"If the Dreamer finds himself in an unknown place, ignorant of the
country and the people, let him be aware that such place is to be
understood of the Other World."--ONEIROCRITICA ACHMETIS.
In the morning I drove down to New York. There were affairs demanding
attention. Also, I was pressed by an eagerness to get my over-night work
into the hands of the publisher. To be exact, I wanted to put the
manuscript out of reach of the Thing at the house. Without reason, I had
awakened with that instinct strong within me.
The atmosphere of the city was tonic. Merely driving through the
friendly, crowded streets was an exhilaration. The practical employment
of the day broomed away fantastic cobwebs. In the evening I turned
toward Connecticut with a feeling of leaving home behind me. But I would
not stay away from the house for a night, risking that Desire Michell
might come and find me missing. She might believe I had been seized by
cowardice and deserted. She might never return.
I will not deny that I had lied to her. There was no intention in me of
accepting her fleeting visits as the utmost she could give. I meant to
snatch her out of darkness and mystery, to set her in the wholesome
sunlight where Phillida flitted happily. If I could prevent, those gates
of which she vaguely spoke never should close between us. But it was
plain that I must tread warily. Once frightened away, how could she be
found? Her home, her history, even her face, were unknown to me. Tracing
her by a perfume and a tress of hair had been tried, and failed. Of her
connection with the Dark Thing I refused to think too deeply. Her
connection with me must come first.
It was not until I passed the cottage of Mrs. Hill, glimmering whitely
in the starlight, where the road made an angle toward the farm, that I
recalled our talk in her "best room."
"_The Michell family always owned it. The Reverend Cotton Mather Michell
went to foreign parts for missionary work twenty years ago and died
there----_"
My lady of the night was Desire Michell. A clue?
"_He never married, so the family's run out._"
It was damp here in the hollow where the road dipped down. A chill ran
coldly over me.
Arrived at the garage which had taken the place of our tumble-down barn,
I put the car away as quietly as possible. Ten o'clock had struck as I
passed through the last village, and our household was asleep. Moving
without unnecessary noise, I crossed to the house. Bagheera, the cat,
padded across the porch to meet me and rubbed himself around my legs
while I stooped to put the latch-key in the lock.
As the key slid in place, I heard the waterfall over the dam abruptly
change the sound of its flow, swelling and accelerating as when a gust
of wind hurries a greater volume of water over the brink. But there was
no wind. Immediately followed that sound from the lake which I can liken
to nothing better than the smack of huge lips unclosing, or the suck of
a thick body drawing itself from a bed of mud. The cat thrust himself
violently between my feet and pressed against the house-door uttering a
whimpering mew of urgency. Startled, I looked in the direction of the
lake.
At this distance it showed as a mere expanse of darkness, only the
reflection of a star here and there revealing the surface as water. What
else could be shown, I rebuked my nerves by querying of them; and turned
the key. Bagheera rushed into the hall when the door opened wide enough
to admit his body. I followed more sedately and closed the door behind
us both.
Now I was not acquainted with Bagheera's night privileges. Did Phillida
allow him in the house, or not? After an instant's consideration, I bent
and picked him up from his repose on the hall rug. He should spend the
night shut in with me, out of mischief yet comfortable. Purring in the
curve of my arm, he was carried upstairs without objection on his part.
Until we reached my room! On its threshold I felt his body stiffen; his
yellow eyes snapped open alertly. Cat antipathy to a strange place, I
reflected, amused, as I switched on the lights.
"All right, Bagheera," I spoke soothingly, and put him upon the rug.
He bounded erect, fur bristling, tail lashing from side to side after
the fashion of a miniature panther. When I stooped to stroke him, he
eluded my hand. In a gliding run, body crouched, ears flattened, he sped
toward the doorway, was through it and gone.
Well, I decided, he could not be pursued all through the house. It would
be easier to explain him to Phillida next morning. I was tired;
pleasantly tired. The day had been filled with the enthusiasm and
congratulations of my associates, with conferences and plans for
launching the new music via theatres and advertising. It ought to "go
big," they assured me. In my optimism of mood, I wondered if I had not
already driven off the Dark Thing, since the girl had come to me the
night past without It appearing before or afterward. Perhaps,
woman-timid, she exaggerated the danger and It had retreated after the
second failure to overpower me.
I fell asleep with a tranquil conviction that nothing would disturb my
rest this night.
* * * * *
Stillness enveloped me, absolute, desolate. Silence contained me. Yet
the thought of another scorched against my understanding in a burning
communication of intelligence.
"Man," It commanded, "I am here. Fear!"
And I knew that which was my body did fear to the point of death, but
that which was myself stood up in revolt.
"Crouch," It bade. "Crouch, pygmy, and beg. Fear! The blood crawls in
the veins, the heart checks, the nerves shrink and wither--man, your
life wanes thin and faint. Down--shall your race affront mine?"
My heart did stagger and beat slow. Life crept a sluggish current. But
there was another force that stiffened to resistance, and gathered
itself to compact strength within me.
"No," my thought refused the dark intelligence. "I am not yours. Command
your own, not me."
"Weakling, you have touched that which is mine. Into my path you have
dared step. Back--for in my breath you die!"
The air my lungs drew in was foul and poisonous. With more and more
difficulty my heart labored. Confused memories came to me of men found
dead in their beds in haunted rooms. Would morning find me so? Better
that way than to yield to the Thing! Better----
I struggled erect; or fancied so.
Now I saw myself as one who stood with folded arms fronting a breach in
a colossal wall. Huge, immeasurably huge that cliff reared itself beyond
the sight and ranged away on either side into unknown distances, dully
glistening like gray ice, unbroken save in this place. The gray strand
on which I stood was a narrow strip following the foot of the wall.
Behind me lay a vast, unmoving ocean banked over with an all-concealing
mist. Not a ripple stirred along that weird beach, or a ray changed the
fixed gray twilight. And I was afraid, for my danger was not of the
common dangers of mankind, but that which freezes the blood of man when
he draws near the supernatural; the ancient fear.
I stood there, while sweat poured painfully from me, and fronted my
enemy who pressed me hard.
The Thing was at the breach, couched in the great cleft that split the
Barrier, darkness within darkness. Unseen, I felt the glare of Its hate
beat upon me. From It emanated deathly cold, like the nearness of an
iceberg in the night, with an odor of damp and mold.
"Puny earth-dweller, lost here," Its menace breathed, "what keeps you
from destruction? For you the circle has not been traced nor the
pentagram fixed, for you no law has been thrust down. Trespass is death.
Die, then."
Only my will held It from me, and I felt that will reel in sickened
bewilderment. I had no strength to answer, only the steadfast instinct
to oppose.
The Thing did not pass. There in the breach It ravened for me, thrust
Itself toward me, pressed against the thin veil of separation between
us. I saw nothing, yet knew where It raised Itself, gigantic in
formlessness more dreadful than any shape. Its whispered threats broke
against me like an evil surf.
"Man, the prey is mine. Would you challenge me? The woman is mine by the
pact of centuries. Save yourself. Escape."
The woman? Startled wonder filled me. Was I then fighting for Desire
Michell?
Out of the air I was answered as if her voice had spoken; certainty came
to grip me as if with her small hands. She had no help but in me. If I
fell, she fell. If I stood firm----? Exultant resolve flared strong and
high within me. My will to protect leaped forward.
The Thing shrank. It dwindled back through the gap in the Barrier. But
as It fled, a last venomous message drifted to me:
"Again! And again! Tire but once, pygmy----!"
* * * * *
I was sitting up in bed in my lighted room, my fingers clutching the
chain of the lamp beside me. Was some dark bulk just fading from beyond
my window? Or was I still dreaming?
I was trembling with cold, drenched as with water so that my relaxing
hand made a wet mark on the table beneath the lamp. This much might have
been caused by nightmare. But what sane man had nightmares like these?
When I was able, I rose, changed to dry garments and wrapped myself in a
heavy bathrobe. There was an electric coffee service in my room kept for
occasions when I worked late into the night. I made strong black coffee
now and drank it as near boiling as practicable. Presently the blood
again moved warmly in my veins.
Then I knew that the chill in the room was not a delusion of my chilled
body. I was warm, yet the air around me remained moist and cold, unlike
a summer night. It seemed air strangely thickened and soiled, as pure
water may be muddied by the passage of some unclean body. In this
atmosphere persisted a fetid smell of mold and decay, warring with the
homely scent of coffee and the fragrance of the pomander beneath my
pillow.
I was more shaken, more exhausted by this encounter with the unknown
than by either of my former experiences. A fact which drove home the
grim farewell of my enemy! _Tire but once, pygmy----!_ Desire herself
had foretold that the dark Thing would wear me down.
Well, perhaps! But not without fighting for Its victory. At least I
would be no supine victim. Already I had forced my way--where? Where was
that Barrier before which I had stood? Awe sank coldly through me at
memory of that colossal land where I was pygmy indeed, an insolent human
intruder upon the unhuman. What other shapes of dread stalked and
watched beyond that titanic wall? By what swollen conceit could I hope
to win against Them?
I would not consider escape by flight, even if the end had been certain
destruction. But my head sank to my hands beneath the weight of a
profound depression and discouragement.
It was the hour before dawn, traditionally the worst for man. The hour
superstition sets apart for its own, when the life flame burns lowest.
At a distance a dog had treed some little wood creature, and bayed
monotonously.
There was a weakness at the core of my strength. I waged this combat for
the sake of Desire Michell. _But what was she to whom the Thing laid
claim by the pact of centuries?_
Darkness began to tinge with light. Pale gray filtered into the dusk
with grudging slowness. As day approached I saw that a fog enfolded the
house in vapor, stealing into the room in coils and swirls like thin
smoke. The lamps looked sickly and dim. I forced away my languor, rose
and walked to the nearest window.
Something was moving up the slope from the lake; a dim shape about which
the fog clung in steamy billows. My shaken nerves thrilled unpleasantly.
What stirred at this empty hour? What should loom so tall?
A moment later the figure was near enough to be distinguished as Ethan
Vere, bearing several long fishing-rods over his shoulder.
"Vere!" I hailed him, with mingled relief and utter disgust with myself.
"Anything going on so early?"
He looked up at me--I never saw Vere startled--and came on to stop
beneath the window. Taking off his cap, he ran his fingers through his
black curls, pushing their wetness from his forehead. I noticed how the
mists painted him with a spectral pallor.
"Good morning, Mr. Locke," he greeted me. "Just as I've been thinking,
there are some big snapping-turtles about the lake and creek. I guessed
there'd be some war between them and me before that water was safe for
use! One of the fellows dragged a duck under, drowned it and started
feeding right before my eyes, just now."
"We will have to get a canoe."
He nodded placid assent.
"That'll look pretty on the lake. Phillida will like it. But I guess
I'll keep a homely old flat-bottomed punt out of sight around some
corner for work. The other craft goes over too prompt for jobs like
mine, and don't hold enough. I'm going to fetch my rifle, now. I'd
admire to blow that duck-eater's ugly head off."
"I will get into some clothes and be right with you," I invited myself
to the hunt.
"I'd like to have you," he replied with his quaint politeness. There
were times when I could visualize Vere's New England mother as if I had
known her.
The human interlude had been enough to dispel the black humors of the
night. When I was ready to go out, I opened the drawer that held the
copper-bronze braid and took it into my hand. How vital with youth its
crisp resilience felt in my clasp, I thought; young, too, were its
luxuriance and shining color. Nonsense, indeed, to fancy ghostliness
here or the passing of musty centuries over the head that had worn this
tress! A flood of reassurance rose high in me. Whatever the Thing might
be, I would trust the girl Desire Michell. Yes, and for her I would
stand fast at that Barrier until victory declared for the enemy or for
me. Until It passed me, It should not reach her.
I went downstairs to join Vere. The brightening mist was cool and fresh.
There was neither horror nor defeat in the promise of the morning.