Page:Weird Tales volume 28 number 03.djvu/37

Rh has never been found. It will never be found again. Only for a brief moment you and I have been granted a glimpse of something we can not understand."

"And Wrexler——" I groaned.

"He was happy," de Lacy comforted. "No matter what happened after, he has had happiness such as I have never seen before."

My head pitched forward and I knew no more.

days later, I was escorted to the library by de Lacy, to whom since Wrexler's loss I was more devoted than ever. With great ceremony I was given the key to the gilded casket, then left alone.

Seated in the great chair before the oaken table, I unlocked the casket. It contained many pages closely written in my father's hand. In them were instructions as to my future conduct, my care of Rougemont, what he had done and what he expected me to do. But the lines that interested me most were these:

"I bought Rougemont for your mother, shortly after your birth, because when riding through this country, she saw and loved it. It was a purchase that cost me dear. For Rougemont held a curse and an avenging spirit in the form of a beautiful young girl who could not hear to see others' happiness. So my wife died.

"Two months after your mother's death, I first saw la belle Helene. We fought a long battle, she and I, but I was strong, my son, because I loved your mother. No other woman's charms could lure me to my doom. Finally I made a bargain with a ghost.

"She hated modern things and longed for Rougemont to be great again, I promised to restore the château to its former splendor, to make it just as it had been in her days, and in return she promised immunity to me, and afterward to you, and to all my court when I should have established it.

"I restored Rougemont. I repeopled it. With her help and advice, I have made it as it was in her own day.

"She showed me the hidden treasure vaults of the d'Harcourts so that I would have enough money to purchase the things she wanted.

"She too has kept her bargain, for I and my court have lived happily here unmolested. Only when an outsider came or someone disobeyed or longed for the outside world, has she wreaked vengeance.

"She has sworn to give you the kiss that promises immunity, the night you come. Only, beware, my son, whom you bring here from the world you know, and beware of the lovely Helene. Old man as I am, devoted to your mother's memory as I am, she can still make my pulses leap.

"Above all things, if she shows you the Lost Door, do not be tempted to cross its threshold, for that way, unless you are the reincarnation of the Englishman, annihilation lies."

There was more, pages more, of other matters, but I left them for another day. Alone there in the library, I let my eyes wander to where the little Gothic door had been.

Had Wrexler been the Englishman come back to earth to claim his bride? Could that account for the strange, unsatisfied longings he had always had, his unearthly feelings, his unlikeness to other people? Or was he Black George, lured back to Rougemont for Helene's vengeance? I hope for his sake that was not the explanation; that he and Helene