The Yellow Sign

The CampfireThe openingFree

I was a painter in New York, in a studio near Washington Square. Across the street from my window was an old church. And in the churchyard, in the evenings, a man stood. The night watchman.

The first time I noticed him, he was standing at the gate of the church, looking up at my window.

I don't know why, but he disgusted me. The sight of him made my skin crawl. He was fat, pale, soft. And his face. His face looked like something you'd find under a rock. Like a coffin worm. A white, plump grave worm.

He looked up at my window. And I stepped back from it as if I'd been caught.

My model, a young woman named Tessie, noticed him too. She told me something strange.

She'd had a dream about him. She dreamed she was looking out of her window at night and saw a hearse coming down the street. A black hearse, with black horses. And the driver turned and looked up at her.

It was the night watchman.

And in the dream, she looked inside the hearse, through the glass. And there was a coffin. And lying in the coffin, she said, was me. And I was alive.

The night watchman turned and looked up at her and grinned.