Read The Return Of Bulldog Drummond for Free Online Page A

there were other sounds, for all the world like the flounderings of some huge fish on the floor above. Gradually they died away, and once again silence settled on the house.
    After a while, as the silence continued, he grew a little calmer: he must decide what he was going to do. On one thing he was absolutely determined: clothes or no clothes, nothing would induce him to go upstairs. And the only point was whether he should go through the window now and out into the foggy night, or whether he dared to wait a few more hours. He opened the shutters, and found the point was settled for him: there were bars outside, and so that means of exit was cut out. And the bare idea of going through the hall until daylight came was out of the question.
    He sat down once more in the chair by the table, and tilted up the bottle of beer to see if by chance a drop remained. Then he spied a cupboard in the corner, and crossing the room he looked inside. And there, to his joyful amazement, he found five more. He greedily seized one, and turned back towards the table to get the glass. And the next moment the bottle fell from his nervous fingers on the carpet. For the door had opened again.
    He stared at it, making hoarse little croaking noises in his throat. He was in such a position that he could not see into the passage. All he knew was that it was open wide enough to admit a human being, or whatever it was that was outside. And now it was opening wider still, and he cowered back with his arm over his eyes. In another second he felt he would yell: his reason would give. And then suddenly the tension snapped. He heard a voice speaking, and it was a woman’s voice, though curiously deep and solemn.
    “My poor man, do not be frightened. I am here to help you.”
    He lowered his arm: the door was now wide open. And framed in the entrance was a grey-haired woman dressed in black. She stood very still. Her features were dead white, her hands like those of a corpse. But for her eyes, that gleamed strangely from her mask-like face, she might have been a waxwork model.
    The convict swallowed twice, and then he spoke.
    “Gaw lumme, mum, you didn’t ’alf give me a start opening that there door like that. The fust time was bad enough, but this time I thought as ’ow I was going to go barmy.”
    “The first time?” she said, still in the same deep voice. “This is the first time that I have been here tonight.”
    “Then ’oo was monkeying with that blinking door quarter of an hour ago?”
    She came slowly into the room, and the convict backed away. There was something almost as terrifying about this woman as if she had actually been a ghost.
    “Strange things happen in this house,” she said. “It is not wise to ask too many questions.”
    “There was a norful row going on above ’ere a few minutes ago,” he said nervously.
    “So you heard them too, did you?” she answered gravely. “Every foggy night the curse must be fulfilled: such is the penalty that even in death they must carry out.”
    “Spooks!” he muttered. “Is that wot you mean?”
    “Thirty years ago my son killed a man in the room above. He deserved to die if ever a man did, but they took my son, and they hanged him. Even, Morris, as they might have hanged you.”
    He took a step forward, snarling, only to stand abashed before those glowing eyes.
    “’Ow do you know my name is Morris?” he muttered sullenly.
    “There are many things that I know,” she said: “things that are whispered to me in the night by those who live around my bedside: those whom you could never see.”
    He shivered uncomfortably.
    “But it was not they who told me about you,” she went on. “This afternoon a warder came and warned me to be on my guard against you. I listened to what he had to say, and when he had gone I laughed. For I knew you would come, Morris: I willed you to come to me through the fog: it was for you I prepared the meal.”
    “Very nice of you, I’m sure, mum,” he