Karma: a novel

Front matter

KARMA KARMA I S«Hl BV A. P. SINNETT, AUTHOR OF "THE OCCULT WORLD" AND " ESOTERIC BUDDHISM.' IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON— CHAPMAN and HALL LIMITED. 1885. (All Sights reserved.) WESTMINSTER: PRINTED BY NICHOLS AND SONS, 25, PARLIAMENT STREET. CONTENTS. VOLUME I. CHAP. page I. — En Route to the Castle . . 1 II. — The " Admiral " hoists her Flag . 14 Til. — The Purpose of the Party . . 43 IV. — Professor Massilton . . 66 V. — A Visit to the Dungeons . . 79 VI. — Convicted of Clairvoyance . . 95 VII. — The Baron's Arrival . . .111 VIII. — A curious Manifestation . . 127 IX. — The Higher Life . . . 147 X. — The beautiful Miss Vaughan. . 160 XI. — The Baron's Explanation . . 171 XII. — A fresh Development . . . 184 XIII. — Contrasted Visions . . . 217 XIV. — A quiet Evening .... 248 XV. — An exciting Night .... 267 XVI. — Occult power in Excelsis . . KAEMA

Chapter I. En Route To The Castle

"It's Mrs. Miller's party though it's the Baron's castle, I assure you, Mrs. Vaughan. She has full authority to issue invitations." The speaker was a slightly built, well dressed man of about fifty, with a fair moustache, light-coloured clothes, and a buoyant, airy manner. The scene of the conversation was the pleasant garden of the Hotel du Nord at Cologne, and the group engaged in it, three ladies and the Captain — Captain Miller, R.N. " I do not understand," he went on, "what right Mrs. Miller has to be giving parties in another fellow's castle ; but my experience of VOL. I. B KARMA married life is, that a husband's business is to obey orders and ask no questions." " Don't be too stupid, Jem," — this remark naturally coming from Mrs. Miller. "This once you know as much about the matter as I do myself.

Baron Friedrich said, when the arrangement was made in London months ago, that the party must have a lady at the head of it, and that I was to be the lady. That's all the mystery there is in the affair. I would have no hesitation in asking any friends I thought likely to be congenial, even if they were only friends of my own ; but as regards you and Miss Vaughan it goes without saying that the Baron will be delighted to have you." " I'm sure it will be charming, Mrs. Miller, and I hope mamma will decide for us to go ; but do tell me all about it yourself. We have only had the general idea as yet from Captain Miller." "Jem ought to have been able to have explained the whole arrangement properly, Miss Vaughan, but he never will take trouble enough to make anything clear, and so he is always misleading people " " She doesn't know yet whether I've told it right or wrong," the Captain put in, sot to voce, addressing the elder lady, and appa. rently enjoying his ill-usage.

" At all events, I'm putting the thing in a charitable light ; for if you do take trouble, and yet make mistakes all the same, so much the worse for you." Jem being thus non-suited, Mrs. Miller went on in reply to Miss Vaughan — " Baron Friedrich had been telling me about the castle at Heiligenfels, which he has had put into thorough repair inside, so that it is a charming country-house to live in, while it still looks like a regular Rhine ruin from the outside — at all events, unless you look close with a telescope ; and he asked me whether it wouldn't be a good idea to have a party of people to stay there in the autumn. I applauded the notion; and then we agreed that the party, to be really enjoyable, ought to consist of people who had shown some intelligent leaning towards inquiry into psychic matters.

That's how the arrangement grew up." " To have the Baron helpless," said Miss b2 KARMA Vaughan, " in his own house, and make him tell one all sorts of things that he never would do more than half explain in London — that would be delightful." " I want the time to be profitably spent by all of us," Mrs. Miller continued. "We'll have serious reading as a foundation for first-rate talk. What is there in the month of August, I should like to know, that ought to make people put away their books, and shut up their minds, and do nothing but gape at mountains and waterfalls ? " "But with me, Mrs. Miller, the autumn is my great time for reading and study. There is absolutely no opportunity of opening a book during the London season. I do all my reading down in Devonshire." " Ah, well, everybody does not live in such a fashionable whirl as Miss Lucy Vaughan.

But what I say is right either way. If you can't be sensible in the season it's all the more reason why you should be in the autumn." " Everybody knows," said the Captain, " that Miss Vaughan is sensible all the year round. Don't let her put it that way, Miss Vaughan ; you're not her husband." " Miss Vaughan is sensible enough to understand what I mean even if you're not, Jem. So just be quiet for a little, please, and let me speak." "Well, Lucy at least may be content, as she is complimented on both sides," said her mother, Mrs. Vaughan, the elder lady of the group, with a little air of waving off further comments on "Jem." "So you were asked by the Baron, I understand, Mrs. Miller, to organise his party on the principle you suggested, and have done so accordingly." " Quite so, Mrs. Vaughan, and, mind, I am not representing it as especially a fashionable party, though they are all people you might meet in London any day."

" But indeed, if there is a question which never rises in my mind about people, it is the question whether or not they are fashionable. The attraction for me in your invitation, Mrs. Miller, I frankly con fess, always recognising that which lies in your own pleasant society, is centred in KARMA the Baron himself. I am more than in terested in him." " The Baron is perfect, of course, and he has not a thought in this matter, I assure you, beyond realising my wishes in all respects. I have mapped out all the plans, and have had quantities of all the books we shall want sent on to Heiligenfels, and Sir John Hexton is going to send a steam launch for excursions on the river." "But, my dear Mrs. Miller, have you recruited Sir John Hexton for one of your intellectual party ? " " Oh, well, perhaps I'll convert him in time, but he is a connection of the Baron's, you know — his brother-in-law, and I think it was the Baron wanted him asked.

Claude Merland is more one of my selec tions. He's coming, and his friend Annerly, as clever as he is ugly to look at, poor creature, and my niece Marian Blane, and Mrs. Lakesby. Have you ever met Mrs. Lakesby ? " " No, but as a friend either of Baron Friedrich, or of yours, I am sure I should meet her with pleasure." It had been almost settled before the little conversation recorded that Mrs. Vaughan would accept the invitation to the castle; and, before the two couples separated to make ready for the table d'hote, Mrs. Miller had the great satisfaction of receiving a definite promise that she and her daughter would come. " For you know, Jem," said the energetic lady — "the Admiral" as she was sometimes called by her intimates, in recognition of her authority over the Captain —when they had gone up to their room together, " I don't mean that I aim especially at having this party talked about ; but still, if it is talked about, the Vaughans will give it a cachet.

It is quite providential that their house in Devonshire should be in the builders' hands after that fire. They hardly ever come abroad in the autumn. They have great parties of their own at Seabury Hill. I tell you I should never have had the impudence to ask Mrs. Vaughan to Heiligenfels if it had not been for this odd coincidence of their coming to the Rhine of their own accord." " Invitations you give in the Baron's KARMA name, Milly," said the Captain, lifting his good-tempered face out of a basin of water, and blowing the drops out of his moustache, " do honour — where the dickens is the towel — do honour to whoever receives them, no matter who they are. And if I were you, Milly, I think I would keep him as much as possible in the foreground of this business and not let anybody forget, you know, that, after all " " Why, good gracious, Jem, if there is a human being I reverence and honour it is Baron Friedrich.

And I know very well that Mrs. Vaughan is not coming out of her way to pay a visit to Captain and Mrs. Miller. I'm honouring him when I show myself proud of having the management of his party. Don't be afraid of my making a fool of myself or disgracing the flag." The Captain's face was dry by this time, and he was in a position to make a demonstration of confidence in his superior officer appropriate to her sex and attractions ; for " the Admiral " was about a dozen years the Captain's junior, with bright brown hair and eyes, a trim neat figure finished off with hands she could afford to make prominent use of in argument, and feet that never feared the consequences of a short skirt. Meanwhile Miss Vaughan had gone with her mother to the little saloon attached to the rooms selected for them, for their night's rest at Cologne.

" Did you know Baron von Mondstern had English connections, mamma ? " asked the young lady. " I always thought he dropped from the clouds without any one having the privilege of claiming kin with him." " Lady Hexton was of German birth I know, though I don't remember having heard she was his sister. He is so re markable a man himself, however, that one's attention is concentrated on him. And there is no mystery about his origin to excite curiosity on that score. He is the last of his family left living, but Count Blumenthal " — naming a famous German diplomate — " knows all about his people, and has known him at intervals from boyhood." KARMA " And yet one can't understand him altogether." " One can't understand him at all. He has all the qualities that make men shine in society, and yet he very rarely emerges from what seems a life of almost com plete seclusion.

Then you cannot account for this by supposing him a misanthrope or unsound in mind, for he is the most genial, cheerful, and sympathetic friend when he does appear in society " " And is simply a god-like creature to look at," added Lucy, with frank enthusiasm. " I think he is the best linguist I know," said Mrs. Vaughan, reflectively. "In all the languages that I know anything of he seems quite equally at home." " But, mamma, the oddest thing about him is that you may say anything in the world to him without drawing him on. You know what I mean ? " " My dear Lucy, I know what you mean much too well. I think it would be better if you made fewer experiments in drawing people on." " Only a little, little way, mamma dear. It's so easy to drive them off, and you never can tell what people are like without giving them little opportunities, and seeing what use they make of them.

But it is no use to give Baron Friedrich opportunities " — and the girl shook her beautiful head and sighed with the utmost simplicity. Lucy Vaughan it should be explained was a tall and stately beauty, with large blue eyes and sunny hair, an animated mouth, in a perfect Cupid's bow, and a joyous exuberance of inanner. " It's a little odd," said Mrs. Vaughan, following her own thoughts rather than pay ing attention to her daughter's touching lament, " that he should have put his house in Mrs. Miller's hands. He might have found so many people one would have thought." " But if everybody is to read and talk about psychic mysteries, mamma, Mrs'. Miller is at all events, the right person to be hostess. She will hardly ever talk of any thing else." " But the gossip about musical-boxes, and flowers, and so forth, that Mrs. Miller KARMA is fond of, lies such immeasurable leagues below the Baron's level."

Then in a lighter tone, "So you have been giving him oppor tunities, my dear, have you, and all in vain ? I don't think you chose a suitable opening for a display of your powers. Would it be indiscreet to ask you for further details ? " " My dear mamma, there has never been time for details. He has always dragged some third person into the conversation directly it bade fair to be in the least degree interesting. At Lady Minterville's, up the river, I actually asked him to row me in a boat, and yet he managed matters so as to turn me over to Lord Millborough." " And I'm sure you ought to have been satisfied." " I don't think Lord Millborough was, con sidering the temper I was in." " My dear Lucy " (with a shade of more serious annoyance), " it is a pity that you should ever let yourself be put out of temper ; and I'm sure I should have regretted it, especially if I had known of it then."

Miss Vaughan carefully examined the pendulum of the clock on the mantelpiece, against which she was leaning, for some appreciable interval, holding a glove she had just taken off by the tips of its fingers in her teeth. Then she waved the glove about a little, and let it drop into her hand, and said with a smile breaking over features which were never used to wear a grave ex pression for long, "Well, perhaps it shall be as you wish, mamma, but you know I always reserve my right to be a Sister of Mercy ! "

Chapter II. The

"ADMIRAL" HOISTS HER FLAG. Baron Friedrich was not at the castle him self when Captain and Mrs. Miller reached it, but this was no infraction of the programme. He had previously explained that he would be obliged to visit a distant part of Germany for a few days about the time fixed for the commencement of the autumn party ; but that he wished Mrs. Miller to take command of the house in his absence, and receive the guests, all the more decisively in the character of chatelaine, with no one her right to dispute. " I shall be but one more guest when I arrive, please to remember, dear madam," he wrote in a note that was handed to Mrs. THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 15 Miller by the German major-domo on her arrival ; " the servants quite understand that you are mistress, and that I am under great obligations to you, in that you enable me to have all the pleasure and none of the trouble incidental to a restoration to the uses of civilized society of the old Heiligenfelsen Schloss.

The little room I reserve for my own occupation when I return is its only Bluebeard's chamber for you. Survey the rest at your leisure and allot the apartments at your pleasure." "Which is the Baron's room?" asked Mrs. Miller, promptly, on reading the note, the sunny morning they arrived by carriage from the nearest station of the railway from Cologne, about four miles distant. She and the Captain, it may be explained, were not accompanied by the Vaughans, who had come to the Rhine in deference to Miss Lucy's desire to visit certain places along its banks, and proposed to see these first, finishing their little tour at the restored castle. " Poor old Bluebeard ! " laughed the Cap tain, " what an insight he had into female character." KARMA " You ridiculous Jem ! How can I allot the rooms if I don't know which is to be left for the Baron ?

I did not say I wanted to see the room. I asked which it was." It appeared, however, that the Baron's room was high up a turret-staircase, and the inspection of the castle, by the suggestion of Franz, the butler, was undertaken in a more systematic way. In the restorations the general plan of the original building had been kept to as closely as possible, and the principal entrance gate led into an outer courtyard, now cheerfully laid out as a flower-garden ; and to the left, out of this, another archway led to the inner courtyard, from which three entrances gave access to the interior of the building. Of course the whole structure was perched on the top of a hill overlooking the river, and the jagged edges of its upper walls were carefully left to preserve the outlines time and decay had bestowed on them.

There was no need to fear that the crumbling of the battlements had extended to the foundations. . The lower parts of the castle were too solidly put together to be any less able than when first THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 17 i <■■ erected, to support the floors and roof of an inhabited building. The outer gate being at the back, or on the landward face of the edifice, the entrance to the right of the inner courtyard as you went in led through an outer vestibule to the grand hall of the castle, overlooking the Rhine. In former days, indeed, though the hall faced the Rhine, it can hardly be said to have overlooked it, for the long narrow windows high up in the wall commanded no convenient view of the scenery. Probably this offered little to interest the old robber knights who came back from Palestine, whitewashed of all their sins past, present, and to come, gaily prepared to spend the rest of their days at Heiligenfels, way laying the commerce of the Rhine, and cutting their neighbours' throats as opportunities offered.

But the architect of the restoration had cunningly cut down these windows to the level of the hall floor ; and, throwing them into one another, had con verted them, below, into a series of glass doors, which led out on to a terrace— a completely .modern invention — from which a magnifi vol. I. c KARMA cent panorama of the winding stream, and the distant hills beyond and on either hand, was commanded. In the hall itself some suits of armour, with authentic histories connecting them with ancestors of the Mondstern family, had been set up on either side of the fireplace opposite the principal windows ; and lance in hand, the butt resting on the ground, they stood erect as sentinels beside the broad stone hearth, that modern taste had decorated — in view of the small likelihood that it would be required to glow with burning logs in August — with delicate glass screens, inlaid with flowers and ferns.

This principal hall had been fitted up as the drawing-room of the modernised castle, and a communication through two or three small rooms in the corner of the building led round to another large hall in the next face of the quadrangle, looking up the river, which had been devoted to the uses of a salle-a-manger. Abundant accom modation for guests had been secured on the upper floor, and, in two or three cases, turrets afforded a third story, while the broad roof of thc grand hall and stone THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 19 terraces around the battlements promised charming opportunities for al fresco enjoy ments on warm summer evenings. An awning covering a portion of this upper promenade, in the angle formed by the battlements, and the principal turret at the corner of the building at the upper end of the river face, provided moreover for the occupation of this part of the roof even during the day while the sun might be shining.

Throughout, the castle had been furnished with all the appliances of comfort that modern upholstery could yield. The bed rooms, for the most part, were cheerfully papered, or panelled with light-coloured fabrics, and fitted up with light wood furniture. In other cases the German taste for deep-toned hangings and dark walnut had been allowed to prevail ; but, on the whole, the effect of the interior was that of an English country-house, embellished with a great quantity of mediæval treasures — arms, pictures, and carving, but not sacri ficing its primary purpose — that of providing c KARMA its inmates with the luxuries of their own era — to any fanatical pursuit of unities. " The ruin will suffice for a fellow of simple tastes like me," said the Captain, after the tour of the house had been accomplished.

" That octagon room in the main tower, with the conservatory so nicely hitched on to the rock outside, is just thc place I could imagine myself smoking a cigarette in, with very tolerable comfort." " Don't you flatter yourself, Jem my boy," replied the Admiral, calmly ; " that octagon room is going to be my lady's bower. We'll find you a roomy dungeon somewhere underground, that you can have for a sulkery all to yourself." " Cool and quiet and shady. That's not half a bad idea of yours, Milly. A fellow would be all to himself, and out of the way of the women. Why shouldn't one fit up a dungeon with a reading-lamp and an easy chair ? With a latch-key in his pocket what more would a fellow want ? " " You're always thinking of your own comforts, Jem. Do try now and be un selfish for a moment and help me choose THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 21 my private room.

Because I shall receive people in the octagon room, so I must have some place where I can't be disturbed when I want to write letters." " By all means let's choose you all the rooms you'll want, because if you're not comfortable you won't leave me in peace in my dungeon." An arrangement was ultimately discovered by which Miss Blane, Mrs. Miller's niece, could have a room adjoining one that appeared well suited in all respects for Mrs. Miller's study, and had the further advantage of opening out of her bedroom. This plan rendered it necessary that the Captain's dressing - room should be at a little distance ; but he pointed out that it was a capital little den in itself, and that he could go backwards and forwards in a dressing-gown and slippers in a way he particularly liked. " It makes a fellow seem so independent when he is in his own quarters."

" I wouldn't allow it for a moment if I didn't know you would be perfectly com fortable so, Jem," Mrs. Miller assured him ; KARMA and thus the afternoon was joyously spent in the distribution of the abundant territory at her disposal ; servants following the queen regent of the castle with cards on which the names of the expected guests had been already written, and affixing these to the various doors as Mrs. Miller gave out her decisions. The first representatives of the expected party arrived in time for dinner that even ing, in the persons of two young men whom Captain Miller espied from the battlements, (where he had gone up to test a conviction he had formed in favour of battlements as a place to smoke cigarettes on) walking up the lower convolutions of the road up to the castle. " Milly, dear," he announced, having descended to the octagon room for the purpose, " Claude Merland and Annerly are coming up the road."

" Very well, Jem, you can go and receive them in the outer courtyard, and bring them to see me here ; and bring them in through the dining-hall and the library ; I would like to show Merland the grand hall my- THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 23 self." Mrs. Miller was already quite at home at the castle, and the octagon room was comfortably littered with books, writing materials and work-baskets; for, though its new mistress preferred to occupy herself in the intervals of conversation with books and pens rather than with needles of any sort, she liked to have some rather showy wool-work or crochet en evidence wher ever she took up her abode. Mrs. Miller's pug, moreover, in a basket with pink silk linings, was also by this time settled in a corner of a window-seat, thoughtfully allotted to him on account of the good view it commanded of the passing Rhine steamers.

Neptune, Mrs. Miller would sometimes ex plain, always liked to see the panorama of life. It diverted his thoughts from himself and assisted digestion. Claude Merland, whom the sunny-tempered Captain walked some little distance down the road to meet, was a young fellow of five or six and twenty, well-made, fair haired, good-looking, and well-dressed, and well endowed intellectually, as a single glance would show an observer of quick KARMA perception. Evidently it was on the level of their higher qualities that he and his friend George Annerly were linked together. Annerly was weakly -built, and moved with the awkward gait of a man whose limbs are not exactly alike. A large head and a shock of black hair were ill-matched with his slight frame, and much physical suffering of various kinds had left its traces on his com plexion, which was sallow, and on the expression of his eyes and mouth, the lines round which were deeper than they should have been for his age, which was but just thirty.

He and Merland had grown to be friends at Cambridge. His five years' seniority, coupled with intellectual gifts far above the average level, had readily invested him in Merland's eyes with attributes that fascinated the younger man's imagination, and evoked his readily kindled enthusiasm. Annerly's means had, to begin with, been of the smallest, and his birth of the humblest ; and his career at the University had only been rendered possible by help of a sizarship. But he drew in the mental stimulants around him as a sponge sucks up water, and took THE "ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 25 high honours that carried with them a fellowship. Merland took a delight in the University triumphs of his friend, in which his interest in his own achievements was almost obliterated. Annerly left the University two years before Merland, and went to London to lay siege to the strongholds of the press.

There Merland afterwards renewed his acquaintance, finding him but little elated by the very fair success he had achieved, not merely in journalism but even in general literature. But Annerly gave no explanation of the deeper gloom that had settled on his spirits, beyond referring it to the general misery that must always be the lot of a man blighted in physique. " What possible happiness in life can ever be the portion of a poor crippled wretch like myself ? " he would say, in this or some other form of words always recurring to the same deep-seated resentment at his fate. " Your friendship, Merland, is a good thing I should deplore to lose, more profoundly than words can express, but it would be affectation to pretend that even your friend- KARMA ship can fill up all the aspirations of my nature.

I don't see how it is possible that existence can ever be anything for me but a burden I would gladly lay down." Merland would sometimes feel something like contrition on account of his straight limbs and strong muscles, his faultless digestion, and clean healthy skin. "I wish we could strike an average old chap," he would say, " and share alike." " I verily believe you do, Claude, and it is a good thing for us both that we can't, for there's that in me that would poison my share and yours too. Some men come into the world accursed, and I'm one of them- Let that stand as a fact that can't be altered or palliated, that I can see, by any reasoning about the inscrutable ways of Providence. Some people would tell me I shall find my reward if I am meek and submissive in another state of existence, and they don't see the ghastly want of logic in that vapid consolation.

If their theory could be worked out it would amount to this : that I am to get advantages in Heaven denied to you for example. What justice would there be in THE " ADMIRAL " HOISTS HER FLAG. 27 that? Apart from the probability that you, ten to one, will lead a life far better-entitling you to heavenly happiness than I shall, and assuming that we are both equally meritorious, then the arrangement suggested would simply turn the tables, and make you the victim of injustice; for your superior lot, in this short finite life, cannot compensate you for getting an inferior fate through all eternity ; added to which, directly you talk about degrees of happiness in Heaven you assume the existence of evil — from which one person relatively suffers there as on earth, and upset the whole hypothesis that Heaven rests on.