“To-morrow,” he thought, “I shall go away and all these people will pass out of my existence. It is pleasant to think one can put them so quietly out of one’s life. Ah! the beauty of liberty!”
He felt that he could not bear to remain more than one more night under the same roof with the Rat. The Twitcher and the Sword-Swallower were to be tolerated, but the Rat made him shudder. There are people who make us wish the world was bigger, that we might have more room to avoid them. The Rat was one of these; his very proximity was physically disagreeable. His skin was the colour of the fresh Gruyère cheese, except where his eye sockets darkened to chocolate. Criminal or not the man suggested reptilian perversions.
When Hugh paid his modest bill, he received a thousand francs in change, and as he stuffed the small notes into his pocket-book, he was aware that the sharp eyes of the Rat were upon him.
It was after ten o’clock and the Pension Paoli was very quiet. All the boarders were apparently at the Casino. The big building seemed deserted.
Leaving the door of his room ajar, Hugh threw himself on his bed. Soon he heard the street door open and some one pass upstairs. It was the Rat.
As he lay in the darkness, and listened to the sounds of the great gloomy house, a strange feeling of uneasiness began to creep over him. This grew so strong that after a bit he rose and went out on his little balcony. The air was exquisite. Over him flowed the river of night, and looking up into its lucid depths he saw the sky, its bed, pebbled with stars. Then his eyes drifted to the myriad lights that lay between him and the sea, lights now clear, now confused into a luminous mist....
What was that? Surely some one was moving softly in the passage? No; he was not wrong. Some one was trying the door of the next room, the Twitcher’s. But the Twitcher had locked it, and after one or two efforts the sound ceased.
Then Hugh had an inspiration. Taking out his pocket-book he threw it on the bed. Enough light came from the window to show it black against the white counterpane. There! the trap was baited.
Footsteps again in the passage, fumbling, muffled. They were drawing nearer, they were opposite his door. In the darkness he heard hard, hurried breathing. His own heart was tapping like a hammer. Surely the footsteps were passing? No, they had halted. Then slowly, slowly, his door was pushed open, and a black stealthy form crept to his bed.
He held his breath, and waited.... Now the dark shape was close.... Now an arm reached out, and a hand seized the pocket-book.... Now....