The Blind Spot, page 20 by Austin Hall
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ck, together with certain comments by the editor. In the lecture itself there was mystery. This strange one, Rhamda, was mixed in the Blind Spot. Undoubtedly he was the essential fact and substance. Until now he had not scented tragedy. Why had Rhamda and the woman come out together? Where was the professor?
Where indeed?
At the end of a half-hour Jerome ventured across the street. He noted the number 288. Then he ascended the steps and clanged at the knocker. From the sounds that came from inside, the place was but partly furnished. Hollow steps sounded down the hallway, shuffling, like weary bones dragging slippers. The door opened and an old woman, very old, peered out of the crack. She coughed. Though it was not a loud cough it seemed to the detective that it would be her last one; there was so little of her.
"Pardon me, but is Dr. Holcomb here?"
The old lady looked up at him. The eyes were of blank expressionless blue; she was in her dotage.
"You mean--oh, yes, I think so, the old man with the white whiskers. He was here a few minutes ago, with that other. But he just went out, sir, he just went out."
"No, I don't think so. There was a man went out and a woman. But not Dr. Holcomb."
"A woman? There was no woman."
"Oh, yes, there was a woman--a very beautiful one."
The old lady dropped her hand. It was trembling.
"Oh, dear," she was saying. "This makes two. This morning it was a man and now it is a woman, that makes two."
It seemed to the man as he looked down in her eyes that he was looking into great fear; she was so slight and frail and helpless and so old; such a fragile thing to bear burden and trouble. Her voice was cracked and just above a shrill whisper, almost uncanny. She kept repeating:
"Now there are two. Now there are two. That makes two. This morning there was one. Now there are two."
Jerome could not understand. He pitied the old lady.
"Did you say that Dr. Holcomb is here?"
Again she looked