Smoke Ghost & Other Apparitions Read Online Free PDF Page B

could attribute everything Delia had told me to her neurotic fancies. I feared, also – but my fear was that there was a plot afoot, one meant to terrify her, to work on her superstitious fears, and delude her.
    "Would you like me to visit Jock?" I asked quietly.
    Some of the weight seemed to drop from her shoulders. "I was hoping you'd say that," she said, with relief...
    The exquisitely lettered sign read:
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    LATHROP'S PUPPETS–2nd Floor
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    Outside, Forty-second Street muttered and mumbled. Inside, a wooden stair with worn brass fittings led up into a realm of dimness and comparative silence.
    "Wait a minute, Delia," I said. "There are a couple of questions I'd like you to answer. I want to get this whole thing straight before I see Jock."
    She stopped and nodded, but before I could speak again our attention was attracted by a strange series of sounds from the second floor. Heavy stamping, then what seemed to be an explosion of curses in a foreign language, then rapid pacing up and down, another explosion of curses, and more pacing. It sounded as if a high-class tantrum were in progress.
    Suddenly the noises ceased. I could visualize a person "pausing and swelling up in silent rage." With equal suddenness they recommenced, this time ending in a swift and jarring clump-clump of footsteps down the stairs. Delia shrank back against the railing as a fattish man with gray eyebrows, glaring eyes, and a mouth that was going through wordless but vituperative contortions neared us. He was wearing an expensive checked suit and a white silk shirt open at the neck. He was crumpling a soft felt hat.
    He paused a few steps above us and pointed at Delia dramatically. His other hand was crumpling a soft felt hat.
    "You, madam, are the wife of that lunatic, are you not?" he demanded accusingly.
    "I'm Jock Lathrop's wife, if that's what you mean, Mr. Franetti," Delia said cooly. "What's the matter?"
    I recognized Luigi Franetti then. He was often referred to by the press as the "Dean of Puppeteers." I remembered that Jock had been in his workshop and studied under him several years ago.
    "You ask me what is the matter with me?" Franetti ranted. "You ask me that, Madam Lathrop? Bah!" Here he crumpled his hat again. "Very well – I will tell you! Your husband is not only a lunatic. He is also an ingrate! I come here to congratulate him on his recent success, to take him to my arms. After all, he is my pupil. Everything he learned from me. And what is his gratitude? What, I ask you? He will not let me touch him? He will not even shake hands! He will not let me into his workshop! Me! Franetti, who taught him everything!"
    He swelled up with silent rage, just as I'd visualized it. But only for a moment. Then he was off again.
    "But I tell you he is a madman!" he shouted, shaking his finger at Delia. "Last night I attended, unannounced and uninvited, a performance of his puppets. They do things that are impossible – impossible without Black Magic. I am Luigi Franetti, and I know! Nevertheless, I thought he might be able to explain it to me today. But no, he shuts me out! He has the evil eye and the devil's fingers, I tell you. In Sicily people would understand such things. In Sicily he would be shot! Bah! Never will I so much as touch him with my eyes again. Let me pass!"
    He hurried down the rest of the stairs, Delia squeezing back and turning her head. In the doorway he turned for a parting shot.
    "And tell me, Madam Lathrop," he cried, "what a puppeteer wants with rats!"
    With a final "Bah!" he rushed out.
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    II  
    Strange Actions
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    I DIDN'T STOP LAUGHING until I saw Delia's face. Then it occurred to me that Franetti's accusations, ludicrous as they were, might seem to her to fit with her own suspicions.
    "You can't take seriously what a man like Franetti says," I remonstrated. "He's jealous because Jock won't bow down to him and make a complete revelation of all his new technical discoveries and