The Empty Coffins

by John Russell Fearn

  He went over to the deep armchair at the far end of the big bedroom, shook Peter into wakefulness and explained matters, and then hurried out of the room. In perhaps three minutes he was back, white-faced and drawn. He closed the door and stood with his eyes shut for a moment as though to blot out something horrifying.

  “What?” Peter whispered, and Elsie half rose on her elbow and then sank back again helplessly.

  “You’d better—go and look,” Meadows said, get­ting control of himself. “It was never more vital for one of us to watch Elsie. Ring the police. They may still be at the inn in the village.”

  Peter went out quickly. Elsie watched Meadows anxiously.

  “What is it, doctor?” she entreated. “Tell me: what’s wrong?”

  He came forward slowly to the bedside, looking down at her.

  “I have to be brutal, my dear,” he said, taking her limp hand in his fingers. “You might as well hear the truth now as later…. Your mother has been murdered. Foully! And George was her killer.”

  Elsie moved her lips but no words came forth. Shock had momentarily killed the power of speech.

  “I saw George down there,” Meadows continued. “He was just at the end of—his orgy. He did not stay to attack me, perhaps remembering the Crucifix I thrust before his eyes last night.”

  “Mother—dead,” Elsie said at last. “Murdered by—George—I—I just can’t believe it! I....”

  She stumbled over her words, her eyes half closing. Meadows put an arm behind her shoulders and raised her slightly. From the table he took up the blood-capsule phial and pushed off the stopper one-handedly.

  “Here, take these,” he murmured, putting three of the pills to the girl’s clenched lips. “They’ll help you....”

  With an effort she opened her mouth and allowed the pills to roll under her tongue, where they dissolved. Then she sank back, her eyes brimming with tears and her shoulders quivering. What happened after that she did not know. Reaction, and the unending horror which seemed to beset her, overwhelmed her.

  * * * * * * *

  When she emerged from the coma that seemed to have struck her she learned that a whole fortnight had passed. Her mother had been buried; the police had investigated again and got no more evidence than before; and she herself was suffering from some form of wasting that had no medical explan­ation.

  It was Peter who told her these things, seated at her bedside. Through the window the mid-March sun was shining brightly. The plane trees were just visible, rich with sticky buds, and beyond them again the countryside was preparing for summer.

  “If only I could understand it all,” Peter muttered, his face haggard from endless days and nights of worry and watching over Elsie. “If only I could gauge the depth of George Timperley’s hatred of you. If only....”

  He stopped, sighing, looking at Elsie’s white face against the pillow. Always ethereal, even when in the best of health, she looked almost like a ghost now.

  “Where’s Dr. Meadows?” she asked, her voice so low that Peter had to incline his head to hear her.

  “Busy with his practice. He’s been grand through these weeks, dearest. Watching over you when I could not, helping in every possible way. He’s seen to it that you’ve been fed by injections whilst you were unconscious. Our job now is to build you up. I’ve also asked Meadows for another doctor to come and have a look at you. He’s a specialist, so maybe he can discover the cause of your slow decline. Meadows can’t understand it—from the medical point of view. From the standpoint of the supernatural, though, he says that you have been more seriously bitten than he thought on that night George attacked you. Venom in your blood may be the cause of your…illness.”

  Elsie said nothing. She looked towards the window, at the glancing sun on the leaves.

  “So beautiful out there,” she whispered. ‘If only I could go into the garden. You and I to­gether, Peter. If we could walk through the fields, smell the grass, feel the fresh sweet wind of heaven in our faces… Rawnee Singh was right, Peter, wasn’t he?”

  “I still don’t believe it,” he answered stubb­ornly. “Now you are conscious again we’ll get you round. You’ll be back to health in no time.”

  Elsie shook her blonde head slowly. “No. Peter. It is not to be. I’m dying...I know I am.”

  Peter got to his feet. “I’m going to ring up Meadows. If he isn’t home the maid can tell him to come up immediately. I want to know what is to be done now you’ve come out of your coma—”

  “No, Peter—don’t leave me.” Her cold, gentle hand caught at his as he turned to go. “I—I want you to stay.”

  “But dearest, I have to look after you. I can’t stay here and talk. I want to tell the cook to get something ready for you—”

  “Cook? When did we get a cook?”

  “Well, she’s a sort of housekeeper, cook, maid, and all the lot. I had to get somebody, after your mother went....” Then Peter hurried on, “I’m sure we’ll get results soon. All the village is on the watch for George now. The story is even in the papers under the heading ‘The Little Payling Horr­or.’ All kinds of people keep arriving to invest­igate—Psychic experts, ghost hunters, sightseers. George has made the place famous—”

  “You mean infamous,” Elsie whispered. Then after a long pause she asked, “Did the Inspector ever find Rawnee Singh again?”

  “Yes. But all Singh could do was repeat his statement, just as he had told it to you—and me. As for trying to help the vampire situation, he said it was a manifestation of the dark arts and he would not touch it.”

  “How right he was,” Elsie murmured, her eyes closing. “How terribly, frighteningly right....”

  Peter looked at her in fear for a moment. She was so utterly still he thought she— Then he gave a smile of relief. Her breast was rising and falling gently. She had merely fallen asleep.

  He gently moved his hand away and crept from the room; then he hurried downstairs to the telephone. To his satisfaction Dr. Meadows was at home, having just arrived back from his morning round.

  “So she’s returned to consciousness?” he asked eagerly, as Peter finished explaining. “Good! See that she has some nourishing soup to begin with. I’ll be over to work things out. Expect me in about twenty minutes.”

  Peter rang off and went into the kitchen. Then he returned to the bedroom and crept in silently. Elsie was still sleeping, so quietly she looked almost dead.

  She had not awakened by the time Dr. Meadows had arrived. He studied her for a while and then shook his head slowly.

  “I don’t like it,” he whispered, as Peter stood beside him. “She’s so thin she’s nearly a shadow. In the past two weeks she’s wasted away in the most alarming fashion—”

  “But she can be built up again now she’s out of that coma!” Peter looked at him with desperate eyes. “Doc, we’ve got to bring her back. I can’t bear to think that I might—lose her.”

  “We’ll do our best, but it’s going to be tough. The trouble is, she doesn’t answer to any known treatment, which is why I think venom from George when he attacked her is consuming her bloodstream—­ Oh, I got that other specialist to come. Sir Gerald Montrose. He should be here today.”

  “You think he’s a good man?” Peter asked.

  “I’m convinced of it. I would hardly call on him—thereby admitting myself baffled—if I didn’t believe in him. You’ve heard of him, surely?”

  “Afraid not—but you know what you’re doing.”

  Meadows was silent for a moment, then he pulled up a chair and sat down.

  “All we can do is wait for her to awaken again,” he said. “I wish I’d been here when she awakened before: I could probably have kept her conscious. It may be a long job now.”

  “How about your own patients?”

  “They can wait. Elsie means more to me than anything else. You know that. She’s yours, yes, but that doesn’t stop me loving her as much as you do.”

  Peter nodded slowly, a thought
crossing his mind like a shadow. Then it passed on and he pulled up a chair.

  At the end of half an hour Elsie had not awaken­ed. Then the weary waiting was interrupted, by a hammer­ing on the front door. Peter left the room, but evidently the housekeeper had already got ahead of him.

  “Who is it, Mrs. Dawlish?” he asked, from the head of the stairs.

  “It’s a Mr. Rawnee Singh, sir. He says he would like to see you.”

  “Singh!” Peter gave a start. He glanced back towards the bedroom, hesitated, and then made up his mind. Quickly he hurried downstairs into the hall. He found Mrs. Dawlish regarding the brown-skinned visitor in some suspicion.

  “All right, Mrs. Dawlish, thank you,” Peter said to her. “I’ll attend to Mr. Singh.”

  Mrs. Dawlish bustled away and Peter looked at the mystic in surprise.

  “What brings you here, Mr. Singh? I thought you’d dropped right out of sight.”

  “An interview I had with Chief-inspector Rushton led me to examine the case of your wife again, Mr. Malden. I had the idea you might wish to hear my conclusions.”

  Peter said nothing. He opened the drawing room door and led the way into it. Then he motioned Singh to a chair. He sat down with a cat-like elegance, his eyes intently studying Peter’s face. Even here, with modern furniture around him, his manner was still that of the enigmatic Easterner, rendered all the more obvious by his silk turban with a small jewel in its centre.

  “I have little time to spare, Mr. Singh,” Peter said quietly. “I don’t wish to seem rude, but my wife is desperately ill and I am keeping a constant watch on her—”

  “Along with Dr. Meadows. Yes, I know.” Singh gave his faint smile. “I am afraid both of you are wasting your time. It is willed that your wife will die, Mr. Malden—only much sooner than I had thought. That is what I came to tell you. After Inspector Rushton questioned me and I real­ized that your wife was surrounded by an aura of dark evil I made a special point of studying her vibrations. I found that she will die—today. I thought that if I came personally and told you this you would not find it such a terrible shock when her life ceases.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Peter said obstinately.

  “You mean you prefer not to,” Singh corrected. “It is no use, Mr. Malden: you cannot defeat dest­iny.... However, I also looked further and I discovered that your wife’s death is, actually, only the beginning of a new life for her—”

  “So you’re going to start preaching about the Hereafter as well?” Peter demanded, his nerves on edge. “I’m in no mood to listen.”

  “You misunderstand me. I mean that your wife will start life anew as a vampire. That, too, would have come as a terrible shock had I not arrived to warn you.”

  Peter sat down slowly. He found it impossible to push Singh’s statements on one side: there was too much solemn conviction about them.

  “Mr. Singh,” he said deliberately, “you once said you had sympathetic feelings towards people. Is there nothing you can do to help us? You read the future—accurately it would appear. Is there nothing that can be done to save my dear wife from the fate hovering over her?”

  “I am afraid not....” Singh considered for a moment, then a thoughtful look crossed his brown features. “There is something,” he said finally, “which is not quite right about this whole bus­iness.”

  Peter laughed hollowly. “Not quite right? The whole thing smells of diabolical evil from start to finish.”

  “I did not quite mean it in that sense,” the mystic said. “I am referring to the underlying current in your wife’s aura. I think I should explain that I read the future by means of the vibrations given off by a living body. I believe that these vibrations exist as a pattern and fore­tell the destiny of a living creature from the cradle to the grave. Normally, the cessation of these vibrations represents death—but in certain abnormal cases it could, I suppose, also represent a cessation of bodily functions.”

  “Like unconsciousness?” Peter suggested.

  “Something more than that. Unconsciousness alone does not prevent bodily vibrations being given off, just as an unconscious person still breathes. No, I mean something more. Let us say—suspended ani­mation. A state wherein the body seems to be dead, but is not.”

  Peter got to his feet again and paced around the room slowly, thumb and finger to his eyes.

  “Too confusing for me, Singh,” he said finally. “Just what are you getting at?”

  “I am wondering,” Singh mused, “if I have really foreseen death, or something else. Your wife’s existence is certainly going to pass through an eclipse—that is inevitable—but I know she will reappear alive, as a vampire—after she has been buried. There is something about it all which is not—absolute.” Singh moved worriedly.

  “Death should bring finality. Her change into a vampire should not become apparent to me because a vampire is outside the realm of human vibrations. Yet I see it….”

  Peter came to a stop, a thought turning over in his mind. Before he could utter it a shout from the top of the stairs sent him hurrying into the hall. Meadows was at the stair top.

  “Better come, Peter,” he said anxiously.

  Forgetting all about Singh—and everything else—Peter dived for the staircase and sped up it. At the summit Meadows caught his arm.

  “Just a minute, son,” he murmured. “I’m afraid—it’s all over. She died a few minutes ago.”

  Peter stood motionless for a moment, the col­our leaving his face; then he turned round and raced up to the bedroom. He did not stop hurrying until he reached the bedside, then he caught Elsie’s limp hand. It was still warm—but lifeless. Through eyes blurring with tears he gazed at her dead face. It was smiling a little. Wisps of her blonde hair were moving gently in the breeze from the window, which Dr. Meadows had opened.

  “Nothing I could do, Peter,” he said. “She just passed away without regaining consciousness. I wish you’d been here—”

  “I was talking to Singh,” Peter said mechan­ically, and Meadows gave a start of surprise.

  “You mean the mystic? What on earth’s he doing here?”

  “Didn’t you hear Mrs. Dawlish call his name from the hall?” Peter turned weary eyes. “No—I suppose you wouldn’t.”

  He looked up as Rawnee Singh himself appeared in the doorway. He hesitated for a moment and then came forward. Impassively he looked at the lifeless girl.

  “What do you want here?” Meadows demanded. “Don’t you realize that this is—”

  “The living may look upon the dead, doctor,” Singh replied, with a direct stare of his oblique eyes. “Just as the living may look upon—the living.”

  “What are you talking about?” Meadows snapped.

  “Death takes many forms,” Singh answered ambig­uously. Then he looked at Peter. “My sincere condolences, Mr. Malden, in your present ordeal. I feel though that the end is not yet. To material eyes—yes. It is the end. The world will say it is death. As for me…” He did not finish. Instead he held out his dark hand. “For the time

  being, Mr. Malden, farewell. We shall meet again in the not too distant future. That, too, is pre­-destined.”

  Peter shook hands mechanically and watched the mystic leave the room silently. Dr. Meadows gazed after him and then looked back at Peter.

  “What did he want here?” he demanded.

  “He came to tell me of two things, Doc. That Elsie would die today, and that she will become a vampire.”

  Meadows’ face clouded. “So George’s ambition is to be fulfilled? His attack upon her succeeded, though it has taken some time for her to pass away. If she becomes a vampire, Peter, we have only one course…to drive a stake through her heart at her first appearance from the grave.”

  Peter said nothing. He drew the sheet over the dead face of the girl and left the room.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  THE TERRIBLE CORPSES

  At two o’clock Sir Gerald Montrose, the specialist in heart and blood disord
ers, arrived in his gleam­ing Buick. He was a small, pink-faced man with flawless manners and hands like a woman’s. Since he had arrived too late to help Elsie he could only make a post-mortem examination and pool his diag­nosis with that of Dr. Meadows.

  Peter, at the end of making funeral arrangements and feeling too stunned to care whether he lived or died, studied the two medicos as they ran him to earth in the drawing room.

  “Because of the unusual circumstances surround­ing Elsie’s death, there’ll probably be an inquest,” Dr. Meadows said. “At any rate I have informed the Local coroner of her death. In the meantime, Sir Gerald and I are both of the same opinion regarding her demise. It was caused by pernicious anaemia—”

  “It was caused by a vampire,” Peter interrupted stonily. “The vampire that was George Timperley. He bit Elsie, sucked away a lot of her blood, and poisoned that which was left.”

  “That may be the truth,” Sir Gerald agreed, “but we have to convince a jury which deals only in facts. A coroner’s jury would not accept the vamp­ire angle. Hence we have to state a medical reason for your wife’s unhappy death.”

  “Do what you like,” Peter muttered, gazing dully in front of him. “I just don’t care what happens any more.”

  But the movement of events did not allow Peter to sink into himself. He had to attend the coron­er’s inquest and the death of Elsie was debated in detail. Rawnee Singh also gave evidence, and Chief-inspector Rushton. The other-world atmosphere of the whole business, however, made it impossible for the hearing to be brought to a logical conclusion, so finally the coroner was compelled to accept the joint opinions of Sir Gerald Montrose and Dr. Meadows....

  For Peter, the rest was a nightmare, rendered all the more horrifying by Singh’s forecast that, once buried, Elsie would become a vampire. He be­came haunted by the thought that he would have to join the villagers in a constant watch on Elsie’s grave to make sure that, when she did appear, she was slain by a stake through her heart. He began to wonder whether life was worth living at all, whether he might not end it and—