[XVII]
In beginning this chapter, which is going to end my story of the Hesketh Mystery, I want to say right here that I'm no coward. The reason that things happened as they did was that I was worn out—more than I knew—by the strain and excitement of the last two months. Also I do think that most any girl would have lost her nerve if she'd been up against what I was.
The gloom of that dreadful Wayside Arbor was still on me as I walked along with Babbitts. After a few moments I thought it had gone off and when I told him I wasn't afraid I said what seemed to me the truth. But when the sound of his footsteps died away, the loneliness crept in on me, seemed to be telling me something that I didn't want to hear. Down deep I knew what it was, and that every step was taking me closer to what I was afraid of—the place where Sylvia Hesketh had been murdered.
It was when I was peering out ahead, trying to locate it, telling myself not to be a fool and gathering up my courage, that I heard that faint, stealthy rustling behind me.
I stopped dead, listening. I was scared but not clear through yet, for I knew it might be some little animal, a rabbit or a chipmunk, creeping through the underbrush. I stood waiting, feeling that I was breathing fast, and as still as one of the telegraph poles along the road. The trees hid me completely. A person could have passed close by and not seen me standing there in my black cloak against the black background.
Then I heard it again, very soft and cautious, a crackle of branches and then a wait, and presently—it seemed hours—a crackle of branches again. I moved forward, stepping on tiptoe, stifling my breath, my head turned sideways, listening, listening with every nerve. Even then I wasn't so terribly frightened, but I was shivery, shivery down to my heart, for I could hear that, whether it was beast or human, it was on the other side of the trees, just a little way back, going the way I was.
It only took a few minutes—me stealing forward and it coming on, now soft as it stepped on the earth, now with a twig snapping sharp—to tell me I was being followed.
When I got that clear, the last of my courage melted away. If it had been anywhere else, if it hadn't been so dark, if there'd been a house or a person within call, but, oh, Lord, in that lonesomeness, far off from everything—it was awful! And the awfullest part was that right there in front of me, getting nearer every minute, was the place where another girl had been murdered on a night like this.
I tried to pull myself together, to remember that Babbitts would be back soon, but I couldn't stop my heart from beating like a hammer, terrible thuds up in my throat. Way off through the trees I could see the twinkle of Cresset's lights and I thought of them there; but it was as if they were at the other end of the world, too far for me to reach them or for them to hear my call.
I don't know why I walked on, but I think it was pure fear. I was afraid if I stopped that dreadful following thing would overtake me. Once I tried to look back but I couldn't. I thought I might see it and I stole forward, now and then stopping and listening and every time hearing the crackle and snap of the twigs as it crept after me. I could see now the place where Sylvia was found, the shrubs curving back from the road as if to leave a space wide enough for her body.