CHAPTER XX
It wasn’t easy to steady Wilkson so that he could tell an intelligent story. His own dark superstitions had hold of him, and his shambling search through the darkened corridors had stretched his nerves to the absolute breaking-point. It was evident at once that there was nothing to do but let him take his time and get the story out the best he could. After all, immediate action had never helped matters in this affair of Kastle Krags. There had been a grim finality about everything that had occurred. Those who were gone had not been brought back by prompt search.
He did not respond to any of the ruses so often used to get a colored man to talk—scorn or incredulity or sternness. He was aware of nothing but his own terror, and the image in those fear-widened eyes no man could guess.
“You say a telegram came for him, Wilkson?” I asked gently. “Some one phoned it in?”
“De phone bell rung, jus’ off de su’vant’s rooms,” he explained. “It was a message fo’ Majo’ Dell. ‘Get him up to get dis telegram,’ some white gen’lman said, so I done went to get him up. He ain’t in his room. Bed not been slept in. I called and no one answered. Den I ask Mrs. Gentry—she saw him go down the hall hour ago, all dressed, and seen him turn in yo’ room——”
“He’s not here. He hasn’t been here.” I slipped on a dressing-gown and slippers, then stood a moment with Wilkson in the darkened hall. It was curious that the housekeeper should have made such an odd mistake—thinking that Dell had turned into my door. Perhaps at the distance she had observed she confused the door either to the right or left with mine.
There was no need for panic yet. Any one of a dozen things might have explained his temporary absence from his room in the dead of night. He might be in the room to my right—Fargo’s room—in some conference with his friend. Yet there was no light under the door.
I knocked loudly. Fargo called sharply from his bed.
“Have you seen Major Dell?” I asked.
“Dell? No! Good Lord, he hasn’t disappeared, too?”