distinction as a student and man of letters, and feared that,\ndifficult as it was to combine the real work of his life with\nbread-and-butter-making in Oxford, it would be still more difficult to\ncombine it with steering the ship of the Merchants' Guild College. But\nhe had the sensitive man's defect of too often deferring to the judgment\nof others, less informed or less judicious than himself. He found it\nimpossible to believe that the opinion of the Master of Durham was not\nbetter than his own; and his old friend and tutor was strongly in favor\nof his accepting the headship. His most really happy and successful\nyears had been those later ones in which he had shone as the Head of the\nmost brilliant College in Oxford, a man of affairs and, in his\nindividual way, a social centre. Accordingly he found it impossible to\nbelieve that it might be otherwise with Ian Stewart.", "start_char_idx": 281433, "end_char_idx": 285508, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81": {"__data__": {"id_": "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "547bea4e44418697271e88a10f850ecea465e8e7949895046ec890839c2adbc0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ddb702e0d152c96dc1bc975f0b2a7bcffe7abbdc923072dad6bb9ad76174df24", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Accordingly he found it impossible to\nbelieve that it might be otherwise with Ian Stewart. The majority of\nIan's most trusted advisers were of the same opinion as the Master,\nsince the number of persons who can understand the conditions necessary\nto the productiveness of exceptional and creative minds is always few.\nBesides, most people at bottom are in Martha's attitude of scepticism\ntowards the immaterial service of the world.\n\nLady Thomson voiced the general opinion in declaring that a man could\nalways find time to do good work if he really wanted to do it. She\nrejoiced when Ian put aside the serious doubts which beset him and\naccepted the London offer. Mildred also rejoiced, although she regretted\nmuch that she must leave behind her, and in particular the old panelled\nhouse.\n\nThis was, however, the one part of Oxford that Milly did not grieve to\nhave lost, when she awoke once more from long months of sleep, to find\nherself in a new home. For she had grown to be silently afraid of the\nold house, with the great chimney-stacks like hollowed towers within it,\nmade, it seemed, for the wind to moan in; its deep embrasures and\npanelling, that harbored inexplicable sounds; its ancient boards that\ncreaked all night as if with the tread of mysterious feet. Awake in the\ndark hours, she fancied there were really footsteps, really knockings,\nmovements, faint sighs passing outside her door, and that some old\nwicked life which should long since have passed away through the portals\nof the grave, clung to those ancient walls with a horrible tenacity,\nstill refusing the great renunciation of death.\n\nIt was true that in the larger, more hurried world of London it was\neasier to dissimulate her transformations than it had been in Oxford.\nThe comparative retirement in which Milly lived was easily explained by\nher delicate health. It seemed as though in her sojourns--which more and\nmore encroached upon those of the original personality--the strong,\nintrusive ego consumed in an unfair degree the vitality of their common\nbody, leaving Milly with a certain nervous exhaustion, a languor against\nwhich she struggled with a pathetic courage. She learned also to cover\nwith a seldom broken silence the deep wound which was ever draining her\nyoung heart of its happiness; and for that very reason it grew deeper\nand more envenomed.\n\nThat Ian should love her evil and mysterious rival as though they two\nwere really one was horrible to her. Even her child was not unreservedly\nher own, to bring up according to her own ideas, to love without fear of\nthat rival. Tony was like his father in the sweetness of his\ndisposition, as well as in his dark beauty, and he accented with\nsurprising resignation the innumerable rules and regulations which Milly\nset about his path and about his bed. But although he was healthy, his\nnerves were highly strung, and it seemed as though her feverish anxiety\nfor his physical, moral, and intellectual welfare reacted upon him and\nmade him, after a few weeks of her influence, less vigorous in\nappearance, less gay and boylike than he was during her absence. Ian\ndared not hint a preference for the animal spirits that Mildred\nencouraged, with their attendant noise and nonsense, considered by Milly\nso undesirable. But one day Tims observed, cryptically, that \"A watched\nboy never boils\"; and Emma, the nurse, told Mrs. Stewart bluntly that\nshe thought Master Tony wasn't near so well and bright when he was\nalways being looked after, as he was when he was let go his own way a\nbit, like other children. Then a miserable fear beset Milly lest the\nboy, too, should notice the change in his mother; lest he should look\nforward to the disappearance of the woman who loved him so passionately,\nwatched over him with such complete devotion, and in his silent heart\nregret, invoke, that other. It was at once soothing and bitter to her to\nbe assured by Ian and by Tims that they had never been able to discover\nthe least sign that Tony was aware when the change occurred between the\ntwo personalities of his mother.\n\nTwo years passed in London, two years out of which the original owner\nenjoyed a total share of only nine months; and this, indeed, she could\nnot truly have been said to have enjoyed, since happiness was far from\nher.", "start_char_idx": 285418, "end_char_idx": 289687, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807": {"__data__": {"id_": "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2ab82ed3e02434f9bb651b2efc9ee2c66f893280832daeea18910b553ee3b757", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f66cd02cc2257fa78f4c7a9acc2b028fe7c88601dea2be18a12900217affe4a5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Death would have been a sad but simple catastrophe, to be met with\nresignation to the will of God. What resignation could be felt before\nthis gradual strangulation of her being at the hands of a nameless yet\nsurely Evil Thing? Her love for Ian was so great that his sufferings\nwere more to her than her own, and in the space of those two years she\nsaw that on him, too, sorrow had set its mark. The glow of his good\nlooks and the brilliancy of his mind were alike dulled. It was not only\nthat his shoulders were bent, his hair thinned and touched with gray,\nbut his whole appearance, once so individual, was growing merely\ntypical; that of the middle-aged Academic, absorbed in the cares of his\nprofession. His real work was not merely at a stand-still, but a few\nmore such years and his capacity for it would be destroyed. She felt\nthis vaguely, with the intuition of love. If the partnership had been\nonly between him and her, he surely would have yielded to her prayer to\ngive up the headship of the Merchants' Guild College after a set term;\nbut he put the question by. Evidently that Other, who cared for nothing\nbut her own selfish interests and amusements, who spent upon them the\nmoney that he ought to be saving, would never allow him to give up his\nappointment unless something better offered. It was not only her own\nlife, it was the higher and happier part of his that she was struggling\nto save in those desperate hours when she sought around her for some\nweapon wherewith to fight that mortal foe. She turned to priests,\nAnglican, Roman Catholic; but they failed her. Both believed her to be\nsuffering under an insane delusion, but the Roman Catholic priest would\nhave attempted to exorcise the evil spirit if she would have joined his\nCommunion. She was too honest to pretend to a belief that was not hers.\n\nWhen she returned from her last vain pilgrimage to the Church of the\nSacred Heart and stood before the glass, removing a thick black veil\nfrom the pale despair of her face, she was suddenly aware of a strange,\nunfamiliar smile lifting the drooped lines of her lips--an elfish smile\nwhich transformed her face to something different from her own. And\nimmediately those smiling lips uttered words that fell as unexpectedly\non her ears as though they had proceeded from the mouth of another\nperson.\n\n\"Never mind,\" they said, briskly. \"It wouldn't have been of the least\nuse.\"\n\nFor a minute a wild terror made her brain swim and she fled to the door,\ninstinctively seeking protection; but she stayed herself, remembering\nthat Ian, who was sleeping badly at night, was now asleep in his study.\nWeak and timid though she was, she would lay no fresh burden on him, but\nfight her battle, if battle there was to be, alone.\n\nShe walked back deliberately to the glass and looked steadily at her\nown reflection. Her brows were frowning, her eyes stern as she had never\nbefore seen them, but they were assuredly hers, answering to the mood of\nher own mind. Her lips were cold, and trembled so that although she had\nmeant solemnly to defy the Power of Evil within her she was unable to\narticulate. As she looked in the glass and saw herself--her real\nself--so evidently there, the strange smile, the speech divorced from\nall volition of hers which had crossed her lips, began to lose reality.\nStill her lips trembled, and at length a convulsion shook them as\nirresistible as that of a sob. Words broke stammeringly out which were\nnot hers:\n\n\"Struggle for life--the stronger wins. I'm stronger. It's no use\nstruggling--no use--no use--no use!\"\n\nMilly pressed her lips hard against her teeth with her hands, stopping\nthis utterance by main force. Her heart hammered so loud it seemed as\nthough some one must hear it and come to ask what was the matter. But no\none came. She was left alone with the Thing within her.\n\nIt may have been a long while, it may have been only a few seconds that\nshe remained standing at her dressing-table, her hands pressed hard\nagainst her convulsed mouth. She had closed her eyes, afraid to look\nlonger in the glass, lest something uncanny should peer out of it.", "start_char_idx": 289688, "end_char_idx": 293787, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f": {"__data__": {"id_": "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "ffd8a649d7fa57a3b65a96c1201d9378fb12298efdd096a51ae4f4a578fa50d2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ef218a3f7a82c7706032f7ff96e202e3872e89f7e0fcb1bbac74483354b1ee46", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She\ndid not pray--she had prayed so often before--but she fought with her\nwhole strength against the encroaching power of the Other. At length she\ngradually released her lips. They were bruised, but they had ceased to\nmove. It was she herself who spoke, low but clearly and with\ndeliberation:\n\n\"I shall struggle. I shall never give in. You think you're the stronger.\nI won't let you be. I'm fighting for my husband's happiness--do you\nhear?--as well as my own. You're strong, but we shall be stronger, he\nand I, in the end.\"\n\nThere was no answer, the sense of struggle was gone from her; and\nsuddenly she felt how mad it was to be talking to herself like that in\nan empty room. She took off the little black toque which sat on her\nbright head with an alien smartness to which she was now accustomed, and\nforced herself to look in the glass while she pinned up a stray lock of\nhair. Beyond an increased pallor and darker marks under her eyes, she\nsaw nothing unusual in her appearance.\n\nIt was five o'clock, and Ian would probably be awake and wanting his\ntea. She went softly into the study and leaned over him. Sleep had\nalmost smoothed away the lines of effort and worry which had marred the\nbeauty of his face; in the eyes of her love he was always the same\nhandsome Ian Stewart as in the old Oxford days, when he had seemed as a\nyoung god, so high above her reach.\n\nShe went to an oak table behind the sofa, on which the maid had set the\ntea-things without awakening him, and sat there quietly watching the\nkettle. The early London twilight began to veil the room. Ian stirred on\nthe sofa and sat up, with his back to her, unconscious of her presence.\nShe rose, vaguely supposing herself about to address some gentle word\nto him. Then suddenly she had thrown one soft hand under his chin and\none across his eyes, and with a _brusquerie_ quite unnatural to her\npulled him backwards, while a ripple of laughter so strange as to be\nshocking in her own ears burst from her lips, which cried aloud with a\ndefiant gayety:\n\n\"Who, Ian? Guess!\"\n\nIan, with a sudden force as strange to her as her own laughter, her own\ngay cry, pulled her hands away, held them an instant fast; then,\nkneeling on the sofa, he caught her in his long arms across the back of\nit, and after the pressure of a kiss upon her lips such as she had never\nfelt before, breathed with a voice of unutterable gladness: \"Mildred!\nDarling! Dearest love!\"\n\nA hoarse cry, almost a shriek, broke from the lips of Milly. The woman\nhe held struggled from his arms and stared at him wildly in the veiling\ntwilight. A strange horror fell upon him, and for several seconds he\nremained motionless, leaning over the back of the sofa. Then, groping\ntowards the wall, he switched on the electric light. He saw it plainly,\nthe white mask of a woman smitten with a mortal blow.\n\n\"Milly,\" he uttered, stammeringly. \"What's the matter? You are ill.\"\n\nShe turned on him her heart-broken look, then pressing her hand to her\nthroat, spoke as though with difficulty.\n\n\"I love you very much--you don't know how much I love you. I've tried\nso hard to be a good wife to you.\"\n\nIan perceived catastrophe, yet dimly; sought with desperate haste to\nremember why for a moment he had believed that that Other was come back;\nwhat irreparable thing he had said or done.\n\nMeantime he must say something. \"Milly, dear! What's gone wrong? What\nhave I done, child?\"\n\n\"You've let her take you--\" She spoke more freely now, but with a\nstartling fierceness--\"You've let her take you from me.\"\n\n\"Ah, the old trouble! My poor Milly! I know it's terrible for you. I can\nonly say that no one else really exists; that you are always you\nreally.\"\n\n\"That's not true. You don't believe it yourself. That wicked creature\nhas made you love her--her own wicked way. You want to have her instead\nof me; you want to destroy your own wife and to get her back again.\"", "start_char_idx": 293788, "end_char_idx": 297665, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa": {"__data__": {"id_": "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "35900b2bb8daa3ef04a7a3a2c951b0844d1713e847cf2e0549e657861a54d2de", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7816f1eef5d715583fda3a26451154958ce1f16b62fe9ca5cdc3ef1f15cac1f2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The cruel, ultimate truth that Milly's words laid bare--the truth which\nhe constantly refused to look upon, in mercy to himself and\nher--paralyzed the husband's tongue. He tried to approach her with vague\nwords and gestures of affection and remonstrance, but she motioned him\nfrom her.\n\n\"No. Don't say you love me; I can't believe it, and I hate to hear you\nsay what's not true.\"\n\nFor a moment the fierce heart of Primitive Woman had blazed up within\nher--that fire which all the waters of baptism fail to quench. But the\nflame died down as suddenly as it had arisen, and appealing with\noutspread hands, as to some invisible judge, she wailed, miserably:\n\n\"Oh, what am I to do--what am I to do? I love you so much, and it's all\nno use.\"\n\nIan was as white as herself.\n\n\"Milly, my poor girl, don't break our hearts.\"\n\nHe stretched his arms towards her, but she turned away from him towards\nthe door, made a few steps, then stopped and clutched her throat. He\nthought her struggling with sobs; but when once more, as though in fear,\nshe turned her face towards him, he saw it strangely convulsed. He moved\ntowards her in an alarmed silence, but before he could reach her and\ncatch her in his arms, her head drooped, she swayed once upon her feet,\nand fell heavily to the ground.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\n\n\"Now be reasonable Tims. You can be if you choose.\"\n\nMildred was perched on a high stool in Tims's Chambers, breathing spring\nfrom a bunch of fresh Neapolitan violets, grown by an elderly admirer of\nhers, and wearing her black, winter toque and dress with that invincible\nair of smartness which she contrived to impart to the oldest clothes,\nprovided they were of her own choosing. Tims, who from her face and\nattitude might have been taken for a victim of some extreme and secret\ntorture, crouched, balancing herself on the top rail of her fender. She\nreplied only by a horrible groan.\n\n\"Who do you suppose is the happier when Milly comes back?\" continued\nMildred.\n\n\"Well--the brat.\"\n\n\"Tony? He doesn't even know when she's there; but by the time she's done\nwith him he's unnaturally good. He can't like that, can he?\"\n\n\"Then there's Ian, good old boy!\"\n\n\"That's humbug. You know it is.\"\n\n\"But it's Milly herself I really care about,\" cried Tims. \"You've been a\npig to her, Mil. She says you're a devil, and if I weren't a scientific\nwoman I swear I should begin to believe there was something in it.\"\n\n\"No, Tims, dear,\" returned Mildred with earnestness. \"I'm neither a pig\nnor a devil.\" She paused. \"Sometimes I think I've lived before, some\nquite different life from this. But I suppose you'll say that's all\nnonsense.\"\n\n\"Of course it is--rot,\" commented Tims, sternly. \"You're a physiological\nfreak, that's what you are. You're nothing but Milly all the time, and\nyou ought to be decent to her.\"\n\n\"I don't want to hurt her anyhow,\" apologized Mildred; \"but you see when\nI'm only half there--well, I am only half there. I'm awfully rudimentary\nand I can't grasp anything except that I'm being choked, squeezed out of\nexistence, and that I must make a fight for my life. Any woman becomes\nrudimentary who is fighting for her life against another woman; only\nI've more excuse for it, because as a scientist you must see that I can\nonly be in very partial possession of my brain.\"\n\nTims had pulled her wig down over her eyes and glared at space. \"That's\nall very well for you,\" she said; \"but why should I help you to kill\npoor old M.?\"\n\n\"Do try and understand! Every time she comes back she's more and more\nmiserable; and that's not cheerful for Ian either, is it? Now, through\nthat underhand trick of rudimentary Me--you see I don't try to hide my\nhorrid ways--she knows Ian adores me and, comparatively speaking,\ndoesn't care two straws about her.", "start_char_idx": 297667, "end_char_idx": 301413, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a": {"__data__": {"id_": "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "b759ec2eebf58154a6a7b7967a73159cc3ae4897db4dc64d430def078bb437fc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ef2141c58eb709ba6871c1abd347b56f364b14a2328cbd62645af3ea9819ba4b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That will make her more miserable\nthan she has ever been before. She'll only want to live so that I\nmayn't.\"\n\n\"I don't see how Ian's going to get on without her. _You_ don't do much\nfor him, my girl, except spend his money.\"\n\n\"Of course, that's quite true. I'm not in the least suited to Ian or his\nlife or his income; but that's not my fault. How perverse men are!\nAlways in love with the wrong women, aren't they?\"\n\nTims's countenance relaxed and she replied with a slight air of\nimportance:\n\n\"My opinion of men has been screwed up a peg lately. Every now and then\nyou do find one who's got too much sense for any rot of that kind.\"\n\nMildred continued.\n\n\"Ian's perfectly wretched at what happened; can't understand it, of\ncourse. He doesn't say much, but I can see he dreads explanations with\nMilly. He's good at reserve, but no good at lies, poor old dear, and\njust think of all the straight questions she'll ask him! It'll be\ntorture to both of them. Poor Milly! I've no patience with her. Why\nshould she want to live? Life's no pleasure to her. She's known a long\ntime that Tony's really jollier and better with me, and now she knows\nIan doesn't want her. How can you pretend to think Milly happy, Tims?\nHasn't she said things to you?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" groaned Tims. \"Poor old M.! She's pretty well down on her luck,\nyou bet.\"\n\n\"And I enjoy every minute of my life, although I could find plenty to\ngrumble at if I liked. Listen to me, Tims. How would it be to strike a\nbargain? Let me go on without any upsets from Milly until I'm forty. I'm\nsure I sha'n't care what happens to me at forty. Then Milly may have\neverything her own way. What would it matter to her? She likes to take\ntime by the forelock and behaves already as though she were forty. I\nfeel sure you could help me to keep her quiet if only you chose.\"\n\n\"If I chose to meddle at all, I should be much more likely to help her\nto come back,\" returned Tims, getting snappish.\n\n\"Alas! I fear you would, Tims, dear, in spite of knowing it would only\nmake her miserable. That shows, doesn't it, how unreasonable even a\ndistinguished scientific woman can be?\"\n\nThis aspersion on Tims's reasoning powers had to be resented and the\nresentment to be soothed. And the soothing was so effectually done that\nTims owned to herself afterwards there was some excuse for Ian's\ninfatuation.\n\nBut Tims had no desire to meddle, and the months passed by without any\nsymptoms of the change appearing. It seemed as if Mildred's hold upon\nlife had never been so firm, the power of her personality never so fully\ndeveloped. She belonged to a large family which in all its branches had\na trick of throwing up successful men and brilliant women. But in\nreaction against Scottish clannishness, it held little together, and in\nthe two houses whence Mildred was launched on her London career, she\nhad no nursery reputation of Milly's with which to contend.\n\nOne of these houses was that of her cousin, Sir Cyril Meres, a\nfashionable painter with a considerable gift for art, and more for\nsuccess--success social and financial. His beautiful house, stored with\nwonderful collections, had a reputation, and was frequented by every one\nof distinction in the artistic or intellectual world--by those of the\nworld of wealth and rank who were interested in such matters, and the\nyet larger number who affected to be interested in them. For those\nAnglo-Saxon deities, Mammon and Snobbery, who have since conquered the\nwhole civilized globe, had temporarily fallen back for a fresh spring,\nand in the eighties and early nineties Culture was reckoned very nearly\nas _chic_ as motoring in the first years of the new century.\n\nSeveral painters of various degrees of talent attempted to fix on canvas\nthe extraordinary charm of Mrs. Stewart's appearance.", "start_char_idx": 301414, "end_char_idx": 305186, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65": {"__data__": {"id_": "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "96e04c2427161d0b23f2dc6a8371b36c8d3f31750ee3523b7ccf60a0e88077a0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "58b149080f2621387233f8bac470c56e37f51807d005e8f81cd6129d78f3cc0e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Stewart's appearance. Not one of them\nsucceeded; but the peculiar shade of her hair, the low forehead and\ndelicate line of the dark eyebrows, the outline of the mask, sometimes\nadmired, sometimes criticised, made her portrait always recognized,\nwhether simpering as a chocolate-box classicality, smiling sadly from\nthe flowery circle of the Purgatorio, or breaking out of some rough mass\nof paint with the provocative leer of a _cocotte_ of the Quartier Latin.\n\nThe magnetism of her personality defied analysis, as her essential\nbeauty defied the painter's art. It was a magnetism which surrounded her\nwith an atmosphere of adorations, admirations, enmities--all equally\nviolent and irrational. Her wit had little to do with the making of her\nenemies, because it was never used in offence against friends or even\nharmless acquaintances; only against her foes she employed it with the\nefficiency and mercilessness of a red Indian wielding the tomahawk.\n\nThe other family where she found her niche awaiting her was of a\ndifferent order. It was that of the retired Indian judge, Sir John\nIreton, whose wife had chaperoned her through a Commemoration the summer\nshe had taken her First in Greats. Ireton was not only in Parliament,\nbut his house was a meeting-place where politicians cemented personal\nties and plotted party moves. Milly in her brief appearances, had been\nof use to Lady Ireton, but Mildred proved socially invaluable. There\nwere serious persons who suspected Mrs. Stewart of approaching politics\nin a flippant spirit; but on certain days she had revealed a grave and\nardent belief in the dogmas of the party and a piety of attitude towards\nthe person of its great apostle, which had convinced them that she was\nnot really cynical or frivolous.\n\nLady Augusta Goring was the most important conquest of the kind Milly\nhad made. She was the only child of the Marquis of Ipswich, and one of\nthose rather stupid people whose energy of mind and character is often\nmistaken by themselves and others for cleverness. Lady Augusta was\nhandsome in a dull, massive way, and so conscientious that she had\nseldom time to smile. Her friends said she would smile oftener if her\nhusband caused her less anxiety; but considering who George Goring was\nand how he had been brought up, he might have been much worse. Where\nwomen were concerned, scandal had never accused him of anything more\nflagrant than dubious flirtations. It was his political intrigues,\nconstantly threatening unholy _liaisons_ in the most unthinkable\ndirections; his sudden fits of obstinate idleness, often occurring at\nthe very moment when some clever and promising political scheme of his\nown was ripe for execution, which so unendurably harassed the staid\nMarquis and the earnest Lady Augusta. They were highly irritating, too,\nto Sir John Ireton, who had believed himself at one time able to tame\nand tutor the tricksy young politician.\n\nThe late Lord Ipswich had been a \"sport\" in the Barthop family; a black\nsheep, but clever, and a well known collector. Accidental circumstances\nhad greatly enriched him, and as he detested his brother and successor,\nhe had left his pictures to the nation and all of his fortune which he\ncould dispose of--which happened to be the bulk--to his natural son,\nGeorge Goring. But his will had not been found for some weeks after his\ndeath, and while the present Marquis had believed himself the inheritor\nof the whole property, he had treated the nameless and penniless child\nof his brother with perfect delicacy and generosity. When George Goring\nfound himself made rich at the expense of his uncle, he proposed to his\ncousin Lady Augusta and was accepted.\n\nMildred was partly amused and partly bored to discover herself on so\nfriendly a footing with Lady Augusta. Putting herself into that passive\nframe of mind in which revelations of Milly's past actions were most\noften vouchsafed to her, she saw herself type-writing in a small,\nhigh-ceilinged room looking out on a foggy London park, and Lady Augusta\nseated at a neighboring table, surrounded by papers. Type-writing was\nnot then so common as it is now, and Milly had learned the art in order\nto give assistance to Ian.", "start_char_idx": 305165, "end_char_idx": 309344, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757": {"__data__": {"id_": "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "378399463063ec4e022eb858bdbb524a850fe4dec86d5ce5e4bec637f2d7dd96", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f56f2839da7330af7419823c81652675827a47c21f943d52cc8e223baa775fa7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mildred was annoyed to find herself in danger\nof having to waste her time in a mechanical occupation which she\ndetested, or else of offending a woman whom her uncle valued as a friend\nand political ally.\n\nIt was a slight compensation to receive an invitation to accompany the\nIretons to a great ball at Ipswich House. There was no question of Ian\naccompanying her. He was usually too tired to care for going out in the\nevening and went only to official dinners and to the houses of old\nfriends, or of people with whom he had educational connections. It did\nnot occur to him that it might be wise to put a strain upon himself\nsometimes, to lay by his spectacles, straighten his back, have his beard\ntrimmed and appear at Mildred's side in the drawing-rooms where she\nshone, looking what he was--a husband of whom she had reason to be\nproud. More and more engrossed by his own work and responsibilities, he\nlet her drift into a life quite apart from his, content to see her world\nfrom his own fireside, in the sparkling mirror of her talk.\n\nIpswich House was a great house, if of little architectural merit, and\nthe ball had all the traditional spectacular splendor common to such\nfestivities. The pillared hall and double staircase, the suites of\nspacious rooms, were filled with a glittering kaleidoscopic crowd of\nfair and magnificently bejewelled women and presumably brave, certainly\nwell-groomed and handsome men. The excellence of the music, the masses\nof flowers, the number of great names and well-advertised society\nbeauties present, would subsequently provide material for long and\neulogistic paragraphs in the half-penny press and the Ladies' Weeklies.\n\nMildred enjoyed it as a spectacle rather than as a ball, for she knew\nfew people there, and the young political men whom she had met at her\nuncle's parties were too much engaged with ladies of more importance, to\nwhom they were related or to whom they owed social attention, to write\ntheir names more than once on her programme. One of these, however,\nasked her if she had noticed how harassed both Lord Ipswich and Lady\nAugusta looked. Goring's speech, he said, at the Fothering by-election\nwas reported and commented upon in all the papers, and had given\ntremendous offence to the leaders of his party; while the fact that he\nhad not turned up in time for the ball must be an additional cross to\nhis wife, who made such a firm stand against the social separation of\nmarried couples.\n\nWhen Mildred returned to her uncle she found him the centre of a group\nof eminent politicians, all denouncing in more or less subdued tones the\noutrageous utterances and conduct of Goring, and most declaring that\nonly consideration for Lord Ipswich and Lady Augusta prevented them from\npublicly excommunicating the hardened offender. Others, however, while\nadmitting the outrage, urged that he was too brilliant a young man to be\nlightly thrown away, and advised patience, combined with the\ndisciplinary rod. Sir John was of the excommunicatory party. Later in\nthe evening he disappeared into some remote smoking or card-room, not so\nmuch forgetting his niece as taking it for granted that she was, as\nusual, surrounded by friends and admirers of both sexes. But a detached\npersonality, however brilliant, is apt to be submerged in such a crowd\nof social eminences, bound together by ties of blood, of interests, and\nof habit, as filled the salons of Ipswich House. Mildred walked around\nthe show contentedly enough for a time, receiving a smile here and a\npleasant word there from such of her acquaintances as she chanced upon,\nbut practically alone. And being alone, she found herself yielding to a\nvulgar envy of richer women's clothes and jewels. Her dress, with which\nshe had been pleased, looked ordinary beside the creations of great\nParisian _ateliers_, and the few old paste ornaments which were the only\njewels she possessed, charming as they were, seemed dim and scant among\nthe crowns and constellations of diamonds that surrounded her. Her pride\nrebelled against this envy, but could not conquer it.\n\nMore gnawing pangs, however, assailed her presently, the pangs of\nhunger; and no one offered to take her in to supper.", "start_char_idx": 309345, "end_char_idx": 313527, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40": {"__data__": {"id_": "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "5f182066f6c97e673c7b699a40dcb3002e8fa7557ed66289402ca4cff7daa046", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0fbaabb5ca193ec66b9c98e1e947b36943e70a343a84d7e19b2eb6ff305d2990", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The idea of taking\nherself in was revolting; she preferred starvation. But where could\nUncle John have hidden himself? She sought the elderly truant with all\nthe suppressed annoyance of a chaperon seeking an inconsiderate flirt of\na girl. And it happened that a spirit in her feet led her to the door of\na small room in which Milly and Lady Augusta had been wont to transact\ntheir business. A curious feeling of familiarity, of physical habit,\ncaused her to open the big mahogany door. There was no air of public\nfestivity about the room, which was furnished with a substantial, almost\nshabby masculine comfort. But oh, tantalizing spectacle! Under the\nillumination of a tall, crimson-shaded, standard lamp, stood a little,\nwhite-covered table, reminding her irresistibly of a little table in a\nfairy story, which the due incantation causes to rise out of the ground.\nA small silver-gilt tureen of soup smoked upon it and a little pile of\ndelicate rolls lay beside the plate set for one. But alas! she might\nnot, like the favored girl in the fairy story, proceed without ceremony\nto satisfy her hunger at the mysterious little table.\n\nA door immediately opposite that of the small sitting-room opened\nnoiselessly, and a young man entered with a light, quick step. He saw\nMildred, but for a second or so she did not see him. He was at her side\nwhen she looked around and their eyes met. They had never seen each\nother before, but at that meeting of the eyes a curious feeling, such as\ntwo Europeans might experience, meeting in the heart of some dark\ncontinent, affected them both.\n\nThere was something picturesque about the young man's appearance, in\nspite of the impeccable cut and finish of his dress-suit and the waxed\nends of his small blond mustache. His hair was of a ruddy nut-brown\ncolor, and had a wave in it; his bright hazel eyes seemed exactly to\nmatch it. His face had a fine warm pallor, and his under lip, which with\nhis chin was somewhat thrust forward, was redder than the lip of a\nchild. It was perhaps this noticeable coloring and something in his port\nwhich made him, in spite of the correct modernity of his dress, suggest\nsome seventeenth-century portrait.\n\n\"Forgive my passing you,\" he said, at length; \"but I'm starving.\"\n\n\"So am I,\" she returned, hardly aware of what she was saying. Some\nstrange, almost hypnotic attraction seemed to rivet her whole attention\non the mere phenomenon of this man.\n\n\"By Jove! Aren't they feeding the multitude down there?\" he asked,\nnodding in the direction of the supper-room.\n\n\"Of course,\" she answered, with the simple gravity of a child, her blue\neyes still fixed upon him. \"But I can't ask for supper for myself, can\nI?\"\n\nHer need was distinctly material; yet the young man confronting her\nwhite grace, the strange look in her blue eyes, had a dreamlike feeling,\nalmost as though he had met a dryad or an Undine between two of the\nprosaic, substantial doors of Ipswich House. And as in a dream the most\nextraordinary things seem familiar and expected, so the apparition of\nthe Undine and her confidence in him seemed familiar, in fact just what\nhe had been expecting during those hours of fog off the Goodwins, when\nthe sirens, wild voices gathering up from all the seas of the world, had\nbeen screaming to each other across the hidden waters. That same inner\nconcentration upon the mere phenomenon of a presence, an existence,\nwhich had given the childlike note to Mildred's speech, froze a\ncompliment upon his lips; and they stood silent, eying each other\ngravely. A junior footman appeared, carrying a bottle of champagne in a\nbucket, and the young man addressed him in a vague, distracted tone,\nvery unlike his usual manner.\n\n\"Look here, Arthur, here's a lady who can't get any supper.\"\n\nThe footman went quite pink at this personal reproach. He happened to\nhave heard some one surmise, on seeing Mildred roaming about alone, that\nshe was a newspaper woman.\n\n\"Please sir,\" he replied, \"I don't know how it's happened, for her\nLadyship told Mr.", "start_char_idx": 313528, "end_char_idx": 317537, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410": {"__data__": {"id_": "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "642c4a8f48f60deb606c13e6166db87f4f24aab637b632f85bdaee75d6cf9116", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "31e9da4f73c81bc50bc48a8c5fea3f85a62b3bc484a3820abdc8ba24cae7dc70", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mackintosh to be sure and see as the newspaper ladies\nand gentlemen were well looked after, and he thought as they'd all had\nsupper.\"\n\nIt seemed incredible that Mildred should not have heard this reply,\nuttered so close to her; but though it fell upon her ears it did not\npenetrate to her mind.\n\n\"Bring up supper for two, Arthur,\" said Goring, in his usual decisive\ntone. \"That'll do, won't it?\" he added, and turned to Mildred, ushering\nher into the room. \"You'll have supper with me, I hope? My name's\nGoring; I'm Lord Ipswich's son-in-law and I live in his house; so you\nsee it's all right.\"\n\nThe corollary was not evident; but the mention of the name brought\nMildred back to the ordinary world. So this was George Goring, the\nplague of his political party, the fly in the ointment of a respectable\nMarquis and his distinguished daughter. She had not fancied him like\nthis. For one thing, she did not know him to be younger than his wife,\nand between the careworn solidity of Lady Augusta and this vivid\nrestless personality, the five actual years of difference seemed\nstretched to ten.\n\n\"I'm convinced it's all right, Mr. Goring,\" she replied, throwing\nherself into a chair and smiling at him sparklingly. \"It must be all\nright. I want my supper so much I should have to accept your invitation\neven if you were a burglar.\"\n\nGoring, whose habit it was to keep moving, laughed as he walked about,\none hand in his trousers pocket.\n\n\"Why shouldn't I be a burglar? A burglar, with an assistant disguised as\na footman, sacking the bedrooms of Lord Ipswich's house while the ball\nproceeds? There's copy for you! Shall I do it? 'Mr. George Goring's\nCelebrated Black Pearls Stolen,' would make a capital head-line. Perhaps\nyou've heard I'd do anything to keep my name in the newspapers.\"\n\n\"It certainly gets there pretty often,\" returned Mildred, politely; \"and\nwhenever it's mentioned it has an enlivening effect.\"\n\nThe footman had reappeared and they were unfolding their dinner-napkins,\nsitting opposite each other at the little table.\n\n\"As how, enlivening?\"\n\n\"Like a bit of bread dropped into a glass of flat champagne.\"\n\n\"You think my party's like champagne? Why, it couldn't exist for a\nmoment if it sparkled.\"\n\n\"I was talking of newspapers, not of your party; though there's no doubt\nyou do enliven that.\"\n\n\"Do I? Like what? No odiously inoffensive comparisons, if you please.\"\n\n\"Well, I have heard people say like--like a blister on the back of the\nneck.\"\n\nGoring laughed. \"Thanks. That's better.\"\n\n\"The patient's using language, but he won't really tear it off, because\nhe knows that would hurt him more, and the blister will do him good in\nthe end, if he bears with it.\"\n\n\"But there's the blister's side to it, too. It's infernally tiring for a\nblister to be sticking on to such a fellow everlastingly. It'll fly off\nof itself before long, if he doesn't look out. Hullo! What am I saying?\nI suppose you'll have all this out in some confounded paper--'The Rebel\nMember Returns. A Chat with Mr. Goring'--Don't do that; but I'll give\nyou some other copy if you like.\"\n\n\"You're very kind in giving me all this copy. What shall I do with it?\nShall I keep it as a memento?\"\n\n\"No, no. You can sell it; honor bright you can.\"\n\n\"Can I? Shall I get much for it? Enough money to buy me a tiara, do you\nthink?\"\n\n\"Do you really want to wear the usual fender? Now, why? I suppose\nbecause you aren't sufficiently aware how--\" he paused on the edge of a\ncompliment which seemed suddenly too full-flavored and ordinary to be\naddressed to this strangely lovely being, with her smile at once so\nsparkling and so mysterious. He substituted: \"How much more\ndistinguished it is to look like an Undine than like a peeress.\"\n\nMildred seemed slightly taken aback.", "start_char_idx": 317538, "end_char_idx": 321281, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59": {"__data__": {"id_": "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "66b94328bd27d489fba3f5728739e133fc92108a445dd801ac37188ba633cac5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "24c8cf8a67e3d888becb0526cd4c8817d12c375357791a1f4da89093ceb906db", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mildred seemed slightly taken aback.\n\n\"Why do you say 'Undine?'\" she asked, almost sharply. \"Do I--do I look\nas if I came out of a Trafalgar Square fountain with fell designs on\nLord Ipswich?\"\n\n\"Of course not. But--I can't exactly define even to myself what I mean,\nonly you do suggest an Undine to me. To some one else you might be\nsimply Miss--Forgive me, I don't know your name.\"\n\nHe had not even troubled to glance at her left hand, and when the \"Mrs.\"\nwas uttered it affected him oddly. It was one of the peculiar\ndifferences between her two personalities that, casually encountered,\nMildred was as seldom taken for a married woman as Milly for an\nunmarried one.\n\n\"Do I look as if I'd got no soul?\" she persisted, leaning a little\ntowards him, an intensity that might almost have been called anxiety in\nher gaze.\n\nHe could even have fancied she had grown paler. He, too, became serious.\nHis eyes brightened, meeting hers, and a slight color came into his\ncheeks.\n\n\"Quite the contrary,\" he answered. \"I should say you had a great\ndeal--in fact, I shall begin to believe in detachable souls again. Fancy\nmost people as just souls, without trimmings. It makes one laugh. But\nyour body looks like an emanation from the spirit; as though it might\nflow away in a white waterfall or go up in a white fire; and as though,\nif it did, your soul could certainly precipitate another body, which\nmust certainly be like this one, because it would be as this is, the\nmaterial expression of a spirit.\"\n\nShe listened as he spoke, seriously, her eyes on his. But when he had\ndone, she dropped her chin on her hand and laughed delightedly.\n\n\"You think I should be able to grow a fresh body, like a lobster growing\na fresh claw? What fun!\"\n\nThere was a sound without, not of the footman struggling with dishes and\nplates and the door-handle, but of middle-aged voices.\n\nInstinctively Goring and Mildred straightened themselves and looked\npolite. Lord Ipswich and Sir John Ireton, deep in political converse,\ncame slowly in and then stopped short in surprise. Mildred lost not a\nmoment in carrying the war into their country. She turned about and\naddressed her uncle in a playful tone, which yet smacked of reproof.\n\n\"Here you are at last, Uncle John! I thought you'd forgotten all about\nme. I've been walking miles in mad pursuit of you, till I was so tired\nand hungry I think I should have dropped if Mr. Goring hadn't taken\npity upon me and made me eat his supper.\"\n\nSir John defended himself, and Lord Ipswich was shocked to think that a\nlady had been in such distress in his house; although the apparition of\nGoring prevented him from feeling it as acutely as he would otherwise\nhave done. His pleasant pink face took on an expression of severity as\nhe responded to his son-in-law's somewhat too cheerful greeting.\n\n\"Sorry to be so late, but we were held up by a fog at the mouth of the\nThames.\"\n\n\"It must have been very important business to take you all the way to\nBrussels so suddenly.\"\n\n\"It certainly wouldn't wait. I heard there was a whole set of Beauvais\ntapestries to be had for a mere song. I couldn't buy them without seeing\nthem you know, and the big London and Paris dealers were bound to chip\nin if I didn't settle the matter pretty quick. I'm precious glad I did,\nfor they're the finest pieces I ever saw and would have fetched five\ntimes what I gave for them at Christie's.\"\n\n\"Ah--really!\" was all Lord Ipswich's response, coldly uttered and\naccompanied by a smile more sarcastic than often visited his neat and\nkindly lips. Sir John Ireton and Mildred, aware of the delicate\nsituation, partly domestic and partly political, upon which they were\nintruding, took themselves away and were presently rolling through the\nempty streets in the gray light of early morning.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\n\nNot long afterwards Mildred received a letter the very address of which\nhad an original appearance, looking as if it were written with a stick\nin a fist rather than with a pen between fingers. It caught her\nattention at once from half a dozen others.", "start_char_idx": 321245, "end_char_idx": 325284, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87": {"__data__": {"id_": "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "fe94347bddd18e44d7817968139bcc405ca7945cb02e750cf38af71245023233", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c730a89791957a3a0b0f5875ec0dbefe71a08c8e71c0485eb33d1d4b82965bf6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It caught her\nattention at once from half a dozen others.\n\n \"DEAR MRS. STEWART,--Yesterday I was at Cochrane's studio\n and he told me Meres was the greatest authority in England\n on tapestry, and also a cousin of yours. Please remember (or\n forgive) the supper on Tuesday, and of your kindness, ask\n him to let me see his lot and give me his opinion on mine.\n Cochrane had a folly he called a portrait of you in his\n studio. I turned its face to the wall; and in the end he\n admitted I was right.\n\n \"Yours sincerely,\n\n \"GEORGE GORING.\"\n\nAccordingly, on a very hot day early in July, Goring met Mildred again,\nat Sir Cyril Meres's house on Campden Hill. The long room at one end of\nwhich stood the small dining-table looked on the greenness of a lawny,\nlilac-sheltered garden, so that such light as filtered through the green\njalousies was green also. There was a great block of ice somewhere in\nthe room, and so cool it was, so greenly dim there, that it seemed\nalmost like a cavern of the sea. Mildred wore a white dress, and, as\nwas the fashion of the moment, a large black hat shadowed with\nostrich-feathers. Once more on seeing her he had a startled impression\nof looking upon an ethereal creature, a being somehow totally distinct\nfrom other beings; and for lack of some more appropriate name, he called\nher again in his mind \"Undine.\" As the talk, which Cyril Meres had a\ngenius for making general, became more animated, he half lost that\nimpression in one of a very clever, charming woman, with a bright wit\nsailing lightly over depths of knowledge to which he was unaccustomed in\nher sex.\n\nThe party was not intended to number more than eight persons, of whom\nLady Thomson was one, and they sat down seven. When Sir Cyril observed:\n\"We won't wait any longer for Davison,\" Mildred was too much interested\nin Goring's presence to inquire who this Davison might be.\n\nShe sparkled on half through luncheon to the delight of every one but\nMiss Ormond the actress, who would have preferred to play the lead\nherself. Then came a pause. A door was opened at the far end of the dim\nroom, and the missing guest appeared. Sir Cyril rose hastily to greet\nhim. He advanced without any apologetic hurry in his gait; the same\nimpassive Maxwell Davison as before, but leaner, browner, more\nsilver-headed from three more years of wandering under Oriental suns.\nMildred could hardly have supposed it possible that the advent of any\nhuman being could have given her so disagreeable a sensation.\n\nSir Cyril was unaware that she knew Maxwell Davison; surprised to hear\nthat he was a cousin of Stewart's, between whom and himself there\nexisted a mutual antipathy, expressing itself in terms of avoidance. His\nown acquaintance with Davison was recent and in the way of business. He\nhad had the fancy to build for the accommodation of his Hellenic\ntreasures a room in imitation of the court of a Gr\u00e6co-Roman house which\nhe had helped to excavate in Asia Minor. He had commissioned Davison to\nbuy him hangings for it to harmonize with an old Persian carpet in cream\ncolor and blue of which he was already possessed. Davison had brought\nthese with him and a little collection of other things which he thought\nMeres might care to look at. He did not know the Stewarts had moved to\nLondon, and it was an unpleasant surprise to find himself seated at the\nsame table with Mildred; he had not forgotten, still less forgiven, the\nlure of her coquetry, the insult of her rebuff.\n\nLady Thomson was next him and questioned him exhaustively about his book\non Persian Literature and the travels of his lifetime. Miss Ormond took\nadvantage of Mrs. Stewart's sudden silence to talk to the table rather\ncleverly around the central theme of herself. Goring conversed apart\nwith Mrs. Stewart.", "start_char_idx": 325227, "end_char_idx": 329025, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b": {"__data__": {"id_": "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f10b6f5eb55bcdb5bed95238b80d8c548957e94eb6fa05e31916e4fba4b19d26", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e9f57238f20763251cc07d37499d96994991f1703e80fc7fc3816f0184a1b55b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Goring conversed apart\nwith Mrs. Stewart.\n\nCoffee was served in the shrine which Sir Cyril had reared for his Greek\ncollection, of which the gem was a famous head of Aphrodite--an early\nAphrodite, divine, removed from all possible pains and agitations of\nhuman passion. The room was an absurdity on Campden Hill, said some,\nbut undeniably beautiful in itself. The columns, of singular lightness\nand grace, were of a fine marble which hovered between creamy white and\nfaint yellow, and the walls and floor were of the same tone, except for\na frieze on a Greek model, very faintly colored, and the old Persian\ncarpet. In fine summer weather the large skylight covering the central\nspace was withdrawn, and such sky as London can show looked down upon\nit. The new hangings which Maxwell Davison had brought with him were\nalready displayed on a tall screen, and his miscellaneous collection of\nantiquities, partly sent from Durham College, partly lately acquired,\nwere arranged on a marble bench.\n\n\"I shouldn't have brought these things, Sir Cyril,\" he said; \"if I'd\nknown Mrs. Stewart was here. She's got a way of hinting that my most\ncherished antiquities are forgeries; and the worst of it is, she makes\nevery one believe her, including myself.\"\n\nMildred protested.\n\n\"I don't pretend to know anything about antiquities, Mr. Davison. I'm\nsure I never suspected you of a forgery, and if I had, I hope I\nshouldn't have been rude enough to tell you so.\"\n\nMaxwell Davison laughed his harsh laugh.\n\n\"Do you want me to believe you can't be rude, Mrs. Stewart?\"\n\n\"I'm almost afraid she can't be,\" interposed Lady Thomson's full voice.\n\"People who make a superstition of politeness infallibly lose the higher\ncourtesy of truth.\"\n\nHere Sir Cyril Meres called Davison away to worship at the shrine of the\nAphrodite, while Goring invited Mrs. Stewart into a neighboring corridor\nwhere some tapestries were hanging.\n\nThe divining crystal was among the objects returned from Oxford, and had\nbeen included in the collection which Davison had brought with him, on\nthe chance that the painter might fancy such curiosities. When Goring\nand Mildred returned from their leisurely inspection of the tapestries,\nMiss Ormond had it in her hand, and Lady Thomson was commenting on some\nremark of hers.\n\n\"I've no doubt, as you say, it has played a wicked part before now in\nOriental intrigues. But of course the poor crystal is perfectly innocent\nof the things read into it by rascals, practising on the ignorant and\nsuperstitious.\"\n\n\"Sometimes, perhaps, Lady Thomson,\" returned Miss Ormond; \"but sometimes\npeople do see extraordinary visions in a crystal.\"\n\nLady Thomson sniffed.\n\n\"Excitable, imaginative people do, I dare say.\"\n\n\"On the contrary, prosaic people are far more likely to see things than\nhighly strung imaginative creatures like myself. I've tried several\ntimes and have never seen anything. I believe having a great deal of\nbrain-power and emotion and all that tells against it. I shouldn't be at\nall surprised now if Mrs. Stewart, who is--well, I should fancy, just a\nlittle cold, very bright and all that on the surface, you know--I\nshouldn't wonder if she could crystal-gaze very successfully. I should\nlike to know whether she's ever tried.\"\n\n\"I'm sure she's not,\" replied Lady Thomson, firmly. \"My niece, Mrs.\nStewart, is a great deal too sensible and well-educated.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Stewart can't honestly say the same for herself,\" interposed\nDavison; \"she gazed in this very crystal some years ago and certainly\nsaw something in it.\"\n\nMiss Ormond exclaimed in triumph. Mildred froze. She did not desire the\nr\u00f4le of Society Seer.\n\n\"What did I see, Mr. Davison?\" she asked.\n\nHe shrugged his shoulders.\n\n\"Nothing of importance. You saw a woman in a light dress. Perhaps it was\nLady Hammerton the collector, originally guilty, you remember, in the\nmatter of the forged Augustus.\"\n\n\"Mildred had only to peep in any glass to see Lady Hammerton, or some\none sufficiently like her,\" observed Meres.", "start_char_idx": 328984, "end_char_idx": 332963, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7": {"__data__": {"id_": "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "127fbd6fc59ddbf9ab5a4d250287e2180a4b40466a485d1990156bf8aa19fc41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "14053b563f3ac5bc5b04214115b67209bbc3b2dd478b86a08666b254bbe727cb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"That idea was started when David Fletcher picked up the fancy picture\nwhich he chose to call a portrait of Lady Hammerton,\" cried Lady\nThomson, who was just taking her leave. \"Such nonsense! I protest\nagainst my own niece and a scholar of Ascham being likened to that\nscandalous woman.\"\n\nCyril Meres smiled and stroked his soft, silvery beard.\n\n\"Quite right of you to protest, Beatrice. Still, I'm glad Lady Hammerton\ndidn't stick heroically to her Professor--as Mildred here does. We\nshould never have been proud of her as an ancestress if she had.\"\n\n\"Heroically?\" repeated Maxwell Davison under his breath, and laughed.\nBut the meaning of his laugh was lost on every one except Mildred. She\nflushed hotly at the thought of having to bear the responsibility of\nthat ridiculous scene on the Cherwell; it was humiliating, indeed. She\ntook up the crystal to conceal her chagrin.\n\n\"Do please see something, Mrs. Stewart!\" exclaimed Miss Ormond.\n\n\"What sort of thing?\"\n\n\"Anything! Whatever you see, it will be quite thrilling.\n\n\"Please see me, Mrs. Stewart,\" petitioned Goring, wandering towards the\ncrystal-gazer. \"I should so like to thrill Miss Ormond.\"\n\n\"It's no good your trying that way,\" smiled the lady, playing fine eyes.\n\"It's only shadows that are thrilling in the crystal; shadows of\nsomething happening a long way off; or sometimes a coming event casts a\nshadow before--and that's the most thrilling of all.\"\n\n\"A coming event! That's exactly what I am, a tremendous coming Political\nEvent. You ask them in the House,\" cried Goring, thrusting out his chin\nand aiming a provocative side-smile at a middle-aged Under-Secretary of\nState who discreetly admired Miss Ormond.\n\n\"Modest creature!\" ejaculated the Under-Secretary playfully with his\nlips; and in his heart vindictively, \"Conceited devil!\"\n\n\"Please see me, Mrs. Stewart!\" pleaded Goring, half kneeling on a chair\nand leaning over the crystal.\n\n\"I do,\" she returned. \"I'd rather not. You look so distorted and odd;\nand so do I, don't I? Dreadful! But the crystal's getting cloudy.\"\n\n\"Then you're going really to see something!\" exclaimed Miss Ormond. \"How\ndelightful! Come away directly, Mr. Goring, or you'll spoil everything.\"\n\nSir Cyril and Davison looked up from some treasure of Greek art. The\nconversation was perfunctory, every one's curiosity waiting on Mildred\nand the crystal.\n\n\"Don't you see anything yet, Mrs. Stewart?\" asked Miss Ormond at length,\nimpatiently.\n\n\"No,\" replied Mildred, hesitatingly. \"At least, not exactly. I see\nsomething like rushing water and foam.\"\n\n\"The reflection of clouds overhead,\" pronounced the Under-Secretary,\ndogmatically, glancing upward.\n\n\"I'm sure it's nothing of the kind,\" asserted Miss Ormond. \"Please go on\nlooking, Mrs. Stewart, and perhaps you'll see a water-spirit.\"\n\n\"Why do you want her to see a water-spirit?\" asked Davison, ironically.\n\"In all countries of the world they are reckoned spiteful, treacherous\ncreatures. I was once bitten by one severely, and I have never wanted to\nsee one since.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Davison! Are you serious? What do you mean?\" questioned Miss\nOrmond.\n\nMrs. Stewart hastily put down the crystal. \"I don't want to see one,\"\nshe said; \"I'm afraid it might bring me bad luck, and, besides, I can't\nwait for it, I've got several calls to make before I go home, and I\nthink there's a storm coming.\" She shivered. \"I'm quite cold.\"\n\nMiss Ormond said that must be the effect of the crystal, as the\nafternoon was still oppressively hot.\n\nGoring caught up with Mrs. Stewart in the gravel drive outside the house\nand walked through Kensington Gardens with her. It seemed to them both\nquite natural that they should be walking together, and their talk was\nin the vein of old friends who have met after a long separation rather\nthan in that of new acquaintances.", "start_char_idx": 332965, "end_char_idx": 336759, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6": {"__data__": {"id_": "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "45fd847a03b826f72bdf48bb73969331bc1a7d2799523b35a0e7c52eaf578c97", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "759cd62b300f05fa066f7f9141a54b53366ffaec85c010c6dcf11cfc4bc9ab97", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "When he left her and turned to walk\nacross Hyde Park towards Westminster, he examined his impressions and\nperceived that he was in a state of mind foreign to his nature, and\ntherefore the butt of his ridicule; a state in which, if he and Mrs.\nStewart had been unmarried persons, he would have said to himself, \"That\nis the woman I shall marry.\" It would not have been a passion or an\nemotion that would have made him say that; it would have been a\nconviction. As it was, the thing was absurd. Cochrane had told him, half\nin jest, that Mrs. Stewart was a breaker of hearts, but had not hinted\nthat her own was on the market. Her appearance made it surely an\ninteresting question whether she had a heart at all.\n\nAnd for himself? He hated to think of his marriage, because he\nrecognized in it the fatal \"little spot\" in the yet ungarnered fruit of\nhis life. He was only thirty, but he had been married seven years and\nhad two children, both of them the image of all the Barthops that had\never been, except his own father. In moments of depression he saw\nhimself through all the coming years being gradually broken, crushed\nunder a weight of Barthops--father-in-law, wife and children--moulded\ninto a thin semblance of a Marquis of Ipswich, a bastard Marquis. No one\nbut himself knew the weakness of his character--explosive, audacious in\nalarums or excursions, but without the something, call it strength or\nhardness or stupidity, which enables the man or woman possessing it to\nresist constant domestic pressure--the unconscious pressure of radically\nopposed character. The crowd applauds the marriage of such opposites\nbecause their side almost always wins; partly by its own weight and\npartly by their weight behind. But the truth is that two beings opposed\nin emotional temperament and mental processes are only a few degrees\nmore able to help and understand each other in the close union of\nmarriage than the two personalities of Milly Stewart in the closer union\nof her body.\n\nFrom one point of view it was Goring's fatal weakness to have a real\naffection for his father-in-law, who was a pattern of goodness and\ngood-breeding. Consequently, that very morning he had promised Lord\nIpswich to walk in the straightest way of the party, for one year at\nleast; and if he must slap faces, to select them on the other side of\nthe House. Nevertheless, if he really wished to give sincere\ngratification to Lord Ipswich and to dear Augusta, he must needs give\nup his capricious and offensive tactics altogether. These things might\ngive him a temporary notoriety in the House and country, but they were\nnot in the traditions of the Ipswich family, which had held a high place\nin politics for two hundred years. The Marquis said that he had always\ntried to make George feel that he was received as a true son of the\nfamily and heir of its best traditions, if not of its name. There had\nbeen a great deal of good faith on both sides. Yet now a solitary young\nman, looking well in the frock-coat and tall hat of convention, might\nhave been observed stopping and striking the gravel viciously as he\nreflected on the political future which his father-in-law was mapping\nout for him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\n\nSir James Carus, the well-known scientist, had for some time been\nemploying Miss Timson in the capacity of assistant, and spoke highly of\nher talents. She began to have a reputation in scientific circles, and\nowing to her duties with Carus she could not come to the Stewarts' as\noften as she had formerly done. But she preserved her habit of\ndismissing the parlor-maid at the door and creeping up to the\ndrawing-room like a thief in the night.\n\nOn the day following Sir Cyril Meres's luncheon-party she arrived in her\nusual fashion. The windows were shaded against the afternoon sun, but\nthe sky was now overcast, and such a twilight reigned within that at\nfirst she could distinguish little, and the drawing-room seemed to her\nto be empty. But in a minute she discerned a white figure supine in a\nlarge arm-chair--Mildred, and asleep.\n\nShe had a writing-board on her knee, and a hand resting on it still held\na stylograph.", "start_char_idx": 336760, "end_char_idx": 340874, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f": {"__data__": {"id_": "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2b0b641ae62495515d91a230ab4088f3159399141135e5707ba01a6c6e9c8b41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "047539b7644d37deae65121aa8cdfb7d353beb46affb389eac3394a9f9f208e2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She must have dozed over her writing; yet she did not stir\nwhen her name was uttered. Tims noticed a peculiar stillness in her, a\nsomething almost inanimate in her attitude and countenance, which\nsuggested that this was no ordinary siesta. The idea that Milly might\neven now be resurgent fluttered Tims's pulses with a mixed emotion.\n\n\"Good old Milly! Poor old girl!\" she breathed to the white figure in the\narm-chair. \"Don't be in a hurry! You won't find it all beer and skittles\nwhen you're here.\"\n\nIt seemed to her that a slight convulsion passed over the sleeper's\nface.\n\nTims seated herself on a low chair, in the attitude of certain gargoyles\nthat crouch under the eaves of old churches, elbows on knees, chin on\nhands, and fixed her eyes in silence on her silent companion. In spite\nof her work along the acknowledged lines of science, she had pursued her\nhypnotic studies furtively, half in scorn and half in fear of her\nscientific brethren. What would she not have given to be enabled to\nwatch, to comprehend the changes passing within that human form so close\nto her that she could see its every external detail, could touch it by\nthe out-stretching of a hand! But its inner shrine, its secret place,\nremained barred against those feeble implements of sense with which\nnature has provided the explorative human intelligence. Its content was\nmore mysterious, more inaccessible than that of the remotest star which\nyields the secret of its substance to the spectroscope of the\nastronomer.\n\nTims's thoughts had forsaken the personal side of the question, when she\nwas recalled to it by seeing the right hand in which the stylograph had\nbeen lying begin to twitch, the fingers to contract. There was no\nanswering movement in the face--even when the sleeper at length firmly\ngrasped the pen and suddenly sat up. Tims rose quickly, and then\nperceived, lying on the writing-board, a directed envelope and a\nhalf-finished note to herself. She slipped the note-paper nearer to the\ntwitching hand, and after a few meaningless flourishes, it wrote slowly\nand tentatively:\n\n\"Tims--Milly--cannot get back. Help me ... Save Ian. Wicked creature--no\nconscience--\"\n\nHere the power of the hand began to fail, and the writing was terminated\nby mere scrawls. The sleeper's eyes were now open, but not wide. They\nhad a strange, glassy look in them, nor did she show any consciousness\nof Tims's presence. She dropped the pen, folded the paper in the same\nslow and tentative manner in which she had written upon it, and placed\nit in the directed envelope lying there. Then her face contracted, her\nfingers slackened, and she fell back again to the depths of the chair.\n\n\"Milly!\" cried Tims, almost involuntarily bending over her. \"Milly!\"\n\nAgain there was a slight contraction of the face and of the whole body.\n\nAt the moment that Tims uttered Milly's name, Ian was entering the room.\nHis long legs brought him up to the chair in an instant, and he asked,\nwithout the usual salutation:\n\n\"What's the matter? Has--has the change happened?\"\n\nHis voice unconsciously spoke dismay. Tims looked at him.\n\n\"No, not exactly,\" she articulated, slowly; and, after a pause: \"Poor\nold Milly's trying to come back, that's all.\"\n\nShe paused again; then:\n\n\"You look a bit worried, old man.\"\n\nHe tossed back his head with a gesture he had kept from the days when\nthe crest of raven-black hair had been wont to grow too long and\nencroach on his forehead. It was grizzled now, and much less intrusive.\n\n\"I'm about tired out,\" he said, shortly.\n\n\"Look here,\" she continued, \"if you really want Milly back, just say so.\nShe's kind of knocking at the door, and I believe I could let her in if\nI tried.\"\n\nHe dropped wearily into a chair.\n\n\"For Heaven's sake, Miss Timson, don't put the responsibility on me!\"\n\n\"I can't help it,\" returned Tims. \"She's managed to get this through to\nme--\" She handed Milly's scrawled message to Ian.\n\nHe read it, then read it again and handed it back.\n\n\"Strange, certainly.\"\n\n\"Does it mean anything in particular?\"", "start_char_idx": 340875, "end_char_idx": 344887, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b": {"__data__": {"id_": "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c4062ffe35019bdb62815eb6a32697441f2b5a71aa456fb49615d144b832e99e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "680289f7a4d6d14ad5344c41e56476a54fce25708f02911fc5b5797d439f687a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Strange, certainly.\"\n\n\"Does it mean anything in particular?\"\n\nHe shrugged his shoulders almost impatiently and sighed.\n\n\"Oh no! It's the poor child's usual cry when she's here. She's got it\ninto her head that the self she doesn't know is frightfully wicked, and\nmakes me miserable. I've tried over and over again to convince her, but\nit's all nonsense.\"\n\nHe thought to himself: \"She is coming back still full of this mortal,\nheart-rending jealousy, and we shall have more painful scenes.\"\n\n\"Well, it's your business to say what I'm to do,\" insisted Tims. \"I\ndon't think she'd have troubled to write if she'd found she could get\nback altogether without my help; but the other one's grown a bit too\nstrong for her. Do you want Milly back?\"\n\nThe remorseless Tims forced on Ian a plain question which in his own\nmind he habitually sought to evade. He leaned back and shaded his eyes\nwith his hand. After a silence he spoke, low, as if with effort:\n\n\"I can't honestly say I want the change to happen just now, Miss Timson.\nIt means a great deal of agitation, a thorough upheaval of everything.\nWe have an extremely troublesome business on at the Merchants'\nGuild--I've just come away from a four hours' meeting; and upon my word\nI don't think I can stand a--domestic revolution at the same time. It\nwould utterly unfit me for my work.\"\n\nHe did not add that he had been looking forward to receiving helpful\ncounsel from Mildred, with her clear common-sense, seasoned with wit.\n\nTims wagged her head and stared in his face.\n\n\"Poor old M.!\" she ejaculated, slowly.\n\nMiss Timson still possessed the rare power of irritating Ian Stewart. He\ngrew restive.\n\n\"I suppose I am a selfish brute. Men always are, aren't they? But, after\nall, my wife enjoys life in her present state at least as much as she\ndoes in the other.\"\n\n\"Not for the same reason, dear boy,\" returned Tims. \"Old M., bless her,\njust lives for you. You don't imagine, do you, that Mildred cares about\nyou like that?\"\n\nIan flushed slightly, and his face hardened.\n\n\"One can't very well discuss one's wife's feeling for one's self,\" he\nsaid. \"I believe I have every reason to be happy, however things are.\nAnd I very much doubt, Miss Timson, whether you can really effect the\nchange in her in any way. At any rate, I'd rather you didn't try,\nplease. I'll have her moved to her room, where she'll most likely sleep\ntill to-morrow.\"\n\nTims bent over the sleeper. Then:\n\n\"I don't believe she will, somehow. You'd better leave her with me for\nthe present, and I'll let you know if anything happens.\"\n\nHe obeyed, and in a minute she heard the front door close after him.\nTims sat down in the chair which he had vacated.\n\n\"Poor old M.!\" she ejaculated again, presently, and added: \"What idiots\nmen are! All except old Carus and Mr. Fitzallan. He's sensible enough.\"\n\nHer thoughts wandered away, until they were recalled by the door opening\na mere chink to let a child slip into the room--a slim, tall child, in a\nblue smock--Tony. His thick, dark hair was cropped boywise now, and the\nlikeness of the beautiful, sensitive child face to Ian's was more\nmarked. It was evident that in him there was to be no blending of\nstrains, but an exact reproduction of the paternal type.\n\nTims was in his eyes purely a comic character, but the ready grin with\nwhich he usually greeted her was replaced to-day by a little,\ninattentive smile. He went past her and stood by the sofa, looking\nfixedly at his mother with a grave mouth and a slight frown on his\nforehead. At length he turned away, and was about to leave the room as\nquietly as he had come, when Tims brought him to a stand-still at her\nknee. He held up an admonishing finger.\n\n\"Sh! Don't you wake my Mummy, or Daddy 'll be angry with you.\"\n\n\"We sha'n't wake her; she's too fast asleep. Tell me why you looked so\nsolemnly at her just now, Tony?\"", "start_char_idx": 344826, "end_char_idx": 348662, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f": {"__data__": {"id_": "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "4893b65c8c80f19b03599be68c40195c2a51968276c2a7da46d11ff43273b5c1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bb6740091b705e0baabaf4fdfb8ecb52b72407744260407d0fa31074c6e78d94", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Tell me why you looked so\nsolemnly at her just now, Tony?\"\n\nTony, his hands held fast, wriggled, rubbed his shoulder against his\near, and for all answer laughed in a childish, silly way. Such is the\ndepth and secretiveness of children, whom we call transparent.\n\n\"Did you think Mummy was dead?\"\n\n\"What's 'dead'?\" asked Tony, with interest, putting off his mask of\ninanity.\n\n\"People are dead when they've gone to sleep and will never wake again,\"\nreturned Tims.\n\nTony thought a minute; then his dark eyes grew very large. He whispered\nslowly, as though with difficulty formulating his ideas:\n\n\"Doesn't they _never_ wake? Doesn't they wake up after ever so long,\nwhen peoples can't remember everything--and it makes them want to cry,\nonly grown-up people aren't 'lowed?\"\n\nTims was puzzled. But even in her bewilderment it occurred to her that\nif poor Milly should return, she would be distressed to find in what a\nslovenly manner Tony was allowed to express himself.\n\n\"I don't know what you mean, Tony. Say it again and put it more\nclearly.\"\n\nTims had around her neck a necklace composed of casts of coins in the\nBritish Museum. She did not usually wear ornaments, because she\npossessed none, except a hair-bracelet, two brooches, and a large gold\ncross which had belonged to her late aunt. Tony's soft, slender fingers\nwent to the necklace, and ignoring her question, he asked: \"Why have you\ngot these funny things round your neck, Auntie Tims?\"\n\n\"They're not funny. They're beautiful--copies of money which the old\nGreeks used to use. A gentleman gave it to me.\" Tims spoke with a grand\ncarelessness. \"I dare say if you're a good boy he'll tell you stories\nabout them himself some day. But I want you to explain what it was you\nmeant to say about dead people. Dead people don't come back, you know.\"\n\nTony touched her hand, which lay open on her knee, and played with the\nfingers a minute. Then raising his eyes he said, plaintively:\n\n\"I do so want my tea.\"\n\nOnce more he had wiped the conversational slate, and the baffled Tims\ndismissed him. He opened the door a little and slipped out; put his dark\nhead in again with an engaging smile, said politely, \"I sha'n't be away\n_very_ long,\" and closed the door softly behind him. For that soft\nclosing of the door was one of the things poor Milly had taught him\nwhich the little 'peoples' did contrive to remember.\n\nThe sleeper now began to stir slightly in her sleep, and before Tony's\nsomewhat prolonged tea was over, she sat up and looked about her.\n\n\"Is that Tims?\" she asked, in a colorless voice.\n\n\"Yes--is it you, Milly?\"\n\n\"No. What makes you think so?\"\n\n\"Milly's been trying to come back. I suppose she couldn't manage it.\"\n\n\"Ah!\"--there was a deep satisfaction in Mildred's tone now; \"I thought\nshe couldn't!\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\n\nGeorge Goring and Mildred Stewart did not move in the same social set,\nbut their sets had points of contact, and it was at these that Goring\nwas now most likely to be found; especially at the pleasant bachelor\nhouse on Campden Hill. Mrs. Stewart walked in the Park every morning at\nan unfashionable hour, and sometimes, yet not too often for discretion,\nGoring happened to be walking there too. All told, their meetings were\nnot very numerous, nor very private. But every half-hour they spent in\neach other's company seemed to do the work of a month of intimacy.\n\nJuly hastened to an end, but an autumn Session brought Goring up to town\nin November, and three months of absence found him and Mildred still at\nthe same point. Sir Cyril Meres was already beginning to plan his\nwonderful _tableaux-vivants_, which, however, did not come off until\nFebruary. The extraordinary imitative talent which his artistic career\nhad been one long struggle to disguise, was for once to be allowed full\nplay.", "start_char_idx": 348604, "end_char_idx": 352382, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468": {"__data__": {"id_": "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "3a65583099ef4011407f89932f7c45367aa19486f152630aee8787bb5f7fb87b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b1987a0f2085429b07e6bdb9da36e4c21b4f043a06409ea6d0471fe58991c95c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The _tableaux_ were to represent paintings by certain\nfellow-artists and friends; not actual pictures by them, but pictures\nwhich they might have painted, and the supposed authors were allowed a\nright of veto or criticism.\n\nA stage of Renaissance design, which did not jar with the surrounding\narchitecture, was erected in the depth of the portico at the end of the\nHellenic room.\n\nThe human material at Meres's command was physically admirable. He had\nlong been the chosen portrait-painter of wealth and fashion, and there\nwas not a beauty in Society, with the biggest \"S,\" who was not delighted\nto lend her charms for his purpose. The young men might grumble for\nform's sake, but at the bottom of their hearts they were equally\nsensible to the compliment of being asked to appear. It was when it came\nto the moulding of the material for artistic purposes, that the trouble\nbegan. The English have produced great actors, but in the bulk they have\nlittle natural aptitude for the stage; and what they have is discouraged\nby a social training which strains after the ideal composure, the few\nmovements, the glassy eye of a waxwork. Only a small and chosen number,\nit is true, fully attain that ideal; but when we see them we recognize\nwith a start, almost with a shudder, that it is there, the perfection of\nour deportment.\n\nCyril Meres was, however, an admirable stage-manager, exquisite in tact,\nin temper, and urbane patience. The results of his prolonged training\nwere wonderful; yet again and again he found it impossible to carry out\nhis idea without placing his cousin Mrs. Stewart at the vital point of\nhis picture. She was certainly not the most physically beautiful woman\nthere, but she was unrivalled by any other in the grace, the variety,\nthe meaning of her gestures, the dramatic transformations of her\ncountenance. She was Pandora, she was Hope, she was Lady Hammerton, she\nwas the Vampire, and she was the Queen of Faerie.\n\nThere is jealousy on the amateur stage as well as on the professional,\nand ladies of social position, accustomed to see their beauty lauded in\nthe newspapers, saw no reason why Mrs. Stewart should be thrust to the\nfront of half of the pictures. Lady Langham, the \"smart\" Socialist, with\nwhom George Goring had flirted last season, to Lady Augusta's real\ndismay, was the leading rival candidate for Mildred's r\u00f4les. But Lady\nLangham never guessed that Mrs. Stewart was the cause of George Goring's\ndisappearance from the list of her admirers, and she still had hopes of\nhis return.\n\nThe _tableaux_ were a brilliant success. Ian was there on the first\nevening, so was Lady Augusta Goring. Lady Langham, peeping through the\ncurtains, saw her, and swept the horizon--that is, the circle of black\ncoats around the walls--in vain for George Goring. Then Lady Augusta\nbecame audible, saying that in the present state of affairs in the House\nit was quite impossible for Mr. Goring to leave it, even for dinner, on\nthat evening or the next. Nevertheless, on the next evening, Lady\nLangham espied George Goring in the act of taking a vacant chair near\nthe front, next to a social _prot\u00e9g\u00e9e_ of her own. She turned and\nmentioned the fact to a friend, who smiled meaningly and remarked, \"In\nspite of Lady Augusta's whip!\"\n\nMildred, passing, caught the information, the comment, the smile. During\nthe rehearsals for the _tableaux_, she had heard people coupling the\nnames of Goring and Lady Langham, not seriously, yet seriously enough\nfor her. A winged shaft of jealousy pierced at once her heart and her\npride. Was she allowing her whole inner life to be shaken, dissolved by\nthe passing admiration of a flirt? Her intimate self had assurance that\nit was not so; but sometimes a colder wind, blowing she knew not whence,\nor the lash of a chance word, threw her into the attitude of a chance\nobserver, one who sees, guesses, does not know.", "start_char_idx": 352383, "end_char_idx": 356249, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1": {"__data__": {"id_": "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "946b9ed5a286ec92949a650a3bc7959707c5aabe4da4842ec614b1f0b064f485", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4fe56c0cad520cca10b1dd18e079e7014e3ebba4ba0154c61927e8387b7a8577", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Meantime George Goring had flung himself down in the only vacant chair\nhe could see, and careless of the brilliant company about him, careless\neven of the face of Aphrodite herself, smiling divinely, unconcerned\nwith human affairs, from a far corner he waited for the curtain to go\nup. His neighbor spoke. She had met him at the Langhams last season.\nWhat a pity he had just missed Lady Langham's great _tableau_, \"Helen\nbefore the Elders of Troy\"! There was no one to be compared to Maud\nLangham, so beautiful, so clever! She would have made her fortune if she\nhad gone on the stage. Goring gave the necessary assent.\n\nThe curtain went up, exhibiting a picture called \"The Vampire.\" It was\nsmaller than most and shown by a curious pale light. A fair young girl\nwas lying in a deep sleep on a curtained bed, and hovering, crawling\nover her with a deadly, serpentine grace, was a white figure wrapped in\na veiling garment that might have been a shroud. Out of white cerements\nshowed a trail of yellow hair and a face alabaster white, save for the\nlips that were blood red--an intent face with a kind of terrible beauty,\nyet instinct with cruelty. One slender, bloodless hand was in the girl's\nhair, and, even without the title, it would have been plain that there\nwas a deadly purpose in that creeping figure.\n\n\"Isn't it horrid?\" whispered Goring's neighbor. \"Fancy that Mrs. Stewart\nletting herself be made to look so dreadful!\"\n\n\"Who?\" asked Goring, horrified. He had not recognized Mildred.\n\n\"Why, the girl on the bed's Gertrude Waters, and the Vampire's a cousin\nof Sir Cyril Meres. A horrid little woman some people admire, but I\nshouldn't think any one would after this. I call it disgusting, don't\nyou?\"\n\n\"It's horrible!\" gasped George; \"it oughtn't to be allowed. What does\nthat fellow Meres mean by inventing such deviltries? By Jove, I should\nlike to thrash him!\"\n\nThe neighbor stared. It was all very well to be horrified at Mrs.\nStewart, but why this particular form of horror?\n\n\"Please call me when it's over,\" said Goring, putting his head down\nbetween his hands.\n\nWhat an eccentric young man he was! But clever people often were\neccentric.\n\nIn due course the _tableau_ was over, and to the relief of one\nspectator at least, it was not encored. The next was some harmless\ndomestic scene with people in short waists. George Goring looked in vain\nfor Mildred among them, longing to see her, the real lovely her, and\nforget the horrible thing she had portrayed. Lady Langham was there, and\nhis neighbor commended her tediously, convinced of pleasing.\n\nThere followed a large and very beautiful picture in the manner of a\ngreat English Pre-Raphaelite. This was called \"Thomas the Rhymer,\nmeeting with the Faerie Queen,\" but it did not follow the description of\nthe ballad. The Faerie Queen, a figure of a Botticellian grace, was\ncoming, with all her fellowship, out of a wonderful pinewood, while\nThomas the Rhymer, handsome and young and lean and brown, his harp\nacross his back, had just crossed a mountain-stream by a rough bridge.\nHe appeared suddenly to have beheld her, pausing above him before\ndescending the heathery bank that edged the wood; and looking in her\nface, to have entered at once into the land of Faerie. The pose, the\nfigure, the face of the Faerie Queen were of the most exquisite charm\nand beauty, touched with a something of romance and mystery that no\nother woman there except Mildred could have lent it. The youth who\npersonated Thomas the Rhymer was temporarily in love with Mrs. Stewart\nand acted his part with intense expression. Goring, shading his eyes\nwith his hand, fixed them upon her as long as he dared; then glanced at\nthe Rhymer and was angry. He turned to his chattering neighbor and\nasked:\n\n\"Who's the chap doing Thomas? Looks as if he wanted a wash.\"\n\n\"I don't know. Nobody particular, I should think.", "start_char_idx": 356251, "end_char_idx": 360102, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf": {"__data__": {"id_": "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "08d031072de6dc35380181ef1fe8b9ed1d497b2b1576d397ba3fa600f7ec41e9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "3718fe8ce56494f93bed139f4209401345838d86f912d394db8d1ae5b8efc1ed", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I don't know. Nobody particular, I should think. Wasn't it a pity they\ndidn't have Lady Langham for the Faerie Queen? I do call it absurd the\nway Sir Cyril Meres has put that pert, insignificant cousin of his\nforward in quite half the pictures--and when he might have had Maud\nLangham.\"\n\nGoring threw himself back in his chair and laughed his quite loud laugh.\n\n\"'A mad world, my masters,'\" he quoted.\n\nHis neighbor took this for Mr. Goring's eccentric way of approving her\nsentiments. But what he really meant was: What a strange masquerade is\nthe world! This neighbor of his, so ordinary, so desirous to please,\nwould have shuddered at the notion of hinting to him the patent fact\nthat Lady Augusta Goring was a tiring woman; while she pressed upon him\nlaudations of a person to whom he was perfectly indifferent, mingled\nwith insulting comments on the only woman in the world for him--the\nwoman who was his world, without whom nothing was; on her whose very\nname, even on these silly, hostile lips, gave him a strong sensation,\nwhether of pain or pleasure he could hardly tell.\n\nAfter the performance he constrained himself to go the round of the\nladies of his acquaintance who had been acting and compliment them\ncleverly and with good taste. Lady Langham of course seized the lion's\nshare of his company and his compliments. He seemed to address only a\nfew remarks of the same nature to Mrs. Stewart, but he had watched his\nopportunity and was able to say to her:\n\n\"I must leave in a quarter of an hour at latest. Please let me drive you\nback. You won't say no?\"\n\nThere was a pleading note in the last phrase and his eyes met hers\ngravely, anxiously. It was evident that she must answer immediately,\nwhile their neighbors' attention was distracted from them. She was pale\nbefore under her stage make-up, and now she grew still paler.\n\n\"Thanks. I told Cousin Cyril I was tired and shouldn't stay long. I'll\ngo and change at once.\"\n\nThen Thomas the Rhymer was at her elbow again, bringing her something\nfor which she had sent him.\n\nThe green-room, in which she resumed the old white lace evening-dress\nthat she had worn to dine with her cousin, was strewn with the delicate\nunderclothing, the sumptuous wraps and costly knick-knacks of wealthy\nwomen. She had felt ashamed, as she had undressed there, of her own poor\nlittle belongings among these; and ashamed to be so ashamed. As she had\nseen her garments overswept by the folds of the fair Socialist's white\nvelvet mantle, lined with Arctic fox and clasped with diamonds, she had\nsmiled ironically at the juxtaposition. Since circumstances and her own\ngifts had drawn her into the stream of the world, she had been more and\nmore conscious, however unwillingly, of a longing for luxuries, for rich\nsettings to her beauty, for some stage upon which her brilliant\npersonality might shine uplifted, secure. For she seemed to herself\nsometimes like a tumbler at a fair, struggling in the crowd for a space\nin which to spread his carpet. Now--George Goring loved her. Let the\nothers keep their furs and laces and gewgaws, their great fortunes or\ngreat names. Yet if it had been possible for her to take George Goring's\nlove, he could have given her most of these things as well.\n\nWrapped in a gauzy white scarf, she seemed to float rather than walk\ndown the stairs into the hall, where Thomas the Rhymer was lingering, in\nthe hope of finding an excuse to escort her home. She was pale, with a\nclear, beautiful pallor, a strange smile was on her lips and her eyes\nshone like stars. The Queen of Faerie had looked less lovely, meeting\nhim on the edge of the wood. She nodded him good-night and passed\nquickly on into the porch. With a boyish pang he saw her vanish, not\ninto the darkness of night, but into the blond interior of a smart\nbrougham. A young man, also smart--her husband, for aught he\nknew--paused on the step to give orders to the coachman, and followed\nher in.", "start_char_idx": 360053, "end_char_idx": 363976, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b": {"__data__": {"id_": "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "bbad3e30c1d5b9f0ecaf8f61c57db6e72a5e03f754eeffcf542905f49bb4c60a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ede178d8d71e63e32aa199ba39dc37944618eaa583e6c153e66bf8ef7fd607d8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "A moment he saw her dimly, in the glare of carriage-lamps, a\nwhite vision, half eclipsed by the black silhouette of the man at her\nside; then they glided away over the crunching gravel of the drive, into\nthe fiery night of London.\n\n\"Do you really think it went off well?\" she asked, as they passed\nthrough the gates into the street. George was taking off his hat and\nputting it down on the little shelf opposite. He leaned back and was\nsilent a few seconds; then starting forward, laid his hand upon her\nknee.\n\n\"Don't let's waste time like that, Mildred,\" he said--and although he\nhad never called her so before, it seemed natural that he should--\"we\nhaven't got much. You know, don't you, why I asked you to drive with\nme?\"\n\nShe in her turn was silent a moment, then meeting his eyes:\n\n\"Yes,\" she said, quite simply and courageously.\n\n\"I thought you could hardly help seeing I loved you, however blind other\npeople might be.\"\n\nHer head was turned away again and she looked out of the window, as she\nanswered in a voice that tried to be light:\n\n\"But it isn't of any consequence, is it? I suppose you're always in love\nwith somebody or other.\"\n\n\"Is that what people told you about me?\"--and it was new and wonderful\nto her to hear George Goring speak with this calmness and\ngravity--\"You've not been long in the world, little girl, or you'd know\nhow much to believe of what's said there.\"\n\n\"No,\" she answered, in turn becoming calm and deliberate. \"When I come\nto think of it, people only say that women generally like you and that\nyou flirt with them. I--I invented the rest.\"\n\n\"But, good Heavens! Why?\" There was a note of pain and wonder in his\nvoice.\n\nShe paused, and his hand moved under her cloak to be laid on the two\nslender hands clasped on her lap.\n\n\"I suppose I was jealous,\" she said.\n\nHe smiled.\n\n\"Absurd child! But I'm a bit of an ass that way myself. I was jealous of\nThomas the Rhymer this evening.\"\n\n\"That brat!\"\n\nShe laughed low, the sweet laugh that was like no one else's. It was\npast midnight and the streets were comparatively quiet and dark, but at\nthat moment they were whirled into a glare of strong light. They looked\nin each other's eyes in silence, his hand tightening its hold upon hers.\nThen again they plunged into wavering dimness, and he resumed, gravely\nand calmly as before, but bending nearer her.\n\n\"If I weren't anxious to tell you the exact truth, to avoid\nexaggeration, I should say I fell in love with you the first time I met\nyou. It seems to me now as though it had been so. And the second\ntime--you remember it was one very hot day last July, when we both\nlunched with Meres--I hadn't the least doubt that if I had been free and\nyou also, I should have left no stone unturned to get you for my wife.\"\n\nEvery word was sweet to her, yet she answered sombrely:\n\n\"But we are not free.\"\n\nHe, disregarding the answer, went on:\n\n\"You love me, as I love you?\"\n\n\"As you love me, dearest; and from the first.\"\n\nA minute's silence, while the hands held each other fast. Then low,\ntriumphantly, he exclaimed: \"Well?\"\n\nHer slim hands began to flutter a little in his as she answered all that\nthat \"Well\" implied.\n\n\"It's impossible, dear. It's no use arguing about it. It's just waste of\ntime--and we've only got this little time.\"\n\n\"To do what? To make love in? Dear, we've got all our lives if we\nplease. We've both made a tremendous mistake, we've both got a chance\nnow of going back on it, of setting our lives right again, making them\nbetter indeed than we ever dreamed of their being. We inflict some loss\non other people--no loss comparable to our gain--we hurt them chiefly\nbecause of their bloated ideas of their claims on us. I know you've\nweighed things, have no prejudices. Rules, systems, are made for types\nand classes, not for us. You belong to no type, Mildred. I belong to no\nclass.\"", "start_char_idx": 363977, "end_char_idx": 367805, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a": {"__data__": {"id_": "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2d341aa3f3aceed0229f4f6dfc833a48e6d4894009f7c3fe8c5aa6022ab7ad80", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "eecb48639b2cf1c4359eb275de343d6d757b3da7f3322633f29dd877e28365a0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "You belong to no type, Mildred. I belong to no\nclass.\"\n\nShe answered low, painfully:\n\n\"It's true I am unlike other people; that's the very reason, why--I--I'm\nnot good to love.\" There was a low utterance that was music in her ears,\nyet she continued: \"Then, dear friend, think of your career, ruined for\nme, by me. You might be happy for a while, then you'd regret it.\"\n\n\"That's where you're wrong. My career? A rotten little game, these House\nof Commons party politics, when you get into it! The big things go on\noutside them; there's all the world outside them. Anyhow, my career, as\nI planned it, is ruined already. The Ipswich gang have collared me; I\ncan't call my tongue my own, Mildred. Think of that!\"\n\nShe smiled faintly.\n\n\"Temporary, George! You'll soon have your head up--and your tongue\nout.\"\n\n\"Oh, from time to time, I presume, I shall always be the Horrid Vulgar\nBoy of those poor Barthops; I shall kick like a galvanized frog long\nafter I'm dead. But--I wouldn't confess it to any one but you, dear--I'm\nnot strong enough to stand against the everlasting pressure that's\nbrought to bear upon me. You know what I mean, don't you?\"\n\n\"Yes. You'll be no good if you let the originality be squeezed out of\nyou. Don't allow it.\"\n\n\"Nothing can prevent it--unless the Faerie Queen will stretch out her\ndearest, sweetest hands to me and lead me, poor mortal, right away into\nthe wide world, into some delightful country where there's plenty of\nlove and no politics. I want love so much, Mildred; I've never had it,\nand no one has ever guessed how much I wanted it except you,\ndear--except you.\"\n\nYes, she had guessed. The queer childhood, so noisy yet so lonely, had\nbeen spoken of; the married life spoke for itself.\n\nHis arm was around her now, their faces drawn close together, and in the\npale, faint light they looked each other deep in the eyes. Then their\nlips met in a long kiss.\n\n\"You see how it is,\" he whispered; \"you can't help it. It's got to be.\nNo one has power to prevent it.\"\n\nBut he spoke without knowledge, for there was one who had power to\nprevent it, one conquered, helpless, less than a ghost, who yet could\nlay an icy hand on the warm, high-beating heart of her subduer, and say:\n\"Love and desire, the pride of life and the freedom of the world, are\nnot for you. I forbid them to you--I--by a power stronger than the laws\nof God or man. True, you have no husband, you have no child, for those\nwho seem to be yours are mine. You have taken them from me, and now you\nmust keep them, whether you will or no. You have taken my life from me,\nand my life you must have, that and none other.\"\n\nIt was against this unknown and inflexible power that George Goring\nstruggled with all the might of his love, and absolutely in vain.\nBetween him and Mildred there could be no lies, no subterfuges; only\nthat one silence which to him, of all others, she dared not break.\n\nShe seemed to have been engaged in this struggle, at once so sweet and\nso bitter, for an eternity before she stood on her own doorstep,\nlatch-key in hand.\n\n\"Good-night, Mr. Goring. So much obliged for the lift.\"\n\n\"Delighted, I'm sure. All right now? Good-night. Drop me at the House,\nEdwards.\"\n\nHe lifted his hat, stepped in and closed the carriage-door sharply\nbehind him; and in a minute the brougham with its lights rolling almost\nnoiselessly behind the big fast-trotting bay horse, had disappeared\naround a neighboring corner.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe house was cold and dark, except for a candle which burned on an oak\ndresser in the narrow hall. As Mildred dragged herself up the stairs,\nshe had a sensation of physical fatigue, almost bruisedness, as though\nshe had come out of some actual bodily combat.", "start_char_idx": 367751, "end_char_idx": 371471, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52": {"__data__": {"id_": "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "af117e79e067eb5b2c6e511f64105c258a7f57ed1038ffa57cbcccfda5fc4282", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4a8db8155345fdd8bcbca7a922dad0c8bfe117202806b068cc18317245b63b4a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her room, fireless and\ncold, was solitary, for Ian's sleep had to be protected from\ndisturbance. Nevertheless, having loosened her wraps, she threw herself\non the bed and lay there long, her bare arms under her head. The\nsensation of chill, her own cold soft flesh against her face, seemed to\nbrace her mind and body, to restore her powers of clear, calm judgment,\nso unlike the usual short-sighted, emotionalized judgments of youth. She\nhad nothing of the ordinary woman's feeling of guilt towards her\nhusband. The intimate bond between herself and George Goring did not\nseem in any relation the accidental one between her and Ian Stewart. She\nhad never before faced the question, the possibility of a choice between\nthe two. Now she weighed it with characteristic swiftness and decision.\nShe reasoned that Ian had enjoyed a period of great happiness in his\nmarriage with her, in spite of the singularity of its conditions; but\nthat now, while Milly could never satisfy his fastidious nature, she\nherself had grown to be a hinderance, a dissonance in his life. Could\nshe strike a blow which would sever him from her, he would suffer\ncruelly, no doubt; but it would send him back again to the student's\nlife, the only life that could bring him honor, and in the long run\nsatisfaction. And that life would not be lonely, because Tony, so\ncompletely his father's child, would be with him. As for herself and\nGeorge Goring, she had no fear of the future. They two were strong\nenough to hew and build alone their own Palace of Delight. Her intuitive\nknowledge of the world informed her that, in the long run, society, if\nfirmly disregarded, admits the claim of certain persons to go their own\nway--even rapidly admits it, though they be the merest bleating strays\nfrom the common fold, should they haply be possessed of rank or fortune.\nThe way lay plain enough before Mildred, were it not for that Other. But\nshe, the shadowy one, deep down in her limbo, laid a finger on the gate\nof that Earthly Paradise and held it, as inflexibly as any armed\narchangel, against the master key of her enemy's intelligence, the\npassionate assaults of her heart.\n\nMildred, however, was one who found it hard, if not impossible, to\nacquiesce in defeat. Two o'clock boomed from the watching towers of\nWestminster over the great city. She rose from her bed, cold as a marble\nfigure on a monument, and went to the dressing-table to take off her few\nand simple ornaments. The mirror on it was the same from which that\nalien smile had peered twelve months ago, filling the sad soul of Milly\nwith trembling fear and sinister foreboding. The white face that stole\ninto its shadowy depths to-night, and looked Mildred in the eyes, was in\na manner new to her also. It had a new seriousness, a new intensity, as\nof a woman whose vital energies, once spending themselves in mere\ncorruscations, in mere action for action's sake, were now concentrated\non one definite thought, one purpose, one emotion, which with an intense\nyet benign fire blended in perfect harmony the life of the soul and of\nthe body.\n\nFor a moment the face in its gravity recalled to her the latest\nphotograph of Milly, a tragic photograph she did not care to look at\nbecause it touched her with a pity, a remorse, which were after all\nquite useless. But the impression was false and momentary.\n\n\"No,\" she said, speaking to the glass, \"it's not really like. Poor weak\nwoman! I understand better now what you have suffered.\" Then almost\nrepeating the words of her own cruel subconscious self--\"But there's all\nthe difference between the weak and the strong. I am the stronger, and\nthe stronger must win; that's written, and it's no use struggling\nagainst the law of nature.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\n\nGeorge Goring was never so confident in himself as when he was fighting\nan apparently losing game; and the refusal of Mildred to come to him, a\nrefusal based, as he supposed, on nothing but an insurmountable\nprejudice against doing what was not respectable, struck him as a stage\nin their relations rather than as the end of them.", "start_char_idx": 371472, "end_char_idx": 375536, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712": {"__data__": {"id_": "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "44a636c182cc0e53932b053a209b78d122530b052b536d35c35f4be0ab91ab7c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2a009369b4ef5f493e0fe1e16221905d5ed775df26ae49eef07025119af92676", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He did not attempt to\nsee her until the close of the Easter Vacation. People began to couple\ntheir names, but lightly, without serious meaning, for Goring being\npopular with women, had a somewhat exaggerated reputation as a flirt.\nWhen a faithful cousin hinted things about him and Mrs. Stewart to Lady\nAugusta, she who believed herself to have seen a number of similar\ntemporary enslavers, put the matter by, really glad that a harmless\nnobody should have succeeded to Maud Langham with her dangerous\nopinions.\n\nIan Stewart on his side was barely acquainted with Goring. Sir John\nIreton and the newspapers informed him that George Goring was a flashy,\nuntrustworthy politician; and the former added that he was a terrible\nnuisance to poor Lord Ipswich and Lady Augusta. That such a man could\nattract Mildred would never have occurred to him.\n\nThe fear of Milly's return, which she could not altogether banish, still\nat times checked and restrained Mildred. Could she but have secured\nTims's assistance in keeping Milly away, she would have felt more\nconfident of success. It was hopeless to appeal directly to the\nhypnotist, but her daring imagination began to conceive a situation in\nwhich mere good sense and humanity must compel Tims to forbid the return\nof Milly to a life made impossible for her. She had not seen Tims for\nmany weeks, not since the Easter Vacation, which had already receded\ninto a remote distance; so far had she journeyed since then along the\npath of her fate. Nor had she so much as wondered at not seeing Tims.\nBut now her mind was turned to consider the latent power which that\nstrange creature held over her life, her dearest interests; since how\nmight not Milly comport herself with George?\n\nThen it was that she realized how long it had been since Tims had crept\nup the stairs to her drawing-room; pausing probably in the middle of\nthem to wipe away with hasty pocket-handkerchief some real or fancied\ntrace of her foot on a carpet which she condemned as expensive.\n\nMildred had written her a note, but it was hardly posted when the door\nwas flung open and Miss Timson was formally announced by the\nparlor-maid. Tony, who was looking at pictures with his mother, rose\nfrom her side, prepared to take a hop, skip, and jump and land with his\narms around Tims's waist. But he stopped short and contemplated her\nwith round-eyed solemnity. The ginger-colored man's wig had developed\ninto a frizzy fringe and the rest of the coiffure of the hour. A large\npicture hat surmounted it, and her little person was clothed in a vivid\nheliotrope dress of the latest mode. It was a handsome dress, a handsome\nhat, a handsome wig, yet somehow the effect was jarring. Tony felt\nvaguely shocked. \"Bless thee! Thou art translated!\" he might have cried\nwith Quince; but being a polite child, he said nothing, only put out a\nsmall hand sadly. Tims, however, unconscious of the slight chill cast by\nher appearance, kissed him in a perfunctory, patronizing way, as ladies\ndo who are afraid of disarranging their veils. She greeted Mildred also\nwith a parade of mundane elegance, and sat down deliberately on the\nsofa, spreading out her heliotrope skirts.\n\n\"You can run away just now, little man,\" she said to Tony. \"I want to\ntalk to your mother.\"\n\n\"How smart you are!\" observed Mildred, seeing that comment of some kind\nwould be welcome. \"Been to Sir James Carus's big party at the Museum, I\nsuppose. You're getting a personage, Tims.\"\n\n\"I dare say I shall look in later, but I shouldn't trouble to dress up\nfor that, my girl. Clothes would be quite wasted there. But I think one\nshould always try to look decent, don't you? One's men like it.\"\n\nMildred smiled.\n\n\"I suppose Ian would notice it if I positively wasn't decent. But, Tims,\ndear, does old Carus really criticise your frocks?\"\n\nFor indeed the distinguished scientist, Miss Timson's chief, was the\nonly man she could think of to whom Tims could possibly apply the\npossessive adjective. Tims bridled.\n\n\"Of course not; I was thinking of Mr.", "start_char_idx": 375537, "end_char_idx": 379544, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40": {"__data__": {"id_": "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "efe938d2d4fc5f3c2597de586594ad788fc91621580690578e936bd16e2fb53a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b89c71a25a2436a66ba20d33a41b0d15e48d8973043f06d4de890af3537b4adb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Tims bridled.\n\n\"Of course not; I was thinking of Mr. Fitzalan.\"\n\nThat she had for years been very kind to a lonely little man of that\nname who lived in the same block of chambers, Mildred knew,\nbut--Heavens! Even Mildred's presence of mind failed her, and she\nstared. Meeting her amazed eye, Tims's borrowed smile suddenly broke its\nbounds and became her own familiar grin, only more so:\n\n\"We're engaged,\" she said.\n\n\"My dear Tims!\" exclaimed Mildred, suppressing an inclination to burst\nout laughing. \"What a surprise!\"\n\n\"I quite thought you'd have been prepared for it,\" returned Tims. \"A bit\nstupid of you not to guess it, don't you know, old girl. We've been\ncourting long enough.\"\n\nMildred hastened to congratulate the strange bride and wish her\nhappiness, with all that unusual grace which she knew how to employ in\nadorning the usual.\n\n\"I thought I should like you to be the first to know,\" said Tims,\nsentimentally, after a while; \"because I was your bridesmaid, you see.\nIt was the prettiest wedding I ever saw, and I should love to have a\nwedding like yours--all of us carrying lilies, you know.\"\n\n\"I remember there were green stains on my wedding-dress,\" returned\nMildred, with forced gayety.\n\nTims, temporarily oblivious of all awkward circumstances, continued,\nstill more sentimentally:\n\n\"Then I was there, as I've told you, when Ian's pop came to poor old M.\nPoor old girl! She was awfully spifligatingly happy, and I feel just the\nsame now myself.\"\n\n\"Well, it wasn't I, anyhow, who felt 'awfully spifligatingly happy' on\nthat occasion,\" replied Mildred, with a touch of asperity in her voice.\n\nTims, legitimately absorbed in her own feelings, did not notice it. She\ncontinued:\n\n\"I dare say the world will say Mr. Fitzalan had an eye on my money; and\nit's true I've done pretty well with my investments. But, bless you! he\nhadn't a notion of that. You see, I was brought up to be stingy, and I\nenjoy it. He thought of course I was a pauper, and proposed we should\npauper along together. He was quite upset when he found I was an\nheiress. Wasn't it sweet of him?\"\n\nMildred said it was.\n\n\"Flora Fitzalan!\" breathed Tims, clasping her hands and smiling into\nspace. \"Isn't it a pretty name? It's always been my dream to have a\npretty name.\" Then suddenly, as though in a flash seeing all those\npersonal disadvantages which she usually contrived to ignore:\n\n\"Life's a queer lottery, Mil, my girl. We know what we are, we know not\nwhat we shall be, as old Billy says. Who'd ever have thought that a\nnice, quiet girl like Milly, marrying the lad of her heart and all that,\nwould come to such awful grief; while look at me--a queer kind of girl\nyou'd have laid your bottom dollar wouldn't have much luck, prospering\nlike anything, well up in the Science business, and now, what's ever so\nmuch better, scrumptiously happy with a good sort of her own. Upon my\nword, Mil, I've half a mind to fetch old M. back to sympathize with me,\nfor although you've said a peck of nice things, I don't believe you\nunderstand what I'm feeling the way the old girl would.\"\n\nMildred went a little pale and spoke quickly.\n\n\"You won't do that really, Tims? You won't be so cruel to--to every\none?\"\n\n\"I don't know. I don't see why you're always to be jolly and have\neverything your own way. Oh, Lord! When I think how happy old M. was\nwhen she was engaged, the same as I am, and then on her\nwedding-day--just the same as I shall be on mine.\"\n\nMildred straightened out the frill of a muslin cushion cover, her head\nbent.\n\n\"Just so. She had everything _her_ own way that time. I gave her that\nhappiness, it was all my doing. She's had it and she ought to be\ncontent.", "start_char_idx": 379492, "end_char_idx": 383140, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649": {"__data__": {"id_": "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "17666e94378a36062f1f5b648fef0ce2430ae8b14f7d8071080682251c5ea440", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1bc55de7cebddebe82a1508285e4293894c87ad3fa78692083185cbb34813e11", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She's had it and she ought to be\ncontent. Don't be a fool, Tims--\" she lifted her face and Tims was\nstartled by its expression--\"Can't you see how hard it is on me never to\nbe allowed the happiness you've got and Milly's had? Don't you think I\nmight care to know what love is like for myself? Don't you think I might\nhappen to want--I tell you I'm a million times more alive than\nMilly--and I want--I want everything a million times more than she\ndoes.\"\n\nTims was astonished.\n\n\"But it's always struck me, don't you know, that Ian was a deal more in\nlove with you than he ever was with poor old M.\"\n\n\"And you pretend to be in love and think that's enough! It's not enough;\nyou must know it's not. It's like sitting at a Barmecide feast, very\nhungry, only the Barmecide's sitting opposite you eating all the time\nand talking about his food. I tell you it's maddening, perfectly\nmaddening--\" There was a fierce vehemence in her face, her voice, the\nclinch of her slender hands on the muslin frill. That strong vitality\nwhich before had seemed to carry her lightly as on wings, over all the\nrough places of life, had now not failed, but turned itself inwards,\nburning in an intense flame at once of pain and of rebellion against its\nown pain.\n\nTims in the midst of her happiness, felt vaguely scared. Mildred seeing\nit, recovered herself and plunged into the usual engagement talk. In a\nfew minutes she was her old beguiling self--the self to whose charm Tims\nwas as susceptible in her way as Thomas the Rhymer had been in his.\n\nWhen she had left, and from time to time thereafter, Tims felt vaguely\nuncomfortable, remembering Mildred's outburst of vehement bitterness on\nthe subject of love. It was so unlike her usual careless tone, which\nimplied that it was men's business, or weakness, to be in love with\nwomen, and that only second-rate women fell in love themselves.\n\nMildred seemed altogether more serious than she used to be, and Milly\nherself could not have been more sympathetic over the engagement. Even\nMr. Fitzalan, when Tims brought him to call on the Stewarts was not\nafraid of her, and found it possible to say a few words in reply to her\nremarks. Tims's ceremonious way of speaking of her betrothed, whom she\nnever mentioned except as Mr. Fitzalan, made Ian reflect with sad humor\non the number of offensively familiar forms of address which he himself\nhad endured from her, and on the melancholy certainty that she had never\nspoken of him in his absence by any name more respectful than the plain\nunprefixed \"Stewart.\" But he hoped that the excitement of her engagement\nhad wiped out of her remembrance that afternoon when poor Milly had\ntried to return. For he did not like to think of that moment of weakness\nin which he had allowed Tims to divine so much of a state of mind which\nhe could not unveil even to himself without a certain shame.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\n\nThe summer was reaching its height. The weather was perfect. Night after\nnight hot London drawing-rooms were crowded to suffocation, awnings\nsprang mushroom-like from every West End pavement; the sound of music\nand the rolling of carriages made night, if not hideous, at least\ndiscordant to the unconsidered minority who went to bed as usual.\nOutside in the country, even in the suburbs, June came in glory, with\nwoods in freshest livery of green, with fragrance of hawthorn and broom\nand gorse, buttercup meadows and gardens brimmed with roses. It seemed\nto George Goring and Mildred as though somehow this warmth, this gayety\nand richness of life in the earth had never been there before, but that\nFate and Nature, of which their love was part, were leading them on in a\ngreat festal train to the inevitable consummation. The flame of life had\nnever burned clearer or more steadily in Mildred, and every day she felt\na growing confidence in having won so complete a possession of her whole\nbodily machinery that it would hardly be in the power of Milly to\ndethrone her.", "start_char_idx": 383099, "end_char_idx": 387047, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726": {"__data__": {"id_": "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0914666766133c76adb9858d75fd5b9babf3baecbfe3cd1c7903ecd4df3e894a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8a82e3dcefa3581cf2d590c31c2dff5ce3f0b0f82be83b0e3d7e7e9c7df19985", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The sight of George Goring, the touch of his hand, the\nvery touch of his garment, gave her a feeling of unconquerable life. It\nwas impossible that she and George should part. All her sanguine and\ndaring nature cried out to her that were she once his, Milly should not,\ncould not, return. Tims, too, was there in reserve. Not that Tims would\nfeel anything but horror at Mildred's conduct in leaving Ian and Tony;\nbut the thing done, she would recognize the impossibility of allowing\nMilly to return to such a situation.\n\nIan, whose holidays were usually at the inevitable periods, was by some\nextraordinary collapse of that bloated thing, the Academic conscience,\ngoing away for a fortnight in June. He had been deputed to attend a\ncentenary celebration at some German University, and a conference of\nsavants to be held immediately after it, presented irresistible\nattractions.\n\nOne Sunday Tims and Mr. Fitzalan went to Hampton Court with the usual\ncrowd of German, Italian, and French hair-dressers, waiters, cooks, and\nrestaurant-keepers, besides native cockneys of all classes except the\nupper.\n\nThe noble old Palace welcomed this mass of very common humanity with\nsuch a pageant of beauty as never greeted the eyes of its royal\nbuilders. Centuries of sunshine seem to have melted into the rich reds\nand grays and cream-color of its walls, under which runs a quarter of a\nmile of flower-border, a glowing mass of color, yet as full of delicate\nand varied detail as the border of an illuminated missal. Everywhere\nthis modern wealth and splendor of flowers is arranged, as jewels in a\nsetting, within the architectural plan of the old garden. There the dark\nyews retain their intended proportion, the silver fountain rises where\nit was meant to rise, although it sprinkles new, unthought-of lilies.\nBehind it, on either side the stately vista of water, and beside it, in\nthe straight alley, the trees in the freshness and fulness of their\nleafage, stand tall and green, less trim and solid it may be, but\nessentially as they were meant to stand when the garden grew long ago in\nthe brain of a man. And out there beyond the terrace the Thames flows\nquietly, silverly on, seeming to shine with the memory of all the\nloveliness those gliding waters have reflected, since their ripples\nplayed with the long, tremulous image of Lechlade spire.\n\nSeen from the cool, deep-windowed rooms of the Palace, where now the\npictures hang and hundreds of plebeian feet tramp daily, the gardens\ngave forth a burning yet pleasant glow of heat and color in the full\nsunshine. Tims and Mr. Fitzalan, having eaten their frugal lunch early\nunder the blossoming chestnut-trees in Bushey Park, went into the\nPicture Gallery in the Palace at an hour when it happened to be almost\nempty. The queer-looking woman not quite young, and the little, bald,\nnarrow-chested, short-sighted man, would not have struck the passers-by\nas being a pair of lovers. A few sympathetic smiles, however, had been\nbestowed upon another couple seated in the deep window of one of the\nsmaller rooms; a pretty young woman and an attractive man. The young man\nhad disposed his hat and a newspaper in such a way as not to make it\nindecently obvious that he was holding her hand. It was she who called\nattention to the fact by hasty attempts to snatch it away when people\ncame in.\n\n\"What do you do that for?\" asked the young man. \"There's not the\nslightest chance of any one we know coming along.\"\n\n\"But George--\"\n\n\"Do try and adapt yourself to your _milieu_. These people are probably\nblaming me for not putting my arm around your waist.\"\n\n\"George! What an idiot you are!\" She laughed a nervous laugh.\n\nBy this time the last party of fat, dark young women in rainbow hats,\nand narrow-shouldered, an\u00e6mic young men, had trooped away towards food.\nGoring waited till the sound of their footsteps had ceased. He was\nholding Mildred's hand, but he had drawn it out from under the newspaper\nnow, and the gay audacity of his look had changed to something at once\nmore serious and more masterful.\n\n\"I don't like your seeming afraid, Mildred,\" he said.", "start_char_idx": 387048, "end_char_idx": 391141, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d": {"__data__": {"id_": "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "92aee4418f298da715ec1a53476b9a227594cb6fcc0da98fb01c1cfc8f5e26df", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "eca05dc43f6b0377cf74b7008c85feed51b5a31f95765838a455d81c9e63dda2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I don't like your seeming afraid, Mildred,\" he said. \"It spoils my idea\nof you. I like to think of you as a high-spirited creature, conscious\nenough of your own worth to go your own way and despise the foolish\ncomments of the crowd.\"\n\nTo hear herself so praised by him made the clear pink rise to Mildred's\ncheeks. How could she bear to fall below the level of his expectation,\nalthough the thing he expected of her had dangers of which he was\nignorant?\n\n\"I'm glad you believe that of me,\" she said; \"although it's not quite\ntrue. I cared a good deal about the opinion of the world before--before\nI knew you; only I was vain enough to think it would never treat me very\nbadly.\"\n\n\"It won't,\" he replied, his audacious smile flashing out for a moment.\n\"It'll come sneaking back to you before long; it can't keep away.\nBesides, I'm cynic enough to know my own advantages, Mildred. Society\ndoesn't sulk forever with wealthy people, whatever they choose to do.\"\n\nShe answered low: \"But I shouldn't care if it did, George. I want\nyou--just to go right away with you.\"\n\nA wonderful look of joy and tenderness came over his face. \"Mildred! Can\nit really be you saying that?\" he breathed. \"Really you, Mildred?\"\n\nThey looked each other in the eyes and were silent a minute; but while\nthe hand next the window held hers, the other one stole out farther to\nclasp her. He was too much absorbed in that gaze to notice anything\nbeyond it; but Mildred was suddenly aware of steps and a voice in the\nadjoining room. Tims and Mr. Fitzalan, in the course of a conscientious\nsurvey of all the pictures on the walls, had reached this point in their\nprogress. The window-seat on which Goring and Mildred were sitting was\nvisible through a doorway, and Tims had on her strongest glasses.\n\nSince her engagement, Tims's old-maidish bringing up seemed to be\nbearing fruit for the first time.\n\n\"I think we'd better cough or do something,\" she said. \"There's a couple\nin there going on disgracefully. I do think spooning in public such bad\nform.\"\n\n\"I dare say they think they're alone,\" returned the charitable Mr.\nFitzalan, unable to see the delinquents because he was trying to put a\nloose lens back into his eye-glasses. Tims came to his assistance,\ntalking loudly; and her voice was of a piercing quality. Mildred,\nleaning forward, saw Mr. Fitzalan and Tims, both struggling with\neye-glasses. She slipped from George's encircling arm and stood in the\ndoorway of the farther room, beckoning to him with a scared face. He got\nup and followed her.\n\n\"What's the matter?\" he asked, more curious than anxious; for an\nencounter with Lady Augusta in person could only precipitate a crisis he\nwas ready to welcome. Why should one simple, definite step from an old\nlife to a new one, which his reason as much as his passion dictated, be\nso incredibly difficult to take?\n\nMildred hurried him away, explaining that she had seen some one she knew\nvery well. He pointed out that it was of no real consequence. She could\nnot tell him that if Tims suspected anything before the decisive step\nwas taken, one of the safeguards under which she took it might fail.\n\nThey found no exit at the end of the suite of rooms, still less any\nplace of concealment. Tims and Mr. Fitzalan came upon them discussing\nthe genuineness of a picture in the last room but one. When Tims saw\nthat it was Mildred, she made some of the most dreadful grimaces she had\never made in her life. Making them, she approached Mildred, who seeing\nthere was no escape, turned around and greeted her with a welcoming\nsmile.\n\n\"Were you--were you sitting on that window-seat?\" asked Tims, fixing her\nwith eyes that seemed bent on piercing to her very marrow.\n\nMildred smiled again, with a broader smile.\n\n\"I don't know about 'that window-seat.' I've sat on a good many\nwindow-seats, naturally, since I set forth on this pilgrimage. Is there\nanything particular about that one?", "start_char_idx": 391088, "end_char_idx": 394988, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a": {"__data__": {"id_": "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "c3acef01e0681a2a752f2d4094b16411e996f97e98ca638a163cf18f484a5439", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f5885cc48f1041905e2a842725e51995f5bc1118546d2f63b61e357407ca7b23", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Is there\nanything particular about that one? I've never seen Hampton Court\nbefore, Mr. Fitzalan, so as some people I knew were coming to-day, I\nthought I'd come too. May I introduce Mr. Goring?\"\n\nSo perfectly natural and easy was Mildred's manner, that Tims already\nhalf disbelieved her own eyes. They must have played her some trick; yet\nhow could that be? She recalled the figures in the window-seat, as seen\nwith all the peculiar, artificial distinctness conferred by strong\nglasses. The young man called Goring had smiled into the hidden face of\nhis companion in a manner that Tims could not approve. She made up her\nmind that as soon as she had leisure she would call on Mildred and\nquestion her once more, and more straitly, concerning the mystery of\nthat window-seat.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX\n\n\nOn Monday and Tuesday an interesting experiment which she was conducting\nunder Carus claimed Tims's whole attention, except for the evening\nhours, which were dedicated to Mr. Fitzalan. But she wrote to say that\nMildred might expect her to tea on Wednesday. On Wednesday the post\nbrought her a note from Mildred, dated Tuesday, midnight.\n\n \"DEAR TIMS,--I am afraid you will not find me to-morrow\n afternoon, as I am going out of town. But do go to tea with\n Tony, who is just back from the sea and looking bonny. He is\n such a darling! I always mind leaving him, although of\n course I am not his mother. Oh, dear, I am so sleepy, I\n hardly know what I am saying. Good-bye, Tims, dear. I am\n very glad you are so happy with that nice Mr. Fitzalan of\n yours.\n\n Yours,\n\n M. B. S.\"\n\nSo far the note, although bearing signs of haste, was in Mildred's usual\nclear handwriting; but there was a postscript scrawled crookedly across\nthe inner sides of the sheet and prefixed by several flourishes:\n\n \"Meet me at Paddington 4.30 train to-morrow. Meet me.\n M.\"\n\nAnother flourish followed.\n\nThe note found Tims at the laboratory, which she had not intended\nleaving till half-past four. But the perplexing nature of the\npostscript, conflicting as it did with the body of the letter, made her\nthe more inclined to obey its direction.\n\nShe arrived at Paddington in good time and soon caught sight of Mildred,\nalthough for the tenth part of a second she hesitated in identifying\nher; for Mildred seldom wore black, although she looked well in it.\nTo-day she was dressed in a long, black silk wrap--which, gathered about\nher slender figure by a ribbon, concealed her whole dress--and wore a\nlong, black lace veil which might have baffled the eyes of a mere\nacquaintance. Tims could not fail to recognize that willowy figure, with\nits rare grace of motion, that amber hair, those turquoise-blue eyes\nthat gleamed through the swathing veil with a restless brilliancy\nunusual even in them. With disordered dress and hat on one side, Tims\nhastened after Mildred.\n\n\"So here you are!\" she exclaimed; \"that's all right! I managed to come,\nyou see, though it's been a bit of a rush.\"\n\nMildred looked around at her, astonished, possibly dismayed; but the\nveil acted as a mask.\n\n\"Well, this is a surprise, Tims! What on earth brought you here? Is\nanything the matter?\"\n\n\"Just what I wanted to know. Why are you in black? Going to a funeral?\"\n\n\"Good Heavens, no! The only funeral I mean to go to will be my own. But,\nTims, I thought you were going to tea with Tony. Why have you come\nhere?\"\n\n\"Didn't you tell me to come in the postscript of your letter?\"\n\nMildred was evidently puzzled.\n\n\"I don't remember anything about it,\" she said. \"I was frightfully tired\nwhen I wrote to you--in fact, I went to sleep over the letter; but I\ncan't imagine how I came to say that.\"\n\nTims was not altogether surprised.", "start_char_idx": 394944, "end_char_idx": 398661, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043": {"__data__": {"id_": "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "d867baba6ce311dfae5cfd908dfd7ef114e8b75a2131cdd9709ec827d84aee43", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "46659691d929648577180f534b3a2b33459e51a4a5033e62a0375b98195b1e48", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Tims was not altogether surprised. She had had an idea that Mildred was\nnot answerable for that postscript, but Mildred herself had no clew to\nthe mystery, never having been told of Milly's written communication of\na year ago. She sickened at the possibility that in some moment of\naberration she might have written words meant for another on the note to\nTims.\n\nTims felt sure that Milly wished her to do something--but what?\n\n\"Where are you going?\" she asked. \"What are you going to do?\"\n\n\"I'm going to stay with some friends who have a house on the river, and\nI'm going to do--what people always do on the river. Any other questions\nto ask, Tims?\"\n\n\"Yes. I should like to know who your friends are.\"\n\nMildred laughed nervously.\n\n\"You won't be any the wiser if I tell you.\" And in the instant she\nreflected that what she said was true. \"I am going to the Gorings'.\"\n\nThe difference between that and the exact truth was only the difference\nbetween the plural and the singular.\n\n\"Don't go, old girl,\" said Tims, earnestly. \"Come back to Tony with me\nand wait till Ian comes home.\"\n\nMildred was very pale behind the heavy black lace of her veil and her\nheart beat hard; but she spoke with self-possession.\n\n\"Don't be absurd, Tims. Tony is perfectly well, and there's Mr. Goring\nwho is to travel down with me. How can I possibly go back? You're\nworrying about Milly, I suppose. Well, I'm rather nervous about her\nmyself. I always am when I go away alone. You don't mind my telling them\nto wire for you if I sleep too long, do you? And you'd come as quick as\never you could? Think how awkward it would be for Milly and for--for the\nGorings.\"\n\n\"I'd come right enough,\" returned Tims, sombrely. \"But if you feel like\nthat, don't go.\"\n\n\"I don't feel like that,\" replied Mildred; \"I never felt less like it,\nor I shouldn't go. Still, one should be prepared for anything that may\nhappen. All the same, I very much doubt that you will ever see your poor\nfriend Milly again, Tims. You must try to forgive me. Now do make haste\nand go to darling Tony--he's simply longing to have you. I see Mr.\nGoring has taken our places in the train, and I shall be left behind if\nI don't go. Good-bye, old Tims.\"\n\nMildred kissed Tims's heated, care-distorted face, and turned away to\nwhere Goring stood at the book-stall buying superfluous literature. Tims\nsaw him lift his hat gravely to Mildred. It relieved her vaguely to\nnotice that there seemed no warmth or familiarity about their greeting.\nShe turned away towards the Metropolitan Railway, not feeling quite sure\nwhether she had failed in an important mission or merely made a fool of\nherself.\n\nShe found Tony certainly looking bonny, and no more inclined to break\nhis heart about his mother's departure than any other healthy, happy\nchild under like circumstances. Indeed, it may be doubted whether a\nhealthy, happy child, unknowing whence its beatitudes spring, does not\nin its deepest, most vital moment regard all grown-up people as\nnecessary nuisances. No one came so delightfully near being another\nchild as Mildred; but Tims was a capital playfellow too, a broad\ncomedian of the kind appreciated on the nursery boards.\n\nA rousing game with him and an evening at the theatre with Mr. Fitzalan,\ndistracted Tims's thoughts from her anxieties. But at night she dreamed\nrepeatedly and uneasily of Milly and Mildred as of two separate persons,\nand of Mr. Goring, whose vivid face seen in the full light of the window\nat Hampton Court, returned to her in sleep with a distinctness\nunobtainable in her waking memory.\n\nOn the following day her work with Sir James Carus was of absorbing\ninterest, and she came home tired and preoccupied with it. Yet her\ndreams of the night before recurred in forms at once more confused and\nmore poignant.", "start_char_idx": 398627, "end_char_idx": 402396, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d": {"__data__": {"id_": "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f2b0272e30ff2fdcb7b71221407af369eb9260905040b3d3449fa3638c8413e5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "af9d2443b5f37c3d328378714e1083c0d10b6b88d526b14d7f30609a62c2e173", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "At two o'clock in the morning she awoke, crying aloud: \"I\nmust get Milly back\"; and her pillow was wet with tears. For the two\nfollowing hours she must have been awake, because she heard all the\nquarters strike from a neighboring church-tower, yet they appeared like\na prolonged nightmare. The emotional impression of some forgotten dream\nremained, and she passed them in an agony of grief for she knew not\nwhat, of remorse for having on a certain summer afternoon denied Milly's\npetition for her assistance, and of intense volition, resembling prayer,\nfor Milly's return.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\n\nThe intense heat of early afternoon quivered on the steep woods which\nfell to the river opposite the house. The sunlit stream curved under\nthem, moving clear and quiet over depths of brown, tangled\nwater-growths, and along its fringe of gray and green reeds and grasses\nand creamy plumes of meadow-sweet. The house was not very large. It was\nsquare and white; an old wistaria, an old Gloire-de-Dijon, and a newer\ncarmine cluster-rose contended for possession of its surface. Striped\nawnings were down over all the lower windows and some of the upper. A\nlarge lawn, close-shorn and velvety green, as only Thames-side lawns can\nbe, stretched from the house to the river. It had no flower-beds on it,\nbut a cedar here, an ilex there, dark and substantial on their own dark\nshadows, and trellises and pillars overrun by a flood of roses of every\nshade, from deep crimson to snow white. The lawn was surrounded by\nshrubberies and plantations, and beyond it there was nothing to be seen\nexcept the opposite woods and the river, and sometimes boats passing by\nwith a measured sound of oars in the rowlocks, or the temporary\ncommotion of a little steam-launch. It looked a respectable early\nVictorian house, but it had never been quite that, for it had been\nbuilt by George Goring's father fifty years earlier, and he himself had\nspent much of his boyhood there.\n\nEverything and every one seemed asleep, except a young man in flannels\nwith a flapping hat hanging over his eyes, who stood at the end of a\npunt and pretended to fish. There was no one to look at him or at the\nhouse behind him, and if there had been observers, they would not have\nguessed that they were looking at the Garden of Eden and that he was\nAdam. Only last evening he and that fair Eve of his had stood by the\nriver in the moonlight, where the shattering hawthorn-bloom made the air\nheavy with sweetness, and had spoken to each other of this their\nexquisite, undreamed-of happiness. There had been a Before, there would\nbe an After, when they must stand on their defence against the world,\nmust resist a thousand importunities, heart-breaking prayers, to return\nto the old, false, fruitless existence.\n\nBut just for these days they could be utterly alone in their paradise,\nundisturbed even by the thoughts of others, since no one knew they were\nthere and together. Alas! they had been so only forty-eight hours, and\nalready a cold little serpent of anxiety had crept in among their roses.\n\nBefore entrusting herself to him, Mildred had told him that, in spite of\nher apparent good health, she was occasionally subject to long\ntrance-like fits, resembling sleep; should this happen, it would be\nuseless to call an ordinary doctor, but that a Miss Timson, a well-known\nscientific woman and a friend of hers, must be summoned at once. He had\ntaken Miss Timson's address and promised to do so; but Mildred had not\nseemed to look upon the fit as more than a remote contingency. Perhaps\nthe excitement, the unconscious strain of the last few days had upset\nher nerves; for this morning she had lain in what he had taken for a\nnatural sleep, until, finding her still sleeping profoundly at noon, he\nhad remembered her words and telegraphed to Miss Timson. An answer to\nhis telegram, saying that Miss Timson would come as soon as possible,\nlay crumpled up at the bottom of the punt.\n\nThe serpent was there, but Goring did not allow its peeping coils\nthoroughly to chill his roses.", "start_char_idx": 402397, "end_char_idx": 406427, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a": {"__data__": {"id_": "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "fcb1562e2101c02c85e5edf188533737cb1caac963fa78ed20ea14b476a9fa94", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cb776ecf023cd90e1d3b024373258419564ebc74646fc900df73e9bdd9483088", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "His temperament was too sanguine, he felt\ntoo completely steeped in happiness, the weather was too beautiful. Most\nlikely Mildred would be all right to-morrow.\n\nMeantime, up there in the shaded room, she who had been Mildred began to\nstir in her sleep. She opened her eyes and gazed through the square\nwindow, at the sunlit awning that overhung it, and at the green leaves\nand pale buds of the Gloire-de-Dijon rose. There was a hum of bees close\nby that seemed like the voice of the hot sunshine. It should have been a\npleasant awakening, but Milly awoke from that long sleep of hers with a\nbrooding sense of misfortune. The remembrance of the afternoon when she\nhad so suddenly been snatched away returned to her, but it was not the\nrevelation of Ian's passionate love for her supplanter that came back to\nher as the thing of most importance. Surely she must have known that\nlong before, for now the pain seemed old and dulled from habit. It was\nthe terrible strength with which the Evil Spirit had possessed her,\nseizing her channels of speech even while she was still there, hurling\nher from her seat without waiting for the passivity of sleep. No, her\nsense of misfortune was not altogether, or even mainly, connected with\nthat last day of hers. Unlike Mildred, she had up till now been without\nany consciousness of things that had occurred during her quiescence, and\nshe had now no vision; only a strong impression that something terrible\nhad befallen Ian.\n\nShe looked around the bedroom, and it seemed to her very strange;\nsomething like an hotel room, yet at once too sumptuous and too shabby.\nThere was a faded pink flock wall-paper with a gilt pattern upon it, the\nchairs were gilded and padded and covered with worn pink damask, the bed\nwas gilded and hung with faded pink silk curtains. Everywhere there was\npink and gilding, and everywhere it was old and faded and rubbed. A few\nearly Victorian lithographs hung on the walls, portraits of\nballet-dancers and noblemen with waists and whiskers. No one had tidied\nthe room since the night before, and fine underclothing was flung\ncarelessly about on chairs, a fussy petticoat here, the bodice of an\nevening dress there; everywhere just that touch of mingled daintiness\nand disorder which by this time Milly recognized only too well.\n\nThe bed was large, and some one else had evidently slept there besides\nherself, for the sheet and pillow were rumpled and there was a\nhalf-burnt candle and a man's watch-chain on the small table beside it.\nWherever she was then, Ian was there too, so that she was at a loss to\nunderstand her own sinister foreboding.\n\nShe pulled at the bell-rope twice.\n\nThere were only three servants in the house; a housekeeper and two\nmaids, who all dated from the days of Mrs. Maria Idle, ex-mistress of\nthe late Lord Ipswich, dead herself now some six months. The housekeeper\nwas asleep, the maids out of hearing. She opened the door and found a\nbathroom opposite her bedroom. It had a window which showed her a strip\nof lawn with flower-beds upon it, beyond that shrubberies and tall trees\nwhich shut out any farther view. A hoarse cuckoo was crying in the\ndistance, and from the greenery came a twittering of birds and sometimes\na few liquid pipings; but there was no sound of human life. The place\nseemed as empty as an enchanted palace in a fairy story.\n\nMilly's toilet never took her very long. She put on a fresh, simple\ncotton dress, which seemed to have been worn the day before, and was\njust hesitating as to whether she should go down or wait for Ian to\ncome, when Clarkson, the housekeeper, knocked at her door.\n\n\"I thought if you was awake, madam, you might like a bit of lunch,\" she\nsaid.\n\nMilly refused, for this horrible feeling of depression and anxiety made\nher insensible to hunger. She looked at the housekeeper with a certain\nsurprise, for Clarkson was as decorated and as much the worse for wear\nas the furniture of the bedroom.", "start_char_idx": 406428, "end_char_idx": 410358, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf": {"__data__": {"id_": "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "877b035769ab238967d59907c7f4d698a10fed4f816c81a9d66c790a4de0a640", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "14e2c945e33af6334a18df2dab7f9680f4d50820e97a6e0bc38750e0e93d328b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She was a large, fat woman, laced into\na brown cashmere dress, with a cameo brooch on her ample bosom; her hair\nwas unnaturally black, curled and dressed high on the top of her head,\nshe had big gold earrings, and a wealth of powder on her large, red\nface.\n\n\"Can you tell me where I am likely to find Mr. Stewart?\" asked Milly,\npolitely.\n\nThe woman stared, and when she answered there was more than a shade of\ninsolence in her coarse voice and smile.\n\n\"I'm sure I can't tell, madam. Mr. Stewart's not our gentleman here.\"\n\nMilly, understanding the reply as little as the housekeeper had\nunderstood the question, yet felt that some impertinence was intended\nand turned away.\n\nThere was nothing for it but to explore on her own account. A staircase\nof the dull Victorian kind led down to a dark, cool hall. The front door\nwas open. She walked to it and stood under a stumpy portico, looking\nout. The view was much the same as that seen from the bathroom, only\nthat instead of grass and flower-beds there was a gravel sweep, and,\njust opposite the front door, a circle of grass with a tall\nmonkey-puzzle tree in the centre. Except for the faded gorgeousness of\nthe bedroom, the house looked like an ordinary country house, belonging\nto old people who did not care to move with the times. Why should she\nfeel at every step a growing dread of what might meet her there?\n\nShe turned from the portico and opened, hesitatingly, the door of a room\non the opposite side of the hall. It was a drawing-room, with traces of\nthe same shabby gorgeousness that prevailed in the bedroom, but\nmitigated by a good deal of clean, faded chintz; and at one end was a\nbrilliant full-length Millais portrait of Mrs. Maria Idle in blue silk\nand a crinoline. It was a long room, pleasant in the dim light; for\nalthough it had three windows, the farthest a French one and open, all\nwere covered with awnings, coming low down and showing nothing of the\nouter world but a hand's breadth of turf and wandering bits of creeper.\nIt was sweet with flowers, and on a consol table before a mirror stood a\nhigh vase from which waved and twined tall sprays and long streamers of\ncluster-roses, carmine and white. It was beautiful, yet Milly turned\naway from it almost with a shudder. She recognized the touch of the hand\nthat must have set the roses there. And the nameless horror grew upon\nher.\n\nExcept for the flowers, there was little sign of occupation in the room.\nA large round rosewood table was set with blue glass vases on mats and\nsome dozen photograph--albums and gift-books, dating from the sixties.\nBut on a stool in a corner lay a newspaper; and the date on it gave her\na shock. She had supposed herself to have been away about four months;\nshe found she had been gone sixteen. There had been plenty of time for a\nmisfortune to happen, and she felt convinced that it had happened. But\nwhat? If Ian or Tony were dead she would surely still be in mourning.\nThen on a little rosewood escritoire, such as ladies were wont to use\nwhen they had nothing to write, she spied an old leather writing-case\nwith the initials M. B. F. upon it. It was one Aunt Beatrice had given\nher when she first went to Ascham, and it seemed to look on her\npleasantly, like the face of an old friend. She found a few letters in\nthe pockets, among them one from Ian written from Berlin a few days\nbefore, speaking of his speedy return and of Tony's amusing letter from\nthe sea-side. She began to hope her feeling of anxiety and depression\nmight be only the shadow of the fear and anguish which she had suffered\non that horrible afternoon sixteen months ago. She must try not to think\nabout it, must try to be bright for Ian's sake. Some one surely was with\nher at this queer place, since she was sharing a room with another\nperson--probably a female friend of that Other's, who had such a crowd\nof them.\n\nShe drew the awning half-way up and stood on the step outside the French\nwindow.", "start_char_idx": 410359, "end_char_idx": 414293, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379": {"__data__": {"id_": "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "2664cd172759870170bef4748bc22b432a72e90d2bc5d2abe3170f3424b69e26", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "51d779b7d7ed537d730ea7645da6fb900e520745e3cdeeac0df0c46b9afa1e74", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She drew the awning half-way up and stood on the step outside the French\nwindow. The lawn, the trees, the opposite hills were unknown to her, but\nthe spirit of the river spoke to her familiarly, and she knew it for the\nThames. A gardener in shirt-sleeves was filling a water-barrel by the\nriver, under a hawthorn-tree, and the young man in the punt was putting\nup his fishing-tackle. As she looked, the strangeness of the scene\npassed away. She could not say where it was, but in some dream or vision\nshe had certainly seen this lawn, that view, before; when the young man\nturned and came nearer she would know his face. And the dim, horrible\nthing that was waiting for her somewhere about the quiet house, the\nquiet garden, seemed to draw a step nearer, to lift its veil a little.\nWho was it that had stood not far from where the gardener was standing\nnow, and seen the moon hanging large and golden over the mystery of the\nopposite woods? Whoever it was, some one's arm had been fast around her\nand there had been kisses--kisses.\n\nIt took but a few seconds for these half-revelations to drop into her\nmind, and before she had had time to reflect upon them, the young man in\nthe punt looked up and saw her standing there on the step. He took off\nhis floppy hat and waved it to her; then he put down his tackle, ran to\nthe near end of the punt and jumped lightly ashore. He came up the green\nlawn, and her anxiety sent her down to meet him almost as eagerly as\nlove would have done. The hat shaded all the upper part of his face, and\nat a distance, in the strong sunshine, the audacious chin, the red lower\nlip, caught her eye first and seemed to extinguish the rest of the face.\nAnd suddenly she disliked them. Who was the man, and how did she come to\nknow him? But former experiences of strange awakenings had made her\ncautious, self-controlling, almost capable of hypocrisy.\n\n\"So you're awake!\" shouted George, still a long way down the lawn.\n\"Good! How are you? All right?\"\n\nShe nodded \"Yes,\" with a constrained smile.\n\nIn a minute they had met, he had turned her around, and with his arm\nunder hers was leading her towards the house again.\n\n\"All right? Really all right?\" he asked very softly, pressing her arm\nwith his hand and stooping his head to bring his mouth on a level with\nher ear.\n\n\"Very nearly, at any rate,\" she answered, coldly, trying to draw away\nfrom him.\n\n\"What are you doing that for?\" he asked. \"Afraid of shocking the\ngardener, eh? What queer little dear little ways you've got! I suppose\nUndines are like that.\"\n\nHe drew her closer to him as he threw back his head and laughed a noisy\nlaugh that jarred upon her nerves.\n\nMilly began to feel indignant. It was just possible that a younger\nsister in Australia might have married and brought this extraordinary\nyoung man home to England, but his looks, his tone, were not fraternal;\nand she had never forgotten the Maxwell Davison episode. She walked on\nstiffly.\n\n\"Every one seems to be out,\" she observed, as calmly as she could.\n\nHe frowned.\n\n\"You mean those devils of servants haven't been looking after you?\" he\nasked. \"Yet I gave Clarkson her orders. Of course they're baggages, but\nI haven't had the heart to send them away from the old place, for who on\nearth would take them? I expect we aren't improving their chances, you\nand I, at this very moment; in spite of respecting the gardener's\nprejudices.\"\n\nHe chuckled, as at some occult joke of his own.\n\nThey stooped together under the half-raised awning of the French window,\nand entered the dim, flower-scented drawing-room side by side. The young\nman threw off his hat, and she saw the silky ripple of his nut-brown\nhair, his smooth forehead, his bright-glancing hazel eyes, all the happy\npleasantness of his countenance. Before she had had time to reconsider\nher dislike of him, he had caught her in his arms and kissed her hair\nand face, whispering little words of love between the kisses.", "start_char_idx": 414213, "end_char_idx": 418137, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907": {"__data__": {"id_": "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "0a6af59ea6d528ec39bffb2e057b30fbc27e700344456618e02f818d385438c2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4817110f6a7aa94d4b2641816d051b3725a0b98d56429807c142e6dbfaed5b40", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "For one\nparalyzed moment Milly suffered these dreadful words, these horrible\ncaresses. Then exerting the strength of frenzy, she pushed him from her\nand bounded to the other side of the room, entrenching herself behind\nthe big rosewood table with its smug mats and vases and albums.\n\n\"You brute! you brute! you hateful cad!\" she stammered with trembling\nlips; \"how dare you touch me?\"\n\nGeorge Goring stared at her with startled eyes.\n\n\"Mildred! Dearest! Good God! What's gone wrong?\"\n\n\"Where's my husband?\" she asked, in a voice sharp with anger and terror.\n\"I want to go--I must leave this horrid place at once.\"\n\n\"Your husband?\"\n\nIt was Goring's turn to feel himself plunged into the midst of a\nnightmare, and he grew almost as pale as Milly. How in Heaven's name was\nhe going to manage her? She looked very ill and must of course be\ndelirious. That would have been alarming in any case, and this\nparticular form of delirium was excruciatingly painful.\n\n\"Yes, my husband--where is he? I shall tell him how you've dared to\ninsult me. I must go. This is your house--I must leave it at once.\"\n\nGoring did not attempt to come near her. He spoke very quietly.\n\n\"Try and remember, Mildred; Stewart is not here. He will not even be in\nEngland till to-morrow. You are alone with me. Hadn't you better go to\nbed again and--\" he was about to say, \"wait until Miss Timson comes,\"\nbut as it was possible that the advent of the person she had wished him\nto summon might now irritate her, he substituted--\"and keep quiet? I\npromise not to come near you if you don't wish to see me.\"\n\n\"I am alone here with you?\" Milly repeated, slowly, and pressed her hand\nto her forehead. \"Good God,\" she moaned to herself, \"what can have\nhappened?\"\n\n\"Yes. For Heaven's sake, go and lie down. I expect the doctor can give\nyou something to soothe your nerves and then perhaps you'll remember.\"\n\nShe made a gesture of fierce impatience.\n\n\"You think I'm mad, but I'm not. I have been mad and I am myself again;\nonly I can't remember anything that's happened since I went out of my\nmind. I insist upon your telling me. Who are you? I never saw you before\nto my knowledge.\"\n\nHer voice, her attitude were almost truculent as she faced him, her\nright hand dragging at the loose clasp of a big photograph album. Every\nword, every look, was agony to Goring, but he controlled himself by an\neffort.\n\n\"I am George Goring,\" he said, slowly, and paused with anxious eyes\nfixed upon her, hoping that the name might yet stir some answering\nstring of tenderness in the broken lyre of her mind.\n\nShe too paused, as though tracking some far-off association with the\nname. Then:\n\n\"Ah! poor Lady Augusta's husband,\" she repeated, yet sterner than before\nin her anger. \"My friend Lady Augusta's husband! And why am I here alone\nwith you, Mr. Goring?\"\n\n\"Because I am your lover, Mildred. Because I love you better than any\none or any thing in the world; and yesterday you thought you loved me,\nyou thought you could trust all your life to me.\"\n\nShe had known the answer already in her heart, but the fact stated\nplainly by another, became even more dreadful, more intolerable, than\nbefore. She uttered a low cry and covered her eyes with her hand.\n\n\"Mildred--dearest!\" he breathed imploringly.\n\nThen she raised her head and looked straight at him with flaming eyes,\nthis fair, fragile creature transformed into a pitiless Fury. She forgot\nthat indeed an Evil Spirit had dwelt within her; George Goring might be\nvictim rather than culprit. In this hour of her anguish the identity of\nthat body of hers, which through him was defiled, that honor of hers,\nyes and of Ian Stewart's, which through him was dragged in the dust,\nmade her no longer able to keep clearly in mind the separateness of the\nMildred Stewart of yesterday from herself.", "start_char_idx": 418138, "end_char_idx": 421925, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68": {"__data__": {"id_": "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "f91922563a50bbc623f76d57ad42ae5e860ae83095b6187ee3ff3a3af41dbbb5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "fc4ae0ff840e69c463246cff5d6606865756d2dae0f8772bd78c005c480c9fe0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I tell you I was mad,\" she gasped; \"and you--you vile, wicked man!--you\ntook advantage of it to ruin my life--to ruin my husband's life! You\nmust know Ian Stewart, a man whose shoes you are not fit to tie. Do you\nthink any woman in her senses would leave him for you? Ah!--\" she\nbreathed a long, shuddering breath and her hand was clinched so hard\nupon the loose album clasp that it ran into her palm.\n\n\"Mildred!\" cried George, staggered, stricken as though by some fiery\nrain.\n\n\"I ought to be sorry for your wife,\" she went on. \"She is a splendid\nwoman, she has done nothing to deserve that you should treat her so\nscandalously. But I can't--I can't\"--a dry sob caught her voice--\"be\nsorry for any one except myself and Ian. I always knew I wasn't good\nenough to be his wife, but I was so proud of it--so proud--and now--Oh,\nit's too horrible! I'm not fit to live.\"\n\nGeorge had sunk upon a chair and hidden his face in his hands.\n\n\"Don't say that,\" he muttered hoarsely, almost inaudibly. \"It was my\ndoing.\"\n\nShe broke out again.\n\n\"Of course it was. It's nothing to you, I suppose. You've broken my\nhusband's heart and mine too; you've hopelessly disgraced us both and\nspoiled our lives; and all for the sake of a little amusement, a little\nlow pleasure. We can't do anything, we can't punish you; but if curses\nwere any use, oh, how I could curse you, Mr. Goring!\"\n\nThe sobs rising in a storm choked her voice. She rushed from the room,\nclosing the door behind her and leaving George Goring there, his head on\nhis hands. He sat motionless, hearing nothing but the humming silence of\nthe hot afternoon.\n\nMilly, pressing back her tears, flew across the hall and up the stairs.\nThe vague nightmare thing that had lurked for her in the shadows of the\nhouse, when she had descended them so quietly, had taken shape at last.\nShe knew now the unspeakable secret of the pink and gold bedroom, the\nshabbily gorgeous bed, the posturing dancers, the simpering, tailored\nnoblemen. The atmosphere of it, scented and close, despite the open\nwindow, seemed to take her by the throat. She dared not stop to think,\nlest this sick despair, this loathing of herself, should master her. To\nget home at once was her impulse, and she must do it before any one\ncould interfere.\n\nIt was a matter of a few seconds to find a hat, gloves, a parasol. She\nnoticed a purse in the pocket of her dress and counted the money in it.\nThere was not much, but enough to take her home, since she felt sure the\nriver shimmering over there was the Thames. She did not stay to change\nher thin shoes, but flitted down the stairs and out under the portico,\nas silent as a ghost. The drive curved through a shrubbery, and in a\nminute she was out of sight of the house. She hurried past the lodge,\nhesitating in which direction to turn, when a tradesman's cart drove\npast. She asked the young man who was driving it her way to the station,\nand he told her it was not very far, but that she could not catch the\nnext train to town if she meant to walk. He was going in that direction\nhimself and would give her a lift if she liked. She accepted the young\nman's offer; but if he made it in order to beguile the tedium of his\nway, he was disappointed.\n\nThe road was dusty and sunny, and this gave her a reason for opening her\nlarge parasol. She cowered under it, hiding herself from the women who\nrolled by in shiny carriages with high-stepping horses; not so much\nbecause she feared she might meet acquaintances, as from an instinctive\ndesire to hide herself, a thing so shamed and everlastingly wretched,\nfrom every human eye. And so it happened that, when she was close to the\nstation, she missed seeing and being seen by Tims, who was driving to\nMr. Goring's house in a hired trap which he had sent to meet her.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII", "start_char_idx": 421927, "end_char_idx": 425714, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e": {"__data__": {"id_": "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "fa04074d40ada1974b345bd8a7a6161515fa0f0bffa476d24f87081350ed4178", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ceba8ffcd2446e3489e68e996ed8ca157f9bb0fde6f9f8863c0251599724d40a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Goring's house in a hired trap which he had sent to meet her.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXII\n\n\nMilly took a ticket for Paddington and hurried to the train, which was\nwaiting at the platform, choosing an empty compartment. Action had\ntemporarily dulled the passion of her misery, her rage, her shuddering\nhorror at herself. But alone in the train, it all returned upon her,\nonly with a complete realization of circumstance which made it worse.\n\nIt had been her impulse to rush to her home, to her husband, as for\nrefuge. Now she perceived that there was no refuge for her, no comfort\nin her despair, but rather another ordeal to be faced. She would have to\ntell her husband the truth, so far as she knew it. Good God! Why could\nshe not shake off from her soul the degradation, the burning shame of\nthis fair flesh of hers, and return to him with some other body, however\nhomely, which should be hers and hers alone? She remembered that the man\nshe loathed had said that Ian would not be back in England until\nto-morrow. She supposed the Evil Thing had counted on stealing home in\ntime to meet him, and would have met him with an innocently smiling\nface.\n\nA moment Milly triumphed in the thought that it was she herself who\nwould meet Ian and reveal to him the treachery of the creature who had\nsupplanted her in his heart. Then with a shudder she hid her face,\nremembering that it was, after all, her own dishonor and his which she\nmust reveal. He would of course take her back, and if that could be the\nend, they might live down the thing together. But it would not be the\nend. \"I am the stronger,\" that Evil Thing had said, and it was the\nstronger. At first step by step, now with swift advancing strides, it\nwas robbing her of the months, the years, till soon, very soon, while in\nthe world's eyes she seemed to live and thrive, she would be dead; dead,\nwithout a monument, without a tear, her very soul not free and in God's\nhands, but held somewhere in abeyance. And Ian? Through what\ndegradation, to what public shame would he, the most refined and\nsensitive of men, be dragged! His child--her child and Ian's--would grow\nup like that poor wretched George Goring, breathing corruption, lies,\ndishonor, from his earliest years. And she, the wife, the mother, would\nseem to be guilty of all that, while she was really bound,\nhelpless--dead.\n\nThe passion of her anger and despair stormed through her veins again\nwith yet greater violence, but this time George Goring was forgotten and\nall its waves broke impotently against that adversary whose diabolical\npower she was so impotent to resist, who might return to-morrow, to-day\nfor aught she knew.\n\nShe had been moving restlessly about the compartment, making vehement\ngestures in her desperation, but now a sudden, terrible, yet calming\nidea struck her to absolute quietness. There was a way, just one, to\nthwart this adversary; she could destroy the body into which it thought\nto return. At the same moment there arose in her soul two opposing waves\nof emotion--one of passionate self-pity to think that she, so weak and\ntimid, should be driven to destroy herself; the other of triumph over\nher mortal foe delivered into her hands. She felt a kind of triumph too\nin the instantaneousness with which she was able to make up her mind\nthat this was the only thing to be done--she, usually so full of mental\nand moral hesitation. Let it be done quickly--now, while the spur of\nexcitement pricked her on. The Thing seemed to have a knowledge of her\nexperiences which was not reciprocal. How it would laugh if it\nrecollected in its uncanny way, that she had wanted to kill herself and\nit with her, that she had had it at her mercy and then had been too weak\nand cowardly to strike! Should she buy some poison when she reached\nPaddington? She knew nothing about poisons and their effects, except\nthat carbolic caused terrible agony, and laudanum was not to be trusted\nunless you knew the dose. The train was slowing up and the lonely river\ngleamed silverly below.", "start_char_idx": 425635, "end_char_idx": 429632, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d": {"__data__": {"id_": "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "a9acd6be8899ee293a94b103d1130ea4995a15f575ac18b901b2dd6d7554401d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "479e76b4e8e5e5939aa2dd3c91a90a102406ee9c126d6a3d0edb30c871514e21", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The train was slowing up and the lonely river\ngleamed silverly below. It beckoned to her, the river, upon whose stream\nshe had spent so many young, happy days.\n\nShe got out at the little station and walked away from it with a quick,\nlight step, as though hastening to keep some pleasurable appointment.\nAfter all the years of weak, bewildered subjection, of defeat and\nhumiliation, her turn had come; she had found the answer to the Sphinx's\nriddle, the way to victory.\n\nShe knew the place where she found herself, for she had several times\nmade one of a party rowing down from Oxford to London. But it was not\none of the frequented parts of the river, being a quiet reach among\nsolitary meadows. She remembered that there was a shabby little house\nstanding by itself on the bank where boats could be hired, for they had\nput in there once to replace an oar, having lost one down a weir in the\nneighborhood. The weir had not been on the main stream, but they had\ncome upon it in exploring a backwater. It could not be far off.\n\nShe walked quickly along the bank, turning over and over in her mind the\nsame thoughts; the cruel wrong which now for so many years she had\nsuffered, the final disgrace brought upon her and her husband, and she\nbraced her courage to strike the blow that should revenge all. The act\nto which this fair-haired, once gentle woman was hurrying along the\nlonely river-bank, was not in its essence suicide; it was revenge, it\nwas murder.\n\nWhen she came to the shabby little house where the boats lay under an\nunlovely zinc-roofed shed, she wondered whether she might ask for ink\nand paper and write to some one. She longed to send one little word to\nIan; but then what could she say? She could not have seen him and\nconcealed the truth from him, but it was one of the advantages of her\ndisappearance that he need never know the dishonor done him. And she\nknew he considered suicide a cowardly act. He was quite wrong there. It\nwas an act of heroic courage to go out like this to meet death. It was\nso lonely; even lonelier than death must always be. She had the\nconviction that she was not doing wrong, but right. Hers was no common\ncase. And for the first time she saw that there might be a reason for\nthis doom which had befallen her. Men regard one sort of weakness as a\nsin to be struggled against, another as something harmless, even\namiable, to be acquiesced in. But perhaps all weakness acquiesced in was\na sin in the eyes of Eternal Wisdom, was at any rate to be left to the\nmercy of its own consequences. She looked back upon her life and saw\nherself never exerting her own judgment, always following in some one\nelse's tracks, never fighting against her physical, mental, moral\ntimidity. It was no doubt this weakness of hers that had laid her open\nto the mysterious curse which she was now, by a supreme effort of\nindependent judgment and physical courage, resolved to throw off.\n\nA stupid-looking man in a dirty cotton shirt got out the small boat she\nchose; stared a minute in surprise to see the style in which she, an\nOxford girl born and bred, handled the sculls, and then went in again to\ncontinue sleeping off a pint of beer.\n\nShe pulled on mechanically, with a long, regular stroke, and one by one\nscenes, happy river-scenes out of past years, came back to her with\nwonderful vividness. Looking about her she saw an osier-bed dividing\nthe stream, and beside it the opening into the willow-shaded backwater\nwhich she remembered. She turned the boat's head into it. Heavy clouds\nhad rolled up and covered the sky, and there was a kind of twilight\nbetween the dark water and the netted boughs overhead. Very soon she\nheard the noise of a weir. Once such a sound had been pleasant in her\nears; but now it turned her cold with fear. On one side the backwater\nflowed sluggishly on around the osier-bed; on the other it hurried\nsmoothly, silently away, to broaden suddenly before it swept in white\nfoam over an open weir into a deep pool below.", "start_char_idx": 429563, "end_char_idx": 433540, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824": {"__data__": {"id_": "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "28162", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "6bd72af558972f0c0876d8ce9d2e90c43bc239f7ec498156719acddcd6177ea2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "ff4dde77710a79a7acf31d48d7705e7bbc6b9fe6407ef569c42097c42377be00", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f4f4955e372f7939296c38b207f6d46e3bfe1e3cf91fe76ee5c264757e7b29ea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She trembled violently\nand the oars moved feebly in her hands, chill for all the warmth of the\nafternoon. Her boat was in the stream which led to the weir, but not yet\nfully caught by the current. A few more strokes and the thing would be\ndone, she would be carried quickly on and over that dancing, sparkling\nedge into the deep pool below. Her courage failed, could not be screwed\nto the sticking-point; she hung on the oars, and the boat, as if\nanswering to her thought, stopped, swung half around. As she held the\nboat with the oars and closed her eyes in an anguish of hesitation and\nterror, a strange convulsion shook her, such as she had felt once\nbefore, and a low cry, not her own, broke from her lips.\n\n\"No--no!\" they uttered, hoarsely.\n\nThe Thing was there then, awake to its danger, and in another moment\nmight snatch her from herself, return laughing at her cowardice, to that\nhouse by the river. She pressed her lips hard together, and silently,\nwith all the strength of her hate and of her love, bent to the oars. The\nlittle boat shot forward into mid-stream, the current seized it and\nswept it rapidly on towards the dancing edge of water. She dropped the\nsculls and a hoarse shriek broke from her lips; but it was not she who\nshrieked, for in her heart was no fear, but triumph--triumph as of one\nwho is at length avenged of her mortal enemy.\n\n * * * * *\n\nIn the darkened drawing-room, the room so full of traces of all that had\nbeen exquisite in Mildred Stewart, Ian mourned alone. Presently the door\nopened a little, and a tall, slender, childish figure in a white smock,\nslipped in and closed it gently behind him. Tony stole up to his father\nand stood between his knees. He looked at Ian, silent, pale, large-eyed.\nThat a grown-up person and a man should shed tears was strange, even\nportentous, to him.\n\n\"Won't Mummy come back, not ever?\" asked the child at last, piteously,\nin a half whisper.\n\n\"No, never, Tony; Mummy won't ever come back. She's gone--gone for\nalways.\"\n\nThe child looked in his father's eyes strangely, penetratingly.\n\n\"Which Mummy?\" he asked.\n\n\nTHE END\n\n * * * * *", "start_char_idx": 433541, "end_char_idx": 435705, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd": {"__data__": {"id_": "872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}, "hash": "691892148beff3409fb17565e06c9bc991605c061561cfcfc1d9a96bf5b0c7f5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "986de4c967d00e526a4214e22ff9a3307ae251bd63c77d9024df97b625393c45", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "[Editor's Note: It has been called to our attention that Project Gutenberg ebook #43 which is the same title as this, is much easier to read than file #42 which you have presently opened.]\n\n\n\n\n STRANGE CASE OF\n DR. JEKYLL AND\n MR. HYDE\n\n BY\n ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON\n\n\n\n\n1)\n\n\n\n STORY OF THE DOOR\n\nMR. UTTERSON the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance, that was\nnever lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in\ndiscourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and\nyet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to\nhis taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye;\nsomething indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which\nspoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but\nmore often and loudly in the acts of his life. He was austere with\nhimself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for\nvintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the\ndoors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved tolerance for\nothers; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high pressure\nof spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined\nto help rather than to reprove.\n\n2)\n\n\"I incline to Cain's heresy,\" he used to say quaintly: \"I let my\nbrother go to the devil in his own way.\" In this character, it was\nfrequently his fortune to be the last reputable acquaintance and the\nlast good influence in the lives of down-going men. And to such as\nthese, so long as they came about his chambers, he never marked a\nshade of change in his demeanour.\n\nNo doubt the feat was easy to Mr. Utterson; for he was\nundemonstrative at the best, and even his friendship seemed to be\nfounded in a similar catholicity of good-nature. It is the mark of a\nmodest man to accept his friendly circle ready-made from the hands\nof opportunity; and that was the lawyer's way. His friends were\nthose of his own blood or those whom he had known the longest; his\naffections, like ivy, were the growth of time, they implied no\naptness in the object. Hence, no doubt, the bond that united him to\nMr. Richard Enfield, his distant kinsman, the well-known man about\ntown. It was a nut to crack for many, what these two could see in\neach other, or what subject they could find in common. It was\nreported by those who encountered them in their Sunday walks, that\nthey said nothing, looked singularly dull, and would hail with\nobvious relief the appearance of a friend. For all that, the two men\nput the greatest store by these excursions, counted them the chief\njewel of each week, and not only set aside occasions of pleasure,\nbut even resisted the calls\n\n3)\n\nof business, that they might enjoy them uninterrupted.\n\nIt chanced on one of these rambles that their way led them down a\nby-street in a busy quarter of London. The street was small and\nwhat is called quiet, but it drove a thriving trade on the\nweek-days. The inhabitants were all doing well, it seemed, and all\nemulously hoping to do better still, and laying out the surplus of\ntheir gains in coquetry; so that the shop fronts stood along that\nthoroughfare with an air of invitation, like rows of smiling\nsaleswomen. Even on Sunday, when it veiled its more florid charms\nand lay comparatively empty of passage, the street shone out in\ncontrast to its dingy neighbourhood, like a fire in a forest; and\nwith its freshly painted shutters, well-polished brasses, and\ngeneral cleanliness and gaiety of note, instantly caught and pleased\nthe eye of the passenger.\n\nTwo doors from one corner, on the left hand going east, the line\nwas broken by the entry of a court; and just at that point, a\ncertain sinister block of building thrust forward its gable on the\nstreet. It was two stories high; showed no window, nothing but a\ndoor on the lower story and a blind forehead of discoloured wall on\nthe upper; and bore in every feature, the marks of prolonged and\nsordid negligence.", "start_char_idx": 12, "end_char_idx": 4100, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc": {"__data__": {"id_": "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "764e9fea828b3d4f8f5b6559f0c5e8a51abc2867add0405fccab98e1a6ec8d34", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "17a1c7e4770835bfeba5f21303b609e6528692d16168f9f0e8076f81d82ca09e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The door, which was equipped with neither bell\nnor knocker, was blistered and distained. Tramps slouched into the\nrecess and struck matches on\n\n4)\n\nthe panels; children kept shop upon the steps; the schoolboy had\ntried his knife on the mouldings; and for close on a generation, no\none had appeared to drive away these random visitors or to repair\ntheir ravages.\n\nMr. Enfield and the lawyer were on the other side of the by-street;\nbut when they came abreast of the entry, the former lifted up his\ncane and pointed.\n\n\"Did you ever remark that door?\" he asked; and when his companion\nhad replied in the affirmative, \"It is connected in my mind,\" added\nhe, \"with a very odd story.\"\n\n\"Indeed?\" said Mr. Utterson, with a slight change of voice, \"and\nwhat was that?\"\n\n\"Well, it was this way,\" returned Mr. Enfield: \"I was coming home\nfrom some place at the end of the world, about three o'clock of a\nblack winter morning, and my way lay through a part of town where\nthere was literally nothing to be seen but lamps. Street after\nstreet, and all the folks asleep--street after street, all lighted\nup as if for a procession and all as empty as a church--till at\nlast I got into that state of mind when a man listens and listens\nand begins to long for the sight of a policeman. All at once, I saw\ntwo figures: one a little man who was stumping along eastward at a\ngood walk, and the other a girl of maybe eight or ten who was\nrunning as hard as she was able down a cross street. Well, sir, the\ntwo ran into one another naturally enough at the\n\n5)\n\ncorner; and then came the horrible part of the thing; for the man\ntrampled calmly over the child's body and left her screaming on\nthe ground. It sounds nothing to hear, but it was hellish to see.\nIt wasn't like a man; it was like some damned Juggernaut. I gave a\nview-halloa, took to my heels, collared my gentleman, and brought\nhim back to where there was already quite a group about the\nscreaming child. He was perfectly cool and made no resistance, but\ngave me one look, so ugly that it brought out the sweat on me like\nrunning. The people who had turned out were the girl's own family;\nand pretty soon, the doctor, for whom she had been sent, put in his\nappearance. Well, the child was not much the worse, more frightened,\naccording to the Sawbones; and there you might have supposed would\nbe an end to it. But there was one curious circumstance. I had taken\na loathing to my gentleman at first sight. So had the child's\nfamily, which was only natural. But the doctor's case was what\nstruck me. He was the usual cut-and-dry apothecary, of no particular\nage and colour, with a strong Edinburgh accent, and about as\nemotional as a bagpipe. Well, sir, he was like the rest of us; every\ntime he looked at my prisoner, I saw that Sawbones turn sick and\nwhite with the desire to kill him. I knew what was in his mind, just\nas he knew what was in mine; and killing being out of the question,\nwe did the next best. We told the man we could\n\n6)\n\nand would make such a scandal out of this, as should make his name\nstink from one end of London to the other. If he had any friends or\nany credit, we undertook that he should lose them. And all the time,\nas we were pitching it in red hot, we were keeping the women off him\nas best we could, for they were as wild as harpies. I never saw a\ncircle of such hateful faces; and there was the man in the middle,\nwith a kind of black, sneering coolness--frightened too, I could\nsee that--but carrying it off, sir, really like Satan. 'If you\nchoose to make capital out of this accident,' said he, 'I am\nnaturally helpless. No gentleman but wishes to avoid a scene,' says\nhe. 'Name your figure.'", "start_char_idx": 4101, "end_char_idx": 7767, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b": {"__data__": {"id_": "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "633c33f326c37bca626ac97657d325a1d82679faabb3c28a35f5fc514701131c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "94f20cd9d45a3c81239e9414c85513e8fbae6595d8d0e35d36fdc979df11cac0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "No gentleman but wishes to avoid a scene,' says\nhe. 'Name your figure.' Well, we screwed him up to a hundred pounds\nfor the child's family; he would have clearly liked to stick out;\nbut there was something about the lot of us that meant mischief, and\nat last he struck. The next thing was to get the money; and where\ndo you think he carried us but to that place with the door?--\nwhipped out a key, went in, and presently came back with the matter\nof ten pounds in gold and a cheque for the balance on Coutts's,\ndrawn payable to bearer and signed with a name that I can't mention,\nthough it's one of the points of my story, but it was a name at\nleast very well known and often printed. The figure was stiff; but\nthe signature was good for more than that, if it was only genuine. I\ntook the liberty of pointing out to my gentleman that the whole\n\n7)\n\nbusiness looked apocryphal, and that a man does not, in real life,\nwalk into a cellar door at four in the morning and come out of it\nwith another man's cheque for close upon a hundred pounds. But he\nwas quite easy and sneering. 'Set your mind at rest,' says he, 'I\nwill stay with you till the banks open and cash the cheque myself.'\nSo we all set off, the doctor, and the child's father, and our\nfriend and myself, and passed the rest of the night in my chambers;\nand next day, when we had breakfasted, went in a body to the bank. I\ngave in the check myself, and said I had every reason to believe it\nwas a forgery. Not a bit of it. The cheque was genuine.\"\n\n\"Tut-tut,\" said Mr. Utterson.\n\n\"I see you feel as I do,\" said Mr. Enfield. \"Yes, it's a bad story.\nFor my man was a fellow that nobody could have to do with, a really\ndamnable man; and the person that drew the cheque is the very pink\nof the proprieties, celebrated too, and (what makes it worse) one of\nyour fellows who do what they call good. Black-mail, I suppose; an\nhonest man paying through the nose for some of the capers of his\nyouth. Black-Mail House is what I call that place with the door, in\nconsequence. Though even that, you know, is far from explaining\nall,\" he added, and with the words fell into a vein of musing.\n\nFrom this he was recalled by Mr. Utterson asking rather suddenly:\n\"And you don't know if the drawer of the cheque lives there?\"\n\n8)\n\n\"A likely place, isn't it?\" returned Mr. Enfield. \"But I happen to\nhave noticed his address; he lives in some square or other.\"\n\n\"And you never asked about the--place with the door?\" said Mr.\nUtterson.\n\n\"No, sir: I had a delicacy,\" was the reply. \"I feel very strongly\nabout putting questions; it partakes too much of the style of the\nday of judgment. You start a question, and it's like starting a\nstone. You sit quietly on the top of a hill; and away the stone\ngoes, starting others; and presently some bland old bird (the last\nyou would have thought of) is knocked on the head in his own\nback-garden and the family have to change their name. No, sir, I\nmake it a rule of mine: the more it looks like Queer Street, the\nless I ask.\"\n\n\"A very good rule, too,\" said the lawyer.\n\n\"But I have studied the place for myself,\" continued Mr. Enfield.\n\"It seems scarcely a house. There is no other door, and nobody goes\nin or out of that one but, once in a great while, the gentleman of\nmy adventure. There are three windows looking on the court on the\nfirst floor; none below; the windows are always shut but they're\nclean. And then there is a chimney which is generally smoking; so\nsomebody must live there. And yet it's not so sure; for the\nbuildings are so packed together about that court, that it's hard to\nsay where one ends and another begins.\"\n\n9)\n\nThe pair walked on again for a while in silence; and then,\n\"Enfield,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"that's a good rule of yours.\"\n\n\"Yes, I think it is,\" returned Enfield.", "start_char_idx": 7696, "end_char_idx": 11478, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237": {"__data__": {"id_": "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "3027a220ac6d170c4b16573f26474832d2b5c53ba19da0eff2f0977214d3fb96", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "454603ad4ede0387c34ba76cbf14b13711587c40c125ec8cc2355a3acf0ea131", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Yes, I think it is,\" returned Enfield.\n\n\"But for all that,\" continued the lawyer, \"there's one point I want\nto ask: I want to ask the name of that man who walked over the\nchild.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Mr. Enfield, \"I can't see what harm it would do. It\nwas a man of the name of Hyde.\"\n\n\"H'm,\" said Mr. Utterson. \"What sort of a man is he to see?\"\n\n\"He is not easy to describe. There is something wrong with his\nappearance; something displeasing, something downright detestable. I\nnever saw a man I so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be\ndeformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although\nI couldn't specify the point. He's an extraordinary-looking man, and\nyet I really can name nothing out of the way. No, sir; I can make no\nhand of it; I can't describe him. And it's not want of memory; for I\ndeclare I can see him this moment.\"\n\nMr. Utterson again walked some way in silence and obviously under a\nweight of consideration.\n\n\"You are sure he used a key?\" he inquired at last.\n\n\"My dear sir...\" began Enfield, surprised out of himself.\n\n10)\n\n\"Yes, I know,\" said Utterson; \"I know it must seem strange. The\nfact is, if I do not ask you the name of the other party, it is\nbecause I know it already. You see, Richard, your tale has gone\nhome. If you have been inexact in any point, you had better correct\nit.\"\n\n\"I think you might have warned me,\" returned the other, with a\ntouch of sullenness. \"But I have been pedantically exact, as you\ncall it. The fellow had a key; and what's more, he has it still. I\nsaw him use it, not a week ago.\"\n\nMr. Utterson sighed deeply but said never a word; and the young man\npresently resumed. \"Here is another lesson to say nothing,\" said he.\n\"I am ashamed of my long tongue. Let us make a bargain never to\nrefer to this again.\"\n\n\"With all my heart,\" said the lawyer. \"I shake hands on that,\nRichard.\"\n\n11)", "start_char_idx": 11439, "end_char_idx": 13299, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483": {"__data__": {"id_": "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "d268b48270118411c20310c0ddcad5e3d0e55b180709afd4d578e07b37eff213", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2acc6c0e4588e348bde0f0d8550b6f7e9f73a757c4cf276940e537fec79c4750", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"With all my heart,\" said the lawyer. \"I shake hands on that,\nRichard.\"\n\n11)\n\n\n SEARCH FOR MR. HYDE\n\nTHAT evening Mr. Utterson came home to his bachelor house in sombre\nspirits and sat down to dinner without relish. It was his custom of\na Sunday, when this meal was over, to sit close by the fire, a\nvolume of some dry divinity on his reading-desk, until the clock of\nthe neighbouring church rang out the hour of twelve, when he would\ngo soberly and gratefully to bed. On this night, however, as soon as\nthe cloth was taken away, he took up a candle and went into his\nbusiness-room. There he opened his safe, took from the most private\npart of it a document endorsed on the envelope as Dr. Jekyll's Will,\nand sat down with a clouded brow to study its contents. The will was\nholograph, for Mr. Utterson, though he took charge of it now that it\nwas made, had refused to lend the least assistance in the making of\nit; it provided not only that, in case of the decease of Henry\nJekyll, M.D., D.C.L., L.L.D., F.R.S., etc., all his possessions were\nto pass into the hands of his \"friend and benefactor Edward Hyde,\"\nbut that in case of\n\n12)\n\nDr. Jekyll's \"disappearance or unexplained absence for any period\nexceeding three calendar months,\" the said Edward Hyde should step\ninto the said Henry Jekyll's shoes without further delay and free\nfrom any burthen or obligation, beyond the payment of a few small\nsums to the members of the doctor's household. This document had\nlong been the lawyer's eyesore. It offended him both as a lawyer and\nas a lover of the sane and customary sides of life, to whom the\nfanciful was the immodest. And hitherto it was his ignorance of Mr.\nHyde that had swelled his indignation; now, by a sudden turn, it was\nhis knowledge. It was already bad enough when the name was but a\nname of which he could learn no more. It was worse when it began to\nbe clothed upon with detestable attributes; and out of the shifting,\ninsubstantial mists that had so long baffled his eye, there leaped\nup the sudden, definite presentment of a fiend.\n\n\"I thought it was madness,\" he said, as he replaced the obnoxious\npaper in the safe, \"and now I begin to fear it is disgrace.\"\n\nWith that he blew out his candle, put on a great-coat, and set\nforth in the direction of Cavendish Square, that citadel of\nmedicine, where his friend, the great Dr. Lanyon, had his house and\nreceived his crowding patients. \"If any one knows, it will be\nLanyon,\" he had thought.\n\nThe solemn butler knew and welcomed him;\n\n13)\n\nhe was subjected to no stage of delay, but ushered direct from the\ndoor to the dining-room where Dr. Lanyon sat alone over his wine.\nThis was a hearty, healthy, dapper, red-faced gentleman, with a\nshock of hair prematurely white, and a boisterous and decided\nmanner. At sight of Mr. Utterson, he sprang up from his chair and\nwelcomed him with both hands. The geniality, as was the way of the\nman, was somewhat theatrical to the eye; but it reposed on genuine\nfeeling. For these two were old friends, old mates both at school\nand college, both thorough respecters of themselves and of each\nother, and, what does not always follow, men who thoroughly enjoyed\neach other's company.\n\nAfter a little rambling talk, the lawyer led up to the subject\nwhich so disagreeably pre-occupied his mind.\n\n\"I suppose, Lanyon,\" said he \"you and I must be the two oldest\nfriends that Henry Jekyll has?\"\n\n\"I wish the friends were younger,\" chuckled Dr. Lanyon. \"But I\nsuppose we are. And what of that? I see little of him now.\"\n\n\n\"Indeed?\" said Utterson. \"I thought you had a bond of common\ninterest.\"\n\n\"We had,\" was the reply. \"But it is more than ten years since Henry\nJekyll became too fanciful for me.", "start_char_idx": 13223, "end_char_idx": 16939, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d": {"__data__": {"id_": "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "81d66eb2ebb139a70ca53aa3fb63960509daa099a13c9e0b9aebe242c3a06bb3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1d0d66dd7e933504b53b4af0db53a5863cae34ceee819a0f90367459ed5b6263", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"But it is more than ten years since Henry\nJekyll became too fanciful for me. He began to go wrong, wrong in\nmind; and though of course I continue to take an interest in him for\nold sake's sake, as they say,\n\n14)\n\nI see and I have seen devilish little of the man. Such unscientific\nbalderdash,\" added the doctor, flushing suddenly purple, \"would have\nestranged Damon and Pythias.\"\n\nThis little spirit of temper was somewhat of a relief to Mr.\nUtterson. \"They have only differed on some point of science,\" he\nthought; and being a man of no scientific passions (except in the\nmatter of conveyancing), he even added: \"It is nothing worse than\nthat!\" He gave his friend a few seconds to recover his composure,\nand then approached the question he had come to put. \"Did you ever\ncome across a protege of his--one Hyde?\" he asked.\n\n\"Hyde?\" repeated Lanyon. \"No. Never heard of him. Since my time.\"\n\nThat was the amount of information that the lawyer carried back\nwith him to the great, dark bed on which he tossed to and fro,\nuntil the small hours of the morning began to grow large. It was a\nnight of little ease to his toiling mind, toiling in mere darkness\nand besieged by questions.\n\nSix o'clock struck on the bells of the church that was so\nconveniently near to Mr. Utterson's dwelling, and still he was\ndigging at the problem. Hitherto it had touched him on the\nintellectual side alone; but now his imagination also was engaged,\nor rather enslaved; and as he lay and tossed in the gross darkness\nof the night and the curtained room, Mr. Enfield's tale went by\n\n15)\n\nbefore his mind in a scroll of lighted pictures. He would be aware\nof the great field of lamps of a nocturnal city; then of the figure\nof a man walking swiftly; then of a child running from the doctor's;\nand then these met, and that human Juggernaut trod the child down\nand passed on regardless of her screams. Or else he would see a room\nin a rich house, where his friend lay asleep, dreaming and smiling\nat his dreams; and then the door of that room would be opened, the\ncurtains of the bed plucked apart, the sleeper recalled, and lo!\nthere would stand by his side a figure to whom power was given, and\neven at that dead hour, he must rise and do its bidding. The figure\nin these two phases haunted the lawyer all night; and if at any time\nhe dozed over, it was but to see it glide more stealthily through\nsleeping houses, or move the more swiftly and still the more\nswiftly, even to dizziness, through wider labyrinths of lamplighted\ncity, and at every street-corner crush a child and leave her\nscreaming. And still the figure had no face by which he might know\nit; even in his dreams, it had no face, or one that baffled him and\nmelted before his eyes; and thus it was that there sprang up and\ngrew apace in the lawyer's mind a singularly strong, almost an\ninordinate, curiosity to behold the features of the real Mr. Hyde.\nIf he could but once set eyes on him, he thought the mystery would\nlighten and perhaps roll altogether away, as was the habit of\nmysterious\n\n16)\n\nthings when well examined. He might see a reason for his friend's\nstrange preference or bondage (call it which you please) and even\nfor the startling clause of the will. At least it would be a face\nworth seeing: the face of a man who was without bowels of mercy: a\nface which had but to show itself to raise up, in the mind of the\nunimpressionable Enfield, a spirit of enduring hatred.\n\nFrom that time forward, Mr. Utterson began to haunt the door in the\nby-street of shops. In the morning before office hours, at noon when\nbusiness was plenty, and time scarce, at night under the face of the\nfogged city moon, by all lights and at all hours of solitude or\nconcourse, the lawyer was to be found on his chosen post.\n\n\"If he be Mr. Hyde,\" he had thought, \"I shall be Mr. Seek.\"\n\nAnd at last his patience was rewarded.", "start_char_idx": 16862, "end_char_idx": 20717, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1": {"__data__": {"id_": "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "1140ee2148c314263f6788f643394253b1e8eec425967326286f23dbc14d1b28", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8ab0a41f3d95dfb8acc396356f382681c1d295b5f1a676a1ee712ae1317df578", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Seek.\"\n\nAnd at last his patience was rewarded. It was a fine dry night;\nfrost in the air; the streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the\nlamps, unshaken, by any wind, drawing a regular pattern of light\nand shadow. By ten o'clock, when the shops were closed, the\nby-street was very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of\nLondon from all round, very silent. Small sounds carried far;\ndomestic sounds out of the houses were clearly audible on either\nside of the roadway; and the rumour of the approach of any\npassenger preceded him by a long time. Mr. Utterson had been some\nminutes at his post, when he was\n\n17)\n\naware of an odd, light footstep drawing near. In the course of his\nnightly patrols, he had long grown accustomed to the quaint effect\nwith which the footfalls of a single person, while he is still a\ngreat way off, suddenly spring out distinct from the vast hum and\nclatter of the city. Yet his attention had never before been so\nsharply and decisively arrested; and it was with a strong,\nsuperstitious prevision of success that he withdrew into the entry\nof the court.\n\nThe steps drew swiftly nearer, and swelled out suddenly louder as\nthey turned the end of the street. The lawyer, looking forth from\nthe entry, could soon see what manner of man he had to deal with.\nHe was small and very plainly dressed, and the look of him, even at\nthat distance, went somehow strongly against the watcher's\ninclination. But he made straight for the door, crossing the\nroadway to save time; and as he came, he drew a key from his pocket\nlike one approaching home.\n\nMr. Utterson stepped out and touched him on the shoulder as he\npassed. \"Mr. Hyde, I think?\"\n\nMr. Hyde shrank back with a hissing intake of the breath. But his\nfear was only momentary; and though he did not look the lawyer in\nthe face, he answered coolly enough: \"That is my name. What do you\nwant?\"\n\n\"I see you are going in,\" returned the lawyer. \"I am an old friend\nof Dr. Jekyll's--Mr. Utter-\n\n18)\n\nson of Gaunt Street--you must have heard my name; and meeting you\nso conveniently, I thought you might admit me.\"\n\n\"You will not find Dr. Jekyll; he is from home,\" replied Mr. Hyde,\nblowing in the key. And then suddenly, but still without looking up,\n\"How did you know me?\" he asked.\n\n\"On your side,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"will you do me a favour?\"\n\n\"With pleasure,\" replied the other. \"What shall it be?\"\n\n\"Will you let me see your face?\" asked the lawyer.\n\nMr. Hyde appeared to hesitate, and then, as if upon some sudden\nreflection, fronted about with an air of defiance; and the pair\nstared at each other pretty fixedly for a few seconds. \"Now I shall\nknow you again,\" said Mr. Utterson. \"It may be useful.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" returned Mr. Hyde, \"it is as well we have, met; and a\npropos, you should have my address.\" And he gave a number of a\nstreet in Soho.\n\n\"Good God!\" thought Mr. Utterson, \"can he, too, have been thinking\nof the will?\" But he kept his feelings to himself and only grunted\nin acknowledgment of the address.\n\n\"And now,\" said the other, \"how did you know me?\"\n\n\"By description,\" was the reply.\n\n\"Whose description?\"\n\n19)\n\n\"We have common friends,\" said Mr. Utterson.\n\n\"Common friends?\" echoed Mr. Hyde, a little hoarsely. \"Who are\nthey?\"\n\n\"Jekyll, for instance,\" said the lawyer.\n\n\"He never told you,\" cried Mr. Hyde, with a flush of anger. \"I did\nnot think you would have lied.\"\n\n\"Come,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"that is not fitting language.\"", "start_char_idx": 20671, "end_char_idx": 24087, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021": {"__data__": {"id_": "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "cfa01b0a32ee8b80865684b0265caebed5dd535f1556765fb3ae7699b93d7e1d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4115e6746130f5218948485dce0c1b9d4d21e33ac8499e3886107cc7006354db", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Come,\" said Mr. Utterson, \"that is not fitting language.\"\n\n\nThe other snarled aloud into a savage laugh; and the next moment,\nwith extraordinary quickness, he had unlocked the door and\ndisappeared into the house.\n\nThe lawyer stood awhile when Mr. Hyde had left him, the picture of\ndisquietude. Then he began slowly to mount the street, pausing\nevery step or two and putting his hand to his brow like a man in\nmental perplexity. The problem he was thus debating as he walked,\nwas one of a class that is rarely solved. Mr. Hyde was pale and\ndwarfish, he gave an impression of deformity without any nameable\nmalformation, he had a displeasing smile, he had borne himself to\nthe lawyer with a sort of murderous mixture of timidity and\nboldness, and he spoke with a husky, whispering and somewhat broken\nvoice; all these were points against him, but not all of these\ntogether could explain the hitherto unknown disgust, loathing, and\nfear with which Mr. Utterson regarded him. \"There must be some-\n\n20)\n\nthing else,\" said the perplexed gentleman. \"There is something\nmore, if I could find a name for it. God bless me, the man seems\nhardly human! Something troglodytic, shall we say? or can it be the\nold story of Dr. Fell? or is it the mere radiance of a foul soul\nthat thus transpires through, and transfigures, its clay continent?\nThe last, I think; for, O my poor old Harry Jekyll, if ever I read\nSatan's signature upon a face, it is on that of your new friend.\"\n\nRound the corner from the by-street, there was a square of ancient,\nhandsome houses, now for the most part decayed from their high\nestate and let in flats and chambers to all sorts and conditions of\nmen: map-engravers, architects, shady lawyers, and the agents of\nobscure enterprises. One house, however, second from the corner, was\nstill occupied entire; and at the door of this, which wore a great\nair of wealth and comfort, though it was now plunged in darkness\nexcept for the fan-light, Mr. Utterson stopped and knocked. A\nwell-dressed, elderly servant opened the door.\n\n\"Is Dr. Jekyll at home, Poole?\" asked the lawyer.\n\n\"I will see, Mr. Utterson,\" said Poole, admitting the visitor, as\nhe spoke, into a large, low-roofed, comfortable hall, paved with\nflags, warmed (after the fashion of a country house) by a bright,\nopen fire, and furnished with costly cabinets of oak. \"Will you\nwait here by the\n\n21)\n\nfire, sir? or shall I give you a light in the dining room?\"\n\n\"Here, thank you,\" said the lawyer, and he drew near and leaned on\nthe tall fender. This hall, in which he was now left alone, was a\npet fancy of his friend the doctor's; and Utterson himself was wont\nto speak of it as the pleasantest room in London. But to-night there\nwas a shudder in his blood; the face of Hyde sat heavy on his\nmemory; he felt (what was rare with him) a nausea and distaste of\nlife; and in the gloom of his spirits, he seemed to read a menace in\nthe flickering of the firelight on the polished cabinets and the\nuneasy starting of the shadow on the roof. He was ashamed of his\nrelief, when Poole presently returned to announce that Dr. Jekyll\nwas gone out.\n\n\"I saw Mr. Hyde go in by the old dissecting-room door, Poole,\" he\nsaid. \"Is that right, when Dr. Jekyll is from home?\"\n\n\"Quite right, Mr. Utterson, sir,\" replied the servant. \"Mr. Hyde\nhas a key.\"\n\n\"Your master seems to repose a great deal of trust in that young\nman, Poole,\" resumed the other musingly.\n\n\"Yes, sir, he do indeed,\" said Poole. \"We have all orders to obey\nhim.\"\n\n\"I do not think I ever met Mr. Hyde?\" asked Utterson.", "start_char_idx": 24029, "end_char_idx": 27572, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5": {"__data__": {"id_": "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "8990c6f77cfdecf86737ed93c105d8b0c85e05e0cfdf1351a8384a84b22d0c5a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "14c7017a5421fe81a69c23bea35dd5854a979a12a9d2d8ad51a4ad8b7646bc0f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"O, dear no, sir. He never dines here,\" replied the butler. \"Indeed\nwe see very little of\n\n22)\n\nhim on this side of the house; he mostly comes and goes by the\nlaboratory.\"\n\n\"Well, good-night, Poole.\"\n\n\"Good-night, Mr. Utterson.\" And the lawyer set out homeward with a\nvery heavy heart. \"Poor Harry Jekyll,\" he thought, \"my mind\nmisgives me he is in deep waters! He was wild when he was young; a\nlong while ago to be sure; but in the law of God, there is no\nstatute of limitations. Ay, it must be that; the ghost of some old\nsin, the cancer of some concealed disgrace: punishment coming, PEDE\nCLAUDO, years after memory has forgotten and self-love condoned the\nfault.\" And the lawyer, scared by the thought, brooded a while on\nhis own past, groping in all the corners of memory, lest by chance\nsome Jack-in-the-Box of an old iniquity should leap to light there.\nHis past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls of their\nlife with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust by the\nmany ill things he had done, and raised up again into a sober and\nfearful gratitude by the many that he had come so near to doing, yet\navoided. And then by a return on his former subject, he conceived a\nspark of hope. \"This Master Hyde, if he were studied,\" thought he,\n\"must have secrets of his own; black secrets, by the look of him;\nsecrets compared to which poor Jekyll's worst would be like\nsunshine. Things cannot continue as they are. It turns me cold to\nthink of this creature stealing like a\n\n23)\n\nthief to Harry's bedside; poor Harry, what a wakening! And the\ndanger of it; for if this Hyde suspects the existence of the will,\nhe may grow impatient to inherit. Ay, I must put my shoulder to the\nwheel if Jekyll will but let me,\" he added, \"if Jekyll will only let\nme.\" For once more he saw before his mind's eye, as clear as a\ntransparency, the strange clauses of the will.\n\n24)\n\n\n\n DR. JEKYLL WAS QUITE AT EASE\n\nA FORTNIGHT later, by excellent good fortune, the doctor gave one\nof his pleasant dinners to some five or six old cronies, all\nintelligent, reputable men and all judges of good wine; and Mr.\nUtterson so contrived that he remained behind after the others had\ndeparted. This was no new arrangement, but a thing that had\nbefallen many scores of times. Where Utterson was liked, he was\nliked well. Hosts loved to detain the dry lawyer, when the\nlight-hearted and the loose-tongued had already their foot on the\nthreshold; they liked to sit a while in his unobtrusive company,\npractising for solitude, sobering their minds in the man's rich\nsilence after the expense and strain of gaiety. To this rule, Dr.\nJekyll was no exception; and as he now sat on the opposite side of\nthe fire--a large, well-made, smooth-faced man of fifty, with\nsomething of a slyish cast perhaps, but every mark of capacity and\nkindness--you could see by his looks that he cherished for Mr.\nUtterson a sincere and warm affection.\n\n25)", "start_char_idx": 27575, "end_char_idx": 30520, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c": {"__data__": {"id_": "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "9aa2fc9ad264d9c95a23e1786b7f9a347b448430a52a281a578662d74c7ca8a6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "db8c571097263ada7c273b5379151ac9cf61ca417b5b3e31d994aef437b78561", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I have been wanting to speak to you, Jekyll,\" began the latter.\n\"You know that will of yours?\"\n\nA close observer might have gathered that the topic was\ndistasteful; but the doctor carried it off gaily. \"My poor\nUtterson,\" said he, \"you are unfortunate in such a client. I never\nsaw a man so distressed as you were by my will; unless it were that\nhide-bound pedant, Lanyon, at what he called my scientific heresies.\nOh, I know he's a good fellow--you needn't frown--an excellent\nfellow, and I always mean to see more of him; but a hide-bound\npedant for all that; an ignorant, blatant pedant. I was never more\ndisappointed in any man than Lanyon.\"\n\n\"You know I never approved of it,\" pursued Utterson, ruthlessly\ndisregarding the fresh topic.\n\n\"My will? Yes, certainly, I know that,\" said the doctor, a trifle\nsharply. \"You have told me so.\"\n\n\"Well, I tell you so again,\" continued the lawyer. \"I have been\nlearning something of young Hyde.\"\n\nThe large handsome face of Dr. Jekyll grew pale to the very lips,\nand there came a blackness about his eyes. \"I do not care to hear\nmore,\" said he. \"This is a matter I thought we had agreed to drop.\"\n\n\"What I heard was abominable,\" said Utterson.\n\n\"It can make no change. You do not under-\n\n26)\n\nstand my position,\" returned the doctor, with a certain incoherency\nof manner. \"I am painfully situated, Utterson; my position is a very\nstrange--a very strange one. It is one of those affairs that\ncannot be mended by talking.\"\n\n\"Jekyll,\" said Utterson, \"you know me: I am a man to be trusted.\nMake a clean breast of this in confidence; and I make no doubt I\ncan get you out of it.\"\n\n\"My good Utterson,\" said the doctor, \"this is very good of you,\nthis is downright good of you, and I cannot find words to thank you\nin. I believe you fully; I would trust you before any man alive, ay,\nbefore myself, if I could make the choice; but indeed it isn't what\nyou fancy; it is not so bad as that; and just to put your good heart\nat rest, I will tell you one thing: the moment I choose, I can be\nrid of Mr. Hyde. I give you my hand upon that; and I thank you again\nand again; and I will just add one little word, Utterson, that I'm\nsure you'll take in good part: this is a private matter, and I beg\nof you to let it sleep.\"\n\n\nUtterson reflected a little, looking in the fire.\n\n\"I have no doubt you are perfectly right,\" he said at last, getting\nto his feet.\n\n\"Well, but since we have touched upon this business, and for the\nlast time I hope,\" continued the doctor, \"there is one point I\nshould like you to understand. I have really a very great interest\nin poor Hyde. I know you have seen\n\n27)\n\nhim; he told me so; and I fear he was rude. But, I do sincerely\ntake a great, a very great interest in that young man; and if I am\ntaken away, Utterson, I wish you to promise me that you will bear\nwith him and get his rights for him. I think you would, if you knew\nall; and it would be a weight off my mind if you would promise.\"\n\n\"I can't pretend that I shall ever like him,\" said the lawyer.\n\n\"I don't ask that,\" pleaded Jekyll, laying his hand upon the\nother's arm; \"I only ask for justice; I only ask you to help him\nfor my sake, when I am no longer here.\"\n\nUtterson heaved an irrepressible sigh. \"Well,\" said he, \"I\npromise.\"\n\n28)\n\n\n\n THE CAREW MURDER CASE\n\nNEARLY a year later, in the month of October, 18---, London was\nstartled by a crime of singular ferocity and rendered all the more\nnotable by the high position of the victim. The details were few and\nstartling. A maid servant living alone in a house not far from the\nriver, had gone up-stairs to bed about eleven.", "start_char_idx": 30523, "end_char_idx": 34145, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410": {"__data__": {"id_": "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "0d41ab82500cafd0817729970dc429e4b704c44c33d756514943be0af69b50c7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "4e53add4261bead0137ca92073987ba065b2f2af7137d9922c4b01dfa2d96cb8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Although a fog rolled\nover the city in the small hours, the early part of the night was\ncloudless, and the lane, which the maid's window overlooked, was\nbrilliantly lit by the full moon. It seems she was romantically\ngiven, for she sat down upon her box, which stood immediately under\nthe window, and fell into a dream of musing. Never (she used to say,\nwith streaming tears, when she narrated that experience), never had\nshe felt more at peace with all men or thought more kindly of the\nworld. And as she so sat she became aware of an aged and beautiful\ngentleman with white hair, drawing near along the lane; and\nadvancing to meet him, another and very small gentleman, to whom at\nfirst she\n\n29)\n\npaid less attention. When they had come within speech (which was\njust under the maid's eyes) the older man bowed and accosted the\nother with a very pretty manner of politeness. It did not seem as\nif the subject of his address were of great importance; indeed,\nfrom his pointing, it sometimes appeared as if he were only\ninquiring his way; but the moon shone on his face as he spoke, and\nthe girl was pleased to watch it, it seemed to breathe such an\ninnocent and old-world kindness of disposition, yet with something\nhigh too, as of a well-founded self-content. Presently her eye\nwandered to the other, and she was surprised to recognise in him a\ncertain Mr. Hyde, who had once visited her master and for whom she\nhad conceived a dislike. He had in his hand a heavy cane, with which\nhe was trifling; but he answered never a word, and seemed to listen\nwith an ill-contained impatience. And then all of a sudden he broke\nout in a great flame of anger, stamping with his foot, brandishing\nthe cane, and carrying on (as the maid described it) like a madman.\nThe old gentleman took a step back, with the air of one very much\nsurprised and a trifle hurt; and at that Mr. Hyde broke out of all\nbounds and clubbed him to the earth. And next moment, with ape-like\nfury, he was trampling his victim under foot and hailing down a\nstorm of blows, under which the bones were audibly shattered and the\nbody jumped upon the roadway. At the horror of these sights and\nsounds, the maid fainted.\n\n30)\n\nIt was two o'clock when she came to herself and called for the\npolice. The murderer was gone long ago; but there lay his victim in\nthe middle of the lane, incredibly mangled. The stick with which the\ndeed had been done, although it was of some rare and very tough and\nheavy wood, had broken in the middle under the stress of this\ninsensate cruelty; and one splintered half had rolled in the\nneighbouring gutter--the other, without doubt, had been carried\naway by the murderer. A purse and a gold watch were found upon the\nvictim: but no cards or papers, except a sealed and stamped\nenvelope, which he had been probably carrying to the post, and which\nbore the name and address of Mr. Utterson.\n\nThis was brought to the lawyer the next morning, before he was out\nof bed; and he had no sooner seen it, and been told the\ncircumstances, than he shot out a solemn lip. \"I shall say nothing\ntill I have seen the body,\" said he; \"this may be very serious. Have\nthe kindness to wait while I dress.\" And with the same grave\ncountenance he hurried through his breakfast and drove to the police\nstation, whither the body had been carried. As soon as he came into\nthe cell, he nodded.\n\n\"Yes,\" said he, \"I recognise him. I am sorry to say that this is\nSir Danvers Carew.\"\n\n\"Good God, sir,\" exclaimed the officer, \"is it possible?\" And the\nnext moment his eye\n\n31)\n\nlighted up with professional ambition. \"This will make a deal of\nnoise,\" he said. \"And perhaps you can help us to the man.\" And he\nbriefly narrated what the maid had seen, and showed the broken\nstick.\n\nMr.", "start_char_idx": 34146, "end_char_idx": 37886, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e": {"__data__": {"id_": "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "5af41bee61ab4d9c90573ec660098083d422a6788562a34e5e93a70d4675aac5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7170e22fee9b02acaa7b63a7696eaf3ea160a9aa45ac239831df36f1730a590e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Mr. Utterson had already quailed at the name of Hyde; but when the\nstick was laid before him, he could doubt no longer; broken and\nbattered as it was, he recognised it for one that he had himself\npresented many years before to Henry Jekyll.\n\n\"Is this Mr. Hyde a person of small stature?\" he inquired.\n\n\"Particularly small and particularly wicked-looking, is what the\nmaid calls him,\" said the officer.\n\nMr. Utterson reflected; and then, raising his head, \"If you will\ncome with me in my cab,\" he said, \"I think I can take you to his\nhouse.\"\n\nIt was by this time about nine in the morning, and the first fog of\nthe season. A great chocolate-coloured pall lowered over heaven, but\nthe wind was continually charging and routing these embattled\nvapours; so that as the cab crawled from street to street, Mr.\nUtterson beheld a marvellous number of degrees and hues of twilight;\nfor here it would be dark like the back-end of evening; and there\nwould be a glow of a rich, lurid brown, like the light of some\nstrange conflagration; and here, for a moment, the fog would be\nquite broken up, and a haggard shaft\n\n32)\n\nof daylight would glance in between the swirling wreaths. The\ndismal quarter of Soho seen under these changing glimpses, with its\nmuddy ways, and slatternly passengers, and its lamps, which had\nnever been extinguished or had been kindled afresh to combat this\nmournful re-invasion of darkness, seemed, in the lawyer's eyes, like\na district of some city in a nightmare. The thoughts of his mind,\nbesides, were of the gloomiest dye; and when he glanced at the\ncompanion of his drive, he was conscious of some touch of that\nterror of the law and the law's officers, which may at times assail\nthe most honest.\n\nAs the cab drew up before the address indicated, the fog lifted a\nlittle and showed him a dingy street, a gin palace, a low French\neating-house, a shop for the retail of penny numbers and twopenny\nsalads, many ragged children huddled in the doorways, and many\nwomen of different nationalities passing out, key in hand, to have a\nmorning glass; and the next moment the fog settled down again upon\nthat part, as brown as umber, and cut him off from his blackguardly\nsurroundings. This was the home of Henry Jekyll's favourite; of a\nman who was heir to a quarter of a million sterling.\n\nAn ivory-faced and silvery-haired old woman opened the door. She\nhad an evil face, smoothed by hypocrisy; but her manners were\nexcellent. Yes, she said, this was Mr. Hyde's, but he was not at\nhome; he had been in that night very late,\n\n33)\n\nbut had gone away again in less than an hour; there was nothing\nstrange in that; his habits were very irregular, and he was often\nabsent; for instance, it was nearly two months since she had seen\nhim till yesterday.\n\n\"Very well, then, we wish to see his rooms,\" said the lawyer; and\nwhen the woman began to declare it was impossible, \"I had better\ntell you who this person is,\" he added. \"This is Inspector Newcomen\nof Scotland Yard.\"\n\nA flash of odious joy appeared upon the woman's face. \"Ah!\" said\nshe, \"he is in trouble! What has he done?\"\n\nMr. Utterson and the inspector exchanged glances. \"He don't seem a\nvery popular character,\" observed the latter. \"And now, my good\nwoman, just let me and this gentleman have a look about us.\"\n\nIn the whole extent of the house, which but for the old woman\nremained otherwise empty, Mr. Hyde had only used a couple of rooms;\nbut these were furnished with luxury and good taste. A closet was\nfilled with wine; the plate was of silver, the napery elegant; a\ngood picture hung upon the walls, a gift (as Utterson supposed) from\nHenry Jekyll, who was much of a connoisseur; and the carpets were of\nmany plies and agreeable in colour.", "start_char_idx": 37883, "end_char_idx": 41596, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532": {"__data__": {"id_": "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "1b15edd218a9749261127543c53d931cd8ef5312da7b087659c74924b5cdd891", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "aa657505228d82e0357494b8b5e431712c96f64d2e637ae09ca073f5fdf6d82c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "At this moment, however, the\nrooms bore every mark of having been recently and hurriedly\nransacked; clothes lay about the floor, with their pockets inside\nout;\n\n34)\n\nlock-fast drawers stood open; and on the hearth there lay a pile of\ngrey ashes, as though many papers had been burned. From these\nembers the inspector disinterred the butt-end of a green\ncheque-book, which had resisted the action of the fire; the other\nhalf of the stick was found behind the door; and as this clinched\nhis suspicions, the officer declared himself delighted. A visit to\nthe bank, where several thousand pounds were found to be lying to\nthe murderer's credit, completed his gratification.\n\n\"You may depend upon it, sir,\" he told Mr. Utterson: \"I have him in\nmy hand. He must have lost his head, or he never would have left the\nstick or, above all, burned the cheque-book. Why, money's life to\nthe man. We have nothing to do but wait for him at the bank, and get\nout the handbills.\"\n\nThis last, however, was not so easy of accomplishment; for Mr. Hyde\nhad numbered few familiars--even the master of the servant-maid\nhad only seen him twice; his family could nowhere be traced; he had\nnever been photographed; and the few who could describe him differed\nwidely, as common observers will. Only on one point, were they\nagreed; and that was the haunting sense of unexpressed deformity\nwith which the fugitive impressed his beholders.\n\n35)\n\n\n\n INCIDENT OF THE LETTER\n\nIT was late in the afternoon, when Mr. Utterson found his way to\nDr. Jekyll's door, where he was at once admitted by Poole, and\ncarried down by the kitchen offices and across a yard which had\nonce been a garden, to the building which was indifferently known\nas the laboratory or the dissecting-rooms. The doctor had bought\nthe house from the heirs of a celebrated surgeon; and his own\ntastes being rather chemical than anatomical, had changed the\ndestination of the block at the bottom of the garden. It was the\nfirst time that the lawyer had been received in that part of his\nfriend's quarters; and he eyed the dingy, windowless structure with\ncuriosity, and gazed round with a distasteful sense of strangeness\nas he crossed the theatre, once crowded with eager students and now\nlying gaunt and silent, the tables laden with chemical apparatus,\nthe floor strewn with crates and littered with packing straw, and\nthe light falling dimly through the foggy cupola. At the further\nend, a flight of stairs mounted to a door covered with red baize;\n\n36)\n\nand through this, Mr. Utterson was at last received into the\ndoctor's cabinet. It was a large room, fitted round with glass\npresses, furnished, among other things, with a cheval-glass and a\nbusiness table, and looking out upon the court by three dusty\nwindows barred with iron. A fire burned in the grate; a lamp was\nset lighted on the chimney shelf, for even in the houses the fog\nbegan to lie thickly; and there, close up to the warmth, sat Dr.\nJekyll, looking deadly sick. He did not rise to meet his visitor,\nbut held out a cold hand and bade him welcome in a changed voice.\n\n\"And now,\" said Mr. Utterson, as soon as Poole had left them, \"you\nhave heard the news?\"\n\nThe doctor shuddered. \"They were crying it in the square,\" he said.\n\"I heard them in my dining-room.\"\n\n\"One word,\" said the lawyer. \"Carew was my client, but so are you,\nand I want to know what I am doing. You have not been mad enough to\nhide this fellow?\"\n\n\"Utterson, I swear to God,\" cried the doctor, \"I swear to God I\nwill never set eyes on him again. I bind my honour to you that I am\ndone with him in this world. It is all at an end. And indeed he does\nnot want my help; you do not know him as I do; he is safe, he is\nquite safe; mark my words, he will never more be heard of.\"", "start_char_idx": 41597, "end_char_idx": 45362, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073": {"__data__": {"id_": "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "d56b0b5bf80141f10e08e9ba72b64a3ae81c1f21621ae030bd2902f66037910b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bac03b61a6085e73c14190b8aac3b84fcbb334abca80fd73437fb34915d8f830", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The lawyer listened gloomily; he did not like his friend's feverish\nmanner. \"You seem pretty\n\n37)\n\nsure of him,\" said he; \"and for your sake, I hope you may be right.\nIf it came to a trial, your name might appear.\"\n\n\"I am quite sure of him,\" replied Jekyll; \"I have grounds for\ncertainty that I cannot share with any one. But there is one thing\non which you may advise me. I have--I have received a letter; and\nI am at a loss whether I should show it to the police. I should like\nto leave it in your hands, Utterson; you would judge wisely, I am\nsure; I have so great a trust in you.\"\n\n\"You fear, I suppose, that it might lead to his detection?\" asked\nthe lawyer.\n\n\"No,\" said the other. \"I cannot say that I care what becomes of\nHyde; I am quite done with him. I was thinking of my own character,\nwhich this hateful business has rather exposed.\"\n\nUtterson ruminated a while; he was surprised at his friend's\nselfishness, and yet relieved by it. \"Well,\" said he, at last, \"let\nme see the letter.\"\n\nThe letter was written in an odd, upright hand and signed \"Edward\nHyde\": and it signified, briefly enough, that the writer's\nbenefactor, Dr. Jekyll, whom he had long so unworthily repaid for a\nthousand generosities, need labour under no alarm for his safety, as\nhe had means of escape on which he placed a sure dependence. The\nlawyer liked this letter well enough; it put a better colour on the\nintimacy than he had looked for; and he blamed himself for some of\nhis past suspicions.\n\n38)\n\n\n\"Have you the envelope?\" he asked.\n\n\"I burned it,\" replied Jekyll, \"before I thought what I was about.\nBut it bore no postmark. The note was handed in.\"\n\n\"Shall I keep this and sleep upon it?\" asked Utterson.\n\n\"I wish you to judge for me entirely,\" was the reply. \"I have lost\nconfidence in myself.\"\n\n\"Well, I shall consider,\" returned the lawyer. \"And now one word\nmore: it was Hyde who dictated the terms in your will about that\ndisappearance?\"\n\nThe doctor seemed seized with a qualm of faintness: he shut his\nmouth tight and nodded.\n\n\"I knew it,\" said Utterson. \"He meant to murder you. You have had a\nfine escape.\"\n\n\"I have had what is far more to the purpose,\" returned the doctor\nsolemnly: \"I have had a lesson--O God, Utterson, what a lesson I\nhave had!\" And he covered his face for a moment with his hands.\n\nOn his way out, the lawyer stopped and had a word or two with\nPoole. \"By the by,\" said he, \"there was a letter handed in to-day:\nwhat was the messenger like?\" But Poole was positive nothing had\ncome except by post; \"and only circulars by that,\" he added.\n\nThis news sent off the visitor with his fears renewed. Plainly the\nletter had come by the laboratory door; possibly, indeed, it had\nbeen\n\n39)\n\nwritten in the cabinet; and if that were so, it must be differently\njudged, and handled with the more caution. The newsboys, as he went,\nwere crying themselves hoarse along the footways: \"Special edition.\nShocking murder of an M. P.\" That was the funeral oration of one\nfriend and client; and he could not help a certain apprehension lest\nthe good name of another should be sucked down in the eddy of the\nscandal. It was, at least, a ticklish decision that he had to make;\nand self-reliant as he was by habit, he began to cherish a longing\nfor advice. It was not to be had directly; but perhaps, he thought,\nit might be fished for.\n\nPresently after, he sat on one side of his own hearth, with Mr.\nGuest, his head clerk, upon the other, and midway between, at a\nnicely calculated distance from the fire, a bottle of a particular\nold wine that had long dwelt unsunned in the foundations of his\nhouse.", "start_char_idx": 45365, "end_char_idx": 48965, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6": {"__data__": {"id_": "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "74828c7149526b3291b7ea80de252e4ea8e1e1cf32b021b7de2182503340bf87", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2410bae190fe2a2d7c9c9153b7e7d21677c039caacf244d4a1fa49b4ecb5a2cf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The fog still slept on the wing above the drowned city, where\nthe lamps glimmered like carbuncles; and through the muffle and\nsmother of these fallen clouds, the procession of the town's life\nwas still rolling in through the great arteries with a sound as of a\nmighty wind. But the room was gay with firelight. In the bottle the\nacids were long ago resolved; the imperial dye had softened with\ntime, As the colour grows richer in stained windows; and the glow of\nhot autumn afternoons on hillside vineyards was ready to be set free\n\n40)\n\nand to disperse the fogs of London. Insensibly the lawyer melted.\nThere was no man from whom he kept fewer secrets than Mr. Guest;\nand he was not always sure that he kept as many as he meant. Guest\nhad often been on business to the doctor's; he knew Poole; he could\nscarce have failed to hear of Mr. Hyde's familiarity about the\nhouse; he might draw conclusions: was it not as well, then, that he\nshould see a letter which put that mystery to rights? and above all\nsince Guest, being a great student and critic of handwriting, would\nconsider the step natural and obliging? The clerk, besides, was a\nman of counsel; he would scarce read so strange a document without\ndropping a remark; and by that remark Mr. Utterson might shape his\nfuture course.\n\n\"This is a sad business about Sir Danvers,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes, sir, indeed. It has elicited a great deal of public feeling,\"\nreturned Guest. \"The man, of course, was mad.\"\n\n\"I should like to hear your views on that,\" replied Utterson. \"I\nhave a document here in his handwriting; it is between ourselves,\nfor I scarce know what to do about it; it is an ugly business at\nthe best. But there it is; quite in your way a murderer's\nautograph.\"\n\nGuest's eyes brightened, and he sat down at once and studied it\nwith passion. \"No, sir,\" he said: \"not mad; but it is an odd hand.\"\n\n41)\n\n\"And by all accounts a very odd writer,\" added the lawyer.\n\nJust then the servant entered with a note.\n\n\"Is that from Dr. Jekyll, sir?\" inquired the clerk. \"I thought I\nknew the writing. Anything private, Mr. Utterson?\"\n\n\"Only an invitation to dinner. Why? Do you want to see it?\"\n\n\"One moment. I thank you, sir\"; and the clerk laid the two sheets\nof paper alongside and sedulously compared their contents. \"Thank\nyou, sir,\" he said at last, returning both; \"it's a very\ninteresting autograph.\"\n\nThere was a pause, during which Mr. Utterson struggled with\nhimself. \"Why did you compare them, Guest?\" he inquired suddenly.\n\n\"Well, sir,\" returned the clerk, \"there's a rather singular\nresemblance; the two hands are in many points identical: only\ndifferently sloped.\"\n\n\"Rather quaint,\" said Utterson.\n\n\"It is, as you say, rather quaint,\" returned Guest.\n\n\"I wouldn't speak of this note, you know,\" said the master.\n\n\"No, sir,\" said the clerk. \"I understand.\"\n\nBut no sooner was Mr. Utterson alone that night than he locked the\nnote into his safe, where it reposed from that time forward.\n\"What!\" he thought. \"Henry Jekyll forge for a murderer!\" And his\nblood ran cold in his veins.\n\n\n\n42)\n\n\n\n REMARKABLE INCIDENT OF DR. LANYON\n\nTIME ran on; thousands of pounds were offered in reward, for the\ndeath of Sir Danvers was resented as a public injury; but Mr. Hyde\nhad disappeared out of the ken of the police as though he had never\nexisted. Much of his past was unearthed, indeed, and all\ndisreputable: tales came out of the man's cruelty, at once so\ncallous and violent; of his vile life, of his strange associates,\nof the hatred that seemed to have surrounded his career; but of his\npresent whereabouts, not a whisper. From the time he had left the\nhouse in Soho on the morning of the murder, he was simply blotted\nout; and gradually, as time drew on, Mr. Utterson began to recover\nfrom the hotness of his alarm, and to grow more at quiet with\nhimself.", "start_char_idx": 48966, "end_char_idx": 52796, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12": {"__data__": {"id_": "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "261d2e05139c95a4def6f4e0e283f07a0d023d627f3ceb7f7ad4c25f4bf1e266", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1f31f8edf3d65b76afa3578412773e2bac48f01a180b90aae8f3922154769a86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The death of Sir Danvers was, to his way of thinking, more\nthan paid for by the disappearance of Mr. Hyde. Now that that evil\ninfluence had been withdrawn, a new life began for Dr. Jekyll. He\ncame out of his seclusion, renewed relations with his friends,\nbecame once more their familiar guest\n\n43)\n\nand entertainer; and whilst he had always been known for\ncharities, he was now no less distinguished for religion. He was\nbusy, he was much in the open air, he did good; his face seemed to\nopen and brighten, as if with an inward consciousness of service;\nand for more than two months, the doctor was at peace.\n\nOn the 8th of January Utterson had dined at the doctor's with a\nsmall party; Lanyon had been there; and the face of the host had\nlooked from one to the other as in the old days when the trio were\ninseparable friends. On the 12th, and again on the 14th, the door\nwas shut against the lawyer. \"The doctor was confined to the\nhouse,\" Poole said, \"and saw no one.\" On the 15th, he tried again,\nand was again refused; and having now been used for the last two\nmonths to see his friend almost daily, he found this return of\nsolitude to weigh upon his spirits. The fifth night he had in Guest\nto dine with him; and the sixth he betook himself to Dr. Lanyon's.\n\nThere at least he was not denied admittance; but when he came in,\nhe was shocked at the change which had taken place in the doctor's\nappearance. He had his death-warrant written legibly upon his face.\nThe rosy man had grown pale; his flesh had fallen away; he was\nvisibly balder and older; and yet it was not so much, these tokens\nof a swift physical decay that arrested the lawyer's notice, as a\nlook in the eye and quality of manner that seemed to testify to\n\n44)\n\nsome deep-seated terror of the mind. It was unlikely that the\ndoctor should fear death; and yet that was what Utterson was\ntempted to suspect. \"Yes,\" he thought; \"he is a doctor, he must\nknow his own state and that his days are counted; and the knowledge\nis more than he can bear.\" And yet when Utterson remarked on his\nill-looks, it was with an air of greatness that Lanyon declared\nhimself a doomed man.\n\n\"I have had a shock,\" he said, \"and I shall never recover. It is a\nquestion of weeks. Well, life has been pleasant; I liked it; yes,\nsir, I used to like it. I sometimes think if we knew all, we should\nbe more glad to get away.\"\n\n\"Jekyll is ill, too,\" observed Utterson. \"Have you seen him?\"\n\nBut Lanyon's face changed, and he held up a trembling hand. \"I wish\nto see or hear no more of Dr. Jekyll,\" he said in a loud, unsteady\nvoice. \"I am quite done with that person; and I beg that you will\nspare me any allusion to one whom I regard as dead.\"\n\n\"Tut-tut,\" said Mr. Utterson; and then after a considerable pause,\n\"Can't I do anything?\" he inquired. \"We are three very old friends,\nLanyon; we shall not live to make others.\"\n\n\"Nothing can be done,\" returned Lanyon; \"ask himself.\"\n\n\"He will not see me,\" said the lawyer.\n\n\"I am not surprised at that,\" was the reply. \"Some day, Utterson,\nafter I am dead, you may\n\n45)\n\nperhaps come to learn the right and wrong of this. I cannot tell\nyou. And in the meantime, if you can sit and talk with me of other\nthings, for God's sake, stay and do so; but if you cannot keep clear\nof this accursed topic, then, in God's name, go, for I cannot bear\nit.\"\n\nAs soon as he got home, Utterson sat down and wrote to Jekyll,\ncomplaining of his exclusion from the house, and asking the cause\nof this unhappy break with Lanyon; and the next day brought him a\nlong answer, often very pathetically worded, and sometimes darkly\nmysterious in drift. The quarrel with Lanyon was incurable.", "start_char_idx": 52797, "end_char_idx": 56448, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69": {"__data__": {"id_": "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "95c2f5a12029b8d2d30e3c418e55685cfcd5aa15610e54d7900272545474a25f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "30c36ce10290fc56e19c3d94b4f638095e15115c7e19c98da944989183b595a4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The quarrel with Lanyon was incurable. \"I do\nnot blame our old friend,\" Jekyll wrote, \"but I share his view\nthat we must never meet. I mean from henceforth to lead a life of\nextreme seclusion; you must not be surprised, nor must you doubt\nmy friendship, if my door is often shut even to you. You must\nsuffer me to go my own dark way. I have brought on myself a\npunishment and a danger that I cannot name. If I am the chief of\nsinners, I am the chief of sufferers also. I could not think that\nthis earth contained a place for sufferings and terrors so\nunmanning; and you can do but one thing, Utterson, to lighten\nthis destiny, and that is to respect my silence.\" Utterson was\namazed; the dark influence of Hyde had been withdrawn, the doctor\nhad returned to his old tasks and amities; a week ago, the\nprospect had smiled with every promise of a cheerful and an\nhonoured age;\n\n46)\n\nand now in a moment, friendship, and peace of mind, and the whole\ntenor of his life were wrecked. So great and unprepared a change\npointed to madness; but in view of Lanyon's manner and words,\nthere must lie for it some deeper ground.\n\nA week afterwards Dr. Lanyon took to his bed, and in something\nless than a fortnight he was dead. The night after the funeral,\nat which he had been sadly affected, Utterson locked the door of\nhis business room, and sitting there by the light of a melancholy\ncandle, drew out and set before him an envelope addressed by the\nhand and sealed with the seal of his dead friend. \"PRIVATE: for\nthe hands of G. J. Utterson ALONE and in case of his predecease\nto be destroyed unread,\" so it was emphatically superscribed; and\nthe lawyer dreaded to behold the contents. \"I have buried one\nfriend to-day,\" he thought: \"what if this should cost me\nanother?\" And then he condemned the fear as a disloyalty, and\nbroke the seal. Within there was another enclosure, likewise\nsealed, and marked upon the cover as \"not to be opened till the\ndeath or disappearance of Dr. Henry Jekyll.\" Utterson could not\ntrust his eyes. Yes, it was disappearance; here again, as in the\nmad will which he had long ago restored to its author, here again\nwere the idea of a disappearance and the name of Henry Jekyll\nbracketed. But in the will, that idea had sprung from the\nsinister suggestion of\n\n47)\n\nthe man Hyde; it was set there with a purpose all too plain and\nhorrible. Written by the hand of Lanyon, what should it mean? A\ngreat curiosity came on the trustee, to disregard the prohibition\nand dive at once to the bottom of these mysteries; but\nprofessional honour and faith to his dead friend were stringent\nobligations; and the packet slept in the inmost corner of his\nprivate safe.\n\nIt is one thing to mortify curiosity, another to conquer it; and\nit may be doubted if, from that day forth, Utterson desired the\nsociety of his surviving friend with the same eagerness. He\nthought of him kindly; but his thoughts were disquieted and\nfearful. He went to call indeed; but he was perhaps relieved to\nbe denied admittance; perhaps, in his heart, he preferred to\nspeak with Poole upon the doorstep and surrounded by the air and\nsounds of the open city, rather than to be admitted into that\nhouse of voluntary bondage, and to sit and speak with its\ninscrutable recluse. Poole had, indeed, no very pleasant news to\ncommunicate. The doctor, it appeared, now more than ever confined\nhimself to the cabinet over the laboratory, where he would\nsometimes even sleep; he was out of spirits, he had grown very\nsilent, he did not read; it seemed as if he had something on his\nmind. Utterson became so used to the unvarying character of these\nreports, that he fell off little by little in the frequency of\nhis visits.\n\n48)", "start_char_idx": 56410, "end_char_idx": 60106, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da": {"__data__": {"id_": "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "b147ef2c384f1a3e0b994000b9afec58523a65099066f7002ff5ad8309310779", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b1fe98e4d7b0a52026362c542bccba2872f921001f7a32a55c8819bd7eb3892a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "48)\n\n\n\n INCIDENT AT THE WINDOW\n\nIT chanced on Sunday, when Mr. Utterson was on his usual walk\nwith Mr. Enfield, that their way lay once again through the\nby-street; and that when they came in front of the door, both\nstopped to gaze on it.\n\n\"Well,\" said Enfield, \"that story's at an end at least. We shall\nnever see more of Mr. Hyde.\"\n\n\"I hope not,\" said Utterson. \"Did I ever tell you that I once saw\nhim, and shared your feeling of repulsion?\"\n\n\"It was impossible to do the one without the other,\" returned\nEnfield. \"And by the way, what an ass you must have thought me,\nnot to know that this was a back way to Dr. Jekyll's! It was\npartly your own fault that I found it out, even when I did.\"\n\n\"So you found it out, did you?\" said Utterson. \"But if that be\nso, we may step into the court and take a look at the windows. To\ntell you the truth, I am uneasy about poor Jekyll; and even\noutside, I feel as if the presence of a friend might do him\ngood.\"\n\n49)\n\nThe court was very cool and a little damp, and full of premature\ntwilight, although the sky, high up overhead, was still bright\nwith sunset. The middle one of the three windows was half-way\nopen; and sitting close beside it, taking the air with an\ninfinite sadness of mien, like some disconsolate prisoner,\nUtterson saw Dr. Jekyll.\n\n\"What! Jekyll!\" he cried. \"I trust you are better.\"\n\n\"I am very low, Utterson,\" replied the doctor, drearily, \"very\nlow. It will not last long, thank God.\"\n\n\"You stay too much indoors,\" said the lawyer. \"You should be out,\nwhipping up the circulation like Mr. Enfield and me. (This is my\ncousin--Mr. Enfield--Dr. Jekyll.) Come, now; get your hat and\ntake a quick turn with us.\"\n\n\"You are very good,\" sighed the other. \"I should like to very\nmuch; but no, no, no, it is quite impossible; I dare not. But\nindeed, Utterson, I am very glad to see you; this is really a\ngreat pleasure; I would ask you and Mr. Enfield up, but the place\nis really not fit.\"\n\n\"Why then,\" said the lawyer, good-naturedly, \"the best thing we\ncan do is to stay down here and speak with you from where we\nare.\"\n\n\"That is just what I was about to venture to propose,\" returned\nthe doctor with a smile. But the words were hardly uttered,\nbefore the smile was struck out of his face and succeeded\n\n50)\n\nby an expression of such abject terror and despair, as froze the\nvery blood of the two gentlemen below. They saw it but for a\nglimpse, for the window was instantly thrust down; but that\nglimpse had been sufficient, and they turned and left the court\nwithout a word. In silence, too, they traversed the by-street;\nand it was not until they had come into a neighbouring\nthoroughfare, where even upon a Sunday there were still some\nstirrings of life, that Mr. Utterson at last turned and looked at\nhis companion. They were both pale; and there was an answering\nhorror in their eyes.\n\n\"God forgive us, God forgive us,\" said Mr. Utterson.\n\nBut Mr. Enfield only nodded his head very seriously and walked on\nonce more in silence.\n\n51)\n\n\n\n THE LAST NIGHT\n\nMR. UTTERSON was sitting by his fireside one evening after\ndinner, when he was surprised to receive a visit from Poole.\n\n\"Bless me, Poole, what brings you here?\" he cried; and then\ntaking a second look at him, \"What ails you?\" he added; \"is the\ndoctor ill?\"\n\n\"Mr. Utterson,\" said the man, \"there is something wrong.\"", "start_char_idx": 60103, "end_char_idx": 63478, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508": {"__data__": {"id_": "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "549db0a999aecb3d07cc86673b129251d8f43a64832fff391c7e70b5c5b6c52d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "454ff57ecc99817883cf5680142f8fb48fcf4eba611b7efb0d3fc18d2418b331", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Take a seat, and here is a glass of wine for you,\" said the\nlawyer. \"Now, take your time, and tell me plainly what you want.\"\n\n\"You know the doctor's ways, sir,\" replied Poole, \"and how he\nshuts himself up. Well, he's shut up again in the cabinet; and I\ndon't like it, sir--I wish I may die if I like it. Mr. Utterson,\nsir, I'm afraid.\"\n\n\"Now, my good man,\" said the lawyer, \"be explicit. What are you\nafraid of?\"\n\n\"I've been afraid for about a week,\" returned Poole, doggedly\ndisregarding the question, \"and I can bear it no more.\"\n\nThe man's appearance amply bore out his\n\n52)\n\nwords; his manner was altered for the worse; and except for the\nmoment when he had first announced his terror, he had not once\nlooked the lawyer in the face. Even now, he sat with the glass of\nwine untasted on his knee, and his eyes directed to a corner of\nthe floor. \"I can bear it no more,\" he repeated.\n\n\"Come,\" said the lawyer, \"I see you have some good reason, Poole;\nI see there is something seriously amiss. Try to tell me what it\nis.\"\n\n\"I think there's been foul play,\" said Poole, hoarsely.\n\n\n\"Foul play!\" cried the lawyer, a good deal frightened and rather\ninclined to be irritated in consequence. \"What foul play? What\ndoes the man mean?\"\n\n\"I daren't say, sir,\" was the answer; \"but will you come along\nwith me and see for yourself?\"\n\nMr. Utterson's only answer was to rise and get his hat and\ngreat-coat; but he observed with wonder the greatness of the\nrelief that appeared upon the butler's face, and perhaps with no\nless, that the wine was still untasted when he set it down to\nfollow.\n\nIt was a wild, cold, seasonable night of March, with a pale moon,\nlying on her back as though the wind had tilted her, and a flying\nwrack of the most diaphanous and lawny texture. The wind made\ntalking difficult, and flecked the blood into the face. It seemed\nto have swept the\n\n53)\n\nstreets unusually bare of passengers, besides; for Mr. Utterson\nthought he had never seen that part of London so deserted. He\ncould have wished it otherwise; never in his life had he been\nconscious of so sharp a wish to see and touch his\nfellow-creatures; for struggle as he might, there was borne in\nupon his mind a crushing anticipation of calamity. The square,\nwhen they got there, was all full of wind and dust, and the thin\ntrees in the garden were lashing themselves along the railing.\nPoole, who had kept all the way a pace or two ahead, now pulled\nup in the middle of the pavement, and in spite of the biting\nweather, took off his hat and mopped his brow with a red\npocket-handkerchief. But for all the hurry of his coming, these\nwere not the dews of exertion that he wiped away, but the\nmoisture of some strangling anguish; for his face was white and\nhis voice, when he spoke, harsh and broken.\n\n\"Well, sir,\" he said, \"here we are, and God grant there be\nnothing wrong.\"\n\n\"Amen, Poole,\" said the lawyer.\n\nThereupon the servant knocked in a very guarded manner; the door\nwas opened on the chain; and a voice asked from within, \"Is that\nyou, Poole?\"\n\n\"It's all right,\" said Poole. \"Open the door.\" The hall, when\nthey entered it, was brightly lighted up; the fire was built\nhigh; and about the hearth the whole of the servants, men and\n\n54)\n\nwomen, stood huddled together like a flock of sheep. At the sight\nof Mr. Utterson, the housemaid broke into hysterical whimpering;\nand the cook, crying out, \"Bless God! it's Mr. Utterson,\" ran\nforward as if to take him in her arms.\n\n\"What, what? Are you all here?\" said the lawyer peevishly. \"Very\nirregular, very unseemly; your master would be far from pleased.\"\n\n\"They're all afraid,\" said Poole.", "start_char_idx": 63481, "end_char_idx": 67095, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de": {"__data__": {"id_": "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "ad55bac66a9d8546b1c31a0ce85a7717b51d8eaf35b91665fe7bfadc47e8e54f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "61b4e8405d14ac3ab5d021025626461a65d0049c0e524868db09502b5eb58deb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"They're all afraid,\" said Poole.\n\nBlank silence followed, no one protesting; only the maid lifted\nup her voice and now wept loudly.\n\n\"Hold your tongue!\" Poole said to her, with a ferocity of accent\nthat testified to his own jangled nerves; and indeed, when the\ngirl had so suddenly raised the note of her lamentation, they had\nall started and turned toward the inner door with faces of\ndreadful expectation. \"And now,\" continued the butler, addressing\nthe knife-boy, \"reach me a candle, and we'll get this through\nhands at once.\" And then he begged Mr. Utterson to follow him,\nand led the way to the back-garden.\n\n\"Now, sir,\" said he, \"you come as gently as you can. I want you\nto hear, and I don't want you to be heard. And see here, sir, if\nby any chance he was to ask you in, don't go.\"\n\nMr. Utterson's nerves, at this unlooked-for termination, gave a\njerk that nearly threw him from his balance; but he re-collected\nhis courage\n\n55)\n\nand followed the butler into the laboratory building and through\nthe surgical theatre, with its lumber of crates and bottles, to\nthe foot of the stair. Here Poole motioned him to stand on one\nside and listen; while he himself, setting down the candle and\nmaking a great and obvious call on his resolution, mounted the\nsteps and knocked with a somewhat uncertain hand on the red baize\nof the cabinet door.\n\n\"Mr. Utterson, sir, asking to see you,\" he called; and even as he\ndid so, once more violently signed to the lawyer to give ear.\n\nA voice answered from within: \"Tell him I cannot see any one,\" it\nsaid complainingly.\n\n\"Thank you, sir,\" said Poole, with a note of something like\ntriumph in his voice; and taking up his candle, he led Mr.\nUtterson back across the yard and into the great kitchen, where\nthe fire was out and the beetles were leaping on the floor.\n\n\"Sir,\" he said, looking Mr. Utterson in the eyes, \"was that my\nmaster's voice?\"\n\n\"It seems much changed,\" replied the lawyer, very pale, but\ngiving look for look.\n\n\"Changed? Well, yes, I think so,\" said the butler. \"Have I been\ntwenty years in this man's house, to be deceived about his voice?\nNo, sir; master's made away with; he was made, away with eight\ndays ago, when we heard him cry out upon the name of God; and\nwho's in there instead of him, and why it stays there, is a thing\nthat cries to Heaven, Mr. Utterson!\"\n\n56)\n\n\"This is a very strange tale, Poole; this is rather a wild tale,\nmy man,\" said Mr. Utterson, biting his finger. \"Suppose it were\nas you suppose, supposing Dr. Jekyll to have been--well,\nmurdered, what could induce the murderer to stay? That won't hold\nwater; it doesn't commend itself to reason.\"\n\n\"Well, Mr. Utterson, you are a hard man to satisfy, but I'll do\nit yet,\" said Poole. \"All this last week (you must know) him, or\nit, or whatever it is that lives in that cabinet, has been crying\nnight and day for some sort of medicine and cannot get it to his\nmind. It was sometimes his way--the master's, that is--to\nwrite his orders on a sheet of paper and throw it on the stair.\nWe've had nothing else this week back; nothing but papers, and a\nclosed door, and the very meals left there to be smuggled in when\nnobody was looking. Well, sir, every day, ay, and twice and\nthrice in the same day, there have been orders and complaints,\nand I have been sent flying to all the wholesale chemists in\ntown. Every time I brought the stuff back, there would be another\npaper telling me to return it, because it was not pure, and\nanother order to a different firm. This drug is wanted bitter\nbad, sir, whatever for.\"\n\n\"Have you any of these papers?\" asked Mr. Utterson.\n\nPoole felt in his pocket and handed out a crumpled note, which\nthe lawyer, bending nearer\n\n57)\n\nto the candle, carefully examined.", "start_char_idx": 67062, "end_char_idx": 70787, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5": {"__data__": {"id_": "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "64eab51d1c9853a9dc36e37ce1358c6ea047f8baa3195a8f9746399bb097d4c3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9524c25532b164d745cc8cff2e2aa81558f2867efdf2bf1dedab8716c5ff4da7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Its contents ran thus: \"Dr.\nJekyll presents his compliments to Messrs. Maw. He assures them\nthat their last sample is impure and quite useless for his\npresent purpose. In the year 18---, Dr. J. purchased a somewhat\nlarge quantity from Messrs. M. He now begs them to search with\nthe most sedulous care, and should any of the same quality be\nleft, to forward it to him at once. Expense is no consideration.\nThe importance of this to Dr. J. can hardly be exaggerated.\" So\nfar the letter had run composedly enough, but here with a sudden\nsplutter of the pen, the writer's emotion had broken loose. \"For\nGod's sake,\" he had added, \"find me some of the old.\"\n\n\"This is a strange note,\" said Mr. Utterson; and then sharply,\n\"How do you come to have it open?\"\n\n\"The man at Maw's was main angry, sir, and he threw it back to me\nlike so much dirt,\" returned Poole.\n\n\"This is unquestionably the doctor's hand, do you know?\" resumed\nthe lawyer.\n\n\"I thought it looked like it,\" said the servant rather sulkily;\nand then, with another voice, \"But what matters hand-of-write?\"\nhe said. \"I've seen him!\"\n\n\"Seen him?\" repeated Mr. Utterson. \"Well?\"\n\n\"That's it!\" said Poole. \"It was this way. I came suddenly into\nthe theatre from the\n\n58)\n\ngarden. It seems he had slipped out to look for this drug or\nwhatever it is; for the cabinet door was open, and there he was\nat the far end of the room digging among the crates. He looked up\nwhen I came in, gave a kind of cry, and whipped up-stairs into\nthe cabinet. It was but for one minute that I saw him, but the\nhair stood upon my head like quills. Sir, if that was my master,\nwhy had he a mask upon his face? If it was my master, why did he\ncry out like a rat, and run from me? I have served him long\nenough. And then...\" The man paused and passed his hand over his\nface.\n\n\"These are all very strange circumstances,\" said Mr. Utterson,\n\"but I think I begin to see daylight. Your master, Poole, is\nplainly seized with one of those maladies that both torture and\ndeform the sufferer; hence, for aught I know, the alteration of\nhis voice; hence the mask and the avoidance of his friends; hence\nhis eagerness to find this drug, by means of which the poor soul\nretains some hope of ultimate recovery--God grant that he be\nnot deceived! There is my explanation; it is sad enough, Poole,\nay, and appalling to consider; but it is plain and natural, hangs\nwell together, and delivers us from all exorbitant alarms.\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said the butler, turning to a sort of mottled pallor,\n\"that thing was not my master, and there's the truth. My master\"\nhere he looked round him and began to whisper--\"is\n\n59)\n\na tall, fine build of a man, and this was more of a dwarf.\"\nUtterson attempted to protest. \"O, sir,\" cried Poole, \"do you\nthink I do not know my master after twenty years? Do you think I\ndo not know where his head comes to in the cabinet door, where I\nsaw him every morning of my life? No, Sir, that thing in the mask\nwas never Dr. Jekyll--God knows what it was, but it was never\nDr. Jekyll; and it is the belief of my heart that there was\nmurder done.\"\n\n\"Poole,\" replied the lawyer, \"if you say that, it will become my\nduty to make certain. Much as I desire to spare your master's\nfeelings, much as I am puzzled by this note which seems to prove\nhim to be still alive, I shall consider it my duty to break in\nthat door.\"\n\n\"Ah Mr. Utterson, that's talking!\" cried the butler.\n\n\"And now comes the second question,\" resumed Utterson: \"Who is\ngoing to do it?\"\n\n\"Why, you and me,\" was the undaunted reply.", "start_char_idx": 70788, "end_char_idx": 74310, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372": {"__data__": {"id_": "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "42956f23cf0169bac902fa156becc17861d53abe57889d609b58fb3b8b9fc4d0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5647467f7d7217be9b621142837ba14c868cb5170dd88b79e84f8293535ff014", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Why, you and me,\" was the undaunted reply.\n\n\"That's very well said,\" returned the lawyer; \"and whatever comes\nof it, I shall make it my business to see you are no loser.\"\n\n\"There is an axe in the theatre,\" continued Poole; \"and you might\ntake the kitchen poker for yourself.\"\n\nThe lawyer took that rude but weighty instrument into his hand,\nand balanced it. \"Do you know, Poole,\" he said, looking up, \"that\n\n60)\n\nyou and I are about to place ourselves in a position of some\nperil?\"\n\n\"You may say so, sir, indeed,\" returned the butler.\n\n\"It is well, then, that we should be frank,\" said the other. \"We\nboth think more than we have said; let us make a clean breast.\nThis masked figure that you saw, did you recognise it?\"\n\n\"Well, sir, it went so quick, and the creature was so doubled up,\nthat I could hardly swear to that,\" was the answer. \"But if you\nmean, was it Mr. Hyde?--why, yes, I think it was! You see, it\nwas much of the same bigness; and it had the same quick, light\nway with it; and then who else could have got in by the\nlaboratory door? You have not forgot, sir that at the time of the\nmurder he had still the key with him? But that's not all. I don't\nknow, Mr. Utterson, if ever you met this Mr. Hyde?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the lawyer, \"I once spoke with him.\"\n\n\"Then you must know as well as the rest of us that there was\nsomething queer about that gentleman--something that gave a man\na turn--I don't know rightly how to say it, sir, beyond this:\nthat you felt it in your marrow kind of cold and thin.\"\n\n\"I own I felt something of what you describe,\" said Mr. Utterson.\n\n\"Quite so, sir,\" returned Poole. \"Well, when\n\n61)\n\nthat masked thing like a monkey jumped from among the chemicals\nand whipped into the cabinet, it went down my spine like ice. Oh,\nI know it's not evidence, Mr. Utterson. I'm book-learned enough\nfor that; but a man has his feelings, and I give you my\nBible-word it was Mr. Hyde!\"\n\n\"Ay, ay,\" said the lawyer. \"My fears incline to the same point.\nEvil, I fear, founded--evil was sure to come--of that\nconnection. Ay, truly, I believe you; I believe poor Harry is\nkilled; and I believe his murderer (for what purpose, God alone\ncan tell) is still lurking in his victim's room. Well, let our\nname be vengeance. Call Bradshaw.\"\n\nThe footman came at the summons, very white and nervous.", "start_char_idx": 74267, "end_char_idx": 76576, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af": {"__data__": {"id_": "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "f5d613adfa95423d232e07181ef7c15219eb9a7ab72b83e3fca0223dfa77831f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2f5273d55a6323ecaf4ea35178f57a1a1eea8a63bb6bf4cc7952d08da195bc4b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Call Bradshaw.\"\n\nThe footman came at the summons, very white and nervous.\n\n\n\"Pull yourself together, Bradshaw,\" said the lawyer. \"This\nsuspense, I know, is telling upon all of you; but it is now our\nintention to make an end of it. Poole, here, and I are going to\nforce our way into the cabinet. If all is well, my shoulders are\nbroad enough to bear the blame. Meanwhile, lest anything should\nreally be amiss, or any malefactor seek to escape by the back,\nyou and the boy must go round the corner with a pair of good\nsticks and take your post at the laboratory door. We give you ten\nminutes to get to your stations.\"\n\nAs Bradshaw left, the lawyer looked at his watch. \"And now,\nPoole, let us get to ours,\"\n\n62)\n\nhe said; and taking the poker under his arm, led the way into the\nyard. The scud had banked over the moon, and it was now quite\ndark. The wind, which only broke in puffs and draughts into that\ndeep well of building, tossed the light of the candle to and fro\nabout their steps, until they came into the shelter of the\ntheatre, where they sat down silently to wait. London hummed\nsolemnly all around; but nearer at hand, the stillness was only\nbroken by the sounds of a footfall moving to and fro along the\ncabinet floor.\n\n\"So it will walk all day, sir,\" whispered Poole; \"ay, and the\nbetter part of the night. Only when a new sample comes from the\nchemist, there's a bit of a break. Ah, it's an ill conscience\nthat's such an enemy to rest! Ah, sir, there's blood foully shed\nin every step of it! But hark again, a little closer--put your\nheart in your ears, Mr. Utterson, and tell me, is that the\ndoctor's foot?\"\n\nThe steps fell lightly and oddly, with a certain swing, for all\nthey went so slowly; it was different indeed from the heavy\ncreaking tread of Henry Jekyll. Utterson sighed. \"Is there never\nanything else?\" he asked.\n\nPoole nodded. \"Once,\" he said. \"Once I heard it weeping!\"\n\n\"Weeping? how that?\" said the lawyer, conscious of a sudden chill\nof horror.\n\n\"Weeping like a woman or a lost soul,\" said\n\n63)\n\nthe butler. \"I came away with that upon my heart, that I could\nhave wept too.\"\n\nBut now the ten minutes drew to an end. Poole disinterred the axe\nfrom under a stack of packing straw; the candle was set upon the\nnearest table to light them to the attack; and they drew near\nwith bated breath to where that patient foot was still going up\nand down, up and down, in the quiet of the night.\n\n\"Jekyll,\" cried Utterson, with a loud voice, \"I demand to see\nyou.\" He paused a moment, but there came no reply. \"I give you\nfair warning, our suspicions are aroused, and I must and shall\nsee you,\" he resumed; \"if not by fair means, then by foul! if not\nof your consent, then by brute force!\"\n\n\"Utterson,\" said the voice, \"for God's sake, have mercy!\"\n\n\n\"Ah, that's not Jekyll's voice--it's Hyde's!\" cried Utterson.\n\"Down with the door, Poole!\"\n\nPoole swung the axe over his shoulder; the blow shook the\nbuilding, and the red baize door leaped against the lock and\nhinges. A dismal screech, as of mere animal terror, rang from the\ncabinet. Up went the axe again, and again the panels crashed and\nthe frame bounded; four times the blow fell; but the wood was\ntough and the fittings were of excellent workmanship; and it was\nnot until the fifth, that the lock burst in sunder and the wreck\nof the door fell inwards on the carpet.\n\n64)\n\n\nThe besiegers, appalled by their own riot and the stillness that\nhad succeeded, stood back a little and peered in.", "start_char_idx": 76503, "end_char_idx": 79967, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3": {"__data__": {"id_": "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "8d67ec0cf978b410eeeb66400058e80e7cdcd872d8bfeb5fb65c88f90fbaac72", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6cfb0bc1f3f2a685b6c718db0e3eaabc82792098bd92bcd41d09e12429d77d68", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There lay the\ncabinet before their eyes in the quiet lamplight, a good fire\nglowing and chattering on the hearth, the kettle singing its thin\nstrain, a drawer or two open, papers neatly set forth on the\nbusiness-table, and nearer the fire, the things laid out for tea:\nthe quietest room, you would have said, and, but for the glazed\npresses full of chemicals, the most commonplace that night in\nLondon.\n\nRight in the midst there lay the body of a man sorely contorted\nand still twitching. They drew near on tiptoe, turned it on its\nback and beheld the face of Edward Hyde. He was dressed in\nclothes far too large for him, clothes of the doctor's bigness;\nthe cords of his face still moved with a semblance of life, but\nlife was quite gone; and by the crushed phial in the hand and the\nstrong smell of kernels that hung upon the air, Utterson knew\nthat he was looking on the body of a self-destroyer.\n\n\"We have come too late,\" he said sternly, \"whether to save or\npunish. Hyde is gone to his account; and it only remains for us\nto find the body of your master.\"\n\nThe far greater proportion of the building was occupied by the\ntheatre, which filled almost the whole ground story and was\nlighted from above, and by the cabinet, which formed an upper\nstory at one end and looked upon the\n\n65)\n\ncourt. A corridor joined the theatre to the door on the\nby-street; and with this the cabinet communicated separately by a\nsecond flight of stairs. There were besides a few dark closets\nand a spacious cellar. All these they now thoroughly examined.\nEach closet needed but a glance, for all were empty, and all, by\nthe dust that fell from their doors, had stood long unopened. The\ncellar, indeed, was filled with crazy lumber, mostly dating from\nthe times of the surgeon who was Jekyll's predecessor; but even\nas they opened the door they were advertised of the uselessness\nof further search, by the fall of a perfect mat of cobweb which\nhad for years sealed up the entrance. Nowhere was there any trace\nof Henry Jekyll, dead or alive.\n\nPoole stamped on the flags of the corridor. \"He must be buried\nhere,\" he said, hearkening to the sound.\n\n\"Or he may have fled,\" said Utterson, and he turned to examine\nthe door in the by-street. It was locked; and lying near by on\nthe flags, they found the key, already stained with rust.\n\n\"This does not look like use,\" observed the lawyer.\n\n\"Use!\" echoed Poole. \"Do you not see, sir, it is broken? much as\nif a man had stamped on it.\"\n\n\"Ay,\" continued Utterson, \"and the fractures, too, are rusty.\"\nThe two men looked at each other with a scare. \"This is beyond\nme,\n\n66)\n\nPoole,\" said the lawyer. \"Let us go back to the cabinet.\"\n\nThey mounted the stair in silence, and still with an occasional\nawe-struck glance at the dead body, proceeded more thoroughly to\nexamine the contents of the cabinet. At one table, there were\ntraces of chemical work, various measured heaps of some white\nsalt being laid on glass saucers, as though for an experiment in\nwhich the unhappy man had been prevented.\n\n\"That is the same drug that I was always bringing him,\" said\nPoole; and even as he spoke, the kettle with a startling noise\nboiled over.\n\nThis brought them to the fireside, where the easy-chair was drawn\ncosily up, and the tea-things stood ready to the sitter's elbow,\nthe very sugar in the cup. There were several books on a shelf;\none lay beside the tea-things open, and Utterson was amazed to\nfind it a copy of a pious work, for which Jekyll had several\ntimes expressed a great esteem, annotated, in his own hand, with\nstartling blasphemies.\n\nNext, in the course of their review of the chamber, the searchers\ncame to the cheval glass, into whose depths they looked with an\ninvoluntary horror. But it was so turned as to show them nothing\nbut the rosy glow playing on the roof, the fire sparkling in a\nhundred repetitions along the glazed front of the presses, and\ntheir own pale and fearful countenances stooping to look in.", "start_char_idx": 79968, "end_char_idx": 83914, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6": {"__data__": {"id_": "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "3ff093354af4695079aac722852b7a6c031d7055e1cc4363807558b9636d7a16", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ca2fed950fe04e9cbcf7edc3a027952f015929a10055d67ba5302ed55e5bb891", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "67)\n\n\"This glass have seen some strange things, sir,\" whispered Poole.\n\n\"And surely none stranger than itself,\" echoed the lawyer in the\nsame tones. \"For what did Jekyll\"--he caught himself up at the\nword with a start, and then conquering the weakness--\"what\ncould Jekyll want with it?\" he said.\n\n\"You may say that!\" said Poole. Next they turned to the\nbusiness-table. On the desk among the neat array of papers, a\nlarge envelope was uppermost, and bore, in the doctor's hand, the\nname of Mr. Utterson. The lawyer unsealed it, and several\nenclosures fell to the floor. The first was a will, drawn in the\nsame eccentric terms as the one which he had returned six months\nbefore, to serve as a testament in case of death and as a deed of\ngift in case of disappearance; but, in place of the name of\nEdward Hyde, the lawyer, with indescribable amazement, read the\nname of Gabriel John Utterson. He looked at Poole, and then back\nat the paper, and last of all at the dead malefactor stretched\nupon the carpet.\n\n\"My head goes round,\" he said. \"He has been all these days in\npossession; he had no cause to like me; he must have raged to see\nhimself displaced; and he has not destroyed this document.\"\n\nHe caught up the next paper; it was a brief note in the doctor's\nhand and dated at the top.\n\n68)\n\n\"O Poole!\" the lawyer cried, \"he was alive and here this day. He\ncannot have been disposed of in so short a space, he must be\nstill alive, he must have fled! And then, why fled? and how? and\nin that case, can we venture to declare this suicide? Oh, we must\nbe careful. I foresee that we may yet involve your master in some\ndire catastrophe.\"\n\n\"Why don't you read it, sir?\" asked Poole.\n\n\"Because I fear,\" replied the lawyer solemnly. \"God grant I have\nno cause for it!\" And with that he brought the paper to his eyes\nand read as follows:\n\n\n\"MY DEAR UTTERSON,--When this shall fall into your hands, I\nshall have disappeared, under what circumstances I have not the\npenetration to foresee, but my instinct and all the circumstances\nof my nameless situation tell me that the end is sure and must be\nearly. Go then, and first read the narrative which Lanyon warned\nme he was to place in your hands; and if you care to hear more,\nturn to the confession of\n\n \"Your unworthy and unhappy friend,\n \"HENRY JEKYLL.\"\n\n\n\"There was a third enclosure?\" asked Utterson.\n\n\"Here, sir,\" said Poole, and gave into his hands a considerable\npacket sealed in several places.\n\n69)\n\nThe lawyer put it in his pocket. \"I would say nothing of this\npaper. If your master has fled or is dead, we may at least save\nhis credit. It is now ten; I must go home and read these\ndocuments in quiet; but I shall be back before midnight, when we\nshall send for the police.\"\n\nThey went out, locking the door of the theatre behind them; and\nUtterson, once more leaving the servants gathered about the fire\nin the hall, trudged back to his office to read the two\nnarratives in which this mystery was now to be explained.\n\n70)\n\n\n\n DR. LANYON'S NARRATIVE\n\nON the ninth of January, now four days ago, I received by the\nevening delivery a registered envelope, addressed in the hand of\nmy colleague and old school-companion, Henry Jekyll. I was a good\ndeal surprised by this; for we were by no means in the habit of\ncorrespondence; I had seen the man, dined with him, indeed, the\nnight before; and I could imagine nothing in our intercourse that\nshould justify formality of registration. The contents increased\nmy wonder; for this is how the letter ran:\n\n \"10th December, 18---\n\n\"DEAR LANYON, You are one of my oldest friends; and although we\nmay have differed at times on scientific questions, I cannot\nremember, at least on my side, any break in our affection.", "start_char_idx": 83916, "end_char_idx": 87735, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca": {"__data__": {"id_": "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "4997321dc6055e03794a918720abe6b83bf1d02dbfb72ff3f2ffe3648b62c70b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d43d11582c0077c9595708598cbdd717c7bd2f1ee9033bae2e6272ff0a858045", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There\nwas never a day when, if you had said to me, 'Jekyll, my life, my\nhonour, my reason, depend upon you,' I would not have sacrificed\nmy left hand to help you. Lanyon, my life, my honour my reason,\nare all at your mercy;\n\n71)\n\nif you fail me to-night I am lost. You might suppose, after this\npreface, that I am going to ask you for something dishonourable\nto grant. Judge for yourself.\n\n\"I want you to postpone all other engagements for to-night--ay,\neven if you were summoned to the bedside of an emperor; to take a\ncab, unless your carriage should be actually at the door; and\nwith this letter in your hand for consultation, to drive straight\nto my house. Poole, my butler, has his orders; you will find, him\nwaiting your arrival with a locksmith. The door of my cabinet is\nthen to be forced: and you are to go in alone; to open the glazed\npress (letter E) on the left hand, breaking the lock if it be\nshut; and to draw out, with all its contents as they stand, the\nfourth drawer from the top or (which is the same thing) the third\nfrom the bottom. In my extreme distress of wind, I have a morbid\nfear of misdirecting you; but even if I am in error, you may know\nthe right drawer by its contents: some powders, a phial and a\npaper book. This drawer I beg of you to carry back with you to\nCavendish Square exactly as it stands.\n\n\"That is the first part of the service: now for the second. You\nshould be back, if you set out at once on the receipt of this,\nlong before midnight; but I will leave you that amount of margin,\nnot only in the fear of one of those obstacles that can neither\nbe prevented nor fore-\n\n72)\n\nseen, but because an hour when your servants are in bed is to be\npreferred for what will then remain to do. At midnight, then, I\nhave to ask you to be alone in your consulting-room, to admit\nwith your own hand into the house a man who will present himself\nin my name, and to place in his hands the drawer that you will\nhave brought with you from my cabinet. Then you will have played\nyour part and earned my gratitude completely. Five minutes\nafterwards, if you insist upon an explanation, you will have\nunderstood that these arrangements are of capital importance; and\nthat by the neglect of one of them, fantastic as they must\nappear, you might have charged your conscience with my death or\nthe shipwreck of my reason.\n\n\"Confident as I am that you will not trifle with this appeal, my\nheart sinks and my hand trembles at the bare thought of such a\npossibility. Think of me at this hour, in a strange place,\nlabouring under a blackness of distress that no fancy can\nexaggerate, and yet well aware that, if you will but punctually\nserve me, my troubles will roll away like a story that is told.\nServe me, my dear Lanyon, and save\n \"Your friend,\n\n \"H. J.\n\n\"P. S. I had already sealed this up when a fresh terror struck\nupon my soul. It is possible that the postoffice may fail me, and\nthis letter\n\n73)\n\nnot come into your hands until to-morrow morning. In that case,\ndear Lanyon, do my errand when it shall be most convenient for\nyou in the course of the day; and once more expect my messenger\nat midnight. It may then already be too late; and if that night\npasses without event, you will know that you have seen the last\nof Henry Jekyll.\"\n\n\nUpon the reading of this letter, I made sure my colleague was\ninsane; but till that was proved beyond the possibility of doubt,\nI felt bound to do as he requested. The less I understood of this\nfarrago, the less I was in a position to judge of its importance;\nand an appeal so worded could not be set aside without a grave\nresponsibility. I rose accordingly from table, got into a hansom,\nand drove straight to Jekyll's house. The butler was awaiting my\narrival; he had received by the same post as mine a registered\nletter of instruction, and had sent at once for a locksmith and a\ncarpenter.", "start_char_idx": 87736, "end_char_idx": 91670, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d": {"__data__": {"id_": "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "39296c6e7a2a6560cf13ce04bc68b09f14d09c43d7fefa2dd9345117507cd800", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6c2c68ef074ca1a2549bbde6298e7358ed82857cd70953c07fbcadf07bebbf22", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The tradesmen came while we were yet speaking; and we\nmoved in a body to old Dr. Denman's surgical theatre, from which\n(as you are doubtless aware) Jekyll's private cabinet is most\nconveniently entered. The door was very strong, the lock\nexcellent; the carpenter avowed he would have great trouble and\nhave to do much damage, if force were to be used; and the\nlocksmith was near despair. But this last was a handy fellow,\n\n74)\n\nand after two hours' work, the door stood open. The press marked\nE was unlocked; and I took out the drawer, had it filled up with\nstraw and tied in a sheet, and returned with it to Cavendish\nSquare.\n\nHere I proceeded to examine its contents. The powders were neatly\nenough made up, but not with the nicety of the dispensing\nchemist; so that it was plain they were of Jekyll's private\nmanufacture; and when I opened one of the wrappers I found what\nseemed to me a simple crystalline salt of a white colour. The\nphial, to which I next turned my attention, might have been about\nhalf-full of a blood-red liquor, which was highly pungent to the\nsense of smell and seemed to me to contain phosphorus and some\nvolatile ether. At the other ingredients I could make no guess.\nThe book was an ordinary version-book and contained little but a\nseries of dates. These covered a period of many years, but I\nobserved that the entries ceased nearly a year ago and quite\nabruptly. Here and there a brief remark was appended to a date,\nusually no more than a single word: \"double\" occurring perhaps\nsix times in a total of several hundred entries; and once very\nearly in the list and followed by several marks of exclamation,\n\"total failure!!!\" All this, though it whetted my curiosity, told\nme little that was definite. Here were a phial of some tincture,\na paper of some salt, and the record of a series of experi-\n\n75)\n\nments that had led (like too many of Jekyll's investigations) to\nno end of practical usefulness. How could the presence of these\narticles in my house affect either the honour, the sanity, or the\nlife of my flighty colleague? If his messenger could go to one\nplace, why could he not go to another? And even granting some\nimpediment, why was this gentleman to be received by me in\nsecret? The more I reflected the more convinced I grew that I was\ndealing with a case of cerebral disease: and though I dismissed\nmy servants to bed, I loaded an old revolver, that I might be\nfound in some posture of self-defence.\n\nTwelve o'clock had scarce rung out over London, ere the knocker\nsounded very gently on the door. I went myself at the summons,\nand found a small man crouching against the pillars of the\nportico.\n\n\"Are you come from Dr. Jekyll?\" I asked.\n\nHe told me \"yes\" by a constrained gesture; and when I had bidden\nhim enter, he did not obey me without a searching backward glance\ninto the darkness of the square. There was a policeman not far\noff, advancing with his bull's eye open; and at the sight, I\nthought my visitor started and made greater haste.\n\nThese particulars struck me, I confess, disagreeably; and as I\nfollowed him into the bright light of the consulting-room, I kept\nmy hand ready on my weapon. Here, at last, I had a\n\n76)\n\nchance of clearly seeing him. I had never set eyes on him before,\nso much was certain. He was small, as I have said; I was struck\nbesides with the shocking expression of his face, with his\nremarkable combination of great muscular activity and great\napparent debility of constitution, and--last but not least--\nwith the odd, subjective disturbance caused by his neighbourhood.\nThis bore some resemblance to incipient rigour, and was\naccompanied by a marked sinking of the pulse. At the time, I set\nit down to some idiosyncratic, personal distaste, and merely\nwondered at the acuteness of the symptoms; but I have since had\nreason to believe the cause to lie much deeper in the nature of\nman, and to turn on some nobler hinge than the principle of\nhatred.", "start_char_idx": 91671, "end_char_idx": 95600, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc": {"__data__": {"id_": "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "3016dc569f148a9ed8d94b1b1fe184d8550102ef67780ad150ecbbea9bad0ca3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b5ee3c38f2cae9b48b793d5477d3691d9cefbd99d62b8b917579a4495008ad05", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "This person (who had thus, from the first moment of his entrance,\nstruck in me what I can only describe as a disgustful curiosity)\nwas dressed in a fashion that would have made an ordinary person\nlaughable; his clothes, that is to say, although they were of\nrich and sober fabric, were enormously too large for him in every\nmeasurement--the trousers hanging on his legs and rolled up to\nkeep them from the ground, the waist of the coat below his\nhaunches, and the collar sprawling wide upon his shoulders.\nStrange to relate, this ludicrous accoutrement was far from\nmoving me to laughter. Rather, as there was something abnormal\nand misbe-\n\n77)\n\ngotten in the very essence of the creature that now faced me--\nsomething seizing, surprising, and revolting--this fresh\ndisparity seemed but to fit in with and to reinforce it; so that\nto my interest in the man's nature and character, there was added\na curiosity as to his origin, his life, his fortune and status in\nthe world.\n\nThese observations, though they have taken so great a space to be\nset down in, were yet the work of a few seconds. My visitor was,\nindeed, on fire with sombre excitement.\n\n\"Have you got it?\" he cried. \"Have you got it?\" And so lively was\nhis impatience that he even laid his hand upon my arm and sought\nto shake me.\n\nI put him back, conscious at his touch of a certain icy pang\nalong my blood. \"Come, sir,\" said I. \"You forget that I have not\nyet the pleasure of your acquaintance. Be seated, if you please.\"\nAnd I showed him an example, and sat down myself in my customary\nseat and with as fair an imitation of my ordinary manner to a\npatient, as the lateness of the hour, the nature of my\npre-occupations, and the horror I had of my visitor, would suffer\nme to muster.\n\n\"I beg your pardon, Dr. Lanyon,\" he replied civilly enough. \"What\nyou say is very well founded; and my impatience has shown its\nheels to my politeness. I come here at the instance of your\ncolleague, Dr. Henry Jekyll, on a piece of business of some\nmoment; and I under-\n\n78)\n\nstood...\" He paused and put his hand to his throat, and I could\nsee, in spite of his collected manner, that he was wrestling\nagainst the approaches of the hysteria--\"I understood, a\ndrawer...\"\n\nBut here I took pity on my visitor's suspense, and some perhaps\non my own growing curiosity.\n\n\"There it is, sir,\" said I, pointing to the drawer, where it lay\non the floor behind a table and still covered with the sheet.\n\nHe sprang to it, and then paused, and laid his hand upon his\nheart: I could hear his teeth grate with the convulsive action of\nhis jaws; and his face was so ghastly to see that I grew alarmed\nboth for his life and reason.\n\n\"Compose yourself,\" said I.\n\nHe turned a dreadful smile to me, and as if with the decision of\ndespair, plucked away the sheet. At sight of the contents, he\nuttered one loud sob of such immense relief that I sat petrified.\nAnd the next moment, in a voice that was already fairly well\nunder control, \"Have you a graduated glass?\" he asked.\n\nI rose from my place with something of an effort and gave him\nwhat he asked.\n\nHe thanked me with a smiling nod, measured out a few minims of\nthe red tincture and added one of the powders. The mixture, which\nwas at first of a reddish hue, began, in proportion as the\ncrystals melted, to brighten in colour, to effervesce audibly,\nand to throw off small\n\n79)\n\nfumes of vapour. Suddenly and at the same moment, the ebullition\nceased and the compound changed to a dark purple, which faded\nagain more slowly to a watery green. My visitor, who had watched\nthese metamorphoses with a keen eye, smiled, set down the glass\nupon the table, and then turned and looked upon me with an air of\nscrutiny.\n\n\"And now,\" said he, \"to settle what remains. Will you be wise?\nwill you be guided? will you suffer me to take this glass in my\nhand and to go forth from your house without further parley? or\nhas the greed of curiosity too much command of you?", "start_char_idx": 95602, "end_char_idx": 99535, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f": {"__data__": {"id_": "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "3f15b2976faf4e207051d95653a7d4969e9ad596781e8a0776b1ad79ecfdc0fb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dccb624d8d40f7911d4f9c571947570627cb44bde3f67af6fb08f80d659bf2cc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "or\nhas the greed of curiosity too much command of you? Think before\nyou answer, for it shall be done as you decide. As you decide,\nyou shall be left as you were before, and neither richer nor\nwiser, unless the sense of service rendered to a man in mortal\ndistress may be counted as a kind of riches of the soul. Or, if\nyou shall so prefer to choose, a new province of knowledge and\nnew avenues to fame and power shall be laid open to you, here, in\nthis room, upon the instant; and your sight shall be blasted by a\nprodigy to stagger the unbelief of Satan.\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said I, affecting a coolness that I was far from truly\npossessing, \"you speak enigmas, and you will perhaps not wonder\nthat I hear you with no very strong impression of belief. But I\nhave gone too far in the way of inexplicable services to pause\nbefore I see the end.\"\n\n\"It is well,\" replied my visitor. \"Lanyon,\n\n80)\n\nyou remember your vows: what follows is under the seal of our\nprofession. And now, you who have so long been bound to the most\nnarrow and material views, you who have denied the virtue of\ntranscendental medicine, you who have derided your superiors--\nbehold!\"\n\nHe put the glass to his lips and drank at one gulp. A cry\nfollowed; he reeled, staggered, clutched at the table and held\non, staring with injected eyes, gasping with open mouth; and as I\nlooked there came, I thought, a change--he seemed to swell--\nhis face became suddenly black and the features seemed to melt\nand alter--and the next moment, I had sprung to my feet and\nleaped back against the wall, my arm raised to shield me from\nthat prodigy, my mind submerged in terror.\n\n\"O God!\" I screamed, and \"O God!\" again and again; for there\nbefore my eyes--pale and shaken, and half-fainting, and groping\nbefore him with his hands, like a man restored from death--\nthere stood Henry Jekyll!\n\nWhat he told me in the next hour, I cannot bring my mind to set\non paper. I saw what I saw, I heard what I heard, and my soul\nsickened at it; and yet now when that sight has faded from my\neyes, I ask myself if I believe it, and I cannot answer. My life\nis shaken to its roots; sleep has left me; the deadliest terror\nsits by me at all hours of the day and night; I feel that my days\nare numbered, and that I\n\n81)\n\nmust die; and yet I shall die incredulous. As for the moral\nturpitude that man unveiled to me, even with tears of penitence,\nI cannot, even in memory, dwell on it without a start of horror.\nI will say but one thing, Utterson, and that (if you can bring\nyour mind to credit it) will be more than enough. The creature\nwho crept into my house that night was, on Jekyll's own\nconfession, known by the name of Hyde and hunted for in every\ncorner of the land as the murderer of Carew.\n HASTIE LANYON\n\n82)\n\n\n\n HENRY JEKYLL'S FULL STATEMENT OF THE CASE\n\nI WAS born in the year 18--- to a large fortune, endowed besides\nwith excellent parts, inclined by nature to industry, fond of the\nrespect of the wise and good among my fellow-men, and thus, as\nmight have been supposed, with every guarantee of an honourable\nand distinguished future. And indeed the worst of my faults was a\ncertain impatient gaiety of disposition, such as has made the\nhappiness of many, but such as I found it hard to reconcile with\nmy imperious desire to carry my head high, and wear a more than\ncommonly grave countenance before the public. Hence it came about\nthat I concealed my pleasures; and that when I reached years of\nreflection, and began to look round me and take stock of my\nprogress and position in the world, I stood already committed to\na profound duplicity of life. Many a man would have even blazoned\nsuch irregularities as I was guilty of; but from the high views\nthat I had set before me, I regarded and hid them with an almost\nmorbid sense of shame.", "start_char_idx": 99481, "end_char_idx": 103323, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7": {"__data__": {"id_": "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "a518860aa3d399db656a97f77ecaae26dced223575c297339dff8ddc10460761", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "daeaad7d9ab0cb572f4201138caa9e492ba256d6e388d2127673a3921fce6e4f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was thus rather the exacting\n\n83)\n\nnature of my aspirations than any particular degradation in my\nfaults, that made me what I was and, with even a deeper trench\nthan in the majority of men, severed in me those provinces of\ngood and ill which divide and compound man's dual nature. In this\ncase, I was driven to reflect deeply and inveterately on that\nhard law of life, which lies at the root of religion and is one\nof the most plentiful springs of distress. Though so profound a\ndouble-dealer, I was in no sense a hypocrite; both sides of me\nwere in dead earnest; I was no more myself when I laid aside\nrestraint and plunged in shame, than when I laboured, in the eye\nof day, at the furtherance of knowledge or the relief of sorrow\nand suffering. And it chanced that the direction of my scientific\nstudies, which led wholly toward the mystic and the\ntranscendental, re-acted and shed a strong light on this\nconsciousness of the perennial war among my members. With every\nday, and from both sides of my intelligence, the moral and the\nintellectual, I thus drew steadily nearer to that truth, by whose\npartial discovery I have been doomed to such a dreadful\nshipwreck: that man is not truly one, but truly two. I say two,\nbecause the state of my own knowledge does not pass beyond that\npoint. Others will follow, others will outstrip me on the same\nlines; and I hazard the guess that man will be ultimately known\nfor a mere polity of multifarious, incongruous, and independent\ndenizens. I, for my\n\n84)\n\npart, from the nature of my life, advanced infallibly in one\ndirection and in one direction only. It was on the moral side,\nand in my own person, that I learned to recognise the thorough\nand primitive duality of man; I saw that, of the two natures that\ncontended in the field of my consciousness, even if I could\nrightly be said to be either, it was only because I was radically\nboth; and from an early date, even before the course of my\nscientific discoveries had begun to suggest the most naked\npossibility of such a miracle, I had learned to dwell with\npleasure, as a beloved day-dream, on the thought of the\nseparation of these elements. If each, I told myself, could but\nbe housed in separate identities, life would be relieved of all\nthat was unbearable; the unjust delivered from the aspirations\nmight go his way, and remorse of his more upright twin; and the\njust could walk steadfastly and securely on his upward path,\ndoing the good things in which he found his pleasure, and no\nlonger exposed to disgrace and penitence by the hands of this\nextraneous evil. It was the curse of mankind that these\nincongruous fagots were thus bound together that in the agonised\nwomb of consciousness, these polar twins should be continuously\nstruggling. How, then, were they dissociated?\n\nI was so far in my reflections when, as I have said, a side-light\nbegan to shine upon the subject from the laboratory table. I\nbegan to perceive\n\n85)\n\nmore deeply than it has ever yet been stated, the trembling\nimmateriality, the mist-like transience of this seemingly so\nsolid body in which we walk attired. Certain agents I found to\nhave the power to shake and to pluck back that fleshly vestment,\neven as a wind might toss the curtains of a pavilion. For two\ngood reasons, I will not enter deeply into this scientific branch\nof my confession. First, because I have been made to learn that\nthe doom and burthen of our life is bound for ever on man's\nshoulders, and when the attempt is made to cast it off, it but\nreturns upon us with more unfamiliar and more awful pressure.\nSecond, because, as my narrative will make, alas! too evident, my\ndiscoveries were incomplete. Enough, then, that I not only\nrecognised my natural body for the mere aura and effulgence of\ncertain of the powers that made up my spirit, but managed to\ncompound a drug by which these powers should be dethroned from\ntheir supremacy, and a second form and countenance substituted,\nnone the less natural to me because they were the expression, and\nbore the stamp, of lower elements in my soul.", "start_char_idx": 103324, "end_char_idx": 107375, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78": {"__data__": {"id_": "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "85b1c08254438a94678eedaa4227dd5c6354d3aeb15b5b6bf8aa3241eff52b3a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2f8664c924f95faaa26df300c10ab40e1d437e28fe6fa1cc4ce9b636dde53ca8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I hesitated long before I put this theory to the test of\npractice. I knew well that I risked death; for any drug that so\npotently controlled and shook the very fortress of identity,\nmight by the least scruple of an overdose or at the least\ninopportunity in the moment of exhibition, utterly blot out that\nimmaterial tabernacle which I\n\n86)\n\nlooked to it to change. But the temptation of a discovery so\nsingular and profound, at last overcame the suggestions of alarm.\nI had long since prepared my tincture; I purchased at once, from\na firm of wholesale chemists, a large quantity of a particular\nsalt which I knew, from my experiments, to be the last ingredient\nrequired; and late one accursed night, I compounded the elements,\nwatched them boil and smoke together in the glass, and when the\nebullition had subsided, with a strong glow of courage, drank off\nthe potion.\n\nThe most racking pangs succeeded: a grinding in the bones, deadly\nnausea, and a horror of the spirit that cannot be exceeded at the\nhour of birth or death. Then these agonies began swiftly to\nsubside, and I came to myself as if out of a great sickness.\nThere was something strange in my sensations, something\nindescribably new and, from its very novelty, incredibly sweet. I\nfelt younger, lighter, happier in body; within I was conscious of\na heady recklessness, a current of disordered sensual images\nrunning like a mill-race in my fancy, a solution of the bonds of\nobligation, an unknown but not an innocent freedom of the soul. I\nknew myself, at the first breath of this new life, to be more\nwicked, tenfold more wicked, sold a slave to my original evil;\nand the thought, in that moment, braced and delighted me like\nwine. I stretched out my hands, exulting in the freshness of\nthese\n\n87)\n\nsensations; and in the act, I was suddenly aware that I had lost\nin stature.\n\nThere was no mirror, at that date, in my room; that which stands\nbeside me as I write, was brought there later on and for the very\npurpose of these transformations. The night, however, was far\ngone into the morning--the morning, black as it was, was nearly\nripe for the conception of the day--the inmates of my house\nwere locked in the most rigorous hours of slumber; and I\ndetermined, flushed as I was with hope and triumph, to venture in\nmy new shape as far as to my bedroom. I crossed the yard, wherein\nthe constellations looked down upon me, I could have thought,\nwith wonder, the first creature of that sort that their\nunsleeping vigilance had yet disclosed to them; I stole through\nthe corridors, a stranger in my own house; and coming to my room,\nI saw for the first time the appearance of Edward Hyde.\n\nI must here speak by theory alone, saying not that which I know,\nbut that which I suppose to be most probable. The evil side of my\nnature, to which I had now transferred the stamping efficacy, was\nless robust and less developed than the good which I had just\ndeposed. Again, in the course of my life, which had been, after\nall, nine-tenths a life of effort, virtue, and control, it had\nbeen much less exercised and much less exhausted. And hence, as I\nthink, it came about that Edward Hyde was so much smaller,\n\n88)\n\nslighter, and younger than Henry Jekyll. Even as good shone upon\nthe countenance of the one, evil was written broadly and plainly\non the face of the other. Evil besides (which I must still\nbelieve to be the lethal side of man) had left on that body an\nimprint of deformity and decay. And yet when I looked upon that\nugly idol in the glass, I was conscious of no repugnance, rather\nof a leap of welcome. This, too, was myself. It seemed natural\nand human. In my eyes it bore a livelier image of the spirit, it\nseemed more express and single, than the imperfect and divided\ncountenance I had been hitherto accustomed to call mine. And in\nso far I was doubtless right.", "start_char_idx": 107377, "end_char_idx": 111212, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280": {"__data__": {"id_": "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "98ef099c41f66d7ee4e7a33174a33abc91661bc9847b8f85a444751416141693", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6a76a50d2197ea7ae324663817198ca8fbe0837aa6ab182bd9ba60fd8c241383", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "And in\nso far I was doubtless right. I have observed that when I wore\nthe semblance of Edward Hyde, none could come near to me at first\nwithout a visible misgiving of the flesh. This, as I take it, was\nbecause all human beings, as we meet them, are commingled out of\ngood and evil: and Edward Hyde, alone in the ranks of mankind,\nwas pure evil.\n\nI lingered but a moment at the mirror: the second and conclusive\nexperiment had yet to be attempted; it yet remained to be seen if\nI had lost my identity beyond redemption and must flee before\ndaylight from a house that was no longer mine; and hurrying back\nto my cabinet, I once more prepared and drank the cup, once more\nsuffered the pangs of dissolution, and came to myself once more\nwith the character, the stature, and the face of Henry Jekyll.\n\n89)\n\nThat night I had come to the fatal cross-roads. Had I approached\nmy discovery in a more noble spirit, had I risked the experiment\nwhile under the empire of generous or pious aspirations, all must\nhave been otherwise, and from these agonies of death and birth, I\nhad come forth an angel instead of a fiend. The drug had no\ndiscriminating action; it was neither diabolical nor divine; it\nbut shook the doors of the prison-house of my disposition; and\nlike the captives of Philippi, that which stood within ran forth.\nAt that time my virtue slumbered; my evil, kept awake by\nambition, was alert and swift to seize the occasion; and the\nthing that was projected was Edward Hyde. Hence, although I had\nnow two characters as well as two appearances, one was wholly\nevil, and the other was still the old Henry Jekyll, that\nincongruous compound of whose reformation and improvement I had\nalready learned to despair. The movement was thus wholly toward\nthe worse.\n\nEven at that time, I had not yet conquered my aversion to the\ndryness of a life of study. I would still be merrily disposed at\ntimes; and as my pleasures were (to say the least) undignified,\nand I was not only well known and highly considered, but growing\ntoward the elderly man, this incoherency of my life was daily\ngrowing more unwelcome. It was on this side that my new power\ntempted me until I fell in slavery. I had but to drink the cup,\nto doff at once the body\n\n90)\n\nof the noted professor, and to assume, like a thick cloak, that\nof Edward Hyde. I smiled at the notion; it seemed to me at the\ntime to be humorous; and I made my preparations with the most\nstudious care. I took and furnished that house in Soho, to which\nHyde was tracked by the police; and engaged as housekeeper a\ncreature whom I well knew to be silent and unscrupulous. On the\nother side, I announced to my servants that a Mr. Hyde (whom I\ndescribed) was to have full liberty and power about my house in\nthe square; and to parry mishaps, I even called and made myself a\nfamiliar object, in my second character. I next drew up that will\nto which you so much objected; so that if anything befell me in\nthe person of Dr. Jekyll, I could enter on that of Edward Hyde\nwithout pecuniary loss. And thus fortified, as I supposed, on\nevery side, I began to profit by the strange immunities of my\nposition.\n\nMen have before hired bravos to transact their crimes, while\ntheir own person and reputation sat under shelter. I was the\nfirst that ever did so for his pleasures. I was the first that\ncould thus plod in the public eye with a load of genial\nrespectability, and in a moment, like a schoolboy, strip off\nthese lendings and spring headlong into the sea of liberty. But\nfor me, in my impenetrable mantle, the safety was complete. Think\nof it--I did not even exist!", "start_char_idx": 111176, "end_char_idx": 114769, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0": {"__data__": {"id_": "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "e41228638797651fe28fe28a8e0805dceb9a1b1333669abfdef068559cb46f07", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "eacf50664afbdbfe14a3f3af152fce3597d3cb8fabe0ff2af3a6daa14b54be8f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Think\nof it--I did not even exist! Let me but escape into my\nlaboratory door, give me but a second or\n\n91)\n\ntwo to mix and swallow the draught that I had always standing\nready; and whatever he had done, Edward Hyde would pass away like\nthe stain of breath upon a mirror; and there in his stead,\nquietly at home, trimming the midnight lamp in his study, a man\nwho could afford to laugh at suspicion, would be Henry Jekyll.\n\nThe pleasures which I made haste to seek in my disguise were, as\nI have said, undignified; I would scarce use a harder term. But\nin the hands of Edward Hyde, they soon began to turn toward the\nmonstrous. When I would come back from these excursions, I was\noften plunged into a kind of wonder at my vicarious depravity.\nThis familiar that I called out of my own soul, and sent forth\nalone to do his good pleasure, was a being inherently malign and\nvillainous; his every act and thought centred on self; drinking\npleasure with bestial avidity from any degree of torture to\nanother; relentless like a man of stone. Henry Jekyll stood at\ntimes aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde; but the situation\nwas apart from ordinary laws, and insidiously relaxed the grasp\nof conscience. It was Hyde, after all, and Hyde alone, that was\nguilty. Jekyll was no worse; he woke again to his good qualities\nseemingly unimpaired; he would even make haste, where it was\npossible, to undo the evil done by Hyde. And thus his conscience\nslumbered.\n\nInto the details of the infamy at which I thus\n\n92)\n\nconnived (for even now I can scarce grant that I committed it) I\nhave no design of entering; I mean but to point out the warnings\nand the successive steps with which my chastisement approached. I\nmet with one accident which, as it brought on no consequence, I\nshall no more than mention. An act of cruelty to a child aroused\nagainst me the anger of a passer-by, whom I recognised the other\nday in the person of your kinsman; the doctor and the child's\nfamily joined him; there were moments when I feared for my life;\nand at last, in order to pacify their too just resentment, Edward\nHyde had to bring them to the door, and pay them in a cheque\ndrawn in the name of Henry Jekyll. But this danger was easily\neliminated from the future, by opening an account at another bank\nin the name of Edward Hyde himself; and when, by sloping my own\nhand backward, I had supplied my double with a signature, I\nthought I sat beyond the reach of fate.\n\nSome two months before the murder of Sir Danvers, I had been out\nfor one of my adventures, had returned at a late hour, and woke\nthe next day in bed with somewhat odd sensations. It was in vain\nI looked about me; in vain I saw the decent furniture and tall\nproportions of my room in the square; in vain that I recognised\nthe pattern of the bed-curtains and the design of the mahogany\nframe; something still kept insisting that I was not where I was,\n\n93)\n\nthat I had not wakened where I seemed to be, but in the little\nroom in Soho where I was accustomed to sleep in the body of\nEdward Hyde. I smiled to myself, and, in my psychological way\nbegan lazily to inquire into the elements of this illusion,\noccasionally, even as I did so, dropping back into a comfortable\nmorning doze. I was still so engaged when, in one of my more\nwakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry\nJekyll (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape and\nsize: it was large, firm, white, and comely. But the hand which I\nnow saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London\nmorning, lying half shut on the bed-clothes, was lean, corded,\nknuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth\nof hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.", "start_char_idx": 114735, "end_char_idx": 118431, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7": {"__data__": {"id_": "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "7246287438bd24c50926bad1ee8727dd41d56a8d856ac0023d3dfbc1a7f91743", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "700213a50045938734daf0a03132fc8280162ac971294878c682588f63cf5913", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was the hand of Edward Hyde.\n\nI must have stared upon it for near half a minute, sunk as I was\nin the mere stupidity of wonder, before terror woke up in my\nbreast as sudden and startling as the crash of cymbals; and\nbounding from my bed, I rushed to the mirror. At the sight that\nmet my eyes, my blood was changed into something exquisitely thin\nand icy. Yes, I had gone to bed Henry Jekyll, I had awakened\nEdward Hyde. How was this to be explained? I asked myself, and\nthen, with another bound of terror--how was it to be remedied?\nIt was well on in the morning; the servants were up; all my drugs\nwere in the\n\n94)\n\ncabinet--a long journey down two pairs of stairs, through the\nback passage, across the open court and through the anatomical\ntheatre, from where I was then standing horror-struck. It might\nindeed be possible to cover my face; but of what use was that,\nwhen I was unable to conceal the alteration in my stature? And\nthen with an overpowering sweetness of relief, it came back upon\nmy mind that the servants were already used to the coming and\ngoing of my second self. I had soon dressed, as well as I was\nable, in clothes of my own size: had soon passed through the\nhouse, where Bradshaw stared and drew back at seeing Mr. Hyde at\nsuch an hour and in such a strange array; and ten minutes later,\nDr. Jekyll had returned to his own shape and was sitting down,\nwith a darkened brow, to make a feint of breakfasting.\n\nSmall indeed was my appetite. This inexplicable incident, this\nreversal of my previous experience, seemed, like the Babylonian\nfinger on the wall, to be spelling out the letters of my\njudgment; and I began to reflect more seriously than ever before\non the issues and possibilities of my double existence. That part\nof me which I had the power of projecting, had lately been much\nexercised and nourished; it had seemed to me of late as though\nthe body of Edward Hyde had grown in stature, as though (when I\nwore that form) I were conscious of a more generous tide of\nblood; and I began to spy a danger that,\n\n95)\n\nif this were much prolonged, the balance of my nature might be\npermanently overthrown, the power of voluntary change be\nforfeited, and the character of Edward Hyde become irrevocably\nmine. The power of the drug had not been always equally\ndisplayed. Once, very early in my career, it had totally failed\nme; since then I had been obliged on more than one occasion to\ndouble, and once, with infinite risk of death, to treble the\namount; and these rare uncertainties had cast hitherto the sole\nshadow on my contentment. Now, however, and in the light of that\nmorning's accident, I was led to remark that whereas, in the\nbeginning, the difficulty had been to throw off the body of\nJekyll, it had of late gradually but decidedly transferred itself\nto the other side. All things therefore seemed to point to this:\nthat I was slowly losing hold of my original and better self, and\nbecoming slowly incorporated with my second and worse.\n\nBetween these two, I now felt I had to choose. My two natures had\nmemory in common, but all other faculties were most unequally\nshared between them. Jekyll (who was composite) now with the most\nsensitive apprehensions, now with a greedy gusto, projected and\nshared in the pleasures and adventures of Hyde; but Hyde was\nindifferent to Jekyll, or but remembered him as the mountain\nbandit remembers the cavern in which he conceals himself from\npursuit. Jekyll had more than a father's interest; Hyde\n\n96)\n\nhad more than a son's indifference. To cast in my lot with\nJekyll, was to die to those appetites which I had long secretly\nindulged and had of late begun to pamper. To cast it in with\nHyde, was to die to a thousand interests and aspirations, and to\nbecome, at a blow and for ever, despised and friendless.", "start_char_idx": 118400, "end_char_idx": 122186, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa": {"__data__": {"id_": "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "4856f53e3493ea0533e682831e70b2ea6b14da0837e644452aa806f6db7bfd28", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a6b7071afb622a25182863219c85a6eef2e12fca15429e4d3eb0ad6c985c90c6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The\nbargain might appear unequal; but there was still another\nconsideration in the scales; for while Jekyll would suffer\nsmartingly in the fires of abstinence, Hyde would be not even\nconscious of all that he had lost. Strange as my circumstances\nwere, the terms of this debate are as old and commonplace as man;\nmuch the same inducements and alarms cast the die for any tempted\nand trembling sinner; and it fell out with me, as it falls with\nso vast a majority of my fellows, that I chose the better part\nand was found wanting in the strength to keep to it.\n\nYes, I preferred the elderly and discontented doctor, surrounded\nby friends and cherishing honest hopes; and bade a resolute\nfarewell to the liberty, the comparative youth, the light step,\nleaping impulses and secret pleasures, that I had enjoyed in the\ndisguise of Hyde. I made this choice perhaps with some\nunconscious reservation, for I neither gave up the house in Soho,\nnor destroyed the clothes of Edward Hyde, which still lay ready\nin my cabinet. For two months, however, I was true to my\ndetermination; for two months I led a life of such\n\n97)\n\nseverity as I had never before attained to, and enjoyed the\ncompensations of an approving conscience. But time began at last\nto obliterate the freshness of my alarm; the praises of\nconscience began to grow into a thing of course; I began to be\ntortured with throes and longings, as of Hyde struggling after\nfreedom; and at last, in an hour of moral weakness, I once again\ncompounded and swallowed the transforming draught.\n\nI do not suppose that, when a drunkard reasons with himself upon\nhis vice, he is once out of five hundred times affected by the\ndangers that he runs through his brutish, physical insensibility;\nneither had I, long as I had considered my position, made enough\nallowance for the complete moral insensibility and insensate\nreadiness to evil, which were the leading characters of Edward\nHyde. Yet it was by these that I was punished. My devil had been\nlong caged, he came out roaring. I was conscious, even when I\ntook the draught, of a more unbridled, a more furious propensity\nto ill. It must have been this, I suppose, that stirred in my\nsoul that tempest of impatience with which I listened to the\ncivilities of my unhappy victim; I declare, at least, before God,\nno man morally sane could have been guilty of that crime upon so\npitiful a provocation; and that I struck in no more reasonable\nspirit than that in which a sick child may break a plaything. But\nI had voluntarily stripped myself of all those balancing\ninstincts\n\n98)\n\nby which even the worst of us continues to walk with some degree\nof steadiness among temptations; and in my case, to be tempted,\nhowever slightly, was to fall.\n\nInstantly the spirit of hell awoke in me and raged. With a\ntransport of glee, I mauled the unresisting body, tasting delight\nfrom every blow; and it was not till weariness had begun to\nsucceed, that I was suddenly, in the top fit of my delirium,\nstruck through the heart by a cold thrill of terror. A mist\ndispersed; I saw my life to be forfeit; and fled from the scene\nof these excesses, at once glorying and trembling, my lust of\nevil gratified and stimulated, my love of life screwed to the\ntopmost peg. I ran to the house in Soho, and (to make assurance\ndoubly sure) destroyed my papers; thence I set out through the\nlamplit streets, in the same divided ecstasy of mind, gloating on\nmy crime, light-headedly devising others in the future, and yet\nstill hastening and still hearkening in my wake for the steps of\nthe avenger. Hyde had a song upon his lips as he compounded the\ndraught, and as he drank it, pledged the dead man. The pangs of\ntransformation had not done tearing him, before Henry Jekyll,\nwith streaming tears of gratitude and remorse, had fallen upon\nhis knees and lifted his clasped hands to God.", "start_char_idx": 122187, "end_char_idx": 126030, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6": {"__data__": {"id_": "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "5a160119276d81496d88e67f1b4045aa6e8cbafb2689b870e343367846a88eed", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "806b2842c842e9aa2055ac8aec033cf68624283881c15f1c67746421eda54854", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The veil of\nself-indulgence was rent from head to foot, I saw my life as a\nwhole: I followed it up from the days of childhood, when I had\nwalked\n\n99)\n\nwith my father's hand, and through the self-denying toils of my\nprofessional life, to arrive again and again, with the same sense\nof unreality, at the damned horrors of the evening. I could have\nscreamed aloud; I sought with tears and prayers to smother down\nthe crowd of hideous images and sounds with which my memory\nswarmed against me; and still, between the petitions, the ugly\nface of my iniquity stared into my soul. As the acuteness of this\nremorse began to die away, it was succeeded by a sense of joy.\nThe problem of my conduct was solved. Hyde was thenceforth\nimpossible; whether I would or not, I was now confined to the\nbetter part of my existence; and oh, how I rejoiced to think it!\nwith what willing humility, I embraced anew the restrictions of\nnatural life! with what sincere renunciation, I locked the door\nby which I had so often gone and come, and ground the key under\nmy heel!\n\nThe next day, came the news that the murder had been overlooked,\nthat the guilt of Hyde was patent to the world, and that the\nvictim was a man high in public estimation. It was not only a\ncrime, it had been a tragic folly. I think I was glad to know it;\nI think I was glad to have my better impulses thus buttressed and\nguarded by the terrors of the scaffold. Jekyll was now my city of\nrefuge; let but Hyde peep out an instant, and the hands of all\nmen would be raised to take and slay him.\n\n100)\n\nI resolved in my future conduct to redeem the past; and I can say\nwith honesty that my resolve was fruitful of some good. You know\nyourself how earnestly in the last months of last year, I\nlaboured to relieve suffering; you know that much was done for\nothers, and that the days passed quietly, almost happily for\nmyself. Nor can I truly say that I wearied of this beneficent and\ninnocent life; I think instead that I daily enjoyed it more\ncompletely; but I was still cursed with my duality of purpose;\nand as the first edge of my penitence wore off, the lower side of\nme, so long indulged, so recently chained down, began to growl\nfor licence. Not that I dreamed of resuscitating Hyde; the bare\nidea of that would startle me to frenzy: no, it was in my own\nperson, that I was once more tempted to trifle with my\nconscience; and it was as an ordinary secret sinner, that I at\nlast fell before the assaults of temptation.\n\nThere comes an end to all things; the most capacious measure is\nfilled at last; and this brief condescension to evil finally\ndestroyed the balance of my soul. And yet I was not alarmed; the\nfall seemed natural, like a return to the old days before I had\nmade discovery. It was a fine, clear, January day, wet under foot\nwhere the frost had melted, but cloudless overhead; and the\nRegent's Park was full of winter chirrupings and sweet with\nspring odours. I sat in the sun on a bench; the animal within me\nlicking the\n\n101)\n\nchops of memory; the spiritual side a little drowsed, promising\nsubsequent penitence, but not yet moved to begin. After all, I\nreflected, I was like my neighbours; and then I smiled, comparing\nmyself with other men, comparing my active goodwill with the lazy\ncruelty of their neglect. And at the very moment of that\nvain-glorious thought, a qualm came over me, a horrid nausea and\nthe most deadly shuddering. These passed away, and left me faint;\nand then as in its turn the faintness subsided, I began to be\naware of a change in the temper of my thoughts, a greater\nboldness, a contempt of danger, a solution of the bonds of\nobligation. I looked down; my clothes hung formlessly on my\nshrunken limbs; the hand that lay on my knee was corded and\nhairy. I was once more Edward Hyde.", "start_char_idx": 126031, "end_char_idx": 129805, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891": {"__data__": {"id_": "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "f956f98f76ddbd3554a86239c81f8d460a917cd9a3b3da57cda263c93a9ad9f2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "85ac68cee681ff4281f161a76964e4e1c26d0b0d03b5db6365829cada2b0c925", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I was once more Edward Hyde. A moment before I had been\nsafe of all men's respect, wealthy, beloved--the cloth laying\nfor me in the dining-room at home; and now I was the common\nquarry of mankind, hunted, houseless, a known murderer, thrall to\nthe gallows.\n\nMy reason wavered, but it did not fail me utterly. I have more\nthan once observed that, in my second character, my faculties\nseemed sharpened to a point and my spirits more tensely elastic;\nthus it came about that, where Jekyll perhaps might have\nsuccumbed, Hyde rose to the importance of the moment. My drugs\nwere in one of the presses of my cabinet; how was I\n\n102)\n\nto reach them? That was the problem that (crushing my temples in\nmy hands) I set myself to solve. The laboratory door I had\nclosed. If I sought to enter by the house, my own servants would\nconsign me to the gallows. I saw I must employ another hand, and\nthought of Lanyon. How was he to be reached? how persuaded?\nSupposing that I escaped capture in the streets, how was I to\nmake my way into his presence? and how should I, an unknown and\ndispleasing visitor, prevail on the famous physician to rifle the\nstudy of his colleague, Dr. Jekyll? Then I remembered that of my\noriginal character, one part remained to me: I could write my own\nhand; and once I had conceived that kindling spark, the way that\nI must follow became lighted up from end to end.\n\n Thereupon, I arranged my clothes as best I could, and summoning\na passing hansom, drove to an hotel in Portland Street, the name\nof which I chanced to remember. At my appearance (which was\nindeed comical enough, however tragic a fate these garments\ncovered) the driver could not conceal his mirth. I gnashed my\nteeth upon him with a gust of devilish fury; and the smile\nwithered from his face--happily for him--yet more happily for\nmyself, for in another instant I had certainly dragged him from\nhis perch. At the inn, as I entered, I looked about me with so\nblack a countenance as made the attendants tremble; not a look\ndid they exchange in my\n\n103)\n\npresence; but obsequiously took my orders, led me to a private\nroom, and brought me wherewithal to write. Hyde in danger of his\nlife was a creature new to me; shaken with inordinate anger,\nstrung to the pitch of murder, lusting to inflict pain. Yet the\ncreature was astute; mastered his fury with a great effort of the\nwill; composed his two important letters, one to Lanyon and one\nto Poole; and that he might receive actual evidence of their\nbeing posted, sent them out with directions that they should be\nregistered.\n\nThenceforward, he sat all day over the fire in the private room,\ngnawing his nails; there he dined, sitting alone with his fears,\nthe waiter visibly quailing before his eye; and thence, when the\nnight was fully come, he set forth in the corner of a closed cab,\nand was driven to and fro about the streets of the city. He, I\nsay--I cannot say, I. That child of Hell had nothing human;\nnothing lived in him but fear and hatred. And when at last,\nthinking the driver had begun to grow suspicious, he discharged\nthe cab and ventured on foot, attired in his misfitting clothes,\nan object marked out for observation, into the midst of the\nnocturnal passengers, these two base passions raged within him\nlike a tempest. He walked fast, hunted by his fears, chattering\nto himself, skulking through the less-frequented thoroughfares,\ncounting the minutes that still divided him from midnight. Once a\n\n104)\n\nwoman spoke to him, offering, I think, a box of lights. He smote\nher in the face, and she fled.\n\nWhen I came to myself at Lanyon's, the horror of my old friend\nperhaps affected me somewhat: I do not know; it was at least but\na drop in the sea to the abhorrence with which I looked back upon\nthese hours. A change had come over me.", "start_char_idx": 129777, "end_char_idx": 133558, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf": {"__data__": {"id_": "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "50fbd08db8c23acb30475c13be1049ce7eaf5c1c133d8a13a125e9824c3768af", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7bc3dcfbfff588514bd0cc4bedd0760ccce1b0a0f06e392512231a1cd7f7b406", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "A change had come over me. It was no longer the fear\nof the gallows, it was the horror of being Hyde that racked me. I\nreceived Lanyon's condemnation partly in a dream; it was partly\nin a dream that I came home to my own house and got into bed. I\nslept after the prostration of the day, with a stringent and\nprofound slumber which not even the nightmares that wrung me\ncould avail to break. I awoke in the morning shaken, weakened,\nbut refreshed. I still hated and feared the thought of the brute\nthat slept within me, and I had not of course forgotten the\nappalling dangers of the day before; but I was once more at home,\nin my own house and close to my drugs; and gratitude for my\nescape shone so strong in my soul that it almost rivalled the\nbrightness of hope.\n\nI was stepping leisurely across the court after breakfast,\ndrinking the chill of the air with pleasure, when I was seized\nagain with those indescribable sensations that heralded the\nchange; and I had but the time to gain the shelter of my cabinet,\nbefore I was once again raging and freezing with the passions of\nHyde. It took on this occasion a double dose to recall me to\n\n105)\n\nmyself; and alas! Six hours after, as I sat looking sadly in the\nfire, the pangs returned, and the drug had to be re-administered.\nIn short, from that day forth it seemed only by a great effort as\nof gymnastics, and only under the immediate stimulation of the\ndrug, that I was able to wear the countenance of Jekyll. At all\nhours of the day and night, I would be taken with the premonitory\nshudder; above all, if I slept, or even dozed for a moment in my\nchair, it was always as Hyde that I awakened. Under the strain of\nthis continually-impending doom and by the sleeplessness to which\nI now condemned myself, ay, even beyond what I had thought\npossible to man, I became, in my own person, a creature eaten up\nand emptied by fever, languidly weak both in body and mind, and\nsolely occupied by one thought: the horror of my other self. But\nwhen I slept, or when the virtue of the medicine wore off, I\nwould leap almost without transition (for the pangs of\ntransformation grew daily less marked) into the possession of a\nfancy brimming with images of terror, a soul boiling with\ncauseless hatreds, and a body that seemed not strong enough to\ncontain the raging energies of life. The powers of Hyde seemed to\nhave grown with the sickliness of Jekyll. And certainly the hate\nthat now divided them was equal on each side. With Jekyll, it was\na thing of vital instinct. He had now seen the full deformity of\nthat creature that shared with him some of the phenomena of\n\n106)\n\nconsciousness, and was co-heir with him to death: and beyond these\nlinks of community, which in themselves made the most poignant\npart of his distress, he thought of Hyde, for all his energy of\nlife, as of something not only hellish but inorganic. This was the\nshocking thing; that the slime of the pit seemed to utter cries\nand voices; that the amorphous dust gesticulated and sinned; that\nwhat was dead, and had no shape, should usurp the offices of life.\nAnd this again, that that insurgent horror was knit to him closer\nthan a wife, closer than an eye; lay caged in his flesh, where he\nheard it mutter and felt it struggle to be born; and at every hour\nof weakness, and in the confidence of slumber, prevailed against\nhim and deposed him out of life. The hatred of Hyde for Jekyll,\nwas of a different order. His terror of the gallows drove him\ncontinually to commit temporary suicide, and return to his\nsubordinate station of a part instead of a person; but he loathed\nthe necessity, he loathed the despondency into which Jekyll was\nnow fallen, and he resented the dislike with which he was himself\nregarded.", "start_char_idx": 133532, "end_char_idx": 137261, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f": {"__data__": {"id_": "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "42", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "253b9c45e3730b0d3de14815744de00ffff128e3318c9f50be1e6d550ee68e86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "6e22cba50672d8ffe1ccec9e1bae1ab9152e992f48ec8d7608e78ef29eb36833", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6fc91e5b102805dae2dc1aadbf66c3cf82204fe4fdf65172cf0adf34448c2fae", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Hence the ape-like tricks that he would play me,\nscrawling in my own hand blasphemies on the pages of my books,\nburning the letters and destroying the portrait of my father; and\nindeed, had it not been for his fear of death, he would long ago\nhave ruined himself in order to involve me in the ruin. But his\nlove of life is wonderful; I go further: I, who sicken\n\n107)\n\nand freeze at the mere thought of him, when I recall the\nabjection and passion of this attachment, and when I know how he\nfears my power to cut him off by suicide, I find it in my heart\nto pity him.\n\nIt is useless, and the time awfully fails me, to prolong this\ndescription; no one has ever suffered such torments, let that\nsuffice; and yet even to these, habit brought--no, not\nalleviation--but a certain callousness of soul, a certain\nacquiescence of despair; and my punishment might have gone on for\nyears, but for the last calamity which has now fallen, and which\nhas finally severed me from my own face and nature. My provision\nof the salt, which had never been renewed since the date of the\nfirst experiment, began to run low. I sent out for a fresh\nsupply, and mixed the draught; the ebullition followed, and the\nfirst change of colour, not the second; I drank it and it was\nwithout efficiency. You will learn from Poole how I have had\nLondon ransacked; it was in vain; and I am now persuaded that my\nfirst supply was impure, and that it was that unknown impurity\nwhich lent efficacy to the draught.\n\nAbout a week has passed, and I am now finishing this statement\nunder the influence of the last of the old powders. This, then,\nis the last time, short of a miracle, that Henry Jekyll can think\nhis own thoughts or see his own face (now how sadly altered!)\nin the glass. Nor must I delay\n\n108)\n\ntoo long to bring my writing to an end; for if my narrative has\nhitherto escaped destruction, it has been by a combination of\ngreat prudence and great good luck. Should the throes of change\ntake me in the act of writing it, Hyde will tear it in pieces;\nbut if some time shall have elapsed after I have laid it by, his\nwonderful selfishness and Circumscription to the moment will\nprobably save it once again from the action of his ape-like\nspite. And indeed the doom that is closing on us both, has\nalready changed and crushed him. Half an hour from now, when I\nshall again and for ever re-indue that hated personality, I know\nhow I shall sit shuddering and weeping in my chair, or continue,\nwith the most strained and fear-struck ecstasy of listening, to\npace up and down this room (my last earthly refuge) and give ear\nto every sound of menace. Will Hyde die upon the scaffold? or\nwill he find courage to release himself at the last moment? God\nknows; I am careless; this is my true hour of death, and what is\nto follow concerns another than myself. Here then, as I lay down\nthe pen and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of\nthat unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.", "start_char_idx": 137262, "end_char_idx": 140210, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d": {"__data__": {"id_": "465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}, "hash": "cead7cd8227bed85d7c1e84db921f6ed9970843fd64cc43dfd67d386597fa7e2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "30a43743f2290cc6b4477cdc7f55cecc8be196581b4efa41f3a14056f60997bd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "THE DARK OTHER\n\n By Stanley G. Weinbaum\n\n _Fantasy Publishing Co., Inc._\n LOS ANGELES 1950\n\n Copyright 1950 by Fantasy Publishing Co., Inc.\n\n Manufactured in U. S. A.\n\n [Transcriber's Note: Extensive research did not uncover any\n evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]\n\n _Other Books by Stanley G. Weinbaum_\n\n DAWN OF FLAME\n THE NEW ADAM\n THE BLACK FLAME\n A MARTIAN ODYSSEY\n\n\n\n\n CONTENTS\n\n\n Chapter Page\n\n 1. PURE HORROR 9\n\n 2. SCIENCE OF MIND 17\n\n 3. PSYCHIATRICS OF GENIUS 25\n\n 4. THE TRANSFIGURATION 33\n\n 5. A FANTASY OF FEAR 42\n\n 6. A QUESTION OF SCIENCE 50\n\n 7. THE RED EYES RETURN 58\n\n 8. GATEWAY TO EVIL 65\n\n 9. DESCENT INTO AVERNUS 73\n\n 10. RESCUE FROM ABADDON 81\n\n 11. WRECKAGE 89\n\n 12. LETTER FROM LUCIFER 96\n\n 13. INDECISION 104\n\n 14. TOO BIZARRE 112\n\n 15. A MODERN MR. HYDE 119\n\n 16. POSSESSED 127\n\n 17. WITCH-DOCTOR 135\n\n 18. VANISHED 142\n\n 19. MAN OR MONSTER? 149\n\n 20. THE ASSIGNATION 156\n\n 21. A QUESTION OF SYNAPSES 164\n\n 22. DOCTOR AND DEVIL 172\n\n 23. WEREWOLF 180\n\n 24. THE DARK OTHER 186\n\n 25. THE DEMON LOVER 194\n\n 26. THE DEPTHS 201\n\n 27. TWO IN HELL 209\n\n 28. LUNAR OMEN 217\n\n 29. SCOPOLAMINE FOR SATAN 225\n\n 30. THE DEMON FREE 233\n\n 31. \"NOT HUMANLY POSSIBLE\" 242\n\n 32. REVELATION 250\n\n\n\n\nThe Dark Other\n\n\n\n\n1\n\nPure Horror\n\n\n\"That isn't what I mean,\" said Nicholas Devine, turning his eyes on his\ncompanion. \"I mean pure horror in the sense of horror detached from\nexperience, apart from reality. Not just a formless fear, which implies\neither fear of something that _might_ happen, or fear of unknown\ndangers. Do you see what I mean?\"\n\n\"Of course,\" said Pat, letting her eyes wander over the black expanse\nof night-dark Lake Michigan. \"Certainly I see what you mean but I don't\nquite understand how you'd do it. It sounds--well, difficult.\"\n\nShe gazed at his lean profile, clear-cut against the distant light.\nHe had turned, staring thoughtfully over the lake, idly fingering the\nlevers on the steering wheel before him. The girl wondered a little at\nher feeling of contentment; she, Patricia Lane, satisfied to spend an\nevening in nothing more exciting than conversation! And they must have\nparked here a full two hours now. There was something about Nick--she\ndidn't understand exactly what; sensitivity, charm, personality. Those\nwere meaningless cliches, handles to hold the unexplainable nuances of\ncharacter.\n\n\"It _is_ difficult,\" resumed Nick. \"Baudelaire tried it, Poe tried it.\nAnd in painting, Hogarth, Goya, Dore. Poe came closest, I think; he\ncaught the essence of horror in an occasional poem or story. Don't you\nthink so?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" said Pat. \"I've forgotten most of my Poe.\"\n\n\"Remember that story of his--'The Black Cat'?\"\n\n\"Dimly. The man murdered his wife.\"\n\n\"Yes. That isn't the part I mean. I mean the cat itself--the second\ncat.", "start_char_idx": 46, "end_char_idx": 3803, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660": {"__data__": {"id_": "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "05fbcda8f28161cdb47adcff740d30fed44b46b94805e6a871c0ba6e6490c748", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9d7211dbad64c7b636baecd500f496eb9b2edf21f36724beb72dc1483f478a0b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I mean the cat itself--the second\ncat. You know a cat, used rightly, can be a symbol of horror.\"\n\n\"Indeed yes!\" The girl shuddered. \"I don't like the treacherous beasts!\"\n\n\"And this cat of Poe's,\" continued Nick, warming to his subject. \"Just\nthink of it--in the first place, it's black; element of horror. Then,\nit's gigantic, unnaturally, abnormally large. And then it's not all\nblack--that would be inartistically perfect--but has a formless white\nmark on its breast, a mark that little by little assumes a fantastic\nform--do you remember what?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"The form of a gallows!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said the girl. \"Ugh!\"\n\n\"And then--climax of genius--the eyes! Blind in one eye, the other a\nbaleful yellow orb! Do you feel it? A black cat, an enormous black cat\nmarked with a gallows, and lacking one eye, to make the other even\nmore terrible! Literary tricks, of course, but they work, and _that's_\ngenius! Isn't it?\"\n\n\"Genius! Yes, if you call it that. The perverse genius of the Devil!\"\n\n\"That's what I want to write--what I will write some day.\" He watched\nthe play of lights on the restless surface of the waters. \"Pure horror,\nthe epitome of the horrible. It could be written, but it hasn't been\nyet; not even by Poe.\"\n\n\"That little analysis of yours was bad enough, Nick! Why should you\nwant to improve on his treatment of the theme?\"\n\n\"Because I like to write, and because I'm interested in the horrible.\nTwo good reasons.\"\n\n\"Two excuses, you mean. Of course, even if you'd succeed, you couldn't\nforce anyone to read it.\"\n\n\"If I succeed, there'd be no need to force people. Success would mean\nthat the thing would be great literature, and even today, in these\ntimes, there are still people to read that. And besides--\" He paused.\n\n\"Besides what?\"\n\n\"Everybody's interested in the horrible. Even you are, whether or not\nyou deny it.\"\n\n\"I certainly do deny it!\"\n\n\"But you are, Pat. It's natural to be.\"\n\n\"It isn't!\"\n\n\"Then what is?\"\n\n\"Interest in people, and life, and gay times, and pretty things,\nand--and one's self and one's own feelings. And the feelings of the\npeople one loves.\"\n\n\"Yes. It comes to exactly the point I've been stressing. People are\nsordid, life is hopeless, gay times are stupid, beauty is sensual,\none's own feelings are selfish. And love is carnal. That's the array of\nhorrors that holds your interest!\"\n\nThe girl laughed in exasperation. \"Nick, you could out-argue your\nname-sake, the Devil himself! Do you really believe that indictment of\nthe normal viewpoint?\"\n\n\"I do--often!\"\n\n\"Now?\"\n\n\"Now,\" he said, turning his gaze on Pat, \"I have no feeling of it at\nall. Now, right now, I don't believe it.\"\n\n\"Why not?\" she queried, smiling ingenuously at him.\n\n\"You, obviously.\"\n\n\"Gracious! I had no idea my logic was as convincing as that.\"\n\n\"Your logic isn't. The rest of you is.\"\n\n\"That sounds like a compliment,\" observed Pat. \"If it is,\" she\ncontinued in a bantering tone, \"it's the only one I can recall\nobtaining from you.\"\n\n\"That's because I seldom call attention to the obvious.\"\n\n\"And that's another,\" laughed the girl. \"I'll have to mark this date in\nred on my calendar. It's entirely unique in our--let's see--nearly a\nmonth's acquaintance.\"\n\n\"Is it really so short a time? I know you so well that it must have\ntaken years. Every detail!\" He closed his eyes. \"Hair like black silk,\nand oddly dark blue eyes--if I were writing a poem at the moment, I'd\ncall them violet. Tiny lips, the sort the Elizabethan called bee-stung.\nStraight nose, and a figure that is a sort of vest-pocket copy of\nDiana. Right?\" He opened his eyes.\n\n\"Nice, but exaggerated. And even if you were correct, that isn't Pat\nLane, the real Pat Lane.", "start_char_idx": 3765, "end_char_idx": 7410, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c": {"__data__": {"id_": "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "8e9c8e3ca30b63f695b0bea6eeb18070402b9e1b793c38019b40b9969b140aa5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "07c8cc8bbf14847b1c022fce0560d37210c09d3cf88b8166e15c71c20a4c5ef6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "And even if you were correct, that isn't Pat\nLane, the real Pat Lane. A camera could do better on a tenth of a\nsecond's acquaintance!\"\n\n\"Check!\" He closed his eyes again. \"Personality, piquant. Character,\nloyal, naturally happy, intelligent, but not serious. An intellectual\nbutterfly; a dilettante. Poised, cool, self-possessed, yet inherently\naffectionate. A being untouched by reality, as yet, living in Chicago\nand in a make-believe world at the same time.\" He paused, \"How old are\nyou, Pat?\"\n\n\"Twenty-two. Why?\"\n\n\"I wondered how long one could manage to stay in the world of\nmake-believe. I'm twenty-six, and I'm long exiled.\"\n\n\"I don't think you know what you mean by a make-believe world. I'm sure\nI don't.\"\n\n\"Of course you don't. You can't know and still remain there. It's like\nbeing happy; once you realize it, it's no longer perfect.\"\n\n\"Then don't explain!\"\n\n\"Wouldn't make any difference if I did, Pat. It's a queer world, like\nthe Sardoodledom of Sardou and the afternoon-tea school of playwrights.\nAll stage-settings and pretense, but it looks real while you're\nwatching, especially if you're one of the characters.\"\n\nThe girl laughed. \"You're a deliciously solemn sort, Nick. How would\nyou like to hear my analysis of you?\"\n\n\"I wouldn't!\"\n\n\"You inflicted yours on me, and I'm entitled to revenge. And so--you're\nintelligent, lazy, dreamy, and with a fine perception of artistic\nvalues. You're very alert to impressions of the senses--I mean you're\nsensuous without being sensual. You're delightfully serious without\nbeing somber, except sometimes. Sometimes I feel a hint, just a\nthrilling hint, in your character, of something dangerously darker--\"\n\n\"Don't!\" said Nick sharply.\n\nPat shot him a quick glance. \"And you're frightened to death of\nfalling in love,\" she concluded imperturbably.\n\n\"Oh! Do you think so?\"\n\n\"I do.\"\n\n\"Then you're wrong! I can't be afraid of it, since I've known for the\nbetter part of a month that I've been in love.\"\n\n\"With me,\" said the girl.\n\n\"Yes, with you!\"\n\n\"Well!\" said Pat. \"It never before took me a month to extract that\nadmission from a man. Is twenty-two getting old?\"\n\n\"You're a tantalizing imp!\"\n\n\"And so?\" She pursed her lips, assuming an air of disappointment. \"What\nam I to do about it--scream for help? You haven't given me anything to\nscream about.\"\n\nThe kiss, Pat admitted to herself, was quite satisfactory. She yielded\nherself to the pleasure of it; it was decidedly the best kiss she had,\nin her somewhat limited experience, encountered. She pushed herself\naway finally, with a little gasp, gazing bright-eyed at her companion.\nHe was staring down at her with serious eyes; there was a tense twist\nto his mouth, and a curiously unexpected attitude of unhappiness.\n\n\"Nick!\" she murmured. \"Was it as bad as all that?\"\n\n\"Bad! Pat, does it mean you--care for me? A little, anyway?\"\n\n\"A little,\" she admitted. \"Maybe more. Is that what makes you look so\nforlorn?\"\n\nHe drew her closer to him. \"How could I look forlorn, Honey, when\nsomething like this has happened to me? That was just my way of looking\nhappy.\"\n\nShe nestled as closely as the steering wheel permitted, drawing his arm\nabout her shoulders. \"I hope you mean that, Nick.\"\n\n\"Then _you_ mean it? You really do?\"\n\n\"I really do.\"\n\n\"I'm glad,\" he said huskily. The girl thought she detected a strange\ndubious note in his voice. She glanced at his face; his eyes were\ngazing into the dim remoteness of the night horizon.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, \"why were you so--well, so reluctant about admitting\nthis? You must have known I--like you. I showed you that deliberately\nin so many ways.\"\n\n\"I--I wasn't quite sure.\"\n\n\"You were! That isn't it, Nick.", "start_char_idx": 7341, "end_char_idx": 10996, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374": {"__data__": {"id_": "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "e7f3e45a86e3441f6065e94ae5683c51bce5b922ba9d2fc2877fca460ea64c86", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5294f84f1fb5675837fb29b0807456d07bc7167546bf6f6646fc45670fbc7a57", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I--I wasn't quite sure.\"\n\n\"You were! That isn't it, Nick. I had to practically browbeat you into\nconfessing you cared for me. Why?\"\n\nHe stepped on the starter; the motor ground into sudden life. The car\nbacked into the road, turning toward Chicago, that glared like a false\ndawn in the southern sky.\n\n\"I hope you never find out,\" he said.\n\n\n\n\n2\n\nScience of Mind\n\n\n\"She's out,\" said Pat as the massive form of Dr. Carl Horker loomed in\nthe doorway. \"Your treatments must be successful; Mother's out playing\nbridge.\"\n\nThe Doctor gave his deep, rumbling chuckle. \"So much the better, Pat.\nI don't feel professional anyway.\" He moved into the living room,\ndepositing his bulk on a groaning davenport. \"And how's yourself?\"\n\n\"Too well to be a patient of yours,\" retorted the girl. \"Psychiatry!\nThe new religion! Just between friends, it's all applesauce, isn't it?\"\n\n\"If I weren't trying to act in place of your father, I'd resent that,\nyoung lady,\" said the Doctor placidly. \"Psychiatry is a definite\nscience, and a pretty important one. Applied psychology, the science of\nthe human mind.\"\n\n\"If said mind exists,\" added the girl, swinging her slim legs over the\narm of a chair.\n\n\"Correct,\" agreed the Doctor. \"In my practice I find occasional\nevidence that it does. Or did; your generation seems to have found\nsubstitutes.\"\n\n\"Which appears to work just as well!\" laughed Pat. \"All our troubles\nare more or less inherited from your generation.\"\n\n\"Touche!\" admitted Dr. Horker. \"But my generation also bequeathed you\nsome solid values which you don't know how to use.\"\n\n\"They've been weighed and found wanting,\" said Pat airily. \"We're busy\nreplacing them with our own values.\"\n\n\"Which are certainly no better.\"\n\n\"Maybe not, Doc, but at least they're ours.\"\n\n\"Yours and Tom Paine's. I can't see that you young moderns have brought\nany new ideas to the social scheme.\"\n\n\"New or not, we're the first ones to give 'em a try-out. Your crowd\ntook it out in talk.\"\n\n\"That's an insult,\" observed the Doctor cheerfully. \"If I weren't\nacting _in loco parentis_--\"\n\n\"I know! You'd give me a few licks in the spot popularly supposed to\ndo the most good! Well, that's part of a parent's privilege, isn't it?\"\n\n\"You've grown beyond the spanking age, my dear. Physically, if not\nmentally--though I don't say the process would hurt me as much as you.\nI'd doubtless enjoy it.\"\n\n\"Then you might try sending me to bed without my dinner,\" the girl\nlaughed.\n\n\"That's a doctor's prerogative, Pat. I've even done that to your\nMother.\"\n\n\"In other words, you're a complete flop as a parent. All the\nresponsibilities, and none of the privileges.\"\n\n\"That expresses it.\"\n\n\"Well, you elected yourself, Doc. It's not my fault you happened to\nlive next door.\"\n\n\"No. It's my misfortune.\"\n\n\"And I notice,\" remarked Pat wickedly, \"that you're not too thoroughly\n_in loco_ to neglect sending Mother a bill for services rendered!\"\n\n\"My dear girl, that's part of the treatment!\"\n\n\"So? And how?\"\n\n\"I furnish a bill just steep enough to keep your mother from indulging\ntoo frequently in medical services. Without that little practical check\non her inclinations, she'd be a confirmed neurotic. One of those sweet,\nresigned, professional invalids, you know.\"\n\n\"Then why not send her a bill tall enough to cure her altogether?\"\n\n\"She might change to psychoanalysis or New Thought,\" chuckled the\nDoctor. \"Besides, your father wanted me to look after her, and besides\nthat, I like having the run of the house.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm sure I don't mind,\" observed Pat. \"We've a dog and a canary\nbird, too.\"\n\n\"You're in fine fettle this afternoon!\" laughed her companion. \"Must've\nbeen a successful date last night.\"\n\n\"It was.\" Her eyes turned suddenly dreamy.\n\n\"You're in love again, Pat!\" he accused.\n\n\"Again? Why the 'again'?\"", "start_char_idx": 10938, "end_char_idx": 14706, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31": {"__data__": {"id_": "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "d32c70dc11f59f461222f3a5ca7253821995c2583b77b467fc29649b05aba9af", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b7bb87f7d61b95fbe88a8aec32d0c4cf6c6994c573ef46173ab01ea738dca605", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "he accused.\n\n\"Again? Why the 'again'?\"\n\n\"Well, there was Billy, and that Paul--\"\n\n\"Oh, those!\" Her tone was contemptuous. \"Merely passing fancies, Doc.\nJust whims, dreams of the moment--in other words, puppy love.\"\n\n\"And this? I suppose this is different--a grand passion?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" she said, frowning abruptly. \"He's nice, but--odd.\nAttractive as--well, as the devil.\"\n\n\"Odd? How?\"\n\n\"Oh, he's one of those minds you think we moderns lack.\"\n\n\"Intellectual, eh? New variety for you; out of the usual run of your\ndancing collegiates. I've often suspected that you picked your swains\nby the length and lowness of their cars.\"\n\n\"Maybe I did. That was one of the chief differences between them.\"\n\n\"How'd you meet this mental paragon?\"\n\n\"Billy Fields dragged him around to one of those literary evenings he\naffects--where they read Oscar Wilde and Eugene O'Neil aloud. Bill met\nhim at the library.\"\n\n\"And he out-shone all the local lights, I perceive.\"\n\n\"He surely did!\" retorted Pat. \"And he hardly said a word the whole\nevening.\"\n\n\"He wouldn't have to, if they're all like Billy! What's this prodigy's\nspecialty?\"\n\n\"He writes. I think--laugh if you want to!--I think perhaps he's a\ngenius.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Doctor Horker, \"even that's possible. It's been known to\noccur, but rarely, to my knowledge, in your generation.\"\n\n\"Oh, we're just dimmed by the glare of brilliance from yours.\" She\nswung her legs to the floor, facing the Doctor. \"Do you psychiatrists\nactually _know_ anything about love?\" she queried.\n\n\"We're supposed to.\"\n\n\"What is it, then?\"\n\n\"Just a device of Nature's for perpetuating the species. Some organisms\nmanage without it, and do pretty well.\"\n\n\"Yes. I've heard references to the poor fish!\"\n\n\"Then they're inaccurate; fish have primitive symptoms of eroticism.\nBut below the vertebrates, notably in the amoeba, I don't recall any\namorous habits.\"\n\n\"Then your definition doesn't explain a thing, does it?\"\n\n\"Not to one of the victims, perhaps.\"\n\n\"Anyway,\" said Pat decisively, \"I've heard of the old biological urge\nbefore your kind analysis. It doesn't begin to explain why one should\nbe attracted to this person and repelled by that one. Does it?\"\n\n\"No, but Freud does. The famous Oedipus Complex.\"\n\n\"That's the love of son for mother, or daughter for father, isn't it?\nAnd I don't see how that clears up anything; for example, I can just\nbarely remember my father.\"\n\n\"That's plenty. It could be some little trait in these swains of yours,\nsome unimportant mannerism that recalls that memory. Or there's that\nportrait of him in the hall--the one under the mellow red light. It\nmight happen that you'd see one of these chaps under a similar light\nin some attitude that brings the picture to mind--or a hundred other\npossibilities.\"\n\n\"Doesn't sound entirely convincing,\" objected Pat with a thoughtful\nfrown.\n\n\"Well, submit to the proper treatments, and I'll tell you exactly what\ncaused each and every one of your little passing fancies. You can't\nexpect me to hit it first guess.\"\n\n\"Thanks, no! That's one of these courses where you tell the doctor all\nyour secrets, and I prefer to keep what few I have.\"\n\n\"Good judgment, Pat. By the way, you said this chap was odd. Does that\nmean merely that he writes? I've known perfectly normal people who\nwrote.\"\n\n\"No,\" she said, \"it isn't that. It's--he's so sweet and gentle and\nmanageable most of the time, but sometimes he has such a thrilling\nspark of mastery that it almost scares me. It's puzzling but\nfascinating, if you grasp my import.\"\n\n\"Huh! He's probably a naturally selfish fellow who's putting on a good\nshow of gentleness for your benefit. Those flashes of tyranny are\nprobably his real character in moment of forgetfulness.\"\n\n\"You doctors can explain anything, can't you?\"\n\n\"That's our business. It's what we're paid for.\"\n\n\"Well, you're wrong this time. I know Nick well enough to know if he's\nacting.", "start_char_idx": 14668, "end_char_idx": 18553, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3": {"__data__": {"id_": "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "2462728b6c88722a9383f95d8934d2bdb3d2d6d60e48fa70287984a879194c85", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f16ba594985c944fb41065fcf883afd3835e29a2eb60a1f05a6a876b792ef010", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I know Nick well enough to know if he's\nacting. His personality is just what I said--gentle, sensitive, and\nyet--It's perplexing, and that's a good part of his charm.\"\n\n\"Then it's not such a serious case you've got,\" mocked the doctor.\n\"When you're cool enough to analyze your own feelings, and dissect the\nelements of the chap's attraction, you're not in any danger.\"\n\n\"Danger! I can look out for myself, thanks. That's one thing we\nmindless moderns learn young, and don't let me catch you puttering\naround in my romances! _In loco parentis_ or just plain loco, you'll\nget the licking instead of me!\"\n\n\"Believe me, Pat, if I wanted to experiment with affairs of the heart,\nI'd not pick a spit-fire like you as the subject.\"\n\n\"Well, Doctor Carl, you're warned!\"\n\n\"This Nick,\" observed the Doctor, \"must be quite a fellow to get the\nprincess of the North Side so het up. What's the rest of his cognomen?\"\n\n\"Nicholas Devine. Romantic, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Devine,\" muttered Horker. \"I don't know any Devines. Who are his\npeople?\"\n\n\"Hasn't any.\"\n\n\"How does he live? By his writing?\"\n\n\"Don't know. I gathered that he lives on some income left by his\nparents. What's the difference, anyway?\"\n\n\"None. None at all.\" The other wrinkled his brows thoughtfully. \"There\nwas a colleague of mine, a Dr. Devine; died a good many years ago.\nReputation wasn't anything to brag about; was a little off balance\nmentally.\"\n\n\"Well, Nick isn't!\" snapped Pat with some asperity.\n\n\"I'd like to meet him.\"\n\n\"He's coming over tonight.\"\n\n\"So'm I. I want to see your mother.\" He rose ponderously. \"If she's not\nplaying bridge again!\"\n\n\"Well, look him over,\" retorted Pat. \"And I think your knowledge\nof love is a decided flop. I think you're woefully ignorant on the\nsubject.\"\n\n\"Why's that?\"\n\n\"If you'd known anything about it, you could have married mother some\ntime during the last seventeen years. Lord knows you've tried, and\nall you've attained is the state of _in loco parentis_ instead of\n_parens_.\"\n\n\n\n\n3\n\nPsychiatrics of Genius\n\n\n\"How do you charge--by the hour?\" asked Pat, as Doctor Horker returned\nfrom the hall. The sound of her mother's departing footsteps pattered\non the porch.\n\n\"Of course, Young One; like a plumber.\"\n\n\"Then your rates per minute must be colossal! The only time you ever\nsee Mother is a moment or so between bridge games.\"\n\n\"I add on the time I waste with you, my dear. Such as now, waiting to\nlook over that odd swain of yours. Didn't you say he'd be over this\nevening?\"\n\n\"Yes, but it's not worth your rates to have him psychoanalyzed. I can\ndo as well myself.\"\n\n\"All right, Pat. I'll give you a sample analysis free,\" chuckled the\nDoctor, distributing his bulk comfortably on the davenport.\n\n\"I don't like free trials,\" she retorted. \"I sent for a beauty-culture\nbook once, on free trial. I was twelve years only, and returned it in\nseven days, but I'm still getting sales letters in the mails. I must be\non every sucker list in the country.\"\n\n\"So that's the secret of your charm.\"\n\n\"What is?\"\n\n\"You must have read the book, I mean. If you remember the title, I\nmight try it myself. Think it'd help?\"\n\n\"Dr. Carl,\" laughed the girl, \"you don't need a book on beauty\nculture--you need one on bridge! It's that atrocious game you play\nthat's bothering Mother.\"\n\n\"Indeed? I shouldn't be surprised if you were right; I've suspected\nthat.\"\n\n\"Save your surprise for when I'm wrong, Doc. You'll suffer much less\nfrom shock.\"\n\n\"Confident little brat! You're apt to get that knocked out of you some\nday, though I hope you never do.\"\n\n\"I can take it,\" grinned Pat.\n\n\"No doubt you can, but you're an adept at handing it out. Where's this\nchap of yours?\"\n\n\"He'll be along. No one's ever stood me up on a date yet.\"", "start_char_idx": 18506, "end_char_idx": 22208, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05": {"__data__": {"id_": "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "a0f01b9eb4c21dcfa350d15f3d9635311cc1666cf56847eac39c7fb2944f5394", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ddb597da175f409c56907bff05bd22349f425f1f6f3d53aabf30cf8b37efe5a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"He'll be along. No one's ever stood me up on a date yet.\"\n\n\"I can understand that, you imp! Is that the famous Nick?\" he queried\nas a car purred to a stop beyond the windows.\n\n\"No one else!\" said the girl, glancing out. \"The Big Thrill in person.\"\n\nShe darted to the door. Horker turned casually to watch her as she\nopened it, surveying Nicholas Devine with professional nonchalance.\nHe entered, tall, slender, with his thin sensitive features sharply\noutlined in the light of the hall. He cast a quick glance toward the\nDoctor; the latter noted the curious amber-green eyes of the lad, set\nwide in the lean face, deep, speculative, the eyes of a dreamer.\n\n\"Evening, Nick,\" Pat was bubbling. The newcomer gave her a hasty\nsmile, with another glance at the Doctor. \"Don't mind Dr. Carl,\" she\ncontinued. \"Aren't you going to kiss me? It irks the medico, and I\nnever miss a chance.\"\n\nNicholas flushed in embarrassment; he gestured hesitantly, then placed\na hasty peck of a kiss on the girl's forehead. He reddened again at the\nDoctor's rumble of \"Young imp of Satan!\"\n\n\"Not very good,\" said Pat reflectively, obviously enjoying the\nsituation. \"I've known you to do better.\" She pulled him toward the\narch of the living room. \"Come meet Dr. Horker. Dr. Carl, this is the\naforesaid Nicholas Devine.\"\n\n\"Dr. Horker,\" repeated the lad, smiling diffidently. \"You're the\npsychiatrist and brain specialist, aren't you, Sir?\"\n\n\"So my patients believe,\" rumbled the massive Doctor, rising at the\nintroduction, and grasping the youth's hand. \"And you're the genius\nPatricia has been raving about. I'm glad to have the chance of looking\nyou over.\"\n\nNick gave the girl a harassed glance, shifting uncomfortably, and\npatently at a loss for a reply. She grinned mischievously.\n\n\"Sit down, both of you,\" she suggested helpfully. She seized his hat\nfrom the reluctant hands of Nick, sailing it carelessly to a chair.\n\n\"So!\" boomed the Doctor, lowering his great bulk again to the\ndavenport. He eyed the youth sitting nervously before him. \"Devine, did\nyou say?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\"\n\n\"I knew a Devine once. Colleague of mine.\"\n\n\"A doctor? My father was a doctor.\"\n\n\"Dr. Stuart Devine?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\" He paused. \"Did you say you knew him, Dr. Horker?\"\n\n\"Slightly,\" rumbled the other. \"Only slightly.\"\n\n\"I don't remember him at all, of course, I was very young when he--and\nmy mother too--died.\"\n\n\"You must have been. Patricia claims you write.\"\n\n\"I try.\"\n\n\"What sort of material?\"\n\n\"Why--any sort. Prose or poetry; what I feel like writing.\"\n\n\"Whatever inspires you, I suppose?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\" The lad flushed again.\n\n\"Ever have anything published?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir. In _Nation's Poetry_.\"\n\n\"Never heard of it.\"\n\n\"It has a large circulation,\" said Nick apologetically.\n\n\"Humph! Well, that's something. Whom do you like?\"\n\n\"Whom do I like?\" The youth's tone was puzzled.\n\n\"What authors--writers?\"\n\n\"Oh.\" He cast another uncomfortable glance at Pat. \"Why--I like\nBaudelaire, and Poe, and Swinburne, and Villon, and--\"\n\n\"Decadents, all of them!\" sniffed the Doctor. \"What prose writers?\"\n\n\"Well--\" He hesitated--\"Poe again, and Stern, and Rabelais--\"\n\n\"Rabelais!\" Horker's voice boomed. \"Well! Your taste can't be as bad as\nI thought, then. There's one we agree on, anyway. And I notice you name\nno moderns, which is another good point.\"\n\n\"I haven't read many moderns, sir.\"\n\n\"That's in your favor.\"\n\n\"Cut it!\" put in Pat with assumed sharpness. \"You've taken enough\nwhacks at my generation for one day.\"\n\n\"I'm glad to find one of your generation who agrees with me,\" chuckled\nthe Doctor.", "start_char_idx": 22150, "end_char_idx": 25699, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632": {"__data__": {"id_": "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "b4a46bf2488c56f5998b031bc1dac3c491f7a121e8fbc41b085c5504fa285d1d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bf07972124bfaf4c0c91459c9486c7c01a1547b671391aba8d3983ecd5d6d0e5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I'm glad to find one of your generation who agrees with me,\" chuckled\nthe Doctor. \"At least to the extent of not reading its works.\"\n\n\"I'll teach him,\" grinned Pat. \"I'll have him writing vess libre, and\nmaybe even dadaism, in a week.\"\n\n\"Maybe it won't be much loss,\" grunted Horker. \"I haven't seen any of\nhis work yet.\"\n\n\"We'll bring some around sooner or later. We will, won't we, Nick?\"\n\n\"Of course, if you want to. But--\"\n\n\"He's going to say something modest,\" interrupted the girl. \"He's in\nthe retiring mood now, but he's apt to change any moment, and snap your\nsurly head off.\"\n\n\"Humph! I'd like to see it.\"\n\n\"So'd I,\" retorted Pat. \"You've had it coming all day; maybe I'll do it\nmyself.\"\n\n\"You have, my dear, innumerable times. But I'm like the Hydra, except\nthat I grow only one head to replace the one you snap off.\" He turned\nagain to Nicholas. \"Do you work?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir. At my writing.\"\n\n\"I mean how do you live?\"\n\n\"Why,\" said the youth, reddening again in embarrassment, \"my parents--\"\n\n\"Listen!\" said Pat. \"That's enough of Dr. Carl's cross examination.\nYou'd think he was a Victorian father who had just been approached for\nhis daughter's hand. We haven't whispered any news of an engagement to\nyou, have we, Doc?\"\n\n\"No, but I'm acting--\"\n\n\"Sure. _In loco parentis._ We know that.\"\n\n\"You're incorrigible, Pat! I wash my hands of you. Run along, if you're\ngoing out.\"\n\n\"You'll be telling me never to darken my own door again in the next\nbreath!\" She stretched forth a diminutive foot at the extremity of\na superlatively attractive ankle, caught Nick's hat on her toe, and\nkicked it expertly to his lap. \"Come on, Nick. There's a moon.\"\n\n\"There is not!\" objected the Doctor huffily. \"It rises at four, as you\nought to know. You didn't see it last night, did you?\"\n\n\"I didn't notice,\" said the girl. \"Come on, Nick, and we'll watch\nit rise tonight. We'll check up on the Doctor's astronomy, or is it\nchronology?\"\n\n\"You do and I'll know it! I can hear you come home, you imp!\"\n\n\"Nice neighbor,\" observed Pat airily, as she stepped to the door. \"I'll\nbet you peek out of the window, too.\"\n\nShe ignored the Doctor's irritated rumble as she passed into the hall,\nwhere Nick, after a diffident murmur of farewell to Horker, followed.\nShe caught up a light cape, which he draped about her shoulders.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, \"suppose you run out to the car and wait. I think\nI've stepped too hard on Dr. Carl's corns, and I want to give him a\nlittle cheering up. Will you?\"\n\n\"Of course, Pat.\"\n\nShe darted back into the living room, perching on the arm of the\ndavenport beside the Doctor.\n\n\"Well?\" she said, running her hand through his grizzled hair. \"What's\nthe verdict?\"\n\n\"Seems like a nice kid,\" grumbled Horker reluctantly. \"Nice enough,\nbut introverted, repressed, and I shouldn't be surprised to find him\nanti-social. Doesn't adjust easily to his environment; takes refuge in\na dream world of his own.\"\n\n\"That's what he accuses me of doing,\" grinned Pat. \"That all you've got\nagainst him?\"\n\n\"That's all, but where's that streak of mastery you mentioned? You lead\nhim around on a leash!\"\n\n\"It didn't show up tonight. That's the thrill--the unexpectedness of\nit.\"\n\n\"Bah! You must've dreamed it. There's no more aggressiveness in that\nlad than in KoKo, your canary.\"\n\n\"Don't you believe it, Dr. Carl! The trouble is that he's a genius, and\nthat's where your psychology falls flat.\"\n\n\"Genius,\" said the Doctor oracularly, \"is a sublimation of qualities--\"\n\n\"I'll tell you tomorrow how sublime the qualities are,\" called Pat as\nshe skipped out of the door.\n\n\n\n\n4\n\nThe Transfiguration", "start_char_idx": 25617, "end_char_idx": 29204, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34": {"__data__": {"id_": "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "c02b43dd2cd32f205a1dc53c37ebe8ed48adcc5e11ec693ed05ed053b0814685", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f796b14d5977e8aa38099a9ddc2bc80da51abd46ee1d4aa032a543c483590c29", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "4\n\nThe Transfiguration\n\n\nThe car slid smoothly along a straight white road that stretched ahead\ninto the darkness like an earth-bound Milky Way. In the dim distance\nbefore them, red as Antares, glowed the tail-light of some automobile;\nexcept for this lone evidence of humanity, reflected Pat, they might\nhave been flashing through the cosmic depths of interstellar space,\ninstead of following a highway in the very shadow of Chicago. The\ncolossal city of the lake-shore was invisible behind them, and the\nclustering suburbs with it.\n\n\"Queer, isn't it?\" said Pat, after a silence, \"how contented we can\nbe with none of the purchased amusement people crave--shows, movies,\ndancing, and all that.\"\n\n\"It doesn't seem queer to me,\" answered Nick. \"Not when I look at you\nhere beside me.\"\n\n\"Nice of you!\" retorted Pat. \"But it's never happened to me before.\"\nShe paused, then continued, \"How do you like the Doctor?\"\n\n\"How does he like me? That's considerably more to the point, isn't it?\"\n\n\"He thinks you're nice, but--let's see--introverted, repressed, and\nill-adjusted to your environment. I think those were the points.\"\n\n\"Well, _I_ liked _him_, in spite of your manoeuvers, and in spite of\nhis being a doctor.\"\n\n\"What's wrong with being a doctor?\"\n\n\"Did you ever read 'Tristram Shandy'?\" was Nick's irrelevant response.\n\n\"No, but I read the newspapers!\"\n\n\"What's the connection, Pat?\"\n\n\"Just as much connection as there is between the evils of being a\ndoctor and reading 'Tristram Shandy'. I know that much about the book,\nat least.\"\n\n\"You're nearly right,\" laughed Nick. \"I was just referring to one of\nTristram's remarks on doctors and lawyers. It fits my attitude.\"\n\n\"What's the remark?\"\n\n\"Well, he had the choice of professions, and it occurred to him that\nmedicine and law were the vulture professions, since lawyers live\nby men's quarrels and doctors by men's misfortunes. So--he became a\nwriter.\"\n\n\"And what do writers live by?\" queried Pat mischievously. \"By men's\nstupidity!\"\n\n\"You're precious, Pat!\" Nick chuckled delightedly. \"If I'd created you\nto order, I couldn't have planned you more to taste--pepper, tabasco\nsauce, vinegar, spice, and honey!\"\n\n\"And to be taken with a grain of salt,\" retorted the girl, puckering\nher piquant, impish features. She edged closer to him, locking her arm\nthrough his where it rested on the steering wheel.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, her tones suddenly gentle, \"I think I'm pretty crazy\nabout you. Heaven knows why I should be, but it's a fact.\"\n\n\"Pat, dear!\"\n\n\"I'm crazy about you in this meek, sensitive pose of yours, and I'm\nfascinated by those masterful moments you flash occasionally. Really,\nNick, I almost wish you flamed out oftener.\"\n\n\"Don't!\" he said sharply.\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"Let's not talk about me, Pat. It--embarrasses me.\"\n\n\"All right, Mr. Modesty! Let's talk about me, then. I'll promise we\nwon't succeed in embarrassing me.\"\n\n\"And it's quite the most interesting subject in the world, Pat.\"\n\n\"Well, then?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Why don't you start talking? The topic is all attention.\"\n\nHe chuckled. \"How many men have told you you were beautiful, Pat?\"\n\n\"I never kept account.\"\n\n\"And in many different ways?\"\n\n\"Why? Have you, perchance, discovered a new way, Nick?\"\n\n\"Not at all. The oldest way of any, the way of Sappho and Pindar.\"\n\n\"O-ooh!\" She clapped her hands in mock delight. \"Poetry!\"\n\n\"The only medium that could possibly express how lovely you are,\" said\nNick.\n\n\"Nicholas, have you gone and composed a poem to me?\"\n\n\"Composed? No. It isn't necessary, with you here beside me.\"\n\n\"What's that? Some very subtle compliment?\"\n\n\"Not subtle, Pat. You're the poem yourself; all I need do is look at\nyou, listen to you, and translate.\"\n\n\"Neat!\" applauded the girl. \"Do I hear the translation?\"\n\n\"You certainly do.\" He turned his odd amber-green eyes on her, then\nbent forward to the road.", "start_char_idx": 29182, "end_char_idx": 33015, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8": {"__data__": {"id_": "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "bce9562c60bb3152c74618b442c75d78b7a1d3f7d783c9fc472af84f17f5210b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "683036c36e7ad51d49d1a7610515c6bb599c324109c728e6b139b8fd8d7629a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He turned his odd amber-green eyes on her, then\nbent forward to the road. He began to speak in a low voice.\n\n \"In no far country's silent ways\n Shall I forget one little thing--\n The soft intentness of your gaze,\n The sweetness of your murmuring\n Your generously tender praise,\n The words just hinted by a breath--\n In no far country's silent way,\n Unless that country's name be Death--\"\n\nHe paused abruptly, and drove silently onward.\n\n\"Oh,\" breathed Pat. \"Why don't you go on, Nick? Please.\"\n\n\"No. It isn't the mood for this night, Dear. Not this night, alone with\nyou.\"\n\n\"What is, then?\"\n\n\"Nothing sentimental. Something lighter, something--oh, Elizabethan.\nThat's it.\"\n\n\"And what's stopping you?\"\n\n\"Lack of an available idea. Or--wait. Listen a moment.\" He began, this\ntime in a tone of banter.\n\n \"When mornings, you attire yourself\n For riding in the city,\n You're such a lovely little elf,\n Extravagantly pretty!\n And when at noon you deign to wear\n The habit of the town,\n I cannot call to mind as fair\n A symphony in brown.\n\n \"Then evenings, you blithely don\n A daintiness of white,\n To flash a very paragon\n Of lightsomeness--and light!\n But when the rounds of pleasure cease,\n And you retire at night,\n The Godling on your mantelpiece\n Must know a fairer sight!\"\n\n\"Sweet!\" laughed Pat. \"But personal. And anyway, how do you know I've a\ngodling on my mantel? Don't you credit me with any modesty?\"\n\n\"If you haven't, you should have! The vision I mentioned ought to\nenliven even a statue.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the girl, \"I have one--a jade Buddha, and with all the\ncharms I flash before him nightly, he's never batted an eyelash.\nExplain that!\"\n\n\"Easily. He's green with envy, and frozen with admiration, and struck\ndumb by wonder.\"\n\n\"Heavens! I suppose I ought to be thankful you didn't say he was\npetrified with fright!\" Pat laughed. \"Oh Nick,\" she continued, in a\nvoice gone suddenly dreamy, \"this _is_ marvelous, isn't it? I mean our\nenjoying ourselves so completely, and our being satisfied to be so\nalone. Why, we've never even danced together.\"\n\n\"So we haven't. That's a subterfuge we haven't needed, isn't it?\"\n\n\"It is,\" replied the girl, dropping her glossy gleaming black head\nagainst his shoulder. \"And besides, it's much more satisfactory to be\nheld in your arms in private, instead of in the midst of a crowd, and\nsitting down, instead of standing up. But I should like to dance with\nyou, Nick,\" she concluded.\n\n\"We'll go dancing, then, whenever you like.\"\n\n\"You're delightfully complaisant, Nick. But--you're puzzling.\" She\nglanced up at him. \"You're so--so reluctant. Here we've been driving an\nhour, and you haven't tried to kiss me a single time, and yet I'm quite\npositive you care for me.\"\n\n\"Lord, Pat!\" he muttered. \"You never need doubt that.\"\n\n\"Then what is it? Are you so spiritual and ethereal, or is my\nattraction for you just sort of intellectual? Or--are you afraid?\" As\nhe made no reply, she continued, \"Or are those poems you spout about my\nphysical charms just--poetic license?\"\n\n\"They're not, and you know it!\" he snapped. \"You've a mirror, haven't\nyou? And other fellows than I have taken you around, haven't they?\"\n\n\"Oh, I've been taken around! That's what perplexes me about you, Nick.\nI'd think you were actually afraid of kissing me if it weren't--\" Her\nvoice trailed into silence, and she stared speculatively ahead at the\nribbon of road that rolled steadily into the headlights' glare.\n\nShe broke the interval of wordlessness. \"What is it, Nick?\" she\nresumed almost pleadingly. \"You've hinted at something now and then.", "start_char_idx": 32942, "end_char_idx": 36597, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3": {"__data__": {"id_": "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "212927a236eeabcc121b3fd5591fc05efe0bb133a4e288e16fcea7dd5cc65cd7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a3dbfdedda485eaacb980537b39931eb5879e1152df248f542f390f8a2497549", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "she\nresumed almost pleadingly. \"You've hinted at something now and then.\nPlease--you don't have to hesitate to tell me; I'm modern enough to\nforgive things past, entanglements, affairs, disgraces, or anything\nlike that. Don't you think I should know?\"\n\n\"You'd know,\" he said huskily, \"if I could tell you.\"\n\n\"Then there is something, Nick!\" She pressed his arm against her. \"Tell\nme, isn't there?\"\n\n\"I don't know.\" There was the suggestion of a groan in his voice.\n\n\"You don't know! I can't understand.\"\n\n\"I can't either. Please, Pat, let's not spoil tonight; if I could tell\nyou, I would. Why, Pat, I love you--I'm terribly, deeply, solemnly in\nlove with you.\"\n\n\"And I with you, Nick.\" She gazed ahead, where the road rose over the\narch of a narrow bridge. The speeding car lifted to the rise like a\nzooming plane.\n\nAnd suddenly, squarely in the center of the road, another car, until\nnow concealed by the arch of the bridge, appeared almost upon them.\nThere was a heart-stopping moment when a collision seemed inevitable,\nand Pat felt the arm against her tighten convulsively into a bar of\nsteel. She heard her own sobbing gasp, and then, somehow, they had\nslipped unscathed between the other car and the rail of the bridge.\n\n\"Oh!\" she gasped faintly, then with a return of breath, \"That was nice,\nNick!\"\n\nBeyond the bridge, the road widened once more; she felt the car\nslowing, edging toward the broad shoulder of the road.\n\n\"There was danger,\" said her companion in tones as emotionless as the\nrasping of metal. \"I came to save it.\"\n\n\"Save what?\" queried Pat as the car slid to a halt on the turf.\n\n\"Your body.\" The tones were still cold, like grinding wheels. \"The\nbeauty of your body!\"\n\nHe reached a thin hand toward her, suddenly seized her skirt and\nsnatched it above the silken roundness of her knees. \"There,\" he\nrasped. \"That is what I mean.\"\n\n\"Nick!\" Pat half-screamed in appalled astonishment. \"How--\" She paused,\nshocked into abrupt silence, for the face turned toward her was but a\nremote, evil caricature of Nicholas Devine's. It leered at her out of\nblood-shot eyes, as if behind the mask of Nick's face peered a red-eyed\ndemon.\n\n\n\n\n5\n\nA Fantasy of Fear\n\n\nThe satyr beside pat was leaning toward her; the arm about her was\ntightening with a brutal ruthlessness, and while still staring in\nfascination at the incredible eyes, she realized that another arm and\na white hand was moving relentlessly, exploratively, toward her body.\nIt was the cold touch of this hand as it slipped over her silk-sheathed\nlegs that broke the chilling spell of her fascination.\n\n\"Nick!\" she screamed. \"Nick!\" She had a curious sensation of calling\nhim back from far distances, the while she strove with both hands and\nall her strength to press him back from her. But the ruthless force of\nhis arms was overcoming her resistance; she saw the red eyes a hand's\nbreadth from her own.\n\n\"Nick!\" she sobbed in terror.\n\nThere was a change. Abruptly, she was looking into Nick's eyes,\nblood-shot, frightened, puzzled, but indubitably Nick's eyes. The\nflaming orbs of the demon were no more; it was as if they had receded\ninto Nick's head. The arm about her body relaxed, and they were staring\nat each other in a medley of consternation, amazement and unbelief. The\nyouth drew back, huddled in his corner of the car, and Pat, breathing\nin sobs, smoothed out her rumpled apparel with a convulsive movement.\n\n\"Pat!\" he gasped. \"Oh, my God! He couldn't have--\" He paused abruptly.\nThe girl gazed at him without reply.\n\n\"Pat, Dear,\" he spoke in a low, tense murmur, \"I'm--sorry. I don't\nknow--I don't understand how--\"\n\n\"Never mind,\" she said, regaining a vestige of her customary composure.\n\"It's--all right, Nick.\"\n\n\"But--oh, Pat--!\"\n\n\"It was that near accident,\" she said.", "start_char_idx": 36525, "end_char_idx": 40282, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed": {"__data__": {"id_": "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "0606facd0cb22665415bc3333340d7746363121104a142996602475d8dcc2bf0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2bdcad7e45871d286dd7c6a6a8251794a2628c893ded4ebcd92575df9b96749e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"But--oh, Pat--!\"\n\n\"It was that near accident,\" she said. \"That upset you--both of us, I\nmean.\"\n\n\"Yes!\" he said eagerly. \"That's what it was, Pat. It must have been\nthat, but Dear, can you forgive? Do you want to forgive me?\"\n\n\"It's all right,\" she repeated. \"After all, you just complimented my\nlegs, and I guess I can stand that. It's happened before, only not\nquite so--convincingly!\"\n\n\"You're sweet, Pat!\"\n\n\"No; I just love you Nick.\" She felt a sudden pity for the misery in\nhis face. \"Kiss me, Nick--only gently.\"\n\nHe pressed his lips to hers, very lightly, almost timidly. She lay back\nagainst the seat for a moment, her eyes closed.\n\n\"That's you again,\" she murmured. \"This other--wasn't.\"\n\n\"Please, Pat! Don't refer to it,--not ever.\"\n\n\"But it wasn't you, Nick. It was just the strain of that narrow escape.\nI don't hold it against you.\"\n\n\"You're--Lord, Pat, I don't deserve you. But you know that I--I\nmyself--could never touch you except in tenderness, even in reverence.\nYou're too dainty, too lovely, too spirited, to be hurt, or to be held\nroughly, against your will. You know I feel that way about you, don't\nyou?\"\n\n\"Of course. It was nothing, Nick. Forget it.\"\n\n\"If I can,\" he said somberly. He switched on the engine, backed out\nupon the pavement, and turned the car toward the glow that marked\nChicago. Neither of them spoke as the machine hummed over the arching\nbridge and down the slope, where, so few minutes before, the threat of\naccident had thrust itself at them.\n\n\"We won't see a moon tonight,\" said Pat in a small voice, after an\ninterval. \"We'll never check up on Dr. Carl's astronomy.\"\n\n\"You don't want to tonight, Pat, do you?\"\n\n\"I guess perhaps we'd better not,\" she replied. \"We're both upset, and\nthere'll be other nights.\"\n\nAgain they were silent. Pat felt strained, shaken; there was something\nuncanny about the occurrence that puzzled her. The red eyes that had\nglared out of Nick's face perplexed her, and the curious rasping voice\nhe had used still sounded inhumanly in her memory. Out of recollection\nrose still another mystery.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, \"what did you mean--then--when you said there was\ndanger and you came to save me?\"\n\n\"Nothing,\" he said sharply.\n\n\"And then, afterwards, you started to say something about 'He couldn't\nhave--'. Who's 'he'?\"\n\n\"It meant nothing, I tell you. I was frantic to think you might have\nbeen hurt. That's all.\"\n\n\"I believe you, Honey,\" she said, wondering whether she really did. The\nthing was beginning to grow hazy; already it was assuming merely the\nproportions of an upheaval of youthful fervor. Such occurrences were\nnot unheard of, though never before had it happened to Patricia Lane!\nStill, even that was conceivable, far more conceivable than the dark,\nunformed, inchoate suspicions she had been harboring. They hadn't even\nbeen definite enough to be called suspicions; indefinite apprehensions\ncame closer.\n\nAnd yet--that strange, wild face that had formed itself of Nick's fine\nfeatures, and the terrible red eyes! Were they elements in a picture\nconjured out of her own imagination? They must be, of course. She had\nbeen frightened by that hairbreadth escape, and had seen things that\ndidn't exist. And the rest of it--well, that might be natural enough.\nStill, there was something--she knew that; Nick had admitted it.\n\nHorker's words concerning Nick's father rose in her mind. Suspected\nof being crazy! Was that it? Was that the cause of Nick's curious\nreluctance where she was concerned? Was the face that had glared\nat her the visage of a maniac? It couldn't be. It couldn't be, she\ntold herself fiercely. Not her fine, tender, sensitive Nick! And\nbesides, that face, if she hadn't imagined it, had been the face, not\nof a lunatic, but of a devil.", "start_char_idx": 40225, "end_char_idx": 43964, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896": {"__data__": {"id_": "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "ba56bec5295777c9d4b4f9b4e21c427a683dbeb499c277d1e1069d0cd11247c4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6b6d4a1322cdbb43cd7e384c47a19d5b56141da63c24c24e31f099c0929d7e25", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She shook her head, as if to deny her\nthoughts, and placed her hand impulsively on Nick's.\n\n\"I don't care,\" she said. \"I love you, Nick.\"\n\n\"And I you,\" he murmured. \"Pat, I'm sorry about spoiling this evening.\nI'm sorry and ashamed.\"\n\n\"Never mind, Honey. There'll be others.\"\n\n\"Tomorrow?\"\n\n\"No,\" she said. \"Mother and I are going out to dinner. And Friday we're\nhaving company.\"\n\n\"Really, Pat? You're not just trying to turn me off gently.\"\n\n\"Really, Nick. Try asking me for Saturday evening and see!\"\n\n\"You're asked, then.\"\n\n\"And it's a date.\" Then, with a return of her usual insouciance, she\nadded. \"If you're on good behavior.\"\n\n\"I will be. I promise.\"\n\n\"I hope so,\" said Pat. An inexplicable sense of foreboding had come\nover her; despite her self-given assurances, something unnameable\ntroubled her. She gave a mental shrug, and deliberately relegated the\nunpleasant cogitations to oblivion.\n\nThe car turned into Dempster Road; the lights of the teeming\nroadhouses, dance halls, road-side hamburger and barbecue stands\nflashed by. There were many cars here; there was no longer any\nimpression of solitude now, in the overflow from the vast city in\nwhose shadow they moved. The incessant flow of traffic gave the girl\na feeling of security; these were tangible things about her, and once\nmore the memory of that disturbing occurrence became dim and dreamlike.\nThis was Nick beside her, gentle, intelligent, kind; had he ever been\notherwise? It seemed highly unreasonable, a fantasy of fear and the\nhysteria of the moment.\n\n\"Hungry?\" asked Nick unexpectedly.\n\n\"I could use a barbecue, I guess. Beef.\"\n\nThe car veered to the graveled area before a brightly lit stand. Nick\ngave the order to an attendant. He chuckled as Pat, with the digestive\ndisregard of youth attacked the greasy combination.\n\n\"That's like a humming bird eating hay!\" he said. \"Or better, like a\nleprechaun eating that horse-meat they can for dogs.\"\n\n\"You might as well discover that I don't live on honey and\nrose-petals,\" said Pat. \"Not even on caviar and terrapin--at least, not\nexclusively. I leave the dainty palate for Mother to indulge.\"\n\n\"Which is just as well. Hamburger and barbecue are more easily\nbudgeted.\"\n\n\"Nicholas,\" said the girl, tossing the paper napkin out of the car\nwindow, \"is that an indirect and very evasive proposal of marriage?\"\n\n\"You know it could be, if you wished it!\"\n\n\"And do I?\" she said, assuming a pensive air. \"I wonder. Suppose we say\nI'll let you know later.\"\n\n\"And meanwhile?\"\n\n\"Oh, meanwhile we can be sort of engaged. Just the way we've been.\"\n\n\"You're sweet, Pat,\" he murmured, as the car edged into the line of\ntraffic. \"I don't know just how to convey my appreciation, but it's\nthere!\"\n\nThe buildings drew more closely together; the road was suddenly a\nlighted street, and then, almost without realizing it, they were before\nPat's home. Nick walked beside her to the door; he stood facing her\nhesitantly.\n\n\"Good night, Pat,\" he said huskily. He leaned down, kissing her very\ngently, turned, and departed.\n\nThe girl watched him from the open doorway, following the lights of\nhis car until they vanished down the street. Dear, sweet Nick! Then\nthe disturbing memory of that occurrence of the evening returned; she\nfrowned in perplexity as the thought rose. That was all of a piece with\nthe puzzling character of him, and the curious veiled references he'd\nmade. References to what? She didn't know, couldn't imagine. Nick had\nsaid he didn't know either, which added still another quirk to the maze.\n\nShe thought of Dr. Horker's words. With the thought, she glanced at his\nhouse, adjacent to her own home. A light gleamed in the library; he\nwas still awake. She closed the door behind her, and darted across the\nnarrow strip of lawn to his porch. She rang the bell.\n\n\"Good evening, Dr.", "start_char_idx": 43965, "end_char_idx": 47765, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f": {"__data__": {"id_": "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "17e0d16aadc127175ab83f02f34ac74bc01762115d306f3388a02c6fbc7d6f83", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b73c4ee623de8be9f2c0edfb71a0d59e12a0190da51a180b1cf3807d5f88ebe0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She rang the bell.\n\n\"Good evening, Dr. Carl,\" she said as the massive form of Horker\nappeared. She puckered her lips impudently at him as she slipped by him\ninto the house.\n\n\n\n\n6\n\nA Question of Science\n\n\n\"Not that I'm displeased at this visit, Pat,\" rumbled the Doctor,\nseating himself in one of the great chairs by the fireplace, \"but I'm\ncurious. I thought you were dating your ideal tonight, yet here you\nare, back alone a little after eleven. How come?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said the girl nonchalantly, dropping crosswise in the other\nchair, \"we decided we needed our beauty sleep.\"\n\n\"Then why are you here, you young imp?\"\n\n\"Thought you might be lonesome.\"\n\n\"I'll bet you did! But seriously, Pat, what is it? Any trouble?\"\n\n\"No-o,\" she said dubiously. \"No trouble. I just wanted to ask you a few\nhypothetical questions. About science.\"\n\n\"Go to it, then, and quickly. I was ready to turn in.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Pat, \"about Nick's father. He was a doctor, you said, and\nsupposed to be cracked. Was he really?\"\n\n\"Humph! That's curious. I just looked up a brochure of his tonight in\nthe American Medical Journal, after our conversation of this afternoon.\nWhy do you ask that?\"\n\n\"Because I'm interested, of course.\"\n\n\"Well, here's what I remember about him, Pat. He was an M.D., all\nright, but I see by his paper there--the one I was reading--that he was\non the staff of Northern U. He did some work at the Cook County Asylum,\nsome research work, and there was a bit of talk about his maltreating\nthe patients. Then, on top of that, he published a paper that medical\nmen considered crazy, and that started talk of his sanity. That's all I\nknow.\"\n\n\"Then Nick--.\"\n\n\"I thought so! So it's come to the point where you're investigating his\nantecedents, eh? With an eye to marriage, or what?\"\n\n\"Or what!\" snapped Pat. \"I was curious to know, naturally.\"\n\n\"Naturally.\" The Doctor gave her a keen glance from his shrewd eyes.\n\"Did you think you detected incipient dementia in your ideal?\"\n\n\"No,\" said the girl thoughtfully. \"Dr. Carl, is there any sort\nof craziness that could take an ordinarily shy person and make a\npassionate devil of him? I don't mean passionate, either,\" she added.\n\"Rather cold, ruthless, domineering.\"\n\n\"None that I know of,\" said Horker, watching her closely. \"Did this\nNick of yours have one of his masterful moments?\"\n\n\"Worse than that,\" admitted Pat reluctantly. \"We had a near accident,\nand it startled both of us, and then suddenly, he was looking at me\nlike a devil, and then--\" She paused. \"It frightened me a little.\"\n\n\"What'd he do?\" demanded Horker sharply.\n\n\"Nothing.\" She lied with no hesitation.\n\n\"Were there any signs of Satyromania?\"\n\n\"I don't know. I never heard of that.\"\n\n\"I mean, in plain Americanese, did he make a pass at you?\"\n\n\"He--no, he didn't.\"\n\n\"Well, what _did_ he do?\"\n\n\"He just looked at me.\" Somehow a feeling of disloyalty was rising in\nher; she felt a reluctance to betray Nick further.\n\n\"What did he say, then? And don't lie this time.\"\n\n\"He just said--He just looked at my legs and said something about their\nbeing beautiful, and that was all. After that, the look on his face\nfaded into the old Nick.\"\n\n\"Old Nick is right--the impudent scoundrel!\" Horker's voice rumbled\nangrily.\n\n\"Well, they're nice legs,\" said Pat defiantly, swinging them as\nevidence. \"You've said it yourself. Why shouldn't _he_ say it? What's\nto keep him from it?\"\n\n\"The code of a gentleman, for one thing!\"\n\n\"Oh, who cares for your Victorian codes! Anyway, I came here for\ninformation, not to be cross-examined. I want to ask the questions\nmyself.\"\n\n\"Pat, you're a reckless little spit-fire, and you're going to get\nburned some day, and deserve it,\" the Doctor rumbled ominously.", "start_char_idx": 47727, "end_char_idx": 51414, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb": {"__data__": {"id_": "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "384f3b8ea61ddfd836ae0ecde6bdef2264ed100927640a6e1a850c13163c3cdf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "612790ecd7df190150adbf656703b27d684428811175ee8d129413c987f36281", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Ask\nyour fool questions, and then I'll ask mine.\"\n\n\"All right,\" said the girl, still defiant. \"I don't guarantee to answer\nyours, however.\"\n\n\"Well, ask yours, you imp!\"\n\n\"First, then--Is that Satyro-stuff you mentioned intermittent or\ncontinuous?\"\n\n\"It's necessarily intermittent, you numb-skull! The male organism can't\nfunction continuously!\"\n\n\"I mean, does the mania lie dormant for weeks or months, and then flare\nup?\"\n\n\"Not at all. It's a permanent mania, like any other psychopathic sex\ncondition.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Pat thoughtfully, with a sense of relief.\n\n\"Well, go on. What next?\"\n\n\"What are these dual personalities you read about in the papers?\"\n\n\"They're aphasias. An individual forgets his name, and he picks, or is\ngiven, another, if he happens to wander among strangers. He forgets\nmuch of his past experience; the second personality is merely what's\nleft of the first--sort of a vestige of his normal character. There\nisn't any such thing as a dual personality in the sense of two distinct\ncharacters living in one body.\"\n\n\"Isn't there?\" queried the girl musingly. \"Could the second personality\nhave qualities that the first one lacked?\"\n\n\"Not any more than it could have an extra finger! The second is merely\na split off the first, a forgetfulness, a loss of memory. It couldn't\nhave _more_ qualities than the whole, or normal, character; it _must_\nhave fewer.\"\n\n\"Isn't that just too interesting!\" said Pat in a bantering tone. \"All\nright, Dr. Carl. It's your turn.\"\n\n\"Then what's the reason for all this curiosity about perversions and\naphasias? What's happened to your genius now?\"\n\n\"Oh, I'm thinking of taking up the study of psychiatry,\" replied the\ngirl cheerfully.\n\n\"Aren't you going to answer me seriously?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Then what's the use of my asking questions?\"\n\n\"I know the right answer to that one. None!\"\n\n\"Pat,\" said Horker in a low voice, \"you're an impudent little hoyden,\nand too clever for your own good, but you and your mother are very\nprecious to me. You know that.\"\n\n\"Of course I do, Dr. Carl,\" said the girl, relenting. \"You're a dear,\nand I'm crazy about you, and you know that, too.\"\n\n\"What I'm trying to say,\" proceeded the other, \"is simply that I'm\ntrying to help you. I want to help you, if you need help. Do you?\"\n\n\"I guess I don't, Dr. Carl, but you're sweet.\"\n\n\"Are you in love with this Nicholas Devine?\"\n\n\"I think perhaps I am,\" she admitted softly.\n\n\"And is he in love with you?\"\n\n\"Frankly, could he help being?\"\n\n\"Then there's something about him that worries you. That's it, isn't\nit?\"\n\n\"I thought there was, Dr. Carl. I was a little startled by the change\nin him right after we had that narrow escape, but I'm sure it was\nnothing--just imagination. Honestly, that's all that troubled me.\"\n\n\"I believe you, Pat,\" said the Doctor, his eyes fixed on hers. \"But\nguard yourself, my dear. Be sure he's what you think he is; be sure you\nknow him rightly.\"\n\n\"He's clean and fine,\" murmured the girl. \"I _am_ sure.\"\n\n\"But this puzzling yourself about his character, Pat--I don't like it.\nMake doubly sure before you permit your feelings to become too deeply\ninvolved. That's only common sense, child, not psychiatry or magic.\"\n\n\"I'm sure,\" repeated Pat. \"I'm not puzzled or troubled any more. And\nthanks, Dr. Carl. You run along to bed and I'll do likewise.\"\n\nHe rose, accompanying her to the door, his face unusually grave.\n\n\"Patricia,\" he said, \"I want you to think over what I've said. Be\nsure, be doubly sure, before you expose yourself to the possibility of\nsuffering. Remember that, won't you?\"\n\n\"I'll try to. Don't fret yourself about it, Dr. Carl; I'm a hard-boiled\nyoung modern, and it takes a diamond to even scratch me.\"\n\n\"I hope so,\" he said soberly. \"Run along; I'll watch until you're\ninside.\"", "start_char_idx": 51415, "end_char_idx": 55162, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04": {"__data__": {"id_": "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "5de10e1f5512af1296ab6a68eedd93e1b87f81d436ff55ce2947e38dd72c9751", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "25da99f0dfa1af89109ebff9520fcc9f7922114ad2badd1b8e7870c9e1181359", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Run along; I'll watch until you're\ninside.\"\n\nPat darted across the strip of grass, turned at her door to blow a\ngoodnight kiss to the Doctor, and slipped in. She tiptoed quietly to\nher room, slipped off her dress, and surveyed her long, slim legs in\nthe mirror.\n\n\"Why shouldn't he say they were beautiful?\" she queried of the image.\n\"I can't see any reason to get excited over a simple compliment like\nthat.\"\n\nShe made a face over her shoulder at the green Buddha above the\nfireplace.\n\n\"And as for you, fat boy,\" she murmured, \"I expect to see you wink at\nme tonight. And every night hereafter!\"\n\nShe prepared herself for slumber, slipped into the great bed. She had\nhardly closed her lids before the image of a leering face with terrible\nbloody eyes flamed out of memory and set her trembling and shuddering.\n\n\n\n\n7\n\nThe Red Eyes Return\n\n\n\"I suppose I really ought to meet your friends, Patricia,\" said Mrs.\nLane, peering out of the window, \"but they all seem to call when I'm\nnot at home.\"\n\n\"I'll have some of them call in February,\" said Pat. \"You're not out as\noften in February.\"\n\n\"Why do you say I'm not out as often in February?\" demanded her mother.\n\"I don't see what earthly difference the month makes.\"\n\n\"There are fewer days in February,\" retorted Pat airily.\n\n\"Facetious brat!\"\n\n\"So I've been told. You needn't worry, though, Mother; I'm sober,\nsteady, and reliable, and if I weren't, Dr. Carl would see to it that\nmy associates were.\"\n\n\"Yes; Carl is a gem,\" observed her mother. \"By the way, who's this\nNicholas you're so enthusiastic about?\"\n\n\"He's a boy I met.\"\n\n\"What's he like?\"\n\n\"Well, he speaks English and wears a hat.\"\n\n\"Imp! Is he nice?\"\n\n\"That means is his family acceptable, doesn't it? He hasn't any family.\"\n\nMrs. Lane shrugged her attractive shoulders. \"You're a self-reliant\nsort, Patricia, and cool as iced lettuce, like your father. I don't\ndoubt that you can manage your own affairs, and here comes Claude with\nthe car.\" She gave the girl a hasty kiss. \"Good-bye, and have a good\ntime, as I'm sure I shan't with Bret Cutter in the game.\"\n\nPat watched her mother's trim, amazingly youthful figure as she entered\nthe car. More like a companion than a parent, she mused; she liked the\nindependence her mother's attitude permitted her.\n\n\"Better than being watched like a prize-winning puppy,\" she thought.\n\"Maybe Dr. Carl as a father would have a detriment or two along with\nthe advantages. He's a dear, and I'm mad about him, but he does lean to\nthe nineteenth century as far as parental duties are concerned.\"\n\nShe saw Nick's car draw to the curb; as he emerged she waved from the\nwindow and skipped into the hall. She caught up her wrap and bounded\nout to meet him just ascending the steps.\n\n\"Let's go!\" she greeted him. She cast an apprehensive glance at his\nfeatures, but there was nothing disturbing about him. He gave her a\ndiffident smile, the shy, gentle smile that had taken her in that first\nmoment of meeting. This was certainly no one but her own Nick, with no\ntrace of the unsettling personality of their last encounter.\n\nHe helped her into the car, seating himself at her side. He leaned over\nher, kissing her very tenderly; suddenly she was clinging to him, her\nface against the thrilling warmth of his cheek.\n\n\"Nick!\" she murmured. \"Nick! You're just safely you, aren't you? I've\nbeen imagining things that I knew couldn't be so!\"\n\nHe slipped his arm caressingly about her, and the pressure of it was\nlike the security of encircling battlements. The world was outside\nthe circle of his arms; she was within, safe, inviolable. It was some\nmoments before she stirred, lifting her pert face with tear-bright eyes\nfrom the obscurity of his shoulder.\n\n\"So!\" she exclaimed, patting the black glow of her hair into composure.\n\"I feel better, Nick, and I hope you didn't mind.\"\n\n\"Mind!\" he ejaculated.", "start_char_idx": 55118, "end_char_idx": 58955, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed": {"__data__": {"id_": "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "2004c82af8dea5bef5f6742090b7fd7d478b048114661fd8d0bd761aaebd683a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "96d2e85aa179c722879b071fbe0704544b41cde94fbf12e06136aab956fb5eec", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Mind!\" he ejaculated. \"If you mean that as a joke, Honey, it's far too\nsubtle for me.\"\n\n\"Well, I didn't think you'd mind,\" said Pat demurely, settling herself\nbeside him. \"Let's be moving, then; Dr. Carl is nearly popping his eyes\nout in the window there.\"\n\nThe car hummed into motion; she waved a derisive arm at the Doctor's\nwindow by way of indicating her knowledge of his surveillance. \"Ought\nto teach him a lesson some time,\" she thought. \"One of these fine\nevenings I'll give him a real shock.\"\n\n\"Where'll we go?\" queried Nick, veering skilfully into the swift\ntraffic of Sheridan Road.\n\n\"Anywhere!\" she said blithely. \"Who cares as long as we go together?\"\n\n\"Dancing?\"\n\n\"Why not? Know a good place?\"\n\n\"No.\" He frowned in thought. \"I haven't indulged much.\"\n\n\"The Picador?\" she suggested. \"The music's good, and it's not too\nexpensive. But it's 'most across town, and besides, Saturday nights\nwe'd be sure to run into some of the crowd.\"\n\n\"What of it?\"\n\n\"I want to dance with you, Nick--all evening. I want to be without\ndistractions.\"\n\n\"Pat, dear! I could kiss you for that.\"\n\n\"You will,\" she murmured softly.\n\nThey moved aimlessly south with the traffic, pausing momentarily at the\nlight-controlled intersections, then whirring again to rapid motion.\nThe girl leaned against his arm silently, contentedly; block after\nblock dropped behind.\n\n\"Why so pensive, Honey?\" he asked after an interval. \"I've never known\nyou so quiet before.\"\n\n\"I'm enjoying my happiness, Nick.\"\n\n\"Aren't you usually happy?\"\n\n\"Of course, only these last two or three days, ever since our last\ndate, I've been making myself miserable. I've been telling myself\nfoolish things, impossible things, and it's only now that I've thrown\noff the blues. I'm happy, Dear!\"\n\n\"I'm glad you are,\" he said. His voice was strangely husky, and he\nstared fixedly at the street rushing toward them. \"I'm glad you are,\"\nhe repeated, a curious tensity in his tones.\n\n\"So'm I.\"\n\n\"I'll never do anything to make you unhappy, Pat--never. Not--if I can\nhelp it.\"\n\n\"You can help it, Nick. You're the one making me happy; please keep\ndoing it.\"\n\n\"I--hope to.\" There was a queer catch in his voice. It was almost as if\nhe feared something.\n\n\"Selah!\" said Pat conclusively. She was thinking, \"Wrong of me to refer\nto that accident. After all it was harmless; just a natural burst of\npassion. Might happen to anyone.\"\n\n\"Where'll we go?\" asked Nick as they swung into the tree-shadowed road\nof Lincoln Park. \"We haven't decided that.\"\n\n\"Anywhere,\" said the girl dreamily. \"Just drive; we'll find a place.\"\n\n\"You must know lots of them.\"\n\n\"We'll find a new place; we'll discover it for ourselves. It'll mean\nmore, doing that, than if we just go to one of the old places where\nI've been with every boy that ever dated me. You don't want me dancing\nwith a crowd of memories, do you?\"\n\n\"I shouldn't mind as long as they stayed merely memories.\"\n\n\"Well, I should! This evening's to be ours--exclusively ours.\"\n\n\"As if it could ever be otherwise!\"\n\n\"Indeed?\" said Pat. \"And how do you know what memories I might choose\nto carry along? Are you capable of inspecting my mental baggage?\"\n\n\"We'll check it at the door. You're traveling light tonight, aren't\nyou?\"\n\n\"Pest!\" she said, giving his cheek an impudent vicious pinch. \"Nice,\npleasurable pest!\"\n\nHe made no answer. The car was idling rather slowly along Michigan\nBoulevard; half a block ahead glowed the green of a traffic light.\nFaster traffic flowed around them, passing them like water eddying\nabout a slow floating branch.\n\nSuddenly the car lurched forward.", "start_char_idx": 58933, "end_char_idx": 62494, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc": {"__data__": {"id_": "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "e9a0642d5298c4e4c028c24135a1a579d4688bc80a74d192695e73d46d9343e1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "372bcec60fd4e739b6d8eb882628ec571062402f0c9ce22021d4c131918a7b23", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Suddenly the car lurched forward. The amber flame of the warning light\nhad flared out; they flashed across the intersection a split second\nbefore the metallic click of the red light, and a scant few feet before\nthe converging lines of traffic from the side street swept in with\nprotesting horns.\n\n\"Nick!\" the girl gasped. \"You'll rate yourself a traffic ticket! Why'd\nyou cut the light like that?\"\n\n\"To lose your guardian angel,\" he muttered in tones so low she barely\nunderstood his words.\n\nPat glanced back; the lights of a dozen cars showed beyond the barrier\nof the red signal.\n\n\"Do you mean one of those cars was following us? What on earth makes\nyou think that, and why should it, anyway?\"\n\nThe other made no answer; he swerved the car abruptly off the avenue,\ninto one of the nondescript side streets. He drove swiftly to the\ncorner, turned south again, and turned again on some street Pat failed\nto identify--South Superior or Grand, she thought. They were scarcely\na block from the magnificence of Michigan Avenue and its skyscrapers,\nits brilliant lights, and its teeming night traffic, yet here they\nmoved down a deserted dark thoroughfare, a street lined with ramshackle\nwooden houses intermingled with mean little shops.\n\n\"Nick!\" Pat exclaimed. \"Where are we going?\"\n\nThe low voice sounded. \"Dancing,\" he said.\n\nHe brought the car to the curb; in the silence as the motor died, the\nfaint strains of a mechanical piano sounded. He opened the car door,\nstepped around to the sidewalk.\n\n\"We're here,\" he said.\n\nSomething metallic in his tone drew Pat's eyes to his face. The eyes\nthat returned her stare were the bloody orbs of the demon of last\nWednesday night!\n\n\n\n\n8\n\nGateway to Evil\n\n\nPat stared curiously at the apparition but made no move to alight from\nthe vehicle. She was conscious of no fear, only a sense of wonder\nand perplexity. After all, this was merely Nick, her own harmless,\nadoring Nick, in some sort of mysterious masquerade, and she felt full\nconfidence in her ability to handle him under any circumstances.\n\n\"Where's here?\" she said, remaining motionless in her place.\n\n\"A place to dance,\" came the toneless reply.\n\nPat eyed him; a street car rumbled past, and the brief glow from its\nlighted windows swept over his face. Suddenly the visage was that\nof Nick; the crimson glare of the eyes was imperceptible, and the\nfeatures were the well-known appurtenances of Nicholas Devine, but\nqueerly tensed and strained.\n\n\"A trick of the light,\" she thought, as the street car lumbered away,\nand again a faint gleam of crimson appeared. She gazed curiously at the\nyouth, who stood impassively returning her survey as he held the door\nof the car. But the face was the face of Nick, she perceived, probably\nin one of his grim moods.\n\nShe transferred her glance to the building opposite which they had\nstopped. The strains of the mechanical piano had ceased; blank,\nshaded windows faced them, around whose edges glowed a subdued light\nfrom within. A drab, battered, paintless shack, she thought, dismal\nand unpleasant; while she gazed, the sound of the discordant music\nrecommenced, adding, it seemed, the last unprepossessing item.\n\n\"It doesn't look very attractive, Nick,\" she observed dubiously.\n\n\"I find it so, however.\"\n\n\"Then you've been here?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"But I thought you said you didn't know any place to go.\"\n\n\"This one hadn't occurred to me--then.\"\n\n\"Well,\" she said crisply, \"I could have done as well as this with my\neyes closed. It doesn't appeal to me at all, Nick.\"\n\n\"Nevertheless, here's where we'll go. You're apt to find\nit--interesting.\"\n\n\"Look here, Nicholas Devine!\" Pat snapped, \"What makes you think you\ncan bully me? No one has ever succeeded yet!\"\n\n\"I said you'd find it interesting.\" His voice was unchanged; she stared\nat him in complete bafflement.\n\n\"Oh, Nick!\" she exclaimed in suddenly softer tones. \"What difference\ndoes it make? Didn't I say anywhere would do, so we went together?\" She\nsmiled at him. \"This will do if you wish, though really, Honey, I'd\nprefer not.\"\n\n\"I do wish it,\" the other said.", "start_char_idx": 62461, "end_char_idx": 66513, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f": {"__data__": {"id_": "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "73d34fb01b44aa0196b456777a7a99c3a293fdafa53405e222ab80544bfeb867", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "60c54b6030591f8e053b260a2bdf07c94abac612a3445cb0bb400f011c5a22e5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I do wish it,\" the other said.\n\n\"All right, Honey,\" said Pat the faintest trace of reluctance in her\nvoice as she slipped from the car. \"I stick to my bargains.\"\n\nShe winced at the intensity of his grip as he took her arm to assist\nher. His fingers were like taunt wires biting into her flesh.\n\n\"Nick!\" she cried. \"You're hurting me! You're bruising my arm!\"\n\nHe released her; she rubbed the spot ruefully, then followed him to the\ndoor of the mysterious establishment. The unharmonious jangle of the\npiano dinned abruptly louder as he swung the door open. Pat entered and\nglanced around her at the room revealed.\n\nDull, smoky, dismal--not the least exciting or interesting as yet,\nshe thought. A short bar paralleled one wall, behind which lounged a\nlittle, thin, nondescript individual with a small mustache. Half a\ndozen tables filled the remainder of the room; four or five occupied\nby the clientele of the place, as unsavory a group as the girl could\nrecall having encountered on the hither side of the motion picture\nscreen. Two women tittered as Nick entered; then with one accord, the\neyes of the entire group fixed on Pat, where she stood drawing her wrap\nmore closely about her, standing uncomfortably behind her escort. And\nthe piano tinkled its discords in the far corner.\n\n\"Same place,\" said Nick shortly to the bartender, ignoring the glances\nof the others. Pat followed him across the room to a door, into a hall,\nthence into a smaller room furnished merely with a table and four\nchairs. The nondescript man stood waiting in the doorway as Nick took\nher wrap and seated her in one of the chairs.\n\n\"Quart,\" he said laconically, and the bartender disappeared.\n\nPat stared intently, studiously, into the face of her companion. Nick's\nface, certainly; here in full light there was no trace of the red-eyed\nhorror she had fancied out there in the semi-darkness of the street. Or\nwas there? Now--when he turned, when the light struck his eyes at an\nangle, was that a glint of crimson? Still, the features were Nick's,\nonly a certain grim intensity foreign to him lurked about the set of\nhis mouth, the narrowed eye-lids.\n\n\"Well!\" she said. \"So this is Paris! What are you trying to do--teach\nme capital L--life? And where do we dance?\"\n\n\"In here.\"\n\n\"And what kind of quart was that you ordered? You know how little I\ndrink, and I'm darned particular about even that little.\"\n\n\"You'll like this.\"\n\n\"I doubt it.\"\n\n\"I said you'll like it,\" he reiterated in flat tones.\n\n\"I heard you say it.\" She regarded him with a puzzled frown. \"Nick,\"\nshe said suddenly, \"I've decided I like you better in your gentle pose;\nthis masterful attitude isn't becoming, and you can forget what I said\nabout wishing you'd display it oftener.\"\n\n\"You'll like that, too.\"\n\n\"Again I doubt it. Nick, dear, don't spoil another evening like that\nlast one!\"\n\n\"This one won't be like the last one!\"\n\n\"But Honey--\" she paused at the entrance of the bartender bearing a\ntray, an opened bottle of ginger ale, two glasses of ice, and a flask\nof oily amber liquid. He deposited the assortment on the red-checked\ntable cloth.\n\n\"Two dollars,\" he said, pocketed the money and silently retired.\n\n\"Nicholas,\" said the girl tartly, \"there's enough of that poison for a\nregiment.\"\n\n\"I don't think so.\"\n\n\"Well, I won't drink it, and I won't let you drink it! So now what?\"\n\n\"I think you'll do both.\"\n\n\"I don't!\" she snapped. \"And I don't like this, Nick--the place, or the\nliquor, or your attitude, or anything. We're going to leave!\"\n\nInstead of answering, he pulled the cork from the bottle, pouring a\nquantity of the amber fluid into each of the tumblers. To one he added\nan equal quantity of ginger ale, and set it deliberately squarely in\nfront of Pat. She frowned at it distastefully, and shook her head.\n\n\"No,\" she said. \"Not I. I'm leaving.\"", "start_char_idx": 66482, "end_char_idx": 70296, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952": {"__data__": {"id_": "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "ee141f584d220990da01e97d8d38eda42ab8fff35746f82e34b81d17d896ab9a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8b87799b6a77d91123735b606e47fed178959c38381afed82d03db61658406b1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"No,\" she said. \"Not I. I'm leaving.\"\n\nShe made no move, however; her eyes met those of her companion, gazing\nat her with a cold intentness in their curious amber depths. And\nagain--was that a flash of red? Impulsively she reached out her hand,\ntouched his.\n\n\"Oh, Nick!\" she said in soft, almost pleading tones. \"Please, Honey--I\ndon't understand you. Don't you know I love you, Nick? You can hear me\nsay it: I love you. Don't you believe that?\"\n\nHe continued his cold, intense stare; the grim set of his mouth was as\nunrelaxing as marble. Pat felt a shiver of apprehension run through\nher, and an almost hypnotic desire to yield herself to the demands of\nthe inexplicable eyes. She tore her glance away, looking down at the\nred checks of the table cloth.\n\n\"Nick, dear,\" she said. \"I can't understand this. Will you tell me what\nyou--will you tell me why we're here?\"\n\n\"It is out of your grasp.\"\n\n\"But--I know it has something to do with Wednesday night, something\nto do with that reluctance of yours, the thing you said you didn't\nunderstand. Hasn't it?\"\n\n\"Do you think so?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said. \"I do! And Nick, Honey--didn't I tell you I could\nforgive you anything? I don't care what's happened in the past; all I\ncare for is now, now and the future. Don't you understand me? I've told\nyou I loved you, Honey! Don't you love me?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the other, staring at her with no change in the fixity of\nhis gaze.\n\n\"Then how can you--act like this to me?\"\n\n\"This is my conception of love.\"\n\n\"I don't understand!\" the girl said helplessly. \"I'm completely\npuzzled--it's all topsy-turvy.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he said in impassive agreement.\n\n\"But what is this, Nick? Please, please--what is this? Are you mad?\"\nShe had almost added, \"Like your father.\"\n\n\"No,\" he said, still in those cold tones. \"This is an experiment.\"\n\n\"An experiment!\"\n\n\"Yes. An experiment in evil.\"\n\n\"I don't understand,\" she repeated.\n\n\"I said you wouldn't.\"\n\n\"Do you mean,\" she asked, struck by a sudden thought, \"that discussion\nof ours about pure horror? What you said that night last week?\"\n\n\"That!\" His voice was icy and contemptuous. \"That was the drivel of a\nweakling. No; I mean evil, not horror--the living evil that can be so\nbeautiful that one walks deliberately, with open eyes, into Hell only\nto prevent its loss. That is the experiment.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Pat, her own voice suddenly cool. \"Is that what you wish to\ndo--experiment on me?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"And what am I supposed to do?\"\n\n\"First you are to drink with me.\"\n\n\"I see,\" she said slowly. \"I see--dimly. I am a subject, a reagent,\na guinea pig, to provide you material for your writing. You propose\nto use me in this experiment of yours--this experiment in evil. All\nright!\" She picked up the tumbler; impulsively she drained it. The\nliquor, diluted as it was, was raw and strong enough to bring tears\nsmarting to her eyes. Or _was_ it the liquor?\n\n\"All right!\" she cried. \"I'll drink it all--the whole bottle!\" She\nseized the flask, filling her tumbler to the brim, while her companion\nwatched her with impassive gaze. \"You'll have your experiment! And\nthen, Nicholas Devine, we're through! Do you hear me? Through!\"\n\nShe caught up the tumbler, raised it to her lips, and drained the\nsearing liquid until she could see her companion's cold eyes regarding\nher through the glass of its bottom.\n\n\n\n\n9\n\nDescent into Avernus\n\n\nPat slammed the empty tumbler down on the checked table cloth and\nburied her face in her hands, choking and gasping from the effects\nof the fiery liquor. Her throat burned, her mouth was parched by the\nacrid taste, and a conflagration seemed to be raging somewhere within\nher.", "start_char_idx": 70259, "end_char_idx": 73874, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99": {"__data__": {"id_": "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "56652379b212934cfbe0aa1462d36c54f33c5a6bde7594d9c385ea608b80c4ed", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e157fadccd00286837d44361383ea828b4897876a4ea193cfd825d2b08df7db3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Then she steadied, raised her eyes, and stared straight into the\nstrange eyes of Nicholas Devine.\n\n\"Well?\" she said fiercely. \"Is that enough?\"\n\nHe was watching her coldly as an image or a painting; the intensity of\nhis gaze was more cat-like than human. She moved her head aside; his\neyes, without apparent shift, were still on hers, like the eyes of a\npictured face. A resurgence of anger shook her at his immobility; his\naloofness seemed to imply that nothing she could do would disturb him.\n\n\"Wasn't it enough?\" she screamed. \"Wasn't it? Then look!\"\n\nShe seized the bottle, poured another stream of the oily liquid\ninto her glass, and raised it to her lips. Again the burning fluid\nexcoriated her tongue and throat, and then suddenly, the tumbler was\nstruck from her hand, spilling the rest of its contents on the table.\n\n\"That is enough,\" said the icy voice of her companion.\n\n\"Oh, it is? We'll see!\" She snatched at the bottle, still more than\nhalf full. The thin hand of Nicholas Devine wrenched it violently away.\n\n\"Give me that!\" she cried. \"You wanted what you're getting!\" The warmth\nwithin her had reached the surface now; she felt flushed, excited,\nreckless, and desperately angry.\n\nThe other set the bottle deliberately on the floor; he rose, circled\nthe table, and stood glaring down at her with that same inexplicable\nexpression. Suddenly he raised his hand; twisting her black hair in\nhis fist, he dealt her a stinging blow across the lips half-opened to\nscream, then flung her away so violently that she nearly sprawled from\nher chair.\n\nThe scream died in her throat; dazed by the blow, she dropped her head\nto the table, while sobs of pain and fear shook her. Coherent thought\nhad departed, and she knew only that her lips stung, that her clear,\nactive little mind was caught in a mesh of befuddlement. She couldn't\nthink; she could only sob in the haze of dizziness that encompassed\nher. After a long interval, she raised her head, opened her eyes upon\na swaying, unsteady world, and faced her companion, who had silently\nresumed his seat.\n\n\"Nicholas Devine,\" she said slowly, speaking as if each word were an\neffort, \"I hate you!\"\n\n\"Ah!\" he said and was again silent.\n\nShe forced her eyes to focus on his face, while his features danced\nvaguely as if smoke flowed between the two of them. It was as if there\nwere smoke in her mind as well; she made a great effort to rise above\nthe clouds that bemused her thoughts.\n\n\"Take me home,\" she said. \"Nicholas, I want to go home.\"\n\n\"Why should I?\" he asked impassively. \"The experiment is hardly begun.\"\n\n\"Experiment?\" she echoed dully. \"Oh, yes--experiment. I'm an\nexperiment.\"\n\n\"An experiment in evil,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes--in evil. And I hate you! That's evil enough, isn't it?\"\n\nHe reached down, lifted the bottle to the table, and methodically\npoured himself a drink of the liquor. He raised it, watching the oily\nswirls in the light, then tipped the fluid to his lips while the girl\ngazed at him with a sullen set to her own lips. A tiny crimson spot\nhad appeared in the corner of her mouth; at its sting, she raised her\nhand and brushed it away. She stared as if in unbelief at the small red\nsmear it left on her fingers.\n\n\"Nicholas,\" she said pleadingly, \"won't you take me home? Please,\nNicholas, I want to leave here.\"\n\n\"Do you hate me?\" he asked, a queer twisting smile appearing on his\nlips.\n\n\"If you'll take me home I won't,\" said Pat, snatching through the\nrising clouds of dizziness at a straw of logic. \"You're going to take\nme home, aren't you?\"\n\n\"Let me hear you say you hate me!\" he demanded, rising again. The girl\ncringed away with a little whimper as he approached. \"You hate me,\ndon't you?\"\n\nHe twisted his hand again in her ebony hair, drawing her face back so\nthat he stared down at it.\n\n\"There's blood on your lips,\" he said as if gloating.", "start_char_idx": 73875, "end_char_idx": 77700, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4": {"__data__": {"id_": "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "a79a749e87512350a6760dc05227cb7ecacef9957e8f689f1869a2cee9deffbd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e3f528f5c91c545d5aa0ad03518a4ac433877fd23231d734a0dbf91fbb42d2d9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"There's blood on your lips,\" he said as if gloating. \"Blood on your\nlips!\"\n\nHe clutched her hair more tightly; abruptly he bent over her, pressing\nhis mouth to hers. Her bruised lips burned with pain at the fierce\npressure of his; she felt a sharp anguish at the impingement of his\nteeth. Yet the cloudy pall of dizziness about her was unbroken; she was\ntoo frightened and bewildered for resistance.\n\n\"Blood on your lips!\" he repeated exultingly. \"Now is the beauty of\nevil!\"\n\n\"Nicholas,\" she said wearily, clinging desperately to a remnant of\nlogic, \"what do you want of me? Tell me what you want and then let me\ngo home.\"\n\n\"I want to show you the face of evil,\" he said. \"I want you to know the\nglory of evil, the loveliness of supreme evil!\"\n\nHe dragged his chair around the table, placing it beside her. Seated,\nhe drew her into his arms, where she lay passive, too limp and\nbefuddled to resist. With a sudden movement, he turned her so that her\nback rested across his knees, her face gazing up into his. He stared\nintently down at her, and the light, shining at an angle into his eyes,\nsuddenly struck out the red glow that lingered in them.\n\n\"I want you to know the power of evil,\" he murmured. \"The irresistible,\nincomprehensible fascination of it, and the unspeakable pleasures of\nindulgence in it.\"\n\nPat scarcely heard him; she was struggling now in vain against the\noverwhelming fumes of the alcohol she had consumed. The room was\nwavering around her, and behind her despair and terror, a curious\nelation was thrusting itself into her consciousness.\n\n\"Evil,\" she echoed vaguely.\n\n\"Blood on your lips!\" he muttered, peering down at her. \"Taste the\nunutterable pleasure of kisses on bloody lips; drain the sweet anguish\nof pain, the fierce delight of suffering!\"\n\nHe bent down; again his lips pressed upon hers, but this time she felt\nherself responding. Some still sane portion of her brain rebelled,\nbut the intoxication of sense and alcohol was dominant. Suddenly she\nwas clinging to him, returning his kisses, glorying in the pain of her\nlacerated lips. A red mist suffused her; she had no consciousness of\nanything save the exquisite pain of the kiss, that somehow contrived\nto transform itself into an ecstacy of delight. She lay gasping as the\nother withdrew his lips.\n\n\"You see!\" he gloated. \"You understand! Evil is open to us, and all the\nunutterable pleasures of the damned, who cry out in transports of joy\nat the bite of the flames of Hell. Do you see?\"\n\nThe girl made no answer, sobbing in a chaotic mingling of pain and\nexcruciating pleasure. She was incapable of speech or connected\nthought; the alcohol beat against her brain with a persistence that\ndefied resistance. After a moment, she stirred, struggling erect to a\nsitting posture.\n\n\"Evil!\" she said dizzily. \"Evil and good--what's difference? All in a\nlifetime!\"\n\nShe felt a surge of tipsy elation, and then the muffled music of the\nmechanical piano, drifting through the closed door, penetrated her\nbefuddled consciousness.\n\n\"I want to dance!\" she cried. \"I'm drunk and I want to dance! Am I\ndrunk?\" she appealed to her companion.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said.\n\n\"I am not! I just want to dance, only it's hot in here. Dance with me,\nNicholas--show me an evil dance! I want to dance with the Devil, and\nI will! You're the Devil, name and all! I want to dance with Old Nick\nhimself!\"\n\nShe rose unsteadily from her chair; instantly the room reeled crazily\nabout her and she fell sprawling. She felt the grasp of arms beneath\nher shoulders, raising her erect; she leaned against the wall and heard\nherself laughing wildly.\n\n\"Funny room!\" she said. \"Evil room--on pivots!\"\n\n\"You're still to learn,\" came the toneless voice of Nicholas Devine.\n\"Do you want to see the face of evil?\"\n\n\"Sure!\" she said. \"Got a good memory for faces!\"", "start_char_idx": 77647, "end_char_idx": 81443, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530": {"__data__": {"id_": "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "63d827e6e49abe86e8841603bfbd3df0253bb5b23cffde5a624baffc3326714b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9cde75f7e14b3558c7e2930d860f62e0dc60c2fca50971d5233845cf2ee93784", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Sure!\" she said. \"Got a good memory for faces!\"\n\nShe realized that he was fumbling with the catch of her dress on her\nleft shoulder; again some remnant, some vestige of sanity deep in her\nbrain warned her.\n\n\"Mustn't,\" she said vaguely.\n\nThen suddenly the catch was open; the dress dropped away around her,\ncrumpling to a shapeless blob of cloth about her diminutive feet. She\ncovered her face with her hands, fighting to hold that last, vanishing\nvestige of sobriety, while she stood swaying drunkenly against the wall.\n\nThen Nicholas Devine's arms were about her again; she felt the sharp\nsting of his kisses on her throat. He swung her about, bent her\nbackwards across the low table; she was conscious of a bewildered\nsensation of helplessness and of little else.\n\n\"Now the supreme glory of evil!\" he was muttering in her ear. She felt\nhis hands on her bare shoulders as he pressed her backward.\n\nThen, abruptly, he paused, releasing her. She sat dizzily erect,\nfollowing the direction of his gaze. In the half open door stood the\nnondescript bartender leering in at them.\n\n\n\n\n10\n\nRescue from Abaddon\n\n\nPat slid dizzily from her perch on the table and sank heavily to\na chair. The interruption of the mustached keeper of this den\nof contradictions struck her as extremely humorous; she giggled\nhysterically as her wavering gaze perceived the consternation in his\nsharp little face. Some forlorn shred of modesty asserted itself, and\nshe dragged a corner of the red-checked table cloth across her knees.\n\n\"Get out!\" said Nicholas Devine in that voice of rasping metal. \"Get\nout!\" he repeated in unchanging tones.\n\nThe other made no move to leave. \"Yeah?\" he said. \"Listen, Bud--this\nplace is respectable, see? You want to pull something like this, you go\nupstairs, see? And pay for your room.\"\n\n\"Get out!\" There was no variation in the voice.\n\n\"_You_ get out! The both of you, see?\"\n\nNicholas Devine stepped slowly toward him; his back, as he advanced\nupon the bartender, was toward Pat, yet through the haze of\nintoxication, she had an impression of evil red eyes in a chill,\nimpassive face. \"Get out!\"\n\nThe other had no stomach for such an adversary. He backed out of the\ndoor, closing it as he vanished. His voice floated in from the hall.\n\n\"I'm telling you!\" he called. \"Clear out!\"\n\nNicholas Devine turned back toward the girl. He surveyed her sitting in\nher chair; she had dropped her chin to her hand to steady the whirling\nof her head.\n\n\"We'll go,\" he said. \"Come on.\"\n\n\"I just want to sit here,\" she said. \"Just let me sit here. I'm tired.\"\n\n\"Come on,\" he repeated.\n\n\"Why?\" she muttered petulantly. \"I'm tired.\"\n\n\"I want no interruptions. We'll go elsewhere.\"\n\n\"Must dress!\" she murmured dazedly, \"can't go on street without dress.\"\n\nNicholas Devine swept her frock from its place in the corner, gathered\nher wrap from the chair, and flung them over his arm. He grasped her\nwrist, tugging her to an unsteady standing position.\n\n\"Come on,\" he said.\n\n\"Dress!\"\n\nHe snatched the red checked table cloth from its place, precipitating\nbottles, ash-tray, and glasses into an indiscriminate pile, and threw\nthe stained and odorous fabric across her shoulders. She gathered it\nabout her like a toga; it hung at most points barely below her waist,\nbut it satisfied the urge of her muddled mind for a covering of some\nsort.\n\n\"We'll go through the rear,\" her companion said. \"Into the alley. I\nwant no trouble with that rat in the bar--yet!\"\n\nHe still held Pat's wrist; she stumbled after him as he dragged her\ninto the darkness of the hall. They moved through it blindly to a door\nat the far end; Nicholas swung it open upon a dim corridor flanked by\nbuildings on either side, with a strip of star-sprinkled sky above.\n\nPat's legs were somehow incapable of their usual lithe grace; she\nfailed to negotiate the single step, and crashed heavily to the\nconcrete paving.", "start_char_idx": 81395, "end_char_idx": 85261, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366": {"__data__": {"id_": "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "ad93c65d1fe318b415e2eda4386c9c54b98217fa10f5b2afadab3da2c2e48717", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2e3e76584c706d8acc7b5077c0b1b7da390582ae8c081e6907a2fc24d21f774c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The shock and the cooler air of the open steadied her\nmomentarily; she felt no pain from her bruised knees, but a temporary\nrift in the fog that bound her mind. She gathered the red-checked cloth\nmore closely about her shoulders as her companion, still clutching her\nwrist, jerked her violently to her feet.\n\nThey moved into the gulch of the alley, and here she found difficulty\nin following. Her tiny high-heeled pumps slipped at every step on\nthe uneven cobbles of the paving, and the unsteady footing made her\nlurch and stumble until the dusty stretch of the alley was a writhing\npanorama of shadows and lighted windows and stars. Nicholas Devine\nturned an impatient glare on her, and here in the semi-darkness, his\nface was again the face of the red-eyed demon. She dragged him to a\nhalt, laughing strangely.\n\n\"There it is!\" she cried, pointing at him with her free hand. He turned\nagain, staring at her with grim features.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"There! Your face--the face of evil!\" Again she laughed hysterically.\n\nThe other stepped to her side; the disturbing eyes were inches from\nher own. He raised his hand as she laughed, slapped her sharply, so\nthat her head reeled. He seized her shoulders, shaking her until the\ncheckered cloth billowed like a flag in a wind.\n\n\"Now come!\" he muttered.\n\nBut the girl, laughing no longer, leaned pale and weak against a\nlow board fence. Her limbs seemed paralyzed, and movement was quite\nimpossible. She was conscious of neither the blow nor the shaking, but\nonly of a devastating nausea and an all-encompassing weakness. She bent\nover the fence; she was violently ill.\n\nThen the nausea had vanished, and a weariness, a strange lassitude, was\nall that remained. Nicholas Devine stood over her; suddenly he pressed\nher body to him in a convulsive embrace, so that her head dropped back,\nand his face loomed above her, obliterating the stars.\n\n\"Ah!\" he said. He seemed about to kiss her when a\nsound--voices--filtered out of somewhere in the maze of dark courts\nand littered yards along the alley. He released her, seized her wrist,\nand once more she was stumbling wretchedly behind him over the uneven\nsurface of the cobblestones.\n\nA numbness had come over her; consciousness burned very low as she\nwavered doggedly along through the darkness. She perceived dimly that\nthey were approaching the end of the alley; the brighter glow of the\nstreet loomed before them, and a passing motor car cut momentary\nparallel shafts of luminescence across the opening.\n\nNicholas Devine slowed his pace, still clutching her wrist in a cold\ngrip; he paused, moving cautiously toward the corner of the building.\nHe peered around the edge of the structure, surveying the now deserted\nstreet, while Pat stood dully behind him, incapable alike of thought or\nvoluntary movement, clutching desperately at the dirty cloth that hung\nabout her shoulders.\n\nHer companion finished his survey; apparently satisfied that progress\nwas safe, he dragged her after him, turning toward the corner beyond\nwhich his car was parked. The girl staggered behind him with\ndiminishing vigor; consciousness was very nearly at the point of\ndisappearance, and her steps were wavering unsteadily, and doggedly\nslow. She dragged heavily on his arm; he gave a gesture of impatience\nat her weakness.\n\n\"Come on!\" he growled. \"We're just going to the corner.\" His voice rose\nslightly in pitch, still sounding harsh as rasping metals. \"There still\nremains the ultimate evil!\" he said. \"There is still a depth of beauty\nunplumbed, a pain whose exquisite pleasure is yet to find!\"\n\nThey approached the corner; abruptly Nicholas Devine drew back as two\nfigures came unexpectedly into view from beyond it. He turned back\ntoward the alley-way, dragging the girl in a dizzy circle. He took a\nfew rapid steps.\n\nBut Pat was through, exhausted. At his first step she stumbled and\nsprawled, dragging prone behind him. He released her hand and turned\ndefiantly to face the approaching men, while the girl lying on the\npavement struggled to a sitting posture with her back against the wall.", "start_char_idx": 85262, "end_char_idx": 89321, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473": {"__data__": {"id_": "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "689e84442e9145771f55549f1446c7812d80edddca85408c508872ae8f50e29c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "5f4a737152c59edd69c07ff85e6b6748bb9abe4c67f0b9b7f55791a69a027a45", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She turned dull, indifferent eyes on the scene, then was roused to a\nsomewhat higher pitch of interest by the sound of a familiar voice.\n\n\"There he is! I told you it was his car.\"\n\nDr. Horker! She struggled for clarity of thought; she realized dimly\nthat she ought to feel relief, happiness--but all she could summon\nwas a faint quickening of interest, or rather, a diminution of the\nlassitude that held her. She drew the rag of a table cloth about her\nand huddled against the wall, watching. The Doctor and some strange\nman, burly and massive in the darkness, dashed upon them, while\nNicholas Devine waited, his red-orbed face a demoniac picture of cold\ncontempt. Then the Doctor glanced at her huddled, bedraggled figure;\nshe saw his face aghast, incredulous, as he perceived the condition of\nher clothing.\n\n\"Pat! My God, girl! What's happened? Where've you been?\"\n\nShe found a hidden reserve somewhere within her. Her voice rose, shrill\nand hysterical.\n\n\"We've been in Hell!\" she said. \"You came to take me back, didn't you?\nOrpheus and Eurydice!\" She laughed. \"Dr. Orpheus Horker!\"\n\nThe Doctor flashed her another incredulous glance and a grim and very\nterrible expression flamed in his face. He turned toward Nicholas\nDevine, his hands clenching, his mouth twisting without utterance,\nwith no sound save a half-audible snarl. Then he spoke, a low, grating\nphrase flung at his thick-set companion.\n\n\"Bring the car,\" was all he said. The man lumbered away toward the\ncorner, and he turned again toward Nicholas Devine, who faced him\nimpassively. Suddenly his fist shot out; he struck the youth or demon\nsquarely between the red eyes, sending him reeling back against the\nbuilding. Then the Doctor turned, bending over Pat; she felt the\npressure of his arms beneath knees and shoulders. He was carrying her\ntoward a car that drew up at the curb; he was placing her gently in the\nback seat. Then, without a glance at the figure still leaning against\nthe building, he swept from the sidewalk the dark mass that was Pat's\ndress and her wrap, and re-entered the car beside her.\n\n\"Shall I turn him in?\" asked the man in the front seat.\n\n\"We can't afford the publicity,\" said the Doctor, adding grimly, \"I'll\nsettle with him later.\"\n\nPat's head lurched as the car started; she was losing consciousness,\nand realized it vaguely, but she retained one impression as the vehicle\nswung into motion. She perceived that the face of the lone figure\nleaning against the building, a face staring at her with horror and\nunbelief, was no longer the visage of the demon of the evening, but\nthat of her own Nick.\n\n\n\n\n11\n\nWreckage\n\n\nPat opened her eyes reluctantly, with the impression that something\nunpleasant awaited her return to full consciousness. Something, as yet\nshe could not recall just what, had happened to her; she was not even\nsure where she was awakening.\n\nHowever, her eyes surveyed her own familiar room; there opposite the\nbed grinned the jade Buddha on his stand on the mantel--the one that\nNick had--Nick! A mass of troubled, terrible recollections thrust\nthemselves suddenly into consciousness. She visioned a medley of\ndisturbing pictures, as yet disconnected, unassorted, but waiting only\nthe return of complete wakefulness. And she realized abruptly that her\nhead ached miserably, that her mouth was parched, that twinges of pain\nwere making themselves evident in various portions of her anatomy. She\nturned her head and caught a glimpse of a figure at the bed-side; her\nstartled glance revealed Dr. Horker, sitting quietly watching her.\n\n\"Hello, Doctor,\" she said, wincing as her smile brought a sharp pain\nfrom her lips. \"Or should I say, Good morning, Judge?\"\n\n\"Pat!\" he rumbled, his growling tones oddly gentle. \"Little Pat! How do\nyou feel, child?\"\n\n\"Fair,\" she said. \"Just fair. Dr. Carl, what happened to me last night?\nI can't seem to remember--Oh!\"\n\nA flash of recollection pierced the obscure muddle.", "start_char_idx": 89322, "end_char_idx": 93238, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea": {"__data__": {"id_": "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "0758e71fea22a589cd6f64378fcbe470cbd7ecff43c47cf0b818bd0580ee414c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "735c9e513a059e9478fd1b926ee4b1708e06019a89e9b8ea74aab629291bd4a2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "A flash of recollection pierced the obscure muddle. She remembered\nnow--not all of the events of that ghastly evening, but enough. Too\nmuch!\n\n\"Oh!\" she murmured faintly. \"Oh, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he nodded. \"'Oh!'--and would you mind very much telling me what\nthat 'Oh' of yours implies?\"\n\n\"Why--\". She paused shuddering, as one by one the events of that\nsequence of horrors reassembled themselves. \"Yes, I'd mind very\nmuch,\" she continued. \"It was nothing--\" She turned to him abruptly.\n\"Oh, it was, though, Dr. Carl! It was horrible, unspeakable,\nincomprehensible!--But I can't talk about it! I can't!\"\n\n\"Perhaps you're right,\" said the Doctor mildly. \"Don't you really want\nto discuss it?\"\n\n\"I do want to,\" admitted the girl after a moment's reflection. \"I want\nto--but I can't. I'm afraid to think of all of it.\"\n\n\"But what in Heaven's name did you do?\"\n\n\"We just started out to go dancing,\" she said hesitatingly. \"Then, on\nthe way to town, Nick--changed. He said someone was following us.\"\n\n\"Some one was,\" said Horker. \"_I_ was, with Mueller. That Nick of yours\nhas the Devil's own cleverness!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" the girl echoed soberly. \"The Devil's own!--Who's Mueller, Dr.\nCarl?\"\n\n\"He's a plain-clothes man, friend of mine. I treated him once. What do\nyou mean by changed?\"\n\n\"His eyes,\" she said. \"And his mouth. His eyes got reddish and\nterrible, and his mouth got straight and grim. And his voice turned\nsort of--harsh.\"\n\n\"Ever happen before, that you know of?\"\n\n\"Once. When--\" She paused.\n\n\"Yes. Last Wednesday night, when you came over to ask those questions\nabout pure science. What happened then?\"\n\n\"We went to a place to dance.\"\n\n\"And that's the reason, I suppose,\" rumbled the Doctor sardonically,\n\"that I found you wandering about the streets in a table cloth,\nstep-ins, and a pair of hose! That's why I found you on the verge of\npassing out from rotten liquor, and looking like the loser of a battle\nwith an airplane propellor! What happened to your face?\"\n\n\"My face? What's wrong with it?\"\n\nThe Doctor rose from his chair and seized the hand-mirror from her\ndressing table.\n\n\"Look at it!\" he commanded, passing her the glass.\n\nPat gazed incredulously at the reflection the surface presented; a dark\nbruise colored her cheek, her lips were swollen and discolored, and her\nchin bore a jagged scratch. She stared at the injuries in horror.\n\n\"Your knees are skinned, too,\" said Horker. \"Both of them.\"\n\nPat slipped one pajamaed limb from the covers, drawing the pants-leg up\nfor inspection. She gasped in startled fright at the great red stain on\nher knee.\n\n\"That's mercurochrome,\" said the Doctor. \"I put it there.\"\n\n\"_You_ put it there. How did I get home last night, Dr. Carl? How did I\nget to bed?\"\n\n\"I'm responsible for that, too. I put you to bed.\" He leaned forward.\n\"Listen, child--your mother knows nothing about this as yet. She wasn't\nhome when I brought you in, and she's not awake yet this morning.\nWe'll tell her you had an automobile accident; explain away those\nbruises.--And now, how did you get them?\"\n\n\"I fell, I guess. Two or three times.\"\n\n\"That bruise on your cheek isn't from falling.\"\n\nThe girl shuddered. Now in the calm light of morning, the events of\nlast night seemed doubly horrible; she doubted her ability to believe\nthem, so incredible did they seem. She was at a loss to explain even\nher own actions, and those of Nicholas Devine were simply beyond\ncomprehension, a chapter from some dark and blasphemous book of ancient\ntimes--the Kabbala or the Necronomicon.\n\n\"What happened, Pat?\" queried the Doctor gently. \"Tell me,\" he urged\nher.\n\n\"I--can't explain it,\" she said doubtfully. \"He took me to that place,\nbut drinking the liquor was my own fault.", "start_char_idx": 93187, "end_char_idx": 96874, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c": {"__data__": {"id_": "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "6ee5a992993ec5c78c2a9eab3ea3c7c49180f7971dfab545ed9e23fc7d59bf50", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "704616b36919acf117b95fd6ccbe1be0eac67b5d93b0b8eb7bc7d012e1975911", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"He took me to that place,\nbut drinking the liquor was my own fault. I did it out of spite because\nI saw he didn't--care for me. And then--\" She fell silent.\n\n\"Yes? And then?\"\n\n\"Well--he began to talk about the beauty of evil, the delights of evil,\nand his eyes glared at me, and--I don't understand it at all, Dr. Carl,\nbut all of a sudden I was--yielding. Do you see?\"\n\n\"I see,\" he said gently, soberly.\n\n\"Suddenly I seemed to comprehend what he meant--all that about the\nsupreme pleasure of evil. And I was sort of--swept away. The dress--was\nhis fault, but I--somehow I'd lost the power to resist. I guess I was\ndrunk.\"\n\n\"And the bruises? And your cut lips?\" queried the Doctor grimly.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said in a low voice. \"He--struck me. After a while I didn't\ncare. He could have--would have done other things, only we were\ninterrupted, and had to leave. And that's all, Dr. Carl.\"\n\n\"Isn't that enough?\" he groaned. \"Pat, I should have killed the fiend\nthere!\"\n\n\"I'm glad you didn't.\"\n\n\"Do you mean to say you'd care?\"\n\n\"I--don't know.\"\n\n\"Are you intimating that you still love him?\"\n\n\"No,\" she said thoughtfully. \"No, I don't love him, but--Dr. Carl,\nthere's something inexplicable about this. There's something I don't\nunderstand, but I'm certain of one thing!\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"That it wasn't Nick--not _my_ Nick--who did those things to me last\nnight. It wasn't, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"Pat, you're being a fool!\"\n\n\"I know it. But I'm sure of it, Dr. Carl. I _know_ Nick; I loved him,\nand I know he couldn't have done--that. Not the same gentle Nick that I\nhad to beg to kiss me!\"\n\n\"Pat,\" said the Doctor gently, \"I'm a psychiatrist; it's my business\nto know all the rottenness that can hide in a human being. My office\nis the scene of a parade of misfits, failures, potential criminals,\nlunatics, and mental incompetents. It's a nasty, bitter side I see of\nlife, but I know that side--and I tell you this fellow is dangerous!\"\n\n\"Do you understand this, Dr. Carl?\"\n\nHe reached over, taking her hand in his great palm with its long,\ncurious delicate fingers. \"I have my theory, Pat. The man's a sadist,\na lover of cruelty, and there's enough masochism in any woman to make\nhim terribly dangerous. I want your promise.\"\n\n\"About what?\"\n\n\"I want you to promise never to see him again.\"\n\nThe girl turned serious eyes on his face; he noted with a shock of\nsympathy that they were filled with tears.\n\n\"You warned me I'd get burned playing with fire,\" she said. \"You did,\ndidn't you?\"\n\n\"I'm an old fool, Honey. If I'd believed my own advice, I'd have seen\nthat this never happened to you.\" He patted her hand. \"Have I your\npromise?\"\n\nShe averted her eyes. \"Yes,\" she murmured. He winced as he perceived\nthat the tears were on her cheeks.\n\n\"So!\" he said, rising. \"The patient can get out of bed when she feels\nlike it--and don't forget that little fib we've arranged for your\nmother's peace of mind.\"\n\nShe stared up at him, still clinging to his hand.\n\n\"Dr. Carl,\" she said, \"are you sure--quite sure--you're right about\nhim? Couldn't there be a chance that you're mistaken--that it's\nsomething your psychiatry has overlooked or never heard of?\"\n\n\"Small chance, Pat dear.\"\n\n\"But a chance?\"\n\n\"Well, neither I nor any reputable medic claims to know everything, and\nthe human mind's a subtle sort of thing.\"\n\n\n\n\n12\n\nLetter from Lucifer\n\n\n\"I'm glad!\" Pat told herself. \"I'm glad it's over, and I'm glad I\npromised Dr. Carl--I guess I was mighty close to the brink of disaster\nthat time.\"\n\nShe examined the injuries on her face, carefully powdered to conceal\nthe worst effects from her mother.", "start_char_idx": 96806, "end_char_idx": 100381, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e": {"__data__": {"id_": "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "4ce14689a54da48cd7c02d6175cbbef9b1a3461ee9529686145097c191cdb675", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e29e9d8c2e33cfdadb9bb80a3b83ba80279035772cc0c7cfa2ae3329e390d118", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The trick had worked, too; Mrs.\nLane had delivered herself of an excited lecture on the dangers of\nthe gasoline age, and then thanked Heaven it was no worse. Well, Pat\nreflected, she had good old Dr. Carl to thank for the success of the\nsubterfuge; he had broken the news very skillfully, set the stage for\nher appearance, and calmed her mother's apprehensions of scars. And\nPat, surveying her image in the glass above her dressing-table, could\nsee for herself the minor nature of the hurts.\n\n\"Scars--pooh!\" she observed. \"A bruised cheek, a split lip, a skinned\nchin. All I need is a black eye, and I guess I'd have had that in five\nminutes more, and perhaps a cauliflower ear into the bargain.\"\n\nBut her mood was anything but flippant; she was fighting off the time\nwhen her thoughts had of necessity to face the unpleasant, disturbing\nfacts of the affair. She didn't want to think of the thing at all;\nshe wanted to laugh it off and forget it, yet she knew that for an\nimpossibility. The very desire to forget she recognized as a coward's\nwish, and she resented the idea that she was cowardly.\n\n\"Forget the wise-cracks,\" she advised her image. \"Face the thing and\nargue it out; that's the only way to be satisfied.\"\n\nShe rose with a little grimace of pain at the twinge from her bruised\nknees, and crossed to the chaise lounge beside the far window. She\nsettled herself in it and resumed her cogitations. She was feeling more\nor less herself again; the headache of the morning had nearly vanished,\nand aside from the various aches and a listless fagged-out sensation,\nshe approximated her normal self. Physically, that is; the shadow of\nthat other catastrophe, the one she hesitated to face, was another\nmatter.\n\n\"I'm lucky to get off this easily,\" she assured herself, \"after going\non a bust like that one, like a lumberjack with his pay in his pocket.\"\nShe shook her head in mournful amazement. \"And I'm Patricia Lane, the\ngirl whom Billy dubbed 'Pat the Impeccable'! Impeccable! Wandering\nthrough alleys in step-ins and a table cloth--getting beaten up in a\ndrunken brawl--passing out on rot-gut liquor--being carried home and\nput to bed! Not impeccable; incapable's the word! I belong to Dr.\nCarl's parade of incompetents.\"\n\nShe continued her rueful reflections. \"Well, item one is, I don't love\nNick any more. I couldn't now!\" she flung at the smiling green buddha\non the mantel. \"That's over; I've promised.\"\n\nSomehow there was not satisfaction in the memory of that promise. It\nwas logical, of course; there wasn't anything else to do now, but\nstill--\n\n\"That _wasn't_ Nick!\" she told herself. \"That wasn't _my_ Nick. I guess\nDr. Carl is right, and he's a depressed what-ever-it-was; but if he's\ncrazy, so am I! He had me convinced last night; I understood what he\nmeant, and I felt what he wanted me to feel. If he's crazy, I am too; a\nfine couple we are!\"\n\nShe continued. \"But it wasn't Nick! I saw his face when we drove off,\nand it had changed again, and that was Nick's face, not the other. And\nhe was sorry; I could see he was sorry, and the other could never have\nregretted it--not ever! The other isn't--quite human, but Nick is.\"\n\nShe paused, considering the idea. \"Of course,\" she resumed, \"I might\nhave imagined that change at the end. I was hazy and quavery, and it's\nthe last thing I _do_ remember; that must have been just before I\npassed out.\"\n\nAnd then, replying to her own objection, \"But I _didn't_ imagine it! I\nsaw it happen once before, that other night when--Well, what difference\ndoes it make, anyway? It's over, and I've given my promise.\"\n\nBut she was unable to dismiss the matter as easily as that. There\nwas some uncanny, elusive element in it that fascinated her.", "start_char_idx": 100382, "end_char_idx": 104082, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508": {"__data__": {"id_": "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "fa8d3aca09d9dbbee9c50082186e3ef13a36ed2d70b8f2ce050187eac221cd93", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e7cb2693ec62e7b13c2f82a0534db5bc73de1ff83593218e2a88fede7c0c0d23", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "There\nwas some uncanny, elusive element in it that fascinated her. Cruel,\nterrible, demoniac, he might have been; he had also been kind, lovable,\nand gentle. Yet Dr. Carl had told her that split personalities could\ncontain no characteristics that were not present in the original,\nnormal character. Was cruelty, then, a part of kindness? Was cruelty\nmerely the lack of kindness, or, cynical thought, was kindness but the\nlack of cruelty? Which qualities were positive in the antagonistic\nphases of Nicholas Devine's individuality, and which negative? Was the\ngentle, lovable, but indubitably weaker character the split, and the\ndemon of last evening his normal self? Or vice-versa? Or were both of\nthese fragmentary entities, portions of some greater personality as yet\nunapparent to her?\n\nThe whole matter was a mystery; she shrugged in helpless perplexity.\n\n\"I don't think Dr. Carl knows as much about it as he says,\" she mused.\n\"I don't think psychiatry or any other science knows that much about\nthe human soul. Dr. Carl doesn't even believe in a soul; how could he\nknow anything about it, then?\" She frowned in puzzlement and gave up\nthe attempt to solve the mystery.\n\nThe hours she had spent in her room, at her mother's insistence, began\nto pall; she didn't feel particularly ill--it was more of a languor, a\ndepressed, worn-out feeling. Her mother, of course, was out somewhere;\nshe felt a desire for human companionship, and wondered if the Doctor\nmight by some chance drop in. It seemed improbable; he had his regular\nSunday afternoon routine of golf at the Club, and it took a real\ncatastrophe to keep him away from that. She sighed, stretched her legs,\nrose from her position on the chaise lounge, and wandered toward the\nkitchen where Magda was doubtless to be found.\n\nIt was in the dusk of the rear hall that the first sense of her loss\ncame over her. Heretofore her renunciation of Nicholas Devine was a\nrational thing, a promise given but not felt; but now it was suddenly a\npoignant reality. Nick was gone, she realized; he was out of her world,\nirrevocably sundered from her. She paused at the top of the rear flight\nof stairs, considering the matter.\n\n\"He's gone! I won't see him ever again.\" The thought was appalling; she\nfelt already a premonition of loneliness to come, of an emptiness in\nher world, a lack that nothing could replace.\n\n\"I shouldn't have promised Dr. Carl,\" she mused, knowing that even\nwithout that promise her course must still have been the same. \"I\nshouldn't have, not until I'd talked to Nick--my own Nick.\"\n\nAnd still, she reflected forlornly, what difference did it make? She\nhad to give him up; she couldn't continue to see him not knowing at\nwhat instant that terrible caricature of him might appear to torment\nher. But he might have explained, she argued miserably, answering\nher own objection at once--he's said he couldn't explain, didn't\nunderstand. The thing was at an impasse.\n\nShe shook her shining black head despondently, and descended the dusky\nwell of the stairs to the kitchen. Magda was there clattering among her\npots and pans; Pat entered quietly and perched on the high stool by the\nlong table. Old Magda, who had warmed her babyhood milk and measured\nout her formula, gave her a single glance and continued her work.\n\n\"Sorry about the accident, I was,\" she said without looking up.\n\n\"Thanks,\" responded the girl. \"I'm all right again.\"\n\n\"You don't look it.\"\n\n\"I feel all right.\"\n\nShe watched the mysterious, alchemistic mixing of a pastry, and thought\nof the vast array of them that had come from Magda's hands. As far back\nas she could remember she had perched on this stool observing the same\nmystic culinary rites.\n\nSuddenly another memory rose out of the grave of forgetfulness and\nwent gibbering across her world. She remembered the stories Magda used\nto tell her, frightening stories of witchcraft and the evil eye, tales\nout of an older region and a more credulous age.\n\n\"Magda,\" she asked, \"did you ever see a devil?\"", "start_char_idx": 104016, "end_char_idx": 108006, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba": {"__data__": {"id_": "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "16bf1334a5d19a420df29f8041913685a7fd2f6ed7e58ba5add680da3becf981", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cc3589916844add4528668faf88791ce0b16270155e4fd77062885b9a90ad9e4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Magda,\" she asked, \"did you ever see a devil?\"\n\n\"Not I, but I've talked with them that had.\"\n\n\"Didn't you ever see one?\"\n\n\"No.\" The woman slid a pan into the oven. \"I saw a man once, when I was\na tot, possessed by a devil.\"\n\n\"You did? How did he look?\"\n\n\"He screamed terrible, then he said queer things. Then he fell down and\nfoam came out of his mouth.\"\n\n\"Like a fit?\"\n\n\"The Priest, he said it was a devil. He came and prayed over him, and\nafter a while he was real quiet, and then he was all right.\"\n\n\"Possessed by a devil,\" said Pat thoughtfully. \"What happened to him?\"\n\n\"Dunno.\"\n\n\"What queer things did he say?\"\n\n\"Wicked things, the Priest said. I couldn't tell! I was a tot.\"\n\n\"Possessed by a devil!\" Pat repeated musingly. She sat immersed in\nthoughts on the high stool while Magda clattered busily about. The\nwoman paused finally, turning her face to the girl.\n\n\"What you so quiet about, Miss Pat?\"\n\n\"I was just thinking.\"\n\n\"You get your letter?\"\n\n\"Letter? What letter? Today's Sunday.\"\n\n\"Special delivery. The girl, she put it in the hall.\"\n\n\"I didn't know anything about it. Who'd write me a special?\"\n\nShe slipped off the high stool and proceeded to the front hall. The\nletter was there, solitary on the salver that always held the mail. She\npicked it up, examining the envelope in sudden startled amazement and\nmore than a trace of illogical exultation.\n\nFor the letter, post-marked that same morning, was addressed in the\nirregular script of Nicholas Devine!\n\n\n\n\n13\n\nIndecision\n\n\nPat turned the envelope dubiously in her hands, while a maze of chaotic\nthoughts assailed her. She felt almost a sensation of guilt as if\nshe were in some manner violating the promise given to Dr. Horker;\nshe felt a tinge of indignation that Nicholas Devine should dare\ncommunicate with her at all, and she felt too that queer exultation,\nan inexplicable pleasure, a feeling of secret triumph. She slipped the\nletter in the pocket of her robe and padded quietly up the stairs to\nher own room.\n\nStrangely, her loneliness had vanished. The great house, empty now\nsave for herself and Magda in the distant kitchen, was no longer a\nplace of solitude; the discovery of the letter, whatever its contents,\nhad changed the deserted rooms into chambers teeming with her own\nexcitements, trepidations, doubts, and hopes. Even hopes, she admitted\nto herself, though hopes of what nature she was quite unable to say.\nWhat _could_ Nick write that had the power to change things? Apologies?\nPleas? Promises? None of these could alter the naked, horrible facts of\nthe predicament.\n\nNevertheless, she was almost a-tremble with expectation as she skipped\nhastily into her own room, carefully closed the door, and settled\nherself by the west windows. She drew the letter from her pocket, and\nthen, with a tightening of her throat, tore open the envelope, slipping\nout the several pages of scrawled paper. Avidly she began to read.\n\n \"I don't know whether you'll ever see this\"--the missive began\n without salutation--\"and I'll not blame you, Pat dear, if you do\n return it unopened. There's nothing you can do that wouldn't be\n justified, nor can you think worse of me than I do of myself. And\n that's a statement so meaningless that even as I wrote it, I could\n anticipate its effect on you.\n\n \"Pat--How am I going to convince you that I'm sincere? Will you\n believe me when I write that I love you? Can you believe that I\n love you tenderly, worshipfully--reverently?\n\n \"You can't; I know you can't after that catastrophe of last night.\n But it's true, Pat, though the logic of a Spinoza might fail to\n convince you of it.\n\n \"I don't know how to write you this. I don't know whether you want\n to hear what I could say, but I know that I must try to say it.", "start_char_idx": 107959, "end_char_idx": 111749, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152": {"__data__": {"id_": "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "c3d0a3ae86a2f2b2a5232cdca36821ff728705a543465fdfc53d486ebedf5866", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c7b8fbc0dee7308c2f494b1c29d6310b077435c65a18447ce20be3da76e4f277", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Not apologies, Pat--I shouldn't dare approach you for so poor a\n reason as that--but a sort of explanation. You more than any one\n in the world are entitled to that explanation, if you want to hear\n it.\n\n \"I can't write it to you, Pat; it's something I can only make you\n believe by telling you--something dark and rather terrible. But\n please, Dear, believe that I mean you no harm, and that I plan no\n subterfuge, when I suggest that you see me. It will be, I think,\n for the last time.\n\n \"Tonight, and tomorrow night, and as many nights to follow as I\n can, I'll sit on a bench in the park near the place where I kissed\n you that first time. There will be people passing there, and cars\n driving by; you need fear nothing from me. I choose the place to\n bridle my own actions, Pat; nothing can happen while we sit there\n in the view of the world.\n\n \"To write you more than this is futile. If you come, I'll be\n there; if you don't, I'll understand.\n\n \"I love you.\"\n\nThe letter was signed merely \"Nick.\" She stared at the signature with\nfeelings so confused that she forebore any attempt to analyze them.\n\n\"But I can't go,\" she mused soberly. \"I've promised Dr. Carl. Or at\nleast, I can't go without telling him.\"\n\nThat last thought, she realized, was a concession. Heretofore she\nhadn't let herself consider the possibility of seeing Nicholas Devine\nagain, and now suddenly she was weakening, arguing with herself about\nthe ethics of seeing him. She shook her head decisively.\n\n\"Won't do, Patricia Lane!\" she told herself. \"Next thing, you'll be\nslipping away without a word to anybody, and coming home with two black\neyes and a broken nose. Won't do at all!\"\n\nShe dropped her eyes to the letter. \"Explanations,\" she reflected. \"I\nguess Dr. Carl would give up a hole-in-one to hear that explanation.\nAnd I'd give more than that.\" She shook her head regretfully. \"Nothing\nto do about it, though. I promised.\"\n\nThe sun was slanting through the west windows; she sat watching the\nshadows lengthen in the room, and tried to turn her thoughts into more\nprofitable channels. This was the first Sunday in many months that\nshe had spent alone in the house; it was a custom for herself and her\nmother to spend the afternoon at the club. The evening too, as a rule;\nthere was invariably bridge for Mrs. Lane, and Pat was always the\ncenter of a circle of the younger members. She wondered dreamily what\nthe crowd thought of her non-appearance, reflecting that her mother\nhad doubtless enlarged on Dr. Carl's story of an accident. Dr. Carl\nwouldn't say much, simply that he'd ordered her to stay at home. But\nsooner or later, Nick would hear the accident story; she wondered what\nhe'd think of it.\n\nShe caught herself up sharply. \"My ideas wander in circles,\" she\nthought petulantly. \"No matter where I start, they curve around back to\nNick. It won't do; I've got to stop it.\"\n\nNearly time for the evening meal, she mused, watching the sun as it\ndropped behind Dr. Horker's house. She didn't feel much like eating;\nthere was still a remnant of the exhausted, dragged-out sensation,\nthough the headache that had accompanied her awakening this morning had\ndisappeared.\n\n\"I know what the morning after feels like, anyway,\" she reflected with\na wry little smile. \"Everybody ought to experience it once, I suppose.\nI wonder how Nick--\"\n\nShe broke off abruptly, with a shrug of disgust. She slipped the letter\nback into its envelope, rose and deposited it in the drawer of the\nnight-table. She glanced at the clock ticking on its shiny top.\n\n\"Six o'clock,\" she murmured. Nick would be sitting in the park in\nanother two hours or so. She had a twinge of sympathy at the thought of\nhis lone vigil; she could visualize the harried expression on his face\nwhen the hours passed without her arrival.\n\n\"Can't be helped,\" she told herself.", "start_char_idx": 111755, "end_char_idx": 115639, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b": {"__data__": {"id_": "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "1a0089c7a6f47b04a1adfaf355f59e280c9315d4b668980a5d071241a690f2da", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0f2acd12c635477d59b1f52b44c23a5c01783fb8ca2233cd6d0bdde3c6d1b0de", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Can't be helped,\" she told herself. \"He's no right to ask for\nanything of me after last night. He knows that; he said so in his\nletter.\"\n\nShe suppressed an impulse to re-read that letter, and trotted\ndeliberately out of the room and down the stairs. Magda had set the\ntable in the breakfast room; it was far cozier than the great dining\nroom, especially without her mother's company. And the maid was away;\nthe breakfast room simplified serving, as well.\n\nShe tried valorously to eat what Magda supplied, but the food failed\nto tempt her. It wasn't so much her physical condition, either; it\nwas--She clenched her jaws firmly; was the memory of Nicholas Devine to\nhaunt her forever?\n\n\"Pat Lane,\" she said in admonition, \"you're a crack-brained fool! Just\nbecause a man kicks you all over the place is no reason to let him\nbecome an obsession.\"\n\nShe drank her coffee, feeling the sting of its heat on her injured\nlips. She left the table, tramped firmly to her room, and began\ndefiantly to read. The effort was useless; half a dozen times she\nforced her attention to the page only to find herself staring vaguely\ninto space a moment or two later. She closed the book finally with an\nirritable bang, and vented her restlessness in pacing back and forth.\n\n\"This house is unbearable!\" she snapped. \"I'm not going to stay shut up\nhere like a jail-bird in solitary confinement. A walk in the open is\nwhat I need, and that's what I'll have.\"\n\nShe glanced at the clock; seven-thirty. She tore off her robe\npettishly, flung out of her pajamas, and began to dress with angry\ndetermination. She refused to think of a lonely figure that might even\nnow be sitting disconsolately on a bench in the near-by park.\n\nShe disguised her bruised cheek as best she could, dabbed a little\npowder on the abrasion on her chin, and tramped militantly down the\nstairs. She caught up her wrap, still lying where the Doctor had\ntossed it last night, and moved toward the door, opening it and nearly\ncolliding with the massive figure of Dr. Horker!\n\n\"Well!\" boomed the Doctor as she started back in surprise. \"You're\npretty spry for a patient. Think you were going out?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Pat defiantly.\n\n\"Not tonight, child! I left the Club early to take a look at you.\"\n\n\"I am perfectly all right. I want to go for a walk.\"\n\n\"No walk. Doctor's orders.\"\n\n\"I'm of legal age!\" she snapped. \"I want to go for a walk. Do I go?\"\n\n\"You do not.\" The Doctor placed his great form squarely in the doorway.\n\"Not unless you can lick me, my girl, and I'm pretty tough. I put you\nto bed last night, and I can do as much tonight. Shall I?\"\n\nPat backed into the hall. \"You don't have to,\" she said sullenly. \"I'm\ngoing there myself.\" She flung her wrap angrily to a chair and stalked\nup the stairs.\n\n\"Good night, spit-fire,\" he called after her. \"I'll read down here\nuntil your mother comes home.\"\n\nThe girl stormed into her room in anger that she knew to be illogical.\n\n\"I won't be watched like a problem child!\" she told herself viciously.\n\"I know damn well what he thought--and I wasn't going to meet Nick! I\nwasn't at all!\"\n\nShe calmed suddenly, sat on the edge of her bed and kicked off her\npumps. It had occurred to her that Nick had written his intention to\nwait for her in the park tomorrow night as well, and Dr. Horker's\ninterference had confirmed her in a determination to meet him.\n\n\n\n\n14\n\nBizarre Explanation\n\n\n\"I won't be bullied!\" Pat told herself, examining her features in the\nmirror. The two day interval had faded the discoloration of her cheek\nto negligible proportions, and all that remained as evidence of the\nviolence of Saturday night was the diminishing mark on her chin. Of\ncourse, her knees--but they were covered; most of the time, at least.\nShe gave herself a final inspection, and somewhere below a clock boomed.", "start_char_idx": 115603, "end_char_idx": 119397, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef": {"__data__": {"id_": "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "ec3a243aafd1df33b0d88ba41cb01fb8ecce641bc5c448b757325689cb250190", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "411c14c193b0c5185766b64960604fbe4c931f3e9991cc17942d0ac7fc248a7a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She gave herself a final inspection, and somewhere below a clock boomed.\n\n\"Eight o'clock,\" she remarked to her image; \"Time to be leaving, and it\nserves Dr. Carl right for his high-handed actions last night. I won't\nbe bullied by anybody.\" She checked herself as her mind had almost\nadded, \"Except Nick.\" True or not, she didn't relish the thought; the\nrecent recollections it roused were too disturbing.\n\nShe tossed a stray wisp of black hair from her forehead and turned to\nthe door. She heard her mother's voice as she descended the stairs.\n\n\"Are you going out, Patricia? Do you think it wise?\"\n\n\"I am perfectly all right. I want to go for a walk.\"\n\n\"I know, Dear; it was largely your appearance I meant.\" She surveyed\nthe girl with a critical eye. \"Nice enough, except for that little spot\non your chin, and will you never learn to keep your hair away from that\nside of your forehead? One can never do a bob right; why don't you let\nit grow out like the other girls?\"\n\n\"Makes me individual,\" replied Pat, moving toward the outer door. \"I\nwon't be late at all,\" she added.\n\nOn the porch she cast a cautious glance at Dr. Horker's windows, but\nhis great figure was nowhere evident. Only a light burning in the\nlibrary evinced his presence. She gave a sigh of relief, and tiptoed\ndown the steps to the sidewalk, and moved hastily away from the range\nof his watchful eyes.\n\nNo sooner had she sighted the park than doubts began to torment her.\nSuppose this were some trick of Nicholas Devine's, to trap her into\nsome such situation as that of Saturday night. Even suppose that she\nfound him the sweet personality that she had loved, might that also\nbe a trick? Mightn't he be trusting to his ability to win her over, to\nthe charm she had confessed to him that he held for her? Couldn't he\nbe putting his faith in his own amorous skill, planning some specious\nexplanation to win her forgiveness only to use her once more as the\nmaterial for some horrible experiment? And if he were, would she be\nable to prevent herself from yielding?\n\n\"Forewarned is fore-armed,\" she told herself. \"I'll not put up such a\nfeeble resistance this time, knowing what I now know. And it's only\nfair of me to listen to his explanation, if he really has one.\"\n\nShe was reassured by the sight of the crowded park; groups strolled\nalong the walks, and an endless procession of car-headlights marked the\ncourse of the roadway. Nothing could happen in such an environment;\nthey'd be fortunate even to have an opportunity for confidential\ntalk. She waited for the traffic lights, straining her eyes to locate\nNicholas Devine; at the click of the signal she darted across the\nstreet.\n\nShe moved toward the lake; here was the spot, she was sure. She glanced\nabout with eagerness unexpected even to herself, peering through the\nshadow-shot dusk. He wasn't there, she concluded, with a curious sense\nof disappointment; her failure to appear last night had disheartened\nhim; he had abandoned his attempt.\n\nThen she saw him. He sat on a bench isolated from the rest in a\ntreeless area overlooking the lake. She saw his disconsolate figure,\nhis chin on his hand, staring moodily over the waters. A tremor ran\nthrough her, she halted deliberately, waiting until every trace of\nemotion had vanished, then she advanced, standing coolly beside him.\n\nFor a moment he was unaware of her presence; he sat maintaining his\ndejected attitude without glancing at her. Suddenly some slight\nmovement, the flutter of her skirt, drew his attention; he turned\nsharply, gazing directly into her face.\n\n\"Pat!\" He sprang to his feet. \"Pat! is it you--truly you? Or are you\none of these visions that have been plaguing me for hours?\"\n\n\"I'm real,\" she said, returning his gaze with a studied coolness in her\nface. She made no other move; her cold composure disconcerted him, and\nhe winced, flushed, and moved nervously aside as she seated herself.", "start_char_idx": 119325, "end_char_idx": 123215, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea": {"__data__": {"id_": "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "864d59dfe6cf39d9ec81304dcea89de8c3b91ca441b4bb811ce1c9d2dfc3833e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1b0562a4dcdf7f00d88bb5e91b40cceb64c3d290676d88b61abbd72aa2617c01", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He\ndropped beside her; he made no attempt to touch her, but sat watching\nher in silence for so long a time that she felt her composure ebbing.\nThere was a hungry, defeated look about him; there was a wistfulness,\na frustration, in his eyes that seemed about to tug tears from her own\neyes. Abruptly she dropped her gaze from his face.\n\n\"Well?\" she said finally in a small voice, and as he made no reply,\n\"I'm here.\"\n\n\"Are you really, Pat? Are you truly here?\" he murmured, still watching\nher avidly. \"I--I still don't believe it. I waited here for hours and\nhours last night, and I'd given up hope for tonight, or any night. But\nI would have come again and again.\"\n\nShe started as he bent suddenly toward her, but he was merely examining\nher face. She saw the gleam of horror in his expression as his eyes\nsurveyed the faintly visible bruise on her cheek, the red mark on her\nchin.\n\n\"Oh my God, Pat!\" His words were barely audible. \"Oh my God!\" he\nrepeated, drawing away from her and resuming the attitude of desolation\nin which her arrival had found him. \"I've hoped it wasn't true!\"\n\n\"What wasn't?\" She was keeping her voice carefully casual; this\nmiserable contrition of Nick's was tugging at her rather too powerfully\nfor complete safety.\n\n\"What I remembered. What I saw just now.\"\n\n\"You hoped it wasn't true?\" she queried in surprise. \"But you did it.\"\n\n\"_I_ did it, Pat? Do you think _I_ could have done it?\"\n\n\"But you did!\" Her voice had taken on a chill inflection; the memory of\nthose indignities came to steel her against him.\n\n\"Pat, do you think I could assault your daintiness, or maltreat the\nbeauty I worship? Didn't anything occur to you? Didn't anything seem\nqueer about--about that ghastly evening?\"\n\n\"Queer!\" she echoed. \"That's certainly a mild word to use, isn't it?\"\n\n\"But I mean--hadn't you any idea of what had happened? Didn't you\nthink anything of it except that I had suddenly gone mad? Or that I'd\ngrown to hate you?\"\n\n\"What was I to think?\" she countered, trying to control the tremor that\nhad crept into her voice.\n\n\"But did you think that?\"\n\n\"No,\" the girl confessed after a pause. \"At first, when you started\nwith that drink, I thought you were looking for material for your work.\nThat's what you said--an experiment. Didn't you?\"\n\n\"I guess so,\" he groaned.\n\n\"But after that, after I'd swallowed that horrible stuff, but before\neverything went hazy, I--thought differently.\"\n\n\"But what, Pat? What did you think?\"\n\n\"Why, then I realized that it wasn't you--not the real you. I could\nfeel the--well, the presence of the person I knew; this presence\nthat was tormenting me was another person, a terrible, cold, inhuman\nstranger.\"\n\n\"Pat!\" There was a note almost of relief in his voice. \"Did you really\nfeel that?\"\n\n\"Yes. Does it help matters, my sensing that? I can't see how.\"\n\nHis eyes, which had been fixed on hers, dropped suddenly. \"No,\" he\nmuttered, all the relief gone out of his tones, \"no, it doesn't help,\ndoes it? Except that it's a meager consolation to me to know that you\nfelt it.\"\n\nPat struggled to suppress an impulse to reach out her hand, to stroke\nhis hair. She caught herself sharply; this was the very danger against\nwhich she had warned herself--this was the very attitude she had\nanticipated in Nicholas Devine, the lure which might bait a trap. Yet\nhe looked so forlorn, so wistful! It was an effort to forbear from\ntouching him; her fingers fairly ached to brush his cheek.\n\n\"Only a fool walks twice into the same trap,\" she told herself. Aloud\nshe said, \"You promised me an explanation. If you've any excuse, I'd\nlike to hear it.\" Her voice had resumed its coolness.\n\n\"I haven't any excuse,\" he responded gloomily, \"and the explanation is\nperhaps too bizarre, too fantastic for belief.", "start_char_idx": 123216, "end_char_idx": 126955, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4": {"__data__": {"id_": "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "9500e70845868616904ecfac0840e6c819270ec181131ff46a133640a6abb523", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c80d1f589a9bf8621e53ec5b8bc1183e81e1b56a17262e633756a60da6bfefa4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "_I_ don't believe it\nentirely; I suppose _you_ couldn't believe it at all.\"\n\n\"You promised,\" she repeated. The carefully assumed composure of her\nvoice threatened to crack; this wistfulness of his was a powerful\nweapon against her defense.\n\n\"Oh, I'll give you the explanation,\" he said miserably. \"I just wanted\nto warn you you'd not believe me.\" He gave her a despondent glance.\n\"Pat, as I love you I swear that what I tell you is the truth. Do you\nthink you can believe me?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she murmured. The tremor had reappeared in her voice despite her\nefforts.\n\nNicholas Devine turned his eyes toward the lake and began to speak.\n\n\n\n\n15\n\nA Modern Mr. Hyde\n\n\n\"I don't remember when I first noticed it,\" began Nick in a low voice,\n\"but I'm two people. I'm me, the person who's talking to you now, and\nI'm--another.\"\n\nPat, looking very pale and serious in the dusky light, said nothing at\nall. She simply gazed at him silently, without the slightest trace of\nsurprise in her wide dark eyes.\n\n\"This is the real me,\" proceeded Nick miserably. \"The other is an\noutsider, that has somehow contrived to grow into me. He is different;\ncold, cruel, utterly selfish, and not exactly--human. Do you\nunderstand?\"\n\n\"Y--Yes,\" said the girl, fighting to control her voice. \"Sort of.\"\n\n\"This is a struggle that has continued for a long time,\" he pursued.\n\"There were times in childhood when I remember punishments for offenses\nI never committed, for nasty little meannesses _he_ perpetrated. My\nmother, and after her death, my tutoress, thought I was lying when I\ntried to explain; they thought I was trying to evade responsibility.\nAfter a while I learned not to explain; I learned to accept my\npunishments doggedly, and to fight this other when he sought dominance.\"\n\n\"And could you?\" asked Pat, her voice frankly quavery. \"Could you fight\nhim?\"\n\n\"I was the stronger; I could win--usually. He slipped into\nconsciousness as wilful, mean little impulses, nasty moods, unreasoning\nhates and such unpleasant things. But I was always the stronger: I\nlearned to drive him into the background.\"\n\n\"You said you _were_ the stronger,\" she mused. \"What does that mean,\nNick?\"\n\n\"I've always been the stronger; I am now. But recently, Pat--I think\nit's since I fell in love with you--the struggle has been on evener\nterms. I've weakened or he's gained. I have to guard against him\nconstantly; in any moment of weakness he may slip in, as on our ride\nlast week, when we had that near accident. And again Saturday.\" He\nturned appealing eyes on the girl. \"Pat, do you believe me?\"\n\n\"I guess I'll have to,\" she said unhappily. \"It--makes things rather\nhopeless, doesn't it?\"\n\nHe nodded dejectedly. \"Yes. I've always felt that sooner or later I'd\nwin, and drive him away permanently. I've felt on the verge of complete\nvictory more than once, but now--\" He shook his head doubtfully. \"He\nhad never dominated me so entirely until Saturday night--Pat, you\ndon't know what Hell is like until you're forced as I was to watch\nthe violation of the being you worship, to stand helpless while a\ndesecration is committed. I'd rather die than suffer it again!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said the girl faintly. She was thinking of the sorry picture she\nmust have presented as she reeled half-clothed through the alley. \"Can\nyou see what--_he_ sees?\"\n\n\"Of course, and think his thoughts. But only when he's dominant. I\ndon't know what evil he's planning now, else I could forestall him, I\nwould have warned you if I could have known.\"\n\n\"Where is he now?\"\n\n\"Here,\" said Nick somberly. \"Here listening to us, knowing what I'm\nthinking and feeling, laughing at my unhappiness.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" gasped Pat again. She watched her companion doubtfully. Then the\nmemory of Dr. Horker's diagnosis came to her, and set her wondering.\nWas this story the figment of an unsettled mind?", "start_char_idx": 126956, "end_char_idx": 130754, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69": {"__data__": {"id_": "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "6b808ef44396cfea1d8b63a14807d43c7f6adcf4a87428b49056d33a35707bd9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c5ca2c6fd5577bb1c520114838421e0bc8763af28eb83d5355aac5928ef1053c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Was this story the figment of an unsettled mind? Was this irrational\ntale of a fiendish intruder merely evidence that the Doctor was right\nin his opinion? She was in a maze of uncertainty.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, \"did you ever try medical help? Did you ever go to a\ndoctor about it?\"\n\n\"Of course, Pat! Two years ago I went to a famous psychiatrist in\nNew York--you'd know the name if I mentioned it--and told him about\nthe--the case. And he studied me, and he treated me, and psychoanalyzed\nme, and the net result was just nothing. And finally he dismissed\nme with the opinion that 'the whole thing is just a fixed delusion,\nfortunately harmless!' Harmless! Bah! But it wasn't I that did those\nthings, Pat; I had to stand by in horror and watch. It was enough to\n_drive_ me crazy, but it didn't--quite.\"\n\n\"But--Oh, Nick, what is it? What is this--this outsider? Can't we fight\nit somehow?\"\n\n\"How can anyone except me fight it?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know!\" she wailed miserably. \"There must be a way. Doctors\nclaim to know pretty nearly everything; there must be _something_ to\ndo.\"\n\n\"But there isn't,\" he retorted gloomily. \"I don't know any more than\nyou what that thing is, but it's beyond your doctors. I've got to fight\nit out alone.\"\n\n\"Nick--\" Her voice was suddenly tense. \"Are you sure it isn't some\nkind of madness? Something tangible like that could perhaps be treated.\"\n\n\"It's no kind your doctors can treat, Pat. Did you ever hear of a\nmadman who stood aside and rationally watched the working of his own\ninsanity? And that's what I'm forced to do. And yet--this other isn't\ninsane either. Were its actions insane?\"\n\nPat shuddered. \"I--don't know,\" she said in low tones. \"I guess not.\"\n\n\"No. Horrible, cruel, bestial, devilishly cunning, evil--but not\ninsane. I don't know what it is, Pat. I know that the fight has to be\nmade by me alone. There's nothing, nobody in the world, that can help.\"\n\n\"Nick!\" she wailed.\n\n\"I'm sorry, Pat dear. You understand now why I was so reluctant to fall\nin love with you. I was afraid to love you; now I know I was right.\"\n\n\"Nick!\" she cried, then paused hopelessly. After a moment she\ncontinued, \"Yesterday I was determined to forget you, and now--now I\ndon't care if this whole tale of yours is a mesh of fantastic lies, I\nlove you! I'd love you even if your real self were that--that other\ncreature, and even if I knew that this was just a trap. I'd love you\nanyway.\"\n\n\"Pat,\" he said seriously, \"don't you believe me? Why should I offer to\ngive you up if this were--what you said? Wouldn't I be pleading for\nanother chance, making promises, finding excuses?\"\n\n\"Oh, I believe you, Nick! It isn't that; I was just thinking how\nstrange it is that I could hate you so two nights past and love you so\ntonight.\"\n\n\"Oh God, Pat! Even you can't know how much I love you; and to win you\nand then be forced to give you up--\" He groaned.\n\nThe girl reached out her hand and covered his; it was the first time\nduring the evening that she had touched him, and the feel of his flesh\nsent a tingle through her. She was miserably distraught.\n\n\"Honey,\" she murmured brokenly. \"Nick, Honey.\"\n\nHe looked at her. \"Do you suppose there's a chance to beat the thing?\"\nhe asked. \"I'd not ask you to wait, Pat, but if I only glimpsed a\nchance--\"\n\n\"I'll wait. I don't think I could do anything else but wait for you.\"\n\n\"If I only knew what I had to fight!\" he whispered. \"If I only knew\nthat!\"\n\nA sudden memory leaped into Pat's mind. \"Nick,\" she said huskily, \"I\nthink I know.\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Pat?\"\n\n\"It's something Magda--the cook--said to me.", "start_char_idx": 130706, "end_char_idx": 134266, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc": {"__data__": {"id_": "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "33b536a62888ff7739cea0bf171e74b5b2e404703b8583d93e441dbf7fb7f274", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d2082192a7d714503fd13bf87d35510e409a3bf8c3a8269b3f67aaa37acde32e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"It's something Magda--the cook--said to me. It's foolish,\nsuperstitious, but Nick, what else can it be?\"\n\n\"Tell me!\"\n\n\"Well, she was talking to me yesterday, and she said that when she\nwas a child in the old country, she had seen a man once--\" she\nhesitated--\"a man who was possessed by a devil. Nick, I think you're\npossessed by a devil!\"\n\nHe stared at her. \"Pat,\" he said hoarsely, \"that's--an impossibility!\"\n\n\"I know, but what else can it be?\"\n\n\"Out of the Dark Ages,\" he muttered. \"An echo of the Black Mass and\nwitchcraft, but--\"\n\n\"What did they do,\" asked the girl, \"to people they thought were\npossessed?\"\n\n\"Exorcism!\" he whispered.\n\n\"And how did they--exorcise?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" he said in a low voice. \"Pat, that's an impossible\nidea, but--I don't know!\" he ended.\n\n\"We'll try,\" she murmured, still covering his hand with her own. \"What\nelse can we do, Nick?\"\n\n\"What's done I'll do alone, Pat.\"\n\n\"But I want to help!\"\n\n\"I'll not let you, Dear. I won't have you exposed to a repetition of\nthose indignities, or perhaps worse!\"\n\n\"I'm not afraid.\"\n\n\"Then I am, Pat! I won't have it!\"\n\n\"But what'll you do?\"\n\n\"I'll go away. I'll battle the thing through once for all, and I'll\neither come back free of it or--\" He paused and the girl did not\nquestion him further, but sat staring at him with troubled eyes.\n\n\"I won't write you, Pat,\" he continued. \"If you should receive a letter\nfrom me, burn it--don't read it. It might be from--the other, a trap or\na lure of some sort. Promise me! You'll promise that, won't you?\"\n\nShe nodded; there was a glint of tears in her eyes.\n\n\"And I don't want you to wait, Pat,\" he proceeded. \"I don't want you to\nfeel that you have any obligations to me--God knows you've nothing to\nthank me for! When--If I come back and you haven't changed, then we'll\ntry again.\"\n\n\"Nick,\" she said in a small voice, \"how do you know the--the other\nwon't come back here? How can you promise for--it?\"\n\n\"I'm still master!\" he said grimly. \"I won't be dominated long enough\nat any time for that to happen. I'll fight it down.\"\n\n\"Then--it's good-bye?\"\n\nHe nodded. \"But not for always--I hope.\"\n\n\"Nick,\" she murmured, \"will you kiss me?\" She felt a tear on her cheek.\n\"I'll stand losing you a little better if I can have a--last kiss--to\nremember.\" Her voice was faltering.\n\nHis arms were about her. She yielded herself completely to his caress;\nthe park, the crowd passing a few yards away, the people on near-by\nbenches, were all forgotten, and once more she felt herself alone with\nNicholas Devine in a vast empty cosmos.\n\nAn insistent voice penetrated her consciousness; she realized that it\nhad been calling her name for some seconds.\n\n\"Miss Lane,\" she heard, and again, \"Miss Lane.\" A hand tapped her\nshoulder; with a sudden start, she tore her lips away, and looked up\ninto a face unrecognized for a moment. Then she placed it. It was the\nvisage of Mueller, Dr. Horker's companion on that disastrous Saturday\nnight.\n\n\n\n\n16\n\nPossessed\n\n\nPat stared at the intruder in a mingling of embarrassment, perplexity,\nand indignation. She felt her cheeks reddening as the latter emotion\ngained the dominance of her mood.\n\n\"Well!\" she snapped. \"What do you want?\"\n\n\"I thought I'd walk home with you,\" Mueller said amiably.\n\n\"Walk home with me! Please explain that!\" She grasped the arm of\nNicholas Devine, who had risen angrily at the interruption. \"Sit down,\nNick, I know the fellow.\"\n\n\"So should he,\" said Mueller. \"Sure; I'll explain. I'm on a job for Dr.\nHorker.\"\n\n\"Spying on me for him, I suppose!\" taunted the girl.\n\n\"No. Not on you.\"\n\n\"He means on me,\" said Nick soberly.", "start_char_idx": 134222, "end_char_idx": 137815, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23": {"__data__": {"id_": "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7b3ec276408d0e52cfc4a92f27c93a30cdcfe5e43644ec05341cb77b9cbec2af", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0e957ee56c694992e5f6ee29b7bed14573527f9a62cf51f901bc343aafd32f36", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"No. Not on you.\"\n\n\"He means on me,\" said Nick soberly. \"You can't blame him, Pat. And\nperhaps you had better go home; we've finished here. There's nothing\nmore we can do or say.\"\n\n\"Very well,\" she said, her voice suddenly softer. \"In a moment, Nick.\"\nShe turned to Mueller. \"Would you mind telling me why you waited until\nnow to interfere? We've been here two hours, you know.\"\n\n\"Sure I'll tell you. I got no orders to interfere, that's why.\"\n\n\"Then why did you?\" queried Pat tartly.\n\n\"I didn't until I saw him there\"--he nodded at Nick--\"put his arms\naround you. Then I figured, having no orders, it was time to use my own\njudgment.\"\n\n\"If any!\" sniffed the girl. She turned again to Nick; her face\nsoftened, became very tender. \"Honey,\" she murmured huskily, \"I guess\nit's good-bye now. I'll be fighting with you; you know that.\"\n\n\"I know that,\" he echoed, looking down into her eyes. \"I'm almost\nhappy, Pat.\"\n\n\"When'll you go?\" she whispered in tones inaudible to Mueller.\n\n\"I don't know,\" he answered, his voice unchanged. \"I'll have to make\nsome sort of preparations--and I don't want you to know.\"\n\nShe nodded. She gazed at him a moment longer with tear-bright eyes.\n\"Good-bye, Nick,\" she whispered. She rose on tiptoe, and kissed him\nvery lightly on his lips, then turned and walked quickly away, with\nMueller following behind.\n\nShe walked on, ignoring him until he halted beside her at the crossing\nof the Drive. Then she gave him a cold glance.\n\n\"Why is Dr. Carl having him watched?\" she asked.\n\nMueller shrugged. \"The ins and outs of this case are too much for me,\"\nhe said. \"I do what I'm paid to do.\"\n\n\"You're not watching him now.\"\n\n\"Nope. Seemed like the Doctor would think it was more important to get\nyou home.\"\n\n\"You're wasting your time,\" she said irritably as the lights changed\nand they stepped into the street. \"I was going home anyway.\"\n\n\"Well, now you got company all the way.\" Mueller's voice was placid.\n\nThe girl sniffed contemptuously, and strode silently along. The other's\npresence irritated her; she wanted time and solitude to consider the\namazing story Nicholas Devine had given her. She wanted to analyze her\nown feelings, and most of all she wanted just a place of privacy to\ncry out her misery. For now the loss of Nicholas Devine had changed\nfrom a fortunate escape to a tragedy, and liar, madman, or devil, she\nwanted him terribly, with all the power of her tense little heart. So\nshe moved as swiftly as she could, ignoring the silent companionship of\nMueller.\n\nThey reached her home; the light in the living room window was evidence\nthat the bridge game was still in progress. She mounted the steps,\nMueller watching her silently from the walk; she fumbled for her key.\n\nSuddenly she snapped her hand-bag shut; she couldn't face her mother\nand the two spinster Brocks and elderly, inquisitive Carter Henderson.\nThey'd suggest that she cut into the game, and they'd argue if\nshe refused, and she couldn't play bridge now! She glanced at the\nimpassive Mueller, turned and crossed the strip of lawn to Dr. Horker's\nresidence, where the light still glowed in the library, and rang the\nbell. She saw the figure on the sidewalk move away as the shadow of the\nDoctor appeared on the lighted square of the door.\n\n\"Hello,\" boomed the Doctor amiably. \"Come in.\"\n\nPat stalked into the library and threw herself angrily into Dr.\nHorker's particular chair. The other grinned, and chose another place.\n\n\"Well,\" he said, \"What touched off the fuse this time?\"\n\n\"Why are you spying on my friends?\" snapped the girl. \"By what right?\"\n\n\"So he's spotted Mueller, eh? That lad's diabolically clever, Pat--and\nI mean diabolic.\"\n\n\"That's no answer!\"\n\n\"So it isn't,\" agreed the Doctor. \"Say it's because I'm acting _in loco\nparentis_.\"\n\n\"And _in loco_ is as far as you'll get, Dr.", "start_char_idx": 137760, "end_char_idx": 141556, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0": {"__data__": {"id_": "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "296b8a6318afe7524bee82cefb4616eb91da63185bec4e49d1881182dd8d703a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "540d89c0d6cfd67883d34c63207efd8c38c6d3db1e2433f5a46d089b7ea7da32", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"And _in loco_ is as far as you'll get, Dr. Carl, if you're going to\nspy on me!\"\n\n\"On you?\" he said mildly. \"Who's spying on you?\"\n\n\"On us, then!\"\n\n\"Or on us?\" queried the Doctor. \"I set Mueller to watch the Devine lad.\nHave you by some mischance broken your promise to me?\"\n\nPat flushed. She had forgotten that broken promise; the recollection of\nit suddenly took the wind from her sails, placed her on the defensive.\n\n\"All right,\" she said defiantly. \"I did; I admit it. Does that excuse\nyou?\"\n\n\"Perhaps it helps to explain my actions, Pat. Don't you understand that\nI'm trying to protect you? Do you think I hired Mueller out of morbid\ncuriosity, or professional interest in the case? Times aren't so good\nthat I can throw money away on such whims.\"\n\n\"I don't need any protection. I can take care of myself!\"\n\n\"So I noticed,\" said the Doctor dryly. \"You gave convincing evidence of\nit night before last.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said the girl in exasperation. \"You would say that!\"\n\n\"It's true, isn't it?\"\n\n\"Suppose it is! I don't have to learn the same lesson twice.\"\n\n\"Well, apparently once wasn't enough,\" observed the other amiably. \"You\nwalked into the same danger tonight.\"\n\n\"I wasn't in any danger tonight!\" Suddenly her mood changed as she\nrecalled the circumstances of her parting with Nicholas Devine. \"Dr.\nCarl,\" she said, her voice dropping, \"I'm terribly unhappy.\"\n\n\"Lord!\" he exclaimed staring at her. \"Pat, your moods are as changeable\nas my golf game! You're as mercurial as your Devine lad! A moment ago\nyou were snapping at me, and now I'm suddenly acceptable again.\" He\nperceived the misery in her face. \"All right, child; I'm listening.\"\n\n\"He's going away,\" she said mournfully.\n\n\"Don't you think that's best for everybody concerned? I commend his\njudgment.\"\n\n\"But I don't want him to!\"\n\n\"You do, Pat. You can't continue seeing him, and his absence will make\nit easier for you.\"\n\n\"It'll never be easier for me, Dr. Carl.\" She felt her eyes fill. \"I\nguess I'm--just a fool about him.\"\n\n\"You still feel that way, after the experience you went through?\"\n\n\"Yes. Yes, I do.\"\n\n\"Then you _are_ a fool about him, Pat. He's not worth such devotion.\"\n\n\"How do you know what he's worth? I'm the only one to judge that.\"\n\n\"I have eyes,\" said the Doctor. \"What happened tonight to change your\nattitude so suddenly? You were amenable to reason yesterday.\"\n\n\"I didn't know yesterday what I know now.\"\n\n\"So he told a story, eh?\" The Doctor watched her serious, troubled\nfeatures. \"Would you mind telling me, Honey? I'm interested in the\ndefense mechanisms these psychopathic cases erect to explain their own\nimpulses to themselves.\"\n\n\"No, I won't tell you!\" snapped Pat indignantly. \"Psychopathic cases!\nWe're all just cases to you. I'm a case and he's another, and all you\nwant is our symptoms!\"\n\nDoctor Horker smiled placatingly into her face. \"Pat dear,\" he said\nearnestly, \"don't you see I'd give my eyes to help you? Don't take\nmy flippancies too seriously, Honey; look once in a while at the\nintentions behind them.\" He continued his earnest gaze.\n\nThe girl returned his look; her face softened. \"I'm sorry,\" she said\ncontritely. \"I never doubted it, Dr. Carl--it's only that I'm so--so\ntorn to pieces by all this that I get snappy and irritable.\" She\npaused. \"Of course I'll tell you.\"\n\n\"I'd like to hear it.\"\n\n\"Well,\" she began hesitantly, \"he said he was two personalities--one\nthe character I knew, and one the character that we saw Saturday night.\nAnd the first one is--well, dominant, and fights the other one. He says\nthe other has been growing stronger; until lately he could suppress\nit. And he says--Oh, it sounds ridiculous, the way I tell it, but it's\ntrue! I'm sure it's true!\"", "start_char_idx": 141513, "end_char_idx": 145199, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503": {"__data__": {"id_": "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "92b767b9035d49d3eb6cd2fce3aa2990b8f01d26998c9ee315f97e4c76d01f28", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "34197f611abc0cb461ae57dce3587256a6bb7eee66394bfa16060ad17eff3b4f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I'm sure it's true!\" She leaned toward the Doctor. \"Did you ever\nhear of anything like it? Did you, Dr. Carl?\"\n\n\"No.\" He shook his head, still watching her seriously. \"Not exactly\nlike that, Honey. Don't you think he might possibly have lied to you,\nPat? To excuse himself for the responsibility of Saturday night, for\ninstance?\"\n\n\"No, I don't,\" she said defiantly.\n\n\"Then you have an idea yourself what the trouble is? I judge you have.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said in low tones. \"I have an idea.\"\n\n\"What is it?\"\n\n\"I think he's possessed by a devil!\" said the girl flatly.\n\nA quizzical expression came into the Doctor's face. \"Well, of all the\nqueer ideas that harum-scarum mind of yours has _ever_ produced, that's\nthe queerest!\" He broke into a chuckle.\n\n\"Queer, is it?\" flared Pat. \"I don't think you and your mind-doctors\nknow as much as a Swahili medicine-man with a mask!\"\n\nShe leaped angrily to her feet, stamped viciously into the hall.\n\n\"Devil and all,\" she repeated, \"I love him!\"\n\n\"Pat!\" called the Doctor anxiously. \"Pat! Where are you going, child?\"\n\n\"Where do devils live?\" Her voice floated tauntingly back from the\nfront door. \"Hell, of course!\"\n\n\n\n\n17\n\nWitch-Doctor\n\n\nPat had no intentions, however, of following the famous highway that\nevening. She stamped angrily down the Doctor's steps, swished her way\nthrough the break in the hedge with small regard to the safety of her\nsheer hose, and mounted to her own porch. She found her key, opened the\ndoor and entered.\n\nAs she ascended the stairs, her fit of temper at the Doctor passed, and\nshe felt lonely, weary, and unutterably miserable. She sank to a seat\non the topmost step and gave herself over to bitter reflections.\n\nNick was gone! The realization came poignantly at last; there would be\nno more evening rides, no more conversations whose range was limited\nonly by the scope of the universe, no more breath-taking kisses, the\nsweeter for his reluctance. She sat mournfully silent, and considered\nthe miserable situation in which she found herself.\n\nIn love with a madman! Or worse--in love with a demon! With a being\nhalf of whose nature worshiped her while the other half was bent on her\ndestruction! Was any one, she asked herself--was any one, anywhere,\never in a more hopeless predicament?\n\nWhat could she do? Nothing, she realized, save sit helplessly aside\nwhile Nick battled the thing to a finish. Or possibly--the only\nalternative--take him as he was, chance the vicissitudes of his\nunstable nature, lay herself open to the horrors she had glimpsed so\nrecently, and pray for her fortunes to point the way of salvation. And\nin the mood in which she now found herself, that seemed infinitely the\npreferable solution. Yet rationally she knew it was impossible; she\nshook her head despondently, and leaned against the wall in abject\nmisery.\n\nThen, thin and sharp sounded the shrill summons of the door bell, and\na moment later, the patter of the maid's footsteps in the hall below.\nShe listened idly to distract herself from the chain of despondency\nthat was her thoughts, and was mildly startled to recognize the booming\ndrums of Dr. Horker's voice. She heard his greeting and the muffled\nreply from the group, and then a phrase understandable because of his\nsonorous tones.\n\n\"Where's Pat?\" The words drifted up the well of the stairs, followed\nby a scarcely audible reply from her mother. Heavy footfalls on the\ncarpeted steps, and then his figure bulked on the landing below her.\nShe cupped her chin on her hands, and stared down at him while he\nascended to her side, sprawling his great figure beside her.\n\n\"Pat, Honey,\" he rumbled, \"you're beginning to get me worried!\"\n\n\"Am I?\" Her voice was weary, dull. \"I've had myself like that for a\nlong time.\"\n\n\"Poor kid! Are you really so miserable over this Nick problem of yours?\"\n\n\"I love him.\"\n\n\"Yes.\" He looked at her with sympathy and calculation mingling in his\nexpression.", "start_char_idx": 145179, "end_char_idx": 149076, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c": {"__data__": {"id_": "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "1d2f22b65c9840316f12656a6269cc0b44f9893716870371ab2ccbf5682244be", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "30131547e422aca3d9bebc832a44bc84a89a17fac086f9ef6a0205fe84da49d3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Yes.\" He looked at her with sympathy and calculation mingling in his\nexpression. \"I believe you do. I'm sorry, Honey; I didn't realize until\nnow what he means to you.\"\n\n\"You don't realize now,\" she murmured, still with the weary intonation.\n\n\"Perhaps not, Pat, but I'm learning. If you're in this thing as deeply\nat all that, I'm in too--to the finish. Want me?\"\n\nShe reached out her hand, plucking at his coatsleeve. Abruptly she\nleaned toward him, burying her face against the rough tweed of his\nsuit; she sobbed a little, while he patted her gently with his great,\ndelicately fingered hand. \"I'm sorry, Honey,\" he rumbled. \"I'm sorry.\"\n\nThe girl drew herself erect and leaned back against the wall, shaking\nher head to drive the tears from her eyes. She gave the Doctor a wan\nlittle smile.\n\n\"Well?\" she asked.\n\n\"I'll return your compliment of the other night,\" said Horker briskly.\n\"I'll ask a few questions--purely professional, of course.\"\n\n\"Fire away, Dr. Carl.\"\n\n\"Good. Now, when our friend has one of these--uh--attacks, is he\nrational? Do his utterances seem to follow a logical thought sequence?\"\n\n\"I--think so.\"\n\n\"In what way does he differ from his normal self?\"\n\n\"Oh, every way,\" she said with a tremor. \"Nick's kind and gentle and\nsensitive and--and naive, and this--other--is cruel, harsh, gross,\ncrafty, and horrible. You can't imagine a greater difference.\"\n\n\"Um. Is the difference recognizable instantly? Could you ever be in\ndoubt as to which phase you were encountering?\"\n\n\"Oh, no! I can--well, sort of dominate Nick, but the other--Lord!\" She\nshuddered again. \"I felt like a terrified child in the presence of some\npowerful, evil god.\"\n\n\"Humph! Perhaps the god's name was Priapus. Well, we'll discount your\nfeelings, Pat, because you weren't exactly in the best condition\nfor--let's say _sober_ judgment. Now about this story of his. What\nhappens to his own personality when this other phase is dominant? Did\nhe say?\"\n\n\"Yes. He said his own self was compelled to sort of stand by while\nthe--the intruder used his voice and body. He knew the thoughts of the\nother, but only when it was dominant. The rest of the time he couldn't\ntell its thoughts.\"\n\n\"And how long has he suffered from these--intrusions?\"\n\n\"As long as he can remember. As a child he was blamed for the other's\nmischief, and when he tried to explain, people thought he was lying to\nescape punishment.\"\n\n\"Well,\" observed the Doctor, \"I can see how they might think that.\"\n\n\"Don't you believe it?\"\n\n\"I don't exactly disbelieve it, Honey. The human mind plays queer\ntricks sometimes, and this may be one of its little jokes. It's a\npsychiatrist's business to investigate such things, and to painlessly\nremove the point of the joke.\"\n\n\"Oh, if you only can, Dr. Carl! If you only can!\"\n\n\"We'll see.\" He patted her hand comfortingly.\n\n\"Now, you say the kind, gentle, and all that, phase is the normal one.\nIs that usually dominant?\"\n\n\"Yes. Nick can master the other, or could until recently. He says this\nlast--attack--is the worst he's ever had; the other has been gaining\nstrength.\"\n\n\"Strange!\" mused the Doctor. \"Well,\" he said with a smile of\nencouragement, \"I'll have a look at him.\"\n\n\"Do you think you can help?\" Pat asked anxiously. \"Have you any idea\nwhat it is?\"\n\n\"It isn't a devil, at any rate,\" he smiled.\n\n\"But have you any idea?\"\n\n\"Naturally I have, but I can't diagnose at second hand. I'll have to\ntalk to him.\"\n\n\"But what do you think it is?\" she persisted.\n\n\"I think it's a fixation of an idea gained in childhood, Honey. I had\na patient once--\" He smiled at the reminiscence--\"who had a fixed\ndelusion of that sort.", "start_char_idx": 148995, "end_char_idx": 152608, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461": {"__data__": {"id_": "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "422d0863f6c0c3b223a82fd07fc9235faeb63a6ddbdc133d87d8791035a5b2da", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8d1cff9dd5b158ccf51d0d310120bbfe0df1b4ae4db1f5c66befa434e569be55", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He was perfectly rational on every point\nsave one--he believed that a pig with a pink ribbon was following\nhim everywhere! Down town, into elevators and offices, home to\nbed--everywhere he went this pink-ribboned prize porker pursued him!\"\n\n\"And did you cure him?\"\n\n\"Well, he recovered,\" said the Doctor non-committally. \"We got rid of\nthe pig. And it might be something of that nature that's troubling your\nboy friend. Your description doesn't sound like a praecox or a manic\ndepressive, as I thought originally.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Pat abruptly. \"I forgot. He went to a doctor in New York, a\nvery great doctor.\"\n\n\"Muenster?\"\n\n\"He didn't say whom. But this doctor studied him a long time, and\nfinally came out with this fixed idea theory of yours. Only he couldn't\ncure him.\"\n\n\"Um.\" Horker grunted thoughtfully.\n\n\"Do fixed ideas do things like that to people?\" queried the girl.\n\"Things like the pig and what happened to Nick?\"\n\n\"They might.\"\n\n\"Then they're devils!\" she announced with an air of finality. \"They're\njust your scientific jargon for exactly what Magda means when she says\na person's possessed by a devil. So I'm right anyway!\"\n\n\"That's good orthodox theology, Pat,\" chuckled the Doctor. \"We'll try a\nlittle exorcism on your devil, then.\" He rose to his feet. \"Bring your\nboy friend around, will you?\"\n\n\"Oh, Dr. Carl!\" she cried. \"He's leaving! I'll have to call him\ntonight!\"\n\n\"Not tonight, Honey. Mueller would let me know if anything of that sort\nwere happening. Tomorrow's time enough.\"\n\nThe girl stood erect, mounting to the top step to bring her head level\nwith the Doctor's. She threw her arms about him, burying her face in\nhis massive shoulder.\n\n\"Dr. Carl,\" she murmured, \"I'm a nasty, ill-tempered, vicious little\nshrew, and I'm sorry, and I apologize. You know I'm crazy about you,\nand,\" she whispered in his ear, \"so's Mother!\"\n\n\n\n\n18\n\nVanished\n\n\n\"He doesn't answer! I'm too late,\" thought Pat disconsolately as she\nreplaced the telephone. The cheerfulness with which she had awakened\nvanished like a patch of April sunshine. Now, with the failure of her\nthird attempt in as many hours to communicate with Nicholas Devine,\nshe was ready to confess defeat. She had waited too long. Despite Dr.\nHorker's confidence in Mueller, she should have called last night--at\nonce.\n\n\"He's gone!\" she murmured distractedly. She realized now the\nimpossibility of finding him. His solitary habits, his dearth of\nfriends, his lonely existence, left her without the least idea of how\nto commence a search. She knew, actually, so little about him--not\neven the source of the apparently sufficient income on which he\nsubsisted. She felt herself completely at a loss, puzzled, lonesome,\nand disheartened. The futile buzzing of the telephone signal symbolized\nher frustration.\n\nPerhaps, she thought, Dr. Horker might suggest something to do;\nperhaps, even, Mueller had reported Nick's whereabouts. She seized\nthe hope eagerly. A glance at her wrist-watch revealed the time as\nten-thirty; squarely in the midst of the Doctor's morning office hours,\nbut no matter. If he were busy she could wait. She rose, bounding\nhastily down the stairs.\n\nShe glimpsed her mother opening mail in the library, and paused\nmomentarily at the door. Mrs. Lane glanced up as she appeared.\n\n\"Hello,\" said the mother. \"You've been on the telephone all morning,\nand what did Carl want of you last night?\"\n\n\"Argument,\" responded Pat briefly.\n\n\"Carl's a gem! He's been of inestimable assistance in developing you\ninto a very charming and clever daughter, and Heaven knows what I'd\nhave raised without him!\"\n\n\"Cain, probably,\" suggested Pat. She passed into the hall and out the\ndoor, blinking in the brilliant August sunshine. She crossed the strip\nof turf, picked her way through the break in the hedge, and approached\nthe Doctor's door. It was open; it often was in summer time, especially\nduring his brief office hours.", "start_char_idx": 152609, "end_char_idx": 156501, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584": {"__data__": {"id_": "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "cd2bdf5a3489b2e3063a322f48733f822a598367843cfab71c467398f545ee8c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a2edcc38895961fe36f814ae1c8ac1a548be4af63dbeceb1ba2572459eaa8c6a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was open; it often was in summer time, especially\nduring his brief office hours. She entered and went into the chamber\nused as waiting room.\n\nHis office door was closed; the faint hum of his voice sounded. She sat\nimpatiently in a chair and forced herself to wait.\n\nFortunately, the delay was nominal; it was but a few minutes when the\ndoor opened and an opulent, middle-aged lady swept past her and away.\nPat recognized her as Mrs. Lowry, some sort of cousin of the Brock pair.\n\n\"Good morning!\" boomed the Doctor. \"Professional call, I take it, since\nyou're here during office hours.\" He settled his great form in a chair\nbeside her.\n\n\"He's gone!\" said Pat plaintively. \"I can't reach him.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" grunted Horker helpfully.\n\n\"I've tried all morning--he's always home in the morning.\"\n\n\"Listen, you little scatter-brain!\" rumbled the Doctor. \"Why didn't you\ntell me Mueller brought you home last night? I thought he was on the\njob.\"\n\n\"I didn't think of it,\" she wailed. \"Nick said he'd have to make some\npreparations, and I never dreamed he'd skip away like this.\"\n\n\"He must have gone home directly after you left him, and skipped out\nimmediately,\" said the Doctor ruminatively. \"Mueller never caught up\nwith him.\"\n\n\"But what'll we do?\" she cried desperately.\n\n\"He can't have gone far with no more preparation than this,\" soothed\nHorker. \"He'll write you in a day or two.\"\n\n\"He won't! He said he wouldn't. He doesn't want me to know where he\nis!\" She was on the verge of tears.\n\n\"Now, now,\" said the Doctor still in his soothing tones. \"It isn't as\nbad as all that.\"\n\n\"Take off your bed-side manner!\" she snapped, blinking to keep back the\ntears. \"It's worse! What ever can we do? Dr. Carl,\" she changed to a\npleading tone, \"can't you think of something?\"\n\n\"Of course, Pat! I can think of several things to do if you'll quiet\ndown for a moment or so.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, Dr. Carl--but what _can_ we do?\"\n\n\"First, perhaps Mueller can trace him. That's his business, you know.\"\n\n\"But suppose he can't--what then?\"\n\n\"Well, I'd suggest you write him a letter.\"\n\n\"But I don't know where to write!\" she wailed. \"I don't know his\naddress!\"\n\n\"Be still a moment, scatter-brain! Address it to his last residence;\nyou know that, don't you? Of course you do. Now, don't you suppose\nhe'll leave a forwarding address? He must receive some sort of mail\nabout his income, or estate, or whatever he lives on. Your letter'll\nfind him, Honey; don't you doubt it.\"\n\n\"Oh, do you think so?\" she asked, suddenly hopeful. \"Do you really\nthink so?\"\n\n\"I really think so. You would too if you didn't fly into a panic every\ntime some little difficulty confronts you. Sometimes even my psychiatry\nis puzzled to explain how you can be so clever and so stupid, so\nself-reliant and so dependent, so capable and so helpless--all at one\nand the same time. Your Nick can't be as much of a paradox as you are!\"\n\n\"I wonder if a letter _will_ reach him,\" she said eagerly, ignoring the\nDoctor's remarks. \"I'll try. I'll try immediately.\"\n\n\"I sort of had a feeling you would,\" said Horker amiably. \"I hope you\nsucceed; and not only for your sake, Pat, because God knows how this\nthing will work out. But I'm anxious to examine this youngster of yours\non my own account; he must be a remarkable specimen to account for all\nthe perturbation he's managed to cause you. And this Jekyll-and-Hyde\nangle sounds interesting, too.\"\n\n\"Jekyll and Hyde!\" echoed Pat. \"Dr. Carl, is that possible?\"\n\n\"Not literally,\" chuckled the other, \"though in a sense, Stevenson\nanticipated Freud in his thesis that liberating the evil serves also to\nrelease the good.\"\n\n\"But--It was a drug that caused that change in the story, wasn't it?\"\n\n\"Well?", "start_char_idx": 156418, "end_char_idx": 160101, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25": {"__data__": {"id_": "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "c408fd62ea6aaa31152161fa0d25d2c3d0b10abb345d270171cc33cb49d72bf6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a736ec399d0c21b41fa63b86af6e813b46f0bb1769afb076f760f3f3ca0f1402", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Well? Do you suspect your friend of being addicted to some mysterious\ndrug? Is that the latest hypothesis?\"\n\n\"_Is_ there such a drug? One that could change a person's character?\"\n\n\"_All_ alkaloids do that, Honey. Some of them stimulate, some depress,\nsome breed frenzies, and some give visions of delight--but all of\nthem influence one's mental and emotional organization, which you call\ncharacter. So for that matter, does a square meal, or a cup of coffee,\nor even a rainy day.\"\n\n\"But isn't there a drug that can separate good qualities from evil,\nlike the story?\"\n\n\"Emphatically not, Pat! That's not the trouble with this pesky boy\nfriend of yours.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the girl doubtfully, \"I only wish I had as much faith in\nyour psychologies as you have. If you brain-doctors know it all, why do\nyou switch theories every year?\"\n\n\"We _don't_ know it all. On the other hand, there are a few things to\nbe said in our favor.\"\n\n\"What are they?\"\n\n\"For one,\" replied the Doctor, \"we do cure people occasionally. You'll\nadmit that.\"\n\n\"Sure,\" said Pat. \"So did the Salem witches--occasionally.\" She\ngave him a suddenly worried look. \"Oh, Dr. Carl, don't think I'm\nnot grateful! You know how much I'm hoping from your help, but I'm\nmiserably anxious over all this.\"\n\n\"Never mind, Honey. You're not the first one to point out the\nshortcomings of the medical profession. That's a game played by plenty\nof physicians too.\" He paused at the sound of footsteps on the porch,\nfollowed by the buzz of the doorbell. \"Run along and write your letter,\ndear--here comes that Tuesday hypochondriac of mine, and he's rich\nenough for my careful attention.\"\n\nPat flashed him a quick smile of farewell and slipped quietly into the\nhall. At the door she passed the Doctor's patient--a lean, elderly\ngentleman of woe-begone visage--and returned to her own home.\n\nHer spirits, mercurial to a degree, had risen again. She was suddenly\npositive that the Doctor's scheme would bring results, and she darted\ninto the house almost buoyantly. Her mother had abandoned the desk,\nand she ensconced herself before it, finding paper and pen, and staring\nthoughtfully at the blank sheet.\n\nFinally she wrote.\n\n \"Dear Nick--\n\n \"Something has happened, favorable, I think, to us. I believe I\n have found the help we need.\n\n \"Will you come if you can, or if that's not possible, break that\n self-given promise of yours, and communicate with me?\n\n \"I love you.\"\n\nShe signed it simply \"Pat\", placed it in an envelope, addressed it\nhastily, and hurried out to post it. On her return she spied the\nDoctor's hypochondriac in the act of leaving. He walked past her with\nhis lean, worry-smitten face like a study of Hogarth, and she heard him\nmumbling to himself. The elation went out of her; she mounted the steps\nvery soberly, and went miserably inside.\n\n\n\n\n19\n\nMan or Monster?\n\n\nPat suffered Wednesday through somehow, knowing that any such early\nresponse to her letter was impossible. Still, that impossibility did\nnot deter her from starting at the sound of the telephone, and sorting\nthrough the mail with an eagerness that drew a casual attention from\nher mother.\n\n\"Good Heavens, Patricia! You're like a child watching for an answer to\nhis note to Santa Claus!\"\n\n\"That's what I am, I guess,\" responded the girl ruefully. \"Maybe I\nexpect too much from Santa Claus.\"\n\nLate in the afternoon she drifted over to Dr. Horker's residence, to\nbe informed that he was out. For distraction, she went in anyway, and\nspent a while browsing among the books in the library. She blundered\ninto Kraft-Ebing, and read a few pages in growing indignation.\n\n\"I'm ashamed to be human!\" she muttered disgustedly to herself,\nslamming shut the _Psychopathia Sexualis_. \"I wouldn't be a doctor, or\nhave a child of mine become one, if I were positively certain he'd turn\ninto Lord Lister himself! Nick was right when he said doctors live on\npeople's troubles.\"", "start_char_idx": 160095, "end_char_idx": 164011, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc": {"__data__": {"id_": "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "203f1fa07fbc1381f6c9761d92ec33e00287fa5c83d36860d3c30b312a805222", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b390b9cc7d5c596c1ddec85fef078f55db64fdb7e111485a9c0ab02dc45b67f8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Nick was right when he said doctors live on\npeople's troubles.\"\n\nShe wondered how Dr. Horker could remain so human, so kindly and\nunderstanding, when as he said himself his world was a parade of\nmisfits, incompetents, and all the nastiness of mortals. _He_ was nice;\nshe felt no embarrassment in confiding in him even when she might\nhesitate to bare her feelings to her own mother. Or was it simply the\nnatural thing to do to tell one's troubles to a doctor?\n\nNot, of course, that the situation reflected any discredit on her\nmother. Mrs. Lane was a very precious sort of parent, she mused,\nyoung as Pat in spirit, appreciative and enthusiastically fond of her\ndaughter. That she trusted Pat, that she permitted her to do entirely\nas she pleased, was exactly as the girl would have it; it argued no\nlack of affection that each of them had their separate interests, and\nif the girl occasionally found herself in unpleasantness such as this,\nthat too was her own fault.\n\nAnd yet, she reflected, it was a bitter thing to have no one to whom to\nturn. If it weren't for Dr. Carl and his jovial willingness to commit\nany sin up to malpractice to help her, she might have felt differently.\nBut there always _was_ Dr. Carl, and that, she concluded, was that.\n\nShe wandered back to her own side of the hedge, missing for the first\ntime in many weeks the companionship of the old crowd. There hadn't\nbeen many idle afternoons heretofore during the summer; there'd always\nbeen some of the collegiate vacationing in town, and Pat had never\nneeded other lure than her own piquant vivacity to assure herself\nof ample attention. Now, of course, it was different; she had so\ndefinitely tagged herself with the same Nicholas Devine that even the\nmost ardent of the group had taken the warning.\n\n\"And I don't regret it either!\" she told herself as she entered the\nhouse. \"Trouble, mystery, suffering and all--I don't regret it! I've\nhad my compensations too.\"\n\nShe sighed and trudged upstairs to prepare for dinner.\n\n * * * * *\n\nMorning found Pat in a fair frenzy of trepidation. She kept repeating\nto herself that two days wasn't enough, that more time might be\nrequired, that even had Nicholas Devine received her letter, he might\nnot have answered at once. Yet she was quivering as she darted into\nthe hall to examine the mail.\n\nIt was there! She spied a fragment of the irregular handwriting and\nseized the envelope from beneath a clutter of notes, bills, and\nadvertisements. She glanced at the post-mark. Chicago! He hadn't left\nthe city, trusting perhaps to the anonymity conferred by its colossal\nswarm of humanity. Indeed, she thought as she stared at the missive,\nhe might have moved around the corner, and save for the chance of a\nfortuitous meeting she'd never know it.\n\nShe tore open the envelope and scanned the several scrawled lines.\n\nNo heading, no salutation, not even a signature. Just, \"Thursday\nevening at our place in the park.\" No more; she studied the few words\nintently, as if she could read into their bald phrasing the moods and\nhidden emotions of the writer.\n\nA single phrase, but sufficient. The day was suddenly brighter, and\nthe hope which had glowed so dimly yesterday was abruptly almost more\nthan a hope--a certainty. All her doubts of Dr. Horker's abilities were\nforgotten; already the solution of this uncanny mystery seemed assured,\nand the restoration of romance imminent. She carried the letter to her\nown room and tucked it carefully by the other in the drawer of the\nnight-table.\n\nThursday evening--this evening! Many hours intervened between now and a\nreasonable time for the meeting, but they loomed no longer drab, dull,\nand hopeless. She lay on her bed and dreamed.\n\nShe could meet Nick as early as possible; perhaps at eight-thirty, and\nbring him directly to the Doctor's residence. No use wasting a moment,\nshe mused; the sooner some light could be thrown on the affliction,\nthe sooner they could lay the devil--exorcise it. Demon, fixed idea,\nmental aberration, or whatever Dr.", "start_char_idx": 163948, "end_char_idx": 167984, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5": {"__data__": {"id_": "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "f57d2680b77752bd5c02adbcb383d975da1438855dbad634cead411c9c55c30e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0427202f1b2243d80fb09c14e72e4bbe7f01230d8177fe0a7554ad3dc45a8279", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Demon, fixed idea,\nmental aberration, or whatever Dr. Carl chose to call it, it had to be\nmet and vanquished once and forever. And it _could_ be vanquished; in\nher present mood she didn't doubt it. Then--after that--there was the\nprospect of her own Nick regained, and the sweet vistas opened by that\nreflection.\n\nShe lunched in an abstracted manner. In the afternoon, when the phone\nrang, she jumped in a startled manner, then relaxed with a shrug.\n\nBut this time it _was_ for her. She darted into the hall to take the\ncall on the lower phone; she was hardly surprised but thoroughly\nexcited to recognize the voice of Nicholas Devine.\n\n\"Pat?\"\n\n\"Nick! Oh, Nick, Honey! What is it?\"\n\n\"My note to you.\" Even across the wire she sensed the strain in his\ntense tones. \"You've read it?\"\n\n\"Of course, Nick! I'll be there.\"\n\n\"No.\" His voice was trembling. \"You won't come, Pat. Promise you won't!\"\n\n\"But why? Why not, Nick? Oh, it's terribly important that I see you!\"\n\n\"You're not to come, Pat!\"\n\n\"But--\" An idea was struggling to her consciousness. \"Nick, was it--?\"\n\n\"Yes. You know now.\"\n\n\"But, Honey, what difference does it make? _You_ come. You must, Nick!\"\n\n\"I won't meet you, I tell you!\" She could hear his voice rising\nexcitedly in pitch, she could feel the intensity of the struggle across\nunknown miles of lifeless copper wire.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said, \"I'm going to be there, and you're going to meet me.\"\n\nThere was silence at the other end.\n\n\"Nick!\" she cried anxiously. \"Do you hear me? I'll be there. Will you?\"\n\nHis voice sounded again, now flat and toneless.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said. \"I'll be there.\"\n\nThe receiver clicked at the far end of the wire; there was only a\nfutile buzzing in Pat's ears. She replaced the instrument and sat\nstaring dubiously at it.\n\nHad that been Nick, really her Nick, or--? Suppose she went to that\nmeeting and found--the other? Was she willing to face another evening\nof indignities and terrors like those still fresh in her memory?\n\nStill, she argued, what harm could come to her on that bench, exposed\nas it was to the gaze of thousands who wandered through the park on\nsummer evenings? Suppose it _were_ the other who met her; there was no\nway to force her into a situation such as that of Saturday night. Nick\nhimself had chosen that very spot for their other meeting, and for that\nvery reason.\n\n\"There's no risk in it,\" she told herself, \"Nothing can possibly\nhappen. I'll simply go there and bring Nick back to Dr. Carl's, along a\nlighted, busy street, the whole two blocks. What's there to be afraid\nof?\"\n\nNothing at all, she answered herself. But suppose--She shuddered and\ndeliberately abandoned her chain of thought as she rose and rejoined\nher mother.\n\n\n\n\n20\n\nThe Assignation\n\n\nPat was by no means as buoyant as she had been in the morning. She\napproached the appointed meeting place with a feeling of trepidation\nthat all her arguments could not subdue.\n\nShe surveyed the crowded walks of the park with relief; she felt\nconfirmed in her assumption that nothing unpleasant could occur with\nso many on-lookers. So she approached the bench with somewhat greater\nself-assurance than when she had left the house.\n\nShe saw the seat with its lone occupant, and hastened her steps.\nNicholas Devine was sitting exactly as he had on that other occasion,\nchin cupped on his hands, eyes turned moodily toward the vast lake\nthat coruscated now with the reflection of stars and many lights. As\nbefore, she moved close to his side before he looked up, but here the\nsimilarity of the two occasions vanished. Her fears were realized; she\nwas looking into the red-gleaming eyes and expressionless features of\nhis other self--the demon of Saturday evening!\n\n\"Sit down!\" he said as a sardonic half-smile twisted his lips. \"Aren't\nyou pleased? Aren't you thrilled to the very core of your being?\"", "start_char_idx": 167931, "end_char_idx": 171746, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e": {"__data__": {"id_": "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "cd58ecdb11a6f0469ad4a934ae4612f88ae40314e24627574bebbebeca5977d7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "842e6d22741e01d756fe04467ee74b0bf7e5bdb3166e28e950831d3733c4fed7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Aren't you thrilled to the very core of your being?\"\n\nPat stood irresolute; she controlled an impulse to break into sudden,\nabandoned flight. The imminence of the crowded walks again reassured\nher, and she seated herself gingerly on the extreme edge of the bench,\nstaring at her companion with coolly inimical eyes. He returned her\ngaze with features as immobile as carven stone; only his red eyes gave\nevidence of the obscene, uncanny life behind the mask.\n\n\"Well?\" said Pat in as frigid a voice as she could muster.\n\n\"Yes,\" said the other surveying her. \"You are quite as I recalled you.\nVery pretty, almost beautiful, save for a certain irregularity in your\nfeatures. Not unpleasant, however.\" His eyes traveled over her body;\nautomatically she drew back, shrinking away from him. \"You have a\nseductive body,\" he continued. \"A most seductive body; I regret that\ncircumstances prevented our full enjoyment of it. But that will come.\nYes, that will come!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Pat faintly. It took all her determination to remain seated\nby the side of the horror.\n\n\"You were extremely attractive as I attired you Saturday,\" the other\nproceeded. His lips took on a curious sensual leer. \"I could have\ndone better with more time; I would have stripped you somewhat more\ncompletely. Everything, I think, except your legs; I am pleased by\nthe sight of long, straight, silk-clad legs, and should perhaps have\nreceived some pleasure by running these hands along them--scratching\nat proper intervals for the aesthetic effect of blood. But that too\nwill come.\"\n\nThe girl sprang erect, gasping and speechless in outraged anger. She\nturned abruptly; nothing remained of her determination now. She felt\nonly an urge to escape from the sneering tormentor who had lost in her\nmind all connection with her own Nicholas Devine. She took a sudden\nstep.\n\n\"Sit down!\" She heard the tones of the entity behind her, flat,\nunchanged. \"Sit down, else I'll drag you here!\"\n\nShe paused in sheer surprise, turning a startled face on the other.\n\n\"You wouldn't dare!\" she said, amazed at the bald effrontery of the\nthreat. \"You don't dare touch me here!\"\n\nThe other laughed. \"Don't I? What have I to risk? _He_'ll suffer for\nany deed of mine! You'll call for aid against me and only loose the\nhounds on _him_.\"\n\nPat stared blankly at the evil face. She had no answer; for once her\nready tongue found no retort.\n\n\"Sit down!\" reiterated the other, and she dropped dazedly to her\nposition on the bench. She turned dark questioning eyes on him.\n\n\"Do you see,\" he sneered, \"how weakening an influence is this love of\nyours? To protect him you are obeying me; this is my authority over\nyou--this body I share with him!\"\n\nShe made no reply; she was making a desperate effort to lash her mind\ninto activity, to formulate some means of combating the being who\ntortured her.\n\n\"It has weakened him, too,\" the other proceeded. \"This disturbed\nlove of his has taken away the mastery which birth gave him, and his\nenfeeblement has given that mastery to me. He knows now the reason for\nhis weakness; I tell it to him too late to harm me.\"\n\nPat struggled for composure. The very presence of the cold demon tore\nat the roots of her self-control, and she suppressed a fierce desire to\nbreak into hysterical laughter. Ridiculous, hopeless, incomprehensible\nsituation! She forced her quivering throat to husky speech.\n\n\"What--what are you?\" she stammered.\n\n\"Synapse! I'm a question of synapses,\" jeered the other. \"Simple! Very\nsimple! Ask your friend the Doctor!\"\n\n\"I think,\" said the girl, a measure of control returning to her voice,\n\"that you're a devil. You're some sort of a fiend that has managed to\nattach itself to Nick, and you're not human. That's what I think!\"\n\n\"Think what you please,\" said the other. \"We're wasting time here,\" he\nsaid abruptly. \"Come.\"\n\n\"Where?\" Pat was startled; she felt a recurrence of fright.\n\n\"No matter where. Come.\"\n\n\"I won't! Why do you want me?\"", "start_char_idx": 171694, "end_char_idx": 175626, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479": {"__data__": {"id_": "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "6f30da297d56bbd9da8a3bebc8e730b9888b77ce96e06d37b846055e9ad3d0bf", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bae2fb3c837fb76d8a334b805d3a1ddfbe3d8d89352392226966e311fa4c1260", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"No matter where. Come.\"\n\n\"I won't! Why do you want me?\"\n\n\"To complete the business of Saturday night,\" he said. \"Your lips have\nhealed; they bleed no longer, but that is easy to remedy. Come.\"\n\n\"I won't!\" exclaimed the girl in sudden panic. \"I won't!\" She moved as\nif to rise.\n\n\"You forget,\" intoned the being beside her. \"You forget the authority\nvested in me by virtue of this love of yours. Let me convince you.\" He\nstretched forth a thin hand. \"Move and you condemn your sweetheart to\nthe punishment you threaten me.\"\n\nHe seized her arm, pinching the flesh brutally, his nails breaking the\nsmooth skin. Pat felt her face turn ashy pale; she closed her eyes\nand bit her nearly-healed lips at the excruciating pain, but she made\nnot the slightest sound nor the faintest movement. She simply sat and\nsuffered.\n\n\"You see!\" sneered the other, releasing her. \"Thank my kindly nature\nthat I marked your arm instead of your face. Shall we go?\"\n\nA scarcely audible whimper of pain came from the girl's lips. She sat\npalled and unmoving, with her eyes still closed.\n\n\"No,\" she murmured faintly at last. \"No. I won't go with you.\"\n\n\"Shall I drag you?\"\n\n\"Yes. Drag me if you dare.\"\n\nHis hand closed on her wrist; she felt herself jerked violently to her\nfeet, so roughly that it wrenched her shoulder. A startled, frightened\nlittle cry broke from her lips, and then she closed them firmly at the\nsight of several by-passers turning curious eyes on them.\n\n\"I'll come,\" she murmured. The glimmering of an idea had risen in her\nchaotic mind.\n\nShe followed him in grim, bitter silence across the clipped turf to the\nlimit of the park. She recognized Nick's modest automobile standing\nin the line of cars along the street; her companion, or captor, moved\ndirectly towards it, opened the door and clambered in without a single\nbackward glance. He turned about and watched her as she paused with\none diminutive foot on the running board, and rubbed her hand over her\naching arm.\n\n\"Get in!\" he ordered coldly.\n\nShe made no move. \"I want to know where you intend to take me.\"\n\n\"It doesn't matter. To a place where we can complete that unfinished\nexperiment of ours. Aren't you happy at the prospect?\"\n\n\"Do you think,\" she said unsteadily, \"that I'd consent to that even to\nsave Nick from disgrace and punishment? Do you think I'm fool enough\nfor that?\"\n\n\"We'll soon see.\" He extended his hand. \"Scream--fight--struggle!\" he\njeered. \"Call them down on your sweetheart!\"\n\nHe had closed his hand on her wrist; she jerked it convulsively from\nhis grasp.\n\n\"I'll bargain with you!\" she gasped. She needed a moment's respite to\nclarify a thought that had been growing in her mind.\n\n\"Bargain? What have you to offer?\"\n\n\"As much as you!\"\n\n\"Ah, but I have a threat--the threat to your sweetheart! And I'm\noffering too the lure of that evil whose face so charmed you recently.\nHave you forgotten how nearly I won you to the worship of that\nprinciple? Have you forgotten the ecstasy of that pain?\"\n\nHis terrible, blood-shot eyes were approaching her face; and strangely,\nthe girl felt a curious recurrence of that illogical desire to yield\nthat had swept over her on that disastrous night of Saturday. There\n_had_ been an ecstasy; there _had_ been a wild, ungodly, unhallowed\npleasure in his blows, in the searing pain of his kisses on her\nlacerated lips. She realized vaguely that she was staring blankly,\ndazedly, into the red eyes, and that somewhere within her, some insane\nbrain-cells were urging her to clamber to the seat beside him.\n\nShe tore her eyes away. She rubbed her bruised shoulder, and the pain\nof her own touch restored her vanishing logical faculties. She returned\nher gaze to the face of the other, meeting his gaze now coolly.\n\n\"Nick!\" she said earnestly, as if calling him from a distance. \"Nick!\"", "start_char_idx": 175570, "end_char_idx": 179361, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61": {"__data__": {"id_": "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "159fd4b97cf05c84126f2e1799c7344bd434db69bd3add5ee27ba1da640e4d76", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a9fee15340aa84a1e203b49a9c01be00a591330d83ad4e34699bd9b0557c4fc6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "she said earnestly, as if calling him from a distance. \"Nick!\"\n\nThere was, she fancied, the faintest gleam of concern apparent in the\nfeatures opposite her. She continued.\n\n\"Nick!\" she repeated. \"You can hear me, Honey. Come to the house as\nsoon as you are able. Come tonight, or any time; I'll wait until you\ndo. You'll come, Honey; you must!\"\n\nShe backed away from the car; the other made no move to halt her. She\ncircled the vehicle and dashed recklessly across the street. From the\nsafety of the opposite walk she glanced back; the red-eyed visage was\nregarding her steadily through the glass of the window.\n\n\n\n\n21\n\nA Question of Synapses\n\n\nPat almost ran the few blocks to her home. She hastened along in a near\npanic, regardless of the glances of pedestrians she chanced to pass.\nWith the disappearance of the immediate urge, the composure for which\nshe had struggled had deserted her, and she felt shaken, terrified,\nand weak. Her arm ached miserably, and her wrenched shoulder pained at\neach movement. It was not until she attained her own door-step that she\npaused, panting and quivering, to consider the events of the evening.\n\n\"I can't stand any more of this!\" she muttered wretchedly to herself.\n\"I'll just have to give up, I guess; I can't pit myself another time\nagainst--that thing.\"\n\nShe leaned wearily against the railing of the porch, rubbing her\ninjured arm.\n\n\"Dr. Carl was right,\" she thought. \"Nick was right; it's dangerous.\nThere was a moment there at the end when he--or it--almost had me. I'm\nfrightened,\" she admitted. \"Lord only knows what might have happened\nhad I been a little weaker. If the Lord _does_ know,\" she added.\n\nShe found her latch-key and entered the house. Only a dim light burned\nin the hall; her mother, of course, was at the Club, and the maid and\nMagda were far away in their chambers on the third floor. She tossed\nher wrap on a chair, switched on a brighter light, and examined the\npainful spot on her arm, a red mark already beginning to turn a nasty\nblue, with two tiny specks of drying blood. She shuddered, and trudged\nwearily up the stairs to her room.\n\nThe empty silence of the house oppressed her. She wanted human\ncompanionship--safe, trustworthy, friendly company, anyone to distract\nher thoughts from the eerie, disturbing direction they were taking.\nShe was still in somewhat of a panic, and suppressed with difficulty a\ndesire to peep fearfully under the bed.\n\n\"Coward!\" she chided herself. \"You knew what to expect.\"\n\nSuddenly the recollection of her parting words recurred to her. She\nhad told Nick--if Nick had indeed heard--to come to the house, to come\nat once, tonight, if he could. A tremor of apprehension ran through\nher. Suppose he came; suppose he came as her own Nick, and she admitted\nhim, and then--or suppose that other came, and managed by some trick to\nenter, or suppose that unholy fascination of his prevailed on her--she\nshivered, and brushed her hand distractedly across her eyes.\n\n\"I can't stand it!\" she moaned. \"I'll have to give up, even if it means\nnever seeing Nick again. I'll have to!\" She shook her head miserably as\nif to deny the picture that had risen in her mind of herself and that\nhorror alone in the house.\n\n\"I won't stay here!\" she decided. She peeped out of the west windows at\nthe Doctor's residence, and felt a surge of relief at the sight of his\niron-gray hair framed in the library window below. He was reading; she\ncould see the book on his knees. There was her refuge; she ran hastily\ndown the stairs and out of the door.\n\nWith an apprehensive glance along the street she crossed to his door\nand rang the bell. She waited nervously for his coming, and, with\na sudden impulse, pulled her vanity-case from her bag and dabbed a\nfilm of powder over the mark on her arm. Then his ponderous footsteps\nsounded and the door opened.\n\n\"Hello,\" he said genially.", "start_char_idx": 179299, "end_char_idx": 183156, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb": {"__data__": {"id_": "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "53577bb2d05cf929e022fb810b36abf96f7042feee2a6a440badb50577609bc6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "904ad4820fae547f3ad230a69311288055097fe854ccf4db0c2e166eab050fe6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Hello,\" he said genially. \"These late evening visits of yours are\nbecoming quite customary--and see if I care!\"\n\n\"May I come in a while?\" asked Pat meekly.\n\n\"Have I ever turned you away?\" He followed her into the library, pushed\na chair forward for her, and dropped quickly into his own with an air\nof having snatched it from her just in time.\n\n\"I didn't want your old arm-chair,\" she remarked, occupying the other.\n\n\"And what's the trouble tonight?\" he queried.\n\n\"I--well, I was just nervous. I didn't want to stay in the house alone.\"\n\n\"You?\" His tone was skeptical. \"You were nervous? That hardly sounds\nreasonable, coming from an independent little spit-fire like you.\"\n\n\"I was, though. I was scared.\"\n\n\"And of what--or whom?\"\n\n\"Of haunts and devils.\"\n\n\"Oh.\" He nodded. \"I see you've had results from your letter-writing.\"\n\n\"Well, sort of.\"\n\n\"I'm used to your circumlocutions, Pat. Suppose you come directly to\nthe point for once. What happened?\"\n\n\"Why, I wrote Nick to get in touch with me, and I got a reply. He said\nto meet him in the park at a place we knew. This evening.\"\n\n\"And you did, of course.\"\n\n\"Yes, but before that, this afternoon, he called up and told me not to,\nbut I insisted and we did.\"\n\n\"Told you not to, eh? And was his warning justified?\"\n\n\"Yes. Oh, yes! When I came to the place, it was--the other.\"\n\n\"So! Well, he could hardly manhandle you in a public park.\"\n\nPat thought of her wrenched shoulder and bruised arm. She shuddered.\n\n\"He's horrible!\" she said. \"Inhuman! He kept referring to Saturday\nnight, and he threatened that if I moved or made a disturbance he'd let\nNick suffer the consequences. So I kept still while he insulted me.\"\n\n\"You nit-wit!\" There was more than a trace of anger in the Doctor's\nvoice. \"I want to see that pup of yours! We'll soon find out what this\nthing is--a mania or simply lack of a good licking!\"\n\n\"What it is?\" echoed Pat. \"Oh--it told me! Dr. Carl, what's a synopsis?\"\n\n\"A synopsis! You know perfectly well.\"\n\n\"I mean applied to physiology or psychology or something. It--he told\nme he was a question of synopsis.\"\n\n\"This devil of yours said that?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Hum!\" The Doctor's voice was musing. He frowned perplexedly, then\nlooked up abruptly. \"Was it--did he by any chance say synapses? Not\nsynopsis--synapses?\"\n\n\"That's it!\" exclaimed the girl. \"He said he was a question of\nsynapses. Does that explain him? Do you know what he is?\"\n\n\"Doesn't explain a damn thing!\" snapped Horker. \"A synapse is a\njuncture, or the meeting of two nerves. It's why you can develop\nautomatic motions and habits, like playing piano, or dancing. When you\nform a habit, the synapses of the nerves involved are sort of worn\nthin, so the nerves themselves are, in a sense, short-circuited. You go\nthrough motions without the need of your brain intervening, which is\nall a habit amounts to. Understand?\"\n\n\"Not very well,\" confessed Pat.\n\n\"Humph! It doesn't matter anyway. I can't see that it helps to analyze\nyour devil.\"\n\n\"I don't care if it's never analyzed,\" said Pat with a return of\ndespondency. \"Dr. Carl, I can't face that evil thing again. I can't do\nit, not even if it means never seeing Nick!\"\n\n\"Sensible,\" said the Doctor approvingly. \"I'd like to have a chance at\nhim, but not enough to keep you in this state of jitters. Although,\" he\nadded, \"a lot of this mystery is the product of your own harum-scarum\nmind. You can be sure of that, Honey.\"\n\n\"You _would_ say so,\" responded the girl wearily. \"You've never seen\nthat--change. If it's my imagination, then I'm the one that needs your\ntreatments, not Nick.\"\n\n\"It isn't _all_ imagination, most likely,\" said Horker defensively.", "start_char_idx": 183130, "end_char_idx": 186763, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff": {"__data__": {"id_": "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "c0f20ad2db86c409a6f92732ced119e984a7b9280663f8f0a9f453be7ee19117", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "409ee732896446a16fc9dbdfc6d0fbdd4162d7090888659d204b8e6b2dab8318", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"It isn't _all_ imagination, most likely,\" said Horker defensively. \"I\nknow these introverted types with their hysterias, megalomanias, and\ndefense mechanisms! They've paraded through my office there for a good\nmany years, Pat; they've provided the lion's share of my practice. But\nthis young psychopathic of yours seems to have it bad--abnormally so,\nand that's why I'm so interested, apart from helping you, of course.\"\n\n\"I don't care,\" said Pat apathetically, repressing a desire to rub her\ninjured arm. \"I'm through. I'm scared out of the affair. Another week\nlike this last one and I _would_ be one of your patients.\"\n\n\"Best drop it, then,\" said Horker, eyeing her seriously. \"Nothing's\nworth upsetting yourself like this, Pat.\"\n\n\"Nick's worth it,\" she murmured. \"He's worth it--only I just haven't\nthe strength. I haven't the courage. I can't do it!\"\n\n\"Never mind, Honey,\" the Doctor muttered, regarding her with an\nexpression of concern. \"You're probably well out of the mess. I know\ndamn well you haven't told me everything about this affair--notably,\nhow you acquired that ugly mark on your arm that's so carefully\npowdered over. So, all in all, I guess you're well out of it.\"\n\n\"I suppose I am.\" Her voice was still weary. Suddenly the glare of\nheadlights drew her attention to the window; a car was stopping before\nher home. \"There's Mother,\" she said. \"I'll go on back now, Dr. Carl,\nand thanks for entertaining a lonesome and depressed lady.\"\n\nShe rose with a casual glance through the window, then halted in frozen\nastonishment and a trace of terror.\n\n\"Oh!\" she gasped. The car was the modest coupe of Nicholas Devine.\n\nShe peered through the window; the Doctor rose and stared over her\nshoulder. \"I told him to come,\" she whispered. \"I told him to come when\nhe was able. He heard me, he or--the other.\"\n\nA figure alighted from the vehicle. Even in the dusk she could perceive\nthe exhaustion, the weariness in its movements. She pressed her face\nto the pane, surveying the form with fascinated intentness. It turned,\nsupporting itself against the car and gazing steadily at her own door.\nWith the movement the radiance of a street-light illuminated its\nfeatures.\n\n\"It's Nick!\" she cried with such eagerness that the Doctor was\nstartled. \"It's _my_ Nick!\"\n\n\n\n\n22\n\nDoctor and Devil\n\n\nPat rushed to the door, out upon the porch, and down to the street.\nDr. Horker followed her to the entrance and stood watching her as she\ndarted toward the dejected figure beside the car.\n\n\"Nick!\" she cried. \"I'm here, Honey. You heard me, didn't you?\"\n\nShe flung herself into his arms; he held her eagerly, pressing a hasty,\ntender kiss on her lips.\n\n\"You heard me!\" she murmured.\n\n\"Yes.\" His voice was husky, strained. \"What is it, Pat? Tell me\nquickly--God knows how much time we have!\"\n\n\"It's Dr. Carl. He'll help us, Nick.\"\n\n\"Help us! No one can help us, dear. No one!\"\n\n\"He'll try. It can't do any harm, Honey. Come in with me. Now!\"\n\n\"It's useless, I tell you!\"\n\n\"But come,\" she pleaded. \"Come anyway!\"\n\n\"Pat, I tell you this battle has to be fought out by me alone. I'm the\nonly one who can do anything at all and,\" he lowered his voice, \"Pat,\nI'm losing!\"\n\n\"Nick!\"\n\n\"That's why I came tonight. I was too cowardly to make our last\nmeeting--Monday evening in the park--a definite farewell. I wanted to,\nbut I weakened. So tonight, Pat, it's a final good-bye, and you thank\nHeaven for it!\"\n\n\"Oh, Nick dear!\"\n\n\"It was touch and go whether I came at all tonight. It was a struggle,\nPat; _he_ is as strong as I am now. Or stronger.\"\n\nThe girl gazed searchingly into his worn, weary face.", "start_char_idx": 186696, "end_char_idx": 190282, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da": {"__data__": {"id_": "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "a9be6c977763952b301c19bbb4e87ad08a0b5decd103ef9d6a5e925aef011b2b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "369ba6aa815cfb04a3be3ea5863558d81a10f24a38e923714f3f1810acbc7a8d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Or stronger.\"\n\nThe girl gazed searchingly into his worn, weary face. He looked\nmiserably ill, she thought; he seemed as exhausted as one who had been\nengaged in a physical battle.\n\n\"Nick,\" she said insistently, \"I don't care what you say, you're coming\nin with me. Only for a little while.\"\n\nShe tugged at his hand, dragging him reluctantly after her. He followed\nher to the porch where the open door still framed the great figure of\nthe Doctor.\n\n\"You know Dr. Carl,\" she said.\n\n\"Come inside,\" growled Horker. Pat noticed the gruffness of his voice,\nhis lack of any cordiality, but she said nothing as she pulled her\nreluctant companion through the door and into the library.\n\nThe Doctor drew up another chair, and Pat, more accustomed to his\ndevices, observed that he placed it in such position that the lamp cast\na stream of radiance on Nick's face. She sank into her own chair and\nwaited silently for developments.\n\n\"Well,\" said Horker, turning his shrewd old eyes on Nick's countenance,\n\"let's get down to cases. Pat's told me what she knows; we can take\nthat much for granted. Is there anything more you might want to tell?\"\n\n\"No, sir,\" responded the youth wearily. \"I've told Pat all I know.\"\n\n\"Humph! Maybe I can ask some leading questions, then. Will you answer\nthem?\"\n\n\"Of course, any that I can.\"\n\n\"All right. Now,\" the Doctor's voice took on a cool professional edge,\n\"you've had these--uh--attacks as long as you can remember. Is that\nright?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"But they've been more severe of late?\"\n\n\"Much worse, sir!\"\n\n\"Since when?\"\n\n\"Since--about as long as I've known Pat. Four or five weeks.\"\n\n\"M--m,\" droned the Doctor. \"You've no idea of the cause for this\nincrease in the malignancy of the attacks?\"\n\n\"No sir,\" said Nick, after a barely perceptible hesitation.\n\n\"You don't think the cause could be in any way connected with, let us\nsay, the emotional disturbances attending your acquaintance with Pat\nhere?\"\n\n\"No, sir,\" said the youth flatly.\n\n\"All right,\" said Horker. \"Let that angle go for the present. Are there\nany after effects from these spells?\"\n\n\"Yes. There's always a splitting headache.\" He closed his eyes. \"I have\none of them now.\"\n\n\"Localized?\"\n\n\"Sir?\"\n\n\"Is the pain in any particular region? Forehead, temples, eyes, or so\nforth?\"\n\n\"No. Just a nasty headache.\"\n\n\"But no other after-effects?\"\n\n\"I can't think of any others. Except, perhaps, a feeling of exhaustion\nafter I've gone through what I've just finished.\" He closed his eyes as\nif to shut out the recollection.\n\n\"Well,\" mused the Doctor, \"we'll forget the physical symptoms. What\nhappens to your individuality, your own consciousness, while you're\nsuffering an attack?\"\n\n\"Nothing happens to it,\" said Nick with a suppressed shudder. \"I\nwatch and hear, but what _he_ does is beyond my control. It's\nterrifying--horrible!\" he burst out suddenly.\n\n\"Doubtless,\" responded Horker smoothly. \"What about the other? Does\nthat one stand by while you're in the saddle?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" muttered Nick dully. \"Of course he does!\" he added\nabruptly. \"I can feel his presence at all times--even now. He's always\nlurking, waiting to spring forth, as soon as I relax!\"\n\n\"Humph!\" ejaculated the Doctor. \"How do you manage to sleep?\"\n\n\"By waiting for exhaustion,\" said Nick wearily. \"By waiting until I can\nstay awake no longer.\"\n\n\"And can you bring this other personality into dominance? Can you\nchange controls, so to speak, at will?\"\n\n\"Why--yes,\" the youth answered, hesitating as if puzzled. \"Yes, I\nsuppose I could.\"\n\n\"Let's see you, then.\"\n\n\"But--\" Horror was in his voice.\n\n\"No, Dr. Carl!\" Pat interjected in fright. \"I won't let him!\"\n\n\"I thought you declared yourself out of this,\" said Horker with a\nshrewd glance at the girl.\n\n\"Then I'm back in it! I won't let him do what you want--anyway, not\nthat!\"", "start_char_idx": 190214, "end_char_idx": 193994, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5": {"__data__": {"id_": "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "0b129e1a4ecc5a46b86ce5a6d4e21a6291a807240008b6e34715b858a4dc3fdc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8c1dd555a8adc4e3ee6ff109fb43f7ce4f496f7dec536455829113a7f4f889d9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I won't let him do what you want--anyway, not\nthat!\"\n\n\"Pat,\" said the Doctor with an air of patience, \"you want me to treat\nthis affliction, don't you? Isn't that what both of you want?\"\n\nThe girl murmured a scarcely audible assent.\n\n\"Very well, then,\" he proceeded. \"Do you expect me to treat the thing\nblindly--in the dark? Do you think I can guess at the cause without\nobserving the effect?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Pat faintly.\n\n\"So! Now then,\" he turned to Nick, \"Let's see this transformation.\"\n\n\"Must I?\" asked the youth reluctantly.\n\n\"If you want my help.\"\n\n\"All right,\" he agreed with another tremor. He sat passively staring\nat the Doctor; a moment passed. Horker heard Pat's nervous breathing;\nother than that, the room was in silence. Nicholas Devine closed his\neyes, brushed his hand across his forehead. A moment more and he opened\nthem to gaze perplexedly at the Doctor.\n\n\"He won't!\" he muttered in astonishment. \"He won't do it!\"\n\n\"Humph!\" snapped Horker, ignoring Pat's murmur of relief. \"Finicky\ndevil, isn't he? Likes to pick company he can bully!\"\n\n\"I don't understand it!\" Nick's face was blank. \"He's been tormenting\nme until just now!\" He looked at the Doctor. \"You don't think I'm lying\nabout it, do you, Dr. Horker?\"\n\n\"Not consciously,\" replied the other coolly. \"If I thought you were\nresponsible for a few of the indignities perpetrated on Pat here, I'd\nwaste no time in questions, young man. I'd be relieving myself of\ncertain violent impulses instead.\"\n\n\"I _couldn't_ harm Pat!\"\n\n\"You gave a passable imitation of it, then! However, that's beside the\npoint; as I say, I don't hold you responsible for aberrations which I\nbelieve are beyond your control. The main thing is a diagnosis.\"\n\n\"Do you know what it is?\" cut in Pat eagerly.\n\n\"Not yet--at least, not for certain. There's only one real method\navailable; these questions will get us nowhere. We'll have to\npsychoanalyze you, young man.\"\n\n\"I don't care what you do, if you can offer any hope!\" he declared\nvehemently. \"Let's get it over!\"\n\n\"Not as easy as all that!\" rumbled Horker. \"It takes time; and besides,\nit can't be successful with the subject in a hectic mood such as\nyours.\" He glanced at his watch. \"Moreover, it's after midnight.\"\n\nHe turned to Nicholas Devine. \"We'll make it Saturday evening,\"\nhe said. \"Meanwhile, young man, you're not to see Pat. Not at\nall--understand? You can see her here when you come.\"\n\n\"That's infinitely more than I'd planned for myself,\" said the youth in\na low voice. \"I'd abandoned the hope of seeing her.\"\n\nHe rose and moved toward the door, and the others followed. At the\nentrance he paused; he leaned down to plant a brief, tender kiss on\nthe girl's lips, and moved wordlessly out of the door. Pat watched\nhim enter his car, and followed the vehicle with her eyes until it\ndisappeared. Then she turned to Horker.\n\n\"Do you really know anything about it?\" she queried. \"Have you any\ntheory at all?\"\n\n\"He's not lying,\" said the Doctor thoughtfully. \"I watched him closely;\nhe believes he's telling the truth.\"\n\n\"He is. I know what I saw!\"\n\n\"He hasn't the signs of praecox or depressive,\" mused the Doctor. \"It's\npuzzling; it's one of those functional aberrations, or a fixed delusion\nof some kind. We'll find out just what it is.\"\n\n\"It's the devil,\" declared Pat positively. \"I don't care what sort of\nscientific tag you give it--that's what it is. You doctors can hide a\nlot of ignorance under a long name.\"\n\nHorker paid no attention to her remarks. \"We'll see what the\npsychoanalysis brings out,\" he said. \"I shouldn't be surprised if the\nwhole thing were the result of a defense mechanism erected by a timid\nchild in an effort to evade responsibility. That's what it sounds like.\"\n\n\"It's a devil!\" reiterated Pat.", "start_char_idx": 193942, "end_char_idx": 197674, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22": {"__data__": {"id_": "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "005d3a1097800ce511bda844a33bfa38d0ceecc56edf998ce2b977a3a60a51b7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "921ca1a9319a5ff4ca243616bc3634d6616a4f99c6fbc75e893adb558b535baa", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That's what it sounds like.\"\n\n\"It's a devil!\" reiterated Pat.\n\n\"Well,\" said the Doctor, \"if it is, it has one thing in common with\nevery spook or devil I ever heard of.\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"It refuses to appear under any conditions where one has a chance to\nexamine it. It's like one of these temperamental mediums trying to\nperform under a spot-light.\"\n\n\n\n\n23\n\nWerewolf\n\n\nPat awoke in rather better spirits. Somehow, the actual entrance of Dr.\nHorker into the case gave her a feeling of security, and her natural\noptimistic nature rode the pendulum back from despair to hope. Even the\npainful black-and-blue mark on her arm, as she examined it ruefully,\nfailed to shake her buoyant mood.\n\nHer mood held most of the day; it was only at evening that a recurrence\nof doubt assailed her. She sat in the dim living room waiting the\narrival of her mother's guests, and wondered whether, after all, the\npredicament was as easily solvable as she had assumed. She watched\nthe play of lights and shadows across the ceiling, patterns cast\nthrough the windows by moving headlights in the street, and wondered\nanew whether her faith in Dr. Carl's abilities was justified. Science!\nShe had the faith of her generation in its omnipotence, but here in\nthe dusk, the outworn superstitions of childhood became appalling\nrealities, and some of Magda's stories, forgotten now for years, rose\nout of their graves and went squeaking and maundering like sheeted\nghosts in a ghastly parade across the universe of her mind. The\nmeaningless taunts she habitually flung at Dr. Carl's science became\nsuddenly pregnant with truth; his patient, hard-learned science seemed\nin fact no more than the frenzies of a witch-doctor dancing in the\nheart of a Rhodesian swamp.\n\nWhat was it worth--this array of medical facts--if it failed to\ncure? Was medicine falling into the state of Chinese science--a vast\ncollection of good rules for which the reasons were either unknown or\nlong forgotten? She sighed; it was with a feeling of profound relief\nthat she heard the voices of the Brocks outside; she played miserable\nbridge the whole evening, but it was less of an affliction than the\nsolitude of her own thoughts.\n\nSaturday morning, cloudy and threatening though it was, found the\npendulum once more at the other end of the arc. She found herself, if\nnot buoyantly cheerful, at least no longer prey to the inchoate doubts\nand fears of the preceding evening. She couldn't even recall their\nnature; they had been apart from the cool, day-time logic that preached\na common-sense reliance on accepted practices. They had been, she\nconcluded, no more than childish nightmares induced by darkness and the\nplay of shadows.\n\nShe dressed and ate a late breakfast; her mother was already en route\nto the Club for her bridge-luncheon. Thereafter, she wandered into the\nkitchen for the company of Magda, whom she found with massive arms\nimmersed in dish water. Pat perched on her particular stool beside the\nkitchen table and watched her at her work.\n\n\"Magda,\" she said finally.\n\n\"I'm listening, Miss Pat.\"\n\n\"Do you remember a story you told me a long time ago? Oh, years\nand years ago, about a man in your town who could change into\nsomething--some fierce animal. A wolf, or something like that.\"\n\n\"Oh, him!\" said Magda, knitting her heavy brows. \"You mean the\nwerewolf.\"\n\n\"That's it! The werewolf. I remember it now--how frightened I was after\nI went to bed. I wasn't more than eight years old, was I?\"\n\n\"I couldn't remember. It was years ago, though, for sure.\"\n\n\"What was the story?\" queried Pat. \"Do you remember that?\"\n\n\"Why, it was the time the sheep were being missed,\" said the woman,\npunctuating her words with the clatter of dishes on the drainboard.\n\"Then there was a child gone, and another, and then tales of this great\nwolf about the country. I didn't see him; us little ones stayed under\nroof by darkness after that.\"\n\n\"That wasn't all of it,\" said Pat. \"You told me more than that.\"\n\n\"Well,\" continued Magda, \"there was my uncle, who was best hand with\na rifle in the village.", "start_char_idx": 197613, "end_char_idx": 201658, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0": {"__data__": {"id_": "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "74a09315aa79a93f406be3c53a97835a4386eb9078425d9fa216ea9a6081de2a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6e07573998f619dfcb574db23024a5d51105270ad172cc51de197bbb48929057", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He and others went after the creature, and my\nuncle, he came back telling how he'd seen it plain against the sky, and\nhow he'd fired at it. He couldn't miss, he was that close, but the wolf\ngave him a look and ran away.\"\n\n\"And then what?\"\n\n\"Then the Priest came, and he said it wasn't a natural wolf. He melted\nup a silver coin and cast a bullet, and he gave it to my uncle, he\nbeing the best shot in the village. And the next night he went out once\nmore.\"\n\n\"Did he get it?\" asked Pat. \"I don't remember.\"\n\n\"He did. He came upon it by the pasture, and he aimed his gun. The\ncreature looked straight at him with its evil red eyes, and he shot it.\nWhen he came to it, there wasn't a wolf at all, but this man--his name\nI forget--with a hole in his head. And then the Priest, he said he was\na werewolf, and only a silver bullet could kill him. But my uncle, _he_\nsaid those evil red eyes kept staring at him for many nights.\"\n\n\"Evil red eyes!\" said Pat suddenly. \"Magda,\" she asked in a faint\nvoice, \"could he change any time he wanted to?\"\n\n\"Only by night, the Priest said. By sunrise he had to be back.\"\n\n\"Only by night!\" mused the girl. Another idea was forming in her active\nlittle mind, another conception, disturbing, impossible to phrase. \"Is\nthat worse than being possessed by a devil, Magda?\"\n\n\"Sure it's worse! The Priest, he could cast out the devil, but I never\nheard no cure for being a werewolf.\"\n\nPat said nothing further, but slid from her high perch to the floor and\nwent soberly out of the kitchen. The fears of last night had come to\nlife again, and now the over-cast skies outside seemed a fitting symbol\nto her mood. She stared thoughtfully out of the living room windows,\nand the sudden splash of raindrops against the pane lent a final touch\nto the whole desolate ensemble.\n\n\"I'm just a superstitious little idiot!\" she told herself. \"I laugh\nat Mother because she always likes to play North and South, and here\nI'm letting myself worry over superstitions that were discarded before\nthere was any such thing as a game called contract bridge.\"\n\nBut her arguments failed to carry conviction. The memory of the\nterrible eyes of that _other_ had clicked too aptly to Magda's phrase.\nShe couldn't subdue the picture that haunted her, and she couldn't cast\noff the apprehensiveness of her mood. She recalled gloomily that Dr.\nHorker was at the Club--wouldn't be home before evening, else she'd\nhave gladly availed herself of his solid, matter-of-fact company.\n\nShe thought of Nick's appointment with the Doctor for that evening.\nSuppose his psychoanalysis brought to light some such horror as these\nfears of hers--that would forever destroy any possibility of happiness\nfor her and Nick. Even though the Doctor refused to recognize it,\ncalled it by some polysyllabic scientific name, the thing would be\nthere to sever them.\n\nShe wandered restlessly into the hall. The morning mail, unexamined,\nlay in its brazen receptacle, she moved over, fingering it idly.\nAbruptly she paused in astonishment--a letter in familiar script\nhad flashed at her. She pulled it out; it was! It was a letter from\nNicholas Devine!\n\nShe tore it open nervously, wondering whether he had reverted to his\noriginal refusal of Dr. Horker's aid, whether he was unable to come,\nwhether _that_ had happened. But only a single unfolded sheet slipped\nfrom the envelope, inscribed with a few brief lines of poetry.\n\n \"The grief that is too faint for tears,\n And scarcely breathes of pain,\n May linger on a hundred years\n Ere it creep forth again.\n But I, who love you now too well\n To suffer your disdain,\n Must try tonight that love to quell--\n And try in vain!\"\n\n\n\n\n24\n\nThe Dark Other\n\n\nIt was early in the evening, not yet eight o'clock, when Pat saw the\ncar of Nicholas Devine draw up before the house. She had already been\nwatching half an hour, sitting cross-legged in the deep window seat,\nlike her jade Buddha.", "start_char_idx": 201659, "end_char_idx": 205589, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb": {"__data__": {"id_": "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "f48cf9d8212db67401154487f3eeb81b94f75d17132729d00305d405e899731d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "0459e495d86c1ef41d249f30d4629d066be8e61518554f33a0952d3d078a7723", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That equivocal poem of his had disturbed her,\nlent an added strength to the moods and doubts already implanted by\nMagda's mystical tale, and it was with a feeling of trepidation that\nshe watched him emerge wearily from his vehicle and stare in indecision\nfirst at her window and then at the Horker residence. The waning\ndaylight was still sufficient to delineate his worn features; she\ncould see them, pale, harried, but indubitably the mild features of her\nown Nick.\n\nWhile he hesitated, she darted to the door and out upon the porch. He\ngave her a wan smile of greeting, advanced to the foot of the steps,\nand halted there.\n\n\"The Doctor's not home yet,\" she called to him. He stood motionless\nbelow her.\n\n\"Come up on the porch,\" she invited, as he made no move. She uttered\nthe words with a curious feeling of apprehension; for even as she ached\nfor his presence, the uncertain state of affairs was frightening. She\nthought fearfully that what had happened before might happen again.\nStill, there on the open porch, in practically full daylight, and for\nso brief a time--Dr. Carl would be coming very shortly, she reasoned.\n\n\"I can't,\" said Nick, staring wistfully at her. \"You know I can't.\"\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"I promised. You remember--I promised Dr. Horker I'd not see you except\nin his presence.\"\n\n\"So you did,\" said Pat doubtfully. The promise offered escape from\na distressing situation, she thought, and yet--somehow, seeing Nick\nstanding pathetically there, she couldn't imagine anything harmful\nemanating from him. There had been many and many evenings in his\ncompany that had passed delightfully, enjoyably, safely. She felt a\nwave of pity for him; after all, the affliction was his, most of the\nsuffering was his.\n\n\"We needn't take it so literally,\" she said almost reluctantly. \"He'll\nbe home very soon now.\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Nick soberly, \"but it was a promise, and besides, I'm\nafraid.\"\n\n\"Never mind, Honey,\" she said, after a momentary hesitation. \"Come up\nand sit here on the steps, then--here beside me. We can talk just as\nwell as there on the settee.\"\n\nHe climbed the steps and seated himself, watching Pat with longing\neyes. He made no move to touch her, nor did she suggest a kiss.\n\n\"I read your poem, Honey,\" she said finally. \"It worried me.\"\n\n\"I'm sorry, Pat. I couldn't sleep. I kept wandering around the house,\nand at last I wrote it and took it out and mailed it. It was a vent, a\nrelief from the things I'd been thinking.\"\n\n\"What things, Honey?\"\n\n\"A way, mostly,\" he answered gloomily, \"of removing myself from your\nlife. A permanent way.\"\n\n\"Nick!\"\n\n\"I didn't, as you see, Pat. I was too cowardly, I suppose. Or perhaps\nit was because of this forlorn hope of ours. There's always hope, Pat;\neven the condemned man with his foot on the step to the gallows feels\nit.\"\n\n\"Nick dear!\" she cried, her voice quavering in pity. \"Nick, you mustn't\nthink of those things! It might weaken you--make it easier for _him_!\"\n\n\"It can't. If it frightens _him_, I'm glad.\"\n\n\"Honey,\" she said soothingly, \"we'll give Dr. Carl a chance. Promise me\nyou'll let him try, won't you?\"\n\n\"Of course I will. Is there anything I'd refuse to promise you, Pat?\nEven,\" he added bitterly, \"when reason tells me it's a futile promise.\"\n\n\"Don't say it!\" she urged fiercely. \"We've got to help him. We've got\nto believe--There he comes!\" she finished with sudden relief.\n\nThe Doctor's car turned up the driveway beyond his residence. Pat saw\nhis face regarding them as he disappeared behind the building.\n\n\"Come on, Honey,\" she said. \"Let's get at the business.\"\n\nThey moved slowly over to the Doctor's door, waiting there until his\nponderous footsteps sounded. A light flashed in the hall, and his broad\nshadow filled the door for a moment before it opened.\n\n\"Come in,\" he rumbled jovially.", "start_char_idx": 205590, "end_char_idx": 209370, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee": {"__data__": {"id_": "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "6ec081dd85dedd66d2c8f928b1fc1d0c45d3df84d3e153f55da5eb39df08dd28", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "92eadc45972b01b47baf8d86e42afe8abdfbef5b5e79c6762d2d00869d008162", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Come in,\" he rumbled jovially. \"Fine evening we're spoiling, isn't it?\"\n\n\"It could be,\" said Pat as they followed him into the library, \"only\nit'll probably rain some more.\"\n\n\"Hah!\" snorted the Doctor, frowning at the mention of rain. \"The course\nwas soft. Couldn't get any distance, and it added six strokes to my\nscore. At least six!\"\n\nPat chuckled commiseratingly. \"You ought to lay out a course in\nGreenland,\" she suggested. \"They say anyone can drive a ball a quarter\nof a mile on smooth ice.\"\n\n\"Humph!\" The Doctor waved toward a great, low chair. \"Suppose you sit\nover there, young man, and we'll get about our business. And don't look\nso woe-begone about it.\"\n\nNick settled himself nervously in the designated chair; the Doctor\nseated himself at a little distance to the side, and Pat sat tensely in\nher usual place beside the hearth. She waited in strained impatience\nfor the black magic of psychoanalysis to commence.\n\n\"Now,\" said Horker, \"I want you to keep quiet, Pat--if possible. And\nyou, young man, are to relax, compose yourself, get yourself into as\npassive a state as possible. Do you understand?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" The youth leaned back in the great chair, closing his eyes.\n\n\"So! Now, think back to your childhood, your earliest memories. Let\nyour thoughts wander at random, and speak whatever comes to your mind.\"\n\nNick sat a moment in silence. \"That's hard to do, sir,\" he said finally.\n\n\"Yes. It will take practice, weeks of it, perhaps. You'll have to\nacquire the knack of it, but to do that, we'll have to start.\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.\" He sat with closed eyes. \"My mother,\" he murmured, \"was\nkind. I remember her a little, just a little. She was very gentle, not\napt to blame me. She could understand. Made excuses to my father. He\nwas hard, not cruel--strict. Couldn't understand. Blamed me when I\nwasn't to blame. Other did it. I wasn't mischievous, but got the blame.\nCouldn't explain, he wouldn't believe me.\" He paused uncertainly.\n\n\"Go on,\" said Horker quietly, while Pat strained her ears to listen.\n\n\"Mrs. Stevens,\" he continued. \"Governess after Mother died. Strict like\nFather, got punished when I wasn't to blame. Just as bad after Father\ndied. Always blamed. Couldn't explain, nobody believed me. Other threw\ncat in window, I had to go to bed. Put salt in bird seed, broke leg of\nchair to make it fall. Punished--I couldn't explain.\" His voice droned\ninto silence; he opened his eyes. \"That all,\" he said nervously.\n\n\"Good enough for the first time,\" said the Doctor briskly. \"Wait a few\nweeks; we'll have your life's history out of you. It takes practice.\"\n\n\"Is that all?\" queried Pat in astonishment.\n\n\"All for the first time. Later we'll let him talk half an hour at a\nstretch, but it takes practice, as I've mentioned. You run along home\nnow,\" he said to Nick.\n\n\"But it's early!\" objected Pat.\n\n\"Early or not,\" said the Doctor, \"I'm tired, and you two aren't to see\neach other except here. You remember that.\"\n\nNick rose from his seat in the depths of the great chair. \"Thank you,\nsir,\" he said. \"I don't know why, but I feel easier in your presence.\nThe--the struggle disappears while I'm here.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Horker with a smile, \"I like patients with confidence in\nme. Good night.\"\n\nAt the door Nick paused, turning wistful eyes on Pat. \"Good night,\" he\nsaid, leaning to give her a light kiss. A rush of some emotion twisted\nhis features; he stared strangely at the girl. \"I'd better go,\" he said\nabruptly, and vanished through the door.\n\n\"Well?\" said Pat questioningly, turning to the Doctor. \"Did you learn\nanything from that?\"\n\n\"Not much,\" the other admitted, yawning. \"However, the results bear out\nmy theory.\"", "start_char_idx": 209339, "end_char_idx": 212983, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e": {"__data__": {"id_": "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "ba4cb3fc6f4a3eeb9ccab60eee01f71a4e2080d44ad434d87004788450ad16f7", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "959449b92ab029800db9d5d6dcda636dd180571ab0059aa21ec2dcc755c7afb4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"However, the results bear out\nmy theory.\"\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"Did you notice how he harped on the undeserved punishment theme? He\nwas punished for another's mischief?\"\n\n\"Yes. What of that?\"\n\n\"Well, picture him as a timid, sensitive child, rather afraid of being\npunished. Afraid, say, of being locked up in a dark closet. Now, when\nhe inadvertently commits a mischief, as all children do, he tries\ndesperately to divert the blame from himself. But there's no one else\nto blame! So what does he do?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"He invents this _other_, the mischievous one, and blames him. And\nnow the other has grown to the proportions of a delusion, haunting\nhim, driving him to commit acts apart from his normal inclinations.\nUnderstand? Because I'm off to bed whether you do or not.\"\n\n\"I understand all right,\" murmured Pat uncertainly as she moved to the\ndoor. \"But somehow, it doesn't sound reasonable.\"\n\n\"It will,\" said the Doctor. \"Good night.\"\n\nPat wandered slowly down the steps and through the break in the hedge,\nmusing over Doctor Horker's expression of opinion. Then, according\nto him, the devil was nothing more than an invention of Nick's mind,\nthe trick of a cowardly child to evade just punishment. She shook her\nhead; it didn't sound like Nick at all. For all his gentleness and\nsensitivity, he wasn't the one to hide behind a fabrication. He wasn't\na coward; she was certain of that. And she was as sure as she could\never be that he hated, feared, loathed this personality that afflicted\nhim; he _couldn't_ have created it.\n\nShe sighed, mounted the steps, and fumbled for her key. The sound\nof a movement behind her brought a faint gasp of astonishment. She\nturned to see a figure materializing from the shadows of the porch.\nThe light from the hall fell across its features, and she drew back as\nshe recognized Nicholas Devine--not the being she had just kissed good\nnight, but in the guise of her tormentor, the red-eyed demon!\n\n\n\n\n25\n\nThe Demon Lover\n\n\nPat drew back, leaning against the door, and her key tinkled on the\nconcrete of the porch. She was startled, shocked, but not as completely\nterrified as she might have expected. After all, she thought rapidly,\nthey were standing in full view of a public street, and Dr. Carl's\nresidence was but a few feet distant. She could summon his help by\nscreaming.\n\n\"Well!\" she exclaimed, eyeing the figure inimically. \"Your appearances\nand disappearances are beginning to remind me of the Cheshire Cat.\"\n\n\"Except for the grin,\" said the other in his cold tones.\n\n\"What do you want?\" snapped Pat.\n\n\"You know what I want.\"\n\n\"You'll not get it,\" said the girl angrily. \"You--you're doomed to\nextinction, anyway! Go away!\"\n\n\"Suppose,\" said the other with a strange, cold, twisted smile, \"it were\n_he_ that's doomed to extinction--what then?\"\n\n\"It isn't!\" cried Pat. \"It isn't!\" she repeated, while a quiver of\nuncertainty shook her. \"He's the stronger,\" she said defiantly.\n\n\"Then where is he now?\"\n\n\"Dr. Carl will help us!\"\n\n\"Doctor!\" sneered the other. \"He and his clever theory! Am I an\nillusion?\" he queried sardonically, thrusting his red-glinting eyes\ntoward her. \"Am I the product of his puerile, vacillating nature? Bah!\nI gave you the clue, and your Doctor hasn't the intelligence to follow\nit!\"\n\n\"Go away!\" murmured Pat faintly. The approach of his face had unnerved\nher, and she felt terror beginning to stir within her. \"Go away!\" she\nsaid again. \"Why do you have to torment me? Any one would serve your\npurpose--any woman!\"\n\n\"You have an aesthetic appeal, as I've told you before,\" replied the\nother in that toneless voice of his. \"There is a pleasure in the\ndefacement of black hair and pale skin, and your body is seductive,\nmost seductive. Another might afford me less enjoyment, and besides,\nyou hate me. Don't you hate me?\" He peered evilly at her.", "start_char_idx": 212941, "end_char_idx": 216743, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1": {"__data__": {"id_": "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "66319f477c00a06014a0db9ad4a0342a5be9a502b10e968b2184a0bf05a68922", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c0714e51436b2e1df9f1d53815c9934286cbd495d3853e63ed3d7d4e7ab12dac", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Don't you hate me?\" He peered evilly at her.\n\n\"Oh, God--yes!\" The girl was shuddering.\n\n\"Say it, then! Say you hate me!\"\n\n\"I hate you!\" the girl cried vehemently. \"Will you go away now?\"\n\n\"With you!\"\n\n\"I'll scream if you come any closer. You don't dare touch me; I'll call\nDr. Horker.\"\n\n\"You'll only damage _him_--your lover.\"\n\n\"Then I'll do it! He'll understand.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the other reflectively. \"He's fool enough to forgive you.\nHe'll forgive you anything--the weakling!\"\n\n\"Go away! Get away from here!\"\n\nThe other stared at her out of blood-shot eyes. \"Very well,\" he said in\nhis flat tones. \"This time the victory is yours.\"\n\nHe backed slowly toward the steps. Pat watched him as he moved, feeling\na surge of profound relief. As his shadow shifted, her key gleamed\nsilver at her feet, and she stooped to retrieve it.\n\nThere was a rush of motion as her eyes left the form of her antagonist.\nA hand was clamped violently over her mouth, an arm passed with\nsteel-like rigidity about her body. Nicholas Devine was dragging her\ntoward the steps; she was half-way down before she recovered her wits\nenough to struggle.\n\nShe writhed and twisted in his grasp. She drove her elbow into his\nbody with all her power, and kicked with the strength of desperation\nat his legs. She bit into the palm across her mouth--and suddenly,\nwith a subdued grunt of pain, he released her so abruptly that her own\nstruggles sent her spinning blindly into the bushes of the hedge.\n\nShe turned gasping, unable for the moment to summon sufficient breath\nto scream. The other stood facing her with his eyes gleaming terribly\ninto her own; then they ranged slowly from her diminutive feet to the\nrumpled ebony of her hair that she was brushing back with her hands\nfrom her pallid, frightened face.\n\n\"Obstinate,\" he observed, rubbing his injured palm.\n\n\"Obstinate and unbroken--but worth the trouble. Well worth it!\" He\nreached out a swift hand, seizing her wrist as she backed against the\nbushes.\n\nPat twisted around, gazing frantically at Doctor Horker's house, where\na light had only now flashed on in the upper windows. Her breath flowed\nback into her lungs with a strengthening rush.\n\n\"Dr. Carl!\" she screamed. \"Dr. Carl! Help me!\"\n\nThe other spun her violently about. She had a momentary glimpse of\na horribly evil countenance, then he drew back his arm and shot a\nclenched fist to her chin.\n\nThe world reeled into a blaze of spinning lights that faded quickly to\ndarkness. She felt her knees buckling beneath her, and realized that\nshe was crumpling forward toward the figure before her. Then for a\nmoment she was aware of nothing.\n\nShe didn't quite lose consciousness, or at least for no more than a\nmoment. She was suddenly aware that she was gazing down at a moving\npavement, at her own arms dangling helplessly toward it. She perceived\nthat she was lying limply across Nicholas Devine's shoulder with his\narms clenched about her knees. And then, still unable to make the\nslightest resistance, she was bundled roughly into the seat of his\ncoupe; he was beside her, and the car was purring into motion.\n\nShe summoned what remained of her strength. She drew herself erect,\nfumbling at the handle of the door with a frantic idea of casting\nherself out of the car to the street. The creature beside her jerked\nher violently back; as she reeled into the seat, he struck her again\nwith the side of his fist. It was a random blow, delivered with\nscarcely a glance at her; it caught her on the forehead, snapping her\nhead with an audible thump against the wall of the vehicle. She swayed\nfor a moment with closing eyes, then collapsed limply against him, this\ntime in complete unconsciousness.\n\nThat lapse too must have been brief. She opened dazed eyes on a vista\nof moving street lights; they were still in the car, passing now along\nsome unrecognized thoroughfare lined with dark old homes. She lay\nfor some moments uncomprehending; she was completely unaware of her\nsituation.", "start_char_idx": 216699, "end_char_idx": 220658, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d": {"__data__": {"id_": "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "f88dc9b86f66944c06fda0b5fa16edb4968c60006f24d45905c7dc8354b8caf6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2f96a60d3f6e1e71c34be1a5bf6c1f70a9202ffe44cc7cc4a6fd15e4265c651e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It dawned on her slowly. She moaned, struggled away from the shoulder\nagainst which she had been leaning, and huddled miserably in the far\ncorner of the seat. Nicholas Devine gave her a single glance with his\nunpleasant eyes, and turned them again on the street.\n\nThe girl was helpless, unable to put forth the strength even for\nanother attempt to open the door. She was still only half aware of her\nposition, and realized only that something appalling was occurring to\nher. She lay in passive misery against the cushions of the seat as the\nother turned suddenly up a dark driveway and into the open door of a\nsmall garage. He snapped off the engine, extinguished the headlights,\nand left them in a horrible, smothering, silent darkness.\n\nShe heard him open the door on his side; after an apparently\ninterminable interval, she heard the creak of the hinges on her own\nside. She huddled terrified, voiceless, and immobile.\n\nHe reached in, fumbling against her in the darkness. He found her arm,\nand dragged her from the car. Again, as on that other occasion, she\nfound herself reeling helplessly behind him through the dark as he\ntugged at her wrist. He paused at a door in the building adjacent to\nthe garage, searching in his pocket with his free hand.\n\n\"I won't go in there!\" she muttered dazedly. The other made no reply,\nbut inserted a key in the lock, turned it, and swung open the door.\n\nHe stepped through it, dragging her after him. With a sudden access of\ndesperate strength, she caught the frame of the door, jerked violently\non her prisoned wrist, and was unexpectedly free. She reeled away,\nturned toward the street, and took a few faltering steps down the\ndriveway.\n\nAlmost instantly her tormentor was upon her, and his hand closed again\non her arm. Pat had no further strength; she sank to the pavement and\ncrouched there, disregarding the insistent tugging on her arm.\n\n\"Come on,\" he growled. \"You only delay the inevitable. Must I drag you?\"\n\nShe made no reply. He tugged violently at her wrist, dragging her a few\ninches along the pavement. Then he stooped over her, raised her in his\narms, and bore her toward the dark opening of the door. He crowded her\nroughly through it, disregarding the painful bumping of her shoulders\nand knees. She heard the slam of the door as he kicked it closed,\nand she realized that they were mounting a flight of stairs, moving\nsomewhere into the oppressive threatening darkness.\n\nThen they were moving along a level floor, and her arm was bruised\nagainst another door. There was a moment of stillness, and then she was\nreleased, dropped indifferently to the surface of a bed or couch. A\nmoment later a light flashed on.\n\nThe girl was conscious at first only of the gaze of the red eyes. They\nheld her own in a fascinating, unbreakable, trance-like spell. Then, in\na wave of dizziness, she closed her own eyes.\n\n\"Where are we?\" she murmured. \"In Hell?\"\n\n\"You should call it Heaven,\" came the sardonic voice. \"It's the home of\nyour sweetheart. His home--and mine!\"\n\n\n\n\n26\n\nThe Depths\n\n\n\"Heaven and Hell always were the same place,\" said Nicholas Devine, his\nred eyes glaring down at the girl. \"We'll demonstrate the fact.\"\n\nPat shifted wearily, and sat erect, passing her hand dazedly across her\nface. She brushed the tangled strands of black hair from before her\neyes, and stared dully at the room in which she found herself.\n\nIt had some of the aspects of a study, and some of a laboratory, or\nperhaps a doctor's office. There was a case of dusty books on the wall\nopposite, and another crystal-fronted cabinet containing glassware,\nbottles, little round boxes suggestive of drugs or pharmaceuticals.\nThere was a paper-littered table too; she gave a convulsive shudder at\nthe sight of a bald, varnished death's head, its lower jar articulated,\nthat reposed on a pile of papers and grinned at her.\n\n\"Where--\" she began faintly.\n\n\"This was the room of your sweetheart's father,\" said the other. \"His\nand my mutual father. He was an experimenter, a researcher, and so, in\nanother sense, am I!\"", "start_char_idx": 220660, "end_char_idx": 224700, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568": {"__data__": {"id_": "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "796fcb6c8fdd8bc2aad2a350524ee0053b5f4cdf3e1c3a32e05f7bf079163cff", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bfdefaa54ef1bbd60444f176605a87bfde472090e75320dd2d65f06762410871", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He leered evilly at her. \"He used this chamber\nto further his experiments, and I for mine--the carrying on of a noble\nfamily tradition!\"\n\nThe girl scarcely heard his words; the expressionless tone carried no\nmeaning to the chaos which was her mind. She felt only an inchoate\nhorror and a vague but all-encompassing fear, and her head was aching\nfrom the blows he had dealt her.\n\n\"What do you want?\" she asked dully.\n\n\"Why, there is an unfinished experiment. You must remember our\ninterrupted proceedings of a week ago! Have you already forgotten the\nearly steps of our experiment in evil?\"\n\nPat cringed at the cold, sardonic tones of the other. \"Let me go,\" she\nwhimpered. \"Please!\" she appealed. \"Let me go!\"\n\n\"In due time,\" he responded. \"You lack gratitude,\" he continued. \"Last\ntime, out of the kindness that is my soul, I permitted you to dull your\nsenses with alcohol, but you failed, apparently, to appreciate my\nindulgence. But this time\"--His eyes lit up queerly--\"this time you\napproach the consummation of our experiment with undimmed mind!\"\n\nHe approached her. She drew her knees up, huddling back on the couch,\nand summoned the final vestiges of her strength.\n\n\"I'll kick you!\" she muttered desperately. \"Keep back from me!\"\n\nHe paused just beyond her reach. \"I had hoped,\" he said ironically, \"if\nnot for your cooperation, at least for no further active resistance.\nIt's quite useless; I told you days ago that this time would come.\"\n\nHe advanced cautiously; Pat thrust out her foot, driving it with all\nher power. Instantly he drew back, catching her ankle in his hand. He\njerked her leg sharply upwards, and she was precipitated violently to\nthe couch. Again he advanced.\n\nThe girl writhed away from him. She slipped from the foot of the couch\nand darted in a circle around him, turning in an attempt to gain the\nroom's single exit--the door by which they had entered. He moved\nquickly to intercept her; he closed the door as she backed despairingly\naway, retreating to the far end of the room. Once more he faced her,\nhis malicious eyes gleaming, and moved deliberately toward her.\n\nShe drew back until the table halted her; she pressed herself against\nit as if to force her way still further. The other moved at unaltered\npace. Suddenly her hand pressed over some smooth, round, hard object;\nshe grasped it and flung the grinning skull at the more terrible\nface that approached her. He dodged; there was a crash of glass as\nthe gruesome missile shattered the pane of the cabinet of drugs. And\ninexorably, Nicholas Devine approached once more.\n\nShe moved along the edge of the table, squeezed herself between it and\nthe wall. Behind her was one of the room's two windows, curtainless,\nwith drawn shades. She found the cord, jerked it, and let the blind\ncoil upward with an abrupt snap.\n\n\"I'll throw myself through the window!\" she announced with a sort of\ndesperate calm. \"Don't dare move a step closer!\"\n\nThe demon paused once more in his deliberate advance. \"You will, of\ncourse,\" he said as if considering. \"Given the opportunity. Your body\ntorn and broken, spotted with blood--that might be a pleasure second\nonly to that I plan.\"\n\n\"You'll suffer for it!\" said the girl hysterically. \"I'll be glad to do\nit, knowing you'll suffer!\"\n\n\"Not I--your sweetheart.\"\n\n\"I don't care! I can't stand it!\"\n\nThe other smiled his demoniac smile, and resumed his advance. She\nwatched him in terror that had now reached the ultimate degree; her\nmind could bear no more. She turned suddenly, raised her arm, and beat\nher fist against the pane of the window.\n\nWith the surprising resistance glass sometimes displays, it shook at\nher blow but did not shatter. She drew back for a second attempt,\nand her upraised arm was caught in a rigid grip, and she was dragged\nbackward to the center of the room, thrown heavily to the floor. She\nsat dazedly looking up at the form standing over her.\n\n\"Must I render you helpless again?\" queried the flat voice of the\nother.", "start_char_idx": 224701, "end_char_idx": 228664, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4": {"__data__": {"id_": "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "54b53eae7329302263e357c796ddf891d96c4019ab0763f7792bcf39ad274dd8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dc55f25357f3bcad29a16d837440dad7e8fb7490b1831502eea04cd635572904", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Must I render you helpless again?\" queried the flat voice of the\nother. \"Are you not yet broken, convinced of the uselessness of this\nstruggle?\"\n\nShe made no answer, staring dully at his immobile features.\n\n\"Are you going to fight me further?\" As she was still silent, he\nrepeated, \"Are you?\"\n\nShe shook her head vaguely. \"No,\" she muttered. She had reached the\npoint of utter indifference; nothing at all was important enough now to\nstruggle for.\n\n\"Stand up!\" ordered the being above her.\n\nShe pulled herself wearily to her feet, leaning against the wall. She\nclosed her eyes for a moment, then opened them dully as the other moved.\n\n\"What--are you--are you going to do?\" she murmured.\n\n\"First,\" said the demon coldly, \"I shall disrobe you somewhat more\ncompletely than on our other occasion. Thereafter we will proceed to\nthe consummation of our experiment.\"\n\nShe watched him indifferently, uncomprehendingly, as he crooked a thin\nfinger in the neck of her frock. She felt the pressure as he pulled,\nheard the rip of the fabric, and the pop of buttons, but she was\nconscious of no particular sensation as the garment cascaded into a\nblack and red pool at her feet. She stood passive as he hooked his\nfinger in the strap of her vest, and that too joined the little mound\nof cloth. She shivered slightly as she stood bared to the waist, but\ngave no other sign.\n\nAgain the thin hand moved toward her; from somewhere in her tormented\nspirit a final shred of resistance arose, and she pushed the questing\nmember feebly to one side. She heard a low, sardonic laugh from her\noppressor.\n\n\"Look at me!\" he commanded.\n\nShe raised her eyes wearily; she drew her arm about her in a forlorn\ngesture of concealment. Her eyes met the strange orbs of the other, and\na faint thrill of horror stirred; other than this, she felt nothing.\nThen his eyes were approaching her; she was conscious of the illusion\nthat they were expanding, filling all the space in front of her. Their\nweird glow filled the world, dominated everything.\n\n\"Will you yield?\" he queried.\n\nThe eyes commanded. \"Yes,\" she said dully.\n\nShe felt his hands icy cold on her bare shoulders. They traveled like a\nshudder about her body, and suddenly she was pressed close to him.\n\n\"Are you mine?\" he demanded. For the first time there was a tinge of\nexpression in the toneless voice, a trace of eagerness. She made no\nanswer; her eyes, held by his, stared like the eyes of a person in a\ntrance, unwinking, fascinated.\n\n\"Are you mine?\" he repeated, his breath hissing on her cheek.\n\n\"Yes.\" She heard her own voice in automatic reply to his question.\n\n\"Mine--for the delights of evil?\"\n\n\"Yours!\" she murmured. The eyes had blotted out everything.\n\n\"And do you hate me?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nThe arms about her tightened into crushing bands. The pressure\nstopped her breath; her very bones seemed to give under their fierce\ncompression.\n\n\"Do you hate me?\" he muttered.\n\n\"Yes!\" she gasped. \"Yes! I hate you!\"\n\n\"Ah!\" He twisted his hand in her black hair, wrenching it roughly back.\n\"Are you ready now for the consummation? To look upon the face of evil?\"\n\nShe made no reply. Her eyes, as glassy as those of a sleep-walker,\nstared into his.\n\n\"Are you ready?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" she said.\n\nHe pressed his mouth to hers. The fierceness of the kiss bruised her\nlips, the pull of his hand in her hair was a searing pain, the pressure\nof his arm about her body was a suffocation. Yet--somehow--there was\nagain the dawning of that unholy pleasure--the same degraded delight\nthat had risen in her on that other occasion, in the room of the\nred-checked table cloth. Through some hellish alchemy, the leaden pain\nwas transmuting itself into the garish gold of a horrible, abnormal\npleasure. She found her crushed lips attempting a feeble, painful\nresponse.\n\nAt her movement, she felt herself swung abruptly from her feet.", "start_char_idx": 228592, "end_char_idx": 232424, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e": {"__data__": {"id_": "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "61bbf1f1c29cf56e52ba3b9d1d74f48cb5b39d8cee5c49013211ebc5a9186034", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "342289c5f974db701cdb7edac74564e63848f93bf0c4544c5e8e14adfb092233", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "At her movement, she felt herself swung abruptly from her feet. With\nhis lips still crushing hers, he raised her in his arms; she felt\nherself borne across the room. He paused; there was a sudden release,\nand she crashed to the hard surface of the couch, whose rough covering\nscratched the bare flesh of her back. Nicholas Devine bent over her;\nshe saw his hand stretch toward her single remaining garment. And\nagain, from somewhere in her harassed soul, a spark of resistance\nflashed.\n\n\"Nick!\" she moaned. \"Oh, Nick! Help me!\"\n\n\"Call him!\" said the other, a sneer on his face. \"Call him! He hears;\nit adds to his torment!\"\n\nShe covered her eyes with her hands. She felt his hand slip coldly\nbetween her skin and the elastic about her waist.\n\n\"Nick!\" she moaned again. \"Nick! Oh, my God! Nick!\"\n\n\n\n\n27\n\nTwo in Hell\n\n\nThe cold hand against Pat was still; she felt it rigid and stiff on\nher flesh. She lay passive with closed eyes; having voiced her final\nappeal, she was through. The words torn from her misery represented\nthe final iota of spirit remaining to her; and her bruised body and\nbattered mind had nothing further to give.\n\nThe hand quivered and withdrew. For a moment more she lay motionless\nwith her arms clutched about her, then she opened her eyes, gazing\ndully, hopelessly at the demon standing over her. He was watching her\nwith a curious abstracted frown; as she stirred, the scowl intensified,\nand he drew back a step.\n\nHis face contorted suddenly in a spasm of some unguessable emotion.\nHis fists clenched; a low unintelligible mutter broke from his lips.\n\"Strange!\" she heard him say, and after a moment, \"I'm still master\nhere!\"\n\nHe _was_ master; in a moment the emotion vanished, and he was again\nstanding over her, his face the same impassive demoniac mask. She\nwatched him in a dull stupor of despair that was too deep for even a\nwhimper of pain as he wrenched at the elastic about her waist, and it\ncut into her flesh and parted. He tore the garment away, and the red\neyes bored down with a wild elation in their depths.\n\n\"Mine!\" the being muttered, a new hoarseness in his voice. \"Are you\nmine?\"\n\nPat made no answer; his voice croaked in more insistent tones. \"Are you\nmine?\"\n\nShe could not reply. She felt his fingers bite into the flesh of her\nshoulder. She was shaken roughly, violently, and the question came\nagain, fiercely. The eyes flamed in command, and she felt through\nher languor and weakness, the stirring of that strange and unholy\nfascination that he held over her.\n\n\"Answer!\" he croaked. \"Are you mine?\"\n\nThe torture of his searing grip on her shoulder wrung an answer from\nher.\n\n\"Yes,\" she murmured faintly. \"Yours.\"\n\nShe closed her eyes again in helpless resignation. She felt the\nhand withdrawn, and she lay passive, waiting, on the verge of\nunconsciousness, numb, spirit-broken, and beaten.\n\nNothing happened. After a long interval she opened her eyes, and saw\nthe other standing again with clenched fists and contorted countenance.\nHis features were writhing in the intensity of his struggle; a strange\nlow snarl came from his lips. He backed away from her, step by step; he\nleaned against the book-shelves, and beads of perspiration formed on\nhis scowling face.\n\nHe was no longer master! She saw the change; imperceptibly the evil\nvanished from his features, and suddenly they were no longer his,\nbut the weary, horror-stricken visage of her Nick! The red eyes were\nno longer Satanic, but only the blood-shot, troubled, gentle eyes of\nher sweetheart, and the lips had lost their grimness, and gasped and\nquivered and trembled. He reeled against the wall, staggered to the\nchair at the table, and sank weakly into it.\n\nPat was far too exhausted, far too dazed, to feel anything but the\nfaintest sensation of relief. She realized only dimly that tears were\nwelling from her eyes, and that sharp sobs were shaking her.", "start_char_idx": 232361, "end_char_idx": 236223, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670": {"__data__": {"id_": "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "0327ed294e8635fbf9ac7e633af09f82cad5c9c092bd1a862eb5ba3da7fd57a1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "78287d12b14d3430b09a6582f73b3587962bcc75567c5412f40ee5388822705f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She was\nfor the moment unable to stir, and it was not long until the being at\nthe table turned stricken eyes on her that she moved. Then she drew\nher knees up before her, as if to hide her body behind their slim,\nchiffon-clad grace.\n\nNick rose from the table, approaching her with weary, hesitant tread.\nHe seized a cover of some sort that was folded over the foot of the\ncouch, shook it out and cast it over her. She clutched it about her\nbody, sat erect and leaned back against the wall in utter exhaustion.\nMany minutes passed with no word from either of the occupants of the\nunholy chamber. It was Nick who broke the long silence.\n\n\"Pat,\" he murmured in low tones. \"Pat--Dear. Are you--all right?\"\n\nShe stared at him dazedly without answer.\n\n\"Honey!\" he said. \"Honey! Tell me you're all right!\"\n\n\"All right?\" she repeated uncomprehendingly. \"Yes. I guess I'm all\nright.\"\n\n\"Then go, Pat! Get away from here before he--before anything happens!\nPut your clothes on and hurry away!\"\n\n\"I can't!\" she said, faintly. \"I--can't!\"\n\n\"You must, Honey!\"\n\n\"I'm just--not able to. I will soon, Nick--honest. When I--when I get\nmy breath back.\"\n\n\"Pat!\" There was anguish in the cry. \"Oh, God--Pat! We mustn't ever be\ntogether again--not ever!\"\n\n\"No,\" she said. A bit of sanity was returning to her; comprehension of\nher position sent a shudder through her. \"No, we mustn't.\"\n\n\"I couldn't bear another night like this--watching! I'd go mad!\"\n\n\"Oh!\" she choked, tears starting. \"If you hadn't come back, Nick!\"\n\n\"I conquered him,\" he said. \"I don't think I could do it again. It was\nyour call that gave me the strength, Pat.\" He shook his head as if\nbewildered. \"He thought it was being in love with you that weakened me,\nbut in the end it was that which gave me the strength to subdue him.\"\n\n\"I'm scared!\" said the girl suddenly. \"Oh, Nick! I'm frightened!\"\n\n\"You'd better go. You'd better dress and leave at once, Honey. Here.\"\nHe gathered her clothes from the floor, depositing them beside her on\nthe couch. \"There are pins in the tray on the table, Pat. Fix yourself\nup as well as you can, dear--and hurry out of here!\"\n\nHe turned toward the door as if to leave, and a shock of terror shook\nher.\n\n\"Nick!\" she cried. \"Don't go away! I'm more afraid when I can't see\nyou--afraid that _he_--\" She broke off sobbing.\n\n\"All right, Honey. I'll turn my back.\"\n\nShe slipped out from under the blanket, found the pins, and repaired\nher ruined costume. The frock was torn, crushed and bedraggled; she\npinned it together at the throat, though her trembling fingers made the\ntask difficult. She pulled it on and took a tentative step toward the\ndoor.\n\n\"Nick!\" she called as a wave of dizziness sent her swaying against the\nwall.\n\n\"What's the matter, Honey?\" He turned anxiously at her cry.\n\n\"I'm dizzy,\" she moaned. \"My head aches, and--I'm scared!\"\n\n\"Pat, darling! You can't go out alone like this--and,\" he added\nmiserably, \"I can't take you!\" He slipped his arm around her tenderly,\nsupporting her to the couch. \"Honey, what'll we do?\"\n\n\"I'll be--all right,\" she murmured. \"I'll go in a moment.\" The\ndizziness was leaving her; strength was returning.\n\n\"You must!\" he said dolefully. \"What a parting, Pat! Never to see you\nagain, and then having this to remember as farewell!\"\n\n\"I know, Nick. You see, I love you too.\" She turned her dark, troubled\neyes on him. \"Honey, kiss me good-bye! We'll have that to remember,\nanyway!\" Tears were again on her cheeks.\n\n\"Do I dare?\" he asked despondently. \"After the things these lips of\nmine have said, and what these arms have done to you?\"", "start_char_idx": 236224, "end_char_idx": 239786, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79": {"__data__": {"id_": "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "65ff624e70666f1f5a2c504551181701a8baf782c0ee17cb6b99728174111f45", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "33c328daaf2f0e05ed934614fba0437c123f34c77ee76a71f4356963ac6080f0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"After the things these lips of\nmine have said, and what these arms have done to you?\"\n\n\"But you didn't, Nick! Could I blame you for--that _other_?\"\n\n\"God! You're kind, Pat! Honey, if ever I win out in this battle, if\never I know I'm the final victor, I'll--No,\" he said his tones dropping\nabruptly. \"I'll never come back to you, Pat. It's far too dangerous,\nand--can I ever be certain? Can I?\"\n\n\"I don't know, Nick. Can you?\"\n\n\"I can't be, Pat! I'll never be sure that _he_ isn't just dormant, as\nhe was before, waiting for my weakness to betray me! I'll never be\ncertain, Honey! It _has_ to be good-bye!\"\n\n\"Then kiss me!\"\n\nShe clung to him; the room that had been so recently a chamber of\nhorrors was transformed. As she held him, as her lips were pressed to\nhis, she thought suddenly of the words of the demon, that Heaven and\nHell were always the same place. They had taken on a new meaning, those\nwords; she drew away from Nick and turned her tear-bright eyes tenderly\non his.\n\n\"Honey,\" she murmured, \"I don't want you to leave me. I don't want you\nto go!\"\n\n\"Nor do I want to, Pat! But I must.\"\n\n\"You mustn't! You're to stay, and we'll fight it out together--be\nmarried, or any way that permits us to fight it through together.\"\n\n\"Pat! Do you think I'd consent to that?\"\n\n\"Nick,\" she said. \"Nick darling--It's worth it to me! I'm realizing it\nnow; I thought it wasn't--but it is! I can't lose you, Nick--anything,\neven that _other_, is better than losing you.\"\n\n\"You're sweet, Pat! You know I'd trade my very soul for that, but--No.\nI can't do it! And don't Honey, torture me by suggesting it again.\"\n\n\"But I will, Nick!\" She was speaking softly, earnestly. \"You're worth\nanything to me! If _he_ should kill me, you'd still be worth it!\" She\ngazed tenderly at him. \"I'd want to die anyway without you!\"\n\n\"No more than I without you,\" he muttered brokenly. \"But I won't do it,\nPat! I won't do that to you!\"\n\n\"I love you, Nick!\" she said in a low voice. \"I don't want to live\nwithout you. Do you understand me, dear? I don't want to live without\nyou!\"\n\nHe stared at her somberly. \"I've thought of that too,\" he said.\n\"Pat--if I only believed that we'd be together after, together\n_anywhere_, I'd say yes. If only I believed there _were_ an afterwards!\"\n\n\"Doesn't he prove that by his very existence?\"\n\n\"Your Doctor would deny that.\"\n\n\"Doctor Carl never saw _him_, Nick. And anyway, even oblivion together\nwould be better than being separated, and far better than this!\"\n\nHe gazed at her silently. She spoke again. \"That doesn't frighten me,\nNick. It's only losing you that frightens me, especially the fear of\nlosing you to _him_.\"\n\nHe continued his silent gaze. Suddenly he drew her close to him, held\nher in a tight, tender embrace.\n\n\n\n\n28\n\nLunar Omen\n\n\nAfter a considerable interval, during which Nick held the girl tightly\nand silently in his arms, he released her, sat with his head resting\non his cupped palms in an attitude of deep study. Pat, beside him,\nfell mechanically to repinning the throat of her frock, which had\nopened during the moments of the embrace. He rose to his feet, pacing\nnervously before her.\n\n\"It isn't a thing to do on the impulse of a moment, Pat,\" he muttered,\npausing at her side. \"You must see that.\"\n\n\"It isn't the impulse of a moment.\"\n\n\"But one doesn't abandon everything, the whole world, so easily,\nHoney. One doesn't cast away a last hope, however forlorn a hope it may\nbe!\"\n\n\"Is there a hope, Nick?\" she asked gently. \"Is there a chance left to\nus?\"\n\n\"I don't know!\"", "start_char_idx": 239700, "end_char_idx": 243210, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8": {"__data__": {"id_": "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "5d195939dcff6d69374040ba02159b3b180342d674c7cda1d4648edc8ef62aca", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8006e9386ab19062d7bac8b5a246263c04dc120ece97ecbeeef3529248e6d833", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Is there a chance left to\nus?\"\n\n\"I don't know!\" His voice held an increasing tenseness. \"Before\nGod--I--don't know!\"\n\n\"If there's a chance, the very slightest shadow of the specter of a\nchance, we'll take it, won't we? Because the other way is always open\nto us, Nick.\"\n\n\"Yes. It's always open.\"\n\n\"But we won't take that chance,\" she continued defiantly, \"if it\ninvolves my losing you, Honey. I meant what I said, Nick: I don't want\nto live without you!\"\n\n\"What chance have we?\" he queried somberly. \"Those are our\nalternatives--life apart, death together.\"\n\n\"Then you know my choice!\" she cried desperately. \"Nick, Honey--don't\nlet's draw it out in futile talking! I can't stand it!\"\n\nHe moved his hand in a gesture of bewilderment and frustration, and\nturned away, striding nervously toward the window whose blind she had\nraised. He leaned his hands on the table, peering dejectedly out upon\nthe street below.\n\n\"What time,\" he asked irrelevantly in a queer voice, \"did the Doctor\nsay the moon rose? Do you remember?\"\n\n\"No,\" she said tensely. \"Oh, Honey! Please--don't stand there with your\nback to me now, when I'm half crazy!\"\n\n\"I'm thinking,\" he responded. \"It rises a little earlier each night--or\nis it later? No matter; come here, Pat.\"\n\nShe rose wearily and joined him; he slipped his arm about her, and drew\nher against him.\n\n\"Look there,\" he said, indicating the night-dark vista beyond the\nwindow.\n\nShe looked out upon a dim-lit street or court, at the blind end of\nwhich the house was apparently situated. Far off at the open end,\nacross a distant highway where even at this hour passed a constant\nstream of traffic, flashed a narrow strip of lake; and above it, rising\ngigantic from the coruscating moon-path, lifted the satellite. She\nwatched the remote flickering of the waves as they tossed back the\nbroken bits of the light strewn along the path. Then she turned puzzled\neyes on her companion.\n\n\"That's Heaven,\" he said pointing a finger at the great flowing lunar\ndisk. \"There's a world that never caught the planet-cancer called Life,\nor if it ever suffered, it's cured. It's clean--burned clean by the\nsun and scoured clean by the airless zero of space. A dead world, and\ntherefore not an unhappy one.\"\n\nThe girl stared at him without comprehension. She murmured, \"I don't\nunderstand, Nick.\"\n\n\"Don't you, Pat?\" He pointed again at the moon. \"That's Heaven, the\ndead world, and this is Hell, the living one. Heaven and Hell swinging\nforever about their common center!\" He gestured toward the sparkling\nmoon-path on the water. \"Look, Pat! The dead world strews flowers on\nthe grave of the living one!\"\n\nSome of his bitter ecstasy caught the girl; she felt his somber mood of\nexaltation.\n\n\"I love you, Nick!\" she whispered, pressing closely to him.\n\n\"What difference does it make--our actions?\" he queried. \"There's the\nomen, that lifeless globe in the sky. Where we go, all humanity now\nliving will follow before a century, and in a million years, the human\nrace as well! What if we go a year or a million years before the rest?\nWill it make any difference in the end?\" He looked down at her. \"All\nwe've been valuing here is hope. To the devil with hope! Let's have\npeace instead!\"\n\n\"I'm not afraid, Nick.\"\n\n\"Nor I. And if we go, _he_ goes, and he's mortally afraid of death!\"\n\n\"Can he--prevent you?\"\n\n\"Not now! I'm the stronger now. For this time, I'm master.\"\n\nHe turned again to stare at the glowing satellite as it rose\nimperceptibly from the horizon. \"There's nothing to regret,\" he\nmurmured, \"except one thing--the loss of beauty. Beauty like that--and\nlike you, Pat. That's bitterly hard to foreswear!\"", "start_char_idx": 243162, "end_char_idx": 246790, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d": {"__data__": {"id_": "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "a332340608ce4f836a5d4fbee1133f377b471109e8db3a75777a2610b36d6d33", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "dbab7d2d782f1ad82847f3e03767a2c65d05db519a3145a066c10dc80ba0a5a6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That's bitterly hard to foreswear!\" He leaned forward\ntoward the remote disk of the moon; he spoke as if addressing it, in\ntones so low that the girl, pressed close to him, had to quiet the\nsound of her own breath to listen. He said:\n\n \"Long miles above cloud-bank and blast,\n And many miles above the sea,\n I watch you rise majestically\n Feeling your chilly light at last--\n Cold beauty in the way you cast\n Split silver fragments on the waves,\n As if this planet's life were past,\n And all men peaceful in their graves.\"\n\nPat was silent for a moment as he paused, then she murmured a low\nphrase. \"Oh, I love you, Nick!\" she said.\n\n\"And I you, dear,\" he responded. \"Have we decided anything? Are\nwe--going through with it?\"\n\n\"I've not faltered,\" she said soberly. \"I meant it, Nick. Without you,\nlife would be as empty as that airless void you speak of. I'm not\nafraid. What's there to be afraid of?\"\n\n\"Only the transition, Pat. That and the unknown--but no situation could\npossibly be more terrible than our present one. It _couldn't_ be!\nOblivion, annihilation--they're preferable, aren't they?\"\n\n\"Oh, yes! Nothing I can imagine could be other than a change for the\nbetter.\"\n\n\"Then let's face it!\" His voice took on a note of determination. \"I've\nthought to face it a dozen times before this, and each time I've\nhesitated. The hesitation of a coward, Pat.\"\n\n\"You're no coward, dear. It was that illusion of hope; that always\nweakens one. No one's strong who hasn't given up hope.\"\n\n\"Then,\" he repeated, \"let's face it!\"\n\n\"How, Nick?\"\n\n\"My father has left us the means. There in the cabinet are a hundred\ndeaths--swift ones, lingering ones, painful, and easy! I don't know one\nfrom the other; our choice must be blind.\" He strode over to the case,\nsending slivers of glass from the shattered front glistening along\nthe floor. \"I'd choose an easy one, Dear, if I knew, for your sake.\nEuthanasia!\"\n\nHe stared hesitantly at the files of mysterious drugs with their\nincomprehensible labels.\n\nSuddenly the scene appeared humorous to the girl, queerly funny, in\nsome unnatural horrible fashion. Her nerves, overstrained for hours,\nwere on the verge of breaking; without realization of it, she had come\nto the border of hysteria.\n\n\"Shopping for death!\" she choked, trying to suppress the wild laughter\nthat beat in her throat. \"Which one's most suitable? Which one's most\nbecoming? Which one\"--an hysterical laughing sob shook her--\"will wear\nthe longest?\"\n\nHe turned, gazing at her with an illogical concern in his face.\n\n\"What's the difference?\" she cried wildly. \"I don't care--painful or\npleasant, it all ends in the same grave! Close your eyes and choose!\"\n\nSuddenly he was holding her in his arms again, and she was sobbing,\nclinging to him frantically. She was miserably unstrung; her body\nshook under the impact of her gasping breath. Then gradually, she\nquieted, and was silent against him.\n\n\"We've been mad!\" he murmured. \"It's been an insane idea--for me to\ninflict this on you, Pat. Do you think I could consider the destruction\nof your beauty, Dear? I've been lying to myself, stifling my judgment\nwith poetic imagery, when all the while it was just that I'm afraid to\nface the thing alone!\"\n\n\"No,\" she murmured, burying her face against his shoulder. \"I'm the\ncoward, Nick. I'm the one that's frightened, and I'm the one that broke\ndown! It's just been--too much, this evening; I'm all right now.\"\n\n\"But we'll not go through with _this_, Pat!\"\n\n\"But we will! It's better than life without you, Dear. We've argued and\nargued, and at last forgotten the one truth, the one thing I'll never\nretract: I can't face living without you, Nick! I can't!\"\n\nHe brushed his hand wearily before his eyes. \"Back at the starting\npoint,\" he muttered.", "start_char_idx": 246755, "end_char_idx": 250529, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d": {"__data__": {"id_": "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "352489215b973c4a73e9512ab7113d5d2dddd91e9939d38a94a1378e7ff09fe1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b8c11e8780f960da7c57e845296067e8333ae45ef45532ba398e4bea6a1d1af9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Back at the starting\npoint,\" he muttered. \"All right, Honey. So be it!\"\n\nHe strode again to the cabinet. \"Corrosive sublimate,\" he murmured.\n\"Cyanide of Potassium. They're both deadly, but I think the second is\nrapid, and therefore less painful. Cyanide let it be!\"\n\nHe extracted two small beakers from the glassware on the shelf. He\nfilled them with water from a carafe on the table, and, while the girl\nwatched him with fascinated eyes, he deliberately tilted a spoonful or\nso of white crystals into each of them. The mixture swirled a moment,\nthen settled clear and colorless, and the crystals began to shrink as\nthey passed swiftly into solution.\n\n\"There it is,\" he announced grimly. \"There's peace, oblivion,\nforgetfulness, and annihilation for you, for me, and--for _him_! Beyond\nall doubt, the logical course for us, isn't it? Do we take it?\"\n\n\"Please,\" she said faintly. \"Kiss me first, Honey. Isn't that the\nproper course for lovers in this situation?\" She felt a faint touch of\nastonishment at her own irony; the circumstances had ceased to have\nany reality to her, and had become merely a dramatic sequence like the\nhappenings in a play.\n\nHe gathered her again into his arms and pressed his lips to hers. It\nwas a long, tender, wistful kiss; when at last it ended, Pat found her\neyes again filled with tears, but not this time the tears of hysteria.\n\n\"Nick!\" she murmured. \"Nick, darling!\"\n\nHe gave her a deep, somber, but very tender smile, and reached for one\nof the deadly beakers, \"To another meeting!\" he said as his fingers\nclosed on it.\n\nSuddenly, amazingly, the strident ring of a doorbell sounded, the more\nsurprising since they had all but forgotten the existence of a world\nabout them. Interruption! It meant only the going through once more of\nall that they had just passed.\n\n\"Drink it!\" exclaimed Pat impulsively, seizing the remaining beaker.\n\n\n\n\n29\n\nScopolamine for Satan\n\n\nThe glass was struck from Pat's hand, and the water-clear contents\nstreamed into pools and darkening blots over the table and its litter\nof papers. She stared unseeingly at the mess, without realizing\nthat it was Nick who had dashed the draught from her very lips. She\nfelt neither anger nor relief, but only a numbness, and a sense of\nanti-climax. Somewhere below the bell was ringing again, and a door was\nresounding to violent blows, but she only continued her bewildered,\nquestioning gaze.\n\n\"I can't let you, Pat!\" he muttered, answering her unspoken query.\n\n\"But Nick--why?\"\n\n\"There's somebody at the door, isn't there? Mustn't we find out who?\"\n\n\"What difference can it make?\" she asked wearily.\n\n\"I don't know. I want to find out.\"\n\n\"It's that illusion of hope again,\" she murmured. \"That's all it is,\nNick--and it means now that it's all to do over again! The whole thing,\nfrom the beginning--and we were so near--the end!\"\n\n\"I know,\" he said miserably. \"I know all that, but--\" He paused as the\ninsistent racket below was redoubled. \"I'm going to answer that bell,\"\nhe ended.\n\nHe moved away from her, vanishing through the room's single door. She\nwatched his disappearance without moving, but no sooner had he passed\nfrom sight than a curious feeling of fear oppressed her. She cast off\nthe numbness and languor, and darted after him into the darkness of the\nhall.\n\n\"Nick!\" she called. Somewhere ahead a light flashed on; she saw the\nwell of a stair-case, and heard his footsteps descending. She followed\nin frantic haste, gaining the top step just as the pounding below\nceased. She heard the click of the door, and paused suddenly at the\nsound of a familiar voice.\n\n\"Where's Pat?\" The words drifted up in low, rumbling, ominous tones.\n\n\"Dr. Carl!\" she shrieked. She ran swiftly down the stairs to Nick's\nside, where he stood facing the great figure of the Doctor. \"Dr. Carl!\nHow'd you find me?\"", "start_char_idx": 250487, "end_char_idx": 254292, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1": {"__data__": {"id_": "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "3380fb7dcb1f90ca6de87018fc30770d69309e080c3de6c639753fcf9c7d27aa", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "41990abda52b5643811599268afb9d9429fca5d37a07f51814346f7b1679cded", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Dr. Carl!\nHow'd you find me?\"\n\nThe newcomer gave her a long, narrow-eyed, speculative survey. \"I\nspent nearly the whole night doing it,\" he growled at last. \"It took\nme hours to locate Mueller and get this address from him.\" He stepped\nforward, taking the girl's arm. \"Come on!\" he said gruffly, without a\nglance at Nick standing silently beside her. \"I'm taking you home!\"\n\nShe held back. \"But why?\"\n\n\"Why? Because I don't like the company you keep. Is that reason enough?\"\n\nShe still resisted his insistent tug. \"Nick hasn't done anything,\" she\nsaid defiantly, with a side glance at the youth's flushed, unhappy\nfeatures.\n\n\"He hasn't? Look at yourself, girl! Look at your clothes, and your\nforehead! What's more, I saw enough from my window; I saw him bundle\nyou into that car!\" His eyes were flashing angrily, and his grip on her\narm tightened, while his free hand clenched into an enormous fist.\n\n\"That wasn't Nick!\"\n\n\"No. It was your devil, I suppose!\" said Horker sarcastically. \"Anyway,\nPat, you're coming with me before I do violence to what remains of your\ndevil!\"\n\nNick spoke for the first time since the Doctor's entrance. \"Please do,\nPat,\" he said softly. \"Please go with him.\"\n\n\"I won't!\" she snapped. The sudden shifts of situation during the long\nhours of that terrible evening were irritating her. She had alternated\nso rapidly between horror and hope and despair that her frayed nerves\nhad seized now at the same reality of anger.\n\nHer mind, so long overstrained, was now deliberately forgetting her\nswing from the pit of terror to the verge of death. \"You come up like a\nhero to the rescue!\" she taunted the doctor. \"Hairbreadth Horker!\"\n\n\"You little fool!\" growled the Doctor. \"A fine reception, after\nlosing a night's sleep! I'll drag you home, if I have to!\" He moved\nponderously toward the door; she gave a violent wrench and freed her\narm from his grasp.\n\n\"If you can, you mean!\" she jeered. She looked at his exasperated face,\nand suddenly, with one of her abrupt changes of mood, she softened.\n\"Dr. Carl, Honey,\" she said in apologetic tones, \"I'm sorry. You're\nvery sweet, and I'm really grateful, but I can't leave Nick now.\" Her\neyes turned troubled. \"Not now.\"\n\n\"Why, Pat?\" Mollified by the change in her mien, his voice rumbled in\nsympathetic notes.\n\n\"I can't,\" she repeated. \"It's--it's getting worse.\"\n\n\"Bah!\"\n\n\"So it's 'Bah'!\" she flared. \"Well, if you're so contemptuous of the\nthing, why don't you cure it? What good did your psychoanalysis do? You\ndon't even know what it is!\"\n\n\"What do you expect?\" roared the Doctor. \"Can I diagnose it by absent\ntreatment? I haven't had a chance to see the condition active yet!\"\n\n\"All right!\" said Pat, her strained nerves driving her to impatience.\n\"You're here and Nick's here! Go on with your diagnosis; get it over\nwith, and let's see what you can do. _You_ ought at least to be able\nto name the condition--the outstanding authority in the Middle West on\nneural and mental pathology!\" Her tone was sardonic.\n\n\"Listen, Pat,\" said Horker with exaggerated patience, in the manner of\none addressing a stupid child, \"I've explained before that I can't get\nat the root of a mental aberration when the subject's as unstrung as\nyour young man here seems to be. Psychoanalysis just won't work unless\nthe subject is calm, composed, and not in a nervous state. Can you\ncomprehend that?\"\n\n\"Just dimly!\" she snapped. \"You ought to know another way--you, the\noutstanding authority--\"\n\n\"Be still!\" he interrupted gruffly. \"Of course I know another way,\nif I wanted to drag all of us back to my office, where I have the\nequipment!--which I won't do tonight,\" he finished grimly.\n\n\"Then do it here.\"\n\n\"I haven't what I need.\"", "start_char_idx": 254262, "end_char_idx": 257948, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4": {"__data__": {"id_": "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "f2ca9442186cf6575c8c9c4c1ecf2b8eaabf91523b1a3832005fde0dc7b7e3ca", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7e72e79e869b86853c06a6860f40ae62d5be6511ec2fa1becba7fb8f4d6b9d6d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Then do it here.\"\n\n\"I haven't what I need.\"\n\n\"There's everything upstairs,\" said Pat. \"It's all there, all Nick's\nfather's equipment.\"\n\n\"Not tonight! That's final.\"\n\nThe girl's manner changed again. She turned troubled, imploring eyes\non Horker. \"Dr. Carl,\" she said plaintively, \"I can't leave Nick now.\"\nShe seized the arm of the silent, dejected youth, who had been standing\npassively by. \"I can't leave him, really. I'd not be sure of seeing him\nagain, ever. Please, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"If these frenzies of yours,\" rumbled Horker, \"are so violent and\nmalicious, you ought to be confined. Do you know that, young man?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" mumbled Nick wretchedly.\n\n\"And I've thought of it,\" continued the Doctor. \"I've thought of it!\"\n\n\"Please!\" cried Pat imploringly. \"Won't you try, Dr. Carl?\"\n\n\"The devil!\" he growled. \"All right, then.\"\n\nHe followed the girl up the stairs, while Nick trailed disconsolately\nbehind. She led him back into the chamber they had quitted, where a\ncurious odor of peach pits seemed to scent the air. Horker sniffed\nsuspiciously, then seized the remaining beaker, raising it cautiously\nto his nostrils.\n\n\"Damnation!\" he exploded. \"Prussic acid--or cyanide! What in--\" He\ncaught sight of Pat's tragic eyes, and suddenly replaced the container.\n\"Pat!\" he groaned. \"Pat, Honey!\" He drew her into the circle of his\ngreat arm. \"I'll help you, dear! All I can, with all my heart, since\nit means that much to you!\" He groaned again under his breath. \"Oh, my\nGod!\"\n\nHe held her a moment, patting her tousled black head with his massive,\ndelicate fingered hand. Then he released her, turning to Nick.\n\n\"This the stuff?\" he asked, brusquely, indicating the cabinet of\nbottles, with its splintered front.\n\nNick nodded. Pat sank to the chair beside the table and watched Horker\nas he scanned the array of containers. He pulled out a tiny wooden case\nand snapped it open to reveal a number of steel needles that glinted\nbrightly in the yellow light. He grunted in satisfaction and continued\nhis inspection.\n\n\"Atropine,\" he muttered, reading the labeled boxes. \"Cocaine, daturine,\nhyoscine, hyoscyamine--won't do!\"\n\n\"What do you need?\" the girl queried faintly.\n\n\"A mild hypnotic,\" said the Doctor abstractedly, still searching.\n\"Pretty good substitutes for psychoanalysis--certain drugs. Dulls the\nconscious mind, but not to complete unconsciousness. Good means of\ngetting at the subconscious. See?\"\n\n\"Sort of,\" said Pat. \"If it only works!\"\n\n\"Oh, it'll work if we can find--ah!\" He seized a tiny cardboard box.\n\"Scopolamine! This'll do the work.\"\n\nHe extracted a tiny glassy something from one or other of the boxes he\nheld, and frowned down at it. He seized the carafe of water, plunged\nsomething pointed and shiny into it.\n\n\"Antiseptic,\" he muttered thoughtfully. He seized a brown bottle from\nthe case, held it toward the light, and shook it. \"Peroxide's gone\nflat,\" he growled. \"Nothing but water.\"\n\nHe pulled a silver cigar-lighter from his pocket and snapped a yellow\nflame to it. He passed the point of the hypodermic rapidly back and\nforth through the little spear of fire. Finally he turned to Nick.\n\n\"Take off your coat,\" he ordered. \"Roll up your shirt sleeve--the left\none. And sit over there.\" He indicated the couch along the wall.\n\nThe youth obeyed without a word. The only indication of emotion was a\nlong, miserable, wistful look at Pat as he seated himself impassively\non the spot that the girl had so recently occupied.\n\n\"Now!\" said the Doctor briskly, approaching the youth. \"This will make\nyou drowsy, sleepy. That's all it'll do. Don't fight the effect.", "start_char_idx": 257904, "end_char_idx": 261489, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5": {"__data__": {"id_": "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "2b61e5a6569d9f92fac208b362b06e9e4cbeb41b7b9f223fa1192b09514b2d59", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cf05b5f45e9fc73153139b293e0f92f09aeee6a17c15bd36290ee5959fd0f794", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That's all it'll do. Don't fight the effect. Just\nrelax, let the thing take its course, and I'll see what I can get out\nof you.\"\n\nPat gasped and Nick winced as he drove the needle into the bared arm.\n\n\"So!\" he said. \"Now relax. Lean back and close your eyes.\"\n\nHe stepped to the door, dragged in a battered chair from the hall,\nand occupied it. He sat beside Pat, watching the pale features of the\nyouth, who sat quietly with closed eyes, breathing slowly, heavily.\n\n\"Long enough,\" muttered Horker. He raised his voice. \"Can you hear me?\"\nhe called to the motionless figure on the couch. There was no response,\nbut Pat fancied she saw a slight change in Nick's expression.\n\n\"Can you hear me?\" repeated Horker in louder tones.\n\n\"Yes, I can hear you,\" came in icy tones from the figure on the couch.\nPat started violently as the voice sounded. The eyes opened, and she\nsaw in sudden terror the ruddy orbs of the demon!\n\n\n\n\n30\n\nThe Demon Free\n\n\nPat emitted a small, startled shriek, and heard it echoed by a\nsurprised grunt from Dr. Horker.\n\n\"Queer!\" he muttered. \"The stuff must be mislabeled. Scopolamine\ndoesn't act like this; it's a narcotic.\"\n\n\"He's--the other!\" gasped Pat, while the being on the couch grinned\nsardonically.\n\n\"Eh? An attack? Can't be!\" The Doctor shook his head emphatically.\n\n\"It's not Nick!\" cried the girl in panic. \"You're not, are you?\" she\nappealed to the grim entity.\n\n\"Not your sweetheart?\" queried the creature, still with his mocking\nleer. \"A few hours ago you were lying here all but naked, confessing\nyou were mine. Have you forgotten?\"\n\nShe shuddered at the reference, and shrank back in her chair. She heard\nthe Doctor's ominous, angry rumble, and the evil tittering chuckle of\nthe other.\n\n\"Pathological or not,\" snapped Horker, \"I can resent your remarks! I've\nconsidered several times varying my treatment with another solid cut to\nthe jaw!\" He rose from his chair, stamping viciously toward the other.\n\n\"A moment,\" said Nicholas Devine. \"Do you know what you've done? Have\nyou any idea what you've done?\" He turned cool, mocking, red-glinting\neyes on the Doctor.\n\n\"Huh?\" Horker paused as if puzzled. \"What _I've_ done? What do you\nmean?\"\n\n\"You don't know, then.\" The other gave a satyric smile. \"You're stupid;\nI gave you the clue, yet you hadn't the intelligence to follow it.\nDo you know what I am?\" He leaned forward, his eyes leering evilly\ninto the Doctor's. \"I'll tell you. I'm a question of synapses. That's\nall--merely a question of synapses!\" He tittered again, horribly. \"It\nstill means nothing to you, doesn't it, Doctor?\"\n\n\"I'll show you what it means!\" Horker clenched a massive fist and\nstrode toward the figure, whose eyes stared, steadily, unwinkingly into\nhis own.\n\n\"Back!\" the being snapped as the great form bent over him. The Doctor\npaused as if struck rigid, his arm and heavy fist drawn back like the\nconventional fighting pose of a boxer. \"Go back!\" repeated the other,\nrising. Pat whimpered in abject terror as she heard Horker's surprised\ngrunt, and saw him recede slowly, and finally sink into his chair. His\nbewildered eyes were still fixed on those of Nicholas Devine.\n\n\"I'll tell you what you've done!\" said the strange being. \"You've freed\nme! There was nothing wrong with your scopolamine. It worked!\" He\nchuckled. \"You drugged _him_ and freed me!\"\n\nHorker managed a questioning grunt.\n\n\"I'm free!\" exulted the other. \"For the first time I haven't _him_ to\nfight! He's here, but helpless to oppose me--he's feeble--feeble!\" He\ngave again the horrible tittering chuckle.", "start_char_idx": 261445, "end_char_idx": 264982, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6": {"__data__": {"id_": "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "abe40eea4863bc96c979b52fd7d95f0b8753dcbf5da446c7eb93fc5a4f1131b5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "67f8ed775dd01c2e107e571b6376dc2998e2438b90b01059037f15026aed13b3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He\ngave again the horrible tittering chuckle. \"See how weak the two of you\nare against my unopposed powers!\" he jeered. \"Weaklings--food for my\npleasures!\"\n\nHe turned his eyes, luminous and avid, on Pat. \"This time,\" he said,\n\"there'll be no interruptions. A witness to our experiment will add a\ndelicate touch of pleasure--\"\n\nHe broke off at the Doctor's sudden movement. Horker had snatched\na glistening blue revolver from his pocket, held it leveled at the\nlust-filled eyes.\n\n\"Huh!\" growled the Doctor triumphantly. \"Do you think I come trailing a\nmaniac without some protection? Especially a vicious one like you?\"\n\nNicholas Devine turned his eyes on his opponent. He stared long and\nintently.\n\n\"Drop it!\" he commanded at length. Pat felt a surge of chaotic terror\nas the weapon clattered to the floor. She turned a frightened glance on\nHorker's face, and her fright redoubled at the sight of his straining\njaw, the perspiration-beaded forehead, and his bewildered eyes. The\ndemon kicked the gun carelessly aside.\n\n\"Puerile!\" he said contemptuously. He backed away from them, re-seating\nhimself on the couch whence he had risen. He surveyed the pair in\nsardonic mirth.\n\n\"Pat!\" muttered the Doctor huskily. \"Get out of here, Honey! He's got\nsome hellish trick of fascination that's paralyzed me. Get out and get\nhelp!\"\n\nThe girl moved as if to rise. Nicholas Devine shifted his eyes for the\nbarest instant to her face; she felt the strength drain out of her\nbody, and she sank weakly to her chair.\n\n\"It's useless,\" she murmured hopelessly to the Doctor. \"He's--he's just\nwhat I told you--a devil!\"\n\n\"I guess you were right,\" mumbled Horker dazedly.\n\nThere was a burst of demonic mirth from the being on the couch. \"Merely\na matter of synapses,\" he rasped, chuckling. His face changed, took\non the familiar coldness, the stony expression Pat had observed there\nbefore. \"This palls!\" he snapped. \"I've better amusement--after we've\nrendered your friend merely an interested on-looker.\" He narrowed his\nred eyes as if in thought. \"Take off a stocking,\" he ordered. \"Tie his\nhands to the back of the chair.\"\n\n\"I won't!\" said the girl. The eyes shifted to her face. \"I won't!\" she\nrepeated tremulously as she kicked off a diminutive pump. She shuddered\nat the gleam in the evil eyes as she stripped the long silken sheath\nfrom a white, rounded limb. She slipped a bare foot into the pump and\nmoved reluctantly behind the chair that held the groaning Horker. She\ntook one of the clenched, straining hands, and drew it back, fumbling\nwith shaking fingers as she twisted the strip of thin chiffon. The\ndemon moved closer, standing over her.\n\n\"Loose knots!\" he snarled abruptly. He knocked her violently away with\na stinging slap across her cheek, and seized the strip in his own\nhands. He drew the binding tight, twisting it about the lowest rung of\nthe chair's ladder back. Horker was forced to lean awkwardly to the\nrear; in this unbalanced position it was quite impossible to rise.\n\nNicholas Devine turned away from the straining, perspiring Doctor, and\nadvanced toward Pat, who cowered against the shattered cabinet.\n\n\"Now!\" he muttered. \"The experiment!\" He chuckled raspingly. \"What\ndelicacy of degradation! Your lover and your guardian angel--both\nhelpless watchers! Excellent! Oh, very excellent!\"\n\nHe grasped her wrist, drawing her after him to the center of the room,\ninto the full view of the horrified, staring eyes of Horker.\n\n\"Always before,\" continued her tormentor, \"these hands have prepared\nyou for the rites--the ceremony that failed on two other occasions\nto transpire. Would it add a poignancy to the torture if I made you\nstrip this body of yours with your own hands? Or will they suffer more\nwatching me? Which do you think?\"", "start_char_idx": 264937, "end_char_idx": 268680, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a": {"__data__": {"id_": "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "b80429b8185b3cfa745231386f119549b037368064ced7b8643bfe29bacc88c8", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "9d02bec6f38d71292f5d1975db08b73912568c339eb38574a244d47843a9eaae", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Or will they suffer more\nwatching me? Which do you think?\"\n\nPat closed her eyes in helpless resignation to her fate. \"Nick!\" she\nmoaned. \"Oh, Nick dearest!\"\n\n\"Not this time!\" sneered the other. \"Your friend and protector, the\nDoctor, has thoughtfully eliminated your sweetheart as a factor. He\nstruggles too feebly for me to feel.\"\n\n\"Nick!\" she murmured again. \"Dr. Carl!\"\n\nBut the Doctor, now pulling painfully at his bonds, could only groan in\ndistraction, and curse the unsuspected strength of sheer chiffon. He\nwrithed miserably at the chafing of his wrists; his strange paralysis\nhad departed, but he was quite helpless to assist Pat.\n\n\"I think,\" said the cold tones of Nicholas Devine, \"that the more\ndelicate torture lies in your willingness. Let us see.\"\n\nHe drew her into his arms. He twisted a hand in her hair, jerked her\nhead violently backward, and pressed avid lips to hers. She struggled a\nlittle, but hopelessly, automatically. At last she lay quite passive,\nquite motionless, supported by his arms, and making not the slightest\nresponse to his kiss.\n\n\"Are you mine?\" he queried fiercely, releasing her lips. \"Are you mine\nnow?\"\n\nShe shook her head without opening her eyes. \"No,\" she said dully. \"Not\nnow, or ever.\"\n\nAgain he crushed her, while the Doctor looked on in helpless,\nbewildered, voiceless anger. This time his kiss was painful, burning,\nsearing. Again that unholy fascination and unnatural delight in her own\npain stirred her, and it took what little effort she was able to make\nto keep from responding. After a long interval, his lips again withdrew.\n\n\"Are you mine?\" he repeated. She made no answer; she was gasping,\nand tears glistened under her closed eye-lids, from the pain of her\ncrushed lips. Again he kissed her, and again the wild abandonment to\nevil suffused her. She was suddenly responding to his agonizing caress;\nshe was clinging fiercely to his torturing lips, feeling an unholy\nexaltation in the pain of his tearing fingers in the flesh of her back.\n\n\"Yours!\" she murmured in response to his query. She heard her voice\nrepeat madly, \"Yours! Yours! Yours!\"\n\n\"Do you yield willingly?\" came the icy tones of the demon.\n\n\"Yes--yes--yes! Willingly!\"\n\n\"Take off your clothes!\" sounded the terrible, overpowering voice. He\nthrust her from him, so that she staggered dizzily backward. She stood\nswaying; the voice repeated its command.\n\nThe girl's eyes widened wildly; she had the appearance of one in an\necstasy, a religious fervor. She raised her hand with a jerky impulsive\ngesture to the neck of her frock, still pinned together in the\nmakeshift repairs of the evening.\n\nThere came a strange interruption. The Doctor, helpless on-looker,\nhad at length evolved an idea out of the bewilderment in his mind. He\nopened his mouth and emitted a tremendous, deep, ear-shattering bellow!\n\nNicholas Devine sent the girl spinning to the floor with a vicious\nshove, and turned his blazing eyes on Horker, who was drawing in his\nbreath for a repetition of his roar. \"Quiet!\" he rasped, his red orbs\nboring down at the other. \"Quiet, or I'll muffle you!\" Closing his\neyes, the Doctor repeated his mighty shout.\n\nThe demon snatched the blanket from the couch, tossing it over the\nfigure of the Doctor, where it became a billowing, writhing heap of\nbrown wool. He turned his gaze on Pat, who was just struggling to her\nfeet, and moved as if to advance toward her.\n\nHe paused. She had retrieved the Doctor's revolver from the floor, and\nnow faced him with the madness gone out of her eyes, supporting the\nweapon with both hands, the muzzle wavering toward his face.\n\n\"Drop it!\" he commanded. She felt a recurrence of fascination, and an\nimpulse to obey. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Doctor's\nhead emerging from the blanket as he shook it off.\n\n\"Drop it!\" repeated Nicholas Devine.", "start_char_idx": 268622, "end_char_idx": 272441, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f": {"__data__": {"id_": "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "bf1086945b1ba91b5ace70dcda9588396d49e4464e6187e29cc5577dacb2716e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "d08df31546bc49c1c49d7c3a74ec047f8332e6176bfa96f3b8343b70cd3d2200", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Drop it!\" repeated Nicholas Devine.\n\nShe closed her eyes, shutting out the vision of his dominant visage.\nWith a surge of terror, she squeezed the trigger, staggering back to\nthe couch at the roar and the recoil.\n\nShe opened her eyes. Nicholas Devine lay in the center of the room on\nhis face; a crimson spot was matting the hair on the back of his head.\nShe saw the Doctor raise a free hand; he was working clear of his bonds.\n\n\"Pat!\" he said softly. He looked at her pale, sickened features.\n\"Honey,\" he said, \"sit down till I get free. Sit down, Pat; you look\nfaint.\"\n\n\"Never faint!\" murmured the girl, and pitched backward to the couch,\nwith one clad and one bare leg hanging in curious limpness over the\nedge.\n\n\n\n\n31\n\n\"Not Humanly Possible\"\n\n\nPat opened weary eyes and gazed at a blank, uninformative ceiling. It\nwas some moments before she realized that she was lying on the couch in\nthe room of Nicholas Devine. Somebody had placed her there, presumably,\nsince she was quite unaware of the circumstances of her awakening. Then\nrecollection began to form--Dr. Carl, the _other_, the roar of a shot.\nAfter that, nothing save a turmoil ending in blankness.\n\nA sound of movement beside her drew her attention. She turned her head\nand perceived Dr. Horker kneeling over a form on the floor, fingering\na white bandage about the head of the figure. Her recollections took\ninstant form; she remembered the catastrophes of the evening--last\nnight, rather, since dawn glowed dully in the window. She had shot\nNick! She gave a little moan and pushed herself to a sitting position.\n\nThe Doctor glanced at her with a sick, shaky smile. \"Hello,\" he\nsaid. \"Come to, have you? Sorry I couldn't give you any attention.\"\nHe gave the bandage a final touch. \"Here's a job I had no heart\nfor,\" he muttered. \"Better for everyone to let things happen without\ninterference.\"\n\nThe girl, returning to full awareness, noticed now that the bandage\nconsisted of strips of the Doctor's shirt. She glanced fearfully at the\nstill features of Nicholas Devine; she saw pale cheeks and closed eyes,\nbut indubitably not the grim mien of the demon.\n\n\"Dr. Carl!\" she whispered. \"He isn't--he isn't--\"\n\n\"Not yet.\"\n\n\"But will he--?\"\n\n\"I don't know. That's a bad spot, a wound in the base of the brain.\nYou'd best know it now, Pat, but also realize that nothing can happen\nto you. I'll see to that!\"\n\n\"To me!\" she said dully. \"What difference does that make? It's Nick I\nwant saved.\"\n\n\"I'll do my best for you, Honey,\" said Horker with almost a hint of\nreluctance. \"I've phoned Briggs General for an ambulance. Your faint\nlasted a full quarter hour,\" he added.\n\n\"What can we tell them?\" asked the girl. \"What can we say?\"\n\n\"Don't you say anything, Pat. I'm not on the board for nothing.\" He\nrose from his knees, glancing out of the window into the cool dawn.\n\"Queer neighborhood!\" he said. \"All that yelling and a shot, and still\nno sign of interest from the neighbors. That's Chicago, though,\" he\nmused. \"Lucky for us, Pat; we can handle the thing quietly now.\"\n\nBut the girl was staring dully at the still figure on the floor. \"Oh\nGod!\" she said huskily. \"Help him, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"I'll do my best,\" responded Horker gloomily. \"I was a good surgeon\nbefore I specialized in psychiatry. Brain surgery, too; it led right\ninto my present field.\"\n\nPat said nothing, but dropped her head on her hands and stared vacantly\nbefore her.\n\n\"Better for you, and for him too, if I fail,\" muttered the Doctor.\n\nHis words brought a reply. \"You won't fail,\" she said tensely. \"You\nwon't!\"\n\n\"Not voluntarily, I'm afraid,\" he growled morosely.", "start_char_idx": 272405, "end_char_idx": 275995, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded": {"__data__": {"id_": "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "efe3b258bfb9dcf4e612f77f05be53e4d65cc24411490d3388ad17544b6859d2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7ea3dd7de8e17847b607a74e660dbdde27ebff532c390fb1e5004684475ce967", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"You\nwon't!\"\n\n\"Not voluntarily, I'm afraid,\" he growled morosely. \"I've still a\nlittle respect for medical ethics, but if ever a case--\" His voice\ntrailed into silence as from somewhere in the dawn sounded the wail of\na siren. \"There's the ambulance,\" he finished.\n\nPat sat unmoving as the sounds from outdoors detailed the stopping\nof the vehicle before the house. She heard the Doctor descending the\nsteps, and the creak of the door. Though it took place before her eyes,\nshe scarcely saw the white-coated youths as they lifted the form of\nNicholas Devine and bore it from the room on a stretcher, treading\nwith carefully broken steps to prevent the swaying of the support. Dr.\nHorker's order to follow made no impression on her; she sat dully on\nthe couch as the chamber emptied.\n\nWhy, she wondered, had the thought of Nick's death disturbed her so?\nWasn't it but a short time since they had both contemplated it? What\nhad occurred to alter that determination? Nick was dying, she thought\nmournfully; all that remained was for her to follow. There on the\nfloor lay the revolver, and on the table, glistening in the wan light,\nreposed the untouched lethal draft. That was the preferable way, she\nmused, staring fixedly at its glowing contour.\n\nBut suppose Nick weren't to die--she'd have abandoned him to his\nterrible doom, left him to face a situation far more ominous than any\nunknown terrors beyond death. She shook her head distractedly, and\nlooked up to meet the eyes of Dr. Horker, who was watching her gravely\nin the doorway.\n\n\"Come on, Pat,\" he said gently.\n\nShe rose, followed him down the stairs and out into the morning light.\nThe driver of the ambulance stared curiously at her dishevelled,\nbedraggled figure, but she was so weary and forlorn that even the\neffort of brushing away the black strands of hair that clouded her\nsmoke-dark eyes was beyond her. She slumped into the seat of the\nDoctor's car and sighed in utter exhaustion.\n\n\"Rush it!\" Horker called to the driver ahead. \"I'll follow you.\"\n\nThe car swept into motion, and the swift cool morning air beating\nagainst her face from the open window restored some clarity to her\nmind. She fixed her eyes on the rear of the speeding vehicle they\nfollowed.\n\n\"Is there any hope at all?\" she queried despondently.\n\n\"I don't know, Pat. I can't tell yet. When you closed your eyes, he\nhalf turned, dodged; the bullet entered his skull near the base,\nnear the cerebellum. If it had pierced the cerebellum, his heart and\nbreathing must have stopped instantly. They didn't, however, and that's\na mildly hopeful sign. Very mildly hopeful, though.\"\n\n\"Do you know now what that devil--what the attack was?\"\n\n\"No, Pat,\" Horker admitted. \"I don't. Call it a devil if you like;\nI can't name it any better.\" His voice changed to a tone of wonder.\n\"Pat, I can't understand that paralyzing fascination the thing exerted.\nI--any medical man--would say that mental dominance of that sort\ndoesn't exist.\"\n\n\"Hypnotism,\" the girl suggested.\n\n\"Bah! Every psychiatrist uses hypnotism in his business; it's part of\nsome treatments. There's nothing of fascination about it; no dominance\nof one will over another, despite the popular view. That's natural\nand understandable; this was like--well, like the exploded claims of\nMesmerism. I tell you, it's not humanly possible--and yet I felt it!\"\n\n\"Not _humanly_ possible,\" murmured Pat. \"That's the answer, then, Dr.\nCarl. Maybe now you'll believe in my devil.\"\n\n\"I'm tempted to.\"\n\n\"You'll have to! Can't you see it, Dr. Carl? Even his name,\nNick--that's a colloquialism for the devil, isn't it?\"\n\n\"And Devine, I suppose,\" said Horker, \"refers to his angelic ancestry.\nDevils are only fallen angels, aren't they?\"\n\n\"All right,\" said Pat wearily. \"Make fun of it. You'll see!\"\n\n\"I'm not making fun of your theory, Honey. I can't offer a better one\nmyself.", "start_char_idx": 275930, "end_char_idx": 279773, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba": {"__data__": {"id_": "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "93f72415243a0383086cb8bf54a0aec7a0bab57ea44f5ddbf4db4088229231cd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "e85255987e501f1bf0f9fee7689faf16d3563d26e14b48c318af87dd9d8f37c0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I can't offer a better one\nmyself. I never saw nor heard of anything similar, and I'm not in\nposition to ridicule any theory.\"\n\n\"But you don't believe me.\"\n\n\"Of course I don't, Pat. You're weaving an intricate fairy tale about\na pathological condition and a fortuitous suggestiveness in names.\nWhatever the condition is--and I confess I don't understand it--it's\nsomething rational, and those things can be treated.\"\n\n\"Treated by exorcism,\" said the girl. \"That's the only way anyone ever\nsucceeded in casting out a devil.\"\n\nThe Doctor made no answer. The wailing vehicle ahead of them swung\nrapidly out of sight into an alley, and Horker halted his car before\nthe gray facade of Briggs General.\n\n\"Come in here,\" he said, helping Pat to alight. \"You'll want to wait,\nwon't you?\"\n\n\"How long,\" she queried listlessly, \"before--before you'll know?\"\n\n\"Perhaps immediately. The only chance is to get that bullet out at\nonce--if there's still time for it.\"\n\nShe followed him into the building, past a desk where a white-clad girl\nregarded her curiously, and up an elevator. He led her into a small\noffice.\n\n\"Sit here,\" he said gently, and disappeared.\n\nShe sat dully in the chair he had indicated, and minutes passed. She\nmade no attempt to think; the long, cataclysmic night had exhausted her\npowers. She simply sat and suffered; the deep scratches of fingernails\nburned in the flesh of her back, her cheek pained from the violent\nslap, and her head and jaw ached from that first blow, the one that had\nknocked her unconscious last evening. But these twinges were minor;\nthey were merely physical, and the hurts of the demon had struck far\ndeeper than any physical injury. The damage to her spirit was by all\nodds the more painful; it numbed her mind and dulled her thoughts, and\nshe simply sat idle and stared at the blank wall.\n\nShe had no conception of the interval before Dr. Horker returned. He\nentered quietly, and began rinsing his hands at a basin in the corner.\n\n\"Is it over?\" she asked listlessly.\n\n\"Not even begun,\" he responded. \"However, it isn't too late. He'll be\nready in a moment or so.\"\n\n\"I wish it were over,\" she murmured. \"One way or the other.\"\n\n\"I too!\" said the Doctor. \"With all my heart, I wish it were over! If\nthere were anyone within call who could handle it, I'd turn it to him\ngladly. But there isn't!\"\n\nHe moved again toward the door, leaning out and glancing down the hall.\n\n\"You stay here,\" he admonished her. \"Don't try to find us; I want no\ninterruptions, no matter what enters that mind of yours!\"\n\n\"You needn't worry,\" she said soberly. \"I'm not fool enough for that.\"\nShe leaned wearily back in the chair, closing her eyes. A long interval\npassed; she was vaguely surprised to see the Doctor still standing in\nthe doorway when she opened her eyes. She had fancied him already in\nthe midst of his labor.\n\n\"What will you do?\" she asked.\n\n\"About what?\"\n\n\"I mean what sort of operation will it need? Probing or what?\"\n\n\"Oh,\" he said. \"I'll have to trephine him. Must get that bullet.\"\n\n\"What's that--trephine?\"\n\nHe glanced down the hall. \"They're ready,\" he said, and turned to go.\nAt the door he paused. \"Trephining is to open a little door in the\nskull. If your devil is in his head, we'll have it out along with the\nbullet.\"\n\nHis footsteps receded down the hall.\n\n\n\n\nRevelation\n\n\n\"Is it over now?\" queried Pat tremulously as the Doctor finally\nreappeared. The interminable waiting had left her even more worn, and\nher pallid features bore the marks of strain.\n\n\"Twenty minutes ago,\" said Horker. His face too bore evidence of\ntension; moreover, there was a puzzled, dubious expression in his eyes\nthat frightened Pat. She was too apprehensive to risk a question as to\nthe outcome, and simply stared at him with wide, fearful, questioning\neyes.\n\n\"I called up your home,\" he said irrelevantly.", "start_char_idx": 279739, "end_char_idx": 283563, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864": {"__data__": {"id_": "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "214559ddb1bda52cfaedff10ea059f9e5b1812cc779b7a23ce168d41669e5686", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cacee4a4429fd497f1b5f6bd497cb318c38199f6f7e47259dd8cc097da9694ea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"I called up your home,\" he said irrelevantly. \"I told them you left\nwith me early this morning. Your mother's still in bed, although it's\nafter ten.\" He paused. \"Slip in without anyone seeing you, will you,\nHoney? And rumple up your bed.\"\n\n\"If I haven't lost my key,\" she said, still with the question in her\neyes.\n\n\"It's in the mail-box. Magda found it on the porch this morning. I\ntalked to her.\"\n\nShe could bear the uncertainty no longer. \"Tell me!\" she demanded.\n\n\"It's all right, I think.\"\n\n\"You mean--he'll live?\"\n\nThe Doctor nodded. \"I think so.\" He turned his puzzled eyes on her.\n\n\"Oh!\" breathed Pat. \"Thank God!\"\n\n\"You wanted him back, Honey, didn't you?\" Horker's tone was gentle.\n\n\"Oh, yes!\"\n\n\"Devil and all?\"\n\n\"Yes--devil and all!\" she echoed. Suddenly she sensed something strange\nin the other's manner. She perceived the uncertainty in his visage, and\nfelt a rising trepidation. \"What's the matter?\" she queried anxiously.\n\"You're not telling me everything! Tell me, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"There's something else,\" he said. \"I'm not sure, Pat, but I think--I\nhope--you've got him back without the devil!\"\n\n\"He's cured?\" Her voice was incredulous; she did not dare accept the\nDoctor's meaning.\n\n\"I hope so. At least I located the cause.\"\n\n\"What was it?\" she demanded, an unexpected vigor livening her tired\nbody. \"What was that devil? Tell me! I want to know, Dr. Carl!\"\n\n\"I think the best name for it is a tumor,\" he said slowly. \"I told them\nin there it was a tumor. I wish I knew myself.\"\n\n\"A tumor! I don't understand!\"\n\n\"I don't either, Pat--not fully. It's something on or beyond the border\nof medical knowledge. I don't think any living authority could classify\nit definitely.\"\n\n\"But tell me!\" she cried fiercely. \"Tell me!\"\n\n\"Well, Honey--I'll try.\" He paused thoughtfully. \"Cancers and\ntumors--sarcomas--are curious things, Dear. Doctors aren't at all\nsure just what they are. And one of their peculiarities is that they\nsometimes seem to be trying to develop into separate entities, trying\nto become human by feeding like parasites on their hosts. Do you\nunderstand?\"\n\n\"No,\" said the girl. \"I'm sorry, Dr. Carl, but I don't.\"\n\n\"I mean,\" he continued, \"that sometimes these growths seem to be trying\nto develop into--into organisms. I've seen them, for instance--every\nsurgeon has--with bones developing. I've seen one with a rather perfect\njaw-bone, and little teeth, and hair. As if,\" he added, \"it were\nmaking a sort of attempt to become human, in a primitive, disorganized\nfashion. Now do you see what I mean?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said the girl, with a violent shudder. \"Dr. Carl, that's\nhorrible!\"\n\n\"Life sometimes is,\" he agreed. \"Well,\" he continued slowly, \"I opened\nup our patient's skull at the point where the fluoroscope indicated the\nbullet. I trephined it, and there, pierced by the shot, was this--\" He\nhesitated, \"--this tumor.\"\n\n\"Did you--remove it?\"\n\n\"Of course. But it wasn't a natural sort of brain tumor, Honey. It was\na little cerebrum, apparently joined to a Y-shaped branch of the spinal\ncord. A little brain, Pat--no larger than your small fist, but deeply\nconvoluted, and with the pre-Rolandic area highly developed.\"\n\n\"What's pre-Rolandic, Dr. Carl?\" asked Pat, shivering.\n\n\"The seat of the motor nerves. The home, you might say, of the will.\nThis brain was practically all will--and I wonder,\" he said musingly,\n\"if that explains the ungodly, evil fascination the creature could\ncommand. A brain that was nothing but pure will-power, relieved by\nits parasitic nature of all the distractions of a directing body! I\nwonder--\" He fell silent.\n\n\"Tell me the rest!\" she said frantically.", "start_char_idx": 283517, "end_char_idx": 287129, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683": {"__data__": {"id_": "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "4fc2b22b8bd0041c1e4948e22d60093774862e5f8ebbed28c98d26ae290d7cfc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "22023e9a413b755544ebaeb356f03d43d6797d2d1599ed85dd2ad71aefb9d6dc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Tell me the rest!\" she said frantically.\n\n\"That's all, Honey. I removed it, and I guess I'm the only surgeon in\nthe world who ever removed a brain from a human skull without killing\nthe patient! Luckily, he had two of them!\"\n\n\"Oh God!\" murmured the girl faintly. She turned to Horker. \"But he will\nlive?\"\n\n\"I think so. Your shot killed the devil, it seems.\" He frowned. \"I said\nit was a tumor; I told them it was a tumor, but I'm not sure. Perhaps,\njust as some people are born with six fingers or toes on each member,\nhe was born with two brains. It's possible; one developed normally,\nhumanly, and the other--into that creature we faced last night. I don't\nknow!\"\n\n\"It's what I said,\" asserted Pat. \"It's a devil, and what you've just\ntold me about tumors proves it. They're devils, that's all, and some\nday some student is going to cut one loose and raise it to maturity\noutside a human body, and you'll see what a devil is really like! And\ngo ahead and laugh!\"\n\n\"I'm not laughing, Pat. I'd be the last one to laugh at your theory,\nafter facing that thing last night. It had satanic powers, all\nright--that paralyzing fascination! You felt it too; it wasn't just a\nmental lapse on my part, was it?\"\n\n\"I felt it, Dr. Carl! I'd felt it before that; I was always helpless in\nthe presence of it.\"\n\n\"Could it,\" he asked, \"have imposed its will actively on yours? I mean,\ncould it have made you actually do what it asked there at the end, just\nbefore I recovered enough sense to let out that bellow?\"\n\n\"To take off--my dress?\" She shivered. \"I don't know, Dr. Carl.--I'm\nafraid so.\" She looked at him appealingly. \"Why did I yield to it so?\"\nshe cried. \"What made me find such a fierce pleasure in its kisses--in\nits blows and scratches, and the pain it inflicted on me? Why was that,\nDr. Carl?\"\n\n\"Why,\" he countered, \"do gangsters' girls and apache women enjoy the\ncruelties perpetrated on them by their men? There's a little masochism\nin most women, and that--creature was sadistic, perverted, abnormal,\nand somehow dominating. It took an unfair advantage of you, Pat; don't\nblame yourself.\"\n\n\"It was--utterly evil!\" she muttered. \"It was the ultimate in\neverything unholy.\"\n\n\"It was an aberrant brain,\" said Horker. \"You can't judge it by human\nstandards, since it wasn't actually human. It was, I suppose, just\nwhat you said--a devil. I didn't even keep it,\" he added grimly. \"I\ndestroyed it.\"\n\n\"Do you know what it meant by saying it was a question of synapses?\"\nshe asked.\n\n\"That was queer!\" The Doctor's voice was puzzled. \"That remark implies\nthat the thing itself knew what it was. How? It must have possessed\nknowledge that the normal brain lacked.\"\n\n\"Was it a question of synapses?\"\n\n\"In a sense it was. The nerves from the two rival brains must have met\nin a synaptic juncture. The oftener the aberrant brain gained control,\nthe easier it became for it to repeat the process, as the synapse, so\nto speak, wore thin. That's why the attacks intensified so horribly\ntoward the end; the habit was being formed.\"\n\n\"Last night was the very worst!\"\n\n\"Of course. As the thing itself pointed out, I made the mistake of\ndrugging the normal brain and giving the other complete control of\nthe body. At other times, there'd always been the rivalry to weaken\nwhichever was dominant.\"\n\n\"Does that mean,\" asked Pat anxiously, \"that Nick's character will be\nchanged now?\"\n\n\"I think so. I think you'll find him less meek, less gentle, than\nheretofore. More spirited, perhaps, since his energies won't be drained\nso constantly by the struggle.\"\n\n\"I don't care!\" she said. \"I'd like that, and anyway, it doesn't make a\nbit of difference to me as long as he's just--_my_ Nick.\"\n\nThe Doctor gave her a tender smile.", "start_char_idx": 287088, "end_char_idx": 290791, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46": {"__data__": {"id_": "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "50561", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "7d1d4efb269a69a6c85039d15a7b00bf9c8defbb53609bb75683439db6434cd3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "d389cc90751698478774a2d8fcc7dad0372b858e9e5eefac31a9668b22cac633", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "50796f081bf7b9c7706c8d14578e12101dddea13796fb7bf18f416dffa79e2b4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The Doctor gave her a tender smile. \"Let's go home,\" he said, pinching\nher cheek in his great hand.\n\n\"Can you leave him?\"\n\n\"I'll run back after a while, Honey. I think he'll do.\" He took her\nhand, drawing her after him. \"Don't forget to slip in unseen, Pat, and\nrumple up your bed.\"\n\n\"Rumple it!\" She gave him a weary smile. \"I'll be _in_ it!\"\n\n\"Good idea. You look a bit worn out, Honey, and we can't have you\ngetting sick now, or even pull a temporary faint like that one last\nnight.\"\n\n\"I didn't faint!\"\n\n\"Maybe not,\" grinned Horker. \"Perhaps the proceedings grew a little\nboring, and you just lay down on the couch for a nap. It _was_ a dull\nevening.\"", "start_char_idx": 290756, "end_char_idx": 291410, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2": {"__data__": {"id_": "266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}, "hash": "b5277a4296442c4957abfc54fc86ac54c81b98d49d320d0ef7a106c1341b0f73", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7a99d2a84c20f41c744960f980fce097b6f057198fe3b178e705e6b5c6f68c92", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "BEYOND BEDLAM\n\n By WYMAN GUIN\n\n Illustrated by DAVID STONE\n\n [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from\n Galaxy Science Fiction August 1951.\n Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that\n the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]\n\n\n\n\n However fantastic it may seem, the society\n so elaborately described in this story has\n its seeds in ours. Just check the data....\n\n\nThe opening afternoon class for Mary Walden's ego-shift was almost\nover, and Mary was practically certain the teacher would not call on\nher to recite her assignment, when Carl Blair got it into his mind to\ntry to pass her a dirty note. Mary knew it would be a screamingly\nfunny Ego-Shifting Room limerick and was about to reach for the note\nwhen Mrs. Harris's voice crackled through the room.\n\n\"Carl Blair! I believe you have an important message. Surely you will\nwant the whole class to hear it. Come forward, please.\"\n\nAs he made his way before the class, the boy's blush-covered freckles\nreappeared against his growing pallor. Haltingly and in an agonized\nmonotone, he recited from the note:\n\n \"There was a young hyper named Phil,\n Who kept a third head for a thrill.\n Said he, 'It's all right,\n I enjoy my plight.\n I shift my third out when it's chill.'\"\n\nThe class didn't dare laugh. Their eyes burned down at their laps in\nshame. Mary managed to throw Carl Blair a compassionate glance as he\nreturned to his seat, but she instantly regretted ever having been kind\nto him.\n\n\"Mary Walden, you seemed uncommonly interested in reading something\njust now. Perhaps you wouldn't mind reading your assignment to the\nclass.\"\n\nThere it was, and just when the class was almost over. Mary could have\nscratched Carl Blair. She clutched her paper grimly and strode to the\nfront.\n\n\"Today's assignment in Pharmacy History is, 'Schizophrenia since the\nAncient Pre-pharmacy days.'\" Mary took enough breath to get into the\nfirst paragraph.\n\n\"Schizophrenia is where two or more personalities live in the\nsame brain. The ancients of the 20th Century actually looked upon\nschizophrenia as a disease! Everyone felt it was very shameful to have\na schizophrenic person in the family, and, since children lived right\nwith the same parents who had borne them, it was very bad. If you were\na schizophrenic child in the 20th Century, you would be locked up\nbehind bars and people would call you--\"\n\nMary blushed and stumbled over the daring word--\"crazy.\" \"The ancients\nlocked up strong ego groups right along with weak ones. Today we would\nlock up those ancient people.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe class agreed silently.\n\n\"But there were more and more schizophrenics to lock up. By 1950 the\n_prisons_ and hospitals were so full of schizophrenic people that\nthe ancients did not have room left to lock up any more. They were\nbeginning to see that soon everyone would be schizophrenic.\n\n\"Of course, in the 20th Century, the schizophrenic people were almost\nas helpless and 'crazy' as the ancient Modern men. Naturally they did\nnot fight wars and lead the silly life of the Moderns, but without\nproper drugs they couldn't control their Ego-shiftability. The\npersonalities in a brain would always be fighting each other. One\npersonality would cut the body or hurt it or make it filthy, so that\nwhen the other personality took over the body, it would have to suffer.\nNo, the schizophrenic people of the 20th Century were almost as 'crazy'\nas the ancient Moderns.\n\n\"But then the drugs were invented one by one and the schizophrenic\npeople of the 20th Century were freed of their troubles. With the\ndrugs the personalities of each body were able to live side by side in\nharmony at last. It turned out that many schizophrenic people, called\noverendowed personalities, simply had so many talents and viewpoints\nthat it took two or more personalities to handle everything.\n\n\"The drugs worked so well that the ancients had to let millions of\nschizophrenic people out from behind the bars of 'crazy' houses.", "start_char_idx": 47, "end_char_idx": 4180, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419": {"__data__": {"id_": "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "68a377bd19f8d212d9677ee9d7eebec33700c1731cbb648f8892321dfc3e5beb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ef3271c04f1374058e8762b8ed53c79ee34fc45656289c6e90bc3627b999ef7a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "That\nwas the Great Emancipation of the 1990s. From then on, schizophrenic\npeople had trouble only when they criminally didn't take their drugs.\nUsually, there are two egos in a schizophrenic person--the hyperalter,\nor prime ego, and the hypoalter, the alternate ego. There often were\nmore than two, but the Medicorps makes us take our drugs so that won't\nhappen to us.\n\n\"At last someone realized that if everyone took the new drugs, the\ngreat wars would stop. At the World Congress of 1997, laws were passed\nto make everyone take the drugs. There were many fights over this\nbecause some people wanted to stay Modern and fight wars. The Medicorps\nwas organized and told to kill anyone who wouldn't take their drugs as\nprescribed. Now the laws are enforced and everybody takes the drugs and\nthe hyperalter and hypoalter are each allowed to have the body for an\nego-shift of five days....\"\n\nMary Walden faltered. She looked up at the faces of her classmates,\nstarted to turn to Mrs. Harris and felt the sickness growing in her\nhead. Six great waves of crescendo silence washed through her. The\nsilence swept away everything but the terror, which stood in her frail\nbody like a shrieking rock.\n\nMary heard Mrs. Harris hurry to the shining dispensary along one\nwall of the classroom and return to stand before her with a swab of\nantiseptic and a disposable syringe.\n\nMrs. Harris helped her to a chair. A few minutes after the expert\ninjection, Mary's mind struggled back from its core of silence.\n\n\"Mary, dear, I'm sorry. I haven't been watching you closely enough.\"\n\n\"Oh, Mrs. Harris....\" Mary's chin trembled. \"I hope it never happens\nagain.\"\n\n\"Now, child, we all have to go through these things when we're young.\nYou're just a little slower than the others in acclimatizing to the\ndrugs. You'll be fourteen soon and the medicop assures me you'll be\nover this sort of thing just as the others are.\"\n\nMrs. Harris dismissed the class and when they had all filed from the\nroom, she turned to Mary.\n\n\"I think, dear, we should visit the clinic together, don't you?\"\n\n\"Yes, Mrs. Harris.\" Mary was not frightened now. She was just ashamed\nto be such a difficult child and so slow to acclimatize to the drugs.\n\nAs she and the teacher walked down the long corridor to the clinic,\nMary made up her mind to tell the medicop what she thought was wrong.\nIt was not herself. It was her hypoalter, that nasty little Susan\nShorrs. Sometimes, when Susan had the body, the things Susan was doing\nand thinking came to Mary like what the ancients had called _dreams_,\nand Mary had never liked this secondary ego whom she could never really\nknow. Whatever was wrong, it was Susan's doing. The filthy creature\nnever took care of her hair, it was always so messy when Susan shifted\nthe body to her.\n\nMrs. Harris waited while Mary went into the clinic.\n\nMary was glad to find Captain Thiel, the nice medicop, on duty. But she\nwas silent while the X-rays were being taken, and, of course, while he\ngot the blood samples, she concentrated on being brave.\n\nLater, while Captain Thiel looked in her eyes with the bright little\nlight, Mary said calmly, \"Do you know my hypoalter, Susan Shorrs?\"\n\nThe medicop drew back and made some notes on a pad before answering.\n\"Why, yes. She's in here quite often too.\"\n\n\"Does she look like me?\"\n\n\"Not much. She's a very nice little girl....\" He hesitated, visibly\nfumbling.\n\nMary blurted, \"Tell me truly, what's she like?\"\n\nCaptain Thiel gave her his nice smile. \"Well, I'll tell you a secret if\nyou keep it to yourself.\"\n\n\"Oh, I promise.\"\n\nHe leaned over and whispered in her ear and she liked the clean odor of\nhim. \"She's not nearly as pretty as you are.\"\n\nMary wanted very badly to put her arms around him and hug him. Instead,\nwondering if Mrs. Harris, waiting outside, had heard, she drew back\nself-consciously and said, \"Susan is the cause of all this trouble, the\nnasty little thing.\"\n\n\"Oh now!\" the medicop exclaimed. \"I don't think so, Mary.", "start_char_idx": 4181, "end_char_idx": 8139, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715": {"__data__": {"id_": "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "68069a5e0fb44b87d203c364b84e402c35c961d61a0c055d3593f72072ddff41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "b74905370645835795b5293d138f84d59bc235b9597beabad8c61a73f233d8dd", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Oh now!\" the medicop exclaimed. \"I don't think so, Mary. She's in\ntrouble, too, you know.\"\n\n\"She still eats sauerkraut.\" Mary was defiant.\n\n\"But what's wrong with that?\"\n\n\"You told her not to last year because it makes me sick on my shift.\nBut it agrees in buckets with a little pig like her.\"\n\nThe medicop took this seriously. He made a note on the pad. \"Mary, you\nshould have complained sooner.\"\n\n\"Do you think my father might not like me because Susan Shorrs is my\nhypoalter?\" she asked abruptly.\n\n\"I hardly think so, Mary. After all, he doesn't even know her. He's\nnever on her Ego shift.\"\n\n\"A little bit,\" Mary said, and was immediately frightened.\n\nCaptain Thiel glanced at her sharply. \"What do you mean by that, child?\"\n\n\"Oh, nothing,\" Mary said hastily. \"I just thought maybe he was.\"\n\n\"Let me see your pharmacase,\" he said rather severely.\n\nMary slipped the pharmacase off the belt at her waist and handed it\nto him. Captain Thiel extracted the prescription card from the back\nand threw it away. He slipped a new card in the taping machine on his\ndesk and punched out a new prescription, which he reinserted in the\npharmacase. In the space on the front, he wrote directions for Mary to\ntake the drugs numbered from left to right.\n\nMary watched his serious face and remembered that he had complimented\nher about being prettier than Susan. \"Captain Thiel, is your hypoalter\nas handsome as you are?\"\n\nThe young medicop emptied the remains of the old prescription from the\npharmacase and took it to the dispensary in the corner, where he slid\nit into the filling slot. He seemed unmoved by her question and simply\nmuttered, \"Much handsomer.\"\n\nThe machine automatically filled the case from the punched card on its\nback and he returned it to Mary. \"Are you taking your drugs exactly as\nprescribed? You know there are very strict laws about that, and as soon\nas you are fourteen, you will be held to them.\"\n\nMary nodded solemnly. Great straitjackets, who didn't know there were\nlaws about taking your drugs?\n\nThere was a long pause and Mary knew she was supposed to leave. She\nwanted, though, to stay with Captain Thiel and talk with him. She\nwondered how it would be if he were appointed her father.\n\nMary was not hurt that her shy compliment to him had gone unnoticed.\nShe had only wanted something to talk about. Finally she said\ndesperately, \"Captain Thiel, how is it possible for a body to change as\nmuch from one Ego shift to another as it does between Susan and me?\"\n\n\"There isn't all the change you imagine,\" he said. \"Have you had your\nfirst physiology?\"\n\n\"Yes. I was very good....\" Mary saw from his smile that her inadvertent\nlittle conceit had trapped her.\n\n\"Then, Miss Mary Walden, how do _you_ think it is possible?\"\n\nWhy did teachers and medicops have to be this way? When all you wanted\nwas to have them talk to you, they turned everything around and made\nyou think.\n\nShe quoted unhappily from her schoolbook, \"The main things in an\nego shift are the two vegetative nervous systems that translate the\nconditions of either personality to the blood and other organs right\nfrom the brain. The vegetative nervous systems change the rate at which\nthe liver burns or stores sugar and the rate at which the kidneys\nexcrete....\"\n\nThrough the closed door to the other room, Mrs. Harris's voice raised\nat the visiophone said distinctly, \"_But, Mr. Walden...._\"\n\n\"Reabsorb,\" corrected Captain Thiel.\n\n\"What?\" She didn't know what to listen to--the medicop or the distant\nvoice of Mrs. Harris.\n\n\"It's better to think of the kidneys as reabsorbing salts and nutrients\nfrom the filtrated blood.\"\n\n\"Oh.\"\n\n\"_But, Mr. Walden, we can overdo a good thing. The proper amount of\nneglect is definitely required for full development of some personality\ntypes and Mary certainly is one of those...._\"\n\n\"What about the pituitary gland that's attached to the brain and\ncontrols all the other glands during the shift of egos?\" pressed\nCaptain Thiel distractingly.\n\n\"_But, Mr.", "start_char_idx": 8082, "end_char_idx": 12051, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e": {"__data__": {"id_": "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "5f12743750b741ac2c7f510f966ee00e8a1b5e5b1ffe45ade16192d25e33f8f4", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f6fe54d5912c5c2175bb8afd83eb5d2fe741b6197680f9ef9a5c5d829c7e07a9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "pressed\nCaptain Thiel distractingly.\n\n\"_But, Mr. Walden, too much neglect at this critical point may cause\nanother personality to split off and we can't have that. Adequate\npersonalities are congenital. A new one now would only rob the present\npersonalities. You are the appointed parent of this child and the Board\nof Education will enforce your compliance with our diagnosis...._\"\n\nMary's mind leaped to a page in one of her childhood storybooks. It\nwas an illustration of a little girl resting beneath a great tree that\noverhung a brook. There were friendly little wild animals about. Mary\ncould see the page clearly and she thought about it very hard instead\nof crying.\n\n\"Aren't you interested any more, Mary?\" Captain Thiel was looking at\nher strangely.\n\nThe agitation in her voice was a surprise. \"I have to get home. I have\na lot of things to do.\"\n\nOutside, when Mrs. Harris seemed suddenly to realize that something was\nwrong, and delicately probed to find out whether her angry voice had\nbeen overheard, Mary said calmly and as if it didn't matter, \"Was my\nfather home when you called him before?\"\n\n\"Why--yes, Mary. But you mustn't pay any attention to conversations\nlike that, darling.\"\n\n_You can't force him to like me_, she thought to herself, and she was\nangry with Mrs. Harris because now her father would only dislike her\nmore.\n\nNeither her father nor her mother was home when Mary walked into the\nevening-darkened apartment. It was the first day of the family shift,\nand on that day, for many periods now, they had not been home until\nlate.\n\nMary walked through the empty rooms, turning on lights. She passed\nup the electrically heated dinner her father had set out for her.\nPresently she found herself at the storage room door. She opened it\nslowly.\n\nAfter hesitating a while she went in and began an exhausting search for\nthe old storybook with the picture in it.\n\nFinally she knew she could not find it. She stood in the middle of the\njunk-filled room and began to cry.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe day which ended for Mary Walden in lonely weeping should have been,\nfor Conrad Manz, a pleasant rest day with an hour of rocket racing in\nthe middle of it. Instead, he awakened with a shock to hear his wife\nactually _talking_ while she was _asleep_.\n\nHe stood over her bed and made certain that she was asleep. It was as\nthough her mind thought it was somewhere else, doing something else.\nVaguely he remembered that the ancients did something called _dreaming_\nwhile they slept and the thought made him shiver.\n\nClara Manz was saying, \"Oh, Bill, they'll catch us. We can't pretend\nany more unless we have drugs. Haven't we any drugs, Bill?\"\n\nThen she was silent and lay still. Her breathing was shallow and even\nin the dawn light her cheeks were deeply flushed against the blonde\nhair.\n\nHaving just awakened, Conrad was on a very low drug level and the\nincident was unpleasantly disturbing. He picked up his pharmacase\nfrom beside his bed and made his way to the bathroom. He took his\nhypothalamic block and the integration enzymes and returned to the\nbedroom. Clara was still sleeping.\n\nShe had been behaving oddly for some time, but there had never been\nanything as disturbing as this. He felt that he should call a medicop,\nbut, of course, he didn't want to do anything that extreme. It was\nprobably something with a simple explanation. Clara was a little\nscatterbrained at times. Maybe she had forgotten to take her sleeping\ncompound and that was what caused _dreaming_. The very word made his\npowerful body chill. But if she was neglecting to take any of her drugs\nand he called in a medicop, it would be serious.\n\nConrad went into the library and found the _Family Pharmacy_. He\nswitched on a light in the dawn-shrunken room and let his heavy\nframe into a chair. _A Guide to Better Understanding of your Family\nPrescriptions. Official Edition, 2831._ The book was mostly Medicorps\npropaganda and almost never gave a practical suggestion. If something\nwent wrong, you called a medicop.\n\nConrad hunted through the book for the section on sleeping compound.", "start_char_idx": 12003, "end_char_idx": 16100, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860": {"__data__": {"id_": "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "26f86a86a12699c6514758fbc3ce943300c2597e2052ebdb7f52830b7dbaa8b6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "a0118a1c42e053b3b6d35956f3b31f895ede883e95639e8fda41c476ae07d893", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Conrad hunted through the book for the section on sleeping compound. It\nwas funny, too, about that name Bill. Conrad went over all the men of\ntheir acquaintance with whom Clara had occasional affairs or with whom\nshe was friendly and he couldn't remember a single Bill. In fact, the\nonly man with that name whom he could think of was his own hyperalter,\nBill Walden. But that was naturally impossible.\n\nMaybe dreaming was always about imaginary people.\n\n SLEEPING COMPOUND: An official mixture of soporific and\n hypnotic alkaloids and synthetics. A critical drug; an essential\n feature in every prescription. Slight deviations in following\n prescription are unallowable because of the subtle manner in which\n behavior may be altered over months or years. The first sleeping\n compound was announced by Thomas Marshall in 1986. The formula has\n been modified only twice since then.\n\nThere followed a tightly packed description of the chemistry and\npharmacology of the various ingredients. Conrad skipped through this.\n\n The importance of Sleeping Compound in the life of every individual\n and to society is best appreciated when we recall Marshall's words\n announcing its initial development:\n\n \"It is during so-called _normal_ sleep that the vicious unconscious\n mind responsible for wars and other symptoms of unhappiness\n develops its resources and its hold on our conscious lives.\n\n \"In this _normal_ sleep the critical faculties of the cortex are\n paralyzed. Meanwhile, the infantile unconscious mind expands\n misinterpreted experience into the toxic patterns of neurosis and\n psychosis. The conscious mind takes over at morning, unaware that\n these infantile motivations have been cleverly woven into its very\n structure.\n\n \"Sleeping Compound will stop this. There is no unconscious activity\n after taking this harmless drug. We believe the Medicorps should at\n once initiate measures to acclimatize every child to its use. In\n these children, as the years go by, infantile patterns unable to\n work during sleep will fight a losing battle during waking hours\n with conscious patterns accumulating in the direction of\n adulthood.\"\n\nThat was all there was--mostly the Medicorps patting its own back for\nsaving humanity. But if you were in trouble and called a medicop, you'd\nrisk getting into real trouble.\n\nConrad became aware of Clara standing in the doorway. The flush of\nher disturbed emotions and the pallor of her fatigue mixed in ragged\nbanners on her cheeks.\n\nConrad waved the _Family Pharmacy_ with a foolish gesture of\nembarrassment.\n\n\"Young lady, have you been neglecting to take your sleeping compound?\"\n\nClara turned utterly pale. \"I--I don't understand.\"\n\n\"You were talking in your sleep.\"\n\n\"I--was?\"\n\nShe came forward so unsteadily that he helped her to a seat. She stared\nat him. He asked jovially, \"Who is this 'Bill' you were so desperately\ninvolved with? Have you been having an affair I don't know about?\nAren't my friends good enough for you?\"\n\nThe result of this banter was that she alarmingly began to cry,\nclutching her robe about her and dropping her blonde head on her knees\nand sobbing.\n\n * * * * *\n\nChildren cried before they were acclimatized to the drugs, but Conrad\nManz had never in his life seen an adult cry. Though he had taken his\nmorning drugs and certain disrupting emotions were already impossible,\nnevertheless this sight was completely unnerving.\n\nIn gasps between her sobs, Clara was saying, \"Oh, I can't go back to\ntaking them? But I can't keep this up! I just can't!\"\n\n\"Clara, darling, I don't know what to say or do. I think we ought to\ncall the Medicorps.\"\n\nIntensely frightened, she rose and clung to him, begging, \"Oh, no,\nConrad, that isn't necessary! It isn't necessary at all. I've only\nneglected to take my sleeping compound and it won't happen again. All\nI need is a sleeping compound. Please get my pharmacase for me and it\nwill be all right.\"\n\nShe was so desperate to convince him that Conrad got the pharmacase and\na glass of water for her only to appease the white face of fright.\n\nWithin a few minutes of taking the sleeping compound, she was calm. As\nhe put her back to bed, she laughed with a lazy indolence.", "start_char_idx": 16032, "end_char_idx": 20310, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9": {"__data__": {"id_": "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "f34208800a7edb7d9bf2b600a4ec6db83694f9c889bdd11a89d307e28de3d178", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "afad27b6f40983e529bded89c352d52940a72efcfa824fed51a6269e5489058d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "As\nhe put her back to bed, she laughed with a lazy indolence.\n\n\"Oh, Conrad, you take it so seriously. I only needed a sleeping\ncompound very badly and now I feel fine. I'll sleep all day. It's a\nrest day, isn't it? Now go race a rocket and stop worrying and thinking\nabout calling the medicops.\"\n\nBut Conrad did not go rocket racing as he had planned. Clara had been\nasleep only a few minutes when there was a call on the visiophone; they\nwanted him at the office. The city of Santa Fe would be completely out\nof balance within twelve shifts if revised plans were not put into\noperation immediately. They were to start during the next five days\nwhile he would be out of shift. In order to carry on the first day of\ntheir next shift, he and the other three traffic managers he worked\nwith would have to come down today and familiarize themselves with the\nnew operations.\n\nThere was no getting out of it. His rest day was spoiled. Conrad\nresented it all the more because Santa Fe was clear out on the edge of\ntheir traffic district and could have been revised out of the Mexican\noffices just as well. But those boys down there rested all five days of\ntheir shift.\n\nConrad looked in on Clara before he left and found her asleep in the\ntotal suspension of proper drug level. The unpleasant memory of her\nbehavior made him squirm, but now that the episode was over, it no\nlonger worried him. It was typical of him that, things having been set\nstraight in the proper manner, he did not think of her again until late\nin the afternoon.\n\n * * * * *\n\nAs early as 1950, the pioneer communications engineer Norbert\nWiener had pointed out that there might be a close parallel between\ndisassociation of personalities and the disruption of a communication\nsystem. Wiener referred back specifically to the first clear\ndescription, by Morton Prince, of multiple personalities existing,\ntogether in the same human body. Prince had described only individual\ncases and his observations were not altogether acceptable in Wiener's\ntime. Nevertheless, in the schizophrenic society of the 29th Century,\na major managerial problem was that of balancing the communicating and\nnon-communicating populations in a city.\n\nAs far as Conrad and the other traffic men present at the conference\nwere concerned, Santa Fe was a resort and retirement area of 100,000\nhuman bodies, alive and consuming more than they produced every\nday of the year. Whatever the representatives of the Medicorps and\nCommunications Board worked out, it would mean only slight changes in\nthe types of foodstuffs, entertainment and so forth moving into Santa\nFe, and Conrad could have grasped the entire traffic change in ten\nminutes after the real problem had been settled. But, as usual, he and\nthe other traffic men had to sit through two hours while small wheels\nfrom the Medicorps and Communications acted big about rebalancing a\ncity.\n\nFor them, Conrad had to admit, Santa Fe was a great deal more complex\nthan 100,000 consuming, moderately producing human bodies. It was\n200,000 human personalities, two to each body. Conrad wondered\nsometimes what they would have done if the three and four personality\ncases so common back in the 20th and 21st Centuries had been allowed to\nreproduce. The 200,000 personalities in Santa Fe were difficult enough.\n\nLike all cities, Santa Fe operated in five shifts, A, B, C, D, and E.\n\nJust as it was supposed to be for Conrad in his city, today was rest\nday for the 20,000 hypoalters on D-shift in Santa Fe. Tonight at around\n6:00 P.M. they would all go to shifting rooms and be replaced by their\nhyperalters, who had different tastes in food and pleasure and took\ndifferent drugs.\n\nTomorrow would be rest day for the hyperalters on E-shift and in the\nevening they would turn things over to their hyperalters.\n\nThe next day it would be rest for the A-shift hyperalters and three\ndays after that the D-shift hyperalters, including Bill Walden, would\nrest till evening, when Conrad and the D-shift hypoalters everywhere\nwould again have their five day use of their bodies.\n\nRight now the trouble with Santa Fe's retired population, which worked\nonly for its own maintenance, was that too many elderly people on the\nD-shift and E-shift had been dying off.", "start_char_idx": 20249, "end_char_idx": 24515, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e": {"__data__": {"id_": "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "9ec88ae8688a57e0e202300516f3a8f84d8b96cf43f5bd0bcf1ecd6c8ce75518", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "34769b0cfa643a54fc98264f94bfa3e6e83b1ee4a9da8eaf75e5c7263c471c0a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "This point was brought out by a\ndapper young department head from Communications.\n\nConrad groaned when, as he knew would happen, a Medicorps officer\npromptly set out on an exhaustive demonstration that Medicorps\npredictions of deaths for Santa Fe had indicated clearly that\nCommunications should have been moving people from D-shift and E-shift\ninto the area.\n\nActually, it appeared that someone from Communications had blundered\nand had overloaded the quota of people on A-shift and B-shift moving\nto Santa Fe. Thus on one rest day there weren't enough people working\nto keep things going, and later in the week there were so many\navailable workers that they were clogging the city.\n\nNone of this was heated exchange or in any way emotional. It was just\ninterminably, exhaustively logical and boring. Conrad fidgeted through\ntwo hours of it, seeing his chance for a rocket race dissolving. When\nat last the problem of balanced shift-populations for Santa Fe was\nworked out, it took him and the other traffic men only a few minutes\nto apply their tables and reschedule traffic to coordinate with the\npopulation changes.\n\nDisgusted, Conrad walked over to the Tennis Club and had lunch.\n\nThere were still two hours of his rest day left when Conrad Manz\nrealized that Bill Walden was again forcing an early shift. Conrad\nwas in the middle of a volley-tennis game and he didn't like having\nthe shift forced so soon. People generally shifted at their appointed\nregular hour every five days, and a hyperalter was not supposed to use\nhis power to force shift. It was such an unthinkable thing nowadays\nthat there was occasional talk of abolishing the terms hyperalter and\nhypoalter because they were somewhat disparaging to the hypoalter, and\nreally designated only the antisocial power of the hyperalter to force\nthe shift.\n\nBill Walden had been cheating two to four hours on Conrad every\nshift for several periods back. Conrad could have reported it to the\nMedicorps, but he himself was guilty of a constant misdemeanor about\nwhich Bill had not yet complained. Unlike the sedentary Walden, Conrad\nManz enjoyed exercise. He overindulged in violent sports and put off\nsleep, letting Bill Walden make up the fatigue on his shift. That was\nundoubtedly why the poor old sucker had started cheating a few hours on\nConrad's rest day.\n\nConrad laughed to himself, remembering the time Bill Walden had\nregistered a long list of sports which he wished Conrad to be\nrestrained from--rocket racing, deepsea exploration, jet-skiing. It\nhad only given Conrad some ideas he hadn't had before. The Medicorps\nhad refused to enforce the list on the basis that danger and violent\nexercise were a necessary outlet for Conrad's constitution. Then poor\nold Bill had written Conrad a note threatening to sue him for any\ninjury resulting from such sports. As if he had a chance against the\nMedicorps ruling!\n\nConrad knew it was no use trying to finish the volley-tennis game. He\nlost interest and couldn't concentrate on what he was doing when Bill\nstarted forcing the shift. Conrad shot the ball back at his opponent in\na blistering curve impossible to intercept.\n\n\"So long,\" he yelled at the man. \"I've got some things to do before my\nshift ends.\"\n\nHe lounged into the locker rooms and showered, put his clothes and\nbelongings, including his pharmacase, in a shipping carton, addressed\nthem to his own home and dropped them in the mail chute.\n\nHe stepped with languid nakedness across the hall, pressed his\nidentifying wristband to a lock-face and dialed his clothing sizes.\n\nIn this way he procured a neatly wrapped, clean shifting costume from\nthe slot. He put it on without bothering to return to his shower room.\n\nHe shouted a loud good-bye to no one in particular among the several\nmen and women in the baths and stepped out onto the street.\n\nConrad felt too good even to be sorry that his shift was over. After\nall, nothing happened except you came to, five days later, on your\nnext shift. The important thing was the rest day. He had always said\nthe last day of the shift should be a work day; then you would be glad\nit was over. He guessed the idea was to rest the body before another\npersonality took over. Well, poor old Bill Walden never got a rested\nbody. He probably slept off the first twelve hours.", "start_char_idx": 24516, "end_char_idx": 28801, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba": {"__data__": {"id_": "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "35e187911e185b7ca30cb13adaed2e752cc30448e590a2544e77c6681ef6edee", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "441405be12a589d691c81b20d88ee428728256a22e1dea00ae46ff9e72ecd50d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He probably slept off the first twelve hours.\n\nWalking unhurriedly through the street crowds, Conrad entered a public\nshifting station and found an empty room. As he started to open the\ndoor, a girl came out of the adjoining booth and Conrad hastily averted\nhis glance. She was still rearranging her hair. There were so many rude\npeople nowadays who didn't seem to care at all about the etiquette of\nshifting, women particularly. They were always redoing their hair or\nmakeup where a person couldn't help seeing them.\n\nConrad pressed his identifying wristband to the lock and entered the\nbooth he had picked. The act automatically sent the time and his shift\nnumber to Medicorps Headquarters.\n\nOnce inside the shifting room, Conrad went to the lavatory and turned\non the faucet of makeup solvent. In spite of losing two hours of his\nrest day, he decided to be decent to old Bill, though he was half\ntempted to leave his makeup on. It was a pretty foul joke, of course,\nespecially on a humorless fellow like poor Walden.\n\nConrad creamed his face thoroughly and then washed in water and\nused the automatic dryer. He looked at his strong-lined features in\nthe mirror. They displayed a less distinct expression of his own\npersonality with the makeup gone.\n\nHe turned away from the mirror and it was only then that he remembered\nhe hadn't spoken to his wife before shifting. Well, he couldn't\ndecently call up and let her see him without makeup.\n\nHe stepped across to the visiophone and set the machine to deliver\nhis spoken message in type: \"Hello, Clara. Sorry I forgot to call you\nbefore. Bill Walden is forcing me to shift early again. I hope you're\nnot still upset about that business this morning. Be a good girl and\nsmile at me on the next shift. I love you. Conrad.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nFor a moment, when the shift came, the body of Conrad Manz stood\nmoronically uninhabited. Then, rapidly, out of the gyri of its brain,\nthe personality of Bill Walden emerged, replacing the slackly powerful\nattitude of Conrad by the slightly prim preciseness of Bill's bearing.\n\nThe face, just now relaxed with readiness for action, was abruptly\npulled into an intellectualized mask of tension by habitual patterns of\nconflict in the muscles. There were also acute momentary signs of clash\nbetween the vegetative nervous activity characteristic of Bill Walden\nand the internal homeostasis Conrad Manz had left behind him. The face\npaled as hypersensitive vascular beds closed down under new vegetative\nvolleys.\n\nBill Walden grasped sight and sound, and the sharp odor of makeup\nsolvent stung his nostrils. He was conscious of only one clamoring,\nterrifying thought: _They will catch us. It cannot go on much longer\nwithout Helen guessing about Clara. She is already angry about Clara\ndelaying the shift, and if she learns from Mary that I am cheating on\nConrad's shift.... Any time now, perhaps this time, when the shift is\nover, I will be looking into the face of a medicop who is pulling a\nneedle from my arm, and then it'll all be over._\n\nSo far, at least, there was no medicop. Still feeling unreal but\nanxious not to lose precious moments, Bill took an individualized kit\nfrom the wall dispenser and made himself up. He was sparing and subtle\nin his use of the makeup, unlike the horrible makeup jobs Conrad Manz\noccasionally left on. Bill rearranged his hair. Conrad always wore it\ntoo short for his taste, but you couldn't complain about everything.\n\nBill sat in a chair to await some of the slower aspects of the shift.\nHe knew that an hour after he left the booth, his basal metabolic rate\nwould be ten points higher. His blood sugar would go down steadily.\nIn the next five days he would lose six to eight pounds, which Conrad\nlater would promptly regain.\n\nJust as Bill was about to leave the booth, he remembered to pick up\na news summary. He put his wristband to the switch on the telephoto\nand a freshly printed summary of the last five days in the world fell\ninto the rack. His wristband, of course, called forth one edited for\nhyperalters on the D-shift.\n\nIt did not mention by name any hypoalter on the D-shift.", "start_char_idx": 28756, "end_char_idx": 32895, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72": {"__data__": {"id_": "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "72f857f637103b105aff580e7f6e9a70e19e0054ed80aba53b163aa7466ed96b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "263786ba0d304462949438554f8886c7850ee81672480980d8f10b89a70af67d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It did not mention by name any hypoalter on the D-shift. Should one\nof them have done something that it was necessary for Bill or other\nD-shift hyperalters to know about, it would appear in news summaries\ncalled forth by their wristbands--but told in such fashion that the\npersonality involved seemed namelessly incidental, while names and\npictures of hyperalters and hypoalters on any of the other four\nshifts naturally were freely used. The purpose was to keep Conrad\nManz and all other hypoalters on the D-shift, one-tenth of the total\npopulation, non-existent as far as their hyperalters were concerned.\nThis convention made it necessary for photoprint summaries to be on\nlight-sensitive paper that blackened illegibly before six hours were\nup, so that a man might never stumble on news about his hypoalter.\n\nBill did not even glance at the news summary. He had picked it up only\nfor appearances. The summaries were essential if you were going to\nstart where you left off on your last shift and have any knowledge of\nthe five intervening days. A man just didn't walk out of a shifting\nroom without one. It was failure to do little things like that that\nwould start them wondering about him.\n\nBill opened the door of the booth by applying his wristband to the lock\nand stepped out into the street.\n\nLate afternoon crowds pressed about him. Across the boulevard, a\nhelicopter landing swarmed with clouds of rising commuters. Bill had\nsome trouble figuring out the part of the city Conrad had left him\nin and walked two blocks before he understood where he was. Then he\ngot into an idle two-place cab, started the motor with his wristband\nand hurried the little three-wheeler recklessly through the traffic.\nClara was probably already waiting and he first had to go home and get\ndressed.\n\nThe thought of Clara waiting for him in the park near her home was a\nsharp reminder of his strange situation. He was in a left you with\nshame, and a fear that the other fellow would tell people you seemed to\nhave a pathological interest in your alter and must need a change in\nyour prescription.\n\nBut the most flagrant abuser of such morbid little exchanges would have\nbeen horrified to learn that right here, in the middle of the daylight\ntraffic, was a man who was using his antisocial shifting power to meet\nin secret the wife of his own hypoalter!\n\nBill did not have to wonder what the Medicorps would think. Relations\nbetween hyperalters world was literally not supposed to exist for\nhim, for it was the world of his own hypoalter, Conrad Manz.\n\nUndoubtedly, there were people in the traffic up ahead who knew both\nhim and Conrad, people from the other shifts who never mentioned the\none to the other except in those guarded, snickering little confidences\nthey couldn't resist telling and you couldn't resist listening to.\nAfter all, the most important person in the world was your alter. If he\ngot sick, injured or killed, so would you.\n\nThus, in moments of intimacy or joviality, an undercover exchange went\non ... _I'll tell you about your hyperalter if you'll tell me about\nmy hypoalter._ It was orthodox bad manners that and hypoalters of\nopposite sex were punishable--drastically punishable.\n\n * * * * *\n\nWhen he arrived at the apartment, Bill remembered to order a dinner for\nhis daughter Mary. His order, dialed from the day's menu, was delivered\nto the apartment pneumatically and he set it out over electric warmers.\nHe wanted to write a note to the child, but he started two and threw\nboth in the basket. He couldn't think of anything to say to her.\n\nStaring at the lonely table he was leaving for Mary, Bill felt his\nguilt overwhelming him. He could stop the behavior which led to\nthe guilt by taking his drugs as prescribed. They would return him\nimmediately to the sane and ordered conformity of the world. He would\nno longer have to carry the fear that the Medicorps would discover he\nwas not taking his drugs. He would no longer neglect his appointed\nchild. He would no longer endanger the very life of Conrad's wife Clara\nand, of course, his own.\n\nWhen you took your drugs as prescribed, it was impossible to experience\nsuch ancient and primitive emotions as guilt. Even should you\nmiscalculate and do something wrong, the drugs would not allow any\nsuch emotional reaction.", "start_char_idx": 32839, "end_char_idx": 37154, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21": {"__data__": {"id_": "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "d984de9d7699beede614043a792ea852f5622503f59cdae5cdaf03db92a67592", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "570e29703ff0a50e727a395b1868557d2c7d5cc028d1b51eb70ecb701e78701f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "To be free to experience his guilt over the\nlonely child who needed him was, for these reasons, a precious thing\nto Bill. In all the world, this night, he was undoubtedly the only man\nwho could and did feel one of the ancient emotions. People felt shame,\nnot guilt; conceit, not pride; pleasure, not desire. Now that he had\nstopped taking his drugs as prescribed, Bill realized that the drugs\nallowed only an impoverished segment of a vivid emotional spectrum.\n\nBut however exciting it was to live them, the ancient emotions did not\nseem to act as deterrents to bad behavior. Bill's sense of guilt did\nnot keep him from continuing to neglect Mary. His fear of being caught\ndid not restrain him from breaking every rule of inter-alter law and\nloving Clara, his own hypoalter's wife.\n\n * * * * *\n\nBill got dressed as rapidly as possible. He tossed the discarded\nshifting costume into the return chute. He retouched his makeup, trying\nto eliminate some of the heavy, inexpressive planes of muscularity\nwhich were more typical of Conrad than of himself.\n\nThe act reminded him of the shame which his wife Helen had felt when\nshe learned, a few years ago, that her own hypoalter, Clara, and his\nhypoalter, Conrad, had obtained from the Medicorps a special release\nto marry. Such rare marriages in which the same bodies lived together\non both halves of a shift were something to snicker about. They verged\non the antisocial, but could be arranged if the batteries of Medicorps\ntests could be satisfied.\n\nPerhaps it had been the very intensity of Helen's shame on learning\nof this marriage, the nauseous display of conformity so typical of\nhis wife, that had first given Bill the idea of seeking out Clara,\nwho had dared convention to make such a peculiar marriage. Over the\nyears, Helen had continued blaming all their troubles on the fact that\nboth egos of himself were living with, and intimate with, both egos of\nherself.\n\nSo Bill had started cutting down on his drugs, the curiosity having\nbecome an obsession. What was this other part of Helen like, this\nClara who was unconventional enough to want to marry only Bill's own\nhypoalter, in spite of almost certain public shame?\n\nHe had first seen Clara's face when it formed on a visiophone, the\nfirst time he had forced Conrad to shift prematurely. It was softer\nthan Helen's. The delicate contours were less purposefully, set, gayer.\n\n\"Clara Manz?\" Bill had sat there staring at the visiophone for several\nseconds, unable to continue. His great fear that she would immediately\nreport him must have been naked on his face.\n\nHe had watched an impish suspicion grow in the tender curve of her lips\nand her oblique glance from the visiophone. She did not speak.\n\n\"Mrs. Manz,\" he finally said, \"I would like to meet you in the park\nacross from your home.\"\n\nTo this awkward opening he owed the first time he had heard Clara\nlaugh. Her warm, clear laughter, teasing him, tumbled forth like a\ncloud of gay butterflies.\n\n\"Are you afraid to see me here at home because my husband might _walk\nin on us_?\"\n\nBill had been put completely at ease by this bantering indication that\nClara knew who he was and welcomed him as an intriguing diversion.\nQuite literally, the one person who could not _walk in on them_, as the\nancients thought of it, was his own hypoalter, Conrad Manz.\n\n * * * * *\n\nBill finished retouching his makeup and hurried to leave the apartment.\nBut this time, as he passed the table where Mary's dinner was set out,\nhe decided to write a few words to the child, no matter how empty they\nsounded to himself. The note he left explained that he had some early\nwork to do at the microfilm library where he worked.\n\nJust as Bill was leaving the apartment, the visiophone buzzed. In his\nhurry Bill flipped the switch before he thought. Too late, his hand\nfroze and the implications of this call, an hour before anyone would\nnormally be home, shot a shaft of terror through him.\n\nBut it was not the image of a medicop that formed on the screen. The\nwoman introduced herself as Mrs. Harris, one of Mary's teachers.\n\nIt was strange that she should have thought he might be home.", "start_char_idx": 37155, "end_char_idx": 41337, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48": {"__data__": {"id_": "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "f53f99a69a8edf66b1bab086663c92239cc867cce884748baa6710a7706f92fb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "564df4f09d31aa1f121037a890b0a8759935b940ad2e9be9c81976a2a7c61065", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was strange that she should have thought he might be home. The\nshift for children was half a day earlier than that for adults, so\nthe parents could have half their rest day free. This afternoon would\nbe for Mary the first classes of her shift, but the teacher must have\nguessed something was wrong with the shifting schedules in Mary's\nfamily. Or had the child told her?\n\nMrs. Harris explained rather dramatically that Mary was being\nneglected. What could he say; to her? That he was a criminal breaking\ndrug regulations in the most flagrant manner? That nothing, not even\nthe child appointed to him, meant more to him than his wife's own\nhypoalter? Bill finally ended the hopeless and possibly dangerous\nconversation by turning off the receiver and leaving the apartment.\n\nBill realized that now, for both him and Clara, the greatest joy had\nbeen those first few times together. The enormous threat of a Medicorps\nretaliation took the pleasure from their contact and they came together\ndesperately because, having tasted this fantastic non-conformity and\nthe new undrugged intimacy, there was no other way for them. Even now\nas he drove through the traffic toward where she would be waiting, he\nwas not so much concerned with meeting Clara in their fear-poisoned\npresent as with the vivid, aching remembrance of what those meetings\nonce had really been like.\n\nHe recalled an evening they had spent lying on the summer lawn of the\npark, looking out at the haze-dimmed stars. It had been shortly after\nClara joined him in cutting down on the drugs, and the clear memory of\ntheir quiet laughter so captured his mind now that Bill almost tangled\nhis car in the traffic.\n\nIn memory he kissed her again and, as it had then, the newly cut grass\nmixed with the exciting fragrance of her skin. After the kiss they\ncontinued a mock discussion of the ancient word \"sin.\" Bill pretended\nto be trying to explain the meaning of the word to her, sometimes with\ndefinitions that kept them laughing and sometimes with demonstrational\nkisses that stopped their laughter.\n\nHe could remember Clara's face turned to him in the evening light\nwith an outrageous parody of interest. He could hear himself saying,\n\"You see, the ancients would say we are not _sinning_ because they\nwould disagree with the medicops that you and Helen are two completely\ndifferent people, or that Conrad and I are not the same person.\"\n\nClara kissed him with an air of tentative experimentation. \"Mmm, no. I\ncan't say I care for that interpretation.\"\n\n\"You'd rather be sinning?\"\n\n\"Definitely.\"\n\n\"Well, if the ancients did agree with the medicops that we are\ndistinct from our alters, Helen and Conrad, then they would say we are\nsinning--but not for the same reasons the Medicorps would give.\"\n\n\"That,\" asserted Clara, \"is where I get lost. If this sinning business\nis going to be worth anything at all, it has to be something you can\nidentify.\"\n\nBill cut his car out of the main stream of traffic and toward the park,\nwithout interrupting his memory.\n\n\"Well, darling, I don't want to confuse you, but the medicops would\nsay we are sinning only because you are my wife's hypoalter, and I am\nyour husband's hyperalter--in other words, for the very reason the\nancients would say we are _not_ sinning. Furthermore, if either of us\nwere with anyone else, the medicops would think it was perfectly all\nright, and so would Conrad and Helen. Provided, of course, I took a\nhyperalter and you took a hypoalter only.\"\n\n\"Of course,\" Clara said, and Bill hurried over the gloomy fact.\n\n\"The ancients, on the other hand, would say we are sinning because we\nare making love to someone we are not married to.\"\n\n\"But what's the matter with that? Everybody does it.\"\n\n\"The ancient Moderns didn't. Or, that is, they often did, but....\"\n\nClara brought her full lips hungrily to his. \"Darling, I think the\nancient Moderns had the right idea, though I don't see how they ever\narrived at it.\"\n\nBill grinned. \"It was just an invention of theirs, along with the wheel\nand atomic energy.\"\n\nThat evening was long gone by as Bill stopped the little taxi beside\nthe park and left it there for the next user. He walked across the\nlawns toward the statue where he and Clara always met.", "start_char_idx": 41276, "end_char_idx": 45491, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187": {"__data__": {"id_": "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "b61b772018e7821bdf3bc5b4ec02e8c7f1b25352ceb2c0d84484a9151d8695fa", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "17f86c1cfef7b75e39157a8dd1d057ca555c6220d34f8c9e284ad7df18bd08d2", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He walked across the\nlawns toward the statue where he and Clara always met. The very thought\nof entering one's own hypoalter's house was so unnerving that Bill\nbrought himself to do it only by first meeting Clara near the statue.\nAs he walked between the trees, Bill could not again capture the spirit\nof that evening he had been remembering. The Medicorps was too close.\nIt was impossible to laugh that way now.\n\nBill arrived at the statue, but Clara was not there. He waited\nimpatiently while a livid sunset coagulated between the branches of the\ngreat trees. Clara should have been there first. It was easier for her,\nbecause she was leaving her shift, and without doing it prematurely.\n\nThe park was like a quiet backwater in the eddying rush of the evening\ncity. Bill felt conspicuous and vulnerable in the gloaming light. Above\nall, he felt a new loneliness, and he knew that now Clara felt it, too.\nThey needed each other as each had been, before fear had bleached their\nfeeling to white bones of desperation.\n\nThey were not taking their drugs as prescribed, and for that they would\nbe horribly punished. That was the only unforgivable _sin_ in their\nworld. By committing it, he and Clara had found out what life could be,\nin the same act that would surely take life from them. Their powerful\nemotions they had found in abundance simply by refusing to take the\ndrugs, and by being together briefly each fifth day in a dangerous\nbreach of all convention. The closer their discovery and the greater\ntheir terror, the more desperately they needed even their terror, and\nthe more impossible became the delight of their first meetings.\n\nTelegraphing bright beads of sound, a night bird skimmed the sunset\nlawns to the looming statue and skewed around its monolithic base. The\nbird's piping doubled and then choked off as it veered frantically from\nBill. After a while, far off through the park, it released a fading\nprotest of song.\n\nAbove Bill, the towering statue of the great Alfred Morris blackened\nagainst the sunset. The hollowed granite eyes bore down on him out\nof an undecipherable dark ... the ancient, implacable face of the\nMedicorps. As if to pronounce a sentence on his present crimes by a\nmagical disclosure of the weight of centuries, a pool of sulfurous\nlight and leaf shadows danced on the painted plaque at the base of the\nstatue.\n\n On this spot in the Gregorian year 1996, Alfred Morris announced to\n an assembly of war survivors the hypothalamic block. His stirring\n words were, \"This new drug selectively halts at the thalamic brain\n the upward flow of unconscious stimuli and the downward flow of\n unconscious motivations. It acts as a screen between the cerebrum\n and the psychosomatic discharge system. Using hypothalamic block,\n we will not act emotively, we will initiate acts only from the\n logical demands of situations.\"\n\n This announcement and the subsequent wholehearted action of the\n war-weary people made the taking of hypothalamic block obligatory.\n This put an end to the powerful play of unconscious mind in the\n public and private affairs of the ancient world. It ended the\n great paranoid wars and saved mankind.\n\nIn the strange evening light, the letters seemed alive, a centuries-old\ncondemnation of any who might try to go back to the ancient\npre-pharmacy days. Of course, it was not really possible to go back.\nWithout drugs, everybody and all society would fall apart.\n\nThe ancients had first learned to keep endocrine deviates such as the\ndiabetic alive with drugs. Later they learned with other drugs to\n\"cure\" the far more prevalent disease, schizophrenia, that was jamming\ntheir hospitals. The big change came when the ancients used these same\ndrugs on everyone to control the private and public irrationality of\ntheir time and stop the wars.\n\nIn this new, drugged world, the schizophrene thrived better than any,\nand the world became patterned on him. But, just as the diabetic was\nstill diabetic, the schizophrene was still himself, plus the drugs.\nMeanwhile, everyone had forgotten what it was the drugs did to\nyou--that the emotions experienced were blurred emotions, that insight\nwas at an isolated level of rationality because the drugs kept true\nfeelings from ever emerging.", "start_char_idx": 45416, "end_char_idx": 49687, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd": {"__data__": {"id_": "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "bf89826217c627265a9625f8ef73607b9b18666bab8c5506a1abbbc18ed04512", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "06b08e922f7c515149d9869aa4ce2940c414b758eda31bf552d021f3f551ab74", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "How inconceivable it would be to Helen and the other people of his\nworld to live on as little drug as possible ... to experience the\nconflicting emotions, the interplay of passion and logic that almost\ntore you apart! Sober, the ancients called it, and they lived that way\nmost of the time, with only the occasional crude and clublike effects\nof alcohol or narcotics to relieve their chronic anxiety.\n\nBy taking as little hypothalamic block as possible, he and Clara were\nable to desire their fantastic attachment, to delight in an absolutely\nillogical situation unheard of in their society. But the society would\njudge their refusal to take hypothalamic block in only one sense. The\nweight of this judgment stood before him in the smoldering words, \"_It\nended the great paranoid wars and saved mankind_.\"\n\nWhen Clara did appear, she was searching myopically in the wrong\nvicinity of the statue. He did not call to her at once, letting the\nsight of her smooth out the tensions in him, convert all the conflicts\ninto this one intense longing to be with her.\n\nHer halting search for him was deeply touching, like that of a tragic\nlittle puppet in a darkening dumbshow. He saw suddenly how like puppets\nthe two of them were. They were moved by the strengthening wires of a\nnew life of feeling to batter clumsily at an implacable stage setting\nthat would finally leave them as bits of wood and paper.\n\nThen suddenly in his arms Clara was at the same time hungrily moving\nand tense with fear of discovery. Little sounds of love and fear choked\neach other in her throat. Her blonde head pressed tightly into his\nshoulder and she clung to him with desperation.\n\nShe said, \"Conrad was disturbed by my tension this morning and made me\ntake a sleeping compound. I've just awakened.\"\n\nThey walked to her home in silence and even in the darkened apartment\nthey used only the primitive monosyllables of apprehensive need. Beyond\nthese mere sounds of compassion, they had long ago said all that could\nbe said.\n\nBecause Bill was the hyperalter, he had no fear that Conrad could force\na shift on him. When later they lay in darkness, he allowed himself to\ndrift into a brief slumber. Without the sleeping compound, distorted\nevents came and went without reason. Dreaming, the ancients had called\nit. It was one of the most frightening things that had begun to happen\nwhen he first cut down on the drugs. Now, in the few seconds that he\ndozed, a thousand fragments of incidental knowledge, historical reading\nand emotional need melded and, in a strange contrast to their present\ntranquility, he was dreaming a frightful moment in the 20th century.\n_These are the great paranoid wars_, he thought. And it was so because\nhe had thought it.\n\nHe searched frantically through the glove compartment of an ancient\nautomobile. \"Wait,\" he pleaded. \"I tell you we have sulfonamide-14.\nWe've been taking it regularly as directed. We took a double dose back\nin Paterson because there were soft-bombs all through that part of\nJersey and we didn't know what would be declared Plague Area next.\"\n\nNow Bill threw things out of his satchel onto the floor and seat of\nthe car, fumbling deeper by the flashlight Clara held. His heart beat\nthickly with terror. Then he remembered his pharmacase. Oh, why hadn't\nthey remembered sooner about their pharmacases. Bill tore at the belt\nabout his waist.\n\nThe Medicorps captain stepped back from the door of their car. He\njerked his head at the dark form of the corporal standing in the\nroadway. \"Shoot them. Run the car off the embankment before you burn\nit.\"\n\nBill screamed metallically through the speaker of his radiation mask.\n\"Wait. I've found it.\" He thrust the pharmacase out the door of the\ncar. \"This is a pharmacase,\" he explained. \"We keep our drugs in one of\nthese and it's belted to our waist so we are never without them.\"\n\nThe captain of the Medicorps came back. He inspected the pharmacase and\nthe drugs and returned it. \"From now on, keep your drugs handy. Take\nthem without fail according to radio instructions. Do you understand?\"\n\nClara's head pressed heavily against Bill's shoulder, and he could hear\nthe tinny sound of her sobbing through the speaker of her mask.", "start_char_idx": 49689, "end_char_idx": 53882, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4": {"__data__": {"id_": "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "b876949cee3b7ced4f3b497adb29fd9de80aaaff5e9c8db78f98a3eeab59c8e5", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "1191f79772b7baeaa0ae572f617fc805bc50420288e75a17f6538953e2c62457", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The captain stepped into the road again. \"We'll have to burn your\ncar. You passed through a Plague Area and it can't be sterilized on\nthis route. About a mile up this road you'll come to a sterilization\nunit. Stop and have your person and belongings rayed. After that, keep\nwalking, but stick to the road. You'll be shot if you're caught off it.\"\n\nThe road was crowded with fleeing people. Their way was lighted by\npiles of cadavers writhing in gasoline flames. The Medicorps was\neverywhere. Those who stumbled, those who coughed, the delirious and\ntheir helping partners ... these were taken to the side of the road,\nshot and burned. And there was bombing again to the south.\n\nBill stopped in the middle of the road and looked back. Clara clung to\nhim.\n\n\"There is a plague here we haven't any drug for,\" he said, and realized\nhe was crying. \"We are all mad.\"\n\nClara was crying too. \"Darling, what have you done? Where are the\ndrugs?\"\n\nThe water of the Hudson hung as it had in the late afternoon, ice\ncrystals in the stratosphere. The high, high sheet flashed and glowed\nin the new bombing to the south, where multicolored pillars of flame\nboiled into the sky. But the muffled crash of the distant bombing was\nsuddenly the steady click of the urgent signal on a bedside visiophone,\nand Bill was abruptly awake.\n\nClara was throwing on her robe and moving toward the machine on\nterror-rigid limbs. With a scrambling motion, Bill got out of the\npossible view of the machine and crouched at the end of the room.\n\nDistinctly, he could hear the machine say, \"Clara Manz?\"\n\n\"Yes.\" Clara's voice was a thin treble that could have been a shriek\nhad it continued.\n\n\"This is Medicorps Headquarters. A routine check discloses you have\ndelayed your shift two hours. To maintain the statistical record of\ndeviations, please give us a full explanation.\"\n\n\"I ...\" Clara had to swallow before she could talk. \"I must have taken\ntoo much sleeping compound.\"\n\n\"Mrs. Manz, our records indicate that you have been delaying your shift\nconsistently for several periods now. We made a check of this as a\nroutine follow up on any such deviation, but the discovery is quite\nserious.\" There was a harsh silence, a silence that demanded a logical\nanswer. But how could there be a logical answer?\n\n\"My hyperalter hasn't complained and I--well, I have just let a bad\nhabit develop. I'll see that it--doesn't happen again.\"\n\nThe machine voiced several platitudes about the responsibilities of one\npersonality to another and the duty of all to society before Clara was\nable to shut it off.\n\nBoth of them sat as they were for a long, long time while the tide of\nterror subsided. When at last they looked at each other across the dim\nand silent room, both of them knew there could be at least one more\ntime together before they were caught.\n\n * * * * *\n\nFive days later, on the last day of her shift, Mary Walden wrote the\naddress of her appointed father's hypoalter, Conrad Manz, with an\nindelible pencil on the skin just below her armpit.\n\nDuring the morning, her father and mother had spoiled the family rest\nday by quarreling. It was about Helen's hypoalter delaying so many\nshifts. Bill did not think it very important, but her mother was angry\nand threatened to complain to the Medicorps.\n\nThe lunch was eaten in silence, except that at one point Bill said, \"It\nseems to me Conrad and Clara Manz are guilty of a peculiar marriage,\nnot us. Yet they seem perfectly happy with it and you're the one who is\nmade unhappy. The woman has probably just developed a habit of taking\ntoo much sleeping compound for her rest day naps. Why don't you drop\nher a note?\"\n\nHelen made only one remark. It was said through her teeth and very\nsoftly. \"Bill, I would just as soon the child did not realize her\nrelationship to this sordid situation.\"\n\nMary cringed over the way Helen disregarded her hearing, the\npossibility that she might be capable of understanding, or her feelings\nabout being shut out of their mutual world.", "start_char_idx": 53884, "end_char_idx": 57893, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de": {"__data__": {"id_": "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "2889477521f251ed6ea8c559e14c6d74ab1ea453323ca0dcb6638d719cf8dd1f", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "8660ad1490b260fd6a3bf596719ed595d1f21fbbc3dd2f5ef78d3283d3d484d1", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "After the lunch Mary cleared the table, throwing the remains of the\nmeal and the plastiplates into the flash trash disposer. Her father had\nretreated to the library room and Helen was getting ready to attend\na Citizen's Meeting. Mary heard her mother enter the room to say\ngood-bye while she was wiping the dining table. She knew that Helen was\nstanding, well-dressed and a little impatient, just behind her, but she\npretended she did not know.\n\n\"Darling, I'm leaving now for the Citizen's Meeting.\"\n\n\"Oh ... yes.\"\n\n\"Be a good girl and don't be late for your shift. You only have an hour\nnow.\" Helen's patrician face smiled.\n\n\"I won't be late.\"\n\n\"Don't pay any attention to the things Bill and I discussed this\nmorning, will you?\"\n\n\"No.\"\n\nAnd she was gone. She did not say good-bye to Bill.\n\nMary was very conscious of her father in the house. He continued to sit\nin the library. She walked by the door and she could see him sitting in\na chair, staring at the floor. Mary stood in the sun room for a long\nwhile. If he had risen from his chair, if he had rustled a page, if he\nhad sighed, she would have heard him.\n\nIt grew closer and closer to the time she would have to leave if Susan\nShorrs was to catch the first school hours of her shift. Why did\nchildren have to shift half a day before adults?\n\nFinally, Mary thought of something to say. She could let him know she\nwas old enough to understand what the quarrel had been about if only it\nwere explained to her.\n\nMary went into the library and hesitantly sat on the edge, of a couch\nnear him. He did not look at her and his face seemed gray in the midday\nlight. Then she knew that he was lonely, too. But a great feeling of\ntenderness for him went through her.\n\n\"Sometimes I think you and Clara Manz must be the only people in the\nworld,\" she said abruptly, \"who aren't so silly about shifting right\non the dot. Why, I don't _care_ if Susan Shorrs _is_ an hour late for\nclasses!\"\n\nThose first moments when he seized her in his arms, it seemed her heart\nwould shake loose. It was as though she had uttered some magic formula,\none that had abruptly opened the doors to his love. It was only after\nhe had explained to her why he was always late on the first day of the\nfamily shift that she knew something was wrong. He _did_ tell her, over\nand over, that he knew she was unhappy and that it was his fault. But\nhe was at the same time soothing her, petting her, as if _he was afraid\nof her_.\n\nHe talked on and on. Gradually, Mary understood in his trembling body,\nin his perspiring palms, in his pleading eyes, that he was afraid of\ndying, that he was afraid _she_ would kill him with the merest thing\nshe said, with her very presence.\n\nThis was not painful to Mary, because, suddenly, something came with\nponderous enormity to stand before her: _I would just as soon the child\ndid not realize her relationship to this sordid situation._\n\nHer relationship. It was some kind of relationship to Conrad and Clara\nManz, because those were the people they had been talking about.\n\nThe moment her father left the apartment, she went to his desk and\ntook out the file of family records. After she found the address of\nConrad Manz, the idea occurred to her to write it on her body. Mary was\ncertain that Susan Shorrs never bathed and she thought this a clever\nidea. Sometime on Susan's rest day, five days from now, she would try\nto force the shift and go to see Conrad and Clara Manz. Her plan was\nsimple in execution, but totally vague as to goal.\n\nMary was already late when she hurried to the children's section of a\npublic shifting station. A Children's Transfer Bus was waiting, and\nMary registered on it for Susan Shorrs to be taken to school. After\nthat she found a shifting room and opened it with her wristband. She\nchanged into a shifting costume and sent her own clothes and belongings\nhome.\n\nChildren her age did not wear makeup, but Mary always stood at the\nmirror during the shift.", "start_char_idx": 57895, "end_char_idx": 61834, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611": {"__data__": {"id_": "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "8c9e7dcd8d8ea8bf9ac680a1db7783431e162029d9d22b4ee903f94bcfe3b5f6", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "c97f83fd542d8bf057f025c9824cc376154c39bc53ffab5090a042298b5e6ea3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "She always tried as hard as she could to\nsee what Susan Shorrs looked like. She giggled over a verse that was\nscrawled beside the mirror ...\n\n Rouge your hair and comb your face;\n Many a third head is lost in this place.\n\n... and then the shift came, doubly frightening because of what she\nknew she was going to do.\n\n * * * * *\n\nEspecially if you were a hyperalter like Mary, you were supposed to\nhave some sense of the passage of time while you were out of shift. Of\ncourse, you did not know what was going on, but it was as though a more\nor less accurate chronometer kept running when you went out of shift.\nApparently Mary's was highly inaccurate, because, to her horror, she\nfound herself sitting bolt upright in one of Mrs. Harris's classes, not\nout on the playgrounds, where she had expected Susan Shorrs to be.\n\nMary was terrified, and the ugly school dress Susan had been wearing\naccented, by its strangeness, the seriousness of her premature shift.\nChildren weren't supposed to show much difference from hyperalter to\nhypoalter, but when she raised her eyes, her fright grew. Children did\nchange. She hardly recognized anyone in the room, though most of them\nmust be the alters of her own classmates. Mrs. Harris was a B-shift and\noverlapped both Mary and Susan, but otherwise Mary recognized only Carl\nBlair's hypoalter because of his freckles.\n\nMary knew she had to get out of there or Mrs. Harris would eventually\nrecognize her. If she left the room quietly, Mrs. Harris would not\nquestion her unless she recognized her. It was no use trying to guess\nhow Susan would walk.\n\nMary stood and went toward the door, glad that it turned her back to\nMrs. Harris. It seemed to her that she could feel the teacher's eyes\nstabbing through her back.\n\nBut she walked safely from the room. She dashed down the school\ncorridor and out into the street. So great was her fear of what she was\ndoing that her hypoalter's world actually seemed like a different one.\n\nIt was a long way for Mary to walk across town, and when she rang the\nbell, Conrad Manz was already home from work. He smiled at her and she\nloved him at once.\n\n\"Well, what do you want, young lady?\" he asked.\n\nMary couldn't answer him. She just smiled back.\n\n\"What's your name, eh?\"\n\nMary went right on smiling, but suddenly he blurred in front of her.\n\n\"Here, here! There's nothing to cry about. Come on in and let's see if\nwe can help you. Clara! We have a visitor, a very sentimental visitor.\"\n\nMary let him put his big arm around her shoulder and draw her, crying,\ninto the apartment. Then she saw Clara swimming before her, looking\nlike her mother, but ... no, not at all like her mother.\n\n\"Now, see here, chicken, what is it you've come for?\" Conrad asked when\nher crying stopped.\n\nMary had to stare hard at the floor to be able to say it. \"I want to\nlive with you.\"\n\nClara was twisting and untwisting a handkerchief. \"But, child, we have\nalready had our first baby appointed to us. He'll be with us next\nshift, and after that I have to bear a baby for someone else to keep.\nWe wouldn't be allowed to take care of you.\"\n\n\"I thought maybe I was your real child.\" Mary said it helplessly,\nknowing in advance what the answer would be.\n\n\"Darling,\" Clara soothed, \"children don't live with their natural\nparents. It's neither practical nor civilized. I have had a child\nconceived and borne on my shift, and this baby is my exchange, so you\nsee that you are much too old to be my conception. Whoever your natural\nparents may be, it is just something on record with the Medicorps\nGenetic Division and isn't important.\"\n\n\"But you're a special case,\" Mary pressed. \"I thought because it was a\nspecial arrangement that you were my real parents.\" She looked up and\nshe saw that Clara had turned white.\n\nAnd now Conrad Manz was agitated, too. \"What do you mean, we're a\nspecial case?\" He was staring hard at her.", "start_char_idx": 61835, "end_char_idx": 65737, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54": {"__data__": {"id_": "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "a6f29955b38d64d4e3471f6ad318fe3561ce1f02f2eecadd016d65b524bfb4c9", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "635f964924bfa2d39286248bbfa3192fb060a09e54747a12ca52f1402bc47bee", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"What do you mean, we're a\nspecial case?\" He was staring hard at her.\n\n\"Because....\" And now for the first time Mary realized how special this\ncase was, how sensitive they would be about it.\n\nHe grasped her by the shoulders and turned her so she faced his\nunblinking eyes. \"I said, what do you mean, we're a special case?\nClara, what in thirty heads does this kid mean?\"\n\nHis grip hurt her and she began to cry again. She broke away. \"You're\nthe hypoalters of my appointed father and mother. I thought maybe when\nit was like that, I might be your real child ... and you might want me.\nI don't want to be where I am. I want somebody....\"\n\nClara was calm now, her sudden fear gone. \"But, darling, if you're\nunhappy where you are, only the Medicorps can reappoint you. Besides,\nmaybe your appointed parents are just having some personal problems\nright now. Maybe if you tried to understand them, you would see that\nthey really love you.\"\n\nConrad's face showed that he did not understand. He spoke with a stiff,\nquiet voice and without taking his eyes from Mary. \"What are you doing\nhere? My own hyperalter's kid in my house, throwing it up to me that\nI'm married to his wife's hypoalter!\"\n\nThey did not feel the earth move, as she fearfully did. They sat there,\nstaring at her, as though they might sit forever while she backed away,\nout of the apartment, and ran into her collapsing world.\n\n * * * * *\n\nConrad Manz's rest day fell the day after Bill Walden's kid showed\nup at his apartment. It was ten days since that strait jacket of a\nconference on Santa Fe had lost him a chance to blast off a rocket\nracer. This time, on the practical knowledge that emergency business\nconferences were seldom called after lunch, Conrad had placed his\nreservation for a racer in the afternoon. The visit from Mary Walden\nhad upset him every time he thought of it. Since it was his rest day,\nhe had no intention of thinking about it and Conrad's scrupulously\ndrugged mind was capable of just that.\n\nSo now, in the lavish coolness of the lounge at the Rocket Club, Conrad\nsipped his drink contentedly and made no contribution to the gloomy\nconversation going on around him.\n\n\"Look at it this way,\" the melancholy face of Alberts, a pilot from\nEngland, morosely emphasized his tone. \"It takes about 10,000 economic\nunits to jack a forty ton ship up to satellite level and snap it around\nthe course six times. That's just practice for us. On the other hand,\nan intellectual fellow who spends his spare time at a microfilm library\ndoesn't use up 1,000 units in a year. In fact, his spare time activity\nmay turn up as units gained. The Economic Board doesn't argue that all\npastime should be gainful. They just say rocket racing wastes more\neconomic units than most pilots make on their work days. I tell you the\nday is almost here when they ban the rockets.\"\n\n\"That's just it,\" another pilot put in. \"There was a time when you\ncould show that rocket races were necessary for better spaceship\ndesign. Design has gone way beyond that. From their point of view we\njust burn up units as fast as other people create them. And it's no use\ntrying to argue for the television shows. The Board can prove people\nwould rather see a jet-skiing meet at a cost of about one-hundredth\nthat of a rocket race.\"\n\nConrad Manz grinned into his drink. He had been aware for several\nminutes that pert little Angela, Alberts' soft-eyed, husky-voiced wife,\nwas trying to catch his eye. But stranded as she was in the buzzing\ntraffic of rockets, she was trying to hail the wrong rescuer. He had\nabout fifteen minutes till the ramp boys would have a ship ready for\nhim. Much as he liked Angela, he wasn't going to miss that race.\n\nStill, he let his grin broaden and, looking up at her, he lied\nmaliciously by nodding. She interpreted this signal as he knew she\nwould. Well, at least he would afford her a graceful exit from the\nboring conversation.\n\nHe got up and went over and took her hand. Her full lips parted a\nlittle and she kissed him on the mouth.", "start_char_idx": 65668, "end_char_idx": 69707, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81": {"__data__": {"id_": "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "30143c84392b97209843a71e7bf0b097dd81514d3410717002f60b596eb0667e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f6d5903959125fe06be44674d2dd7ab91baa8725c6ce20e9456e93b5b5262e1d", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Her full lips parted a\nlittle and she kissed him on the mouth.\n\nConrad turned to Alberts and interrupted him. \"Angela and I would like\nto spend a little time together. Do you mind?\"\n\nAlberts was annoyed at having his train of thought broken and rather\nsnapped out the usual courtesy. \"Of course not. I'm glad for both of\nyou.\"\n\nConrad looked the group over with a bland stare. \"Have you lads ever\ntried jet-skiing? There's more genuine excitement in ten minutes of it\nthan an hour of rocket racing. Personally, I don't care if the Board\ndoes ban the rockets soon. I'll just hop out to the Rocky Mountains on\nrest days.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nConrad knew perfectly well that if he had made this assertion before\nasking Alberts for his wife, the man would have found some excuse to\nhave her remain. All the faces present displayed the _aficionado's_\ndisdain for one who has just demonstrated he doesn't _belong_. What the\nstraitjacket did they think they were--some ancient order of noblemen?\n\nConrad took Angela's yielding arm and led her serenely away before\nAlberts could think of anything to detain her.\n\nOn the way out of the lounge, she stroked his arm with frank\nadmiration. \"I'm so glad you were agreeable. Honestly, Harold could\ntalk rockets till I died.\"\n\nConrad bent and kissed her. \"Angela, I'm sorry, but this isn't going\nto be what you think. I have a ship to take off in just a few minutes.\"\n\nShe flared and dug into his arm now. \"Oh, Conrad Manz! You ... you made\nme believe....\"\n\nHe laughed and grabbed her wrists. \"Now, now. I'm neglecting you to\n_fly_ a rocket, not just to talk about them. I won't let you die.\"\n\nAt that she could not suppress her husky musical laugh. \"I found that\nout the last time you and I were together. Clara and I had a drink the\nother day at the Citizen's Club. I don't often use dirty language, but\nI told Clara she must be keeping you in a _straitjacket_ at home.\"\n\nConrad frowned, wishing she hadn't brought up the subject. It worried\nhim off and on that something was wrong with Clara, something even\nworse than that awful _dreaming_ business ten days ago. For several\nshifts now she had been cold, nor was it just a temporary lack of\ninterest in himself, for she was also cold to the men of their\nacquaintance of whom she was usually quite fond. As for himself, he had\nhad to depend on casual contacts such as Angela. Not that they weren't\npleasant, but a man and wife were supposed to maintain a healthy\nlove life between themselves, and it usually meant trouble with the\nMedicorps when this broke down.\n\nAngela glanced at him. \"I didn't think Clara laughed well at my remark.\nIs something wrong between you?\"\n\n\"Oh, no,\" he declared hastily. \"Clara is sometimes that way ... doesn't\ncatch a joke right off.\"\n\nA page boy approached them where they stood in the rotunda and advised\nConrad that his ship was ready.\n\n\"Honestly, Angela, I'll make it up, I promise.\"\n\n\"I know you will, darling. And at least I'm grateful you saved me from\nall those rocket jets in there.\" Angela raised her lips for a kiss and\nafterward, as she pushed him toward the door, her slightly vacant face\nsmiled at him.\n\n * * * * *\n\nOut on the ramp, Conrad found another pilot ready to take off. They\nmade two wagers--first to reach the racing course, and winner in a\nsix-lap heat around the six-hundred-mile hexagonal course.\n\nThey fired together and Conrad blasted his ship up on a thunderous\ncolumn of flame that squeezed him into his seat. He was good at this\nand he knew he would win the lift to the course. On the course,\nthough, if his opponent was any good at all, Conrad would probably\nlose because he enjoyed slamming the ship around the course in his\nwasteful, swashbuckling style much more than merely winning the heat.\n\nConrad kept his drive on till the last possible second and then shot\nout his nose jets.", "start_char_idx": 69645, "end_char_idx": 73535, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc": {"__data__": {"id_": "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "1ba1be668bb2b61979df8bf27e973cb54d63444f4918386958e083328d8a72fb", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "7fcd8a568ef46962900dd5596a4815f41e9d4b2ad36bb16f3d2694020f35186b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The ship shuddered up through another hundred miles\nand came to a lolling halt near the starting buoys. The other pilot\ngasped when Conrad shouted at him over the intership, \"The winner by\nall thirty heads!\"\n\nIt was generally assumed that a race up to the course consisted of\ncutting all jets when you had enough lift, and using the nose brakes\nonly to correct any over-shot. \"What did you do, just keep your power\non and flip the ship around?\" The other racer coasted up to Conrad's\nlevel and steadied with a brief forward burst.\n\nThey got the automatic signal from the starting buoy and went for the\nfirst turn, nose and nose, about half a mile apart. Conrad lost 5000\nyards on the first turn by shoving his power too hard against the\nstarboard steering Jets.\n\nIt made a pretty picture when a racer hammered its way around a turn\nthat way with a fan of outside jets holding it in place. The Other\nfellow made his turns cleanly, using mostly the driving jets for\nsteering. But that didn't look like much to those who happened to\nflip on their television while this little heat was in progress. On\nevery turn, Conrad lost a little in space, but not in the eye of the\nautomatic televisor on the buoy marking the turn. As usual, he cut\ncloser to the buoys than regulations allowed, to give the folks a show.\n\nWithout the slightest regret, Conrad lost the heat by a full two sides\nof the hexagon. He congratulated his opponent and watched the fellow\nlet his ship down carefully toward earth on its tail jets. For a while\nConrad lolled his ship around near the starting buoy and its probably\nwatching eye, flipping through a series of complicated maneuvers with\nthe steering jets.\n\nConrad did not like the grim countenance of outer space. The lifeless,\ngemlike blaze of cloud upon cloud of stars in the perspectiveless black\nrepelled him. He liked rocket racing only because of the neat timing\nnecessary, and possibly because the knowledge that he indulged in it\nscared poor old Bill Walden half to death.\n\nToday the bleak aspect of the Galaxy harried his mind back upon its\nown problems. A particularly nasty association of Clara with Bill\nWalden and his sniveling kid kept dogging Conrad's mind and, as soon as\nstunting had exhausted his excess of fuel, he turned the ship to earth\nand sent it in with a short, spectacular burst.\n\nNow that he stopped to consider it, Clara's strange behavior had begun\nat about the same time that Bill Walden started cheating on the shifts.\nThat kid Mary must have known something was going on, or she would not\nhave done such a disgusting thing as to come to their apartment.\n\nConrad had let the rocket fall nose-down, until now it was screaming\ninto the upper ionosphere. With no time to spare, he swiveled the ship\non its guiding jets and opened the drive blast at the up-rushing earth.\nHe had just completed this wrenching maneuver when two appalling things\nhappened together.\n\nConrad suddenly knew, whether as a momentary leak from Bill's mind to\nhis, or as a rapid calculation of his own, that Bill Walden and Clara\nshared a secret. At the same moment, something tore through his mind\nlike fingers of chill wind. With seven gravities mashing him into the\nbucket-seat, he grunted curses past thin-stretched lips.\n\n\"Great blue psychiatrists! What in thirty straitjackets is that\nthree-headed fool trying to do, kill us both?\"\n\nConrad just managed to raise his leaden hand and set the plummeting\nracer for automatic pilot before Bill Walden forced him out of the\nshift. In his last moment of consciousness, and in the shock of his\noverwhelming shame, Conrad felt the bitter irony that he could not cut\nthe power and kill Bill Walden.\n\n * * * * *\n\nWhen Bill Walden became conscious of the thunderous clamor of the\nbraking ship and the awful weight of deceleration into which he had\nshifted, the core of him froze. He was so terrified that he could not\nhave thought of reshifting even had there been time.\n\nHis head rolled on the pad in spite of its weight, and he saw the\nearth coming at him like a monstrous swatter aimed at a fly. Between\nhis fright and the inhuman gravity, he lost consciousness without ever\nseeing on the control panel the red warning that saved him: _Automatic\nPilot_.", "start_char_idx": 73536, "end_char_idx": 77789, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52": {"__data__": {"id_": "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "b450cbefdc56aa8e7351fd60deda43d3c6402ce29221040773464a19b55489af", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "2e0113c52a37c93bc866f67a95eb60e31bb04ba3626ec7638a26cb3fec374607", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The ship settled itself on the ramp in a mushroom of fire. Bill\nregained awareness several seconds later. He was too shaken to do\nanything but sit there for a long time.\n\nWhen at last he felt capable of moving, he struggled with the door till\nhe found how to open it, and climbed down to the still-hot ramp he had\nlanded on. It was at least a mile to the Rocket Club across the barren\nflat of the field, and he set out on foot. Shortly, however, a truck\ncame speeding across to him.\n\nThe driver leaned out. \"Hey, Conrad, what's the matter? Why didn't you\npull the ship over to the hangars?\"\n\nWith Conrad's makeup on, Bill felt he could probably get by. \"Controls\naren't working,\" he offered noncommittally.\n\nAt the club, a place he had never been to before in his life, Bill\nfound an unused helicopter and started it with his wristband. He flew\nthe machine into town to the landing station nearest his home.\n\nHe was doomed, he knew. Conrad certainly would report him for this.\nHe had not intended to force the shift so early or so violently.\nPerhaps he had not intended to force it at all this time. But there was\nsomething in him more powerful than himself ... a need to break the\nshift and be with Clara that now acted almost independently of him and\ncertainly without regard for his safety.\n\nBill flew his craft carefully through the city traffic, working his way\nbetween the widely spaced towers with the uncertain hand of one to whom\nmachines are not an extension of the body. He put the helicopter down\nat the landing station with some difficulty.\n\nClara would not be expecting him so early. From his apartment, as soon\nas he had changed makeup, he visiophoned her. It was strange how long\nand how carefully they needed to look at each other and how few words\nthey could say.\n\nAfterward, he seemed calmer and went about getting ready with more\nefficiency. But when he found himself addressing the package of\nConrad's clothes to his home, he chuckled bitterly.\n\nIt was when he went back to drop the package in the mail chute that he\nnoticed the storage room door ajar. He disposed of the package and went\nover to the door. Then he stood still, listening. He had to stop his\nown breathing to hear clearly.\n\nBill tightened himself and opened the door. He flipped on the light and\nsaw Mary. The child sat on the floor in the corner with her knees drawn\nup against her chest. Between the knees and the chest, the frail wrists\nwere crossed, the hands closed limply like--like those of a fetus. The\nforehead rested on the knees so that, should the closed eyes stray\nopen, they would be looking at the placid hands.\n\nThe sickening sight of the child squeezed down on his heart till the\ncolor drained from his face. He went forward and knelt before her. His\ndry throat hammered with the words, _what have I done to you_, but he\ncould not speak. The question of how long she might have been here, he\ncould not bear to think.\n\nHe put out his hand, but he did not touch her. A shudder of revulsion\nshook him and he scrambled to his feet. He hurried back into the\napartment with only one thought. He must get someone to help her. Only\nthe Medicorps could take care of a situation like this.\n\nAs he stood at the visiophone, he knew that this involuntary act of\npanic had betrayed all that he had ever thought and done. He had to\ncall the Medicorps. He could not face the result of his own behavior\nwithout them. Like a ghostly after-image, he saw Clara's face on the\nscreen. She was lost, cut off, with only himself to depend on.\n\nA part of him, a place where there were no voices and a great tragedy,\nhad been abruptly shut off. He stood stupidly confused and disturbed\nabout something he couldn't recall. The emotion in his body suddenly\nhad no referent. He stood like a badly frightened animal while his\nheart slowed and blood seeped again into whitened parenchymas, while\ntides of epinephrine burned lower.\n\nRemembering he must hurry, Bill left the apartment. It was an apartment\nwith its storage room door closed, an apartment without a storage room.", "start_char_idx": 77791, "end_char_idx": 81838, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36": {"__data__": {"id_": "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "c31c7c1ee134be95a2b16710cca4b1030bb37733db77b733fa85f6f2098d6a5b", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "70973a10cc11a39a8932764d6b52b8e2142605316a2848c13726d89b8a6400db", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was an apartment\nwith its storage room door closed, an apartment without a storage room.\n\nFrom the moment that he walked in and took Clara in his arms, he was\nnot worried about being caught. He felt only the great need for her.\nThere seemed only one difference from the first time and it was a good\ndifference, because now Clara was so tense and apprehensive. He felt\na new tenderness for her, as one might feel for a child. It seemed to\nhim that there was no end to the well of gentleness and compassion that\nwas suddenly in him. He was mystified by the depth of this feeling.\nHe kissed her again and again and petted her as one might a disturbed\nchild.\n\nClara said, \"Oh, Bill, we're doing wrong! Mary was here yesterday!\"\n\nWhoever she meant, it had no meaning for him. He said, \"It's all right.\nYou mustn't worry.\"\n\n\"She needs you, Bill, and I take you away from her.\"\n\nWhatever it was she was talking about was utterly unimportant beside\nthe fact that she was not happy herself. He soothed her. \"Darling, you\nmustn't worry about it. Let's be happy the way we used to be.\"\n\nHe led her to a couch and they sat together, her head resting on his\nshoulder.\n\n\"Conrad is worried about me. He knows something is wrong. Oh, Bill, if\nhe knew, he'd demand the worst penalty for you.\"\n\nBill felt the stone of fear come back in his chest. He thought, too,\nof Helen, of how intense her shame would be. Medicorps action would be\nmachinelike, logical as a set of equation; they were very likely to\ntake more drastic steps where the complaints would be so strong and no\nrequest for leniency forthcoming. Conrad knew now, of course. Bill had\nfelt his hate.\n\nIt was nearing the end. Death would come to Bill with electronic\nfingers. A ghostly probing in his mind and suddenly....\n\nClara's great unhappiness and the way she turned her head into his\nshoulder to cry forced him to calm the rising panic in himself, and\nagain to caress the fear from her.\n\nEven later, when they lay where the moonlight thrust into the room\nan impalpable shaft of alabaster, he loved her only as a succor.\nCarefully, slowly, smoothing out her mind, drawing it away from all the\nother things, drawing it down into this one thing. Gathering all her\nmind into her senses and holding it there. Then quickly taking it away\nfrom her in a moaning spasm so that now she was murmuring, murmuring,\npalely drifting. Sleeping like a loved child.\n\nFor a long, long time he watched the white moon cut its arc across\ntheir window. He listened with a deep pleasure to her evenly breathing\nsleep. But slowly he realized that her breath had changed, that the\nbody so close to his was tensing. His heart gave a great bound and tiny\nmoths of horror fluttered along his back. He raised himself and saw\nthat the eyes were open in the silver light. Even through the makeup he\nsaw that they were Helen's eyes.\n\nHe did the only thing left for him. He shifted. But in that terrible\ninstant he understood something he had not anticipated. In Helen's eyes\nthere was not only intense shame over shifting into her hypoalter's\nhome; there was not only the disgust with himself for breaking\ncommunication codes. He saw that, as a woman of the 20th Century might\nhave felt, Helen hated Clara as a sexual rival. She hated Clara doubly\nbecause he had turned not to some other woman, but to the other part of\nherself whom she could never know.\n\nAs he shifted, Bill knew that the next light he saw would be on the\nadamant face of the Medicorps.\n\n * * * * *\n\nMajor Paul Grey, with two other Medicorps officers, entered the\nWalden apartment about two hours after Bill left it to meet Clara.\nMajor Grey was angry with himself. Important information on a case\nof communication-breaks and drug-refusal could be learned by letting\nit run its course under observation. But he had not intended Conrad\nManz's life to be endangered, and certainly he would not have taken the\nslightest chance on what they found in the Walden apartment if he had\nexpected it this early.", "start_char_idx": 81747, "end_char_idx": 85763, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d": {"__data__": {"id_": "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "782ec7c32769c02ad75bd730063888365c4fd1054ed8fce93c11348d29c6796c", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ee420329f6f1ca724df1d25abb084205ada790d2b884a9b28567899968c640b0", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Major Grey blamed himself for what had happened to Mary Walden. He\nshould have had the machines watching Susan and Mary at the same time\nthat they were relaying all wristband data for Bill and Conrad and for\nHelen and Clara to his office.\n\nHe had not done this because it was Susan's shift and he had not\nexpected Mary to break it. Now he knew that Helen and Bill Walden\nhad been quarreling over the fact that Clara was cheating on Helen's\nshifts, and their conversations had directed the unhappy child's\nattention to the Manz couple. She had broken shift to meet them ...\nlooking for a loving father, of course.\n\nStill--things would not have turned out so badly if Captain Thiel,\nMary's school officer, had not attributed Susan Shorrs' disappearance\nonly to poor drug acclimatization. Captain Thiel had naturally known\nthat Major Grey was in town to prosecute Bill Walden, because the major\nhad called on him to discuss the case. Yet it had not occurred to him,\nuntil 18 hours after Susan's disappearance, that Mary might have forced\nthe shift for some reason associated with her aberrant father.\n\nBy the time the captain advised him, Major Grey already knew that Bill\nhad forced the shift on Conrad under desperate circumstances and he had\ndecided to close in. He fully expected to find the father and daughter\nat the apartment, and now ... it sickened him to see the child's\ndemented condition and realize that Bill had left her there.\n\nMajor Grey could see at a glance that Mary Walden would not be\naccessible for days even with the best treatment. He left it to the\nother two officers to hospitalize the child and set out for the Manz\napartment.\n\nHe used his master wristband to open the door there, and found a woman\nstanding in the middle of the room, wrapped in a sheet. He knew that\nthis must be Helen Walden. It was odd how ill-fitting Clara Manz's\nsoftly sensual makeup seemed, even to a stranger, on the more rigidly\ncomposed face before him. He guessed that Helen would wear color higher\non her cheeks and the mouth would be done in severe lines. Certainly\nthe present haughty face struggled with its incongruous makeup as well\nas the indignity of her dress.\n\nShe pulled the sheet tighter about her and said icily, \"I will not wear\nthat woman's clothes.\"\n\nMajor Grey introduced himself and asked, \"Where is Bill Walden?\"\n\n\"He shifted! He left me with.... Oh, I'm so ashamed!\"\n\nMajor Grey shared her loathing. There was no way to escape the\nconditioning of childhood--sex relations between hyperalter and\nhypoalter were more than outlawed, they were in themselves disgusting.\nIf they were allowed, they could destroy this civilization. Those\nidealists--they were almost all hypoalters, of course--who wanted the\nold terminology changed didn't take that into account. Next thing\nthey'd want children to live with their actual parents!\n\nMajor Grey stepped into the bedroom. Through the bathroom door beyond,\nhe could see Conrad Manz changing his makeup.\n\nConrad turned and eyed him bluntly. \"Would you mind staying out of here\ntill I'm finished? I've had about all I can take.\"\n\nMajor Grey shut the door and returned to Helen Walden. He took a\nhypothalamic block from his own pharmacase and handed it to her. \"Here,\nyou're probably on very low drug levels. You'd better take this.\" He\npoured her a glass of pop from a decanter and, while they waited for\nConrad, he dialed the nearest shifting station on the visiophone and\nordered up an emergency shifting costume for her.\n\nWhen at last they were both dressed, made up to their satisfaction and\ndrugged to his satisfaction, he had them sit on a couch together across\nfrom him. They sat at opposite ends of it, stiff with resentment at\neach other's presence.\n\nMajor Grey said calmly, \"You realize that this matter is coming to a\nMedicorps trial. It will be serious.\"\n\nMajor Grey watched their faces. On hers he saw grim determination. On\nConrad's face he saw the heavy movement of alarm. The man loved his\nwife. That was going to help. \"It is necessary in a case such as this\nfor the Medicorps to weigh your decisions along with the scientific\nevidence we will accumulate.", "start_char_idx": 85765, "end_char_idx": 89896, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706": {"__data__": {"id_": "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "77683e8db5146b273b24e4e0d2af3e7ae445cd9fc63d96b62d6c0a3aa1ca7a41", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "f9ae68f3f5e9a54e917318063d0c95740cea6ae6cf19263111ec56c4095b154a", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Unfortunately, the number of laymen\ndirectly involved in this case--and not on trial--is only two, due\nto your peculiar marriage. If the hypoalters, Clara and Conrad, were\nmarried to other partners, we might call on as many as six involved\npersons and obtain a more equitable lay judgment. As it stands, the\nentire responsibility rests on the two of you.\"\n\nHelen Walden was primly confident. \"I don't see how we can fail to\ntreat the matter with perfect logic. After all, it is not _we_ who\nneglect our drug levels.... They _were_ refusing to take their drugs,\nweren't they?\" she asked, hoping for the worst and certain she was\nright.\n\n\"Yes, this is drug refusal.\" Major Grey paused while she relished the\nanswer. \"But I must correct you in one impression. Your proper drug\nlevels do not assure that you will act logically in this matter. The\ndrugged mind _is_ logical. However, its fundamental datum is that the\ndrugs and drugged minds must be protected before everything else.\" He\nwatched Conrad's face while he added, \"Because of this, it is possible\nfor you to arrive logically at a conclusion that ... death is the\nrequired solution.\" He paused, looking at their white lips. Then he\nsaid, \"Actually, other, more suitable solutions may be possible.\"\n\n\"But they _were_ refusing their drugs,\" she said. \"You talk as if you\nare defending them. Aren't you a Medicorps prosecutor?\"\n\n\"I do not prosecute _people_ in the ancient 20th Century sense, Mrs.\nWalden. I prosecute the _acts_ of drug refusal and communication\nbreaks. There is quite a difference.\"\n\n\"Well!\" she said almost explosively. \"I always knew Bill would get\ninto trouble sooner or later with his wild, antisocial ideas. I never\n_dreamed_ the Medicorps would take _his_ side.\"\n\nMajor Grey held his breath, almost certain now that she would walk into\nthe trap. If she did, he could save Clara Manz before the trial.\n\n\"After all, they have broken every communication code. They have\nrefused the drugs, a defiance aimed at our very lives. They--\"\n\n\"Shut up!\" It was the first time Conrad Manz had spoken since he sat\ndown. \"The Medicorps spent weeks gathering evidence and preparing their\nrecommendations. You haven't seen any of that and you've already made\nup your mind. How logical is that? It sounds as if you _want_ your\nhusband dead. Maybe the poor devil had some reason, after all, for what\nhe did.\" On the man's face there was the nearest approach to hate that\nthe drugs would allow.\n\nMajor Grey let his breath out softly. They were split permanently. She\nwould have to trade him a mild decision on Clara in order to save Bill.\nAnd even there, if the subsequent evidence gave any slight hope, Major\nGrey believed now that he could work on Conrad to hang the lay judgment\nand let the Medicorps' scientific recommendation go through unmodified.\n\nHe let them stew in their cross-purposed silence for a while and then\nnailed home a disconcerting fact.\n\n\"I think I should remind you that there are few advantages to having\nyour alter extinguished in the _mnemonic eraser_. A man whose\nhyperalter has been extinguished must report on his regular shift days\nto a hospital and be placed for five days in suspended animation. This\nis not very healthy for the body, but necessary. Otherwise, everyone's\nnatural distaste for his own alter and the understandable wish to spend\ntwice as much time living would generate schemes to have one's alter\nsucked out by the eraser. That happened extensively back in the 21st\nCentury before the five day suspension was required. It was also used\nas a 'cure' for schizophrenia, but it was, of course, only the brutal\nmurder of innocent personalities.\"\n\nMajor Grey smiled grimly to himself. \"Now I will have to ask you both\nto accompany me to the hospital. I will want you, Mrs. Walden, to shift\nat once to Mrs. Manz. Mr. Manz, you will have to remain under the close\nobservation of an officer until Bill Walden tries to shift back. We\nhave to catch him with an injection to keep him in shift.\"", "start_char_idx": 89897, "end_char_idx": 93884, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7": {"__data__": {"id_": "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "8f0d4fa57842a2cbe9379f0e31610d80b975d87632c8ba404742a2e0760cb199", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "cbfd95ced7fb9adcfd95d7cc4b7fa4fbf3c006dafe67864d86df11c84f2ff2ea", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "We\nhave to catch him with an injection to keep him in shift.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe young medicop put the syringe aside and laid his hand on Bill\nWalden's forehead. He pushed the hair back out of Bill's eyes.\n\n\"There, Mr. Walden, you don't have to struggle now.\"\n\nBill let his breath out in a long sigh. \"You've caught me. I can't\nshift any more, can I?\"\n\n\"That's right, Mr. Walden. Not unless we want you to.\" The young man\npicked up his medical equipment and stepped aside.\n\nBill noticed then the Medicorps officer standing in the background. The\nman was watching as though he contemplated some melancholy distance. \"I\nam Major Grey, Bill. I'm handling your case.\"\n\nBill did not answer. He lay staring at the hospital ceiling. Then he\nfelt his mouth open in a slow grin.\n\n\"What's funny?\" Major Grey asked mildly.\n\n\"Leaving my hypoalter with my wife,\" Bill answered candidly. It had\nalready ceased to be funny to him, but he saw Major Grey smile in\nspite of himself.\n\n\"They were quite upset when I found them. It must have been some\nscramble before that.\" Major Grey came over and sat in the chair\nvacated by the young man who had just injected Bill. \"You know, Bill,\nwe will need a complete analysis of you. We want to do everything we\ncan to save you, but it will require your cooperation.\"\n\nBill nodded, feeling his chest tighten. Here it came. Right to the end,\nthey would be tearing him apart to find out what made him work.\n\nMajor Grey must have sensed Bill's bitter will to resist. His resonant\nvoice was soft, his face kindly. \"We must have your sincere desire to\nhelp. We can't force you to do anything.\"\n\n\"Except die,\" Bill said.\n\n\"Maybe helping us get the information that might save your life at the\ntrial isn't worth the trouble to you. But your aberration has seriously\ndisturbed the lives of several people. Don't you think you owe it to\nthem to help us prevent this sort of thing in the future?\" Major Grey\nran his hand through his whitening hair. \"I thought you would like\nto know Mary will come through all right. We will begin shortly to\nacclimatize her to her new appointed parents, who will be visiting her\neach day. That will accelerate her recovery a great deal. Of course,\nright now she is still inaccessible.\"\n\nThe brutally clear picture of Mary alone in the storage room crashed\nback into Bill's mind. After a while, in such slow stages that the\nbeginning was hardly noticeable, he began to cry. The young medicop\ninjected him with a sleeping compound, but not before Bill knew he\nwould do whatever the Medicorps wanted.\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe next day was crowded with battery after battery of tests. The\ninterviews were endless. He was subjected to a hundred artificial\nsituations and every reaction from his blood sugar to the frequency\nranges of his voice was measured. They gave him only small amounts of\ndrugs in order to test his reaction to them.\n\nLate in the evening, Major Grey came by and interrupted an officer who\nwas taking an electroencephalogram for the sixth time after injection\nof a drug.\n\n\"All right, Bill, you have really given us cooperation. But after\nyou've had your dinner, I hope you won't mind if I come to your room\nand talk with you for a little while.\"\n\nWhen Bill finished eating, he waited impatiently in his room for the\nMedicorps officer. Major Grey came soon after. He shook his head at\nthe mute question Bill shot at him.\n\n\"No, Bill. We will not have the results of your tests evaluated until\nlate tomorrow morning. I can't tell you a thing until the trial in any\ncase.\"\n\n\"When will that be?\"\n\n\"As soon as the evaluation of your tests is in.\" Major Grey ran his\nhand over his smooth chin and seemed to sigh. \"Tell me, Bill, how do\nyou feel about your case? How did you get into this situation and what\ndo you think about it now?\" The officer sat in the room's only chair\nand motioned Bill to the cot.\n\nBill was astonished at his sudden desire to talk about his problem. He\nhad to laugh to cover it up.", "start_char_idx": 93823, "end_char_idx": 97835, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084": {"__data__": {"id_": "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "b13fb2c9d422af5df4f0690f15c537cca87ab790195ef8d312b0d76f168fd0fc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "99fbbeef76993a39b22e84f90b709c3100680724ad85ce91647cc37f06ff7321", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "He\nhad to laugh to cover it up. \"I guess I feel as if I am being condemned\nfor trying to stay sober.\" Bill used the ancient word with a mock tone\nof righteousness that he knew the major would understand.\n\nMajor Grey smiled. \"How do you feel when you're sober?\"\n\nBill searched his face. \"The way the ancient Moderns did, I guess. I\nfeel what happens to me the _way_ it happens to me, not the artificial\nway the drugs let it happen. I think there is a way for us to live\nwithout the drugs and really enjoy life. Have you ever cut down on your\ndrugs. Major?\"\n\nThe officer shook his head.\n\nBill smiled at him dreamily. \"You ought to try it. It's as though a new\nlife has suddenly opened up. Everything looks different to you.\n\n\"Look, with an average life span of 100 years, each of us only lives\n50 years and our alter lives the other 50. Yet even on half-time we\nexperience only about half the living we'd do if we didn't take the\ndrugs. We would be able to feel the loves and hatreds and desires\nof life. No matter how many mistakes we made, we would be able\noccasionally to live those intense moments that made the ancients\ngreat.\"\n\nMajor Grey said tonelessly, \"The ancients were great at killing,\ncheating and debasing one another. And they were worse sober than\n_drunk_.\" This time he did not smile at the word.\n\nBill understood the implacable logic before him. The logic that had\nsaved man from himself by smothering his spirit. The carefully achieved\nlogic of the drugs that had seized upon the disassociated personality,\nand engineered it into a smoothly running machine, where there was no\nunhappiness because there was no great happiness, where there was no\ncrime except failure to take the drugs or cross the alter sex line.\nWithout drugs, he was capable of fury and he felt it now.\n\n\"You should see how foolish these communication codes look when you\nare undrugged. This stupid hide-and-seek of shifting! These two-headed\nmonsters simpering, about their artificial morals and their endless\nprescriptions! They belong in _crazy_ houses! What use is there in such\na world? If we are all this sick, we should die....\"\n\nBill stopped and there was suddenly a ringing silence in the barren\nlittle room.\n\nFinally Major Grey said, \"I think you can see, Bill, that your desire\nto live without drugs is incompatable with this society. It would\nbe impossible for us to maintain in you an artificial need for the\ndrugs that would be healthy. Only if we can clearly demonstrate that\nthis aberration is not an inherent part of your personality can we do\nsomething medically or psycho-surgically about it.\"\n\nBill did not at first see the implication in this. When he did, he\nthought of Clara rather than of himself, and his voice was shaken. \"Is\nit a localized aberration in Clara?\"\n\nMajor Grey looked at him levelly. \"I have arranged for you to be with\nClara Manz a little while in the morning.\" He stood up and said good\nnight and was gone.\n\nSlowly, as if it hurt him to move, Bill turned off the light and lay on\nthe cot in the semi-dark. After a while he could feel his heart begin\nto take hold and he started feeling better. It was as though a man who\nhad thought himself permanently expatriated had been told, \"Tomorrow,\nyou walk just over that hill and you will be home.\"\n\nAll through the night he lay awake, alternating between panic and\ndesperate longing in a cycle with which finally he became familiar. At\nlast, as a rusty light of dawn reddened his silent room, he fell into a\ntroubled sleep.\n\nHe started awake in broad daylight. An orderly was at the door with his\nbreakfast tray. He could not eat, of course. After the orderly left, he\nhastily changed to a new hospital uniform and washed himself. He redid\nhis makeup with a trembling hand, straightened the bedclothes and then\nhe sat on the edge of the cot.\n\nNo one came for him.\n\nThe young medicop who had given him the injection that caught him in\nshift finally entered, and was standing near him before Bill was aware\nof his presence.\n\n\"Good morning, Mr. Walden. How are you feeling?\"", "start_char_idx": 97804, "end_char_idx": 101849, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87": {"__data__": {"id_": "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "b737b096ded37d2699d0f0b9f98f13fb5c0ed83c2f0f5a9db2f84314c688714e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "ecce678ab4fe5cbb9ea9f93798be6379eaab9965942039f40d1e55e0647b24bc", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "\"Good morning, Mr. Walden. How are you feeling?\"\n\nBill's wildly oscillating tensions froze at the point where he could\nonly move helplessly with events and suffer a constant, unchangeable\nlonging.\n\nIt was as if in a dream that they moved in silence together down the\nlong corridors of the hospital and took the elevator to an upper floor.\nThe medicop opened the door to a room and let Bill enter. Bill heard\nthe door close behind him.\n\nClara did not turn from where she stood looking out the window. Bill\ndid not care that the walls of the chill little room were almost\ncertainly recording every sight and sound. All his hunger was focused\non the back of the girl at the window. The room seemed to ring with his\nracing blood. But he was slowly aware that something was wrong, and\nwhen at last he called her name, his voice broke.\n\nStill without turning, she said in a strained monotone, \"I want you to\nunderstand that I have consented to this meeting only because Major\nGrey has assured me it is necessary.\"\n\nIt was a long time before he could speak. \"Clara, I need you.\"\n\nShe spun on him. \"Have you no shame? You are married to my\nhyperalter--don't you understand that?\" Her face was suddenly wet with\ntears and the intensity of her shame flamed at him from her cheeks.\n\"How can Conrad ever forgive me for being with his hyperalter and\ntalking about him? Oh, how can I have been so _mad_?\"\n\n\"They have done something to you,\" he said, shaking with tension.\n\nHer chin raised at this. She was defiant, he saw, though not toward\nhimself--he no longer existed for her--but toward that part of herself\nwhich once had needed him and now no longer existed. \"They have cured\nme,\" she declared. \"They have cured me of everything but my shame, and\nthey will help me get rid of that as soon as you leave this room.\"\n\nBill stared at her before leaving. Out in the corridor, the young\nmedicop did not look him in the face. They went back to Bill's room and\nthe officer left without a word. Bill lay down on his cot.\n\nPresently Major Grey entered the room. He came over to the cot. \"I'm\nsorry it had to be this way, Bill.\"\n\nBill's words came tonelessly from his dry throat. \"Was it necessary to\nbe cruel?\"\n\n\"It was necessary to test the result of her psycho-surgery. Also, it\nwill help her over her shame. She might otherwise have retained a seed\nof fear that she still loved you.\"\n\nBill did not feel anything any more. Staring at the ceiling, he knew\nthere was no place left for him in this world and no one in it who\nneeded him. The only person who had really needed him had been Mary,\nand he could not bear to think of how he had treated her. Now the\nMedicorps was efficiently curing the child of the hurt he had done her.\nThey had already erased from Clara any need for him she had ever felt.\n\nThis seemed funny and he began to laugh. \"Everyone is being cured of\nme.\"\n\n\"Yes, Bill. That is necessary.\" When Bill went on laughing Major\nGrey's voice turned quite sharp. \"Come with me. It's time for your\ntrial.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nThe enormous room in which they held the trial was utterly barren.\nAt the great oaken table around which they all sat, there were three\nMedicorps officers in addition to Major Grey.\n\nHelen did not speak to Bill when they brought him in. He was placed on\nthe same side of the table with an officer between them. Two orderlies\nstood behind Bill's chair. Other than these people, there was no one in\nthe room.\n\nThe great windows were high above the floor and displayed only the\nblissful sky. Now and then Bill saw a flock of pigeons waft aloft on\nsilver-turning wings. Everyone at the table except himself had a copy\nof his case report and they discussed it with clipped sentences.\nBetween the stone floor and the vaulted ceiling, a subtle echolalia\nbabbled about Bill's problem behind their human talk.\n\nThe discussion of the report lulled when Major Grey rapped on the\ntable.", "start_char_idx": 101801, "end_char_idx": 105718, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f": {"__data__": {"id_": "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "91f04f67dc69055f9ebd89a907d1e1ec918f982ed74509f1f7a79c2a1eba10c3", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "6bc8029c27357533b1e937d11e58623c8e41172dfbe098f5f4c676bbe70eb2ae", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "The discussion of the report lulled when Major Grey rapped on the\ntable. He glanced unsmiling from face to face, and his voice hurried\nthe ritualized words: \"This is a court of medicine, co-joining the\nresults of medical science and considered lay judgment to arrive\nat a decision in the case of patient Bill Walden. The patient is\nhospitalized for a history of drug refusal and communication breaks. We\nhave before us the medical case record of patient Walden. Has everyone\npresent studied this record?\"\n\nAll at the table nodded.\n\n\"Do all present feel competent to pass judgment in this case?\"\n\nAgain there came the agreement.\n\nMajor Grey continued, \"It is my duty to advise you, in the presence\nof the patient, of the profound difference between a trial for simple\ndrug refusal and one in which that aberration is compounded with\ncommunication breaks.\n\n\"It is true that no other aberration is possible when the drugs are\ntaken as prescribed. After all, the drugs _are_ the basis for our\nschizophrenic society. Nevertheless, simple drug refusal often is a\nmere matter of physiology, which is easy enough to remedy.\n\n\"A far more profound threat to our society is the break in\ncommunication. This generally is more deeply motivated in the patient,\nand is often inaccessible to therapy. Such a patient is driven to\nemotive explorations which place the various ancient passions, and the\ninfamous art of _historical gesture_, such as 'give me liberty or give\nme death,' above the welfare of society.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nBill watched the birds flash down the sky, a handful of heavenly\ncoin. Never had it seemed to him so good to look at the sky. _If they\nhospitalize me_, he thought, _I will be content forever to sit and look\nfrom windows._\n\n\"Our schizophrenic society,\" Major Grey was saying, \"holds together and\nruns smoothly because, in each individual, the personality conflicts\nhave been compartmentalized between hyperalter and hypoalter. On\nthe social level, conflicting personalities are kept on opposite\nshifts and never contact each other. Or they are kept on shifts where\ncontact is possible no more than one or two days out of ten. Bill\nWalden's break of shift is the type of behavior designed to reactivate\nthese conflicts, and to generate the destructive passions on which\nan undrugged mind feeds. Already illness and disrupted lives have\nresulted.\"\n\nMajor Grey paused and looked directly at Bill. \"Exhaustive tests\nhave demonstrated that your entire personality is involved. I might\nalso say that the aberration to live without the drugs and to break\ncommunication codes _is_ your personality. All these Medicorps officers\nare agreed on that diagnosis. It remains now for us of the Medicorps\nto sit with the laymen intimately involved and decide on the action\nto be taken. The only possible alternatives after that diagnosis are\npermanent hospitalization or ... total removal of the personality by\nmnemonic erasure.\"\n\nBill could not speak. He saw Major Grey nod to one of the orderlies\nand felt the man pushing up his sleeve and injecting his nerveless arm.\nThey were forcing him to shift, he knew, so that Conrad Manz could sit\non the trial and participate.\n\nHelplessly, he watched the great sky blacken and the room dim and\ndisappear.\n\n * * * * *\n\nMajor Grey did not avert his face, as did the others, while the shift\nwas in progress. Helen Walden, he saw, was dramatizing her shame at\nbeing present during a shift, but the Medicorps officers simply stared\nat the table. Major Grey watched the face of Conrad Manz take form\nwhile the man who was going to be tried faded.\n\nBill Walden had been without makeup, and as soon as he was sure Manz\ncould hear him, Major Grey apologized. \"I hope you won't object to this\nbrief interlude in public without makeup. You are present at the trial\nof Bill Walden.\"\n\nConrad Manz nodded and Major Grey waited another full minute for the\nshift to complete itself before he continued. \"Mr. Manz, during the\ntwo days you waited in the hospital for us to catch Walden in shift, I\ndiscussed this case quite thoroughly with you, especially as it applied\nto the case of Clara Manz, on which we were already working.\n\n\"You will recall that in the case of your wife, the Medicorps diagnosis\nwas one of a clearly localized aberration.", "start_char_idx": 105646, "end_char_idx": 109972, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8": {"__data__": {"id_": "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "76430374cf03aae26b6bc93a591d8fc6b2832be12758020daaf6075b9d02e510", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "978e8b5a45baacf1eddacdccabadb792fdc03f8c044288899398d46dd6cfd896", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "It was quite simple to apply\nthe mnemonic eraser to that small section without disturbing in any way\nher basic personality. Medicorps agreement was for this procedure and\nthe case did not come to trial, but simply went to operation, because\nlay agreement was obtained. First yourself and eventually--\" Major Grey\npaused and let the memory of Helen's stubborn insistence that Clara die\nstir in Conrad's mind--\"Mrs. Walden agreed with the Medicorps.\"\n\nMajor Grey let the room wait in silence for a while. \"The case of\nBill Walden is quite different. The aberration involves the whole\npersonality, and the alternative actions to be taken are permanent\nhospitalization or total erasure. In this case, I believe that\nMedicorps opinion will be divided as to proper action and--\" Major Grey\npaused again and looked levelly at Conrad Manz--\"this may be true,\nalso, of the lay opinion.\"\n\n\"How's that, Major?\" demanded the highest ranking Medicorps officer\npresent, a colonel named Hart, a tall, handsome man on whom the\nmilitary air was a becoming skin. \"What do you mean about Medicorps\nopinion being divided?\"\n\nMajor Grey answered quietly, \"I'm holding out for hospitalization.\"\n\nColonel Hart's face reddened. He thrust it forward and straightened his\nback. \"That's preposterous! This is a clear-cut case of a dangerous\nthreat to our society, and we, let me remind you, are _sworn_ to\nprotect that society.\"\n\nMajor Grey felt very tired. It was, after all, difficult to understand\nwhy he always fought so hard against erasure of these aberrant cases.\nBut he began with quiet determination. \"The threat to society is\neffectively removed by either of the alternatives, hospitalization\nor total erasure. I think you can all see from Bill Walden's medical\nrecord that his is a well rounded personality with a remarkable\nmind. In the environment of the 20th Century, he would have been an\noutstanding citizen, and possibly, if there had been more like him, our\npresent society would have been better for it.\n\n\"Our history has been one of weeding out all personalities that did not\nfit easily into our drugged society. Today there are so few left that I\nhave handled only 136 in my entire career....\"\n\nMajor Grey saw that Helen Walden was tensing in her chair. He realized\nsuddenly that she sensed better than he the effect he was having on the\nother men.\n\n\"We should not forget that each time we erase one of these\npersonalities,\" he pressed on relentlessly, \"society loses irrevocably\na certain capacity for change. If we eliminate all personalities who\ndo not fit, we may find ourselves without any minds capable of meeting\nfuture change. Our direct ancestors were largely the inmates of mental\nhospitals ... we are fortunate _they_ were not erased. Conrad Manz,\" he\nasked abruptly, \"what is your opinion on the case of Bill Walden?\"\n\nHelen Walden started, but Conrad Manz shrugged his muscular shoulders.\n\"Oh, hospitalize the three-headed monster!\"\n\nMajor Grey snapped his eyes directly past Colonel Hart and fastened\nthem on the Medicorps captain. \"Your opinion, Captain?\"\n\nBut Helen Walden was too quick. Before he could rap the table for\norder, she had her thin words hanging in the echoing room. \"Having been\nMr. Walden's wife for 15 years, my sentiments naturally incline me to\nask for hospitalization. That is why I may safely say, if Major Grey\nwill pardon me, that the logic of the drugs does not entirely fail us\nin a situation like this.\"\n\nHelen waited while all present got the idea that Major Grey had accused\nthem of being illogical. \"Bill's aberration has led to our daughter's\nillness. And think how quickly it contaminated Clara Manz! I cannot ask\nthat society any longer expose itself, even to the extent of keeping\nBill in the isolation of the hospital, for my purely sentimental\nreasons.\n\n\"As for Major Grey's closing remarks, I cannot see how it is fair to\nbring my husband to trial as a threat to society, if some future chance\nis expected, in which a man of his behavior would benefit society.\nSurely such a change could only be one that would ruin our present\nworld, or Bill would hardly fit it. I would not want to save Bill or\nanyone else for such a future.\"", "start_char_idx": 109973, "end_char_idx": 114146, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825": {"__data__": {"id_": "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "eb6475b161aaf6f100ff855680978c49dc8079bddc2ec15e1fe3c6b1a7e20a6e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "229768a1a25c05e6ac6724fb36625f0b7a3ff19fdbece4751dc9f411051f4783", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "I would not want to save Bill or\nanyone else for such a future.\"\n\nShe did not have to say anything further. Both of the other Medicorps\nofficers were now fully roused to their duty. Colonel Hart, of course,\n\"humphed\" at the opinions of a woman and cast his with Major Grey. But\nthe fate of Bill Walden was sealed.\n\nMajor Grey sat, weary and uneasy, as the creeping little doubts began.\nIn the end, he would be left with the one big stone-heavy doubt ...\ncould he have gone through with this if he had not been drugged, and\nhow would the logic of the trial look without drugs?\n\nHe became aware of the restiveness in the room. They were waiting for\nhim, now that the decision was irrevocable. Without the drugs, he\nreflected, they might be feeling--what was the ancient word, _guilt_?\nNo, that was what the criminal felt. _Remorse?_ That would be what they\nshould be feeling. Major Grey wished Helen Walden could be forced to\nwitness the erasure. People did not realize what it was like.\n\nWhat was it Bill had said? \"You should see how foolish these\ncommunication codes took when you are undrugged. This stupid\nhide-and-seek of shifting....\"\n\nWell, wasn't that a charge to be _inspected_ seriously, if you were\ntaking it seriously enough to kill the man for it? As soon as this case\nwas completed, he would have to return to his city and blot himself out\nso that his own hyperalter, Ralph Singer, a painter of bad pictures and\na useless fool, could waste five more days. To that man he lost half\nhis possible living days. What earthly good was Singer?\n\nMajor Grey roused himself and motioned the orderly to inject Conrad\nManz, so that Bill Walden would be forced back into shift.\n\n\"As soon as I have advised the patient of our decision, you will all be\ndismissed. Naturally, I anticipated this decision and have arranged for\nimmediate erasure. After the erasure, Mr. Manz, you will be instructed\nto appear regularly for suspended animation.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nFor some reason, the first thing Bill Walden did when he became\nconscious of his surroundings was to look out the great window for the\nflock of birds. But they were gone.\n\nBill looked at Major Grey and said, \"What are you going to do?\"\n\nThe officer ran his hand back through his whitening hair, but he looked\nat Bill without wavering. \"You will be erased.\"\n\nBill began to shake his head. \"There is something wrong,\" he said.\n\n\"Bill....\" the major began.\n\n\"There is something wrong,\" Bill repeated hopelessly. \"Why must we be\nsplit so there is always something missing in each of us? Why must we\nbe stupefied with drugs that keep us from knowing what we should feel?\nI was trying to live a better life. I did not want to hurt anyone.\"\n\n\"But you _did_ hurt others,\" Major Grey said bluntly. \"You would do so\nagain if allowed to function in your own way in this society. Yet it\nwould be insufferable to you to be hospitalized. You would be shut off\nforever from searching for another Clara Manz. And--there is no one\nelse for you, is there?\"\n\nBill looked up, his eyes cringing as though they stared at death. \"No\none else?\" he asked vacantly. \"No one?\"\n\nThe two orderlies lifted him up by his arms, almost carrying him into\nthe operating room. His feet dragged helplessly. He made no resistance\nas they lifted him onto the operating table and strapped him down.\n\nBeside him was the great panel of the mnemonic eraser with its thousand\nunblinking eyes. The helmetlike prober cabled to this calculator was\nfastened about his skull, and he could no longer see the professor who\nwas lecturing in the amphitheater above. But along his body he could\nsee the group of medical students. They were looking at him with great\ninterest, too young not to let the human drama interfere with their\ntechnical education.\n\nThe professor, however, droned in a purely objective voice. \"The\nmnemonic eraser can selectively shunt from the brain any identifiable\ncategory of memory, and erase the synaptic patterns associated with its\ntranslation into action. Circulating memory is disregarded.", "start_char_idx": 114082, "end_char_idx": 118133, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6": {"__data__": {"id_": "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "bca228ef6af66315a5a7ec71af4369609ba76f12a66b45ef9c4029dc11f5c334", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "3": {"node_id": "689324f8-05b5-45d4-9e82-1b344b0107ea", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {}, "hash": "bc0188732b7ce15173b0092fb0b4fcac1f9966edbece9e9c5fc0ed5b5111b137", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Circulating memory is disregarded. The machine\nonly locates and shunts out those energies present as permanent memory.\nThese are there in part as permanently echoing frequencies in closed\ncytoplasmic systems. These systems are in contact with the rest of the\nnervous system only during the phenomenon of remembrance. Remembrance\noccurs when, at all the synapses in a given network 'y,' the\npermanently echoing frequencies are duplicated as transient circulating\nfrequencies.\n\n\"The objective in a total operation of the sort before us is to\ndistinguish all the stored permanent frequencies, typical of the\npersonality you wish to extinguish, from the frequencies typical of the\nother personality present in the brain.\"\n\nMajor Grey's face, very tired, but still wearing a mask of adamant\nreassurance, came into Bill's vision. \"There will be a few moments of\ndrug-induced terror, Bill. That is necessary for the operation. I hope\nknowing it beforehand will help you ride with it. It will not be for\nlong.\" He squeezed Bill's shoulder and was gone.\n\n\"The trick was learned early in our history, when this type of total\noperation was more often necessary,\" the professor continued. \"It is\nreally quite simple to extinguish one personality while leaving the\nother undisturbed. The other personality in the case before us has\nbeen drug-immobilized to keep this one from shifting. At the last\nmoment, this personality before us will be drug-stimulated to bring\nit to the highest possible pitch of total activity. This produces\nutterly disorganized activity, every involved neuron and synapse being\nactivated simultaneously by the drug. It is then a simple matter for\nthe mnemonic eraser to locate all permanently echoing frequencies\ninvolved in this personality and suck them into its receiver.\"\n\nBill was suddenly aware that a needle had been thrust into his arm.\nThen it was as though all the terror, panic and traumatic incidents of\nhis whole life leaped into his mind. All the pleasant experiences and\nfeelings he had ever known were there, too, but were transformed into\nterror.\n\nA bell was ringing with regular strokes. Across the panel of the\nmnemonic eraser, the tiny counting lights were alive with movement.\n\nThere was in Bill a fright, a demand for survival so great that it\ncould not be felt.\n\nIt was actually from an island of complete calm that part of him saw\nthe medical students rising dismayed and white-faced from their seats.\nIt was apart from himself that his body strained to lift some mountain\nand filled the operating amphitheater with shrieking echoes. And all\nthe time the thousand eyes of the mnemonic eraser flickered in swift\npatterns, a silent measure of the cells and circuits of his mind.\n\nAbruptly the tiny red counting lights went off, a red beam glowed with\na burr of warning. Someone said, \"Now!\" The mind of Bill Walden flashed\nalong a wire as electrical energy and, converted on the control panel\ninto mechanical energy, it spun a small ratchet counter.\n\n\"Please sit down,\" the professor said to the shaken students. \"The drug\nthat has kept the other personality immobilized is being counteracted\nby this next injection. Now that the sickly personality has been\ndissipated, the healthy one can be brought back rapidly.\n\n\"As you are aware, the synapse operates on the binary 'yes-no' choice\nsystem of an electronic calculator. All synapses which were involved in\nthe diseased personality have now been reduced to an atypical, uniform\nthreshold. Thus they can be re-educated in new patterns by the healthy\npersonality remaining.... There, you see the countenance of the healthy\npersonality appearing.\"\n\n * * * * *\n\nIt was Conrad Manz who looked up at them with a wry grin. He rotated\nhis shoulders to loosen them. \"How many of you pushed old Bill Walden\naround? He left me with some sore muscles. Well, I did that often\nenough to him....\"\n\nMajor Grey stood over him, face sick and white with the horror of\nwhat he had seen. \"According to law, Mr. Manz, you and your wife are\nentitled to five rest days on your next shift. When they are over, you\nwill, of course, report for suspended animation for what would have\nbeen your hyperalter's shift.\"\n\nConrad Manz's grin shrank and vanished. \"_Would_ have been? Bill\nis--gone?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I never thought I'd miss him.\"", "start_char_idx": 118099, "end_char_idx": 122419, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}, "689324f8-05b5-45d4-9e82-1b344b0107ea": {"__data__": {"id_": "689324f8-05b5-45d4-9e82-1b344b0107ea", "embedding": null, "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "excluded_embed_metadata_keys": [], "excluded_llm_metadata_keys": [], "relationships": {"1": {"node_id": "51842", "node_type": "4", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e12207d2062f637d2167835e329032d40891671784a20d1348fd058630c41b9e", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}, "2": {"node_id": "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6", "node_type": "1", "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}, "hash": "e4a4d07eb51c06c404113646759dfb9016c0bfb855b3d1d2f79520378c40b800", "class_name": "RelatedNodeInfo"}}, "text": "Bill\nis--gone?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"I never thought I'd miss him.\" Conrad looked as sick as Major Grey\nfelt. \"It makes me feel--I don't know if I can explain it--sort of\n_amputated_. As though something's wrong with me because everybody else\nhas an alter and I don't. Did the poor son of a straitjacket suffer\nmuch?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid he did.\"\n\nConrad Manz lay still for a moment with his eyes closed and his mouth\nthin with pity and remorse. \"What will happen to Helen?\"\n\n\"She'll be all right,\" Major Grey said. \"There will be Bill's\ninsurance, naturally, and she won't have much trouble finding another\nhusband. That kind never seems to.\"\n\n\"Five rest days?\" Conrad repeated. \"Is that what you said?\" He sat up\nand swung his legs off the table, and he was grinning again. \"I'll get\nin a whole shift of jet-skiing! No, wait--I've got a date with the wife\nof a friend of mine out at the rocket grounds. I'll take Clara out\nthere; she'll like some of the men.\"\n\nMajor Grey nodded abstractedly. \"Good idea.\" He shook hands with\nConrad Manz, wished him fun on his rest shift, and left.\n\nTaking a helicopter back to his city, Major Grey thought of his own\nhyperalter, Ralph Singer. He'd often wished that the silly fool\ncould be erased. Now he wondered how it would be to have only one\npersonality, and, wondering, realized that Conrad Manz had been\nright--it _would_ be like amputation, the shameful distinction of\nliving in a schizophrenic society with no alter.\n\nNo, Bill Walden had been wrong, completely wrong, both about drugs\nand being split into two personalities. What one made up in pleasure\nthrough not taking drugs was more than lost in the suffering of\nconflict, frustration and hostility. And having an alter--any kind,\neven one as useless as Singer--meant, actually, _not being alone_.\n\nMajor Grey parked the helicopter and found a shifting station. He took\noff his makeup, addressed and mailed his clothes, and waited for the\nshift to come.\n\nIt was a pretty wonderful society he lived in, he realized. He wouldn't\ntrade it for the kind Bill Walden had wanted. Nobody in his right mind\nwould.", "start_char_idx": 122363, "end_char_idx": 124450, "text_template": "{metadata_str}\n\n{content}", "metadata_template": "{key}: {value}", "metadata_seperator": "\n", "class_name": "TextNode"}, "__type__": "1"}}, "docstore/metadata": {"2124c308-64aa-4790-abd1-3fa58ea34223": {"doc_hash": "7a657281328608455034f184f0b47edb4485fae62a54e668941d6c683a1109bb", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea": {"doc_hash": "ed711a9773d3ecd7b6f368bab44aa19aa904eb4d127e2d5ad8fa49c20b42c8e5", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4": {"doc_hash": "9b442b0066cf16aad4d7c05c1154d7e8f7728af71316eadfbecf95d71633b8fc", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3": {"doc_hash": "0fea4fec6b20c0b4ee47a00a769a8a8f780df83fad3fea12e58ad7d2ef33702d", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91": {"doc_hash": "060bcc3bd22a080ec6750c6483a8c64083ff319e2c927e65afad7d5bb4842339", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50": {"doc_hash": "e239cadff7b464ca772a65161856f9518b06c71405a6480926d839e5f8eddc71", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe": {"doc_hash": "4f86d154ef3b22570db5c851d6561712c6b2389146cac2fd160a2dee3aa6caf6", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e": {"doc_hash": "591e4dd4d9557af780abea1a49fb67de1174145fd379e9778cebf393137777c1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa": {"doc_hash": "f022c35c5632b38fa85a5201765fe27dd81427a68ce38953bd688c16c11d2164", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621": {"doc_hash": "0a21a0760c68ec980310112818603f66db95ecd5d28fe27f70a5c38171bdbbcf", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1": {"doc_hash": "84ff5a86e6dc67367928a47bb2368f5af7e731793f4e5dd6b072de46b91755ac", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9": {"doc_hash": "1e6f7505e2a8e9ba0c6b65ab4bf62c7b3d6dbee41319dae6c1a8accbbb490c9b", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f": {"doc_hash": "c8813ee4c88dcf7bec3004d76d171e95286b16d7bfeda720c073fb12c934a747", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1": {"doc_hash": "7bc534f153a1fa0c5ba17219198dfad98a8e6e1fe0deeced3d292c55fb7f1450", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e": {"doc_hash": "c48e26a275b5b9a4c595cd1a62be17a9a7a9bab4fa06ff4b7a4397240508c2b1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90": {"doc_hash": "911f7744c84963b99f8829bef766fbfac5eb80ff766aba4997a576f3df14a3cd", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170": {"doc_hash": "5658b7fe6693dc804dbf91cd94a4be28ab6f1a6a3b66dee0f76059a9248430d8", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e": {"doc_hash": "258864160b468c3a752f6de0aac65b6d0bc3e370c7f4eb10cae10f0fd05f97bc", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d": {"doc_hash": "2d25ed8dabcc01965561018c0ae596a8b19a2218cb1597ad7f5a348eabd3d1b6", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181": {"doc_hash": "81d45e4429251788517ce6327b240eec4e75155de5877ab57c4b8141058e0fae", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312": {"doc_hash": "fa5b9a3031f43ed784f53ba6e11d7adf965101b66860e3b94ab4fe3a31515676", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce": {"doc_hash": "8240dc2f05a899db693fc28fccde25c3c0ab8d56c7d0c256597acb40c1497b6c", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a": {"doc_hash": "d43b3bff69488e643e103007e8d7b36b6bff5aadfe3409aa69fea9add398fab4", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95": {"doc_hash": "3c2dc4e84217dbdddac9557085690cf84646b9e5c2083f5742e7aafa092ada91", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29": {"doc_hash": "6989d0d99ef44335daed6df39bf4298594bc117b143fb4d916e2c57d845b2e68", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb": {"doc_hash": "27dfa9c722affb066e0315688d5d9db6b17df667a6c1d3c47ec769e4eec288d1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9": {"doc_hash": "98d2c91c37dcf9528e1c3dfda2b3d29f186140ef24e6b6fe8274dc06d773f940", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c": {"doc_hash": "09e8fccab9e280dddc45dcfb3b816034691eba5429b6cb520177b193c10d2a6f", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232": {"doc_hash": "1ac9d0ad93bb58cbfbb1b2a6ce147226fde9ca016d59d2a15ff065774f3ae7bf", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d": {"doc_hash": "cf4ded05d139244f91108b047b19e5b3da6959f79fa8dfd01242ef1f6f363208", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef": {"doc_hash": "8941645267bf4ce0d7bdd11e8564ee6c47f23b60445f5c793a2578fa52fe9b2b", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff": {"doc_hash": "f925dce6022f858fef1b8d684e040dd345db0a2536617967964e2bae0229758d", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90": {"doc_hash": "146ce6fce2062cfee8b6015a7b7e398e165bbcbeb054778d92a74736f788c310", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f": {"doc_hash": "4f38c98007aaa664ee4b6e4028a4d50ebd067786624a533253248b50c3fa30a6", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971": {"doc_hash": "ff72db2c5c847798612b70511543bed3d30c762603cf2649df513450fbf8a7bb", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a": {"doc_hash": "8ad7053deda407a14702c006a2acf4f883752fcdf20f9ebd5f43901313321604", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7": {"doc_hash": "cae9e6cfe374d2343de38b64b161785ec30bd7e07ebabc0de9adfdeeeda8e8e1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53": {"doc_hash": "314efe97deb6c24c2855fbc507e26a115c0977d14392fbf0f2063ce7b0d7aac1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db": {"doc_hash": "e2b731bcff14d569f481839013875172f24a661192147fae9b1747163b440e1c", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de": {"doc_hash": "7752554cda3aa942876abd5e79212361ad06b95eb6686719709f2ec5ba1c3e80", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7": {"doc_hash": "82e4e29b5ff7e1f9563569bab8e9b3fa3fd15ca7ca4e12752e7078018daad4ba", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029": {"doc_hash": "4e8ea0131aba89f3c355172842406c0eeec73528fd846a402df0a4e069465cbe", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930": {"doc_hash": "fd2fa9f2ffb2523d78695a5e5b6ffce340506ff7e312308b81ff7150e05152bd", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa": {"doc_hash": "52b5c85b23048f361ce58872bf1818ad09ba934141839b4efcfacb941a8e66f0", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679": {"doc_hash": "1060da8202d0eb40653e230e831f1e933f3c187a690f1149dcaa9873c858906e", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13": {"doc_hash": "2c3a12b2aa4f47fd4b34096b33c09258ef2caccc7d91530e6ac4d2c878b7c8e4", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383": {"doc_hash": "7fcb39019d9a750b786733d6c7c345a401383e495a55fef6c4834890cb52f4a9", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3": {"doc_hash": "48635f902df1b90ec230edf49d9a2d811c1ca7404ba5372204b941c99b7cbc65", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b": {"doc_hash": "ef54d9c71568c9538277e3ecff6c406e82d15e9e6570175c05fe5365c86f5f59", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966": {"doc_hash": "0bcdcd70d0e9c96df83a2cb8d00c1f4168443d0dfbf93e3a481926a3ae24ac83", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa": {"doc_hash": "f6084532a3ee649fe7456785d5c90f2ef5b1ad0d019990b8cb3b2f9e7002e359", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f": {"doc_hash": "c758a2d178b525e16dbe6376f9d2e4ff93621a38de9e1fef1595558dbb3f7c84", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d": {"doc_hash": "952921f941cadb40410ce814c3d38ec28c4beb99bc182002b852f470b22f00f9", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d": {"doc_hash": "1625322315c53d37158acc09922ea60902e32f3be49a5bc79ddd4952aa5f5835", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912": {"doc_hash": "7446c131fb4443f464f1cea7d7be402cb8e1e42379c5877ca11997ec020d162f", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8": {"doc_hash": "6c33a0dee38e1a6505b6995cfd01a063c1c9202500257c16e59bb58884b2fec7", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048": {"doc_hash": "3aef3f06c522b3948f02109eff08f0af2d80d96357b0d08a12573e7980c01257", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529": {"doc_hash": "25a25d905a87f5d39b3ea92e90658a1cdf7f28201f603110db2191d6ba353fc6", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce": {"doc_hash": "aedca39ade5f968853fc461d4d2af5b419c2d3318629538d0bfcfd4f55e539f5", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0": {"doc_hash": "3088a45e5cbd31a3a034775138d7d9404c6eeaffbbde5145816b59bf10e0ccfe", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899": {"doc_hash": "5010e3fe86f740de5b84a624d7db0905a5f51600eefe50e42821101a817f8832", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe": {"doc_hash": "b3bdaabad6773aa9b3ddb4baf8a63fe9ac3da9d08da229b70648e25e24b55102", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f": {"doc_hash": "38a67a7a56fb4b98aea1144caf1ebf4a144752f3f0a703262899866a435d7129", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f": {"doc_hash": "e8aa3f89d285df509fcbef34bd3d313825ac4154c9bb3acd224fc63f7486dcf1", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a": {"doc_hash": "0efe1a2541f5e5281b0a23d7f2a5d40bd12fed81938d43b90c5520c33dd08963", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222": {"doc_hash": "c04f57e6ff411c4b0419c4a779a468470863ad59a28a3871da28caf6011cdd3b", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe": {"doc_hash": "07976b82dd6155f482918081f318acae75cac3df94c39ae11423cf2dbb6212ab", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359": {"doc_hash": "a1a04337581ec4b22474f88e9d24a39634b3f6bcc0f0e4199af61930682f4f41", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614": {"doc_hash": "c576d64b754d8403865d62b42c3a84a72e09b4bcd8c1739f6ee9823bd0cb0d7d", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778": {"doc_hash": "42918ab1704d31757d5101ca9c3ffc324ad0c6f452cd202fda0c680fc43c8fee", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0": {"doc_hash": "4ff7148a1cbfb3deb894f6734ed2ba1fd29c995fd89a3c6bb7baa4cb8ed4c4a7", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53": {"doc_hash": "7bc8049d605ce2220e9879fc149e285502a92a34cadec4bdd35fe94227612755", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e": {"doc_hash": "80309e1a97461ddf451b2d92a8a86a1fdfca61bb1b605a587d1cb0ca1c1bc507", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c": {"doc_hash": "bf2d80e2297f20cabc1d18fabd0128e253059ec6eb1032f11c12076750ab374d", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd": {"doc_hash": "42ffa0c78a3c1de977d4aa55fad1fbbf427f56faae61961bfaa94afc3de3320e", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e": {"doc_hash": "0667d6684eecfa97c6d8e5d5e540d8c0ca037f1342e7034e5c4a7247defc8245", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9": {"doc_hash": "6d8663fd12bd4613dc948b158317c13372d2962f391d07f348e5bbb2ad5aa18e", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf": {"doc_hash": "2fbdb425b648fd5b67b154ac6656d292d9c577be7a01b0c437cd738d9f3b47bf", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d": {"doc_hash": "ef7ec1960f94f552d681de5c0df49c57d5209de0819e4846023d53db205862a7", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315": {"doc_hash": "9e32790a878812f22f5c59c7830d461bcf24dc1a1312be8363c5a8788254bf42", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371": {"doc_hash": "8430fdbe935fd42eb767d0279999c95ec096ce3553912931faaaf3904a93e8b6", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e": {"doc_hash": "fff51d3df6cc13d9e3a432b67663100e77bb36be4ceef11c3508e36959179cf0", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca": {"doc_hash": "b3f827e99978827644c46aa46e44371e61be309738d1e8e7d2080f20ddaa4928", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b": {"doc_hash": "8c6df1ce2e2223ba90395aea9b91e88687daa3b2c497dad636b18fa06bf2fadb", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402": {"doc_hash": "205cefbcc9635c89cc098d3b55880b563167e6dccb6c82109f4af62b5a868442", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584": {"doc_hash": "d97c0c082a0390b5952f9bddd20acede6061da24d2e5163430de0b1d80bdab27", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874": {"doc_hash": "f7f11c146219a841dc6ff0f158af78a9482e81c5c4cb27e21b413ca53d45b061", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd": {"doc_hash": "d85db182f83318a320924e6ad07be4de6d48794d91524e2055d1d8505a7e792a", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273": {"doc_hash": "0d6994cece2ddf75ce272b5a59ae844e4bca895185470de603ed66f88c8ad9f7", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6": {"doc_hash": "4f2294ebced134750302238d26397173aa4ca2f9b57b11a4797ddbd69fbaf607", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55": {"doc_hash": "9a8d41c080b3d53dbe2596109f795230e44cc169a1655b9baa49748e689424c4", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c": {"doc_hash": "c6320febb902a1f9d24736e8bd40a0182b4cb4047dfde831c915d36ea1c07e47", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45": {"doc_hash": "8ceda25b699046ba1b50627e091078e06eabb337457e3bc008da5f6da4173293", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951": {"doc_hash": "920f41f595e36fa4bad25bfe5d0773fe7aaf7e945b78dfa20e2d862b68e2e6b8", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889": {"doc_hash": "2f17341e953223b6537c222e80f201561efc7a19fa000a73b7024bc8f4aa60ef", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702": {"doc_hash": "806cfbca8800ba2c9eb065c95d84577e5227d38869385420e691792192d05c97", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5": {"doc_hash": "f103dcfc42680e4deb97cf8b162bdf0a04f6a4547bb003e26f50c6a36cec7106", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd": {"doc_hash": "9d3a5ef431ca2baf5255a4d2924e78964a1193c2817067c410b71d67320491fa", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28": {"doc_hash": "1309dccb8cb8f46669d83cb73b7d975dca906d8ec3a84bb5c0fe54f6c75a2540", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa": {"doc_hash": "86758a5ddfd937ef0830d7b6336bd83a5e3bbc97e9c9bf091e59e7c6fa3cac68", "ref_doc_id": "19451"}, "f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94": {"doc_hash": "0446d417f006261cbba742edcf51a5a770b7955f33462f9140f9a34167353c77", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81": {"doc_hash": "204e09eba3f32df1595d42f111fe0035cfbd64c435377835607597a22293102b", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916": {"doc_hash": "514da80aea4e2fe255251526bb9801701324383b39ffd7389a90e7ede3fb017a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155": {"doc_hash": "dd115ecfef0e51e70533077c135d9b40bb34815960a860fbdd26ee19be7ee9e0", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb": {"doc_hash": "0af26762d5d3633f6d0874f7c6908c88af8ed20b23c16afcee3ef43ee5f133a6", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201": {"doc_hash": "8f964ecbaf9d7503694d7ced833195fb3e5a3374e91d38dac03a006d6b343354", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3": {"doc_hash": "73400b63c17ee33ee8963d4e64cd33aa58a1afeccf9081c84732974f00c28126", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d": {"doc_hash": "b221851aeb160ee6bf261c557e83f26a44b21e12e0f4220798d6dfb5f622f883", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb": {"doc_hash": "f5a690395d4d90f13ceb1d26d803c766c19f82626c401debc1f785fbcd24cec2", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf": {"doc_hash": "91c174664d24c1f599a76c0976438e095ed7d51a77b3e4375bde79431eea539e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37": {"doc_hash": "bce8de3ac5753570fcf0333db54fd436d3413bf716665938598b9ce66d8ac82e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18": {"doc_hash": "23011c130d6d305be86bf1f16ad83dcb78536d784f4e59a91b0552022ff36694", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45": {"doc_hash": "dc2303b75a5e5a763ff5c3da67ec9c8fdf4dd2449ff006f0d91ddc239204526a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414": {"doc_hash": "3407f08bb285fdc1691d78e5bf44a939700800d4a164e6dc4f9c18045ca0ebfb", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923": {"doc_hash": "eb7f47b3e037740026d54958f2b17b6740ce30c57ea82f0c10275f0bb4d4581f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca": {"doc_hash": "b1c628aecf0e70a0abfae42d067583396a8c191ef238bedcc9d70dc788e7ab23", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c": {"doc_hash": "282346809ea2fae8c10272d20a94501684bef28d1b6e31f56e0ccba253e997dd", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334": {"doc_hash": "5e6a432349a66b88e8c98618d192dfa868e190469843314db153c55c4f3a6bbf", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988": {"doc_hash": "488f34d49f501225de1c288394b4d171d7f12964cb59245a85e701f8aca7808f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e": {"doc_hash": "a13b698708cc50d054c176f8bb6e751ea199aeed114c5dcfaf97257dc4de7914", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b": {"doc_hash": "8ff4d83b58038c7f045a3247b589f58e06cb42c3af6f39a66453d6f07627c22a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd": {"doc_hash": "c269605dcb1fb6231d9e222c197622b410950316d31de241c445c66a53a08018", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b": {"doc_hash": "a6bc6a4dbe5ead23b27bd8e4cf7d40841329333f2c41a2ddd153d99ec83d3ce0", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e": {"doc_hash": "f0515cec9491ce889b07cc738beaafd8fe5ff2713924cda7d059c1946e22cfd3", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0": {"doc_hash": "c7bd0fb2f4c8ae6a2765a1bb312fc40533e24a4f1aaa4140aa06e64d5d0aa6a9", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699": {"doc_hash": "2aa6f68931252dccaf144ba62f1b7472a5cce33b30127d4de1e4493795b13eb7", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7": {"doc_hash": "f50e5c75ff6c7ea4ce729e165ecbaaf8f6b81c1d7daba1be28b707555bbcc521", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8": {"doc_hash": "be23fcda952b1352cdfea9105c36f1db5727cf03363a81b673179a4923ed3572", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312": {"doc_hash": "d0ed591d4b122d0ee0c2c2f6609ecf64220aeb35b1a4a14e463ca90baa3b5eb6", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a": {"doc_hash": "17cf087b6a09a5cdf543a5aa389c254ab50532094e9b4371c15dcdceab7560ec", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61": {"doc_hash": "3626f8e24ecde312696654ac389b0450097014c6ff694272cfbc8b20a7eb800b", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58": {"doc_hash": "c7099bd2b14cc6b819413cf95b8d7c1d1fba8190658f673803799dd006cd01d8", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e": {"doc_hash": "ab7f1ab15bb1c2a803eb73a6067d4938f2941af7e7acdbcf59d94fcdcdf93655", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8": {"doc_hash": "0adae36b7e02f8c57930c71c1fa27e751075d95a39e92461ada8fe94947c4061", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6": {"doc_hash": "3f921d966e6d2d67f51a064ac782e0815bd8720dec82deb9899054f3c33e3794", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd": {"doc_hash": "1f5de298390b12cd3722de8f78240812c7030944d8dc9747e274ac9abe627a8f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd": {"doc_hash": "91cbad7404cdc00700bc34ef8410759efdf7efa21a0c79584af29c0f809a6351", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7": {"doc_hash": "ec25ca216008e0b64b96124b0071908e05b1c05fc3b59634e8d618e7eb08fb60", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8": {"doc_hash": "e0b7e220cf7e886ddc1a6be10383b976d18f9720d5c6e51244ee60fc3a136983", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536": {"doc_hash": "1ca576d97a217aa61732f884b967241b4951991d4f275d620f3819f481dcda3c", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965": {"doc_hash": "34817cb683fc2cbda90c0ea14a1d0ac942c980ff91890301a1dee4427c492c74", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6": {"doc_hash": "3949cb6a32bde8385a521a81abf957f7e0d674ad800f095fed2e6ae355980a3d", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e": {"doc_hash": "a671acbb266cde88686ef7fb1fbfe244257185410b4baf44a81c6261568b663b", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5": {"doc_hash": "4328d311e271bb026108662e996199cca602d53d39ea1185a09a178a339abda8", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29": {"doc_hash": "cf06da1d603d10edfa84e6d42a0d6d3ac5a51b3e5e529484288081ac5cfa1139", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814": {"doc_hash": "e01203b3d983f756637f6a661e7f561ccf1e7fb5a140525dd08d41ee5fa60a79", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f": {"doc_hash": "0a3b69a316d6f5c9a0e477de291d8f74b3ebb73423979713cc54c575cb83e2be", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee": {"doc_hash": "c4d40daa4e94eeaa5ae8b1b044144ba49180557dae8e6a6a8d28e8d65409e6ed", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279": {"doc_hash": "1ac62d37784de55a3e0e73086746c0c882873eb8740dca45ea75e3446a601b2e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607": {"doc_hash": "f098d61c746068ab843d199413ca21f6cecbae92588f922c6f3f4a30714567a4", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e": {"doc_hash": "407a7976c8913fc875575f8ca8c1d471ba30f534e79375ec02cec67d58657517", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7": {"doc_hash": "325ce82e4597ca1540aecb10bc4192116a0fbbfe9ed2eb99c987fc606e0b242d", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20": {"doc_hash": "3ec935724355cb8f2521881f8d1dcd758fe4bc5cd4f0bfc73de793213be338c0", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c": {"doc_hash": "817b4a4f0c849bce382047d8fa647693d2c1a49bd8c75f59f51191c7c5fa23b3", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439": {"doc_hash": "b604e64a675b3e16edb5b7795e1294e011379d3c42b9d6dd8620073f8ccadf98", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5": {"doc_hash": "9418b09696fc3300b942371e47673e3077dee438a14a8ad361ba689fa14f499f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8": {"doc_hash": "d3cbe16fa9749ba0d4b2b16ffc4bd20a2666052d101d6f84a9134f023154fd61", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3": {"doc_hash": "2892056d1b58e65c0343c7b6d34300e47fa41ebcdc491e7ead425450ff8dcc29", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309": {"doc_hash": "06cb526defe3124bee7fe4f4bb5db5d11df52bbc3254c1b49c7502625e3c5e89", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9": {"doc_hash": "9bd9b65724f380fdbfce797cffa7b5dd42859390285fbf28d47da7287f1c9681", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade": {"doc_hash": "bc5c76093a792ad48cb0d7afe7b04966bbe94e79481284233361f61724aac45f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d": {"doc_hash": "b6f8e1dbe2f740fa000ba0e17cc2862f504456fb2e7d84584ab7fcb6b71bcbb8", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2": {"doc_hash": "e6316d101f47b2b0c11051061528e9edc5400d23662d0eb1e3801ac915a850d4", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2": {"doc_hash": "77bc118f67f742a26c26b1271b253966722ab05f4a2b159a2e40741bc3734b8f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935": {"doc_hash": "9d7e93e6eaf0ed08c5a51a3a8816ec33e97c37b9628aaa96ac1fcafe3630735c", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b": {"doc_hash": "2ced7b6ddef4e20211e70213e7663dfd9d5b043eade4407758bb98099adbaa9f", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2": {"doc_hash": "554fe203b265ecc70ab445d29dadf261d3376d89fe6bcb69204fbd501c06f092", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337": {"doc_hash": "1a9184ef959074e6e66c3174d9cc6317399c4e20fddad68e620149727e38147e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75": {"doc_hash": "3088c6f2a150ac6ad561306f654ed354020321fd8a4def2fc96def6cb9946318", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a": {"doc_hash": "50dca6f52af1ac9836d4ef97ebe3c002ffea88e78d0b01a0cd924c14630074eb", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03": {"doc_hash": "253ee8a91d94347932560afb1fecb76a36c69d567676d225f643ee39f0672045", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071": {"doc_hash": "1f376164715126559d7422b87b1a870f38202c164cd286f8c30421b7981242d4", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4": {"doc_hash": "68d7d63f55908c5b249e2a6856cfe57ba96e731fb78a2f9e616d1b4b9fcc017e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f": {"doc_hash": "547bea4e44418697271e88a10f850ecea465e8e7949895046ec890839c2adbc0", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81": {"doc_hash": "2ab82ed3e02434f9bb651b2efc9ee2c66f893280832daeea18910b553ee3b757", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807": {"doc_hash": "ffd8a649d7fa57a3b65a96c1201d9378fb12298efdd096a51ae4f4a578fa50d2", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f": {"doc_hash": "35900b2bb8daa3ef04a7a3a2c951b0844d1713e847cf2e0549e657861a54d2de", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa": {"doc_hash": "b759ec2eebf58154a6a7b7967a73159cc3ae4897db4dc64d430def078bb437fc", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a": {"doc_hash": "96e04c2427161d0b23f2dc6a8371b36c8d3f31750ee3523b7ccf60a0e88077a0", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65": {"doc_hash": "378399463063ec4e022eb858bdbb524a850fe4dec86d5ce5e4bec637f2d7dd96", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757": {"doc_hash": "5f182066f6c97e673c7b699a40dcb3002e8fa7557ed66289402ca4cff7daa046", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40": {"doc_hash": "642c4a8f48f60deb606c13e6166db87f4f24aab637b632f85bdaee75d6cf9116", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410": {"doc_hash": "66b94328bd27d489fba3f5728739e133fc92108a445dd801ac37188ba633cac5", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59": {"doc_hash": "fe94347bddd18e44d7817968139bcc405ca7945cb02e750cf38af71245023233", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87": {"doc_hash": "f10b6f5eb55bcdb5bed95238b80d8c548957e94eb6fa05e31916e4fba4b19d26", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b": {"doc_hash": "127fbd6fc59ddbf9ab5a4d250287e2180a4b40466a485d1990156bf8aa19fc41", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7": {"doc_hash": "45fd847a03b826f72bdf48bb73969331bc1a7d2799523b35a0e7c52eaf578c97", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6": {"doc_hash": "2b0b641ae62495515d91a230ab4088f3159399141135e5707ba01a6c6e9c8b41", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f": {"doc_hash": "c4062ffe35019bdb62815eb6a32697441f2b5a71aa456fb49615d144b832e99e", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b": {"doc_hash": "4893b65c8c80f19b03599be68c40195c2a51968276c2a7da46d11ff43273b5c1", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f": {"doc_hash": "3a65583099ef4011407f89932f7c45367aa19486f152630aee8787bb5f7fb87b", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468": {"doc_hash": "946b9ed5a286ec92949a650a3bc7959707c5aabe4da4842ec614b1f0b064f485", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1": {"doc_hash": "08d031072de6dc35380181ef1fe8b9ed1d497b2b1576d397ba3fa600f7ec41e9", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf": {"doc_hash": "bbad3e30c1d5b9f0ecaf8f61c57db6e72a5e03f754eeffcf542905f49bb4c60a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b": {"doc_hash": "2d341aa3f3aceed0229f4f6dfc833a48e6d4894009f7c3fe8c5aa6022ab7ad80", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a": {"doc_hash": "af117e79e067eb5b2c6e511f64105c258a7f57ed1038ffa57cbcccfda5fc4282", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52": {"doc_hash": "44a636c182cc0e53932b053a209b78d122530b052b536d35c35f4be0ab91ab7c", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712": {"doc_hash": "efe938d2d4fc5f3c2597de586594ad788fc91621580690578e936bd16e2fb53a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40": {"doc_hash": "17666e94378a36062f1f5b648fef0ce2430ae8b14f7d8071080682251c5ea440", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649": {"doc_hash": "0914666766133c76adb9858d75fd5b9babf3baecbfe3cd1c7903ecd4df3e894a", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726": {"doc_hash": "92aee4418f298da715ec1a53476b9a227594cb6fcc0da98fb01c1cfc8f5e26df", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d": {"doc_hash": "c3acef01e0681a2a752f2d4094b16411e996f97e98ca638a163cf18f484a5439", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a": {"doc_hash": "d867baba6ce311dfae5cfd908dfd7ef114e8b75a2131cdd9709ec827d84aee43", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043": {"doc_hash": "f2b0272e30ff2fdcb7b71221407af369eb9260905040b3d3449fa3638c8413e5", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d": {"doc_hash": "fcb1562e2101c02c85e5edf188533737cb1caac963fa78ed20ea14b476a9fa94", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a": {"doc_hash": "877b035769ab238967d59907c7f4d698a10fed4f816c81a9d66c790a4de0a640", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf": {"doc_hash": "2664cd172759870170bef4748bc22b432a72e90d2bc5d2abe3170f3424b69e26", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379": {"doc_hash": "0a6af59ea6d528ec39bffb2e057b30fbc27e700344456618e02f818d385438c2", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907": {"doc_hash": "f91922563a50bbc623f76d57ad42ae5e860ae83095b6187ee3ff3a3af41dbbb5", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68": {"doc_hash": "fa04074d40ada1974b345bd8a7a6161515fa0f0bffa476d24f87081350ed4178", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e": {"doc_hash": "a9acd6be8899ee293a94b103d1130ea4995a15f575ac18b901b2dd6d7554401d", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d": {"doc_hash": "ff4dde77710a79a7acf31d48d7705e7bbc6b9fe6407ef569c42097c42377be00", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824": {"doc_hash": "691892148beff3409fb17565e06c9bc991605c061561cfcfc1d9a96bf5b0c7f5", "ref_doc_id": "28162"}, "872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd": {"doc_hash": "764e9fea828b3d4f8f5b6559f0c5e8a51abc2867add0405fccab98e1a6ec8d34", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc": {"doc_hash": "633c33f326c37bca626ac97657d325a1d82679faabb3c28a35f5fc514701131c", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b": {"doc_hash": "3027a220ac6d170c4b16573f26474832d2b5c53ba19da0eff2f0977214d3fb96", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237": {"doc_hash": "d268b48270118411c20310c0ddcad5e3d0e55b180709afd4d578e07b37eff213", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483": {"doc_hash": "81d66eb2ebb139a70ca53aa3fb63960509daa099a13c9e0b9aebe242c3a06bb3", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d": {"doc_hash": "1140ee2148c314263f6788f643394253b1e8eec425967326286f23dbc14d1b28", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1": {"doc_hash": "cfa01b0a32ee8b80865684b0265caebed5dd535f1556765fb3ae7699b93d7e1d", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021": {"doc_hash": "8990c6f77cfdecf86737ed93c105d8b0c85e05e0cfdf1351a8384a84b22d0c5a", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5": {"doc_hash": "9aa2fc9ad264d9c95a23e1786b7f9a347b448430a52a281a578662d74c7ca8a6", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c": {"doc_hash": "0d41ab82500cafd0817729970dc429e4b704c44c33d756514943be0af69b50c7", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410": {"doc_hash": "5af41bee61ab4d9c90573ec660098083d422a6788562a34e5e93a70d4675aac5", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e": {"doc_hash": "1b15edd218a9749261127543c53d931cd8ef5312da7b087659c74924b5cdd891", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532": {"doc_hash": "d56b0b5bf80141f10e08e9ba72b64a3ae81c1f21621ae030bd2902f66037910b", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073": {"doc_hash": "74828c7149526b3291b7ea80de252e4ea8e1e1cf32b021b7de2182503340bf87", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6": {"doc_hash": "261d2e05139c95a4def6f4e0e283f07a0d023d627f3ceb7f7ad4c25f4bf1e266", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12": {"doc_hash": "95c2f5a12029b8d2d30e3c418e55685cfcd5aa15610e54d7900272545474a25f", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69": {"doc_hash": "b147ef2c384f1a3e0b994000b9afec58523a65099066f7002ff5ad8309310779", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da": {"doc_hash": "549db0a999aecb3d07cc86673b129251d8f43a64832fff391c7e70b5c5b6c52d", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508": {"doc_hash": "ad55bac66a9d8546b1c31a0ce85a7717b51d8eaf35b91665fe7bfadc47e8e54f", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de": {"doc_hash": "64eab51d1c9853a9dc36e37ce1358c6ea047f8baa3195a8f9746399bb097d4c3", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5": {"doc_hash": "42956f23cf0169bac902fa156becc17861d53abe57889d609b58fb3b8b9fc4d0", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372": {"doc_hash": "f5d613adfa95423d232e07181ef7c15219eb9a7ab72b83e3fca0223dfa77831f", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af": {"doc_hash": "8d67ec0cf978b410eeeb66400058e80e7cdcd872d8bfeb5fb65c88f90fbaac72", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3": {"doc_hash": "3ff093354af4695079aac722852b7a6c031d7055e1cc4363807558b9636d7a16", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6": {"doc_hash": "4997321dc6055e03794a918720abe6b83bf1d02dbfb72ff3f2ffe3648b62c70b", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca": {"doc_hash": "39296c6e7a2a6560cf13ce04bc68b09f14d09c43d7fefa2dd9345117507cd800", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d": {"doc_hash": "3016dc569f148a9ed8d94b1b1fe184d8550102ef67780ad150ecbbea9bad0ca3", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc": {"doc_hash": "3f15b2976faf4e207051d95653a7d4969e9ad596781e8a0776b1ad79ecfdc0fb", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f": {"doc_hash": "a518860aa3d399db656a97f77ecaae26dced223575c297339dff8ddc10460761", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7": {"doc_hash": "85b1c08254438a94678eedaa4227dd5c6354d3aeb15b5b6bf8aa3241eff52b3a", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78": {"doc_hash": "98ef099c41f66d7ee4e7a33174a33abc91661bc9847b8f85a444751416141693", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280": {"doc_hash": "e41228638797651fe28fe28a8e0805dceb9a1b1333669abfdef068559cb46f07", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0": {"doc_hash": "7246287438bd24c50926bad1ee8727dd41d56a8d856ac0023d3dfbc1a7f91743", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7": {"doc_hash": "4856f53e3493ea0533e682831e70b2ea6b14da0837e644452aa806f6db7bfd28", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa": {"doc_hash": "5a160119276d81496d88e67f1b4045aa6e8cbafb2689b870e343367846a88eed", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6": {"doc_hash": "f956f98f76ddbd3554a86239c81f8d460a917cd9a3b3da57cda263c93a9ad9f2", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891": {"doc_hash": "50fbd08db8c23acb30475c13be1049ce7eaf5c1c133d8a13a125e9824c3768af", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf": {"doc_hash": "6e22cba50672d8ffe1ccec9e1bae1ab9152e992f48ec8d7608e78ef29eb36833", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f": {"doc_hash": "cead7cd8227bed85d7c1e84db921f6ed9970843fd64cc43dfd67d386597fa7e2", "ref_doc_id": "42"}, "465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d": {"doc_hash": "05fbcda8f28161cdb47adcff740d30fed44b46b94805e6a871c0ba6e6490c748", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660": {"doc_hash": "8e9c8e3ca30b63f695b0bea6eeb18070402b9e1b793c38019b40b9969b140aa5", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c": {"doc_hash": "e7f3e45a86e3441f6065e94ae5683c51bce5b922ba9d2fc2877fca460ea64c86", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374": {"doc_hash": "d32c70dc11f59f461222f3a5ca7253821995c2583b77b467fc29649b05aba9af", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31": {"doc_hash": "2462728b6c88722a9383f95d8934d2bdb3d2d6d60e48fa70287984a879194c85", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3": {"doc_hash": "a0f01b9eb4c21dcfa350d15f3d9635311cc1666cf56847eac39c7fb2944f5394", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05": {"doc_hash": "b4a46bf2488c56f5998b031bc1dac3c491f7a121e8fbc41b085c5504fa285d1d", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632": {"doc_hash": "c02b43dd2cd32f205a1dc53c37ebe8ed48adcc5e11ec693ed05ed053b0814685", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34": {"doc_hash": "bce9562c60bb3152c74618b442c75d78b7a1d3f7d783c9fc472af84f17f5210b", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8": {"doc_hash": "212927a236eeabcc121b3fd5591fc05efe0bb133a4e288e16fcea7dd5cc65cd7", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3": {"doc_hash": "0606facd0cb22665415bc3333340d7746363121104a142996602475d8dcc2bf0", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed": {"doc_hash": "ba56bec5295777c9d4b4f9b4e21c427a683dbeb499c277d1e1069d0cd11247c4", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896": {"doc_hash": "17e0d16aadc127175ab83f02f34ac74bc01762115d306f3388a02c6fbc7d6f83", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f": {"doc_hash": "384f3b8ea61ddfd836ae0ecde6bdef2264ed100927640a6e1a850c13163c3cdf", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb": {"doc_hash": "5de10e1f5512af1296ab6a68eedd93e1b87f81d436ff55ce2947e38dd72c9751", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04": {"doc_hash": "2004c82af8dea5bef5f6742090b7fd7d478b048114661fd8d0bd761aaebd683a", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed": {"doc_hash": "e9a0642d5298c4e4c028c24135a1a579d4688bc80a74d192695e73d46d9343e1", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc": {"doc_hash": "73d34fb01b44aa0196b456777a7a99c3a293fdafa53405e222ab80544bfeb867", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f": {"doc_hash": "ee141f584d220990da01e97d8d38eda42ab8fff35746f82e34b81d17d896ab9a", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952": {"doc_hash": "56652379b212934cfbe0aa1462d36c54f33c5a6bde7594d9c385ea608b80c4ed", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99": {"doc_hash": "a79a749e87512350a6760dc05227cb7ecacef9957e8f689f1869a2cee9deffbd", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4": {"doc_hash": "63d827e6e49abe86e8841603bfbd3df0253bb5b23cffde5a624baffc3326714b", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530": {"doc_hash": "ad93c65d1fe318b415e2eda4386c9c54b98217fa10f5b2afadab3da2c2e48717", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366": {"doc_hash": "689e84442e9145771f55549f1446c7812d80edddca85408c508872ae8f50e29c", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473": {"doc_hash": "0758e71fea22a589cd6f64378fcbe470cbd7ecff43c47cf0b818bd0580ee414c", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea": {"doc_hash": "6ee5a992993ec5c78c2a9eab3ea3c7c49180f7971dfab545ed9e23fc7d59bf50", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c": {"doc_hash": "4ce14689a54da48cd7c02d6175cbbef9b1a3461ee9529686145097c191cdb675", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e": {"doc_hash": "fa8d3aca09d9dbbee9c50082186e3ef13a36ed2d70b8f2ce050187eac221cd93", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508": {"doc_hash": "16bf1334a5d19a420df29f8041913685a7fd2f6ed7e58ba5add680da3becf981", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba": {"doc_hash": "c3d0a3ae86a2f2b2a5232cdca36821ff728705a543465fdfc53d486ebedf5866", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152": {"doc_hash": "1a0089c7a6f47b04a1adfaf355f59e280c9315d4b668980a5d071241a690f2da", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b": {"doc_hash": "ec3a243aafd1df33b0d88ba41cb01fb8ecce641bc5c448b757325689cb250190", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef": {"doc_hash": "864d59dfe6cf39d9ec81304dcea89de8c3b91ca441b4bb811ce1c9d2dfc3833e", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea": {"doc_hash": "9500e70845868616904ecfac0840e6c819270ec181131ff46a133640a6abb523", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4": {"doc_hash": "6b808ef44396cfea1d8b63a14807d43c7f6adcf4a87428b49056d33a35707bd9", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69": {"doc_hash": "33b536a62888ff7739cea0bf171e74b5b2e404703b8583d93e441dbf7fb7f274", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc": {"doc_hash": "7b3ec276408d0e52cfc4a92f27c93a30cdcfe5e43644ec05341cb77b9cbec2af", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23": {"doc_hash": "296b8a6318afe7524bee82cefb4616eb91da63185bec4e49d1881182dd8d703a", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0": {"doc_hash": "92b767b9035d49d3eb6cd2fce3aa2990b8f01d26998c9ee315f97e4c76d01f28", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503": {"doc_hash": "1d2f22b65c9840316f12656a6269cc0b44f9893716870371ab2ccbf5682244be", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c": {"doc_hash": "422d0863f6c0c3b223a82fd07fc9235faeb63a6ddbdc133d87d8791035a5b2da", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461": {"doc_hash": "cd2bdf5a3489b2e3063a322f48733f822a598367843cfab71c467398f545ee8c", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584": {"doc_hash": "c408fd62ea6aaa31152161fa0d25d2c3d0b10abb345d270171cc33cb49d72bf6", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25": {"doc_hash": "203f1fa07fbc1381f6c9761d92ec33e00287fa5c83d36860d3c30b312a805222", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc": {"doc_hash": "f57d2680b77752bd5c02adbcb383d975da1438855dbad634cead411c9c55c30e", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5": {"doc_hash": "cd58ecdb11a6f0469ad4a934ae4612f88ae40314e24627574bebbebeca5977d7", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e": {"doc_hash": "6f30da297d56bbd9da8a3bebc8e730b9888b77ce96e06d37b846055e9ad3d0bf", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479": {"doc_hash": "159fd4b97cf05c84126f2e1799c7344bd434db69bd3add5ee27ba1da640e4d76", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61": {"doc_hash": "53577bb2d05cf929e022fb810b36abf96f7042feee2a6a440badb50577609bc6", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb": {"doc_hash": "c0f20ad2db86c409a6f92732ced119e984a7b9280663f8f0a9f453be7ee19117", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff": {"doc_hash": "a9be6c977763952b301c19bbb4e87ad08a0b5decd103ef9d6a5e925aef011b2b", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da": {"doc_hash": "0b129e1a4ecc5a46b86ce5a6d4e21a6291a807240008b6e34715b858a4dc3fdc", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5": {"doc_hash": "005d3a1097800ce511bda844a33bfa38d0ceecc56edf998ce2b977a3a60a51b7", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22": {"doc_hash": "74a09315aa79a93f406be3c53a97835a4386eb9078425d9fa216ea9a6081de2a", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0": {"doc_hash": "f48cf9d8212db67401154487f3eeb81b94f75d17132729d00305d405e899731d", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb": {"doc_hash": "6ec081dd85dedd66d2c8f928b1fc1d0c45d3df84d3e153f55da5eb39df08dd28", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee": {"doc_hash": "ba4cb3fc6f4a3eeb9ccab60eee01f71a4e2080d44ad434d87004788450ad16f7", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e": {"doc_hash": "66319f477c00a06014a0db9ad4a0342a5be9a502b10e968b2184a0bf05a68922", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1": {"doc_hash": "f88dc9b86f66944c06fda0b5fa16edb4968c60006f24d45905c7dc8354b8caf6", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d": {"doc_hash": "796fcb6c8fdd8bc2aad2a350524ee0053b5f4cdf3e1c3a32e05f7bf079163cff", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568": {"doc_hash": "54b53eae7329302263e357c796ddf891d96c4019ab0763f7792bcf39ad274dd8", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4": {"doc_hash": "61bbf1f1c29cf56e52ba3b9d1d74f48cb5b39d8cee5c49013211ebc5a9186034", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e": {"doc_hash": "0327ed294e8635fbf9ac7e633af09f82cad5c9c092bd1a862eb5ba3da7fd57a1", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670": {"doc_hash": "65ff624e70666f1f5a2c504551181701a8baf782c0ee17cb6b99728174111f45", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79": {"doc_hash": "5d195939dcff6d69374040ba02159b3b180342d674c7cda1d4648edc8ef62aca", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8": {"doc_hash": "a332340608ce4f836a5d4fbee1133f377b471109e8db3a75777a2610b36d6d33", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d": {"doc_hash": "352489215b973c4a73e9512ab7113d5d2dddd91e9939d38a94a1378e7ff09fe1", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d": {"doc_hash": "3380fb7dcb1f90ca6de87018fc30770d69309e080c3de6c639753fcf9c7d27aa", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1": {"doc_hash": "f2ca9442186cf6575c8c9c4c1ecf2b8eaabf91523b1a3832005fde0dc7b7e3ca", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4": {"doc_hash": "2b61e5a6569d9f92fac208b362b06e9e4cbeb41b7b9f223fa1192b09514b2d59", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5": {"doc_hash": "abe40eea4863bc96c979b52fd7d95f0b8753dcbf5da446c7eb93fc5a4f1131b5", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6": {"doc_hash": "b80429b8185b3cfa745231386f119549b037368064ced7b8643bfe29bacc88c8", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a": {"doc_hash": "bf1086945b1ba91b5ace70dcda9588396d49e4464e6187e29cc5577dacb2716e", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f": {"doc_hash": "efe3b258bfb9dcf4e612f77f05be53e4d65cc24411490d3388ad17544b6859d2", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded": {"doc_hash": "93f72415243a0383086cb8bf54a0aec7a0bab57ea44f5ddbf4db4088229231cd", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba": {"doc_hash": "214559ddb1bda52cfaedff10ea059f9e5b1812cc779b7a23ce168d41669e5686", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864": {"doc_hash": "4fc2b22b8bd0041c1e4948e22d60093774862e5f8ebbed28c98d26ae290d7cfc", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683": {"doc_hash": "d389cc90751698478774a2d8fcc7dad0372b858e9e5eefac31a9668b22cac633", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46": {"doc_hash": "b5277a4296442c4957abfc54fc86ac54c81b98d49d320d0ef7a106c1341b0f73", "ref_doc_id": "50561"}, "266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2": {"doc_hash": "68a377bd19f8d212d9677ee9d7eebec33700c1731cbb648f8892321dfc3e5beb", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419": {"doc_hash": "68069a5e0fb44b87d203c364b84e402c35c961d61a0c055d3593f72072ddff41", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715": {"doc_hash": "5f12743750b741ac2c7f510f966ee00e8a1b5e5b1ffe45ade16192d25e33f8f4", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e": {"doc_hash": "26f86a86a12699c6514758fbc3ce943300c2597e2052ebdb7f52830b7dbaa8b6", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860": {"doc_hash": "f34208800a7edb7d9bf2b600a4ec6db83694f9c889bdd11a89d307e28de3d178", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9": {"doc_hash": "9ec88ae8688a57e0e202300516f3a8f84d8b96cf43f5bd0bcf1ecd6c8ce75518", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e": {"doc_hash": "35e187911e185b7ca30cb13adaed2e752cc30448e590a2544e77c6681ef6edee", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba": {"doc_hash": "72f857f637103b105aff580e7f6e9a70e19e0054ed80aba53b163aa7466ed96b", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72": {"doc_hash": "d984de9d7699beede614043a792ea852f5622503f59cdae5cdaf03db92a67592", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21": {"doc_hash": "f53f99a69a8edf66b1bab086663c92239cc867cce884748baa6710a7706f92fb", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48": {"doc_hash": "b61b772018e7821bdf3bc5b4ec02e8c7f1b25352ceb2c0d84484a9151d8695fa", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187": {"doc_hash": "bf89826217c627265a9625f8ef73607b9b18666bab8c5506a1abbbc18ed04512", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd": {"doc_hash": "b876949cee3b7ced4f3b497adb29fd9de80aaaff5e9c8db78f98a3eeab59c8e5", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4": {"doc_hash": "2889477521f251ed6ea8c559e14c6d74ab1ea453323ca0dcb6638d719cf8dd1f", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de": {"doc_hash": "8c9e7dcd8d8ea8bf9ac680a1db7783431e162029d9d22b4ee903f94bcfe3b5f6", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611": {"doc_hash": "a6f29955b38d64d4e3471f6ad318fe3561ce1f02f2eecadd016d65b524bfb4c9", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54": {"doc_hash": "30143c84392b97209843a71e7bf0b097dd81514d3410717002f60b596eb0667e", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81": {"doc_hash": "1ba1be668bb2b61979df8bf27e973cb54d63444f4918386958e083328d8a72fb", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc": {"doc_hash": "b450cbefdc56aa8e7351fd60deda43d3c6402ce29221040773464a19b55489af", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52": {"doc_hash": "c31c7c1ee134be95a2b16710cca4b1030bb37733db77b733fa85f6f2098d6a5b", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36": {"doc_hash": "782ec7c32769c02ad75bd730063888365c4fd1054ed8fce93c11348d29c6796c", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d": {"doc_hash": "77683e8db5146b273b24e4e0d2af3e7ae445cd9fc63d96b62d6c0a3aa1ca7a41", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706": {"doc_hash": "8f0d4fa57842a2cbe9379f0e31610d80b975d87632c8ba404742a2e0760cb199", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7": {"doc_hash": "b13fb2c9d422af5df4f0690f15c537cca87ab790195ef8d312b0d76f168fd0fc", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084": {"doc_hash": "b737b096ded37d2699d0f0b9f98f13fb5c0ed83c2f0f5a9db2f84314c688714e", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87": {"doc_hash": "91f04f67dc69055f9ebd89a907d1e1ec918f982ed74509f1f7a79c2a1eba10c3", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f": {"doc_hash": "76430374cf03aae26b6bc93a591d8fc6b2832be12758020daaf6075b9d02e510", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8": {"doc_hash": "eb6475b161aaf6f100ff855680978c49dc8079bddc2ec15e1fe3c6b1a7e20a6e", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825": {"doc_hash": "bca228ef6af66315a5a7ec71af4369609ba76f12a66b45ef9c4029dc11f5c334", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6": {"doc_hash": "e4a4d07eb51c06c404113646759dfb9016c0bfb855b3d1d2f79520378c40b800", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}, "689324f8-05b5-45d4-9e82-1b344b0107ea": {"doc_hash": "f60c5d1ee44b397d00155a28099afcee26e9a74f246fba922b9f05b3a6d8ff9f", "ref_doc_id": "51842"}}, "docstore/ref_doc_info": {"19451": {"node_ids": ["2124c308-64aa-4790-abd1-3fa58ea34223", "527daa46-98c3-4748-803f-56d458b51aea", "f3f57b2e-e7d8-4735-ac58-a5e0948c34d4", "54a960c1-d9bd-41d1-8e80-19d52da1d4f3", "a7f130f4-2180-4766-95e9-4b48b7b15d91", "78476278-0b98-402b-b505-87ddeb59ed50", "27f96edc-77c6-4a50-9c4b-669461d7acbe", "362a6421-1b2b-4bc0-8d22-785a7b6e250e", "1a147311-9b80-401a-a82b-4c96af37cbfa", "1f6c70e0-7662-4f7b-9196-87bf7acca621", "548d531f-2ba5-466d-806b-03de35a387c1", "c7550abe-7b59-4bc7-8277-438099155bb9", "106ddbe9-9b87-427e-8715-0528620cff4f", "fbe13840-3892-4b20-9234-696820eadee1", "4168392a-fb0a-4878-9e49-4e9d9a5b053e", "a9000c34-f5e1-46a5-9902-c0e86e24df90", "3bcae748-7684-4cd8-b10a-e3495ddd2170", "0eec60e5-a6cb-4fc3-944c-0edd0d1e3a0e", "4afb2ca2-839d-4940-8912-a07b54721d0d", "f93f71a6-3085-427d-b276-54eb84509181", "fe4fcf09-f08f-4366-9c99-b5a134d99312", "11c8c5d1-0536-4556-b224-4ec9483598ce", "e5af815c-1660-4ace-a743-fb44ab55058a", "a5d5c8b9-8683-4ed7-a033-1722c2185d95", "cb577614-6a91-44d3-b7fb-7c14981cef29", "fdae73f9-0859-4860-bc47-e0f6a06a34bb", "06fd0c18-d4dd-4d4d-991a-702a7ddab3a9", "175a4daf-9f43-4d77-8617-11533c972f4c", "396ed82c-76ff-4d44-b536-80733aa7f232", "6f332b49-50a4-4e24-88b9-d69f5ddde38d", "11bd67fa-7828-499d-9e04-e3b178406cef", "e8285976-295c-403f-a990-0557a88844ff", "16debc96-3250-4064-adf5-58eecadc3d90", "550a84b7-cb05-4951-b912-2ce3513dfa3f", "e72c0f90-1ae7-45d4-86a8-cd8f9e7cc971", "89d3b68e-f1d1-4385-9f96-1a15d3ec128a", "345a087b-3932-493b-9f0f-b1bd2cf917c7", "2b0460c3-5398-485b-ba09-eb21cbcaeb53", "1a2165b4-5baf-4ea7-80b6-930c804683db", "2ebf87cc-625a-4ad4-bc0c-f365e85638de", "eaebef04-5191-470f-b18b-6f88c11863f7", "770463d9-9fd7-4704-bf33-5987ef765029", "9f56fc50-10ad-476d-a466-58e9d5d57930", "7b92a1c0-bd7b-4faa-8d87-e48f2646c7fa", "d848a580-bee5-4bdb-89cb-235add0c0679", "f20df8c4-bacc-40c0-b06b-5995c50e7a13", "a9b27bf3-75e7-4cd6-b19f-3a07af02f383", "5e6fdfe7-c51a-4dac-9d2d-ec9b53f54df3", "d081b9a2-1afa-45cf-9cea-2fb52397398b", "8a01bb55-6cad-46d0-a753-319ce68fe966", "c5c0ae12-f798-4d1a-b12a-3b278966a6aa", "55b514af-e84e-404d-9389-6afd4dcb1e7f", "80dbb883-e6b1-4916-9287-9568701bc98d", "d912839b-3c5f-4a75-9845-3c934ebd260d", "1ec3e0f4-e9c0-456f-b555-cc5def400912", "a4e29ebe-1993-46d8-babb-69fba2e781b8", "f815602f-4435-4981-9320-583f2a2a0048", "a1a38f72-f786-416a-92f5-781890674529", "31a8a96f-5fd2-4b1b-a969-e39e02955cce", "a0ae2dde-0a05-474b-91f8-8ffdb27020e0", "ee0b7391-d6b0-4fb0-85ac-35f0bccad899", "1b33cc4f-a8cb-4cf8-8973-0a92d44260fe", "e8f5df7a-bb0e-4391-8494-27defc472a0f", "b898960f-df56-48ee-8491-8c2c374c2f7f", "b7c44c44-d93a-42e1-b9a2-026eabe90a2a", "bc828408-e5f4-4109-96c9-0c0e1c090222", "25559d99-0d3d-46d3-999e-31dc455661fe", "4585e675-99e3-47ce-9233-5b600891c359", "f057f16c-8f93-425c-bd84-f58376078614", "3567290b-30e1-4961-8135-af7bb040c778", "38effbf3-9671-4261-a108-5bc9fa82f5f0", "86908037-a632-4f3e-abde-f195fa6e6a53", "645f8852-9ad7-45a6-8fe1-91acad9bc71e", "e7e27619-4c81-4863-9c19-c9b26952857c", "0092fa1b-13fd-4290-971d-b82f2613e4bd", "e0597597-609e-4eaa-8d9d-7bb4a9f78e7e", "0b9162a6-cf5b-4143-b802-0de2113494e9", "9b0d556e-d4a9-49d9-a70c-070f61667bcf", "8a543218-f5e3-40bf-94f0-6d125faa717d", "e094fb31-04dd-47bb-9688-a3100ad0c315", "318c9ac6-a697-4833-91d1-d358dd667371", "ff0711cf-572f-43a7-881c-7c39aaaa4d2e", "21735361-6276-4426-8e6e-93d2d98117ca", "388f5481-2acd-4b10-a82f-22978fd8f62b", "28e3f78e-5989-4664-af82-b4336e7f7402", "5998a67c-f4f6-44c1-a047-e53877d1a584", "13017bb1-8ace-4a29-b863-8e7177cc2874", "e09bbd1f-59df-4242-88a5-fe3c478463cd", "122b88b5-f819-4422-8ee9-b58a0d43b273", "6098cd7d-6695-4fc9-b4e8-7632dc1efee6", "4e5a5dbb-2282-4c03-a054-b35a4a6fba55", "ef98e137-57af-43cf-b2b3-14bc5a13c03c", "cf98fa31-2d90-4018-9ca8-add7129b6e45", "f270b717-e8f0-4b9c-b9f5-e7b3de4f3951", "1bd5bc3d-cda2-40db-9f62-b66c0bce7889", "12dd3cc3-f5ad-44e0-bd1e-e6c8f9bc4702", "eb8f9012-1d1e-42a1-b556-8de5e7041eb5", "822e80c7-4c9d-43d7-813d-db2df51e07cd", "2727e91d-9d47-45f2-a34c-a2da896e5f28", "d06ecb52-5515-45f3-97a7-a0f1095911aa"], "metadata": {"identifier": "19451", "author": "Quick, Herbert", "title": "Double Trouble; Or, Every Hero His Own Villain", "date": null, "file": "19451.txt"}}, "28162": {"node_ids": ["f8685614-5272-4bbd-95fc-c38f5ba91a94", "2f047476-1309-486c-9483-5c2dff45fd81", "d4b53285-e25a-474a-8905-0d703934d916", "fd60b7af-3cd3-4f02-9c1b-a82440cbc155", "00511af3-8c02-48d2-8422-1169db020fcb", "3c7a3b27-d45f-4db3-8652-9c8f4ffc7201", "9bb7f64b-e1e2-4c45-adf5-feb89f9887d3", "db6eccba-66bf-4691-b036-da78bbf8442d", "30e039a0-a9d6-41b7-8f73-98fba94cc8bb", "86974038-7c1e-4ee2-b655-eb4d302fc0cf", "7e9955ad-96c9-47ea-804c-eb00e8163c37", "1aabb512-d173-49e9-b51e-0a4fe6bd5f18", "2697a511-4fdc-4a08-818e-7e6ea8278c45", "f5385fbf-ba9e-46f0-a9ea-0d1d11f3c414", "635bcb3a-046d-4633-b023-3c84c3cfd923", "95227134-42ab-4207-883a-2a99dee86cca", "d5dc94fa-bcf8-45ca-932c-14ca8782271c", "6832c8d4-19ce-466d-904b-8d62ea8d6334", "acbcd88c-e777-4348-bb8b-823f31511988", "92b945b3-6128-4a66-a81a-69e2448cc04e", "3644713c-ecda-4464-a3a6-ad540301d19b", "e780b17b-e3a5-4455-9269-8fcdcb95a1bd", "bea9d8e6-b0a7-4c9d-936e-9c7c200e6b1b", "0e061e9b-1d64-44f8-bff0-60553190be8e", "020b33c5-9aee-472f-901b-ae7fb13775a0", "44176cc9-7952-49d1-8641-7a4a4e009699", "1be3842b-4093-4c7f-846e-722c7ce31bd7", "19fe7133-7a6d-4159-838d-0a46420b59c8", "c7e528da-9e94-4441-ae49-84f19133d312", "2d542a3a-12fb-4743-ba23-e6e98a21602a", "28ff5905-4ebe-4ec9-99ef-56fa9ae34c61", "f3ee961d-eec3-421e-8e91-9f669057ce58", "7876afcd-e7c9-48b0-aea7-8ef97061cc0e", "c094f074-818d-4fdc-a4e6-5ab11a9c4dd8", "d10cfdeb-5ca3-4835-8d1c-cbfbdeaa24e6", "565b8919-74aa-46af-aa45-3d2313992cbd", "492555e4-ee48-4821-8520-7b4854c37dcd", "68790223-ff7e-40c7-8533-bea3eff63ff7", "2316e8f9-87f4-4eab-8403-1b5407c2bcd8", "bae43fc0-64c9-4711-8cc2-57b50bef0536", "2d9dedfd-0e45-47df-8bd3-e7311bcc5965", "0a717bd5-ba7c-424e-b4d0-df4958f5b7d6", "8e97c144-77c1-4253-befb-e323e8c8f79e", "119ebb82-a86e-4264-96b7-22735481efe5", "e5df27b7-94cd-46a0-88b6-24400b8afb29", "cb492838-8e95-4645-ae23-781722fb1814", "b001e664-009d-4c15-8aca-61b7bbe1fe3f", "5d525811-15bd-4b19-a79d-e24ea4657cee", "8c7be334-3266-40e4-b784-4282764da279", "12449585-ece5-4d3c-a49e-6c40ef2bd607", "045da58c-ade5-42b9-9bbf-59611076fb4e", "cef978f2-ba9c-4f59-acdf-335190cc77b7", "b82df7d9-486d-48e5-8d7f-63cf5c9d5f20", "a9f82fc1-69d7-49e0-86ec-4eb607b5627c", "4a3f2484-0066-4e25-ae64-42078480b439", "d1c94598-29bf-4d29-858d-a4fdf66cb3f5", "24c5fbc9-1903-4392-a7cb-5228967a5cc8", "07f1a770-f161-4319-bc6e-3ef9422f4dc3", "1cee25c0-3efd-4342-a792-74db311db309", "08c77a5a-1dfa-4f59-85b9-c8b5868c13c9", "44379f62-8fd2-4186-bee4-1f96836dbade", "7057a505-6fba-47b4-b35e-86ce7c79461d", "e6b660e6-5f5b-4253-b0a1-524d37e454c2", "ddcf8115-8e7f-487e-82b9-a9caf50dc1c2", "97081beb-4a90-4ec5-bcf7-9146a6583935", "53d08e34-8244-4d23-a29e-f8b76b3c987b", "0a1ac6d8-ae7f-4455-b46e-5785a3fb1db2", "a5c30d27-008e-44b9-ab05-ae4b6ffd1337", "e708034f-7ec5-4509-b938-47c892a78d75", "c1b3a505-7aba-4b20-b459-265a886ba56a", "d5afd967-74d7-4dc6-b798-62987f5ddc03", "69c23cef-3548-4c31-bb81-cbae4ef70071", "57a9f082-d002-4aed-8297-a95e4cacd1a4", "3c76870c-3f08-466c-8de4-593910e9cb0f", "a48adb78-94b0-4343-b320-a369fa39ac81", "af5ae5d8-832d-40cf-8ac4-74eeb9172807", "27868afd-be3d-46bf-a994-060234e2017f", "e3dd435c-b651-4aee-9bce-e39ea23a7baa", "92aab40b-e0e6-4ef5-9783-8b9da299769a", "4c1685a2-2b8e-4dd0-9571-81838858dd65", "2ec8ff49-06d7-4c10-b71c-582b345fd757", "d93e392d-dd12-4191-9982-a72e305eca40", "eb940564-daaa-40f0-9be5-55b0bd9fa410", "51460e2e-e8e6-4472-bd53-141fda7a7a59", "1ece308e-cb61-446e-8e9f-e2212a8fbd87", "eb9c421f-6b84-48ed-b91a-2646b0b0ed5b", "8d80e6ed-d17a-4911-937b-73ec3fa110b7", "e2b9748b-40ac-4f8f-87f7-4ca0f9c407d6", "65124507-8c93-452e-ae6d-f0b867d62f8f", "533050fe-3915-4f17-b394-1816ea02747b", "bcc24b7d-c9da-4c1a-b18a-8ebd66dc0c6f", "3c3293b0-3650-45b3-a969-d7ea333b8468", "27d4e5d5-4e3e-4e1b-ba48-3219fe43aae1", "94059b2b-b5f8-410c-8f85-d5649b1588cf", "68038fb5-7602-4449-8d91-b41b3f505b3b", "7a156e09-bcc8-4069-b0d5-05264fbafe4a", "12675973-a050-448f-ae15-b9fd347dbb52", "0df2354d-6cfc-499b-ab2b-3a21341be712", "558591a2-4ddd-4c05-a8af-3a5a40f84e40", "130eca55-fac7-4e5c-90ad-cd0a1cd37649", "17c8549f-ee8a-451a-b275-0803d0d16726", "e3ca3ae3-9a27-4c93-aea6-f9234c1e956d", "05658139-18cf-4a7b-812b-b2fff65d750a", "4533f22b-f3f3-4022-b039-1930a7ff5043", "13ccc8fe-ffba-4bc7-99a1-19057841502d", "551ab143-d17a-4111-9129-969fb1a1de2a", "add005e8-14fc-44d5-9439-63e530ce3ebf", "a6ee0f69-9943-476d-8b42-a8e603430379", "47d29448-d1bb-4271-b6f2-e07de67b8907", "b4684874-ccee-487b-b740-31d835d21c68", "744b5e74-163f-4dad-af19-be4c333ae68e", "12949669-fd49-4517-b40e-6f1ecbd9e39d", "e22b2e78-a44f-41ce-a950-65ed2395e824"], "metadata": {"identifier": "28162", "author": "Woods, Margaret L. (Margaret Louisa)", "title": "The Invader: A Novel", "date": null, "file": "28162.txt"}}, "42": {"node_ids": ["872dd777-e664-436b-9ab0-84175ec7bdfd", "8db1dd6c-de3e-4151-ab62-a98e6335b0dc", "6ec2f845-ffe8-4233-a777-f432908ade2b", "92530f53-3c5f-469c-bc2a-839069e30237", "ad9b3888-2ef9-4fa0-93f7-cd5a03324483", "4e7925ff-6d5a-4ee5-a5fd-a512e1d9bb8d", "f95a2b6f-d9d1-4060-9584-27514258a7d1", "559b822c-0560-4774-af0a-a19a2c8ee021", "4694a477-b1d5-4697-a4ec-8fd92479a2a5", "c84b7697-bcb6-4caa-8c33-bdfe0780422c", "c2d5cd45-a19c-4d78-8ff8-66cd90446410", "89b7d6a8-fa5b-4ccd-a85e-6f2bca52664e", "2c37a180-0219-4a17-b0e0-b16a5c090532", "1cf90f22-4163-459c-8eb4-77a6162fd073", "5835c0a6-136e-442d-9938-3eb80f25a7c6", "90145ffa-6bde-4d8e-8c90-84532f5a5e12", "63e1b88b-8f9b-4030-a38a-76c20e5f4a69", "056bfd45-750b-43f6-bb39-81d84ac275da", "4558c6b5-e9cf-4bd0-8fd7-87f157948508", "3539e97d-04e6-4878-811d-35e9539197de", "e8954564-485c-4f61-bfd6-f90cf0d608a5", "102f2bff-f273-4112-98b5-81a9f232c372", "f0474bb4-fdd9-4fe2-8f73-2f39055570af", "4307eab7-2ae4-4532-835d-886678818fd3", "c428fa44-3678-463b-80be-a1f462477aa6", "70599310-5a76-41f0-9f50-48e9ac16b9ca", "731b5399-193b-4283-937d-3cf905778d8d", "dfd4607a-6ee3-42d2-8cf7-a2d68cfc5ccc", "0fe0d41b-8464-4804-beb3-d0ba4e454b5f", "99cf5a5d-bf66-4472-affa-218feff85ee7", "fb9fc8ae-d38d-4813-a4e3-c9b587d49c78", "996dd912-3c58-4b6d-bc99-a728479cd280", "404abd92-e223-4efa-b8ac-90e84cf279a0", "3e50bf11-74a2-4a50-94fa-78840f51bba7", "cdca2de5-b9bb-4416-9157-ab7b2866d3fa", "3fba67ac-d50d-48b9-8db7-bf93f4b0b6d6", "05dce054-f7cb-4ab5-acf5-e876fe82a891", "0d204d35-ef69-4e7a-b3e9-ab9471a398bf", "803ab8d3-545a-45cf-bb22-b9f8edf60b4f"], "metadata": {"identifier": "42", "author": "Stevenson, Robert Louis", "title": "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde", "date": null, "file": "42.txt"}}, "50561": {"node_ids": ["465bc894-206a-4bc6-b706-4d0b9eb0184d", "8911eef4-f75c-464a-9f90-3ac76f0c8660", "241d481a-eb01-4b50-9ed3-2edc94b8e46c", "fac38166-6f3e-4452-9600-f3487a18e374", "afca22e7-96fc-4cd4-82ce-4cc47a90da31", "58832eba-bf0b-429a-847c-5b88453472d3", "06a8f04e-a6c9-41a5-b140-7ddd9a653e05", "25c9574a-df9b-4441-8467-64dc9f974632", "a9cf546c-0f50-4905-9fe2-065b82fa1c34", "f513fcbd-e484-4818-9169-e0c335a3deb8", "cb0f3209-83ea-4ebb-9430-23a5955f8bf3", "510e118e-afc4-4803-95f0-dfe4631fc3ed", "cbe7c788-fb42-42bb-be35-21daa326f896", "f930b549-aa74-4814-b161-02f98bbf544f", "685e191e-22d2-4c41-bb6f-016d986001fb", "15deacb3-7d78-4b60-adfc-6ad32ecb6a04", "69b05012-b6c3-4c30-a294-517eac5c0bed", "7d36a0ae-8567-4d2e-b5ea-a4dde2cf84bc", "920f44e6-e67a-470f-a6a8-d5fa9ab3573f", "6ac2aecd-c53f-41af-bc2d-b17869c86952", "323283e7-3f21-46fb-a56c-1764e814ac99", "4ba14f4b-b1d7-48b5-ab0e-5c64653634e4", "967b2785-d526-4d30-8a97-ddbae0ff4530", "8c164d84-d7ad-410d-bc73-8819401e7366", "1557e684-2559-4a0b-a50b-4767e73a0473", "514d3931-81d8-476a-890f-bae13205cfea", "a183912d-4211-4db3-951e-354a37bc0c7c", "ef2bfdcb-d2bd-4ceb-af1c-b0ffd9cbe33e", "dba9f749-e4af-49d0-8e15-d4250052c508", "336a4962-7767-482d-b993-97c3995670ba", "4d56f624-f737-4786-9a2c-e8278a02d152", "86ba6fe4-86a4-46a2-94c8-ce51f079086b", "ae58e89a-c51a-482c-b527-21d4213dd6ef", "12975da1-f498-48ee-8fa0-d8e5d5af28ea", "ef297dd0-0252-40d7-b1ce-ed79cad202e4", "718866f4-ff52-4bad-afa3-389efd76bc69", "d209b227-0578-44e6-a1f4-7c54d0b339fc", "3256c500-6104-4efa-8251-f007b2941b23", "f8cb4d37-5cc4-40f2-ab7f-6b28d39d8eb0", "dce6d030-668c-4b8f-a520-5c82c9255503", "5e027de0-07f5-4dd7-8966-391a026d6d0c", "c1458ef9-b778-4288-bd9c-358cb6fb6461", "b13ea9f2-fb4f-43ce-88d7-32dafa6cf584", "12cd55f9-b2b2-46a2-b6b9-611ae5893a25", "f836fc32-68ee-4b4c-91de-575bf16250bc", "ff6b6f2a-534d-4f54-a61a-de98d54850e5", "49ae705c-17c1-4f46-ae21-c775d703624e", "3eb5628b-a828-4723-a504-345c6b551479", "6fb07463-9e7b-4f44-8d3e-cb849ac59d61", "5a2c3888-6893-4c1e-b563-62e997068dfb", "9ef46892-e3cf-4124-bb2f-8b9c1c8f2dff", "5dc8c67c-741c-4abe-a2e6-76213faf99da", "7d1bfbac-aa76-4521-aca9-852ebd3265a5", "adb3b344-abe1-4258-8b14-c7531e3c4b22", "257fe6f8-8a89-48a8-9a65-5fb542fbedd0", "8bcb5799-59c7-4969-9241-be28ad2d22eb", "12e76ac7-2992-469e-9125-776eccf612ee", "dc163f6c-2bb6-4f0b-bb45-c1a3b0dd7c4e", "e30dfa2c-9f5c-47c4-963c-5d6eb702afd1", "cad5b7b2-f66c-4c0b-850e-a4f502245a2d", "1f332689-2d72-4186-b40a-d78ba32ff568", "5d6bfa42-ada1-4dcc-97c8-c08e4d9845a4", "74d8da45-b9e9-4be7-bccf-576661005c6e", "c3660f59-4f1b-495c-938a-7322c593b670", "262106e1-dfcd-4dfc-9d2e-3f0512823f79", "43126043-e788-4cb5-b08d-2cb472780fc8", "28c5c8aa-c9f8-48e0-aee9-c3e22a94c58d", "4c4414f8-d132-4fc1-b83d-77e6ffe54a1d", "f068f49f-8b7f-4a92-b987-6103d06b08b1", "2975ed07-251e-427d-9bc5-3ed605970bf4", "9653f607-72d5-4ab5-887c-7414c3fa47e5", "c8cb8e8a-2c96-4709-9942-c0edd1f729c6", "dc2d4fab-d354-468a-93df-581337b2b33a", "ec8050ef-6eb0-4a75-993b-aeda3e47f95f", "040688c7-b467-45e6-a9e3-d485eea97ded", "37c00d69-e226-4c6e-beab-601405ce85ba", "25ca6ed5-be50-41aa-b717-b2f2018b7864", "5f3214c4-d489-4989-811b-69a966e10683", "e56aa92a-b86d-447c-941e-794419163a46"], "metadata": {"identifier": "50561", "author": "Weinbaum, Stanley G. (Stanley Grauman)", "title": "The Dark Other", "date": null, "file": "50561.txt"}}, "51842": {"node_ids": ["266913e2-8d5f-42f1-b75e-ed080cda2ec2", "b69e3959-3e59-475e-b923-e3017e150419", "9f4ee5f2-26ac-466b-8dc9-205d929cc715", "fd069494-5949-4c08-b3b4-2ec7668bf85e", "1d3e0224-e2ed-47eb-9860-1af19fea7860", "836a175e-4ae5-44e6-8ab8-536a508678b9", "6677416d-7713-49b6-bfb1-6c32cfa27a6e", "6ccbd3f2-3a58-4cda-a718-e26c21d6a2ba", "e8191f23-9451-4761-83ae-65167f628d72", "76966f4b-7711-418c-9e5f-0274c7332c21", "75d24755-c642-45bb-99d3-457723424f48", "8a2cc8b3-f7e8-4d07-9ec5-c320f4a91187", "2123bc6d-d549-461a-9a37-68326467aadd", "05e1e1ac-26c7-4a11-9ecf-0080e01420d4", "e282d4e9-5dc7-41b4-afed-5c0518ef40de", "5f3bed00-0f38-48e5-a344-2cc63df90611", "0847bfbc-eb16-440e-aa76-56a772cede54", "2ac2bfb4-5227-4fef-b27c-f948d4fb9a81", "5e5ea008-e0e1-4f83-a788-20abc0f639dc", "f4669dc1-b929-40e7-8bc4-7076670faa52", "8c1ade5e-9eee-4a04-8a1b-455b4329bc36", "b8a8d911-618b-47cd-87cd-65296ef0121d", "a1a91ebc-3876-4124-b854-2e2bbb5c6706", "f3f96ec6-60b7-4cc9-b91c-0b7d1d26b0d7", "9afca8e3-f7ca-4fad-89b5-342428a74084", "54208ea0-9f50-48b3-babd-3148e3ce9b87", "3512ba76-a583-4b6e-a9ee-a34f07ba195f", "8ea2d9f5-821a-4065-9e50-dc43bb9d47a8", "fdcbd288-7cf0-40cb-ab26-ee3a1a107825", "791593fc-a4ee-4efe-8ae7-1fadebecc0d6", "689324f8-05b5-45d4-9e82-1b344b0107ea"], "metadata": {"identifier": "51842", "author": "Guin, Wyman", "title": "Beyond Bedlam", "date": null, "file": "51842.txt"}}}}