The next minute Storm’s tense attitude relaxed. What a fool he was to be stirred by the idle superstition of an old-wives’ tale! His nerves must be going back on him, what with that accursed howling and the shifting shadows of the moonlight which were worse than utter darkness could be. Would it never end?
As if in answer the mellow chime of the clock sounded upon his ears. It must be three o’clock at least, possibly four——! He waited breathlessly. A second note pealed forth softly to die away in a vibrating echo, and then silence. Only two o’clock! Nearly five hours more! God, could he endure it and keep his sanity? Doyle’s gruesome story of Lady Sannox came to his mind. Would he be found in the morning as the great physician had been after the night of horror, a gibbering idiot trying to thrust both feet into one leg of his trousers and babbling meaninglessly? Lady Sannox had been unfaithful, too, but it was the lover, not the husband, who paid!
He forced the hideous picture from his thoughts and turned for one final glance at the garden below. How still everything was! The howling of the dog had ceased, and the wind had died down to a mere rustling, whispering breeze. The moonlight, too, was paling, and beneath its waning radiance the garden still slumbered undisturbed as it had when he cast the ashes forth upon the air. From these ashes would spring the phoenix, not of love, but of murder; of hatred, vengeance and the lust to kill! What had he not loosed upon the world!
He covered his eyes as if to shut out the scene of false peace, of menacing, brooding calm before the crimson dawn; and staggering back to the bed, he sank down upon it once more. The touch of the smooth, cool linen beneath his fevered hand steadied him and brought a moment of tranquility to his reeling senses, but he could not stretch himself out upon it. The space beside him where Leila had so often lain was blank and empty, yet oddly her presence seemed near. He could almost hear her light tap upon the connecting door, almost see it open and her slender, white-clad form appear with the two heavy ropes of golden hair falling over her shoulders. She would come to him swiftly, tenderly, and he would take her in his arms and hold her close . . . .
But no tapping came upon the door, no form appeared, his arms were empty! Great God, why could he not forget!
The clock struck three, the moonlight faded and vanished, swallowed up in the darkest hour which comes before the dawn, and still Storm crouched there at the bed’s foot sunk in a reverie of retrospection.
In just such another springtime as this they had gone upon their honeymoon. The awe and ecstasy of those days like a half-forgotten fragrance stole again over his spirit and thrilled him anew. How wonderful she had been, how wondrously sweet her shy confidences, her little outbursts of tenderness, her bewitching, bewildering changes of mood! How he reveled in each new phase of her nature as it revealed itself to him; how he had worshipped her, gloried in the possession of her! In the golden years that followed, the first ecstasy had not faded; it had but stabilized, deepened into a steady glow of unquestioning devotion, and the honeymoon had never really ended until this hour!
Impotently he struck his forehead with his clenched fist. Why must he go on thinking, thinking! The past was dead, buried beyond hope of resurrection! Why must it come trooping back to rob him of his strength and lull him to forgetfulness of the immediate future and the crisis which impended? The night had been years long! Would it never come to an end? Would this hideous darkness envelop him forever?
Four o’clock! Thank God, he had missed an hour! Only two more now, or three at the most, and then the cry of alarm would come winging up from below and the curtain would rise!
A chill dampness as of the grave itself stole in at the window, and Storm shivered although he was bathed in sweat. His pulse slowed and weakness descended upon him, while a swift, unnerving fear laid its clammy hands upon his throat.