Amazing Stories, Vol. 3, No. 2 — page 47: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

142 company that owned the London flying-stages to which the aeroplanes came from all parts of the world. This much for his public activities. In his private life he was a man of pleasure. And this is the story of his heart. But before proceeding to such depths, one must devote a little time to the exterior of this person. Its physical basis was slender, and short, and dark; and the face, which was fine-featured and assisted by pig- ments, varied trom an insecure self-complacency to an intelligent uneasiness. His face and head had been depilated, according to the cleanly and hygienic fashion of the time, so that the color and contour of his hair varied with his costume. This he was constantly changing. At times he would distend himself with pneumatic vestments in the rococo vein. From among the billowy developments of this style, and beneath a translucent and illuminated headdress, his eye watched jealously for the respect of the less fashionable world. At other times he emphasized his elegant slenderness in close- fitting garments of black satin. For effects of dignity he would assume broad pneumatic shoulders, from which hung a robe of carefully arranged folds of China silk, and a classical Bindon in pink tights was also a transient phenomenon in the eternal pageant of Destiny. In the days when he hoped to marry Elizabeth, he sought to impress and charm her, and at the same time to take off something of his burden of forty years, by wearing the last fancy of the contemporary buck, a costume of elastic material with distensible warts and horns, changing in color as he walked, by an in- genious arrangement of versatile chromatophores.* And no doubt, already engaged by the worthless Denton, and if her tastes had not had that odd bias for old-fashioned ways, this extremely chic conception would have ravisehd her. Bindon had consulted Elizabeth’s father before pre- senting himself in this garb—he was one of those men who always invite criticism of their costume—and Mwres had pronounced him all that the heart of woman could desire. - But the affair of the hypnotist proved that his knowledge of the heart of woman was incomplete. : Bindon’s idea of marrying had been formed some little time before Mwres threw Elizabeth's budding womanhood in his way. It was one of Bindon’s most cherished secrets that he had a considerable capacity for a pure and simple life of a grossly sentimental type. The thought imparted a sort of pathetic seri- ousness to the offensive and quite inconsequent and — unmeaning excesses, which he was pleased to regard as dashing wickedness, and which a number of good people also were so unwise as to treat in that desirable manner, As a consequence of these excesses, and per- haps by reason also of an inherited tendency to early decay, his liver became seriously affected, and he suf- — fered increasing inconvenience when traveling by aero- plane. tracted bilious attack that it occurred to him that in *A pigment cell, especially one capable of changing its form or size, causing changing of color in the translucent skin by bringing the pigment near the surface or by contracting, con- centrating it in the deeper layers. if Elizabeth's affection had not been. It was during his convalescence from a pro- AMAZING STORIES spite of all the terrible fascinations of Vice, if he found a beautiful, gentle, good young woman of a not too violently intellectual type to devote her life to him, he might yet be saved to Goodness, and even rear a spirited family in his likeness to solace his declining years. But lke so many experienced men of the world, he doubted if there were any good women. Of such as he had heard tell he was outwardly sceptical and privately much afraid. HEN the aspiring Mwres effected his introduc- tion to Elizabeth, it seemed to him that his good fortune was complete. He fell in love with her at once. Of course, he had always been falling in love since he was sixtten, in accordance with the extremely varied recipes to be found in the accumulated litera- ture of many centuries. But this was different. This was real love. It seemed to him to call forth all the lurking goodness in his nature. He felt that for her sake he could give up a way of life that had already produced the gravest lesions on his liver and nervous system. His imagination presented him with idyllic pictures of the life of the reformed rake. He would never be sentimental with her, or silly; but always a little cynical and bitter, as became the past. Yet he- was sure she would have an intuition of his real great- ness and goodness. And in due course he would con- fess things to her, pour his version of what he regarded as his wickedness—showing what a complex of Goethe; and Benvenuto Cellini, and Shelley, and all those other chaps he really was—into her shocked, very beautiful, and no doubt sympathetic ear, And preparatory to these things he wooed her with infinite subtlety and respect. And the reserve with which Elizabeth treated him seemed nothing more nor less than an exquisite modesty touched and enhanced by an equally exquisite lack of ideas. — Bindon knew nothing of her wandering affections, nor of the attempt made by Mwres to utilize hypnotism as a corrective to this digression of her heart; he con- ceived he was on the best of terms with Elizabeth, and had made her quite successfully various significant presents of jewelry and the more virtuous cosmetics, when her elopement-with Denton threw the world out of gear for him, His first aspect of the matter was rage begotten of wounded vanity, and as Mwres happened to be the most convenient person, he vented the first brunt of it upon him. He went immediately and insulted the desolate father grossly, and then spent an active and determined day going to and fro about the city and interviewing people in a consistent and partly successful attempt to ruin that matrimonial speculator. The effectual nature of these activities gave him a temporary exhilaration, and he went to the dining-place he had frequented in his wicked days in a devil-may-care frame of mind, and — dined altogether too amply and cheerfully with two -other | golden youths in the early forties, He threw up the game; no woman was worth being good for, _and he astonished even himself by the strain of witty cynicism he developed. One of the other desperate blades, warmed with wine, made a facetious allusion - ——— _comicbooksic com 2