was touching, opened quietly of itself. We looked at each other a single
instant. The same thought seized both--some human agency might be
detected here. I rushed in first, my servant followed. A small blank
dreary room without furniture--a few empty boxes and hampers in a
corner--a small window--the shutters closed--not even a fireplace--no
other door but that by which we had entered--no carpet on the floor, and
the floor seemed very old, uneven, worm-eaten, mended here and there, as
was shown by the whiter patches on the wood; but no living being, and no
visible place in which a living being could have hidden. As we stood
gazing around, the door by which we had entered closed as quietly as it
had before opened: we were imprisoned.
For the first time I felt a creep of undefinable horror. Not so my
servant. "Why, they don't think to trap us, sir; I could break that
trumpery door with a kick of my foot."
"Try first if it will open to your hand," said I, shaking off the vague
apprehension that had seized me, "while I open the shutters and see what
is without."
I unbarred the shutters--the window looked on the little backyard I have
before described; there was no ledge without--nothing but sheer descent.
No man getting out of that window would have found any footing till he
had fallen on the stones below.
F----, meanwhile, was vainly attempting to open the door. He now turned
round to me, and asked my permission to use force. And I should here
state, in justice to the servant, that, far from evincing any
superstitious terrors, his nerve, composure, and even gaiety amidst
circumstances so extraordinary compelled my admiration, and made me
congratulate myself on having secured a companion in every way fitted to
the occasion. I willingly gave him the permission he required. But
though he was a remarkably strong man, his force was as idle as his
milder efforts; the door did not even shake to his stoutest kick.
Breathless and panting, he desisted. I then tried the door myself,
equally in vain.
As I ceased from the effort, again that creep of horror came over me;
but this time it was more cold and stubborn. I felt as if some strange
and ghastly exhalation were rising up from the chinks of that rugged
floor, and filling the atmosphere with a venomous influence hostile to
human life. The door now very slowly and quietly opened as of its own
accord. We precipitated ourselves into the landing-place. We both saw a
large pale light--as large as the human figure, but shapeless and
unsubstantial--move before us, and ascend the stairs that led from the
landing into the attics. I followed the light, and my servant followed
me. It entered, to the right of the landing, a small garret, of which
the door stood open. I entered in the same instant. The light then
collapsed into a small globule, exceedingly brilliant and vivid; rested
a moment on a bed in the corner, quivered, and vanished. We approached
the bed and examined it--a half-tester, such as is commonly found in
attics devoted to servants. On the drawers that stood near it we
perceived an old faded silk kerchief, with the needle still left in a
rent half repaired. The kerchief was covered with dust; probably it had
belonged to the old woman who had last died in that house, and this
might have been her sleeping-room.
I had sufficient curiosity to open the drawers; there were a few odds
and ends of female dress, and two letters tied round with a narrow
ribbon of faded yellow. I took the liberty to possess myself of the
letters. We found nothing else in the room worth noticing--nor did the
light reappear; but we distinctly heard, as we turned to go, a pattering
footfall on the floor--just before us. We went through the other attics
(in all, four), the footfall still preceding us. Nothing to be
seen--nothing but the footfall heard. I had the letters in my hand; just
as I was descending the stairs I distinctly felt my wrist seized, and a
faint, soft effort made to draw the letters from my clasp. I only held
them the more tightly, and the effort ceased.
We regained the bedchamber appropriated to myself, and I then remarked
that my dog had not followed us when we had left it. He was thrusting
himself close to the fire, and trembling. I was impatient to examine the
letters; and while I read them, my servant opened a little box in which
he had deposited the weapons I had ordered him to bring, took them out,
placed them on a table close at my bed-head, and then occupied himself
in soothing the dog, who, however, seemed to heed him very little.
The letters were short--they were dated; the dates exactly thirty-five
years ago. They were evidently from a lover to his mistress, or a
husband to some young wife. Not only the terms of expression, but a
distinct reference to a former voyage indicated the writer to have been
a seafarer. The spelling and handwriting were those of a man imperfectly
educated, but still the language itself was forcible. In the expressions
of endearment there was a kind of rough wild love; but here and there
were dark unintelligible hints at some secret not of love--some secret
that seemed of crime. "We ought to love each other," was one of the
sentences I remember, "for how everyone else would execrate us if all
was known." Again: "Don't let anyone be in the same room with you at
night--you talk in your sleep." And again: "What's done can't be undone;
and I tell you there's nothing against us unless the dead could come to
life." Here there was underlined in a better handwriting (a female's),
"They do!" At the end of the letter latest in date the same female hand
had written these words: "Lost at sea the 4th of June, the same day
as--"
I put down the letters, and began to muse over their contents.
Fearing, however, that the train of thought into which I fell might
unsteady my nerves, I fully determined to keep my mind in a fit state to
cope with whatever of marvellous the advancing night might bring forth.
I roused myself--laid the letters on the table--stirred up the fire,
which was still bright and cheering--and opened my volume of Macaulay. I
read quietly enough till about half-past eleven. I then threw myself
dressed upon the bed, and told my servant he might retire to his own
room, but must keep himself awake. I bade him leave open the door
between the two rooms. Thus alone, I kept two candles burning on the
table by my bed-head. I placed my watch beside the weapons, and calmly
resumed my Macaulay.
Opposite to me the fire burned clear; and on the hearth-rug, seemingly
asleep, lay the dog. In about twenty minutes I felt an exceedingly cold
air pass by my cheek, like a sudden draught. I fancied the door to my
right, communicating with the landing-place, must have got open; but
no--it was closed. I then turned my glance to my left, and saw the flame
of the candles violently swayed as by a wind. At the same moment the
watch beside the revolver softly slid from the table--softly, softly--no
visible hand--it was gone. I sprang up, seizing the revolver with the
one hand, the dagger with the other; I was not willing that my weapons
should share the fate of the watch. Thus armed, I looked round the
floor--no sign of the watch. Three slow, loud, distinct knocks were now
heard at the bed-head; my servant called out, "Is that you, sir?"
"No; be on your guard."
The dog now roused himself and sat on his haunches, his ears moving
quickly backwards and forwards. He kept his eyes fixed on me with a look
so strange that he concentrated all my attention on himself. Slowly he
rose up, all his hair bristling, and stood perfectly rigid, and with the
same wild stare. I had no time, however, to examine the dog. Presently
my servant emerged from his room; and if ever I saw horror in the human
face, it was then. I should not have recognised him had we met in the
streets, so altered was every lineament. He passed by me quickly, saying
in a whisper that seemed scarcely to come from his lips, "Run--run! it
is after me!" He gained the door to the landing, pulled it open, and
rushed forth. I followed him into the landing involuntarily, calling him
to stop; but, without heeding me, he bounded down the stairs, clinging
to the balusters, and taking several steps at a time. I heard, where I
stood, the street door open--heard it again clap to. I was left alone in
the haunted house.
It was but for a moment that I remained undecided whether or not to
follow my servant; pride and curiosity alike forbade so dastardly a
flight. I re-entered my room, closing the door after me, and proceeded
cautiously into the interior chamber. I encountered nothing to justify
my servant's terror. I again carefully examined the walls, to see if
there were any concealed door. I could find no trace of one--not even a
seam in the dull-brown paper with which the room was hung. How, then,
had the Thing, whatever it was, which had so scared him, obtained
ingress except through my own chamber?
I returned to my room, shut and locked the door that opened upon the
interior one, and stood on the hearth, expectant and prepared. I now
perceived that the dog had slunk into an angle of the wall, and was
pressing himself close against it, as if literally trying to force his
way into it. I approached the animal and spoke to it; the poor brute was
evidently beside itself with terror. It showed all its teeth, the slaver
dropping from its jaws, and would certainly have bitten me if I had
touched it. It did not seem to recognise me. Whoever has seen at the
Zoological Gardens a rabbit fascinated by a serpent, cowering in a
corner, may form some idea of the anguish which the dog exhibited.
Finding all efforts to soothe the animal in vain, and fearing that his
bite might be as venomous in that state as if in the madness of
hydrophobia, I left him alone, placed my weapons on the table beside the
fire, seated myself, and recommenced my Macaulay.
Perhaps in order not to appear seeking credit for a courage, or rather a
coolness, which the reader may conceive I exaggerate, I may be pardoned
if I pause to indulge in one or two egotistical remarks.
As I hold presence of mind, or what is called courage, to be precisely
proportioned to familiarity with the circumstance that lead to it, so I
should say that I had been long sufficiently familiar with all
experiments that appertain to the Marvellous. I had witnessed many very
extraordinary phenomena in various parts of the world--phenomena that
would be either totally disbelieved if I stated them, or ascribed to
supernatural agencies. Now, my theory is that the Supernatural is the
Impossible, and that what is called supernatural is only a something in
the laws of nature of which we have been hitherto ignorant. Therefore,
if a ghost rise before me, I have not the right to say, "So, then, the
supernatural is possible," but rather, "So, then, the apparition of a
ghost is, contrary to received opinion, within the laws of
nature--_i.e._ not supernatural."
Now, in all that I had hitherto witnessed, and indeed in all the wonders
which the amateurs of mystery in our age record as facts, a material
living agency is always required. On the Continent you will find still
magicians who assert that they can raise spirits. Assume for the moment
that they assert truly, still the living material form of the magician
is present; and he is the material agency by which from some
constitutional peculiarities, certain strange phenomena are represented
to your natural senses.
Accept again, as truthful, the tales of Spirit Manifestation in
America--musical or other sounds--writings on paper, produced by no
discernible hand--articles of furniture moved without apparent human
agency--or the actual sight and touch of hands, to which no bodies seem
to belong--still there must be found the _medium_ or living being, with
constitutional peculiarities capable of obtaining these signs. In fine,
in all such marvels, supposing even that there is no imposture, there
must be a human being like ourselves, by whom, or through whom, the
effects presented to human beings are produced. It is so with the now
familiar phenomena of mesmerism or electro-biology; the mind of the
person operated on is affected through a material living agent. Nor,
supposing it true that a mesmerised patient can respond to the will or
passes of a mesmeriser a hundred miles distant, is the response less
occasioned by a material being; it may be through a material fluid--call
it Electric, call it Odic, call it what you will--which has the power of
traversing space and passing obstacles, that the material effect is
communicated from one to the other.
Hence all that I had hitherto witnessed, or expected to witness, in this
strange house, I believed to be occasioned through some agency or medium
as mortal as myself; and this idea necessarily prevented the awe with
which those who regard as supernatural things that are not within the
ordinary operations of nature, might have been impressed by the
adventures of that memorable night.
As, then, it was my conjecture that all that was presented, or would be
presented, to my senses, must originate in some human being gifted by
constitution with the power so to present them, and having some motive
so to do, I felt an interest in my theory which, in its way, was rather
philosophical than superstitious. And I can sincerely say that I was in
as tranquil a temper for observation as any practical experimentalist
could be in awaiting the effects of some rare though perhaps perilous
chemical combination. Of course, the more I kept my mind detached from
fancy, the more the temper fitted for observation would be obtained; and
I therefore riveted eye and thought on the strong daylight sense in the
page of my Macaulay.
I now became aware that something interposed between the page and the
light--the page was overshadowed; I looked up, and I saw what I shall
find it very difficult, perhaps impossible, to describe.
It was a Darkness shaping itself out of the air in very undefined
outline. I cannot say it was of a human form, and yet it had more
resemblance to a human form, or rather shadow, than anything else. As it
stood, wholly apart and distinct from the air and the light around it,
its dimensions seemed gigantic, the summit nearly touching the ceiling.
While I gazed, a feeling of intense cold seized me. An iceberg before me
could not more have chilled me; nor could the cold of an iceberg have
been more purely physical. I feel convinced that it was not the cold
caused by fear. As I continued to gaze, I thought--but this I cannot say
with precision--that I distinguished two eyes looking down on me from
the height. One moment I seemed to distinguish them clearly, the next
they seemed gone; but still two rays of a pale-blue light frequently
shot through the darkness, as from the height on which I half-believed,
half-doubted, that I had encountered the eyes.
I strove to speak--my voice utterly failed me; I could only think to
myself, "Is this fear? it is _not_ fear!" I strove to rise--in vain; I
felt as if weighed down by an irresistible force. Indeed, my impression
was that of an immense and overwhelming Power opposed to my volition;
that sense of utter inadequacy to cope with a force beyond men's, which
one may feel _physically_ in a storm at sea, in a conflagration, or when
confronting some terrible wild beast, or rather, perhaps, the shark of
the ocean, I felt _morally_. Opposed to my will was another will, as far
superior to its strength as storm, fire, and shark are superior in
material force to the force of men.
And now, as this impression grew on me, now came, at last,
horror--horror to a degree that no words can convey. Still I retained
pride, if not courage; and in my own mind I said, "This is horror, but
it is not fear; unless I fear, I cannot be harmed; my reason rejects
this thing; it is an illusion--I do not fear." With a violent effort I
succeeded at last in stretching out my hand towards the weapon on the
table; as I did so, on the arm and shoulder I received a strange shock,
and my arm fell to my side powerless. And now, to add to my horror, the
light began slowly to wane from the candles--they were not, as it were,
extinguished, but their flame seemed very gradually withdrawn; it was
the same with the fire--the light was extracted from the fuel; in a few
minutes the room was in utter darkness.
The dread that came over me, to be thus in the dark with that dark
Thing, whose power was so intensely felt, brought a reaction of nerve.
In fact, terror had reached that climax, that either my senses must have
deserted me, or I must have burst through the spell. I did burst through
it. I found voice, though the voice was a shriek. I remember that I
broke forth with words like these--"I do not fear, my soul does not
fear"; and at the same time I found the strength to rise. Still in that
profound gloom I rushed to one of the windows--tore aside the
curtain--flung open the shutters; my first thought was--LIGHT.
And when I saw the moon high, clear, and calm, I felt a joy that almost
compensated for the previous terror. There was the moon, there was also
the light from the gas-lamps in the deserted slumberous street. I turned
to look back into the room; the moon penetrated its shadow very palely
and partially--but still there was light. The dark Thing, whatever it
might be, was gone--except that I could yet see a dim shadow which
seemed the shadow of that shade, against the opposite wall.
My eye now rested on the table, and from under the table (which was
without cloth or cover--an old mahogany round table) there rose a hand,
visible as far as the wrist. It was a hand, seemingly, as much of flesh
and blood as my own, but the hand of an aged person--lean, wrinkled,
small too--a woman's hand.
That hand very softly closed on the two letters that lay on the table:
hand and letters both vanished. There then came the same three loud
measured knocks I had heard at the bed-head before this extraordinary
drama had commenced.
As those sounds slowly ceased, I felt the whole room vibrate sensibly;
and at the far end there rose, as from the floor, sparks or globules
like bubbles of light, many-coloured--green, yellow, fire-red, azure. Up
and down, to and fro, hither, thither, as tiny will-o'-the-wisps, the
sparks moved, slow or swift, each at its own caprice. A chair (as in the
drawing-room below) was now advanced from the wall without apparent
agency, and placed at the opposite side of the table. Suddenly, as forth
from the chair, there grew a shape--a woman's shape. It was distinct as
a shape of life--ghastly as a shape of death. The face was that of
youth, with a strange mournful beauty; the throat and shoulders were
bare, the rest of the form in a loose robe of cloudy white. It began
sleeking its long yellow hair, which fell over its shoulders; its eyes
were not turned towards me, but to the door; it seemed listening,
watching, waiting. The shadow of the shade in the background grew
darker; and again I thought I beheld the eyes gleaming out from the
summit of the shadow--eyes fixed upon that shape.
As if from the door, though it did not open, there grew out another
shape equally distinct, equally ghastly--a man's shape--a young man's.
It was in the dress of the last century, or rather in a likeness of such
dress; for both the male shape and the female, though defined, were
evidently unsubstantial, impalpable--simulacra--phantasms; and there was
something incongruous, grotesque, yet fearful, in the contrast between
the elaborate finery, the courtly precision of that old-fashioned garb,
with its ruffles and lace and buckles, and the corpse-like aspect and
ghost-like stillness of the flitting wearer. Just as the male shape
approached the female, the dark Shadow started from the wall, all three
for a moment wrapped in darkness. When the pale light returned, the two
phantoms were as if in the grasp of the Shadow that towered between
them; and there was a bloodstain on the breast of the female; and the
phantom-male was leaning on its phantom-sword, and blood seemed
trickling fast from the ruffles, from the lace; and the darkness of the
intermediate Shadow swallowed them up--they were gone. And again the
bubbles of light shot, and sailed, and undulated, growing thicker and
thicker and more wildly confused in their movements.
The closet-door to the right of the fireplace now opened, and from the
aperture there came the form of a woman, aged. In her hand she held
letters--the very letters over which I had seen _the_ Hand close; and
behind her I heard a footstep. She turned round as if to listen, then
she opened the letters and seemed to read; and over her shoulder I saw a
livid face, the face as of a man long drowned--bloated,
bleached--seaweed tangled in its dripping hair; and at her feet lay a
form as of a corpse and beside the corpse there cowered a child, a
miserable, squalid child, with famine in its cheeks and fear in its
eyes. And as I looked in the old woman's face, the wrinkles and lines
vanished, and it became a face of youth--hard-eyed, stony, but still
youth; and the Shadow darted forth, and darkened over these phantoms as
it had darkened over the last.
Nothing now was left but the Shadow, and on that my eyes were intently
fixed, till again eyes grew out of the Shadow--malignant, serpent eyes.
And the bubbles of light again rose and fell, and in their disordered,
irregular, turbulent maze, mingled with the wan moonlight. And now from
these globules themselves as from the shell of an egg, monstrous things
burst out; the air grew filled with them; larvæ so bloodless and so
hideous that I can in no way describe them except to remind the reader
of the swarming life which the solar microscope brings before his eyes
in a drop of water--things transparent, supple, agile, chasing each
other, devouring each other--forms like nought ever beheld by the naked
eye. As the shapes were without symmetry, so their movements were
without order. In their very vagrancies there was no sport; they came
round me and round, thicker and faster and swifter, swarming over my
head, crawling over my right arm, which was outstretched in involuntary
command against all evil beings.
Sometimes I felt myself touched, but not by them; invisible hands
touched me. Once I felt the clutch as of cold soft fingers at my throat.
I was still equally conscious that if I gave way to fear I should be in
bodily peril; and I concentrated all my faculties in the single focus of
resisting, stubborn will. And I turned my sight from the Shadow--above
all, from those strange serpent eyes--eyes that had now become
distinctly visible. For there, though in nought else around me, I was
aware that there was a _will_, and a will of intense, creative, working
evil, which might crush down my own.
The pale atmosphere in the room began now to redden as if in the air of
some near conflagration. The larvæ grew lurid as things that live in
fire. Again the room vibrated; again were heard the three measured
knocks; and again all things were swallowed up in the darkness of the
dark Shadow, as if out of that darkness all had come, into that darkness
all returned.
As the gloom receded, the Shadow was wholly gone. Slowly as it had been
withdrawn, the flame grew again into the candles on the table, again
into the fuel in the grate. The whole room came once more calmly,
healthfully into sight.
The two doors were still closed, the door communicating with the
servants' room still locked. In the corner of the wall, into which he
had so convulsively niched himself, lay the dog. I called to him--no
movement; I approached--the animal was dead; his eyes protruded; his
tongue out of his mouth; the froth gathered round his jaws. I took him
in my arms; I brought him to the fire; I felt acute grief for the loss
of my poor favourite--acute self-reproach; I accused myself of his
death; I imagined he had died of fright. But what was my surprise on
finding that his neck was actually broken--actually twisted out of the
vertebræ. Had this been done in the dark?--must it not have been by a
hand human as mine?--must there not have been a human agency all the
while in that room? Good cause to suspect it. I cannot tell. I cannot do
more than state the fact fairly; the reader may draw his own inference.
Another surprising circumstance--my watch was restored to the table from
which it had been so mysteriously withdrawn; but it had stopped at the
very moment it was so withdrawn; nor, despite all the skill of the
watchmaker, has it ever gone since--that is, it will go in a strange
erratic way for a few hours, and then comes to a dead stop--it is
worthless.