The High House

by James Stoddard

  When he discovered a fourth, he could have wept, imagining a corridor filled with trip strings, and anarchists at every side. He controlled his fear and helplessness with an effort , informed Duskin of the new danger, and stepped carefully over.

  He moved forward by inches, feeling for another line, but found none. Duskin crossed the fourth cord.

  Carter felt no relief; there might be many such snares before them. Slowly, deliberately, he groped his way, mentally ticking off each second. It was difficult to concentrate with nothing to see; bursts of color, deep emerald and crimson, flashed before him, hallucinations from eyes starved for light.

  They met no more alarms, but an hour passed before they reached another intersection, where they turned back to the left. Only then did Carter feel any relief. Beyond doubt, they had passed within a few feet of one or more sentries, but only a short corridor lay between them and the stair leading to the secret panel that would bring them back to the Curvings. Once inside, they would be safe. With his newfound powers he also sensed two secret panels within that corridor.

  As they felt their way down the passage, Carter perceived the secret doors to be along the right wall, though he could not be certain of their exact location. Yet, when they were past, he knew it, as if a heat that had been before him was now behind. He had sensed many such secret ways all along their journey, but had felt none so strong as those in this utter darkness.

  They had gone nearly half the distance when a dim glow appeared before them, the light of a lantern, illuminating the floral prints and baseboards at the far end of the corridor, approaching from around the corner. They froze. Only a moment more, and they would stand revealed.

  Carter thought desperately. He could not reach the stairs in time, but he might reach one of the secret doors. He turned quickly; by the dim light he saw the wall was paneled, with only two of the wainscots covered with carvings of bears, the nearest a few feet away. He strode to it quickly, with only an instant to locate the opening mechanism. A brazier hung on the wall nearby, and he grasped it, hoping he had chosen well, thinking the catch as likely to be hidden among the bears. But the brazier turned easily to the left, and the panel opened at once. He stepped in, Duskin behind him. An instant’s fumbling and the wainscot slid shut, leaving him staring out through a spy-hole.

  The light had not fallen full upon the passage when the voices of the anarchists drifted to the companions’ ears.

  “A lovely conundrum, strolling about with a lantern, hoping to catch skulkers, warning them of our approach at every turn. A marvelous plan for getting ourselves skewered.”

  “Protestations are ineffectual,” the other replied. “You should have been in the Yellow Room Wars, back in ‘fifty-eight. I was at Dannershot when the tigers came; ghastly it was, all corridors and torches, and the big cats ambushing us from the dark. The Bobby wasn’t commander then; I don’t believe it would occur under his leadership. He is more circumspect.”

  The full glow of the lantern lit the walls as the two anarchists passed before the spy-hole.

  “Spare me the war stories. I only want to relieve the sentries so we can sit quietly in the darkness, where we won’t be targets.”

  The footfalls continued down the corridor. The voices faded. When all trace of light had fled Carter opened the panel.

  “Quick thinking,” Duskin whispered.

  “The maps are so strong in me now, I seem to keep track of the secret ways even when I’m not thinking of them,” Carter replied. “But we better hurry; the sentries they are relieving will probably return this way.”

  With the assurance that the corridor was deserted, they quickly found the steps, a narrow, servants’ stair. This, too, had to be traversed in darkness, and it protested their intrusion by creaking at every footfall. They covered two landings before reaching the top, where stood a full-length picture frame.

  Carter discovered the secret stud behind its right side, and the latch clicked open as a light appeared at the far end of the corridor. But long before it revealed their position, they were back in the Curvings, the portal secured behind them.

  Once down the way, they lit their lantern and settled wearily to the floor.

  “That was a trial,” Duskin said.

  “It was indeed,” Carter said. “Congratulations.”

  “And to you.”

  They suddenly broke into grins and shook hands. The meal was only dry biscuits and salted beef, but such was their relief that they ate it as if it were a victory banquet, and for a time Carter forgot the Room of Horrors. It strengthened them, and they followed the Curvings for another two hours, pausing occasionally to check the spy-holes. The anarchists seemed to be everywhere.

  Eventually, they reached a series of landings leading down to an empty room, with fireplace brick leading up one wall. Carter quickly located a spy-hole, and finding their way unhindered, pulled a long lever on the floor. The fireplace swung inward, opening into the gray mist of the Long Corridor.

  They came out from behind one of the mantels scattered all down the passage, and the entryway rolled silently back into place at the turning of a marble bust of a peculiarly coiffured noble identified by a placard as Athammaus, Chief Headsman of Commoriom.

  As ever was the way in that part of the Long Corridor, the mist, like fluffy clouds, obscured the source of illumination, which drifted down from the ceiling, and the gray walls and the gray carpet cast a gray silence all along the passage, leaving the men’s voices subdued, as if they stood by a bog.

  “We go to the left,” Carter said. “We must make haste, lest we be seen.”

  They followed the gentle curve of the passage, Duskin gripping his revolver, Carter with his hand on his Lightning Sword. Less than two hundred yards down the path they heard voices approaching before them. They exchanged glances, then retreated to a portal they had noticed earlier. No sooner had they found concealment than a pair of merchants strolled by, pushing a heavy cart before them, gossiping happily on the news of the house. Once the sounds of the cart wheels faded from earshot, the brothers returned to the corridor.

  “At least they weren’t anarchists,” Duskin said.

  “Quite right, but I don’t want to be seen by anyone. Who knows who may be in their service?”

  They traveled the rest of the passage without incident, for they had to go only a few hundred yards before exiting through a doorway leading to a white stair, which they ascended into a hallway with a marvelous portrait of the winning of the lovely Zehowah by the genii, Khaled. This proved to be the entrance to another secret way, and Carter found the mechanism easily.

  This passage, lit by opaque skylights, was wider and more cheerful than many of the hidden halls, but Carter looked upon it with trepidation, for it meant he was nearing the Room of Horrors. Besides his fear of the room itself, he knew the stairway leading to it would be guarded, and he could not conceive how they might pass. He intended to part company with Duskin before then, and that saddened him as well.

  They journeyed an hour along the corridor before twilight paled the walls. Carter called an early halt, too weary, too apprehensive to go on; they ate in silence as night descended, and did not bother to light the lamp, but lay down immediately. Despite his fatigue, Carter slept fitfully once more, unmentionable dreams dancing across the borders of his slumber. The night lasted a lifetime, and they rose when the morning sun drifted through the skylights, disclosing dust motes spinning like remote galaxies. Breakfast was a morose affair; Carter’s bleak mood had subdued them both, and they departed at once.

  Within half an hour they found an exit that brought them into a series of rooms, all painted drab-brown, with malachite green curtains, threadbare carpets, and an odd assortment of pummeled furniture. Cigars in the ashtrays and half-empty whiskey glasses showed signs of occupancy.

  “Is this the lair of the anarchists?” Duskin asked softly. “I would have expected otherwise; laboratories for making bombs, posters, slogans and such. These rooms coul
d belong to a Gentlemen’s Society.”

  “They are far beyond guns and bombs,” Carter said, “though they can use them well enough. Evil is no less so for appearing civilized. We must move swiftly.”

  They passed through a drawing room, a small library, and into a hall, where they made their way forward by concealing themselves behind a series of flying buttresses. Once, as they peered out, they saw an anarchist pass between two doors far down the corridor. When he did not return, they went on, until they came to a white door with a brass knob. Carter opened it gently, his hand at his sword. He heard the murmur of voices, though he saw no one.

  His heart pounded as he led Duskin into a foyer, with doors standing ajar to the right and left and a stair leading upward straight before them, the voices ushering from behind the left door. They did not investigate, but climbed the stair, taking the steps two at a time, but softly. The gentle creak of the floorboards sounded to their ears loud as sawed lumber; Carter’s hands, slick with sweat, slipped on the banister.

  The stairs extended to the floor above, where a gallery spread before them permeated with every manner of debris. They had no time to contemplate it, for no sooner had they rounded the banister when a voice called up: “Hello! Is anyone there?”

  Numerous alcoves pocked the gallery, and they slipped quickly into the shadows of the nearest, even as the stairs groaned beneath a heavy tread. They stood pressed against the wall, their hands to their weapons, scarcely daring to breathe. It was hard to judge, but Carter thought the man had stopped halfway up the steps, and was looking between the rails. Finally, after what seemed a long age, they heard a sigh and receding footfalls.

  They crept out. The stair was empty. They regarded the gallery, stacked high with books and old newspapers, boxes and trunks, machinery and chemicals, all covered with layers of dust from countless decades. A banister ran along the inside edge of the gallery, and by peering over a pile of vile forbidden volumes: the Necronomicon, The King in Yellow, the Book of Eibon, even the dreaded Krankenhammer, Carter saw three more floors below, each with its own gallery. A massive mosaic skylight provided light, depicting a skeletal, black-robed figure, his face hidden in shadows, holding in his hands a scroll with the words Mundus vult decipi emblazoned upon it, an inscription indicating the world wishes to be deceived. Despite the sunshine streaming through it, it was a grim portrait, all ashes and death.

  They slipped along the gallery, passing between the rows of paraphernalia, hidden from the sight of those on the floors beneath, staying low to escape detection from any on their own level. When nearly halfway, approaching voices sent them scampering behind the ragged rows of boxes. From their concealment, while they crouched in silence, they saw, above the cartons, the hats of two anarchists bobbing by, and heard their voices passing out of the gallery, engrossed in a conversation on “placing the pylons.”

  They continued making their way between the trunks and cases, and despite the fear of discovery, a joy overtook Carter, a sense that he was indeed the Master of Evenmere, outmaneuvering his enemies as if it were only a game played in the yard among the privet. He became aware of the dirt and oils upon the floorboards, the dust motes drifting down between the barrels, the wood grain on the boxes, the paint on the trunks. And he smiled, even as he chastised himself for smiling in this precarious place. Yet, in the brief moment before the gravity of his position overtook him once more, he would not have traded this adventure for all the warm, safe hearths in the world.

  A soft click, not twenty feet away, tore his smugness from him. Something was moving among the cartons to their right. The companions drifted deeper among the debris, back into the shadows. A soft tuneless whistling told them that whoever had come was not seeking them, yet he was approaching. They dropped to hands and knees, and scuttled silently behind a large wardrobe.

  Footfalls and the whistling came nearer. Carter drew a short knife and steeled himself to attack, hoping to disable his enemy without arousing the others.

  The whistling stopped. Just to the left of the wardrobe, inches from their position, a pair of hands reached down and picked up a gray box. “Here it is,” the anarchist muttered to himself. Carter could have turned the wardrobe corner and stood face to-face with the man, but the whistling resumed and the anarchist returned the way he had come, leaving the brothers’ hearts pounding in their throats.

  They waited several long minutes, half expecting the man to sound an alarm, but as the gallery lapsed into silence, they found their courage, and worked their way onward.

  Finally, they came to the end of the gallery and made their way back to the railing, where lay a wide stair leading downward. They would have to descend without being seen, and it was all a gamble. Drawing his Tawny Mantle over him, Carter crawled the last few feet to the top of the stair, and raised his head enough to peer down.

  The way was vacant though voices wafted from the floors below. He signaled Duskin, who hurried up, and together they started down the steps.

  And just at that moment, footfalls approached from below.

  They flung themselves back to the landing on their stomachs and crawled hastily to a hiding place. But the footsteps seemed to halt at the bottom of the stairs.

  A voice called, “We need everyone! Rally everyone! I have assignments.”

  Carter and Duskin slipped deeper into the debris as several anarchists came from behind them in answer to the call. Within moments there was a general murmuring of voices, and it became apparent that a score or more were gathered on the floor below.

  A plan came to Carter at once. “We can reach our destination one of two ways,” he whispered. “Come, back the direction we came.”

  They retreated beside the gallery banister, hoping that “everyone” was indeed gathered at the bottom of the stair. What had taken an hour to cross before took mere seconds. They peered cautiously down the back stair, found it deserted, and hurried down.

  Upon reaching the doors leading to the left and right, Carter hesitated only an instant before choosing the left-hand way. Even as he did, an anarchist stepped through it.

  Carter reacted without thought, striking the man a solid blow in the face. Before he could do more than reel in surprise, Duskin caught him in the forehead with the butt of his revolver, sending him sprawling.

  They dragged him out of the foyer into the room beyond. Carter wished to bind him, but there was no time, so they left him heaped behind a fainting couch. They hurried through a sitting room, but did not go onto the gallery on that floor, for a spiral staircase took them two flights down. They crept through an empty hall and from the concealment of the doorway, looked out upon a corridor, leading to the right and left, and across it, in the midst of a wide burgundy-carpeted room, a black stair leading down.

  Carter shuddered. It was as he remembered—the stairs to the Room of Horrors. Five men stood at its threshold, carrying rifles.

  “I have to get there,” he whispered to Duskin. “But how? At best, we might get three of them before they took cover, and we can’t cross that room against Winchesters.”

  Duskin looked about. “See the door on the other side of the room? I’d guess this corridor leads around to it.”

  Carter consulted the maps within him. “It does.”

  “I’ll slip around to that side and draw them off. When I do, you rush the stair.”

  “They’ll kill you!”

  Duskin grinned. “They won’t. I’m a fast runner and handy with a revolver. Anyway, you said you wouldn’t let me enter the Room of Horrors. I’ll return to Glis and bring an army to fetch you out.”

  Despair wrenched at Carter’s heart, despair of leaving his brother to the anarchists, despair of going alone to the room. But he put on a fierce grin. “That’s all there is for it, then. Good luck.”

  “Godspeed.” The two clasped hands, a lingering grip, and then Duskin was gone down the passage. And Carter suddenly knew he loved his brother very much.

  An anxious eternity passed b
efore he saw Duskin step into the room from the other side. He put on a good act, as if he were surprised to see the guards; they shouted and raised their rifles as he downed one with his revolver, then dodged back behind the doorway as a barrage of bullets whizzed past the place where he had stood.

  Of the four remaining sentries, three immediately gave chase, leaving a single man to guard the stair. This one crossed to the door, to see how his fellows fared.

  Carter saw his chance, and scurried across the room, revolver drawn, aimed at the anarchist’s back. Still, the man did not turn to see him. Shots and the shrieks of men roared out in the hall; Carter prayed Duskin had not been hit.

  He reached the stair and bounded down it, his boots squeaking as he rounded the railing. As he descended, he looked back over his shoulder to see the head of the guard rising above the top of the steps. He fired without aiming, and the fellow went down, clutching the left side of his face.

  He plunged wildly down that dark staircase, and it was as if he relived his kidnapping in double time, for the ebony stair, with its carved ghouls and fallen angels, its ghastly green lanterns, its darkness and dolor, sped by him while his fear grew, until he whimpered as he ran.

  Sooner than he would have thought possible he stood before the imposing, black marble door. For a moment, paralysis took him. I am truly a coward, he thought. There can no longer be any doubt. Yet he put his hand upon the knob and turned.

  It was locked, but that, at least, did not give him pause. He had seen it destroyed before.

  He felt every bit like his father as he drew his jagged sword and shattered the door with a single blow.

  The Room Of Horrors

  The last sparks of the Lightning Sword withered; the splinters from the sundered door fell away. Beyond lay the room, its revolving darkness heavy with nebulous forms. Sepulchral winds, bitterly cold, moaned across the portal. Carter’s satisfaction at destroying the door faded. With trembling hands, he lit the lantern, holding it aloft as he crossed the threshold. He cried out at the first touch of those shadows, the involuntary whimper of a boy, as the whole weight of malice pressed against him. It paralyzed; it crippled; it consumed him. His courage was gone; he dropped to his knees and could not rise. All the terror, sublimated so many years, returned. He clenched his eyes tight; from his frozen lips issued a half prayer.