A. Merritt's Fantasy Magazine, April 1950 — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

36 in the middle of the night. mysterious.” “T wish Cleo hadn't insisted on staying on there alone,” Tony said. . The still, dull winter’s day was near its end when Gees got his first view of the boxlike, Georgian outline of the Grange, and saw, too, three sides of the oblong moat which surrounded house and grounds—an area of nearly two acres. The place looked neglected; the para- pets of the gray stone bridge over which he must drive to come at the house needed repair ; shrubs and trees looked unkempt ; and last year’s grass lay lank and dead on the borders of flower beds and round the edges of the lawn. The house was set on a massive sub- structure of darker, more aged-looking stone than its upper part, indicating that an eighteenth-century builder had set his edifice on the foundations of an earlier structure. He entered the portico and pressed an incongruous bellpush—its bright newness emphasized the need of paint on its sur- It’s most roundings. The opening door revealed Cleo Kefra herself. “Ah! Mr. Green,” she said coolly. “All but one of my servants have fled to- day, and that one has gone to Hedlington for provisions. So I welcome you my- self. Will you come in?” ~- “Thank you,” he answered, with equal lack of warmth, and stepped inside. He followed her into a high-ceilinged drawing room crowded with ugly Vic- torian furniture. “T expected you about this time,” remarked. “‘Won’t you take your coat off? This room is rather warm.” He took off his coat and turned to put it on the bench behind him. As Cleo Kefra looked up at him, he noted that the pupils of her eyes were dilated in the dim light of the room, ren- dering them dark and softly lustrous. “This must be very inconvenient for you, Miss Kefra,” he said. ‘No servants, I mean.” “Tt will not be inconvenient, since my guests left this morning,” she said. “Saleh —he is the man who attends to me in the - flat when I am in London—can attend to all my own needs. But draw up a chair.” Cleo “But why are you left like this, servant- A. MERRITT’S FANTASY less?”’? he inquired. ‘“Isn’t it sudden?” “Some nonsense about ghostly cats, as nearly as I can gather,” she answered. “Or real cats, trespassing from some near- by farm. I expect—”’ she smiled slightly— “the village is buzzing wth excitement over them, by this time. My three maids all marched away before lunch, and a boy arrived with a hand-cart an hour later to take their belongings. But why—why do you nod your head like that, Mr. Green?” “Just—” he paused to think hard for a reply— “your excellent English. Not a trace of accent in it.” “Why should there be? I have known it... it is my language.” The pause was significant, he felt. She had intended a different end to the sen- tence. “And Tony couldn’t wait for me?” he remarked, stirring his tea. “He went by train—Saleh drove him to Cheltenham,” she said. ‘‘And he has al- ready explained what he said you’ wished to see me about—Miss Brandon, I mean, and that you were interested in the child’s disappearance. I am sorry I miscon- strued her presence at the Gravenor.” “T am still interested in that child’s disappearance,”’ he said slowly, and saw her eyes darken still more. “T understood it had been found,” she said half-questioningly. “The body—not the living child,” he answered her. “Terribly mauled and clawed as if by—” he drank the last of his tea, and put the cup back on the tray— “cats,” he ended, looking full at her. “How very strange!” she remarked, with incisive irony. “And they must pay—all nine lives,” _he stated with finality. UTSIDE the room the light had so far failed that leafless trees had grown shadowy beyond the uncurtained window. Here, they sat in a dimness mitigated only by the firelight, and Cleo’s face was all in shadow, since it was turned toward him and away from the fire. But her eyes glowed at him, dark fires in them- _ selves. “T do not understand,” she said. “Sekhmet herself shall not save them,” he said again, somberly. “Still I I do not understand,” she re- | “(eoynalicel exove) <SEiGO —a— ob ake ae