It was dark when I reached San Francisco. I was a full twenty minutes
early at the pier. A few people were waiting. I looked about for Harry.
He was to meet me and I was certain that I would find him. But he was
not there. Of course there was still time. He was sure to be on hand to
greet Hobart.
Nevertheless, I had a vague mistrust. Since that strange visit I had not
been sure. Harry wasn't well. There was something to this mystery that
he had not told me. Why had he asked me to meet him at the pier? Why
didn't he come? When the boat docked and he was still missing I was
doubly worried.
Hobart came down the gangplank. He was great, strong, healthy, and it
seemed to me in a terrible hurry. He scanned the faces hurriedly and ran
over to me.
“Where's Harry?” He kissed me and in the same breath repeated, “Where's
Harry?”
“Oh, Hobart!” I exclaimed. “What's the matter with Harry? Tell me. It's
something terrible!”
He was afraid. Plainly I could see that! There were lines of anxiety
about his eyes. He clutched me by the arm and drew me away.
“He was to meet me here,” I said. “He didn't come. He was to meet me
here! Oh, Hobart, I saw him some time ago. He was--it was not Harry at
all! Do you know anything about it?”
For a minute he stood still, looking at me. I had never seen Hobart
frightened; but at that moment there was that in his eyes which I could
not understand. He caught me by the arm and started out almost at a
run. There were many people and we dodged in and out among them. Hobart
carried a suitcase. He hailed a taxi.
I don't know how I got into the car. It was a blur. I was frightened.
Some terrible thing had occurred, and Hobart knew it. I remember a few
words spoken to the driver. “Speed, speed, no limit; never mind the
law--and Chatterton Place!” After that the convulsive jerking over the
cobbled streets, a climbing over hills and twisted corners. And Hobart
at my side. “Faster--faster,” he was saying; “faster! My lord, was there
ever a car so slow! Harry! Harry!” I could hear him breathing a prayer.
Another hill; the car turned and came suddenly to a stop! Hobart leaped
out.
A sombre two-storey house; a light burning in one of the windows, a dim
light, almost subdued and uncanny. I had never seen anything so lonely
as that light; it was grey, uncertain, scarcely a flicker. Perhaps
it was my nerves. I had scarcely strength to climb the steps. Hobart
grasped the knob and thrust open the door; I can never forget it.
It is hard to write. The whole thing! The room; the walls lined with
books; the dim, pale light, the faded green carpet, and the man. Pale,
worn, almost a shadow of his former self. Was it Harry Wendel? He had
aged forty years. He was stooped, withered, exhausted. A bottle
of brandy on the desk before him. In his weak, thin hand an empty
wineglass. The gem upon his finger glowed with a flame that was almost
wicked; it was blue, burning, giving out sparkles of light--like a
colour out of hell. The path of its light was unholy--it was too much
alive.
We both sprang forward. Hobart seized him by the shoulders.
“Harry, old boy; Harry! Don't you know us? It's Hobart and Charlotte.”
It was terrible. He didn't seem to know. He looked right at us. But he
spoke in abstractions.
“Two,” he said. And he listened. “Two! Don't you hear it?” He caught
Hobart by the arm. “Now, listen. Two! No, it's three. Did I say three?
Can't you hear? It's the old lady. She speaks out of the shadows. There!
There! Now, listen. She has been counting to me. Always she says three!
Soon it will be four.”
What did he mean? What was it about? Who was the old lady? I looked
round. I saw no one. Hobart stooped over. Harry began slowly to
recognise us. It was as if his mind had wandered and was coming back
from a far place. He spoke slowly; his words were incoherent and
rambling.
“Hobart,” he said; “you know her. She is the maiden out of the
moonbeams. The Rhamda, he is our enemy. Hobart, Charlotte. I know so
much. I cannot tell you. You are two hours late. It's a strange thing. I
have found it and I think I know. It came suddenly. The discovery of the
great professor. Why didn't you come two hours earlier? We might have
conquered.”
He dropped his head upon his arms; then as suddenly he looked up. He
drew the ring from his finger.
“Give it to Charlotte,” he said. “It won't hurt her. Don't touch it
yourself. Had I only known. Watson didn't know--”
He straightened; he was tense, rigid, listening.
“Do you hear anything? Listen! Can you hear? It's the old lady. There--”
But there was not a sound; only the rumble of the streets, the ticking
of the clock, and our heart-beats. Again he went through the counting.
“Hobart!”
“Yes, Harry.”
“And Charlotte! The ring--ah, yet it was there, Keep it. Give it to no
one. Two hours ago we might have conquered. But I had to keep the ring.
It was too much, too powerful; a man may not wear it. Charlotte”--he
took my hand and ran the ring upon my finger. “Poor Charlotte. Here is
the ring. The most wonderful--”
Again he dropped over. He was weak--there was something going from him
minute by minute.
“Water,” he asked. “Hobart, some water.”
It was too pitiful. Harry, our Harry--come to a strait like this! Hobart
rushed to another room with the tumbler. I could hear him fumbling. I
stooped over Harry. But he held up his hand.
“No, Charlotte, no. You must not. If--”
He stopped. Again the strange attention, as if he was listening to
something far off in the distance; the pupils of his hollow, worn,
lustreless eyes were pin-points. He stood on his feet rigid, quivering;
then he held up his hand. “Listen!”
But there was nothing. It was just as before; merely the murmuring of
the city night, and the clock ticking.
“It's the dog! D'you hear her? And the old lady. Now listen, 'Two!
Now there are two! Three! Three! Now there are three!' There--now.” He
turned to me. “Can you hear it, Charlotte? No? How strange. Perhaps--”
He pointed to the corner of the room. “That paper. Will you--”
I shall always go over that moment. I have thought over it many times
and have wondered at the sequence. Had I not stepped across the library,
what would have happened?
What was it.
I had stooped to pick up the piece of paper. There came a queer,
cracking, snapping sound, almost audible, I have a strange recollection
of Harry standing up by the side of the desk--a flitting
vision. An intuition of some terrible force. It was out of
nothing--nowhere--approaching. I turned about. And I saw it--the dot of
blue.
Blue! That is what it was at first. Blue and burning, like the flame
of a million jewels centred into a needlepoint. On the ceiling directly
above Harry's head. It was scintillating, coruscating, opalescent; but
it was blue most of all. It was the colour of life and of death; it was
burning, throbbing, concentrated. I tried to scream. But I was frozen
with horror. The dot changed colour and went to a dead-blue. It seemed
to grow larger and to open. Then it turned to white and dropped like a
string of incandescence, touching Harry on the head.
What was it? It was all so sudden. A door flung open and a swish of
rushing silk. A woman! A beautiful girl! The Nervina! It was she!
Never have I seen anyone like her. She was so beautiful. In her face all
the compassion a woman is heir to. For scarcely a second she stopped.
“Charlotte,” she called. “Charlotte--oh, why didn't you save him! He
loves you!” Then she turned to Harry. “It shall not be. He shall not go
alone. I shall save him, even beyond--”
With that she rushed upon Harry. It was all done in an instant. Her arms
were outstretched to the dimming form of Harry and the incandescence.
The splendid impassioned girl. Their forms intermingled. A blur of her
beautiful body and Harry's wan, weary face. A flash of light, a thread
of incandescence, a quiver--and they were gone.
The next I knew was the strong arms of my brother Hobart. He gave me the
water he had fetched for Harry. He was terribly upset, but very calm. He
held the glass up to my lips. He was speaking.
“Don't worry. Don't worry. I know now. I think I know. I was just in
time to see them go. I heard the bell. Harry is safe. It is the Nervina.
I shall get Harry. We'll solve the Blind Spot.”