Max Brand

Devil Ritter

Warsaw 2019

Contents

I. ABDALLAH

II. THE HOUSE OF FEAR

III. THE SMILE OF THE SPHINX

IV. DEVIL RITTER

V. DEVIL AND SATYR

I. ABDALLAH

WHEN a man is stretched out in a comfortable chair with his feet propped on the back of another, a good book in his hands and silver drifts of smoke rising from his pipe to tangle under the shade of a reading-lamp, it requires nothing less than a catastrophe to recall his attention and make him change his position.

Jim Crawley did not change his position, but he looked up from his book with a scowl and stared at the ceiling. A soft, hurried footfall sounded from the room above, a continuous padding sound like the tread of a cat. All that evening, the night before, the night before that, for a week he had heard this ceaseless walking with a slight creak at regular intervals as the man turned at either end of the room. Crawley removed his pipe, blew a thin stream of smoke into the air and decided gravely: “Insomnia or plain nerves.”

In spite of this solution the continued sound troubled him. He was glad when it broke off, a door closed overhead, and the stairs of the old lodging-house groaned under a descending step. He glanced a comfortable eye over his room where the spoils of his many wanderings lay here and there, and then went back to his reading.

For perhaps half an hour his peace was unbroken, then the door flew open and a man jumped into the room, shutting the door quickly but noiselessly behind him.

Crawley sprang up from his chair with an exclamation.

The other stared at him with an odd expression, half fear and half horror, and whirled back to the door with a cry. Before he could open it Crawley had him by the shoulder; under his ample grip he seemed to feel the shoulder of a skeleton–there was no suggestion of flesh to his touch. The slightest motion of his arm sufficed to jerk the stranger back against the wall where he flattened himself, one hand clutching at the smooth surface for support, the other hand clutching at an inside pocket of his coat. Crawley seized that hand and yanked it out. It came bearing a heavy automatic. He tore it easily from the nerveless fingers of the owner.

“Now what in hell–” he began, and stopped short.

The other man was trying to speak, but only a faint whisper came from his white lips.

“Out with it!” said Crawley.

“I seem–I seem,” stammered the man, “to have come to the wrong room.”

“With a gun,” finished Crawley.

The other reeled where he stood, and a sudden pity took hold of Crawley He half carried the man to a chair, propped him up in it, and forced him to swallow a stiff drink of brandy.

“What is it?” he went on in a gentler voice. “Were you up against it, my friend, and decided to get the price of a meal at the point of a gun? I’m not very flush myself, but I have enough to–”

He stopped short, for he had taken another glance at the gun. It was of the most expensive make, and the handle was heavily chased with gold. Any pawnbroker would give fifty dollars for such a weapon. He looked curiously at the thin face of the stranger, now not quite so colorless.

“It has been simply a childish mistake on my part,” said the man, making a visible effort to seem at ease. “Here is my card. I have the room just above this on the third floor. I–I simply mistook the rooms in–in a fit of absent-mindedness. And then at the shock–I mean the surprise of seeing someone in the room–”

He had to break off, for his voice was as unsteady as the hand which extended a card to Crawley. It bore the name of Vincent Cadmon Noyes. Crawley hesitated a single instant. Then he reached out his large brown hand and shook with the stranger.

“Glad to know you, Mr. Noyes. My name is Crawley–Jim Crawley.”

The cold, slender hand pressed his slightly. Noyes rose.

“You’ll forgive my foolishness?” he said with an uncertain smile.

“If you’ll pardon my roughness,” answered Crawley, “we’ll call quits. Will you stay awhile?”

Noyes dropped back into the chair. There was a strange thankfulness in his eyes as he accepted the invitation.

“I’m very glad to,” he said. And then by way of explanation, “it’s hard to leave such a comfortable chair when one’s fagged. And I’m worn out.”

“No wonder,” said Crawley, with a touch of irritation, “you walk such a lot.”

A question flashed in the eyes of Noyes, but he attempted to laugh.

“Have I bothered you with my tramping up and down?”

“A little,” confessed Crawley. “What is it? Insomnia?”

“No,” said Noyes, and then hesitated; “yes, I think it’s as much insomnia as anything else.”

He shifted his eyes about the room, evidently intent on finding some new subject for conversation. For an hour he maintained a broken talk about little or nothing. Nevertheless Crawley was not bored. There was a singular atmosphere about Noyes which fascinated him. It lay in nothing that he said–it was rather an indefinable and sinister emotion which the lean, white face and the haunted eyes inspired. One detail of his actions peculiarly caught the attention of Crawley. His visitor had moved the chair until it directly faced the door. By so doing he brought his face in the full glare of the electric light, but when Crawley suggested another position, he shook his head and insisted that he was too comfortable to move. It was quite late before he rose.

“Good night, Mr. Crawley,” he said. “You’ve given me the first pleasant evening I’ve had in–” He stopped short, and then went on, “May I come down to see you again?”

“Glad to have you,” said Crawley heartily. “Hope you get rid of that–er–insomnia.”

“Thanks,” responded Noyes, “I think–”

He broke off with a sharp gasp and clutched Crawley frantically by the arm while he stared up at the ceiling.

“In the name of Heaven, man–” began Crawley angrily.

“Hush! Hush!” whispered the other. “Didn’t you hear it?”

“Hear what?”

“The footstep in my room!”

“Look here, Mr. Noyes, you let your imagination run away with you. There wasn’t any sound from the room above us.”

“I tell you there was! There was! I heard it! They’re in my room waiting–”

“Who are in your room? Come, come; this is childish!”

Noyes relaxed his hold on Crawley’s arm, but he had to lean his weight a moment against the back of a chair. He drew out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead.

“You are–are sure you heard nothing?” he asked, stammering.

“Not a thing in the world.”

Noyes turned to him with a sick smile.

“Perhaps you are right. It was just my imagination. Good night again.”

“Good night.”

He went to the door and hesitated, with his hand upon the knob.

“I say, Noyes,” said Crawley, a little more gently than he had spoken before, “do you wish to have me go up to your room with you–just to make sure that they are not up there waiting for you?”

Noyes turned to him with an almost ludicrous gratitude.

“God bless you,” he said “If you will–”

“Of course,” said Crawley, and he started out up the stairs after the younger man, muttering to himself, “plain neurasthenia–have to be gentle with such a fellow!”

AT the door of Noyes’ room he paused and banged loudly. An instant of silence followed, and then a peculiar spitting sound. Crawley set his square fighting jaw and reached a hand toward the trembling Noyes.

“Give me that revolver,” he said.

“Is there–is there anyone there?” asked Noyes in a shaken voice.

“I don’t know,” said Crawley, “but I’ll find out in half a second.”

He flung the door open and made a single crouching step, the revolver poised. A great, black Persian cat stood in the center of the floor, with back bowed and hair bristling. Perhaps it was the green shade of the lamp which made the animal’s eyes seem of that color.

The big cat spat at him.

“Nothing but a fool cat,” said Crawley, drawing a long breath. “Noyes, I must have caught some of your nerves from you.”

“Abdallah!” said Noyes. “No one but Abdallah!”

He entered the room with a cautious manner.

“You say that as if the cat were a human being,” Crawley said, smiling.

The other made no answer. His hand was at the knob of a closet door. He threw it open with a quick gesture and stepped back hastily from before the dark opening, into which he peered.

“What’s the matter?” asked Crawley, with a contempt which he could not entirely keep out of his voice.

“I–I merely want to put my hat away,” said Noyes, and accordingly he tossed his hat upon the shelf inside the closet. When he turned he cast a shrewd glance at the bed. Something told Crawley that as soon as Noyes was alone he would take a careful look under that bed.

“Now, my friend,” said Crawley, “better trust in me. Tell me, who are ‘they’ you mentioned awhile ago?”

Noyes started, but made a strong effort to pretend he did not hear the question. Instead he pointed.

“Well, well!” he said. “Abdallah has started to make friends with you already!”

The big Persian was rubbing affectionately against Crawley’s knees.

“Sure,” said the latter. “I always get along well with animals.”

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This is a free sample. Please purchase full version of the book to continue.

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