The Man and the Snake
I
Stretched at ease upon a sofa, in
gown and slippers, Harker Brayton smiled as he read the foregoing sentence in
old Morryster's "Marvells of Science." "The only marvel in the
matter," he said to himself, "is that the wise and learned in
Morryster's day should have believed such nonsense as is rejected by most of
even the ignorant in ours."
A train of reflections
followed—for Brayton was a man of thought— and he unconsciously lowered his
book without altering the direction of his eyes. As soon as the volume had gone
below the line of sight, something in an obscure corner of the room recalled
his attention to his surroundings. What he saw, in the shadow under his bed,
were two small points of light, apparently about an inch apart. They might have
been reflections of the gas jet above him, in metal nail heads; he gave them
but little thought and resumed his reading. A moment later something—some
impulse which it did not occur to him to analyze—impelled him to lower the book
again and seek for what he saw before. The points of light were still there.
They seemed to have become brighter than before, shining with a greenish luster
which he had not at first observed. He thought, too, that they might have moved
a trifle—were somewhat nearer. They were still too much in the shadow, however,
to reveal their nature and origin to an indolent attention, and he resumed his
reading. Suddenly something in the text suggested a thought which made him
start and drop the book for the third time to the side of the sofa, whence,
escaping from his hand, it fell sprawling to the floor, back upward. Brayton,
half-risen, was staring intently into the obscurity beneath the bed, where the
points of light shone with, it seemed to him, an added fire. His attention was
now fully aroused, his gaze eager and imperative. It disclosed, almost directly
beneath the foot rail of the bed, the coils of a large serpent—the points of
light were its eyes! Its horrible head, thrust flatly forth from the innermost
coil and resting upon the outermost, was directed straight toward him, the
definition of the wide, brutal jaw and the idiotlike forehead serving to show
the direction of its malevolent gaze. The eyes were no longer merely luminous
points; they looked into his own with a meaning, a malign significance.
II
A snake in a bedroom of a modern
city dwelling of the better sort is, happily, not so common a phenomenon as to
make explanation altogether needless. Harker Brayton, a bachelor of
thirty-five, a scholar, idler, and something of an athlete, rich, popular, and
of sound health, had returned to San Francisco from all manner of remote and
unfamiliar countries. His tastes, always a trifle luxurious, had taken on an
added exuberance from long privation; and the resources of even the Castle
Hotel being inadequate for their perfect gratification, he had gladly accepted
the hospitality of his friend, Dr. Druring, the distinguished scientist. Dr.
Druring's house, a large, old-fashioned one in what was now an obscure quarter
of the city, had an outer and visible aspect of reserve. It plainly would not
associate with the contiguous elements of its altered environment, and appeared
to have developed some of the eccentricities which come of isolation. One of
these was a "wing," conspicuously irrelevant in point of
architecture, and no less rebellious in the matter of purpose; for it was a
combination of laboratory, menagerie, and museum. It was here that the doctor
indulged the scientific side of his nature in the study of such forms of animal
life as engaged his interest and comforted his taste—which, it must be
confessed, ran rather to the lower forms. For one of the higher types nimbly
and sweetly to recommend itself unto his gentle senses, it had at least to
retain certain rudimentary characteristics allying it to such "dragons of
the prime" as toads and snakes. His scientific sympathies were distinctly
reptilian; he loved nature's vulgarians and described himself as the Zola of
zoology. His wife and daughters, not having the advantage to share his
enlightened curiosity regarding the works and ways of our ill-starred
fellow-creatures, were, with needless austerity, excluded from what he called
the Snakery, and doomed to companionship with their own kind; though, to soften
the rigors of their lot, he had permitted them, out of his great wealth, to
outdo the reptiles in the gorgeousness of their surroundings and to shine with
a superior splendor.
Architecturally, and in point of
"furnishing," the Snakery had a severe simplicity befitting the
humble circumstances of its occupants, many of whom, indeed, could not safely
have been intrusted with the liberty which is necessary to the full enjoyment
of luxury, for they had the troublesome peculiarity of being alive. In their
own apartments, however, they were under as little personal restraint as was
compatible with their protection from the baneful habit of swallowing one
another; and, as Brayton had thoughtfully been apprised, it was more than a
tradition that some of them had at divers times been found in parts of the
premises where it would have embarrassed them to explain their presence.
Despite the Snakery and its uncanny associations—to which, indeed, he gave
little attention—Brayton found life at the Druring mansion very much to his
mind.
III
Beyond a smart shock of surprise
and a shudder of mere loathing, Mr. Brayton was not greatly affected. His first
thought was to ring the call bell and bring a servant; but, although the bell
cord dangled within easy reach, he made no movement toward it; it had occurred
to his mind that the act might subject him to the suspicion of fear, which he
certainly did not feel. He was more keenly conscious of the incongruous nature
of the situation than affected by its perils; it was revolting, but absurd.
The reptile was of a species with
which Brayton was unfamiliar. Its length he could only conjecture; the body at
the largest visible part seemed about as thick as his forearm. In what way was
it dangerous, if in any way? Was it venomous? Was it a constrictor? His
knowledge of nature's danger signals did not enable him to say; he had never
deciphered the code.
If not dangerous, the creature
was at least offensive. It was de trop—"matter out of place"—an
impertinence. The gem was unworthy of the setting. Even the barbarous taste of
our time and country, which had loaded the walls of the room with pictures, the
floor with furniture, and the furniture with bric-a-brac, had not quite fitted
the place for this bit of the savage life of the jungle. Besides—insupportable
thought!—the exhalations of its breath mingled with the atmosphere which he
himself was breathing!
These thoughts shaped themselves
with greater or less definition in Brayton's mind, and begot action. The
process is what we call consideration and decision. It is thus that we are wise
and unwise. It is thus that the withered leaf in an autumn breeze shows greater
or less intelligence than its fellows, falling upon the land or upon the lake.
The secret of human action is an open one—something contracts our muscles. Does
it matter if we give to the preparatory molecular changes the name of will?
Brayton rose to his feet and
prepared to back softly away from the snake, without disturbing it, if
possible, and through the door. People retire so from the presence of the
great, for greatness is power, and power is a menace. He knew that he could
walk backward without obstruction, and find the door without error. Should the
monster follow, the taste which had plastered the walls with paintings had
consistently supplied a rack of murderous Oriental weapons from which he could
snatch one to suit the occasion. In the meantime the snake's eyes burned with a
more pitiless malevolence than ever.
Brayton lifted his right foot
free of the floor to step backward.
That moment he felt a strong
aversion to doing so.
"I am accounted brave,"
he murmured; "is bravery, then, no more than pride? Because there are none
to witness the shame shall I retreat?"
He was steadying himself with his
right hand upon the back of a chair, his foot suspended.
"Nonsense!" he said
aloud; "I am not so great a coward as to fear to seem to myself
afraid."
He lifted the foot a little
higher by slightly bending the knee, and thrust it sharply to the floor—an inch
in front of the other! He could not think how that occurred. A trial with the
left foot had the same result; it was again in advance of the right. The hand
upon the chair back was grasping it; the arm was straight, reaching somewhat
backward. One might have seen that he was reluctant to lose his hold. The
snake's malignant head was still thrust forth from the inner coil as before,
the neck level. It had not moved, but its eyes were now electric sparks,
radiating an infinity of luminous needles.
The man had an ashy pallor. Again
he took a step forward, and another, partly dragging the chair, which, when
finally released, fell upon the floor with a crash. The man groaned; the snake
made neither sound nor motion, but its eyes were two dazzling suns. The reptile
itself was wholly concealed by them. They gave off enlarging rings of rich and
vivid colors, which at their greatest expansion successively vanished like soap
bubbles; they seemed to approach his very face, and anon were an immeasurable
distance away. He heard, somewhere, the continual throbbing of a great drum,
with desultory bursts of far music, inconceivably sweet, like the tones of an
aeolian harp. He knew it for the sunrise melody of Memnon's statue, and thought
he stood in the Nileside reeds, hearing, with exalted sense, that immortal
anthem through the silence of the centuries.
The music ceased; rather, it
became by insensible degrees the distant roll of a retreating thunderstorm. A
landscape, glittering with sun and rain, stretched before him, arched with a
vivid rainbow, framing in its giant curve a hundred visible cities. In the
middle distance a vast serpent, wearing a crown, reared its head out of its
voluminous convolutions and looked at him with his dead mother's eyes. Suddenly
this enchanting landscape seemed to rise swiftly upward, like the drop scene at
a theater, and vanished in a blank. Something struck him a hard blow upon the
face and breast. He had fallen to the floor; the blood ran from his broken nose
and his bruised lips. For a moment he was dazed and stunned, and lay with
closed eyes, his face against the door. In a few moments he had recovered, and
then realized that his fall, by withdrawing his eyes, had broken the spell which
held him. He felt that now, by keeping his gaze averted, he would be able to
retreat. But the thought of the serpent within a few feet of his head, yet
unseen—perhaps in the very act of springing upon him and throwing its coils
about his throat—was too horrible. He lifted his head, stared again into those
baleful eyes, and was again in bondage.
The snake had not moved, and
appeared somewhat to have lost its power upon the imagination; the gorgeous
illusions of a few moments before were not repeated. Beneath that flat and
brainless brow its black, beady eyes simply glittered, as at first, with an
expression unspeakably malignant. It was as if the creature, knowing its
triumph assured, had determined to practice no more alluring wiles.
Now ensued a fearful scene. The
man, prone upon the floor, within a yard of his enemy, raised the upper part of
his body upon his elbows, his head thrown back, his legs extended to their full
length. His face was white between its gouts of blood; his eyes were strained
open to their uttermost expansion. There was froth upon his lips; it dropped
off in flakes. Strong convulsions ran through his body, making almost
serpentine undulations. He bent himself at the waist, shifting his legs from
side to side. And every movement left him a little nearer to the snake. He
thrust his hands forward to brace himself back, yet constantly advanced upon
his elbows.
IV
Dr. Druring and his wife sat in
the library. The scientist was in rare good humor.
"I have just obtained, by
exchange with another collector," he said, "a splendid specimen of
the Ophiophagus."
"And what may that be?"
the lady inquired with a somewhat languid interest.
"Why, bless my soul, what
profound ignorance! My dear, a man who ascertains after marriage that his wife
does not know Greek, is entitled to a divorce. The Ophiophagus is a snake which
eats other snakes."
"I hope it will eat all
yours," she said, absently shifting the lamp. "But how does it get
the other snakes? By charming them, I suppose."
"That is just like you,
dear," said the doctor, with an affectation of petulance. "You know
how irritating to me is any allusion to that vulgar superstition about the
snake's power of fascination."
The conversation was interrupted
by a mighty cry which rang through the silent house like the voice of a demon
shouting in a tomb. Again and yet again it sounded, with terrible distinctness.
They sprang to their feet, the man confused, the lady pale and speechless with
fright. Almost before the echoes of the last cry had died away the doctor was
out of the room, springing up the staircase two steps at a time. In the
corridor, in front of Brayton's chamber, he met some servants who had come from
the upper floor. Together they rushed at the door without knocking. It was unfastened,
and gave way. Brayton lay upon his stomach on the floor, dead. His head and
arms were partly concealed under the foot rail of the bed. They pulled the body
away, turning it upon the back. The face was daubed with blood and froth, the
eyes were wide open, staring—a dreadful sight!
"Died in a fit," said
the scientist, bending his knee and placing his hand upon the heart. While in
that position he happened to glance under the bed. "Good God!" he
added; "how did this thing get in here?"
He reached under the bed, pulled
out the snake, and flung it, still coiled, to the center of the room, whence,
with a harsh, shuffling sound, it slid across the polished floor till stopped
by the wall, where it lay without motion. It was a stuffed snake; its eyes were
two shoe buttons.