X: The Abode of Dr. NewsteadDespite the lateness of the hour, we were encouraged to stop at Dr. Newstead’s estate by the lights burning in the windows, which suggested that the inhabitants were still awake. The ornately arabesqued gate to the grounds stood open as well. In any event the weather, which had turned to sheets of rain, seemed to rebuke any plan to proceed onward in search of a roadside inn to shelter at for the night. The moisture and discomfort of the ride had taken a heavy toll on Miss Zorah, and she coughed miserably, though she stolidly endured without complaint. As the headlights of Miss William’s motorcar swept through the downpour, it became clear that the grounds were unkempt, verging on overgrown. Ornamental benches and trellises seemed to have been overtaken completely by curious growths of vine. These obscurely repellent shoots extended up the walls of the manor itself, the tough rope-like tendrils swarming in a horrifying manner all the way to the eaves. Nor did they lend to the appearance of a quaint, ivy-walled country house, for the vines were without leaf, and had a strange, doughy appearance completely unwholesome to the eye.
Much to my surprise, we were greeted at the door by one Lieutenant -- Alenko, whom I had met years before in France. The disinherited scion of a White Russian family, Lt. Alenko had traveled widely, serving in the Foreign Legion during the Great War where he had made my acquaintance. Now bereft of his homeland by the October Revolution, it appeared he lived as a soldier of fortune, lacking any other skills. A sensitive man despite his unfortunate profession, he was much afflicted by headaches and, laboring under the Eastern superstition common to his race, consumed philters made from cacao leaves and other more obscure substances besides to alleviate his ailment. Much given to philosophy, it was his claim that the dream-trances and wild imaginings these potions induced in him helped to calm his nerves and give him insight into the world about him.
He and another Russian were serving as bodyguards to Dr. Newstead, he told me, though he remained evasive on what cause the doctor had to require protection. Welcoming us into the manor, he assured us that Dr. Newstead would be happy to accommodate us for the night, given the inclement weather and the state of the country roads. However, before I was able to elaborate on our reasons for intruding on the doctor’s privacy, the other bodyguard happened to appear.
Where Lt. Alenko was darkly handsome and well-groomed in a European style, slender as befitted a man of his stature and profession, -- Urdnot was a barrel-chested brute of a Cossack, his face marred by injury and his bristling beard lending an aspect of ferocity to his face. Despite initial appearances, however, he seemed a more brooding sort, seething over some deep hurt within his psyche, rather than the innate dour fatalism of his kind. It seemed his custom to go armed about the house, as if expecting attack from any quarter.
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