The Land Of Mist - Doyle Arthur Conan - Страница 27

The three sat in silence, looking at each other.

«By Jove!» said Lord Roxton at last. His face was pale but firm. Malone scribbled some notes and the hour. The clergyman was praying.

«Well, we are up against it,» said Roxton after a pause. «We can't leave it at that. We have to go through with it. I don't mind tellin' you, padre, that I've followed a wounded tiger in thick jungle and never had quite the feelin' I've got now. If I'm out for sensations, I've got them. But I'm going upstairs.»

«We will go, too,» cried his comrades, rising from their chairs.

«Stay here, young fellah! And you, too, padre. Three of us make too much noise. I'll call you if I want you. My idea is just to steal out and wait quiet on the stair. If that thing, whatever it was, comes again, it will have to pass me.»

All three went into the passage. The two candles were throwing out little circles of light, and the stair was deeply illuminated, with heavy shadows at the top. Roxton sat down half-way up the stair, pistol in hand. He put his finger to his lips and impatiently waved his companions back to the room. Then they sat by the fire, waiting, waiting.

Half an hour, three-quarters – and then, suddenly it came. There was a sound as of rushing feet, the reverberation of a shot, a scuffle and a heavy fall, with a loud cry for help. Shaking with horror, they rushed into the hall. Lord Roxton was lying on his face amid a litter of plaster and rubbish. He seemed half dazed as they raised him, and was bleeding where the skin had been grazed from his cheek and hands. Looking up the stair, it seemed that the shadows were blacker and thicker at the top.

«I'm all right,» said Roxton, as they led him to his chair. «Just give me a minute to get my wind and I'll have another round with the devil – for if this is not the devil, then none ever walked the earth.»

«You shan't go alone this time,» said Malone.

«You never should,» added the clergyman. «But tell us what happened.»

«I hardly know myself. I sat, as you saw, with my back to the top landing. Suddenly I heard a rush. I was aware of something dark right on the top of me. I half-turned and fired. The next instant I was chucked down as if I had been a baby. All that plaster came showering down after me. That's as much as I can tell you.»

«Why should we go further in the matter?» said Malone. «You are convinced that this is more than human, are you not?»

«There is no doubt of that.»

«Well, then, you have had your experience. What more can you want?»

«Well, I, at least, want something more,» said Mr. Mason. «I think our help is needed.»

«Strikes me that we shall need the help,» said Lord Roxton, rubbing his knee. «We shall want a doctor before we get through. But I'm with you, padre. I feel that we must see it through. If you don't like it, young fellah – « The mere suggestion was too much for Malone's Irish blood.

«I am going up alone!» he cried, making for the door.

«No, indeed. I am with you.» The clergyman hurried after him.

«And you don't go without me!» cried Lord Roxton, limping in the rear.

They stood together in the candle-lit, shadow-draped passage. Malone had his hand on the balustrade and his foot on the lower step, when it happened.

What was it? They could not tell themselves. They only knew that the black shadows at the top of the staircase had thickened, had coalesced, had taken a definite, batlike shape. Great God! They were moving! They were rushing swiftly and noiselessly downwards! Black, black as night, huge, ill-defined, semi-human and altogether evil and damnable. All three men screamed and blundered for the door. Lord Roxton caught the handle and threw it open. It was too late; the thing was upon them. They were conscious of a warm, glutinous contact, of a purulent smell, of a half-formed, dreadful face and of entwining limbs. An instant later all three were lying half-dazed and horrified, hurled outwards on to the gravel of the drive. The door had shut with a crash.

Malone whimpered and Roxton swore, but the clergyman was silent as they gathered themselves together, each of them badly shaken and bruised, but with an inward horror which made all bodily ill seem insignificant. There they stood in a little group in the light of the sinking moon, their eyes turned upon the black square of the door.

«That's enough,» said Roxton, at last.

«More than enough,» said Malone. « I wouldn't enter that house again for anything Fleet Street could offer.»

«Are you hurt?»

«Defiled, degraded – oh, it was loathsome!»

«Foul!» said Roxton! «Did you get the reek of it? And the purulent warmth?»

Malone gave a cry of disgust. «Featureless save for the dreadful eyes! Semi-materialized! Horrible!»

«What about the lights?»

«Oh, damn the lights! Let them burn. I am not going in again!»

«Well, Belchamber can come in the morning. Maybe he is waiting for us now at the inn.»

«Yes, let us go to the inn. Let us get back to humanity.» Malone and Roxton turned away, but the clergyman stood fast. He had drawn a crucifix from his pocket.

«You can go,» said he. «I am going back.»

«What! Into the house?»

«Yes, into the house.»

«Padre, this is madness! It will break your neck. We were all like stuffed dolls in its clutch.»

«Well, let it break my neck. I am going.»

«You are not! Here, Malone, catch hold of him!»

But it was too late With a few quick steps, Mr. Mason had reached the door, flung it open, passed in and closed it behind him. As his comrades tried to follow, they heard a creaking clang upon the further side. The padre had bolted them out. There was a great slit where the letter-box had been. Through it Lord Roxton entreated him to return.

«Stay there!» said the quick, stern voice of the clergyman. « I have my work to do. I will come when it is done.» A moment later he began to speak. His sweet, homely, affectionate accents rang through the hall. They could only hear snatches outside, bits of prayer, bits of exhortation, bits of kindly greeting. Looking through the narrow opening, Malone could see the straight, dark figure in the candlelight, its back to the door, its face to the shadows of the stair, the crucifix held aloft in its right hand.

His voice sank into silence and then there came one more of the miracles of this eventful night. A voice answered him. It was such a sound as neither of the auditors had heard before – a guttural, rasping, croaking utterance, indescribably menacing. What it said was short, but it was instantly answered by the clergyman, his tone sharpened to a fine edge by emotion. His utterance seemed to be exhortation and was at once answered by the ominous voice from beyond. Again and again, and yet again came the speech and the answer, sometimes shorter, sometimes longer, varying in every key of pleading, arguing, praying, soothing, and everything save upbraiding. Chilled to the marrow, Roxton and Malone crouched by the door, catching snatches of that inconceivable dialogue. Then, after what seemed a weary time, though it was less than an hour, Mr. Mason, in a loud, full, exultant tone, repeated the « Our Father.» Was it fancy, or echo, or was there really some accompanying voice in the darkness beyond him? A moment later the light went out in the left-hand window, the bolt was drawn, and the clergyman emerged carrying Lord Roxton's bag. His face looked ghastly in the moonlight, but his manner was brisk and happy.

«I think you will find everything here,» he said, handing over the bag.

Roxton and Malone took him by either arm and hurried him down to the road.

«By Jove! You don't give us the slip again!» cried the nobleman. « Padre, you should have a row of Victoria Crosses.»

«No, no, it was my duty. Poor fellow, he needed help so badly. I am but a fellow-sinner and yet I was able to give it.»