"Come on," he growled. "You only delay the inevitable. Must I drag you?”
She made no reply. He tugged violently at her wrist, dragging her a few inches along the pavement. Then he stooped over her, raised her in his arms, and bore her toward the dark opening of the door. He crowded her roughly through it, disregarding the painful bumping of her shoulders and knees. She heard the slam of the door as he kicked it closed, and she realized that they were mounting a flight of stairs, moving somewhere into the oppressive threatening darkness.
Then they were moving along a level floor, and her arm was bruised against another door. There was a moment of stillness, and then she was released, dropped indifferently to the surface of a bed or couch. A moment later a light flashed on.
The girl was conscious at first only of the gaze of the red eyes. They held her own in a fascinating, unbreakable, trance-like spell. Then, in a wave of dizziness, she closed her own eyes.
"Where are we?” she murmured. "In Hell?”
"You should call it Heaven," came the sardonic voice. "It's the home of your sweetheart. His home —and mine!"
26
The Depths
EAVEN AND HELL ALWAYS WERE THE SAME place," said Nicholas Devine, his red eyes glaring down at the girl. "We'll demonstrate the fact."
Pat shifted wearily, and sat erect, passing her hand dazedly across her face. She brushed the tangled strands of black hair from before her eyes, and stared dully at the room in which she found herself.
It had some of the aspects of a study, and some of a laboratory, or perhaps a doctor's office. There was a case of dusty books on the wall opposite, and another crystal-fronted cabinet containing glassware, bottles, little round boxes suggestive of drugs or pharmaceuticals. There was a paper-littered table too; she gave a convulsive shudder at the sight of a bald, varnished death's head, its lower jar articulated, that reposed on a pile of papers and grinned at her.
'Where —" she began faintly.
"This was the room of your sweetheart's father," said the other. "His and my mutual father. He was an experimenter, a researcher, and so, in another sense, am I!" He leered evilly at her. "He used this chamber to further his experiments, and I for mine — the carrying on of a noble family tradition!"
The girl scarcely heard his words; the expressionless tone carried no meaning to the chaos which was her mind. She felt only an inchoate horror and a vague but all-encompassing fear, and her head was aching from the blows he had dealt her.
"What do you want?” she asked dully.
"Why, there is an unfinished experiment. You must remember our interrupted proceedings of a week ago! Have you already forgotten the early steps of our experiment in evil?"
Pat cringed at the cold, sardonic tones of the other. "Let me go," she whimpered. "Please!" she appealed. "Let me go!"
"In due time," he responded. "You lack gratitude," he continued. "Last time, out of the kindness that is my soul, I permitted you to dull your senses with alcohol, but you failed, apparently, to appreciate my indulgence. But this time" — His eyes lit up queerly — "this time you approach the consummation of our experiment with undimmed mind!"
He approached her. She drew her knees up, huddling back on the couch, and summoned the final vestiges of her strength.
"I'll kick you!" she muttered desperately. "Keep back from me!"
He paused just beyond her reach. "I had hoped," he said ironically, "if not for your cooperation, at least for no further active resistance. It's quite useless; I told you days ago that this time would come."
He advanced cautiously; Pat thrust out her foot, driving it with all her power. Instantly he drew back, catching her ankle in his hand. He jerked her leg sharply upwards, and she was precipitated violently to the couch. Again he advanced.
The girl writhed away from him. She slipped from the foot of the couch and darted in a circle around him, turning in an attempt to gain the room's single exit —the door by which they had entered. He moved quickly to intercept her; he closed the door as she backed despairingly away, retreating to the far end of the room. Once more he faced her, his malicious eyes gleaming, and moved deliberately toward her.
She drew back until the table halted her; she pressed herself against it as if to force her way still further. The other moved at unaltered pace. Suddenly her hand pressed over some smooth, round, hard object; she grasped it and flung the grinning skull at the more terrible face that approached her. He dodged; there was a crash of glass as the gruesome missile shattered the pane of the cabinet of drugs. And inexorably, Nicholas Devine approached once more.
She moved along the edge of the table, squeezed herself between it and the wall. Behind her was one of the room's two windows, curtainless, with drawn shades. She found the cord, jerked it, and let the blind coil upward with an abrupt snap.
"I'll throw myself through the window!" she announced with a sort of desperate calm. "Don't dare move a step closer!"
The demon paused once more in his deliberate advance. "You will, of course," he said as if considering. "Given the opportunity. Your body torn and broken, spotted with blood — that might be a pleasure second only to that I plan."
"You'll suffer for it!" said the girl hysterically. "I'll be glad to do it, knowing you'll suffer!" "Not I — your sweetheart."
"I don't care! I can't stand it!"
The other smiled his demoniac smile, and resumed his advance. She watched him in terror that had now reached the ultimate degree; her mind could bear no more. She turned suddenly, raised her arm, and beat her fist against the pane of the window.
With the surprising resistance glass sometimes displays, it shook at her blow but did not shatter. She drew back for a second attempt, and her upraised arm was caught in a rigid grip, and she was dragged backward to the center of the room, thrown heavily to the floor. She sat dazedly looking up at the form standing over her.
"Must I render you helpless again?” queried the flat voice of the other. "Are you not yet broken, convinced of the uselessness of this struggle?”
She made no answer, staring dully at his immobile features.
"Are you going to fight me further?” As she was still silent, he repeated, "Are you?”
She shook her head vaguely. "No," she muttered. She had reached the point of utter indifference; nothing at all was important enough now to struggle for.
"Stand up!" ordered the being above her.
She pulled herself wearily to her feet, leaning against the wall. She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them dully as the other moved.
"What — are you — are you going to do?” she murmured.
"First," said the demon coldly, "I shall disrobe you somewhat more completely than on our other occasion. Thereafter we will proceed to the consummation of our experiment."
She watched him indifferently, uncomprehendingly, as he crooked a thin finger in the neck of her frock. She felt the pressure as he pulled, heard the rip of the fabric, and the pop of buttons, but she was conscious of no particular sensation as the garment cascaded into a black and red pool at her feet. She stood passive as he hooked his finger in the strap of her vest, and that too joined the little mound of cloth. She shivered slightly as she stood bared to the waist, but gave no other sign.
Again the thin hand moved toward her; from somewhere in her tormented spirit a final shred of resistance arose, and she pushed the questing member feebly to one side. She heard a low, sardonic laugh from her oppressor.
"Look at me!" he commanded.
She raised her eyes wearily; she drew her arm about her in a forlorn gesture of concealment. Her eyes met the strange orbs of the other, and a faint thrill of horror stirred; other than this, she felt nothing. Then his eyes were approaching her; she was conscious of the illusion that they were expanding, filling all the space in front of her. Their weird glow filled the world, dominated everything.
"Will you yield?” he queried.
The eyes commanded. "Yes," she said dully.
She felt his hands icy cold on her bare shoulders. They traveled like a shudder about her body, and suddenly she was pressed close to him.
"Are you mine?” he demanded. For the first time there was a tinge of expression in the toneless voice, a trace of eagerness. She made no answer; her eyes, held by his, stared like the eyes of a person in a trance, unwinking, fascinated.
"Are you mine?" he repeated, his breath hissing on her cheek.
"Yes." She heard her own voice in automatic reply to his question.
"Mine — for the delights of evil?"
"Yours!" she murmured. The eyes had blotted out everything.
"And do you hate me?"
"No."
The arms about her tightened into crushing bands. The pressure stopped her breath; her very bones seemed to give under their fierce compression.
"Do you hate me?" he muttered.
"Yes!" she gasped. "Yes! I hate you!"
"Ah!" He twisted his hand in her black hair, wrenching it roughly back. "Are you ready now for the consummation? To look upon the face of evil?"
She made no reply. Her eyes, as glassy as those of a sleep-walker, stared into his.
"Are you ready?”
"Yes," she said.
He pressed his mouth to hers. The fierceness of the kiss bruised her lips, the pull of his hand in her hair was a searing pain, the pressure of his arm about her body was a suffocation. Yet — somehow — there was again the dawning of that unholy pleasure — the same degraded delight that had risen in her on that other occasion, in the room of the red-checked table cloth. Through some hellish alchemy, the leaden pain was transmuting itself into the garish gold of a horrible, abnormal pleasure. She found her crushed lips attempting a feeble, painful response.
At her movement, she felt herself swung abruptly from her feet. With his lips still crushing hers, he raised her in his arms; she felt herself borne across the room. He paused; there was a sudden release, and she crashed to the hard surface of the couch, whose rough covering scratched the bare flesh of her back. Nicholas Devine bent over her; she saw his hand stretch toward her single remaining garment. And again, from somewhere in her harassed soul, a spark of resistance flashed.
"Nick!" she moaned. "Oh, Nick! Help me!"
"Call him!" said the other, a sneer on his face. "Call him! He hears; it adds to his torment!"
She covered her eyes with her hands. She felt his hand slip coldly between her skin and the elastic about her waist.
"Nick!" she moaned again. "Nick! Oh, my God! Nick!"
27
Two in Hell
HE COLD HAND AGAINST PAT WAS STILL; SHE felt it rigid and stiff on her flesh. She lay passive with closed eyes; having voiced her final appeal, she was through. The words torn from her misery represented the final iota of spirit remaining to her; and her bruised body and battered mind had nothing further to give.
The hand quivered and withdrew. For a moment more she lay motionless with her arms clutched about her, then she opened her eyes, gazing dully, hopelessly at the demon standing over her. He was watching her with a curious abstracted frown; as she stirred, the scowl intensified, and he drew back a step.
His face contorted suddenly in a spasm of some unguessable emotion. His fists clenched; a low unintelligible mutter broke from his lips. "Strange!" she heard him say, and after a moment, "I'm still master here!"
He was master; in a moment the emotion vanished, and he was again standing over her, his face the same impassive demoniac mask. She watched him in a dull stupor of despair that was too deep for even a whimper of pain as he wrenched at the elastic about her waist, and it cut into her flesh and parted. He tore the garment away, and the red eyes bored down with a wild elation in their depths.
"Mine!" the being muttered, a new hoarseness in his voice. "Are you mine?"
Pat made no answer; his voice croaked in more insistent tones. "Are you mine?"
She could not reply. She felt his fingers bite into the flesh of her shoulder. She was shaken roughly, violently, and the question came again, fiercely. The eyes flamed in command, and she felt through her languor and weakness, the stirring of that strange and unholy fascination that he held over her.
"Answer!" he croaked. "Are you mine?"
The torture of his searing grip on her shoulder wrung an answer from her.
"Yes," she murmured faintly. "Yours."
She closed her eyes again in helpless resignation. She felt the hand withdrawn, and she lay passive, waiting, on the verge of unconsciousness, numb, spirit-broken, and beaten.
Nothing happened. After a long interval she opened her eyes, and saw the other standing again with clenched fists and contorted countenance. His features were writhing in the intensity of his struggle; a strange low snarl came from his lips. He backed away from her, step by step; he leaned against the bookshelves, and beads of perspiration formed on his scowling face.
He was no longer master! She saw the change; imperceptibly the evil vanished from his features, and suddenly they were no longer his, but the weary, horrorstricken visage of her Nick! The red eyes were no longer satanic, but only the blood-shot, troubled, gentle eyes of her sweetheart, and the lips had lost their grimness, and gasped and quivered and trembled. He reeled against the wall, staggered to the chair at the table, and sank weakly into it.
Pat was far too exhausted, far too dazed, to feel anything but the faintest sensation of relief. She realized only dimly that tears were welling from her eyes, and that sharp sobs were shaking her. She was for the moment unable to stir, and it was not long until the being at the table turned stricken eyes on her that she moved. Then she drew her knees up before her, as if to hide her body behind their slim, chiffon-clad grace.
Nick rose from the table, approaching her with weary, hesitant tread. He seized a cover of some sort that was folded over the foot of the couch, shook it out and cast it over her. She clutched it about her body, sat erect and leaned back against the wall in utter exhaustion. Many minutes passed with no word from either of the occupants of the unholy chamber. It was Nick who broke the long silence.
"Pat," he murmured in low tones. "Pat — Dear. Are you — all right?"
She stared at him dazedly without answer. "Honey!" he said. "Honey! Tell me you're all right!"
"All right?" she repeated uncomprehendingly. "Yes. I guess I'm all right."
"Then go, Pat! Get away from here before he —before anything happens! Put your clothes on and hurry away!"
"I can't!" she faintly. "I — can't!"
"You must, Honey!"
"I'm just — not able to. I will soon, Nick —honest. When I — when I get my breath back."
"Pat!" There was anguish in the cry. "Oh, God —Pat! We mustn't ever be together again — not ever!"
"No," she said. A bit of sanity was returning to her; comprehension of her position sent a shudder through her. "No, we mustn't."
"I couldn't bear another night like this — watching! I'd go mad!"
"Oh!" she choked, tears starting. "If you hadn't come back, Nick!"
"I conquered him," he said. "I don't think I could do it again. It was your call that gave me the strength, Pat." He shook his head as if bewildered. "He thought it was being in love with you that weakened me, but in the end it was that which gave me the strength to subdue him."
"I'm scared!" said the girl suddenly. "Oh, Nick! I'm frightened!"
"You'd better go. You'd better dress and leave at once, Honey. Here." He gathered her clothes from the floor, depositing them beside her on the couch. "There are pins in the tray on the table, Pat. Fix yourself up as well as you can, dear — and hurry out of here!"
He turned toward the door as if to leave, and a shock of terror shook her.
"Nick!" she cried. "Don't go away! I'm more afraid when I can't see you — afraid that he —" She broke off sobbing.
"All right, Honey. I'll turn my back."
She slipped out from under the blanket, found the pins, and repaired her ruined cos
tume. The frock was torn, crushed and bedraggled; she pinned it together at the throat, though her trembling fingers made the task difficult. She pulled it on and took a tentative step toward the door.
"Nick!" she called as a wave of dizziness sent her swaying against the wall.
"What's the matter, Honey?" He turned anxiously at her cry.
"I'm dizzy," she moaned. "My head aches, and — I'm scared!"
"Pat, darling! You can't go out alone like this —and," he added miserably, "I can't take you!" He slipped his arm around her tenderly, supporting her to the couch. "Honey, what'll we do?”
"I'll be — all right," she murmured. "I'll go in a moment." The dizziness was leaving her; strength was returning.
"You must!" he said dolefully. "What a parting, Pat! Never to see you again, and then having this to remember as farewell!"
"I know, Nick. You see, I love you too." She turned her dark, troubled eyes on him. "Honey, kiss me good-bye! We'll have that to remember, anyway!" Tears were again on her cheeks.
"Do I dare?" he asked despondently. "After the things these lips of mine have said, and what these arms have done to you?”
"But you didn't, Nick! Could I blame you for —that other?"
"God! You're kind, Pat! Honey, if ever I win out in this battle, if ever I know I'm the final victor, I'll — No," he said his tones dropping abruptly. "I'll never come back to you, Pat. It's far too dangerous, and -can I ever be certain? Can I?"
"I don't know, Nick. Can you?”
"I can't be, Pat! I'll never be sure that he isn't just dormant, as he was before, waiting for my weakness to betray me! I'll never be certain, Honey! It has to be good-bye!"
"Then kiss me!"
She clung to him; the room that had been so recently a chamber of horrors was transformed. As she held him, as her lips were pressed to his, she thought suddenly of the words of the demon, that Heaven and Hell were always the same place. They had taken on a new meaning, those words; she drew away from Nick and turned her tear-bright eyes tenderly on his.
"Honey," she murmured, "I don't want you to leave me. I don't want you to go!"
The Lost Master - The Collected Works Page 74