“You are no doubt quite right about the book I wrote, and the public
demonstrations and proofs we have given of the results of our great
fluid upon matter and mind, being the cause of so much trouble. On that
score, Juan, you are right. But there have been no evil results, and
there will be none. But what is this? Look, Juan, look; who is this the
picture of? Don’t be mistaken, man; don’t. Be sure you speak correctly.
Have you seen the face before?”
“My sight is not good, your Honor. It’s failing,” replied the frightened
man, getting further away from his master, out of pure fear. “My sight
is nigh gone, your Honor.”
“Can it be? Can it be the face of the one I loved? Of the one I now
love?”
“It is Helen Hinckley’s picture, papa, taken in that life long gone by,”
cried Catalina, grasping the Governor’s hand.
“Child, how do you know? You have not seen it.”
“Oh, I do know, I knew last night he was going to bring it. I heard him
say so at your lecture last night. He _remembers_, you know. He is
trying to palliate the wrongs he did in that day long gone by. He is
afraid that retribution will overtake him, that he will be reduced to
poverty.”
“Did I not tell you, your Honor, that she was no child. That she is a
ghost a-talking like a grown woman philosopher,” ventured Juan, edging
nearer the Governor, while he glared at Catalina as if she were a spook.
“Be sensible, Juan. Be sensible. I do admit, however, that the child is
a wonder even to me; that she has a power of speech that would be the
envy of many a collegian. But she is a child of flesh and blood,
nevertheless, and a wonderful creation, too,” concluded the Governor.
Catalina put an end to further remarks by him, by saying: “What is it,
dear papa, written on the back of the picture?”
The Governor turned the photograph around, and said: “To be sure, child,
there is something written on it. It is very dim. One moment—I will use
some of our restorative liquid, and then read it.”
In the center of his bedroom stood a beautifully carved rosewood table,
on which was a magnificently beautiful piece of sculpture. It
represented a little girl, about eight years old, distributing the olive
leaves from a branch which seemed to be always full. The Governor placed
his hand fondly upon the head of the statue, and at the same moment held
the back of the photograph over the mouth of the marble representation
of the child. A vapor spread over the pasteboard, yellow and stained by
time, and in three seconds, every word written thereon stood out in bold
relief.
He read aloud: “My baby girl, Helen Hinckley, July 3d, 1898. Boston,
Massachusetts. Age, eight.”
“The same, the same,” replied the Governor, his voice full of emotion.
“But it does not tell me enough! How am I to know that this was brought
here by the ‘Plunger from Kansas.’”
“On the paper in your hand,” said Catalina, “is a message from the
‘Plunger.’”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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