More Short & Shivery
Page 9
“Have a care, Loft,” his neighbors warned, “or thou wilt suffer the same fate. Or a worse one!”
But the young man only laughed at them. “I will become the greatest wizard of all,” he boasted. “I will hold the most powerful spirits in my hands.”
When the good pastor of the village urged him to change his ways, Loft grew angry. He caused a monstrous shape to appear and frighten the pastor’s horse while he was crossing a stream swollen with snowmelt. The pastor was tumbled into the raging water and barely escaped with his life. Thereafter, the clergyman offered prayers for Loft’s soul but stayed out of his path.
In time, Loft traveled far to the north, where the most powerful sorcerers in the region kept a school for the study of the black arts. There he increased his skills and learned the dangerous secrets of the terrible book called Greyskin. In this, the greatest wizards and warlocks of the past had written down many of their most potent spells.
His unceasing pursuit of dark secrets turned his mind to wickedness. While he was still a student he punished a fellow student, a bully who had beaten him. Using magic, Loft created a doorway in a solid wall. From within came elfin music and sweet singing. When the curious boy stepped through it, the wall flowed back together, trapping him forever in the stone. The mystery of his disappearance caused great puzzlement, and more than a little suspicion was cast on Loft. But the young man denied any knowledge of the missing pupil’s whereabouts.
Greedy for even more knowledge and power, Loft vowed to conjure up the ghost of the mightiest sorcerer of old, Gottskalk the Cruel. He hoped to compel that spirit to hand over the legendary book Redskin, which had been buried with the magician in his secret grave. In this book Gottskalk had gathered the most fearsome spells of old.
On a moonlit night, Loft barred the door to his tower room and began the conjuring spell. But as soon as he started, a voice moaned, “Cease, while there is still time.”
“I will not,” Loft answered boldly. He continued about his evil business.
A second time the voice warned, “Cease! There is but a little time to save yourself.”
“Silence!” Loft commanded.
When Loft had fully cast his spell, the ghost of Gottskalk appeared. The figure was tall and lean, with burning eyes and skin as gray as the grave.
“Thou hast chanted well enough,” said the spirit, “for all that thou didst stumble over certain words.”
“I command thee, hand over the book Redskin,” ordered Loft.
“Upstart,” growled the specter. “Dost thou dare to treat me like some mere apprentice? Though thou study for a hundred times a hundred years, thou shalt never force me to surrender Redskin to thee.”
“Give it here,” Loft persisted, extending his hand. “As I have summoned thee, thou must do my bidding.”
By the flickering candlelight, the ghost began to grow huge until it bent double at the ceiling. “Arrogant fool,” the monstrous shape said with a laugh, “thy doom is sealed, because thou hast tampered with power thou cannot begin to understand.”
Then the ghost began to laugh again. The sound was so loud that Loft pressed his hands to his ears. All the while, the vast gray figure continued to grow and swell, until it filled the room and forced Loft out onto the stairway landing.
Standing upright, the ghastly giant pressed its shoulders against the ceiling beams. The wood snapped and masonry rained down as it lifted the roof off the tower.
Loft fled, but the booming laughter followed him down the winding stairs. Suddenly a great foot thrust down through the overhead wreckage and tried to smash him like a bug. Loft threw himself out of the way, tumbling down the remaining steps and landing, bruised and dazed, at the bottom.
He forced himself to his feet, while the whole tower around him heaved and shook as in an earthquake. Walls cracked and falling dust nearly blinded him. From outside he could hear alarms and the cries of masters and students.
Loft stumbled to the stable, saddled his horse, and fled the sorcerers’ school. Behind him a voice roared, “Run to the ends of the earth or cross the seven seas, thou shalt never escape my vengeance.” Then came peals of titanic laughter.
Loft lashed his horse and sped away until the thunderous laughter dwindled to an echo in his ears. The night grew silent.
He rode west for several days and nights. Finally he took refuge in a small hamlet called Stadastadur, where green hills sloped down to the sea. The simple houses built of rough blocks of lava with roofs of turf were a far cry from the grand halls of the school.
Here he found the pastor kindly disposed toward him. The old man charged Loft with the upkeep of the church and grounds; in return, he promised to help Loft study Scripture.
For a long while, Loft refused to leave the blessed grounds of the church. At night he stayed indoors and would only read his Bible and pray.
But in time his fear subsided, as one day became the next and there was no sign of punishment from beyond the grave. At first Loft only dared to venture into the village on errands. Later he would sometimes stroll the outskirts of the town, or go for longer walks in the countryside.
“I have escaped the doom that Gottskalk pronounced on me,” he decided. “Whatever power I gave him that night must have faded with the dawn. He cannot reach me in my new life here.”
One sunny day not long after this, when the sea was calm and the sky was clear, Loft decided to row out into the cove to do some fishing. Several locals who happened to be gazing seaward later reported to the pastor that they had seen his boat bobbing on gentle waves in the windless afternoon. And they had recognized the figure of the assistant pastor fishing.
Then, to their horror, they saw a huge arm, gray as the grave and covered with dripping seaweed, rise up out of the sea. It grabbed the boat by the stern and, in a trice, pulled it under the water.
No bit of wreckage—not so much as an oarblade—floated back to shore. Nor was Loft ever seen on earth again.
The Accursed House
(United States—Ohio)
An old farmhouse belonging to a man named Herman Deluse once stood near Gallipolis, Ohio. Though he paid scant attention to his fields or livestock, and the house was little better than a ruin, the old man never lacked for anything. He kept to himself, and discouraged his neighbors from visiting.
Many people suspected that Deluse had been a pirate. He called his place the Isle of Pines, after a notorious gathering place for buccaneers in the West Indies. On those rare occasions when the Reverend Henry Galbraith and his son William visited—the only two callers Deluse would tolerate—the man made no attempt to conceal the strange objects from distant lands and curious weapons that filled his house.
As William grew older, he asked more and more questions about the old man’s source of wealth. The boy was sure that Deluse had pirate treasure hidden in the house. Though the old man never appeared to have much money at one time, he always had enough to meet his needs. And he always paid for things with old Spanish gold pieces. This convinced the people of Gallipolis—and young William in particular—that he was a former pirate. Some even suggested that he had moved so far away from the ocean because there was a price on his head.
But all William’s efforts to get the old man to reveal the source of his gold failed. Deluse remained tight-lipped, never providing any clue as to the whereabouts of his treasure—if, indeed, it existed.
When it came time for Deluse to die, he passed away alone, and was buried quietly in the nearby cemetery. Isle of Pines was locked up, while inquiries were made to determine if there were any relatives to claim the estate.
Now, it chanced that while this was going on, the Reverend Galbraith was away for a month-long visit to Cincinnati. He did not know that Herman Deluse had died. One night he returned home in the middle of a terrible storm. The snow was so deep and the road so blocked with drifts and fallen branches that he looked around for shelter.
To his relief, he saw a light. He followed it through the dri
ving snow and recognized the Isle of Pines. As he neared the place, he noted that the light was moving about the house, brightening one darkened room after another. Whatever could old Deluse be up to? he wondered as he knocked. When no one came to the door, he rapped again even more loudly.
But still he was ignored, as the light moved from chamber to chamber. Finally, afraid of freezing to death, the reverend put his shoulder to the door and forced it open.
“Hello, Herman!” he called. “I apologize for my rude entry.”
But when the old man at last appeared, carrying a candle, he paid no attention to the clergyman. Instead, he wandered about like a sleepwalker, muttering to himself, searching for something. His visitor tried to strike up a conversation, but Herman persisted in running his hands over each wall, then dropping to his knees and searching the floor.
“What have you lost?” asked the concerned Reverend Galbraith. “Can I help you search?”
Still the old man would not look at him; rather, he carried his candle to a room at the end of the passageway. In the chilly darkness, the reverend could hear him muttering over and over again. The sound made the reverend as uncomfortable as the cold. To ease his mind and body, he set about building a fire in the fireplace. Then, spreading his coat before it, he lay down, intending but a few moments’ rest.
Instead, he fell into a deep sleep that lasted the better part of the night. The first light of dawn was just visible through the thinning snow when Reverend Galbraith was roused by Deluse’s triumphant cry, “ ’Tis here! ’Tis found!”
Pulling his coat around him, the clergyman hurried down the hall to the little room at its end. He was sure that was where the cry had come from.
But when he entered the room, he found no trace of Herman Deluse. Against the northern wall was an unlit candle stub in the curious holder that the old man had carried during his midnight search. In the dust that coated the wall, he could just make out the impression of two hands, as though someone—old Deluse, surely—had pressed his palms against the surface.
More puzzled than ever, Reverend Galbraith called out his friend’s name. But though he searched from cellar to attic, he could find no trace of the man. The doors and windows were all shut tight. Nor, as he peered through the early morning dimness, could he see any footsteps in the newfallen snow.
Daunted by this mystery, Reverend Galbraith took his horse from its shelter in the tumbledown barn and continued the rest of the way home, the storm having fully abated.
He was welcomed by his wife and son and a good friend—a lawyer named Maren—who had come by on some bit of business that morning. But when he told his story, his wife and son merely glanced at each other, while the lawyer remarked, “Didn’t you know that Deluse was dead and buried?”
The clergyman, speechless, merely shook his head.
“You must have been dreaming,” said his son. But William’s eyes shone with a curious light.
Reverend Galbraith insisted, “I tell you, it happened just as I said.”
“If you like,” said the lawyer good-naturedly, “we will go there tonight and investigate. Perhaps the ghost will appear again after dark.”
“Play the fools if you want!” exclaimed William, adding, “I have business on the other side of town. I won’t be back until supper.”
By nine o’clock, when the lawyer came by to accompany Reverend Galbraith to Isle of Pines, William had not returned. “I’m relieved he isn’t here,” the clergyman confessed to Maren. “He seems to have no patience with talk of ghosts.”
Together they rode out to the farm. Just as the clergyman had reported, the two men saw a light appearing first at one window, then the next. But when they drew near, the place went suddenly dark.
The front door stood open. “I know that I locked it securely when I left,” said Reverend Galbraith.
Inside, all was darkness and silence. The men had brought candles, which they now lighted. In the thick dust on the floor they saw the marks of the clergyman’s stay and his footprints. A second set of footprints led purposefully from the front door down the hall to the little room at its end. The door, which had been open that morning, was now shut. Flickering candlelight shone beneath it.
“Someone else has been here since you left,” said the lawyer. “And I believe he is still here.”
Suddenly from behind the door came a scream, then the sound of a heavy body hitting the floor, then silence.
Trembling, the two men hurried down the passage. Inside the little room they found the northern wall broken open. From the hollow space behind it several pouches had spilled their golden contents, while just below, William Galbraith lay sprawled on the floor, covered with antique Spanish coins.
With a cry, his father stooped to pick him up, then staggered back in horror, for the young man was cold and dead.
A postmortem examination revealed no cause of death, and a jury issued a verdict of death due to a “visitation of God.” But Reverend Galbraith remained convinced to the end of his days that his son had been frightened to death by something quite ungodly in that accursed farmhouse.
Escape up the Tree
(Nigeria)
There was a young man, a hunter, who had some power with charms and magic. Each day, when he set out into the forest, he would place a bowl of water in the sun. Then he would tell his mother, “If this water turns the color of blood, you will know I am in danger. Then you must unchain my three dogs and send them to rescue me.”
The old woman always promised that she would do as he asked.
Now it happened that, one day while he was hunting, the young man came to a nearby village. There he found a crowd of people watching as all the unmarried young men tried to toss ege, tree seeds, into a hollow calabash shell. Behind the gourd knelt the most beautiful woman the hunter had ever seen.
When the young man asked what was going on, he was told that the woman had promised to marry whichever man could toss the most ege into the calabash.
Thinking to try his luck, the hunter took his place at the proper distance from the gourd. The woman glanced up at him and smiled. Now he was more determined than ever to win the contest. Carefully he tossed the seeds one after another into the calabash. Every seed hit its mark, a feat no one else was able to match.
At last the headman of the village declared that the hunter had won the contest and earned the woman’s hand.
She came to him shyly, but when he asked where she lived, she only said, “A great distance from here.”
“Then I will take you with me to my home,” the man said, “where my mother will welcome you like a daughter.”
Now, despite the hunter’s skills with magic, he did not realize that the young woman was really a she-devil. She had come to town seeking to lure away a man so that she could satisfy her hunger for human flesh.
After they had walked for a time, the young woman said, “Let us stop in this clearing and rest awhile. I have grown very tired.”
Indeed, the young man was feeling weary himself, so he was quite willing to sit down with his back to a tree. Across from him, his bride-to-be sat watching him, smiling and licking her lips.
His eyes closed. He slept. Then an insect stung him on the shoulder, waking him. The woman across from him was no longer a woman. She was changing into a big mass of red eyes and sharp teeth.
Instantly the young man jumped up and climbed into the lower branches of the tree, just as the horror rolled across the clearing toward him. Dozens of sets of teeth snapped at his heels as he scrambled higher and higher.
Now, the she-demon could not climb the tree, but she set to work chewing the trunk, determined to topple it. The hunter recited one of the magical chants he knew, and ordered the tree to grow higher while the trunk grew thicker.
At this, the monster roared in anger. “Whatever power you have,” the many mouths said together, “it will not be enough to escape me. You are going to die. I will pick your bones clean and then grind them to dust!”
“Why have my dogs not come to rescue me?” he wondered.
Now, his mother had taken some clothes to the stream to wash them, so she had not seen the water in the bowl turn blood red. The dogs, sensing something was amiss, were howling and trying to burst their chains. Finally the old woman at the riverbank heard them barking. Gathering up her washing, she ran to the hut.
The moment she saw the blood-red water bubbling in the pot, she gave a frightened cry. Then she unchained her son’s three dogs. Instantly they raced into the woods. They reached the clearing just as the mass of teeth, busy at the base of the tree, had bitten almost all the way through the trunk.
The three huge hounds attacked the monstrous thing from all sides. As they worried it, and chased it away from the tree, the hunter slipped down and recovered his spear, which he had left lying on the ground. The dogs had already badly wounded the demon, so the hunter was able to kill it with a single thrust of his spear.
The rolling eyes grew dark; the snapping teeth were stilled; the thing shuddered and died.
Then the hunter returned home with his three dogs. There his mother, overjoyed to see him safe, prepared a great meal, to which she invited all their friends. And the hunter’s three faithful dogs ate as well as any of the guests.
The Headrest
(Papua New Guinea)
In the old days, it happened that Inay, a man from the hills, came to a certain village, leading his little son by the hand. He spent the day trading with the villagers and talking with them. His boy, Mimau, sat beside him, silent and smiling shyly. People remarked what a well-behaved child he was—a blessing to his father and mother. The women kindly gave father and son taro, bananas, plantains, and sugarcane to eat.