do we not?"
"Now, that,s a good English word I understand," said Simon with Arthur Hammermill nodding vigorously in support.
"Thank you." Reuben blushed. "I think I fell in love with the house, I know I fell in love with Marchent. And I became enamored of Felix Nideck, with the idea of him, the explorer, the scholar - the teacher perhaps." He paused, then: "Those diaries written in that mysterious script. The house is full of treasures, and those tablets, those tiny fragile tablets. Even the name Nideck is a mystery. I found the name in an old short story. So many names in the house seem connected to old stories - Sperver, Gorlagon, even Marrok. There,s a poetry and romance to that, isn,t there - finding names that resonate with mysteries in lore and legend, finding names that promise revelations in a world where the questions multiply every day - ."
"Reuben, please!" said Simon, raising his voice.
"You have a flair for the poetic," murmured Arthur Hammermill, rolling his eyes. "Your father would be justly proud."
Simon Oliver visibly bristled.
The man,s smile was easy and again almost doting. He pressed his lips together and gave a small, almost imperceptible nod.
"I,m enthralled," said Reuben. "I,ve been overwhelmed. I,m glad to see you,re more sanguine on the matter, because your friend was pessimistic, grim."
"Well, we can forget about him now, can,t we?" the man whispered. He appeared to be marveling in his own way.
"I imagined Felix Nideck to be a fount of knowledge, maybe secret knowledge," Reuben said. "You know, someone who would know the answers to so many questions, what my father calls cosmic questions, someone who could shed some light into the darkest corners of this life."
Simon shifted uncomfortably in his chair, and so did Arthur Hammermill, as if they were signaling one another. Reuben ignored them.
The man was simply staring at him with those large compassionate eyes.
"It must be marvelous for you," said Reuben, "to read that secret writing. Just last night, I found ledgers filled with that secret writing, very old. Very old indeed."
"Did you?" asked the man gently.
"Yes, they go way back. Years back. Years before Felix Nideck can have been alive. Your ancestors must have known the secret writing. Unless of course Felix had some great secret of longevity that no one knows. One could almost believe it in that house. That house is a labyrinth. Did you know, it has secret stairways, actually, and a large secret room?"
The lawyers were both clearing their throats at the same time.
The man,s face registered only quiet understanding.
"Seems there were scientists once working in that house, doctors perhaps. It,s impossible to know now of course unless one can read that secret writing. Marchent tried long ago to have it decoded - ."
"Did she?"
"But no one could crack it. You,re in possession of a rather valuable skill."
Simon again tried to interrupt. Reuben rode over him.
"The house prompts me to imagine things," said Reuben, "that Felix Nideck is still somehow alive, that he,s going to come and somehow explain things which on my own I can,t grasp, may never grasp."
"Reuben, please, if you will, I think perhaps - ," said Simon who actually started to rise to his feet.
"Sit down, Simon," said Reuben.
"It never entered my mind that you knew so much of Felix Nideck," said the man gently. "I didn,t realize that you knew anything of him at all."
"Oh, I know many little things about him," said Reuben. "He was a lover of Hawthorne, Keats, those old European gothic stories, and he even loved theology. He was a lover of Teilhard de Chardin. I found a little book in the house, Teilhard,s How I Believe. I should have brought it to you. I forgot to bring it. I,ve been treating it rather like a sacred relic. It was inscribed to Felix by one of his good friends."
The man,s face underwent another subtle shift, but the openness, the generosity, remained. "Teilhard," he said. "Such a brilliant and original thinker." He dropped his voice just a little. " ,Our doubts, like our misfortunes, are the price we have to pay for the fulfillment of the universe...., "
Reuben nodded. He couldn,t suppress a smile.
" ,Evil is inevitable,, " Reuben quoted, " ,in the course of a creation which develops within time., "
The man was speechless. Then very softly, with a radiant smile, he said, "Amen."
Arthur Hammermill was staring at Reuben as if Reuben had lost his mind. Reuben went on:
"Marchent painted such a vivid portrait of