Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 4 (1925-10).djvu/21

"Morbleu! Yes? And then?" de Grandin murmured eagerly.

"Then I lunged out with all my might and kicked it on the shins. It released its grip a second, and I beat it. Ran as I never did on the quarter-mile track, jumped into the car and took off down the road with everything wide open. But I got these gashes in my back and arms before I got into the roadster. He made three or four grabs for me, and every one of 'em took the flesh away where his nails raked me. By the time I got home I was almost crazy with fright and pain and loss of blood. I remember kicking and banging on the door and yelling for the folks to open, and then I went out like a light."

The boy paused and regarded us seriously. "I know you think I'm the biggest liar out of jail," he announced; "but I've been telling you the absolute, honest-to-goodness truth."

Costello looked skeptical, but de Grandin nodded eagerly, affirmatively. "But of course, you speak truth," he replied. "Now tell me, young Monsieur, if you can, this poilu, this hairy one, how was he dressed?"

"Um," Paul wrinkled his brow in an effort at remembrance. "I can't say surely, for it was dark in the woods and I was pretty much excited, but—I—think he was in evening clothes. Yes; I'd swear to it. I saw his white shirt bosom."

"Ah," muttered de Grandin softly. "A hairy thing, a fellow who leaps up and down like a jumping-jack or an ape in his anger, and in evening clothes. It is to think, mes amis."

"I'll say it is," Costello agreed. "What sort o' hootch did they have out to th' club last night, young feller?"

"Dr. Trowbridge is wanted on the 'phone, please," a maid announced from the door. "You can take it on this one, if you wish, sir; it's connected with the main line."

I picked up the instrument from young Maitland's bedside table and called, "Hello, Dr. Trowbridge speaking."

"This is Mrs. Comstock, doctor," a voice informed me. "Your housekeeper told us you were at Mrs. Maitland's. Can you come to my house, please? Mr. Manly, my daughter's fiancé, was hurt last night."

"Hurt last night?" I repeated.

"Yes, out by the country club."

"Very well, I'll be over shortly," I answered, then held out my hand to de Grandin.

"Sorry to have to run away," I apologized, "but another man was hurt at the club last night."

"Ah?" he replied interrogatively. "That club, it is an unfortunate place. May I accompany you, doctor? This other man, he may tell us something also."

"Very well," I agreed, "I'll be pleased to have your company."

Young Manly's injury proved to be a gunshot wound inflicted by a small caliber weapon, and was located in the left shoulder. He was very reticent concerning its cause, and neither de Grandin nor I felt inclined to inquire too insistently, for Mrs. Comstock hovered about the sickroom from our entrance until the treatment was concluded.

"Nom d'un petit porc!" de Grandin muttered as we left the Comstock residence. "He is close-mouthed, that one. Almost, it would seem—pah! I talk the rot. Let us get to the morgue, cher docteur. You shall drive me there in your motor and tell me what it is you see. Ofttimes you gentlemen of the general practise see things which we specialists overlook because of the mental blinders of our specialties. N'est-ce-pas?"

In the cold, uncharitable light of the city mortuary we viewed the re-