Pat stared curiously at the apparition but made no move to alight from
the vehicle. She was conscious of no fear, only a sense of wonder
and perplexity. After all, this was merely Nick, her own harmless,
adoring Nick, in some sort of mysterious masquerade, and she felt full
confidence in her ability to handle him under any circumstances.
"Where's here?" she said, remaining motionless in her place.
"A place to dance," came the toneless reply.
Pat eyed him; a street car rumbled past, and the brief glow from its
lighted windows swept over his face. Suddenly the visage was that
of Nick; the crimson glare of the eyes was imperceptible, and the
features were the well-known appurtenances of Nicholas Devine, but
queerly tensed and strained.
"A trick of the light," she thought, as the street car lumbered away,
and again a faint gleam of crimson appeared. She gazed curiously at the
youth, who stood impassively returning her survey as he held the door
of the car. But the face was the face of Nick, she perceived, probably
in one of his grim moods.
She transferred her glance to the building opposite which they had
stopped. The strains of the mechanical piano had ceased; blank,
shaded windows faced them, around whose edges glowed a subdued light
from within. A drab, battered, paintless shack, she thought, dismal
and unpleasant; while she gazed, the sound of the discordant music
recommenced, adding, it seemed, the last unprepossessing item.
"It doesn't look very attractive, Nick," she observed dubiously.
"I find it so, however."
"Then you've been here?"
"Yes."
"But I thought you said you didn't know any place to go."
"This one hadn't occurred to me--then."
"Well," she said crisply, "I could have done as well as this with my
eyes closed. It doesn't appeal to me at all, Nick."
"Nevertheless, here's where we'll go. You're apt to find
it--interesting."
"Look here, Nicholas Devine!" Pat snapped, "What makes you think you
can bully me? No one has ever succeeded yet!"
"I said you'd find it interesting." His voice was unchanged; she stared
at him in complete bafflement.
"Oh, Nick!" she exclaimed in suddenly softer tones. "What difference
does it make? Didn't I say anywhere would do, so we went together?" She
smiled at him. "This will do if you wish, though really, Honey, I'd
prefer not."
"I do wish it," the other said.
"All right, Honey," said Pat the faintest trace of reluctance in her
voice as she slipped from the car. "I stick to my bargains."
She winced at the intensity of his grip as he took her arm to assist
her. His fingers were like taunt wires biting into her flesh.
"Nick!" she cried. "You're hurting me! You're bruising my arm!"
He released her; she rubbed the spot ruefully, then followed him to the
door of the mysterious establishment. The unharmonious jangle of the
piano dinned abruptly louder as he swung the door open. Pat entered and
glanced around her at the room revealed.
Dull, smoky, dismal--not the least exciting or interesting as yet,
she thought. A short bar paralleled one wall, behind which lounged a
little, thin, nondescript individual with a small mustache. Half a
dozen tables filled the remainder of the room; four or five occupied
by the clientele of the place, as unsavory a group as the girl could
recall having encountered on the hither side of the motion picture
screen. Two women tittered as Nick entered; then with one accord, the
eyes of the entire group fixed on Pat, where she stood drawing her wrap
more closely about her, standing uncomfortably behind her escort. And
the piano tinkled its discords in the far corner.
"Same place," said Nick shortly to the bartender, ignoring the glances
of the others. Pat followed him across the room to a door, into a hall,
thence into a smaller room furnished merely with a table and four
chairs. The nondescript man stood waiting in the doorway as Nick took
her wrap and seated her in one of the chairs.
"Quart," he said laconically, and the bartender disappeared.
Pat stared intently, studiously, into the face of her companion. Nick's
face, certainly; here in full light there was no trace of the red-eyed
horror she had fancied out there in the semi-darkness of the street. Or
was there? Now--when he turned, when the light struck his eyes at an
angle, was that a glint of crimson? Still, the features were Nick's,
only a certain grim intensity foreign to him lurked about the set of
his mouth, the narrowed eye-lids.
"Well!" she said. "So this is Paris! What are you trying to do--teach
me capital L--life? And where do we dance?"
"In here."
"And what kind of quart was that you ordered? You know how little I
drink, and I'm darned particular about even that little."
"You'll like this."
"I doubt it."
"I said you'll like it," he reiterated in flat tones.
"I heard you say it." She regarded him with a puzzled frown. "Nick,"
she said suddenly, "I've decided I like you better in your gentle pose;
this masterful attitude isn't becoming, and you can forget what I said
about wishing you'd display it oftener."
"You'll like that, too."
"Again I doubt it. Nick, dear, don't spoil another evening like that
last one!"
"This one won't be like the last one!"
"But Honey--" she paused at the entrance of the bartender bearing a
tray, an opened bottle of ginger ale, two glasses of ice, and a flask
of oily amber liquid. He deposited the assortment on the red-checked
table cloth.
"Two dollars," he said, pocketed the money and silently retired.
"Nicholas," said the girl tartly, "there's enough of that poison for a
regiment."
"I don't think so."
"Well, I won't drink it, and I won't let you drink it! So now what?"
"I think you'll do both."
"I don't!" she snapped. "And I don't like this, Nick--the place, or the
liquor, or your attitude, or anything. We're going to leave!"
Instead of answering, he pulled the cork from the bottle, pouring a
quantity of the amber fluid into each of the tumblers. To one he added
an equal quantity of ginger ale, and set it deliberately squarely in
front of Pat. She frowned at it distastefully, and shook her head.
"No," she said. "Not I. I'm leaving."
She made no move, however; her eyes met those of her companion, gazing
at her with a cold intentness in their curious amber depths. And
again--was that a flash of red? Impulsively she reached out her hand,
touched his.
"Oh, Nick!" she said in soft, almost pleading tones. "Please, Honey--I
don't understand you. Don't you know I love you, Nick? You can hear me
say it: I love you. Don't you believe that?"
He continued his cold, intense stare; the grim set of his mouth was as
unrelaxing as marble. Pat felt a shiver of apprehension run through
her, and an almost hypnotic desire to yield herself to the demands of
the inexplicable eyes. She tore her glance away, looking down at the
red checks of the table cloth.
"Nick, dear," she said. "I can't understand this. Will you tell me what
you--will you tell me why we're here?"
"It is out of your grasp."
"But--I know it has something to do with Wednesday night, something
to do with that reluctance of yours, the thing you said you didn't
understand. Hasn't it?"
"Do you think so?"
"Yes," she said. "I do! And Nick, Honey--didn't I tell you I could
forgive you anything? I don't care what's happened in the past; all I
care for is now, now and the future. Don't you understand me? I've told
you I loved you, Honey! Don't you love me?"
"Yes," said the other, staring at her with no change in the fixity of
his gaze.
"Then how can you--act like this to me?"
"This is my conception of love."
"I don't understand!" the girl said helplessly. "I'm completely
puzzled--it's all topsy-turvy."
"Yes," he said in impassive agreement.
"But what is this, Nick? Please, please--what is this? Are you mad?"
She had almost added, "Like your father."
"No," he said, still in those cold tones. "This is an experiment."
"An experiment!"
"Yes. An experiment in evil."
"I don't understand," she repeated.
"I said you wouldn't."
"Do you mean," she asked, struck by a sudden thought, "that discussion
of ours about pure horror? What you said that night last week?"
"That!" His voice was icy and contemptuous. "That was the drivel of a
weakling. No; I mean evil, not horror--the living evil that can be so
beautiful that one walks deliberately, with open eyes, into Hell only
to prevent its loss. That is the experiment."
"Oh," said Pat, her own voice suddenly cool. "Is that what you wish to
do--experiment on me?"
"Yes."
"And what am I supposed to do?"
"First you are to drink with me."
"I see," she said slowly. "I see--dimly. I am a subject, a reagent,
a guinea pig, to provide you material for your writing. You propose
to use me in this experiment of yours--this experiment in evil. All
right!" She picked up the tumbler; impulsively she drained it. The
liquor, diluted as it was, was raw and strong enough to bring tears
smarting to her eyes. Or _was_ it the liquor?
"All right!" she cried. "I'll drink it all--the whole bottle!" She
seized the flask, filling her tumbler to the brim, while her companion
watched her with impassive gaze. "You'll have your experiment! And
then, Nicholas Devine, we're through! Do you hear me? Through!"
She caught up the tumbler, raised it to her lips, and drained the
searing liquid until she could see her companion's cold eyes regarding
her through the glass of its bottom.
9