fool.
'I tell you that wasn't the reason!' Reynard shouted suddenly. 'I
loved your sister! No one is sorrier than I that she is dead! But I
warned her! God knows I warned her about that floor!'
Wharton was dimly aware of Louise staring greedily at them,
storing up gossip like a squirrel stores up nuts. 'Get her out of
here,' he said thickly.
'Yes,' Reynard said. 'Go see to supper. '
'Yes, sir.' Louise moved reluctantly toward the hall, and the
shadows swallowed her.
'Now,' Wharton said quietly. 'It seems to me that you have some
explaining to do, Reynard. This whole thing sounds funny to me.
Wasn't there even an inquest?'
'No,' Reynard said. He slumped back into his chair suddenly, and
he looked blindly into the darkness of the vaulted overhead ceiling.
'They know around here about the - East Room.'
'And just what is there to know?' Wharton asked tightly
'The East Room is bad luck,' Reynard said. 'Some people might
even say it's cursed.
'Now listen,' Wharton said, his ill temper and unlaid grief building
up like steam in a teakettle, 'I'm not going to be put off, Reynard.
Every word that comes out of your mouth makes me more
determined to see that room. Now are you going to agree to it or do
I have to go down to that village and ... ?'
'Please.' Something in the quiet hopelessness of the word made
Wharton look up. Reynard looked directly into his eyes for the first
time and they were haunted, haggard eyes. 'Please, Mr. Wharton.
Take my word that your sister died naturally and go away. I don't
want to see you die!' His voice rose to a wail. 'I didn't want to see
anybody die!'
Wharton felt a quiet chill steal over him. His gaze skipped from the
grinning fireplace gargoyle to the dusty, empty-eyed bust of Cicero
in the corner to the strange wainscoting carvings. And a voice
came from within him: Go away from here. A thousand living yet
insentient eyes seemed to stare at him from the darkness, and again
the voice spoke... 'Go away from here.'
Only this time it was Reynard.
'Go away from here,' he repeated. 'Your sister is beyond caring
and beyond revenge. I give you my word...
'Damn your word!' Wharton said harshly. 'I'm going down to the
sheriff, Reynard. And if the sheriff won't help me, I'll go to the
county commissioner. And if the county commissioner won't help
me ...
'Very well.' The words were like the faraway tolling of a
churchyard bell.
'Come.'
Reynard led the way into the hall, down past the kitchen, the empty
dining room with the chandelier catching and reflecting the last
light of day, past the pantry, toward the blind plaster of the
