What?
Fred felt a hand groping over his covered body. It found his arm and m,oved gentiy down to his wrist Cold fingers pressed there. He couldn't control his heartbeats. But they were less fast than strong. He devoted himself to slow breathing. Maybe that would make the heart behave.
The fingers let him go. Air swirled in the wake of the figure as it moved away. Was this aU? Was this aU?
They heard a breath sharply drawn.
Then the silence exploded into a thousand pieces. She called out. Lifted up her voice and called into the dark and waiting house. Called, and shivers crawled on the skin at the alarm in it. The warning, the terror of the cry.
'Alice,' she called. 'Alice.' And again . . . 'Alice.'
Fred's fingernails dug into the flesh of Alice's hand, and the pain was good. She kept quiet
For the call was going down the silent hall, around the comer, like a hound hunting. It went down the hall to Alice's door.
'AHce.'
Would Alice come? She, herself, stiff behind the bed, so close, seemed to lose her identity. Surely there was an Alice somewhere else to hear that calling. And to answer. It must be answered. It couldn't be denied.
'Alice.' It grew a litde sharper, that desperate cry. 'Alice.'
180
n
They heard a door, the faint click of the knob turning, the rustle of its opening. Half-fainting, Alice seemed to see her own ghost. Someone was opening the door of the room where she ought to be. Someone was coming to answer. Alice was comiug. Alice. It must be Alice. But Alice was here. No, Alice was in the hall. One could hear her feet. Reluctant, those feet. Groping, naturally, in the thick darkness. Cautious feet. But coming, answering.
Alice would come, if one called her in the night like that. Of course she would.
The voice called no more. But the footsteps . . . Not Alice. Art Killeen. The world tumbled back to another balance as Alice wrenched herself around to a reasonable belief. He'd come, she told herself. He'd come, no matter what, for that name, that wailing Alice!
There! Did the door click? This door?
A door opened. The feet. . . . Alice's feet? No, no, Killeen's ... the feet took a step in the dark.
It screamed. Alice's ghost, whatever it was. A strangling scream as if the throat closed with terror. Screamed, and the scream died away as if in the wind. Died away and was gone, and was out of the house. There was a terrible sound. Not very loud, but hideous, like the pulpy squash of a fly. Mingled with it, they thought they heard the little triumphant croak of evil victory.
Now the voice said, 'Innes? Innes?' Urgendy, anxiously, aloud, with a nervous whine.
Out in the hall another voice said, 'What's the matter? What's the matter?'
'Gertrude? Is that you, Gertrude?'
'Isabel?'
Calling to each other, the two sisters. Isabel in here, Gertrude out there. Which of them had made that litde horrible Well-remembered sound?
Alice's heart gave a great bound and returned to its work with a swift pounding. She felt her face get hot. Fred's fingers moved on her hand.
Oh, God, someone was coming in the window! The sash was thrown up, violently, not stealthily at all. They braced themselves again. But Duff's voice came through the dark with quiet authority.
'Stay exactly where you are, everybody.'
Isabel said, rapidly, as if her jaw was oscillating out of her control. 'Oh, Mr. Duff, is it you? Mr. Duff, what's happened? The lights. Innes. Something's wrong, I think. I think . . .'
'Be quiet,' said Duff.
Footsteps in the haU again. But this was Gertrude. This was her firm tread, her unhesitating feet. From the top of the stairs, turning to the left, coming toward the door of Papa's room.
They stopped. It seemed very abrupt. It seemed like an exclamation of surprise.
'Isabel,' Gertrude's voice was aggreived. 'The chest of drawers has been moved. Isabel, Isabel . . .' They heard the woman's breath drawn. 'The old porch door . . .'
'Miss Whidock,' said Duff curtly, 'come along to this room, please.'
Gertrude's feet came on. She stopped accurately where the door was. They could tell by the heightened sound. She stepped in.
Duff nad moved near the bed, where Fred maintained his silence. 'My flashlight has failed. I'm afraid Mr. Whidock, here, has fainted . . .'
Gertrude was quivering. Even in the dark silence, they could tell. 'Where is Innes?' she said. Her voice went higher, like a frightened child's. 'Where is he?'
It became immediately plain where Innes was. A door burst open down the hall. They could hear his sobbing, his hysteria.
