Weird Tales volume 31 number 03 (7 page)

Dmitri put down the gun and rubbed his hands together affably.

"Should anyone care to examine the back of that chair, he will find all the bullets I have just fired, together with a great many others fired in previous experiments." He stooped over his still, pallid-faced servant. "You may awaken now, little one." Then, to the horror-ridden group before him, "There will be refreshments and music immediately, downstairs. I will mingle among you, and you may ask me any cjuestions you wish."

Stepan, the slight, wholly undistinguished-appearing servant, had risen from the chair and was holding wide the door. Slowly, regally, his master walked from the room. . . .

WEIRD TALES

3. The Hypnotic tamp

**\7" ou *eally must meet him, Mar}'.

X He's—he's such an overwhelming personality, and it would be rude, really, to avoid him now. See, he's looking toward us "

Casually Mary Roberts turned her head. Across the long expanse of this almost flamboyantly oriental downstairs room in which Dmitri's guests had assembled she saw the man. He was seated in a massive, ivory-armed, dragon-footed chair, and he was talking to a group of three or four women. But he was looking beyond them, speculatively, at Mary.

"Helen, I'm afraid of him. He's—he's evil—blasphemous!"

Helen Stacey-Forbes only laughed. "Blasphemous?" she echoed. "Nonsense! He's only years ahead of his time. Never fear—his interest in you will vanish as soon as he learns that you can't pay his outrageous fees." She was already— Mary's arm linked in her own—threading her way through the chatting throng, . . .

The colossus, as they approached, abruptly cut short his conversation with the group of admiring ladies and turned his flabby bulk toward them.

"They are thrill-seekers, Miss Stacey-Forbes," he exclaimed petulantly. "Still —I have made appointments with two of them. . . . But how is your brother, Ronald? And who is your friend?"

"Dmitri—Mary Roberts," Helen Stacey-Forbes said formally. "Miss Roberts is the daughter of the Honorable James Roberts. . . . Ronald is well; he is very careful not to endanger himself."

Dmitri chuckled. "Ronald is being very careful, eh? Well, well—but accidents sometimes happen—and then there is only Dimitri." He stared fixedly at Mary. "You are very beautiful, my child; our Police Commissioner Ethredge is a fortunate man—indeed he is."

Mary Roberts flushed. "I was impressed by your — demonstration," she said hastily. "It was—spectacular."

He lifted a monstrous, shapeless paw.

"Histrionics," he said flatly. "My real work does not deal with such fireworks. Would you be convinced? Are you in every respect sound and well?"

Mary tried to repress the shudder of aversion that crept through her as she looked at the man.

"I am in perfect health," she said firmly.

Dmitri looked down at his great soft hands. Then he spoke, as it were casually, to Helen Stacey-Forbes.

"I have wanted—since your brother came to me a year ago—to examine you, as well. You come from an old family; should you marry it is possible that you would transmit to your children the hemophilia from which he suffers. Today is a propitious day; your friend can accompany us while I interrogate you; then, should she need me at some future time she would not fear me — as she does now."

Helen Stacey-Forbes' face was grave. "I had thought—of coming to you," she admitted. "Perhaps—if Miss Roberts is willing ?"

Mary objected only faintly. She was wondering if perhaps Helen had not really brought her here because she feared to be alone with this man. . . .

"The—guests?"

Dmitri glanced about the room, heaved himself ponderously to his feet.

"The guests!" he exclaimed. "We will be but a few minutes. Those in need of me will wait; the others are better gone. Come."

THE chamber into which Dmitri ushered the two young women was a small room, almost monastically furnished. There was a large table and

THE THING ON THE FLOOR

287

Dmitri's usual massive chair; several other, smaller chairs were scattered haphazardly about. A faded strip of carpeting ran diagonally from the door toward the table. There were no pictures, no bookcases or books, no filing-cabinet or desk. A telephone rested at one end of the table, close beside an ambiguity that —save for its grotesquely large bulb, full of an uncommon multiplicity of filaments and several oddly shaped and curiously perforated metal vanes—looked like an unshaded desk-lamp.

Dmitri lowered himself into his tremendous chair. "Sit down," he directed abruptly. "Compose yourselves. You, Miss Roberts, may watch this experiment; it is in no way new, yet it is always fascinating. Notice this lamp; it is so designed that it emits whorls of multicolored light, which move according to a recurrent pattern, somewhat in the manner of a pin-wheel."

His hands, hidden beneath the table, touched a concealed switch, and the odd-looking lamp began to glow in all its many filaments, while simultaneously the complexity of tiny vanes began to revolve, slowly at first and then faster and faster, until they had attained a maximum velocity beyond which there was no further acceleration. And as the filaments within the lamp gradually warmed, Mary realized that they gave off light of many colors, as varied and as beautiful as the spectrum seen in rainbows, colors which moved and changed in a weirdly hypnotic sequence of patterns. . . .

"Observe the lamp, Miss Stacey-Forbes," Dmitri said, in a calm, conversational tone. "Do not trouble to think— merely observe the lamp—see how the colors melt and run together and repeat themselves again "

Abruptly the ceiling light was extinguished. And Mary Roberts gasped at the unearthly beauty of the whirling

lights; even beneath the cold glow of the Mazda lamp they had been a strange symphony, but now, glowing and whirling like a mighty nebula of spinning

suns ! Her eyes were riveted upon

them; the)' seemed to draw her toward

them, to suck her into themselves. . . .

"Observe the lights, Miss Stacey-

Forbes " Mary knew that it was

Dmitri's voice, yet it sounded billions of miles away. And, curiously, she believed for a fleeting instant that there was a new note in that slumbrous whisper—a hint of exultation. But the thought vanished in its second of birth, lost amid the maze of spinning lights—the lights that were too, too beautiful. . . .

4. The Stolen Jewels

MRS. Gregory luce stood surveying herself with pardonable satisfaction in the almost-complete circle of full-length, chromium-framed mirrors that glittered their utilitarian splendor in a corner of her bedroom. It was well, she was reflecting, that the electric-blue gown fitted her with wrinkleless perfection, that her hair was a miracle even Francois had seldom achieved; today was her tenth wedding anniversary, and tonight Gregory was taking her to hear Tristan and Isolde.

With sophisticated grace she returned to her dressing-table and seated herself. In her walk, languid and self-appreciative though it had been, there was nevertheless a vague essence reminiscent of Mary Roberts; Prisdlla Luce might almost have been a prophetic vision of Mary as she would some day be—their mothers were sisters. Only Priscilla was a little more the cautious type than was Mary: Priscilla had selected her husband with an eye to the future; she did not wholly approve of Charles Ethredge. Otherwise the two young women were very much alike. . . ,

:ss

WEIRD TALES

Slowly, then, Priscilla Luce smiled. Surprizingly, her marriage had turned out an emotional as well as a financial success; she was truly grateful to and in love with Gregory, now. There had been an unsuspected tinge of romanticism in him, after all; on their wedding day he had given her his grandmother's emerald brooch, set with its great, flawless, square-cut stone—and the ruby and emerald tiara. And today he had brought her a Cartier bracelet, also of cool green emeralds. . . .

Languidly she arose and walked to the south wall. Here, between the two windows, hung a single, exquisite little etching. Priscilla Luce reached up, swung the etching back on cleverly concealed hinges, twirled the combination of the blued-steel wall-safe. . . .

In the moment that she reached inside the tiny safe Priscilla Luce knew that someone other than herself had handled the little leather-bound jewel-cases within.

For a moment she stood stock-still. Then, carefully, she began to remove the jewel-cases, opening and examining each one.

When she had finished she walked to the dressing-table and sat down. She knew that she would not tell Gregory tonight; she would wear the Cartier bracelet, and he would not know; his evening would not be spoiled. But she would have to tell him, tomorrow, and they would have to decide what to do. . . .

The emerald brooch and the priceless old tiara were gone!

And very clearly Priscilla Luce realized that the thief was someone they knew

someone they trusted. . . .

She stared at herself in the mirror.

She was beginning to feel frightened,

beginning to feci a sick, anticipatory dread. . . .

5. Ethredge Hears Startling News

When Police Commissioner Charles B. Ethredge received Priscilla Luce's enigmatic and disturbingly urgent telephone call he lost no time in getting to the Vermont marble and Bethlehem steel palace the Luce millions had built, ten years before, for Gregory Luce's young bride. "It concerns Mary, terribly," his fiancee's cousin had said, her voice taut and strange, "but do not, under any circumstances, tell her that I have called you."

Priscilla Luce met him in the library. She greeted him with grave gratitude; as soon as they were seated she began almost bruskly to speak.

"I called you, Charles, because you are both influential and discreet, and because you are vitally concerned in what I have to say. Charles, do you know anything of a psychiatrist who came to town about fourteen months ago—a man who calls himself Dmitri?"

Ethredge nodded.

"Why, yes, I have heard of him; Mary attended one of his Thursday evenings a week or two ago with Helen Stacey-Forbes. Helen is enthusiastic about what he seems to have done for Ronald."

Priscilla Luce smiled thinly. "It seems strange that Ronald was never ill until after he met this Dmitri. Do you know anything more about the man?"

"Yes," Ethredge grunted, "I do. Dmitri is a sensationalist. The more conservative psychiatrists have tried to convict him of extortion, of making Messianic and un-fulfillable promises, of other unethical and even criminal practises. As he is still practising, their attempts, needless to say, have all failed."

Priscilla Luce nodded.

"What did Mary say about him?"

Ethredge grinned.

"Very little. Said that she was amused W. T.—2

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289

■—that perhaps, beneath all his stage trappings, the man might even be competent. That's all."

Nervously Priscilla Luce leaned forward.

"Charles, obviously you don't know that Mary has been after me these past two weeks to go to Dmitri's with her. She hasn't asked me merely a few times; asked me incessantly. I've always refused—Gregorj, as you know, would disapprove—and since last Friday she hasn't asked me once. But last Thursday evening she went again to Dmitri's. Did you know?"

Ethredge's mouth was grim. "I didn't. no."

Priscilla Luce leaned forward and put her hands pleadingly on Charles Eth-iean strong wrists.

"This is going to be hard, terribly hard, to tell you. And please, Charles, please understand that I have not come to you because you are Mary's fiance; I am not as despicable as that. I have come to you because you are the Commissioner of Police, because, if anyone can, you can help her "

"In God's name." Ethredge whispered, "what is wrong? Tell me "

The woman's face was drawn with miser)'.

"Between Thursday last and last night Grandma Luce's brooch and tiara were stolen from my wall-safe. Only two pcr-,ow the combination to that safe, and of those two persons Gregory is automatically absolved "

"You . It was not a

question; it was a statement—flat, lifeless. And in Ethredge's heart was a slow-growing horror, for this thing Mary could never have done; yet he knew, knew already that her hands had taken the jewels. . . .

"Yes. Oregon,' has had private detec-\V. T.— 3

tives—from Philadelphia. Mary's fingerprints "

There was silence in that room, then, while Ethredge stared at Priscilla Luce's slender, patrician hands, still clasping his wrists.

"It was not in Mar)' to do this thing, ' he said at last, quietly. "There must be some other explanation, however incredible. Mary could never steal."

The small hands touching his wrists trembled.

"Perhaps 1 was wrong about you, and Mar)'," Priscilla Luce said softly. "I was arrogant—and ambitious for her. I am sorry."

Suddenly her eyes welled with tears, the great drops falling like glistening diamonds on Ethredge's hands. . . .

6. Ethredge Asks Help

""pETERS, come to my apartment; I've JL got to talk to you."

Detective-Lieutenant Peters of the homicide squad, sitting with his square-toed boots outsplayed on the scarred top of his Detective-Bureau desk, listened, his face expressionless as stone, to the taut, nerve-racked voice of his chief. Calmly he spoke.

"O. K., Commissioner; I'll be right out." Carefully, leaning forward from his hips, he set the telephone down. For an instant he did not move; then he swung his feet to the floor and stood erect. His face, as he crossed the room toward the coat-rack, was still impassive.

Yet within his skull his thoughts were seething. Through an instinct born of long association and mutual trust he knew that the Commissioner had at last decided to confide in him; between the Commissioner and his subordinate there existed a peculiar—and by jnost persons unsuspected—friendship. . . .

WEIRD TALES

The distance to Ethredge's home was not great, and Peters, driving a police sedan, covered it quickly. The Commissioner, when he rang, let him in at once.