“You must take it for what it is worth,” replied Westcott, fastening his yellow teeth upon his cigar and puffing meditatively. “Be good enough, my dear doctor, to send your little bill by mail. I can dress the wound myself or have it done for me by … Wagner.”
He looked up sharply, removing his cigar as the hint of a smile died from his face.
“Doctor Dreeme,” he said. “I am a peculiar man. I am a student who has found a secluded harborage. I do not care to make acquaintances. They are unpleasant responsibilities and they deprive me of that leisure which I owe to my researches. I live my own life in my own way. I do not want to be disturbed by the curiosity of—er—neighbors.”
Dreeme bowed silently, his face flushed, and turned to the door. Yes, he decided, Westcott was an offensive brute. The farmer smiled faintly, his cloven head bending forward in the lamplight.
“You must pardon my abruptness,” he remarked. “I am a solitary anchorite except for my little circle and am not, perhaps, as courteous as I should be.”
Dreeme said nothing. He could sense the faint mockery in the farmer’s stiff speech.
“Will you show the doctor to the door?” said Westcott gently to his wife.
She started from her attitude of rapt listening and turned toward Dreeme, her heavy-lidded casual eyes flitting coolly across his face. Then she moved slowly toward the door. Dreeme’s last picture of Westcott was of a curiously cloven head suddenly bowed above a huge tome. He could hear the soft rustling of Mrs. Westcott’s skirt as she crossed the sitting room floor. His heart pounded rapidly as he moved through the closeness of the room after her. It was as though a strange drug that affected his breathing filled the air. He heard her unbar the door, and, as it opened, a rush of cool rain-washed air swept across his face bringing instant relief from the choked sensation that had overpowered him in the room. It was still raining, a desultory and gloomy patter that rattled on the trees and the tiny roof of the back porch. The wet air was filled with the fresh scent of water and soaked grass. Dreeme drew in long breaths of it as he stepped bareheaded into the rain, wondering somewhat vaguely how he was to be conducted back to town. Just as he was about to bid Mrs. Westcott goodbye and was turning toward her he felt her arm fall sharply against his shoulder.
“Do you hear anything?” she asked in her low husky voice.
He strained his ears in some surprise and for a moment in the patter of rain he seemed to hear a thin rushing overhead as though a flock of heavy-winged birds were beating through the night air. The sound swept into nothingness so suddenly that he decided it was no more than the blood beating in his own ears or the upper whir of the rain. It was as though a door had been suddenly closed.
“No,” he answered, “I don’t hear anything but the rain.”
Her hand pressed against him and he could sense in the darkness the soft rise and fall of her bosom. The blood started to race through his pulses again and the choked feeling that had persisted during the short space of time while they had crossed the dark room to the door filled him. He felt his lips trembling as though with a faint palsy. As he strained his eyes violently toward her he could dimly note the outline of her face turned toward his and he knew that her heavy-lidded eyes were wide open and fixed with a disturbing intensity upon him. Her full bloodred lips moved slowly. Then her hand dropped from his arm, and it was as though a strange power had been removed from him.
“Good night,” she said in her low muffled tones.
The door closed softly and he heard the bolts being shot into place. Still he stood there, knowing that she, too, was standing just on the other side of the bolted door. After a moment’s pause he heard her footsteps passing slowly and evenly through the room. Dreeme turned to the rain, a bewildered smile at his own impressionability creeping to his lips. At the same moment he heard Miles clucking to the horse. Blundering through the dark, he stumbled toward the road. Before he reached the gate it began to rain furiously, a heavy roaring downpour that soaked him to the skin.
II
I
A rainy night abdicated to a warm sun-shot day. Dreeme, who had slept late after his disturbed rest, rose to a world that moved calmly and soberly toward midday. From his window he could see the weather-beaten sides of houses basking in the tranquil light and hear the deliberate and heavy footsteps of occasional pedestrians drifting down to the post office or the general store. This was his Marlborough as he knew it best, a sober and silent community that clustered about the narrow Saccarac River and occupied itself with the daily functions of a somewhat abstemious living. Superficially Marlborough was uninteresting although it was not without a certain suggested placidity that might appeal strongly to the man in search of quietness, rest, and an escape from the febrile business of that greater world of cities where life was such a strenuous matter. There was little to see here and still less to beguile one. It is true that occasional youngsters ventured into the river but they did not make a habit of it. There were no halls of entertainment, no motion pictures, no wandering tent shows to raise their canvas on one of the surrounding meadows. Social intercourse was limited to casual greetings and infrequent meals. Each Sunday witnessed the crowding of the small white Congregational church and a dry and unimpressive religious service. Thus for one day in the week the space before the
