Part 5

"Eet was awful--horrible!" she said finally. "Père d'Arcy, he give ze wild scream. Ze theeng--ze awful theeng--drop upon heem like ze great veil. Jacques, he moan again and again. Zen, ze moan, eet, too, stop. We have rush out and we are here. We are afraid of ze theeng. Zen you come----"

Lamontaine shoved her aside and, darting to the door of the sickroom, seized the knob and jerked it open.

The room was in darkness, yet the light, shining through the open door from the outer room, was strong enough to reveal the scene that was being enacted. Even Lamontaine, inured though he was to death and violence, shrank back.

Old Jacques d'Arcy lay upon the floor by the side of the bed. His face, glaring up at them, was twisted into a horrible contortion, the eyes protruding as if they had been squeezed from their sockets. His body was shriveled into a million wrinkles; it was like a toy balloon that has been deflated.

Over the dead man was a form--a strange, gossamer-like wraith, vague, shadowy, indistinct. The physician had an impression of malignant eyes glaring at him--of a slit of a mouth drawn back into a wolfish snarl. Yet there were no eyes--no mouth. The thing was shapeless.

Recovering himself, Lamontaine took a step forward. The hellish thing seemed about to spring at him. Then it drew back as if reluctant to leave the body of its victim.

Slowly it dissolved itself--floating away like a bit of vapor, through the open window.

Lamontaine turned to the others who stood shuddering in the doorway. The old woman took up her hysterical wailing again.

A faint odor filled the room. It was strange, indistinguishable, horrible, nauseating. It was the odor of death.

The thing from beyond, gorged with vitality, had reached a point in its development where it was visible to human eyes.

3. Out of the Night

It was apparent to Lamontaine that Aaron Kronk was the medium by which the horrific spirit form from the other world had been materialized. Yet the burly physician was puzzled. What sinister motive did the diabolical Kronk have in thus wreaking his vengeance upon the inoffensive, simple-minded inhabitants of the sleepy little village? They had done him no harm. Until a few weeks earlier, when Lamontaine had met and bested him in his struggle for the de Laval fortune, these people had never known of his existence.

Yet in Lamontaine's mind there was no doubt that Kronk was possessed of more than ordinary mediumistic ability and that it was through him that the terrible primal force had been developed. But why? He asked himself the question a hundred times as he completed his rounds of the sick, following the horrible death of Jacques d'Arcy.

It was late when he had finished. Now, even though it was well past midnight, he still sat in his darkened office, his feet upon the desk, his eyes, half closed, gazing out of the open window. He had kicked off his shoes and thrust his toes into carpet slippers. His shirt was tossed carelessly into the corner and his suspenders hung down over his hips.

The little village had long since quieted down for the night. Here and there a dim light glimmered in a curtained window, marking the home of some helpless victim who was fighting the horror that was hovering over the peaceful little hamlet like a great pall--a horror that he, the man in whom these simple village folk had learned to place their trust, was unable to combat.

Lamontaine cursed aloud as he realized the futility of his struggle against the thing from beyond. He had found in his books no surcease of sorrow--no way to scotch the demon. It was something that he must think out--reason out for himself.

His only chance lay in the trap he had laid by means of the little schoolmaster. Had he done right in thus exposing Noel Pelletier to the terrible danger? There was no other way. He consoled himself with the thought that Pelletier had no desire to live if Evelyn l'Brest died. And unless he was successful in his assault on the malevolent spirit through the little dominie, Evelyn l'Brest must surely go.

And yet he had no set plan. He was trusting to luck--blind luck--hoping against hope that he would succeed.

There was a light footstep on the gravel outside the window. He looked out. It was Pierre Le Front, the constable, making his midnight rounds. Seeing the physician sitting in the open window, he had entered the yard. Now, at Lamontaine's invitation, he stepped inside.

The physician picked the rum-jug from the floor and, filling a cup for himself, tossed another across the desk to the officer and jerked his thumb toward the jug.

"Drink?" he growled. "Jamaica rum. It'll do you good on a night like this--a night when the very atmosphere tingles with death."

"Mon Dieu! Yes, yes!" Le Front ejaculated. "I, too, feel eet een ze air, doctaire."

He filled the cup and tossed off the contents with an appreciative smack of his lips.

"Ze dominie ees worse," he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "I am go zere and stay ze night weeth heem w'en I feenish my round. He ees fear to stay alone."

Lamontaine cursed again--full, man-sized oaths.

"And there's not a damned thing that I can do," he mourned. "Not a damned thing!"

Le Front leaned forward, the better to see through the darkness the face of the man on the other side of the desk.

"Zen eet ees true, zat wheech ze dominie wheesper to me--zat ze theeng wheech we see awhile ago at d'Arcy's ees not a ghost--zat eet navaire lived lak' you an' me?"