The Shadow on the House

by Mark Hansom

  There was a moment or two of silence. I could picture the two of them in there, the conclave having reached a deadlock, standing pondering, each trying to think of the next word.

  “Not even to you,” the Professor said again, as though to break the silence. “It is too horrible.”

  “Horrible?”

  “If it is true, yes. And I think it is true. All that I ask is that you put the wedding off for a time — a month, say. Much might happen in a month.”

  There was another silence.

  “You make me afraid,” said Lady Somerton at length. “I don’t know what you mean, and that makes it so much worse. The first thing that springs to one’s mind when you speak about a field of inquiry that has not been thoroughly investigated is the spirit world. But it can’t have anything to do with that. Has it?”

  But the Professor would not fall into the trap.

  “I must refuse to say anything whatever about what it might be. I merely ask you to use your influence in trying to have the wedding postponed. You will do that?”

  “Oh, I don’t see how I can!”

  “Very well. If you don’t, I will. But don’t be afraid: I shan’t mention it to Sylvia — not until I can state definitely that my suspicions are correct. It would be an unpardonable unkindness to mention it before. There is just a possibility that I may be wrong; and, in any event, there is no reflection, as I have told you, upon the young man.”

  “I hope you may be wrong in whatever you suspect. I pray you may be wrong.” Lady Somerton’s voice had suddenly become very quiet.

  “I also pray that I may be wrong.”

  “And you’ll forgive me,” said Lady Somerton, “for suggesting that you were speaking on behalf of Sydney. I ought not to have said that. I didn’t really mean it. I had to try to account for your strange request in some way.”

  “Quite! Quite!” exclaimed the Professor, in a noticeably kind voice. “You are eager for the marriage to take place, aren’t you?”

  “I am very happy about it,” she replied. “I took to Martin the first time I saw him. But I hear that people are saying it is his wealth that is making the marriage.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it isn’t,” the Professor assured her hurriedly. “And I don’t think people are saying that.”

  But he spoke so earnestly that I, listening, was certain that he did not believe what he said. People were saying that my wealth was making the marriage? That was interesting, but it had little enough significance to me at that moment. I failed to see then what I saw later, namely, that there must be some reason for what people were saying, and that perhaps Sylvia’s lack of enthusiasm and Lady Somerton’s eagerness for the marriage were a true indication of the state of affairs.

  But, as I say, these things had little enough significance at the moment. In fact, I hardly took any notice of the latter part of the conversation. My mind was concerned, fearfully, intensely, with the Professor’s disclosures. How he had got on the track of my secret I could not fathom; but that he had got on the track of it was obvious in every word that he had spoken.

  Of course it was a thing that he dared not hint at! And of course it was horrible! And of course there was no reflection on my character!

  I slipped along the corridor to the hall again. I had heard all that I wanted to hear.

  I was alarmed, but not unduly alarmed. In fact, I took it with marvellous calm. I knew that the Professor dared not speak until he had conclusively laid bare my secret, and in doing that (though how he could hope to do it, I did not know) he might succeed in solving the mystery and thus freeing me from my terrible fears.

  I picked up my hat and gloves from the rug-chest, and when Lady Somerton and the Professor sauntered through into the hall a few minutes later they found me standing in a negligent attitude surveying the section of Park Lane that was framed by the oblong of the doorway.

  “Ah, Martin!” exclaimed the Professor. “Here you are!”

  The Professor did not usually address me, “Ah, Martin!” He invariably called me by my surname, thus raising me to the status of mature manhood. The “Ah, Martin!” suggested the father addressing the fledgling.

  Lady Somerton shook hands. In her handshake and in the few words of welcome that she muttered there was a trace of nervousness, which I pretended not to notice.

  The Professor, too, shook hands — not a frequent habit of his; and I detected — for I was keyed up to observe subtleties of expression and manner — an immense kindliness in his glance. He was not afraid to meet my eyes, as Lady Somerton was. He suspected my secret, and he was moved by pity for me.

  I ought to have appreciated that. But did I?

  I did not. In my soul I said: “Confound you and your pity and your kindliness and your fatherliness and your fields of inquiry that have not been thoroughly investigated!”

  That was unreasonable, I know. But it was in accordance with the psychology governing the individual who finds himself set apart from the herd.

  “And you think you’re going to postpone the wedding!” the perverse demon within me went on, as I watched the Professor descend the steps. “You think you’re going to postpone the wedding until you can prove or disprove your theories about the spirit world! Well, you just aren’t!”

  CHAPTER XIII

  Sunlit Horror

  T

  hat afternoon I had a surprise visit from the Professor.

  I had not had my desired tête-à-tête with Sylvia. She had appeared in the hall not half a minute before lunch was due to begin, and she and Lady Somerton and I had gone into the dining-room together.

  The sight of her, as she quietly joined us when we turned back from seeing the Professor off, doubly confirmed me in my determination that the wedding arrangements should not be interfered with. She displayed no excessive joy at seeing me. Her face did not light up. She welcomed me in level tones. She gave up not one shred of that feminine mystery in which she was enveloped.

  But that fostered my pride wonderfully. Had she been freer in her manner she would have been less sublime, and I would have been less maddened by her beauty. The fact that over-ruled everything else in her relations with me was the fact that she and I were about to be married. In the light of that, smiles and kisses and fondlings were as naught.

  I left immediately after lunch, and returned to Grosvenor Square.

  I had a great deal to think about, but I deliberately tried not to think about anything in particular. Yet I could not for long keep my mind off what I had overheard. That my secret was in danger of being discovered was a source of very real fear and uneasiness. The other — the dread of another visitation such as that which had occurred two nights ago — was much more intense while it lasted. It was an ordeal that no strength of will could overcome, and its contemplation, in the setting of the dark, silent flat, was enough to bring dampness to one’s forehead, as it had brought dampness to my forehead while I listened to Makepeace’s recital of the visitation. But in the daytime its power was negligible.

  The discovery of my secret, however, was another matter. It was a practical matter. It was a fear less horrible — not horrible at all compared with the brooding terror of night. But it was always with me — at night and in the daytime — and it might rob me of Sylvia and leave me alive to know of my loss. The mysterious force that was haunting me might also rob me of Sylvia, but it would do so only by killing me — or Sylvia — as it had killed Christopher Knight and my cousin. But the Professor could bring about that which would be worse than death — namely, life without Sylvia. I was so completely enthralled by her ineffable beauty that I could not contemplate life without her.

  The thought struck me that I might enlist the sympathies of the Professor. With my assistance he might succeed in ridding me of the terror that might otherwise make my nights fearsome throughout the rest of my existence. And if he could do that he would then offer no resistance to my marriage with Sylvia.

  But I dismissed the thought. The risk was too g
reat. The odds against his solving the mystery were many chances to one. I could not afford to stake my secret on such an improbable hope. My desire for Sylvia was greater than my dread of the unknown.

  The spacious grandeur of Grosvenor Square lay peacefully under the sweltering early afternoon sunshine. The gardens in the middle of the Square — mark of stern respectability — were darkly green behind their guardian railings. An enclosed delivery van, of a sombre brown, showing on its sides in restrained lettering the name of a world-famous shoemaker, stood half-way along the Square. A string of glittering cars hugged the railings of the gardens. A maid in black and white came from a house and hurried away, touching her hair with one hand as she went. Except for the two men in charge of the restrainedly dignified delivery van belonging to the world-famous shoemaker, no one was in the Square.

  The uniformed driver of the van on his throne behind the wheel called out impatiently to his uniformed colleague who was then shutting the door at the back. The colleague hurried round and, as the van shot forward, swung himself on board with the ease and beauty of long practice, and sank nonchalantly into his seat.

  Then I noticed that someone else was in the Square.

  A man in a dark grey suit was standing on the edge of the kerb near where the van had been. He was a fairly tall man, and his suit had the appearance of being a ready-made one.

  I noticed these things, not because they were in themselves particularly noticeable, but because of the illusion of the man’s having seemingly appeared from nowhere. In a moment, of course, I could see that he had been hidden by the van and that the moving off of the van had left him discovered. He started to walk slowly away.

  I went up the steps towards my flat, and as I did so my mind flashed back to the Square as I had seen it last night — rather, early this morning — and I remembered the man who had come into it half a minute after I did.

  Both that man and this man had a characteristic walk — the slow, large-gestured walk of the policeman.

  I wondered what that meant.

  My being unwittingly connected with so much that was mysterious made me assume at once that the presence of the policemen in the Square was due to me, directly or indirectly. Naturally I would assume that. That I knew myself to be perfectly innocent did nothing to alter my suspicions. I did not conclude that they were watching me, though, having regard to my being on intimate terms with two men who had met with violent deaths, I could not be blind to that possibility. For a moment, indeed, I thought that they could very well arrest me on suspicion, and my heart gave one or two uncomfortable thumps and I recalled a great deal that I had heard regarding miscarriages of justice.

  But these were only startled fears. I had too much faith in the persistence of right to allow a foolish panic to grip me. If the police were suspicious of me, then they were suspicious of me. But I knew that as time went on they would not have reason to be more suspicious of me than they were now — unless another death among my acquaintances should occur, which heaven forbid! And they had not proved anything, of course; and they never would.

  I was content, therefore, to let them watch me if they thought it their duty to watch me.

  I ascended to my flat.

  By this time I was weary from lack of sleep. I had not been to bed the night before, and in the meantime I had gone through some very intense nervous experiences. Yet I was determined not to give way to my extreme weariness, but to wait until night so that I should sleep soundly.

  A strange young man — weedy and nervous — opened the door for me. This was another of my ancient retainer’s staff.

  “Makepeace about?” I asked, handing him my hat and gloves.

  “He’s lying down, sir. He isn’t feeling too grand, sir.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that! Nothing much, I hope?”

  “No, sir. Said he felt a bit tired.”

  I went to my study, through the door that opened directly out of the hall.

  “A bit tired!” I murmured to myself, suddenly realizing the stuff that Makepeace was made of. “He hasn’t slept for two nights, and he says he’s only ‘a bit tired’! I’ve missed only one night, and I’m dead beat.”

  In the bedroom, as I could see through the open communicating door, there was a new piece of furniture — a large, ungainly sort of settee. Makepeace’s idea for snatching some rest during the night!

  How reverently I thanked heaven for Makepeace!

  I returned to the study and, selecting a book, threw myself into an easy chair. Mr. Ashton, I knew, had gone down to the City with some lists of investments that my solicitors wanted to look over. At four o’clock someone would come in with tea and a few slices of thin, rolled brown bread-and-butter. Makepeace awake or Makepeace asleep was equally reliable.

  In the meantime I had two hours in front of me, a delicious sense of tiredness, and an entertaining book.

  I read a page or two, and then I found that I was dropping off to sleep. I pulled myself together with a jerk and again fixed my attention on the book. But my tiredness was greater even than I had thought it to be. My eyes closed involuntarily and my head began to droop forward on to my chest. I got up and took a few vigorous turns about the room. And when I thought I had shaken myself fully awake I sat down again.

  But my attempt at fighting against sleep was hopeless. I simply fell asleep. I did not doze off. I do not remember any period of gradual sinking into unconsciousness. I simply fell asleep. And in that room — the room into which the ghost had fled two nights before!

  And what follows is the simplest account I can give of my experiences from the moment of falling asleep.

  I knew I had fallen asleep. I mean that I was conscious of the fact that the young man, Martin Strange, was lying in that easy chair — his back to the window, his face towards the empty fireplace — asleep. I could see him. I could see his head slowly roll over sideways. I could see the book slipping bit by bit from his relaxing fingers. I could hear it fall to the floor with a cluttering of pages, and see it come to rest open and face downwards.

  I was horribly afraid. The room and everything in the room was invested with the sinister significance of objects glimpsed in nightmares. Everything was hostile and deadly, charged with horror. Things that in daylight were innocent and that called forth pleasant associations had lost their passive characters and were transformed into symbols of active, malignant force. (For it was no longer daylight. Night had come. They had forgotten my tea. They had not called me, I remember thinking, but had allowed me to sleep on; and it had grown dark, and the terror had come forth.)

  And though acutely, intensely conscious of the horror that was going on around me, I could not wake myself. I was in a fever of excitement because of the inertness of that body with the pale face lying peacefully sleeping in the chair.

  I thought of it objectively. I feared for it. It was the other half of me — the physical half — and I was bound to protect it from the encroaching malevolent force that was in the room. I wanted to scream, and could not.

  Then I became aware that out of the darkness and the encroaching terror two eyes were looking at me. They commanded me. I dared not let my attention wander from those eyes. They were the supreme horror in that room of horror. All the evil of the world seemed to be concentrated in those eyes, and all the evil was transformed into active hostility against me.

  I knew I must meet that hostility and hold it at bay by a superhuman effort of will, or it would slowly envelop me and render me incapable of protecting the unconscious body in the chair. And the protection of that body was the sole reason for my existence. If I failed in that I should be overwhelmed and die, and death would mean endless terror.

  The eyes came nearer and nearer, so slowly that they seemed hardly to advance. But they did advance, and they would continue to advance. They held me, fascinated me, made me impotent in my terror. Their expression was wholly and unbelievably evil. There was in them nothing of sympathy, pity, mercy — nothing that I c
ould understand; nothing to which I could appeal. They were as the eyes of a snake, and my helplessness was as the helplessness of a rabbit. I felt myself forgetting all else but the bestial cruelty of those eyes.

  Then a change came over the room. It was not my study, though it had the same sinister atmosphere. It was Christopher Knight’s bedroom.

  Christopher was there — alive. I knew he was there, though I could not see him. And someone else was there — someone I dared not face.

  I knew — how I knew I cannot tell — that some terrible truth was to be revealed. And I could not bear to have that truth revealed. I would die before I should look at what was about to happen. Christopher Knight’s murder was about to be enacted again, and I was to witness it so that I might know the identity of the murderer, who was that inscrutable presence whom I dared not face.

  And I knew I must see it. I had not the power to flee. I had not the power even to look away. And I knew that if I were to see it the sheer horror of it would kill me.

  But my will was not strong enough. I was now completely in the power of those sinister mysteries.

  Movement was going on about me — stealthy movement; and it was Christopher who was in danger.

  In an access of panic I shrieked. Panic gave my will a momentary ascendancy over that which had subjugated me; and the horror instantly fell away.

  I opened my eyes to the familiar, comforting solidity of my study. In the easy chair at the other side of the empty fireplace sat Professor Wetherhouse.

  CHAPTER XIV

  A Gamble

  Y

  ou must excuse me, old chap, for violating your privacy like this,” said the Professor. “They tried to turn me away when they found that you were having forty winks, but I said I would wait.”