All these impressions came to me in the space of a few hectic moments,
when in upon my mental tumult intruded a husky whisper from the man on
the sofa.
“Kreener!” he said. “Kreener!”
At the sound of that name, and because of the way in which it was
pronounced, I felt my blood running cold. The speaker was staring
straight at my companion.
I clutched at the open door. I felt that there was still some crowning
horror to come. I wanted to escape from that reeking room, but my
muscles refused to obey me, and there I stood while:
“Kreener!” repeated the husky voice, and I saw that the speaker was
rising unsteadily to his feet.
“You have brought him again. Why have you brought him again? He will
play. He will play me a step nearer to Hell.”
“Brace yourself, Colquhoun,” said the voice of my companion. “Brace
yourself.”
“Take him awa'!” came in a sudden frenzied shriek. “Take him awa'! He's
there at your elbow, Kreener, mockin' me, and pointing to that damned
violin.”
“Here!” said the stranger, a high note of command in his voice. “Drop
that! Sit down at once.”
Even as the other obeyed him, the cloaked stranger, stepping to the
mantelpiece, opened a small box which lay there beside the glass case.
He turned to me; and I tried to shrink away from him. For I knew--I
knew--yet I loathed to look upon--what was in the box. Muffled as though
reaching me through fog, I heard the words:
“A perfect human body...in miniature... every organ intact by means
of... process... rendered indestructible. Tcheriapin as he was in life
may be seen by the curious ten thousand years hence. Incomplete... one
respect... here in this box...”
The spell was broken by a horrifying shriek from the man whom my
companion had addressed as Colquhoun, and whom I could only suppose
to be the painter of the celebrated picture which rested upon the
mantelshelf.
“Take him awa', Kreener! He is reaching for the violin!”
Animation returned to me, and I fell rather than ran down the darkened
stair. How I opened the street door I know not, but even as I stepped
out into the squalid alleys of Pennyfields the cloaked figure was beside
me. A hand was laid upon my shoulder.
“Listen!” commanded a deep voice.
Clearly, with an eerie sweetness, an evil, hellish beauty indescribable,
the wailing of a Stradivarius violin crept to my ears from the room
above. Slowly--slowly the music began, and my soul rose up in revolt.
“Listen!” repeated the voice. “Listen! It is 'The Black Mass'!”