"_I cannot tell how the truth may be:I say the tale as 'twas said to me. _" BY THE SAME AUTHOR IDOLSSEPTIMUSTHE USURPERTHE WHITE DOVETHE BELOVED VAGABONDTHE DEMAGOGUE AND LADY PHAYRETHE MORALS OF MARCUS ORDEYNEAT THE GATE OF SAMARIAA STUDY IN SHADOWSSIMON THE JESTERWHERE LOVE ISDERELICTS [Illustration: "I HEARD IT. I FELT IT. It WAS LIKE THE BEATING OFWINGS. "] A CHRISTMAS MYSTERYTHE STORY OF THREE WISE MEN BY WILLIAM J. LOCKE ILLUSTRATED BY BLENDON CAMPBELL 1910 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS "I heard it. I felt it. It was like the beating of wings. " Frontispiece "I told you the place was uncanny. " Instinctively they all knelt down. Carried with them an inalienable joy and possession into the greatworld. A CHRISTMAS MYSTERY Three men who had gained great fame and honour throughout the world metunexpectedly in front of the bookstall at Paddington Station. Like mostof the great ones of the earth they were personally acquainted, and theyexchanged surprised greetings. Sir Angus McCurdie, the eminent physicist, scowled at the two othersbeneath his heavy black eyebrows. "I'm going to a God-forsaken place in Cornwall called Trehenna, " saidhe. "That's odd; so am I, " croaked Professor Biggleswade. He was a little, untidy man with round spectacles, a fringe of greyish beard and a weak, rasping voice, and he knew more of Assyriology than any man, living ordead. A flippant pupil once remarked that the Professor's face wasfurnished with a Babylonic cuneiform in lieu of features. "People called Deverill, at Foulis Castle?" asked Sir Angus. "Yes, " replied Professor Biggleswade. "How curious! I am going to the Deverills, too, " said the third man. This man was the Right Honourable Viscount Doyne, the renowned EmpireBuilder and Administrator, around whose solitary and remote life popularimagination had woven many legends. He looked at the world through tiredgrey eyes, and the heavy, drooping, blonde moustache seemed tired, too, and had dragged down the tired face into deep furrows. He was smoking along black cigar. "I suppose we may as well travel down together, " said Sir Angus, notvery cordially. Lord Doyne said courteously: "I have a reserved carriage. The railwaycompany is always good enough to place one at my disposal. It would giveme great pleasure if you would share it. " The invitation was accepted, and the three men crossed the busy, crowdedplatform to take their seats in the great express train. A porter, ladenwith an incredible load of paraphernalia, trying to make his way throughthe press, happened to jostle Sir Angus McCurdie. He rubbed his shoulderfretfully. "Why the whole land should be turned into a bear garden on account ofthis exploded superstition of Christmas is one of the anomalies ofmodern civilization. Look at this insensate welter of fools travellingin wild herds to disgusting places merely because it's Christmas!" "You seem to be travelling yourself, McCurdie, " said Lord Doyne. "Yes--and why the devil I'm doing it, I've not the faintest notion, "replied Sir Angus. "It's going to be a beast of a journey, " he remarked some moments later, as the train carried them slowly out of the station. "The whole countryis under snow--and as far as I can understand we have to change twiceand wind up with a twenty-mile motor drive. " He was an iron-faced, beetle-browed, stern man, and this morning he didnot seem to be in the best of tempers. Finding his companions inclinedto be sympathetic, he continued his lamentation. "And merely because it's Christmas I've had to shut up my laboratory andgive my young fools a holiday--just when I was in the midst of a mostimportant series of experiments. " Professor Biggleswade, who had heard vaguely of and rather looked downupon such new-fangled toys as radium and thorium and helium andargon--for the latest astonishing developments in the theory ofradio-activity had brought Sir Angus McCurdie his world-wide fame--saidsomewhat ironically: "If the experiments were so important, why didn't you lock yourself upwith your test tubes and electric batteries and finish them alone?" "Man!" said McCurdie, bending across the carriage, and speaking with acurious intensity of voice, "d'ye know I'd give a hundred pounds to beable to answer that question?" "What do you mean?" asked the Professor, startled. "I should like to know why I'm sitting in this damned train and going tovisit a couple of addle-headed society people whom I'm scarcelyacquainted with, when I might be at home in my own good companyfurthering the progress of science. " "I myself, " said the Professor, "am not acquainted with them at all. " It was Sir Angus McCurdie's turn to look surprised. "Then why are you spending Christmas with them?" "I reviewed a ridiculous blank-verse tragedy written by Deverill on theDeath of Sennacherib. Historically it was puerile. I said so in nomeasured terms. He wrote a letter claiming to be a poet and not anarchæologist. I replied that the day had passed when poets could withimpunity commit the abominable crime of distorting history. He retortedwith some futile argument, and we went on exchanging letters, until hisinvitation and my acceptance concluded the correspondence. " McCurdie, still bending his black brows on him, asked him why he had notdeclined. The Professor screwed up his face till it looked more like acuneiform than ever. He, too, found the question difficult to answer, but he showed a bold front. "I felt it my duty, " said he, "to teach that preposterous ignoramussomething worth knowing about Sennacherib. Besides I am a bachelor andwould sooner spend Christmas, as to whose irritating and meaninglessannoyance I cordially agree with you, among strangers than among mymarried sisters' numerous and nerve-racking families. " Sir Angus McCurdie, the hard, metallic apostle of radio-activity, glanced for a moment out of the window at the grey, frost-bitten fields. Then he said: "I'm a widower. My wife died many years ago and, thank God, we had nochildren. I generally spend Christmas alone. " He looked out of the window again. Professor Biggleswade suddenlyremembered the popular story of the great scientist's antecedents, andreflected that as McCurdie had once run, a barefoot urchin, through theGlasgow mud, he was likely to have little kith or kin. He himself enviedMcCurdie. He was always praying to be delivered from his sisters andnephews and nieces, whose embarrassing demands no calculated coldnesscould repress. "Children are the root of all evil, " said he. "Happy the man who has hisquiver empty. " Sir Angus McCurdie did not reply at once; when he spoke again it waswith reference to their prospective host. "I met Deverill, " said he, "at the Royal Society's Soirée this year. Oneof my assistants was demonstrating a peculiar property of thorium andDeverill seemed interested. I asked him to come to my laboratory thenext day, and found he didn't know a damned thing about anything. That'sall the acquaintance I have with him. " Lord Doyne, the great administrator, who had been wearily turning overthe pages of an illustrated weekly chiefly filled with flamboyantphotographs of obscure actresses, took his gold glasses from his noseand the black cigar from his lips, and addressed his companions. "I've been considerably interested in your conversation, " said he, "andas you've been frank, I'll be frank too. I knew Mrs. Deverill's mother, Lady Carstairs, very well years ago, and of course Mrs. Deverill whenshe was a child. Deverill I came across once in Egypt--he had been senton a diplomatic mission to Teheran. As for our being invited on suchslight acquaintance, little Mrs. Deverill has the reputation of beingthe only really successful celebrity hunter in England. She inheritedthe faculty from her mother, who entertained the whole world. We're sureto find archbishops, and eminent actors, and illustrious divorcées askedto meet us. That's one thing. But why I, who loathe country houseparties and children and Christmas as much as Biggleswade, am going downthere to-day, I can no more explain than you can. It's a devilish oddcoincidence. " The three men looked at one another. Suddenly McCurdie shivered and drewhis fur coat around him. "I'll thank you, " said he, "to shut that window. " "It is shut, " said Doyne. "It's just uncanny, " said McCurdie, looking from one to the other. "What?" asked Doyne. "Nothing, if you didn't feel it. " "There did seem to be a sudden draught, " said Professor Biggleswade. "But as both window and door are shut, it could only be imaginary. " "It wasn't imaginary, " muttered McCurdie. Then he laughed harshly. "My father and mother came from Cromarty, " hesaid with apparent irrelevance. "That's the Highlands, " said the Professor. "Ay, " said McCurdie. Lord Doyne said nothing, but tugged at his moustache and looked out ofthe window as the frozen meadows and bits of river and willows racedpast. A dead silence fell on them. McCurdie broke it with another laughand took a whiskey flask from his hand-bag. "Have a nip?" "Thanks, no, " said the Professor. "I have to keep to a strict dietary, and I only drink hot milk and water--and of that sparingly. I have somein a thermos bottle. " Lord Doyne also declining the whiskey, McCurdie swallowed a dram anddeclared himself to be better. The Professor took from his bag a foreignreview in which a German sciolist had dared to question hisinterpretation of a Hittite inscription. Over the man's ineptitude hefell asleep and snored loudly. To escape from his immediate neighbourhood McCurdie went to the otherend of the seat and faced Lord Doyne, who had resumed his gold glassesand his listless contemplation of obscure actresses. McCurdie lit apipe, Doyne another black cigar. The train thundered on. Presently they all lunched together in the restaurant car. The windowssteamed, but here and there through a wiped patch of pane a white worldwas revealed. The snow was falling. As they passed through Westbury, McCurdie looked mechanically for the famous white horse carved into thechalk of the down; but it was not visible beneath the thick covering ofsnow. "It'll be just like this all the way to Gehenna--Trehenna, I mean, " saidMcCurdie. Doyne nodded. He had done his life's work amid all extreme fiercenessesof heat and cold, in burning droughts, in simoons and in icywildernesses, and a ray or two more of the pale sun or a flake or twomore of the gentle snow of England mattered to him but little. ButBiggleswade rubbed the pane with his table-napkin and gazedapprehensively at the prospect. "If only this wretched train would stop, " said he, "I would go backagain. " And he thought how comfortable it would be to sneak home again to hisbooks and thus elude not only the Deverills, but the Christmas jollitiesof his sisters' families, who would think him miles away. But the trainwas timed not to stop till Plymouth, two hundred and thirty-five milesfrom London, and thither was he being relentlessly carried. Then hequarrelled with his food, which brought a certain consolation. * * * * * The train did stop, however, before Plymouth--indeed, before Exeter. Anaccident on the line had dislocated the traffic. The express was held upfor an hour, and when it was permitted to proceed, instead of thunderingon, it went cautiously, subject to continual stoppings. It arrived atPlymouth two hours late. The travellers learned that they had missed theconnection on which they had counted and that they could not reachTrehenna till nearly ten o'clock. After weary waiting at Plymouth theytook their seats in the little, cold local train that was to carry themanother stage on their journey. Hot-water cans put in at Plymouthmitigated to some extent the iciness of the compartment. But that onlylasted a comparatively short time, for soon they were set down at adesolate, shelterless wayside junction, dumped in the midst of a hillysnow-covered waste, where they went through another weary wait foranother dismal local train that was to carry them to Trehenna. And inthis train there were no hot-water cans, so that the compartment was ascold as death. McCurdie fretted and shook his fist in the direction ofTrehenna. "And when we get there we have still a twenty miles' motor drive toFoullis Castle. It's a fool name and we're fools to be going there. " "I shall die of bronchitis, " wailed Professor Biggleswade. "A man dies when it is appointed for him to die, " said Lord Doyne, inhis tired way; and he went on smoking long black cigars. "It's not the dying that worries me, " said McCurdie. "That's a meremechanical process which every organic being from a king to acauliflower has to pass through. It's the being forced against my willand my reason to come on this accursed journey, which something tells mewill become more and more accursed as we go on, that is driving me todistraction. " "What will be, will be, " said Doyne. "I can't see where the comfort of that reflection comes in, " saidBiggleswade. "And yet you've travelled in the East, " said Doyne. "I suppose you knowthe Valley of the Tigris as well as any man living. " "Yes, " said the Professor. "I can say I dug my way from Tekrit to Bagdadand left not a stone unexamined. " "Perhaps, after all, " Doyne remarked, "that's not quite the way to knowthe East. " "I never wanted to know the modern East, " returned the Professor. "Whatis there in it of interest compared with the mighty civilizations thathave gone before?" McCurdie took a pull from his flask. "I'm glad I thought of having a refill at Plymouth, " said he. At last, after many stops at little lonely stations they arrived atTrehenna. The guard opened the door and they stepped out on to thesnow-covered platform. An oil lamp hung from the tiny pent-house roofthat, structurally, was Trehenna Station. They looked around at thesilent gloom of white undulating moorland, and it seemed a place whereno man lived and only ghosts could have a bleak and unsheltered being. Aporter came up and helped the guard with the luggage. Then they realizedthat the station was built on a small embankment, for, looking over therailing, they saw below the two great lamps of a motor car. A fur-cladchauffeur met them at the bottom of the stairs. He clapped his handstogether and informed them cheerily that he had been waiting for fourhours. It was the bitterest winter in these parts within the memory ofman, said he, and he himself had not seen snow there for five years. Then he settled the three travellers in the great roomy touring carcovered with a Cape-cart hood, wrapped them up in many rugs and started. After a few moments, the huddling together of their bodies--for, theProfessor being a spare man, there was room for them all on the backseat--the pile of rugs, the serviceable and all but air-tight hood, induced a pleasant warmth and a pleasant drowsiness. Where they werebeing driven they knew not. The perfectly upholstered seat eased theirlimbs, the easy swinging motion of the car soothed their spirits. Theyfelt that already they had reached the luxuriously appointed home which, after all, they knew awaited them. McCurdie no longer railed, ProfessorBiggleswade forgot the dangers of bronchitis, and Lord Doyne twisted thestump of a black cigar between his lips without any desire to relightit. A tiny electric lamp inside the hood made the darkness of the worldto right and left and in front of the talc windows still darker. McCurdie and Biggleswade fell into a doze. Lord Doyne chewed the end ofhis cigar. The car sped on through an unseen wilderness. Suddenly there was a horrid jolt and a lurch and a leap and a rebound, and then the car stood still, quivering like a ship that has been struckby a heavy sea. The three men were pitched and tossed and thrownsprawling over one another onto the bottom of the car. Biggleswadescreamed. McCurdie cursed. Doyne scrambled from the confusion of rugsand limbs and, tearing open the side of the Cape-cart hood, jumped out. The chauffeur had also just leaped from his seat. It was pitch dark savefor the great shaft of light down the snowy road cast by the acetylenelamps. The snow had ceased falling. "What's gone wrong?" "It sounds like the axle, " said the chauffeur ruefully. He unshipped a lamp and examined the car, which had wedged itselfagainst a great drift of snow on the off side. Meanwhile McCurdie andBiggleswade had alighted. "Yes, it's the axle, " said the chauffeur. "Then we're done, " remarked Doyne. "I'm afraid so, my lord. " "What's the matter? Can't we get on?" asked Biggleswade in his querulousvoice. McCurdie laughed. "How can we get on with a broken axle? The thing's asuseless as a man with a broken back. Gad, I was right. I said it wasgoing to be an infernal journey. " The little Professor wrung his hands. "But what's to be done?" he cried. "Tramp it, " said Lord Doyne, lighting a fresh cigar. "It's ten miles, " said the chauffeur. "It would be the death of me, " the Professor wailed. "I utterly refuse to walk ten miles through a Polar waste with a goutyfoot, " McCurdie declared wrathfully. The chauffeur offered a solution of the difficulty. He would set outalone for Foullis Castle--five miles farther on was an inn where hecould obtain a horse and trap--and would return for the three gentlemenwith another car. In the meanwhile they could take shelter in a littlehouse which they had just passed, some half mile up the road. This wasagreed to. The chauffeur went on cheerily enough with a lamp, and thethree travellers with another lamp started off in the oppositedirection. As far as they could see they were in a long, desolatevalley, a sort of No Man's Land, deathly silent. The eastern sky hadcleared somewhat, and they faced a loose rack through which one palestar was dimly visible. * * * * * "I'm a man of science, " said McCurdie as they trudged through the snow, "and I dismiss the supernatural as contrary to reason; but I haveHighland blood in my veins that plays me exasperating tricks. My reasontells me that this place is only a commonplace moor, yet it seems like aValley of Bones haunted by malignant spirits who have lured us here toour destruction. There's something guiding us now. It's just uncanny. " "Why on earth did we ever come?" croaked Biggleswade. Lord Doyne answered: "The Koran says, 'Nothing can befall us but whatGod hath destined for us. ' So why worry?" "Because I'm not a Mohammedan, " retorted Biggleswade. "You might be worse, " said Doyne. Presently the dim outline of the little house grew perceptible. A faintlight shone from the window. It stood unfenced by any kind of hedge orrailing a few feet away from the road in a little hollow beneath somerising ground. As far as they could discern in the darkness when theydrew near, the house was a mean, dilapidated hovel. A guttering candlestood on the inner sill of the small window and afforded a vague viewinto a mean interior. Doyne held up the lamp so that its rays fell fullon the door. As he did so, an exclamation broke from his lips and hehurried forward, followed by the others. A man's body lay huddledtogether on the snow by the threshold. He was dressed like a peasant, inold corduroy trousers and rough coat, and a handkerchief was knottedround his neck. In his hand he grasped the neck of a broken bottle. Doyne set the lamp on the ground and the three bent down together overthe man. Close by the neck lay the rest of the broken bottle, whosecontents had evidently run out into the snow. "Drunk?" asked Biggleswade. Doyne felt the man and laid his hand on his heart. "No, " said he, "dead. " McCurdie leaped to his full height. "I told you the place was uncanny!"he cried. "It's fey. " Then he hammered wildly at the door. There was no response. He hammered again till it rattled. This time afaint prolonged sound like the wailing of a strange sea-creature washeard from within the house. McCurdie turned round, his teethchattering. "Did ye hear that, Doyne?" [Illustration: I TOLD YOU THE PLACE WAS UNCANNY. ] "Perhaps it's a dog, " said the Professor. Lord Doyne, the man of action, pushed them aside and tried thedoor-handle. It yielded, the door stood open, and the gust of cold windentering the house extinguished the candle within. They entered andfound themselves in a miserable stone-paved kitchen, furnished withpoverty-stricken meagreness--a wooden chair or two, a dirty table, somebroken crockery, old cooking utensils, a fly-blown missionary societyalmanac, and a fireless grate. Doyne set the lamp on the table. "We must bring him in, " said he. They returned to the threshold, and as they were bending over to gripthe dead man the same sound filled the air, but this time louder, moreintense, a cry of great agony. The sweat dripped from McCurdie'sforehead. They lifted the dead man and brought him into the room, andafter laying him on a dirty strip of carpet they did their best tostraighten the stiff limbs. Biggleswade put on the table a bundle whichhe had picked up outside. It contained some poor provisions--a loaf, apiece of fat bacon, and a paper of tea. As far as they could guess (andas they learned later they guessed rightly) the man was the master ofthe house, who, coming home blind drunk from some distant inn, hadfallen at his own threshold and got frozen to death. As they could notunclasp his fingers from the broken bottleneck they had to let himclutch it as a dead warrior clutches the hilt of his broken sword. Then suddenly the whole place was rent with another and yet anotherlong, soul-piercing moan of anguish. "There's a second room, " said Doyne, pointing to a door. "The soundcomes from there. " He opened the door, peeped in, and then, returningfor the lamp, disappeared, leaving McCurdie and Biggleswade in the pitchdarkness, with the dead man on the floor. "For heaven's sake, give me a drop of whiskey, " said the Professor, "orI shall faint. " Presently the door opened and Lord Doyne appeared in the shaft of light. He beckoned to his companions. "It is a woman in childbirth, " he said in his even, tired voice. "Wemust aid her. She appears unconscious. Does either of you know anythingabout such things?" They shook their heads, and the three looked at each other in dismay. Masters of knowledge that had won them world-wide fame and honour, theystood helpless, abashed before this, the commonest phenomenon of nature. "My wife had no child, " said McCurdie. "I've avoided women all my life, " said Biggleswade. "And I've been too busy to think of them. God forgive me, " said Doyne. * * * * * The history of the next two hours was one that none of the three menever cared to touch upon. They did things blindly, instinctively, as mendo when they come face to face with the elemental. A fire was made, theyknew not how, water drawn they knew not whence, and a kettle boiled. Doyne accustomed to command, directed. The others obeyed. At hissuggestion they hastened to the wreck of the car and came staggeringback beneath rugs and travelling bags which could supply clean linen andneedful things, for amid the poverty of the house they could findnothing fit for human touch or use. Early they saw that the woman'sstrength was failing, and that she could not live. And there, in thatnameless hovel, with death on the hearthstone and death and lifehovering over the pitiful bed, the three great men went through the painand the horror and squalor of birth, and they knew that they had neveryet stood before so great a mystery. With the first wail of the newly born infant a last convulsive shudderpassed through the frame of the unconscious mother. Then three or fourshort gasps for breath, and the spirit passed away. She was dead. Professor Biggleswade threw a corner of the sheet over her face, for hecould not bear to see it. They washed and dried the child as any crone of a midwife would havedone, and dipped a small sponge which had always remained unused in acut-glass bottle in Doyne's dressing-bag in the hot milk and water ofBiggleswade's thermos bottle, and put it to his lips; and then theywrapped him up warm in some of their own woollen undergarments, and tookhim into the kitchen and placed him on a bed made of their fur coats infront of the fire. As the last piece of fuel was exhausted they took oneof the wooden chairs and broke it up and cast it into the blaze. Andthen they raised the dead man from the strip of carpet and carried himinto the bedroom and laid him reverently by the side of his dead wife, after which they left the dead in darkness and returned to the living. And the three grave men stood over the wisp of flesh that had been borna male into the world. Then, their task being accomplished, reactioncame, and even Doyne, who had seen death in many lands, turned faint. But the others, losing control of their nerves, shook like men strickenwith palsy. Suddenly McCurdie cried in a high pitched voice, "My God! Don't you feelit?" and clutched Doyne by the arm. An expression of terror appeared onhis iron features. "There! It's here with us. " Little Professor Biggleswade sat on a corner of the table and wiped hisforehead. "I heard it. I felt it. It was like the beating of wings. " "It's the fourth time, " said McCurdie. "The first time was just before Iaccepted the Deverills' invitation. The second in the railway carriagethis afternoon. The third on the way here. This is the fourth. " Biggleswade plucked nervously at the fringe of whisker under his jawsand said faintly, "It's the fourth time up to now. I thought it wasfancy. " "I have felt it, too, " said Doyne. "It is the Angel of Death. " And hepointed to the room where the dead man and woman lay. "For God's sake let us get away from this, " cried Biggleswade. "And leave the child to die, like the others?" said Doyne. "We must see it through, " said McCurdie. * * * * * A silence fell upon them as they sat round in the blaze with thenew-born babe wrapped in its odd swaddling clothes asleep on the pile offur coats, and it lasted until Sir Angus McCurdie looked at his watch. "Good Lord, " said he, "it's twelve o'clock. " "Christmas morning, " said Biggleswade. "A strange Christmas, " mused Doyne. McCurdie put up his hand. "There it is again! The beating of wings. " Andthey listened like men spellbound. McCurdie kept his hand uplifted, andgazed over their heads at the wall, and his gaze was that of a man in atrance, and he spoke: "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given--" Doyne sprang from his chair, which fell behind him with a crash. "Man--what the devil are you saying?" Then McCurdie rose and met Biggleswade's eyes staring at him through thegreat round spectacles, and Biggleswade turned and met the eyes ofDoyne. A pulsation like the beating of wings stirred the air. The three wise men shivered with a queer exaltation. Something strange, mystical, dynamic had happened. It was as if scales had fallen fromtheir eyes and they saw with a new vision. They stood together humbly, divested of all their greatness, touching one another in the instinctivefashion of children, as if seeking mutual protection, and they looked, with one accord, irresistibly compelled, at the child. At last McCurdie unbent his black brows and said hoarsely: "It was not the Angel of Death, Doyne, but another Messenger that drewus here. " The tiredness seemed to pass away from the great administrator's face, and he nodded his head with the calm of a man who has come to the quietheart of a perplexing mystery. "It's true, " he murmured. "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son isgiven. Unto the three of us. " Biggleswade took off his great round spectacles and wiped them. "Gaspar, Melchior, Balthazar. But where are the gold, frankincense andmyrrh?" "In our hearts, man, " said McCurdie. The babe cried and stretched its tiny limbs. [Illustration: INSTINCTIVELY THEY ALL KNELT DOWN. ] Instinctively they all knelt down together to discover, if possible, andadminister ignorantly to, its wants. The scene had the appearance of anadoration. * * * * * Then these three wise, lonely, childless men who, in furtherance oftheir own greatness, had cut themselves adrift from the sweet and simplethings of life and from the kindly ways of their brethren, and had grownold in unhappy and profitless wisdom, knew that an inscrutableProvidence had led them, as it had led three Wise Men of old, on aChristmas morning long ago, to a nativity which should give them a newwisdom, a new link with humanity, a new spiritual outlook, a new hope. And, when their watch was ended, they wrapped up the babe with preciouscare, and carried him with them, an inalienable joy and possession, intothe great world. [Illustration: CARRIED WITH THEM AN INALIENABLE JOY AND POSSESSION INTOTHE GREAT WORLD. ]