Behind me someone screamed derisively.
"Come here! The lovers are going to kiss!"
They swarmed about us, pressed in on us, leering and cackling. They held their sides in hysterical laughter. I closed my ears to their insane giggling, and drew Helen to me in frantic desperation. Her head was lowered, and she did not wish to respond to my caress. But I was not to be denied. I forced her head back. As my lips neared hers a look of infinite sadness came over her and she closed her eyes.
And then we kissed. A sensation of utter horror shot through me. Instead of feeling her soft, full lips on mine, I felt as if bone were pressed against bone. Our teeth met and scraped together harshly. It was as if our lips were not there.
I felt my senses slipping from me. I had the confused impression that the timbers and rafters were buckling, and roaring in on us. The table rocked; the jeering laughter roared in my ears. The lights in the holders flickered, grew dim, and all was darkness and cold. . . .
I was revived from our immersion in the waters of Long Island Sound some minutes before Helen opened her eyes. I learned what had happened. Helen had fallen overboard during our excursion with our yachting friends, and at a moment when the yacht was steaming swiftly on its course. Fortunately, I had seen her fall and had dived to her rescue. But the reversing of the yacht's course and the arrival of aid had taken some time and I, who am not an expert swimmer, went down with my unconscious burden. Now we were back on the yacht's deck, literally returned from the home of the dead. How literally? I wondered. Was the whole of the ghastly experience in the mansion of ghosts which I still remembered in such vivid detail a fantasy spun by my subconscious brain while I struggled in the water?
I had some moments for consecutive thought. Thank God I did. I was in complete command of my faculties when Helen opened her eyes. The first thing they met were mine. I read in them a message of horror—recent horror—and I knew what it was. Instantly I was on my guard for the question I knew would come.
Her whole soul was in the words: "Tell me—did you feel that kiss?"
I hope and am convinced that I betrayed no sign.
"What kiss?" I blankly returned. "Did you dream something, dear?"
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