Dean read the message again, and a flash of remembrance came to him.
Michael Leigh was his uncle, but he had not seen the man for years.
Leigh had been a puzzle to the family; he was an occultist, and spent
most of his time delving in far corners of the earth. Occasionally he
dropped from sight for long periods of time. The cable Dean held was
sent from Calcutta, and he supposed that Leigh had recently emerged
from some spot in the interior of India to learn of Dean's inheritance.
Dean searched his mind. He recalled now, that there had been some
family quarrel about this very house years ago. The details were no
longer clear, but he remembered that Leigh had demanded the San Pedro
house be razed. Leigh had given no sane reasons, and when the request
was refused he had dropped out of sight for a time. And now came this
inexplicable cablegram.
Dean was tired from his long drive, and the unsatisfactory interview
with the doctor had irritated him more than he had realized. Nor was he
in the mood to follow his uncle's cabled request and undertake the long
journey to Buena Street, which was miles away. The drowsiness which he
felt, however, was normal healthy exhaustion, unlike the languor of
recent weeks. The tonic he had taken was of some value after all.
He dropped into his favorite chair by the window that overlooked
the sea, rousing himself to watch the flaming colors of the sunset.
Presently the sun dropped below the horizon, and gray dusk crept in.
Stars appeared, and far to the north he could see the dim lights of
the gambling-ships off Venice. The mountains shut off his view of San
Pedro, but a diffused pale glow in that direction told him that the
New Barbary was wakening into roaring, brawling life. Slowly the face
of the Pacific brightened. A full moon was rising above the San Pedro
hills.
* * * * *
For a long time Dean sat quietly by the window, his pipe forgotten in
his hand, staring down at the slow swells of the ocean, which seemed
to pulse with a mighty and alien life. Gradually drowsiness crept up
and overwhelmed him. Just before he dropped into the abyss of sleep
there flashed into his mind da Vinci's saying, "The two most wonderful
things in the world are a woman's smile and the motion of mighty
waters."
He dreamed, and this time it was a different dream. At first only
blackness, and a roaring and thundering as of angry seas, and oddly
mingled with this was the hazy thought of a woman's smile ... and a
woman's lips ... pouting lips, softly alluring ... but strangely the
lips were not red--no! They were very pale, bloodless, like the lips of
a thing that had long rested beneath the sea....
The misty vision changed, and for a flashing instant Dean seemed to see
the green and silent place of his earlier visions. The shadowy black
shapes were moving more quickly behind the veil, but this picture was
of but a second's duration. It flashed out and vanished, and Dean was
standing alone on a beach; a beach he recognized in his dream--the
sandy cove beneath the house.
The salt breeze blew coldly across his face, and the sea glistened like
silver in the moonlight. A faint splash told of a sea-thing that broke
the surface of the waters. To the north the sea washed against the
rugged surface of the cliff, barred and speckled with black shadows.
Dean felt a sudden, inexplicable impulse to move in that direction. He
yielded.
As he clambered over the rocks he was suddenly conscious of a strange
sensation, as though keen eyes were focussed upon him--eyes that
watched and warned! Vaguely in his mind rose up the gaunt face of his
uncle, Michael Leigh, the deep-set eyes glowing. But swiftly this was
gone, and he found himself before a deeper niche of blackness in the
cliff face. Into it he knew he must go.
He squeezed himself between two jutting points of rock, and found
himself in utter, dismal darkness. Yet somehow he was conscious that he
was in a cave, and he could hear water lapping near by. All about him
was a musty salt odor of sea-decay, the fetid smell of sunless ocean
caves and holds of ancient ships. He stepped forward, and, as the floor
shelved sharply downward, stumbled and fell headlong into icy, shallow
water. He felt, rather than saw, a flicker of swift movement, and then
abruptly hot lips were pressed against his.
Human lips, Dean thought, at first.
He lay on his side in the chill water, his lips against those
responsive ones. He could see nothing, for all was lost in the
blackness of the cave. The unearthly lure of those invisible lips
thrilled through him.
He responded to them, pressed them fiercely, gave them what they were
avidly seeking. The unseen waters crawled against the rocks, whispering
warning.
And in that kiss strangeness flooded him. He felt a shock and a
tingling go through him, and then a thrill of sudden ecstasy, and swift
on its heels came horror. Black loathsome foulness seemed to wash
his brain, indescribable but fearfully real, making him shudder with
nausea. It was as though unutterable evil were pouring into his body,
his mind, his very soul, through the blasphemous kiss on his lips. He
felt loathsome, contaminated. He fell back. He sprang to his feet.
And Dean saw, for the first time, the ghastly thing he had kissed,
as the sinking moon sent a pale shaft of radiance creeping through
the cave mouth. For something rose up before him, a serpentine and
seal-like bulk that coiled and twisted and moved toward him, glistening
with foul slime; and Dean screamed and turned to flee with nightmare
fear tearing at his brain, hearing behind him a quiet splashing as
though some bulky creature had slid back into the water....
_2. A Visit from Doctor Yamada_
He awoke. He was still in his chair before the window, and the moon was
paling before the grayness of dawn. He was shaken with nausea, sick
and shuddering with the shocking realism of his dream. His clothing
was drenched with perspiration, and his heart hammered furiously. An
immense lethargy seemed to have overwhelmed him, making it an intense
effort to rise from the chair and stagger to a couch, on which he flung
himself to doze fitfully for several hours.
A sharp pealing of the door-bell roused him. He still felt weak and
dizzy, but the frightening lethargy had somewhat abated. When Dean
opened the door, a Japanese standing on the porch began a bobbing
little bow, a gesture that was abruptly arrested as the sharp black
eyes focussed on Dean's face. A little hiss of indrawn breath came from
the visitor.