A Night in the Lonesome October Read Online Free PDF Page B

moisture about in a place where it would evaporate harmlessly.
         "Damn dog!" it snarled.   "Another few minutes and I'd've made it!"
         "I guess it's just not your lucky day," I replied.
         There were footsteps on the stair.
         When Jack entered and saw what had happened, he went and fetched a mop.   Shortly, he was cleaning up the rest of the puddle and wringing it out into a basin, while the Thing fumed and turned pink, blue, and sickly green.   He set a pail beneath the drip then and told me to call him again if we developed any other leaks.
         We didn't, though.   I checked regularly all afternoon.   The rain finally stopped after dark, and I waited several hours after that, just to be sure, before going out.
         Moving around to the front of the house, I unearthed the now slimy piece of drugged meat from where I had buried it.   I carried it up the road with me and deposited it in plain sight at Owen's front door.   The place was dark and Cheeter was nowhere in sight, so I prowled around a bit.
         Under the huge old oak in the back I discovered eight large wicker baskets in various stages of construction, and seven smaller ones.   There were also lots of heavy ropes about.
         I sniffed around.   There was also a ladder nearby.   Such industry, for a frail-looking old guy . . . .
         I walked a straight line then, passing through yard and field.   Partway to my goal it began raining again, lightly.   A huge mass of clouds occluded a small area of sky, darker shapes within darkness, and there came a brief, pale glow from within followed by a low rumble of thunder.
         Continuing, I came at last into the precincts of the Good Doctor's abode.   It was as if I were directly beneath the low cloud-cluster now; and even as I watched, a triple-pronged piece of brightness fell from overhead to dance among the rods on the old building's roof.   The crash came almost immediately and the basement windows blazed more brightly.
         I remained in the grasses, listening, and I heard a man's voice from within shouting something about seeing to the Leydens.   There followed another flash-crash, another devil's tap dance of fire on the roof, more shouts, more flares from the windows.   I crept nearer.
         Peeking in, I could see a tall man in a white coat, his back to me, leaning over something on a long table, his own form blocking my view of his subject.   A small, misshapen individual crouched in a far corner, eyes darting, making nervous movements with his hands.   There came another flash, another crash.   Electrical discharges played about a bank of equipment off to the tall man's right.   They stained my eyes with afterimages for a time.   The tall man shouted something and moved to one side, the small man rose and began to dance about.   Something on the table, covered, I could now see, by a sheet, twitched.   It might have been a large leg that did it, beneath the cloth.   There came another blinding burst and a deafening roar.   The scene within was momentarily an inferno.   Through it all, it seemed to me that something large and manlike tried for a moment to sit up on the table, its exact outline masked by the flowing cloth.
         I backed away.   I turned and ran as more fire fell from the heavens.   I had done my duty.   This seemed ample investigation here for one night.
         I walked my next line from the Good Doctor's to Larry Talbot's place.   I came out of the rain partway there and shook myself at some point.   When I reached Larry's house I saw it to be well lighted.   Perhaps he really did suffer from insomnia.
         Circling the place many times, I spiraled inward, pausing to inspect a small gazebo to the rear.   Within, outlined in dried mud, I discovered a large paw-print which appeared identical to the one I had found near my home.
         Drawing nearer, I rose onto my hind legs, forepaws