The Double Eye

by William Fryer Harvey

  ‘And there’s the sea!’ cried Pipps. ‘Good Old England! And now for ham and eggs and buckets of tea. With any luck we shall have trout tomorrow.’

  Laughing, the three ghosts ran out from the shadows of Gander’s Folly into the sunlight.

  THE SLEEPING MAJOR

  MAJOR BULLIVANT walked across the lawn from the summer-house hot and tired; lassitude was in every limb. He was quite sure that he had a hundred and one things to do, but for the life of him he could not remember what they were. All he knew was that he was weary and more sleepy than he had ever been before. The curious tingling sensation in his arm that he had noticed immediately after lunch—it had become strangely frequent of late—had passed. He went into the library and lay down on the couch; in less than a minute he was snoring heavily.

  On the window-pane a bluebottle buzzed, and in the dream of the sleeping major an aeroplane hovered in the blue, surrounded by white puffs of cotton wool, first compact, then loose and fluffy. Over the parapet of the trench immediately opposite him he could still see the face of the German with the silly smile that he knew so well, that he loathed so intensely. Again he fired and again the German smiled. ‘It’s really too absurd of you,’ said his enemy in excellent English, ‘too absurd for words. You are forever on the qui vive.’ That, of course, was the trouble. It was the perpetual strain that was telling on him. He held a key position, and not only had he to maintain his ground, he had to make plans for a possible evacuation under cover of night. ‘Foolish fellow,’ said the German opposite, ‘how perfectly absurd you are! What can you expect to do when you are keyed to such a pitch? Sit down and think over the position quietly.’ In a fit of anger he fired at the face again, and again missed. The German removed his eyeglasses from his fat, white face and wiped them carefully. ‘How absurdly obstinate you are!’ said his enemy. ‘As obstinate as a mule! Don’t you remember how you had to ship those mules on the transport at the last moment, and the trouble they gave you on the quay?’

  The aeroplane started its drone once more. They would have spotted his position by now, and none of his plans were made, and everything had to be moved before nightfall. What wouldn’t he give for a hot bath and change of clothes with half an hour’s perfect quiet in order to think things over?

  ‘Quite too absurd!’ said the German, with the same eternal smile.

  ‘Try at him with the old air-gun,’ said the sergeant at his elbow. ‘It’ll carry the distance and make next to no noise. The air-gun is what you want for a job like this; it gives you the key of the whole situation. You want to act, man! to act! instead of sitting there waiting for things to happen. Pack up your troubles in your old kit-bag and get out of it, you infernal idiot! They’ll be after you in a minute.’

  Buzz! buzz! droned the aeroplane, up and down the window.

  ‘But, sergeant,’ said the major, ‘there’s this riddle that I’ve got to solve before I go.’

  ‘And you’ve got the key to it in your hand,’ cried the sergeant. ‘Wake up, you damned fool, before it’s too late!’

  The silly fly on the window ceased for a minute its attempts to pass beyond the invisible barrier of glass. Someone knocked on the door.

  ‘Come in,’ said Major Bullivant wearily.

  The old butler entered the room. Though only half awake, the major realised that something had agitated the man.

  ‘Mrs Bullivant, sir,’ he said, ‘told me after lunch to serve tea in the summer-house. I have been down there, but the door is locked. The blinds were drawn and so I could not make sure, but I am rather afraid that Mrs Bullivant may have fainted inside. Have you the key, sir? ‘

  He looked at Bullivant as he spoke, but Bullivant’s eyes were not turned to him. They were fixed on the table at his side. The Tatler lay on the table, and on the open page rested the key. The sight of it brought back at once the memory of all that had passed in the summer-house, the shot from the air-gun fired in frenzy, the body of his wife lying limp and still.

  The bluebottle again began to buzz, and then its droning suddenly ceased with its discovery that the window after all was open, and that only half the sash was filled with an invisible barrier of glass.

  But for the major there was no escape; he had slept and, during his sleep, the windows of life were closed.

  THE ANKARDYNE PEW

  THE FOLLOWING narrative of the occurrences that took place at Ankardyne House in February 1890, is made up chiefly of extracts from letters written by my friend, the Rev. Thomas Prendergast, to his wife, immediately before taking up residence at the vicarage, together with transcripts from the diary which I kept at the time. The names throughout are, of course, fictitious.

  February 9th. I am sorry that I had no opportunity yesterday of getting over to the vicarage, so your questions—I have not lost the list—must remain unanswered. It is almost a quarter of a mile away from the church, in the village. You see, the church, unfortunately, is in the grounds of the park, and there is a flagged passage, cold and horribly draughty, that leads from Ankardyne House to the great loose box of the Ankardyne pew. The squires in the old days could come in late and go out early, or even stay away altogether, without anyone being the wiser. The whole situation of the church is bad and typically English—the House of God in the squire’s pocket. Why should he have right of secret access? I haven’t had time to examine the interior—early eighteenth-century, I should guess—but as we drove up last evening in the dusk, the tall gloomy façade of Ankardyne House, with the elegant little church—a Wren’s nest—adjoining it, made me think of a wicked uncle, setting off for a walk in the woods with one of the babes. The picture is really rather apt, as you will agree, when you see the place. It’s partly a question of the height of the two buildings, partly a question of the shape of the windows, those of the one square, deep-set, and grim; of the other round—the raised eyebrows of startled innocence.

  We were quite wrong about Miss Ankardyne. She is a charming little lady, not a trace of Lady Catherine de Bourgh, and is really looking forward to having you as her nearest neighbour. I will write more of her tomorrow, but the stable clock has struck eleven and my candle is burning low.

  February 10th. I measured the rooms as you asked me to. They are, of course, larger than ours at Garvington, and will swallow all our furniture and carpets. But you will like the vicarage. It, at least, is a cheerful house; faces south, and isn’t, like this place, surrounded by woods. I suppose familiarity with the skies and wide horizons of the fens accounts for the shut-in feeling one gets here. But I have never seen such cedars!

  And now to describe Miss Ankardyne. She is perhaps seventyfive, petite and bird-like, with the graceful, alert poise of a bird. I should say that sight and hearing are abnormally acute and have helped to keep her young. She is a good talker, well read, and interested in affairs, and a still better listener. Parson’s pride! you will exclaim; since we are only two, and if she listens, I must talk. But I mean what I say. All that the archdeacon told us is true; you are conscious in her presence of a living spirit of peace. By the way, she is an interesting example of your theory that there are some people for whom animals have an instinctive dislike—indeed, the best example I have met. For Miss Ankardyne tells me that, though since childhood she has had a fondness for all living creatures, especially for birds, it is one which is not at first reciprocated. She can, after assiduous, continuous persevering, win their affection; her spaniel, her parrot, and Karkar, the tortoiseshell cat, are obviously attached to her. But strange dogs snarl, if she attempts to fondle them; and she tells me that, when she goes to the farm to feed the fowls, the birds seem to sense her coming and run from the scattered corn. I have heard of cows showing this antipathy to individuals, but never before of birds. There is an excellent library here, that badly needs cataloguing. The old vicar, had, I believe, begun the task at the time of his fatal seizure.

  I have been inside the church. Anything less like dear old Garvington it would be impossible to find. Architectu
rally, it has its points, but the unity of design, on which everything here depends, is broken by the Ankardyne pew. Its privacy is an abomination. Even from the pulpit it is impossible to see inside, and I can well believe the stories of the dicing squires and their Sunday play. Miss Ankardyne refuses to use it. The glass is crude and uninteresting; but there is an uncommon chancel screen of Spanish workmanship, which somehow seems in keeping with the place. I wish it didn’t.

  We shall miss the old familiar monuments. There is no snubnosed crusader here, no worthy Elizabethan knight, like our Sir John Parkington, kneeling in supplication, with those nicely balanced families on right and left. The tombs are nearly all Ankardyne tombs—urns, weeping charities, disconsolate relicts, and all the cold Christian virtues. You know the sort. The Ten Commandments are painted on oak panels on either side of the altar. From the Ankardyne pew I doubt if you can see them.

  February 11th. You ask about my neuritis. It is better, despite the fact that I have been sleeping badly. I wake up in the morning, sometimes during the night, with a burning headache and a curious tingling feeling about the tongue, which I can only attribute to indigestion. I am trying the effect of a glass of hot water before retiring. When we move into the vicarage, we shall at least be spared the attention of the owls, which make the nights so dismal here. The place is far too shut in by trees, and I suppose, too, that the disused outbuildings give them shelter. Cats are bad enough, but I prefer the sound of night-walkers to night-fliers. It won’t be long now before we meet. They are getting on splendidly with the vicarage. The painters have already started work; the new kitchen range has come, and is only waiting for the plumbers to put it in. Miss Ankardyne is leaving for a visit to friends in a few days’ time. It seems that she always goes away about this season of the year—wise woman!—so I shall be alone next week. She said Dr Hulse would be glad to put me up, if I find the solitude oppressive, but I shan’t trouble him. You would like the old butler. His name is Mason, and his wife—a Scotchwoman—acts as housekeeper. The three maids are sisters. They have been with Miss Ankardyne for thirty years, and are everything that maids should be. They belong to the Peculiar People. I cannot desire that they should be orthodox. If I could be sure that Dr Hulse was as well served. . . .

  February 13th. I had an experience last night which moved me strangely. I hardly know what to make of it. I went to bed at half past ten after a quiet evening with Miss Ankardyne. I thought she seemed in rather poor spirits, and tried to cheer her by reading aloud. She chose a chapter from The Vicar of Wakefield. I awoke soon after one with an intolerable feeling of oppression, almost of dread. I was conscious, too—and in some way my alarm was associated with this—of a burning, tingling, piercing pain in my tongue. I got up from bed and was about to pour myself out a glass of water, when I heard the sound of someone speaking. The voice was low and continuous, and seemed to come from an adjoining room. I slipped on my dressing-gown and, candle in hand, went out into the corridor. For a moment I stood in silence. Frankly, I was afraid. The voice proceeded from a room two doors away from mine. As I listened, I recognised it as Miss Ankardyne’s. She was repeating the Benedicite.

  There were such depths of sadness, so much of the weariness of defeat in this song of triumph of the Three Children saved from the furnace of fire, that I felt I could not leave her. I should have spoken before knocking, for I could almost feel that gasp of fear. ‘Oh, no!’ she said, ‘Oh, no! Not now!’ and then, as if bracing herself for a great effort: ‘Who is it?’

  I told her and she bade me enter. The poor little woman had risen from her knees and was trembling from head to foot. I spent about an hour with her and left her sleeping peacefully. I did not wish to rouse the house, but I managed to find the Masons’ room and arranged for Mrs Mason to sit by the old lady.

  I can’t say what happened in that hour we spent together in talk and in prayer. There is something very horrible about this house, that Miss Ankardyne is dimly aware of. Something connected with pain and fire and a bird, and something that was human too. I was shaken to the very depths of my being. I don’t think I ever felt the need for prayer and the power of prayer as I did last night. The stable clock has just struck five.

  February 14th. I have arranged for Miss Ankardyne to go away tomorrow. She is fit to travel, and is hardly fit to stay. I had a long talk with her this morning. I think she is the most courageous woman I know. All her life she has felt that the house is haunted, and all her life she has felt pity for that which haunts it. She says that she is sure that she is living it down; that the house is better than it was; but that at this season of the year it is almost too much for her. She is anxious that I should stay with Dr Hulse. I feel, however, that I must see this business through. She then suggested that I should invite a friend to stay with me. I thought of Pellow. You remember how we were obliged to postpone his visit last September. I had a letter from him only last Friday. He is living in this part of the world and could probably run over for a day or two.

  ***

  The extracts from Mr Prendergast’s letters end here. The following are excerpts from my diary:

  February 16th. Arrived at Ankardyne House at midday. Prendergast had meant to meet me at the station, but had been suddenly called away to visit a dying parishioner. I had in consequence a couple of hours by myself in which to form an impression of the place. The house dates from the early eighteenth century. It is dignified though sombre, and is closely surrounded on three sides by shrubberies of rhododendrons and laurel, that merge into thick woods. The cedars in the park must be older than any of the buildings. Miss Ankardyne, I gather, has lived here all her life, and the house gives you the impression of having been lived in, a slightly sinister mansion, well aired by a kindly soul. There is a library that should be well worth exploring. The family portraits are in the dining-room. None are of outstanding interest. The most unusual feature of the house is its connection with the church, which has many of the characteristics of a private chapel. It does not actually abut on the building, but is joined to it by a low, curved façade, unpierced by windows. A corridor, lighted from above, runs behind the façade and gives a private entry from the house to the church. The door into this corridor opens into the spacious hall of Ankardyne House; but there is a second mode of access (of which Prendergast seemed unaware) from Miss Ankardyne’s bedchamber down a narrow stair. This door is kept locked and has never been opened, as far as Mason, the butler, can recollect. The church, with the curved façade connecting it to the house, is balanced on the other side by the coach-house and stables, which can be approached in a similar manner from the kitchens. The architect has certainly succeeded in conveying the idea that religion and horseflesh can be made elegant adjuncts to the life of a country gentleman. Prendergast came in just before luncheon. He does not look well, and was obviously glad to see me and to unburden himself. In the afternoon I had a long talk with Mason, the butler, a very level-headed man.

  From what Prendergast tells me I gather that Miss Ankardyne’s experiences have been both auditory and visual. They are certainly vague.

  Auditory. The cry of a bird—sometimes she thinks it is an owl, sometimes a cock—sometimes a human cry with something bird-like in it. This she has heard almost as long as she can remember, both outside the house and inside her room, but most frequently in the direction of the corridor that leads to the church. The cry is chiefly heard at night, hardly ever before dusk. (This would point to an owl.) It has become less frequent of recent years, but at this particular season is most persistent. Mason confirms this. He doesn’t like the sound, and doesn’t know what to make of it. The maids believe that it is an evil spirit; but, as it can have no power over them—they belong to the Peculiar People—they take no notice of it.

  Visual and Sensory. From time to time—less frequently, again, of recent years—Miss Ankardyne wakes up ‘with her eyes balls of fire’. She can distinguish nothing clearly for several minutes. Then the red spheres slowly contract to pin
-pricks; there is a moment of sharp pain; and normal vision is restored. At other times she is aroused from sleep by a sharp, piercing pain in her tongue. She has consulted several oculists, who find that her sight is perfectly normal. I believe she has never known a day’s illness. Prendergast seems to have had a similar, though less vivid, experience; he used the term ‘burning’ headache. I have elicited from Mason the statement that animals dislike the house, with the exception of Karkar, Miss Ankardyne’s cat, who seems entirely unaffected. The spaniel refuses to sleep in Miss Ankardyne’s bedroom; and on one occasion, when the parrot’s cage was brought up there, the bird ‘fell into such a screaming fit, that it nearly brought the house down’. This I believe, for I tried the experiment myself with the reluctant consent of Mrs Mason. The feathers of the bird lay back flat on its head and neck with rage, and then it began to shriek in a really horrible way.

  All this, of course, is very vague. We have no real evidence of anything supernatural. What impresses me most is the influence of the house on a woman of Miss Ankardyne’s high character and courage.

  February 18th. Certainly an interesting night. After a long walk with Prendergast in the afternoon I went to bed early with a volume of Trollope and a long candle. I did what I have never done before—fell asleep with the candle burning. When I awoke, it was within an inch of the socket; the fire had settled into a dull glow. Close to the candlestick on the table by my bedside stood a carafe of water. As I lay in bed, too sleepy to move, I was conscious of the hypnotic effect induced by gazing into a crystal. Slowly the surface of the glass grew dim and then gradually cleared from the centre. I was looking into the interior of a building, which I at once recognised as Ankardyne church. I could make out the screen and the Ankardyne pew. It seemed to be night, though I could see more clearly than if it had been night—the monuments in the aisle, for example. There were not as many as there are now. Presently the door of the Ankardyne pew opened and a man stepped out. He was dressed in black coat and knee-breeches, such as a clergyman might have worn a century or more ago. In one hand he held a lighted candle, the flame of which he sheltered with the other. I judged him to be of middle age. His face wore an expression of extreme apprehension. He crossed the church, casting backward glances as he went, and stopped before one of the mural monuments in the south aisle. Then, placing his candle on the ground, he drew from his pocket a hammer and some tools and, kneeling on the ground, began to work feverishly at the base of the inscription. When he had finished, and the task was not long, he seemed to moisten a finger and, running it along the floor, rubbed the dust into the newly cut stone. He then picked up his tools and began to retrace his steps. But the wind seemed to have risen; he had difficulty in shielding the flame of the candle, and just before he regained the door of the Ankardyne pew, it went out.