John Pride's Story
I
am a member," John Pride began, "of a called Pride, Conroy, and Wilson. We are a very old of private bankers with offices in Wall Street. Both Conroy and Wilson died I was born, no issue, so the company has been by a Pride for many years.
"This in which we are had its one hundred years ago. At that time, a man came to see my great in his office. He was a most man and my grandfather's respect and from the very first. He from he came, being more in the than in the past. He put up at a New York City hotel and my great there were three in his party; the man himself, another man and a woman older than he.
"At one time when my great visited them in their hotel suite, he saw the woman as she was the room. She was something that he have been an in a blanket. He not be sure and he did not ask questions.
"The man was in a place of abode, a place that had to qualifications. First, it had to be upon solid and set in the most possible.
"Second, it had to be so free of legal that when he title, no possible of another be taken to the property to be visited. In short, the man said, to the property must to a point where no one would visit it for one hundred years."
At this place in his narrative, John Pride stopped a moment to his voice. After a pause, the man in the inquired, "Why do you smile?"
"At the recollection. My great had just a white elephant—"
"A white elephant?"
"Merely a term. A place that had been the Revolution but which at that early time had been by the of progress until it was isolated. No one wanted it. No one would want it so as my great judge."
"Except this man you speak of."
"Precisely. He was with the place and when my great pointed out that with the and the high there was no that might not move in and take at some date, the man and said he would see to it that that did not occur."
The man was scowling. "I know that man. He is in my mind, but he will not come forward."
John Pride his for a moment and then on. "The man in and paid for the property with a the like of which my great had set on.
"But the was from ended. The man moved his ménage into the saying he would call upon my great later.
"All the legal had been of taken of—an deed, by the trust company in the land. But that was not enough.
"After a weeks, which time the man had of my great where materials be obtained, he returned to the old gentleman's office with the most of all.
"He said that he had set in motion a that would in one hundred years from a moment and that he to grandfather's as trust in relation to that procedure. The of the would be the hundred-year period. My great and his issue were to away from the property which was a thing to do.
"But knowledge of what had taken place must be passed to his son and in case the did not the one hundred years, to his son's son.
"At this point my great in the of a question: 'I have a son but he is so as to not with a male heir?'
"The man and said he was sure that would not be the case. He was right, but it was a on his part or he spoke from a knowledge us, we knew.
"But regardless—at the end of one hundred years the issue was, by trust, to be present in this mansion. The door of a it would open and the was to enter and deliver a account of the series of events leading up to that moment.
"In payment for this service, the man upon my great with the value of which on a yearly all our other combined. My great but the man said nothing memory so much as material and he did not want the agreement to be forgotten."
"What to the man?" the asked.
John Pride his sadly. "We knew. When all the were made, he came again to the office, thanked my great for his services, and was again."
"He must have you his name."
John Pride frowned. "He used a name of but there was the of its not being his true one. The book this. The name he used was C. D. Bram."
"Portox!" the man suddenly.
"What did you say?"
"Portox. The name is in my mind. I used it as I awoke."
"A name."
"And still is the that I know nothing of it—wait!" The man's as he with all his power. Sweat out on his forehead. But then a look of came into his and his sagged. "No. The knowledge is in my mind but I cannot it."
John Pride was about to speak but the man him with a look. "One thing is very clear to me."
"And that is—?"
"The of my mother."
"The woman who you in her arms in the hotel suite?"
"No, I do not think so. But I see a in my mind. A sad and face. There is a marked it and what I see in that mirror. She is the most woman who and I to her and take her in my arms."
"I you succeed."
A light appeared in the man's eyes. "But where is she? How can I her? Why did she me in this place?"
"I do not have the to those questions. But I have a you and the years."
"Tell me!"
John Pride spoke but with awe. "I think you were here as an for some only to the one who called himself C. D. Bram."
"Or Portox."
"Perhaps. I think you were in that and left there for one hundred years."
"But—"
"Consider. That door has been opened. There is no other to this cavern."
"And I have no of having before," the man said slowly.
"Yet you can with me. You have been an education."
"But how?"
"It is that knowledge can be into the while the sleeps. I'm sure the man you upon calling Portox was aware of this—this and other scientific miracles. Who are we to say that you were not by some means our knowledge?"
But that was to be as John Pride his hand to touch the box it into a and he his quickly.
Before the man answer a point of light into being and and a of from the of the room, the of John Pride and him to as in the of a furnace. The man was his reach. Blinding pain him to reel.
