The King In Yellow by Robert W. Chambers

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"It's that cursed cat," he said, ceasing his groans, and turning his
colourless eyes to me; "she attacked me while I was asleep. I believe she
will kill me yet."

This was too much, so I went into the kitchen, and, seizing a hatchet
from the pantry, started to find the infernal beast and settle her then
and there. My search was fruitless, and after a while I gave it up and
came back to find Mr. Wilde squatting on his high chair by the table. He
had washed his face and changed his clothes. The great furrows which the
cat's claws had ploughed up in his face he had filled with collodion, and
a rag hid the wound in his throat. I told him I should kill the cat when
I came across her, but he only shook his head and turned to the open
ledger before him. He read name after name of the people who had come to
him in regard to their reputation, and the sums he had amassed were
startling.

"I put on the screws now and then," he explained.

"One day or other some of these people will assassinate you," I insisted.

"Do you think so?" he said, rubbing his mutilated ears.

It was useless to argue with him, so I took down the manuscript entitled
Imperial Dynasty of America, for the last time I should ever take it down
in Mr. Wilde's study. I read it through, thrilling and trembling with
pleasure. When I had finished Mr. Wilde took the manuscript and, turning
to the dark passage which leads from his study to his bed-chamber,
called out in a loud voice, "Vance." Then for the first time, I noticed a
man crouching there in the shadow. How I had overlooked him during my
search for the cat, I cannot imagine.

"Vance, come in," cried Mr. Wilde.

The figure rose and crept towards us, and I shall never forget the face
that he raised to mine, as the light from the window illuminated it.

"Vance, this is Mr. Castaigne," said Mr. Wilde. Before he had finished
speaking, the man threw himself on the ground before the table, crying
and grasping, "Oh, God! Oh, my God! Help me! Forgive me! Oh, Mr.
Castaigne, keep that man away. You cannot, you cannot mean it! You are
different--save me! I am broken down--I was in a madhouse and now--when
all was coming right--when I had forgotten the King--the King in Yellow
and--but I shall go mad again--I shall go mad--"

His voice died into a choking rattle, for Mr. Wilde had leapt on him and
his right hand encircled the man's throat. When Vance fell in a heap on
the floor, Mr. Wilde clambered nimbly into his chair again, and rubbing
his mangled ears with the stump of his hand, turned to me and asked me
for the ledger. I reached it down from the shelf and he opened it. After
a moment's searching among the beautifully written pages, he coughed
complacently, and pointed to the name Vance.

"Vance," he read aloud, "Osgood Oswald Vance." At the sound of his name,
the man on the floor raised his head and turned a convulsed face to Mr.
Wilde. His eyes were injected with blood, his lips tumefied. "Called
April 28th," continued Mr. Wilde. "Occupation, cashier in the Seaforth
National Bank; has served a term of forgery at Sing Sing, from whence he
was transferred to the Asylum for the Criminal Insane. Pardoned by the
Governor of New York, and discharged from the Asylum, January 19, 1918.
Reputation damaged at Sheepshead Bay. Rumours that he lives beyond his
income. Reputation to be repaired at once. Retainer $1,500.

"Note.--Has embezzled sums amounting to $30,000 since March 20, 1919,
excellent family, and secured present position through uncle's influence.
Father, President of Seaforth Bank."

I looked at the man on the floor.

"Get up, Vance," said Mr. Wilde in a gentle voice. Vance rose as if
hypnotized. "He will do as we suggest now," observed Mr. Wilde, and
opening the manuscript, he read the entire history of the Imperial
Dynasty of America. Then in a kind and soothing murmur he ran over the
important points with Vance, who stood like one stunned. His eyes were so
blank and vacant that I imagined he had become half-witted, and remarked
it to Mr. Wilde who replied that it was of no consequence anyway. Very
patiently we pointed out to Vance what his share in the affair would be,
and he seemed to understand after a while. Mr. Wilde explained the
manuscript, using several volumes on Heraldry, to substantiate the result
of his researches. He mentioned the establishment of the Dynasty in
Carcosa, the lakes which connected Hastur, Aldebaran and the mystery of
the Hyades. He spoke of Cassilda and Camilla, and sounded the cloudy
depths of Demhe, and the Lake of Hali. "The scolloped tatters of the King
in Yellow must hide Yhtill forever," he muttered, but I do not believe
Vance heard him. Then by degrees he led Vance along the ramifications of
the Imperial family, to Uoht and Thale, from Naotalba and Phantom of
Truth, to Aldones, and then tossing aside his manuscript and notes, he
began the wonderful story of the Last King. Fascinated and thrilled I
watched him. He threw up his head, his long arms were stretched out in a
magnificent gesture of pride and power, and his eyes blazed deep in their
sockets like two emeralds. Vance listened stupefied. As for me, when at
last Mr. Wilde had finished, and pointing to me, cried, "The cousin of
the King!" my head swam with excitement.

Controlling myself with a superhuman effort, I explained to Vance why I
alone was worthy of the crown and why my cousin must be exiled or die.
I made him understand that my cousin must never marry, even after
renouncing all his claims, and how that least of all he should marry the
daughter of the Marquis of Avonshire and bring England into the question.
I showed him a list of thousands of names which Mr. Wilde had drawn up;
every man whose name was there had received the Yellow Sign which no
living human being dared disregard. The city, the state, the whole land,
were ready to rise and tremble before the Pallid Mask.

The time had come, the people should know the son of Hastur, and the
whole world bow to the black stars which hang in the sky over Carcosa.

Vance leaned on the table, his head buried in his hands. Mr. Wilde drew
a rough sketch on the margin of yesterday's _Herald_ with a bit of
lead pencil. It was a plan of Hawberk's rooms. Then he wrote out the
order and affixed the seal, and shaking like a palsied man I signed my
first writ of execution with my name Hildred-Rex.

Mr. Wilde clambered to the floor and unlocking the cabinet, took a long
square box from the first shelf. This he brought to the table and opened.
A new knife lay in the tissue paper inside and I picked it up and handed
it to Vance, along with the order and the plan of Hawberk's apartment.
Then Mr. Wilde told Vance he could go; and he went, shambling like an
outcast of the slums.

I sat for a while watching the daylight fade behind the square tower of
the Judson Memorial Church, and finally, gathering up the manuscript and
notes, took my hat and started for the door.

Mr. Wilde watched me in silence. When I had stepped into the hall I
looked back. Mr. Wilde's small eyes were still fixed on me. Behind him,
the shadows gathered in the fading light. Then I closed the door behind
me and went out into the darkening streets.

I had eaten nothing since breakfast, but I was not hungry. A wretched,
half-starved creature, who stood looking across the street at the Lethal
Chamber, noticed me and came up to tell me a tale of misery. I gave him
money, I don't know why, and he went away without thanking me. An
hour later another outcast approached and whined his story. I had a blank
bit of paper in my pocket, on which was traced the Yellow Sign, and I
handed it to him. He looked at it stupidly for a moment, and then with an
uncertain glance at me, folded it with what seemed to me exaggerated care
and placed it in his bosom.

The electric lights were sparkling among the trees, and the new moon
shone in the sky above the Lethal Chamber. It was tiresome waiting in the
square; I wandered from the Marble Arch to the artillery stables and back
again to the lotos fountain. The flowers and grass exhaled a fragrance
which troubled me. The jet of the fountain played in the moonlight, and
the musical splash of falling drops reminded me of the tinkle of chained
mail in Hawberk's shop. But it was not so fascinating, and the dull
sparkle of the moonlight on the water brought no such sensations of
exquisite pleasure, as when the sunshine played over the polished steel
of a corselet on Hawberk's knee. I watched the bats darting and turning
above the water plants in the fountain basin, but their rapid, jerky
flight set my nerves on edge, and I went away again to walk aimlessly to
and fro among the trees.

The artillery stables were dark, but in the cavalry barracks the
officers' windows were brilliantly lighted, and the sallyport was
constantly filled with troopers in fatigue, carrying straw and harness
and baskets filled with tin dishes.

Twice the mounted sentry at the gates was changed while I wandered up and
down the asphalt walk. I looked at my watch. It was nearly time. The
lights in the barracks went out one by one, the barred gate was closed,
and every minute or two an officer passed in through the side wicket,
leaving a rattle of accoutrements and a jingle of spurs on the night air.
The square had become very silent. The last homeless loiterer had been
driven away by the grey-coated park policeman, the car tracks along
Wooster Street were deserted, and the only sound which broke the
stillness was the stamping of the sentry's horse and the ring of his
sabre against the saddle pommel. In the barracks, the officers' quarters
were still lighted, and military servants passed and repassed before the
bay windows. Twelve o'clock sounded from the new spire of St. Francis
Xavier, and at the last stroke of the sad-toned bell a figure passed
through the wicket beside the portcullis, returned the salute of the
sentry, and crossing the street entered the square and advanced toward
the Benedick apartment house.

"Louis," I called.

The man pivoted on his spurred heels and came straight toward me.

"Is that you, Hildred?"

"Yes, you are on time."

I took his offered hand, and we strolled toward the Lethal Chamber.

He rattled on about his wedding and the graces of Constance, and their
future prospects, calling my attention to his captain's shoulder-straps,
and the triple gold arabesque on his sleeve and fatigue cap. I believe I
listened as much to the music of his spurs and sabre as I did to his
boyish babble, and at last we stood under the elms on the Fourth Street
corner of the square opposite the Lethal Chamber. Then he laughed and
asked me what I wanted with him. I motioned him to a seat on a bench
under the electric light, and sat down beside him. He looked at me
curiously, with that same searching glance which I hate and fear so in
doctors. I felt the insult of his look, but he did not know it, and I
carefully concealed my feelings.

"Well, old chap," he inquired, "what can I do for you?"

I drew from my pocket the manuscript and notes of the Imperial Dynasty
of America, and looking him in the eye said:

"I will tell you. On your word as a soldier, promise me to read this
manuscript from beginning to end, without asking me a question. Promise
me to read these notes in the same way, and promise me to listen to what
I have to tell later."

"I promise, if you wish it," he said pleasantly. "Give me the paper,
Hildred."

He began to read, raising his eyebrows with a puzzled, whimsical air,
which made me tremble with suppressed anger. As he advanced his, eyebrows
contracted, and his lips seemed to form the word "rubbish."

Then he looked slightly bored, but apparently for my sake read, with an
attempt at interest, which presently ceased to be an effort He started
when in the closely written pages he came to his own name, and when he
came to mine he lowered the paper, and looked sharply at me for a moment
But he kept his word, and resumed his reading, and I let the half-formed
question die on his lips unanswered. When he came to the end and read the
signature of Mr. Wilde, he folded the paper carefully and returned it to
me. I handed him the notes, and he settled back, pushing his fatigue cap
up to his forehead, with a boyish gesture, which I remembered so well in
school. I watched his face as he read, and when he finished I took the
notes with the manuscript, and placed them in my pocket. Then I unfolded
a scroll marked with the Yellow Sign. He saw the sign, but he did not
seem to recognize it, and I called his attention to it somewhat sharply.

"Well," he said, "I see it. What is it?"

"It is the Yellow Sign," I said angrily.

"Oh, that's it, is it?" said Louis, in that flattering voice, which
Doctor Archer used to employ with me, and would probably have employed
again, had I not settled his affair for him.

I kept my rage down and answered as steadily as possible, "Listen, you
have engaged your word?"

"I am listening, old chap," he replied soothingly.

I began to speak very calmly.

"Dr. Archer, having by some means become possessed of the secret of the
Imperial Succession, attempted to deprive me of my right, alleging that
because of a fall from my horse four years ago, I had become mentally
deficient. He presumed to place me under restraint in his own house in
hopes of either driving me insane or poisoning me. I have not forgotten
it. I visited him last night and the interview was final."

Louis turned quite pale, but did not move. I resumed triumphantly, "There
are yet three people to be interviewed in the interests of Mr. Wilde and
myself. They are my cousin Louis, Mr. Hawberk, and his daughter
Constance."

Louis sprang to his feet and I arose also, and flung the paper marked
with the Yellow Sign to the ground.

"Oh, I don't need that to tell you what I have to say," I cried, with a
laugh of triumph. "You must renounce the crown to me, do you hear, to
_me_."

Louis looked at me with a startled air, but recovering himself said
kindly, "Of course I renounce the--what is it I must renounce?"

"The crown," I said angrily.

"Of course," he answered, "I renounce it. Come, old chap, I'll walk back
to your rooms with you."

"Don't try any of your doctor's tricks on me," I cried, trembling with
fury. "Don't act as if you think I am insane."

"What nonsense," he replied. "Come, it's getting late, Hildred."

"No," I shouted, "you must listen. You cannot marry, I forbid it. Do you
hear? I forbid it. You shall renounce the crown, and in reward I grant
you exile, but if you refuse you shall die."

He tried to calm me, but I was roused at last, and drawing my long knife
barred his way.

Then I told him how they would find Dr. Archer in the cellar with his
throat open, and I laughed in his face when I thought of Vance and his
knife, and the order signed by me.

"Ah, you are the King," I cried, "but I shall be King. Who are you to
keep me from Empire over all the habitable earth! I was born the cousin
of a king, but I shall be King!"

Louis stood white and rigid before me. Suddenly a man came running up
Fourth Street, entered the gate of the Lethal Temple, traversed the path
to the bronze doors at full speed, and plunged into the death chamber
with the cry of one demented, and I laughed until I wept tears, for I had
recognized Vance, and knew that Hawberk and his daughter were no longer
in my way.

"Go," I cried to Louis, "you have ceased to be a menace. You will never
marry Constance now, and if you marry any one else in your exile, I will
visit you as I did my doctor last night. Mr. Wilde takes charge of you
to-morrow." Then I turned and darted into South Fifth Avenue, and with a
cry of terror Louis dropped his belt and sabre and followed me like the
wind. I heard him close behind me at the corner of Bleecker Street, and I
dashed into the doorway under Hawberk's sign. He cried, "Halt, or I
fire!" but when he saw that I flew up the stairs leaving Hawberk's shop
below, he left me, and I heard him hammering and shouting at their door
as though it were possible to arouse the dead.

Mr. Wilde's door was open, and I entered crying, "It is done, it is done!
Let the nations rise and look upon their King!" but I could not find Mr.
Wilde, so I went to the cabinet and took the splendid diadem from its
case. Then I drew on the white silk robe, embroidered with the Yellow
Sign, and placed the crown upon my head. At last I was King, King by my
right in Hastur, King because I knew the mystery of the Hyades, and my
mind had sounded the depths of the Lake of Hali. I was King! The first
grey pencillings of dawn would raise a tempest which would shake two
hemispheres. Then as I stood, my every nerve pitched to the highest
tension, faint with the joy and splendour of my thought, without, in the
dark passage, a man groaned.

I seized the tallow dip and sprang to the door. The cat passed me like a
demon, and the tallow dip went out, but my long knife flew swifter than
she, and I heard her screech, and I knew that my knife had found her. For
a moment I listened to her tumbling and thumping about in the darkness,
and then when her frenzy ceased, I lighted a lamp and raised it over my
head. Mr. Wilde lay on the floor with his throat torn open. At first I
thought he was dead, but as I looked, a green sparkle came into his
sunken eyes, his mutilated hand trembled, and then a spasm stretched his
mouth from ear to ear. For a moment my terror and despair gave place to
hope, but as I bent over him his eyeballs rolled clean around in his
head, and he died. Then while I stood, transfixed with rage and despair,
seeing my crown, my empire, every hope and every ambition, my very life,
lying prostrate there with the dead master, _they_ came, seized me
from behind, and bound me until my veins stood out like cords, and my
voice failed with the paroxysms of my frenzied screams. But I still
raged, bleeding and infuriated among them, and more than one policeman
felt my sharp teeth. Then when I could no longer move they came nearer; I
saw old Hawberk, and behind him my cousin Louis' ghastly face, and
farther away, in the corner, a woman, Constance, weeping softly.

"Ah! I see it now!" I shrieked. "You have seized the throne and the
empire. Woe! woe to you who are crowned with the crown of the King in
Yellow!"

[EDITOR'S NOTE.--Mr. Castaigne died yesterday in the Asylum for Criminal
Insane.]

THE MASK

CAMILLA: You, sir, should unmask.

STRANGER: Indeed?

CASSILDA: Indeed it's time. We all have laid aside disguise but you.

STRANGER: I wear no mask.

CAMILLA: (Terrified, aside to Cassilda.) No mask? No mask!

_The King in Yellow, Act I, Scene 2_.

I

Although I knew nothing of chemistry, I listened fascinated. He picked up
an Easter lily which Genevieve had brought that morning from Notre Dame,
and dropped it into the basin. Instantly the liquid lost its crystalline
clearness. For a second the lily was enveloped in a milk-white foam,
which disappeared, leaving the fluid opalescent. Changing tints of orange
and crimson played over the surface, and then what seemed to be a ray of
pure sunlight struck through from the bottom where the lily was resting.
At the same instant he plunged his hand into the basin and drew out the
flower. "There is no danger," he explained, "if you choose the right
moment. That golden ray is the signal."

He held the lily toward me, and I took it in my hand. It had turned to
stone, to the purest marble.

"You see," he said, "it is without a flaw. What sculptor could reproduce
it?"

The marble was white as snow, but in its depths the veins of the lily
were tinged with palest azure, and a faint flush lingered deep in its
heart.

"Don't ask me the reason of that," he smiled, noticing my wonder. "I have
no idea why the veins and heart are tinted, but they always are.
Yesterday I tried one of Genevieve's gold-fish,--there it is."

The fish looked as if sculptured in marble. But if you held it to the
light the stone was beautifully veined with a faint blue, and from
somewhere within came a rosy light like the tint which slumbers in an
opal. I looked into the basin. Once more it seemed filled with clearest
crystal.

"If I should touch it now?" I demanded.

"I don't know," he replied, "but you had better not try."

"There is one thing I'm curious about," I said, "and that is where the
ray of sunlight came from."

"It looked like a sunbeam true enough," he said. "I don't know, it always
comes when I immerse any living thing. Perhaps," he continued, smiling,
"perhaps it is the vital spark of the creature escaping to the source
from whence it came."

I saw he was mocking, and threatened him with a mahl-stick, but he only
laughed and changed the subject.

"Stay to lunch. Genevieve will be here directly."

"I saw her going to early mass," I said, "and she looked as fresh and
sweet as that lily--before you destroyed it."

"Do you think I destroyed it?" said Boris gravely.

"Destroyed, preserved, how can we tell?"

We sat in the corner of a studio near his unfinished group of the
"Fates." He leaned back on the sofa, twirling a sculptor's chisel and
squinting at his work.

"By the way," he said, "I have finished pointing up that old academic
Ariadne, and I suppose it will have to go to the Salon. It's all I have
ready this year, but after the success the 'Madonna' brought me I feel
ashamed to send a thing like that."

The "Madonna," an exquisite marble for which Genevieve had sat, had been
the sensation of last year's Salon. I looked at the Ariadne. It was a
magnificent piece of technical work, but I agreed with Boris that the
world would expect something better of him than that. Still, it was
impossible now to think of finishing in time for the Salon that splendid
terrible group half shrouded in the marble behind me. The "Fates" would
have to wait.

We were proud of Boris Yvain. We claimed him and he claimed us on the
strength of his having been born in America, although his father was
French and his mother was a Russian. Every one in the Beaux Arts called
him Boris. And yet there were only two of us whom he addressed in the
same familiar way--Jack Scott and myself.

Perhaps my being in love with Genevieve had something to do with his
affection for me. Not that it had ever been acknowledged between us. But
after all was settled, and she had told me with tears in her eyes that it
was Boris whom she loved, I went over to his house and congratulated him.
The perfect cordiality of that interview did not deceive either of us, I
always believed, although to one at least it was a great comfort. I do
not think he and Genevieve ever spoke of the matter together, but Boris
knew.

Genevieve was lovely. The Madonna-like purity of her face might have been
inspired by the Sanctus in Gounod's Mass. But I was always glad when she
changed that mood for what we called her "April Manoeuvres." She was
often as variable as an April day. In the morning grave, dignified and
sweet, at noon laughing, capricious, at evening whatever one least
expected. I preferred her so rather than in that Madonna-like
tranquillity which stirred the depths of my heart. I was dreaming of
Genevieve when he spoke again.

"What do you think of my discovery, Alec?"

"I think it wonderful."

"I shall make no use of it, you know, beyond satisfying my own curiosity
so far as may be, and the secret will die with me."

"It would be rather a blow to sculpture, would it not? We painters lose
more than we ever gain by photography."

Boris nodded, playing with the edge of the chisel.

"This new vicious discovery would corrupt the world of art. No, I shall
never confide the secret to any one," he said slowly.

It would be hard to find any one less informed about such phenomena than
myself; but of course I had heard of mineral springs so saturated with
silica that the leaves and twigs which fell into them were turned to
stone after a time. I dimly comprehended the process, how the silica
replaced the vegetable matter, atom by atom, and the result was a
duplicate of the object in stone. This, I confess, had never interested
me greatly, and as for the ancient fossils thus produced, they disgusted
me. Boris, it appeared, feeling curiosity instead of repugnance, had
investigated the subject, and had accidentally stumbled on a solution
which, attacking the immersed object with a ferocity unheard of, in a
second did the work of years. This was all I could make out of the
strange story he had just been telling me. He spoke again after a long
silence.

"I am almost frightened when I think what I have found. Scientists would
go mad over the discovery. It was so simple too; it discovered itself.
When I think of that formula, and that new element precipitated in
metallic scales--"

"What new element?"

"Oh, I haven't thought of naming it, and I don't believe I ever shall.
There are enough precious metals now in the world to cut throats over."

I pricked up my ears. "Have you struck gold, Boris?"

"No, better;--but see here, Alec!" he laughed, starting up. "You and I
have all we need in this world. Ah! how sinister and covetous you look
already!" I laughed too, and told him I was devoured by the desire for
gold, and we had better talk of something else; so when Genevieve came in
shortly after, we had turned our backs on alchemy.

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