They set off together down the village street. There was no one about at
that hour. All Wyngate was partaking of its Sunday night supper within
doors, and one or two of the little wooden houses showed lights in the
front windows; but for the most part life was concentrated in the
kitchen.
The drug store was locked, but a dim light was burning inside, and a
vigorous ringing of the night bell brought Mr. Binz, the owner, to open
the door. He was deeply interested in their errand. He suggested St.
Luke’s Hospital, for the reason that he had once been there himself, and
therefore held it almost sacred.
“But,” he said, in his slow and impressive way, “if I was you, I’d ring
up Doc Quelton first, and find out how things are going up there;
because you may find out--”
Lexy interrupted him hastily, for she didn’t want him to say what he
evidently wished to say.
“There won’t be any change in Mrs. Quelton,” she said. “It would only be
a waste of time.”
It was not so much for that poor woman, who she feared was beyond hope,
that she wanted the New York specialist, as for Captain Grey. It would
help him so much to feel that something was being done, that some one
was hurrying out here!
“Might be more of a waste of time,” said Mr. Binz, “if some one was to
come all the way out here after she--”
“Oh, all right!” cried Lexy impatiently. Then suddenly she remembered.
“They haven’t any telephone at the doctor’s house,” she said.
“Suppose I go out there first, and see?” suggested Captain Grey.
“No!” said Lexy. “Don’t!”
But the idea impressed him as a good one, and go he would.
“I’d rather see how she is, first,” he repeated. “If there’s no change,
I’ll come back.”
Lexy looked at Mr. Binz with an angry and reproachful frown, which the
poor man did not understand. He had only wanted to give helpful advice.
“Come on, then!” she said to Captain Grey.
“I’ll leave you at Mrs. Royce’s,” he told her.
“No, you won’t!” she contradicted with a trace of severity. “If you
_will_ go, I’m going with you!”
He protested against this, but she would not listen, and so they went to
the garage for Joe’s taxi; but Joe and his taxi had gone out. An
interested bystander said that they could get a “rig” from the livery
stable with no trouble at all. They had only to find the proprietor, and
he, in turn, would find the driver, who would harness up the horse.
“No, thanks,” said Captain Grey. He turned to Lexy. “I can’t wait,” he
told her. “I’m going to walk. Thank you for--”
“I can walk, too,” said Lexy. “It’s only three miles.”
“I don’t want you to, Miss Moran.”
“I’m coming anyhow,” she replied.
For that instinct in her, the thing which was beyond reason, drove her
forward. She could not let him go alone. She had walked that three miles
once before to-day, and she had walked farther than that with Houseman
in the afternoon. She was tired, terribly tired, and filled with a
queer, sick reluctance to approach that sinister house again; but she
had to go. She had said to herself that morning that she was coming
back, and now she was going to do so.
They did not try to talk much on the way. What had they to say? They
were both filled with a dread foreboding. They hurried, yet they wished
never to come to the end of the journey.
They turned down the lane, leaving the lights of the highway behind, and
went forward in thick darkness, under the shadow of the trees. The sound
of the sea came to them--the loneliest sound in all the world.
“There’s a light in the house, anyhow!” said Lexy suddenly.
Her own voice sounded so small, so pert, so futile, in the dark, that
she felt no surprise when Captain Grey showed a faint trace of
impatience in answering.
“Naturally!” he said.
Only, to her, it did not seem natural, that one little light shining out
through the glass of the front door. It would be more natural, she
thought, if there were only the darkness and the sound of the sea.
They turned into the drive. Their footsteps sounded strangely and
terribly loud on the gravel, and became as sharp as pistol shots when
they mounted the veranda. The captain rang the bell, and the sound of it
ran through the house like a shudder; but no one came. He rang again and
again, but nothing stirred inside the house. He knocked on the glass,
and they waited, looking into the bright and empty hall; but no one
came.
Captain Grey turned the knob, the door opened, and they went in. The
door of the library was open, showing only darkness. The stairs ran up
into darkness. Nothing moved, nothing stirred. Then, suddenly, a little
breeze rose, and the front door slammed with a crash behind them. Lexy
cried out, and caught the young man’s arm.
“Don’t be afraid!” he said; but his face was ashen. For a moment they
stood where they were. “Miss Moran,” he went on, “would you rather wait
here while I go upstairs?”
“No,” said Lexy. “I’ll come with you.”
He started up the stairs, and she followed him closely. At almost every
step she looked behind her, and she did not know which was the more
horrible to her, the brightly lit hall or the darkness before them.
Suppose she saw some one in the hall behind them!
Captain Grey did not once glance behind. He went on steadily. When he
reached the top of the flight, he took a box of matches from his pocket
and lit the gas. There was the long corridor, with the row of closed
doors. He turned down in the direction of Mrs. Quelton’s room, but Lexy
touched him on the shoulder.
“I think you had better let me go first,” she suggested. “Perhaps she
won’t be ready to see you.”
Their eyes met.
“Thank you, Lexy!” he said simply, and went on again.
He had never used her name before. He was trying to tell her that he
understood what she had wished to do for him. She had offered to go
first, alone, into the silent room, to see whatever might be there--to
spare him something, if she could.
But he would not have it so. He stopped outside the door, and knocked
twice. Then he went in.
It was dark and still in there, with the night wind blowing in through
the open windows. He struck a match and lit the gas. The room was empty.
He went across to the long windows and out on the balcony. There was no
gas connection there. He struck one match after another, and went from
one end of the balcony to the other. There was nothing.
“Not here!” he said, in a dazed, flat voice.
Lexy could not speak at all. She had come out on the balcony, and stood
beside him. The sound of the sea was loud in her ears--or was it the
beating of her own heart? She held her breath and strained her eyes in
the darkness.
“There’s--something--here!” she whispered tensely.
“No!” he said aloud. “I looked. Come! We’ll go through the house.”
She followed close at his heels. He went into every room, lit the gas,
looked about, and found nothing. Lexy grew confused with the opening and
closing of doors, the sudden flare of light in the darkness, the
succession of empty rooms.
He went up into the cupola. Nothing there, nor in the servants’ rooms.
Then downstairs, through the long library, the dining room, the sitting
room, the kitchen, the pantry. He proceeded with a sort of merciless
deliberation, opened every door, looked into every cupboard.
Finding a stable lantern in the kitchen, he lighted it and carried it
with him. The door to the cellar stood open. He went through it, down
the steep wooden stairs, and Lexy followed him.
To her exhausted and frightened gaze the cellar seemed enormous--as vast
and august as some great ancient tomb. The lantern made a little pool of
light, and outside it the shadows closed in on them thickly. She came
near to him and caught him by the sleeve.
“Oh, let’s go away!” she cried. “Let’s go away! We’ve looked--”
“This is the last place,” he said gently. “After this, we’ll give it
up.”
Fighting down the sick terror that had come over her, she walked beside
him in the little circle of light, and tried not to look at the shadows.
“What’s that?” he exclaimed.
“Oh, what?” she cried.
He went back a few paces and set down the lantern. Then he advanced
again and bent over, staring at the floor.
“Do you see?” he asked.
She did see. A narrow strip of light lay along the floor.
“It comes up from below,” he said. “There must be a subcellar. Let’s
see!”
He brought back the lantern and examined the floor by its light, going
down on his hands and knees.
“Stand back!” he said suddenly. “It’s a trapdoor. See--here’s a ring to
lift it.”
Captain Grey pulled at the ring, but nothing happened.
“I’m on the wrong side,” he said.
Moving over, he pulled again, and a square of stone lifted. A clear
light came from below, showing a short ladder clamped to the floor.
“Stay there, please,” he told Lexy. “You have the lantern. I shan’t be a
minute.”
But as soon as he had reached the foot of the ladder, Lexy climbed down
after him; and just at the same moment, they saw--
They were standing in a tiny room with roughly mortared walls. A
powerful electric torch stood on end in one corner, and at their feet
lay the body of a man, face downward across a wooden chest. It was Dr.
Quelton.
With a violent effort Captain Grey lifted the doctor’s heavy shoulder,
while Lexy covered her eyes. She knew that he was dead. No living thing
could lie so.
Her head swam, her knees gave way, and she tottered back against the
wall, half fainting, when the captain’s voice rang out, with a note of
agony and despair that she never forgot.
“My God! My God!” he wailed. “Oh, Muriel!”
She opened her eyes. For a moment she was too giddy to see. Then, as her
vision cleared, she saw him on his knees beside the chest.
Not a chest--it was a coffin; and on it was a strange little plate
glittering like gold, with an inscription: