Page:Weird Tales v34n04 (1939-10).djvu/16

John Frey despite the witch’s plan, the two would build a house all full of creature comforts—cushions, open fires, probably fish and chopped liver. Gib’s tongue caressed his soot-stained lips at the savory thought. It would be good to have a home with Ivy Hill and John Frey, if once he was quit of Jael Bettiss. . . .

But he put the thought from him. The witch had never held his love and loyalty. That went to the house in the hollow, his home since the month that he was born. Even magic had not taught him how to be rid of that cat-instinctive obsession for his own proper dwelling-place. The sinister, strife-sodden hovel would always call and claim him, would draw him back from the warmest fire, the softest bed, the most savory food in the world. Only John Howard Payne could have appreciated Gib’s yearnings to the full, and he died long ago, in exile from the home he loved.

When Jael Bettiss returned, she was in a fine trembling rage. Her real self shone through the glamor of her disguise, like murky fire through a thin porcelain screen.

Gib was on the doorstep again, and tried to dodge away as she came up, but her enchantments, or something else, had made Jael Bettiss too quick even for a cat. She darted out a hand and caught him by the scruff of the neck.

“Listen to me,” she said, in a voice as deadly as the trickle of poisoned water. “You understand human words. You can talk, and you can hear what I say. You can do what I say, too.” She shook him, by way of emphasis. “Can’t you do what I say?”

“Yes,” said Gib weakly, convulsed with fear.

“All right, I have a job for you. And mind you do it well, or else—” She broke off and shook him again, letting him imagine what would happen if he disobeyed.

“Yes,” said Gib again, panting for breath in her tight grip. “What’s it about?"

“It’s about that little fool. Ivy Hill. She’s not quite out of his heart. ... Go to the village tonight,” ordered Jael Bettiss, “and to the house of the marshal. Steal something that belongs to Ivy Hill.”

“Steal something?”

“Don’t echo me, as if you were a silly parrot.” She let go of him, and hurried back to the book that was her constant study. “Bring me something that Ivy Hill owns and touches—and be back here with it before dawn.”

Gib carried out her orders. Shortly after sundown he crept through the deepened dusk to the home of Marshal Hill. Doubly black with the soot habitually smeared upon him by Jael Bettiss, he would have been almost invisible, even had anyone been on guard against his coming. But nobody watched; the genial old man sat on the front steps, talking to his daughter.

“Say,” the father teased, “isn’t young Johnny Frey coming over here tonight, as usual?”

“I don’t know, daddy,” said Ivy Hill wretchedly.

“What’s that daughter?” The marshal sounded surprised. “Is there anything gone wrong between you two young ’uns?”

“Perhaps not, but—oh, daddy, there’s a new girl come to town—”

And Ivy Hill burst into tears, groping dolefully on the step beside her for her little wadded handkerchief. But she could not find it.

For Gib, stealing near, had caught it up in his mouth and was scampering away toward the edge of town, and beyond to the house in the hollow.

MEANWHILE, Jael Bettiss worked hard at a certain project of wax-modeling. Any witch, or student of witchcraft, would have known at once why she did this.

After several tries, she achieved some-