22.
THE CHINA MAIL SPECIAL CHRISTMAS SUPPLEMENT, DECEMBER 19, 1940.
The Haunted House
In B--
Square
come a
when he fell and be lying some- he would never have fallen down, where under the snow. Though knocked his head, and imagined It was very old and dirty, he had himself inside it, if it was only an affection for it. He would imagination. Those diamonds, come again, when it was light, and his mouth watered again' at and look for it.
the thought of them-how they All the way home he pondered had glittered and sparkledi over his strange experience. He
Then
vision of that could not get that scene in the
gloating woman with the knife, bedroom, the awful looking wo and cruel, wicked smile, He could man with the sharp, murderous
see her as plainly in his mind now knife, out of his head. She haunt as he had seen, her in the night, ed him,
could see even the shining black Midday saw him back in B- buttons on her dress, and the gap Square, standing in front of Num in her leering mouth, where one There was a notice board of her yellow teeth was missing. with TO LET on it attached to The house was reputed to be the area railings, and bare flours haunted: had he, in some utterly and walls met his astonished guze inexplicable manner, got into it when he peered in at the win- and, encountered the ghosts? Or dows. The weather had changed. was it some queer delirium, a It was much warmer, consequent- kind of concussion nightmitre, ly the snow had nearly gone, and caused' by his fall? he had no difficulty in finding his cap. It was in the area.
ber 13.
He breathed easier when
hail
she
From Page 12
an
be unhappy. She had lovers and
suit that the pavements and road pen gripped him to such an ex- ways were very slippery. Bu tent that he would have got out
More than ever wondering and got to B-Square just about the of the house as fast as he could, perplexed he went away, not dar- because of the time he had arrived there the had he been able, but a Power he ing to remain. preceding yeht, and at the same could not resist compelled him to Police, being ex-con they window of Number 13 was the stay and go through everything might suspect, he was up to, some saine blonde- Indy dangling the again. Then, just as before, he thing if they saw him hanging diamond necklace in her glisten- was examining the contents
of around. ing, climine, tipped fingers. He the dressing table drawers when He had, however, to go to the rubbed his eyes to make sure he he heard the tap of dainty high trial of the accused lady before was not dreaming, but when he heels on the polished floor of the the Magistrates. He knew it was looked again she was still there. landing, and he had hardly hid- a risky and foolhardy thing to do, Everything then happened just den behind the curtains, when the but he could not resist the Power
The blonde lady entered the as it had happened before.
room, outside himself; that strange, un- the looking so he thought, lovelier canny influence that had been same burning desire to get diuitionde came over him, and he than ever. This time, however, haunting and compelling him ever left the Square resolved to visit as she stood by the bedside gaz- since that first experience in the it again when the coast was quite ing down at the sleeper, Bill be- Square. Directly he set eyes on clear.
came aware of a ghostly unreality the woman in the dock, he re-
and about the
the man. cognised her as
beautiful He returned shortly before mid- about her night. Just as he had done that They seemed no longer to belong blonde with the necklace. Christmas Eve twelve months ago, to a world he knew, but to
The case against her was briefly he tiploed down the area steps, from the same strange unearthly this. trod on a slippery spot, fell and world as the frighteningly bizarre Her married life was known to bumped his head against some shadows on the floor and walls. thing hard. Conscious that all he did was merely a repetition, in de- left the bedside and finally slip had been heard to quarrel with her husband over them and tall, of all he had previously done, ped into her night attire. As she
Her declaration electric money matters. he entered the house by the little stood warming by the
that a burglar had got into the Passing fire, the dainty pearl buttons on house. murdered her husband and The next twe've months saw
window, and Larder
the her pyjamas and her red lac-
stolen her diamond necklace while him at his old vocation whenever through the kitchen, where
a dull quered finger and toe nails shone she was sleeping, was unsupport- he got the opportunity, but never nearly spent fire glowed
ed by any evidence. The necklace with quite his former zeal. What red in the large range, he ascend- and flashed like jewels.
Then, after she was at last in he had gone through that Christ- ed the basement staircase into the
bed, came
certainly could not be found, but the long. harrowing
the Police had not been able to mas Eve had made a deep im- hall; halted in breathless pression on him."
from the curtains to Snatch the coffed at the idea of ghosts and a
necklace, the horrib'y
breaking into the house, and were cautious Hereafter, but he no longer scoffed
of the opinion that the crime had trying of the door handle and
been perpetrated by a member of No our ever stays in it for now. He had a feeling that that
that ugly sinister face in the aper: the household. long.
And who could it It experience of his was nothing ac- Round here they rall
ture, the lurid glow from the
have been but the accused? She "The Unlucky House'. and says cidental but was ordained by. The silence in the house seem- heater throwing into startling it's aunted' Not that
alone had the opportunity and the I believe some Power behind the Scenes, ed even deeper and more unan- prominence is every evil feature motive, and it was absurd to be- in such things as ghosts myself. ordained for a special purpose. It tural than the last time he was In she crept with feline stealth, lieve she had been sleeping too I think it's all imagination, but made him think,
there, and the shadows on
the her glittering eyes full of cruelty soundly to hear her husband kill- there's no doubt there is some-
Once again it
Christmas wall and ceiling more alarming- And once was
became more Bill thing queer about the house.
Eve, and as the day wore on his ly, fantastic. In the semi-g'oom helpless spectator of the fiendish don't think I should care to live in desire to revisit B-Square grew the face of the sleeping man look- murder. Then came the culmin- If Bill got a shock on seeing the
stronger and stronger.
weird. ating horror, when a strange noise accused, he got a much bigger one ed startlingly white and Bill thanked him and moved In the end he went. This time Bill was horribly afraid; afraid of close to Bill attracting the atten- on seeing the principal
Rain in the the sleeper, the shadows, the si- tion of the murderess, she made a for the Prosecution. She was the away. Yes, there was something there was no snow.
the curtains housekeeper at Number 13, B--- queer about Number 13,
some- morning was succeeded by a se- lence, everything. The dread of cat-like spring at thing devilishly queer, otherwise vere frost at night, with the re- what he knew was about to hap- and pulling them aside, saw him. Square, and there was no mistak- The glee with which she beheld ing that long narrow face, bawk- his terror and suspense was even like nose and those dark, sinister more hellish than before, her grin eyes. She was the woman with when brandishing the dagger- the knife, the real murderess. shaped knife in mid-air more dis- Bill had a hard struggle. All bolical, and the pain of the stab, the while she testified against her if possible, even more agonising, mistress he knew she was lying, and as, on the previous Christmas but what could he do? If he nar- Eve, he recovered from uncon- rated his experiences, who would sciousness to And himself lying in believe him? No one. They would the area, on the very, spot where say he was crazy. The only thing. he had fallen and bumped his he could do would be to declare head.
A tradesman's cart was in front came up Who lives in Number 13?" the man driving if aud. In answer to his query. "Why, no one It's been unoccupied for more than a
of Number 12 when he the area steps
year.
it."
I
fear
He had hitherto when he heard the policeman, and wait till she slept, the emerging discover any indication of anyone
then went on up the other stair case on to the first floor landing, and hence into the bedroom the blonde.
Never before AT SUCH
8 Q 2
A PRICE!
RCA VICTOR
New Yorker
RADIO
The RCA Victor "New Yorker" Model 802 is a brilliant receiver whose splendid performance on long and short breath-taking perfection of tone quality and unparalleled beauty of appearance...
will en- dear it to every lover of fine radio entertainment.
waves
Two additional tubes give this superb new three-band "New Yorker" table model increased sensitivity and great- er selectivity, enabling it to bring programs from the world over into your living-room with astonishing ease and amaz- ing tone quality.
Its beautiful tropic-proof cabinet, smartly designed in the modern mode, is made of selected woods carefully match- ed, lacquered, and hand-rubbed to a lustrous high finish. Its tasteful, simple lines add a note of charm and refine- ment to the furnishings of every living-room.
Special X'mas Offer
REA
$25000
ASK FOR A FREE DEMONSTRATION !
of
A
ed.
witness
he was actually in the house on When he opened his eyes
he the night of the murder, and that was quite alone, and the stars would mean a stiff sentence for were shining down on him from burglary. They might even accuse a bright, cloudless sky.
Rising him
of the murder. Bill had with some difficulty, for he had never been over-burdened with lain there a considerable time, he conscience. At times he persuad- clambered up the area steps, saw ed himself he had none, but what what, curiously enough, he had he had of conscience, how joined not noticed before on his arrival, partnership with a sense of chi- namely, a board with "To Let Un- valry and something else, a strange furnished" on it, and wandered uncanny something quite outside thoughtfully home.
himself and beyond his ken.. Ho
Another year passed, and once could not get away from it, it. again it was Christmas Eve,
influenced him all the time and at. mild, muggy Christmas Eve, with last proved so all-powerful, that an occasional drizzle and a gentle he found himself scribbling a note South West wind;
to the Solicitor for the Defence.
All day the impulse to go again "I know something about this to the Square obsessed Bill. He 're case," he wrote, "for Gawd's fought hard against It but in the sake, guvernor, let me speak." end he had to go; and, on reach- And speak he did. He swore ing Number 13, he saw, standing he had entered the house on the in front of the mirror in the room night of the murder, and esconced on the first floor, the same blonde behind the window curtains had | lady, doing precisely the same seen the woman, with, the dark, thing. And, as on those two pre- sinister eyes cut the deceased's vious occasions, the sight of that throat. He explained it all in de- sparkling diamond.
necklace tail, and all the while the mur tempted him sorely,
deress sat staring at him
This time, however, he manage ever increasing, terror and amaze- ed, after a desperate struggle with ment. More than once she open- himself, to tear himself away from ed her mouth, to speak and day. the spot. and go straight home what he said, but words would not. Back in
his little parlour he come, and before Bill had finish-. chuckled to think he had not been ed, she fainted. Later, she con fool enough this time to go down fessed.
into the area of that empty house. · · The motive for the murder was Had he done so he might again the diamond necklace. She be- have fallen and undergone another longed to a gang of Continental harrowing experience. Whether thieves. Her mistress being on ghosts or things of a delirium, and well known bad terms with" the -- he still could not decide which, he murdered man, it seemed an easy had outwitted them.
thing to frame her for the murder, In the morning he went to the She had not, of course, calculat- Free Library across the way and ed on any interference by a Pow- almost the first thing he saw in er of Powers outside the World. large headlines, in a Lunch Edi- It was just too bad for her that tion paper, was
the Superphysical, for some peru-· llar reason-maybe an interest in the Blonde Lady, or in Bill, or in- A man of seventy had been both had thought fit: to inter- found horribly murdered in bed vene.
"SHOCKING MURDER IN
BSQUARE”.
*
and his young and beautiful wife Since Bill's evidence was of had been arrested on suspicion, such vifal importance, the Magis The number of the house where trates, who, baleved, his contes the crime had been committed slon, had not the heart to punish was 13. Bill could hardly believe him, and so he walked out of, the he read aright. Thirteen: why Court a free and conscience- that was the housel Yet it could peased man.
not be because the house of his Some days afterwards he res experiences was empty and un-" furnished.
ceived a letter, It was from the
J
Full of excitement and curiosity blonde lady and contained a he tore off to B Square, to cheque for a sum that fairly took And several policemen and a small his breath away.
crowd of people standing in front Realising he owed his good for-
of 13. It was the house the tune to his strange experiences on. house of his weird experiences those two successive but now there was no "To Let" Eyes, Bill haver again board on the rallings." It was ghosts, but ruly agreed furnished and tchanted. Suppos- sentiments of the rug ho liad gone there the preced- wright that there ing night, what might have hap in Heaven and on pened?
dreamed of in your