For a half-hour John Dunn, doubting, raging, overwhelmed with spiritual agony as to the state of his own soul rather than fear, strove to enter the southwest chamber. He was simply powerless against this uncanny obstacle. Finally a great horror as of evil itself came over him. He was a nervous man and very young. He fairly fled to his own chamber and locked himself in like a terror-stricken girl.
The next morning he went to Miss Gill and told her frankly what had happened.
“What it is I know not, Miss Sophia,” said he, “but I firmly believe, against my will, that there is in that room some accursed evil power at work of which modern faith and modern science know nothing.”
Miss Sophia Gill listened with grimly lowering face.
“I think I will sleep in that room myself to-night,” she said, when the minister had finished.
There were occasions when Miss Sophia Gill could put on a manner of majesty, and she did now.
It was ten o’clock that night when Sophia Gill entered the southwest chamber. She had told her sister what she intended doing and had been proof against her tearful entreaties. Amanda was charged not to tell the young girl, Flora.
“There is no use in frightening that child over nothing,” said Sophia.
Sophia, when she entered the southwest chamber, set the lamp which she carried on the bureau, and began moving about the room, pulling down the curtains, taking the nice white counterpane off the bed, and preparing generally for the night.
As she did so, moving with great coolness and deliberation, she became conscious that she was thinking some thoughts that were foreign to her. She began remembering what she could not have remembered, since she was not then born: the trouble over her mother’s marriage, the bitter opposition, the shutting the door upon her, the ostracizing her from heart and home. She became aware of a most singular sensation of bitter resentment, and not against the mother and sister who had so treated her own mother, but against her own mother herself, and then she became aware of a like bitterness extended to her own self. She felt malignant toward her mother as a young girl whom she remembered, though she could not have remembered, and she felt malignant toward her own self, and her sister Amanda, and Flora. Evil suggestions surged in her brain – suggestions which turned her heart to stone and which still fascinated her. And all the time by a sort of double consciousness she knew that what she thought was strange and not due to her own volition. She knew that she was thinking the thoughts of some other person, and she knew who. She felt herself possessed.
But there was tremendous strength in the woman’s nature. She had inherited strength for good and righteous self-assertion from the evil strength of her ancestors. They had turned their own weapons against themselves. She made an effort which seemed more than human, and was conscious that the hideous thing was gone from her. She thought her own thoughts. Then she scouted to herself the idea of anything supernatural about the terrific experience. “I am imagining everything,” she told herself.
She went on with her preparations; she went to the bureau to take down her hair. She looked in the glass and saw, instead of her own face, middle-aged and good to see, with its expression of a life of honesty and good-will to others and patience under trials, the face of a very old woman scowling forever with unceasing hatred and misery at herself and all others, at life and death, at that which had been and that which was to come. She saw, instead of her own face in the glass, the face of her dead Aunt Harriet, topping her own shoulders in her own well-known dress!
Sophia Gill left the room. She went into the one which she shared with her sister Amanda. Amanda looked up and saw her standing there with her handkerchief pressed to her face.
“Oh, Sophia, let me call in somebody. Is your face hurt? Sophia, what is the matter with your face?” fairly shrieked Amanda.
Suddenly Sophia took the handkerchief from her face.
“Look at me, Amanda Gill,” she said.
Amanda looked, shrinking.
“What is it? Oh, what is it? You don’t look hurt. What is it, Sophia?”
“What do you see?”
“Why, I see you.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. What did you think I would see?”
Sophia Gill looked at her sister.
“Never as long as I live will I tell you what I thought you would see, and you must never ask me,” said she. “I am going to sell this house.”
The Toll-House
W. W. Jacobs
Prospectus
Address:
The Toll-House, Wapping, London, England.
Property:
Early nineteenth-century lodge house. Situated not far from the River Thames, the building has a number of large rooms on three floors and a stylish hallway and stairs. The property is surrounded by a substantial garden. To be let unfurnished.
Viewing Date:
Autumn, 1909.
Agent:
William Wymark Jacobs (1863–1943) was born in London and spread his literary talent widely as a journalist, humourist, dramatist and novelist. He became popular with readers for a series of tales about the lives of seamen, but in 1902 wrote “The Monkey’s Paw” a horror story which has been filmed, adapted for radio and television, and is probably one of the most anthologised stories in English fiction. Haunted buildings feature in several of his tales, including “Jerry Bundler”, “The Three Sisters” and “The Toll-House”, the story of a fearsome ghost who takes his toll of visitors. It has deservedly been ranked the equal of “The Monkey’s Paw”.
“It’s all nonsense,” said Jack Barnes. “Of course people have died in the house; people die in every house. As for the noises – wind in the chimney and rats in the wainscot are very convincing to a nervous man. Give me another cup of tea, Meagle.”
“Lester and White are first,” said Meagle, who was presiding at the tea-table of the Three Feathers Inn. “You’ve had two.”
Lester and White finished their cups with irritating slowness, pausing between sips to sniff the aroma, and to discover the sex and dates of arrival of the “strangers” which floated in some numbers in the beverage. Mr. Meagle served them to the brim, and then, turning to the grimly expectant Mr. Barnes, blandly requested him to ring for hot water.
“We’ll try and keep your nerves in their present healthy condition,” he remarked. “For my part I have a sort of half-and-half belief in the supernatural.”
“All sensible people have,” said Lester. “An aunt of mine saw a ghost once.”
White nodded.
“I had an uncle that saw one,” he said.
“It always is somebody else that sees them,” said Barnes.
“Well, there is the house,” said Meagle, “a large house at an absurdly low rent, and nobody will take it. It has taken toll of at least one life of every family that has lived there – however short the time – and since it has stood empty caretaker after caretaker has died there. The last caretaker died fifteen years ago.”
“Exactly,” said Barnes. “Long enough ago for legends to accumulate.”
“I’ll bet you a sovereign you won’t spend the night there alone, for all your talk,” said White suddenly.
“And I,” said Lester.
“No,” said Barnes slowly. “I don’t believe in ghosts nor in any supernatural things whatever; all the same, I admit that I should not care to pass a night there alone.”
“But why not?” inquired White.
“Wind in the chimney,” said Meagle, with a grin.
“Rats in the wainscot,” chimed in Lester.
“As you like,” said Barnes, colouring.
“Suppose we all go?” said Meagle. “Start after supper, and get there about eleven? We have been walking for ten days now without an adventure – except Barnes’s discovery that ditch-water smells longest. It will be a novelty, at any rate, and, if we break the spell by all surviving, the grateful owner ought to come down handsome.”
“Let’s see what the landlord has
to say about it first,” said Lester. “There is no fun in passing a night in an ordinary empty house. Let us make sure that it is haunted.”
He rang the bell, and, sending for the landlord, appealed to him in the name of our common humanity not to let them waste a night watching in a house in which spectres and hobgoblins had no part. The reply was more than reassuring, and the landlord, after describing with considerable art the exact appearance of a head which had been seen hanging out of a window in the moonlight, wound up with a polite but urgent request that they would settle his bill before they went.
“It’s all very well for you young gentlemen to have your fun,” he said indulgently; “but, supposing as how you are all found dead in the morning, what about me? It ain’t called the Toll-House for nothing, you know.”
“Who died there last?” inquired Barnes, with an air of polite derision.
“A tramp,” was the reply. “He went there for the sake of half-a-crown, and they found him next morning hanging from the balusters, dead.”
“Suicide,” said Barnes. “Unsound mind.”
The landlord nodded. “That’s what the jury brought it in,” he said slowly; “but his mind was sound enough when he went in there. I’d known him, off and on, for years. I’m a poor man, but I wouldn’t spend the night in that house for a hundred pounds.”
He repeated this remark as they started on their expedition a few hours later. They left as the inn was closing for the night; bolts shot noisily behind them, and, as the regular customers trudged slowly homewards, they set off at a brisk pace in the direction of the house. Most of the cottages were already in darkness, and lights in others went out as they passed.
“It seems rather hard that we have got to lose a night’s rest in order to convince Barnes of the existence of ghosts,” said White.
“It’s in a good cause,” said Meagle. “A most worthy object; and something seems to tell me that we shall succeed. You didn’t forget the candles, Lester?”
“I have brought two,” was the reply; “all the old man could spare.”
There was but little moon, and the night was cloudy. The road between high hedges was dark, and in one place, where it ran through a wood, so black that they twice stumbled in the uneven ground at the side of it.
“Fancy leaving our comfortable beds for this!” said White again. “Let me see; this desirable residential sepulchre lies to the right, doesn’t it?”
“Farther on,” said Meagle.
They walked on for some time in silence, broken only by White’s tribute to the softness, the cleanliness, and the comfort of the bed which was receding farther and farther into the distance. Under Meagle’s guidance they turned off at last to the right, and, after a walk of a quarter of a mile, saw the gates of the house before them.
The lodge was almost hidden by over-grown shrubs and the drive was choked with rank growths. Meagle leading, they pushed through it until the dark pile of the house loomed above them.
“There is a window at the back where we can get in, so the landlord says,” said Lester, as they stood before the hall door.
“Window?” said Meagle. “Nonsense. Let’s do the thing properly. Where’s the knocker?”
He felt for it in the darkness and gave a thundering rat-tat-tat at the door.
“Don’t play the fool,” said Barnes crossly.
“Ghostly servants are all asleep,” said Meagle gravely, “but I’ll wake them up before I’ve done with them. It’s scandalous keeping us out here in the dark.”
He plied the knocker again, and the noise volleyed in the emptiness beyond. Then with a sudden exclamation he put out his hands and stumbled forward.
“Why, it was open all the time,” he said, with an odd catch in his voice. “Come on.”
“I don’t believe it was open,” said Lester, hanging back. “Somebody is playing us a trick.”
“Nonsense,” said Meagle sharply. “Give me a candle. Thanks. Who’s got a match?”
Barnes produced a box and struck one, and Meagle, shielding the candle with his hand, led the way forward to the foot of the stairs. “Shut the door, somebody,” he said; “there’s too much draught.”
“It is shut,” said White, glancing behind him.
Meagle fingered his chin. “Who shut it?” he inquired, looking from one to the other. “Who came in last?”
“I did,” said Lester, “but I don’t remember shutting it – perhaps I did, though.”
Meagle, about to speak, thought better of it, and, still carefully guarding the flame, began to explore the house, with the others close behind. Shadows danced on the walls and lurked in the corners as they proceeded. At the end of the passage they found a second staircase, and ascending it slowly gained the first floor.
“Careful!” said Meagle, as they gained the landing.
He held the candle forward and showed where the balusters had broken away. Then he peered curiously into the void beneath.
“This is where the tramp hanged himself, I suppose,” he said thoughtfully.
“You’ve got an unwholesome mind,” said White, as they walked on. “This place is quite creepy enough without you remembering that. Now let’s find a comfortable room and have a little nip of whisky apiece and a pipe. How will this do?”
He opened a door at the end of the passage and revealed a small square room. Meagle led the way with the candle, and, first melting a drop or two of tallow, stuck it on the mantelpiece. The others seated themselves on the floor and watched pleasantly as White drew from his pocket a small bottle of whisky and a tin cup.
“H’m! I’ve forgotten the water,” he exclaimed.
“I’ll soon get some,” said Meagle.
He tugged violently at the bell-handle, and the rusty jangling of a bell sounded from a distant kitchen. He rang again.
“Don’t play the fool,” said Barnes roughly.
Meagle laughed. “I only wanted to convince you,” he said kindly. “There ought to be, at any rate, one ghost in the servants’ hall.”
Barnes held up his hand for silence.
“Yes?” said Meagle, with a grin at the other two. “Is anybody coming?”
“Suppose we drop this game and go back,” said Barnes suddenly. “I don’t believe in spirits, but nerves are outside anybody’s command. You may laugh as you like, but it really seemed to me that I heard a door open below and steps on the stairs.”
His voice was drowned in a roar of laughter.
“He is coming round,” said Meagle, with a smirk. “By the time I have done with him he will be a confirmed believer. Well, who will go and get some water? Will, you, Barnes?”
“No,” was the reply.
“If there is any it might not be safe to drink after all these years,” said Lester. “We must do without it.”
Meagle nodded, and taking a seat on the floor held out his hand for the cup. Pipes were lit, and the clean, wholesome smell of tobacco filled the room. White produced a pack of cards; talk and laughter rang through the room and died away reluctantly in distant corridors.
“Empty rooms always delude me into the belief that I possess a deep voice,” said Meagle. “To-morrow I—”
He started up with a smothered exclamation as the light went out suddenly and something struck him on the head. The others sprang to their feet. Then Meagle laughed.
“It’s the candle,” he exclaimed. “I didn’t stick it enough.”
Barnes struck a match, and re-lighting the candle, stuck it on the mantelpiece, and sitting down took up his cards again.
“What was I going to say?” said Meagle. “Oh, I know; to-morrow I—”
“Listen!” said White, laying his hand on the other’s sleeve. “Upon my word I really thought I heard a laugh.”
“Look here!” said Barnes. “What do you say to going back? I’ve had enough of this. I keep fancying that I hear things too; sounds of something moving about in the passage outside. I know it’s only fancy, but it’s uncomfortable.”
/> “You go if you want to,” said Meagle, “and we will play dummy. Or you might ask the tramp to take your hand for you, as you go downstairs.”
Barnes shivered and exclaimed angrily. He got up, and, walking to the half-closed door, listened.
“Go outside,” said Meagle, winking at the other two. “I’ll dare you to go down to the hall door and back by yourself.”
Barnes came back, and, bending forward, lit his pipe at the candle.
“I am nervous, but rational,” he said, blowing out a thin cloud of smoke. “My nerves tell me that there is something prowling up and down the long passage outside; my reason tells me that that is all nonsense. Where are my cards?”
He sat down again, and, taking up his hand, looked through it carefully and led.
“Your play, White,” he said, after a pause.
White made no sign.
“Why, he is asleep,” said Meagle. “Wake up, old man. Wake up and play.”
Lester, who was sitting next to him, took the sleeping man by the arm and shook him, gently at first and then with some roughness; but White, with his back against the wall and his head bowed, made no sign. Meagle bawled in his ear, and then turned a puzzled face to the others.
“He sleeps like the dead,” he said, grimacing. “Well, there are still three of us to keep each other company.”
“Yes,” said Lester, nodding. “Unless—Good Lord! suppose—”
He broke off, and eyed them, trembling.
The Mammoth Book of Haunted House Stories (Mammoth Books) Page 16