Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 6 (1925-12).djvu/87

horse was as white as snow, and he seemed to glide along on top of the chalky ruins like a phantom. His eyes were two balls of reddest, blazing fire. The coach followed the horse although there was no attachment to join them together. It was of the transparency of glass and it did not roll but slid along noiselessly. The occupants were two men and two women. Their faces were as pale and pasty as death itself. The men wore black, the women white, and I saw the flash of jewels. It passed, continued on to the edge of the bay, glided out upon the water and on out to sea. I could still hear the measured hoof-beats of the horse. I saw it melt into the red moon as that weird satellite sank beneath the waves, and all was darkness.

"Did you see that?" I asked.

"Yes, we saw," they all replied.

There we sat huddled and silent till the sun came up and blazed over the city of the dead. Morning brought the cruiser back, and a boat to carry us away.

Once aboard I reverently delivered the consul's bones to the captain. I have heard that in a certain cemetery in the East there is a grave, rose-covered and mossy, above which stands a stone to the memory of the American consul who died at his post of duty on the Island of Martinique.

Mighty is the storm that rages in the sky; but it is as nothing to the storm that rages in the heart of the murderer. As he stumbles through the wet underbrush, every vivid flash of lightning is a searchlight spying him out; every dead limb that bars his path is the hand of justice outstretched to stay his flight; every roll of thunder is the gun in his pursuer's hand. The rain has drenched him, and his wet clothes chafe his body painfully, but he is not conscious of this. In stark-blind, unthinking terror, pursued by nothing save the gnawings of his own guilty conscience, he plunges deeper and deeper into the treacherous forest. Suddenly his foot drops into a hole, and his body crashes heavily to the ground. A single, agonizing pain in his leg—then blackness . . .

His consciousness returns. He sits up—he can not stand. The leg—perhaps it is broken.

It is dark, but a sickly moon casts milky shafts of light down through the foliage. The shadows are thick, but—horrors of hell! What is this? A white transparent shape is hovering over him. It is visible—yet invisible. He sees through it like a film, but still it is there—it is something! To his terror-crazed eyes it takes the shape of a grisly specter. It is the man whom he killed but a few hours ago. The face—ever so faint—is leering at him with hate and triumph. The murderer closes his eyes. With a trembling hand, he raises the revolver and places the cold barrel between his eyes. He pulls the trigger.

Who will tell him that the ghost was only a wet spider's web, glistening in the moonlight? Once more has destiny played her card. The revolver, still smoking, lies on the damp ground, but now two bullets are missing from the clip. The retribution is complete.