Quincy High School - Goldenrod Yearbook (Quincy, MA)

Page 9 text:

THE GOLDEN-ROD 7 polished mahogany, the table with its beautiful old silver and china, the gaunt, black and white figure of Lisbeth stalking back and forth, these things were as familiar as his own face in the glass. The empty chair opposite him spoke of Aunt Kate and he had the fantastically gruesome fancy that he could still see her there in one of her rustling, gray silk dresses. His teeth chattered and he asked Lis- beth to bring the wine decanter. She did so without a word and he drank two glasses, hastily, chokingly, while the old serving woman stood by with an ex- pressionless face. “Is there no clew to the case?” he asked. “None except that she was murdered at midnight. The rain destroyed the footprints.” “Murdered at midnight?” “The doctors say so. She was stiff and the blood dry, and—” “I don’t want any details.” Harvy pushed his chair away from the table. As he entered the sitting-room he had the perfectly unreasonable impression that someone was following him. He turned angrily, but Lisbeth was cleaning the table in the same methodical manner as usual. He seated himself, reflecting the while that the house was now his, and he would be rich. He felt the desire for another glass of wine, and accordingly, he rose to get the decanter which was in the dining room. On his way he passed a large mirror which reflected a part of the hall. He glanced in it a moment and was startled to see a glimpse of a figure clad in gray silk vanish out of view. He laughed uneasily and then entered the dining-room. In the dark he could hear someone moving about stealthily. “That you, Lisbeth?” he asked. “Did you want me, Mr. Harvy!” Lisbeth's voice sounded from the sitting room. There was a third person in the house! Blindly Harvy siezed the decanter and rushed into the sitting-room. “I’m going to bed now, Mr. Harvy,” said Lisbeth, “will you need an extra lamp?” “No, I’m all right,” Harvy muttered. “Good night, then,” and Lisbeth mounted the stairs slowly. Again he fancied that he heard the rustle of silk, but he muttered to himself, “Lisbeth and I are alone in the house.” Then soft footsteps sounded. With a choked curse he seized the decanter and drank gulp after gulp of the wine. The glass fell to the floor, splintered, but he was past noticing that. He drank madly, insatiably, and paused only for breath. Yet the wine did not go to his head as he prayed it would. He remained cold, rigid, tense with this hideous presence of a Third. His whole body was wet with sweat, even his hair was damp. Setting down the decanter almost empty, he turned, but instantly recoiled from that almost invisible presence which seemed to be in his aunt’s rocking chair. His eyes fixed themselves upon her knitting needles, still left where she had last used them. He almost expected to see the things move in the grip of delicate old fingers adorned with rings, but he realized that the apparition must be na illusion of his over-wrought brain. As he looked at the ball of blue yarn he saw a curious discoloration on one side. He leaned forward, and then staggered back, weak and shaking. It was blood. Suddenly he heard footsteps coming down the hall and proceeding toward the dining-room but he dared not look through the open sitting-room to see who it was.

Page 8 text:

6 THE GOLDEN-ROD THE TREMBLING HOUR It was after sunset that a car ran up to the gate of the old Dexter place, and stopped. A young man sprang quickly out of the whirring car. He carried a suit case and wore a light travelling coat. “Well, good night, Dick,” he cried cheerfully. “Ever so many thanks for the lift from Waterbury. It’s been a great run. hasn’t it?” “Not bad,” came the answer in less exuberant tones. “So long, old man.” The car sped away swiftly, almost noiselessly, after the manner of giant automobiles who can afford to be mild- mannered when they like, and the young man opened the gate of the house and went in. Inside with the fresh, aromatic odors about him and the pleasant murmur of wind-stirred trees in his ear, he paused a moment. How many times he had come there, just at dusk, greeted by this atmosphere of homelike, fragrant com- fort—as a little child coming home from school to spend the holidays with Aunt Kate, as a boy, as a man. What a funny indulgent smile the old house had, anyway; he remembered how it seemed to beam upon him in welcome, as he entered the gate. He walked up the gravel path slowly, obsessed with the notion that for the first time the house did not seem to smile and for the first time in his life he found the wind in the maples melancholy in- stead of soothing. He went up to the steps and knocked on the brass, knocked with something akin to a shiver. The door opened and an elderly woman in black waist and apron, with a stern wrinkled face and neatly banded iron- gray hair, confronted him with the some- what grim greeting to which he had be- come accustomed through twenty-five years. “How are you, Lisbeth?” he asked gayly, entering the hall and placing his suit-case on a settee. Jove, it’s good to be home again with the prospect of some more of your famous pancakes.” As Lisbeth vouchsafed no reply, the young man continued, “Aunt Kate isn’t here to see me?” “No, Mr. Harvy.” Something peculiar in the old woman’s tone caused Harvy to turn. “Lisbeth,” he gasped, “she’s not ill?” “No, not ill, Mr. Harvy.” “Then what has happened, Lisbeth?” “They took her away this afternoon, Mr. Harvy,” replied Lisbeth in her dry tones. “Lisbeth! Dead!” Harvy Dexter’s handsome face was stone-white in the dim lamplight and there was a look of unfeigned horror in his eyes. But Lisbeth was unmoved. She only asked, “You’re surprised, Mr. Harvy?” “Surprised! Good lord, yes! And yet when I entered the house I had a feeling that—that something was wrong.’ 'I dare say you did,” said Lisbeth in untranslatable tones. “What happened to her, Lisbeth?” “She was murdered!” “Murdered! Impossible! You must be mad.” “Not at all. She was stabbed in the back and when I found her, she was lying in a pool of blood with her face all twisted with fear and signs of a struggle.” “But there was no struggle,” cried Harvy. “How do you know?” asked Lisbeth. “Why I -I had a feeling there wasn’t.” “I see. Perhaps you would like some supper,” continued Lisbeth in a hard tone. Supper in the pleasant, homely din- ing-room was familiar and yet strange. The room with its prim curtains and

Page 10 text:

s THE GOLDEN-ROD Then came that frightful silken whis- per and the equally terrible clink of silver. It had been Aunt Kate’s habit always to put the silver away. Harvy emptied the decanter and started toward the dining-room. The wine had spurred that despairing courage which is born of sheer terror. He was going to see Who or What was in the dining-room. But again he had to pass the mirror and again he saw something stir there. The sounds in the dining-room ceased. Then she had come in. She was in the room with him. He found himself staring fixedly at the mirror. His own figure confronted him, almost unrecog- nizable. His eyes were wild and blood- shot, his hair clung damply to his fore- head, his face was ghastly with the ghastliness of a man who has looked on worse than death. In his hand he still grasped uncon- sciously the heavy decanter. The smooth silver-like surface of the mirror held him like a magnet. His eyes were stuck to it, they would not stir. He had never heard of auto-hypno- tism, else he might have made even more determined efforts to get away from that terrible, polished morass of glass and quicksilver. As it was, he struggled madly like a trapped bird. But he could not get away. The mon- strous thing was there. He was help- less before it, as a moth before light. He could no longer stand but clung to the backs of the chairs as he stared into that petrified pool in which the last segments of his soul seemed to move— move strangely. The shining surface made him ill and giddy but—for the time being it was the Alpha and Omega of existence. He stared at that dread- ful glittering expanse and fell on one knee. Was it true that anything could move in that? He could no longer see himself. It was something else that he waited to see, something else,—something else. Dimly, as tho from a very great dis- tance, he heard the clock strike twelve. Midnight! The hour at which his aunt had been murdered! Shuddering no longer, but icy cold, he looked steadily into the mirror. Now it would happen. Now he would see. And he saw! She was standing just behind him, the slim old figure with the white hair and the gray silk dress. There was a stain of red down one sleeve and the hair, usually primly neat, was loose. And the eyes! The reproach in the faded old eyes! He had never thought of this, anything but this. He was a weakling even in crime. He had detested the blood, he always detested pain. He had been thankful that she had died quickly. But she had come back. She would not stay quiet in the death he had dealt her. The eyes, the eyes—blind fury assailed him. He would shut those fearful eyes forever this time, he would not be haunted. He would not be tortured like this. The Thing must go for all time—those eyes! Madly he raised the heavy decanter and dashed it with all his strength against the mirror from which the eyes gazed at him. The glass crashed down, down about him in a brilliant, thunder- ous deadly cascade. He was badly cut but he felt no hurt. He laughed and shouted in triumph because he had murdered her phantom as he had mur- dered her. Then he crumpled up in an inert heap among the piles of splintered glass. “Thought it would work,” remarked the detective, bending over him. “He was a prime subject for such an experi- ment. You bore up wonderfully, Miss Dexter!” Kate Dexter, very white, was sitting