Page:Weird Tales Volume 13 Number 3 (1929-03).djvu/44

consciously doing so, I noted the low, molded ceiling, the huge oaken chest beneath the window, the high-backed old chairs, the carved chimney-piece of unusual and fantastic design. Its ornamentation consisted of a series of small but beautifully executed figures taken from the mythology of ancient Greece: graceful nymphs, sporting fauns, grinning satyrs, heroes, gods and goddesses were there; while forming the keystone of the arch was a huge Cyclops' head having a single staring eye in the center of its forehead. The moment my eyes lighted on it I knew that I had found the key to the baffling couplet.

"The feat of Ulysses!" I cried, pointing to the repulsive countenance of the carved giant. "Don't you remember how, when captured by the Cyclops, he made his escape by thrusting out the single eye of the giant Polyphemus?"

In a flash they understood. Almost before I had finished speaking, Wilmer's finger was on the eyeball, pressing it inward with all his force. At the same moment, almost without a sound, a portion of the wall-paneling swung forward, revealing a narrow, doorlike aperture.

"There's another room beyond!" cried Dick, snatching up the candle and peering through. Then he entered boldly. We were close at his heels.

To my surprize, it was no tiny hiding-place that we entered, but a room, tall, spacious and elegantly furnished in the fashion of an age long past. Rows of well-filled bookshelves covered one wall; beneath them was set a long bench bearing piles of untidy-looking manuscripts. A much-used desk stood on one side; near it was a table having upon it a large, silver-gilt bowl filled with still-blooming roses. In one corner rested a long, eup-hilted sword. There was no trace of dust, no dead, musty odor to denote a room long sealed up.

"We must have penetrated into one of the adjoining houses," whispered Dick Kinnaird. "Those flowers are still fresh———"

It was then that we heard the footsteps.

At first they were so faint that it was only by senses strained to the utmost limit of expectancy—as you may be sure ours were at the moment—that they could be detected at all. Slow, intermittent, with a pause of varying length every now and then, they sounded like the steps of one who paces about deep in thought.

"They're coming from the next room—in there," breathed Wilmer, jabbing his finger in the direction of a door on the opposite side of the room to which we had entered. I nodded silently and, drawn by a curiosity which overmastered my fear, crept forward and listened. The steps were louder now, and, mingled with them, came the sound of a voice speaking in low, measured tones. I have listened to some famous actors both before and since that time, but never have I heard such flowing music as I did in that silent, half-lit room in Stratford-on-Avon. My mind likened the words to a stream of molten gold, interspersed every now and then with the gleam of a precious jewel: