Part 7

“Let me pour it for you,” suggested Flavio Minetti. “Your hand is shaking so that you will spill half of it on the floor.”

The hunchback’s voice had a note of pity in it. Fernet relinquished his hold upon the bottle.

“Don’t look so frightened,” continued Minetti. “I shall not kill you here. The proprietor is a friend of mine, and, besides—”

“What nonsense!” cried Fernet, with a ghastly smile. “But I must confess, you did make my blood run cold for a minute.”

Minetti stirred some cognac into his glass. “And, besides,” he finished, coldly, “I give everybody a sporting chance. It adds to the game.”

――――

That night André Fernet was restless. He lay on his bed looking out at the blinking lights of the harbor. “I must stop drinking coffee,” he muttered to himself.

Finally he fell asleep, and when he did he had a strange dream. It seemed that the pepper-tree outside his window suddenly began to move in the night breeze and its long green boughs became alive, twisting like the relentless tentacles of a devil-fish. Its long green boughs became alive, crawling along the ground, flinging themselves into the air, creeping in at André Fernet’s open window. He lay upon the bed as he had done earlier in the evening, watching the harbor lights. Slowly the green boughs writhed over the faded carpet, scaled the bedpost and fell upon the bed. André Fernet waited, motionless. He felt the green tentacles close about his legs, clasp his hands, slide shudderingly across his throat. Yet he made no move to free himself. It was only when he felt a breath upon his cheek that he turned slightly, and instead of the tentacle-like boughs of the pepper-tree he fancied himself staring down at the hands of Flavio Minetti.... He awoke with a start. The sun was pouring in at the open window. He got up quickly. A noisy clatter issued from the passageway. Fernet opened his door. Two men were carrying a trunk up the stairs. Pollitto, the beggar, walked behind.

“Ah, I see you have rented your front room,” said Fernet, stepping out.

“Yes,” returned the other. “It was taken as early as six o’clock this morning—by a hunchback.”

Fernet stopped breathing. “A hunchback? Was his name Flavio Minetti?”

“Yes. How did you know?”

Fernet tried to smile. “He is a friend of mine,” he answered, as he walked back into his room. “Perhaps it would be better if I moved away,” he thought. “I do not like this room. Heaven knows why I have stayed this long. Is this fellow Minetti really mad or merely making sport of me? I should not like to have him think that I am afraid of him. As for his story about Suvaroff, that is, of course, ridiculous. If I thought otherwise I should go at once to the.... No, it is all a joke! I shall stay where I am. I shall not have it said that a little, mad, puny, twisted fellow frightened André Fernet out of his lodgings. Besides, it will be curious to watch his little game. What a beautiful morning it is, after all! And the pepper-tree—how it glistens in the sun! I should miss that pepper-tree if I moved away. But I must stop drinking _cafés royal_. They upset one. I do not know whether it is the coffee, or the cognac, or the anisette, or all three. Of course, that dream I had toward morning means nothing—but such dreams are unpleasant. I hate this place. But I shall not move now. No, I shall wait and see what happens.”

――――

Fernet did not see Minetti for some days. Indeed, he had dismissed the whole thing from his mind, when, one night, returning home early to get out of a drizzle, who should stop him on the stairway but the hunchback.

“Ah, so here you are!” called out Fernet, gaily, in spite of his rapidly beating heart. “I have been waiting for you to call on me ever since I heard that you were lodging under the same roof.”

“I have been busy,” replied the hunchback, laconically.

Fernet threw open his bedroom door and waved Minetti in.

“Busy?” he echoed, as he struck a light. “And what do you find that is so absorbing, pray?”

“You know my specialty,” replied Minetti, flinging off his cap.

Fernet looked up sharply. A malignant look had crept into the hunchback’s face.

“Oh, there is no doubt of it, he is quite mad!” said Fernet to himself. Then aloud: “Yes, I have been wanting to talk to you more about this. Take a seat and I shall make some coffee. For instance, do you always employ the knife in despatching your—”

“Scarcely,” interrupted Minetti, quickly. “Slow poison has its fascinations. There is a very delicate joy in watching a gradual decline. It is like watching a green leaf fading before the breath of autumn. First a sickly pallor, then a yellowing, finally the sap dries completely, a sharp wind, a fluttering in the air, and it is all over. I have tried nearly every slow way—except mental murder. I fancy that, too, would be exquisite.”

“Mental murder.... I do not understand.”

Minetti stretched himself out and yawned. “Accomplishing the thing without any weapon save the mind.”

Fernet picked up the coffee-pot and laughed. “Why, my dear fellow, it is too absurd! The thing cannot be done. You see I am laughing at you again, but no matter.”

“No, as you say, it is no matter. You can die only once.”

Fernet’s laughter stopped instantly. He went on with his preparation for coffee. Minetti changed the subject.

It turned out that there was no sugar in the cracked bowl. Fernet was putting on his hat to go out for some, when the hunchback stopped him.

“Sugar will not be necessary,” he said. And as he spoke he drew a vial from his vest pocket and laid it upon the table beside the cups. “You know what these are, of course.”

“Saccharine pellets?” inquired Fernet as he threw aside his hat.

Minetti replied with a grunt. Fernet poured out the coffee, set a spoon in each saucer, laid three French rolls upon a blue plate. Then he sat down.

“Permit me!” said Minetti, reaching for the vial and rolling a tiny pellet into his palm.

Fernet held up his cup; the hunchback dropped the pellet into it. Then he corked the vial tightly and laid it aside.

“You forgot to serve yourself,” said Fernet.

“So I did!” answered Minetti, nonchalantly. “Well, no matter. I very often drink my coffee so—without sweetening.”

Fernet drew back suddenly. Could it be possible that.... The hunchback was staring at him, an ironical smile was on his lips. Fernet shuddered.

“Drink your coffee!” Minetti commanded, sneeringly. “You are on the verge of a chill.”

Fernet obeyed meekly. He felt for all the world like an animal caught in a trap. He tried to collect his thoughts. What had the hunchback been talking about?

“Slow poison!” muttered Fernet, inaudibly to himself.

“What is that you are saying?” demanded the other.

“You were speaking of slow poison. How do you go about it?”

“Oh, that is easy! For instance, once in London I lodged next door to my victim. We became capital friends. And he was always calling me in for a bite of something to eat. Nothing elaborate—a bun and a cup of tea, or coffee and cake. Very much as we are doing now. He died in six months. It is no trick, you know, to poison a man who eats and drinks with you—especially drinks!”

As he said this the hunchback reached for the coffee-pot and poured Fernet another cupful. Then he uncorked the vial again and dropped a pellet into the steaming liquid.

“I do not think that I wish any more,” protested Fernet.

“Nonsense! You are still shivering like an old woman with the palsy. Hot coffee will do you good.”

“No,” said Fernet, desperately, “I never drink more than one cup at a sitting. It keeps me awake, and next morning my hand shakes and I am fit for nothing. I need a steady hand in my business.”

“And what may that be, pray?”

“At present I am a draftsman. Some day, if I live long enough, I hope to be an architect.”

“If you live long enough? You forget that you have laughed at _me_, my friend.”

Fernet tried to appear indifferent. “What a droll fellow you are!” he cried, with sudden gaiety, rubbing his hands together. And without thinking, he reached for his coffee-cup and downed the contents in almost one gulp. He laid the cup aside quickly. He could feel the sweat starting out upon his forehead.

“There, you see,” said Minetti, “the coffee has done you good already. You are perspiring, and that is a good sign. A hot drink at the right moment works wonders.”

――――

The next morning Pollitto stopped Fernet as he swung out the front gate to his work.

“What is the matter with you?” exclaimed the beggar, in a surprised tone.

“Why ... what?” demanded Fernet, in a trembling voice. “Do I look so ...? Pray, tell me, is there anything unusual about me?”

“Why, your face.... Have you looked at yourself in the glass? Your skin is the color of stale pastry.”

Fernet tried to laugh. “It is nothing. I have been drinking too much coffee lately. I must stop it.”

It was a fine morning. The sun was shining and the air was brisk and full of little rippling breezes. The bay lay like a blue-green peacock ruffling its gilded feathers. The city had a genial, smiling countenance. But Fernet was out of humor with all this full-blown content. He had spent a wretched night—not sleepless, but full of disturbing dreams. Dreams about Minetti and his London neighbor and the empty sugar-bowl. All night he had dreamed about this empty sugar-bowl. It seemed that as soon as he had it filled Minetti would slyly empty it again. He tried stowing sugar away in his pockets, but when he put his hand in to draw out a lump a score or more of pellets spilled over the floor. Then he remembered saying:

“I shall call on Minetti’s London neighbor. Maybe he will have some sugar.”

He walked miles and miles, and finally beat upon a strange door. A man wrapped in a black coat up to his eyebrows opened to his knock.

“Are you Flavio Minetti’s London neighbor?” he demanded, boldly.

The figure bowed. Fernet drew the cracked sugar-bowl from under his arm.

“Will you oblige me with a little sugar?” he asked, more politely.

The black-cloaked figure bowed and disappeared. Presently he came back. Fernet took the sugar-bowl from him. It struck him that the bowl felt very light. He looked down at his hands. The bowl had disappeared; only a glass vial lay in his palm. He removed the cork—a dozen or more tiny round pellets fell out. He glanced up quickly at Minetti’s London neighbor; a dreadful smile glowed through the black cloak. Fernet gave a cry and hurled the vial in the face of his tormentor. Minetti’s London neighbor let the black cloak fall, and André Fernet discovered that he was staring at himself.... He awakened soon after that and found that it was morning.

When he brushed his hair his hand had shaken so that the brush fell clattering to the floor. And he had spilled the cream for his morning coffee over the faded strip of carpet before the bureau. It had ended by his eating no breakfast at all. But he had drunk glass after glass of cold water.

After Pollitto’s words he trembled more and more like a man with the ague, and before every saloon-door mirror he halted and took a brief survey of his face. Pollitto was right—his skin was dead and full of unhealthy pallor. It was plain that he could not work in his present condition. His trembling fingers could scarcely hold a pencil, much less guide it through the precise demands of a drafting-board. He decided to go to the library and read. But the books on architecture which always enthralled him could not hold his shifting attention. Finally in despair he went up to the librarian and said:

“Have you any books on poison?”

The woman eyed him with a cold, incurious glance.

“Historical or medical?” she snapped out, as she went on stamping mysterious numbers in the pile of books before her.

“Both!”

She consulted a catalogue and made a list for him.

He sat all day devouring books which the librarian had recommended. He did not even go out for lunch. He read historical and romantic instances with a keen, morbid relish; but when it came to the medical books his heart quickened and he followed causes and effects breathlessly. By nightfall he had a relentless knowledge of every poison in the calendar. He knew what to expect from arsenic or strychnine or vitriol. He learned which poisons destroyed tissues, which acted as narcotics, which were irritants. He identified the hemlock, the horse-chestnut, the deadly toadstools. In short, he absorbed and retained everything on the subject. It seemed that the world teemed with poisons; one could be sure of nothing. Even beautiful flowers were not to be trusted.

He was so upset by all he had read that he could scarcely eat dinner. He went to an obscure _pension_ in a wretched basement, where he was sure he would be unknown, and, after two or three mouthfuls of soup and a spoonful of rice boiled with tomato, he rose, paid for his meal, and went out to tramp up and down past the tawdry shops of middle Kearny Street. He was trotting aimlessly in the direction of Market Street when he felt a tug at his coat-sleeve. He turned. Minetti was smiling genially up at him.

“Come,” said the hunchback, “what is your hurry? Have you had coffee yet? I was thinking that—”

Fernet’s heart sank at once. And yet he managed to say boldly: “I have given up drinking coffee. You can see for yourself what a wretched complexion I have. And to-day I have scarcely eaten.”

“Pooh!” cried Minetti. “A cup of coffee will do you good.”

Fernet began to draw away in futile terror. “No!” he protested, with frightened vehemence. “No, I tell you! I won’t drink the stuff! It is useless for you to—”

Minetti began to laugh with scornful good-humor. “What has come over you?” he drawled, half-closing his eyes. “Are you afraid?”

And as he said this Fernet glanced instinctively at the puny wrists, no bigger than a pullet’s wing, and replied, boldly:

“Afraid? Of what? I told you last night I need a steady hand in my business, and to-day I have not been able to do any work.”

Minetti’s mirth softened into genial acquiescence. “Well, maybe you are right. But I must say you are not very companionable. Perhaps the coffee you have been drinking has not been made properly. You should take _something_. You do look badly. A glass of brandy?... No?... Ah, I have it—coffee made in the Turkish fashion. Have you ever drunk that?”

“No,” replied Fernet, helplessly, wondering all the time why he was foolish enough to tell the truth.

“Well, then,” announced the hunchback, confidently, “we shall cross over to Third Street and have some Turkish coffee. I know a Greek café where they brew a cup that would tempt the Sultan himself. Have you ever seen it made? They use coffee pounded to a fine powder—a teaspoonful to a cup, and sugar in the same proportion. It is all put in together and brought to a boil. The result is indescribable! Really, you are in for a treat.”

“If it is sweetened in the making,” flashed through Fernet’s mind, “at least we shall have no more of that pellet business.”

“Yes—the result is quite indescribable,” Minetti was repeating, “and positively no bad effects.”

And as he said this he slipped his arm into Fernet’s and guided him with gentle firmness toward the Greek café in question. Fernet felt suddenly helpless and incapable of offering the slightest objection.

A girl took their orders. She had a freckled nose and was frankly Irish. Naturally, she did not fit the picture, and Fernet could see that she was scornful of the whole business.

“Two coffees ... medium,” Minetti repeated, decisively. “And will you have a sweet with it? They sell taffy made of sesame seeds and honey. Or you can have Turkish delight or a pastry dusted with powdered sugar. Really they are all quite delicious.”

Fernet merely shrugged. Minetti ordered Turkish delight. The girl wiped some moisture from the marble table-top and walked toward the coffee-shelf.

“So you were not able to work to-day?” Minetti began, affably. “How did you put in the time?”

“At the library, reading.”

“Something droll? A French novel or—”

“Books on _poison_!” Fernet shot out with venomous triumph. “I know more than I did yesterday.”

“How distressing!” purred Minetti. “Ignorance is more invulnerable than one fancies. Of course we are taught otherwise, but knowledge, you remember, was the beginning of all trouble. But you choose a fascinating, subject. Some day when we get better acquainted I shall tell you all I know about it. Poison is such a subtle thing. It is everywhere—in the air we breathe, in the water we drink, in the food we eat. And it is at once swift and sluggish, painful and stupefying, obvious and incapable of analysis. It is like a beautiful woman, or a great joy, or love itself.”

Fernet glanced up sharply. The hunchback had slid forward in his seat and his eyes glowed like two shaded pools catching greedily at the yellow sunlight of midday. Fernet shuddered and looked about the room. Groups of swarthy men were drinking coffee, or sipping faintly red draughts of cherry syrup and sweet soda. At a near-by table a group of six shuffled cards and marked their scores upon a slate. And, of course, there were those who played backgammon, rattling the dice and making exaggerated gestures as they spurred on their adversaries with genial taunts.

The girl came back carrying cups of thick steaming coffee and soft lemon-colored sweetmeats speared with two tiny silver forks. She set the tray down. Minetti reached for his coffee greedily, but Fernet sat back in his seat and allowed the waitress to place the second cup before him. As she did so the table shook suddenly and half of the hot liquid spilled over on the marble tabletop. Fernet jumped up to escape the scalding trickle; the girl gave an apologetic scream; Minetti laughed strangely.

“It is all my fault!” cried the hunchback. “What stupidity! Pray be seated. My young woman, will you give the gentleman this coffee of mine? And get me another.”

“Pardon me,” Fernet protested, “but I cannot think of such a thing!” And with that he attempted to pass the coffee in question back to Minetti. But the hunchback would have none of it. Fernet broke into a terrified sweat.

“He has dropped poison into it!” he thought, in sudden panic. “Otherwise why should he be so anxious to have me drink it? He kicked the table deliberately, too. And this cup of his—why was it not spilled also? No, he was prepared—it is all a trick!”

“Come, come, my friend,” broke in Minetti, briskly, “drink your coffee while it is still hot! Do not wait for me. I shall be served presently. And try the sweetmeats; they are delicious.”

“I am not hungry,” replied Fernet, sullenly.

“No? Well, what of that? Sweetmeats and coffee are not matters of hunger. Really, you are more droll than you imagine!” Minetti burst into a terrifying laugh.

“He thinks I am afraid!” muttered Fernet.

And out of sheer bravado he lifted the cup to his lips. Minetti stopped laughing, but a wide smile replaced his diabolical mirth. The girl brought fresh coffee to the hunchback. He sipped it with frank enjoyment, but he did not once take his gaze from Fernet’s pale face.

“Well,” thought Fernet, “one cup of poison more or less will not kill me.... It is not as if he has made up his mind to finish me at once. He is counting on the exquisite joys of a prolonged agony.” And he remembered Minetti’s words: “It is like watching a green leaf fading before the breath of autumn. First a sickly pallor, then a yellowing, a sharp wind, a fluttering in the air....” He tossed off the coffee in one defiant gulp. “He thinks that he has me in his power. But André Fernet is not quite a fool. I shall go away to-morrow!”

――――

They went home as soon as Minetti finished his coffee. Fernet felt a sudden nausea; by the time he reached his lodgings his steps were unsteady and his head reeled. Minetti was kindness itself.

“Let me help you into bed,” he insisted. “You must have a congestion. Presently I shall heat some water and give you a hot gin.”

Fernet was too sick to protest. Minetti started the gas-stove and filled the kettle and went into his room for gin. Fernet dragged himself out of his clothes and crawled in between the sheets. Minetti came back. Fernet lay with his eyes half-closed, shivering. Finally the water boiled, and the hunchback brought Fernet a huge tumbler of gin and water with bits of lemon-peel and cloves floating in it. It tasted so good that Fernet forgot his terror for the moment. But when the tumbler was empty he felt helpless; he could scarcely lift his arms; so he lay flat upon his back, staring up at the ceiling. He tried to recall scraps of what he had been reading all afternoon. What was the name of the poison that left one paralyzed? He could not remember. He found his movements becoming more and more difficult; he could scarcely turn in bed. Minetti brewed another toddy. Fernet could not hold the glass! He tried to push the tumbler away from his lips, but his efforts were useless. Minetti hovered above him with a bland, gentle smile, and Fernet felt the warm liquid trickling into his mouth and down his throat. In the midst of all this he lost consciousness.... Once or twice during the night Fernet had a wakeful interlude. Whenever he opened his eyes he saw Minetti sitting before the open window, gazing down at the twisted pepper-tree.

“Yes, they are both alike!” passed dimly through his mind. “They both are at once beautiful and hideous and they have strange secrets! It is no use, I must go away—to-morrow.”

In the morning Minetti was standing by the bed. “I have sent for the doctor,” he said. But his voice sounded far away.

――――

The doctor came shortly after ten o’clock. He was a little wizened, dried-up old man with a profound air.

“He is a fraud!” thought Fernet. “He knows nothing!”

“Ah,” said the doctor, putting a sly finger against his sharp nose, “our friend here has a nervous collapse. He should have a nurse!”

“A nurse!” exclaimed Minetti, with indignation. “And, pray, what do you call me? Do you not think that—”

“Well, we shall see! we shall see!” replied the doctor, rubbing his hands together. “But he will need all sorts of delicacies and—”

Minetti moistened his lips with sleek satisfaction. “You cannot name a dish that I am not able to prepare.”

“How about a custard? To-day he should eat something light.”

“A custard is simplicity itself,” answered the hunchback, and he cracked his fingers.