The mark of the monster
"Jud!" exclaimed the hollow, surprized voice of Doctor Kyle. "How could
he----"
* * * * *
I rose abruptly to face him.
"You needn't act, Doctor," I told him, grimly. "This thing is your
planning--though God knows what you hoped to gain by preventing my
marriage to Valyne----"
"Clay!" he interrupted, still protesting. "Are you mad? Sarah and I
have loved you since you were an infant. I was desolated at the thought
of your suicide----"
"Suicide!" I grasped the word, with sudden understanding. "That's
it! You were trying to drive me to kill myself. It's all part of a
monstrous plot--everything from that letter you wrote me months ago, to
Jud carrying Valyne up here. You were all trying to drive me to insane
suicide! But, in Heaven's name, why?"
"I'll tell you, Clay." A hard ring came into his hollow voice. "We are
poor in Creston. We live and die in bitter, grinding poverty. And we
knew that you had made money in the Orient; that if you died, before
your marriage, that money would be ours.
"The servants were ready to aid us, for a share. Jud Geer was useful,
because he wanted Valyne. I shot him because I saw you were getting the
better of him; I feared you were about to unmask him. Besides, he was
becoming too impatient for his reward.
"My studies in the dark secret history of Creston supplied material
for the hoax. Some of your forefathers really dealt in the black arts,
Clay--some of them must actually have had a hand in the building of
this altar.
"But out of respect for the dead"--and a twisted smile of terrible
mockery crossed his gaunt, skeletal face--"I should tell you that
your grandfather, Eliakim Coe, was no more than a common lunatic. He
murdered your father in his bed, true enough. And he wrecked your
mother's life, if in a manner a little less picturesque than I told you.
"And your own youth, in the shadow of that crime, was strange enough to
give some color to my account."
He smiled again in the red firelight, hideously.
"The details should be clear enough, if I mention Jud's private
entrance to the cellar----"
The rifle lifted a little in his tense grasp.
"It was a fair plan, Clay." His voice rang grim and cold with
triumphant menace. "And even now it shall not fail me!" His tone sank.
"It is known that you and Jud were rivals for Valyne. It is known that
you have fought, and that you both are violent men. I shall remove from
Jud's body this artistic creation of mine, that made him your brother.
And who will be surprized to find the three of you together, dead?"
Very abruptly, his rifle snapped to the level. Its barrel flamed red
in the glare from the altar, with a companion light to the twin fires
of hell in the sunken eyes. Sparks burst from the muzzle, and the
report shattered against the pillars of stone.
For once, then, I was completely thankful for that swift, deadly
response to danger that has ever been independent of my conscious mind.
I was myself surprized to feel the hard abrupt recoil of the automatic
in my hand.
And Doctor Kyle had never learned of the weapon in my armpit holster.
I think I had fired before he saw the gun; I am sure that he was dead
before his aimless contracting finger pulled the trigger of the falling
rifle.
Valyne and I have never returned to Creston. In the darkness we went
down the farther slope of Blue Squaw Mountain, and morning found us in
a green and peaceful meadow, whose sunlit fragrance washed away the
horror of the night.