Page:Weird Tales v02n04 (1923-11).djvu/80

Rh I tried to speak—to scream—but my parched tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth. I stood there in a frigid trance of speechless terror. I could not utter a sound, though crying for help could not have brought me aid. The door was closed and the howling storm would have drowned my voice.

I had seen this thing that lurked in the shadow. Had it seen me? I pulled myself back nearer the window, trembling with fear, afraid of something I could not recognize, and hoping against hope that it did not know I was there.

Then came the horrible thought. Could it be some victim of Dame Walcott, forced to rise and haunt the place where it had met its untimely end? Some soul that lived in another world or state when our world thought him dead? If he had risen from a sealed tomb, what could he be seeking here?

I tried to pray as my mind flashed back to tales I had heard and read of the spirits of the murdered who were compelled to revisit the scenes of their death until their murders had been avenged, and all the stories of ghosts and goblins that I had heard in the evening now came crowding upon my recollection.

The shadow moved. This, then, was no hallucination, no trick of strained eyesight. I felt that I was in the presence of something that could not only frighten but could actually harm.

I tried to call my bewildered wits to my aid; and, calming the frenzy of my thoughts by a strong effort, I determined to try getting out of the room, and believed that by keeping in the shadow and close to the wall I could make my escape through the door. Scarcely had I taken one step when the shadow turned in my direction. To turn and fly now was too late. All I could do was wait.

Slowly the shadowy form came toward me. As it came into the full glare of the light I saw that it was Dame Walcott, with her head bent upon her breast. I recoiled in wide-eyed horror from this terrifying spectacle.

No one can ever know what I suffered as I waited—waited until she should reach me. There flashed across my mind the pebble prophecy. Was I, too, to be a victim of Dame Walcott? Was the prophecy to be a true one? Was it to be fulfilled the very night it was made, carried out by a specter risen from the dead?

Very slowly she raised her head. Very slowly our eyes met. Very slowly, like some jungle panther, she glided toward me until she stood directly in front of me. She pointed at me jeeringly. Her whole face became animated with a sudden glow of fiendish triumph. Her eyes glistened with a malign expression.

I met her gaze fully, absorbing into my innermost soul the mesmeric spell. I imitated everything she did, though vainly striving to prevent it. It had been difficult for others to oppose her; it was impossible for me.

She clasped her hands about her throat. Unable to resist, I imitated her. Tighter and tighter did my hands close. I was unable to loosen them. It seemed as though they were being controlled by some inexplicable power.

She extended her right arm, slowly opening her hand. In it could be plainly seen something which glimmered faintly in the light.

She described a circle in the air with a perfectly even and majestic motion. The light caught the object in her hand and it gleamed like a living coal. As she did this her eyes looked straight into mine, held steadily for a moment, then dropped to the object in her hand.

My gaze followed hers, and I recognized my pebble of quartz which had disappeared from the bonfire.

VERYTHING gradually became dark about me. I had a convulsion of terror. My tongue was frozen, my teeth clenched. A film settled upon my eyes, a dull faintness overpowered me. Every vestige of strength deserted me, an icy spasm contracted my heart.

Uttering an inarticulate cry, I made a last violent effort to free myself from the spell that held me as I felt the shadow of death creeping over me. Then I sank face downward upon the floor.

I do not know how long I lay in this death-like swoon. Familiar faces were all about me when I was restored to consciousness. I looked around in bewilderment. Where was I? How came I to be there? Suddenly I remembered and swooned again.

When the hot and terrible delirium which followed had burned itself out, my loved ones told me the part they had taken in my Hallowe'en experiences. I had no need to tell them mine. They had heard it all in the ravings of my illness.

My mother had been both angry and anxious because I had refused to heed her, and was unable to sleep. She wakened my father and insisted that he go with her to do what he could to persuade me to spend the remainder the night on the sofa in their room.

On reaching the lumber-room, they found the lamp burning, a window open and the cot unslept in, and in searching for me, found me at the base of the portrait, apparently dead, with some ugly black finger marks on my throat. In my stiff, rigidly clasped hands something gleamed white and shining. It was the quartz pebble.

An alarm was sounded. Soon voices and steps were heard in the corridor and the room was ablaze with light. Friends rushed in, rubbing their eyes, still half asleep, questioning each other as to what had happened.

My grandmother appeared on the threshold, full of astonishment at the sudden disturbance. She stopped short, with a wild cry which rang through the whole house: "Dame Walcott! Where is she?"

All looked to where the portrait had stood against the wall. The frame was still there, but the figure within it was gone. Like a cloud melting in thin air, or a ghost vanishing into the nether world, she had mysteriously disappeared.