Sax Rohmer

“ I am sorry for women who have to live alone and fight for themselves. But I can't be sorry for those who want to fight. Loneliness must be very terrible, and there is really no such thing as a girl friend after school days, is there? Except for very ugly girls or very daft ones."
"I am sure you would be a staunch friend to anyone, dear."
"Yes; but they don't know it, you see. Naturally they judge me by themselves," said Flamby wistfully. "I used to hate being a woman before I met you, Mrs. Chumley, but I am not quite so sorry now." ”

“ Monkish herbs and sweet-smelling old-world flowers grew modestly in this domain once sacred to the chatelaine of Hatton; and Paul kept ghostly tryst with a white-shouldered lady whose hair was dressed high upon her head, and powdered withal, and to whose bewitching red lips the amorous glance was drawn by a patch cunningly placed beside a dimple. My lady's garden was a reliquary of soft whispers, and Paul by the magic of his genius reclaimed them all and was at once the lover and the mistress.
In the depths of the house he found a delightful dungeon. ”

“ The curves of their astral selves were sweeping inward to a point of contact which Paul knew subconsciously would be electric, odic, illuminating. He felt the driving force of Jules Thessaly's personality, and it struck from the lyre of his genius strange harmonious chords. He knew, as some of the ancients knew, that the very insect we crush beneath our feet is crushed not by accident, but in accordance with a design vast beyond human conception; and he wondered what part in his life this strange, powerful man was cast to play. ”

“ One cannot imagine the lyre of Apollo attuned to What's-the-name's marches."
"Two years," echoed Paul; "is it really two years since we met?"
"Two years on June the twenty-second. On June the twenty-second, nineteen hundred and fifteen, you saw me off from Victoria of hateful memory. I have been home six or seven times in the interval, but somehow or other have always missed you. I was appalled when I heard you had joined. God knows we need such brains as yours, but they would be wasted on the Somme; and genius is too rare to be exposed to the sniper's bullet. What are you doing?" ”

“ Instantly Don saw that he had wounded her, and he cursed the clumsiness, of which Paul could never have been guilty, that had led him to touch this girl's acute sensibilities. She was bewildering, of course, and he realised that he must step warily in future. He reached across and grasped her other hand hard. "Please forgive me," he said. "No man had better reason for loving your father than I."
Flamby looked up at him doubtfully, read sincerity in the grey eyes, and smiled again at once. "He wouldn't have minded a bit," she explained, "but I'm only a woman after all, and women are daft." ”

“ Humanity has proved too obstinate."
He spoke with a suppressed vehemence that was startling. "The point of this escapes me," said Paul, watching him. "For what or for whom has humanity proved too obstinate?"
"For us, Mario—for us. There is many an ancient knot to be untied before man can be free to think unfettered. The myth, Imperialism, alone is an iron barrier to universal brotherhood. Not even in the spectacle of the Germanic peoples pouring out their blood in pursuit of that shadow has the rest of the world perceived a lesson. ”

“ Jules Thessaly and Babylon Hall were banished from his mind, although the raid on London might very well prove to be the explanation of Thessaly's sudden departure. From the stricken area his imagination recoiled, and in spirit he stood in a quaintly rambling village street of Devon before a rose-smothered cottage, looking up to an open casement window. It was there that Yvonne was, perhaps already sleeping—Yvonne, his wife. And all the old fear visited him as he contemplated their happiness, their immunity from the horrors, the sacrifices of an anguished world. ”

“ The small tight curls of hair and beard became each a tongue of flame and his eyes glittered like molten gold. "Pardon my apparent rudeness, but I don't think you are listening."
"I am not," murmured Paul. "Your words reach me from a great distance. My spirit is uneasy to-night, and whilst myself I remain in your ivory room and hear you speak another self stands in a vast temple of black gleaming granite before the shrine of a golden bull."
"You are possibly thinking of Apis. From Cairo you have proceeded to Sakkâra. ”

“ Flamby jumped up, took the match and threw it in the hearth, then returned slowly to her place. Her hands were rather unsteady, and she tucked them away behind her, squeezing up closely against the cushions. "We are friends," she said. "You have always been my friend."
"I don't want you to feel alone in the world, as though nobody cared for you. When Don is home I have no fear, but when he is away there is really no one to study your interests, and, after all, Flamby, you are only a girl."
"There is Mrs. Chumley and Mr. Hammett and Claude Chauvin." ”

“ Thessaly gazed into the peculiar hat, and something in the pose of his head transported Paul to the hills above Lower Charleswood, where, backed by the curtain of a moving storm, he seemed to see Babylon Hall framed in a rainbow which linked the crescent of the hills. "You misjudge me," replied Thessaly. "What I have said is true, but I go in response to a sudden and unforeseen summons. Death and a frail woman have tricked me, and at one stroke have undone all that I had done. I am compelled to go."
Paul detected in the deep voice a note of pathos, of defeat. ”

“ The tangled details of Paul's legacy became disentangled at last, and he fixed a definite date for his departure. That same evening the weather broke and grey clouds veiled the stars. He was keenly susceptible to climatic changes, and this abrupt interruption of summer plunged him into a dark mood. Gone were the fairies from the meadows, gone the dryads from the woods. The birds grew mute and roses drooped their heads. He found himself alone facing a sorrowful world and sharing its sorrows. The shadow of the black hat in the dining-room portrait lay darkly on Hatton Towers. ”

“ It is for me a Pharos instantly opening up the fairway to a great man's philosophy. 'Damascus,' too, has such properties, and the phrase 'cherry blossom in Japan' bears me upon a magical carpet to a certain street in Yokohama and there unveils to me all the secrets of Japanese mysticism."
"I quite see your point," Don replied. "In the same way I have never ceased to regret that I was not born in Ashby-de-la-Zouch. The possession of such a euphonious birthplace would have coloured all my life."
"But like the Scotsman you would have revered your home from a distance," said Thessaly. ”

“ However happy one may be, London Bridge Station possesses the qualities of a sovereign joy-killer, and would have inclined the thoughts of Mark Tapley toward the darker things of life; but to Flamby, alone in a world which she did not expect to find sympathetic, it seemed a particularly hopeless place. She was dressed in black, and black did not suit her, and all the wisdom of your old philosophers must fail to solace a woman who knows that she is not looking her best. ”

“ I looked out from an observation-post on the Somme over a landscape like the blasted heath in Macbeth. No living thing moved, but the earth was pregnant with agony and the roar of the guns from hidden pits was like that of the grindstones of hell. There, upon the grave of an epoc, I listened to that deathly music and it beckoned to me like the palm fronds of Mitrahîna and spoke the same message as the voice of the pyramid silence. Don! all that has ever been, is, and within us dwells the first and the last. ”

“ She detested James, but it had been very gratifying to be noticed by a man actually in the company of the dazzling Yvonne Mario. Flamby had profound faith in her ability to take care of herself and not without sound reason, for she was experienced and wise beyond her years, and James's pride in his new conquest amused her vastly because she knew it to be no conquest at all. Only with age do women learn that the foolish world judges beauty harshly and that the judgment of the foolish world may not be wholly neglected. ”

“ Paul silently prayed that the world might not wait in vain.
"Master of Destiny, inscrutable God, grant me light that I may see to perform the duty laid upon me. Use me, mould me, make of me an instrument. Millions have offered all and lost all. Guide my steps. If death lies upon the path I will not shrink, but suffer me to be of some little use to thy scarred and bleeding world. ”

“ They beckon me, Don, bidding me to the gates of royal Memphis, to the palace of the Pharaoh. A faint breeze steals over the desert, and they shudder and sigh because palace and temple are dust and the King of the Upper and Lower Land is but a half-remembered name strange upon the lips of men. Ah! who that has heard it can forget the call, soft and mournful, of the palm-groves of Mitrahîna? ”

“ Thus, for human life is a paradox, this knowledge comes when it is no longer of any use, since every woman is not a Ninon de Lenclos.
Of such-like matters were Flamby's thoughts as she sat squeezed up into the smallest possible compass upon her settee, arms embracing knees; and, as was so often the case, they led her back to Paul Mario. It was wonderful how all paths seemed to lead to Paul Mario. ”

“ The Pipes of Pan were calling, and up in the aisles of the hills moonbeams slyly sought and found bare-limbed dryads darting from the eagerness of wooing fauns. Progress has banished those Pandean spirits from the woodlands, but the moon is the mother of magic, and her children steal out, furtive, half fearful, when she raises her lamp as of old.
Between prescience and imagination the borderline is ill defined. Although Dovelands Cottage was seemingly sleeping, or deserted, Paul pictured Flamby standing by the stile beyond, where the orchard path began. ”

“ There lies the reading of your day dream, Mario, your dream of the Sheikh of El Wasr. Look how the shadow of the campanile creeps out beneath us, over church and War-Office-Annexe, over life and over death. Religion is a corpse and the world is its morgue. But out of corruption comes forth sweetness. No creature known to man possesses more intense vitality than the dermestes beetle which propagates in the skull of a mummy. ”

“ Yonder is a group of Johnsons."
"To whom do you refer?" asked Don.
"To those young men wearing Soho whiskers and coloured collars. I call them Johnsons because they regard Augustus John as their spiritual father."
"And what is your opinion of his school?" inquired Don.
"He has no school. His work is aspirative, if you will grant me the word; the striving of a soul which knew the art of an earlier civilisation to seek expression in this. Such a man may have imitators, but he can never have disciples." ”

“ About them are obscene spirits wearing the semblance of men—of men gross and heavy, and leaden-eyed; and upon each brow is the mark of the Bull, the sigil of Hell."
Flamby watched him, listening spellbound to his strange words. He was inspired; anger and sorrow drove him remorselessly on and a chill finger seemed to touch Flamby's heart as she listened; for resignation and finality informed his speech.
"Each human soul must fight its way out of the night of the valley, Flamby, before it can pass the gates of dawn. ”

“ I live and move and have my being in it. But please don't misunderstand. Anything within my power to do for Flamby I will do gladly. I only learned to-day of her second bereavement. Don, we must protect her from the fate which so often befalls girls in such circumstances."
"My dear Paul, in accusing me of misjudging you, you are misjudging me. If I don't understand you nobody does. My offer to release you from the bargain is not to be understood as a reproach; it is a confession. I am a man utterly devoid of common sense, one to whom reason is a stranger and moderation an enemy. ”

“ Scarcely perceptible was the progress of mankind. In every woman was born a spark of Bacchic fire, which leapt up sweetly at the summons of love or crimson, shameful, at the beck of lust. There were certain conditions peculiarly favourable to its evil development; loneliness, according to Kitty Chester, a loneliness beyond man's understanding....
Paul aroused himself from a reverie and remembered that he had been thinking of Flamby with a strange and lingering tenderness. ”

“ IX
"Look," said Jules Thessaly, "below you stretches the Capital of the greatest empire man has ever known."
They stood in the topmost gallery of the campanile looking down upon a miniature London. The viridescent ribbon of the Thames bound bridge to bridge running thematically through a symphony of grey and green and gold. A consciousness of power leapt high within Paul. Only the sun was above him, the sun and the suave immensity of space. How insignificant an episode was a human life, how futile and inept ”

“ One lost his way and went racing along distant aisles of apple trees in quest of a roundabout route of his own. Paul, who symbolised everything, found food for reflection in the incident.
He lingered in the fragrant orchard looking at a flock of sheep who grazed there, and admiring the frolics of the lambs. In the beauty of nature he always found cause for sorrow, because every living thing is born to pain. ”

“ The newcomer, whose tunic had seen much service, was a man perhaps two or three years Paul Mario's senior, and already the bleaching hand of Time had brushed his temples with furtive fingers. He was dark but of sanguine colouring, now overlaid with a deep tan, wore a short military moustache and possessed those humorous grey eyes which seem to detect in all creation hues roseate and pleasing; eyes made for laughter and which no man other than a good fellow ever owned. ”

“ He mistook it for the ceaseless voice of the guns and weaved it into his brooding as Wagner wove the Valkyrie theme into the score of the Nibelüngen. A faint breeze whispered through the tree-tops.56
Paul came to the foot of the slope; and below him ran a continuous gully roofed over by stunted trees and conforming to the hillside as a brim conforms to a hat. Entrance might be made through any one of several gaps, and Paul, scrambling down, found himself in a dark tunnel, its brown, leafy floor patched at irregular intervals by grey light reflected from the creeping thunder cloud. ”