Still Wier did not return, and still the gloomy shadows and intense silence filled the place. If I looked up, the graven images on the sarcophagi stared at me; if I glanced downward, carved ebony imps on the table legs scowled arrogantly. Every detail seemed to have some hidden meaning, some strange influence, and every detail set my nerves on edge.
Deciding that moving about would be better than sitting still, I examined a sarcophagus. It was the genuine thing, carved from rich red porphyry, and it pleased me not to find an imitation amid the severe splendor of the study. I walked from one to another, examining them all. Twelve there were, each seeming more marvelous than the one before.
At the twelfth I hesitated longer than usual, noting every detail. It was a masterpiece in terra cotta, rare, and surely worth a small fortune. Then slowly, but ever stronger, like the growth of a temptation, came the question—"Is it empty?"
A morbid desire to learn seized me and played havoc with my already overwrought sensibilities. I would peek within. I raised the lid slightly—shoved it back hurriedly. A feeling of nausea overcame me; my knees weakened and I trembled feebly. A body was in the case, but—it was not a mummy.
I returned to the table in a trance. Why didn't Wier come? All my former melancholy gave away to fear. What signified these unholy things in this strange man's house? Were all the mummy cases so occupied?
The latter question took the form of an obsession. I felt that I must learn, and yet I feared to investigate further. But at length dread was overcome; I went to the fifth case, raised the lid—was confronted by the same gruesome sight. A human body was within, but the features were modern.
The body was not mummified, but metal-plated, and it shimmered with a silver-like luster. It was not a cast, not a carving. The expression was too ghastly real for that. The face was that of an American; the features, contorted shockingly, gave evidence of great mental anguish before death.
How came Wier to possess these? What were his aims? What kept him away so long? These and a multitude of similar questions surged through my agitated brain.
I was now wholly resigned to fear, and I believe that I was perilously near the verge of madness. The deathly quiet; the sarcophagi with their grim burdens; the sable curtains; and again the quiet.
I fled to the table and cried out, but the echo reverberated so uproariously and sounded so unreal that I stopped short, and dared not repeat the experiment. I buried my head in my arms for a few minutes, striving vainly to compose my shattered thoughts. But I was powerless. Some sinister, overwhelming force seemed to take hold of my will and juggle it without mercy.
I felt that I must move about; do something. I glanced up, cried out in dismay. The twelfth sarcophagus had vanished! With wildly pounding heart I counted them to make sure. One, two, three . . . . ten, eleven . . . . The twelfth had utterly disappeared; yet the silence had not been broken, nor had anyone entered the room.
Where was Wier? What infamous hoax was he trying to put off on me?
My mind wandered. I was unable to think clearly or to direct my thoughts. That fifth mummy case—had it vanished, too? No, it had not moved, but—most peculiar—the cold stone eyes of the carved cover gleamed wickedly. Yet they attracted . . . like eyes of a snake . . . they beckoned.
And I responded.
WHEN I stood before the case the eyes gleamed no longer. Fool! Thus to allow my imagination to run riot with me because the night was stormy and I was in a strange room! Perhaps I had even imagined that the twelfth case had disappeared. I turned. It stood in its proper place, but its graven face seemed to leer disconcertingly.
I now felt that all had been a trick of my fancy. Of course the huge old coffins were empty! Courage surged up within me, dispelling my terror. I would prove to myself my hallucination.
I drew aside the cover of the fifth sarcophagus, boldly this second time. Suddenly my body went nerveless; I stood dumbfounded, paralyzed. The cover of the sarcophagus slipped from my senseless fingers and shattered on the floor with a crash that I vaguely noticed. And, like it, all my regained control, all my restored confidence. fell from me, leaving me more enervated than ever; my reason further gone.
There, in the sarcophagus, instead of unoccupied space, or at worst, metalplated body, stood Wier, his face contorted fearfully, his eyes gleaming with frightful luster. He laughed diabolically and stepped out. The echoes flung the ungodly sound about the room with horrible realism.
Mechanically, I retreated a few paces.
Wier advanced toward me, I again fell back.
"Fool!" he hissed, "you came to seek a story! To learn how I study the mind! To give it to a blatant press! You shall learn! But never will you see your story in print. You will become a part of the tale, but—you will not be able to write it. Look! Here is your story!"
He strode across the room and pulled a cord. The hanging velvets parted and revealed a door of solid bronze. Wier threw it open, but there remained several doors of wood. At last he reached a heavy iron grating, unlocked it, and threw it open also. Then he seated himself in the carved ebony chair, facing the portals he had swung aside.
"Come here," he commanded, "or my creatures will tear you to bits. Here is one now . . ."
I did not relish the vision Wier pictured, so I stepped to his side. In fact, I was quite powerless to do aught but obey, regardless of what my sentiments might have been.
"Look!"
Out of the door came—a creature. It had once been a woman, a beautiful woman. But now her reason was gone; her face was blank and expressionless; dull were her eyes and listless her step. She advanced nearly to the table.
Then, catching sight of Wier, she became a creature transformed. Hatred flamed in her eyes and she assumed a menacing attitude. She crouched as if to spring at him. He laughed hellishly, clapping his hands sharply together. The woman wilted and crept away.
"Once my wife," said Wier leeringly, swaying back and forth in his huge chair. "But I have taught her to hate me. It is the only emotion she possesses, for I have pruned away all the others, and when she does not hate, she does nothing."
I shuddered.
Another of his puppets came into the room. I watched with fascinated dread. A middle aged man he was, but his actions had the same listless character as those of the first victim. This one, however, when he noticed Wier, fell into the most abject terror, and uttering shriek after shriek, fled from the study.
"Fear," explained Wier, "and once my butler. Now you understand why I have a soundproof study."
Others came. Love, who fawned all over the beast; Pride, who deigned not to notice him; Joy, a clever fool had not his case been so tragic, laughed merrily and capered for the demon; Greed, who scrambled piteously for a few pennies; the mournful resignation of Despair; the buoyant effervescence of Happiness
