“Damn the whole business!” exclaimed Bruton; “my legs feel like jelly. Each time I look I expect to see—something.”
And Cassels found that the hand with which he held the matches on high trembled. His body was cold and he felt sick.
Nothing on the ground-floor. In the room upstairs there was much more furniture, and they feverishly opened the lids of boxes and ottomans, looked under beds, pulled open the doors of wardrobes, and searched behind curtains. Coming out of the third bedroom they had searched, they both suddenly stood still with a sensation of terrible and grotesque fear: Gascoyne was standing at the doorway, leaning drunkenly against the jamb and watching them.
“Looking for me?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Cassels, who was the first to collect himself; “we thought you had fallen asleep in one of the bedrooms. We’ve come to drink with you.”
“Drunk enough,” said Gascoyne. “Been drinking all day. However, you fellows help yourselves: plenty of drink downstairs. Staying the night? Good. I’m going to bed. Choose your own rooms. S’long.”
He groped his way to his bedroom. Bruton followed him. Cassels, standing in the passage, heard the following conversation.
“Are you sure you’re all right, Cyril?”
“Course I’m all right. Why the hell shouldn’t I be all right? What’s the matter with me, eh? That’s what I want to know—what’s the matter with me?”
“Oh—nothing. Of course there’s nothing. Good night, then.”