Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) (951 page)

IV — OF THE MAN WHO CAME IN THE NIGHT

The night set in gusty and tempestuous, and the moon was all girt with ragged clouds.  The wind blew in melancholy gusts, sobbing and sighing over the moor, and setting all the gorse
bushes agroaning.  From time to time a little sputter of rain pattered up against the window-pane.  I sat until near midnight, glancing over the fragment on immortality by Iamblichus, the Alexandrian platonist, of whom the Emperor Julian said that he was posterior to Plato in time but not in genius.  At last, shutting up my book, I opened my door and took a last look at the dreary fell and still more dreary sky.  As I protruded my head, a swoop of wind caught me and sent the red ashes of my pipe sparkling and dancing through the darkness.  At the same moment the moon shone brilliantly out from between two clouds, and I saw, sitting on the hillside, not two hundred yards from my door, the man who called himself the surgeon of Gaster Fell.  He was squatted among the heather, his elbows upon his knees, and his chin resting upon his hands, as motionless as a stone, with his gaze fixed steadily upon the door of my dwelling.

At the sight of this ill-omened sentinel, a chill of horror and of fear shot through me, for his gloomy and mysterious associations had cast a glamour round the man, and the hour and place were in keeping with his sinister presence.  In a moment, however, a manly glow of resentment and self-confidence drove this petty emotion from my mind, and I strode fearlessly in his direction.  He rose as I approached and faced me, with the moon shining on his grave, bearded
face and glittering on his eyeballs.  “What is the meaning of this?” I cried, as I came upon him.  “What right have you to play the spy on me?”

I could see the flush of anger rise on his face.  “Your stay in the country has made you forget your manners,” he said.  “The moor is free to all.”

“You will say next that my house is free to all,” I said, hotly.  “You have had the impertience to ransack it in my absence this afternoon.”

He started, and his features showed the most intense excitement.  “I swear to you that I had no hand in it!” he cried.  “I have never set foot in your house in my life.  Oh, sir, sir, if you will but believe me, there is a danger hanging over you, and you would do well to be careful.”

“I have had enough of you,” I said.  “I saw that cowardly blow you struck when you thought no human eye rested upon you.  I have been to your cottage, too, and know all that it has to tell.  If there is a law in England, you shall hang for what you have done.  As to me, I am an old soldier, sir, and I am armed.  I shall not fasten my door.  But if you or any other villain attempt to cross my threshold it shall be at your own risk.”  With these words, I swung round upon my heel and strode into my cabin.

For two days the wind freshened and increased, with constant squalls of rain until on the third night the most furious storm was
raging which I can ever recollect in England.  I felt that it was positively useless to go to bed, nor could I concentrate my mind sufficiently to read a book.  I turned my lamp half down to moderate the glare, and leaning back in my chair, I gave myself up to reverie.  I must have lost all perception of time, for I have no recollection how long I sat there on the borderland betwixt thought and slumber.  At last, about 3 or possibly 4 o’clock, I came to myself with a start — not only came to myself, but with every sense and nerve upon the strain.  Looking round my chamber in the dim light, I could not see anything to justify my sudden trepidation.  The homely room, the rain-blurred window and the rude wooden door were all as they had been.  I had begun to persuade myself that some half-formed dream had sent that vague thrill through my nerves, when in a moment I became conscious of what it was.  It was a sound — the sound of a human step outside my solitary cottage.

Amid the thunder and the rain and the wind I could hear it — a dull, stealthy footfall, now on the grass, now on the stones — occasionally stopping entirely, then resumed, and ever drawing nearer.  I sat breathlessly, listening to the eerie sound.  It had stopped now at my very door, and was replaced by a panting and gasping, as of one who has travelled fast and far.

By the flickering light of the expiring lamp
I could see that the latch of my door was twitching, as though a gentle pressure was exerted on it from without.  Slowly, slowly, it rose, until it was free of the catch, and then there was a pause of a quarter minute or more, while I still eat silent with dilated eyes and drawn sabre.  Then, very slowly, the door began to revolve upon its hinges, and the keen air of the night came whistling through the slit.  Very cautiously it was pushed open, so that never a sound came from the rusty hinges.  As the aperture enlarged, I became aware of a dark, shadowy figure upon my threshold, and of a pale face that looked in at me.  The features were human, but the eyes were not.  They seemed to burn through the darkness with a greenish brilliancy of their own; and in their baleful, shifty glare I was conscious of the very spirit of murder.  Springing from my chair, I had raised my naked sword, when, with a wild shouting, a second figure dashed up to my door.  At its approach my shadowy visitant uttered a shrill cry, and fled away across the fells, yelping like a beaten hound.

Tingling with my recent fear, I stood at my door, peering through the night with the discordant cry of the fugitives still ringing in my ears.  At that moment a vivid flash of lightning illuminated the whole landscape and made it as clear as day.  By its light I saw far away upon the hillside two dark figures pursuing each other
with extreme rapidity across the fells.  Even at that distance the contrast between them forbid all doubt as to their identity.  The first was the small, elderly man, whom I had supposed to be dead; the second was my neighbour, the surgeon.  For an instant they stood out clear and hard in the unearthly light; in the next, the darkness had closed over them, and they were gone.  As I turned to re-enter my chamber, my foot rattled against something on my threshold.  Stooping, I found it was a straight knife, fashioned entirely of lead, and so soft and brittle that it was a strange choice for a weapon.  To render it more harmless, the top had been cut square off.  The edge, however, had been assiduously sharpened against a stone, as was evident from the markings upon it, so that it was still a dangerous implement in the grasp of a determined man.

And what was the meaning of it all? you ask.  Many a drama which I have come across in my wandering life, some as strange and as striking as this one, has lacked the ultimate explanation which you demand.  Fate is a grand weaver of tales; but she ends them, as a rule, in defiance of all artistic laws, and with an unbecoming want of regard for literary propriety.  As it happens, however, I have a letter before me as I write which I may add without comment, and which will clear all that may remain dark.

“Kirkby Lunatic Asylum,
“
September
4
th
, 1885.

“Sir, — I am deeply conscious that some apology and explanation is due to you for the very startling and, in your eyes, mysterious events which have recently occurred, and which have so seriously interfered with the retired existence which you desire to lead.  I should have called upon you on the morning after the recapture of my father, but my knowledge of your dislike to visitors and also of — you will excuse my saying it — your very violent temper, led me to think that it was better to communicate with you by letter.

“My poor father was a hard-working general practitioner in Birmingham, where his name is still remembered and respected.  About ten years ago he began to show signs of mental aberration, which we were inclined to put down to overwork and the effects of a sunstroke.  Feeling my own incompetence to pronounce upon a case of such importance, I at once sought the highest advice in Birmingham and London.  Among others we consulted the eminent alienist, Mr. Fraser Brown, who pronounced my father’s case to be intermittent in its nature, but dangerous during the paroxysms.  ‘It may take a homicidal, or it may take a religious turn,’ he said; ‘or it may prove to be a mixture of both.  For months he may be as well as you or me, and then in a moment he may break out.  You will incur a great responsibility if you leave him without supervision.’

“I need say no more, sir.  You will understand the terrible task which has fallen upon my poor sister and me in endeavouring to save my father from the asylum which in his sane moments filled him with horror.  I can only regret that your peace has been disturbed by our misfortunes, and I offer you in my sister’s name and my own our apologies.”

“Yours truly,
“J. Cameron.”

DANGER STORY VIII.  HOW IT HAPPENED

She was a writing medium.  This is what she wrote: —

I can remember some things upon that evening most distinctly, and others are like some vague, broken dreams.  That is what makes it so difficult to tell a connected story.  I have no idea now what it was that had taken me to London and brought me back so late.  It just merges into all my other visits to London.  But from the time that I got out at the little country station everything is extraordinarily clear.  I can live it again — every instant of it.

I remember so well walking down the platform and looking at the illuminated clock at the end which told me that it was half-past eleven.  I remember also my wondering whether I could get home before midnight.  Then I remember the big motor, with its glaring head-lights and glitter of polished brass, waiting for me outside.  It was my new thirty-horse-power Robur, which had only been delivered that day.  I remember also asking Perkins, my chauffeur, how she had
gone, and his saying that he thought she was excellent.

“I’ll try her myself,” said I, and I climbed into the driver’s seat.

“The gears are not the same,” said he.  “Perhaps, sir, I had better drive.”

“No; I should like to try her,” said I.

And so we started on the five-mile drive for home.

My old car had the gears as they used always to be in notches on a bar.  In this car you passed the gear-lever through a gate to get on the higher ones.  It was not difficult to master, and soon I thought that I understood it.  It was foolish, no doubt, to begin to learn a new system in the dark, but one often does foolish things, and one has not always to pay the full price for them.  I got along very well until I came to Claystall Hill.  It is one of the worst hills in England, a mile and a half long and one in six in places, with three fairly sharp curves.  My park gates stand at the very foot of it upon the main London road.

We were just over the brow of this hill, where the grade is steepest, when the trouble began.  I had been on the top speed, and wanted to get her on the free; but she stuck between gears, and I had to get her back on the top again.  By this time she was going at a great rate, so I clapped on both brakes, and one after the other
they gave way.  I didn’t mind so much when I felt my footbrake snap, but when I put all my weight on my side-brake, and the lever clanged to its full limit without a catch, it brought a cold sweat out of me.  By this time we were fairly tearing down the slope.  The lights were brilliant, and I brought her round the first curve all right.  Then we did the second one, though it was a close shave for the ditch.  There was a mile of straight then with the third curve beneath it, and after that the gate of the park.  If I could shoot into that harbour all would be well, for the slope up to the house would bring her to a stand.

Perkins behaved splendidly.  I should like that to be known.  He was perfectly cool and alert.  I had thought at the very beginning of taking the bank, and he read my intention.

“I wouldn’t do it, sir,” said he.  “At this pace it must go over and we should have it on the top of us.”

Of course he was right.  He got to the electric switch and had it off, so we were in the free; but we were still running at a fearful pace.  He laid his hands on the wheel.

“I’ll keep her steady,” said he, “if you care to jump and chance it.  We can never get round that curve.  Better jump, sir.”

“No,” said I; “I’ll stick it out.  You can jump if you like.”

“I’ll stick it with you, sir,” said he.

If it had been the old car I should have jammed the gear-lever into the reverse, and seen what would happen.  I expect she would have stripped her gears or smashed up somehow, but it would have been a chance.  As it was, I was helpless.  Perkins tried to climb across, but you couldn’t do it going at that pace.  The wheels were whirring like a high wind and the big body creaking and groaning with the strain.  But the lights were brilliant, and one could steer to an inch.  I remember thinking what an awful and yet majestic sight we should appear to any one who met us.  It was a narrow road, and we were just a great, roaring, golden death to any one who came in our path.

We got round the corner with one wheel three feet high upon the bank.  I thought we were surely over, but after staggering for a moment she righted and darted onwards.  That was the third corner and the last one.  There was only the park gate now.  It was facing us, but, as luck would have it, not facing us directly.  It was about twenty yards to the left up the main road into which we ran.  Perhaps I could have done it, but I expect that the steering-gear had been jarred when we ran on the bank.  The wheel did not turn easily.  We shot out of the lane.  I saw the open gate on the left.  I whirled round my wheel with all the strength of my wrists. 
Perkins and I threw our bodies across, and then the next instant, going at fifty miles an hour, my right front wheel struck full on the right-hand pillar of my own gate.  I heard the crash.  I was conscious of flying through the air, and then — and then — !

* * * * *

When I became aware of my own existence once more I was among some brushwood in the shadow of the oaks upon the lodge side of the drive.  A man was standing beside me.  I imagined at first that it was Perkins, but when I looked again I saw that it was Stanley, a man whom I had known at college some years before, and for whom I had a really genuine affection.  There was always something peculiarly sympathetic to me in Stanley’s personality; and I was proud to think that I had some similar influence upon him.  At the present moment I was surprised to see him, but I was like a man in a dream, giddy and shaken and quite prepared to take things as I found them without questioning them.

“What a smash!” I said.  “Good Lord, what an awful smash!”

He nodded his head, and even in the gloom I could see that he was smiling the gentle, wistful smile which I connected with him.

I was quite unable to move.  Indeed, I had not any desire to try to move.  But my senses
were exceedingly alert.  I saw the wreck of the motor lit up by the moving lanterns.  I saw the little group of people and heard the hushed voices.  There were the lodge-keeper and his wife, and one or two more.  They were taking no notice of me, but were very busy round the car.  Then suddenly I heard a cry of pain.

“The weight is on him.  Lift it easy,” cried a voice.

“It’s only my leg!” said another one, which I recognised as Perkins’s.  “Where’s master?” he cried.

“Here I am,” I answered, but they did not seem to hear me.  They were all bending over something which lay in front of the car.

Stanley laid his hand upon my shoulder, and his touch was inexpressibly soothing.  I felt light and happy, in spite of all.

“No pain, of course?” said he.

“None,” said I.

“There never is,” said he.

And then suddenly a wave of amazement passed over me.  Stanley!  Stanley!  Why, Stanley had surely died of enteric at Bloemfontein in the Boer War!

“Stanley!” I cried, and the words seemed to choke my throat—”Stanley, you are dead.”

He looked at me with the same old gentle, wistful smile.

“So are you,” he answered.