Page:Weird Tales v34n04 (1939-10).djvu/21

She screamed.

The other two looked up, horrified through their stupor. The scream that Jael Bettiss uttered was not deep and rich and young; it was the wild, cracked cry of a terrified old woman.

“I don’t look like that,” she choked out, and drew back from the car. “Not old—ugly—”

Gib sprang at her face. With all four claw-bristling feet he seized and clung to her. Again Jael Bettiss screamed, flung up her hands, and tore him away from his hold; but his soggy fur had smeared the powdered water upon her face and head.

Though he fell to earth, Gib twisted in midair and landed upright. He had one glimpse of his enemy. Jael Bettiss, no mistake—but a Jael Bettiss with hooked beak, rheumy eyes, hideous wry mouth and yellow chisel teeth—Jael Bettiss exposed for what she was, stripped of her lying mask of beauty!

And she drew back a whole staggering step. Rocks were just behind her. Gib saw, and flung himself. Like a flash he clawed his way up her cloak, and with both forepaws ripped at the ugliness he had betrayed. He struck for his home that was forbidden him—Marco Bozzaris never strove harder for Greece, nor Stonewall Jackson for Virginia.

Jael Bettiss screamed yet again, a scream loud and full of horror. Her feet had slipped on the edge of the abyss. She flung out her arms, the cloak flapped from them like frantic wings. She fell, and Gib fell with her, still tearing and fighting.

The waters of the quarry closed over them both.

GIB thought that it was a long way back to the surface, and a longer way to shore. But he got there, and scrambled out with the help of projecting rocks. He shook his drenched body, climbed back into the car and sat upon the rear seat. At least Jael Bettiss would no longer drive him from the home he loved. He’d find food some way, and take it back there each day to eat. . . .

With tongue and paws he began to rearrange his sodden fur.

John Frey, clear-eyed and wide awake, was leaning in and talking to Ivy Hill. As for her, she sat up straight, as though she had never known a moment of sickness.

“But just what did happen?” she was asking.

John Frey shook his head, though all the stupidity was gone from his face and manner. “I don’t quite remember. I seem to have wakened from a dream. But are you all right, darling?”

“Yes, I’m all right.” She gazed toward the quarry, and the black water that had already subsided above what it had swallowed. Her eyes were puzzled, but not frightened. “I was dreaming, too,” she said. “Let’s not bother about it.”

She lifted her gaze, and cried out with joy. “There’s that old house that daddy owns. Isn’t it interesting?”

John Frey looked, too. “Yes. The old witch has gone away—I seem to have heard she did.”

Ivy Hill was smiling with excitement. “Then I have an inspiration. Let’s get daddy to give it to us. And we’ll paint it over and fix it up, and then—” She broke off, with a cry of delight. “I declare, there’s a cat in the car with me!”

It was the first she had known of Gib’s presence.

John Frey stared at Gib. He seemed to have wakened only the moment before. “Yes, and isn’t he a thin one? But he’ll be pretty when he gets through cleaning himself. I think I see a white shirt-front.”

Ivy Hill put out a hand and scratched Gib behind the ear. “He’s bringing us good luck, I think. John, let’s take him to live with us when we have the house fixed up and move in.”