II
i. Marriage—
Three months – exactly thirteen weeks since Charlotte’s burial – had elapsed, and Protopart was bowling homewards from his lawyer’s office in a hired brougham. As for forgiving Flora – he had done that long ago, yet, as it happened, he was thinking at this very moment of her strange behaviour on that stormy August afternoon. What she had said then he had managed to excuse, but not forget. How would she be affected by the news that he was bringing to her now – the news, so unexpected and perturbing, which his dead wife’s second letter held for both of them?
Reclining in the dark-blue cloth upholstery of the old-fashioned vehicle, he put a hand into the breast-pocket of his jacket, then timorously withdrew it. No, he would not take out the letter now. He knew the whole of it by heart. Later, when he got home, he’d have a drink of wine. How strange – how very strange! What would his daughters think? For this visit to the lawyer’s he had somehow felt constrained to put on, once again, the cashmere suit which he had worn in mourning. It had seemed appropriate. Now, in the rather stuffy confines of the brougham, he sniffed repugnantly. The suit, he fancied, drew from him a sourish smell which he found faintly disagreeable. Although the day, for mid-November, was quite mild and sunny, it was not warm enough to let down either of the windows.
Flora! His thoughts returned to her unceasingly, revolved disquietly about her face, her voice, her gestures and her conduct. If only – if only Flora would stop acting as she did about the statue! It was quite bad and horrible enough without her going on in that peculiar way . . .
However, he refused to take her attitude too seriously. Flora had always been extremely highly-strung, and her half-blindness might account for much. Cowan had told him that she was increasingly devout, perhaps too zealous since she had been made a deaconess, and wearing herself out with fastings, vigils and long hours of prayer. Even on one occasion, she had said something about entering a convent . . .
The vehicle drew up before his door. Protopart alighted heavily, went in. The dining-room was deserted, and he refreshed himself with a glass of claret. Then he ascended to the turret room.
For several minutes he stood looking at the statue. He could remember, but too plainly, how, during these three months, he had resented its insistent, frowning presence on the wall – felt injured, mortified, enraged and terrified by turns. And – he had been unable to prevent the story’s leaking out. Whispers, inevitably, had got about. His grief, throughout, had been confused and complicated by a faint, unpleasant shadow of absurdity. He, also, had been forced to seem eccentric, odd . . .
But now he could relent and comprehend at last. Poor Charlie – she was kinder, far more understanding than he guessed. He had misjudged her cruelly. And Flora, Flora . . . ! To-morrow, possibly to-day, he would tell Flora.
ii. —is honourable
However, it was not until the middle of the following week that he had any opportunity to speak with her. His ward had been confined to bed for two days with a chill, and when at length she was escorted, against protest, from the Vicarage by Miss Turnbull her cheeks were flushed and her eyes feverishly bright. ‘She really oughtn’t to have come . . . I’ll call for her and take her back with me at five – five sharp.’
To Jasper Protopart himself meanwhile had come a change of mind if not of heart. He was the prey of anguished doubts and dark misgivings. A degree of trepidation might be natural and seemly, but, beyond that, he knew a keener apprehension. He must think very seriously about this step . . . The elation which he had experienced after he had left the lawyer’s office and opened Charlotte’s letter had entirely ebbed away, leaving him flat and stale.
For the first time that month he had spent one whole morning in the turret room, where a low fire had been kindled on the tiny hearth. He had looked long and earnestly at Charlotte. Had she been really kind? He could not say. At all events, her imputation to him of a frailty which, if it had existed, she should not have seemed to guess was scarcely kind . . . Suddenly, as he stared, he had imagined that the statue’s face had changed, had undergone some strange disfigurement. One corner of the lips had tilted upwards in a sort of sneer. With his scalp prickling he had started back in horror. Not for some moments did he realise that a fly, resuscitated by the fire’s warmth, had settled on the stony mouth, was slowly crawling . . . Beating it hurriedly away, he had observed, as well, that the great metal pins which held the mass of marble to the wall were working loose. That, he supposed with nausea, must be attended to . . . Overcome by revulsion, he turned, in sick abhorrence, from the effigy, looked out again across that sombre wilderness that fled and streamed, rocking and heaving in vast neutral-tinted billows to the sighing, fog-dimmed bounds of the horizon. No, it was useless; he could never bring himself to do as Charlotte had suggested. He was old – worse than old, was elderly. In his own nostrils the ‘body of this death’ was rank and mortified.
Now, as he welcomed Flora in the hall, he was ashamed and chagrined. He had resolved to tell her nothing for the present about Charlotte’s letter. Somewhere at the back of the house the maids were singing. Yes, it was ‘Jesu, Lover of my Soul’ – one of the hymns, it chanced, that had been sung at Charlotte’s funeral. Flora, inclining her head to listen, touched his arm, then nodded, but in what kind of meaning he could not determine. Her friend, Miss Turnbull, already had departed. Mabel, joined presently by Jasper’s second daughter, Hilda, came in through a side-door that led out to the shrubbery, her hands encased in gardening-gloves and bearing a large bouquet of chrysanthemums. ‘Hello . . . Flora! It’s too cold to stay out any more . . . Shall we try over those new parts for Stainer’s anthem? I’ve muffed my entries every time so far . . .’
‘Directly,’ answered Flora, ‘yes, directly.’ Protopart’s heart sank in a foreboding too well founded. ‘Jasper, I want to talk. Can we go up a while – up there?’
It appeared useless to resist. His ears still ringing with the hard chanting of the hymn, he accompanied her reluctantly to the turret room. Mabel and Hilda, with a swift interchange of glances, retired to the drawing-room to play bezique.
iii. Guiltless
‘I talked it out again with Mr Cowan yesterday. Of course, he told me what a serious step it was to take, and that I ought to speak to you about it first.’
Protopart had lit the fire. Its pale commencing glow played timidly about the upturned features of his ward. Almost without preamble she had launched into this one-sided discussion of her plans, sounding, it seemed to him, the death-knell of his hopes.
‘Cowan was right. After all, you’re only how old? Just nineteen. There’s lots of time . . .’
‘It isn’t years that count, but how you feel. I’ve thought it out. I should be – safer, in St Sepulchre’s. It’s a lot wiser I should realise that, and go, at once. And she – if she were here she would be glad . . .’
Beneath her strained composure he could recognise a growing agitation. Outside, though it was barely three o’clock, a foggy dusk was settling. His own tones as he answered her were husky.
‘How do you know that you have a – vocation? You should be very sure that you aren’t doing something you’ll regret. I – I’m your guardian, Flora, and, as for Charlie, if she were with us now she’d say the same. I——’
‘Don’t! Jasper, please, don’t talk like that! Don’t let’s pretend!’ Rising from her chair, she now stood facing him. Not comprehending her emotion, he was, no less, excited and alarmed. What did she mean? This inexplicable and openly expressed hostility to his dead wife argued not only a strange lack of delicacy toward himself but gross ingratitude as well. And her unjustified assumption that he shared in it – was, as it were, her ally and accomplice – her implication of some tacit understanding, mutual agreement, against Charlotte, seemed a most shocking, painful and extraordinary idea, of which he had attempted vainly many times to disabuse her. Looking at her, as her fingers clenched and unclenched nervously upon her rosary, he was struck by
her too-evident fragility. Phrases ran pitifully, excusingly, across his brain – ‘the earthly tenement,’ ‘purged of all dross,’ ‘the spirit’s flame.’ He felt old, very old and cumbrous, stricken with something that was making him pathetically incapable of bridging a profound and ever widening gulf, of coming near to her.
‘Jasp, let’s be honest about everything this once. You know, as well as I do, why she hated me . . . Do let’s play fair. Don’t make it harder for me than it is. I’ve got to go because – because I’m weaker than I thought I was, that’s all.’ Her voice was choked. After a pause she took a deep breath and continued, while he stared at her, spellbound in dismay. ‘It was all right until about three years ago. That time you kissed me, in the summer-house, do you remember? Ever since then I knew . . . and Charlotte knew, at once. Ever since then she knew, still knows. Even at this moment, while we’re——’
‘Stop! Flora . . . !’ Without the recollection of having moved toward her he found his arms enfolding her. She lay on his breast, panting, her body shuddering, and her eyes, upturned to his, convulsed. More loudly now, beyond his power to silence or restrain, her voice raced on:
‘Even at this moment we’re – we’re sinning, playing with fire, while she’s watching us. . . I’ve got to go. It’s sacrifice, renunciation, for you, too, for both of us . . . It’s sin! I never knew what sin was like till then, how – yes, how wonderful! Like a black light. I can’t resist. We’re both of us too weak. I’ve——’
‘Flora, darling Flora, I beg you, I entreat you, listen . . . !’
She had slid from him to the floor and, still upon her knees, approached the statue. Her hands, upraised, were clasped, as if in supplication, round the stony feet. From that repellent picture, which too instantly suggested some capricious act of worship, he might recoil and turn his eyes away, but could not stop his ears to what he heard.
‘I was afraid of you at first – and so was Jasp, but now – we’re proud! Living in sin, for months and months, under your eyes! It’s been our meat and drink . . . And now you’ve gone it’s just as much a sin. He’s still your husband, and you’re watching us, the pair of us, in sin!’
‘Flora, Flora . . . !’ Had she gone mad? He must do something, stop her raving, get her out of here, or else——
She had half-raised herself. Her hands, exploring first the statue’s breast, stole, with fierce delicacy, over it and downwards, so that she finally was forced to crouch. In this performance she was so engrossed that, when he sprang to her at last, she did not turn her head or seem to notice him.
‘Flora, listen! You must listen! And believe what I’m going to tell you is the truth. There was no sin. And there is no sin now. It’s only – only because you’re ill that you imagine it. Charlotte was never like you think. I know it. I can prove it!’
He had seized her hands, but she wrenched them violently from his grasp and raised them once again toward the image. On her face, however, was a peculiar, arrested expression, of mute expectancy, crossed with misgiving.
Protopart continued, slowly and convincingly, throwing his every ounce of energy behind the measured words so as to capture and retain her wandering attention. ‘Charlie was not like that, not jealous. She wanted us to marry. And I want it, too. It’s in this letter, here, this letter. She wanted us to marry after she was gone.’
He waited.
‘Do you hear, Flora?’
Her fingers still ran busily about the marble thighs, from which the screening cloth had long since fallen to the floor. Without ceasing her uneasy motion she replied in a low voice:
‘You – you mean that? You swear it?’
‘About Charlotte? Yes, I tell you that I have the letter here, here now. You can show it to whom you like and they can read it to you. I got it from the lawyer a few days ago. It was written before her last stroke. You see, she had – thought of that, even then. If she were with us now she would be pleased, not jealous – pleased . . . I know that if——’ He broke off, all at once, aghast. ‘Flora, what are you doing? Flora, the——’
Too late! She was indeed convinced. A spasm, as of appalled comprehension, veiled her eyes, then, passing, left her face abashed and desolate. Her mouth dropped open, but her hands tore frenziedly at Charlotte’s knees.
‘Flora, the——’
With a slow, grinding sound, the upper iron pins began to leave their sockets, and for an instant the great white image seemed to hover, poised in space, above them. Then, as the pattering rain of brick and powdered masonry increased, it lurched. Charlotte’s brute weight sped downwards on them both, mangling their limbs, their dreams, involving them in chaos of disintegrated plaster, fractured stone, and drowning out their screams in one colossal and reverberating crash.
iv. Impromptu Fib
The air was thick with dust. Protopart’s daughters – now including Joyce, the eldest sister – made him out, in the firelight, through a choking, gritty cloud. His face was bloody, but, although prostrate, he apparently had come off far more lightly than his ward. The floor was strewn with rubble and with some broken fragments of the statue – feet and arms. The major mass, however, had remained intact, pinning the wretched Flora to the ground.
Even to the three panic-stricken girls it was quite evident that she had not long to live. Her body, under Charlotte’s torso, was grotesquely twisted, and, on the boards nearby, an ominous dark stain was oozing out. As they gazed at her, powerless for several seconds to take any action, her eyes, now glazing, turned in the direction of her guardian. Summoning all her strength, she raised her head. Her lips moved, and the dreadful moaning ceased. They caught her words:
‘I – I pulled it down on purpose. He was trying to – Jasper attacked me. He was trying to——’
Mabel, recovering the first, sprang forward suddenly. ‘Don’t listen to her! Let’s try and move this off her chest. Don’t listen to her! Fetch a doctor, quick!’
But Flora said no more. Her final and surprising accusation had been made. By the time Protopart had crawled to her, across the wreck, she had already breathed her last.
THE DICE by Thomas De Quincey
Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859) is probably best known today for Confessions of an English Opium Eater (1821), an autobiographical account of his experiences – first positive and later horrific – with the use of opium. His essay ‘On Murder Considered as one of the Fine Arts’, a satirical discussion of the aesthetic aspects of murder, influenced many 19th and 20th century authors and was reputedly deemed ‘delightful’ by Alfred Hitchcock. De Quincey did not write a great deal of fiction; however his Klosterheim; or, The Masque (1832), a Gothic novel inspired by the works of Walpole and Radcliffe and probably an influence on Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Masque of the Red Death’, is well worth reading and has been reissued by Valancourt. ‘The Dice’, purportedly a translation from a German original, first appeared in London Magazine in August 1823. Featuring a mysterious book bound in black velvet, a demonic bargain, and a pair of haunted dice, it reflects De Quincey’s lifelong interest in the Gothic and supernatural.
For more than 150 years had the family of Schroll been settled at Taubendorf, and generally respected for knowledge and refinement of manners superior to its station. Its present representative, the bailiff Elias Schroll, had in his youth attached himself to literature, but, later in life, from love to the country, he had returned to his native village, and lived there in great credit and esteem.
During this whole period of 150 years, tradition had recorded only one single Schroll as having borne a doubtful character; he, indeed, as many persons affirmed, had dealt with the devil. Certain it is that there was still preserved in the house a scrutoire fixed in the wall, and containing some mysterious manuscripts attributed to him, and the date of the year, 1630, which was carved upon the front, tallied with his era. The key to this scrutoire had been constantly handed down to the eldest son through five generations, with a solemn charge to take care that no other eye or ear shou
ld ever become acquainted with its contents. Every precaution had been taken to guard against accidents or oversights; the lock was so constructed, that even with the right key it could not be opened without special instructions; and for still greater security the present proprietor had added a padlock of most elaborate workmanship, which presented a sufficient obstacle before the main lock could be approached.
In vain did the curiosity of the whole family direct itself to this scrutoire. Nobody had succeeded in discovering any part of its contents, except Rudolph, the only son of the bailiff; he had succeeded; at least his own belief was, that the old folio with gilt edges, and bound in black velvet, which he had one day surprised his father anxiously reading, belonged to the mysterious scrutoire; for the door of the scrutoire, though not open, was unlocked, and Elias had hastily closed the book with great agitation, at the same time ordering his son out of the room in no very gentle tone. At the time of this incident Rudolph was about twelve years of age.
Since that time the young man had sustained two great losses in the deaths of his excellent mother and a sister tenderly beloved. His father also had suffered deeply in health and spirits under these afflictions. Every day he grew more fretful and humoursome; and Rudolph, upon his final return home from school in his eighteenth year, was shocked to find him greatly altered in mind as well as in person. His flesh had fallen away, and he seemed to be consumed by some internal strife of thought. It was evidently his own opinion that he was standing on the edge of the grave, and he employed himself unceasingly in arranging his affairs, and in making his successor acquainted with all such arrangements as regarded his more peculiar interests. One evening as Rudolph came in suddenly from a neighbor’s house, and happened to pass the scrutoire, he found the door wide open, and the inside obviously empty. Looking round he observed his father standing on the hearth close to a great fire, in the midst of which was consuming the old black book.
The Valancourt Book of Horror Stories, Volume Two Page 23