THEY RETURN AT EVENING

by Herbert Russell Wakefield

  'Well, the upshot was that he came down to Franton next day and stayed on. Now, I know that his motives were entirely mercenary, but none the less he saved me from suicide, and to a great extent gave back peace to my mind.

  'Never could I have imagined such an irresistible and brilliant talker. Whatever he may be, he's also a poet, a profound philosopher and amazingly versatile and erudite. Also, when he likes, his charm of manner carries one away. At least, in my case it did — for a time — though he borrowed £20 or more a week from me.

  'And then one day my butler came to me, and with the hushed gusto appropriate to such revelations murmured that two of the maids were in the family way and that another had told him an hysterical little tale — floating in floods of tears — about how Clinton had made several attempts to force his way into her bedroom.

  'Well, Teddie, that sort of thing is that sort of thing, but I felt such a performance couldn't possibly be justified, that taking advantage of a trio of rustics in his host's house was a dastardly and unforgivable outrage.

  'Other people's morals are chiefly their own affair, but I had a personal responsibility towards these buxom victims — well, you can realise just how I felt.

  'I had to speak about it to Clinton, and did so that night. No one ever saw him abashed. He smiled at me in a superior and patronising way, and said he quite understood that I was almost bound to hold such feudal and socially primitive views, suggesting, of course, that my chief concern in the matter was that he had infringed my droit de seigneur in these cases. As for him, he considered it was his duty to disseminate his unique genius as widely as possible, and that it should be considered the highest privilege for anyone to bear his child. He had to his knowledge seventy-four offspring alive, and probably many more — the more the better for the future of humanity. But, of course, he understood and promised for the future — bowing to my rights and my prejudices — to allow me to plough my own pink and white pastures — and much more to the same effect.

  'Though still under his domination, I felt there was more lust than logic in these specious professions, so I made an excuse and went up to London the next day. As I left the house I picked up my letters, which I read in the car on the way up. One was a three-page catalogue raisonné from my tailor. Not being as dressy as all that, it seemed unexpectedly grandiose, so I paid him a visit. Well, Clinton had forged a letter from me authorising him to order clothes at my expense, and a lavish outfit had been provided.

  'It then occurred to me to go to my bank to discover precisely how much I had lent Clinton during the last three months. It was £420. All these discoveries — telescoping — caused me to review my relationship with Clinton. Suddenly I felt it had better end. I might be mediaeval, intellectually costive, and the possessor of much scandalously unearned increment, but I could not believe that the pursuit and contemplation of esoteric mysteries necessarily implied the lowest possible standards of private decency. In other words, I was recovering.

  'I still felt that Clinton was the most remarkable person I had ever met. I do to this day — but I felt I was unequal to squaring such magic circles.

  'I told him so when I got back. He was quite charming, gentle, understanding, commiserating, and he left the next morning, after pronouncing some incantation whilst touching my forehead. I missed him very much. I believe he's the devil, but he's that sort of person.

  'Once I had assured the prospective mothers of his children that they would not be sacked and that their destined contributions to the population would be a charge upon me — there is a codicil to my will to this effect — they brightened up considerably, and rather too frequently snatches of the Froth-Blowers' Anthem cruised down to me as they went about their duties. In fact, I had a discreditable impression that the Immaculate Third would have shown less lachrymose integrity had the consequences of surrender been revealed ante factum. Eventually a brace of male infants came to contribute their falsettos to the dirge — for whose appearance the locals have respectfully given me the credit. These brats have searching, calign eyes, and when they reach the age of puberty I should not be surprised if the birth statistics for East Surrey began to show a remarkable — even a magical rise.

  'Oh, how good it is to talk to you, Teddie, and get it all off my chest! I feel almost light-hearted, as though my poor old brain had been curetted. I feel I can face and fight it now.

  'Well, for the next month I drowsed and read and drowsed and read until I felt two-lunged again. And several times I almost wrote to you, but I felt such lethargy and yet such a certainty of getting quite well again that I put everything off. I was content to lie back and let that blessed healing process work its quiet kindly way with me.

  'And then one day I got a letter from a friend of mine, Melrose, who was at the House when we were up. He is the Secretary of "Ye Ancient Mysteries", a dining club I joined before the War. It meets once a month and discusses famous mysteries of the past — the Mary Celeste, the "McLachlan Case", and so on — with a flippant yet scholarly zeal; but that doesn't matter. Well, Melrose said that Clinton wanted to become a member, and had stressed the fact that he was a friend of mine. Melrose was a little upset, as he had heard vague rumours about Clinton. Did I think he was likely to be an acceptable member of the club?

  'Well, what was I to say? On the one side of the medal were the facts that he had used my house as his stud-farm, that he had forged my name and sponged on me shamelessly. On the reverse was the fact that he was a genius and knew more about Ancient Mysteries than the rest of the world put together. But my mind was soon made up; I could not recommend him. A week later I got a letter — a charming letter, a most understanding letter, from Clinton. He realised, so he said, that I had been bound to give the secretary of the Ancient Mysteries the advice I had — no doubt I considered he was not a decent person to meet my friends. He was naturally disappointed, and so on.

  'How the devil, I wondered, did he know — not only that I had put my thumbs down against him, but also the very reason for which I had put them down!

  'So I asked Melrose, who told me he hadn't mentioned the matter to a soul, but had discreetly removed Clinton's name from the list of candidates for election. And no one should have been any the wiser; but how much wiser Clinton was!

  'A week later I got another letter from him, saying that he was leaving England for a month. He enclosed a funny little paper pattern thing, an outline cut out with scissors with a figure painted on it, a beastly-looking thing. Like this!'

  And he drew a quick sketch on the table cloth.

  Certainly it was unpleasant, thought Bellamy. It appeared to be a crouching figure in the posture of pursuit. The robes it wore seemed to rise and billow above its head. Its arms were long — too long — scraping the ground with curved and spiked nails. Its head was not quite human, its expression devilish and venomous. A horrid, hunting thing, its eyes encarnadined and infinitely evil, glowing animal eyes in the foul dark face. And those long vile arms — not pleasant to be in their grip. He hadn't realised Philip could draw as well as that. He straightened himself, lit a cigarette, and rallied his fighting powers. For the first time he realised, why, that Philip was in serious trouble! Just a rather beastly little sketch on a table-cloth. And now it was up to him!

  'Clinton told me,' continued Philip, 'that this was a most powerful symbol which I should find of the greatest help in my mystical studies. I must place it against my forehead, and pronounce at the same time a certain sentence. And, Teddie, suddenly, I found myself doing so. I remember I had a sharp feeling of surprise and irritation when I found I had placarded this thing on my head and repeated this sentence.'

  'What was the sentence?' asked Bellamy.

  'Well, that's a funny thing,' said Philip. 'I can't remember it, and both the slip of paper on which it was written and the paper pattern had disappeared the next morning. I remember putting them in my pocket book, but they completely vanished. And, Teddie, things haven't been the same since.' He filled
his glass and emptied it, lit a cigarette, and at once pressed the life from it in an ash tray and then lit another.

  'Bluntly, I've been bothered, haunted perhaps is too strong a word — too pompous. It's like this. That same night I had read myself tired in the study, and about twelve o'clock I was glancing sleepily around the room when I noticed that one of the bookcases was throwing out a curious and unaccountable shadow. It seemed as if something was hiding behind the bookcase, and that this was that something's shadow. I got up and walked over to it, and it became just a bookcase shadow, rectangular and reassuring. I went to bed.

  'As I turned on the light on the landing I noticed the same sort of shadow coming from the grandfather clock. I went to sleep all right, but suddenly found myself peering out of the window, and there was that shadow stretching out from the trees and in the drive. At first there was about that much of it showing,' and he drew a line down the sketch on the table cloth, 'about a sixth. Well, it's been a simple story since then. Every night that shadow has grown a little. It is now almost all visible. And it comes out suddenly from different places. Last night it was on the wall beside the door into the Dutch garden. I never know where I'm going to see it next.'

  'And how long has this been going on?' asked Bellamy.

  'A month tomorrow. You sound as if you thought I was mad. I probably am.'

  'No, you're as sane as I am. But why don't you leave Franton and come to London?'

  'And see it on the wall of the club bedroom! I've tried that, Teddie, but one's as bad as the other. Doesn't it sound ludicrous? But it isn't to me.'

  'Do you usually eat as little as this?' asked Bellamy.

  '"And drink as much?" you were too polite to add. Well, there's more to it than indigestion, and it isn't incipient D.T. It's just I don't feel very hungry nowadays.'

  Bellamy got that rush of tip-toe pugnacity which had won him so many desperate cases. He had had a Highland grandmother from whom he had inherited a powerful visualising imagination, by which he got a fleeting yet authentic insight into the workings of men's minds. So now he knew in a flash how he would feel if Philip's ordeal had been his.

  'Whatever it is, Philip,' he said, 'there are two of us now.'

  'Then you do believe in it,' said Philip. 'Sometimes I can't. On a sunny morning with starlings chattering and buses swinging up Waterloo Place — then how can such things be? But at night I know they are.'

  'Well,' said Bellamy, after a pause, 'let us look at it coldly and precisely. Ever since Clinton sent you a certain painted paper pattern you've seen a shadowed reproduction of it. Now I take it he has — as you suggested — unusual hypnotic power. He has studied mesmerism?'

  'I think he's studied every bloody thing,' said Philip.

  'Then that's a possibility.'

  'Yes,' agreed Philip, 'it's a possibility. And I'll fight it, Teddie, now that I have you, but can you minister to a mind diseased?'

  'Throw quotation to the dogs,' replied Bellamy. 'What one man has done another can undo — there's one for you.'

  'Teddie,' said Philip, 'will you come down to Franton tonight?'

  'Yes,' said Bellamy. 'But why?'

  'Because I want you to be with me at twelve o'clock tonight when I look out from the study window and think I see a shadow flung on the flag-stones outside the drawing-room window.'

  'Why not stay up here for tonight?'

  'Because I want to get it settled. Either I'm mad Or—— Will you come?'

  'If you really mean to go down tonight I'll come with you.'

  'Well, I've ordered the car to be here by 9.15,' said Philip. 'We'll go to your rooms, and you can pack a suitcase and we'll be there by half past ten.' Suddenly he looked up sharply, his shoulders drew together and his eyes narrowed and became intent. It happened that at that moment no voice was busy in the dining-room of the Brooks's Club. No doubt they were changing over at the Power Station, for the lights dimmed for a moment. It seemed to Bellamy that someone was developing wavy, wicked little films far back in his brain, and a voice suddenly whispered in his ear with a vile sort of shyness, 'He cometh and he passeth by!'

  As they drove down through the night they talked little. Philip drowsed and Bellamy's mind was busy. His preliminary conclusion was that Philip was neither mad nor going mad, but that he was not normal. He had always been very sensitive and highly strung, reacting too quickly and deeply to emotional stresses — and this living alone and eating nothing — the worst thing for him.

  And this Clinton. He had the reputation of being an evil man of power, and such persons' hypnotic influence was absurdly underrated. He'd get on his track.

  'When does Clinton get back to England?' he asked.

  'If he kept to his plans he'll be back about now,' said Philip sleepily.

  'What are his haunts?'

  'He lives near the British Museum in rooms, but he's usually to be found at the Chorazin Club after six o'clock. It's in Larn Street, just off Shaftesbury Avenue. A funny place with some funny members.'

  Bellamy made a note of this.

  'Does he know you know me?'

  'No, I think not, there's no reason why he should.'

  'So much the better,' said Bellamy.

  'Why?' asked Philip.

  'Because I'm going to cultivate his acquaintance.'

  'Well, do look out, Teddie, he has a marvellous power of hiding the fact, but he's dangerous, and I don't want you to get into any trouble like mine.'

  'I'll be careful,' said Bellamy.

  Ten minutes later they passed the gates of the drive of Franton Manor, and Philip began glancing uneasily about him and peering sharply where the elms flung shadows. It was a perfectly still and cloudless night, with a quarter moon. It was just a quarter to eleven as they entered the house. They went up to the library on the first floor which looked out over the Dutch Garden to the Park. Franton is a typical Georgian house, with charming gardens and Park, but too big and lonely for one nervous person to inhabit, thought Bellamy.

  The butler brought up sandwiches and drinks, and Bellamy thought he seemed relieved at their arrival. Philip began to eat ravenously, and gulped down two stiff whiskies. He kept looking at his watch, and his eyes were always searching the walls.

  'It comes, Teddie, even when it ought to be too light for shadows.'

  'Now then,' replied the latter, 'I'm with you, and we're going to keep quite steady. It may come, but I shall not leave you until it goes and for ever.' And he managed to lure Philip on to another subject, and for a time he seemed quieter, but suddenly he stiffened, and his eyes became rigid and staring. 'It's there,' he cried, 'I know it!'

  'Steady, Philip!' said Bellamy sharply. 'Where?'

  'Down below,' he whispered, and began creeping towards the window.

  Bellamy reached it first and looked down. He saw it at once, knew what it was, and set his teeth.

  He heard Philip shaking and breathing heavily at his side.

  'It's there,' he said, 'and it's complete at last!'

  'Now, Philip,' said Bellamy, 'we're going down, and I'm going out first, and we'll settle the thing once and for all.'

  They went down the stairs and into the drawing-room. Bellamy turned the light on and walked quickly to the French window and began to try to open the catch. He fumbled with it for a moment.

  'Let me do it,' said Philip, and put his hand to the catch, and then the window opened and he stepped out.

  'Come back, Philip!' cried Bellamy. As he said it the lights went dim, a fierce blast of burning air filled the room, the window came crashing back. Then through the glass Bellamy saw Philip suddenly throw up his hands, and something huge and dark lean from the wall and envelop him. He seemed to writhe for a moment in its folds. Bellamy strove madly to thrust the window open, while his soul strove to withstand the mighty and evil power he felt was crushing him, and then he saw Philip flung down with awful force, and he could hear the foul, crushing thud as his head struck the stone.

  And then the win
dow opened and Bellamy dashed out into a quiet and scented night.

  At the inquest the doctor stated he was satisfied that Mr Franton's death was due to a severe heart attack — he had never recovered from the gas, he said, and such a seizure was always possible.

  'Then there are no peculiar circumstances about the case?' asked the Coroner.

  The doctor hesitated. 'Well, there is one thing,' he said slowly. 'The pupils of Mr Franton's eyes were — well, to put it simply to the jury — instead of being round, they were drawn up so that they resembled half-moons — in a sense they were like the pupils in the eyes of a cat.'

  'Can you explain that?' asked the Coroner.

  'No, I have never seen a similar case,' replied the doctor. 'But I am satisfied the cause of death was as I have stated.'

  Bellamy was, of course, called as a witness, but he had little to say.

  * * * * *

  About eleven o'clock on the morning after these events Bellamy rang up the Chorazin Club from his chambers and learned from the manager that Mr Clinton had returned from abroad. A little later he got a Sloane number and arranged to lunch with Mr Solan at the United Universities Club. And then he made a conscientious effort to estimate the chances in Rex v. Tipwinkle.

  But soon he was restless and pacing the room. He could not exorcise the jeering demon which told him sniggeringly that he had failed Philip. It wasn't true, but it pricked and penetrated. But the game was not yet played out. If he had failed to save he might still avenge. He would see what Mr Solan had to say.

  That personage was awaiting him in the smoking-room. Mr Solan was an original and looked it. Just five feet and two inches — a tiny body, a mighty head with a dominating forehead studded with a pair of thrusting frontal lobes. All this covered with a thick, greying thatch. Veiled, restless little eyes, a perky, tilted, little nose, and a very thin-lipped, fighting mouth from which issued the most curious, resonant, high, and piercing voice. This is a rough and ready sketch of one who is universally accepted to be the greatest living Oriental Scholar — a mystic — once upon a time a Senior Wrangler, a philosopher of European repute, a great and fascinating personality, who lived alone, save for a brace of tortoiseshell cats and a housekeeper, in Chester Terrace, Sloane Square. About every six years he published a masterly treatise on one of his special subjects; otherwise he kept himself to himself with the remorseless determination he brought to bear upon any subject which he considered worth serious consideration, such as the Chess Game, the works of Bach, the paintings of Van Gogh, the poems of Housman, and the short stories of P. G. Wodehouse and Austin Freeman.