Part 5 (1/2)
”It is not necessary,” he answered; ”you are already a member. Your remark to Miss Metford this morning made you one of us. You advised her, you recollect, to beware of us.”
”That girl!” I exclaimed, horrified. ”Then she is one of your spies? Is it possible?”
”No, she is not one of our spies. We have none, and she knew nothing of the purpose for which she was used.”
”Then I beg to say that you have made a d--d shameful use of her.”
In the pa.s.sion of the moment I forgot my manners to my host, and formed the resolution to denounce the Society to the police the moment I returned to London. Brande was not offended by my violence. There was not a trace of anger in his voice as he said:
”Miss Metford's information was telepathically conveyed to my sister.”
”Then it was your sister--”
”My sister knows as little as the other. In turn, I received the information telepathically from her, without the knowledge of either. I was just telling Grey of it when you came into the room.”
”And,” said Grey, ”your intention to go straight from this house to Scotland Yard, there to denounce us to the police, has been telepathically received by myself.”
”My G.o.d!” I cried, ”has a man no longer the right to his own thoughts?”
Grey went on without noticing my exclamation: ”Any overt or covert action on your part, toward carrying out your intention, will be telepathically conveyed to us, and our executive--” He shrugged his shoulders.
”I know,” I said, ”Woking Cemetery, near Saint Anne's Chapel. You have ground there.”
”Yes, we have to dispense with--”
”Say murder.”
”Dispense with,” Grey repeated sharply, ”any member whose loyalty is questionable. This is not our wish; it is our necessity. It is the only means by which we can secure the absolute immunity of the Society pending the achievement of its object. To dispense with any living man we have only to will that he shall die.”
”And now that I am a member, may I ask what is this object, the secret of which you guard with such fiendish zeal?” I demanded angrily.
”The restoration of a local etheric tumour to its original formation.”
”I am already weary of this jargon from Brande,” I interrupted. ”What do you mean?”
”We mean to attempt the reduction of the solar system to its elemental ether.”
”And you will accomplish this triviality by means of Huxley's comet, I suppose?”
I could scarcely control my indignation. This fooling, as I thought it, struck me as insulting. Neither Brande nor Grey appeared to notice my keen resentment. Grey answered me in a quiet, serious tone.
”We shall attempt it by destroying the earth. We may fail in the complete achievement of our design, but in any case we shall at least be certain of reducing this planet to the ether of which it is composed.”
”Of course, of course,” I agreed derisively. ”You will at least make sure of that. You have found out how to do it too, I have no doubt?”
”Yes,” said Grey, ”we have found out.”
CHAPTER VI.
A TELEPATHIC TELEGRAM.