The haunting hand
daybreak and the consequent danger of discovery.
She measured the distance to the door leading into the hall. It wasn’t
so far, and if she didn’t get muscle-bound with fear, she could make
it with one long spring. But even so, before she could open the door,
there would be another spring--from the Other One under the bed, and
It would catch her before she could turn the handle. And if not a
spring, then a shot at her, for of course the creature must be armed.
No! Even if she were to get out of bed in a leisurely, unsuspicious
fashion, for whatever apparent purpose, she would be attacked as
surely and swiftly as if she were to scream for help.
Horrible, this waiting and thinking and planning! Horrible this unseen
menace--man or woman, sane or insane, violent or craven! There was a
limit to what even her healthy nerves could endure without snapping.
A sudden memory of Gene begging to let him call her up. If only she
had told him he might do so. Ridiculous! He would have rung her up an
hour ago at least, and by now he was probably sound asleep. He had
supposed that she was going immediately to bed, and would not have
dared to risk disturbing her after this long interval, even if she had
consented to let him call her.
A sudden alternative, a desperate expedient occurred to her with a
quickening of her pulse. Why couldn’t she call Gene! She would be
taking a fearful chance, for the mere calling of Central might be the
signal for an attack. To be sure, when calling for the police one had
merely to say the one word to the operator, therefore an ordinary
number would sound innocent enough. But how could she be sure that any
such reasoning would occur to the mind of a maniac? The mere sound of
her voice might be enough to bring that creeping, ghostly arm from
under the bed, and the body to which the arm belonged. But she _must_
do something! She’d call Central and get Gene’s number. After
that--God knew what!
Her hand trembling so that she very nearly dropped the instrument, she
lifted the telephone from the table to the bed. She put the receiver
to her ear and after the usual interval at such an hour, when night
operators often seem to be sound asleep, she heard Central’s weak and
far away reply. Nothing stirred in that room of horror except her
trembling body and her anguished breathing. So far, her plan was not
bringing her lurking enemy from hiding.
She heard the distant ringing of Gene’s bell,--ringing, ringing. Again
her heart seemed to be in her throat, choking her. Suppose that Gene
slept so soundly that no mere telephone bell could arouse him! Many
men slept like that. How did she know where Gene had the instrument!
It might be in his closet or his bathroom, anywhere but in his
bedroom! These possibilities flashed through her tortured brain and
made the few seconds seem like hours. Then came a still worse fear.
Perhaps Gene had changed his mind and not gone home at all! She
remembered that often he had told her of taking long midnight walks in
Central Park, when he was unhappy about her and knew that he could not
sleep because of her. Perhaps that was where he was, right that
moment!
Fear weights time with lead, even when thoughts fly in whirling
rapidity through one’s brain. Perhaps Central wasn’t calling the right
number! Her suspense--by this time, acute agony--was unbearable. She
signalled for the operator, started to repeat the number, and
then--God, the relief! Gene’s voice, dull and clouded with sleep,
saying “Hello!” as if he’d like to murder somebody if he were not too
sleepy to take the trouble.
She almost screamed with the easing of tension. Using what little
control she had left, she modulated her voice to a pitch of casual
friendliness and unconcern. Her inspiration had come! She knew,
suddenly, just what she was going to say to Gene.
“I suppose you’ll curse me for waking you up, Gene.”
“For Heaven’s sake, Margot!”
All sleepiness and latent irritation gone; an eager, naïve joy in his
tone, struck her as ludicrous, considering her desperate need of him.
“Awfully sorry to disturb you, but I’ve been trying to read myself to
sleep with a French book, and I’ve struck a passage I can’t
understand. Will you translate it?”
“Translate--French!” His voice sounded flat with disappointment.
Apparently the absurdity of her request did not strike him. Gene was
like that--so darn literal. And he was accustomed to her being erratic
at all times and seasons.
“Yes. Now listen carefully, Gene! These are the phrases that I don’t
understand:
“_Il y a un homme au-dessous de mon lit. Venez tout de suite!_”
She pronounced each word with slow distinctness. Her blood tingled in
her veins and pricked her skin with the realization that if her enemy
happened to know French, it would be all up with her in a few seconds.
He might wait until she hung up the receiver, knowing that a sudden
outcry of fear from her would give the alarm over the wire, but
_after_ that----
For an instant Gene was silent, apparently too surprised to answer
her. He knew well enough that she read French with ease. Then a laugh
came to her over the wires.
“What’s the joke, Margot? Surely you know what those phrases mean.”
Oh, Heavens! Gene, with his literal mind, and his slow imagination!
“I’ll repeat what I said, dear. Guess you didn’t hear me.”
She had all she could do this time to control the trembling of her
voice.
She repeated the foreign words slowly, striving to cut through space
to where Gene seemed to exist only as a voice. By the color in her own
voice and sheer force of will, she must get her meaning over to him.
Sleepiness perhaps made Gene dense. He translated a little flippantly:
“‘_There’s a man under my bed. Come at once!_’”
A third time she repeated the words, then said in English with
cautious urgency:
“Get it now, don’t you, Gene?”
He got it! She heard his gasp of horror.
“Good God! Be there in five minutes!”
“Wait a second, Gene!”
Another swift thought had come to her. The door to her room was not
locked. Thank God for that! She could never have left the bed and gone
to the door, even to open it for Gene. She recalled distinctly having
put the lock on the catch, early in the evening, and had forgotten to
change it. Gene could walk right in!
“Just one more phrase I can’t understand. _Pas besoin de frapper. Ma
porte est ouverte._”
“All right, all right. Be right over!”
“Thanks for translating,” she said quietly, to complete the pretense,
if indeed it were still that. The receiver at Gene’s end had already
been hung up. “Good night!”
Then--seconds that were years of waiting for _It_ to come forth! It
would surely come now if her French had been understood. Nothing! Not
a sound--not a movement. Only the beating of her own heart, so loud it
sounded to her that she wondered if it could not be heard by whatever
it was that waited beneath her.
Gone, that particular and immediate danger! _It_ had _not_ understood
French! She relaxed on her pillow with a sigh that was almost a groan
of relief. Odd that she should still be safe, she reflected vaguely.
Only a few minutes and Gene would be here! Thank Heaven that he lived
in the same block! He would have to ring the house bell, but it
connected with the basement and could not be heard upstairs. Again
thank God for all small mercies.
Hours! Days! Weeks! Then--upon the deathly stillness came a faint
sound of creaking wood. Gene was on the stairs! He was on the landing!
She could hear the shuffle of his feet! Then--the handle of her door
turning without sound, and the next second the door was thrown open,
literally hurled back against the wall. She saw Gene standing there, a
revolver in his hand. She saw him glance at her as if to be sure of
her safety before he could think of anything else. His face was
deathly white. Margot lay under the bed covers as stiff and still as
if she were dead.
Then she heard Gene’s quiet command:
“Get out from under that bed!”
Silence--a silence so thick with suspense that it seemed a part of the
living menace which remained invisible.
Good God! Gene was a target as he stood there waiting, his revolver
leveled toward the floor.
Margot watched with staring, helpless fear, she too waiting, for
Heaven knew what!
Gene advanced slowly into the room, still keeping eyes and revolver
pointed to the floor near the bed. Then he spoke again:
“Get out from there if you don’t want to get shot!”
Silence, a silence that pressed on Margot’s heart like a living thing.
She watched Gene take a few more steps closer to the bed. Then
suddenly he dropped to his knees, facing the foot-board of the bed,
bent until his head almost touched the rug, and aimed the revolver in
a quick motion back and forth. Margot could only see the curve of his
back over the foot of the bed. She felt she could breathe once more.
The fear, for Gene and for herself, had suddenly lifted, for some
strange reason.
Gene got quickly to his feet, and stood looking at Margot. His
expression of utter amazement would have struck her as comic in a
saner moment.
“There’s nothing under that bed.”
He made the announcement with the calmness of a mind suddenly stunned
by surprise and emptied of emotion.
For a second she thought that fear had unbalanced him. Then came a
dazed confusion to her own brain. Of course Gene was right! There
could be nothing under the bed or it would have attacked him.
But--where could the creature have gone--where and how and when, while
she lay there watching and waiting in frozen horror?
“I saw a hand--a hand and arm, come out from under the bed, and put
out a match on the rug.” The mystery which seemed to augment the
horror, made her whisper the words.
Gene lifted the small electric lamp to the floor, raised the
overhanging coverlet, and looked again under the large brass bed. Then
he got to his feet, more slowly this time.
“Nothing there!” His glance at Margot, seeming to raise the doubt as
to there having been anything there at any time, made her spring from
the bed, oblivious to the fact that she stood before him in her
pajamas.
The look she threw him was a challenge and defiant assurance that he
was--must be--mistaken. She knew there was something under that bed!
She dropped to one knee and stared at the empty space extending to two
sides of the wall. Nothing! Absolutely nothing!
She stood up, staring at Gene with a dazed expression, and still
innocently unconscious of her attire.
“Something _was_ under that bed! I was wide awake so it wasn’t a
dream. How could I have _imagined_ what I saw!”
“What did you think you saw--I mean, what did you see?” Gene hastily
corrected himself.
“I’ll tell you what I saw.” She shivered in remembrance of creeping
horror, and her voice trembled with excitement as she tried to tell
him what happened.
“I couldn’t sleep, and I lighted a cigarette to take a few more puffs.
I dropped the match to the floor, then remembered suddenly the danger
on this old rug, I reached over the side of the bed to find the match.
Just at that instant a thin white hand and arm crept out, oh so softly
and quickly and deliberately tapped the lighted match and put it out,
then withdrew back under the bed. _That’s_ what I _saw_, I tell you,
and God knows why I didn’t die of fright.”
Something in Gene’s eyes--a puzzled wonder perhaps--made her say
eagerly:
“You look as if you think I’m crazy, Gene. When I called you my life
was in danger. Don’t you _believe_ me?”
“Of course, of course, dear. But it’s all right now. Whatever it was
you saw isn’t there now, and I’m here instead.”
His smile was meant to be soothing, but it angered her.
“You’re acting as if you thought I were hysterical. I’m never