In an instant, we reached the top. The kitchen was dark, but a stream of light poured through the open door from the room beyond. We sprang to it. I saw it was the dining-room; a light stood on the table and for a second I thought the room was empty. Then my ear caught a kind of dry sobbing, which seemed to come from one corner.
In an alcove between the chimney and the wall was a closet. Its door was open and, as we peered into it, I saw a woman's figure clothed in white straining at some dark and heavy object.
Godfrey took but one glance at it.
"Good God!" he cried, and sprang into the closet. "Bring the light, Lester."
So shaken by I knew not what new horror that I could scarcely walk, I yet had self-control enough to obey. I tottered to the table, took up the lamp, and returned to the closet door. The rays of the light fell within, revealing the whole terrible scene—Lucy Kingdon and Godfrey holding up a figure clothed in black, a figure which swayed and wabbled, turning at last so that I caught a glimpse of the swollen, distorted face—the same face which had glared at us around a corner of the cellar wall.
CHAPTER XVIII
A New Turn to the Puzzle
How we got her down, I scarcely know. I dimly remembered bringing a chair for Godfrey and holding up the body for a dreadful instant while he severed the cord about the neck; but my first clear recollection is of her form upon a bed in the adjoining room, with Godfrey bending over her and Lucy Kingdon standing by with such a face of anguish and despair that, for the first time since I had known her, I found it in my heart to pity her.
She had snatched up some dark garment and thrown it over her night-dress, and she stood looking down at the limp form on the bed, with its hideous, staring face, as though struck to stone. All but her lips—they opened and shut, drinking the air in gasps, and from moment to moment she muttered to herself, "I should have known! I should have known! I should have known!"