Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 5 (1925-11).djvu/50

could scarcely remember. "I—love—you!"

She rose; she stretched out her white arms; she was coming toward him. He shivered and grew cold as she came nearer. Her arms touched him. He shrank away. They encircled him. He tried to pull back but he was held by terror. Her icy lips were seeking his: the fragrance of violets was heavy in his nostrils, and deathly and heavier still, the damp, moist odor of the mold around their roots!

"Don't—don't!" he cried. "You are—oh, God!—go away!"

The white arms fell from around him and she cringed. He looked into eyes of unutterable sadness. Then she covered her face with her slender hands and rocked her body to and fro, moaning:

"Oh, oh, oh! I tried and tried to come—and I came to you at last and you were afraid. You are afraid of me!"

He could not speak: he clung to the table, weeping. The mournful voice went on:

"I must go away; and it will be lonely and cold and I can never come back any more."

Slowly she went over to where the candles burned and lifted one from the bracket, shading it with her hand. She turned her piteous face toward him again, crooning the words over and over to herself as if they were a weird song:

"You were afraid."

And now she was walking through the doorway, the long garment trailing behind her, the dark braids swinging loosely. David could not follow.

"Come back—come back!" he tried to call but the words were only a whisper. "Click, clack, click, clack." Then "Click, clack," again, farther and farther away. He listened and watched until the halo of light grew smaller and smaller and the footsteps died off in the silence; while the wind and rain outside sounded as if they took up the burden of her moaning:

"Oh—oh—oh! I came to you and you were afraid."

A sharp pain—David jerked his head up: it had struck the wooden chest that lay on his knees. How strange! He could not remember having sat down again—or having gathered the things from the floor; stranger still, the candles which had been only half-burned when she was there, flickered fitfully in their sockets, ready to expire. One at a time the flames fluttered and went out.

The next morning was bright and sunshiny, the sky all blue, and the trees and flowers were fresher from last night's rain. As David looked out the window the air was sweet and he saw that the gardener had been putting out new violet plants. From all around the garden their blooms looked up at him with bright faces where drops of moisture lingered, shining like tears. Later, as he walked down the staircase, he found spots of candle-drip all the way—and the last socket of the brass candelabrum on the mantel was empty.