Weird Tales volume 31 number 03 Read Free Page B

comic, grotesque, rather —note about it. A reredos of black cloth was hung against the wall, and before it stood a heavy table more than eight feet long and at least six wide, covered by a black cloth edged with white. It reminded me of something, though I couldn't quite identify it for a moment; then I knew. I'd seen a Jewish funeral once, and this cloth was like the black-serge pall they used to hide the plain pine coffin! At each end of the altar stood a seven-branched candelabrum made of brass, each with a set of tall black candles in it. These were burning and gave off a pale blue glow. They seemed to be perfumed, too, and the odor which they burned with was pleasant—at first. Then, as I sniffed a second time it seemed to me there was a faint suspicion of a stench about it, something like the fetor that you smell if you're driving down the road and pass a dog or cat that's been run over and has lain a while out in the sun—just a momentary whiff, but nauseating, just the same. Between the candelabra, right exactly in the center of the altar, but back against the wall, was a yard-high crucifix of some black wood with an ivory figure
    INCENSE OF ABOMINATION
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    on it, upside down. Before the cross there was a silver wine goblet and a box of gilt inlay about the size and shape of a lady's powder-puff box.
    "I heard Atkins catch his breath and give a sort of groan. He'd been brought up an Episcopalian and knew about such things. He turned half round to leave, but I caught him by the sleeve.
    " 'Come on, you fool, don't be a sissy!' I admonished, and next moment we were all so interested that he had no thought of leaving.
    "There was a sort of congregation in the chapel; every scat was occupied by someone masked and robed just as we were, save three vacant places by the altar steps. These, we knew, were kept for us, but when we looked about for Herbules he was nowhere to be seen; so we went forward to our seats alone. We could hear a hum of whispering as we walked up the aisle, and we knew some of the voices were from women; but who was man and who was woman was impossible to tell, for each one looked just like his neighbor in his shrouding robe.
    "*tt"1he whispering suddenly became in--i- tense, like the susurrus of a hive of swarming bees. Every neck seemed suddenly to crane, ever}' eye to look in one direction, and as we turned our glances toward the right side of the cellar we saw a woman entering through a curtained doorway. She wore a long, loose scarlet cape which she held together with one hand, her hair was very black, her eyes were large and luminously dark, seeming to have a glance of overbearing sensuousness and sweet humility at once. Her white, set face was an imponderable mask; her full red lips were fixed in an uneven, bitter line. Beneath the hem of her red cloak we saw the small feet in the golden, high-heeled slippers were un-stockinged. As she neared the altar she

    sank low in genuflection, then wheeled about and faced us. For a moment she stood there, svelte, graceful, mysteriously beautiful with that thin white face and scarlet lips so like a mask; then with a sudden kicking motion she unshod her feet, opened wide her cloak and let it fall in scarlet billows on the dull-black carpet of the altar steps.
    "She was so beautiful it almost hurt the eyes to look at her as she stood there in white silhouette against the ebon background of the black-draped altar, with her narrow, boy-like hips, slim thighs and full, high, pointed breasts. She was a thing of snow and fire, her body palely cool and virginal, her lips like flame, her eyes like embers blazing when a sudden wind stirs them to brightness.
    "The modern strip-tease routine was unthought of in those days, and though I was sophisticated far beyond my eighteen years I had never seen a woman in the nude before. The flame of her raced in my blood and crashed against my brain with almost numbing impact. I felt myself go faint and sick with sudden