Page:Weird Tales Volume 36 Number 12 (1943-07).djvu/64

Rh his eyes closed and a terrified expression on his face.

Suddenly he shuddered and stared across the grave at Cummings. "We’re standing on the grave of a sated vampire,” he said. "I can feel it tugging at my heart. There is a coldness under my heart and—”

"Oh, nuts,” sneered Limerick. "I’m going to hit the hay. I’m not afraid of little boy things that go boop in the night.”

"We should have driven a stake through the coffin,” said O’Rourke grimly. "We’ll be sorry we didn’t. We’ll be sorry, Limerick.”

T DIDN’T seem as though he could be right. Freddy Simpson was sitting up in bed, and Nancy Summers was holding his hand, and because it was another day entirely and the sunlight was flooding into the hospital room old Simeon Hodges’ corpse seemed unreal, remote.

The four students had trooped in to see Freddy, but Nancy was getting most of the attention. Nancy was a very intelligent, red-headed girl with a willowy figure and a face which was just right. The four students were badly smitten.

They tried to hide their real feelings from one another, but Nancy was aware of how they felt. "You boys have been swell,” she said. "Freddy seems to have a gift for friendship.”

"You bet he has,” agreed Cummings. "We think a lot of Freddy. I guess he knows that.”

Freddy smiled wanly. His thin, freckled face was still abnormally pale.

"I can’t understand it,” he said. "I had a dizzy spell. Naw, I didn’t see anything. As soon as I stepped into the room things began to swim and I went out like a light.”

"You didn’t cut yourself while shaving, Freddy?” asked O’Rourke.

Freddy shook his head. "Of course not. I use an electric razor, except when I’m in a hurry.”

"Freddy, there’s a big hole in your window screen. Know anything about that?”

O’Rourke was holding his breath. He hoped that Freddy was telling the truth.

"Not a thing, Terry. You say there were footsteps on the soft earth under my window. Maybe a burglar was hiding in my room. Maybe he socked me from behind with a lead pipe or something. Maybe the blow stunned me, so that I just folded without feeling it.”

"Yeah,” agreed Limerick. "That would account for it.”

"Doctor Harlow thinks Freddy scratched his throat without noticing it,” Nancy said. "He thinks he fainted when he saw the blood. Freddy says that’s ridiculous, but some people do faint at the sight of blood. Perhaps Freddy saw the blood and it registered in his subconscious—”

"Now, Nancy, you know that’s farfetched,” muttered Freddy, blushing slightly despite his pallor. "Blood doesn’t affect me like that. If it did, would I be studying medicine?”

"You’re just a little boy in some respects, Freddy,” said Nancy, maternally. "If you’ve a psychological handicap you should own up to it.”

"He fainted yesterday in the dissecting room,” said Limerick, flashing a glance at Nancy which said as plain as words: "Why don’t you ditch the kid and take up with a real he-guy, Nancy?”

Freddy glared at him. "It was just biliousness,” he said. "I’ve been studying too hard and I allowed myself to get run down.”

"It occurred at a funny time,” gibed Limerick, mercilessly.

“Maybe he had another bilious attack last night,” prompted Cummings.

"That could be,” admitted Freddy. "I’m subject to them.”