Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 4 (1925-10).djvu/75

A Droll Little Tale Is

The stranger entered my office and dropped wearily into a chair, covering his face with his hands. "I'm dead, doctor," he groaned.

I agreed that it was quite a climb from the street to my office. "But soon—a month or so—I expect to move to the ground floor."

"That will be too late. It won't do me any good, then."

"No? What's your trouble?"

He stared straight at me as he answered. "Trouble? I have none. Dead people have no troubles, and I've been dead for half an hour. I committed suicide."

I looked at him, startled. He was rather pale, I noticed, and the brilliant red necktie which he was wearing gave the impression of a deep and bleeding wound. He seemed very nervous, his hands continually stroking the creased trousers of the light gray suit he was wearing.

"I committed suicide," he repeated. "I shot myself through my heart." He indicated the spot with a long, slender finger, on one knuckle of which I saw just such a stain as dried blood makes. I thought he meant for me to examine him, so I arose, and took a step toward him. He motioned me back. "Don't touch me," he commanded. "It's no use. You couldn't feel me. I wonder whether you can even see me plainly. I'm getting more ethereal all the time. I—what was I saying?"

"That I couldn't see you. But I can. plainly."

"Oh, my clothes, perhaps, my coat, my necktie—"

Yes, that red necktie was very much in evidence. I agreed, wondering whether he were insane.

He seemed to read my mind. "You think I'm crazy, don't you, doctor? But I'm not. My nerves are frazzled, and I thought I would go insane when Polly turned me down; but I didn't. I know I didn't. I've had my knee tapped and have had all sorts of tests. Finally, I couldn't stand the agony and made an end of myself this afternoon." He looked up at the clock. "Just twenty-eight minutes ago my soul left my body."

I studied him carefully. His eyes had none of that stare peculiar to the insane. I was near enough to be sure that he was not intoxicated; yet I could not determine just what ailed him. Perhaps, if he talked longer, he would help me to diagnose his condition. "Tell me about it," I urged.

"I knew you'd be interested. The day I read your book, Do the Dead Survive? I said to myself, 'I wonder whether he ever saw a ghost.' Then, just before I snatched up my revolver, I looked up your office in the telephone book so that if I did live after death I could come to call on you and tell you how correct your assumptions were. And after the shot, and I felt myself growing more aerial and ghostlike, I left my body lying dead on the floor and hurried here to