Ghosts by Gaslight

by Jack Dann

  Afterword to “Face to Face”

  “Face to Face” grew out of my fascination with the “fatal book”: the anonymous manuscript, hedged with dire warnings, which destroys anyone (usually an aspiring author) foolhardy enough to read it. The story came almost by inner dictation; I didn’t know how it would end until I arrived at the closing image. It was partly inspired by Flaubert’s remark that when he was composing the final pages of Madame Bovary, he could hear the rhythms of the still unwritten sentences approaching like footsteps before he knew what the actual words would be: I realised as “Face to Face” unfolded that the idea could be given a distinctly sinister twist.

  —JOHN HARWOOD

  Richard Harland

  Richard Harland was born in England but has spent most of his adult life in Australia. He lives in Figtree, south of Sydney, with his wife, Aileen, between golden beaches and green coastal escarpment—and, incongruously, the biggest steelworks in the southern hemisphere.

  In 1993, he broke the curse of writer’s block and finished his first gothic fantasy. Published by a small press, The Vicar of Morbing Vyle became a cult favorite. Richard took up writing full-time in 1997, and since then has had fifteen novels published, ranging from fantasy to science fiction to horror, and from adult to YA to children’s. He has won five Aurealis Awards, including the Golden Aurealis for Best Novel in any genre of science fiction, fantasy, or horror.

  His recent steampunk fantasy, Worldshaker, has been published in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, France, Germany, and Brazil. The sequel, Liberator, is due to appear in the same countries, starting with Australia and the United Kingdom in May and July 2011. The American edition comes out in April 2012. Richard’s websites are www.richardharland.net and www.worldshaker.info.

  RICHARD HARLAND

  Bad Thoughts and the Mechanism

  NO, YOU MUST not expect me to describe my nightmares. That I shall never do. As a respected and respectable gentleman of business, I have my regular armchair at White’s, I sit with my cigar and brandy-and-soda—and my fellow club members never suspect that, up until the age of thirteen, I suffered from the most appalling nightmares imaginable. No one knows there was a time when my heart stopped beating, and I almost died in my sleep from pure terror.

  It was after I almost died that my parents—you need not know our family name—began to talk about Dr. Kessel. The Harley Street specialist who examined me must have mentioned the new experimental treatment to them—at least, I deduce that connection in retrospect. You should understand that large portions of my life in that period took place as if in a fog. I existed under such oppression of the spirit, such constant weight of fearful anticipation, that many things were confused and ambiguous to me. I remember mainly in flashes—luminous moments of clarity shining out from the general murk.

  One luminous moment was our arrival at Dr. Kessel’s establishment. I can hardly tell you how we had travelled up until that point: presumably by steam locomotive from London to Edinburgh, and thence by horse and carriage. But I remember vividly the tall surrounding hedges and the sign on the gatepost:

  EXPERIMENTAL INSTITUTE OF ELECTRO-MAGNETIC THERAPY

  DR. J. S. KESSEL

  BY APPOINTMENT ONLY

  When we rolled in through the gate, a number of old brick buildings came into view, half hidden by evergreen yews and firs. Two incongruous chimneys rose up from among the trees, more suited to a factory than a research institute. It was late afternoon, and the sun slanting in low under the clouds threw splashes of honey-coloured light over chimneys and treetops.

  Attendants came out to meet us. They wore tailcoats and high collars and seemed to comport themselves with more dignity and assurance than ordinary servants. I was aware of the incongruity, but assumed I had been given an explanation, which I had since forgotten. Perhaps that was indeed the case. At any event, they took care of our luggage like ordinary servants and escorted us to our appointment with Dr. Kessel.

  Dr. Kessel’s study stands out as another vivid memory. We were led through a Gothic arched porch and down a flight of steps—for Dr. Kessel’s rooms were below ground level. Or mostly below ground level; a strip of horizontal windows just under the ceiling let in a little daylight. But my overpowering impression was neither the windows nor the leather armchairs nor the bookcases lining three of the walls—it was a singular smell, at once sweet and stale. I thought of it then—and think of it now—as Dr. Kessel’s own personal odour.

  The man himself was not as I had prefigured him. I had heard the tone, rather than the words, when Mother and Father talked about him—a tone of awe and reverence. In my imagination, he had been tall, with burning eyes and a flowing beard; in reality, he was short and balding, with thick pebble glasses. He did have a beard, admittedly, but only a small, neatly trimmed goatee. Even the way he paced up and down on the carpet was fussy and precise.

  “So this is the boy.” He spoke with a foreign accent, hard and clipped, as though cutting out every word like a piece of metal. “Suffers from nightmares.”

  “We thought they were ordinary night terrors when he was a child,” Father explained. “We expected him to grow out of them. But they’ve continued and become worse over the last three years. Every second night he wakes up screaming.”

  “He all but died three weeks ago,” said Mother. “His heart stopped in his sleep. If I hadn’t been by his bedside . . .”

  “Yes, yes, these facts I know,” Dr. Kessel interrupted. “This was in your letter. What form of nightmares?”

  Mother and Father exchanged glances.

  “Shadowy things,” said Mother. “Recurring monsters.”

  “Being trapped,” said Father.

  “Something about a particular colour,” said Mother. “A particular shade of reddish brown.”

  They looked towards me for assistance, but I had no wish to fill in the details. Even when prostrated by fear, sobbing for deliverance, with my head buried in Mother’s lap, still there were some horrors I would never reveal to anyone.

  Dr. Kessel looked at me too, indifferently, impersonally. “No matter,” he said. “Bad thoughts. My mechanism will draw them off.”

  “How does it work?” asked Father.

  Although Father was a banker by profession, science was his hobby. He must have been reading up on the physics of electricity and the new field of research into the human brain. Dr. Kessel stopped pacing and began an explanation. I tried to pay attention as they discussed experiments with galvanic stimulation . . . individual neurological areas of the brain . . . electrical impulses and electro-magnetic waves . . . the application of Tesla’s alternating current . . . the different rhythms of wakefulness and sleep. Names were tossed about that I have since researched myself: Eduard Hitzig, Gustav Fritsch, Sir David Ferrier, Friedrich Goltz, and more. In effect, all of the notable pioneers in the history of electro-therapy.

  I could tell from Dr. Kessel’s manner that he had scant respect for the pioneers, and even less for Father’s amateur knowledge of electro-therapy. By his own estimate, he had already advanced far beyond the discoveries of the 1870s, and he was not modest about it. His responses to Father’s queries grew shorter and sharper, while Father grew more and more sceptical. Finally, Mother stepped in, putting a hand on Father’s elbow.

  “Does it matter, Charles? We don’t need to understand how it works, so long as it does. Dr. Kessel knows what he’s talking about.”

  Father frowned and stuck out his lower lip. He wasn’t so sure that Dr. Kessel knew what he was talking about.

  “Have a little trust,” she went on. “What do we have to lose?”

  “What indeed?” A small, tight smile appeared on Dr. Kessel’s face. Mother’s way of putting it didn’t much please him either.

  Mother overrode his ill humour. “How soon can the treatment start, Doctor?”

  “There will be a payment required. A donation to fund further research.”

  “Of course.”

>   “In that case, we may start tomorrow.”

  Mother’s eyes widened. “But . . . You don’t need to do tests first?”

  Dr. Kessel uttered a humourless laugh like a dog’s bark. “I see he is healthy and young. Only tired by lack of sleep. My mechanism will cure him.”

  No doubt it had a longer technical name, but he always spoke of it as his mechanism. His mechanism and my bad thoughts . . .

  He snapped his fingers and turned to the attendants. “Show them to their rooms, please.” That was the end of the interview.

  THE ATTENDANTS TOOK us to our rooms in the guest wing. I remember one of them had a strong Yankee accent—the surprise of his American twang was the sole observation that could penetrate the fog now enveloping me. He had a friendly, rough-and-ready sort of face, and his name—as I learned the next day—was Mr. Henry J. Hungerford.

  My spirits had sunk with the declining sun. For me, the end of the afternoon meant only one thing: the approach of night and impending nightmares. It was a cycle I went through every twenty-four hours. The foreboding of nightmares was like a dark aura that changed the appearance of ordinary objects in my perception, painting them with deeper shadows and edges of lurid colour. Whether the impression was produced by an actual nightmare brewing in my brain, or merely by my habitual expectations, I cannot say.

  You would suppose that such a state of dread would set my pulses racing and keep me from sleep. So it might have been on the first, or second, or fiftieth occasion. But when that same foreboding acquired the inevitability of night after night after night—and stretched ahead with the prospect of endless future nights—then the effect was, on the contrary, soporific. Like a leaden weight, it dragged me down and rendered me dull and insensible.

  However, that night was different. I think some gleam of hope had entered my soul. In spite of his lack of personal charisma, Dr. Kessel had been absolutely confident as to the powers of his mechanism. It was just enough to counteract my usual torpor. I lay awake and listened to the rising wind outside, soughing through the trees and shaking the loose frame of my window.

  I have said that, in certain random moments, my senses functioned with unusual clarity. Sometimes, I think, my heightened acuity far exceeded any normal sight and hearing. Lying under the sheets in Dr. Kessel’s institute, I heard—or seemed to hear—a sound carried on the wind, but not of the wind itself. It was a sound of moving mechanical parts, the faintest rhythm of recurring thuds and clanks.

  A fancy came over me then, so wild and odd that I almost laughed aloud. The mechanism awaited my inspection—did I dare visit it now? You must know that mine was no bold or hardy temperament; night terrors had extinguished whatever stock of impulsive animal spirits I had been born with. To creep outside in the middle of the night was, for me, almost unthinkable. Yet I thought of it; and the thought grew and grew until I acted upon it.

  I pulled on socks and shoes, and an overcoat over the top of my nightshirt. My room was on the first storey, and I had to pass by my parents’ room on the way to the stairs. They had left their door a little ajar—as always, since my screams in the night had become a regular occurrence. They were still awake and talking, and the intensity of Mother’s voice made me stop and listen.

  “It will work, Charles, I know it will.”

  “I didn’t say it wouldn’t.”

  “But you don’t really believe. If Anthony picks up on your cynicism . . .”

  “Not cynicism. Scepticism. I have doubts about the science of it, that’s all.”

  “Oh, science, science! Sometimes, Charles, you could do with a bit less science and a bit more faith.”

  “Now I hear religion talking.”

  “Yes, and why not? I was brought up in the Christian faith, and unlike you I haven’t lost it.”

  “But this isn’t a matter of faith. Dr. Kessel’s mechanism is a machine.”

  “So?”

  “So he’s claiming it can locate bad thoughts and draw them off. That’s not physics, it’s superstition. He talks about brain waves and electrical waves, but there’s no science for what he’s claiming to do.”

  “Maybe the world is a more spiritual place than you allow. You didn’t always think in this way, Charles.”

  “I believe in science to explain the physical world. Copper and steel are only copper and steel. There are laws about what they can and can’t do.”

  “Oh, you know all about laws, I’m sure. But you don’t know what it’s like . . .” Mother broke off with a sound like a sob.

  When she resumed, her voice was low and muffled. “You don’t know what it’s like to sit by his bedside in the nights. When he’s tormented by those dreams and I can’t do a single thing to help. He needs me and I can’t reach him. I feel so useless, so utterly, utterly useless. My heart just breaks inside of me.”

  Father uttered soothing noises, but spoke no words that I could hear.

  “There has to be a way, Charles. I need you to believe with me. For his sake. Please.”

  I moved on down the corridor. Father would agree, of course—how could he not? It was a side of Mother’s nature I hardly knew. She was normally so very determined and severe. But perhaps severity could come from love . . . I descended the staircase at the end of the corridor, crossed the lobby, and went out into the night.

  A strangely agitated night it was—a night to fit my mood. My heart was beating fast as I crossed the lawn. Chill flurries of wind blew this way and that, sending leaves and twigs darting in unpredictable movements around my feet. Overhead, long streamers of cloud raced past in front of the face of the moon. I focused on the mechanical rhythm of thuds and clanks and traced it to the institute’s central building—the building with two tall chimneys, where Dr. Kessel had his rooms.

  On this side, a screen of yew trees hid the walls of the building. I remember a sudden lull and calm in the space behind the trees, and the louder reverberation of the mechanism. Long, narrow windows were set just a few inches above the ground. It was as though the whole building had sunk down and buried itself in the earth.

  That impression was confirmed when I knelt and peered inside the first window. The floor of the gloomy interior was a good seven feet below my own level. I observed steel tanks and boilers; an organlike array of pipes; cylinders shooting out steam; wheels, gears, and rotating shafts. There were furnaces, too, distinguishable only by the lines of fiery orange that marked the rims of their doors. The place was like an industrial workshop.

  Following the rotating shafts with my eye, I saw where they passed through a hole in a side wall. Obviously, there had to be an adjoining room with connected machinery. I drew back, looked along to the next low-set window, and resolved to investigate.

  In the adjoining room, the shafts fed into a succession of enormous humped machines, curiously rounded, with protruding ribs and ridges. Nothing appeared to move, yet all was throbbing as if alive. The dominant sound was a deep low hum, which I could feel through the ground in vibrations under my feet. There was a further connection to a further room in the form of insulated cables as thick as my arm, which emerged from the machines and passed through the next wall along.

  The third room was different again, with rows of metal frames and open cabinets, containing an apparatus of glass, brass, and copper. This room was better lit, not only by overhead lightbulbs, but also by the glowing of the apparatus itself. Tubes, domes, and spirals of glass shimmered with an uncanny yellowish light. Some were half filled with a glutinous-looking jelly; others held coils of silvery metal; others again enclosed tiny plates or leaves of gold foil that fluttered as I watched. Compared to the industrial ugliness of the first room, this was like a laboratory—intriguing and enchanting.

  Two men were busy at the back of the room. They wore blue overalls and looked like engineers or workmen. Whatever they were doing, they glanced constantly over their shoulders as if uneasy. Sometimes they glanced towards the next side wall, which drew my attention too. No holes had been kn
ocked through the material of this wall, which was solid wood rather than brick. Evidently, there was no connected machinery on the other side.

  Once more I moved along in the space behind the trees, once more I knelt—and found myself looking down into Dr. Kessel’s study. In spite of the unfamiliar angle, I recognised the bookshelves, the leather armchairs, and the gleaming bald skull of the doctor himself. Even at this late hour, he was up and about—and he wasn’t alone.

  The person with him was a third man in blue overalls. While Dr. Kessel paced back and forth on the carpet, the man stood with cap in hand, respectful yet frowning.

  “Do I not pay enough?” Dr. Kessel was saying.

  “ ’Tis nae about the money.” The man’s voice had a thick Scottish burr. “ ’Tis our safety, sir.”

  Their words reached my ears only because the window was open half an inch at the bottom. I lowered my head, almost touching the ground, to gain a better hearing.

  “Phah!” scoffed Dr. Kessel. “That is a complete nonsense, Norris.”

  “Nae, sir. The men are with me on this.”

  “Where is it not safe? Tell me. Which part of the mechanism?”

  “ ’Tis in every room. We canna tell until it happens. I told ye this a week ago, sir.”

  “You told me nothing about haunting.”

  “Nae, sir. But so the men call it.”

  “What do you call it?”