第50章

He sat upright in the straight-backed chair, the lamp burning at his feet, his pistols and his hanger at his left elbow on the end of the table, his eyes turning incessantly in their sockets round the walls, over the ceiling, over the floor, in the expectation of a mysterious and appalling vision.The thing which could deal death in a breath was outside that bolted door.But Byrne believed neither in walls nor bolts now.Unreasoning terror turning everything to account, his old time boyish admiration of the athletic Tom, the undaunted Tom (he had seemed to him invincible), helped to paralyse his faculties, added to his despair.

He was no longer Edgar Byrne.He was a tortured soul suffering more anguish than any sinner's body had ever suffered from rack or boot.The depth of his torment may be measured when I say that this young man, as brave at least as the average of his kind, contemplated seizing a pistol and firing into his own head.But a deadly, chilly, langour was spreading over his limbs.It was as if his flesh had been wet plaster stiffening slowly about his ribs.

Presently, he thought, the two witches will be coming in, with crutch and stick - horrible, grotesque, monstrous - affiliated to the devil - to put a mark on his forehead, the tiny little bruise of death.And he wouldn't be able to do anything.Tom had struck out at something, but he was not like Tom.His limbs were dead already.He sat still, dying the death over and over again; and the only part of him which moved were his eyes, turning round and round in their sockets, running over the walls, the floor, the ceiling, again and again till suddenly they became motionless and stony-starting out of his head fixed in the direction of the bed.

He had seen the heavy curtains stir and shake as if the dead body they concealed had turned over and sat up.Byrne, who thought the world could hold no more terrors in store, felt his hair stir at the roots.He gripped the arms of the chair, his jaw fell, and the sweat broke out on his brow while his dry tongue clove suddenly to the roof of his mouth.Again the curtains stirred, but did not open."Don't, Tom!" Byrne made effort to shout, but all he heard was a slight moan such as an uneasy sleeper may make.He felt that his brain was going, for, now, it seemed to him that the ceiling over the bed had moved, had slanted, and came level again - and once more the closed curtains swayed gently as if about to part.

Byrne closed his eyes not to see the awful apparition of the seaman's corpse coming out animated by an evil spirit.In the profound silence of the room he endured a moment of frightful agony, then opened his eyes again.And he saw at once that the curtains remained closed still, but that the ceiling over the bed had risen quite a foot.With the last gleam of reason left to him he understood that it was the enormous baldaquin over the bed which was coming down, while the curtains attached to it swayed softly, sinking gradually to the floor.His drooping jaw snapped to - and half rising in his chair he watched mutely the noiseless descent of the monstrous canopy.It came down in short smooth rushes till lowered half way or more, when it took a run and settled swiftly its turtle-back shape with the deep border piece fitting exactly the edge of the bedstead.A slight crack or two of wood were heard, and the overpowering stillness of the room resumed its sway.