“All for tonight, and it’s enough for you to work on as you drift into the land of dreams. Will you go with me? Often before I go to bed, I go out to the front door. It makes me think of Mother and the brother who died so soon in his early manhood. Come.”
It was a command rather than an invitation. Opening the door, Henry Cecil turned a switch and the house darkened—all except the light over the front door. The two men stood on the landing, out in the night air. The darkness was like velvet silence.
“At times we hear a hoot-howl, and now and then a wildcat. You ever hear a wildcat, Hubler? At times they sound like a child crying.”
Hubler shook his head.
“I never heard a wildcat,” he answered. “Do you hear them often?”
“Now and then,” whispered Cecil, “Now and then.” And turning, he pressed strong and hard with his right index finger against the doorbell.
Suddenly the stillness was rent with a sobbing, shuddering shriek, a cry that rose in intensity, that carried with it the terror of a soul torn to bits and cast into the flames of hell. Cecil removed his finger, and slowly the yelling died to sobbing and the sobbing to moaning and the moaning to silence.
“That is what a wildcat sounds like,” explained Cecil. “Come. Let us go to bed. Tomorrow is another day.”
He turned the lights on and personally took his guest to his room and there he left him. Hubler went to sleep slowly, telling himself that there was a wonderful story there but that the pieces did not fit. It did not make sense. There was too much left out. Once he woke and heard an owl hoot, but that was all.
The next morning, the butler served breakfast to him in his room. Hubler tried to question him, but the man was everything a loyal perfect butler should be. All he would say was that the master was busy and would see him at two for dinner and that he would find very interesting books in the library, or the butler would be glad to bring him some, or if the gentleman cared to play pool, the butler would be pleased to play with him. So Hubler called for a typewriter and spent the morning writing the story in a dozen different ways and tearing it up as fast as he wrote, because he realized that all of the ways were poor ways and far from the truth.
Disgusted with himself, he rang for the butler and spent the rest of the time playing pool. He found the man a very excellent opponent.
At two, Cecil came into the billiard room. The butler silently left. Commonplace remarks were exchanged, and then the steel man took the lead to dinner. A third man awaited them and was introduced as Doctor Murdock. The meal was served with some formality and a lack of conversation. Finally, Cecil asked the doctor, “How is your patient?”
“Rested fairly well today but had two severe attacks last night.”
“Your medicine does not relieve him?”
“No. He is going like the other three.”
“Have you made a diagnosis?”
“No. Nothing seems typical of any condition I am familiar with. I really would like a consultation. My professional pride—”
The rich man interrupted him.
“Tut, tut! You have nothing to worry about. You are doing as well as any other doctor could do. Let me make the situation clear to you, Mr. Hubler. I have had four guests lately, one at a time. They come here at my invitation to enjoy my hospitality and fatten their purses on my bounty. Each became mysteriously sick, a stupor which may have been caused by too much drinking. I had them moved to our little hospital room and Doctor Murdock took charge of them. The following symptoms were the same, occasional pains of a terrifying nature at irregular intervals accompanied by a progressive anemia. Three of them died, and the doctor states that the last one is going rapidly. He is a good physician and I have the greatest confidence in him. There is no occasion for him to worry.
“Everything is perfectly regular and each man has had a legal death certificate and a simple but satisfactory burial. Of course, it is to be regretted. It may make other guests, like yourself, feel ill at ease, but I do not think that there will be any more cases. Are you still giving the capsules, doctor?”
“Yes. It is a favorite prescription of mine and one that should do good in cholera.”
“I had your prescription filled by the best druggist in New York City.”
“I know. You said that before. Now an autopsy might help with a diagnosis?”
“No, Doctor Murdock. A thousand times no. It is bad enough to have my guests suffer without cutting them to pieces after they are dead. Diagnose all you want on them while they are alive, but after death, I beg you to respect their cold, pallid forms. But come, let us finish the meal. I want to show Mr. Hubler my place.”
For several hours, the two men rode slowly on horseback through the woods. Hubler expressed his continual astonishment at the large number of birds and animals and their apparent tameness.
“It is nothing to wonder at,” explained his host. “I do not hunt myself and I let no one else hunt on my property. As a result, even the deer have become tame. It seems cruel to kill just for the sake of killing. Of course, they kill each other. The birds eat insects and the weasels eat the birds and now and then one of the big wildcats catches a rabbit or a very young fawn, but that is just the natural course of events. I used to hunt when I was a boy, but after Mother died in my arms, I have never been able to pull a trigger.”
Through the dying day, they rode, and at last, almost in the darkness, came back to the house. An Irishman was waiting for them on a third horse. It seemed that he was to take the horses back to the stable, some miles from the house. Once inside the house, Cecil grew rather proud and expansive. He took delight in showing Hubler through the different rooms, the library, the picture gallery, and a small but complete laboratory for electrical experimentation. At last, he came to a little room. It was empty except for a large mass of wire and iron in the center of the room, reaching from the floor to the ceiling.
“That,” said Cecil, “is something that I am especially proud of. It is an electromagnet, probably as large and powerful a magnet as there is in the world. If it could touch iron, it would probably be able to lift at least four tons at a load. It can attract iron particles at a distance of twenty feet. In fact, I had to have this part of the house built without iron nails; otherwise, it would have pulled the floor apart. It is very simple in construction and most of the time is inert, dead. But if a button is pressed at a distant part of the house and the electric current turned on, it becomes instantly alive and functions perfectly. It is very similar to the electromagnet I have at the mills, but this one is even more powerful. I thought that you would like to see it. It might help you with the story, the story you came up here to write. Have you started it yet?”
“Yes—a dozen times this morning, but I tell you frankly that I cannot write it. It does not make sense; none of it. I feel that there is a story there but it does not click.”
“Perhaps it will later on. Suppose we go down to see our patient. The hospital room is directly below. We will take off our shoes and put on carpet slippers. Nails in the shoes, you know, and all that sort of thing. When you are near a magnet like this, you have to be careful. Come along.”
Down the hall they came to the butler. Cecil called him.
“What time have you?”
“Eight-thirty-five, sir.”
“I have the same. At exactly nine, will you go out and ring the doorbell? Remember. Exactly at nine.”
“I will, sir.”
“A very faithful man,” commented Cecil. “Always obeys orders.”
“Before we go to the hospital, I should tell you about the furnishings. Since it is directly under the electromagnet, we can have no iron or steel there. The sickbed is of wood throughout but very comfortable. Time is told by a series of hourglasses. The instruments and hypodermics are of hardened gold. The doctor wears slippers at my request. He thinks that I am queer, but as I shelter him, he puts up with what he considers my eccentricities. Should the electromagnet start working while we a
re there, for example at nine, when the doorbell is pushed, you need have no fear for your personal safety. The last thing in the world I desire is to see you harmed in any way. Come on.”
They entered the room. Sharp shadows were thrown by a burning candle in a glass holder. Doctor Murdock met them with a whisper.
“He has had a quiet day, Mr. Cecil. The sleep has been one of exhaustion but there has been no recurrence of the colic.”
“Have you used any of the sedative?”
“Yes. He has had his capsules every hour.”
“Good. That is all that can be done for him. Doctor Murdock is a great believer in capsules, Mr. Hubler. He is not a pharmacist, so I have the capsules filled for him in New York. What time have you, doctor?”
“According to the hour-glasses, it should soon be nine.”
“We will wait till then. We left our watches upstairs. Will you tell us when it is nearly nine?”
They sat down and waited. The doctor went over, looked at the hour-glasses steadily pouring their golden sands.
“Only a few seconds now. The hourglass is nearly empty,” he soon said.
The sleeping patient started to move restlessly. Hubler watched him. The author was trying to think, to coordinate his thinking so that it would make sense. Suddenly, the man sat up in bed shrieking and pulling at his abdomen. His cry was a mixture of curses and hopeless despair. It so completely filled Hubler’s soul that he instinctively covered his ears with his hands to try to shut out the horror of it. For he recognized it; it was what he had heard the night he pressed the doorbell, and once heard, was not to be soon forgotten. Doctor Murdock bent over the man trying to calm him. Cecil looked on with detached interest. Suddenly, the noise ceased as the man dropped backward.
“He’s dead!” cried Doctor Murdock.
“No wonder,” sighed Cecil. “No one can stand pain like that forever. He is better dead. You know how to proceed, doctor. Come with me, Mr. Hubler. It may be that a glass of brandy will help you. This was not a pleasant sight.”
They were back in the living room in front of the fireplace. Hubler had taken his three fingers of liquor, shivered and felt better.
“And now for the story,” sighed the steel man. “I realize that you must get this story settled in your mind or you will not sleep tonight, and tomorrow you will leave early for the big city. I will go with you and we will have an early start, so you had better have your rest. You have seen the electromagnet. I will tell you that the four men who have died in our little hospital room were the four brothers who murdered my mother and brother. And as there was a doorbell in our home in Carolina, it seemed best to have a doorbell here. Of course, I had to have a doorbell. Every house, especially a house of wealth, has a doorbell, and you remember that my mother thought it was a very important symbol. Of course, it is important for you to learn that the doorbell was connected with the electromagnet. When it was pressed, the magnet started to work. Now the first brother who came was drunk; he just would not stop drinking, so we placed him in the hospital and I had the second one come on, and he pressed the doorbell a number of times. You see, I was giving him a lot of money and he wanted to please me, and then he became sick and took his brother’s place. Then the third brother came, and did the same thing. Finally the last brother, who was the man you saw die tonight, came. Of course, when he became sick, there was no one to press the button but the butler and myself and so I asked you to come up so you could have a hand in it. And now, since the last of the four brothers has died from this strange disease, I will not use the electromagnet any more but will connect the push button with a sweetly sounding bell which will welcome my guests with the true sound of hospitality. Now you can write the story about the doorbell.”
“I cannot do it!” protested Hubler.
“You know I cannot do it. There is still something left out. What had the magnet to do with it? Doctor Murdock took care of all these men and he did not die. He evidently did not even have a bit of pain. You are leaving something out. What is it? I have to know. It is not fair to tell me so much and still tell me so little.”
“Perhaps you are right,” whispered the steel man. “But even after I tell you, you won’t be able to sell the story, because no one will believe you. It was the capsules that did the work.”
“But you told me that Doctor Murdock wrote the prescriptions and that they were prepared by the best drug house in New York!”
“That is true. But I forgot to tell you something. After I got the capsules, I opened them and put in each one a small fishhook. Murdock gave a good many capsules to each of his patients. Now write the story.”
TIGER CAT
Originally published in Weird Tales, Oct. 1937.
The man tried his best to sell me the house. He was confident that I would like it. Repeatedly he called my attention to the view.
There was something in what he said about the view. The villa on the top of a mountain commanded a vision of the valley, vine-clad and cottage-studded. It was an irregular bowl of green, dotted with stone houses which were whitewashed to almost painful brilliancy.
The valley was three and a third miles at its greatest width. Standing at the front door of the house, an expert marksman with telescopic sight could have placed a rifle bullet in each of the white marks of cottages. They nestled like little pearls amid a sea of green grape-vines.
“A wonderful view, Signor,” the real-estate agent repeated. “That scene, at any time of the year, is worth twice what I am asking for the villa.”
“But I can see all this without buying,” I argued.
“Not without trespassing.”
“But the place is old. It has no running water.”
“Wrong!” and he smiled expansively, showing a row of gold-filled teeth. “Listen.”
We were silent.
There came to us the sound of bubbling water. Turning, I traced the sound. I found a marble Cupid spurting water in a most peculiar way into a wall basin. I smiled and commented.
“There is one like that in Brussels and another in Madrid. But this is very fine. However, I referred to running water in a modern bathroom.”
“But why bathe when you can sit here and enjoy the view?”
He was impossible. So, I wrote a check, took his bill of sale and became the owner of a mountain, topped by a stone house that seemed to be half ruin. But he did not know, and I did not tell him that I considered the fountain alone worth the price that I had paid. In fact, I had come to Italy to buy that fountain if I could; buy it and take it back to America with me. I knew all about that curious piece of marble. George Seabrook had written to me about it. Just one letter, and then he had gone on, goodness knows where. George was like that, always on the move. Now I owned the fountain and was already planning where I should place it in my New York home. Certainly not in the rose garden.
I sat down on a marble bench and looked down on the valley. The real-estate man was right. It was a delicate, delicious piece of scenery. The surrounding mountains were high enough to throw a constant shadow on some part of the valley except at high noon. There was no sign of life, but I was sure that the vineyards were alive with husband-men and their families. An eagle floated serenely on the upper air currents, automatically adjusting himself to their constant changing.
Stretching myself, I gave one look at my car and then walked into the house.
In the kitchen two peasants sat, an old man and an old woman. They rose as I entered.
“Who are you?” I asked in English.
They simply smiled and waved their hands. I repeated my question in Italian.
“We serve,” the man replied.
“Serve whom?”
“Whoever is the master.”
“Have you been here long?”
“We have always been here. It is our home.”
His statement amused me, and I commented, “The masters come and go, but you remain?”
“It seems so.”
“Ma
ny masters?”
“Alas! Yes. They come and go. Nice young men, like you, but they do not stay. They buy and look at the view, and eat with us a few days and then they are gone.”
“And then the villa is sold again?”
The man shrugged. “How should we know? We simply serve.”
“Then prepare me my dinner. And serve it outside, under the grapevine, where I can see the view.”
The woman started to obey. The man came nearer.
“Shall I carry your bags to the bedroom?”
“Yes. And I will go with you and unpack.”
He took me to a room on the second floor. There was a bed there and a very old chest of drawers. The floor, everything about the room was spotlessly clean. The walls had been freshly whitewashed. Their smooth whiteness suggested wonderful possibilities for despoliation, the drawing of a picture, the writing of a poem, the careless writhing autograph that caused my relatives so much despair.
“Have all the masters slept here?” I asked carelessly.
“All.”
“Was there one by the name of George Seabrook?”
“I think so. But they come and go. I am old and forget.”
“And all these masters, none of them ever wrote on the walls?”
“Of a certainty. All wrote with pencil what they desired to write. Who should say they should not? For did not the villa belong to them while they were here? But always we prepared for the new master, and made the walls clean and beautiful again.”
“You were always sure that there would be a new master?”
“Certainly. Someone must pay us our wages.”
I gravely placed a gold piece in his itching palm, asking, “What did they write on the walls?”
He looked at me with old, unblinking eyes. Owl eyes! That is what they were, and he slowly said,
“Each wrote or drew as his fancy led him, for they were the masters and could do as they wished.”
“But what were the words?”
“I cannot speak English, or read it.”
Evidently, the man was not going to talk. To me the entire situation was most interesting. Same servants, same villa, many masters. They came and bought and wrote on the wall and left, and then my real-estate friend sold the house again. A fine racket!
The Golden Age of Weird Fiction Megapack, Volume 5 Page 11