The Romance of Elaine | Page 3

side was a large fireplace that gave to it an air
of quaint hospitality.
Suddenly Rusty woke up, his ears pointed at this fireplace. He stood a
moment, listening, then, with a bark of alarm he sped swiftly from the
living-room, up the stairs at a bound, until he came to Elaine's room.
Elaine felt his cold nose at her hand and stirred, then awoke.
"What is it, Rusty?" she asked, mindful of the former days when Rusty
gave warning of the Clutching Hand and his emissaries.
Rusty wagged his tail. Something was wrong.

Elaine followed him down to the living-room. She went over and
lighted the electric lamp on the table, then turned to Rusty.
"Well, Rusty?" she asked, almost as if he were human.
She had no need to repeat the question. Rusty was looking straight at
the fireplace.
Elaine listened. Sure enough, she heard strange noises. Was that Aunt
Tabby's "haunt"? Whatever it was, it sounded as if it came up from the
very depths of the earth.
She could not make out just what it sounded like. It might have been
some one striking a piece of iron, a bolt, with a sledge.
What was it?
She continued to listen in wonder, then ran to Aunt Tabby's bedroom
door, on the first floor, and knocked.
Aunt Tabby woke up and shook Joshua.
"Aunt Tabby! Aunt Tabby!" called Elaine.
"Yes, my dear," answered the old nurse, now fully awake and
straightening her nightcap. "Joshua!"
Together the old couple came out into the living-room, still in their
nightclothes, Joshua yawning sleepily still.
"Listen!" whispered Elaine.
There was the noise again. This time it was more as though some one
were beating a rat-tat-tat with something on a rock. It was weird,
uncanny, as all stood there, none knowing where the strange noises
came from.
"It's the haunts!" cried Aunt Tabby, trembling a bit. "For three nights
now we've been hearing these noises."

Around and around the room they walked, still trying to locate the
strange sounds. Were they under the floor? It was impossible to say.
They gave it up and stood there, looking blankly at each other. Was it
the work of human or superhuman hands?
Finally Joshua went to a table drawer and opened it. He took out a huge,
murderous-looking revolver.
"Here, Miss Elaine," he urged, pressing it on her, "take this-- keep it
near you!"
The noises ceased at length, as strangely as they had begun.
Half an hour later, they had all gone back to bed and were asleep. But
Elaine's sleep now was fitful, a constant procession of faces flitted
before her closed eyes.
Suddenly, she woke with a start and stared into the semi-darkness. Was
that face real, or a dream face? Was it the hideous helmeted face that
had dragged her down into the sewer once? That man was dead. Who
was this?
She gazed at the bedroom window, holding the huge revolver tightly.
There, vague in the night light, appeared a figure. Surely that was no
dream face of the oxygen helmet. Besides, it was not the same helmet.
She sat bolt upright and fired, pointblank, at the window, shivering the
glass. A second later she had leaped from the bed, switched on the
lights and was running to the sill.
Down-stairs, Aunt Tabby and Uncle Joshua had heard the shot. Joshua
was now wide awake. He seized his old shotgun and ran out into the
livingroom. Followed by Aunt Tabby, he hurried to Elaine.
"Wh-what was it?" he asked, puffing at the exertion of running up-
stairs.
"I saw--a face--at the window--with some kind of thing over it!" gasped

Elaine. "It was like one I saw once before."
Uncle Joshua did not wait to hear any more. With the gun pointed
ahead of him, ready for instant action, he ran out of the room and into
the garden, beneath Elaine's window.
He looked about for signs of an intruder. There was not a sound. No
one was about, here.
"I don't see any one," he called up to Elaine and Atint Tabby in the
window.
He happened to look down at the ground. Before him was a small box.
He picked it up.
"Here's something, though," he said.
Joshua went back into the house.
"What is it?" asked Elaine as he rejoined the women.
She took the curious little box and unfastened the cover. As she opened
it, she drew back. There in the box was a little ivory figure of a man, all
hunched up and shrunken, a hideous figure. She recoiled from it--it
reminded her too much of the Chinese devil-god she had seen,--and she
dropped the box.
For a moment all stood looking at it in horrified amazement.
. . . . . . .
It was the