Part 44 (1/2)

”I can go to her?” he asked. ”You recommend it? The moment has arrived?”

”It has arrived,” Herr Rauchen affirmed. ”She is strong enough to bear your presence--to talk in moderation. I will await here the result. It is an experiment the most interesting of any I have ever known.”

Powers moved toward the door, but the professor called him back.

”My young friend,” he said, ”one moment. There's no hurry. I would ask a question.”

”Well?”

”You say the room is the same, the nurse is the same. Good! Have you the clothes she arrived in?”

”They are there in full view,” Powers answered. ”She has come back to consciousness among precisely the same surroundings as when she first came to me eight months ago.”

”Very good indeed,” the professor declared. ”Now you shall go to her.

Meanwhile, I wait for you here.”

Once more Powers hesitated, with his foot upon the threshold of her room. It seemed so short a time ago since he stood there before on his way to his first interview with her since his great experiment. But his interest was no longer scientific. He knew very well that the next few minutes must make or mar his life.

The professor had given him hope; their theories had been based upon a sound basis. But the issue was the greatest he had ever put to the test.

With it was bound up the whole welfare of the woman he loved. He entered the room without his usual confidence. Yet the moment he saw her his heart beat with pa.s.sionate hope.

She was lying upon a sofa, her hair loosely coiled upon the top of her head, clad in a becoming morning wrap, white with streaming ribbons. At the sound of the opening door she turned her head, and she greeted him with a faint smile. As their eyes met he felt once more that pa.s.sionate thrill of hope. For the change in her face was manifest. This was neither the brilliantly beautiful but soulless child who had taken London by storm, nor the mystic, moody girl, hovering ever on the brink of insanity, who had sung to him upon the seash.o.r.e. It was the Eleanor of his earlier knowledge, who greeted him now half-shyly, yet with a certain mischievous look in her clear soft eyes.

”So, after all,” she murmured, looking up at him, ”I am a disappointment. The great experiment is a failure. I really haven't forgotten a single thing.”

”Hang the experiment!” he declared cheerfully. ”I lost all interest in that long ago. All that I have been anxious for has been your recovery.”

”I am so glad,” she said. ”I was afraid you would be terribly disappointed. It really isn't my fault, is it?”

”Not in the least,” he a.s.sured her heartily. ”You were an excellent subject. I suppose,” he added, struggling to keep the anxiety out of his tone, ”there is no doubt about the failure of it?”

”Not the slightest. My memory feels particularly clear. You can cross-examine me if you like.”

”Well, I will ask you a few questions,” he said. ”Tell me your last recollection before you came to yourself.”

She answered him readily.

”I came to you here,” she said, ”and told you that I was dismissed from Bearmain's. I heard your proposals and agreed to them. You sent for a nurse and you gave me chloroform here. The very last thing in my mind is that you walked to the window, and looked at your watch just before I went off.”

He drew a quick breath--it sounded almost a gasp. ”It is wonderful!” he exclaimed.

”Everything before that day--my miserable life at Bearmain's, your kindness to me, and our little jaunts together,” she said, ”I can remember quite clearly. I am sorry to wound your vanity, but your experiment has been shockingly unsuccessful.”

He smiled.

”It was a very foolish one,” he declared. ”I have been terribly worried about you.”

Their eyes met for a moment, and a spot of color burned in her cheeks.

”You need not have worried,” she said softly. ”You made it all quite clear to me before I consented. I knew the risk I ran.”