She advanced upon him, her eyes two pools of blue, indignant fire; but the man stood his ground. "I am Robert Drayton," he said.
"Robert Drayton! But you can't be. Mr. Drayton is a good friend of Terry's, though I've never met him, and some way you know that and hope to deceive me! Mr. Drayton would not treat me like this. He would not lie to me. He would not-" Sobbing at last, she broke off and clenched her little hands fiercely. "I'll show you!" she cried. "I'll show you what I think of you and your lies, and then I'll make you tell me the true story!"
Before Drayton, springing forward with a cry of wild protest, could prevent, she had dropped on her knees beside the heap of Dust. Another instant and her white-gloved fingers had again raised that ominous gray cloud.
It rose in a spiral swirl-
For a second Drayton still saw her as a vague, translucent blur of blue shading into pink where her face had been. Then the air shimmered and cleared, and once more the unfortunate young man stood alone in Burford's pleasant library. This time not so much as a lighted cigar remained to remind him of recent companionship.
Mr. Robert Drayton began to swear. Serious profanity had never come easily to his lips. Now, however, he heard himself using phrases and words which he had not even been aware that he knew; a steady, low-voiced, earnest stream of expression whose utterance gave him the strangest satisfaction and relief. He swore for two minutes without a pause, then trailed off into silence. The superhuman tension had been broken, however, and he could again think.
This abruptness and totality of disappearance, that left him not so much as a corpse to mourn, awoke in him emotions different from any he had ever experienced. He found that he could not think of Trenmore and his sister as other than alive, nor rid himself of the idea that in some way they were yet present in the library. Not though the very clearest memory informed him that before his eyes those two had been resolved to nothingness.
Pondering on what he should do, however, it came to him that in honor only one course lay open. Had he been content to indulge Trenmore's superstitious regard for that infernal Dust, he would have been left confronting no such ghastly mystery. The fault, by this reckoning, was his. Let him pay, then.
With a firm, resolute tread Drayton approached the sinister gray pile, and of all its victims he alone loosed its deadliness knowingly-or believing that he knew.
Ten seconds later the library was empty of human life.