And somewhere else on that expanse, it was. Could it see and hear more than he? Could it discern form in retinal patterns that were only blackness to Tansy’s sane soul? What was it waiting for? He strained his ears, but the rapid breathing was no longer audible.
This might be the darkness of some jungle floor, roofed by yards of matted creepers. Civilization is a thing of light. When light goes, civilization is snuffed out. Norman was rapidly being reduced to its level. Perhaps it had counted on that when it smashed the lights. This might be the inner chamber of some primeval cave, and he some cloudy-minded primitive huddled in abject terror of his mate, into whose beloved form a demon had been conjured up by the witch woman — the brawny, fat witch woman with the sullen lip and brutish eyes, and copper ornaments twisted in matted red hair. Should he grope for his ax and seek to smash the demon from the skull where it was hiding? Or should he seek out the witch woman and throttle her until she called off her demon? But how could he constrain his wife meanwhile? If the tribe found her, they would slay her instantly — it was the law. And even now the demon in her was seeking to slay him.
With thoughts almost as murky and confused as those of that ghostly primitive forerunner, Norman sought to grapple with the problem, until he suddenly realized what it was waiting for.
Already his muscles were aching. He was getting twinges of pain from his shoulder as the numbness went out of it. Soon he would make an involuntary movement. And in that instant it would be upon him.
Cautiously he stretched out his hand. Slowly — very slowly — he swung it around until it touched a small table and located a large book. Clamping thumb and fingers around the book where it projected from the table edge, he lifted it and drew it to him. His muscles began to shake a little from the effort to maintain absolute quiet.
With a slow movement he launched the book toward the center of the room, so that it hit the carpet a few feet from him. The sound drew the instant response he had hoped for. Waiting a second, he dove forward seeking to pin it to the floor. But its cunning was greater than he had guessed. His arms closed on a heavy cushion that it had hurled toward the book, and only luck saved him as the poker thudded savagely against the carpet close by his head.
Clutching out blindly, his hands closed on the cold metal. There was a moment of straining as it sought to break his grip. Then he was sprawling backward, the poker in his hand, and the footsteps were retreating toward the rear of the house.
He followed it to the kitchen. A drawer, jerked out too far, fell to the floor, and he heard the chilling clatter and scrape of cutlery.
But there was enough light in the kitchen to show him its silhouette. He lunged at the upraised hand holding the long knife, caught the wrist. Then it threw itself against him, and they dropped to the floor.
He felt the warm body against his murderously animated to the last limits of its strength. For a moment he felt the coldness of the flat of the knife against his cheek, then he had forced the weapon away. He doubled up his legs to protect himself from its knees. It surged convulsively down on him and he felt jaws clamp the arm with which he held away the knife. Teeth sawed sideways trying to penetrate the fabric of his coat. Cloth ripped as he sought with his free hand to drag the body away from him. Then he found the hair and forced back the head so the teeth lost their grip. It dropped the knife and clawed at his face. He seized the fingers seeking his eyes and nostrils; it snarled and spat at him.
Steadily he forced down the arms, twisting them behind it, and with a sudden effort got to his knees. Strangled sounds of fury came from its throat.
Only too keenly aware of how close his muscles were to the trembling weakness of exhaustion, he shifted his grip so that with one hand he held the straining wrists. With the other he groped sideways, jerked open the lower door of the cabinet, found a length of cord.
“It’s pretty serious this time, Norm,” said Harold Gunnison. “Fenner and Liddell really want your scalp.”
Norman drew his chair closer, as if the discussion were the real reason for his visit to Gunnison’s office this morning.
Gunnison went on, “I think they’re planning to rake up that Margaret Van Nice business and start yelping that where there’s smoke there must be fire. And they may try to use Theodore Jennings against you. Claim that his ‘nervous breakdown’ was aggravated by unfairness and undue severity on your part, et cetera. Of course we have the strongest defense for you in both cases, still just talking about such matters is bound to have an unfavorable effect on the other trustees. And then this talk on sex you’re going to give the Offcampus Mothers, and those theatrical friends of yours you’ve invited to the college. I have no personal objections, Norm, but you did pick a bad time.”
Norman nodded, dutifully. Mrs. Gunnison ought to be here soon. The maid had told him over the phone that she had just left for her husband’s office.
“Of course, such matters aren’t enough in themselves.” Gunnison looked unusually heavy-eyed and grave. “But as I say, they have a bad taste, and they can be used as an entering wedge. The real danger will come from a restrained but concerted attack on your conduct of classes, your public utterances, and perhaps even trivial details of your social life, followed by talk about the need for retrenchment where it is expeditious — you know what I mean.” He paused. “What really bothers me is that Pollard’s cooled toward you. I told him just what I thought of Sawtelle’s appointment, but he said the trustees had overruled him. He’s a good man, but he’s a politician.” And Gnnnison shrugged, as if it were common knowledge that the distinction between politicians and professors went back to the Ice Age.
Norman roused himself. “I’m afraid I insulted him last week. We had a long talk and I blew up.”
Gunnison shook his head. “That wouldn’t explain it. He can absorb insults. If he sides against you, it will be because he feels it necessary or at least expeditious (I hate that word) on the grounds of public opinion. You know his way of running the college. Every couple of years he throws someone to the wolves.”
Norman hardly heard him. He was thinking of Tansy’s body as he had left it — the trussed-up limbs, the lolling jaw, the hoarse heavy breathing from the whiskey he had finally made it guzzle. He was taking a long chance, but he couldn’t see any other way. At one time last night he had almost decided to call a doctor and perhaps have it placed in a sanitarium. But if he did that he might lose forever his chance to restore Tansy’s rightful self. What psychiatrist would believe the morbid plot he knew existed against his wife’s sanity? For similar reasons there was no friend he could call on for help. No, the only way was to strike swiftly at Mrs. Gunnison. But it was not pleasant to think of such headlines as:
“PROFESSOR’S WIFE A TORTURE VICTIM. FOUND TEU55ED IN CLOSET BY MATE.”
“It’s really serious, Norm,” Gunnison was repeating. “My wife thinks so, and she’s smart about these things. She knows people.”
His wife! Obediently, Norman nodded.
“Hard luck it had to come to a head now,” Gunnison continued, “when you’ve been having more than your share of troubles, with sickness and what-not.” Norman could see that Gunnison was looking with a faint shade of inquisitiveness at the strip of surgical tape close to the corner of his left eye and the other one just below his nostrils. But he attempted no explanation. Gunnison shifted about and resettled himself in his chair. “Norm,” he said, “I’ve got the feeling that something’s gone wrong. Ordinarily I’d say you could weather this blow all right — you’re one of our two-three best men — but I’ve got the feeling that something’s gone wrong all the way down the line.”
The offer his words conveyed was obvious enough, and Norman knew it was made in good faith.
But only for a moment did he consider telling Gunnison even a fraction of the truth. It would be like taking his troubles into the law courts, and he could imagine — with the sharp, almost hallucinatory vividness of extreme fatigue — what that would be like.
Imagine putting Tansy in the witness box even in her earlier non-violent condition. “You say, Mrs. Saylor, that your soul was stolen from your body?” “Yes.” “You are conscious of the absence of your soul?” “No, I am not conscious, of anything.” “Not conscious? You surely don’t mean that you are unconscious?” “But I do. I can neither see nor hear.” “You mean that you can neither see nor hear me?” “That is correct.” “How then —” Bang of the judge’s gavel. “If this tittering does not cease immediately, I will clear the court!” Or Mrs. Gunnison called to the witness box and he himself bursting out with an impassioned plea to the jury. “Gentlemen, look at her eyes! Watch them closely, I implore you. My wife’s soul is there, if you would only see it!”
“What’s the matter, Norm?” he heard Gunnison ask. The genuine sympathy of the voice tugged at him confusedly. Groggy with sudden sleepiness, he tried to rally himself to answer.
Mrs. Gunnison walked in.
“Hullo,” she said. “I’m glad you two finally got together.” Almost patronizingly she looked Norman over. “I don’t think you’ve slept for the last two nights,” she announced brusquely. “And what’s happened to your face? Did that cat of yours finally scratch it?”
Gunnison laughed, as he usually did, at his wife’s frankness. “What a woman. Loves dogs. Hates cats. But she’s right about your needing sleep, Norm.”
The sight of her and the sound of her voice stung Norman into an icy wakefulness. She looked as if she had been sleeping ten hours a night for some time. An expensive green suit set off her red hair and gave her a kind of buxom beauty. Her slip showed and the coat was buttoned in a disorderly way, but now it conveyed to Norman the effect of the privileged carelessness of some all-powerful ruler who is above ordinary standards of neatness. For once she was not carrying the bulging purse. His heart leaped.
He did not trust himself to look into her eyes. He started to get up.
“Don’t go yet, Norm,” Gunnison told him. “There’s a lot we should talk about.”
“Yes, why don’t you stay?” Mrs. Gunnison seconded.
“Sorry,” said Norman. “I’ll come around this afternoon if you can spare the time. Or tomorrow morning, at the latest.”
“Be sure and do that,” said Gunnison seriously. “The trustees are meeting tomorrow afternoon.”
Mrs. Gunnison sat down in the chair he had vacated.
“My regards to Tansy,” she said. “I’ll be seeing her tonight at the Carr’s — that is, if she’s recovered sufficiently.” Norman nodded. Then he walked out rapidly and shut the door behind him.
While his hand was still on the knob, he saw Mrs. Gunnison’s green purse lying on the table in the outer office. It was just this side of the display case of Prince Rupert drops and similar oddities. His heart jumped again.
There was one girl in the outer office — a student employee. He went to her desk.
“Miss Miller,” he said, “would you be so kind as to get me the grade sheets of the following students?” And he rattled off half a dozen names.
“The sheets are in the Recorder’s Office, Professor Saylor,” she said, a little doubtfully.
“I know. But you tell them I sent you. Dr. Gunnison and I want to look them over.”
Obediently she took down the names.
As the door closed behind her he pulled out the top drawer of her desk, where he knew the key for the display case would be.
A few minutes later Mrs. Gunnison came out.
“I thought I heard you go out,” she exclaimed sharply. Then in her usual blunt manner, “Are you waiting for me to leave, so you can talk to Harold alone?”
He did not answer. He glanced at her nose.
She picked up her purse. “There’s really no point in your trying to make a secret of it,” she said. “I know as much about your troubles here as he does — in fact, considerably more. And, to be honest, they’re pretty bad.” Her voice had begun to assume the arrogance of the victor. She smiled at him.
He continued to look at her nose.
“And you needn’t pretend you’re not worried,” she went on, her voice reacting irritably to his silence. “Because I know you are. And tomorrow Pollard will ask for your resignation.” Then, “What are you staring at?”
“Nothing,” he answered, hastily, averting his glance.
With an incredulous sniff, she took out her mirror, glanced at it puzzledly for a moment, then held it up for a detailed inspection of her face.
To Norman the second hand of the wall clock seemed to stand still.
Very softly, but swiftly, and in a most casual voice, which did not even cause Mrs. Gunnison to look around, he said, “I know you’ve stolen my wife’s soul, Mrs. Gunnison, and I know how you’ve stolen it.
I know a bit about stealing souls myself; for instance, if you’re in a room with someone whose soul you want, and they happen to be looking into a mirror, and the mirror breaks while their reflection is still in it, then —”
With a swift, tinkling crack, not very loud, the mirror in Mrs. Gunnison’s hand puffed into a little cloud of iridescent dust.
Instantly it seemed to Norman that a weight added itself to his mind, a tangible darkness pressed down upon his thoughts.
The gasp of astonishment or fear that issued from Mrs. Gunnison’s lips was cut short. What seemed a loose, stupid look flowed slowly over her face, but it was only because the muscles of her face had quite relaxed.
Norman stepped up to Mrs. Gunnison and took her arm. For a moment she stared at him, emptily, then her body lurched, she took a slow step, then another, as he said, “Come with me. It’s your best chance.”
He trembled, hardly able to credit his success, as she followed him into the hall. Near the stairs they met Miss Miller returning with a handful of large cards.
“I’m very sorry to have put you to the trouble,” he told her. “But it turned out that we don’t need them. You had better return them to the Recorder’s Office.”
The girl nodded with a polite but somewhat wry smile. “Professors!”
As Norman steered the uncharacteristically docile Mrs. Gunnison out of the Administration Building, the queer darkness still pressed upon his thoughts. It was like nothing he had ever before experienced.