The drums began again, and with their rhythmic mutter came the muted moaning of the audience, a sound half fearful, half eloquent of adoration, but wholly terrifying.
The girl before the altar crouched and genuflected, her head bowed low, her arms uplifted, as though she were a postulant bending to receive the veil which makes her sacrosanct from the world and undisseverable bride of the Church. And from the iron-bound chest the hideous ape-man dragged forth a squirming, white-bellied snake, a loathsome, five-inch-thick reptile with wicked, wedge-shaped head and villainous, unwinking eyes, and laid it like a garland round the girl’s uncovered shoulders!
Sluggishly, as though but partially aroused from a torpor, the monstrous reptile coiled its length—it was all of fifteen feet—about the bare arms of its holder, slid its twining bulk about her breast and torso, its tail encircling her slender waist, its head protruding underneath her left arm and swinging pendulously from side to side as its evil, changeless eyes glared viciously in the lantern light and its forked tea-colored tongue flickered lambently.
So heavy was the serpent’s weight the girl was forced to plant her naked feet apart as she smoothed the dull, gleaming scales with her taper finger tips and massaged the white-armored throat gently as slowly, slowly, she forced the horrid face upward, turned it toward her face and—my stomach retched at the sight—kissed it on the mouth!
The throng of worshipers went wild. Men and women clung together in strangling embraces and rolled and wallowed on the floor. Some rose erect and tossed their arms aloft, screaming peals of triumphant laughter or unmentionable obscenities. “She has kissed the Queen! She kisses the Queen! The prophecy is fulfilled!” I heard one votary shout, and, mingled with the drums’ unceasing roar came cries of “Ybo, lé, lé; Ybo, c’est l’heure de sang—”
I almost screamed aloud as de Grandin’s elbow struck me in the ribs. The ape-man had left the room, returning with a burlap sack flung across his shoulder, a sack in which something tiny moved and struggled and whimpered with the still, small voice of a little child in fear and pain. He tossed the sack upon the floor and, grinning horribly, turned toward the girl, handling the noisome reptile with the skill of an adept as he uncoiled it from her white body and placed it, wound into a writhing knot, upon the altar by the desecrated cross.
Into the girl’s hands he put the gleaming, razor-edged machete, then turned once more to the struggling, whimpering something in the sack.
“Le bouc, le bouc sans cornes—le bouc blanc sans cornes—the goat without horns—the white goat without horns!” howled the congregation frenziedly. “Le blanc sans cornes—”
“My friend,” de Grandin whispered, “I damn think the time is come!”
A crashing double report shattered the atmosphere as his heavy army revolvers bellowed almost in unison. There was a scream from the region of the altar, a yell of apprehension from the congregation, and the sharp tinkle of broken glass as a bullet smashed the chimney of the lantern illuminating the place, plunging us into instant impenetrable darkness.
Sharp as acid, piercing as a knife-thrust, de Grandin’s shrill whistle sounded through the dark, followed by the deafening roar of his pistols as he fired point-blank into the milling mass of humanity in the darkened cellar.
A crash like all the thunders of heaven let loose at once roared over us, followed by the tramping of heavy-soled boots on the empty floors of the old house, then the pounding of hurrying feet upon the cellar stairs. Costello, with unerring efficiency, had hurled two hand grenades at the outer door of the house, then charged through the opening thus created, taking no chances of delay while his men battered down the stout oak panels.
“Are ye there, Dr. de Grandin, sor?” he shouted as half a dozen powerful bull’s-eye lanterns lighted the place. “Are ye all right, sor?”
A choking, rasping gurgle beside me answered. Turning sharply I saw the little Frenchman struggling frantically in the coils of the monster snake. With reptilian instinct the thing had crawled from the altar when darkness came, and made for the tunneled exit, encountering de Grandin in its course, and wrapping itself about him.
I snatched the machete from the altar and aimed a blow at the creature’s head, but:
“The tail, Friend Trowbridge, strike off its tail!” he gasped.
The keen steel sheared through the reptile’s tail, leaving eight inches of it wrapped about a ceiling beam, and with a writhing crash the great, gray-spotted tubular body unloosed its hold upon the Frenchman’s trunk and slipped twisting to the earth like a monstrous spring released from its tension.
Half consciously, half instinctively, I realized the wisdom of de Grandin’s advice. Had I lopped off the serpent’s head, muscular contraction would have tightened its coils about him, and he would inevitably have been crushed to pulp. By striking off its tail I had deprived it of its grip on the ceiling beam, which it used as a fulcrum for its hold, and thereby rendered it impotent to tighten itself about his body.
The little Frenchman’s execution had been terrible. Four of the snake-worshipers lay stark and dead upon the floor, four more were nursing dreadful wounds, and the rest were huddled together in abject terror and made no resistance as Costello’s men applied the handcuffs.
In a crumpled heap before the altar lay Marrien Thorndyke, her eyes fast closed, her respiration so light I had to listen a second time at her blood-smeared breast before I could detect the faintest murmur of her heart.
“An overcoat for her, Friend Costello, if you please, or she will surely take pneumonia,” de Grandin ordered. “Wrap her warmly and bear her to the hospital. By damn, I greatly fear her nerves have had a shock from which they will not soon recover, but she is in better case than if we had not arrived in time. At the worst she will recover from her illness and live; had we not found her, I greatly fear there would not have remained enough for l’entrepreneur des pompes funèbres to bury.”
“The entrepreneur des pompes funèbres—the undertaker?” I demanded. “Do you mean she would have been killed?”
“No less,” he returned shortly, then:
“Holà, my little cabbage, is it hide-and-go-seek you play in there?” he cried as from the rough sack he lifted a tiny morsel of pink, baby flesh and folded it against his bosom. “Ha, my little goatling,” he chuckled, “it is better that I find you thus than that you serve as ‘the goat without horns’ for these abominations. Attend me, Sergeant. Wrap this one warmly and see that she is given milk to drink, then bid Monsieur and Madame Boswell come to police headquarters to see what they shall see. Name of a cannon, but I think the sight of this one will surely stop their eyes from weeping!”
“Now”—he turned to survey the cellar with a fierce glance as he reached again for his heavy pistols—“where is that misbegotten sacré bête, that ape in half-human shape? Is it possible I missed him with my first shot.”
It was not. Stretched on his back, his short, bandy legs and long, monkey-like arms twisted grotesquely, lay the ape-man, a gaping wound in his temple telling eloquently of the accuracy of de Grandin’s marksmanship. The creature’s shattered head was pillowed in the lap of the aged hag, who bent above him, dropping tears upon his ugly countenance and wailing, “A-hé, a-hé, mon beau, mon beau brave fils; mort, mort; mort!”
De Grandin looked uncertainly at the weeping crone a moment, then removed his hat. “Mourn for your Caliban, Sycorax,” he bade, not ungently, and, turning to Costello:
“Leave her a little while with her dead before you make her arrested, my friend,” he begged. “Ill-favored as an ape he was, and wicked as the foul fiend’s own self, but he was her son, and to a mother every son is dear, and beautiful, though he be ugly as a pig and vicious as a scorpion.
“Précisément, exactement, quite so,” the Frenchman agreed with a serious nod of his head.
6
“NO, NO, MY FRIEND,” Jules de Grandin shook his head in vigorous denial, “it was but the ability to recognize what I did behold which enable
d me to lead us to the snake-worshipers’ den. When Sergeant Costello mentioned the ravishing away of the blessed cross from the church was when I first began to suspect what now we know to be the facts. Consider, if you please—” he checked the items off upon his fingers:
“First comes the murder of the excellent young clergyman, a murder without motive, it appears, and most cruelly executed. That meant little; a madman might have done it.
“Then we have the stealing of little Baby Boswell; by itself that, too, meant little; again a maniac might be to blame.
“Next comes the stealing of a part of the sanctified furniture from the altar. Once more our hypothetical crazy man may be responsible; but would the same lunatic commit all three crimes, or would three separate madmen decide to act so near together? Possibly, but not likely.
“Considered separately, these are but three motiveless crimes; viewed as connected links in a chain of misdemeanors, they begin to show some central underlying motivation. ‘Let us suppose,’ I say to me, ‘the same man have done all these things—he have slain Monsieur Sherwood who is influential for good among the blacks; he have stolen away a baby girl; he have desecrated the sanctuary of a church. What sort of people do so?’
“All quickly I think; all quickly I remember. In voodoo-ridden Haiti, during the reign of the tyrant Antoine-Simone, he and his daughter Célestine, who were reputed to be grande mamaloi of the island—a sort of female pope of the voodooists—those two did actually succeed in hoodwinking Monseigneur the Archbishop of Haiti to bless and almost bury in consecrated ground the carcass of a slaughtered he-goat which they had substituted for the corpse of one of the palace suite. What they desired of the cadaver of a stinking goat which had been blessed with bell, book and candle only God, the Devil and they knew, but the fact remains they wanted it, and but for a fortunate accident would have succeeded in obtaining it.
“This I recalled when the good Costello told of the ravishment of the church, and so I thought, perhaps, I saw one tiny, small gleam of light amid the darkness of these many so strange crimes.
“Then like a confirmation of my theory comes the discovery of the patchwork corset—pure voodoo, that—upon the body of a white girl. ‘Ha,’ I say to me, ‘here are a new angle of this devil’s business.’
“Her murder follows quickly; a murder obviously committed to stop her mouth with blood. We search for the killer; but nowhere can we find him. Only the apes of Tarzan could have gained a vantage-point to hurl the fatal knife, then effect escape from immediately beneath our noses.
“Comes then the killing of Monsieur Lucas, the watchman. When I see his dead corpse all mutilated I tell me, ‘This is no ordinary killing; this is the ritual murder of some most vile secret society.’ And even as I come to that conclusion what do I find but the two burnt matches which mean that voodoo vengeance has been wreaked upon a backslider. Voilà! The mystery is a mystery no more. And the so long footprint marked in blood at the murder-scene—there is the track of my ape-man, the one who could have murdered Mademoiselle Adelaide because of his peculiar ability to climb that ice-encrusted tree beside the room where we interviewed her. Yes, the same one have undoubtlessly done both murders.
“All quickly I investigate her unhappy past, and likewise that of the murdered watchman. I have told you what I found. Undoubtlessly this old nurse of the murdered girl, this old Toinette, is a voodoo mamaloi, or high priestess; she have settled here, she have made many unfortunate Negroes her dupes; aided by the ape-man, she have planned the supreme revenge upon the white oppressor—she has raised up a white girl to serve the snake-goddess of Obeah, to perform the sacrifice not of a goat, as is done at ordinary ceremonies, but of ‘the goat without horns’—a human infant, and a white one, at that. Thus is explained the kidnaping of little Baby Boswell.
“‘Jules de Grandin,’ I tell me, ‘we must work fast if we are to circumvent this abominable abomination.’
“Then comes the riot when the police are defied with guns, an occurrence without parallel, the good Costello declared. It are most significant. I recall that the bloody massacre which drove the French from Haiti was plotted round a voodoo watch-fire on August 14, 1791, by rebellious slaves led by one Doukman, a voodoo papaloi, or priest. Impossible as it seems, a disordered brain had conceived the possibility of waging war against the law here in New Jersey, America. Only alcohol, drugs or religious frenzy, perhaps a mixture of them all, could nurture such an insane plan.
“Quickly on the riot’s heels comes the abduction of Mademoiselle Marrien. I see her remarkable resemblance to the dead Mademoiselle Adelaide; I observe the headache-producing powder on the mysteriously delivered orchids; once more the trail of voodoo cunning lies across my path. Her room was inaccessible to any but an ape; yet she is gone. Ha, but there is an ape-man dodging back and forth between all the happenings in this so mysterious chain of circumstances; once more I think I see his handiwork. Yes, it is unquestionably so.
“‘These wicked ones, they will not be denied their triumph,’ I tell me. ‘Having deprived themselves of the priestess they so carefully trained from childhood, they steal another, as like her in appearance as possible, and by means of drugs and drums, and le bon Dieu only knows what sort of foul magic, they break her will in pieces and force her to serve in place of her they slew.
“I seek a likely place for them to congregate; by great good luck and more than ordinary intelligence, I find it. Forthwith I come to Friend Costello for reinforcements. The rest we know.”
“But see here, de Grandin,” I asked, “in the voodoo temple tonight you said something about Marrien Thorndyke being in peril of her life. Would the same thing have applied to Adelaide Truman? D’ye think old Toinette would have risked her life in the Martinique earthquake to save the child, only to have her slaughtered in the end?”
“Mais certainement,” he assented. “Does not the shepherd repeatedly risk his life for his flock, only that they may at last be driven to the shambles?”
“But she was a priestess, a being regarded almost as divine,” I insisted. “Surely they would not have harmed her after electing her to celebrate their rites. Why—”
“Why, of a certitude, they would,” he interrupted. “The sacrifice of the priest or priestess, even of the god’s own proxy, is no strange thing in many religions. The priest of Dionysus at Potmice was sacrificed following the performance of his priestly office; the Phrygian priests of Attis were of old destroyed when they had done serving their god; a man impersonating Osiris, Sun God of Egypt, was first worshiped with all fervor, then ruthlessly slain in commemoration of the murder of Osiris by Set; and among the ancient Aztecs, Chicomecohuatl, the Corn Goddess, was likewise impersonated by a beauteous maiden who afterward was butchered and flayed in public. Yes, there is nothing strange in the slaughter of a venerated priestess by her worshipers, my friend.”
“Well, annyway, Dr. de Grandin, sor, ye sure ran th’ murtherin’ divils down an’ settled that ape-felly’s hash in tidy order,” Costello interrupted. “Good thing ye did, too. He sure deserved killin’, but we’d never ’a’ convinced a jury he kilt pore little Miss Truman or even the Eagle Laundry’s watchman, Lucas.”
“Eh bien, my friend,” de Grandin cast one of his quick, elfin smiles at the big Irishman, “all that which ends well ends satisfactorily, as Monsieur Shakespeare remarks. The motiveless, meaningless crimes which threatened your tranquility will trouble you no more; neither will the criminals.
“Trowbridge, Costello, good friends”—he filled three glasses with amber cognac and passed us each a bumper—“let us leave off this business as we began it; I bid you Happy New Year.”
The Dust of Egypt
IT WAS AN ODD couple Nora McGinnis ushered into my drawing room that snowy February night. The man was good-looking, extraordinarily so, with fine, regular features crowned by a mass of dark hair, broad forehead and deep, greenish-hazel eyes set well apart beneath brows of almost startling blackness. His chest was deep and
well developed, and his wide, square shoulders told of strength and stamina beyond the usual. Yet he was scarcely more than five feet tall, and the trousers of his well-tailored dinner suit hung baggily on limbs shriveled to mere skeletal proportions. His right knee bent awkwardly at a fixed, unchanging angle which made his walk little more than a lurching, painful hobble, and the patent leather oxfords on his feet were almost boyish in their smallness. Obviously, poliomyelitis had ravaged his once splendid body hideously, leaving a man half-perfect, half-pitiable wreck.
The woman, apparently almost of an age with her companion—somewhere near twenty-five, I judged—was in everything but deformity his perfect feminine counterpart. Close as a skullcap of black satin her manishly shingled, jetty hair lay against her small, well-shaped head; her features were so small and regular as to be almost insignificant by reason of their very symmetry; her walk was one of those smooth, undulant gaits which announce a nervous balance and muscular co-ordination not often found in this neurotic age. A sleeveless evening frock of black net and satin fell in graceful folds almost to her narrow, high-arched insteps, and the tiny emerald buttons decorating her black-satin pumps were matched by the emerald studs set in the lobes of her small ears and, oddly, by the greenish lights in her black-fringed hazel eyes. She was devoid of makeup, save the vivid scarlet of her lips.
I examined the two small oblongs of cardboard Nora had handed me before admitting the visitors. “Mr. Monteith?” I asked tentatively.
“I am he,” the young man answered with a quick smile which lighted his somber, brooding countenance with a peculiar charm, “and this is my sister, Louella.” He paused a moment, as though embarrassed, then:
“We’ve been told you have a friend, a Dr. de Grandin, who occasionally interests himself in matters which have, or seem to have, a supernatural aspect. If you would be good enough to tell us how we might get in touch with him—”
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