The Other Passenger

by John Keir Cross

  Now old MacIlwham had a customer on his books that lived in an old house just outside Dunblane. His name was Gemmell. He had had the electricity put in about ten years before—just before I joined the trade. Old MacIlwham had put it in himself—and I must just say this about the old man, though he was a good master to me all the years I was with him: he was no’ muckle good as an electrician. Anyway, what happened was just at this time we began to get letters from Gemmell saying that all the fitments in his house were breaking up, and would MacIlwham’s send out a man to have a keek at them. At first the letters were quite polite and business-like, but as the time went on and nothing happened, he began to get angry—he said he was reduced to oil lamps again over most of the house. The old man sent him letters saying he was sorry but there was a terrible pressure of work and so on, and he would send a man as soon as he could. And so it went on like that for a while.

  Well, that was the first time I heard of this man Gemmell. He was an oldish man, you know—he had retired from business to this old house outside Dunblane. I wish I could remember what this business of his was. I’m positive it had something to do with motor cars—he had made his money hiring them out or something. I can’t rightly remember, though—except that it had something to do with motors. Anyway, it doesn’t matter—it’s just that ye get a sort of tick—ye know what I mean: something sticks in your mind and ye want to remember it, but it just escapes you all the time. We’ll forget it—I’ll get on wi’ the story.

  Where was I?—Yes, I mind—old MacIlwham saying he’d get a man out to look at Gemmell’s fitments as soon as he could. Well, the chance came at last. And it happened this way:

  I was to be in Dunblane for a big job for a few days, and then I had to hurry back to Stirling. But there was just the off chance I’d be able to fit in the Gemmell house on my way back. MacIlwham wrote to Gemmell and told him this—but he said I’d be so busy in Dunblane that I’d just have to do his job when I could—mebbe I wouldn’t be able to tackle it till the evening, for instance. Gemmell wrote back and said it didn’t matter when I came as long as I came—I could come in the middle of the night if I liked, the main thing was that the job should be done.

  So that was the way of it, and off I went to Dunblane. I got my job done there without bother, though I didn’t finish it till well after five o’clock, and by the time I’d had my fish tea wi’ the old landlady I used to stay with there—a right douce body she was too, and fine I liked her—it was near half-after six before I reached old Mr. Gemmell’s house. And it was winter too—a dark and dreich time yon, wi’ the rain slanting down as I got near the house, and me with a long job to look forward to and then a cauld journey back to Stirling when it was finished.

  I knocked on the door. It was a queer house—sort of blind, if you know what I mean, standing up there against the wild sky, with the big poplar trees swaying and swishing all the way round. And the fact that there wasn’t a glim of light coming from inside—on account of the electricity, you see—that made it all worse. It was an eldritch sight a’thegither.

  Gemmell came to the door after I’d been knocking for a good three minutes. He was a dour-looking, peering sort of man—suspicious-like. He stood there in the mirk wi’ a wee oil lamp in his hand, wi’ the door only barely open, spiering at me who I was and what I wanted. When I said I was frae MacIlwham’s he gave a sort of grunt and then stood back and asked me ben. I went—but none too happy, somehow. There was a sort of cold and dampness in yon house—an unhealthy spirit somewhere.

  I went into the kitchen first. He lit up an oil lamp and I had a look at the fitments. It was exactly the way I had expected—they were just done. What wi’ old MacIlwham’s skimpit work, and the general damp and decay o’ yon house, they were fair fallin’ to bits. It was just a matter o’ fittin’ new ones, and I started on that job straight away, wi’ Gemmell fidgetting about in the background like a hen on a hot girdle.

  I worked quick, so’s I could get finished and away afore it was too late. I got done wi’ the kitchen and the upstairs places inside the hour, and then I said to him, The front room—what about that?

  “Oh aye,” says he. “The front room. Yes. You’ll have to do that, won’t you.”

  There seemed to be something on his mind. He stood thinking for a wee, then he says again:

  “Yes. The front room. Mphm. Well—it’s this way—just along here.”

  I went after him. Just when we got to this front room he stopped and keeked round at me, as if he wanted to say something. Then he seemed to change his mind and opened the door.

  It was a big room, and the minute I went in I felt a queer sort of smell in it. I don’t know what it was like—nothing quite wholesome—a sort of camphor smell, but queer, wi’ an edge to it. I didnae like it—I just didnae like it at all. There was something about the whole room that I didnae like—a sort of coldness in it, though there was no’ a bad wee fire in the grate. It was when I looked over at that fire that I got my shock—though there wasn’t any reason why it should have been a shock—just somehow I had had the impression, you know, that Gemmell was alone in the house—the way he had answered the door to me, the quietness there had been in the place all the time that I was working. But you see, man, there was a woman in that room—sitting down by the fire. And there was something about her—I don’t know what it was—but a something that linked up in my mind in an instant wi’ the queer cauld in the air and the unwholesome smell that I told ye about.

  She was a woman about eight or ten years younger than Gemmell—a bonny enough wee body, dressed in black. She sat wi’ her hands folded in her lap—very straight—on a sofa. And she was smiling—but not at me—she didnae even look at me. She had her eyes fixed straight ahead and she didnae move—she didnae budge an inch. I couldn’t see her very clear in the bad light, but I had the impression that she was—och, how can I put it?—no’ quite real. She had a high colour—she looked, if ye know what I mean, ower healthy—a wee thing too fresh.

  Gemmell had come into the room behind me—I could feel him fidgeting about at my elbow. He gave a sort of cough and then he says:

  “This is my wife,” he says.

  “How-do-ye-do, ma’am,” says I—but the wee soul never answered—not a word. She sat there just staring ahead, wi’ that smile o’ hers. She never moved—I was a wee thing frightened.

  “You mustn’t pay any attention to her,” says Gemmell, wi’ a queer sort of half laugh. “She’s—” But then he hesitated. “Och, never mind,” he says, “get on wi’ your job.”

  Then he went over and sat down beside her and he leaned close up to her and then he says, in a very loud voice—a sort of shout:

  “It’s the electric man, dear. He’s come to mend the lights—and then I’ll be able to see ye properly.”

  He laughed his wee nervous laugh again. She never budged—not an inch. And I fear properly got the wind up. I don’t know what it was—there was just a wee something about her . . .

  Well, I got on wi’ the job. All the time I was working he kept his eyes on me—a sort of jealous and suspicious way, I thought—I could feel it. If I glanced over he would give his wee laugh. Dod, man, I hated yon job! That damned smell was in my nose—a sort of—och, the Lord kens what it was! Sulphur it was—or no—was it forma-something? We had it burnt once in our house at Stirling when my wee sister Jessie had the scarlet fever. Something like that. But it wasnae really the smell or the cauld that was worrying me—it was just yon woman. As the time went on I just wanted her to move. I didn’t want her to speak. I just wanted her to move. Every time I keeked over at her, there she was, wi’ that sonsy wee face a’ glowing in the firelight—and smiling, ye ken, wi’ him quite joco beside her. It was damnable—there was something about it that was damnable. I wanted to drop my tools and run out o’ that terrible house—I didnae care where, just to run.

  I got finished at last.

  “There,” says I, “it’s done. Now I’ll just switch on the lig
ht tae see if it’s working, and then I’ll have to be going.”

  He was up like a flash. And there was a sort of feared look on him.

  “No,” he gasps, “dinnae try it! It’ll be fine—I ken it’ll be fine!”

  “I’ve just got to check on it,” I says.

  “No, no. Ye dinnae need tae—I ken ye made a job o’ the others, and this one’ll be the same. Dinnae bother.”

  I couldn’t understand the man. But what could I do? He was dancing about in front of me, fair jumpit wi’ fright or something. Then he turns suddenly and cries:

  “The electric man’s finished now, dear. He’s just going.”

  And he gives his wee nervous laugh.

  “Ye’ll tell Mr. MacIlwham to send me his bill,” he says. “I’ll settle wi’ him at once.”

  And almost before I could get my tools packed up he was bustling me to the door. I keeked back once, over his shoulder—and there she was, in exactly the same position. And the smile was still on her face . . .

  Eh, ghosts did ye say? Man, man!

  D’ye ken what happened? It gi’es me the jimjams to mind o’ it now. But I’ll tell ye, I’ll tell ye . . .

  I was in no healthy mood yon night when I left Gemmell’s house. I walked along the road fair sweating, wi’ the wind soughing round me in the trees like a warlock’s skirlings.

  And then, thank God, I suddenly minded I had seen a wee pub as I walked out to the job earlier on, and I thought—Well, Andrew boy, it’s you for a dram, and be damned to the train for Stirling for a whiley! And in I went, and cried the dame for a nip.

  I got down in a corner to shift it, and presently in comes a wee man and joins me. I was fair in the mood for a healthy crack, and it wasn’t long till we was gossiping at it like well-tried cronies. A nice wee man he was too—a ploughman from the big farm up the road, just ayont Gemmell’s house.

  Of course we talked about Gemmell. The whole thing was too heavy on my mind for us not to. And by this time, ye see, wi’ a couple o’ nips in me, I was mair inclined to laugh at the old chap, and to feel it hadnae been as queer as I had thought it all at the time. And there I was, just telling the tale—beginning wi’ the time I landed, and him coming out wi’ his wee oil lamp to the door, and the fixing of his fitments in the kitchen and up the stairs, and then the wee hesitation he gave at the door o’ the front room before he ushered me in.

  “And then,” says I, quite perjink, “we enters, you see, and he introduced me to his wife, and I says, quite polite-like——”

  I stopped there and looked up at the wee ploughman. He had given a sort of splutter and a cough—and now I could see he was gaping at me, wi’ his mouth open, and the whisky glass trembling in his hand.

  “His—wife?” he says.

  “Aye, whit wey no’? Ye’re gey surprised. Can a man no’ be mairrit? But losh, a queer wee woman yon! She didnae move—”

  “Guid help us!” says the little man. “His wife, ye say? Guid help us! James Gemmell’s wife is dead—she died eight years ago!”

  I felt the wee hairs bristling.

  “He said it was his wife,” I says—but a’ the time, in my eye, mind you, I had a picture o’ that wee body in the dim light—no’ moving an inch.

  “Janet Gemmell’s dead this eight years,” says the wee chap dourly. “And it was a sad day for yon man when she died. I never kenned a couple more attached to each other. He fair worshipped her—he wouldn’t let her out o’ his sight, almost. We used to call them The Lovers . . . Oh man, it shook him sair when she slippit awa’.”

  I never said a word. The wee man went on, shaking his head:

  “Aye, aye. It was a’ a bit queer wi’ him after she died. If he could’ve brocht her back from the grave he would’ve done—he was fair daft on her, fair daft on her, auld though the pair o’ them was. We all expected him to have her buried decently in the kirkyard up-bye, but maybe he didnae want to have the thocht o’ her so near. He took her away somewhere. And he came back in a big closed motor car about three months after, and from that day to this we’ve hardly seen him. He stays in the house most o’ the time . . . Pair man, pair man!”

  I got up and went out, wi’ my last dram untouched on the table. I walked into Dunblane for my train, very quietlike in the dark. You see, I kenned I had seen her. I kenned the two of them had been together there. Somehow, by some devilish cantrip, they were there—the two of them, in that big house—and she dead for eight years . . . Man, man, ye could have slippit the skin off my banes that night, it shivered so loose about me . . .

  Well, that was the time I saw a ghost—and as I told you, I never knew she was a ghost till after I had seen her. And I’m just an ordinary sort of man—nae book-learning, as I said.

  Oh wait a minute, wait a minute. I’ve just remembered what Gemmell’s business was before he retired. I knew it had something to do wi’ motor-cars. Hiring them out, it was. Taxis. That’s it. I mind it used to say it on his note-paper when he wrote to MacIlwham. He had a fency professional sort of name for it though. What was it?

  Aye—I remember. Taxi-dermist. That was it. Aye—taxi-­dermist.

  He was just an ordinary wee man in business after all, you see. Was that no’ queer?

  The Other Passenger

  THE SPARKS FLY UPWARD

  Sitting like this, with the blank sheets before me, trying to coordinate things before setting them down, I see, above all other images, that wry and beastly figure as it burned: the head lolling grotesquely on the shoulder: the arms outstretched and nailed to the crosspiece of the frame that had, in the children’s excitement, gone all askew; and I, only I, in all that cheering company, with any notion of what was behind the leering mask.

  The flames rose slowly at first, I remember: then, as the straw and the twigs caught properly alight, roared round the sagging clothes and played on the whole crooked figure. I sniffed the air in a sort of ecstasy of relief—and realised immediately, thinking in grotesque parallel to Lamb’s “Dissertation Upon Roast Pig,” why I did so . . .

  Where to begin? The evening in the fog? The first time I heard the sound of the piano come creeping along the corridor? The scene on the platform of the Underground with Miller, and the terrible scream rushing through the crowd to me? Or further back still, to the first vague premonitions?

  I remember, long ago, when I was a student, going to a party. We were very young. We sat round the fire with the lights out, playing a game we called “Horrors.” The idea was for each guest to describe the most horrible thing he could think of. We each took our turn—I remember I had something naïve, about a skele­ton. It was good fun—we laughed a lot. We had all taken part except one shy pretty girl who sat on the outskirts of the circle. In a silence she said, in a low voice:

  “Shall I tell you the most horrible thing I can imagine? You waken suddenly in the night. You have that ineffable feeling that there is someone else—some thing else—in the room with you. You stretch out your hand for the matches, to investigate. And, quite quietly and simply, the matchbox is placed in your hand . . .”

  We all fell silent. As for me, something swept over me—a sudden expression had been given to something I had known always secretly. For the first time I had a real, overwhelming, haunting sense of—well, call it what you may want to: I have my own name.

  We go, you see: and with us goes always Another Passenger. He is beside us in every deepest action and speaks through us in every fateful announcement. There is no escaping him or his influence. His voice whispers suddenly in the night, his presence intangibly lingers at our shoulder when we feel ourselves most alone. He is the Man on the Back, the Secret Sharer. He is the Worm that Dieth Seldom, the Great Sickness.

  Yet in it all there is, I suspect, a terrible paradox. We do not hate him. We fear him, perhaps: but secretly, in our hearts, we still love him. He may be the Worm: if he is, he is Brother Worm.

  We go: and he—the Other Passenger—is always at our side. Always, always, always—to th
e grave: and perhaps beyond it . . .

  My name, I should tell you, is John Aubrey Spenser. I am a pianist, thirty-five years of age. I was, when all this began, engaged to be married. My fiancée’s name was Margaret du Parc, daughter of Georges du Parc, the violinist. She was (perhaps you have seen portraits of her?—there is a famous one by de Laszlo) most exquisitely beautiful. Yet God knows my own remembrances of her now are all vague enough. That has been the most devilish part of it all—I forget things. I forget good things and only remember old agonies. I remember inconsequential torments from my childhood days, for example, and so everything mounts to a deep, ferocious resentment.

  I was born in Scotland—an illegitimate child. My father was an extraordinary man—morose, untidy, clever, lazy. He was one of the Spensers of Barnhall in North Perthshire, a big farming family—old puritans, with the fear of God and a love of the Devil in them. My father’s father, the head of the family, was a dour, powerfully charactered man: autocratic, hard-working, firm in his belief that a man should beget and keep on begetting. Hence there were fourteen children—my father the youngest.

  The old farmer’s death was typical of his life—precise, sparing in emotion, with not a word wasted. As my father used to tell me the story, he came in one night from the fields and stood for a few moments silently in the farmhouse doorway. Then he heaved a great sigh and said, in a perfectly matter-of-fact voice:

  “Aye, Barnha’ will need a new maister in the morning.”

  Forthwith he collapsed in a heap and by the morning he was dead.

  The farm went to my father’s eldest brother, Finlay, a typical phlegmatic Spenser. They still tell the story in the Barnhall district of how, when his young son Geordie had been killed in France in 1915 in the First World War, he appeared wild-eyed on Barnhall Station and slammed his wallet down on the booking-desk. He had no hat or coat, but under his arm he carried his big double-barrelled rabbit gun.