The House on the Borderland and Other Mysterious Places

by William Hope Hodgson; Jeremy Lassen

  “The policemen were pretty quiet, and I judged that they were feeling rather worse than Wentworth; though, for that matter, you must not think that I was altogether natural; yet I have seen so much that is extraordinary, that I daresay I can keep my nerves steady longer than most people; at any rate, in that kind of thing.

  “I looked over my shoulder at the men, and cautioned them, in a low voice, not to move outside of the Barriers, whatever happened; not even though the house should seem to be rocking and about to tumble on to them; for I knew well enough what some of the great Forces are capable of doing. Yet, unless it should prove to be one of the cases of the more terrible Saiitii Manifestations, we were almost certain of safety, so long as we kept to our order within the Pentacle.

  “Perhaps an hour and a half passed, quietly, except when, once in a way, the dogs would whine distressfully. Presently, however, they ceased even from this, and I could see them lying on the floor with their paws over their noses, in a most peculiar fashion, and shivering visibly. The sight made me feel more serious, as you can understand.

  “Suddenly, the candle in the corner furthest from the main door, went out. An instant later, Wentworth jerked my arm, and I saw that a candle before one of the sealed doors had been put out. I held my camera ready. Then, one after another, every candle about the hall was put out, and with such speed and irregularity, that I could never catch one in the actual act of being extinguished. Yet, for all that, I took a flashlight of the hall in general.

  “There was a time in which I sat half-blinded by the great glare of the flash, and I blamed myself for not having remembered to bring a pair of smoked goggles, which I have sometimes used at these times. I had felt the men jump, at the sudden light, and I called out loud to them to sit quiet, and to keep their feet exactly to their proper places. My voice, as you can imagine, sounded rather horrid and frightening in the great, empty room, and altogether it was a beastly moment.

  “Then, I was able to see again, and I stared round and round the hall; but there was nothing showing unusual; only, of course, it was dark now over in the corners.

  “Suddenly, I saw that the great fire was blackening. It was going out visibly, as I looked. If I said that some monstrous, invisible, impossible Force sucked the life from it, I could best explain my impression of the way the light and flame went out of it. It was most extraordinary to watch. In the time that I stared at it, every vestige of fire disappeared, and there was no light outside of the ring of candles around the Pentacle.

  “The deliberateness of the thing troubled me more than I can make clear to you. It conveyed to me such a sense of a calm, Deliberate Force present in the hall. The steadfast intention to ‘make a darkness’ was horrible. The extent of the Power to affect the Material was now the one constant, anxious questioning in my brain. You can understand?

  “Behind me, I heard the policemen moving again, and I knew that they were getting thoroughly frightened. I turned half round, and told them, quietly but plainly, that they were safe only so long as they stayed within the Pentacle, in the position in which I had put them. If they once broke, and went outside of the Barrier, no knowledge of mine could state the full extent or dreadfulness of the danger.

  “I steadied them up, by this quiet, straight reminder; but if they had known, as I knew, that there is no certainty in any ‘Protection’, they would have suffered a great deal more, and probably have broken the ‘Defense’ and made a mad, foolish run for an impossible safety.

  “Another hour passed, after this, in an absolute quietness. I had a sense of awful strain and oppression, as if I were an infinitely insignificant spirit in the company of some invisible, brooding monster of the unseen world, who, as yet, was scarcely conscious of us. I leant across to Wentworth, and asked him in a whisper whether he had a feeling as if Something were in the room. He looked very pale, and his eyes kept always on the move. He glanced just once at me, and nodded; then stared away round the hall again.

  “Abruptly, as though a hundred unseen hands had snuffed them, every candle in the barrier went dead out, and we were left in a darkness that seemed, for a little, absolute; for the light from the Pentacle was too weak and pale to penetrate far across the great hall.

  “I tell you, for a moment, I just sat there as though I had been frozen solid. I felt the ‘creep’ go all over me, and seem to stop in my brain. I felt all at once to be given a power of hearing that was far beyond the normal. I could hear my own heart thudding most extraordinarily loud. I began, however, to feel better, after a little; but I simply had not the pluck to move. You can understand?

  “Presently, I began to get my courage back. I gripped at my camera and flashlight, and waited. My hands were simply soaked with sweat. I glanced once at Wentworth. I could see him only dimly. His shoulders were hunched a little, his head forward; but though it was motionless, I knew that his eyes were not. It is queer how one knows that sort of thing at times. The police were just as silent. And in this way a while passed.

  “A sound broke across the silence. From two sides of the room there came faint noises. I recognised them at once, as the breaking of the sealing-wax. The sealed doors were opening. I raised the camera and flashlight, and it was a peculiar mixture of fear and courage that helped me to press the button. As the great belch of light lit up the hall, I felt the men all about me, jump. The darkness fell like a clap of thunder, if you can understand, and seemed tenfold. Yet, in the moment of brightness, I had seen that all the sealed doors were wide open.

  “Suddenly, all around us, there sounded a drip, drip drip, upon the floor of the great hall. I thrilled with a queer, realising emotion, and a sense of a very real and present danger—imminent. The ‘blood-drip’ had commenced. And the grim question was now whether the Barriers could save us from whatever had come into the huge room.

  “Through some awful minutes the ‘blood-drip’ continued to fall in an increasing rain, and presently some began to fall within the Barriers. I saw several great drops splash and star upon the pale glowing intertwining tubes of the Electric Pentacle; but, strangely enough, I could not trace that any fell among us.

  “Beyond the strange horrible noise of the ‘drip’, there was no other sound. And then, abruptly, from the boarhound over in the far corner, there came a terrible yelling howl of agony, followed instantly by a sickening, breaking noise, and an immediate silence. If you have ever, when out shooting, broken a rabbit’s neck, you will know the sound that I mean—in miniature! Like lightning, the thought sprang into my brain:— IT has crossed the pentacle. For you will remember that I had made one about each of the dogs. I thought instantly, with a sick apprehension, of our own Barriers. There was something in the hall with us that had passed the barrier of the pentacle about one of the dogs. In the awful succeeding silence, I positively quivered. And suddenly, one of the men behind me, gave out a scream, like any woman, and bolted for the door. He fumbled, and had it open in a moment. I yelled to the others not to move; but they followed like sheep, and I heard them kick the candles flying, in their panic. One of them stepped on the Electric Pentacle and smashed it, and there was an utter darkness. In an instant, I realised that I was defenceless against the powers of the Unknown World, and with one savage leap I was out of the useless Barriers, and instantly through the great doorway, and into the night. I believe I yelled with sheer funk.

  “The men were a little ahead of me, and I never ceased running, and neither did they. Sometimes, I glanced back over my shoulder; and I kept glancing into the laurels which grew all along the drive. The beastly things kept rustling, rustling in a hollow sort of way, as though something were keeping parallel with me, among them. The rain had stopped, and a dismal little wind kept moaning through the grounds. It was disgusting.

  “I caught Wentworth and the police at the lodge gate. We got outside, and ran all the way to the village. We found old Dennis up, waiting for us, and half the Villagers to keep him company. He told us that he had known in his ‘sowl’ that
we should come back—that is, if we came back at all; which is not a bad rendering of his remark.

  “Fortunately, I had brought my camera away from the House—possibly because the strap had happened to be over my head. Yet, I did not go straight away to develop; but sat with the rest in the bar, where we talked for some hours, trying to be coherent about the whole horrible business.

  “Later, however, I went up to my room, and proceeded with my photography. I was steadier now, and it was just possible, so I hoped, that the negatives might show something.

  “On two of the plates, I found nothing unusual; but on the third, which was the first one that I snapped, I saw something that made me quite excited. I examined it very carefully with a magnifying-glass; then I put it to wash, and slipped a pair of rubber half shoes over my boots.

  “The negative had shown me something very extraordinary, and I had made up my mind to test the truth of what it seemed to indicate, without losing another moment. It was no use telling anything to Wentworth and the police, until I was certain; and, also, I believed that I stood a greater chance to succeed by myself; though, for that matter, I do not suppose anything would have got them up to the Manor again that night.

  “I took my revolver, and went quietly downstairs, and into the dark. The rain had commenced again; but that did not bother me. I walked hard. When I came to the lodge gates, a sudden, queer instinct stopped me from going through, and I climbed the wall into the park. I kept away from the drive, and approached the building through the dismal, dripping laurels. You can imagine how beastly it was. Every time a leaf rustled, I jumped.

  “I made my way round to the back of the big House, and got in through a little window which I had taken note of during my search; for, of course, I knew the whole place now from roof to cellars. I went silently up the kitchen stairs, fairly quivering with funk; and at the top, I stepped to the left, and then into a long corridor that opened, through one of the doorways we had sealed, into the big hall. I looked up it, and saw a faint flicker of light away at the end; and I tip-toed silently towards it, holding my revolver ready. As I came near to the open door, I heard men’s voices, and then a burst of laughing. I went on, until I could see into the hall. There were several men there, all in a group. They were well dressed, and one, at least, I saw was armed. They were examining my ‘barriers’ against the Supernatural, with a good deal of unkind laughter. I never felt such a fool in my life.

  “It was plain to me that they were a gang of men who had made use of the empty Manor, perhaps for years, for some purpose of their own; and now that Wentworth was attempting to take possession, they were acting up to the traditions of the Place, with the view of driving him away, and keeping so useful a place still at their disposal. But what they were, I mean whether Coiners, Thieves, Inventors, or what—I could not imagine.

  “Presently, they left the Pentacle, and gathered round the living boarhound, which seemed curiously quiet, as if it were half-drugged. There was some talk as to whether to let the poor brute live, or not; but finally they decided it would be good policy to kill it. I saw two of them force a twisted loop of rope into its mouth, and the two bights of the loop were brought together at the back of the hound’s neck. Then a third man thrust a thick walking-stick through the two loops. The two men with the rope, stooped to hold the dog, so that I could not see what was done; but the poor beast gave a sudden awful howl, and immediately there was a repetition of the uncomfortable breaking sound, I had heard earlier in the night, as you will remember.

  “The men stood up, and left the dog lying there—quiet enough now, as you may suppose. For my part, I fully appreciated the calculated remorselessness which had decided upon the animal’s death, and the cold determination with which it had been afterwards executed so neatly. I guessed that a man who might get into the ‘light’ of these particular men, would be likely to come to quite as uncomfortable an ending.

  “A minute later, one of them called out to the rest that they should ‘shift the wires’. One of the men came towards the doorway of the corridor in which I stood, and I ran quickly back into the darkness of the upper end. I saw the man reach up, and take something from the top of the door, and I heard the slight, ringing jangle of steel-wire.

  “When he had gone, I ran back again, and saw the men passing, one after another, through an opening in the stairs, formed by one of the marble steps being raised. When the last man had vanished, the slab that made the step was shut down, and there was not a sign of the secret door. It was the seventh step from the bottom, as I took care to count; and a splendid idea, for it was so solid that it did not ring hollow, even to a fairly heavy hammer, as I found later.

  “There is little more to tell. I got out of the House as quickly and quietly as possible, and back to the inn. The Police came without any coaxing, when they knew the ‘ghosts’ were normal flesh and blood. We entered the Park and the Manor in the same way that I had done. Yet, when we tried to open the step, we failed, and had finally to smash it. This must have warned the haunters; for when we descended to a secret room which we found at the end of a long and narrow passage in the thickness of the walls, we found no one.

  “The Police were horribly disgusted, as you can imagine; for they seemed tolerably certain that I had dropped on the meeting-place of a certain ‘political’ club much wanted by the authorities; but for my part, I did not care either way. I had ‘laid the ghost’, as you might say, and that was what I set out to do. I was not particularly afraid of being laughed at by the others; for they had all been thoroughly ‘taken in’; and in the end, I had scored, without their help.

  “We searched right through the secret ways, and found that there was an exit, at the end of a long tunnel, which opened in the side of a well, out in the grounds. The ceiling of the hall was hollow, and reached by a little secret stairway inside of the big staircase. The ‘blood-drip’ was merely coloured water, dropped through the minute crevices of the ornamented ceiling. How the candles and the fire were put out, I do not know; for the haunters certainly did not act quite up to tradition, which held that the lights were put out by the ‘blood-drip.’ Perhaps it was too difficult to direct the fluid, without positively squirting it, which might have given the whole thing away. The candles and the fire may possibly have been extinguished by the agency of carbonic acid gas; but how suspended, I have no idea.

  “The secret hiding places were, of course, ancient. There was also (did I tell you?) a bell which they had rigged up to ring, when anyone entered the gates at the end of the drive. If I had not climbed the wall, I should have found nothing for my pains; for the bell would have warned them, had I gone in through the gateway.”

  “What was on the negative?” I asked, with much curiosity.

  “A picture of the fine wire with which they were grappling for the hook that held the entrance door open. They were doing it from one of the crevices in the ceiling. They had evidently made no preparations for lifting the hook. I suppose they never thought that anyone would make use of it, and so they had to improvise a grapple. The wire was too fine to be seen by the amount of light we had in the hall; but the flashlight ‘picked it out’. Do you see?

  “The opening of the inner doors was managed by wires, as you will have guessed, which they unshipped after use, or else I should soon have found them, when I made my search.

  “I think I have now explained everything. The hound was killed, of course, by the men direct. You see, they made the place as dark as possible, first. Of course, if I had managed to take a flashlight just at that instant, the whole secret of the haunting would have been exposed. But Fate just ordered it the other way.”

  “And the tramps?” I asked.

  “O, you mean the two tramps who were found dead in the Manor,” said Carnacki. “ Well, of course it is impossible to be sure, one way or the other. Perhaps they happened to find out something, and were given a hypodermic. Or it is quite as probable that they had come to the time of their dying, and just died n
aturally. It is conceivable that a great many tramps had slept in the old house, at one time or another.”

  Carnacki stood up, and knocked out his pipe. We rose also, and went for our coats and hats.

  “Out you go!” said Carnacki, genially, using the recognised formula. And we went out on to the Embankment, and presently through the darkness to our various houses.

  The Whistling Room

  CARNACKI SHOOK A FRIENDLY fist at me, as I entered, late. Then, he opened the door into the dining room, and ushered the four of us—Jessop, Arkright, Taylor and myself—in to dinner.

  We dined well, as usual, and, equally as usual, Carnacki was pretty silent during the meal. At the end, we took our wine and cigars to our accustomed positions, and Carnacki—having got himself comfortable in his big chair—began without any preliminary:—

  “I have just got back from Ireland, again,” he said. “And I thought you chaps would be interested to hear my news. Besides, I fancy I shall see the thing clearer, after I have told it all out straight. I must tell you this, though, at the beginning—up to the present moment, I have been utterly and completely ‘stumped’. I have tumbled upon one of the most peculiar cases of ‘haunting’—or devilment of some sort—that I have come against. Now listen.

  “I have been spending the last few weeks at Iastrae Castle, about twenty miles North-East of Galway. I got a letter about a month ago from a Mr. Sid K. Tassoc, who it seemed had bought the place lately, and moved in, only to find that he had got a very peculiar piece of property.

  “When I reached there, he met me at the station, driving a jaunting-car, and drove me up to the castle, which, by the way, he called a ‘house-shanty’. I found that he was ‘pigging it’ there with his boy brother and another American, who seemed to be half-servant and half-companion. It appears that all the servants had left the place, in a body, as you might say; and now they were managing among themselves, assisted by some day-help.