Brood of the Witch-Queen by Sax Rohmer (the top 100 crime novels of all time .TXT) 📕

but he did not touch it. He was about to switch on the reading lamp, for it was now too dark to write, when his mind wandered off along another channel of reflection. He found himself picturing Myra as she had looked the last time that he had seen her.

She was seated in Mr. Saunderson’s garden, still pale from her dreadful illness, but beautiful⁠—more beautiful in the eyes of Robert Cairn than any other woman in the world. The breeze was blowing her rebellious curls across her eyes⁠—eyes bright with a happiness which he loved to see.

Her cheeks were paler than they were wont to be, and the sweet lips had lost something of their firmness. She wore a short cloak, and a wide-brimmed hat, unfashionable, but becoming. No one but Myra could successfully have worn that hat, he thought.

Wrapt in such lover-like memories, he forgot that he had sat down to write⁠—forgot that he held a pen in his hand⁠—and that this same hand had been outstretched to ignite the lamp.

When he ultimately awoke again to the hard facts of his lonely environment, he also awoke to a singular circumstance; he made the acquaintance of a strange phenomenon.

He had been writing unconsciously!

And this was what he had written:

“Robert Cairn⁠—renounce your pursuit of me, and renounce Myra; or tonight⁠—” The sentence was unfinished.

Momentarily, he stared at the words, endeavouring to persuade himself that he had written them consciously, in idle mood. But some voice within gave him the lie; so that with a suppressed groan he muttered aloud:

“It has begun!”

Almost as he spoke there came a sound, from the passage outside, that led him to slide his hand across the table⁠—and to seize his revolver.

The visible presence of the little weapon reassured him; and, as a further sedative, he resorted to tobacco, filled and lighted his pipe, and leant back in the chair, blowing smoke rings towards the closed door.

He listened intently⁠—and heard the sound again.

It was a soft hiss!

And now, he thought he could detect another noise⁠—as of some creature dragging its body along the floor.

“A lizard!” he thought; and a memory of the basilisk eyes of Antony Ferrara came to him.

Both the sounds seemed to come slowly nearer and nearer⁠—the dragging thing being evidently responsible for the hissing; until Cairn decided that the creature must be immediately outside the door.

Revolver in hand, he leapt across the room, and threw the door open.

The red carpet, to right and left, was innocent of reptiles!

Perhaps the creaking of the revolving chair, as he had prepared to quit it, had frightened the thing. With the idea before him, he systematically searched all the rooms into which it might have gone.

His search was unavailing; the mysterious reptile was not to be found.

Returning again to the study he seated himself behind the table, facing the door⁠—which he left ajar.

Ten minutes passed in silence⁠—only broken by the dim murmur of the distant traffic.

He had almost persuaded himself that his imagination⁠—quickened by the atmosphere of mystery and horror wherein he had recently moved⁠—was responsible for the hiss, when a new sound came to confute his reasoning.

The people occupying the chambers below were moving about so that their footsteps were faintly audible; but, above these dim footsteps, a rustling⁠—vague, indefinite, demonstrated itself. As in the case of the hiss, it proceeded from the passage.

A light burnt inside the outer door, and this, as Cairn knew, must cast a shadow before any thing⁠—or person⁠—approaching the room.

Sssf! ssf!⁠—came, like the rustle of light draperies.

The nervous suspense was almost unbearable. He waited.

What was creeping, slowly, cautiously, towards the open door?

Cairn toyed with the trigger of his revolver.

“The arts of the West shall try conclusions with those of the East,” he said.

A shadow!⁠ ⁠…

Inch upon inch it grew⁠—creeping across the door, until it covered all the threshold visible.

Someone was about to appear.

He raised the revolver.

The shadow moved along.

Cairn saw the tail of it creep past the door, until no shadow was there!

The shadow had come⁠—and gone⁠ ⁠… but there was no substance!

“I am going mad!”

The words forced themselves to his lips. He rested his chin upon his hands and clenched his teeth grimly. Did the horrors of insanity stare him in the face!

From that recent illness in London⁠—when his nervous system had collapsed, utterly⁠—despite his stay in Egypt he had never fully recovered. “A month will see you fit again,” his father had said; but?⁠—perhaps he had been wrong⁠—perchance the affection had been deeper than he had suspected; and now this endless carnival of supernatural happenings had strained the weakened cells, so that he was become as a man in a delirium!

Where did reality end and fantasy begin? Was it all merely subjective?

He had read of such aberrations.

And now he sat wondering if he were the victim of a like affliction⁠—and while he wondered he stared at the rope of silk. That was real.

Logic came to his rescue. If he had seen and heard strange things, so, too, had Sime in Egypt⁠—so had his father, both in Egypt and in London! Inexplicable things were happening around him; and all could not be mad!

“I’m getting morbid again,” he told himself; “the tricks of our damnable Ferrara are getting on my nerves. Just what he desires and intends!”

This latter reflection spurred him to new activity; and, pocketing the revolver, he switched off the light in the study and looked out of the window.

Glancing across the court, he thought that he saw a man standing below, peering upward. With his hands resting upon the window ledge, Cairn looked long and steadily.

There certainly was someone standing in the shadow of the tall plane tree⁠—but whether man or woman he could not determine.

The unknown remaining in the same position, apparently watching, Cairn ran downstairs, and, passing out into the Court, walked rapidly across to the tree. There he paused in some surprise; there was no one visible by the tree and the whole court was quite deserted.

“Must have slipped off through the archway,” he concluded; and, walking back, he