About a month later,
being advised that some samples were ready for his inspection, Mr.
Denton met him again, and had, it seems, reason to be satisfied with
the faithfulness of the reproduction of the design. It had been
finished off at the top in accordance with the indication I mentioned,
so that the vertical bands joined. But something still needed to be
done in the way of matching the colour of the original. Mr. Cattell
had suggestions of a technical kind to offer, with which I need not
trouble you. He had also views as to the general desirability of the
pattern which were vaguely adverse. "You say you don't wish this to be
supplied excepting to personal friends equipped with a authorization
from yourself, sir. It shall be done. I quite understand your wish to
keep it exclusive: lends a catchit, does it not, to the suite? What's every man's, it's been said, is no man's." "Do you think it would be popular if it were generally obtainable?" asked Mr. Denton. "I 'ardly think it, sir," said Cattell, pensively clasping his beard. "I 'ardly think it. Not popular: it wasn't popular with the man that
cut the block, was it, Mr. 'Iggins?" "Did he find it a difficult job?" "He'd no call to do so, sir; but the fact is that the artistic
temperament--and our men are artists, sir, every man of them--true
artists as much as many that the world styles by that term--it's apt
to take some strange 'ardly accountable likes or dislikes, and here
was an example. The twice or thrice that I went to inspect his
progress: language I could understand, for that's 'abitual to him, but
reel distaste for what I should call a dainty enough thing, I did not,
nor am I now able to fathom. It seemed," said Mr. Cattell, looking
narrowly upon Mr. Denton, "as if the man scented something almost
Hevil in the design." "Indeed? did he tell you so? I can't say I see anything sinister in it
myself." "Neether can I, sir. In fact I said as much. 'Come, Gatwick,' I said,
'what's to do here? What's the reason of your prejudice--for I can
call it no more than that?' But, no! no explanation was forthcoming. And I was merely reduced, as I am now, to a shrug of the shoulders,
and a _cui bono_. However, here it is," and with that the technical
side of the question came to the front again. The matching of the colours for the background, the hem, and the knots
of ribbon was by far the longest part of the business, and
necessitated many sendings to and fro of the original pattern and of
new samples. During part of August and September, too, the Dentons
were away from the Manor. So that it was not until October was well in
that a sufficient quantity of the stuff had been manufactured to
furnish curtains for the three or four bedrooms which were to be
fitted up with it. On the feast of Simon and Jude the aunt and nephew returned from a
short visit to find all completed, and their satisfaction at the
general effect was great. The new curtains, in particular, agreed to
admiration with their surroundings. When Mr. Denton was dressing for
dinner, and took stock of his room, in which there was a large amount
of the chintz displayed, he congratulated himself over and over again
on the luck which had first made him forget his aunt's commission and
had then put into his hands this extremely effective means of
remedying his mistake. The pattern was, as he said at dinner, so
restful and yet so far from being dull. And Miss Denton--who, by the
way, had none of the stuff in her own room--was much disposed to agree
with him. At breakfast next morning he was induced to qualify his satisfaction
to some extent--but very slightly. "There is one thing I rather
regret," he said, "that we allowed them to join up the vertical bands
of the pattern at the top. I think it would have been better to leave
that alone." "Oh?" said his aunt interrogatively. "Yes: as I was reading in bed last night they kept catching my eye
rather. That is, I found myself looking across at them every now and
then. There was an effect as if some one kept peeping out between the
curtains in one place or another, where there was no edge, and I think
that was due to the joining up of the bands at the top. The only other
thing that troubled me was the wind." "Why, I thought it was a perfectly still night." "Perhaps it was only on my side of the house, but there was enough to
sway my curtains and rustle them more than I wanted." That night a bachelor friend of James Denton's came to stay, and was
lodged in a room on the same floor as his host, but at the end of a
long passage, halfway down which was a red baize door, put there to
cut off the draught and intercept noise. The party of three had separated. Miss Denton a good first, the two
men at about eleven. James Denton, not yet inclined for bed, sat him
down in an arm-chair and read for a time. Then he dozed, and then he
woke, and bethought himself that his brown spaniel, which ordinarily
slept in his room, had not come upstairs with him. Then he thought he
was mistaken: for happening to move his hand which hung down over the
arm of the chair within a few inches of the floor, he felt on the back
of it just the slightest touch of a surface of hair, and stretching it
out in that direction he stroked and patted a rounded something. But
the feel of it, and still more the fact that instead of a responsive
movement, absolute stillness greeted his touch, made him look over
the arm. What he had been touching rose to meet him. It was in the
attitude of one that had crept along the floor on its belly, and it
was, so far as could be collected, a human figure. But of the face
which was now rising to within a few inches of his own no feature was
discernible, only hair. Shapeless as it was, there was about it so
horrible an air of menace that as he bounded from his chair and rushed
from the room he heard himself moaning with fear: and doubtless he did
right to fly. As he dashed into the baize door that cut the passage in
two, and--forgetting that it opened towards him--beat against it with
all the force in him, he felt a soft ineffectual tearing at his back
which, all the same, seemed to be growing in power, as if the hand, or
whatever worse than a hand was there, were becoming more material as
the pursuer's rage was more concentrated. Then he remembered the trick
of the door--he got it open--he shut it behind him--he gained his
friend's room, and that is all we need know. It seems curious that, during all the time that had elapsed since the
purchase of Poynter's diary, James Denton should not have sought an
explanation of the presence of the pattern that had been pinned into
it. Well, he had read the diary through without finding it mentioned,
and had concluded that there was nothing to be said. But, on leaving
Rendcomb Manor (he did not know whether for good), as he naturally
insisted upon doing on the day after experiencing the horror I have
tried to put into words, he took the diary with him.