“Simes!” I cried. “What’s the meaning of this?”
“I don’t know, sir,” he answered, pale in alarm. “I noticed it almost the instant you had left the house. The ashes were quite warm then.”
“Are you sure you haven’t had an accident with it?” I queried, looking him straight in the face.
“No, sir; I swear I haven’t,” he replied. “Your cab had hardly driven away when I found it just as it is now. I haven’t touched it.”
I looked, and noted its position. It was in the exact spot where Aline had placed it after taking it in her hand.
I recollected, too, that it was there where she had seen the object which had so disturbed her.
That some deep and extraordinary mystery was connected with this sudden spontaneous destruction of the crucifix was plain. It was certainly an uncanny circumstance.
I stood before that little table, my eyes fixed upon the ashes, amazed, open-mouthed, petrified.
A vague, indefinite shadow of evil had fallen upon me.