Bat Wing, Sax Rohmer [top 20 books to read .txt] 📗

mode of expression. “These are so scanty, I fear, of so, shall I say, phantom a kind, that even when they are in your possession you will consider me to be merely the victim of a delusion. In the first place, then, I have reason to believe that someone followed me from my home to your office.”

“Indeed,” said Paul Harley, sympathetically, for this I perceived was exactly what he had anticipated, and merely tended to confirm his suspicion. “Some member of your household?”

“Certainly not.”

“Did you actually see this follower?”

“My dear sir,” cried Colonel Menendez, excitement emphasizing his accent, “if I had seen him, so much would have been made clear, so much! I have never seen him, but I have heard him and felt him—felt his presence, I mean.”

“In what way?” asked Harley, leaning back in his chair and studying the fierce face.

“On several occasions on turning out the light in my bedroom and looking across the lawn from my window I have observed the shadow of someone—how do you say?—lurking in the garden.”

“The shadow?”

“Precisely. The person himself was concealed beneath a tree. When he moved his shadow was visible on the ground.”

“You were not deceived by a waving branch?”

“Certainly not. I speak of a still, moonlight night.”

“Possibly, then, it was the shadow of a tramp,” suggested Harley. “I gather that you refer to a house in the country?”

“It was not,” declared Colonel Menendez, emphatically; “it was not. I wish to God I could believe it had been. Then there was, a month ago, an attempt to enter my house.”

Paul Harley exhibited evidence of a quickening curiosity. He had perceived, as I had perceived, that the manner of the speaker differed from that of the ordinary victim of delusion, with whom he had become professionally familiar.

“You had actual evidence of this?” he suggested.

“It was due to insomnia, sleeplessness, brought about, yes, I will admit it, by apprehension, that I heard the footsteps of this intruder.”

“But you did not see him?”

“Only his shadow”

“What!”

“You can obtain the evidence of all my household that someone had actually entered,” declared Colonel Menendez, eagerly. “Of this, at least, I can give you the certain facts. Whoever it was had obtained access through a kitchen window, had forced two locks, and was coming stealthily along the hallway when the sound of his footsteps attracted my attention.”

“What did you do?”

“I came out on to the landing and looked down the stairs. But even the slight sound which I made had been sufficient to alarm the midnight visitor, for I had never a glimpse of him. Only, as he went swiftly back in the direction from which he had come, the moonlight shining in through a window in the hall cast his shadow on the carpet.”

“Strange,” murmured Harley. “Very strange, indeed. The shadow told you nothing?”

“Nothing at all.”

Colonel Menendez hesitated momentarily, and glanced swiftly across at Harley.

“It was just a vague—do you say blur?—and then it was gone. But—”

“Yes,” said Harley. “But?”

“Ah,” Colonel Menendez blew a cloud of smoke into the air, “I come now to the matter which I find so hard to explain.”

He inhaled again deeply and was silent for a while.

“Nothing was stolen?” asked Harley.

“Nothing whatever.”

“And no clue was left behind?”

“No clue except the filed fastening of a window and two open doors which had been locked as usual when the household retired.”

“Hm,” mused Harley again; “this incident, of course, may have been an isolated one and in no way connected with the surveillance of which you complain. I mean that this person who undoubtedly entered your house might prove to be an ordinary burglar.”

“On a table in the hallway of Cray’s Folly,” replied Colonel Menendez, impressively—“so my house is named—stands a case containing presentation gold plate. The moonlight of which I have spoken was shining fully upon this case, and does the burglar live who will pass such a prize and leave it untouched?”

“I quite agree,” said Harley, quietly, “that this is a very big point.”

“You are beginning at last,” suggested the Colonel, “to believe that my suspicions are not quite groundless?”

“There is a distinct possibility that they are more than suspicions,” agreed Harley; “but may I suggest that there is something else? Have you an enemy?”

“Who that has ever held public office is without enemies?”

“Ah, quite so. Then I suggest again that there is something else.”

He gazed keenly at his visitor, and the latter, whilst meeting the look unflinchingly with his large dark eyes, was unable to conceal the fact that he had received a home thrust.

“There are two points, Mr. Harley,” he finally confessed, “almost certainly associated one with the other, if you understand, but both these so—shall I say remote?—from my life, that I hesitate to mention them. It seems fantastic to suppose that they contain a clue.”

“I beg of you,” said Harley, “to keep nothing back, however remote it may appear to be. It is sometimes the seemingly remote things which prove upon investigation to be the most intimate.”

“Very well,” resumed Colonel Menendez, beginning to roll a second cigarette whilst continuing to smoke the first, “I know that you are right, of course, but it is nevertheless very difficult for me to explain. I mentioned the attempted burglary, if so I may term it, in order to clear your mind of the idea that my fears were a myth. The next point which I have concerns a man, a neighbour of mine in Surrey. Before I proceed I should like to make it clear that I do not believe for a moment that he is responsible for this unpleasant business.”

Harley stared at him curiously. “Nevertheless,” he said, “there must be some data in your possession which suggest to your mind that he has some connection with it.”

“There are, Mr. Harley, but they belong to things so mystic and far away from ordinary crime that I fear you will think me,” he shrugged his great shoulders, “a man haunted by strange superstitions. Do you say ‘haunted?’ Good. You understand. I should tell you, then, that although of pure Spanish blood, I was born in Cuba. The