The Dark Angel Read online

  We cut away his shirt and singlet, for undressing him would have been too hazardous. To the left, between the fifth and sixth ribs, a little in front of the mid-axillary line, there gaped a long incised wound, obviously the result of a knife-thrust. Extensive hemorrhage had already taken place, and the patient was weakening quickly from loss of blood. “A gauze pack and styptic collodion,” de Grandin whispered softly, “and then perhaps ten minims of adrenalin; it’s all that we can do I fear. The state will save electric current by this evening’s work, my friend; he’ll never live to occupy the chair of execution.”

  The treatment finished, we propped the patient up with pillows. “Doctor Sun,” de Grandin announced professionally, “it is my duty to inform you that death is very near. I greatly doubt that you will live till morning.”

  “I realize that,” the other answered weakly, “nor am I sorry it is so. This wound has brought me back my sanity, and I am once again the man I was before I suffered madness. All I have done while I was mentally deranged comes back to me like memories of a disagreeable dream, and when I think of what I was, and what I have become, I am content that Sun Ah Poy should die.

  “But before I go I must discharge my debt—pay you my fee,” he added with another smile, and this time, I thought, there was more of gentleness than irony in the grimace. “My time is short and I must leave some details out, but such facts as you desire shall be yours,” he added.

  “This morning I met Konstantin the Russian as I fled the police, and we agreed to join forces to combat you. He seemed to be a man beset, like me, by the police, and gladly did I welcome him as ally.” He paused a moment, and a quick spasm of pain flickered in his face, but he fought it down. “In the East we learn early of some things the Western world will never learn,” he gasped. “The lore of China is filled with stories of some beings whose existence you deride. Yet they are real, though happily they become more rare each day. Konstantin is one of them; not wholly man, nor yet entirely demon, but a dreadful hybrid of the two. Not till he’d taken me to his lair did I discover this—he is a servant of the Evil One.

  “It cost my life to come and tell you, but he must be exterminated. My life for his; the bargain is a trade by which the world will profit. What matters Sun Ah Poy beside the safety of humanity? Konstantin is virtually immortal, but he can be killed. Unless you hunt him out and slay him—”

  “We know all this,” de Grandin interrupted; “at least, I have suspected it. Tell us while you have time where we may find him, and I assure you we shall do to him according to his sins—”

  “Old Shepherd’s Inn, near Chestertown—the old, deserted place padlocked three years ago for violation of the Prohibition law,” the Chinaman broke in. “You’ll find him there at night, and with him—go there before the moon has set; by day he is abroad, and with him goes his captive, held fast in bonds of fear, but when the moon has climbed the heavens—” He broke off with a sigh of pain, and little beads of perspiration shone upon his brow. The man was going fast; the pauses between his words were longer, and his voice was scarcely louder than a whisper.

  “Renouard”—he rolled his head toward the Inspector—“in the old days you called me friend. Can you forget the things I did in madness and say good-bye to the man you used to know—will you take my hand, Renouard? I can not hold it out to you—I am too weak, but—”

  “Assuredly, I shall do more, mon vieux,” Renouard broke in. “Je vous salue!” He drew himself erect and raised his right hand in stiff and formal military greeting. Jules de Grandin followed suit.

  Then, in turn, they took the dying man’s hand in theirs and shook it solemnly.

  “Shades—of—honorable—ancestors, comes—now—Sun—Ah—Poy to be among—you!” the Oriental gasped, and as he finished speaking a rattle sounded in his throat and from the corners of his mouth there trickled thin twin streams of blood. His jaw relaxed, his eyes were set and glazed, his breast fluttered once or twice, then all was done.

  “Quicker than I thought,” de Grandin commented as he lifted the spare, twisted body from the chair and laid it on the couch, then draped a rug over it. “The moment I perceived his wound I knew the pleural wall was punctured, and it was but a matter of moments before internal hemorrhage set in and killed him, but my calculations erred. I would have said half an hour; he has taken only eighteen minutes to die. We must notify the coroner,” he added practically. “This news will bring great happiness to the police, and rejoice the newspapers most exceedingly, as well.”

  “I wonder how he got that wound?” I asked.

  “You wonder?” he gave me an astonished glance. “Last night we saw how Konstantin can throw a knife—Renouard’s shoulder is still sore in testimony of his skill. The wonder is he got away at all. I wish he had not died so soon; I should have liked to ask him how he did it.”

  7. Though This Be Damnation

  SHEPHERD’S INN WAS LIMNED against the back-drop of wind-driven snow like the gigantic carcass of a stranded leviathan. Remote from human habitation or activity, it stood in the midst of its overgrown grounds, skeletal remains of small summer-houses where in other days Bacchus had dallied drunkenly with Aphrodite stood starkly here and there among the rank-grown evergreens and frost-blasted weeds; flanking the building on the left was a row of frontless wooden sheds where young bloods of the nineties had stabled horse and buggy while reveling in the bar or numerous private dining-rooms upstairs; a row of hitching-posts for tethering the teams of more transient guests stood ranked before the porch. The lower windows were heavily barred by rusted iron rods without and stopped by stout wooden shutters within. Even creepers seemed to have felt the blight which rested on the place, for there was no patch of ivy green upon the brickwork which extended upward to the limit of the lower story.

  Beneath a wide-boughed pine we paused for council. “Sergeant,” de Grandin ordered, “you and Friend Trowbridge will enter at the rear—I have here the key which fits the door. Keep watchful eyes as you advance, and have your guns held ready, for you may meet with desperate resistance. I would advise that one of you precede the other, and that the first man hold the flashlight, and hold it well out from his body. Thus, if you’re seen by Konstantin and he fires or flings a knife at the light, you will suffer injury only to your hand or arm. Meanwhile, the one behind will keep sharp watch and fire at any sound or movement in the dark—a shotgun is most pleasantly effective at any range which can be had within a house.

  “Should you come on him unawares, shoot first and parley afterward. This is a foul thing we face tonight, my friends—one does not parley with a rattlesnake, neither does one waste time with a viper such as this. Non, by no means. And as you hope for pardon of your sins, shoot him but once; no matter what transpires, you are not to fire a second shot. Remember.

  “Renouard and I shall enter from the front and work our way toward you. You shall know when we are come by the fact that our flashlight will be blue—the light in that I give you will be red, so you may shoot at any but a blue light, and we shall blaze away whenever anything but red is shown. You understand?”

  “Perfectly, sor,” the Irishman returned.

  We stumbled through the snow until we reached the rear door and Costello knelt to fit the key into the lock while I stood guard above him with my gun.

  “You or me, sor?” he inquired as the lock unlatched, and even in the excitement of the moment I noted that its mechanism worked without a squeak.

  “Eh?” I answered.

  “Which of us carries th’ light?”

  “Oh. Perhaps I’d better. You’re probably a better shot than I.”

  “O.K. Lead th’ way, sor, an’ watch your shtep. I’ll be right behint ye.”

  Cautiously we crept through the service hall, darting the red rays of our flash to left and right, through the long-vacant dining-room, finally into the lobby at the front. As yet we saw no sign of Konstantin nor did we hear a sound betokening the presence of de Grandin or Renouard.

>   The foyer was paved with flagstones set in cement sills, and every now and then these turned beneath our feet, all but precipitating us upon our faces. The air was heavy and dank with that queer, unwholesome smell of earth one associates with graves and tombs; the painted woodwork was dust-grimed and dirty and here and there wallpaper had peeled off in leprous strips, exposing patches of the corpse-gray plaster underneath. From the center of the hall, slightly to the rear, there rose a wide grand staircase of wood. A sweep of my flashlight toward this brought an exclamation of surprise from both of us.

  The central flight of stairs which led to the landing whence the side-flights branched to left and right, was composed of three steps and terminated in a platform some six feet wide by four feet deep. On this had been placed some sort of packing-case or table—it was impossible to determine which at the quick glance we gave it, and over this was draped a cover of some dark material which hung down nearly to the floor. Upon this darker covering there lay a strip of linen cloth and upright at the center of the case was fixed some sort of picture or framed object, while at either end there stood what I first took to be candelabra, each with three tall black candles set into its sockets. “Why,” I began in a whisper, it looks like an—”

  “Whist, Doctor Trowbridge, sor, there’s some one comin’!” Costello breathed in my ear. “Shall I let ’em have it?” I heard the sharp click of his gunlock in the dark.

  “There’s a door behind us,” I whispered back. “Suppose we take cover behind it and watch to see what happens? If it’s our man and he comes in here, he’ll have to pass us, and we can jump out and nab him; if it’s de Grandin and Renouard, we’ll hail them and let them know there’s no one in the rear of the house. What d’ye say?”

  “A’right,” he acquiesced. “Let’s go.”

  We stepped back carefully, and I heard Costello fumbling with the door. “O.K., sor, it’s open,” he whispered. “Watch your shtep goin’ over th’ sill; it’s a bit high.”

  I followed him slowly, feeling my way with cautious feet, felt his big bulk brush past me as he moved to close the door; then:

  “Howly Moses!” he muttered. “It’s a trap we’re in, sor! It were a snap-lock on th’ door. Who th’ devil’d ’a’ thought o’ that?”

  He was right. As the door swung to there came a faint, sharp click of a spring lock, and though we strained and wrenched at the handle, the strong oak panels refused to budge.

  The room in which we were imprisoned was little larger than a closet, windowless and walled with tongue-and-groove planks in which a line of coat hooks had been screwed. Obviously at one time it had functioned as a sort of cloak room. For some reason the management had fancied decorations in the door, and some five feet from the floor twin designs of interlacing hearts had been bored through the panels with an auger. I blessed the unknown artist who had made the perforations, for they not only supplied our dungeon generously with air but made it possible for us to see all quarters of the lobby without betraying our proximity.

  “Don’t be talkin’, sor,” Costello warned. “There’s some one comin’!”

  The door across the lobby opened slowly, and through it, bearing a sacristan’s taper, came a cowled and surpliced figure, an ecclesiastical-looking figure which stepped with solemn pace to the foot of the staircase, sank low in genuflection, then mounted to the landing and lit the candles on the right, retreated, genuflected again, then lit companion candles at the left.

  As the wicks took fire and spread a little patch of flickering luminance amid the dark, my first impression was confirmed. The box-like object on the stairs was an altar, clothed and vested in accordance, with the rubric of the Orthodox Greek Church; at each end burned a trinity of sable candles which gave off an unpleasant smell, and in the center stood a gilt-framed ikon.

  Now the light fell full upon the sacristan’s face and with a start I recognized Dimitri, the burly Russian Renouard had felled the night we first met Konstantin and Sonia.

  The leering altar-wait retired, backed reverently from the parodied sanctuary, returned to the room whence he had entered, and in a moment we heard the sound of chanting mingled with the sharp, metallic clicking of a censer’s chains.

  Again Dimitri entered, this time swinging a smoking incense-pot, and close behind him, vested as a Russian priest, walked a tall, impressive figure. Above his sacerdotal garb his face stood out sharply in the candles’ lambent light, smooth-shaven, long-jawed, swarthy of complexion. His coal-black eyes were deep-set under curiously arched brows; his lusterless black hair was parted in the middle and brushed abruptly backward, leaving a down-pointing triangle in the center of his high and narrow forehead which indicated the commencement of a line which was continued in the prominent bowed nose and sharp, out-jutting chin. It was a striking face, a proud face, a face of great distinction, but a face so cruel and evil it reminded me at once of every pictured image of the devil which I had ever seen. Held high between his upraised hands the evil-looking man bore carefully a large chalice of silver-gilt with a paten fitted over it for cover.

  The floating cloud of incense stung my nostrils. I sniffed and fought away a strong impulse to sneeze. And all the while my memory sought to classify that strong and pungent odor. Suddenly I knew. On a vacation trip to Egypt I had spent an evening at an Arab camp out in the desert and watched them build their fires of camel-dung. That was it, the strong smell of ammonia, the faintly sickening odor of the carbonizing fumet!

  Chanting slowly in a deep, melodious voice, his attendant chiming in with the responses, the mock-priest marched to the altar and placed the sacred vessels on the fair cloth where the candle-rays struck answering gleams from their cheap gilding. Then with a deep obeisance he retreated, turned, and strode toward the doorway whence he came.

  Three paces from the portal he came to pause and struck his hands together in resounding claps, once, twice, three times; and though I had no intimation what I was about to see, I felt my heart beat faster and a curious weakness spread through all my limbs as I waited breathlessly.

  Into the faint light of the lobby, vague and nebulous as a phantom-form half seen, half apprehended, stepped Sonia. Slowly, with an almost regal dignity she moved. She was enfolded from white throat to insteps in a long and clinging cloak of heavily embroidered linen which one beautiful, slim hand clutched tight round her at the breast. Something familiar yet queerly strange about the garment struck me as she paused. I’d seen its like somewhere, but never on a woman—the candlelight struck full upon it, and I knew. It was a Greek priest’s white-linen over-vestment, an alb, for worked upon it in threads of gold and threads of silver and threads of iridescent color were double-barred Lorraine crosses and three mystic Grecian letters.

  “Are you prepared?” the pseudo-priest demanded as he bent his lusterless black eyes upon the girl’s pale face.

  “I am prepared,” she answered slowly. “Though this be damnation to my soul and everlasting corruption to my body, I am prepared, if only you will promise me that he shall go unharmed!”

  “Think well,” the man admonished, “this rite may be performed only with the aid of a woman pure in heart—a woman in whom there can be found no taint or stain of sin—who gives herself willingly and without reserve, to act the part I call on you to play. Are you such an one?”

  “I am such an one,” she answered steadily, though a ripple of heart-breaking horror ran across her blenching lips, even as they formed the words.

  “And you make the offer willingly, without reserve?” he taunted. “You know what it requires? What the consequences to your flesh and soul must be?” With a quick motion he fixed his fingers in her short, blond hair and bent her head back till he gazed directly down into her upturned eyes. “Willingly?” he grated. “Without reserve?”

  “Willingly,” she answered with a choking sob. “Yes, willingly, ten thousand times ten thousand times I offer up my soul and body without a single reservation, if you will promise—”

  �
�Then let us be about it!” he broke in with a low, almost soundless laugh.

  Dimitri, who had crouched before the altar, descended with his censer and bowed before the girl till his forehead touched the floor. Then he arose and wrapped the loose ends of his stole about him and passed the censer to the other man, while from a fold of his vestments he drew a strange metal plate shaped like an angel with five-fold outspread wings, and this he waved above her head while she moved slowly toward the altar and the other man walked backward, facing her and censing her with reeking fumes at every step.

  A gleam of golden slippers shone beneath her cloak as she approached the lowest of the altar steps, but as she halted for a moment she kicked them quickly off and mounted barefoot to the sanctuary, where she paused a breathless second and blessed herself, but in reverse, commencing at a point below her breast and making the sign of the cross upside-down.

  Then on her knees she fell, placing both hands upon the altar-edge and dropping her head between them, and groveled there in utter self-abasement while in a low but steady voice she repeated words which sent the chills of horror through me.

  I had not looked inside a Greek book for more than thirty years, but enough of early learning still remained for me to translate what she sang so softly in a firm, sweet voice:

  My soul doth magnify the Lord,

  And my spirit hath rejoiced

  In God my Savior,

  For He hath regarded the lowliness

  Of His handmaiden …

  The canticle was finished. She rose and dropped the linen cloak behind her and stretched her naked body on the altar, where she lay beneath the candles’ softly glowing light like some exquisite piece of carven Carrara marble, still, lifeless, cold.

  Chalice and paten were raised and placed upon the living altar-cloth, their hard, metallic weight denting the soft breasts and exquisite torso, their silver-gilt reflecting little halos of brightness on the milk-white skin. The vested man’s voice rose and fell in what seemed to me an endless chant, his kneeling deacon’s heavy guttural intoning the response. On, endlessly on, went the deep chant of celebration, pausing a breathless moment now and then as the order of the service directed that the celebrant should kiss the consecrated place of sacrifice, then hot and avid lips pressed shrinking, wincing flesh.