The Jade God by Alan Sullivan (snow like ashes series txt) 📕

reality of the moment fell on him like a cloak. In a few more clock-ticks there would be others with whom to deal.

“Perkins,” he said evenly, “for better or worse this matter must soon take another form. Two men will shortly be in this room, and one of them in all probability is guilty of murder. You know this, and I know it. The hand of fate may descend suddenly and point clearly, or it may be that the innocent may suffer for the guilty. God forbid that this should happen, but it has happened before, and sometimes because those who knew the truth were not there to tell it or, knowing it, kept an infamous silence. I ask you again, has Blunt to your knowledge ever been at Beech Lodge before, and, if so, was he here at the time your master died?”

“I am not Blunt’s keeper,” repeated the woman.

Derrick slid the wax image into a drawer. “Thank you, Perkins. You’ve told me what I wanted to know.”

The door closed behind her. Derrick did not stir but waited till the last sound died away. The hour of decision had come, and there was but one thing to do. He took a glance at Millicent’s calm face, read in it a mute approval, and, opening the invisible panel, took the jade god from its dark recess.

Setting it a little on one side of the lamp, he stared hard into its pygmy countenance. There still sounded in his ears Blunt’s voice telling of strange gods in strange countries, and there came now the unforgettable whisper of the East, with its mystery, its scarlet passions, its swift terrors, its throbbing invitations, and the jungle call of its fevered life. There was more than that. On these miniature lips was set the smile of sardonic knowledge and the curve of utter evil. The lids that lay over the slant and lazy eyes were heavy with slumber, but it was a repose that carried with it no oblivion. Unnameable knowledge rested on the face, a knowledge that sneered at good and gathered to itself the wickedness of misty centuries. Here was the touch of supreme art, the superb assurance of a master hand, but the issue was to charge the mind with a blinding comprehension of all that decent men most strive to forget.

Still staring, he yielded unconsciously to the spell. Beech Lodge grew oddly indefinite. The landmarks of his mind seemed unsubstantial. He was free as the wind, with neither kith nor kin. He found himself wondering why for months he should have been possessed by the desire to avenge a man he never saw. The tiny green eyes suggested that Millicent, and even Millicent’s daughter, did not matter so much after all. “Come East,” they signaled, “where man can taste all the wild joys of life, and women know how to love as do no others. Books, what are books? Dead things and dusty against the curve of a breast and the languorous hours of tropic nights. Good is ever the same, and it is only evil that changes, assuming a thousand lovely shapes, inviting, alluring, the wine that, having tasted, no man may forget. Come and drink deep while your blood is hot. There are those who wait to show you the way, and soon it will be too late.”

Thus spoke the jade lips; thus cajoled the jade eyes. Even the milky fingers with their narrow, transparent nails seemed to lose their stiffness and beckon, while the blood deserted Derrick’s heart and the hair prickled on his head. He was listening to the soul of the man who had carved this thing, and what manner of man or devil could he be? But, whoever he was, he knew, Derrick felt that, and knew it utterly. Yes, life was short, too short. Perhaps the jade god was right!

His brain began to swim, and the image now to recede, now to approach, dwindling to a pinpoint, and swiftly enlarging till it towered over him, when something drifted in from the outer world. He blinked like one wakened from sleep. It was a tapping at the French window. He got up and crossed the room unsteadily. There was visible through the glass a peaked hat, a broad, red face, and a pair of bright, inquiring eyes. He breathed deeply and with a sudden sense of relief. Here was something sane and strong and wholesome. It seemed to dear away the miasma that surrounded him.

He stepped out and found the sergeant flattened against the wall in a vain endeavor to minimize his own bulk.

“Got here as soon as I could, sir, and had a squint at the cottage; they’re both there. Peters is behind the hedge at the back. Anything new since I saw you?”

“There may be a good deal. I think it’s likely that the peddler is the man we want after all, and not Martin. The woman Perkins declines to say whether she has seen him before or not, also whether he was in this neighborhood the night of the murder.”

“Good enough, sir. That ought to help. Anything else?”

Derrick glanced at his watch. “Yes, the sight of the image produced on her the same effect precisely as it did on the others. She, too, tried to get it. That’s all there’s time to say now, sergeant. The men ought to be here in five minutes.”

“Are you armed, sir?”

“Yes, but I hardly think it’s necessary. You’ll be able to attend to that end of it. Mind you, I’m not at all sure that anything is going to happen. This is only a shot in the dark. Can you see the image on the desk quite clearly from where you are?”

“Yes. Is that the real one? It looks somehow more alive than the other.”

Derrick smiled. “Just what Blunt told me. The dummy wouldn’t serve the purpose with him, so we must take this chance. Don’t stir unless one of them tries to get away with