The Fugitive Statue — Vincent Starrett

MR. OAKLEY ASHENHURST removed his pipe from his mouth with his left hand, and with a lift of his chin blew a cloud of smoke at the ceiling of his study. His right hand held open the volume he had been reading spread out upon the table; in the circle of bright light dropped upon the pages by the young man’s student lamp the black print seemed doubly black. Ashenhurst yawned luxuriously and lay back in his chair. The corners of his study, which was also his bedroom, sitting-room, library, and, on furtive occasions, his dining-room, were deeply dark with a darkness that lightened by degrees as it approached the spot occupied by the reading table and the funnel of intense light from the lamp. Upon a low mantel ticked a nickel-plated clock, and by a swift movement of the ingenious lamp the student ascertained that it was exactly midnight. At this instant, while he was registering satisfaction and relief, in the street beyond his window Oakley Ashenhurst heard the sound of running feet.They were steady footsteps, light but sharp, and they slapped the pavement with a staccato quality that was impressive in the silence. They approached, crescendoed before the house, and diminuendoed in the distance, as drumsticks simulate hoofbeats in the theatre. Reclined in his chair, young Ashenhurst heard them come and heard them go, with idle curiosity. Hazy speculations floated through his mind for a few moments; then with an effort he pulled himself together, marked his place in the volume, snapped off the light, and slipped out of his bathrobe and into his bed. In the morning, he thought nothing about the footsteps at all; he had forgotten them.But the next night, after a harrowing session at the evening medical class in which he was completing his education, as he toiled again over his Anatomy in the darkened room, the young man’s memory was jogged; he was reminded by the footsteps themselves. As before, they approached with soft distinctness, pattered sharply past the dark dwelling, and melted away in the silence.