been gettin' oftener andoftener, till now all his sleeps are like this. He told me not to bescared--an' to--to never bother about him--to--to just let him alone;but--I guess I was scared to-night, when it begun to storm an' himlayin' there like that. It was like havin' a corpse in the house."
I began to gain a fuller appreciation of the situation. I myself hadseen people in a cataleptic condition, had even induced the state insubjects myself, and it appeared to me that Jason Croft was in asimilar state, no matter how induced.
"What does your employer do?" I asked.
"He studies, sir--just studies things like that." Mrs. Goss gesturedat the cases of books. "He don't have to work, you know. His uncleleft him rich."
I followed her arm as she swept it about the glass-fronted cases. Ibrought my glances back to the desk in the center of the room, betweenthe woman and myself as we stood. Upon it I spied another volume lyingopen. It was unlike any book I had ever seen, yellowed with age; infact not a book at all, but a series of parchment pages tied togetherwith bits of silken cord.
I took the thing up and found the open pages covered with marginalnotes in English, although the original was plainly in Sanskrit, anancient language I had seen before, but was wholly unable to read. Thenotations, however, threw some light into my mind, and as I read themI forgot the storm, the little old woman--everything save what I readand the bearing it held on the man behind me on the couch. I felt surethey had been written by his own hand, and they bore on the subject ofastral projection--the ability of the soul to separate itself, or beseparated, from the physical body and return to its fleshy husk againat will.
I finished the open pages and turned to others. The notations werestill present wherever I looked. At last I turned to the very frontand found that the manuscript was by Ahmid, an occult adept ofHindustan, who lived somewhere in the second or third century of theChristian era.
With a strange sensation I laid down the silk-bound pages. They werevery, very old. Over a thousand years had come and passed since theywere written by the dead Ahmid's hand. Yet I had held them to-night,and I felt sure Jason Croft had held them often--read them andunderstood them, and that the condition in which I found him thisnight was in some way subtly connected with their store of ancientlore. And suddenly I sensed the storm and the little old woman and thesilent body of the man at my back again, with a feeling of somethinguncanny in the whole affair.
* * * * *
"You can do nothing for him?" the woman broke my introspection.
I looked up and into her eyes, dark and bright and questioning as shestood still clutching her damp shawl.
"I'm not so sure of that," I said. "But--Mr. Croft's condition israther--peculiar. Whatever I do will require quiet--that I am alonewith him for some time. I think if I can be left here with him forpossibly an hour, I can bring him back."
I paused abruptly. I had used the woman's former words almost. And Isaw she noticed the fact, for a slight smile gathered on her fadedlips. She nodded. "You'll bring him back," she said. "Mind you,doctor, th' trouble is with Mr. Jason's head, I've been thinking.'Twas for that I've been telling myself I would come for you, if heforgot to come back some time, like I've been afraid he would."
"You did quite right," I agreed. "But--the trouble is not with Mr.Croft's mind. In fact, Mrs. Goss, I believe he is a very learned man.How long have you known him, may I ask?"
"Ever since he was a boy, except when he was travelin'," she returned.
"He has traveled?" I took her up.
"Yes, sir, a lot. Me an' my husband kept up th' place while he wasgone."
"I see," I said. "And now if you will let me try what I can do."
"Yes, sir. I'll set out in th' hall," she agreed, and turned in herrapid putter from the room.
Left alone, I took a chair, dragged it to the side of the couch, andstudied my man.
So far as I could judge, he was at least six feet tall, andcorrespondingly built. His hair was heavy, almost tawny, and, as Iknew, his eyes were gray. The whole contour of his head and featuresshowed what appeared to me remarkable intelligence and strength, thenose finely chiseled, the mouth well formed and firm, the chinunmistakably strong. That Croft was an unusual character I felt moreand more as I sat there. His very condition, which, from what I hadlearned from the little old woman and his own notation on the marginsof Ahmid's writings, I believed self-induced, would certainly indicatethat.
But my own years of study had taught me no little of hypnosis,suggestion, and the various phases of the subconscious mind. I haddeveloped no little power with various patients, or "subjects," as ahypnotist calls them, who from time to time had submitted themselvesto my control. Wherefore I felt that I knew about what to do to wakenthe sleeping objective mind of the man on the couch. I had asked foran hour, and the time had been granted. It behooved me to get to work.
I began. I concentrated my mind to the exclusion of all else upon mytask, sending a mental call to the soul of Jason Croft, wherever itmight be, commanding it to return to the body it had temporarilyquitted of its own volition, and once more animate it to a consciouslife. I forgot the strangeness of the situation, the rattle of therain against the glass panes of the room. And after a time I beganspeaking to the form beside which I sat, as to a conscious person,firmly repeating over and over my demand for the presence of JasonCroft--demanding it, nor letting myself doubt for a single instantthat the demand would be given heed in time.
It was a nerve-racking task. In the end it came to seem that I satthere and struggled against some intangible, invisible force whichresisted all my efforts. I look back now on the time spent there thatnight as an ordeal such as I never desire to again attempt. But I didnot desist. I had asked for an hour, because when I asked I neverdreamed the thing I had attempted, the thing which is yet to berelated, concerning the weird, yet true narrative, as I fully believe,of Jason Croft.
I had then no conception of how far his venturesome spirit had plumbedthe universe. If I thought of him at all, it was merely as someexperimenter who might have need of help, rather than as an adept ofadepts, who had transcended all human accomplishments in his line ofresearch and thought.
In my own blindness I had fancied that his overlong period in hiscataleptic trance might even be due to some inability on his part toreanimate his own body, after leaving it where it lay. I thought ofmyself as possibly aiding him in the task by what I would do in thetime for which I had asked.
But the hour ran away, and another, and still the body over which Iworked lay as it had lain at first, nor gave any sign of any effect ofmy concentrated will. It had been close to ten when I came to thehouse. It was three in the morning when I gained my first reward.
And when it came, it was so sudden that I actually started back in mychair and sat clutching its carved arms, and staring in somethingalmost like horror, I think, at first at the body which had lifteditself to a sitting posture on the couch.
And I know that when the man said, "So you are the one who called meback?" I actually gasped before I answered:
"Yes."
* * * * *
Croft fastened his eyes upon me in a steady regard. "You are Dr.Murray, from the Mental Hospital, are you not?" he went on.
"Ye-es," I stammered again. Mrs. Goss had said his sleep was likehaving a corpse about the house. I found myself thinking this wasnearly a though a corpse should rise up and speak.
But he nodded, with the barest smile on his lips. "Only one acquaintedwith the nature of my condition could have roused me," he said."However, you were engaging in a dangerous undertaking, friend."
"Dangerous for you, you mean," I rejoined. "Do you know you have laincataleptic for something like a week?"
"Yes." He nodded again. "But I was occupied on a most importantmission."
"Occupied!" I exclaimed. "You mean you were engaged in someundertaking while you lay there?" I pointed to the couch where hesat.
"Yes." Once more he smiled
.
Well, the man was sane. In fact, it seemed to me in those first fewmoments that he was far saner than I, far less excited, far lessaffected by the whole business from the first to last. In fact, heseemed quite calm and a trifle amused, while I was admittedly upset.And my very knowledge gained by years of study told me he was sane,that his was a perfectly balanced brain. There was nothing about himto even hint at anything else, save his extraordinary words. In theend I continued with a question:
"Where?"
"On the planet Palos, one of the Dog Star pack--a star in the systemof the sun Sirius," he replied.
"And you mean you have just returned from--there?" I faltered over thelast word badly. My brain seemed