Page:Weird Tales volume 36 number 01.djvu/61

Rh He finished, and Scrope's face showed a sudden thankful relief—which went out like a light. Scrope's thin body suddenly gyrated, reeled. His mouth opened, shouting:

"Let go! Let go!"

staggered backward to the door, turned halfway and braced himself against the jamb. He seemed to struggle with something beyond. Pursuivant sprang toward him, and at that instant Scrope was walking shakily back toward the center of the room. His eyes were glassy, his lips slack, his face pale.

"Thought it had me," he panted.

"What?" demanded Pursuivant, quickly pouring whiskey.

"Didn't you see? That big thing with a naked arm—and no eyes—"

"Drink this. I saw nothing."

Scrope drank obediently. Color returned a little. He spoke rapidly, as one who convinces himself of a hopeful fact: "My imagination ran away with me, didn't it?"

"Did it?"

Pursuivant filled Scrope's glass again. Plainly Scrope was trying to save his nerves by chatter. "Oh, it's quite clear, Judge. I've keyed up my imagination to what seems like reality. I was sure some sort of boogey—but if you didn't see it—"

"If I didn't see it," Pursuivant took up Scrope's words, "there is still no proof that it doesn't exist."

Scrope looked blank, and Pursuivant continued, "I take nothing for granted. This looks like the beginning of one of my adventures."

"But look here!" Scrope suddenly went a little wild in his speech. "You were reciting a spell against just that sort of thing. Why should—it—dare to tackle—"

"Desperation. To stave off defeat. Wait here."

He went to the inner door and peered. There was a dim hallway to a kitchen, an open doorway for a bathroom at the left, and two closed doors to the right. He asked about them.

"Bedroom," replied Scrope, steadying his voice. "Want a light?"

"No, thanks." Pursuivant entered the hall.

like stepping into a fog—into the vapor, for instance, of many damp, filthy coats in a sealed closet. Pursuivant snorted, and walked quickly through to the kitchen, turning on a light. Breathing was comfortable there. The sweat dried on his brow and his tawny mustache.

"All clear?" Scrope was asking.

"So far." The judge gazed around the clean white kitchen, with automatic refrigerator and electric range. It was the most reassuring room so far. He walked back into the hall, then into the rear bedroom.

"That's my room," Scrope informed him, from the parlor door.

Pursuivant waited only a moment in the chamber, which filled the rear quarter opposite the kitchen. Then into the hall yet again, to glance into the bathroom. It was a fight to throw off the smothering spiritual weight hanging in the dim atmosphere. Finally to the closed door of the front bedroom. "Who sleeps here?" he asked, hand on knob.

"You will, if you stay tonight," Scrope replied, and the judge entered.

In the first instant he thought he had been struck—his knees wavered, his brain swam and darkened. The walls—weren't they ruinous, flaking away?—whirled around him in the gloom. But he kept his feet and his head, groped for the light switch, turned it.

He had been wrong. The room was quite modern, cream-papered, and should be bright; but the light was as murky as though it shone through smoke. A neat single bed, a bureau, an armchair—how