The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington (top novels of all time TXT) 📗

shooing flies away from her with a palm-leaf fan.

Mrs. Horner’s parted lips closed again abruptly, and became compressed; her shoulders moved a little, then jerked repeatedly; her small chest heaved; she gasped, and the compressed lips relaxed to a slight contortion, then began to move, whispering and bringing forth indistinguishable mutterings.

Suddenly she spoke in a loud, husky voice:

“Lopa is here!”

“Yes,” Eugene said dryly. “That’s what you said last time. I remember ‘Lopa.’ She’s your ‘control’ I think you said.”

“I’m Lopa,” said the husky voice. “I’m Lopa herself.”

“You mean I’m to suppose you’re not Mrs. Horner now?”

“Never was Mrs. Horner!” the voice declared, speaking undeniably from Mrs. Horner’s lips⁠—but with such conviction that Eugene, in spite of everything, began to feel himself in the presence of a third party, who was none the less an individual, even though she might be another edition of the apparently somnambulistic Mrs. Horner. “Never was Mrs. Horner or anybody but just Lopa. Guide.”

“You mean you’re Mrs. Horner’s guide?” he asked.

“Your guide now,” said the voice with emphasis, to which was incongruously added a low laugh. “You came here once before. Lopa remembers.”

“Yes⁠—so did Mrs. Horner.”

Lopa overlooked his implication, and continued, quickly: “You build. Build things that go. You came here once and old gentleman on this side, he spoke to you. Same old gentleman here now. He tell Lopa he’s your grandfather⁠—no, he says ‘father.’ He’s your father.”

“What’s his appearance?”

“How?”

“What does he look like?”

“Very fine! White beard, but not long beard. He says someone else wants to speak to you. See here. Lady. Not his wife, though. No. Very fine lady! Fine lady, fine lady!”

“Is it my sister?” Eugene asked.

“Sister? No. She is shaking her head. She has pretty brown hair. She is fond of you. She is someone who knows you very well but she is not your sister. She is very anxious to say something to you⁠—very anxious. Very fond of you; very anxious to talk to you. Very glad you came here⁠—oh, very glad!”

“What is her name?”

“Name,” the voice repeated, and seemed to ruminate. “Name hard to get⁠—always very hard for Lopa. Name. She wants to tell me her name to tell you. She wants you to understand names are hard to make. She says you must think of something that makes a sound.” Here the voice seemed to put a question to an invisible presence and to receive an answer. “A little sound or a big sound? She says it might be a little sound or a big sound. She says a ring⁠—oh, Lopa knows! She means a bell! That’s it, a bell.”

Eugene looked grave. “Does she mean her name is Belle?”

“Not quite. Her name is longer.”

“Perhaps,” he suggested, “she means that she was a belle.”

“No. She says she thinks you know what she means. She says you must think of a colour. What colour?” Again Lopa addressed the unknown, but this time seemed to wait for an answer.

“Perhaps she means the colour of her eyes,” said Eugene.

“No. She says her colour is light⁠—it’s a light colour and you can see through it.”

“Amber?” he said, and was startled, for Mrs. Horner, with her eyes still closed, clapped her hands, and the voice cried out in delight:

“Yes! She says you know who she is from amber. Amber! Amber! That’s it! She says you understand what her name is from a bell and from amber. She is laughing and waving a lace handkerchief at me because she is pleased. She says I have made you know who it is.”

This was the strangest moment of Eugene’s life, because, while it lasted, he believed that Isabel Amberson, who was dead, had found means to speak to him. Though within ten minutes he doubted it, he believed it then.

His elbows pressed hard upon the table, and, his head between his hands, he leaned forward, staring at the commonplace figure in the easy-chair. “What does she wish to say to me?”

“She is happy because you know her. No⁠—she is troubled. Oh⁠—a great trouble! Something she wants to tell you. She wants so much to tell you. She wants Lopa to tell you. This is a great trouble. She says⁠—oh, yes, she wants you to be⁠—to be kind! That’s what she says. That’s it. To be kind.”

“Does she⁠—”

“She wants you to be kind,” said the voice. “She nods when I tell you this. Yes; it must be right. She is a very fine lady. Very pretty. She is so anxious for you to understand. She hopes and hopes you will. Someone else wants to speak to you. This is a man. He says⁠—”

“I don’t want to speak to anyone else,” said Eugene quickly. “I want⁠—”

“This man who has come says that he is a friend of yours. He says⁠—”

Eugene struck the table with his fist. “I don’t want to speak to anyone else, I tell you!” he cried passionately. “If she is there I⁠—” He caught his breath sharply, checked himself, and sat in amazement. Could his mind so easily accept so stupendous a thing as true? Evidently it could!

Mrs. Horner spoke languidly in her own voice: “Did you get anything satisfactory?” she asked. “I certainly hope it wasn’t like that other time when you was cross because they couldn’t get anything for you.”

“No, no,” he said hastily. “This was different. It was very interesting.”

He paid her, went to his hotel, and thence to his train for home. Never did he so seem to move through a world of dream-stuff: for he knew that he was not more credulous than other men, and, if he could believe what he had believed, though he had believed it for no longer than a moment or two, what hold had he or any other human being on reality?

His credulity vanished (or so he thought) with his recollection that it was he, and not the alleged “Lopa,” who had suggested the word “amber.” Going over the mortifying, plain facts of his experience, he found that Mrs. Horner, or the subdivision of Mrs. Horner known as “Lopa,” had told him to think of a bell