Page:Randall Parrish--My Lady of the South.djvu/236

MY LADY OF THE SOUTH the chimney. I stepped back, staring in bewilderment, begining to doubt the evidence of my own sight. O'Brien still held the lamp in unsteady hands, the flame full on his face, and flickering along the wall in grotesque shadows.

"I tould ye, sor," he burst out wildly, "that was no human. 'T was the Divil's own face that I saw, an' niver a doubt of it. Saint Mary! but it manes the death of the wan or the both of us."

I set my teeth grimly, his fear the very cordial I needed, my anger yielding me new resolve. There was no superstition in my blood, and I realized I faced nothing but human inventiveness and human malice. There was certainly a way leading into that chimney, and I intended to find it, even though I tore the thing apart stone by stone. Not alone our defence of the house was involved in this search, but the solution of the crimes of which I stood accused gave me fresh incentive. That awful face, woman's though it was, was demoniacal enough to cause me to connect it instantly with these deeds of blood feud. Whatever the cause or purpose; whatever of hellish suffering lay behind, that dreadful apparition pictured the very spirit of murder—murder in the dark.

"Perhaps it does, my lad," I answered, my hand on his shoulder, "but when that death comes it will find us plucking the heart out of this mystery. Now come to your senses and listen to me. Two murders have been committed in this house within the last forty-eight hours, and whoever committed them has left no trace. There is a secret passageway leading in here with an opening [ 222 ]