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Roberts felt cold sweat pouring down his cheeks, despite the heat of the night, and although he clapped his hands over his ears the persistent coaxing went on as though inside his head.

Mechanically and blindly Roberts found himself descending to the ground floor, walking like a drunken man. Then he found himself in the studio and the insistent susurration of the water had now assumed a more soothing aspect. The voices in his head went on, caressingly, insistently, as though a lover was welcoming a long-awaited partner.

Roberts sank to his knees on the heavy wooden floor, found his hands operating the windlass. The hatch opened silently and then he was gazing down into the dark stream, which seemed to fascinate him.

Come! Eternal life awaits! Iä-R’lyeh! Cthulhu fhtagn! Iä! Iä! The words rose to a crescendo, and then it happened.

The darkness of the water parted and something white and obscene floated to the surface. Roberts found himself staring into a loathsome visage, neither human nor fish. A pair of large unblinking eyes glistened in the dim light as the thing surveyed him with an alien stare. Its huge slit mouth lined with jagged green teeth opened in an obscene smile. Then two webbed claws reached up and plucked him effortlessly down into oblivion. The water boiled white and Roberts let out scream after scream as the torrent turned briefly scarlet and the surge swept him under.

IX

Kent was roused from a deep sleep by the insistent jangling of the telephone on his bedside table. As he came to full consciousness he glanced at his wristwatch and saw it was 3:00 a.m. Thinking it might be Gilda, he picked up the phone, but it was a man’s voice, full of urgency.

“Carson here, Mr Kent. Something terrible has happened at The Mill House. I know it’s an unearthly hour, but could you come over here right away? It really is imperative.”

At first Kent could not place the voice, but then he remembered it was a CID Inspector based at Lewes, who had read a number of his crime novels and had given him invaluable advice about police procedures. From that a friendship had evolved. “The Mill House?” Kent said, still half-asleep. “Is Roberts...”

Carson interrupted him. “It’s about your friend,” he said gently. “I understand his wife is in New York, so I thought of you. I hope you don’t mind?”

“No, of course not, but I still don’t understand.”

“A local man was walking past the place at midnight when he heard terrible screams coming from the building,” replied Carson. “He tried the bell and there were lights on in the house, but no one answered. The local police had a list of key holders and they had to get his housekeeper to open up. What they found was so shocking that they contacted us. You really must come. Now.”

Kent was already out of bed. “I’ll be there in a quarter of an hour,” he said grimly.

X

When Kent arrived at the mill the place was a blaze of light. There were three police cars with their headlights on and an ambulance. Several police officers in uniform were clustered around the open front door, smoking.

After Kent had identified himself, he hurried upstairs and was met by Carson coming down. The Inspector was a big, impressive-looking man in his early forties, broad-shouldered and athletic.

“A bad business, Mr Kent,” he muttered. “A bad business.” He put his hand on the other’s shoulder as they went up to Roberts’ study. “I’m afraid your friend is dead.”

At first Kent could not take this in and stammered something banal and fatuous.

“It’s true,” the CID man said, ushering Kent into the study and motioning toward the whisky bottle and glasses on the desk. “You’d better have a peg. I’m afraid you’re going to need it.”

“I can’t understand it,” Kent said bewilderedly. “He was all right when I last saw him a few days ago, though a little troubled in his mind.” Now that the whisky was beginning to take effect, his faculties were beginning to function normally. “It wasn’t suicide?”

Carson shook his head.

Kent gave him an incredulous look. “Not murder?”

“Not that either. At least not as we understand it,” Carson said grimly. “As I said, you’d better drink the rest of that glass. You’re going to need it.”

Half-dazed, Kent was led downstairs. As they descended to the last level, just above the mill-race, cold damp air was on his face.

The place was full of light, from portable lamps set about the floor, which was wet and interspersed with reddish stains. The hatch was wide open and gaping, but it was the huddled mass under the green canvas sheet that arrested his attention. A police surgeon, a small sandy-haired man with gold pince-nez dominating his face and wearing a dirty white smock, was kneeling by the shrouded mass.

Two other plain-clothes men sat on stools at the far side of the room, smoking and with stolid expressions on their faces. Nobody spoke for a moment.

Kent licked suddenly dry lips but Carson’s strong hand was beneath his elbow and steered him to the high stool that Roberts sometimes used when spending long hours before his easel. That too was in the far corner, its surface covered by a white sheet.

The surgeon stood up. “Quite outside my experience,” he said in a terse voice. “We’ll know more when we get him down to the mortuary... or perhaps not,” he added after a slight pause.

“Are you ready?” Carson asked. “Just a formality and I’m sorry to have to put you through this, but it will save the widow much grief.”

Kent could not suppress a shudder at the crumpled mass of eviscerated flesh with hands and legs slashed and gouged as though by razor-sharp knives. There was such a look of horror on what was left of the dead face that Kent remembered it for the rest of his life. His legs were giving way and he sank thankfully back on to the stool.

“Beats your novels, eh, Mr Kent?” Carson said. The two men were on Christian name terms, but Carson was on familiar ground now and using his official manner in the presence of his subordinates.

“No blood,” revealed the surgeon, whose name was Snaith.

“The water would wash it down, surely,” Kent said.

The little man shook his head. “Even in cases where bodies are recovered from water after being gashed, say, by the propeller of motor boats, they retain most of their blood.”

“But who could have done this?” Kent asked desperately.

“Nothing human, that’s for sure,” Carson put in.

“So it’s not murder?”

Snaith shook his head. “That’s the damnable thing. How are we going to explain this to high authority?”

“But it must be murder,” Kent went on.

Carson shook his head. “Quite impossible. The house was securely locked for the night. As I said on the phone, we had to get the key from the housekeeper. We made extensive searches from top to bottom of the mill. No one had been here apart from Roberts.”

“But the water,” Kent went on desperately. “Perhaps the mill wheel...”

One of the plain-clothes men stepped forward. “We had a frogman under there, sir. That wheel has been inoperable for at least thirty years. It is secured by steel bolts and great chains.”

Kent persisted in his questions though he knew he was being ridiculous. He turned back to Carson. “Could something like a shark have escaped from an aquarium and come down the stream?”

The Inspector would have laughed had the situation not been so macabre and horrific in its implications. “Quite impossible. Even if you were correct, nothing large enough to have inflicted such terrible injuries. There are massive iron grilles each side of the mill. They go right down to the bed of the stream. The steel has no rust and the grilles would merely let small fish get through. The water’s only about eight or ten feet deep anyway.” He resumed his brisk manner. “You chaps carry on. We’ll try to sort out all this mess later. Mr Kent has had a shock and it’s necessary to get him back to normal surroundings.”