She was screaming! Screaming down in the basement, screaming down in the dark.
He ran, swinging the heavy wrench. He clumped down the stairs, down into the darkness, the screams tearing up at him. She was caught, it had her, she was struggling with it but it was strong, too strong, and the light came streaming in on the pool of water beside the shattered pipe and in the reflection he saw her face and the blackness of other faces swirling around her and holding her.
He brought the wrench up, brought it down on the black blur, hammering and hammering and hammering until the screaming died away. And then he stopped and looked down at her. The dark blur had faded away into the reflection of the water—the reflection that had evoked it. But she was still there, and she was still, and she would be still forever now. Only the water was getting red, where her head rested in it. And the end of the wrench was red, too.
For a moment he started to tell her about it, and then he realized she was gone. Now there were only the two of them left. He and it.
And he was going upstairs. He was walking upstairs, still carrying the bloody wrench, and he was going over to the phone to call the police and explain.
He sat down in a chair before the phone, thinking about what he’d tell them, how he’d explain. It wouldn’t be easy. There was this madwoman, see, and she looked into mirrors until there was more of her alive in her reflection than there was in her own body. So when she committed suicide she lived on, somehow, and came alive in mirrors or glass or anything that reflected. And she killed others or drove them to death and their reflections were somehow joined with hers so that this thing kept getting stronger and stronger, sucking away at life with that awful core of pride that could live beyond death. Woman, thy name is vanity! And that, gen¬tlemen, is why I killed my wife . . .
Yes, it was a fine explanation, but it wouldn’t hold water. Water—the pool in the basement had evoked it. He might have known it if only he’d stopped to think, to reflect. Reflect. That was the wrong word, now. Reflect. The way the window pane before him was reflecting.
He stared into the glass now, saw it behind him, surging up from the shadows. He saw the bearded man’s face, the peering, pathetic, empty eyes of a little girl, the goggling grimacing stare of an old woman. It wasn’t there, behind him, but it was alive in the reflection, and as he rose he gripped the wrench tightly. It wasn’t there, but he’d strike at it, fight at it, come to grips with it somehow.
He turned, moving back, the ring of shadow-faces pressing. He swung the wrench. Then he saw her face coming up through all the rest. Her face, with shining splinters where the eyes should be. He couldn’t smash it down, he couldn’t hit her again.
It moved forward. He moved back. His arm went out to one side. He heard the tinkle of window-glass behind him and vaguely remembered that this was how the old woman had died. The way he was dying now—falling through the window, and cutting his throat, and the pain lanced up and in, tearing at his brain as he hung there on the jagged spikes of glass, bleeding his life away.
Then he was gone.
His body hung there, but he was gone.
There was a little puddle on the floor, moving and growing. The light from outside shone on it, and there was a reflection.
Something emerged fully from the shadows now, emerged and capered demurely in the darkness.
It had the face of an old woman and the face of a child, the face of a bearded man, and his face, and her face, changing and blending.
It capered and postured, and then it squatted, dabbling. Finally, all alone in the empty house, it just sat there and waited. There was nothing to do now but wait for the next to come. And meanwhile, it could always admire itself in that growing, growing red reflection on the floor . . .
FITZ-JAMES O’BRIEN (1828—1862) was born in Ireland and spent his youth writing for Irish, English and Scottish magazines. He came to America in 1852 and continued to write in this country. O’Brien lost his life ten years later fighting in the Civil War on the Union side. He is best remembered for the fantasy tale “What Was It?” and the following verse, a “riding” poem that is structurally reminiscent of Goëthe’s “The Erl-King” (elsewhere this volume).
The Demon of the Gibbet
By Fitz-James O’Brien
There was no west, there was no east,
No star abroad for eyes to see;
And Norman spurred his jaded beast
Hard by the terrible gallows-tree.
“O, Norman, haste across this waste,—
For something seems to follow me!”
“Cheer up, dear Maud, for, thanked be God,
We nigh have passed the gallows-tree!”
He kissed her lip: then—spur and whip!
And fast they fled across the lea.
But vain the heel, and rowel steel,—
For something leaped from the gallows-tree!
“Give me your cloak, your knightly cloak,
That wrapped you oft beyond the sea!
The wind is bold, my bones are old,
And I am cold on the gallows-tree!”
“O holy God! O dearest Maud,
Quick, quick, some prayers—the best that be!
A bony hand my neck has spanned,
And tears my knightly cloak from me!”
“Give me your wine,—the red, red wine,
That in the flask hangs by your knee!
Ten summers burst on me accurst,
And I’m athirst on the gallows-tree!”*
“O Maud, my life, my loving wife!
Have you no prayer to set us free?
My belt unclasps,—a demon grasps,
And drags my wine-flask from my knee!”
“Give me your bride, your bonnie bride,
That left her nest with you to flee!
O she hath flown to be my own,
For I’m alone on the gallows-tree!”
“Cling closer, Maud, and trust in God!
Cling close!—Ah, heaven, she slips from me!”
A prayer, a groan, and he alone
Rode on that night from the gallows-tree.
ANATOLE LE BRAZ was born in 1859 in Saint-Servais, Brittany, and devoted his life to teaching philosophy and writing books and tales dealing with the legends of his nlative province. There are several peculiar folk myths attached to Christmas Eve, and Le Braz chronicled one in “The Fisherman’s Story,” which appeared in Ghosts: A Treasury of Chilling Tales Old and New (Doubleday, 1981). Here is another odd Yuletide tale, one that depends on the belief that animals briefly gain the power of speech on Christmas Eve.
The Owl
By Anatole Le Braz
I
In those days—I mean, during the era of King Louis Philippe—I made wooden shoes for a living. Our work team camped in the Gurunhuël mountain range, on a slope leading into town. Surrounding us was a magnificent forest of beech trees which have since been turned into shoes. Between all of us “cousins” (as we were accustomed to call ourselves), we comprised a sort of village of five or six huts. Mine stood next to the ruins of an old chapel, and here I lived with my wife, God bless her, and our four children, who now are scattered about the world.
The only sections of the chapel still standing are a portion of wall, a dilapidated altar overrun with brambles and here and there the bases of columns buried beneath a thick layer of moss, weeds and dead leaves, but towards the eastern side and behind the altar was one great window through which light fell on the choir, standing nearly intact at the end of a passageway, a frame for the old stones and ancient glass. Here, in the evenings after work, I loved to come and sit peacefully on the edge of this stone sculpture and smoke my pipe and think, remote from the women’s chatter and the gleeful noise of the children.
There were nests of owls amongst the ruins, and late one afternoon, I don’t remember how, as I was hoisting myself up to my usual seat, I startled one of these nocturnal creatures. As it fled its hole, it made such a strange sound that one might ha
ve mistaken it for someone moaning. The setting sun cast a sharp glare of winter light upon the ruins. Shocked and blinded by the dying crimson glow, the owl landed in my lap. I’d never seen one so close, only on barn doors where fearful peasants sometimes crucified them.
Totally bewildered by its predicament, the owl tottered on the edge of my lap and would have pitched downwards from our lofty perch, but I grasped its wings gently. I don’t believe I’ve ever held anything in my hands so soft and silky, so warm and trembling. I turned the bird away from the light to spare him the bright, stabbing glare of the setting sun.
I looked into the owl’s eyes and they transfixed me. Have you ever studied the eyes of an owl? They are dim, and yet like huge mirrors, you think you can see, vaguely, all sorts of mysterious things deep within. They are like the twin openings of a bottomless abyss and seemingly many miles down into their depths, one imagines one perceives great stirrings of shadows and light—undiscovered continents and oceans, processions of crowds and people who come and go like the speechless, melancholy phantoms who people our dreams.
Deeply, deeply I gazed into the owl’s eyes, but it studied me as well, trembling even though its sad, compelling stare never wavered from my face. Who knows what thoughts troubled the frail creature? Did it fear that I, too, in fear, would nail it to the side of one of the surrounding beeches?
In an effort to reassure the owl and perhaps myself, as well, I smoothed its feathers and said, “Peace, peace, you poor beast. I am not a bad person. I do not wish to harm you.” And it was true. We shoemakers live in the woods in quiet solitude amidst the sacred silence of nature. Though we wield axes and fell trees, we are serene souls who love birds that keep us company as we work, singing to us as if we were their guests and they, our hosts, were anxious to soothe and entertain us in our toil. The owl does not sing and does not show itself, but still I know the sound of its mournful melody in the depths of the night, and I sense it perching on the roof of my hut, moving me towards solemn thoughts . . . remembering, sometimes, my long-dead ancestors who, according to legend, occasionally take the form of an owl in order to remind the living to respect those who are long past. For me, such thoughts are often in mind. The life hereafter preoccupies me more than life itself.
I stroked the owl’s russet gray-tinged feathers and spoke my thoughts to it in a low soothing tone, imagining that it might be as old as the beech trees along the path, that once the owl saw the chapel standing where now only stones cover the ground, that once it heard the bells summoning the people to “Saints’ pardon”[1] All the while that I spoke to it, the owl looked at me with its great eyes with their immobile pupils flecked with gold, pupils that seemed like stars against the blue velvet of the dark universe.
“Come,” I said to myself, aloud, “let us return this poor blind creature to his rightful home.”
I pulled back the veil of hanging ivy which hid the nest from which the owl had tumbled forth, and as I did I realized that the bird’s home was not some chance cavity in the wall, but one of the compartments of an old cupboard, the kind one sees in churches to the right of the choir and generally used for storing sacred vials.
Two such vials were still there, one for wine, one for water, both covered with dirt and shrouded in layer upon layer of spiderwebs, which probably preserved them from the erosion of Time.
Next to the sacred vials lay a book. It was an enormous missal, very old and bound with metal clasps, stained with mold and corroded by humidity, but some of the gold edging still shone through.
The sight of the book made me forget the frightened owl who by then had taken refuge in a secluded corner of the cupboard. I was tempted by the missal. I knew a rather eccentric English gentleman in Belle-Isle who collected books of this type, paying their weight in gold, and even more when they were very old.
Surely the missal no longer belonged to anyone—and yet as I hid it underneath my jacket, I felt curiously evil, or at least greedy. I left my customary perch like a robber sneaking away from the scene of his crime, and as I did, the owl hooted mournfully, like a soul wailing the loss of Salvation.
II
Christmas was near. The night before the holiday, our camp leader asked me, “Would you like to go to Belle-Isle tonight? There’s a shipment of shoes requested at Roll Even, the store on the Grand’ Rue. You’d be in time to attend midnight mass at the village church.”
I have always been a good Christian, but to my shame I accepted enthusiastically, not because of the midnight mass, but because I would have the opportunity to seek out my English friend and sell him the missal.
Alone in my hut, I took the book from its hiding place, wrapped it in a piece of cloth and slid it into the inside pocket of my jacket. After supper, with the cart loaded and my horse harnessed, I snapped the whip and began my journey. I was in high spirits. I have heard tales of travelers who set forth on Christmas Eve and met with ill luck, but nothing of the sort occurred to me, for there was the alluring promise of great profit at the end of my ride.
The cold was biting. I wrapped myself in my coarse wool mantle, clamping the reins between my knees, my hands buried in my coat pockets. My horse was the most gentle and intelligent animal one could imagine. He understood the language of Brittany as well as I or any of my “cousins.” All it took was one word for him to speed up his pace or slow down. He took the descending slope of the Gurunhuël at a trot.
It was a clear night. A layer of hoarfrost powdered the countryside. The swaying of the cart rocked me gently, and I was lost in thought, speculating on the price the missal would bring, wondering what gifts I should buy for my wife and children. I pictured in my mind’s eye my loved ones’ surprise and joy when I brought them such presents as only rich children receive . . . and yet the closer I got to Belle-Isle, the less the prospect pleased me. An inarticulate anxiety began to nag at me, the kind of odd uneasiness one feels when seriously contemplating an action that one knows in one’s heart to be wrong.
A sudden sound startled me. Behind me, out of the chilly darkness of the night, I heard a prolonged moan, a plaintive murmur sad enough to melt the soul. I heard it again, and yet again, and each time it was longer and more heavily laden with grief.
I jerked erect, pushed my cover aside, grabbed the reins and lashed out at my horse, who took off at full speed and plunged into the heart of the forest. Gigantic trees lined the path, their entangled, barren branches woven into a ceiling shutting out the sky. On either side of the road black tree trunks hemmed us in; behind them were more trunks, thousands of bare trunks. I, who had always considered myself a child of the forest—born in its shadow, lulled in its ancient arms, nourished at its soft scented breast—I who had always lived in the woods and drew my sustenance from her noble body and blood, I, for the first time was afraid. The large familiar beeches leaned over in a menacing manner I never knew before. Their branches seemed to reach out to pluck at me and stop my horse. The trees were a horde of mute ghosts glowering down with merciless intensity, and yes, they had eyes, every one of them. Look! on each shaft, at the top of the tallest branch, two pupils gleaming large and round, immobile, glaring with a pale colorless light.
My horse was just as frightened as I. He stopped abruptly in his tracks, his legs stiff, the hairs of his mane standing on end. Did I hear his heart beating wildly against his ribs, or was it mine thundering as if it would burst?
I shook so hard that I dropped the reins and was too terrified to think of setting foot outside the cart to pick them up. I sat in agonized expectation, icy drops of sweat trickling over me, my throat clutched tight with fear. God spare me from ever having to live through such unspeakable moments of dreadful anticipation again!
And then a large shape wheeled away from one of the trees and hung in space a moment above the road before landing softly on the side of the cart; a snowflake could not have made less noise. I gazed into two bright eyes I had mistaken for the eyes of the tree and an old formula came to mind, a charm a sorcere
r once taught me to ward off the Evil Eye.
“White or black?” I asked faintly. “Good, or evil? From God or the devil?”
“Mathias, do you not recognize me?” a weak, doleful voice asked. “I am the owl from the ruins of Saint-Melar. You helped me then, and now I shall save you. You think you are on the road to Belle-Isle, but I tell you that you are on the road to Hell.”
There is an old legend which says that on the eve of our Saviour’s birth, dumb beasts are given the power of speech. Was this why the owl spoke to me, calling me by name, or was he some long-dead forebear guiding me away from sin? . . . and yet, I told the bird, “I did no wrong, none that I know of.”
“You have a weight beneath your arm.”
I blushed with shame. “I robbed no one. An old book found in the ruins of a wall. Is that such a great sin?”
“Listen, Mathias,” said the bird. “Once there was a parish at Saint-Melar. A hundred years ago today, a priest celebrated the midnight mass. When he was done and the congregation dispersed to their homes, the priest was just taking off his ornaments, happy at the thought of a warm fire awaiting him in the presbytery, when a beggar woman appeared in the vestry asking him to give her confession and communion. But the priest irritably replied, ‘Return tomorrow morning, Brigada, for I will be here from nine on for confession and you may take communion at the high mass.’ The old woman’s eyes brimmed with tears, not not daring to insist, she bowed humbly and left. The next day at dawn, a road laborer found her wrapped in a shroud of snow, lying dead in a ditch.”
“A terrible” thing,” I muttered, “but what has it to do with me?”
Masterpieces of Terror and the Supernatural Page 72