The Secrets of Dr. Taverner (3 page)

"I paid no attention," I said. "Such a thing is common enough
with mental cases."

"There is a sphere of influence, a kind of psychic bell jar,
over this house to keep out evil entities, what might in popular
language be called a `spell.' Craigie's familiar could not come
inside, and did not like being left behind. I thought we might be
able to tire it out by keeping Craigie away from its influences,
but it has got too strong a hold over him, and he deliberately
co-operates with it. Evil communications corrupt good manners,
and you can't keep company with a thing like that and not be
tainted, especially if you are a sensitive Celt like Craigie."

When we reached the room Taverner went over to the
window and passed his hand across the sill, as if sweeping
something aside.

"There," he said. "It can come in now and fetch him out, and
we will see what it does."

At the doorway he paused again and made a sign on the
lintel.

"I don't think it will pass that," he said.

When I returned to the office I found the village policeman
waiting to see me.

"I should be glad if you would keep an eye on your dog, sir,"
he said. `We have been having complaints of sheepkilling lately,
and whatever animal is doing it is working in a three-mile radius
with this as the centre."

"Our dog is an Airedale," I said. "I should not think he is
likely to be guilty. It is usually collies that take to sheepkilling."

At eleven o'clock we turned out the lights and herded our
patients off to bed. At Taverner's request I changed into an old
suit and rubber-soled tennis shoes and joined him in the
smoking-room, which was under Craigie's bedroom. We sat in
the darkness awaiting events.

"I don't want you to do anything," said Taverner, "but just to
follow and see what happens."

We had not long to wait.

In about a quarter-of-an-hour we heard a rustling in the
creepers, and down came Craigie hand over fist, swinging
himself along by the great ropes of wisteria that clothed the wall.
As he disappeared into the shrubbery I slipped after him,
keeping in the shadow of the house.

He moved at a stealthy dog-trot over the heather paths
towards Frensham.

At first I ran and ducked, taking advantage of every patch of
shadow, but presently I saw that this caution was unnecessary.
Craigie was absorbed in his own affairs, and thereupon I drew
closer to him, following at a distance of some sixty yards.

He moved at a swinging pace, a kind of loping trot that put
me in mind of a bloodhound. The wide, empty levels of that
forsaken country stretched out on either side of us, belts of mist
filled the hollows, and the heights of Hindhead stood out against
the stars. I felt no nervousness; man for man, I reckoned I was a
match for Craigie, and, in addition, I was armed with what is
technically known as a "soother"--two feet of lead gas-piping
inserted in a length of rubber hose-pipe. It is not included in the
official equipment of the best asylums, but can frequently be
found in a keeper's trouser-leg.

If I had known what I had to deal with I should not have put
so much reliance on my "soother." Ignorance is sometimes an
excellent substitute for courage.

Suddenly out of the heather ahead of us a sheep got up, and
then the chase began. Away went Craigie in pursuit, and away
went the terrified wether. A sheep can move remarkably fast for
a short distance, but the poor wool-encumbered beast could not
keep pace, and Craigie ran it down, working in gradually
lessening circles. It stumbled, went to its knees, and he was on it.
He pulled its head back, and whether he used a knife or not I
could not see, for a cloud passed over the moon, but dimly
luminous in the shadow, I saw something that was
semitransparent pass between me and the dark, struggling mass
among the heather. As the moon cleared the clouds I made out
the flat-topped cap and field-grey uniform of the German Army.

I cannot possibly convey the sickening horror of that
sight--the creature that was not a man assisting the man who,
for the moment, was not human.

Gradually the sheep's struggles weakened and ceased.
Craigie straightened his back and stood up; then he set off at his
steady lope towards the east, his grey familiar at his heels.

How I made the homeward journey I do not know. I dared not
look behind lest I should find a Presence at my elbow; every
breath of wind that blew across the heather seemed to be cold
fingers on my throat; fir trees reached out long arms to clutch me
as I passed under them, and heather bushes rose up and assumed
human shapes. I moved like a runner in a nightmare, making
prodigious efforts after a receding goal.

At last I tore across the moonlit lawns of the house,
regardless who might be looking from the windows, burst into
the smoking-room and flung myself face downwards on the sofa.

IV
"Tut, tut!" said Taverner. "Has it been as bad as all that?"

I could not tell him what I had seen, but he seemed to know.

"Which way did Craigie go after he left you?" he asked.

"Towards the moonrise," I told him.

"And you were on the way to Frensham? He is heading for
the Wynters' house. This is very serious, Rhodes. We must go
after him; it may be too late as it is. Do you feel equal to coming
with me?"

He gave me a stiff glass of brandy, and we went to get the car
out of the garage. In Taverner's company I felt secure. I could
understand the confidence he inspired in his patients. Whatever
that grey shadow might be, I felt he could deal with it and that I
would be safe in his hands.

We were not long in approaching our destination.

"I think we will leave the car here," said Taverner, turning
into a grass-grown lane. `We do not want to rouse them if we
can help it."

We moved cautiously over the dew-soaked grass into the
paddock that bounded one side of the Wynters' garden. It was
separated from the lawn by a sunk fence, and we could
command the whole front of the house and easily gain the
terrace if we so desired. In the shadow of a rose pergola we
paused. The great trusses of bloom, colourless in the moonlight,
seemed a ghastly mockery of our business.

For some time we waited, and then a movement caught my
eye.

Out in the meadow behind us something was moving at a
slow lope; it followed a wide arc, of which the house formed the
focus, and disappeared into a little coppice on the left. It might
have been imagination, but I thought I saw a wisp of mist at its
heels.

We remained where we were, and presently he came round
once more, this time moving in a smaller circle-- evidently
closing in upon the house. The third time he reappeared more
quickly, and this time he was between us and the terrace.

"Quick! Head him off," whispered Taverner. "He will be up
the creepers next round."

We scrambled up the sunk fence and dashed across the lawn.
As we did so a girl's figure appeared at one of the windows; it
was Beryl Wynter. Taverner, plainly visible in the moonlight,
laid his finger on his lips and beckoned her to come down.

"I am going to do a very risky thing," he whispered, "but she
is a girl of courage, and if her nerve does not fail we shall be
able to pull it off."

In a few seconds she slipped out of a side door and joined us,
a cloak over her night-dress.

"Are you prepared to undertake an exceedingly unpleasant
task?" Taverner asked her. "I can guarantee you will be perfectly
safe so long as you keep your head, but if you lose your nerve
you will be in grave danger."

"Is it to do with Donald?" she inquired.

"It is," said Taverner. "I hope to be able to rid him of the
thing that is overshadowing him and trying to obsess him."

"I have seen it," she said; "it is like a wisp of grey vapour
that floats just behind him. It has the most awful face you ever
saw. It came up to the window last night, just the face only,
while Donald was going round and round the house."

"What did you do?" asked Taverner.

"I didn't do anything. I was afraid that if someone found him
he might be put in an asylum, and then we should have no
chance of getting him well."

Taverner nodded.

"`Perfect love casteth out fear,'" he said. "You can do the
thing that is required of you."

He placed Miss Wynter on the terrace in full moonlight. "As
soon as Craigie sees you," he said, "retreat round the corner of
the house into the yard. Rhodes and I will wait for you there."

A narrow doorway led from the terrace to the back premises,
and just inside its arch Taverner bade me take my stand.

"Pinion him as he comes past you and hang on for your life,"
he said. "Only mind he doesn't get his teeth into you; these
things are infectious."

We had hardly taken up our positions when we heard the
loping trot come round once more, this time on the terrace itself.
Evidently he caught sight of Miss Wynter, for the stealthy
padding changed to a wild scurry over the gravel, and the girl
slipped quickly through the archway and sought refuge behind
Taverner. Right on her heels came Craigie. Another yard and he
would have had her, but I caught him by the elbows and
pinioned him securely. For a moment we swayed and struggled
across the dew-drenched flagstones, but I locked him in an old
wrestling grip and held him.

"Now," said Taverner, "if you will keep hold of Craigie I will
deal with the other. But first of all we must get it away from
him, otherwise it will retreat on to him, and he may die of shock.
Now, Miss Wynter, are you prepared to play your part?"

"I am prepared to do whatever is necessary," she replied.
Taverner took a scalpel out of a pocket case and made a small
incision in the skin of her neck, just under the ear. A drop of
blood slowly gathered, showing black in the moonlight.

"That is the bait," he said. "Now go close up to Craigie and
entice the creature away; get it to follow you and draw it out into
the open."

As she approached us Craigie plunged and struggled in my
arms like a wild beast, and then something grey and shadowy
drew out of the gloom of the wall and hovered for a moment at
my elbow. Miss Wynter came nearer, walking almost into it.

"Don't go too close," cried Taverner, and she paused.

Then the grey shape seemed to make up its mind; it drew
clear of Craigie and advanced towards her. She retreated
towards Taverner, and the Thing came out into the moonlight.
We could see it quite clearly from its flat-topped cap to its
knee-boots; its high cheekbones and slit eyes pointed its origin
to the south-eastern corner of Europe where strange tribes still
defy civilization and keep up their still stranger beliefs.

The shadowy form drifted onwards, following the girl across
the yard, and when it was some twenty feet from Craigie,
Taverner stepped out quickly behind it, cutting off its retreat.
Round it came in a moment, instantly conscious of his presence,
and then began a game of "puss-in-the-corner." Taverner was
trying to drive it into a kind of psychic killing-pen he had made
for its reception. Invisible to me, the lines of psychic force
which bounded it were evidently plainly perceptible to the
creature we were hunting. This way and that way it slid in its
efforts to escape, but Taverner all the time herded it towards the
apex of the invisible triangle, where he could give it its coup de
grace.