Legacy Of Terror

she had never expected to breathe outside of that attic room again. It was cool and clean and delicious.
    When her nerves had quieted considerably, she smoothed her hair and straightened her blouse. The attention to grooming details helped calm her even more. Recovered, she wondered what she ought to do now. Should she go immediately to Jacob Matherly's room and tell the old man what Dennis had been like and what she had feared he was leading up to?
    No. That would do her no good whatsoever. What, after all, had Dennis done? Talked of his mother. Painted pictures of madness. Showed a morbid fascination for blood. Toyed with a palette knife as if he might turn upon her and use it. None of it, in itself, was conclusive or even vaguely incriminating. Only if one were there could one understand what he had been like. It had not been only what he did, but how he did it, his mood, his expressions, the tone of his voice. And since no one but Elaine had seen those things and could grasp how they had been, the rest of it seemed silly.
    Besides, Jacob would only tell her not to worry, that the killer was, after all, a stranger. A hitchhiker. He must be. Captain Rand said he was.
    All she could expect to gain from Jacob Matherly was a little bit of conversation, a momentary escape from the dark house and the brooding people who lived there. He was the only haven of brightness in the place. But that was enough. Rather than sit alone in her room, she went down to talk to the old man. Disaster was brewing. She could feel it in the air, weighing down on her. At least, when it struck, she could be with someone else. Not alone. Please, not alone.

Chapter 10
    If events in the Matherly house had seemed to describe a descending circle towards a distant point of terror ever since the attempt on Celia Tamlin's life, they plummeted toward that terror like a falling star on the evening of the third day. The night gradually evolved into something like a hideous dream which, at some of its worst moments, she was sure would never end for her.
    It began gradually, at supper.
    Dennis, immersed in his painting of Celia Tamlin, did not come to the table, but had his meal sent up. This seemed to please Lee, Jerry and Bess. They reacted as if his sudden intense interest in his work was an omen of a return to normality. Didn't they understand what sort of painting it was? Didn't his flamboyant fascination with madness make them ill at ease? How could they ever evidence pleasure at such a decadent preoccupation?
    Anyway, whatever Dennis did to lift their spirits, Paul more than compensated for. He had not yet returned from his trip to town and was, apparently, still in some barroom squandering a sizeable sum of his trust check. From time to time, Lee Matherly cast a fretful glance at the empty chair, as if he hoped to look up once and miraculously find Paul there.
    Celia Tamlin, they had learned, had come out of her coma but had not yet been questioned and would not be for at least another twenty- four hours. Her doctor was keeping her heavily sedated.
    This last bit of news should, Elaine supposed, be cheering. But it only made her feel a greater, deeper tension. If the would-be killer was a member of the Matherly household, wouldn't the threat of Celia's soon-to-be-regained consciousness drive him closer to the brink? If he were frightened that she would point the finger at him, wouldn't his borderline madness become a berserk spree against which none of them were safe?
    Dinner would have been a terribly depressing affair if Gordon had not been there. He engaged her in conversation, and he seemed able to draw from her things she would never ordinarily have talked about. His quiet, somewhat shy manner, so much like her own, gave her confidence.
    They were finishing dessert-strawberries and peaches in heavy cream-when Paul Honneker returned home. He slammed the front door so hard the noise reverberated throughout the house like a cannon shot. Then, for a time, he stood in the vestibule, out of sight of the dining room, and cursed someone-perhaps himself-quite loudly.
    “Will you excuse me?” Lee Matherly asked, wiping his lips with a napkin and rising. He was embarrassed for his brother-in-law.
    Gordon stopped talking and listened closely to what was said in the vestibule, and Elaine pretended to be interested in the last of the fat red strawberries swimming in the cream in her dish.
    “What the hell do you want?” Paul Honneker asked.
    From the