CHAPTER VII
TELLS OF AN EXTRAORDINARY INCIDENT IN CULLEN MAYLE'S BEDROOM
I was very tired, but in spite of my fatigue it was some while beforeI fell asleep. Parmiter had thrown a new light upon the businesstonight, and by the help of that light I arrayed afresh my scantyknowledge. The strangeness of my position, besides, kept me in someexcitement. Here was I quietly abed in a house where I knew no one;Clutterbuck might well talk about impertinence, and I could not butwonder what in the world I should find to say if Dick was late in themorning. Finally, there was the adventure of that night. I felt myselfagain slipping down the wet grass and dangling over the precipice. Iheard again that unearthly screeching which had so frightened Dick andperplexed me, It perplexed me still. I could not for a momententertain Dick's supposition of a spirit. This was the middle of theeighteenth century, you will understand, and I had come fresh fromLondon. Ghosts and bogies might do very well for the island of Tresco,but Mr. Berkeley was not to be terrified with any such old-wives'stories, and so Mr. Berkeley fell asleep.
At what precise hour the thing happened I do not know. The room was sodark that I could not have read my watch, even if I had looked at it,which I did not think to do. But at some time during that night I wokeup quite suddenly with a clear sense that I had been waked up.
I sat up in my bed with my heart beating very quick; and then with asa little noise as I could I gathered myself up in the shadow of thebed-hangings, at the head. The fog was still thick about the house, sothat hardly a glimmer of light came from the window. But there wassome one in the room I knew, for I could hear a rustle as of stealthymovements. And then straight in front of me between the two posts ofthe bed-foot, I saw something white that wavered and swayed this wayand that. Only an hour or so before I had been boasting to myself thatI was London-bred and lived in the middle of the eighteenth century.But none the less my hair stirred upon my head, and all the moisturedried up in my throat as I stared at that dim white thing wavering andswaying between the bed-posts. It was taller than any human being thatI had seen. I remembered the weird screeching sound which I had heardin the hollow; I think that in my heart I begged Dick Parmiter'spardon for laughing at his fears; I know that I crouched back amongthe hangings and shuddered till the bed shook and shook again. Andthen it made a sound, and all the blood in my veins stood still. Ithought that my heart would stop or my brain burst. For the sound wasneither a screech like that which rose from the hollow, nor a groan,nor any ghostly noise. It was purely human, it was a kecking sound inthe throat, such as one makes who gasps for breath. The white thingwas a live thing of flesh and blood.
I sprang up on the bed and jumped to the foot of it. It was very darkin the room, but through the darkness, I could see, on a level with myface, the face of a woman. Her eyes were open and they stared intomine. I could see the whites of them; our heads were so near theyalmost touched.
Even then I did not understand. I wondered what it was on which shestood. I noticed a streak of white which ran straight up towards theceiling from behind her head, and I wondered what that was. And thensuddenly her body swung against my legs. She was standing on nothingwhatever! Again the queer gasping coughing noise broke from her lips,and at last I understood it. It was a gasp of a woman strangling todeath. That white stiff streak above her head--I knew what it was too.I caught her by the waist and lifted her up till her weight restedupon my arm. With the other arm I felt about her neck. A thick softscarf--silk it seemed to the touch--was knotted tightly round it, andthe end of the scarf ran up to the cross-beam above the bed-posts. Thescarf was the streak of white.
I fumbled at the knot with my fingers. It was a slip knot, and nowthat no weight kept it taut, it loosened easily. I slipped the nooseback over her head and left it dangling. The woman I laid down uponthe bed, where she lay choking and moaning.
I flung up the window and the cold fog poured into the room. I had nocandle to light and nothing wherewith to light it. But I rememberedthat my foot had knocked against a chair to the right of the window,as I climbed into the room. I groped for the chair and set it to facethe open night. Then I carried the woman to the window and placed herin the chair, and supported her so that she might not fall. Outside Icould hear the surf booming upon the sand almost within arm's reach,and the air was brisk with the salt of the sea.
Such light as there was, glimmered upon the woman's face. I saw thatshe was young, little more than a girl indeed, with hair and eyes ofan extreme blackness. She was of a slight figure as I knew from theease with which I carried her, but tall. I could not doubt who it was,for one thing the white dress she wore was of some fine soft fabric,and even in that light it was easy to see that she was beautiful.
I held her thus with the cold salt air blowing upon her face, and in alittle, she began to recover. She moved her hands upon her lap, andfinally lifted one and held her throat with it.
"Very likely there will be some water in the room," said I. "If youare safe, if you will not fall, I will look for it."
"Thank you," she murmured.
My presence occasioned her no surprise and this I thought was no morethan natural at the moment. I took my arm from her waist and gropedabout the room for the water-jug. I found it at last and a glassbeside it. These I carried back to the window.
The girl was still seated on the chair, but she had changed herattitude. She had leaned her arms upon the sill and her head upon herarms. I poured out the water from the jug into the tumbler. She didnot raise her head. I spoke to her. She did not answer me. A horriblefear turned me cold. I knelt down by her side, and setting down thewater gently lifted her head. She did not resist but sank back with anatural movement into my arms. Her eyes were closed, but she wasbreathing. I could feel her breath upon my cheek and it came steadilyand regular. I cannot describe my astonishment; she was in a deepsleep.
I pondered for a moment what I should do! Should I wake the household?Should I explain what had happened and my presence in the house? ForHelen Mayle's sake I must not do that, since Helen Mayle it surely waswhom I held in my arms.
I propped her securely in the chair, then crossed the room, opened thedoor and listened. The house was very still; so far no one had beendisturbed. A long narrow passage stretched in front of me, with doorsupon either side. Remembering what Dick Parmiter had told me, I meanthat every sound reverberated through the house, I crept down thelanding on tiptoe. I had only my stockings upon my feet and I creptforward so carefully that I could not hear my own footfalls.
I had taken some twenty paces when the passage opened out to my right.I put out my hand and touched a balustrade. A few yards farther on thebalustrade ceased; there was an empty space which I took to be thebeginning of the stairs, and beyond the empty space the passage closedin again.
I crept forward, and at last at the far end of the house and on theleft hand of the passage I came to that for which I searched, andwhich I barely hoped to find--an open door. I held my breath andlistened in the doorway, but there was no sound of any one breathing,so I stepped into the room.
The fog was less dense, it hung outside the window a thin white mistand behind that mist the day was breaking. I looked round the room. Itwas a large bedroom, and the bed had not been slept in. A glance atthe toilette with its dainty knick-knacks of silver proved to me thatit was a woman's bedroom. It had two big windows looking out towardsthe sea, and as I stood in the dim grey light, I wondered whether itwas from one of those windows that Adam Mayle had looked years before,and seen the brigantine breaking up upon the Golden Ball Reef. But thelight was broadening with the passage of every minute. With the samecaution which I had observed before I stole back on tiptoe to CullenMayle's room. Helen Mayle was still asleep, and she had not moved fromher posture. I raised her in my arms, and still she did not wake. Icarried her down the passage, through the open door and laid her onthe bed. There was a coverlet folded at the end of the bed and Ispread it over her. She nest
led down beneath it and her lips smiledvery prettily, and she uttered a little purring murmur of content; butthis she did in her sleep. She slept with the untroubled sleep of achild. Her face was pale, but that I took to be its naturalcomplexion. Her long black eyelashes rested upon her cheeks. There wasno hint of any trouble in her expression, no trace of any passionatedespair. I could hardly believe that this was the girl who had soughtto hang herself, whom I had seen struggling for her breath.
Yet there was no doubt possible. She had come into the emptyroom--empty as she thought, and empty it would have been, had not afisher-boy burst one night into Lieutenant Clutterbuck's lodging offthe Strand--when every one slept, and there she had deliberately stoodupon the bed, fastened her noose to the cross-bar and sprang off.There was no doubt possible. It was her spring from the bed which hadwaked me up, and as I returned to Cullen's room, I saw the silk noosestill hanging from the beam.
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