"Good night. Good night."
It was Maud's turn.
"Well, Innes!" Her bedside maimer was a kind of raucous hilarity. "You got everything, eh? Even the pretty nurse." Innes started to say something, but Maud went right along. "Nothing to do but take it easy. How's the bed? Soft, eh? Papa liked good springs. Best spring in the house." She nudged the mattress with her knuckles.
"Don't, please."
"What's the doctor doing for you, eh? What's he say?"
Innes waggled his eyebrows.
Alice said, "Just rest"
"Eh?"
Innes tapped Maud's arm and acted it out. He folded his hands and closed his eyes.
"Sleep, eh? Does he give you dope?"
Innes shrugged. Alice smiled, uncertainly.
"Donald Follett is getting old," Maud said. "That's a good spring, that is." She punched the bed again, and Innes groaned.
"Well, sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite." Maud grinned and trundled off.
Innes sighed.
About ten o'clock Fred came in to do his turn as combination valet and male nurse. He'd taken upon himself the job of getting Innes ready for the night. Alice escaped. But when she was called back and Innes lay washed and smoothed out, she took her cue from Fred's eyebrow and began carefully.
"Innes, about tomorrow and Mr. Killeen coming . . ."
"Yes?"
"Well, they know, I'm afraid."
"Know? What do you mean? Who knows?"
"Your sisters. They know he's coming and . . . and why, Innes. So Fred and I think we'll just keep an eye on everything all night tonight. Just so you won't have to worry."
Innes said angrily, "Who told them?"
"Isabel heard me talking to Fred. It was an accident"
"Accident, hell," said Fred.
"So we thought we'd watch," said Alice quickly, while Innes looked wildly from one to the other. "And I thought you ought to know." Detached, she could see his panic growing. "Would you like one of us to stay in here with you?"
Innes said nothing.
"I thought I'd just hang around outside the door, sir,'' Fred said. "I can sit on the backstairs and keep quiet."
At that Innes seemed to melt with relief. "You're being awfully good to me, both of you," he said weakly. "But you must get some sleep, Alice."
"It doesn't matter," she murmured.
"Would you leave us a moment, Fred, please? But come back."
Fred went out without a word.
Innes said loving things. He said he appreciated her devotion. He thought she was wonderful. She was beautiful and good. He was a lucky man. He adored her. Did she know that? He hadn't said a great deal, all day, but he knew. He knew she was there. Her loyalty made him love her even more. He knew now, said Innes, that she must care for him. And it made him very happy.
Alice listened miserably.
It made him very happy because once, long ago, he had thought he was in love and beloved in return. He had had a rude awakening.
"Oh, Innes, don't," she said. "Please go to sleep now."
What a charming tyrant she was, said Innes archly. He would be good if she'd kiss him nicely.
"Shall I call Fred now?" she begged.
When Fred came in, Innes changed. He was a frightened man. "I hate to let you sit up all night," he fretted. "It's a great deal to expect." Still, it was perfectly plain that he did expect it, because he went on to say that such devotion warranted a reward and Fred would find him unable to forget this,
Alice watched Fred squirm with malicious pleasure.
"Alice, my dear, do you think you could find another blanket? The doctor said . . . And I am chilly." Nerves, she thought. "In the closet, I think. On the shelf." His voice directed her shrilly.
Alice went in the closet. "I can't reach."
Fred came.The closet was fairly smaU for two people to stand in. Fred stretched his arms up for the blanket. He
could barely reach and as he yanked it tumbled down, landing on her head.
"Oh, say. I'm sorry."
Alice let out a muffled giggle. The blanket slipped back of her. Fred reached to grab it, and all of a sudden they both realized that his arms were an oval and she stood inside. Her mussed-up hair brushed his chin. For a moment she couldn't breathe. Neither was he breathing. Then Fred dropped his hold on the blanket, and Alice felt it fall around her heels. He backed into the hangers. She stepped out into the room as Innes said, "Can't you find it?" querulously.
"We found it," said Alice, out of breath. "It fell on me. She smoothed her hair at the mirror, seeing Fred's reflection come forth with the blanket and stolidly proceed to drape it over the bed. He said, "Is that all, sir?" quietly like a servant.
Innes said that was all, thank you, and good night Fred.
When Fred had gone, Alice looked at her watch. "It's just after eleven," she announced, "so I think . . ."
"Yes, do go to bed, dear. And sleep well."
"Your pill?"
"Perhaps I'd better."
"If you want me, you yell," said Alice with sudden vehemence For the first time, she felt sorry for hun. She seemed to know how he must feel, hurt and helpless and atraid. It wasn't necessary to admire him. One could feel sorry.
"I'll yell," promised Innes. Then faintly, "Good night, my darling."
Fred was sitting on the top step, smoking a cigarette. He didn't look up. "Good night," he said.
Alice looked down on his thick black hair. It had a wave. "I'm not going to sleep. It isn't fair. Let me take a watch or something, hm?"
"I'm the bodyguard," he said.
"Don t you want a pillow?"
"Say, you don't want to be too comfortable at a time like this."
"Well . . . " She hesitated.
"Go on, scram," said Fred under his breath, irritably.
Alice went off to her room, feeling pleased. Feeling quite pleased, she realized. And that was queer. Certainly, looking forward to a night spent in a house full of queer women bent on murder was no time to feel pleased. Nevertheless, stubbornly, she contmued to feel light of heart.
She put on a negligee and tripped to the bathroom and back. Fred was sitting with his back stiff against the wall. He twisted his lips at her in a perfunctory smile, and she made a comradely little gesture with her toothbrush. Back in her room she did not quite close the door.
She opened the window a htde crack. The room was small, and the dry heat pouring out of her register made her skin feel stiff and as if it might crack. The darkness held the threat of a storm. She thought she heard a mutter of thunder. Too early for thunder. Rain, though was beginning to beat down. She only half lay down on her hard bed. She truly meant to keep awake.
She woke with a start about twelve o'clock. She seemed to have been struggling with the mists of sleep for some time, as if whatever woke her had happened and been forgotten before she was awake enough to know what it was. She listened. She became aware of the storm in full blast. Rain slapped her window and spattered in. The wind shook her curtains, and they hissed along the floor. The old house complained as the wind and the rain drove against it. Surely, all she heard was the storm. But her heart beat fast, and she drew up the bed clothing carefully in order not to lose her listening check on the noisy night.
Then in a windless interval she heard a sound. A small sound. Quite near. A rusty clearing of a throat, was it? Or a cough? Or a chuckle? An odd Uttle chuckle, almost a croon. The same queer little sound she'd heard once before. Whatever it was, it was surely the very same.
Alice strained her eyes toward her door. It was still slighdy ajar. Just as she'd left it. Or was it? Did it swing? She listened, and her blood sang in her veins with fear.
Wind raged outside. Honest wind. How much more sinister that strange little soimd was, and what was it doing in the night?
What was it about to do?
Nothing happened. There was no more, except the dying drive of the rain. Whatever had passed her door was past. She felt released, so she knew it had gone. It had passed by.
A long, long time later, when the storm was over and the house wept rain water from its eaves and gutters, Alice put her feet cautiously to the floor and crept to look out ino the hall. It was quiet. The tiny night light near the head of the stairs burned lonesomely. She couldn't see Fred nor the place where he should still be. Walls along the stairs cut off her view. She could see as far as the corner of the old mahogany chest and the picture that hung over it.