That much was obvious. But how had I done all this? And why did I have no recollection of it?
There was only one answer to both those questions. I must have changed the illustration during my drink-befogged sleep. That was the only logical solution. Possibly the unaccustomed stimulus of the alcohol had provided the subconscious impetus to return to the drawing board and re-design the illustration.
Possibly...
I removed the illustration from the drawing board and rolled it up tightly.
There was no sense worrying about the thing. It was done; that was that. This realistic view comforted me more had my attempts at rationalization. I left my studio with the illustration under my arm and walked uptown to the Republic Magazines’ building.
When I spread the illustration on Harry Saunders’ desk, a half hour later, his eyes brightened with interest and he stood up excitedly.
“Now you’ve got it,” he said, slapping me on the shoulder. “This picture has got some guts to it. It’s realistic and convincing.”
He stared a long moment at the illustration.
“Did you get the idea for this scene from the morning newspaper?” he asked abruptly.
“No,” I said, surprised. “I got it from—”
My voice and thoughts trailed away. Where had I got the idea?
“What do you mean?” I demanded. “I haven’t seen the morning papers yet. Was there some sort of murder last night?”
Saunders shuddered slightly.
“A very unpretty one, if we may judge from the harrowing details of our melodramatic reporters. Young girl, axe killer, lonely wharf. Maniac probably.”
For some reason, my thoughts were spinning crazily.
“I didn’t know a thing about it,” I said harshly.
“Okay, okay,” Saunders grinned. “It doesn’t make any difference one way or the other. I don’t care whether you get your ideas from the daily papers or the telephone book. The important thing now is that I want more work from you. This illustration has got what it takes. Now get back to your studio and turn out as many you can just like it. And stick to this main figure of the villain. You’ve got something there. He looks bad enough to be real.”
“All right,” I said.
“I’ll have a check for you tomorrow on this job,” Saunders said. “As long as you can keep up this kind of work, you’re all set.”
“All right,” I said. “I’ll be in tomorrow.”
I left his office and my feelings were difficult to analyze. I should have been riotously happy at having finally made the grade with Republic Magazines, but for some reason my happiness was tempered with another emotion I could not define.
On the street I bought a paper and carefully read the story of the murder Saunders mentioned. This action was in itself unexplainable. Normally such things do not interest me, but now I read the story avidly.
The girl’s body was awaiting identification; the axe killer was still at large. Police were of the opinion that it was the work of a maniac. That was the substance of the story.
I frowned and walked on. When I reached my studio it was about noon. I had a little something to eat, then I sat down at my drawing board.
The strong North light was streaming over my shoulder and every condition was favorable to work, but for some reason I couldn’t recapture the feeling and mood that I had experienced the previous day.
I tried a dozen times to draw from memory the man I’d seen across the court, but it was worse than futile. Each succeeding attempt became less and less what I wanted, until I finally tore the sheet from the board, and with an exclamation of disgust, hurled it to the floor.
The afternoon passed and darkness fell swiftly. I turned on the light over my easel and made another desperate attempt to get to work. While I was seated there, concentrating on the scene in my mind, the light across the court flicked on, and I saw my subject again, silhouetted against the illumination in his room.
He was pacing up and down the floor with slow measured strides. The court that separated our windows was only a dozen feet wide, and I could see details in the room very clearly.
I could see his huge hands clasped behind his back and I could see the black scowl on his face with almost frightening distinctness.
Even more than the first time, I was impressed with the malignant evil that seemed to emanate from the man’s broad brutal face and close-set, blazing eyes.
Again, without conscious volition on my part, I reached for my drawing pencil and began to sketch feverishly. There seemed to be some psychic connection between this ugly brute across the court, and my own mind. When I studied him for a while something seemed to take possession of me, driving me to work, to create scenes which had before been foreign to my imagination.
I was drawing a background now, hastily sketching in a vacant lot, complete with shrubbery, refuse pile and an abandoned incinerator. In the distance were small bungalows with lights burning in the front room. It was night. The moon was shadowed by a passing cloud, and there was an oppressive, eerie stillness over the entire scene.
I began to draw a character. It was the man across the court. Without glancing from my drawing board I blocked in a figure with heavy massive shoulders, swinging arms with curved fingers, slightly bent knees, crouching along the shrubbery that flanked the lonely path leading through the vacant lot to the bungalow. The face was twisted and inhuman, one half in shadow, the other caught in the glare of a street light. One blazing eye, one distended nostril and half of the thick, slavering lips were visible, a horrible, incomplete picture of a creature from the bowels of hell.
I finished the figure rapidly. Every stroke was sure and definite, there was no hesitation, no erasure, nothing but swift sure delineation.
When I finished the picture I was almost in a trance. My work had been so automatic, so instinctive, that I had been unaware of the passage of time. I had been caught in the flow of some indefiniable force and had been swept along in a creative frenzy, which was as effective as it was mysterious.
For the drawing was good. It had a chilling horror to it that was breathtaking. The human, yet inhuman figure, crouching along the path, lying in wait like some savage jungle creature. Lying in wait...
Lying in wait for what?
I didn’t know.
With a shake of my head I tried to dislodge the thoughts that were battering at my consciousness. A mist seemed to rise from my eyes and mind and I found myself looking at the drawing through clear eyes. I had been in a kind of self-induced hypnotic state. The emotional outlet that occurred with creative work, might have the effect of dulling one’s more ordinary perceptions.
Everything was very quiet. I glanced across the court and saw that my subject’s room was dark. I wondered when he had left.
I took the drawing from the board then and sealed it in a special size envelope, for I had decided to mail this drawing in to Saunders. I didn’t intend to go back to Republic for a day or so and postage was the quickest and cheapest way of getting the picture to him.
I mailed the drawing that night. Two days later, about ten o’clock in the morning, I entered Saunders’ office.
He sprang to his feet when he saw me and walked around his desk to pump my hand.
“Glad to see you,” he said, fairly bristling with camaraderie.
“What did you think of the picture I sent in?” I asked. I had an idea of what he would say.