The Return of Peter Grimm Part 38

I had been absent but a few minutes when I heard Kathrien crying my name. I ran back to the house. Peter Grimm was dead.

Ten days later came the seance described in my enclosure. Later in the evening I went to Willem's room and had a quiet little talk with him. He was calm again and spoke freely of what seemed to him an utterly natural experience. And from that conversation I believe I confirmed still further what was already established as a fact, so far as I was concerned. Peter Grimm had kept his compact with me. He had returned!

I wanted to talk with Willem at a time when he was in a normal condition and not in the thrall of fear. I found him without fever, though weaker than he had been for several days. I a.s.sured him that he had nothing to fear from Frederik, that all of us were his friends, and that no harm could come to him.

"Now tell me, Willem," I said, "all about your seeing Uncle Peter this evening."

"I awoke very thirsty and went downstairs for a drink," the boy told me in effect. "The ice pitcher felt so cool that I rested my cheek against it and then I drank some more water. Then I heard some one calling me.

"'Willem, Willem,' a voice said, 'can you hear me? Is there no one in this house that can hear me?'

"I couldn't make out at first who it was. Then I heard it again:

"'Willem, Willem,' it said, 'you _must_ hear me.'

"Then I looked around and saw Mynheer Peter's hat on the rack, and I knew he must have come back. But I couldn't see him.

"'Where are you, Mynheer Peter?' I asked him.

"'You cannot see me, Willem, but I am here. I want you to tell them all I am here.'

"That's as near as I can remember it. We talked a while longer. Then he said something like:

"'Go over and look on the table, Willem.'

"I went to the table and saw some torn pieces of paper.

"'Put them together, Willem,' said Mynheer Grimm.

"When I had got it all pasted together I saw it was my mother, Anne Marie; and then you and Miss Kathrien came down.

"Uncle Peter was standing over there about in the middle of the room. I could tell from his voice, but I couldn't see him.

"'Tell them about the man who made Anne Marie cry,' Mynheer Peter told me. And he kept saying, 'Hurry, Willem, before it is too late; he is coming. Hurry, Willem, hurry,' and just before Mr. Frederik came in Mynheer Peter said, 'Tell them now, Willem; _he_ is listening at the door.'

"Before you came down I asked Mynheer Peter to take me back with him when he went and he said he would."

Now, mind you, Willem knew nothing of the compact Peter and I had made.

Peter Grimm had said he would return, if he could. I believe he did so.

My studies of the so-called "Occult" have done my reputation in this narrow provincial town much harm. I have been sneered at as a "spiritualist," a "spook hunter," an "agnostic." I am none of the three.

I am a seeker after Truth; even while fully aware of the impossibility of absolutely finding that elusive quality. Nor do my researches in any way conflict with revealed religion, nor in the simple Bible faith that has ever been mine and that shall forever sustain me.

Having thus set forth my personal position in the matter--perhaps tediously and to an undue length,--I beg to call your attention to my report.

Very truly yours, ANDREW MCPHERSON, M.D.

CHAPTER XIX

BACK TO THE STORY

Dr. McPherson occasionally gave a vigorous shake to his fountain pen, and made corrections here and there.

It was nearly midnight, and he had been writing almost uninterruptedly since he had followed Willem upstairs after the boy's flight.

Willem had been restless and feverish, and had asked repeatedly to be brought down to the living-room. He seemed irresistibly drawn toward the place where he had talked with Peter Grimm and had "almost seen him."

So the sofa had been drawn up to the fire and a bed made for him there.

Now, however, he was at last sleeping peacefully in his little upstairs room, and the whole house was quiet, though no one else had gone to bed, and there was everywhere a subdued feeling of excitement.

The doctor had drawn a little table close to the vacant side of the fireplace (for the coals still smouldered, and the night was damp and chill). He had placed Willem's medicines there; and a lamp, the only bright spot in the big room.

Outside, the world was bathed in moonlight, and through the window the arms of the windmill could be seen, waving solemnly round and round like some strange, black mysterious creature beckoning silently from another world.

McPherson was preparing a formal statement of the "seance" while it was still fresh in his mind. And as Willem might need him, he was filling in a waiting hour by writing.

Mrs. Batholommey's anxious face, encased in a scarf, broke in upon his concentration.

"Oh--I'm _so_ nervous!" exclaimed the rector's wife, shudderingly, as she came into the room and going to the piano, turned up the second lamp.

"How can you sit here in such a dim light, after all that has happened in this room--just a few hours ago, too?"

Dr. McPherson, intent upon his work, was determined not to be interrupted. His only reply to Mrs. Batholommey was the scratching of his pen and the rattle of paper as he turned over a page.

"I thought perhaps Frederik had come back," she went on.

"So Willem's feeling better again?" she asked, advancing on the doctor.

"Yes," he answered abstractedly. "I took him upstairs a few minutes ago."

"Strange how the boy wants to remain in this room!" said Mrs.

Batholommey.

"M'm----" grunted Dr. McPherson shortly, without looking up at all.

Mrs. Batholommey came nearer and sat down.

"Oh, Doctor! Doctor!" she cried. "The scene that took place here to-night has completely upset me."

The doctor's only reply was to turn his back on Mrs. Batholommey and begin reading his ma.n.u.script aloud in an undertone, scratching out a word here, adding something there.

Mrs. Batholommey, quite unconscious that she was a nuisance, leaned back in her chair and let her words flow on.