These were Uncle Claude's last words as his harsh eyes widened and the log of firewood came down on his head with a heavy thud. The body was dragged to the fireplace, and the log put against the open skull to give the appearance that he had fallen onto it.
Nobody knew Reginald had come to down. Even his Uncle Claude had known the whereabouts of his only living relative until the day Reginald made his friendly visit while just passing through. All he had to do now was to return unseen to his distant home, then come to town some time later to hear of his uncle's unfortunate accident, and claim his inheritance.
As he walked through the chilly night towards the station, his thoughts dwelt upon the ghastly expression in the eyes of his uncle as he lay with his bleeding head against the murder weapon. They had seemed to be staring at him, piercing into his mind, with a look Reginald knew he would never forget.
When he came at last to the station he bought a single ticket to the central station where he would get a train home. The man who sold him the ticket had dark brown eyes and he stared at Reginald with a deathlike stare, the same stare that had burnt into him from his uncle's face.
A little shaken, Reginald moved through the barrier. He was not used to committing murder and was rather nervous. His imagination, he knew, was playing tricks on him.
He waited on the dark platform until the train came and he got into an empty carriage, so he was alone until he reached the next station. That was where the big fat lady and the little man with the beard entered the carriage. Both of them had dark brown eyes and they stared at him, unblinking, all the way to the next station, where he stood up to move to another compartment. Before he could do so a large man pushed himself through the door, followed by two young girls. With all these people present. Reginald felt safe enough to sit down again. But they all did it. They all stared at him with dark brown eyes. The large man was holding a newspaper and pretending to read it, but there were his eyes, staring silently over the top of the paper.
Five pairs of eyes, joined by two more at a further station, all stared at Reginald relentlessly. Not once did they blink. Not once did they look away. Their victim sat and suffered in the deadly silence as the train moved on, rattling monotonously through the still night.
It was early morning when he reached the central station. He looked in each carriage of the second train in the vain hope of finding some people who did not have his uncle's eyes. But in every window he saw the same thing. Everyone in the carriage was looking out at him with that dreaded expression in their dark brown eyes. He was forced to suffer, during the day, the same torture he had been faced with all night. There was no way he could ignore it. This mysterious reminder of his crime haunted him throughout the day. After a journey that was a nightmare, a ticket-collector with dark brown staring eyes silently took his ticket, and he walked home.
When Mr Jacobson greeted him in the street, his dark brown eyes staring fiendishly at Reginald, he reminded himself that Mr Jacobson really had greenish eyes. A good rest perhaps would clear away the spectre that haunted his mind. He had not slept since the night of the murder.
Alone in his room, far from all the eyes that stared, he felt a touch of peace returning to him. It wasn't until a half an hour later that he noticed a strange chill in the atmosphere. There seemed to be somebody in the room with him, watching him. He looked around anxiously, his eyes eventually coming to rest on what appeared to be two lights. But they were not lights. They were eyes, shining in the darkness, eyes without a body, dark brown eyes, staring at him, closing in on him, hovering above his head, staring at him with that fierce intensity he had first seen when he lay his uncle's head on the murder weapon back at the big house he was soon to inherit.
He began to feel for the first time that he had been too impatient, too greedy. His uncle could not have lived very much longer if he had been allowed his natural span. But then this thought faded away, and the eyes staring at him also faded away, as Reginald's life faded away. But before he died, there was just an instant when a thought that had been somewhere at the back of his mind all day sprang into his consciousness. He remembered that his Uncle Claude had had blue eyes.
Reginald was found the next day with his eyes staring into infinity, a frightening look of agony reflected in them, eyes that seemed to reflect a tormented soul, eyes cursing their owner - Reginald's dark brown eyes.