The Altar of the Dead And Other Morbid Tales
Page 39
For some time he sat on, listening to the still soft downpour on the fading leaves. ‘they don’t come to me,” he said softly again; with a tiny smile on his old face. “It’s that old medieval Craik: with a face like a last year’s rookery!” And again he sat, with head a little sidelong, listening now to the infinitesimal sounds of life without, now to the thoughts within, and ever and again he gazed steadfastly on Lawford.
At last it seemed in the haunted quietness other thoughts came to him. A cloud, as it were of youth, drew over the wrinkled skin, composed the birdlike keenness; his head nodded. Once, like Lawford in the darkness at Widderstone, he glanced up sharply across the lamplight at his phantasmagorical shadowy companion, heard the steady surge of multitudinous raindrops, like the roar of Time’s winged chariot hurrying near; then he too, with spectacles awry, bobbed on in his chair, a weary old sentinel on the outskirts of his friend’s denuded battlefield.
END
“Wake Not the Dead” by Osie Turner (2014)
Other Titles Available from The Forlorn Press
Osie Turner is a writer, blogger, and photographer. A collector of antique books, he founded The Forlorn Press to revive forgotten classics and make them available to the modern reader.
Check his website for his latest updates: OsieTurner.weebly.com
Or visit his blog: TheForlornPath.blogspot.com
Books currently available from The Forlorn Press:
Weird Fiction: A Collection of Early Speculative Horror - This anthology contains a selection of early weird or speculative fiction; mostly with a slant towards the supernatural or horrific. The stories were all originally published between the 1850s and 1920s; biographical sketches of each of the authors appear at the end of each tale.
Occult Detectives: An Anthology of Late Victorian investigators of the Paranormal - This anthology contains some of the best early occult detective fiction from the best late Victorian and Edwardian era authors. Join such illustrious paranormal investigators as John Silence, Carnacki the Ghost-Finder, Flaxman Low, and Jules de Grandin on their adventures into the supernatural and beyond.
13 Ghost Stories: A Collection of the Best Tales of the Masters of Weird Fiction - Thirteen stories by some of the best authors of speculative fiction. While they all feature ghosts, these are not traditional ghost stories. These tales are all unique and will stay with you long after you read them. The anthology contains a biography of Oliver Onions, the author of “The Beckoning Fair One.” There are also some annotations within the book with additional information pertinent to the stories.
Alma Newton: The Romantic Mystic - This collection contains the bulk of Alma Newton’s work, as well as the only biography available for the obscure author. Newton wrote mystic fiction, with a touch of romanticism. Her style is particularly unique; all of her strange stories have dream-like quality that treads the borderlands between reality and the ethereal. The collection concludes with the only biography ever written about the life of Alma Newton; the biography includes rare photographs.
Feminist Sci-Fi: An Anthology - Few realize that women played a pivotal role in the development of science fiction. Even fewer know that feminist science fiction became popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This collection contains a broad spectrum of this genre, many of which have been all but forgotten. Ten novels and short stories and two appendices round out this volume.
The Blood Is The Life: An Anthology of Early Vampire Fiction - This anthology is the definitive collection of classic/early vampire fiction. It is broken into three sections: the first is for classic vampire stories, the second is dedicated to psychic vampirism, and the last contains a few stories which are frequently listed as vampire stories, but are not actually about vampires. There are a total of 18 stories, plus two appendices.
Tod Robbins: His Life and Work - This is a huge collection of the work of Tod Robbins, an overlooked author of early weird fiction, and a biography of the author. Includes the complete infamous novel The Unholy Three, among others.
Naughty Victoriana: An Anthology of Victorian Erotica - When one thinks of the late 19th century, images of prim and proper women and stiff-upper-lipped gentlemen strolling down the street cane in hand comes to mind. What one does not realize is that while things may have been so in public, in private it was another story. The Victorians produced tons of erotic, or just plain pornographic, literature—much of which would shock even today’s audience. Spanking and incest were their favorite subjects, but anything was fair game. Ten of the best and rarest of these novels are contained in this volume. In addition to that, there is one appendix, “A brief History of Priapus.”
Strange Tales of the High Seas - Included in this volume are the most bizarre nautical tales. Includes The Wreck of the Titan, a short story by Morgan Robertson about a ship with the exact specifications as the Titanic that sinks in the Atlantic after striking an iceberg. It was written fourteen years before the Titanic sank. Also included is the complete novel The Ghost Pirates by William Hope Hodgson.
The Tomb and Other Macabre Tales of Guy de Maupassant - Maupassant was one of France's most prolific writers, and is especially known for his short stories. This anthology contains his eight most bizarre stories. Invisible demons, insanity, necrophilic lovers, and furniture with a mind of its own rounds out this collection. Also included as an appendix is my essay "The Demise of Maupassant," which focuses on the events leading up to Maupassant's internment in an asylum and eventual death.
The Devil in Manuscript And Other Tales of Forbidden Books - “The Green Book,” a small, unassuming diary of a young girl; an unheard of book of the Talmud known as the “Tractate Middoth”; “The King in Yellow,” a play that drives people to insanity; two mysterious grey stone plaques from the sands of Chaldea known as the “Tablets of The Gods”; “The Confessions of Constantine,” which drives its readers into a homicidal rage—these accursed books are the subject of this collection of olden tales.