Forrester

“ Forrester almost went through the window. But he managed to regain his balance and turn around, saying angrily: "Don't do that!" As the last of the words left his lips, he became aware of the smiling figure facing him.
She was standing in a spotlight, Forrester thought at first. Then he saw that the light was coming from the woman herself—or from her clothing. The dress she wore was a satinlike sheath that glowed with an aura even brighter than the room. Her blonde hair picked up the radiance and glowed, too, illuminating a face that was at once regal, inviting and passionate. ”

“ Then followed a bewildering jumble of Hindustani and a language of which Forrester was ignorant. Taking a cup, Forrester hastened to the stream, filled it with water, and, returning, bathed the stranger's burning brow. The raving ceased. After a brief silence the weak voice again spoke coherently, though the speaker, as the words showed, did not realise his position.
"Don't wait for me. In the hills--four days; nights are better; you won't meet men by night. But march day and night; there's no time to lose, I tell you." ”

“ The Englishmen, of course, understood not a word of his recital; they were indeed as though frozen stiff to the floor. But when the first accuser had come to an end, and his colleague had bowed thrice to the awful figure on the throne before taking up the tale, the girl turned her head slightly and threw upon Forrester a glance in which he read a last anguished plea for help. A hot thrill surged through him; he felt his cheeks flush; and, clenching his fists, he sprang forward, into the gap between the ranks of the priests, and strode swiftly up the floor towards the throne.
"Stop! Stop!" ”

“ Forrester drew up gravely at this, and replied to me slowly,
"That little is all. All that has ever happened to you, and the whole may be expressed in a single word. Your life has scarcely had enough of action in it to stir the surface; it has been a life of inward strife." ”

“ On the far side of the enclosure the priests had emerged from their houses, and were standing in silence, gazing intently, eagerly upwards. When Forrester reached the wall he turned about, set the rifle to his shoulder, took steady aim, and fired. A dead silence followed the reverberations of the shot; then a yell of rage burst from the throng of priests, and they came leaping in one tumultuous mob towards the garden. At the same time, far to the left, a dark, bearded figure jumped down from the top of the outer wall, and rushed straight towards Forrester, spade in hand. ”

“ When darkness fell, and the green glow from the eye of the monster on the wall dominated the little apartment, Forrester, rather from curiosity than with any belief in the efficacy of the screen, held it before his eyes. To his amazement, it was absolutely effective. The glow diminished to a faint luminosity. All its searching brilliance, its compelling power, was gone. He moved the screen aside to make sure that the light was still there, that it was not eclipsed by some other agency. He was immediately undeceived, and again held the screen between his eyes and the monster. ”

“ Forrester quite readily gave permission for the expedition.
"You're such a sensible person, Muvvie dear!" gasped Lorraine ecstatically. "Some mothers would have howled at such a plan. I'm sure Aunt Carrie wouldn't have let Vivien go. You always seem to see things just from the same point of view as we do ourselves."
"I know you'll be safe with Margaret Lindsay, or I wouldn't let you stir five yards from my apron strings. I could be a dragon of a mother if the occasion required!" laughed Mrs. Forrester. "So far, happily, you've never wanted to do anything especially outrageous. ”

“ Forrester said, "suppose I'm not what your tests say. I mean, suppose I—"
"There is no need for supposition. Beyond any shadow of doubt, we know how you, as a mortal, will react to any conceivable set of circumstances."
"Oh," Forrester said. "But—"
"Precisely. You have realized what yet needs to be done. We know what your abilities and limitations are—as a mortal. The tests you have yet to pass are concerned with your actions and reactions as a demi-God." ”

“ There was quiet, and Forrester had time to get dizzy. Maybe, he thought, he had been traveling too much. After all, he had started in New York, and then he had found himself on what he suspected was Mount Olympus, in Greece. And now he was somewhere else.
He wasn't entirely sure where. The Court of the Gods existed; he knew that. But he had never heard just where it existed, and it was entirely possible that no mortal knew. In which case, Forrester thought confusedly, I don't even know where I am. ”

“ It was still, he told himself uneasily, just one drink. And that was all he was going to have.
The bartender brought it and Forrester sipped at it, watching his reflection in the mirror and wishing he felt easier in his mind about the whole Tower of Zeus affair. Then, very suddenly, he noticed that the man next to him was looking at him oddly. Forrester didn't like the look or, for that matter, the man himself, a raw-boned giant with deep-set eyes and a shock of dead-black hair, but so long as nobody bothered him, Forrester wasn't going to start anything. ”

“ Forrester winced. "I'm fine," he said evenly. "And how's the winebibber?"
"Good for you," the figure said. "A little wine for your Stomach's sake, as good old Bacchus always says. Only we make it a lot, eh?" He winked and nudged Forrester in the ribs.
"Sure, sure," Forrester said. He wished desperately that he could take the gross fool and tear him into tastefully arranged pieces. But there was always Gerda. And since this particular idiot happened to be her younger brother, Ed Symes, anything in the nature of violence was unthinkable. ”

“ I should not think of hiding away till I hear that Forrester is better. If he dies I should not care to live, so I should be only too glad to give myself up. I cannot come back to Bolsover now, even if I wanted, as I have only a pound, and my guardian tells me that is all the money I have in the world. Please write and say if Forrester is better. I am too miserable to write more.
“Yours truly,—
“John Jeffreys.” ”

“ Still angry, underneath the sudden need for speed, he turned and sprinted toward the subway.
"And thus," Forrester said tiredly, "having attempted to make himself the equal of the Gods, Man was given a punishment befitting such arrogance." He paused and took a breath, surveying the twenty-odd students in the classroom (and some, he told himself wryly, very odd) with a sort of benign boredom. ”

“ In the meanwhile, the intelligence was not without its effects on Roland Forrester, who, seeing himself so unexpectedly deprived of the promised escort,—for he could scarce think, under such circumstances, of withdrawing a single man from the force called to a duty so important,—perceived the necessity of employing his own resources to effect escape from a position which he now felt to be embarrassing. ”

“ Protection was all very well for the infancy of a race, but man was growing up now. Man needed to make his own world.
The Gods had no place in that world, Forrester saw. He had to find the answers to all of his questions—and now he thought he knew a way to do it.
"Want another, buddy?"
The bartender's voice roused Forrester from his reverie. He had absent-mindedly finished brandy-and-soda number eight.
"Okay," Forrester said. "Sure." He handed the bartender a ten-dollar bill and got a kind of wry pleasure out of seeing the picture of Dionysus on its face. ”

“ Forrester sighed. Why was he talking to the old man, anyway? The answer came to him as soon as he'd asked the question. He wanted to keep his mind off the Tower of Zeus and his own unknown fate there. It was an unpleasant answer; Forrester blanked it out.
"Now, friend," he said. "What have you got? Just what mankind's been looking for all these centuries. Security. You've got security. Nobody's going to blow you to pieces [31] tomorrow. Your job isn't going to vanish overnight. ”

“ If the earth above collapsed en masse, it would smash through the screen and carry us with it into the pit. We must bore a hole gradually with the iron."
"What about the water?" Forrester asked.
Beresford listened intently, Forrester standing below with his hand on the ladder.
"Yes," said Beresford at length, "you are right. But it appears to be at one side, not directly overhead. Ah! there are footsteps. Listen!"
They kept absolute silence. The dull thud of footsteps overhead was clearly audible. Forrester looked up at his friend, dimly visible high above him. ”

“ But Forrester is drunk, you know, and will not understand the young man's civilities. He blunders out a volley of curses right and left, and bullies Master Colleton for a fight, which he declines. But Forrester is too drunk to mind all that. Without more ado, he mounts the young gentleman and is about to pluck out his eyes, when he feels the dirk in his ribs, and then they cut loose. He gets the dirk from Master [397] Colleton, and makes at him; but he picks up a hatchet that happens to be lying about, and drives at his head, and down drops Forrester, as he ought to, dead as a door-nail. ”

“ When I fish, there's the feeling of the stream, the play of the shadows, the long lush meadows——"
"What a rhapsodist is here!" interjected Forrester.
"It's a fact. I'm not so keen on the sport as you think."
"Miss Mitchell-Dene?" Forrester appealed for support.
"I'm no sportswoman," she said. "I don't like worms."
Frank went off into laughter; it tickled him to think that anyone imagined that you fished with worms. He would as soon have cut off his hand or shot a fox.
"What's this?" said Sievwright suddenly, as the servant deposited a plate in front of him. "Good Heavens!" ”

“ To reach the house which Mary Sturtevant had rented it was necessary for Forrester to pass through Jasper lane. He stopped his car in front of the tree and made a careful examination of the ground in every direction. From the trampled condition of the undergrowth, and some withered leaves which had been burned by the flashlight, Forrester was able to locate the spot across the road where Humphrey had been concealed. The wooden pegs which the detectives had placed in the ground near the tree were still there, though the strings had been broken off and scattered during the struggle. ”

“ She stole away behind the curtain, and Forrester, after a momentary pause, put the gift into his pocket and followed his friend into the open air.
"Shall we refuse to go down?" he said.
"We shall get no food if we do. Besides, we must find out what has become of Bob and Hamid. At present my brain is in a whirl; everything is so bewildering; maybe light will dawn by and by."
At the head of the stairway two priests were awaiting them. One signed to Mackenzie to descend, and followed him. When they were out of sight, the other indicated that Forrester was to go down. ”

“ CHAPTER XVII—AT THE DOORSTEP Crushed beneath the weight of his secret knowledge of Mary Sturtevant's seemingly close connection with the infamous band of extortioners and murderers who were literally terrorizing the city, Forrester fell into a dull routine that held him back from making any progress in the case. That a girl of her delicate refinement, superior intelligence and appealing femininity should be involved with these men whose wanton butcheries were becoming more and more appalling, was a bewildering conundrum. ”

“ Forrester asked.
"No, no: don't let us terrify the old chap," his friend answered. "His dread of the unknown is depressing enough as it is: if we told him about the Eye, every moment of his life would be an agony."
They were still conversing when a horn sounded thrice. The zamindar rose from his seat.
"That is the signal for returning below," he said. "The sun is setting. I hope that I may see you to-morrow, sahibs."
His visitors rose to leave the hut, and bowed to the young girl. The zamindar politely escorted them to the doorway. Forrester was a pace or two in the rear. ”

“ To a man of Forrester's active disposition Bellevue Place meant a comparatively easy walk from the downtown section. Moreover, in the present troubled condition of his mind, the exercise would be conducive to clearer thinking, so he started out with the intention of walking home. As he was crossing the Michigan Avenue bridge over the Chicago River, a motor car slowed up by the curb and Forrester heard someone call to him. Glancing around, he saw that it was Prentice. ”

“ There is a man waiting downstairs who can explain all. I have made him stay close at hand every day so that when your mind became clear you could know the whole story immediately. I will bring him up now," and Mary Sturtevant withdrew her hands from Forrester's clasp and ran out of the room.
In a few minutes she returned, followed by a tall, broad-shouldered man, with kindly brown eyes and streaks of gray in his thick, dark hair. He smiled down reassuringly at Forrester as the girl introduced him.
"This," she announced, happily, "is Mr. Keith Marten, whom I call the invisible detective." ”

“ It had no effect on the class. The destruction of the human race interested nobody. "However," Forrester said gamely, "this form of insanity was too much for the Gods to allow. They therefore—"
The bell rang, signifying the end of the period. Forrester didn't know whether to feel relieved or annoyed.
"All right," he said. "That's all for today. Your first assignment will be to read and carefully study Chapters One and Two of the textbook."
Silence gave way to a clatter of noise as the students began to file out. Forrester saw the front-row blonde rise slowly and gracefully. ”