‘I'm not sure I shouldn't feel happier if it was at the bank,’ said Mrs Boucher. ‘Supposing it was stolen.’
Georgie magnanimously took Daisy's side: he knew how Daisy was feeling. Mrs Boucher was outvoted, and he got up.
‘If that's all then, I'll be off,’ he said.
Daisy had a sort of conviction that he was going to do something with Lucia, perhaps have a lesson at golf.
‘Come in presently?’ she said.
‘I can‘t, I'm afraid,’ he said. ‘I'm busy till dinner.’
And of course, on her way home, she saw him hurrying across to The Hurst with his planchette.
11
Lucia made no allusion whatever to her athletic triumph in the afternoon when Georgie appeared. That was not her way: she just triumphed, and left other people to talk about it. But her principles did not prevent her speaking about golf in the abstract.
‘We must get more business-like when you and I are on the committee, Georgie,’ she said. ‘We must have competitions and handicaps, and I will give a small silver cup, the President's Cup, to be competed for. There's no organization at present, you see: great fun, but no organization. We shall have to put our heads together over that. And foursomes: I have been reading about foursomes, when two people on one side hit the ball in turn. Pepino, I'm sure, would give a little cup for foursomes, the Lucas Cup… And you've brought the plan-chette? You must teach me how to use it. What a good employment for winter evenings, Georgie. And we must have some bridge tournaments. Wet afternoons, you know, and then tea, and then some more bridge. But we will talk about all that presently, only I warn you I shall expect you to get up all sorts of diversions for Pepino.’
Lucia gave a little sigh.
‘Pepino adored London,’ she said, ‘and we must cheer him up, Georgie, and not let him feel dull. You must think of lots of little diversions: little pleasant bustling things for these long evenings: music, and bridge, and some planchette. Then I shall get up some Shakespeare readings, selections from plays, with a small part for Pepino and another for poor Daisy. I foresee already that I shall have a very busy autumn. But you must all be very kind and come here for our little entertainments. Madness for Pepino to go out after sunset. Now let us get to our planchette. How I do chatter, Georgie!’
Georgie explained the technique of planchette, how important it was not to push, but on the other hand not to resist its independent motions. As he spoke Lucia glanced over the directions for planchette which he had brought with him.
‘We may not get anything,’ he said. ‘Abfou was very disappointing sometimes. We can go on talking: indeed, it is better not to attend to what it does.’
‘I see,’ said Lucia, ‘let us go on talking then. How late you are, Georgie. I expected you half an hour ago. Oh, you said you might be detained by a Museum committee meeting.’
‘Yes, we settled to shut the Museum up for the winter,’ he said. ‘Just an oil-stove or two to keep it dry. I wanted – and so did Mrs Boucher, I know – to ask you –’
He stopped, for the planchette had already begun to throb in a very extraordinary manner.
‘I believe something is going to happen,’ he said.
‘No! How interesting!’ said Lucia. ‘What do we do?’
‘Nothing,’ said Georgie. ‘Just let it do what it likes. Let's concentrate: that means thinking of nothing at all.’
Georgie of course had noticed and inwardly applauded the lofty reticence which Lucia had shown about Daisy's disaster this afternoon. But he had the strongest suspicion of her wish to weedj, and he fully expected that if Abfou ‘came through’ and talked anything but Arabic, he would express his scorn of Daisy's golf. There would be scathing remarks, corresponding to ‘snob’ and those rude things about Lucia's shingling of her hair, and then he would feel that Lucia had pushed. She might say she hadn't, just as Daisy said she hadn't, but it would be very unconvincing if Abfou talked about golf. He hoped it wouldn't happen, for the very appositeness of Abfou's remarks before had strangely shaken his faith in Abfou. He had been willing to believe that it was Daisy's subconscious self that had inspired Abfou – or at any rate he tried to believe it – but it had been impossible to dissociate the complete Daisy from these violent criticisms.
The planchette began to move.
‘Probably it's Arabic,’ said Georgie. ‘You never quite know. Empty your mind of everything, Lucia.’
She did not answer, and he looked up at her. She had that far-away expression which he associated with renderings of the ‘Moonlight Sonata’. Then her eyes closed.
The planchette was moving quietly and steadily along. When it came near the edge of the paper, it ran back and began again, and Georgie felt quite sure he wasn't pushing: he only wanted it not to waste its energy on the tablecloth. Once he felt almost certain that it traced out the word ‘drive’, but one couldn't be sure. And was that ‘committee’? His heart rather sank: it would be such a pity if Abfou was only talking about the golf-club which no doubt was filling Lucia's subconscious as well as conscious mind… Then suddenly he got rather alarmed, for Lucia's head was sunk forward, and she breathed with strange rapidity.
‘Lucia!’ he said sharply.
Lucia lifted her head, and the planchette stopped.
‘Dear me, I felt quite dreamy,’ she said. ‘Let us go on talking, Georgie. Lady Ambermere this morning: I wish you could have seen her.’
‘Planchette has been writing,’ said Georgie.
‘No!’ said Lucia. ‘Has it? May we look?’
Georgie lifted the machine. There was no Arabic at all, nor was it Abfou's writing, which in quaint little ways resembled Daisy's when she wrote quickly.
‘Vittoria,’ he read. ‘I am Vittoria.’
‘Georgie, how silly,’ said Lucia, ‘or is it the Queen?’
‘Let's see what she says,’ said Georgie. ‘I am Vittoria. I come to Riseholme. For proof, there is a dog and a Vecchia –’
‘That's Italian,’ said Lucia excitedly. ‘You see, Vittoria is Italian. Vecchia means – let me see; yes, of course, it means “old woman”. “A dog, and an old woman who is angry.” O Georgie, you did that! You were thinking about Pug and Lady Ambermere.’
‘I swear I wasn't,’ said Georgie. ‘It never entered my head. Let's see what else. “And Vittoria comes to tell you of fire and water, of fire and water. The strong elements that burn and soak. Fire and water and moonlight”.’
‘O Georgie, what gibberish,’ said Lucia. ‘It's as silly as Abfou. What does it mean? Moonlight! I suppose you would say I pushed and was thinking of the “Moonlight Sonata”.’
That base thought had occurred to Georgie's mind, but where did fire and water come in? Suddenly a stupendous interpretation struck him.
‘It's most extraordinary!’ he said. ‘We had a Museum committee meeting just now, and Mrs Boucher said the place was streaming wet. We settled to get some oil-stoves to keep it dry. There's fire and water for you!’ Georgie had mentioned this fact about the Museum committee, but so casually that he had quite forgotten he had done so. Lucia did not remind him of it.
‘Well, I do call that remarkable!’ she said. ‘But I daresay it's only a coincidence.’
‘I don't think so at all,’ said Georgie. ‘I think it's most curious, for I wasn't thinking about that a bit. What else does it say? “Vittoria bids you keep love and loyalty alive in your hearts. Vittoria has suffered, and bids you to be kind to the suffering.”’
‘That's curious!’ said Lucia. ‘That might apply to Pepino, mightn't it?… O Georgie, why, of course, that was in both of our minds: we had just been talking about it. I don't say you pushed intentionally, and you mustn't say I did, but that might easily have come from us.’
‘I think it's very strange,’ said Georgie. ‘And then, what came over you, Lucia? You looked only half-conscious. I believe it was what the planchette directions call light hypnosis.’
‘No!’ said Lucia. ‘Light hypnosis, that means half-asleep,
doesn't it? I did feel drowsy.’
‘It's a condition of trance,’ said Georgie. ‘Let's try again.
Lucia seemed reluctant.
‘I think I won't, Georgie,’ she said. ‘It is so strange. I'm not sure that I like it.’
‘It can't hurt you if you approach it in the right spirit,’ said Georgie, quoting from the directions.
‘Not again this evening, Georgie,’ said she. ‘To-morrow perhaps. It is interesting, it is curious, and somehow I don't think Vittoria would hurt us. She seems kind. There's something noble, indeed, about her message.’
‘Much nobler than Abfou,’ said Georgie, ‘and much more powerful. Why, she came through at once, without pages of scribbles first! I never felt quite certain that Abfou's scribbles were Arabic.’
Lucia gave a little indulgent smile.
‘There didn't seem much evidence for it from what you told me,’ she said. ‘All you could be certain of was that they weren't English.’
Georgie left his planchette with Lucia, in case she would consent to sit again to-morrow, and hurried back, it is unnecessary to state, not to his own house, but to Daisy's. Vittoria was worth two of Abfou, he thought… that communication about fire and water, that kindness to the suffering, and, hardly less, the keeping of loyalty alive. That made him feel rather guilty, for certainly loyalty to Lucia had flickered somewhat in consequence of her behaviour during the summer.
He gave a short account of these remarkable proceedings (omitting the loyalty) to Daisy, who took a superior and scornful attitude.
‘Vittoria, indeed!’ she said, ‘and Vecchia. Isn't that Lucia all over, lugging in easy Italian like that? And Pug and the angry old lady. Glorifying herself, I call it. Why, that wasn't even subconscious: her mind was full of it.’
‘But how about the fire and water?’ asked Georgie. ‘It does apply to the damp in the Museum and the oil-stoves.’
Daisy knew that her position as priestess of Abfou was tottering. It was true that she had not celebrated the mysteries of late, for Riseholme (and she) had got rather tired of Abfou, but it was gall and wormwood to think that Lucia should steal (steal was the word) her invention and bring it out under the patronage of Vittoria as something quite new.
‘A pure fluke,’ said Daisy. ‘If she'd written mutton and music, you would have found some interpretation for it. Such far-fetched nonsense!’
Georgie was getting rather heated. He remembered how when Abfou had written ‘death’ it was held to apply to the mulberry-tree which Daisy believed she had killed by amateur root-pruning, so if it came to talking about far-fetched nonsense, he could have something to say. Besides, the mulberry-tree hadn't died at all, so that if Abfou meant that he was wrong. But there was no good in indulging in recriminations with Daisy, not only for the sake of peace and quietness, but because Georgie could guess very well all she was feeling.
‘But she didn't write about mutton and music,’ he observed, ‘so we needn't discuss that. Then there was moonlight. I don't know what that means.’
‘I should call it moonshine,’ said Daisy brightly.
‘Well, it wrote moonlight,’ said Georgie. ‘Of course there's the ‘Moonlight Sonata’ which might have been in Lucia's mind, but it's all curious. And I believe Lucia was in a condition of light hypnosis –’
‘Light fiddlesticks!’ said Daisy… (Why hadn't she thought of going into a condition of light hypnosis when she was Abfouing? So much more impressive!) ‘We can all shut our eyes and droop our heads.’
‘Well, I think it was light hypnosis,’ said Georgie firmly. ‘It was very curious to see. I hope she'll consent to sit again. She didn't much want to.’
Daisy profoundly hoped that Lucia would not consent to sit again, for she felt Abfouism slipping out of her fingers. In any case, she would instantly resuscitate Abfou, for Vittoria shouldn't have it all her own way. She got up.
‘Georgie, why shouldn't we see if Abfou has anything to say about it?’ she asked. ‘After all, Abfou told us to make a museum, and that hasn't turned out so badly. Abfou was practical; what he suggested led to something.’
Though the notion that Daisy had thought of the Museum and pushed flitted through Georgie's mind, there was something in what she said, for certainly Abfou had written ‘museum’ (if it wasn't ‘mouse’) and there was the Museum which had turned out so profitably for the committee.
‘We might try,’ he said.
Daisy instantly got out her planchette, which sadly wanted dusting, and it began to move almost as soon as they laid their hands on it: Abfou was in a rather inartistic hurry. And it really wasn't very wise of Daisy to close her eyes and snort: it was indeed light fiddlesticks to do that. It was a sheer unconvincing plagiarism from Lucia, and his distrust of Daisy and of Abfou immeasurably deepened. Furiously the pencil scribbled, going off the paper occasionally and writing on the table till Georgie could insert the paper under it: it was evident that Abfou was very indignant about something, and there was no need to inquire what that was. For some time the writing seemed to feel to Georgie like Arabic, but presently the pencil slowed down, and he thought some English was coming through. Finally Abfou gave a great scrawl, as he usually did when the message was complete, and Daisy looked dreamily up.
‘Anything?’ she said.
‘It's been writing hard,’ said Georgie.
They examined the script. It began, as he had expected, with quantities of Arabic, and then (as he had expected) dropped into English, which was quite legible.
‘Beware of charlatans,’ wrote Abfou, ‘beware of Southern charlatans. All spirits are not true and faithful like Abfou, who instituted your Museum. False guides deceive. A warning from Abfou.’
‘Well, if that isn't convincing, I don't know what is,’ said Daisy.
Georgie thought it convincing too.
The din of battle began to rise. It was known that very evening, for Colonel and Mrs Boucher dined with Georgie, that he and Lucia (for Georgie did not give all the credit to Lucia) had received that remarkable message from Vittoria about fire and water and the dog and the angry old woman, and it was agreed that Abfou cut a very poor figure, and had a jealous temper. Why hadn't Abfou done something better than merely warn them against Southern charlatans?
‘If it comes to that,’ said Mrs Boucher, ‘Egypt is in the south, and charlatans can come from Egypt as much as from Italy. Fire and water! Very remarkable. There's the water there now, plenty of it, and the fire will be there to-morrow. I must get out my planchette again, for I put it away. I got sick of writing nothing but Arabic, even if it was Arabic. I call it very strange. And not a word about golf from the Vittoria. I consider that's most important. If Lucia had been pushing, she'd have written about her golf with Daisy. Abfou and Vittoria! I wonder which will win.’
That summed it up pretty well, for it was felt that Abfou and Vittoria could not both direct the affairs of Riseholme from the other world, unless they acted jointly; and Abfou's remarks about the Southern charlatan and false spirits put the idea of a coalition out of the question. All the time, firm in the consciousness of Riseholme, but never under any circumstances spoken of, was the feeling that Abfou and Vittoria (as well as standing for themselves) were pseudonyms: they stood also for Daisy and Lucia. And how much finer and bigger, how much more gifted of the two in every way was Vittoria-Lucia. Lucia quickly got over her disinclination to weedj, and messages, not very definite, but of high moral significance came from this exalted spirit. There was never a word about golf, and there was never a word about Abfou, nor any ravings concerning inferior and untrustworthy spirits. Vittoria was clearly above all that (indeed, she was probably in some sphere miles away above Abfou), whereas Abfou's pages (Daisy sat with her planchette morning after morning and obtained sheets of the most voluble English) were blistered with denunciations of low and earth-born intelligences and dark with awful warnings for those who trusted them.
Riseholme, in fact, had never been at a higher pitch of excited acti
vity; even the arrival of the Evening Gazette during those weeks when Hermione had recorded so much about Mrs Philip Lucas hadn't roused such emotions as the reception of a new message from Abfou or Vittoria. And it was Lucia again who was the cause of it all: no one for months had cared what Abfou said, till Lucia became the recipient of Vittoria's messages. She had invested planchette with the interest that attached to all she did. On the other hand it was felt that Abfou (though certainly he lowered himself by these pointed recriminations) had done something. Abfou-Daisy had invented the Museum, whereas Vittoria-Lucia, apart from giving utterance to high moral sentiments, had invented nothing (high moral sentiments couldn't count as an invention). To be sure there was the remarkable piece about Pug and angry Lady Ambermere, but the facts of that were already known to Lucia, and as for the communication about fire, water and moonlight, though there were new oil-stoves in the damp Museum, that was not as remarkable as inventing the Museum, and moonlight unless it meant the Sonata was quite unexplained. Over the cavilling objection, rather timidly put forward by Georgie, who longed for some striking vindication of Vittoria, Lucia was superb.
‘Yes, Georgie, I can't tell you what it means,’ she said. ‘I am only the humble scribe. It is quite mysterious to me. For myself, I am content to be Vittoria's medium. I feel it a high honour. Perhaps some day it will be explained, and we shall see.’
They saw.
Meanwhile, since no one can live entirely on messages from the unseen, other interests were not neglected. There were bridge-parties at The Hurst, there was much music, there was a reading of Hamlet at which Lucia doubled several of the principal parts and Daisy declined to be the Ghost. The new committee of the golf club was formed, and at the first meeting Lucia announced her gift of the President's Cup, and Pepino's of the Lucas Cup for foursomes. Notice of these was duly put up in the Club-house, and Daisy's face was of such a grimness when she read them that something very savage from Abfou might be confidently expected. She went out for a round soon after with Colonel Boucher, who wore a scared and worried look when he returned. Daisy had got into a bunker, and had simply hewed her ball to pieces… Pepino's convalescence proceeded well; Lucia laid down the law a good deal at auction bridge, and the oil-stoves at the Museum were satisfactory. They were certainly making headway against the large patches of damp on the walls, and Daisy, one evening, recollecting that she had not made a personal inspection of them, went in just before dinner to look at them. The boy in charge of them had put them out, for they only burned during the day, and certainly they were doing their work well. Daisy felt she would not be able to bring forward any objection to them at the next committee meeting, as she had rather hoped to do. In order to hurry on the drying process, she filled them both up and lit them so that they should burn all night. She spilt a little paraffin, but that would soon evaporate. Georgie was tripping back across the green from a visit to Mrs Boucher, and they walked homeward together.