Kenwick stood outside the closed door, a curious numbness stealing over
him. Was it possible, he asked himself, that there had been some one in
this house during the last twelve hours? Was it possible that this
person was a woman? A solitary woman? It was unmistakably a woman's
voice, and there was no sound of comforting or upbraiding or other
evidence of companionship. As he knocked again at the door he wondered
which one of them was the more startled by the presence of the other.
The sobbing had abruptly ceased. There was dead silence. Had he been of
a superstitious temperament he might have suspected that his knock had
somehow released from bondage an unhappy ghost who, wailing over a dead
tragedy, had vanished leaving this spectral house as desolate as he had
found it.
But Kenwick had no patience whatever with the occult. For him life was
too all-absorbing and vivid an enterprise to tolerate the pastel
existence of ghosts. Through the stillness his voice cut its way like a
torchlight cleaving a path through a blind alley.
"What's the matter?"
As he hurled this question through the panel, he reflected that, being a
woman, she would probably reply, "Nothing." But there was no response.
Kenwick persisted. "Can I do anything for you?" And then a voice that
was little more than a whisper came to him.
"Who are you?"
Conscious that the name would mean nothing to her, he gave it with a
touch of irritation. She must know that he couldn't explain his invasion
of her house through that inscrutably closed door. He had never thought
of the place as belonging to a woman. Nothing that he had seen in it so
far bespoke a woman's presence. The embarrassment that he had felt
during the first hours of his imprisonment ebbed back and for the moment
robbed him of further speech.
"Please go away." The voice from the other side of the door was
entreating. It was a cultured, beautifully modulated voice struggling
against heavy odds for composure. Kenwick had the feeling that it was a
voice that lent itself easily to disguise.
"I can't go away until I have told you about myself," he said firmly.
"I must tell you how I happen to be here, an uninvited guest in your
house." He gave her the story briefly and was horribly conscious that it
lacked conviction. In his own ears it sounded like the still-born
narrative of a debauchee. Having stumbled to the end he waited for her
comment. It came after a long pause.
"I'm sorry you're hurt. I hope you'll feel better to-morrow." To-morrow!
Did she expect him to prolong his visit indefinitely? The casual
courtesy of her tone was more disconcerting than indignation or
resentment or any other form of reply could have been. But he resolved
savagely not to leave that door until he had obtained some sort of
information.
"When I met with the accident I was driving out to the Raeburn house;
Charles Raeburn. Do you know where he lives?"
"No."
"Well, tell me about this place, then, please. Whose is it?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know? And yet you live here?" Kenwick felt as though his
brain were turning over in his head.
"If you call this living." He wouldn't have caught this reply at all if
his ear hadn't been pressed close against the panel.
"Are you all alone here?"
There was no reply.
"Is any one with you?"
"Oh, please go away. Do have pity on me and go away."
She was alone, Kenwick decided, and was afraid to tell him so. The
realization brought a wave of hot color to his face. He dragged himself
painfully back to the landing. And from that distance he sent his voice
up to her, freighted with reassurance.
"Don't be frightened. I'm pretty badly bunged up just now, but I found a
revolver over in the other wing, and if anybody comes prowling
about--well, I'm not a bad shot." Suddenly a new thought occurred to
him. "Have you had anything to eat this morning? Are you hungry?"
"I think--I am starving."
It was like a spray of ice-water in his face. He stood for a moment
considering, "I'll get you something," he promised. "If you don't want
to come out I'll fix it and bring it up on a tray."
"There would be no use."
"Why not?"
"Because I can't open the door."
"Are you in bed?" His voice had sharpened.
Silence again, from which he concluded that she was. He stood there
staring at the heavy mahogany door as though by the mere intensity of
his gaze he could dissolve it. For a long moment he was lost in thought,
but he was not trying now to solve the riddle of the woman on the other
side of the barrier. The needs of the immediate present were all that
concerned him. Finally he spoke again.
"Is your bed anywhere near a window?"
"Yes."
"Is the window open?"
"Yes."
"Then listen. I'll go downstairs and get something for you to eat. I'll
put it into a bucket, attach some kind of rope with a weighted end to
it, and throw the end in at your window. I can't get outside so I'll
have to do it from the pantry window and it may take some time, but I'll
keep at it. When the end comes in, pull up the bucket. Do you see?"
"I'll try to."
He turned away and began the long trip down to the kitchen. Now that he
was animated by a desire to help somebody else, the depression which had
enveloped him was momentarily dissipated. In spite of the ever-present
pain he felt almost elated when at last he arrived again in the kitchen.
Half an hour later the "rope," manufactured from several towels tied
together, with a potato-masher on the end, flew in at the window just
above the pantry and the carefully covered bucket disappeared from
sight. "Pretty neat," Kenwick remarked to himself. "I had no idea that I
could do it when I told her I would."
But the strain had been too great. He was suddenly aware that every
nerve in his body was aching. Back in the den he sank down on the couch
where he had spent the night. Conjecture about the woman upstairs was
submerged now beneath his own physical misery. The shelves in the
library were empty. There was nothing to read save a paper-backed copy
of one of Dumas's earlier novels, which he discovered in a corner. He
took it up and tried to lose himself in the story, but it couldn't hold
him. He found himself wondering resentfully why old man Raeburn hadn't
shown more interest in his non-appearance. He was furiously impatient
and utterly helpless. And he told himself that these two cannot live
long together without wrecking the reason. Never before in his life had
he been in a position where he couldn't do something to alter obdurate
circumstance. To do anything would be better than to do nothing. The
thought came to him all at once that this was what women, overwhelming
numbers of women, must have endured during the terrible years of the war
just past. There must have been whole armies of them, furiously eager to
shoulder guns and march away to the trenches with the men they loved.
And instead they had to submit to being caged up in houses and,
blindfolded to all vision of the outer world, perform day after day the
dreary treadmill duties of routine existence. For the first time he
found himself wondering why more of them hadn't gone insane under the
pressure. He was certain that he himself would lose his mental balance
if the blindfold wasn't soon removed from his mental vision.
Suddenly he sat up and tossed aside his book. There was the sound of a
footstep on the gravel walk at the other side of the house. Pushing a
chair before him he followed the sound out to the dining-room. Through
the window he saw a tall, ungainly looking boy walking toward the
tank-house garage. He was carrying a long pole and a pair of pruning
shears. So this was the accursed gardener, the mysterious gatherer of
eggs, who, having brought him into the house, was content to let him die
there or make off with the family plate.
"Here, you!" Kenwick knocked on the window-pane. It was a loud
resounding knock, but the boy walked on unheeding, carefully examining
one end of his pole.
Kenwick tried the lock. He had noticed in a previous investigation that
all the windows on the lower floor had double locks. Undoing them on the
inside was futile until a spring released them on the outside. And
Kenwick was in no mood for making mechanical experiments. For an instant
he stood there, like some caged animal, staring after the gawky figure
of the boy as though he were the embodiment of hope fading away in the
distance. And then a blind fury seized him. Possessed only of the
overpowering desire to gain the attention of the outside world, he
suddenly doubled his fist and sent it crashing through the heavy
plate-glass pane. It shattered into a hundred pieces and cut a deep gash
in his wrist.
When he had bound this up in a handkerchief with deft first-aid skill,
he leaned out through the ragged aperture that had been the window. The
boy had vanished as completely as though he were a wraith. Kenwick,
controlling his dismay with a stupendous effort, told himself that he
had only gone to put away his tools and would soon come running back to
investigate the damage. He stood there waiting, exulting in his revolt.
In spite of the lacerated wrist this violent assertion of his rights
brought an immense relief. Why, a person might be murdered in this place
and it would be days before anybody would know a thing about it.
The boy did not return, and Kenwick made his way back to the den. It was
mid-afternoon now and a heavy rain had begun to fall. He made no further
attempt to read, but lay on the upholstered window-seat trying to find
some position that would be bearable. He cursed himself for having used
the leg so much. Had he remained quiet all day he might by now have been
able to get away from this uncanny place. But the woman upstairs! He
couldn't throw off an absurd sense of responsibility concerning her.
From all that he could gather she was as helpless a puppet in the hands
of fate as he. But of course she might have been lying to him. As he lay
there on his back gazing out at the needles of rain driven aslant into
the dank ground, he felt distrustful of the whole universe. Could there
be any way, he wondered, of getting a message out of this house? There
must be a rural delivery, and if so, at the gate would be a letterbox.
But that gate----It seemed tortuous miles away.
A search through the empty drawers of the desk revealed several loose
sheets of tablet-paper and the stub of a pencil. With this equipment he
wrote out a telegram to Everett. The mere wording of it seemed to
reinstate him somehow in the world of affairs. The problem of getting it
into the office could be solved later.
At six o'clock he forced himself to go out to the kitchen again and
prepare supper. The thought of eating revolted him, but the woman
upstairs, liar, decoy, or invalid, must be fed. Dangling close to the
pantry window was the white-knotted towel rope with the bucket on the
end. He put into it the last of the loaf of bread and some boiled eggs.
Then he called to her to pull it up. When the bucket had begun its
erratic climb, he leaned out of the narrow opening and spoke with
defiant triumph. "Did you hear me smash that window this afternoon? I
was trying to get the attention of the gardener. And I'm going to get it
too if I have to smash up everything on this place."
If she made any reply he did not catch it. The rain was falling fast now
and there was the growling sound of approaching thunder. Back in the den
again he turned on the reading-light, more for companionship than
illumination. Could it be possible that he would have to spend another
night in this ghostly house? The idea was intolerable, and yet there was
no relief in sight.
Another hour passed, and darkness enveloped the world in a shroud-like
mantle. The bandage with which Kenwick's leg was wrapped was a torture
now. He unwound it and began to massage the badly swollen limb using the
long firm strokes that he had learned from the athletic trainer during
his university days. They seemed to ease the pain somewhat and he
continued to rub until his arms ached with the effort.
Then all at once there came to his ears a sound that made him halt,
every muscle tense with listening. It was a sharp incisive knocking and
it seemed to come from the dining-room. He sat motionless, afraid to
move lest it should stop. But it came again, a clear unmistakable
knocking that had the dull resonance of metal clashing against metal. To
Kenwick it was perfectly obvious now that someone was trying to gain
entrance at that broken dining-room window. He tested his unbandaged
foot upon the floor and drew himself stealthily to a standing position.
And then he turned himself slowly in the direction of the darkened
dining-room.