"All right. Prove that I'm a fool and I'll acknowledge it."
Doctor Groom interrupted sharply.
"What was that?"
They bent forward, listening. Even with Paredes offering them a physical explanation they shrank from the keening that barely survived the heavy atmosphere of the old house.
"You see the woman in black isn't Miss Perrine," Paredes said.
He ran down the stairs. They followed, responding to an excited sense of imminence. Even in the private staircase the pounding that had followed the cry reached them with harsh reverberations. Its echoes filled the house as they dashed across the library and the dining room. In the hall they realized that it came from the front door. It had attained a feverish, a desperate insistence.
Paredes walked to the fireplace.
"Open the door," he directed Rawlins.
Rawlins stepped to the door, unlocked it, and flung it wide.
"The woman!" Katherine breathed.