A CREATURE WITHOUT A BODY
The intense relief of sudden light in a dark room, when one has felt
the grip of deadly fear, brought from Margot a long drawn breath that
her quick wits changed to a yawn--an audible convincing yawn,
convincing to whatever, whoever, waited with the stillness of death,
under her bed.
Determined not to lose self-control, rapid and coherent thought
brought a sequence of small acts calculated to ward off immediate
danger and arrest suspicion in the maniacal creature whose hand and
arm she had seen. By this time Margot was convinced that she had to
deal with a maniac of some description.
She followed up her yawn with a restless twist of her body on the
mattress, a bang to her pillows, and finally a low grunt of physical
discomfort which ended in a self-addressed murmur of:
“Gosh! Wish I could get to sleep!”
Her next move was to seize her book and turn the pages noisily. Would
it be possible, she wondered, to keep on turning pages until
dawn,--possible for her to retain her self-control as the suspense
grew more and more unbearable, and would it be possible so far as the
patience of her lurking enemy was concerned. Would It--she thought of
the living thing as It--wait indefinitely for its proposed attack?
Surely not. Then this was merely a respite. It might wait for hours
for the light to be switched off again, but It would not wait for
daybreak and the consequent danger of discovery.
She measured the distance to the door leading into the hall. It wasn’t
so far, and if she didn’t get muscle-bound with fear, she could make
it with one long spring. But even so, before she could open the door,
there would be another spring--from the Other One under the bed, and
It would catch her before she could turn the handle. And if not a
spring, then a shot at her, for of course the creature must be armed.
No! Even if she were to get out of bed in a leisurely, unsuspicious
fashion, for whatever apparent purpose, she would be attacked as
surely and swiftly as if she were to scream for help.
Horrible, this waiting and thinking and planning! Horrible this unseen
menace--man or woman, sane or insane, violent or craven! There was a
limit to what even her healthy nerves could endure without snapping.
A sudden memory of Gene begging to let him call her up. If only she
had told him he might do so. Ridiculous! He would have rung her up an
hour ago at least, and by now he was probably sound asleep. He had
supposed that she was going immediately to bed, and would not have
dared to risk disturbing her after this long interval, even if she had
consented to let him call her.
A sudden alternative, a desperate expedient occurred to her with a
quickening of her pulse. Why couldn’t she call Gene! She would be
taking a fearful chance, for the mere calling of Central might be the
signal for an attack. To be sure, when calling for the police one had
merely to say the one word to the operator, therefore an ordinary
number would sound innocent enough. But how could she be sure that any
such reasoning would occur to the mind of a maniac? The mere sound of
her voice might be enough to bring that creeping, ghostly arm from
under the bed, and the body to which the arm belonged. But she _must_
do something! She’d call Central and get Gene’s number. After
that--God knew what!
Her hand trembling so that she very nearly dropped the instrument, she
lifted the telephone from the table to the bed. She put the receiver
to her ear and after the usual interval at such an hour, when night
operators often seem to be sound asleep, she heard Central’s weak and
far away reply. Nothing stirred in that room of horror except her
trembling body and her anguished breathing. So far, her plan was not
bringing her lurking enemy from hiding.
She heard the distant ringing of Gene’s bell,--ringing, ringing. Again
her heart seemed to be in her throat, choking her. Suppose that Gene
slept so soundly that no mere telephone bell could arouse him! Many
men slept like that. How did she know where Gene had the instrument!
It might be in his closet or his bathroom, anywhere but in his
bedroom! These possibilities flashed through her tortured brain and
made the few seconds seem like hours. Then came a still worse fear.
Perhaps Gene had changed his mind and not gone home at all! She
remembered that often he had told her of taking long midnight walks in
Central Park, when he was unhappy about her and knew that he could not
sleep because of her. Perhaps that was where he was, right that
moment!
Fear weights time with lead, even when thoughts fly in whirling
rapidity through one’s brain. Perhaps Central wasn’t calling the right
number! Her suspense--by this time, acute agony--was unbearable. She
signalled for the operator, started to repeat the number, and
then--God, the relief! Gene’s voice, dull and clouded with sleep,
saying “Hello!” as if he’d like to murder somebody if he were not too
sleepy to take the trouble.
She almost screamed with the easing of tension. Using what little
control she had left, she modulated her voice to a pitch of casual
friendliness and unconcern. Her inspiration had come! She knew,
suddenly, just what she was going to say to Gene.
“I suppose you’ll curse me for waking you up, Gene.”
“For Heaven’s sake, Margot!”
All sleepiness and latent irritation gone; an eager, naïve joy in his
tone, struck her as ludicrous, considering her desperate need of him.
“Awfully sorry to disturb you, but I’ve been trying to read myself to
sleep with a French book, and I’ve struck a passage I can’t
understand. Will you translate it?”
“Translate--French!” His voice sounded flat with disappointment.
Apparently the absurdity of her request did not strike him. Gene was
like that--so darn literal. And he was accustomed to her being erratic
at all times and seasons.
“Yes. Now listen carefully, Gene! These are the phrases that I don’t
understand:
“_Il y a un homme au-dessous de mon lit. Venez tout de suite!_”
She pronounced each word with slow distinctness. Her blood tingled in
her veins and pricked her skin with the realization that if her enemy
happened to know French, it would be all up with her in a few seconds.
He might wait until she hung up the receiver, knowing that a sudden
outcry of fear from her would give the alarm over the wire, but
_after_ that----
For an instant Gene was silent, apparently too surprised to answer
her. He knew well enough that she read French with ease. Then a laugh
came to her over the wires.
“What’s the joke, Margot? Surely you know what those phrases mean.”
Oh, Heavens! Gene, with his literal mind, and his slow imagination!
“I’ll repeat what I said, dear. Guess you didn’t hear me.”
She had all she could do this time to control the trembling of her
voice.
She repeated the foreign words slowly, striving to cut through space
to where Gene seemed to exist only as a voice. By the color in her own
voice and sheer force of will, she must get her meaning over to him.
Sleepiness perhaps made Gene dense. He translated a little flippantly:
“‘_There’s a man under my bed. Come at once!_’”
A third time she repeated the words, then said in English with
cautious urgency:
“Get it now, don’t you, Gene?”
He got it! She heard his gasp of horror.
“Good God! Be there in five minutes!”
“Wait a second, Gene!”
Another swift thought had come to her. The door to her room was not
locked. Thank God for that! She could never have left the bed and gone
to the door, even to open it for Gene. She recalled distinctly having
put the lock on the catch, early in the evening, and had forgotten to
change it. Gene could walk right in!
“Just one more phrase I can’t understand. _Pas besoin de frapper. Ma
porte est ouverte._”
“All right, all right. Be right over!”
“Thanks for translating,” she said quietly, to complete the pretense,
if indeed it were still that. The receiver at Gene’s end had already
been hung up. “Good night!”
Then--seconds that were years of waiting for _It_ to come forth! It
would surely come now if her French had been understood. Nothing! Not
a sound--not a movement. Only the beating of her own heart, so loud it
sounded to her that she wondered if it could not be heard by whatever
it was that waited beneath her.
Gone, that particular and immediate danger! _It_ had _not_ understood
French! She relaxed on her pillow with a sigh that was almost a groan
of relief. Odd that she should still be safe, she reflected vaguely.
Only a few minutes and Gene would be here! Thank Heaven that he lived
in the same block! He would have to ring the house bell, but it
connected with the basement and could not be heard upstairs. Again
thank God for all small mercies.
Hours! Days! Weeks! Then--upon the deathly stillness came a faint
sound of creaking wood. Gene was on the stairs! He was on the landing!
She could hear the shuffle of his feet! Then--the handle of her door
turning without sound, and the next second the door was thrown open,
literally hurled back against the wall. She saw Gene standing there, a
revolver in his hand. She saw him glance at her as if to be sure of
her safety before he could think of anything else. His face was
deathly white. Margot lay under the bed covers as stiff and still as
if she were dead.
Then she heard Gene’s quiet command:
“Get out from under that bed!”
Silence--a silence so thick with suspense that it seemed a part of the
living menace which remained invisible.
Good God! Gene was a target as he stood there waiting, his revolver
leveled toward the floor.
Margot watched with staring, helpless fear, she too waiting, for
Heaven knew what!
Gene advanced slowly into the room, still keeping eyes and revolver
pointed to the floor near the bed. Then he spoke again:
“Get out from there if you don’t want to get shot!”
Silence, a silence that pressed on Margot’s heart like a living thing.
She watched Gene take a few more steps closer to the bed. Then
suddenly he dropped to his knees, facing the foot-board of the bed,
bent until his head almost touched the rug, and aimed the revolver in
a quick motion back and forth. Margot could only see the curve of his
back over the foot of the bed. She felt she could breathe once more.
The fear, for Gene and for herself, had suddenly lifted, for some
strange reason.
Gene got quickly to his feet, and stood looking at Margot. His
expression of utter amazement would have struck her as comic in a
saner moment.
“There’s nothing under that bed.”
He made the announcement with the calmness of a mind suddenly stunned
by surprise and emptied of emotion.
For a second she thought that fear had unbalanced him. Then came a
dazed confusion to her own brain. Of course Gene was right! There
could be nothing under the bed or it would have attacked him.
But--where could the creature have gone--where and how and when, while
she lay there watching and waiting in frozen horror?
“I saw a hand--a hand and arm, come out from under the bed, and put
out a match on the rug.” The mystery which seemed to augment the
horror, made her whisper the words.
Gene lifted the small electric lamp to the floor, raised the
overhanging coverlet, and looked again under the large brass bed. Then
he got to his feet, more slowly this time.
“Nothing there!” His glance at Margot, seeming to raise the doubt as
to there having been anything there at any time, made her spring from
the bed, oblivious to the fact that she stood before him in her
pajamas.
The look she threw him was a challenge and defiant assurance that he
was--must be--mistaken. She knew there was something under that bed!
She dropped to one knee and stared at the empty space extending to two
sides of the wall. Nothing! Absolutely nothing!
She stood up, staring at Gene with a dazed expression, and still
innocently unconscious of her attire.
“Something _was_ under that bed! I was wide awake so it wasn’t a
dream. How could I have _imagined_ what I saw!”
“What did you think you saw--I mean, what did you see?” Gene hastily
corrected himself.
“I’ll tell you what I saw.” She shivered in remembrance of creeping
horror, and her voice trembled with excitement as she tried to tell
him what happened.
“I couldn’t sleep, and I lighted a cigarette to take a few more puffs.
I dropped the match to the floor, then remembered suddenly the danger
on this old rug, I reached over the side of the bed to find the match.
Just at that instant a thin white hand and arm crept out, oh so softly
and quickly and deliberately tapped the lighted match and put it out,
then withdrew back under the bed. _That’s_ what I _saw_, I tell you,
and God knows why I didn’t die of fright.”
Something in Gene’s eyes--a puzzled wonder perhaps--made her say
eagerly:
“You look as if you think I’m crazy, Gene. When I called you my life
was in danger. Don’t you _believe_ me?”
“Of course, of course, dear. But it’s all right now. Whatever it was
you saw isn’t there now, and I’m here instead.”
His smile was meant to be soothing, but it angered her.
“You’re acting as if you thought I were hysterical. I’m never
hysterical. And I’m not the kind to get any man out of bed in the
middle of the night, just on a wild goose chase!”
The tenderness that filled his eyes and his tentative move toward her,
as if to express his tenderness, brought sudden consciousness to
Margot of her unclad condition. She was too well bred to apologize or
refer to it in words, but she reached to the foot of the bed, seized a
silk kimono that lay there, and slipped it on quickly. Then she looked
at him almost impersonally, her eyes bright with the keenness of the
thought that had come to her.
“Gene! There’s a mystery, sure enough, about this room, and we’re
going to solve it. At least I am, and I’d like to have your help.”
Whatever he may have thought about mysteries which brought Margot
nearer to him in dependence and trust, he was wise enough to keep to
himself. All he said was:
“Righto! I’m keen about detective stuff. You furnish the Sherlock
Holmes end of it, Margot, and I’ll attend to any scrapping that may
form part of the game.”
Her face softened and her voice deepened with a throaty note, as
always when she was deeply stirred.
“You’re _such_ a brick, Gene, dear!” Then her lips quivered into a
smile which made his heart beat faster. “You’re--you’re wonderful to
me. I don’t know what I’d have done without you to-night.”
Her eyes filled with sudden tears and she shivered, drawing the kimono
closer about her. He took an eager step toward her.
“Margot--darling--you’re all in. You’ve had a fearful nervous shock.”
The sympathy in his voice broke down her last reserve. She had poise,
and character and a clever brain, but first and last she was feminine
and she had been badly frightened.
“You--you don’t know what I’ve been through!” She bent a little toward
him as if her own strength were not enough for her.
In the next few minutes, as Margot’s head lay against his shoulder,
and dry, nervous sobs shook her slight body, Gene had the sort of
struggle that few women understand, to compel his arms to express the
tenderness and protective gentleness that was what she wanted of him,
and restrain their passionate yearning to crush her against his heart.
Margot understood perfectly. She felt the trembling that went over him
like a wave, from head to foot, and she felt his soft kiss on her
hair. For the first time she wondered if she didn’t love Gene well
enough for--well, for marriage and all the rest.
His protective strength gave her back her self-control, and it gave
her something else--a realization that it would be good to have Gene’s
love and strength to depend upon. Still clinging to him with one hand,
with the other she rubbed her eyes, then gave a tremulous laugh.
“For an independent female who wants no man’s help, I’m doing rather
well, don’t you think, Gene?”
She looked up into his eyes, and their smile invited his caress. He
bent his lips to hers and for the first time since he had loved her,
Margot’s kiss told him that she cared more for him than any words of
hers had admitted.
He kissed her hair, her temple, her throat, just under her ear where
her hair swept back. Then he whispered into her ear.
“Darling--you do love me--just a little, don’t you?”
“Just a little,” she whispered back. As if afraid that she had
surrendered too much and too quickly, she drew gently out of his arms,
with a glance that told him he mustn’t press the advantage gained.
Then a frown drew her eyes together, as if to remind him that the
situation demanded concentrated thought and action, unrelated to
love-making.
“Gene, whether I ever sleep again in this room or not, I’ve _got_ to
know what was under my bed and where it went to. You said you’d help
me?”
“You bet I will!” His smile was apparently as unemotional as his
words.
She stared at the rug where the match had fallen, as if to seek there
the first clue in the unraveling of the mystery. Suddenly she ran to
the spot, across the few feet of space intervening. She threw herself,
literally, to her knees and bent her head close to the rug. Then,
excitedly she called to him, without lifting her head.
“Gene! Come here! Look at this!”
He got down on his knees beside her and looked where she pointed. What
he saw was a distinct hollow in the nap of the rug, a hollow the size
of the tip of a human finger. Into this the black char from the
burning match had been pressed and smudged.
Slowly they got to their feet and stood in silence for a few seconds,
looked at each other with widened eyes. Gene, for the first time since
he had reached the room, looked sincerely puzzled and uncertain.
“I guess that settles it,” Margot said slowly. “I wasn’t just ‘seein’
things at night.’ Not even a real ghost could have made that mark on
the rug. Now, what?”
“Now,” Gene said thoughtfully, “with your permission, I’m going to
call the police.”
She hesitated. Her glance wavered from the spot on the rug, to the
telephone, then to Gene.
“I think we’d better. It would be foolish to wait till daylight. Of
course they may think us a couple of idiots. Policemen haven’t much
imagination.”
Gene walked to the telephone and called up the police.
“And now, my dear,” said Margot, “I’ve got to put on some clothes
before they get here. I’ll have to do it here, for I’m scared to go
into the bathroom--it might be tenanted.” She gave a nervous laugh.
“So shut your eyes, old dear, or turn your back, and have your
revolver ready in case I have to throw shame to the winds and yell for
help.”
It took her only a few moments to get into a house dress and comb her
ruffled hair. The comb dropped from her hand to the top of the chest
of drawers, as a loud banging at the front door resounded through the
old house. She stood close to Gene as they listened to the heavy
trampling of feet downstairs. Gene ran to the door and flung it open.
The officers of the law came up to the landing with a rush, and behind
them scurried Mrs. Bellew, in a half-buttoned wrapper and curl papers.
For all the excitement and her own nervous tension, Margot’s lips
twisted with the smile she tried to control as she saw her landlady.
Patrolmen Michael Quinlan and Shane Boyle, stood each of them nearly
six feet. Their pugnacious but kindly faces, their clean wholesome
skins, suggesting a life spent in the open, their broad blue-coated
chests, and their nightsticks, swung with just the right suggestion of
authority and force, made Margot’s room seem suddenly and
incongruously, about the safest place in New York.
Quinlan glanced sharply from Margot to Gene. His voice was as sharp as
his words.
“Speak up! What’s wrong here?”
Gene, not wishing to dominate the situation, unless Margot wished him
to, looked at her enquiringly. She nodded quickly with a smile, then
addressed Quinlan, briefly and a little crisply.
“This is _my_ room. I occupy it alone.” Slight emphasis on the last
word. “I’d had a party here. Everybody had gone home and I went to
bed. After I’d switched off the electric light, I lighted a cigarette
and threw the match on to the floor. It struck me suddenly that it was
a dangerous thing to do, so I leaned over the side of the bed to make
sure the match wasn’t still burning. As I did this, I saw a hand and
arm reach out from under the bed----”
“Sneak thief, eh?” Quinlan couldn’t wait for the end of her narrative.
“Think he’s still around here?” He made a movement to approach the
bed, but Margot stopped him with a slight gesture of her hand.
“Wait, please! Let me finish. The hand reached out to the match and
tapped the burning end of it. I was too frightened to move or make a
sound. Then the hand and arm were drawn back under the bed. I made
sure, as soon as I could control my thoughts, that I had a maniac to
deal with. I screwed up my courage and switched on the light. Nothing
happened, but I fully expected to be murdered any minute. Then I
telephoned to my friend Mr. Valery, made up a yarn about wanting him
to translate some French I was reading, and got it over to him in
French that a man--or something--was under my bed. He came right over
in five minutes. When he looked under my bed, there was nothing to be
seen.”
Painfully conscious, as she neared the end of her story, that it must
sound absurd and unconvincing to others, she threw a brightly
challenging look from one policeman to the other. Their friendly Irish
faces expressed a struggle between doubt of her sanity and amusement
at the situation. Then Boyle said bluntly:
“Sounds like a pipe dream to me, lady.”
“It’s neither a pipe dream nor a nightmare,” she said gently. Her
common-sense told her that it would be absurd to get up on her dignity
because these two unimaginative but kindly disposed policemen, showed
frank disbelief of her statements. “Look here, please!” She walked to
where the match had been smudged into the rug. “Just bend down and
take a good look at that and tell me what you both think of it.”
What they both thought of it was not evident in the scowling,
bewildered scrutiny they bent upon the rug. Then a thick, red finger
went out to touch the spot.
“Don’t please!” Margot’s sharp command caused the finger to draw back
slowly. “We may want to examine that later again,” she said more
gently. “It must not be touched by anyone.”
The officers stood erect and exchanged glances that showed an
uncertain state of mind that they were determined to conceal, but
Margot’s keen eyes saw and understood.
Said Quinlan, squaring his shoulders: “Well, Miss, what do you want us
to do?”
“Investigate thoroughly, please.” Something in her quiet assurance and
dignity went further to convince the two men, that here was something
not so easily disposed of as they had thought, stranger than even that
queer mark on the rug.
“Sure,” Quinlan said, swinging shoulders and nightstick as he
approached the bed. “Where’s that door lead to?” He indicated the one
opening upon the roof-garden.
“There’s a roof out there.” It was Gene who gave the information. He
pointed to another door. “That’s a closet, and the bathroom’s next to
this. Opens into the hall.”
Boyle walked to the door opening on the roof, and Quinlan dragged the
heavy bed aside, remarking comfortingly to Margot:
“Never a sniff or sign of a living soul’ll escape us, Miss, so don’t
you worry!”
He moved the bed out into the room, then rapped the floor with his
stick. There was no cupboard behind the bed, nor any aperture in the
wall except a small register protected by a grill through which a
mouse could scarcely have passed. He gave a scornful prod to the
mattress and struck the bed springs, just by way of not omitting
anything. Then he walked to the closet. It was a deep closet and wide,
hung with many clothes. It required a few seconds to give the closet
its due portion of attention. Quinlan turned back into the room just
as Boyle returned from his inspection of the roof and bathroom.
Quinlan stood a little awkwardly, swinging his stick. His lips were
tight shut in a sort of pursed smile, and he lowered his head a little
as he looked at Margot.
“Look here, Miss. Do ye mind telling me what business you’re in?”
Slightly taken aback, and throwing a glance at Gene to which he
responded by moving closer to her, she said:
“I’m a motion picture actress.”
Quinlan lifted his head and the pursed smile widened to good-natured
amusement.
“Say! That don’t surprise me, at all at all. You movie queens sure
like to pull anything to make a story for the papers, don’t ye now?”
His smile was ingratiating.
For the first time Margot felt angry resentment.
“I’ve given you my story, told you the absolute truth. I _saw_ a hand
put out that match. Just because the case is full of mystery is no
reason to insult my intelligence.”
Quinlan had probably heard of insulting a good many things in the
course of his career, but to insult someone’s ‘intelligence’ was a new
one on him, evidently. He frowned, then smiled sheepishly.
“Sure, I meant no harm, Miss. Now, just tell me once more, quiet like.
You were scared out of your boots, as you might say. Then you phoned
this young man.” He glanced at Gene. “Now, did you have to get out of
bed to let him in?”
“No. The door was unlocked. He walked right in.”
“Humph!” Quinlan’s brain found this almost too easy. His smile
widened. “Sure, don’t you see, Miss, didn’t it strike you at all, that
whoever was under that bed could have crawled to the hall door or the
door leadin’ to the roof, and made his get-a-way?”
“There was a streak of light from a street lamp, coming through that
door.” She pointed to the roof-garden exit. “It made a faint shaft of
light across the room. I could have seen anything moving over by that
door.”
“But maybe now, you weren’t lookin’ in that direction all the time.
And it was black, wasn’t it, at this end of the room?” Margot nodded.
“Well, he could have got to the hall door easy. Too dark to see him,
and your heart, likely as not, Miss, was beating too loud for you to
_hear_ him open and shut the door.”
For a moment Margot was staggered by the apparent simplicity of the
explanation. Then once more she knew beyond all doubt, that,
fear-distraught as she had been during those awful minutes,
nevertheless her hearing had been made more acute by her very fear,
and she could not have failed to hear the slightest movement in the
room. Before she could reply to Quinlan, Mrs. Bellew who had been
standing all this time, too overcome by astonishment and fear and
Heaven knew what other mixed emotions, to do anything but stare
open-mouthed and listen spellbound, suddenly broke forth.
“Oh, my God, my God!” She was almost hysterical from cumulative fear.
“That thief or that crazy man or whatever it is, is roaming through my
house. I know he is! He’s hiding in some empty room. Find him, oh my
God, find him!”
Margot went quickly to her distraught landlady and put a hand on her
arm.
“Don’t get excited,” she said gently. “If there’s anything--I mean
anybody--roaming around in the house, these officers will find him.
I’ll see to that. So don’t you worry, my dear.”
Mrs. Bellew’s mouth quivered, and tears came into her eyes.
“I’m that nervous,” she said tremulously. “What with that girl
disappearing the way she did, and that man Murchison, and now this
maniac loose in my house, I’m terribly upset, Miss Anstruther.”
Quinlan had heard what she said. He went closer to her.
“What’s that you said about a girl disappearing and a man?”
Margot, realizing that these other happenings, which might or might
not have bearing on her own experience, would only confuse the present
issue for Quinlan, said quickly:
“Oh, it’s got nothing whatever to do with what happened to me
to-night. A girl lodger here some months ago, walked out suddenly and
never came back, that’s all. And a man living up stairs disappeared at
the same time.” Her smile at Quinlan was deliberately calculated to
mislead him, and it succeeded. He gave a knowing smile and
comprehending nod.
“Sure! I get you!” His good-nature was reinforced by the beautiful
young lady’s confiding manner.
Mrs. Bellew was too self-centered and upset to observe details. She
had not caught Margot’s smile nor the subtle suggestion in her words,
but Gene, delighted at the quick wit of this girl whom he adored,
swallowed a laugh with difficulty.
Margot turned more seriously to Quinlan.
“Now, please Officer, search the house thoroughly. But whatever you
do, don’t leave _this_ room unguarded. I swear to you that I saw a
hand and arm creep out from under that bed and put out the match. And
I _know_--” she raised her hand with a solemn gesture, almost as if
taking an oath, “I am as sure as I am that I’m alive, that whatever
was under my bed _didn’t_ get as far as the door.”
Quinlan’s shrewd look of questioning doubt grew more serious. He
turned to Boyle.
“You stick here till I get back. After we’re all out, just switch off
the light. That’ll bring action if there’s anything round this
neighborhood. Here, give me a hand with the bed.”
They shoved the bed back into place, then Quinlan, again swinging his
stick and his shoulders, went to the hall door.
“Come on, you people. Better find somewheres else to sleep till
mornin’, Miss Anstrooter.” He got the name out with difficulty.
Margot, Gene and Mrs. Bellew went downstairs and waited in the dimly
lighted front hall. From time to time they caught the chittering
voices of lodgers who were being disturbed by Quinlan’s search.
Finally he joined them below, remarking that he had still to take a
look at the front and back parlors. He struck the parlor door with his
stick. The blow against the heavy wood resounded in the silent house.
“Not but what he’d have ducked for the street, right off, and----”
His sentence was never completed. A roar of sheer terror thundered
through the house. Mrs. Bellew gave a scream, and Margot seized Gene’s
arm.
“Mother Mary!” Quinlan almost whispered the words, and his eyes
bulged.
The door of Margot’s room, which could be seen from the foot of the
stairs, burst open, and Boyle dashed down the stairs, face ghastly
white and eyes staring. He seemed oblivious of the four figures in the
hall, and made a spring for the front door. Quinlan threw out his arm
and caught him.
“For the love of God, what’s eatin’ ye?”
“The hand! The hand!” Boyle was beyond lucid speech.
“_What_ hand?” Quinlan shook him and shouted at him.
“The hand from under the bed!”
“You saw it too?” Margot seized Boyle’s arm with trembling fingers.
Her flesh was cold and tingling.
Boyle crossed himself. He spoke in a choked undertone.
“Standin’ there--in the dark--the Holy Saints take witness--it came
out--from under the bed--and doused a flame on the rug!”