Chapter XIV: Part 14

The coroner jumped to his feet in his excitement.

“I see what you mean!” he cried. “Why haven’t we thought of that before? But how, Bert—how will you do it?”

“That remains to be seen.” Sheriff Parker smiled oddly as he looked at his companion. “If you are willing to risk the thing with me, I think I have a plan that will work. We’ll leave here in the car about four this afternoon; that will get us to the pool in plenty of time to set our trap before dark. Bring along your repeating shotgun—a heavy charge of buckshot is far more certain after dark than a rifle ball, and we can’t afford to miss.”

Doctor Morse nodded understandingly.

“I shall not fail you, Bert,” he said.

* * * * *

Early dusk found the two men in the sheriff’s car slowly picking their way over the stony trail which led to the Black Pool. In the bottom of the tonneau was a ten-gallon keg, three or four short boards, and something wrapped in burlap, while the back seat held a pair of repeating shot guns and a box of cartridges. A hundred yards from the pool, at the foot of a little hill, Sheriff Parker killed his engine and stepped out onto the ground.

“We’d better leave the car here,” he remarked. “It is best not to make any more disturbance in the immediate vicinity of the pool than we can help, and we can easily carry what we need from here. But let’s look around a bit first.”

Together, carrying their loaded guns in the manner of men who wish to be prepared against any sudden emergency, they made their way through a fringe of trees to the edge of the black, still water, which gave the pool its name. Even by daylight the place was far from cheerful. The pool, about seventy feet in diameter, was entirely surrounded by trees which grew to within a few feet of its oily surface.

There was no sign of life about the place, not even a frog croaked, and the muddy banks bore mute testimony that none of the many cattle which roamed that region had been there to drink for many days. In one place only was the mud broken by fresh tracks; and when his eyes fell on this spot, the sheriff smiled grimly.

“You see them, Horace,” he said, pointing. “The thing has been here recently—its trail is as plain as day; this must be its drinking place. Now for our little trap.”

Returning to the car, the two men first carried the keg to the foot of a large tree which stood only a few yards from where the “plague” had approached the pool; then they got the boards and the other articles, which, on being unwrapped, proved to be a brass hand pump, with a long spray nozzle, and about a dozen feet of hose.

Doctor Morse regarded this contrivance with considerable perplexity. He could not see of what use it could be in the task that lay ahead of them; but when he expressed his puzzlement, his companion laughed softly.

“It’s really very simple,” he explained, “although it is merely an experiment of my own, and may not work as I hope it will. The keg is full of whitewash, and this pump will throw a steady stream for over thirty feet. If we can get the brute within range, my idea is to spray him with whitewash until we can see enough of him to shoot at. White always shows up fairly well in the dark. Catch the idea?”

Doctor Morse gazed at his friend in surprised admiration for an instant; then he impulsively caught his hand in a hard grip.

“You’re a wonder, Bert!” he exclaimed. “I don’t see how you ever thought of it, but the scheme looks good to me. I am honestly beginning to think we have a chance. But what are those boards for?”

“For a platform on the tree yonder,” replied the sheriff, nodding toward a cotton wood. “For obvious reasons I thought it would be safer to do our watching from above ground, and with these boards we can construct a support that will enable us to stay in the tree with some degree of safety. Of course, the thing may be able to climb, for all we know, but we must chance that. The tree is within easy range of the water, and those tall ferns and weeds, if we watch them closely, should give us warning of the beast’s approach. Now let’s get busy, for it will be dark before we know it.”

At the end of half an hour, just as it was actually growing dark within the shadows of the trees, the two men had built a substantial platform in a fork of the cottonwood, some ten feet from the ground, and established themselves upon it. Sheriff Parker’s gun lay beside him, while he grasped the nozzle of the high-pressure pump in his hands; but the coroner’s weapon was ready for instant use.

Swiftly the day turned into night, and for an hour it was as dark as pitch at the edge of the pool; then the moon, surrounded by myriads of stars, slowly climbed up over the hill-tops beyond the water. With eyes riveted upon the ferns, from the movements of which they expected to be warned of the beast’s approach, the two men waited tensely.

For a long time nothing happened. From the blank darkness around them came merely the familiar noises of night in the wilderness—the long, wailing howl of a distant coyote; the chirping drone of the tireless insects in the trees; strange cries of night birds, so different from those of the birds of the day; the “plop” of muskrats diving in the still water, and all the mysterious chorus of small sounds that one never notices until after night has fallen.

Seated on their narrow platform, the watchers were soon very uncomfortable, for the mosquitoes were numerous and hungry, and the men dared not smoke for fear the smell of tobacco would give warning to the thing they sought. Doctor Morse, eyes fixed on the top of a ridge which could be seen through a break in the trees, and beyond which the stars and the moon seemed to be grouped, was half dozing, when suddenly he straightened up with a little start.

A curious thing had taken place! The stars, rising above the crest of the ridge, _had successively disappeared from right to left_!

Each was blotted out for but an instant, and not more than two or three at the same time, but along half the length of the ridge, all that were within a few degrees of the crest were eclipsed. Something had passed along between them and the coroner’s line of vision; but he could not see it, and the stars were not close enough together to define its shape. After a second of tense watching, Doctor Morse reached out and gripped the sheriff by the arm.

“Did you see it?” he whispered. “It’s coming, I think.”

“Yes; but be quiet, for your life!” Sheriff Parker leaned forward and shifted his grip on the hose nozzle.

For several minutes all was silent, then came a faint patter of stealthy feet, and something like the sniffing of a hound sounded below them, while the ferns waved violently, although there was no breeze. Almost immediately came the sounds of lapping in the water—sounds exactly like those made by a thirsty dog when drinking.

Taking careful aim with the nozzle, Sheriff Parker suddenly pumped out a steady stream of whitewash which began to splash and spatter on the edge of the pool and surface of the water. And, as the milky liquid began to fall, the two watchers saw a strange and wonderful thing. In a spot, which ten seconds before had been merely opaque darkness, _an outline grew up and took shape out of the ground_; a strange, monstrous, misshapen thing, squat and hairy, not unlike a huge wolf in general appearance, but broader and more powerful than any wolf either man had ever seen.

For an instant after the whitewash began to fall upon it, the thing turned a big-jawed, hairy face in the direction of the tree; then, with a horrible snarl of fury, which both men plainly heard, it charged toward them.

“Shoot! _Shoot_, Horace!” Sheriff Parker yelled, dropping the useless nozzle and grabbing his gun.

The two heavy guns, charged with double loads of buckshot, roared out almost together. There was a coughing snarl from the thing on the ground, which save for a white patch or two, was almost invisible again, and the sound of convulsive struggling; then the sheriff fired a second time. Almost immediately there was a heavy splash in the water; then absolute silence.

Doctor Morse wiped the cold sweat from his forehead with a shaking hand.

“Did we get it?” he asked in a low tone.

“Yes, I’m almost sure of it.” Sheriff Parker, though tremendously excited, began to lower himself to the ground. “No animal of the wolf type could stand up against three charges of buckshot at less than a dozen yards,” he declared. “I believe it is dead, Horace.”

When they warily approached the edge of the pool, however, the two men could find no sign of the thing they had shot at, beyond a number of footprints in the soft ground, and, in one spot, very close to the water, a large splotch of crimson, which made the little sheriff chuckle exultantly.

“He was hard hit, and he’s sunk in the pool,” he declared positively, “sunk in water that no man has ever yet found the bottom of—a fitting end for such a beast, although I won’t deny that I should have enjoyed a close look at the body. But it’s too late now, and, at any rate, the brute is dead. Let’s be getting home, Horace.”

Seek Solution To Sahara Desert Mystery

An attempt is being made this Spring to penetrate the heart of the great Sahara Desert and solve the mystery that envelops the savage Tribe of Tauregx, a band of wild Arabs who have never recognized any civilized authority. Both men and women members of the tribe always keep their faces veiled in black. The region where they dwell is known as the Land of Terror. The Chicago Tribune organized the expedition, which is making the 2,000-mile journey across the hot sands on camels.

* * * * *

Light is the fastest-moving thing in the universe. It travels at the speed of 186,326 miles a second. This tremendous speed would carry a person around the earth seven times in one second!

_HELEN ROWE HENZE Spins a Compelling Yarn_

THE ESCAPE

“Are you sure?”

The doctor nodded briefly. “Very sure, and the quicker the better!”

Donaldson gripped the back of the chair beside him till his knuckles showed white.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” the doctor spoke a trifle contemptuously. “Appendicitis is quite commonplace. We operate for it as many as a hundred times a year at the hospital.”

Donaldson rose slowly to his feet.

“I’ll let you know sometime soon,” he said, staring about him vaguely.

“All right. But I’d advise you to have it done quickly.”

Donaldson shuffled toward the door.

“I’ll let you know,” he murmured, and went out.

He descended to the street. He was a man of average height, and rather thin. He was dressed respectably in clothes of a few years back, but still good. One felt that he was careful of them, timidly careful. His blue eyes wandered in odd moments from one object to another, and his thin lips tried to maintain a firm line, but drooped weakly, if, perchance, he forgot. Then he twitched them up, reining them hard, trying to appear casual, indifferent. But his step would drop into its habitual short uncertainty, his shoulders slump down a bit, his eyes begin their covert roving, his whole figure expressing a desire to occupy as small a space as possible, as though his soul and body were squeezed in with a wish to be inconspicuous.

As he emerged from the doctor’s office, his pale eyes shifted as he gazed at the moving throng on the street. Why couldn’t it have been some one else? Here they were, all so gay, so unconscious of him and the shadow that hung over him. Unconscious! That was the word which had so terrified his mind for ten long years. And that was what the anesthetic meant—unconsciousness!

Donaldson threaded his way along and turned into a little side street until he came to his house. He let himself in with his key. The bare hall resounded dismally to his footsteps. The gaunt, shadowy room gave him only a chilly welcome. When Mrs. Saunders had kept house for him, it had been more cheerful. There was not that deathlike stillness when he came in. That had been several years ago, and since then his fear had increased through long keeping, like some great, lank brute, gnawing in the darkness. It was a sly, suspicious fear that shunned companionship. He had lived for ten years all alone, except for Mrs. Saunders, the housekeeper, but finally even her presence had become too much, and he had sent her away.

He began stupidly preparing dinner. There was some ham, cheese, a half loaf of bread, and a few potatoes which he peeled, standing by the sink. There was also a small pie that one of the neighbors had sent him a few days ago. Kindly people they were, unable to understand Donaldson’s solitary life, and who took pity on him and occasionally sent him little bits of pastry or jelly to freshen his meal.

Once, when he was sick with a cold, the husband had brought him over half a tumbler of whisky, but Donaldson had shuddered and held up his arms as if to ward off the other, crying, “None of that! Go away! Let me alone!”

And the neighbor had withdrawn, attributing this strange behavior to the sickness. But no, Donaldson’s fear of whisky was almost equal to that of the beastlike fear that dogged his footsteps or lurked in the shadows ahead of him.

Ever since that terrible, unforgettable night when he had drunk it for the first and last time, he had had a wild terror of it. Even the sight of it recalled more vividly the white, strained face of his wife as she fell to the floor, and the red mark of the fender across her temple. He remembered how he had gone away and brought Jack Dingler home with him a few hours later, and they had found her. The neighbors had been so sympathetic toward him in his calamity. Even the same neighbors that brought him the whisky and went home saying sorrowfully, “Poor Mr. Donaldson. He’s never been quite himself since the missus was murdered. It seems to have turned his mind.”

They were right. His mind was turned. John Donaldson knew what it was to be afraid. For ten terrible years, fear had skulked behind him. His composure and his self-reliance vanished. He had become a coward with the ever-present fear that in some way, by some word or action, he would reveal his secret. He had kept ever alert. Fear, the driving power that would not let him slumber. He always kept his door bolted at night, and the room next to his empty, for fear that he might talk in his sleep.

That was his greatest dread, that sometime, in an unconscious state, he would talk. He learned to take the greatest precautions in regard to his personal safety. He never went on long journeys, nor took an unnecessary risk. And now—appendicitis!

* * * * *

One night, a week later, Donaldson woke up with a start, his body wet with perspiration. He had been dreaming a terrible dream. It seemed as though he saw the white face of his wife with the red mark across the temple, only she was standing up and looking at him with an unfamiliar, ghastly expression in her eyes, and behind her, looking over her shoulder, was a satyr’s face, long and yellow.

Then this figure stepped out and came toward him, holding chains in its hands. Chains for him, Donaldson! He had had dreams like this before, varying slightly in detail sometimes, but always with the same terrible suggestion. And always he had waked up as he did now, wet and cold, with the same monstrous fear clutching him, pricking him like a thousand needles, drawing up his flesh, paralyzing him with a queer, uncanny thrill.

He wondered if he had talked in his sleep. Of course, there was no one to hear, still he wondered. It was something he could never know, an awful, threatening uncertainty that hung over him, that would always hang over him.

And those chains! He had a mental vision of himself in the penal stone quarries, chained to an iron ball.

He looked at his watch. It was later than he had thought—six o’clock. He got out of bed and dressed quickly. He knew from experience the only way to work off the stultifying effect of his dreams. It was physical action, to walk and walk until he tired himself out. Then his mind would be loosed from this crazy, nervous terror, and he would relapse into the steady, dogged fear from which he knew no respite.

He opened the door and stepped into the street. The morning sun was beginning to lighten the grey, deserted court. Some one across the way closed a window. Donaldson straightened up, tightening his lips. Even this early they might see him. He must appear casual, like a man of leisure out for a morning stroll.

But it was an effort, for an unreasoning fear possessed him. He wanted to run. Something behind him seemed to urge his footsteps faster. It seemed to him that his feet actually were going faster than the rest of his body, as though they obeyed the will of that something behind him, while he himself was really moving only at a moderate gait.

He had a detached sense of two entities. One was John Donaldson as he appeared to the world, a slender, inconspicuous man, walking somewhat timidly along the street, and the other was the coward, the terrified being, running from the thing that followed him; alert, cunning to outwit his pursuer. Once, from an irresistible impulse, he dodged into an alley-way. Then, suddenly ashamed and realizing, he came out again, walking boldly, his eyes fixed on a passing horse, trying to appear unconcerned.

Toward noon he returned, and, remembering he had had no breakfast and that there was nothing to eat in the house, stopped at the corner grocery store. The grocer was waiting on another customer when Donaldson came in, but he looked up and nodded.

“Be with you in a minute, Mr. Donaldson.” And then, “Why, what’s the matter? Are you sick?”

Donaldson had sat down suddenly on a flour-barrel, clutching his side, his face gone grey with pain. The grocer ran to get a glass of water.

“Here, better drink this! What’s the matter? Can I help you?”

But Donaldson only shook his head over his knees, unable to speak. They got him home a little later, when the pain had eased a little, and sent a doctor in to see him. Donaldson did not want a doctor, but the grocer was frightened by his pale face and paid no attention to his protests.

The verdict was what Donaldson had anticipated, appendicitis and the necessity of an immediate operation. He heard it, lying on the bed, from a strange doctor, with a feeling, in spite of the pain in his side, that it must be another man under sentence. He could not take that anesthetic! The pain might kill him; then let him die! It would be better than those awful chains. For he knew that once unconscious, the truth would come out, that all the poison which had been maddening him for years would flow from his lips in self-exposure, once he was placed under an anesthetic. How many times had he already related it in the stillness of the night? What of his secret could the walls of his room not tell? They must have heard it over and over.

The doctor repeated his statement and Donaldson nodded.

“Yes,” he said mechanically. He must appease this man, lest a refusal make him too insistent. When the doctor was gone, he was safe again. He would get well. Everybody had these attacks; they meant nothing.

“I’ll be back to see you tonight,” said the doctor, as he prepared to leave.

“No,” said Donaldson, “don’t come. I’ll be all right.”

“I’ll be here,” answered the doctor, and went out.

Suddenly a great fatigue came over the sick man, an overwhelming drowsiness, a desire for sleep, one of the primal, insistent, compelling things that would not be denied.

When he awoke it was quite dark. He did not know the time. Lights shone in the houses across the street. The ticking of the clock was the only noise to be heard. The darkness of the room seemed palpable, as though it floated over and around him, breathing. Then the clock struck eight. Donaldson remembered. The doctor was coming back. He might return any minute. Only he must not! There were footsteps on the walk. It was he, and the door was unlocked! Donaldson rose and started toward it. He had forgotten his side. He was only conscious of a difficulty in moving, like in a nightmare, as though weights were dragging on his feet. The doctor was on the porch. Donaldson struggled. What was holding his feet?

“Don’t come in,” he gasped. “I’m all right!”

Then came the pain, like a sudden knife-blade, piercing him. He screamed, one awful, uncontrollable yell, and pitched forward.

* * * * *

There was a queer, unfamiliar smell, and stillness. Not the empty stillness of his own house, but the stillness of human beings and hushed movements.

Nausea possessed him. He opened his eyes for a moment and then closed them. He was in a white-walled room, darkened. Against the drawn blind he could feel the sunlight beating. A ray of it came in between the shade and the window-jamb and struck the opposite wall. It was broad day. Suddenly, quick and clear as an arrow released from a taut bow-string, Donaldson’s mind leaped up into consciousness.

He was in a hospital, and it was over—the operation. It was the anesthetic which had nauseated him. What had he said? Had he betrayed himself? Yet here he was, lying quietly in this room. However, they couldn’t take him away while he was sick.

They were waiting—waiting till he got well to put the chains on him! He knew it. That was why they were so quiet, not to make him suspicious. He would ask the nurse. She could tell him whether he had talked.

But the nurse was not there. She did not know he was awake. Well, he would wait and ask her. Maybe he hadn’t talked. People didn’t always. The sun streamed against the blind. Light, hope! It might be that he would see it again, free! That he would walk along the streets in the open day.

The door opened and the nurse entered. She came to his bedside. He would smile at her easily, indifferently. She would think his question a casual one.

“Nurse,” he began. His voice sounded far away, weaker than it should have.

The nurse smiled. “How is my patient? Feeling better?”

“Nurse,” he strove valiantly to make his voice strong, casual. He even smiled weakly. “Did I—er—talk under the ether?”

“No, not a word. Now rest quietly and I’ll come back after a while.” And she went out.

Donaldson sighed. He was still safe. She had told him so. She would not deceive a sick man. And yet—wouldn’t she? He remembered reading somewhere that patients were always told they had not talked, lest the knowledge excite them and hinder their recovery.

That was why she had said it. They wanted him to get well, so they could put the chains on him. Hadn’t she hesitated a bit before she answered? He had thought she looked at him a bit suspiciously. Now he was sure of it. And that was why. They didn’t want him to know they knew. They wanted to be sure they’d get him.

Just then Donaldson’s thoughts were interrupted by a noise on the street. Some vehicle clattering over the pavement and the sound of a bell. The door was standing slightly ajar. Two nurses were passing in the hall, and Donaldson’s straining ear caught their voices:

“What is all the noise about?” asked one.

“I don’t know,” replied the other. “It sounds like a police patrol.”

They were after him! What should he do? He threw back the bedclothes. His mind was working like lightning. They would never get him. He slipped to the floor. How he got to the door he never knew. Fear lends strength. He closed it and stumbled back across the floor, half-falling against the bed.

He knew what he was going to do. He pulled up the bed-clothes from the foot of the bed with feverish haste. The sheet—that was what he wanted! He ripped open the hem a few inches, turning it back so that he could get the raw edge of the material. Then he tore off a strip the whole length of the sheet. He laughed excitedly. They’d never get him!

By this time, the cut in his side had re-opened, but he did not notice it. He knew nothing but his one mad purpose. His senses seemed to have deserted him. It was as though he were in a dream. He felt as though his mind were standing off, directing his body to do these things, and as though he were putting a senseless and inanimate other half of him through certain prescribed motions.

He tied one end of the strip to one of the iron bed-posts, then he climbed into bed and lay down. He circled the other end of the strip around his neck. The head of the bed was looped between the posts with scrolls of white iron-work. He lifted his knees and pushed with his feet till his head was through one of these openings, hanging down in the space between the bed and the corner of the room. His neck was now in a straight line between the bed-posts, bent backward, and as he breathed, he emitted from his lips little hoarse noises that seemed to struggle out protestingly from his strained throat. He knew that he could not strangle himself to death, for as soon as unconsciousness came, he would relax his hold. If he could tie the other end! That was sure and safe.

The blood rushed to his head. He pulled the knot tight, very tight, and gasped. He felt as though he were drowning. His temples throbbed, and his ears beat as though the waves were knocking against the inside of his head, now roaring, now singing with queer, unearthly hum. He relaxed his hand, and the noose slackened.

There! That was not so bad, but the blood rushed back from his brain, and the waves swirled around him now and made him fearfully dizzy. He felt like a little brig, tossed in the valley of a tempestuous sea, beaten, dazed, apathetic.

He recovered somewhat. The police! They must be on their way up! The waves were calling. Their restless surging hammered upon his brain, dulling its sensibility. There was peace beneath those waves. Unchanging peace!

But he must hurry. A cloud rose before his eyes, grey and inviting. He seemed to forget. What was he going to do? Where was that peace? Peace, something he had not known for aeons, aching, endless aeons of time. Where was it? Ah, yes! Beneath the waves, those heaving, restless, insistent waves.

“I’m coming,” he murmured thickly. His tongue seemed swollen. There was need of haste. He shook himself to clear his mind for the final effort. Then he pulled the noose tight with all his strength, and tied it quickly to the right-hand bedpost.

The waves seemed to open and he was going down. He saw a faint, opalescent light beneath him. There was something precious down there. It was peace.

“I’m coming,” he muttered, struggling, his arms stretched out toward it. “I’m coming!”

THE SIREN

_A Storiette That Is “Different”_

_By_ TARLETON COLLIER

With an abrupt jerk, Joe Wilson, from lying on a cot in the little tent, lifted himself on his elbow in an attitude of intent listening. There was no sound except the hum of a sleepy breeze through the pines, the sleepier contralto of a mocking bird, and the purring undertone of rippling water.

“That’s her!” he whispered. With an effort he sat erect, and again told himself: “That’s her!”

All at once there came the crackle of voices without, the sound of thudding footsteps. Joe flung himself back on the cot and closed his eyes with furious energy as the flap of the tent was lifted and the engineer and the doctor peered within.

“He’s asleep,” said the engineer in a low voice.

“_Hm!_” said the doctor. He was a wizened little man with spectacles. Then he let the flap drop, and his voice came to Joe brusquely through the canvas. “Well, we’ll come back. I want to talk to him. He’s probably not very sick, but—by God, man, you’ve got to keep your men from the water around here, or you’ll never finish your railroad!”

They were walking away as he spoke, and to Joe the voice seemed to fade.

“I tell you ... polluted ... fever....”

Then they were gone, the sound of them swallowed up in the ripple of the little creek over the rocks. With a start, Joe again was erect, his eyes furtive, glancing about the little canvas chamber. He tiptoed to the flap, and lifted it a bare inch, peering out upon the receding figures of the two men as they passed beneath a water-oak.

With no less caution he crept to the other end of the tent, and stepped through the flap into the open. For a moment he stood irresolute, his eyes closed, as if he were dizzy.

“Keep away from the water, you fool!” he whispered.

There was no other sound of life in the woods now; the breeze had died and the mocking bird was silent. Only the prattle of a nearby stream over its rocky bed....

With a stumbling, nervous stride that was almost a run, Joe Wilson went toward the sound of the water, and at last he plunged through a thick clump of willows and stood stiff, half-crouching, at the top of a bank of damp green moss that sloped steeply to a little stream with pools like black wells, still and silent. Only the silver shallows between pools rippled with life.

At the foot of the bank was a shelf of rock, splotched green with moss, reaching into the stream barely an inch above the water. Upon it Joe’s glance rested, as if held by a power outside himself. He drew back into the willows, his sunken eyes closed in his pale face; then, with a sudden spring, he was over the bank and perched upon the rock.

Something like a smile lighted his face, as if with the leap he had settled a troublesome matter. He sat down as easily and comfortably as he might, his legs doubled, his hands clasped about his knees; and stared intently into the black pool at his feet.

And then, between a closing and an opening of his eyes, a woman was there where he had looked for her.

There was no sense of suddenness about the apparition; only, when he closed his eyes against a dizziness, there was the water and nothing else; when he opened them, an instant later, she was standing in the midst of the pool, almost where he could touch her. And it was as if she had been there all the while.

The water reached a little above her ankles. Her legs were bare to the knees, clothed above that, and her body as well, in a soft clinging garment of white that seemed a part of her; white throat and arms were bare. Her face was alive with a pleasant smile; her eyes, of green and gray together, were alive and pleasant, too.

“You are late,” she said. There was something of the stream’s bright ripple in her voice.

Joe Wilson could only smile, in answer; then his smile faded and his face was scornful and somewhat stubborn.

“Yes,” he said, “and I came near not coming at all. I swore I wouldn’t.”

“But you came,” she said, still smiling.

“Only to tell you that this is the last time.”

Her smile, merrier now, was accompanied by a sound that might have been the gurgle of a little whirlpool in the rapids, or it might have been a low note of laughter.

“You didn’t mean it, then, that you love me,” she chided, coming nearer. It was not by a step that she moved, or by any perceptible effort. The space between them all at once was lessened, nothing else.

Joe had lost his careless air and posture. He was on his knees, a fury in his words.

“I didn’t mean it? You can’t say that. I have become less than a man, I love you so. You bring me here every day to do as you will, and I would die if I didn’t come, I love you so. For you I have broken my word to my friends back there in camp. And I don’t know who you are or _what_ you are.”

Again that gentle sound that might have been a sudden swirl of the water, or her laughter. Then she was nearer, and her pleasant eyes looked into his, mockery in them.

“You don’t know who I am?” she asked softly. “And yet I am yours.”

The stubborn lines in Joe’s face vanished. A quick throb of blood choked into a gulp the word he would have spoken, and he stretched out his arms. She was suddenly beyond his reach.

“Yours,” she said again, and that she laughed there was no doubt this time.

Joe’s eyes were hungry. Joe leaned forward upon his stiffened arms, and stared at her like a wistful dog.

“I don’t know who you are,” he whispered. “I don’t know who you are.”

“I am whoever you want me to be,” she said.

“I’ll call you Sadie,” he said.

“Sadie?” Her lids drooped, veiling her eyes, but their narrow glimmer was keenly alive.

“Yes, there is a girl—”

Between two words she was close before him at the edge of the rock.

“I am yours,” she said in a fierce, low voice. “What do you care for any girl? I am all woman, and you have me. What do you care for the world? You have me.”

He felt her breath on his face. There was warmth and fragrance in it. Her white beauty was greater than that of the dogwood blossoms showering there through the gloom under a sudden breeze; and a dizziness struck him, so that the trees swam before his eyes.

“I have you,” he repeated thickly, rising to his feet.

“And the girl ... Sadie?” she asked.

“You are Sadie. Only you. I have forgotten....” He put out his arms, but she was beyond his reach again, her eyes mysterious.

With outstretched arms, he begged her to return.

“I love you,” he said.

For a full breath she looked at him gravely. Then, “We shall see,” she said, plunging her hands into the stream. As she arose, her hands were cupped and brimming with water. She moved toward him, smiling.

Terror gathered in Joe’s white face.

“Drink,” she tempted him.

He whispered “No,” and the refusal seemed to strengthen him, for when she said again, “Drink,” he shouted it: “_No!_”

She dropped her hands, and the water went splashing back into the stream; and, smiling still, she came nearer until she was beside him upon the rock, her wet feet glistening silver upon its greenish-brown surface. Her eyes held fast his wide, frightened stare.

“Why?” she asked him, when she was so close that he was aware of the warmth and fragrance of her person.

He answered her steadily:

“I will not, that’s why. I must not. I have told you I must not, every day that I have come here, and yet I have always drunk this water. It has made me less than a man. It has made me break my word and my own rules.”

Once more her eyes were grave. “You must not?” she asked. Her voice might have been that of the purring shallows. There was no escaping her gaze, and before it his eyes wavered and shifted. His shoulders drooped.

“You will not?” the purring voice went on. “Not for me, and you say you love me? It is so little that I ask.”

There was pain in his voice as he cried, “Don’t ... Sadie! I have promised ... the rule....”

It was she whose figure drooped now, and her face that was mournful. “But you have broken the rules before this for me,” she murmured.

“I came today to say that I would no more.”

“But it is so little I ask. And I—am—yours.”

He pleaded: “_Don’t!_”

With sudden abandon, she flung herself against him, and for the first time his arms closed about her. She yielded to his fierce embrace, her head against his breast.

“You do not love me,” she whispered.

“Sadie...!” His arms tightened with his cry, and a red mist blinded him as he felt her warm, vital body closer against him.

She lifted her face and looked at him.

“You will?” she asked, smiling.

“No,” he said, almost with a moan.

She kissed him. “To drink, only to drink,” she said softly. “It is so little. I have given you myself ... isn’t that something?”

With one arm she clung to him as tightly as he held her; the other arm was free, and with her hand she stroked his face. Her kisses were hot upon his lips. His eyes were closed, and he swayed with a dizziness that was mightier than any other he had known.

“Only to drink,” she said. “Do you not care for me, and I have given you myself? What are those men in the camp to you, they and their rules? You will not drink ... yet I give you ... this....”

Her lips met his in an eternity of giving and taking.

“No!” he said again, but his voice quivered and broke, with the plain message of surrender.

With a little cry, she knelt at the edge of the pool, her arms still about him so that he was forced to kneel with her. She plunged her hands into the water, and lifted them to him with their silver freight.

With an eager, moaning sound, he drank the cool water; and as he did so the red mist before his eyes thickened, and his ears roared with the thunder of blood within. To drink became then his passion, and he cupped his own hands, filled them with water, and drank.

For a moment the mist cleared and the roaring ceased, and he saw that he was alone on the rock.

“Sadie!” he called.

The answering sound might have been only the prattle of the stream, or it might have been low laughter.

The thought came to him that perhaps she had fled to the bank, and with prodigious labor he clambered up the tiny slope. She was not there. He parted the soft-flowing curtain of the willows, and though the fronds were so light a bird might have flown through them, he gasped with the effort it cost him.

Staggering into the sunlight beyond the fringe of trees, he found that she was not there, either. He tried to run, but only stumbled, lifting himself painfully to stagger onward. Then the mist of his delirium closed upon him, and the blood at his ear drums pounded and a tumult came out of earth and sky to overwhelm him.

* * * * *

The doctor and engineer, going fishing, stumbled upon his crumpled form an hour later. The former, a wizened, spectacled little man, bent over him and studied him with eyes that seemed to see everything. He studied the young fellow’s pulse, loosened his shirt, stared into the pupils of his eyes. At last he turned to the other, frowning, and said:

“Fever, and maybe that damn’ typhoid. He’s the sickest man I ever saw.”

Then his voice rose with a flare of anger.

“Say, can’t you keep these fools away from this water?” he asked. “There’s death in it.”

Men, Lost at Sea, Live Through Week of Horror

A harrowing adventure that probably will never leave their minds befell two fishermen of Freeport, L. I., who passed a week in the open sea in a small motor boat, without water or provisions. Caught in a blizzard off the Long Island coast, something went wrong with their compass and they headed out to sea, where they drifted for nearly a week before the schooner, Catherine M., saw their signals of distress and picked them up. The two men—Capt. Bergen Smith and Harry Matthews—had only a small supply of water and a few raw potatoes. On this they lived for the first two days. Then Matthews lost control of himself, drank sea water and became delirious. Raving in delirium, he urged Smith to split a bottle of iodine in a suicide pact. Their boat began to leak, and they ripped the lining from their overcoats to calk the seams. Finally, after a number of ships had passed without seeing them, they were rescued, more dead than alive, by the schooner.

_A Night of Horror in the Mortuary_

THE MADMAN

_By_ HERBERT HIPWELL

Peter Stubbs has snow-white hair, and he is only twenty-eight. He mutters to himself as he pursues his lowly task of sweeping the streets in our little university town. Children gibe at him and goad him to rage and tears.

Peter once had raven black hair and was as fine and strong a young fellow as ever led the town forces in their frequent battles with our students. That was before the one night he spent as caretaker of our medical school. Only two of us know the real story of that night and why Peter was taken from the building next morning, a gibbering and white-haired idiot.

We have remained silent for various and selfish reasons, but I can no longer keep to myself the story of that awful night.

Our medical college is a lonely, ramshackle old building. The town has grown away from it. It is surrounded by musty old junk yards and infrequently used railway sidings, and it is miles from the fine old group of buildings which form the rest of the university.

There has always been difficulty in getting a suitable caretaker for it. None of the many engaged could be relied on to come early enough to get the fires going properly and to keep the walks clear of snow. Our new dean, Dr. Towney, thought he had solved the problem by deciding to have a caretaker live permanently on the premises.

Peter Stubbs, on learning of this, applied for the post and had no difficulty in obtaining it. The dean showed him around the building and explained the duties required of him. A more imaginative man might have been a little chilled by the gaunt skeletons arranged in the cases of some of our classrooms. Certainly he would not have been pleased with the sleeping quarters picked out for him. The only room available was a closetlike place directly connected with our mortuary.

Frequently, bodies would be there overnight, awaiting the purposes of the college. Most persons would not welcome these as night-time neighbors, but Peter scoffed and said he would as soon sleep there as in a brightly lighted hotel.

Chic Channing and I heard his foolish boast, and Chic and I had old scores to pay with Peter.

His sturdy fist had left a blue circle around my eye for a week, and Chic was minus a tooth as a result of a hot encounter between Peter’s followers and us freshmen.

Chic jumped at this brilliant opening for reprisal.

“Are you game for a little ghost-walking?” he whispered to me, as Peter and the Dean passed to another part of the building.

I asked for details.

“It’s the chance of a lifetime if we have the nerve,” he declared. “Let’s sneak back into the building tonight, crawl on to a couple of slabs in the mortuary and cover ourselves with sheets. We’ll look enough like corpses to fool Peter if he looks in. Then, when Peter goes to bed and it gets good and lonely, we can come to life with a few gentle moans, get Peter aroused, and then do a little ghost dance for his benefit. After we have him frightened stiff we can take off the sheets and give him the laugh. The story will get around quick enough, and poor old Peter won’t be troubling us freshies any more.”

I could scent trouble in the wild scheme, and I hastily began to offer objections.

“Peter knows there aren’t any bodies in there now,” I said.

“That’s all right,” Chic replied. “I heard the dean tell him that a couple might arrive late today. In fact, I know there will be one there for certain. One of the inmates at the government hospital for the insane died today, a poor beggar who was so wild they had to keep him locked up tight all the time. He had no friends, so the body is to come here and the undertaker has already gone for it.”

I was still unconvinced, but I had no plausible excuses. I felt my eye, which was still sore from Peter’s bruising, and I assented to the crazy plan.

* * * * *

Chic was right about the body. The undertaker’s car drew up to the college just as we were leaving. We were the last students to go, and the dean was the only other person there.

He asked our aid in bringing the body to the mortuary, and we laid it on a cold marble slab. Peter arrived from supper, to begin his first night’s stay, just as the dean and we were leaving.

True to my promise, I met Chic near the college about ten o’clock and we prepared to carry out our plan. My courage was oozing already. One of those wan yellow moons was the only light around the dreary building, and every rustle of a leaf or a disturbed pebble began to send shivers up my spine. But I couldn’t turn back.

Silently, we pried open one of the loosely locked basement windows. Then we crept up dark stairs and through the classrooms, where I imagined I could see the skeletons standing out like white patches in the murky darkness.

We reached the mortuary room and groped our way in. I almost cried out as my hand suddenly came in contact with the dead maniac, but I recovered myself. Chic groped in the corners until he found two immense white sheets.

We climbed upon adjacent slabs, and stretched out on our backs and pulled the coverings over us. I managed to keep a small corner raised so that I had a partial view of the room as my eyes grew accustomed to the darkness.

The stillness grew intense. We heard the long, dreary hoot of a freight engine. I shivered involuntarily and thought of the real corpse a few feet away.

Footsteps echoed in the building. Peter was making a round of inspection before retiring. He switched on the lights in the mortuary and gave a little whistle of surprise at the three still, white figures lying there.

Then he began to whistle again, a little tremulously. Evidently he was not feeling as bold as when he accepted his post. He went to his little room, but was soon back again.

In his hand he held a small coil of rope, apparently a clothesline. He unwound it, and then, very gingerly, he approached the slab on which I lay.

I felt a light blow as one end of the rope fell across me. Peter was going to take no chances on midnight ghosts. _He was going to tie us all firmly to the slabs!_

Whistling to keep up his courage, he proceeded with his task. In a few minutes I was firmly bound. I could not have moved if I dared.

Then he cut away the remaining piece of rope and proceeded to truss up Chic in the same way. He had to struggle to make the two ends of the cord meet.

There was none left for the real corpse, and, though he hunted diligently in all parts of the room, he could find no more.

He surveyed the two of us, bound firmly to the slabs, and evidently felt reassured. He decided to take a chance on the third body remaining still and retired to his room, closing the door and leaving us alone in the creepy, moonlit mortuary.

How I cursed Chic as I lay there unable to move, listening to the gradually deepening breathing of Peter as he dropped into a sound sleep. What if he should leave us bound until the professors arrived in the morning? What a fine row there would be!

These, and other unpleasant thoughts running through my mind, were suddenly checked by a slight sound which turned me cold from head to foot. Horrified, I gazed through the small chink in my covering. I could not believe my eyes.

_The corpse of the maniac had moved!_

* * * * *

There came a faint rustle of his covering shroud, and the body moved again ever so slightly. I wanted to shriek in terror, but I was paralyzed.

The shroud moved again, this time more noticeably. My scalp tightened, and I could feel the gooseflesh rising all over my body.

Then, with one sudden motion, the maniac sat bolt upright and threw the shroud from him.

He was clothed only in a long, hospital nightgown. His thin hair stood up in tangled wisps, and his eyes blazed like those of a cat in a dark room.

Slowly he surveyed his surroundings, and then burst into the most hideous laughter I have ever heard. His big, yellow teeth seemed like the fangs of a wild animal. I could imagine them rending my flesh.

The echo of his hideous mirth had hardly died away when Peter burst from his room, clad in his night clothes. His knees almost gave way as he took in the dreadful scene. Horror was apparent in every line of his body, and I had an inexplicable desire to laugh. But by a supreme effort I fought off this hysteria.

Quite calmly the madman swung his legs down from the slab and sat there on its edge, transfixing poor Peter with his terrible gaze. He chuckled.

Peter commenced to back toward his room. In an instant the madman was at him.

Then commenced a wild chase around the room, of which I could only catch fleeting glimpses as they passed on one side of my slab. Once the maniac rested bony hands on my body as he prepared for a new rush at Peter, whom I could hear breathing near by.

Bound hand and foot, Chic and I were unable to make a move, even if terror had not prevented us.

Untiringly, cunningly, the madman pursued his prey. Peter dodged and squirmed in terror. Perspiration poured from his face. But his efforts were futile. He was penned in a corner, at last, where a door led directly to a stairway in the corridor.

Step by step, the madman approached him, his long fingers outstretched like talons, and a low, gleeful laugh came from his lips. Peter backed desperately away from him, as though he hoped to press through the great oaken door. The maniac’s fingers were almost at his throat, when the door swung back suddenly and Peter tumbled from the room, his body bumping and thudding on the stairs outside.

Startled by the sudden disappearance of his victim, the madman halted a moment. The door automatically swung shut again, firmly this time. Apparently, it had not been tightly closed before.

The insane creature flung himself at it. It repelled him. He shrieked and tore at it, but to no avail, and he finally turned away.

His eyes, now wilder than ever, swept the room. They rested on our bound figures. Swiftly, he passed over to where I lay. The rope puzzled him, and he was still for a moment.

Suddenly he grasped it and snapped it as though it had been thread. I was free, but I did not move. I waited for him to seize me, but his footsteps shuffled away. He was beside Chic now. I heard the rope which bound him snap.