Francis Stevens - Citadel of Fear

In an uncomfortably stooped position Colin went through the customary struggle to get Green Gables from Carpentier through a matter of three exchanges, and in the end was rewarded by Cliona's voice on the wire. She had been waiting anxiously for the call and before he could ask a question she imparted her news.

"Colin-she's gone!"

"What? Who's gone?" But he knew very well.

"That Miss Reed, or whoever she was. She's gone-and I've been trying to get you for nearly two hours. Where have you been?"

"Here." Colin's voice was a trifle hoarse. Of course they would find her again-she had wandered away, but he would find her —

Again Cliona was speaking. She had, it appeared, seen her guest safely bestowed in the bedroom assigned to her use, and herself gone to lie down for a short time. When she returned to offer the girl a cup of tea the room was empty. She was nowhere in the house and her coat had also disappeared. And-"Colin, she had taken that dreadful green dress again!"

"Taken it? She didn't wear it?"

"I–I'm afraid she did. The clothes I gave her were on the bed-they were laid out very nicely and in order, Colin dear-she must have had a beautiful bringing up — "

"Never mind consoling me, Cliona. What have you done to find her?"

It seemed she had sent every one of the servants to search the neighborhood and had tried to get in touch with him before notifying the police. And three reporters had been there already about the bungalow-and the servants had all returned with nevus, and she had waited and waited —

"Yes, to be sure. But do you tell me, darling. Did she say anything to you before you left her? Tell me word for word all she said. I may get some trace of her by it."

"Let me think. I asked her about her father, but she would tell me nothing. She said that already she loved me, but only to you would she speak. She said: 'I have seen kindness in the eyes of others than you, but it has been as the mockings of the shadow people. They went and returned not. But between me and my lord hangs a Golden Thread, and therefore there is trust between us.' Something like that. I'm trying to remember exactly, but — "

"You've a wonderful memory, and you're doing fine. And then?"

"Well, she seemed disturbed because you had gone to Carpentier, and asked me to take her and follow you. Then she said she left the reception hall because you disliked the fat, clean man-Mr. MacClellan, I suppose-so much that you were making her hate him. She hates Marco and you-you struck him. And she thought that striking Marco had made you sad, she knew not why. So she went away lest you strike the fat, clean man also. Forgive me, Colin, but you wanted to know exactly. "

"And so I do. Then?"

"That was all. When I wouldn't take her after you, she asked to lie down in her room and she did. She wad so perfectly nice and-and pleasant that I never-never thought — "

"And why would you? There's no blame at all to you, darling." His exoneration of Cliona was quite mechanical, a matter of habit, for in truth his thoughts were not on her.

From head to foot he thrilled with a bitter, uncanny joy that shocked but refused to be banished by his reasoning mind. She had felt his dislike for MacClellan, sensed and sympathized with it to the point of hatred, in the same way that he had flamed to deadly, unjustifiable passion for her sake!

What fire was this in which fleshly barriers melted and their two spirits fused? A dangerous blaze, surely, that expressed itself only in hate! No, that was the chance of unlucky circumstance. What opportunity had there been for happiness to, leap between them? Oh, all madness, madness!

Somewhere in him there must lurk a weak, abnormal strain that responded to her insanity. He forced thought of it from him as something to be faced another time, and resolutely set his mind to the present exigency.

"Don't be telling the police-yet. I've an idea where she may have gone. Had she any money, do you think?"

"How do I know?" wailed his harassed sister. "She might have had some in her coat."

"Cliona, do you take your mind off this business entirely. I'm the one that's responsible for her, and it's myself will find the poor lass. If any more reporters or detectives come bothering you, have Masters send them about their business. All will be well and 'twill be less than a help should you fret yourself into another sickness. Call up Tony at the office and tell him I'm leaving Carpentier and he had best return straight home when he can, so I'll know where to find him. Will you do all that for me, darling?"

"Where are you going?" Her voice hinted of indefinite alarm.

"Well, the railroad station would be a good place to seek first trace of her, don't you think?"

"Perhaps-yes, I believe you're right, Colin. And then try the police stations. She's certainly quiet and well-behaved enough one way, but you can't tell what she might do outside and alone. Then will you come home-whether you find her or not?"

"Oh, I'll come home. Goodby, Cliona, and mind all I told you."

He hung up the receiver without waiting for a reply. Having purposely misled her in regard to the direction his search would take, he wished to answer no more questions.

There was one place to which his Dusk Lady, had she been of sound mind, would have been supremely unlikely to return. Being what she was, in O'Hara's opinion that was the first covert to draw. She had expressed to Cliona alarm for his safety and a desire to follow him.

Danger and the house at Undine must be to her synonymous terms. There she had known misery and terror, there she had barely escaped the clutches of danger carnified in the person of Genghis Khan; there, she had seen him, O'Hara, kill a man and felt vicariously his own after-horror.

There, then, if she thought of danger, would she picture him, and since she wished to follow him, it was to Reed's house that she would straightway go.

It was sketchy theorizing, perhaps, but Colin had been trained in a rough school that turns out excellent and not often mistaken psychologists.

He swung out of Bradshaw's, and almost into the arms of the white haired man, who had followed him down the hill.

"Mr. O'Hara," he began again, but Colin brushed ruthlessly past.

"I've nothing to say," he flung back.

He had an impression that the persistent journalist sprang after him, tried to get a foothold on the running board, and fell. But his thoughts were a rushing torrent that fairly bore him with them. The outer consciousness that repulsed the man and set the car in motion was as mechanical as the motor itself.

And so went Colin's last chance of escape from that which awaited him, swept under by the impetuous nature that no experience could lessen-that would be still impetuous to the very hour of its death.

The road to Undine was well enough known to him, when he was not led cross-country. The big car ate up those few miles at reckless speed. Of course, there was a possibility that the lost maiden might have started for home in a vague, wandering way, without the wits or the money to reach it. But O'Hara deemed otherwise. The cleverness of lunacy is notorious, and who knew how familiar she might be with ways and means of getting about the city?

Ten minutes after leaving Carpentier, he pulled up with a jerk at the iron gates upon whose intricate beauty he gazed for the fourth time in two days. It was then after five o'clock, and dusk was spreading its mantle of indistinctness and mystery. Behind those iron scrolls the gate-lodge loomed as a dim, sepulchral mass.

O'Hara was out of the car almost before it had stopped, and at the gate in two long strides. But with his hand on the bell he paused. The thought of another clandestine intrusion on these premises was distasteful. He wanted to ring the bell and make his demands boldly of whoever should answer. But would anyone answer? Why had he so taken it for granted, because of last night's havoc at the bungalow, that Reed had never gone further from home than Carpentier-that the note transmitted by Marco's hand contained a lie?