In the Shadow of Frankenstein: Tales of the Modern Prometheus

by Edited By Stephen Jones

  Hands reached out for Jeremy, icy fingers tore at his clothing. He screamed, struggled, but their strength rendered him a child in their grasp. The breath from the mouths that vied for his own was fetid, their slobbering kisses muffled his cries of terror.

  Behind them the stranger hovered, bent double, twisting this way and that in a voyeurism that transcended perversion. Grunting in time with their own expletives of carnal delight, urging them on. His eyes were aglow with crazed delight.

  Jeremy was spent but their lust was inexhaustible. He screamed as sharp teeth bit into his neck, began to tear at his flesh.

  “No!” The man’s exultation turned instantly to anger, he grasped at their nakedness, tugged, lifted a foot up on to a seat as an added lever. “No, not that!”

  One of them turned, pushed at him, sent him staggering backwards. Then her bloodied teeth returned to their mutilated victim.

  Jeremy’s vision blurred, the pain was unbearable. He jerked, writhed, struggled but they were too strong for him. Harsh gutteral laughter came from improvised lungs, their cries of pleasure squelched through mouthfuls of raw human flesh.

  Consciousness was slipping from him. His head lolled to one side, afforded him a glimpse of the one who had perpetrated this atrocity. The man was slumped in a seat, holding his head as if he shared his victim’s agony. Anguished moans, the eyes were closed in utter despair.

  “As before,” he shrieked against the background of the train’s klaxon. “It is always the same. Cannibalizm is the strongest urge, destroys everything that I have created!”

  The blood-streaked females reared up from their inert prey, turned upon each other with a ferocity that defied the instincts of human existence. One lust had been appeased, the other was insatiable.

  Their master slumped, waited. In his hour of triumph he had lost all control. Whatever remained of a lifetime of experimenting would take him, too, this time.

  PETER TREMAYNE

  The Hound of Frankenstein

  “Peter Tremayne” is the pseudonym of acclaimed Celtic scholar and historian Peter Berresford Ellis. Born in Coventry, England, of Irish descent on his father’s side, he traveled widely in Ireland, studying its history, politics, language and mythology.

  As “Tremayne,” his many books include the horror novels Dracula Unborn (aka Bloodright), The Revenge of Dracula, The Ants, The Curse of Loch Ness, Zombie!, Snowbeast, Kiss of the Cobra, Swamp! and Trollnight.

  He has edited the anthologies Masters of Terror: William Hope Hodgson and Irish Masters of Fantasy, and he collaborated with the late Peter Haining on the 1997 nonfiction study The Un-Dead: The Legend of Bram Stoker and Dracula. He has also written biographies of authors H. Rider Haggard, W. E. Johns, Talbot Mundy and E. Charles Vivian.

  In 1994 Tremayne published Absolution of Murder, the first of his international bestselling murder mystery novels about seventh century Irish advocate Sister Fidelma, who uses the ancient Brehon Law system. It has since been followed by twenty-four further titles, the most recent being The Second Death (2015) and the forthcoming Penance of the Damned (2016).

  The Hound of Frankenstein was the first Tremayne book ever to be published (by Mills & Boon, in August 1977). The setting of this story is Cornwall, a favorite area of Tremayne’s and from where he devised his pseudonym. Tremayne (Cornish tre = habitation, mayne/maen = stone) is the name of a little hamlet just north of Penzance which, according to the author, is the site of the best Italian restaurant in Cornwall and the only reason why he chose this, a favorite watering hole, as his nom-de-plume.

  The short novel that follows introduces the reader to a fictional village named Bosbradoe on the wild north Cornwall coast beyond the desolate Bodmin Moor. Based on a combination of real places, Bosbradoe and its scenic tavern, The Morvren Arms (morvren = mermaid), also feature in Tremayne’s novels The Vengeance of She (1977) and The Morgow Rises! (1982), as well as in his short story “The Hungry Grass.”

  I

  A man was running across the dark moorland; running in terror of his life.

  Dark storm clouds hurried westward across the night sky, across the pale orb of the moon. The clouds seemed to fly fast and thick as the wind whipped the topmost branches of the trees. Far down on the eastern horizon, lightning spat into the sky, and thunder reverberated the air. And the rain splattered heavily down in isolated showers.

  In the distance the man could hear the low, mournful howl of a hound hunting its quarry.

  He paused to rest a moment against the wet granite of a boulder; paused to try to catch his breath and ease the awful pain in his side.

  He was an elderly man; his clothes had once been well tailored, but now they were torn and mud stained. Blood dripped from a great gash in his forehead and his hair was matted with dirt and rain water. His eyes stood wide and stark out of his pale, death-white face and his mouth hung open, half in fear and half in an attempt to regain his lost breath.

  The mournful howl reached his ears again. This time it was close, very close.

  The man turned, almost sobbing, and set off over the desolate night landscape.

  He did not know where he was making for. All he knew was that he had to flee, to escape, to run.

  A hill before him stood black and gaunt in silhouette. Atop the hill he could see the great stone monoliths of a former age and civilization. Large granite menhirs, standing as a memorial to the religion of the ancients. Unthinking, the man began to ascend the hill, gasping and sobbing in his terror, his heart beating wildly within him.

  Gorse and thorn bushes tore at him, scratching his hands and face and tearing at his already tattered clothing. He did not heed them.

  Scrambling, sometimes upright, sometimes on his hands and knees, the man forced his way to the top of the hill and into the moonlit stone circle.

  He flung himself forward on a black menhir which had fallen on its side and now lay, altar-like, to one side of the circle.

  For a while he tried to breathe deeply, to regulate the pattern of his gasping, shallow breaths. He tried to silence his rasping lungs and listen.

  A low growl made him whirl round.

  Never before, even in the most horrific nightmares of a delirious mind, had he envisaged such a beast as that which slunk forward into the pale moonlight and stood glaring malevolently at him from vicious red eyes.

  It was a hound. No; a grotesque parody of a hound, large as a lion and black as jet. Its eyes gleamed with an unholy aura like glowing red coals. Its great white fangs were bared, and its muzzle, hackles and dewlap were dripping with saliva which was tinged with blood.

  As the man stood before it, frozen in terror, the great beast threw back its muzzle and gave up its low, mournful howl.

  Then it sprang upon him, its mighty jaws snapping and tearing.

  II

  Along a darkened moorland road, a coach came clattering and swaying dangerously, pulled by four sturdy horses whose necks strained forward and hooves pounded in unison, urged by the harsh cries of their driver and the stinging crack of his whip about their flattened ears. Their eyes rolled in terror and there was a suspicion of white lather where their teeth ground against the metal bit of the harness.

  Now and again, the roadway was lit starkly in black and white by flashing lightning, but for the most part, the coach plunged into darkness. Its two side lanterns were nothing more than thick candles placed in a storm glass, and cast little illumination to show the driver the way along the desolate road.

  At intervals, the coach bucked and pitched and threatened to turn over, as the driver edged it too near the grassy embankment, or a stone caused the entire carriage to make a wild leap into the air.

  “I swear the idiot will have us over before long,” gasped the young man who constituted one of the two passengers in the coach. The other, a pale-faced girl, gave an involuntary cry as the coach gave a sudden lurch, and seemed to leave the roadway altogether.

  “Sir, I pray you,” she gasped. “Please ask the driver t
o slow his horses, for I fear that I shall faint if he maintains this speed much longer.”

  The young man leant forward in concern. He wished he had some light by which to observe his traveling companion. He had not seen her until he climbed into the mail coach, The Bodmin Flyer, at the coaching station in Bodmin, and she had sat in a shadowy corner of the coach, hardly speaking since then. If voices were anything to go by, she was surely young and pretty.

  “Madam, I am a doctor. Doctor Brian Shaw at your service. Are you unwell?” His tone was solicitous.

  The girl clung tightly to the passenger straps of the coach and replied in a soft, breathless voice.

  “I was perfectly well, sir, when we left the town of Bodmin. But this man drives as if the furies of hell were at his heels, and I feel quite upset. So I pray you, sir, please ask him to slow the coach.”

  Brian Shaw stood up, balancing himself precariously, holding on to a passenger strap with one hand, and pushing open the flap in the roof of the coach through which driver and passengers could communicate.

  “Hey, hey there! Driver! Slow down!” he called.

  His voice seemed drowned by the clatter of the coach and the thunder of the horses’ hooves on the stone of the roadway.

  “Damn me,” cursed the young man. “Is the fellow deaf or drunk?”

  He banged agitatedly on the roof.

  “Driver! D’you hear me? Slow down!”

  Just then the coach careered around a corner, tipping over at an alarming angle before righting itself. The young man was thrown on to the floor and struck his head against the far door, stunning himself momentarily. The girl gave a low cry and, hanging on her strap with one hand, bent forward in the gloom. The young man was aware of the fragrance of her perfume.

  “Are you all right, sir?”

  Brian shook his head doubtfully.

  “I believe so, madam. No thanks to the idiot of a driver. Ye gods! I believe the fellow is drunk. I’ll put a stop to this.”

  The young girl suddenly raised a fist to her mouth and suppressed a cry of alarm, as the man opened one of the doors of the swaying coach and climbed on to the iron footrest outside.

  “Have a care, sir!”

  If the young man heard, he did not reply, but with teeth clenched, he hauled himself out, clutching the railings which protected the passengers’ baggage on top of the coach. Then, placing a foot on the sill of one of the windows, he heaved himself on to the roof and lay panting for a second or two, spreadeagled among the baggage. Regaining his breath, he swung himself down on the driving box, by the side of the red faced driver.

  The man gave an inarticulate cry, almost of terror, and raised his whip as if in protection.

  Brian snatched it from his hand and grabbed at the reins which suddenly hung loose in the driver’s nerveless fingers. It took him all his strength to haul back the four stout horses, and bring them shuddering to a halt, snorting and blowing, with sweat glistening on their dark bodies.

  The driver sat huddled in his seat as if he had collapsed from the exertion of his drive.

  Brian turned to him with a stern eye.

  “What do you mean by this, man?” he demanded. “Are you trying to kill us all?”

  The man muttered something which Brian could not understand, and reached into the folds of his greatcoat, brought forth a bottle, uncorked it and put it to his lips.

  Brian snorted in disgust.

  “I thought so. Drink. Well, I tell you, my man, I shall bring this to the attention of your employers. Do you realize that you have scared the young lady half to death? Do you realize that you have made her ill with your infernal driving?”

  “Better to be ill, better to be alive to be ill, young sir,” muttered the man, wiping his mouth with the back of a calloused hand. “There be some things worse.”

  Brian gave him a hard look. “What do you mean by that?”

  “You be an upcountry man, sir. You be from beyond the Tamar, eh? Ah, I knows. Well, you be in Cornwall now, sir. Bodmin Moor, and it don’t do to dawdle across the moor at night. There be many a strange thing loose on the moor at night.”

  The young man laughed.

  “What superstitious nonsense is this, man? How much of that bottle have you had?”

  “Scarcely a drop, young sir. Scarcely a drop. And it be no superstitious nonsense, that I tell ’ee. The road to Bosbradoe is a wild, desolate road, and it don’t do to dawdle along it at night … especially this night of all nights in the year.”

  The driver shuddered.

  “What do you mean—this night of all nights?” demanded Brian.

  “Why, sir,” said the man wonderingly. “It be the last day of October … have you forgotten what night this is? It be the Eve of All Saints, when evil marches across the world, when spirits and ghosts set out to wreak their vengeance on the living.”

  The driver rolled his eyes wildly and raised his bottle once again.

  Brian grabbed it from him and threw it into the darkness and cursed the man for a drunken fool.

  Just then, there seemed a pause in the storm, and it became quiet except for the soft patter of rain. And—it seemed as if the sound emanated from nearby—their ears were filled by the long, drawn-out baying of a hound. The sound was cut short by the flash of lightning and the crash of thunder.

  The driver leant forward, and grasped the young man tightly by the sleeve.

  “You hear it, sir? You hear it? ’Tis the hound of hell, sir. I tell ’ee. The hound of hell! Old Tregeagle’s hound!”

  Brian was surprised to note that the man was positively shaking with fright.

  “Look, my man, if you paid more time to your driving, and less to your drinking, then the hound of hell, or where ever, would not bother you.”

  “Ah, ah,” the driver rocked to and fro in his seat, his arms wrapped across his chest, “you upcountry people are alike; you mock things which you cannot understand. Look out there, sir … look!’’

  Brian’s gaze followed the shaky finger of the driver into the darkness of the night which shrouded the moor from their sight. Now and again, a flash of lightning would light up the landscape, causing a vivid white to highlight the trees and what looked like precipitous mountains.

  “I didn’t know you had mountains in Cornwall?”

  The driver spat.

  “Ain’t no mountains, young sir. They be hills … Rough Tor, Brown Willy … they ain’t mountains. No, sir, beyond them … beyond them. There lies Dormazy Pool.”

  “Dormazy Pool?”

  “Aye, a lake of black water near a mile around, sir. That’s where old Jan Tregeagle is, God save us. That’s where the hound of hell waits!”

  Brian sighed his exasperation.

  “Who is this Tregeagle?”

  “He were steward to old Lord Robartes,” said the moon faced driver in a hoarse whisper. “It were back in the days of Charles the Second. Jan Tregeagle were an evil man, vain and godless. They do say he sold his soul to the Devil. When Tregeagle died his spirit was claimed by the eternal furies, but in his life, old Jan had done one good deed, and because of that he was allowed to spend eternity trying to empty Dormazy Pool with a leaky limpet shell. Ah, but the Devil, he swore to claim old Tregeagle’s soul for his own, and he still hunts him over the moor with his hell hound baying.”

  The man sunk back on his seat twitching in fear.

  Again, in the night air, came the lonely baying of a hound.

  “Hear it, young sir? Hear it?”

  Brian laughed and pushed the reins and whip back at the man.

  “Listen you,” he said evenly. “I might be an upcountry man, but I am not to be taken in by such fanciful stories, entertaining as they might be. I am told you have a nice folklore down here in Cornwall but I tell you, I am, as yet, not over-impressed by it.’’

  He eyed the man sternly.

  “Furthermore, I am tired. And the young lady is not in the best of health, thanks to your driving. So, take these reins and drive yo
ur coach at a nice, steady trot. Steady, mind you. And, so help me, if you so much as canter your horses I shall come and whip you across the moor myself! Do I make myself clear, fellow? Now get on with you; we want to reach Bosbradoe before midnight.”

  The driver took the reins from him and sunk back muttering to himself.

  Brian climbed down and re-entered the coach.

  “Are you all right now, madam?” he enquired.

  The young girl inclined her head.

  “Thanks to your intervention, sir.”

  As the driver urged the horses slowly forward, the bay of the hound came again. This time it seemed nearer than before, and Brian leant out of the carriage window and peered curiously into the darkness.

  For a moment he could have sworn he saw a shape in the gloom, a rather large shape slinking along the road behind the coach. But it was surely not a wild dog. It seemed far too large. Then a flash of lightning illuminated the road and Brian saw that it was empty. Either he was seeing things, or perhaps the lightning was playing tricks with the shadows.

  III

  As The Bodmin Flyer continued its journey along the stony moorland road, a wind sprang up fiercely from the south east, moaning across the undulating hills, around the jagged boulders and stone monoliths which dotted the moor. The same wind dispersed the low storm clouds and soon the brilliant white of the moon was shining down unimpeded. The eerie light dispelled the gloom in the interior of the coach and Brian Shaw observed, with a satisfied pleasure, that his estimation of his traveling companion had been right. She was, indeed, pretty.

  Under the dark hood of her traveling cloak he could discern a pale, heart-shaped face with a straight nose and a delicate red mouth whose dimples suggested that it was a mouth used to smiling. She had big solemn-looking eyes, whose color, although it was difficult to tell in the moonlight, must surely be grey or green.

  “Is your home at Bosbradoe?” enquired Brian in an attempt to end the silence that had fallen between them.