'Why not?' questioned Harry.
'Well, for one thing,' the man replied, 'folks say it's haunted. I ain't no believer in ghosts—but if ghosts
would hang out anywhere, it would be on Death Island.
'Some folks say it was ghosts killed the fellow who come there fifteen years ago. An' lately—well, I've
heard things said by people who ain't superstitious.'
'What, for instance?'
'Strange kinds o' noises out over the lake. Little blinkin' lights, up over the island.
'One fellow—I ain't sayin' who—tells me he was out in a rowboat, one cloudy night. Somethin' come
right up outa the water, an' hissed over his head. Then it plopped in again.'
'It might have been a large fish.'
'No fish woulda acted the way he says. He was scared right, I tell you. He... Whoa, boy! Turn left here
for the wharf.'
Harry applied the brakes, and turned the car into a dirt road, that led through a thick woods. The sun had
nearly set, and it was dark beneath the trees. Harry turned on the bright headlights.
His companion was silent. The car moved almost noiselessly, as Harry steered it slowly along the narrow,
winding road. Following his companion's talk of ghosts and eerie happenings, the woods seemed filled
with spectral stillness.
Suddenly they turned into a clearing. The road ended on the shore of a lake, where the waters sparkled
beneath the rays of the setting sun.
In front of them was a small wharf; beyond—a mile out in the lake - towered a tree-clad island. A thin
wisp of smoke curled upward from the trees, indicating the presence of a house.
'See them rocks?'
Harry's companion pointed to the headland of the island, which was a solid mass of stone, rising to a
height of thirty feet. Blackened flaws in the rocky front gave it a peculiar appearance.
'Looks like a big skull, don't it? Some folks say that's why it's called Death Island.'
HARRY noted the resemblance. In the mysterious, dulling light which now hung over the lake, the rocky
headland looked amazingly like a monstrous death's head, its sightless eyes directed toward the wharf.
Harry felt a creepy feeling come over him.
The features of the huge skull seemed more pronounced in the settling gloom. They were intensified as
Harry watched.
Neither he nor his companion spoke. Death Island seemed to hold a fascinating spell that cast its
influence over them.
The chugging of a motor brought Harry from his reverie. A boat had appeared in front of the island. It
was speeding across the water toward the wharf.
'Comin' for you,' observed his companion.
Harry repressed a shudder. The man's words, spoken suddenly in the semidarkness, seemed to carry a
hidden significance.
The boat grew larger; then it neared the wharf. Harry clambered from the coupe, and took out his
traveling bag.
The garage man backed the car, and turned toward the road. In a few seconds he was gone.
The boat docked at the wharf. Harry approached and eyed its single occupant.
The man grunted in greeting. His appearance was well-suited to the environment. He was stockily built,
and roughly dressed. His face was covered with a heavy beard, of pronounced blackness.
Harry entered the boat; the man turned it from the wharf, and they chugged across the lake.
Death Island loomed more formidably than before. The skull-like features of the rock seemed to increase
in size, until they were almost beneath the overhanging bluff.
The man turned off the motor. The boat coasted along, and passed the rocky headland. As they glided
through the still water, Harry could not detect a single sound.
A small dock shone white as they came into the darkness of overhanging trees. The boat came to a stop;
Harry stepped on the dock, and the man tossed his bag after him.
While he waited for his strange companion to tie up the boat and conduct him to the house, Harry
Vincent tried to study his surroundings.
But, this was now impossible. Daylight had faded; all that was visible before Harry's eyes was the
beginning of a path that led up a steep hill.
Strange, gloomy, and forbidding, Death Island was as silent as death itself.
CHAPTER XVI. PROFESSOR WHITBURN
THE bearded man led Harry Vincent up the path on the island. After a few hundred feet they came to a
large house that loomed black in the darkness.
The hill had been short and abrupt. Harry estimated that they were not more than fifteen or twenty feet
above the shore of the lake.
The man knocked at the side door of the building. It was opened, and Harry was ushered in. The house
was lighted by electricity, but the room into which Harry came was gloomy because of sparse
illumination.
The man who had admitted them was as unusual a character as the individual with the beard. He was
clean-shaven, but sallow-faced, and his features had a peculiar twist that Harry instinctively disliked.
Without a word the man pointed to a chair on the other side of the room. Harry sat down. The bearded
man disappeared; the fellow with the twisted face knocked at a door and entered a moment later.
This room in which Harry sat alone could hardly have been termed a living room; yet that appeared to be
its purpose. It had very little furniture; and the single table and few chairs were plain and of cheap
construction. The only inviting feature of the place was a large fireplace in one wall. But there was no fire
burning.
A clock ticked away on the mantel above the fireplace, but the light was so poor that Harry could not
see the time.
His enthusiasm to reach Death Island had cooled somewhat during the journey across the lake. Now,
Harry found himself wishing that he had followed the advice of the girl who had phoned him at the
Baronet Hotel.
Adventure was a real part of Harry Vincent's existence; but he preferred bright lights to gloom. Without
companionship, he was a moody individual; and so far he had met with no signs of friendship on Death
Island.
Silence, broken only by the ticking of the clock, became annoying. Harry seemed to have been deserted.
He found a magazine lying on the table; when he had drawn his chair near to one of the lights, he
discovered that the periodical was three months old.
Evidently the men who lived on Death Island were interested in something other than current literature.
The clock being obscured in the darkness, Harry looked at his watch, and noted that time had slipped
by. It was after seven o'clock.
He began to read the magazine; for a while he forgot his surroundings. Then, glancing at his watch again,
he saw that it was quarter of eight.
Yet he was still alone. He felt the oppressive gloom of this strange house. He decided to walk about the
