"Maxwell Grant - The Shadow - 290 - Death has Grey Eyes" - читать интересную книгу автора (Grant Maxwell)

if for no other reason - to the fact that they had both undergone a similar
psychological experience; that of coming under the dominating sway of the
master hypnotist, Doctor Greug.
Irene couldn't even shudder, but she did steel herself for the ordeal.
Fortunately she'd been preparing for it and unless Greug probed too deeply,
her
replies to his coming questions might prove superficial.
Irene turned in her chair, her face as white as the soft shoulders
beneath
the dressing gown which the girl had carelessly donned before preparing her
make-up. Greug's crisp grey visage was visible only to his chin. He had folded
a cape around his body with one arm, Faustus style.
Like a living head, floating in midair, such was the illusion of Doctor
Greug; in the manner of some Teutonic myth, he had become inquisitor as well
as
oracle.
As the close-up effect of Greug increased, Irene felt more conscious of
her own entirety, but with it she seemed to have calcified into a statue of
solid marble, proclaiming itself by its own chill. Only Irene's eyes remained
warm, the lone fact which told her she might still fight off Greug's spell.
The living oracle spoke.
"You have joined with Dolbart and his friends. Why?"
"Only to save his life." Irene's lips moved as though mechanized. "They
would kill him - if they could."
Which Irene meant by 'him' - Dick or Friedrich - she did not specify. To
Greug, it could only mean Friedrich, since Greug was reasonably sure that
Irene
thought she had seen Dick die, back in that chalet on the Swiss border. Still,
Greug's eyes probed steadily.
Perhaps Greug recognized the sympathy which the warmth of Irene's eyes
displayed and it certainly wasn't sympathy for Greug himself. Knowing nothing
of the episode at Rocky Point, Greug was unaware that Irene had already
displayed her feelings toward a certain man by risking her own life in a
turnabout against the vengeful Maquis.
It was better perhaps that Greug was unacquainted with that incident
involving the real Dick Whitlock!
Coldly, Greug declared:
 "You care for him."
"I do." Irene's words were truthful. "I might even love him."
"Love does not matter," Greug's lips relaxed into a sneer, "except as it
influences your loyalty to our right cause. Friedrich was honored when he was
named to be our future Fuehrer. You are merely privileged to be chosen as his
consort. Guard that privilege, for you are replaceable; Friedrich is not."
A sudden chill was Irene's only reaction to this declaration of her
chattel status. Greug must have sensed it for he gave one of his heartless
smiles. Eyes coldly appraising of the girl's motionless form, Greug added:
"Friedrich is displeased, but I shall talk to him. Since it is better
that
all should proceed as planned, there is a way in which you can prove your
worth."