CHAPTER XXIII
The tide reached its full, shortly after two o'clock, and then began toebb. Almost at once the little waves of the lagoon smoothed out, theylapped no more against the craggy margin, and the water lay like a sheetof gray glass. I had seen the same transformation on several previousoccasions, but to-night it seemed to get hold of me as never before.
Seemingly it partook of a miraculous quality to-night--as if winds hadbeen suddenly stilled by a magician's art. The water was of courseflowing out between the crevices of the rock wall, yet there was nosense of motion. The water-line dropped slowly down.
It is an unescapable fact that the whole atmosphere of the Ochakeecountry is one of death. The moss-draped forests seem without life, therivers convey no sense of motion, the air is dead, and vegetation rotsunderfoot. To-night the lagoon was without any image or indication oflife. The whole vista seemed like some dead, forgotten wasteland in adream--a place where living things had never come and was foreverincompatible with life.
It was a mysterious hour. The half-crescent moon rose at last, at firsta silver tinting of the skyline, a steadily growing wave of light andthen the sharply outlined moon itself above the eastern forest. The darkshadows that were my companions took form, strengthened; again I couldsee their erect figures on the gray crags and the gleam of their riflesin their arms. The perspective widened, the rock wall seemed to extend,stretch ever further across the lagoon, and now the sky was graying inthe East.
A moment later I heard Weldon's voice, ringing full in the hush of thedying night, as he spoke Slatterly's name. The latter answered at once.
"Yes. What is it?"
"Let's go in. The night's over and nothing's happened. It's pretty nearbright day already."
It was true that the eastern sky had begun to be tinged with gray. Icould see the lines of my hands and the finer mechanisms of the rifle.The hour, however, seemed later than it really was, simply because ofthe effulgence of the moon. The dread atmosphere of Kastle Krags had ina moment been wholly destroyed. Instead of a place of mystery andperil, it was simply an old-time manor-house fronting the sea, builtbetween the forest and a calm lagoon.
There didn't seem any use of watching further. If the night was not yet,in fact, completely over, the moon and the graying east gave the effectof morning. Perhaps the fact that the outgoing tide had stilled thelagoon had its effect too. The ominous sound of breaking waves was gone,and it gave a perfect image of quietude and peace.
Slatterly waited an instant before he answered. "Wait a little more," hesaid in a resigned tone. "But you're right--it's almost morning."
I don't think it was five minutes later that I saw Weldon leave his postand saunter over to the sheriff's side. I suppose, bored with his task,the time seemed much longer to him. True, the lagoon was gray, theshadows of the garden had lost their mystery, and there didn't seem anyuse of waiting. Indeed, I don't think any of us escaped a sense of innerembarrassment--something akin to ignominy and chagrin--that we should bestanding beside that quiet water-body, with high-powered rifles in ourhands. It made us feel secretly ridiculous.
Nopp called over, cheerily, "Through for the night?"
"Might as well," Slatterly answered. "It was a fool party anyway."
Very glad that the watch was over, I left my own post, and we had acigarette apiece beside the still lagoon. Then we went through thegardens to the house.
"We've disrupted the regular schedule, anyway," Nopp said. "I thinkwe've come to the end of our trouble, and nothing more to fear. Man, doyou think to-day will clear the thing up?"
"What chance is there to clear up such a mess in one day?" The sheriffspoke moodily.
"Because you're going to have some real help--not a lot of bunglingamateurs. You know who's coming?"
"Lacone--Van Hope's detective."
"Yes. He's a distinguished man--a real scientist in the study of crime.He may do wonders, even in one day."
"I only hope he does! I don't care who clears it up--as long as it'scleared. Now to get a little sleep."
Tired out, we went to our rooms. The cool of early morning had sweptthrough the halls, and the first glimmer of dawn was at the windows. Howwhite the moon was in the sky, how mysteriously gray the whole sweep ofshore and sea! So tired I dreaded the work of undressing, I sat down amoment before the window that overlooked the lagoon.
The moonlight and the dawn gave the appearance of a mist, a gray mist asis sometimes seen over water when the sky is overcast with heavy clouds.At that moment it was impossible to conceive of anything but grayness.The whole conception that the brain had, the only interpretation thatthe senses made was of this same, lifeless hue. If an artist had triedto paint the picture that was spread before my window he would haveneeded but one tube of paint.
It was in some way vaguely startling. It went home to some darkknowledge within a man, and left him fearful and expectant. The shoreand the sea were gray, the gardens were swept with grayness, the lagoonitself had lost its many colors and only the same neutral tint remained.The only way that the eye could distinguish shore from sea, and gardenfrom shore, was the gradations of the same hue.
Surely dawn was almost at hand. The moon looked less vivid in the sky.And nothing remained but to find what sleep I could.
But at that instant my senses quickened. I could hardly call it astart--it was just a sudden wakening of mind and body. I wasn't theleast sure.... Perhaps in a moment the old lull, the well-rememberedsense of well-being and security would return. It had seemed to me thata swift shadow glided through the grayness at the shore of the lagoon.
The window afforded a remarkably wide glimpse of that particular part ofthe estate. The rift in the trees permitted a view of scattered segmentsof the rock wall itself. And it wasn't to be that I could turn and leavethem to the gray of morning. In that mysterious, eerie light I saw thewhisking shadow again.
It was not merely some little creeping thing from the forest--someliving creature such as stirs about at the first ray of dawn. The shadowwas much too large. I would have thought, at the first glance, that itwas the shadow of a man. But at that instant the figure emerged into theopen, and I knew the truth.
The trim form on the shore of the lagoon was that of Edith Nealman. Icould see her outline with entire plainness, dark against the gray. Someerrand of stealth had taken her down to the shore of the lagoon themoment that it was left unguarded.
In an instant she disappeared, and in the interval I found out howdeeply and inexplicably startled I was. And then I saw her again,walking out on the natural rock bridge, and carrying some heavy object,that dragged on the rocks, in her arms.
I could see her stooped figure, and the shadow of the thing thatdragged. And there is no telling under Heaven the thoughts and theterrors that swept through me as to what that dragging thing might be.
But in an instant I saw what it was. It was a rather long, heavy plank,certainly of wood. She was about two hundred feet out on the rock wallby now, and I saw that she was launching the plank to the right of thewall, in the water of the lagoon. Before I could wonder or exclaim sheherself had slipped in with it, her arms pale white from the shouldersof her dark bathing suit, wading out and guiding the heavy plank besideher.
No man who had read that mysterious script could doubt what her purposewas. She had gone fourteen rods out on the wall, and then she had turnedto the right into the lagoon. Plainly she was searching for Jason'streasure.
She, too, knew the key. In that same flash of time, I understood thelook of intent I had seen on her face earlier that night. She had kepther resolve--even now she was herself trying to sound the mystery of heruncle's disappearance. I understood her own exultation when I hadtalked of my many scientific plans, and how I lacked means to carry themout. Even then she had likely been working on the cryptogram. It waswholly possible that either Nealman or herself had encountered a copy ofthe script in the old house, and they had worked on it together.
But there had been some sort of a
guard put over Jason's treasure! Withwhat right had we been so smugly certain that the old legend was nottrue--that there was not still some evil, tentacled monster of the deepleft to slay and drag to his cavern those that dared to penetrate thelagoon. Even now she was wading further and further from the rock wall.I could see just her head and the top of her shoulders above water, theheavy plank still guided beside her.
Fear is an emotion that speeds like lightning through the avenues of thenerves. In the instant that these thoughts went home--thoughts thatwould have taken moments to narrate in speech but which whipped throughthe mind in the twinkling of an eye--I plumbed the utter depths of fear.There can be no other word. The gray expanse seemed the waters of deathitself; the whole scene, in the gray of dawn, was eerie, savage,unutterably dreadful. And the girl that had come to be my own life waseven now wholly within the power of any monstrous foe that should leaveits cavern to attack her.
Why had we been so sure! Why hadn't we guarded those deadly waters everyhour, day and night. Every day teaches that many things that seemedincredible a day ago are true: how had we dared to be so arrogant inregard to the legend of the lagoon. Even when three men, one afteranother, had disappeared without trace we had refused to change ourancient habits of thought: we had still refused to believe. I knew nowthe fate of the missing men. They had gone in search of Jason'schest--and the treasure guard that dwelt in the lagoon had put them todeath. And just before my eyes the girl I loved was following the paththey made, making the same quest.
And in that breathless, never-to-be-forgotten moment, I heard aresounding splash of water. Against the craggy, opposite shore the waterflew far and white as some living thing that had been concealed in thefar crags dived toward her through the still waters of the lagoon.
The whole scene had seemingly occupied less than a second. Already,before I could breathe, I was leaping down the corridor towards thestairs. I called once for help--a door behind me opened. Then I was outin the gray dawn, racing toward the lagoon.
There seemed no interlude of time between the instant that I saw thatsplashing water and that in which I had plunged full into the graydepths myself. In reality there was a space of several seconds--the graylight showed me that the drama of the lagoon had progressed immeasurablyfurther. The girl was fifty or sixty feet from the rock wall now, justher head showing above water, her arms locked tight about the plank andfacing her approaching foe. And something that swam swiftly madestreaming ripples toward her.
I swam with amazing ease and swiftness. The terror, innate love of life,were all forgotten in the hope that I might reach Edith's side in time.And now, by the gray light of dawn, I saw that her foe was upon her.
They were struggling with a desperate frenzy, and for an instant thesplashing water almost obscured them. The plank had been torn from hergrasp, and by some circumstance had been sped hopelessly out of herreach. And now, the water clearing from my eyes, I could determine theidentity of her assailant. No matter what further fate the lagoon had instore for her, this foe was human, at least. Terrible and drawn withpassion as it was, I saw the face of Major Kenneth Dell, the man who haddisappeared the preceding night.
I yelled, trying to give hope. Already I was almost upon them; and Dellhad released his hold of the girl. Whatever had been his purpose it hadbeen forgotten in the face of some greater extremity. Their fight was nomore with each other: rather they seemed at death grips with someresistless foe that tore at them from beneath the waves.
I saw Dell's face. An unspeakable terror, that of one who in wickednessgoes down to an awful death, was on his face. It was such a terror asmen can know but once, for they never live to tell of it, and whichblasts the heart of any one that beholds it. No artist, delving into theabnormal, could have portrayed that fear. It was a thing never toforget, but ever to see again in dreams.
Edith was terrified too, but such a terror as Dell knew was impossiblefor her. The fear of death that curses a godless man is perhaps the mostdreadful retributive force in this world or the next, and Dell knew itto the full. No one who had seen his face could doubt but that all theiniquity of a long life had been atoned for, in one little moment, inthe scales of justice. But only a measure of it could oppress her. Theonly fear that her fine young soul could know was that born of theelemental love of life. And with what seemed to be a final effort sheraised her head to call a warning to me.
But even if I had heeded it, it would have come too late. I saw theheads of the man and woman in front of me go down as if drawn byquicksand. And there was no escape for me. The death that dwelt in thelagoon had already seized me in its resistless grasp.
But the guard over Jason's treasure was not merely some monsterimplanted from the sea, a mortal thing that years could claim ormuscular strength oppose. Rather it was a power that had dwelt theresince the world's young days, ever claiming tribute, and which wouldcontinue on until the very sea itself was changed. The demon that hadhold of me was merely that of rushing waters. They swept me forward andsucked me down with remorseless force.
There was a sink-hole in the floor of the lagoon. No wonder the waterthat rushed in at high-tide had seemed to go so quietly away. I wasbeing carried down a subterranean outlet, through some water passageunder the rock wall, and into the open sea.