And then there were no more houses, and Prosper Nash almost fell on his face as the pavement ended and the street turned into a dirt path. Wouldn't he feel foolish if he walked all night? If not foolish, at least footsore.
The path climbed a little; Nash's boots swished against the weeds that lined it. This was silly; hadn't he better go back? If he didn't like the houses, he could at least ask where a lodging could be had. But no; he arrived at the top of the little vacant hill, and beyond it he could see the dark silhouette of another built-up area.
A slight sound made him prick his ears; a sound that might have been made by a rolling pebble, but too faint to be sure, except that Nash was sure he had not made it. He gripped his scabbard in his left hand to keep it from slapping against his leg, and moved with fair silence except for the slight creak of his boots.
He'd be less frightened, he thought, if he only knew definitely. If somebody was following him, he'd run. That would be the only sensible—
More sounds, small but conclusive, made him turn his head. At the sight of a black shape rushing at him, his mundane mind sent his astral body a frantic command—run! But the astral body had already taken matters into its own hand, literally. Its right one swooped to his sword hilt and swept the blade out, while it spun on its heel with the ease of long practice. Then, heels together, legs straight, left arm up and right straight out, it received the charge on its point.
Nash tightened his grip against the fierce backward thrust of the hilt. The shadow stopped, impaled, and gave a very human grunt. It slowly sagged and toppled.
The body gasped and mumbled something; the next thing Nash knew he was running along the narrow path—anything to get away from there.
Slow down, you fool, he thought; what will the cops think if they catch you running away from the crime with a bloody sticker in your hand?
He stopped, and made himself turn and start back. As he approached the scene of the action he walked more and more slowly.
Go on, go on; you're not a coward.
"Oh, yes I am, and I'm going to keep on being one. I'd like to see you stop me."
Well, anyway, you've got to go back there and see if this man is dead, and then telephone the police. They would take away your assailant, and you, too. After a mild grilling and a lot of waiting around, you would be released, and the Times would carry a brief story headed "ACCOUNTANT SLAYS FOOTPAD."
That is, on the mundane plane. Maybe the astral plane had no Times, no telephones, no cops. He had not seen any.
Nash almost stumbled over the body, silent now. He knelt and reluctantly touched it. It was that of a man, all right, all right. His fingers identified a handkerchief tied around the head, earrings, and a fist with a knife in it. He groped for the pulse; it was throbbing faintly.
Then it stopped.
Gosh!
When Nash had digested the enormous idea of having killed a man, it occurred to him that he need not lug the body around. He'd just leave it, and if anybody asked—hi! In upending his sword to scabbard it, he felt a drop run across his hand. The blade was sticky-wet clear to the hilt. He'd better wipe it off on the garments of the corpse—
There was no corpse.
Nash felt frantically around, and poked with his rapier. The man's clothes were there, even the earrings. They lay flat, as if the body had simply evaporated out of them.
Chapter III.
Prosper Nash sighed and gave up. He wiped his blade and his hand on the now empty pants leg, and he set out on the path once more. The darkness oppressed him like a massive weight.
The path sloped down; Nash found his high heels awkward for this kind of walking. But it also broadened and hardened, and soon he found himself on a sidewalk of uneven flagstones. He could feel the presence of houses lining the street; mostly small, irregularly set structures. The only sign of artificial light was a couple of blocks ahead. Nash quickened his stride. When he made out the word "hotel" on a sign dimly illuminated by an oil lantern, he almost broke into another run.
The building was not prepossessing from the outside, from what could be seen of it; about four stories, and covered with involuted stone and iron gingerbread of the General Grant era. As he stepped inside, Nash got a shock: the decorations were of the most garish and angular modernistic style, badly put together, and lighted by the quiet flames of a couple of huge candelabra.
Behind the desk stood a stocky man with a spade beard and a broad red ribbon running diagonally across the bosom of his gleaming boiled shirt. On the desk, beside the register, lay a large revolver on whose butt the bearded man's hand rested familiarly.
White teeth showed through black beard as the man bowed and said rapidly: "Bon accueil, m'sieur; ma petite auberge est à votre service—" He spread his left hand and exuded hospitality, all of him but his right hand, which remained motionless on the pistol butt as if it were not part of him at all.
"I don't—" Nash started to add "understand French," when he realized that he had understood that sentence perfectly. In fact the appropriate reply also in French, had already leaped into his mind; but while he tried to grasp this wonder the words faded, and when he deliberately tried to compose a French sentence he could not.
"May I have a room?" he said finally.
"With pleasure, my dear sir," replied the man at the desk."Your baggage—"
"I haven't any." Nash forestalled a demand for rent in advance by reaching into his money belt. He picked up the pen beside the register and poised it over the paper while he watched the proprietor count out his change. As the money was pushed deferentially toward him, he became aware of motion on the part of his right hand.
The hand had written, in an ornate script with curling swash-lines: "Jean-Prospère, Chv. de Nêche."
A chevalier, eh? Whew! Mustn't let Spade-beard see how excited you are— If his astral body retained a subconscious memory of its name, maybe it would remember its address, too. But now that Nash wanted it to perform, it failed to do so. After staring blankly at his hand for some seconds, Nash wrote simply "New York City."
"Do you serve meals?" he asked.
The ambassadorial innkeeper said he did. Nash asked how much. Spade-beard waved his hand with a gently embarrassed motion, and seemed to have trouble making articulate speech. When Nash repeated the question, the proprietor resigned himself to the fact that his guest did not show the gentlemanly indifference to prices that one expected of a knight, and told him.
When the candles in Nash's rather glum little room had been lit, and the host had bowed himself out, Nash bounded to the mirror.
The face that looked back at him was not quite his own, though there was a strong resemblance. It was an older face, probably in its thirties; perhaps the face that the mundane Nash would wear in ten years. Not quite: the jaw was more massive and the nose had a higher bridge. Nash chuckled, thinking that if he had wanted to improve his face, he would have made just about those changes in it.
He shed his hat, coat, boots and sword, and sat down to the writing table to try some more unconscious writing. But the right hand of the Chevalier de Nêche remained obstinately inert, whether he concentrated a glower on it or whether he ignored it. He must have it cowed.
He gave that enterprise up and counted his money. Then he ruled off some lines on one of the sheets of writing paper, and filled it in thus:
Dr.