he spoke. “No, it’s too queer. Evil spirits would explain everything,
but I haven’t gone back to the Middle Ages yet. You try to explain it,
Allis, by arranging an intricate system of mental telephone
wires--installed in an instant, ready for the emergency. That may be
accurate, but it’s extremely complicated. Too complicated, I’d say. I’m
not contradicting you, you understand. But for myself, I usually take
the line of least resistance.” He rose and faced us. His fingers
twitched a little as he, in turn, lighted a cigarette.
“Meaning--?” Allis queried.
“Meaning that if Jack Hilles was the kind of person you say he was, the
easiest place for that sort of screed to have come from is--Jack
Hilles.”
Allis’s lips folded themselves firmly. “If you choose to admit the
supernatural hypothesis, I suppose it is easy. I was ruling out
impossibilities.”
“The fact that you haven’t proved a thing possible doesn’t mean that
you’ve proved it impossible, does it? How about you, Gregory?” Fenwick
turned to me.
I threw up my hands. “Oh, I’m with Allis. It sounds queer and
far-fetched and all, but anything is more reasonable than believing the
dead communicate in that way. Even Mrs. Conway is more reasonable.”
“Well, I wish to God they had rigged up their wireless on Allis’s roof
instead of mine!” Fenwick exploded. He turned his back on us and walked
over to a dark window.
I tried to be judicial. “If Allis was thinking about the sort of
creature Jack Hilles really was, that in itself accounts for the
telepathy business.”
Allis glared at me. “I wasn’t thinking of Jack Hilles. I knew he was a
very bad lot, but I wasn’t thinking about it--not at all. I was
wondering if Carter and Genevieve Ford would pull it off. And, anyhow, I
couldn’t have thought that kind of thing about Hilles. It just wouldn’t
naturally have occurred to me. Whereas, it might have, to Fenwick, with
his background.”
Ben Allis stopped, suddenly, and I felt the blood in my body, for an
instant, back up in its channels. For just as Allis finished speaking,
Fenwick drew back from his window and crumpled up against the sofa. No,
he did not faint. He was, rather, at bay there, against the world;
against Allis and me, who rushed to him at once. I did not try to read
that face, though it shouted at me silently. I turned my head away.
“Damn you all, damn you all!” Fenwick’s white lips were saying. “And I
thought I’d got rid of it forever. Oh, damn you both!” Yet he did not
seem to be standing outside his own curse.
Fenwick roused himself at the sound of a knock on the library door, and
we faced about. The knock saved us three from something pretty awful.
It was Maud Allis, and in her hand she carried a ouija-board. “I found
Nora playing with this thing,” she said; “and after to-night it was more
than I could bear. Will you please burn it up now--so I can see it
burn?”
“You bet I will!” Allis broke it over his knee, and went to the fire,
which had almost died out.
With one eye on Fenwick, slowly, very slowly, composing himself to a
normal posture and a normal expression, with a sense that I must keep
Maud off him, I drew her away in the direction of the door. “I
hope”--and I laid my hand on her wrist--“the thing hasn’t been worrying
Nora. She didn’t get any echoes, did she?”
“Oh dear, no. It had just been writing foolishness--probably the kind of
foolishness you would expect to come out of Nora’s subconscious.”
“Nothing about Jack Hilles?” I tried to laugh.
“I should hope not! Betty Dane’s cousin, they’re all in love with; and
their matinée heroes; and their school commencement. But I’ve put her to
bed and taken it away. I will not have my niece ouija-ing.”
Ouija was now burning brightly above the Cape Cod lighter. Ben Allis
called to his wife. “Maud, do get a taxi round at once for Fenwick. He’s
tired and doesn’t want to walk.”
“Certainly, I will. Did you people come to any conclusion?”
“Ben has the right of it, I’m sure. Telepathy.” I spoke quite loud.
“He’ll tell you all about it. We’re going.”
Maud went off to the telephone.
Fenwick’s voice cut in. “Thanks for thinking of the taxi, Allis. I
believe I do want one. Good-night.”
“Shall I come along with you?” I asked, thinking of Mrs. Conway’s brave
support of Fanny Medford.
Allis frowned, and Fenwick, though he had got himself in hand, seemed to
cringe a little before the frown. “No, thanks. I’m going straight to
bed. It’s needless to say, I suppose, that this thing shall go no
further, as far as I am concerned. I can’t say it has been a pleasant
evening, but it has been interesting. It’s funny, isn’t it”--he spoke
rapidly, but carefully--“that a party of friends can react so
differently? Mrs. Conway thinks it’s evil spirits; I think Hilles did
get through; and you and Allis think it was all communicated from
Allis’s subconscious to mine. But we all hope that Mrs. Conway will
convince Mrs. Medford.”
No; he could evidently take care of himself now. Mrs. Allis, returning,
rallied him as she said good-night.
“Your taxi is there already, I think, Mr. Fenwick. What do you think of
Belshazzar’s letter _now_? I’m sorry you had to get the letter.”
It was all right for Maud to carry things off lightly--probably she felt
it was her duty--but it didn’t help Allis and me so much as she
doubtless hoped.
“I think I can promise never to meddle with this sort of thing again,”
he said gravely. “I’m convinced it was the real thing. Your husband
thinks he was responsible. He’ll explain to you.”
Allis answered the plea that sounded faintly in Fenwick’s voice. “Yes,
Maud shall have my telepathy theory. I think she’ll agree. Maud, do go
to the door with Fenwick. There’s no fender here, and I don’t like to
leave ouija.”
Maud Allis, as you may have made out, was a good wife who never argued
an absurdity if her husband perpetrated it. She preceded Fenwick to the
hall.
Allis gripped my hand. “I shall tell Maud exactly what I said. You’ll
tell nobody anything.”
“Of course not. For Mrs. Medford’s sake, if nothing else.”
Allis relaxed his grip. “Yes--and Fenwick’s, too. I’ve been fond of him
for a long time. Perhaps he’ll never give himself away again.”
“Perhaps not,” I agreed. “Asia is a large continent. He may come to
believe it was Hilles communicating, you know.”
“Well, I rather hope he does. Fenwick’s got to live. But you and I don’t
believe it.”
“No, we don’t.
“It’s queer,” Allis mused; “you and I are the only ones of the crowd who
know what happened; and the one thing we are most anxious for is that
everyone concerned--even Fenwick himself--should be convinced of some
explanation we know is wrong. We want Mrs. Medford to believe Mrs.
Conway; I want Maud to believe what I said here a while ago; and I even
want Fenwick to believe that the dead communicate. We’re a scientific
lot, aren’t we?”
“I’m not sure I wouldn’t rather believe any of those things than believe
what I do,” I said grimly. I remembered Fenwick’s face.
“Exactly. Poor science!”
Mrs. Allis returned, and I bade my host and hostess good-night. This
time I did not go back again.
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
in the innnermost fold=> in the innermost fold {pg 20}
to work with you hands=> to work with your hands {pg 29}
of this extraordiary=> of this extraordinary {pg 90}
that fact challenegd=> that fact challenged {pg 147}
He position is=> Her position is {pg 211}
that no unholstery or varnish=> that no upholstery or varnish {pg 275}
Immeditely he knew=> Immediately he knew {pg 285}
It it did not come=> If it did not come {pg 291}
on the treshold=> on the threshold {pg 300}
She accaused me of=> She accused me of {pg 342}