He reached the window, found himself a secure footing, and peered round the edge of the blind. But the light was so poor, and the panes were so dirty, on both sides, that had there been anything to see he could have been very little the wiser. As it was, the small area of the room into which he could dimly peer seemed to be carpetless and unfurnished. There was no movement, no sound. The light itself apparently came from the further end of the room, from the level of a table. He clung on, undecided how to proceed. It appeared that the only thing to do was to wait and listen for some indication of the purpose of the dismal illumination.
He looked at his watch. It was ten-thirty. After a wait of what seemed at least half an hour, he looked again. Ten minutes only had passed. No discernible movement had taken place in the room. Yet he felt perfectly, and very unpleasantly, certain that it was occupied—that something was proceeding within it which, had the blind not intervened, would have revealed the secret of the house. Of what it might be he could form no idea—but, for the first time in his life, he was experiencing, in his mental tenseness and the sinister silence of the surroundings, that sensation which attests a proximity to evil. He was daunted. Fear was a condition to which he was a stranger, but a vivid nervousness was beginning to seize upon him. A sense of personal danger, an element which, so far, he had scarcely considered, was attacking him, and gaining ground. The perspiration was standing out on his face. He found that his hands were cold and wet. The pulses of his body were throbbing; he felt his strength growing less. Muttering a curse, he braced himself with a strong effort. He was accustomed to consider his nerves impregnable. Many times in his life he had known himself to be in far greater danger than he could attribute to the present situation, and such weakness had never assailed him. On four occasions he had been aware that his life was hanging by a thread, and had gloried in his own coolness. And now ... without a doubt the Crooked House was evil.
Still he waited. Another twenty minutes slowly passed.
He started. His hands closed tightly on the trunk of the ivy to which he was clinging. The door of the room had been closed with a slam. He could hear heavy footsteps on the uncarpeted floor. A shadow blotted out the light.
A moment later, a voice—a man's voice, horribly strained and unnatural—rose in a shout of fury.
"Damn you!" it screamed. "Look at your work! Look at it again! Open your rotten eyes and look! Look! Look!"
Tranter was so startled that he almost lost his footing on the ivy. There was no mistaking the voice—it was the scream of madness. He listened for an answer, but there was no sound in response. Then the same voice laughed—a laugh of awful bitterness.
"Are you satisfied? The thing is creeping on. I am getting nearer to you hour by hour. I am more like you to-night. One more grain went yesterday—another to-day. Another will go to-morrow...." Again the voice rose to a shriek of rage and hatred. "Oh, God! There is no hope! No hope! Only on—and on—to that!"
The words trailed off into a sob of agony. Still Tranter could hear no reply.
Silence followed. The shadow again blotted out the light; then sprang aside, and the voice burst out into a fresh paroxysm of madness, yelling a stream of curses at the object of its fury. The madman's frenzy was utterly revolting to listen to, but Tranter searched it closely for some clue to the identity of the person, or thing, to whom it was addressed. The voice rose again to a shriek; then subsided as before into a feeble wail of misery.