The Night of Fear

the long version

>>*Together they looked down at the inert sprawling figure of a man fantastically dressed in red-and-white-striped pyjama trousers, with a red sash belt and a white silk shirt open at the neck.* >A Christmas gathering of young and old in a great country house in England - a masquerade - and the lights are turned off for a game of hide and seek. Silence - then a man's cry for "Lights!" The lights come on, revealing Hugh Darrow, blind since the War, standing in the main hall, fresh blood dripping from his hands and covering his white Pierrot costume. He tells the story of having discovered a dead man, stabbed through the heart, lying in a curtained window embrasure next to the one in which he was hiding. The murdered man proves to be Stallard, one of the visitors, and a writer of mystery tales. >There follows a thrilling tale in which the life of an innocent man hangs in the balance. A grand and baffling tale for the mystery lover. *The Night of Fear* was originally published in 1931.