Out of the Air

by Inez Haynes Gillmore

  III

  Lindsay drove directly from the Quinanog station to the Quinanog Arms.The Arms proved to be a tiny mid-Victorian hotel, not an inexactreplica--and by no means a discreditable one--of many small rustichotels that he had seen in England and France. Indeed Quinanog, as hecaught it in glimpses, might have been one part of France or one part ofEngland--that region which only the English Channel prevents from beingthe same country. The motor, which conducted him from the station to theArms, drove on roads in which high wine-glass elms made Gothic arches;between wide meadowy stretches, brilliant with buttercups, daisies,iris; unassertive, well-proportioned houses with roomy vegetable plotsand tiny patches here and there of flower garden. He arrived at so earlyan hour that the best of the long friendly day stretched before him. Hefelt disposed to spend it merely in reading and smoking. He had plentyto smoke; he had seen to that himself in New York. And he had plenty toread; Spink Sparrel had seen to that in Boston. The bottom of one of histrunks was covered with Lutetia Murray's works.

  But although he smoked a great deal, he did not read at all. Untilluncheon he merely followed his impulses. Those impulses took him alittle way down the main street, which ran between comfortable, whitecolonial houses, set back from the road. He walked through the tinytriangular Common. He visited the little, poster-hung post-office;looked into the big neatly arranged general store; strolled back again.His impulses then led him to explore the grounds of the Arms anddeposited him finally in the hammock on the side porch. After a simpleand very well-cooked luncheon, his languor broke into a suddenrestlessness. "Where is the Murray place?" he asked of the proprietor ofthe Arms, whose name, the letterhead of the Arms stationery stated, wasHyde.

  "The Murray place!" Hyde repeated inquiringly. He was a long,noncommittal-looking person with big pale blue eyes illuminating a sandybaldness. "Oh, the _Murray_ place! You mean the old Murray place."

  "I mean the house, whichever and wherever it is, that Lutetia Murray,the author, used to live in."

  "Oh, sure! I get you. You see it's been empty for such a long spell thatwe forget all about it. The old Murray place is on the road to WestQuinanog."

  "It isn't occupied, you say?"

  "Lord, no! Hasn't been lived in since--well, since Lutetia Murray died.And that was--let me see--" Hyde cast a reflective eye upward. "Ten,eleven, twelve--oh, fifteen or twenty, I should say. Yes, all of fifteenyears."

  "Does it still belong in the Murray family?"

  "Lord bless your soul, no. There hasn't been a Murray around these partssince--well, since Lutetia Murray died."

  "Who owns it now?"

  "The Turners. They bought it when it came up for sale after MissMurray's death."

  "Well, weren't there any heirs?"

  "There was a niece--her brother's little girl. They had to sell theplace and everything in it. There never _was_ a sale in Quinanog likethat. Why, folks say that the mahogany would bring fancy prices in NewYork nowadays."

  "Didn't they get as much as they should have?" Lindsay asked idly.

  "Oh Lord, no! And they found her estate was awful involved, and thedebts et up about all the auction brought in."

  "What became of the little girl?"

  "Some cousins took her."

  "Where is she now?"

  "Never heard tell."

  "Has anybody ever lived in the Murray place since the family left?"

  "No, I believe not."

  "Is it to let?"

  "Yes, and for sale."

  "Well, why hasn't it let or sold?"

  "Oh, I dunno exactly. It's a great big barn of a place. Kindaramshackle, and of course it's off the main-traveled road. You'd need aflivver, at least, to live there nowadays. And there ain't a singlemodern improvement in it. No bathroom, nor electric lights, not settubs, nor any of the things that women like. No garage neither."

  "Every disability you quote makes it sound all the better to me,"Lindsay commented. He meditated a moment. "I'd like to go over and lookat it this afternoon. Is there anyone here to drive me?"

  "Yes, Dick'll take you in the runabout." Hyde appeared to meditate inhis turn, and he cocked an inquiring eye in Lindsay's direction. "Youwasn't thinking of hiring the place, was you?"

  Lindsay laughed. "I should say I wasn't. No, I just wanted to look atit."

  "I was going to say," Hyde went on, "that it's a very pleasant location.City folks always think it's a lovely spot. If you was thinking ofhiring it, my brother's the agent."

  Lindsay laughed again. "Hiring a house is about as far from my plans atpresent as returning to France."

  "Well," Hyde commented dryly, "judging from the way the Quinanog boysfeel, I guess I know just about how much you want to do that."

  "How soon can we go to the Murray place?" Lindsay inquired.

  "Now--as far as Dick's concerned."

  "By the way," Hyde dropped, as he turned toward the garage, "the Murrayscalled the place Blue Medders."

  "Blue Meadows," Lindsay repeated aloud. And to himself, "Blue Meadows."And again, though wordlessly, "Blue Meadows." It was apparent that heliked the sound and the image the sound evoked.

  The runabout chugged to Blue Meadows in less than ten minutes. The roadbranched off from the State highway at the least frequented place in itsample stretch; ran for a long way to West Quinanog. On this side road,houses were few and they grew fewer and fewer until they left BlueMeadows quite by itself. Its situation, though solitary, was not lonely.It sat near the road. Perhaps, Lindsay decided, it would have been toonear if stately wine-glass elms, feathered with leaves all along theirlissom trunks, in collaboration with a high lilac hedge now past itsblooming, had not helped to sequester it. From the street, the houseshowed only a roof with two capacious chimneys, the upper story of itsgray clapboarded facade.

  Dick, a gangling freckled youth, slowed down the machine as if inpreparation for a stop. "I've got the key," he volunteered, "if you wantto go in."

  Until that moment Lindsay had entertained no idea of going in. ButDick's words fired his imagination. "Thanks, I think I will."

  Dick handed over the long, delicately wrought key. He made no move tofollow Lindsay out of the car. "If you don't mind," he said, "I'll rundown the road to see a cousin of mine. How soon before you'll want tostart back?"

  "Oh, give me half an hour or so," Lindsay decided carelessly.

  The runabout chugged into the green arch which imprisoned the distance.

  Alone, Lindsay strolled between lilac bushes and over the sunken flagswhich led to the front door. Then, changing his mind, he made anappraising tour about the outside of the place.

  Blue Meadows was a big old house: big, so it seemed to his amateurjudgment, by an incredible number of rooms; and old--and here hisjudgment, though swift, was more accurate--to the time of two hundredyears. Outside, it had all the earmarks of Colonial architecture--plainlines, stark walls, the windows, with twenty-four lights, geometricallyplaced; but its lovely lines, its beautiful proportions, and the softplushy nap which time had laid upon its front clapboardings mitigatedall its severities. The shingles of the roof and sides wereweather-beaten and gray, the blinds a deep old blue. At one side juttedan incongruous modern addition; into the second story of which was set agalleried piazza. At the other side stretched an endless series ofadditions, tapering in size to a tiny shed.

  "This is Lutetia's house!" Lindsay stopped to muse. "Is it true that Ispent two years with the French Army? Is it true that I served two morewith the American Army? Oh, to think you didn't live to see all that,Lutetia!"

  A lattice arched over the doorway and on it a big climbing rose was justcoming into bud. The beautiful door showed the pointed architrave, theleaded side panels, the fanlight, the engaged columns, of Colonialtimes. It resisted the first attack of the key, but yielded finally toLindsay's persuasion. He stepped into the hall.

  It was a rectangular hall, running straight to the back of the house.Pairs of doors, opposite each other, gaped on both sides. At the leftarose a slend
er straight stairway, mahogany-railed. Lindsay strolledfrom one room to the other, opening windows and blinds. They were bigsquare rooms, finished in the conventional Colonial manner, withfireplaces and fireplace cupboards. The wallpaper, faded and stained,was of course quite bare of pictures and ornaments. He stopped toexamine the carving on the white, painted panels above thefireplace--garlands of flowers caught with torches and masks.

  Smiling to himself, Lindsay returned to the hall. "Oh, Lutetia, I shouldlike to have seen you here!" he remarked wordlessly.

  Behind the stairway, at the back, appeared another door. He opened itinto darkness. Fumbling in his pocket, he produced a box of matches,lighted his way through the blackness; again opened windows andshutters. This proved to be the long back room so common in Colonialhomes; running the entire width of the house. There were two fireplaces.One was small, with a Franklin stove. The other--Lindsay calculated thatit would take six-foot logs. Four well-grown children, shoulder toshoulder, could have walked into it. This room was not entirely empty.In the center--by a miracle his stumbling progress had just avoidedit--was a long table of the refectory type. Lindsay studied the positionof the two fireplaces. He examined the ceiling. "You threw the whole lotof little rooms together to make this big room, Lutetia. You're a ladyquite of my own architectural taste. I, too, like a lot of space."

  He continued his explorations. From one side of the long living-roomextended kitchen, laundry; servants' rooms and servants' dining-room; anendless maze of butteries, pantries, sheds. Lindsay gave them shortshrift. At the other side, however, lay a little half-oval room, thefirst floor of that Victorian addition which he had marked from theoutside.

  "Oh, Lutetia, Lutetia, how could you, how could you?" he burst out atfirst glance. "To add this modern bit to that fine Colonial stateliness!Perhaps we're not kindred souls after all."

  Hugging the wall of this room and leading to the second floor was astairway so narrow that only one person could mount it at a time.Lindsay proved this to his own satisfaction by ascending it. It openedinto a big back room of the main house, the one with the galleriedpiazza. Lindsay opened all the windows here; and then went rapidly fromroom to room, letting in the June sunshine.

  They were all empty, of course--and yet, in a dozen plaintiveways--faded wall spaces, which showed the exact size of pictures, nailswith carpet tufts still clinging to them, a forgotten window shade ortwo--they spoke eloquently of habitation. Indeed, the whole place had afriendly atmosphere, Lindsay reflected; there was none of the cold, deadconnotation of most long-empty houses. This old place was spirituallywarm, as though some reflection of a long-ago vivid life still hungamong its shadows. From the dust, the stains, the cobwebs, it might havebeen vacant for a century. From the welcoming warmth of its quiet rooms,it might have been vacant but for a day.

  Through the back windows, Lindsay looked down onto what must once havebeen a huge rectangle of lawn; and near the house, what must once havebeen an oval of flower garden. The lawn, stretching to a stonewall--beyond which towered a chaos of trees--was now knee-deep intimothy-grass; the garden had reverted to jungle. He studied the garden.Close to the house, an enormous syringa bush heaped into a mountain offragrant snow. Near, a smoke-bush was just beginning to bubble intorounds of blood-scarlet gauze. Strangled rosebushes showed yellow orcrimson. Afar an enormous patch of tiger lilies gave the effect of abizarre, orchidous tropical group. The rest was an indiscriminateearly-summer tangle of sumac; elderberry; bayberry; silver birches; wildroses; daisies; buttercups; and what would later be Queen Anne's laceand goldenrod. From a back corner window, it seemed to him that hecaught a glint of water; but he could not recapture it from any otherpoint of view. However, he lost all memory of this in a more affordingdiscovery. For the front windows gave him the reason of the name, BlueMeadows. Across the road stretched a series of meadows, all bluishpurple with blooming iris.

  Lindsay contemplated this charming prospect for a long interval.

  "And now, Lutetia," he suddenly turned and addressed the empty rooms, "Iwant to find _your_ room. Which of these six was it?"

  Retracing his steps, he went from room to room until, many times, he hadmade a complete survey of the second floor. He crossed and recrossed hisown trail, as the excitement of the quest mounted in him.

  "Ah!" he exclaimed aloud, "here it is! You can't escape your soul-mate,Lutetia."

  It was not because the room was so much bigger than the rest that hemade this decision; it was only because it was so much more quaint. Atone side it merged, by means of a slender doorway, with the galleriedpiazza. From it, by means of that tiny flight of stairs, Lutetia couldhave descended to the first floor of that mid-Victorian addition. "Itake it all back, Lutetia," he approved. "Middle of the nineteenthcentury or not, it's a wonder--this combination." At the back ofLutetia's room was a third door; as slender as the door leading to thegallery, but much lower; not four feet high. Lindsay pushed it open,crawled on hands and knees through it. He had of course, on his firstexploration, entered the small room into which it led. But he had gonein and out without careful examination; it had seemed merely afour-walled room. Coming into it, however, from Lutetia's bedroom, itsuddenly acquired character.

  The walls were papered in white. And on the mid-Victorian dado scarcelylegible now, he suddenly discovered drawings. Drawings of a curiouscharacter and of a more curious technique. He followed their flutterymaze from wall to wall--a flight of little beings, winged at theshoulders and knees, with flying locks and strange finlike hands andfeet; fanciful, comic, tender.

  "Oh!" Lindsay emitted aloud. "Ah!" And in an instant: "I see! This roombelonged to that child Hyde spoke of."

  He ascended to the garret. This was of course the big storeroom of theColonial imagination. It too was quite empty. At one spot apost--obviously not a roof-support--ran from floor to ceiling. Lindsaygazed about a little unseeingly. "I wonder what that post was for?" hequestioned himself absently. After a while, "What's become of thatchild?" he demanded of circumambient space.

  As though this offered food for reflection, he descended by means of themain stairway to the lower floor; sat on the doorsteps a while. Hemused--gazing out into the green-colored, sweet-scented June afternoon.After an interval he arose and repeated his voyage of exploration.

  Again he was struck with the friendly quality of the old place. Thatphysical dampness, which long vacant houses hold in solution, seemedentirely to have disappeared before the flood of June sunshine. Thespiritual chill, which always accompanies it--that sinister quality soconnotative of congregations of evil spirits--he again observed wascompletely lacking. As he emerged from one room to enter another, itseemed to him that the one back of him filled with--_companionship_, hedescribed it to himself. As he continued his explorations, it seemed tohim that the room he was about to enter would offer him not ghostly buthuman welcome. That human welcome did not come, of course. Instead,there surged upon him the rich odors of the lilacs and syringas; thestaccato greetings of the birds.

  After a while he went downstairs again. Sitting in the front doorway, hefell into a rich revery.

  This was where Lutetia Murray wrote the books which had so intrigued hisboyish fancy. Mentally he ran over the list: _The Sport of theGoddesses_, _The Weary Time_, _Mary Towle_, _Old Age_, _Intervals_,_With Pitfall and with Gin_, _Cynthia Ware_-- Details came up before hismental vision which he had entirely forgotten and now only halfremembered; dramatic moments; descriptive passages; conversationalinterludes; scenes; epigrams.... He tried to imagine Lutetia Murray atBlue Meadows. The picture which, in college, he had cut from abook-house catalogue, flashed before him; he had found it among hispapers. The figure was standing.... He had looked at it only yesterday,but his masculine observation retained no details of the gown exceptthat it left her neck and arms bare. The face was in profile. Thecurling hair rose to a high mass on her head. The delicate features were_mignonne_, except for the delicious, warm, lusciously cut mouth-- Wasshe blonde or brunet he wondered. She died at forty-
five. To DavidLindsay at twenty-two, forty-five had seemed a respectable old age. ToDavid Lindsay at twenty-eight, it seemed almost young. She was dead, ofcourse, when he began to read her. Oh, if he could only have met her! Itwas a great pity that she had died so young. Her work--he had made apoint of this in his thesis--had already swung from an erratic, highlycolored first period into a more balanced, carefully characterizedsecond period; was just emerging into a third period that was the unionof these two; big and rounded and satisfying. But death had cut thatdevelopment short. In the last four years Lindsay had seen a great dealof death and often in atrocious form. He had long ago concluded that hehad thought on the end of man all the thoughts that were in him. Butnow, sitting in the scented warmth of Lutetia's trellised doorway, hefound that there were still other thoughts which he could think.

  * * * * *

  The runabout chugged up the road presently. "Ben waiting long?" thefreckled Dick asked with a cheery shamelessness.

  "No, I've been looking the house over. Wonderful old place, isn't it?"

  "Don't care much for it myself," Dick answered. "I don't like anythingold--old houses or that old truck the summer folks are always buying.Things can't be too new or up-to-date for me."

  Lindsay did not appear at first to hear this; he was still bemused fromthe experiences of the afternoon. But as they approached the Arms, heemerged from his daze with a belated reply. "Well, I suppose a lot ofpeople feel the way you do," he remarked vaguely. "Mr. Hyde tells methat the Murray place hasn't been let for fifteen years. I expect therest of the people around here don't like old houses."

  "Oh, that ain't the reason the Murray house hasn't let," Dick explainedwith the scorn of rustic omniscience. "They say it's haunted."

  * * * * *

  "What rent do they ask for the Murray house?" Lindsay asked Hyde thatevening.

  Hyde scratched the back of his head. His face contracted with thatmental agony which afflicts the Yankee when an exact statement isdemanded of him. "Well, I shouldn't be surprised if you could get it fortwo hundred dollars the season," he finally brought out.

  Lindsay considered, but apparently not Hyde's answer; for presently hecame out with a different question. "Why do they say it's haunted?"

  Hyde emitted a short contemptuous laugh. "Did you ever hear of any housein the country that's been empty for a number of years that worn'tconsidered haunted?"

  "No," Lindsay admitted. "I am disappointed, though. I had hoped youwould be able to tell me about the ghost."

  "Well, I can't," Hyde asserted scornfully, "nor nobody else neither."

  The two men smoked in silence.

  After a while Lindsay made the motions preliminary to rising. He knockedthe ashes out of his pipe; put his pipe in his pocket; withdrew his feetfrom their comfortable elevation on the piazza rail. Finally heassembled his full height on the floor, but not without a prolongedstretching movement. "Well," he said, halfway through the yawn, "I guessyou can tell that brother of yours that I'm going to hire the Murrayhouse for the season."

  Hyde was equally if not more _degage_. He did not move; nor did hechange his expression. "All right," he commented without enthusiasm,"I'll let him know. How soon would you like to go in, say?"

  "As soon as I can buy a bed." Lindsay disappeared through the doorway.

  * * * * *

  Two days later Lindsay found himself comfortably settled at BlueMeadows. Upstairs--he had of course chosen Lutetia's room--was a cot anda bureau of soft wood. Downstairs was a limited assortment of cheapchina; cheaper cutlery; the meagerest possible cooking equipment.

  But there was an atmosphere given to Lindsay's room by Lutetia's ownpicture hanging above the bureau. And another to the living-room byLutetia's own works--a miscellaneous collection of ugly-proportioned,ugly-colored, late-nineteenth-century volumes--ranged on the broad shelfabove the fireplace; by Lindsay's writing materials scattered over therefectory table. Economical as he had been inside, he had exploded intoextravagance outside. A Gloucester hammock swung at the back. Acollection of garden materials which included a scythe, a spade, asickle, a lawn-mower, and a hose filled one corner of the barn.Already--his back still complained of the process--he had cut thespacious lawn.

  He was at one and the same time sanely placid and wildly happy.

  Every morning he awoke with the sun and the birds. Adapting himself withan instant spiritual content to the fact that he was no longer in Franceand would not have to fly, he turned over to take another nap. An houror two later, he was up and eating his self-prepared breakfast. The restof the day was reading Lutetia; musing on Lutetia; "scything" or"sickling," as he called it in his letters to Spink, in the garden;reflecting on Lutetia; exploring the neighborhood on foot; meditating onLutetia; reading and rereading the mass of Spink's data on Lutetia;hosing the garden; making notes on Spink's data on Lutetia and thinkingof his notes on Spink's data on Lutetia. He awoke in the morning withLutetia on his mind. He fell asleep at night with Lutetia in his heart.He had come to realize that Lutetia, the author, was even better than hehad supposed her. His college thesis had described her merely as theMrs. Gaskell of New England. Now, mentally, he promoted her to its JaneAusten. His youth had risen to the lure of her color and fecundity, buthis youngness had not realized how rich she was in humor; how wise; whata tenderness for people informed her careful, realistic detail. It was atriumph to find her even better than the flattering dictum of his boyishjudgment.

  Exploring Lutetia's domain gave results only second in satisfaction toexploring Lutetia's mind. It was obvious at his first inspection thatthe garden had once stretched contrasting glories of color and perfume.A careful study from the windows was even more productive than a closesurvey. There, definitely, he could trace the remains of flower-plots;pleached paths; low hedges and lichened rocks. Resurrecting that gardenwould be an integral part of the joy of resurrecting Lutetia. By thistime also, he had explored the barn. There, a big roomy lower floorsustained only part of a broken stairway. The equally roomy upper floorseemed, from such glimpses as he could get below, to be piled withrubbish. Some day, he promised himself, he would clean it out. Beyond,and to the right of the barn, bounded by the stone wall, scrambled aminiature wilderness. That wilderness evaded every effort ofexploration. Only an axe could clear a trail there. Another day he wouldtackle the wilderness. But in the meantime he would devote himself togarden and lawn; in the meantime also loaf and invite his soul. Afterall, that was his main reason for coming to Quinanog. Whenever hethought of this, he took immediately to the Gloucester hammock.

  Every morning he walked briskly over the long mile of road, shaded withwine-glass elms, slashed with vistas of pasture, pond, and brook whichlay between Blue Meadows and the Quinanog post-office. When he hadinquired for his mail--usually he had none--he strolled over to thegeneral store and made his few simple purchases. He had followed thisroutine for ten days before it occurred to him that he had not seen anewspaper since he settled himself at Blue Meadows. "I'll let it go thatway, I guess," he said to himself. He noticed at first with a littleembarrassment and then with amusement that the groups in the post-officewaiting for mail, the customers at the general store, were all quietlywatching him. And one morning this floated to him from behind a pile ofcracker boxes:

  "He's the nut that's taken the Murray place. Lives all alone--batchingit. Some sort of highbrow."

  Gradually, however, he made acquaintance. Silas Turner, who owned thenext farm to Blue Meadows, offered him a ride one morning on the road.Out of a vague conversation on the weather and real estate, Mr. Turnerdropped one interesting fact. He had known Lutetia Murray. Thisrevelation kept Lindsay chatting for half an hour while Mr. Turnerspilled a mass of uncorrelated details. Such as Miss Murray'sneighborliness; the time her cow ran away and Art Curtis brought itback; how Miss Murray admired Mis' Turner's beach plum jelly so muchthat Mis' Turner always made some extra
just for her. As they parted helet fall dispassionately: "She was a mighty handsome woman. Finefigure!" He added, still dispassionately but with an effect somehow ofenthusiastic conviction, "She kept her looks to the last day of herlife."

  Useless, all this, for a biography, Lindsay reflected; but it gave himan idea. He bought that day a second-hand bicycle at the Quinanoggarage; and thereafter, when the devil of restlessness stirred in hisyoung muscles, he trundled about the countryside in search of thosefamilies mentioned in Lutetia's letters. Some were utterly gone fromQuinanog, some were not affording, and some added useful detail; as whenold Mrs. Apperson produced a dozen letters written from Europe duringLutetia's first trip abroad. "I'd have admired to go to Europe, but itnever came so's I could," said Mrs. Apperson. "When Miss Murray went,she wrote me from every city, telling me all about it. I read 'em over alot--makes me feel as though I'd been there too. And every DecorationDay," she added inconsequently, "I put a bunch of heliotrope on hergrave. She just loved the smell of heliotrope."

  Somehow, Lindsay had never even thought of Lutetia's grave. The next dayhe made that pilgrimage. The graveyard lay near the town center,overtopped by the pine-covered hill which bore three austere whitebuildings--church, town-hall, and grange. The grave itself was in apatch of modern tombstones, surrounded by the flaking slabs of twocenturies ago. The stone was featureless, ill-proportioned; theinscription recorded nothing but her name and the dates of her birth anddeath.

  The note which most often came out of these wayside gossipings was ahigh one--of the gaiety and the brilliancy of the Blue Meadowshospitality. Apparently people were coming and going all the time; somedistinguished; some undiscovered: but all with personality. When Lindsayreturned from such a talk, the old house glowed like an opal--so fulldid it seem of the colors of those vivacious days.

  But he was not quite content to be long away from his own fireside. Thefriendly atmosphere of the Murray house continued to exercise itsenchanting sway. He always felt that one room became occupied theinstant he left it, that the one he was about to enter was alreadyoccupied--and this feeling grew day by day, augmented. It brought himback to the house always with a sense of expectancy. "Lutetia's house ismy hotel-lobby, my movie, my theater, my grand opera, my cabaret," hewrote Spink. "There's a strange fascination about it--a fascination withan element of eternal promise."

  At times, when he entered the trellised doorway, he found himselfexpecting someone to come forward to greet him. It kept occurring to himthat a neighbor had stopped to call, was waiting inside for him.Sometimes in the middle of the night he would drift slowly out of adelicious sleep to a sense, equally delicious, of being most gently andlovingly companioned in the room; sometimes in the morning he would wakeup with a snap, as though the house were full of company. For a momentthe whole place would seem brilliant and gay, and then--it was as thougha bubble burst in the air--he was alone. "It's almost as good," he wroteSpink, "as though you were here yourself, you goggle-eyed hick, you!"Once or twice he caught himself talking aloud; addressing the empty air.He stifled this impulse, however. "People always have a tendency to getbughouse," he explained to Spink, "when they live alone. I used to dothat in your rooms. I'm going to try to keep sane as long as possible."

  Ten days increased rather than diminished this impression. By this timehe had burned his thesis and was now making notes that were part thedirect product of Spink's data and part the byproduct of Lutetia's ownworks. The syringas were beginning to run down; but the roses werecoming out in great numbers. The hollyhocks had opened flares of colorunder the living-room window. The lawn was as close to plush as constantcare could make it. The garden was not yet quite cleaned out. He wasglad, for he liked working there. It was not a whit less friendly thanthe house. Indeed, he felt so companioned there that sometimes he lookedup suddenly to see who was watching his efforts to resurrect a neglectedrosebush; or to uproot a flourishing patch of poison ivy. The eveningswere long, and as--consciously girlish and in quotation marks he wroteSpink--"lovely." His big lamp made a spot of golden color in the shadowylong room. One northeaster, which lasted three days, gave him dark anddamp excuse for three days of roaring fire. Much of that time he satopposite the blazing logs in the big, rush-bottomed piazza chair whichhe had purchased, smoking and reading Lutetia. Now and then, he lookedup at Lutetia's picture, which he had finally brought down from hisbedroom.

  Perhaps it was the picture which made him feel more companioned herethan anywhere in the house or out. The living-room was peculiarly richwith presence, so rich that he left it reluctantly at night and returnedto it as quickly as possible in the morning; so rich that often hesmiled, though why he could not have said; so rich that in the eveninghe often looked up suddenly from his book and stared into its shadowylength for a long, moveless--and breathlessly expectant--interval.

  Indeed that sensation so concretely, so steadily, so persistentlyaugmented that one evening--

  He had been reading ever since dark; and it was getting late. Finally hearose; closed the door and windows. He came back to the table and stoodleaning against it, idly whistling the _Sambre et Meuse_ through histeeth, while he looked at Lutetia's portrait.

  He took up _The Sport of the Goddesses_ just to look it over ... turneda page or two ... became immersed.... Suddenly ... he realized that hewas not alone....

  He was not alone. That was conclusive. That he suddenly and absolutelyknew; though how he knew it he could not guess. His eyes stopped, in themidst of Lutetia's single grim murder, fixed on the printed line. Hecould not move them along that line. He did not mind that. But he couldnot move them off the page. And he did mind that; for he wanted--mostintensely wanted--to lift his gaze. After lifting it, he presentlydiscovered, he would want to project it to the left. Whoever his visitorwas, it sat at the left. That he knew, completely, absolutely, andconclusively; but again, how he knew it, he did not know.

  An immeasurable interval passed.

  He tried to raise his eyes. He could not accomplish it. The air grewthick; his hands, still holding the book, turned cold and hard as clampsof iron. His eyes smarted from their unwinking immobility. This wasabsurd. Breaking this deathly ossification was just a matter of will. Hemade himself turn a page. Five lines down he decided; he would look up.But he did not look up. He could not. He wanted to see ... but somethingstronger than desire and will withheld him. He read; turned anotherpage. Five lines down....

  Ah ... the paralysing chill was moving off.... In a moment ... he wasgoing to be able.... In a moment....

  He lifted his eyes.... He gazed steadily to the left....