The Empty Coffins by John Russell Fearn

murmured. “I’m afraid—it’s all over. She died a few minutes ago.”
    Peter stood motionless for a moment, the col­our leaving his face; then he turned round and raced up to the bedroom. He did not stop hurrying until he reached the bedside, then he caught Elsie’s limp hand. It was still warm—but lifeless. Through eyes blurring with tears he gazed at her dead face. It was smiling a little. Wisps of her blonde hair were moving gently in the breeze from the window, which Dr. Meadows had opened.
    â€œNothing I could do, Peter,” he said. “She just passed away without regaining consciousness. I wish you’d been here—”
    â€œI was talking to Singh,” Peter said mechan­ically, and Meadows gave a start of surprise.
    â€œYou mean the mystic? What on earth’s he doing here?”
    â€œDidn’t you hear Mrs. Dawlish call his name from the hall?” Peter turned weary eyes. “No—I suppose you wouldn’t.”
    He looked up as Rawnee Singh himself appeared in the doorway. He hesitated for a moment and then came forward. Impassively he looked at the lifeless girl.
    â€œWhat do you want here?” Meadows demanded. “Don’t you realize that this is—”
    â€œThe living may look upon the dead, doctor,” Singh replied, with a direct stare of his oblique eyes. “Just as the living may look upon—the living.”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” Meadows snapped.
    â€œDeath takes many forms,” Singh answered ambig­uously. Then he looked at Peter. “My sincere condolences, Mr. Malden, in your present ordeal. I feel though that the end is not yet. To material eyes—yes. It is the end. The world will say it is death. As for me…” He did not finish. Instead he held out his dark hand. “For the time
being, Mr. Malden, farewell. We shall meet again in the not too distant future. That, too, is pre­-destined.”
    Peter shook hands mechanically and watched the mystic leave the room silently. Dr. Meadows gazed after him and then looked back at Peter.
    â€œWhat did he want here?” he demanded.
    â€œHe came to tell me of two things, Doc. That Elsie would die today, and that she will become a vampire.”
    Meadows’ face clouded. “So George’s ambition is to be fulfilled? His attack upon her succeeded, though it has taken some time for her to pass away. If she becomes a vampire, Peter, we have only one course…to drive a stake through her heart at her first appearance from the grave.”
    Peter said nothing. He drew the sheet over the dead face of the girl and left the room.

CHAPTER FIVE
    THE TERRIBLE CORPSES
    At two o’clock Sir Gerald Montrose, the specialist in heart and blood disorders, arrived in his gleam­ing Buick. He was a small, pink-faced man with flawless manners and hands like a woman’s. Since he had arrived too late to help Elsie he could only make a post-mortem examination and pool his diag­nosis with that of Dr. Meadows.
    Peter, at the end of making funeral arrangements and feeling too stunned to care whether he lived or died, studied the two medicos as they ran him to earth in the drawing room.
    â€œBecause of the unusual circumstances surround­ing Elsie’s death, there’ll probably be an inquest,” Dr. Meadows said. “At any rate I have informed the Local coroner of her death. In the meantime, Sir Gerald and I are both of the same opinion regarding her demise. It was caused by pernicious anaemia—”
    â€œIt was caused by a vampire,” Peter interrupted stonily. “The vampire that was George Timperley. He bit Elsie, sucked away a lot of her blood, and poisoned that which was left.”
    â€œThat may be the truth,” Sir Gerald agreed, “but we have to convince a jury which deals only in facts. A coroner’s jury would not accept the vamp­ire angle. Hence we have to state a