He went to the Fireside Club but neither Pockman nor Sadoul were there.
He called a taxi and drove to the laboratory. It being New Year’s Day,
the place was closed; but a very dirty old man, who said he was the
engineer, answered the bell.
It seemed that, although the laboratory was closed and the employees
absent, Dr. Pockman had come in. Probably he was in one of the research
rooms.
Stuart climbed the iron stairs, knocked at the private office. Nobody
answered; he went in. A flat, suspicious, morgue-like odour pervaded
everything. Stuart opened the connecting door on a room full of jars
and chemicals and unknown apparatus. A grey chill possessed the place
and the sweetish odour hung heavily, horribly, as though it disguised a
stench more foul.
The place was dusky and empty, but he heard a scuffling in the room
beyond and went in.
In the dim, chilly light he saw Pockman running round and round after
a crippled rat which had escaped. Along the wall hobbled and scrambled
the hump-backed thing, trailing paralysed hind legs, dodging the bony
grasp of Pockman in pursuit, who was capering about like Death gone
crazy.
He caught the creature, which shrieked, and he held it up, twisting and
trying to bite.
“Where the hell did you come from?” he demanded, seeing Stuart.
The latter was experiencing a slight sense of nausea.
“I’m looking for Sadoul,” he managed to say.
Pockman held up the squirming rat. He had it by the back of the neck.
Then he ambled over and thrust it into a wire-faced hutch.
“I gave it a shot of the nymphalic,” he explained, wiping the sweat
away. “It’s an old rat on its last legs, and it’s going crazy with a
rush of youth. Look here; I want to show you a few creatures under
observation----”
“I can’t wait, now. Is Sadoul in the building?”
“I don’t know. That was a rough night last night. You weren’t along,
were you, Sutton?”
“No.”
“Your girl was. Didn’t Eve Ferral ask you?”
“Yes. Was it her party?”
“Hers and Katharine Ashley’s. The whole ‘Godiva’ company showed up.
It was large, Sutton--very noisy and very large.... I haven’t had any
breakfast. You ought to have come; Gilda let go last night----”
Stuart’s bloodless face checked him.
After a moment: “What part of the building does Sadoul occupy?” asked
the boy.
“You can go through that door, follow the corridor.... He may not be
there; I haven’t seen him----”
Stuart had already passed through the door. A whitewashed corridor,
full of the evil odour, led him to an iron door. He opened without
knocking; and saw a small room with a lounge in it. Sadoul lay on the
lounge. His eyes were open. He looked at Sutton as he entered, but made
no motion to rise.
Neither spoke for a few moments, but a sneer etched itself on Sadoul’s
dark features. Sutton came slowly toward him.
“Sadoul,” he said, “will you tell me the truth?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps.”
“Have you really anything to do with these periodic outbreaks of Gilda
Greenway?”
Sadoul disdained to evade the issue.
“I suppose so.”
“How?”
“Well, if you want to know, I suppose I put some badly needed animation
into her, widened her vision, stimulated a natural capacity for
pleasure. She needed a liberal education. She got it.”
“How did you do this?” asked Stuart curiously; but his clenched hand
was quivering and he dropped it into his overcoat pocket.
“I used what skill I had,” replied Sadoul, coolly.
“How? Psychically?”
“Possibly.”
“Hypno-psychic suggestion?”
“A very interesting subject,” sneered Sadoul.
“Yes.... You think, then, that Gilda’s periodic outbreaks”--he
moistened his lips--“these sudden alterations in her character--the
total change----” He could not go on for a moment or two. Sadoul lay
watching him out of smouldering, sardonic eyes.
“You believe you are responsible for these things?” he managed to say
at last.
“Does Gilda think so?”
“Yes.”
“I’m flattered.”
“Sadoul,” said the other slowly, “if it is true that you are
responsible--that you have been able to call in another and sinister
intelligence to combat her own self--break down in her all that
instinct and education have made her--can you, who have done this to
her, drive out this intruder--this enemy you called in?”
“Does it concern you, Sutton?”
“Yes.”
“You are mistaken. It doesn’t. But I’ll tell you that I wouldn’t undo
anything I’ve done if I could.”
“_Can_ you?”
“I don’t know. Possibly. Probably. I have not tried. I don’t intend to
try.”
“But you could free her of this if you tried, couldn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“How? Through hypno-psychic suggestion?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“Is there any other way?” asked Sutton, very white.
The two men looked hard at each other.
“If you died--for example,” added Sutton in a scarcely audible voice.
And he saw in Sadoul’s burning eyes that Gilda’s freedom lay that way.
“Sadoul,” he said, “you had better free her of this obsession if you
can. Because, if you do not, I’m going to do it for her.”
Sadoul slowly raised himself to a sitting posture. There was murder in
his eyes and his dark face sharpened.
Sutton nodded: “That’s it, Sadoul. You understand. If you don’t free
her, I’m going to kill you. I’ll give you time to do it. I’ll give you
reasonable time. I’ll wait as long as I think proper. Then I’ll set her
free in my own way.”
Sadoul got up, his eyes ablaze.
“So that’s a threat, is it, Sutton?”
“Not all of it. What were you doing behind the curtain the night that
Gilda Greenway died in my arms?”
Sadoul’s whole figure froze; a pallour swept the blood out of every
feature.
“I don’t know how big a blackguard you were,” said Stuart in a
curiously still voice. “You may have killed her. You had a chance--with
that misericordia. You look capable of it. I don’t suppose we’ll ever
really know.
“But I know you’ve tried to kill her soul--you and that shadowy devil
that you let into her.
“Now, take your shadow-devil and get out. Get out of her life; or I’ll
put you out of this life.
“That’s all, Sadoul.”