which he had been wearing the night before. For a moment I thought Jo must have been out on a bender and was giving himself a rubdown to help sober up.
I was smiling when I pushed back the curtain. Then, suddenly, I realized what writers mean when they talk about a smile "freezing" on your face. I had started some fool phrase, reproving Fogarty for his unpunctuality, but the words stuck in my throat.
Lying on the marble slab in that tiny room was a thing more ghastly than the furthest horrors of delirium tremens.
"There will be murder." The phrase was familiar enough, but I had not expected anything quite like this.
I could hear a sound re-echoing against the hard stone floors and walls—a muffled, persistent sound. It was my own teeth chattering as they had done those first days without alcohol, here in the sanitarium.
I couldn't think coherently for a moment, but when reason returned, I knew this was no hallucination. It was still there, that thing on the marble slab, that thing which had been Jo Fogarty.
There was no blood, no mutilation. It was the position of the body that was so shocking. The man was lying on his chest in his trunks and socks. And the upper part of his body was bound in a strange garment, the significance of which I didn't immediately recognize. Only gradually did it identify itself in my mind with pictures I had seen of strait-jackets.
The stout canvas was strapped tightly across his great naked torso, pinioning his arms to his sides. Around his neck had been tied an improvised rope, made from plaited strips of towel. This rope was also attached to his ankles, drawing his head and legs back so that he looked like a swallow diver, caught and trussed in mid-air. I noticed vaguely that his feet were secured by his own tie and belt; and his own handkerchief was bound around his mouth to hold in place a gag of torn towel.
The whole tableau was like some mad modern sculpture, symbolizing the apotheosis of agony. And it was the very strength of the man that made it so horrible; the strength of that powerful frame, those swelling muscles straining against the bonds, straining, it seemed, even in death.
For he was dead. Instinct would have told me that immediately even if I had not seen the towel cord, tight around the bull neck, the unnatural set of the head, jerked backward by the weight of the sagging heels. I do not even want to think of the expression on that contorted face, the desperation in those dead eyes.
Suddenly the realization dawned on me that I was alone with death—alone in a small room of vaultlike marble. I was seized by a violent claustrophobia—a fear that I should go mad if I stayed another minute in that cramped, low-ceilinged alcove.
I remembered the key in the lock outside. Swiftly I hurried out of the room and, with trembling fingers, locked the door. I slipped the key into my pocket, looked up and down the corridor, and then started forward.
My thought processes were hopelessly confused. But one phrase repeated itself time and time again in my mind.
"Doctor Lenz ... must go to Doctor Lenz ..."
I didn't hear Moreno as I turned a corner in the passage. He seemed suddenly to have appeared from nowhere, standing in my path and looking at me with that dark, smoldering stare of his.
"You're up early, Mr. Duluth."
Inside my bathrobe pocket my fingers gripped the key. "I've got to see Doctor Lenz," I said with sudden decisiveness.
"Doctor Lenz is not up yet."
"But I've got to see him."
Moreno's eyes seemed to penetrate mine, trying to read my thoughts. "Will you go back to your room alone, Mr. Duluth? Or do you want me to go with you?"
"I have no intention of going back to my room." I stood there a moment, trying to get a grip on myself. Then I added: "Something very serious has happened."
"Has it?"
"Something that only Doctor Lenz must know about Now will you let me go?"
"Listen, Mr. Duluth—"
Moreno started to humor me in his quiet, relentless fashion. Suddenly
I was smiling when I pushed back the curtain. Then, suddenly, I realized what writers mean when they talk about a smile "freezing" on your face. I had started some fool phrase, reproving Fogarty for his unpunctuality, but the words stuck in my throat.
Lying on the marble slab in that tiny room was a thing more ghastly than the furthest horrors of delirium tremens.
"There will be murder." The phrase was familiar enough, but I had not expected anything quite like this.
I could hear a sound re-echoing against the hard stone floors and walls—a muffled, persistent sound. It was my own teeth chattering as they had done those first days without alcohol, here in the sanitarium.
I couldn't think coherently for a moment, but when reason returned, I knew this was no hallucination. It was still there, that thing on the marble slab, that thing which had been Jo Fogarty.
There was no blood, no mutilation. It was the position of the body that was so shocking. The man was lying on his chest in his trunks and socks. And the upper part of his body was bound in a strange garment, the significance of which I didn't immediately recognize. Only gradually did it identify itself in my mind with pictures I had seen of strait-jackets.
The stout canvas was strapped tightly across his great naked torso, pinioning his arms to his sides. Around his neck had been tied an improvised rope, made from plaited strips of towel. This rope was also attached to his ankles, drawing his head and legs back so that he looked like a swallow diver, caught and trussed in mid-air. I noticed vaguely that his feet were secured by his own tie and belt; and his own handkerchief was bound around his mouth to hold in place a gag of torn towel.
The whole tableau was like some mad modern sculpture, symbolizing the apotheosis of agony. And it was the very strength of the man that made it so horrible; the strength of that powerful frame, those swelling muscles straining against the bonds, straining, it seemed, even in death.
For he was dead. Instinct would have told me that immediately even if I had not seen the towel cord, tight around the bull neck, the unnatural set of the head, jerked backward by the weight of the sagging heels. I do not even want to think of the expression on that contorted face, the desperation in those dead eyes.
Suddenly the realization dawned on me that I was alone with death—alone in a small room of vaultlike marble. I was seized by a violent claustrophobia—a fear that I should go mad if I stayed another minute in that cramped, low-ceilinged alcove.
I remembered the key in the lock outside. Swiftly I hurried out of the room and, with trembling fingers, locked the door. I slipped the key into my pocket, looked up and down the corridor, and then started forward.
My thought processes were hopelessly confused. But one phrase repeated itself time and time again in my mind.
"Doctor Lenz ... must go to Doctor Lenz ..."
I didn't hear Moreno as I turned a corner in the passage. He seemed suddenly to have appeared from nowhere, standing in my path and looking at me with that dark, smoldering stare of his.
"You're up early, Mr. Duluth."
Inside my bathrobe pocket my fingers gripped the key. "I've got to see Doctor Lenz," I said with sudden decisiveness.
"Doctor Lenz is not up yet."
"But I've got to see him."
Moreno's eyes seemed to penetrate mine, trying to read my thoughts. "Will you go back to your room alone, Mr. Duluth? Or do you want me to go with you?"
"I have no intention of going back to my room." I stood there a moment, trying to get a grip on myself. Then I added: "Something very serious has happened."
"Has it?"
"Something that only Doctor Lenz must know about Now will you let me go?"
"Listen, Mr. Duluth—"
Moreno started to humor me in his quiet, relentless fashion. Suddenly
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