It left me speechless, but Jesperson’s face was alight with curiosity as he asked, “Weren’t you frightened?”
“Oh, yes! Certainly! Terrified!” She gave a nervous laugh and no longer looked like anything but a pretty, modern, ordinary girl. “Never so frightened in all my … But then that was part of it, don’t you see? Who would not be frightened to die?”
He nodded. “You wanted to meet Death, like the boy in the fairy tale—and for Mr. Smurl, I presume, it was to be an unrivaled opportunity to advertise the worth of his wares?”
She looked as if he had made the most astounding of deductions, like Sherlock Holmes laying out the entire course of a man’s career after a glance at his hat. “Yes! Exactly! How very clever of you! Of course, people would say it was terribly wrong of him if they knew, but it wasn’t like that, you see! Not a real crime—certainly not a crime against me. I begged him—I practically made him do it! And I was never in any danger, for he knew it would work—”
“Having already used the same plan at least three times before,” I interjected. “On those poor women. Surely you won’t tell me they were all just like you, eager to taste death? Or help him prove the worth of his invention?”
She grimaced. “No, of course not. Their reasons … They did it for love. That’s all. They were so crazy in love with Albert Smurl that they’d do anything he asked, agree to any crazy scheme that would allow them to live with him.”
“Afterwards, when they found they weren’t the only one, they still felt the same?”
“You heard them. They are strange, sad creatures, I agree! Love is a peculiar, powerful force, don’t you think, Miss Lane?” The look she gave me was disconcerting, a sudden connection that was the more unexpected after my earlier feeling about her.
“It does make some people act like fools,” I said.
“Albert Smurl is one of them.” She sighed. “He fell in love with me—I never invited his affection!—and then he was unable to resist temptation; especially, I suppose, as all his experience with women suggested that I was bound to return his feelings, that I would fall in love with him soon enough …” She gave me a pleading look. “He was always kind to me. I can’t blame him for loving me, Miss Lane, I truly cannot. What he did was wrong, certainly, but I am not blameless. I gave him my full cooperation, and now that I am free, I should like to say that is the end. I will not bring charges against the man.”
She sounded very sure—not like someone forced to act against her will by a canny hypnotist—but I am no expert on these matters. Still, we could discuss the matter of criminal charges later. We had other things to talk about.
As the train carried us ever farther from Smurl’s territory, the physical distance made it possible to raise the question of when and how Miss Travers might return to her own home, and for her to consider it without alarm. She told us that she did not know why, but the very act of moving towards her own street had made her heart pound uncomfortably hard and her breath come more shallowly: she seemed to be afraid of something she could not name.
Jesperson said, “I suspect Smurl planted a suggestion in your mind while you were in his thrall, to keep you from returning to your family in the event that you managed to escape. You would not know why but would simply feel an aversion to going to your old address.”
She looked distressed. “How dreadful! Does that mean I can never go home again? What if my family should move to another house? Could I go to them there?”
Jesperson smiled. “Hypnotic suggestions can be countered—especially once you are aware of them. I can teach you a simple technique, or, if you prefer, with your permission, I can easily rid you of the problems he created. I have studied the arts of hypnosis …”
Was there no end to his talents?
Although I thought I would not be so eager to allow yet another strange man access to my mind, there is something so likeable about Jasper Jesperson—and he is so obviously trustworthy—that I was not surprised that Miss Travers expressed her gratitude for the offer.
“But when I do go home,” she said hesitantly, “whatever shall I tell them? They all think I am dead. How can I possibly explain? What story can I tell?”
“You must tell them the truth,” I said at once. “However improbable, however unlikely … the truth has a force that cannot be denied; much greater than any fiction you attempt to contrive.”
“But … then I should have to mention … his name.”
I wondered if her reluctance was entirely due to another posthypnotic command. There was certainly much to inhibit any well-bred young girl from admitting to abduction by a serial bigamist. She was undoubtedly sensible of the social consequences that would follow once her story became public. She might claim—it might even be true—that he had treated her with scrupulous courtesy, as a guest in his home, but still she would be regarded with suspicion, as “damaged goods” ruined forever in the marriage market. Society puts a heavy burden on its females. Some carry that burden without noticing, some are able to shrug it off, others manage to adapt in some way or another to the lot imposed upon them. I did not know Alcinda well enough to know if she would think her “taste of death” had been worth the lasting suspicion.
“You will have to bring Mr. Smurl into it. I don’t see any other way … After all, he has invented the device that allowed you to be released from your premature grave.”
“But no one would believe you had been entombed for weeks,” Jesperson added. “Not looking as well as you do.”
She flushed a little, and smiled up at him from under her lashes, although I perceived nothing flirtatious in his manner.
He went on: “You must have been rescued soon after the burial, although it was kept quiet. Perhaps Mr. Smurl’s wife—just the one, mind you; those other ladies must be her unwed sisters—tenderly nursed you back to health. They did not alert your family through fear that at any moment you would expire, and their reluctance to arouse false hopes.”
“Yes, yes,” she said eagerly. “That might do! I think that might be believed. It is close enough to what happened—we might say that only in the last few days have I been back to normal, truly well enough to risk going out … We might say that I awoke while my nurse slept, and did not recognize my surroundings and took fright …” She frowned, and her gaze turned inward; I saw her lips move as she rehearsed her careful lies.
We arrived at 203-A to be greeted by the most welcome smells of cooking. Without knowing when we might arrive, Mrs. Jesperson had made the best possible use of the beef, cooking it slowly in a large pot with onions, carrots, parsnips, turnips, and potatoes, producing a dish that could be reheated, as well as being substantial enough to feed a crowd.
We dined heartily on the ragout (so she called what, in my childhood home, had been simply stew) along with lightly steamed cabbage and a loaf of fresh, crusty bread. Afterwards there was cheese and apple pie with cream.
It was the first meal of the day for Jasper and me, and our guest demonstrated an appetite that matched ours, so that we scarcely said a word beyond “pass the salt” or “may I have more bread, please” until we were finished and, replete, sank back in our chairs to recover while Mrs. Jesperson went to put the kettle on.
Just then there was a knock at the street door. Jasper went to answer, and moments later, Felicity all but flew into the room.
“Is it true? You have found her? Oh, Cinda! My Cinda!”
Alcinda nearly overturned her chair in her haste to rise, and in an instant they were hugging each other and weeping with joy.
“But how? How did you know?” Pulling away from her younger sister a moment, Alcinda looked from her to us, bewildered.