The Plague, Pestilence & Apocalypse MEGAPACK™

by Robert Reed

  about him . Not, at least, until one day of which I am going to tell

  you . James Redpath and I were coming back together to Penrud-

  dock, and we called at a cottage about two miles from the village .

  Here we found a little boy of about four years old, who had been

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  visiting at the cottage and whom they wanted to send home . They

  asked us to take charge of him and we did so . On the way home the

  little boy’s shoe was found to have a nail or a peg in it that hurt his

  foot, and we were quite unable to get it out . It was nothing, however,

  to James Redpath to carry him, and so he took him in his arms . The

  little boy shrank and whimpered as he did so . James had under his

  arm some parts of a fishing-rod and one of these came in contact

  with the little boy’s leg and scratched it rather severely so as to make

  him cry . I took it away and we went on . I was walking a little behind

  Redpath, and as I walked I saw him deliberately take another joint of

  the rod, put it in the same place and then watch the little boy’s face

  as it came in contact with the wire, and as the child cried out I saw

  quite a malignant expression of pleasure pass over James’s face . The

  thing was done in a moment and it was over in a moment; but I felt

  as if I should like to have killed him if I dared . I always dreaded and

  shunned him, more or less, afterwards, and I began from that date to

  associate him with the inhuman heroes of my Welsh stories .

  I don’t think that I should ever have got over the dislike of him

  which I then conceived, but I saw the last of him, at least Penrud-

  dock saw the last of him, about three months later . I had been sitting

  looking over the sea between the pier and the cliffs and trying to

  catch a glimpse of the Wicklow Mountains which were sometimes

  to be seen from that point . Just then James Redpath came up from

  the beach beyond the pier, and passing me with a brief “good morn-

  ing,” went away inland, leaving the cliffs behind him . I don’t know

  how long I lay there, it might be two hours or more, and I think I

  slept a little. But I suddenly started up to find it high day and past

  noon, and I began to think of looking for some shelter . There was

  not a cloud visible, but nevertheless two shadows like, or something

  like, the shadows of clouds lay near me on the ground . What they

  were the shadows of I could not tell, and I was about to get up to

  see, for there was nothing to cast such a shadow within the range of

  my sight as I lay . Just then one of the shadows came down over me

  and seemed to stand for a moment between me and the sun . It had a

  well-defined shape, much too well defined for a cloud. I thought as

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  I looked that it was just such a shadow as might be cast by a yawl-

  built boat lying on the body of a large wheelbarrow . Then the two

  shadows seemed to move together and to move very quickly . I had

  just noticed that they were exactly like one another when the next

  moment they passed out of my sight .

  I started to my feet with a bound, my heart beating furiously .

  But there was nothing more to alarm the weakest . It was broad day .

  Houses and gardens were to be seen close at hand and in every direc-

  tion but one, and in that direction there were three or four fishermen

  drawing their nets . But as I looked away to the part of the sky where

  the strange cloudlike shadows had just vanished, I remembered with

  a shudder that other feature in common of the strange stories of

  which I told you just now . It was a feature that forcibly reminded

  me of what I had just witnessed . Sometimes in the later stories you

  would be told of a cloud coming and going in an otherwise cloud-

  less sky . And sometimes in the elder stories you would be told of an

  invisible car, invisible but not shadowless . I used always to identify

  the shadow of the invisible car in the elder stories with the cloud in

  the later stories, the cloud that unaccountably came and went .

  As I thought it all over and tried to persuade myself that I had been

  dreaming I suddenly remembered that James Redpath had passed by

  a few hours before, and as suddenly I came to the conclusion that I

  should never see him again . And certainly he never was again seen,

  dead or alive, anywhere in Wales or England . His father, and his

  uncle, and their families, continued to live about Penruddock, but

  Penruddock never knew James Redpath any more . Whether I myself

  saw him again or not is more than I can say with absolute certainty .

  You shall know as much as I know about it if you hear my story to

  the end .

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  CHAPTER II

  THE RED SICKNESS

  Of course James Redpath’s disappearance attracted much atten-

  tion, and was the talk not only of the village, but of the whole coun-

  try-side . It was the general opinion that he must have been drowned

  by falling over the cliffs, and that his body had been washed out to

  sea . I proved, however, to have been the very last person to see him,

  and my testimony, as far as it went, was against that opinion . For I

  certainly had seen him walking straight inland . Of course he might

  have returned to the coast afterwards, but at least nobody had seen

  him return . I gave a full account of place and time as far as I could

  fix them, and I mentioned the queer-looking clouds and even de-

  scribed their shape . This I remember, was considered to have some

  value as fixing my memory of the matter, but no further notice was

  taken of it . And I myself did not venture to suggest any connection

  between it and Redpath’s disappearance, because I did not see how

  I could reasonably do so. I had, nevertheless, a firm conviction that

  there was such a connection, but I knew very well that to declare it

  would only bring a storm of ridicule upon me .

  But a public calamity just then befell Penruddock which made

  men forget James Redpath’s disappearance . A pestilence broke out

  in the place of which nobody knew either the nature or the source . It

  seemed to spring up in the place . At least, all efforts to trace it were

  unsuccessful. The first two or three cases were attributed to some

  inflammatory cold, but it soon became clear that there were specific

  features about it, that they were quite unfamiliar, that the disease

  was extremely dangerous to life and highly infectious .

  Then a panic set in, and I believe that the disease would soon

  have been propagated all over England and farther, if it had not been

  for the zeal and ability of two young physicians who happened very

  fortunately to be living in the village just then . Their names were

  Leopold and Furniss . I forget if I ever knew their Christian names .

  We used to call them Doctor Leopold and Doctor Furniss . They had

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  finished their studies for some little time, but they found it advisable

  on the score of health to take a longish holiday before commencing

&
nbsp; practice, and they were spending part of their holiday at Penrud-

  doek . They were just about to leave us when the disease I am telling

  you of broke out .

  The first case occurred in a valley about two miles from the vil-

  lage . In this valley there were several cottages inhabited mostly by

  farm labourers and artisans . These cottages lay one after another in

  the direction of the rising ground which separated the valley from

  Penruddock . Then there were no houses for a considerable space .

  Then, just over the hill, there was another and yet another . The dis-

  ease had made its way gradually up the hill from one cottage to

  another, day after day a fresh ease appearing . Then there had been

  no new eases for four days, but on the fifth day a new ease appeared

  in the cottage just over the brow of the hill And when this became

  known, also that every case (there had now been eleven) had hith-

  erto been fatal, serious alarm arose . Then, too, the disease became

  known as the “red sickness .” This name was due to a discoloration

  which set in on the shoulders, neck, and forehead very shortly after

  seizure .

  How the two doctors, as we called them, became armed with the

  needful powers I do not know . They certainly contrived to obtain

  some sort of legal authority, but I think that they acted in great mea-

  sure on their own responsibility .

  By the time they commenced operations there were three or four

  more cases in the valley, and one more in the second cottage on the

  Penruddock side . There was a large stone house, partly ruinous, in

  the valley, near the sea, and hither they brought every one of the sick .

  Plenty of help was given them in the way of beds, bedding, and all

  sorts of material, but such was the height which the panic had now

  attained that no one from the village would go near any of the sick

  folk, nor even enter the valley . The physicians themselves and their

  two men servants, who seemed to be as fearless and brave as they,

  did all the work . Fortunately, the two infected cottages on the Pen-

  ruddock side were each tenanted only by the person who had fallen

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  ill, and the tenant in each case was a labourer whose work lay in

  the valley . The physicians burnt down these cottages and everything

  that was in them . Then they established a strict quarantine between

  the village and the alley . There was a light fence running from the

  sea for about a mile inland, along the brow of the rising ground on

  the Penruddock side . This they never passed nor suffered any one to

  pass, during the prevalence of the sickness . Butchers and bakers and

  other tradesmen left their wares at a given point at a given time, and

  the people from the valley came and fetched them .

  The excitement and terror in Penruddock were very great . All

  but the most necessary business was suspended, and of social inter-

  course during the panic there was next to none . Ten cases in all were

  treated by the physicians, and four of these recovered . The last two

  cases were three or four days apart, but they were no less malignant

  in character: the very last case was one of the fatal ones . I learned

  nothing of the treatment; but the means used to prevent the disease

  spreading, besides the strict quarantine, were chiefly fire and lime.

  Everything about the sick was passed through the fire, and of these

  everything that the fire would destroy was destroyed. Lime, which

  abounded in the valley, was largely used .

  A month after the last case the two physicians declared the quar-

  antine at an end, and a month later all fear of the disease had ceased .

  And then the people of the village began to think of consoling them-

  selves for the dull and uncomfortable time they had had, and of do-

  ing some honour to the two visitors who had served the village so

  well . With this double purpose in view a picnic on a large scale was

  organized, and there was plenty of eating and drinking and speech-

  making and dancing, all of which I pass over . But at that picnic I

  heard a conversation which made a very powerful impression on

  me then, and which often has seemed to provide a bond which binds

  together all the strange things of which I had experience at the time

  and afterwards .

  In the heat of the afternoon I had happened to be with Mr . Leop-

  old and Mr . Furniss helping them in some arrangements which they

  were making for the amusement of the children who took part in the

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  picnic. After these were finished they two strolled away together

  to the side of a brook which ran through the park where we were

  gathered . I followed them, attracted mainly by Mr . Furniss’s dog,

  but encouraged also by an occasional word from the young men . At

  the brook Mr . Furniss sat upon a log, and leaned his back against a

  rustic fence . The dog sat by him; a very beautiful dog he was, black

  and white, with great intelligent eyes, and an uncommonly large and

  well-shaped head . He would sometimes stretch himself at length,

  and then again he would put his paw upon his master’s shoulder and

  watch Sir . Leopold and me .

  Mr . Leopold stood with his back to an oak-tree, and I leant against

  the fence beside him listening to him . He was a tall, dark man, with

  a keen, thoughtful, and benevolent expression . He was quite strong

  and healthy-looking, and there was a squareness about his features

  that I think one does not often see in dark people . Mr . Furniss was

  of lighter complexion and hardly as tall; there was quite as much

  intelligence and benevolence in his face, but not so much of what I

  have called thoughtfulness as distinguished from intelligence, and

  there was a humorous glint in his eye which the other lacked . They

  began to talk about the disease which had been so successfully dealt

  with, and this was what they said:—

  Leoplold . Well, Furniss, an enemy hath done this .

  Furniss . Done what? The picnic or the red sickness?

  Leopold . The red sickness, of course . Can’t you see what I mean?

  Furniss . No, I can’t . You’re too much of a mystic for me, Leop-

  old; but I’ll tell you what, England owes a debt to you and me, my

  boy, for it was near enough to being a new edition of the black death

  or the plague .

  Leopold . Only the black death and the plague were imported, and

  this was indigenous . It sprung up under our noses in a healthy place .

  I came from nowhere, and, thank God, it is gone nowhither .

  Furniss . But surely the black death and the plague must have

  begun somewhere, and they too seem to have gone nowhither .

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  Leopold . You’re right this far that they all must have had the

  same sort of beginning . 0nly it is given to very few to see the begin-

  ning, as you and I have seen it, or so near the beginning .

  Furniss . Now, Leopold, I hardly see what you are driving at . I am

  not much on religion, as they say in America, but I believe there is a

 
Power above all . Call that lower God, and let us say that God does

  as He pleases, and on the whole that it is best that He should . I don’t

  see that you can get much further than that .

  Leopold . I don’t believe that God ever made the plague, or the

  black death, or the red sickness .

  Furniss . Oh, don’t you? Then you are, I suppose, what the church-

  men call a Manichee—you believe in the two powers of light and darkness, good and evil . Well, it is not a bad solution of the question

  as far as it goes, but I can hardly accept it .

  Leopold . No, I don’t believe in any gods but the 0ne . But let me

  explain . That is a nice dog of yours, Furniss . You told me one day

  something about his breeding, and you promised to tell me more .

  Furniss . Yes, it is quite a problem in natural history . Do you

  know, Tommy’s ancestors have been in our family for four or five

  generations of men, and, I suppose, that is twenty generations of

  dogs .

  Leopold . You told me something of it . You improved the breed

  greatly, I believe?

  Furniss . Yes; but I have some distant cousins, and they have the

  same breed and yet not the same, for they have cultivated it in quite

  another direction .

  Leopold . What are the differences?

  Furniss . Our dogs are all more or less like Tommy here, gentle

  and faithful, very intelligent, and by no means deficient in pluck.

  My cousin’s dogs are fierce and quarrelsome, so much so that they

  have not been suffered for generations to associate with children .

  And so they have lost intelligence and are become ill-conditioned

  and low-lived brutes .

  Leopold . But I think I understood you to say that the change in

  the breed did not come about in the ordinary course of nature .

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  Furniss . I believe not . I heard my grandfather say that his father

  had told him that when he was a young man he had set about im-

  proving the breed . He had marked out the most intelligent and best

  tempered pups, and he had bred from them only and had given away

  or destroyed the others .

  Leopold . And about your cousin’s dogs?

  Furniss. Just let me finish. It seems that while one brother began

  to cultivate the breed upward, so to speak, another brother was liv-

  ing in a part of the country where thieves were numerous and daring,