by Cave, Hugh
I took a step toward the lamp, and stopped. Something unbelievably cold, yet soft—soft as the touch of a woman's lips!—caught at my left ankle. My heart missed a beat. A thrill swept through me—the kind of thrill that would seethe in my blood if a beautiful, undraped woman were to appear suddenly before me in some totally unexpected place!
I looked down and could have sworn, though nothing was there, that something like a human hand had hold of my foot! Then a dull creaking noise stiffened me. I jerked loose, raised my head, and saw that the bulkhead at the far end of the cellar was being raised. There was the explanation of my "clutching hand"—simply an inrush of cold air from the night outside!
I stared. Framed in the aperture was a face, a woman's face. It grew larger. A groping hand appeared, and the woman furtively descended the rotting wooden steps to the cellar floor.
She did not see me—and that was strange, for the lamp still burned. Slowly she advanced. Her dress was a cheap black rag that accented the unbelievable whiteness of her face and throat. Her body gleamed through the gaps in it. I saw a bare shoulder, the sleek curve of a half-bare breast. I saw the too-white flow of a shapely feminine leg.
She prowled past the bench, stopped. Her voice, a sibilant whisper, beat against the cellar walls.
"She's been here again, Jim Callister. I know it! I could tell by the look in her eye when she got home. She comes here more often than I know, and you talk to her, you put ideas into her head. But you ain't going to get her! I'll take her so far away you won't never get your hellish hairy hands on her! You hear? I'm defying you! I stood up to you once and I'm doin' it again!"
She shook her fist. Her calcimine face was shapeless with hate. I swear I could hear the machine-gun beat of her heart beneath that white, bare breast! Sharply I said, "Wait, Mrs. Callister!"
She stopped as though stabbed. Her glittering eyes found me, focused slowly. I realized then why she had not seen me before. She was half blind.
"It's quite all right, Mrs. Callister," I said. "I'm Peter Winslow. I've bought this house. I'd like to talk to you and—"
She flung herself backward, whirled toward the bulkhead. The darkness outside had swallowed her before I could make a move to stop her. Bewildered and afraid, I went upstairs.
That night we heard the rats. Anne trembled in my arms and huddled against me, her sweet young body hot with terror. I tried to comfort her. Gently, gently I kissed her quivering lips, her eyes, the soft warm hollow of her throat. Deliberately I made love to her, seeking artfully to arouse other emotions that would force her fears into the background. But even as my efforts won a delicious response, even as she melted against me and put her arms hungrily about my neck—even as her parted lips shaped themselves to mine in a kiss that was all love and left no room for fear—I thought darkly, The rats are in the cellar. Susie Callister's father died there. Susie is queer. Her mother is queer. No ordinary rats ever whispered like that. . .
And when I slept at last, exhausted, and should have dreamed of the warm and wondrous nearness of the woman I loved, I dreamed instead of the whispers. I heard them in my brain. Strange dreams for a bridegroom!
In the morning I drove alone to the village, to buy traps. The proprietor of the general store was a thin, bony man. "You're the feller who bought the old Prentiss place, ain't you?" he asked."Like it there, do you?"
"I think we might," I said. "When the place is fixed up."
He gave me an oblique look. "Paint and repairs will help a heap, but they won't alter what happened to Jim Callister. I'm the undertaker here, and I fixed Jim up for buryin'. You can't tell me he died natural, and I said so till I was hoarse, but no one'd listen!"
"What do you mean?" I asked uneasily.
"Well, he was workin' down in the cellar the night he died. Seems he spent most of his spare time workin' down there. So this night it was mighty quiet down there and his wife got worried, and went down and found him layin' there. Heart attack it was, accordin' to old Doc Digby. But I took care of the body. I ain't no learned medical man and don't pretend to be, but I never see a heart attack grow hair on a man. Did you?"
"Hair?"
"Outside of his face, there wasn't an inch of Jim Callister that didn't have hair on it. Hair like you'd see on a monkey!"
I gave him a long stare, trying to figure him out.
"Another thing," he said. "When I pumped Jim Callister clean, I didn't like what I took out of him. I still think it was poison!"
I had plenty to think about on the ride back. One thing was certain: I was going to have a talk with Dr. Digby. And I was going to have a more thorough look at that cellar.
A car of rather ancient vintage was parked at our gate when I got there, and by its doctor's emblem I knew at once that our visitor was a medical man. He was. His name was Everett Digby. He was a bald little man in his sixties, whom I disliked immediately. The hand he offered me was like a wet rubber glove.
"Thought I'd drop in," he said with a mechanical smile, "to say hello."
"You thought you'd drop in," I mused, "to see if I intend to reside here permanently. You've found out I'm a doctor, and you're afraid of competition!"
We talked for half an hour about nothing. Finally, after a cautious build-up, I said, "The fellow at the store seems to think there was something strange about Jim Callister's death."
Digby laughed. "I wouldn't pay too much attention to Ben if I were you. He makes his own liquor and it does queer things to him."
I thought: One of you is lying! Anne excused herself and went to prepare lunch. Then Digby changed his manner.
Leaning forward, he said pointedly, in a low voice, "You were crazy to buy this place, Winslow. What Ben Nevins told you is right, or partly right, anyhow. There was something odd about Callister's death, and this house was the cause of it! If I were you, I'd clear out!"
"Why?"
He shot another glance at the door. "I'll tell you what I know, and leave out what I think. Jim Callister came here to live eight years ago. At first everything went fine. Then he built a work-bench down in the cellar, and things began happening. He got thin and worried. His wife begged me to look at him and I did—and it stumped me. There wasn't a thing wrong with him that I could discover, yet his skin was turning soft and white, and little clumps of hair were growing out of it. And he was changing mentally. Jim used to be a fine fellow with a big, hearty laugh. Now he was grim as a grave, sort of sly and stealthy."
"He got worse," I asked, "before his death?"
"I wouldn't know about the condition of his body. After that first examination he wouldn't ever let me look at him again. Mentally he got more surly by the hour. His wife and girl went through hell."
"And you think this house had something to do with it?"
Digby looked away, moistening his lips. "Something changed him. I don't know what. All I say is, you ought to clear out of here. There's things in this world we don't understand, Winslow. I don't know what turned Jim Callister into a vicious, hairy beast, but—" He caught himself, but it was too late. Anne was there in the doorway.
Digby stood up, little lines of sweat forming on his bald head. "Got to be going," he mumbled. "Said more than I meant to." He hurried down the steps to his car.
When he had gone, Anne said quietly, "What did he mean about Jim Callister, Peter?"
"Nothing, darling."
"I want you to tell me."
I told her, selecting with care the words I used. "Chances are," I concluded, "Digby doesn't relish the thought of having another doctor in this town, and is trying to frighten us out." I put my arms around her and shaped my mouth to hers. Yet even then, now that I think back on it—even with Anne's delectable body trembling eagerly in my embrace, and her soft, warm, willing lips thrilling me with a kiss—I was thinking of something else. Of the whispers!
That evening while knocking down some old shelves in the kitchen, I felt a sharp, shooting pain in my ankle. It disappeared almost at once, but at the first opportu
nity I went upstairs, shut the bedroom door behind me and removed my sock.
A patch of grayish white skin, peculiarly soft, extended from my instep to a point an inch or so above the shin bone. Thoroughly scared, I smeared it with salve and bound it, replacing shoe and sock. Then I began thinking of the cellar again. I had to go down there! Furtively I began seeking some excuse for leaving Anne upstairs, so that I might shut myself up down there and wait. Wait for the whispers.
The opportunity came just before bedtime. Anne had undressed and slipped into her pajamas. We were having a nightcap in the kitchen. I was staring at my wife, at the loose neck of her pajama jacket. As a bridegroom, I should have been marveling at the youthful beauty of her—the seductive shadows that played about her half exposed breasts; the alluring flow of her slim legs. I should have been saying, "This, all this, is mine to have and to hold, to love and to caress!" But I said, instead: "You go on upstairs, darling. I'll set those traps in the cellar."
She looked at me queerly. She took a step toward me, her arms half extended. I was thrillingly aware of the warm, sweet scent of her, of her smooth white skin, of her eagerness to be loved. But I turned and went down the cellar stairs, closing the door behind me.
Unerringly my feet took me to that patch of brown earth near the work bench. I waited. Ten, fifteen minutes I waited. Then—the whispers again! Out of the earth they came, or out of the walls—sibilant, seductive sounds that seemed to be words but were not.
My hands trembled. My whole body quivered with excitement. I crawled toward the source of the sounds, and suddenly my hands were claws, frantically digging in the earth!
Now the whispers mocked me. They beat against my brain, tormenting me, spurring me on to greater efforts. I clawed like an animal. Before long I had dug a hole some eighteen inches deep and encountered wood.
It was a cistern cover. I could not budge it. But I found a crowbar back of the furnace and worked like a madman, with sweat rolling down my face and arms, until slowly, bit by bit, I broke the seal of mortar that held the cover in place. And then, using all my strength, I pried it up and managed to move it to one side.
There in the black depths of the cellar I dropped to my hands and knees to peer into the yawning pit, and from the depths of it issued a human-like sigh, a sigh as caressing as the touch of a lover's hand.
I seized my flashlight and aimed it into the pit. Now the walls leaped into frightening prominence. Gray, wet walls they were, covered with a fungus growth that seemed to writhe in agony as the light laved it. But the depths of the cistern held their secret tenaciously. Powerful as was the light, it revealed only gray walls vanishing into a deep, impenetrable darkness. A whispering darkness. A darkness full of nameless rustlings that called to me!
The cellar had grown unbearably cold. My flesh crawled. I retreated in dismay from the pit's mouth, but the dank, freezing chill enveloped me, as though invisible hands had stripped me naked and were rubbing me with ice!
Sharp, biting pains attacked my chest and arms. Then came the fear, fear of the dark, of the pit, of the crowding cellar walls! Sobbing out my terror, I swung the cistern cover back into place and clawed the earth over it. Then I ran.
When I entered the bedroom, Anne knew at once that something was wrong. She was lying there in bed with a magazine, waiting for me. "Peter!" she cried. "You're so pale! What's wrong?"
I crept into bed and huddled against her, seeking relief in the warm, sweet closeness of her body. I was afraid! My hands clutched at her, desperately, and I buried my face against the satin warmth of her shoulder. I crushed her against me, afraid that something might come between us and destroy me.
"Darling," she whispered without complaint—though God knows I must have been brutally hurting her!— "Darling, you're upset." Then her lips found mine; her slim body lay limp and yielding in my embrace. My fears subsided.
In the morning Anne rose quietly, so not to wake me. But I was awake. I lay with one eye half open, watching her dress. I thought of the whispers, and of what they had commanded me to do. My furtive gaze explored the lovely lines of her body, the rounded fullness of her exquisite breasts, the curve of her throat, the soft, sweet beauty of her face. In her innocence, she thought I was asleep!
She had planned to drive to Harkness this morning for curtain material and a few other things we badly needed. I heard her go. Then, stealthily, I slipped out of bed, peeled off my pajamas and studied myself, naked, in the mirror.
I liked what I saw.
I dressed and went downstairs. Anne had left breakfast on the table. I ate slowly, filled with thoughts of her, of what was going to happen—had to happen —when she returned. Suddenly I heard the front door open, and the voice of Susie Callister calling anxiously, "Is—is anybody home?"
I smiled at that. The voice with which I answered her was not my voice. Oh, no. They told me what to say! They told me to invite the child in, to humor her.
I called to her and she came timidly into the sitting-room, and stood staring at me. "You—you said I could come sometimes," she reminded me. "You said I could talk to pa."
"My dear child . . . of course!"
"If—if I go downstairs, you won't tell ma I done it, will you?" Her deep-set eyes were pleading with me, and her lips trembled. "She licked me somethin' awful the last time. She—she says we're goin' to move away from here. Tomorrow, maybe. And I—I want to say goodbye to pa."
I smiled and took her arm. I led her down the hall to the cellar door and opened it, and stood there at the top of the treacherous cellar stairs, watching her while she slowly descended into the darkness. She was young, of course. Her frail little body was not very attractive. Still, her skin was white and clear; she had arms and legs and the beginnings of breasts. She was better than nothing.
I heard the whispers, and they were evil. Never before had they been so loud, so commanding. They told me what to do.
I closed the door softly and turned the key. Then I went back to the sitting-room and sat down to wait.
To—wait.
It came at last, and every expectant nerve in my body thrilled to it, as a lover to the subtle caress of his beloved's lips. A scream of terror pulsed up from the dark cellar walls. A sudden rush of footfalls sounded on the stairs. Frantic fists beat against the locked door!
Then the scream again, this time a rising ululation of agony, a wailing, tenuous cry that fluttered for a moment in space, then died. And I sat there smiling, with my twisted mind and sated senses soaking up every last lingering echo, until the house was still again.
The cellar was a vast vault of silence when I opened the door. There were no whispers. Descending, I looked about me. My little friend had said farewell to more than her dead father. She had vanished.
"There will be another soon," I said softly. "Just be patient."
The woman came about an hour later. Angrily she strode up the porch steps and banged on the front door, and when I opened the door to her she thrust her contorted face at me and said shrilly, "Susie came here, didn't she? Where is she?"
"My dear Mrs. Callister," I murmured, "what on earth makes you think—"
"Don't lie to me! I know that child like a book!"
"Come in, Mrs. Callister," I invited, "and look for yourself."
She stormed into the house, stabbed a quick look into the sitting-room, the dining-room, then strode down the hail to the kitchen. "Susie! Susie! Are you hiding from me, you little she-devil? Susie! Where are you?"
I followed her from room to room, slyly watching her. She would please them. She was shapely. Her legs were nicely rounded. Her mature body gleamed white as snow through the gaps in her worn-out dress. The front of her dress was tight, and her breasts thrust hard against the thin fabric. She was a woman, and in her own indelicate way she was desirable.
Upstairs we went, down again, and finally to the cellar door. There she hesitated. For one brief instant the anger on her wretched face was supplanted by fear. I opened the door.
"My dear Mrs. Callister, why not?"
"I just ain't!" Her voice rose to a screech. "Susie! Are you down there?"
It seemed strange to me that she could not hear the whispers. I heard them. I knew what they wanted me to do. Very carefully I stepped back. Mrs. Callister did not notice. I looked at my hands and raised them. Slowly, slowly . . . until they were poised only a few inches from her shoulders.
One savage thrust, and Susie Callister's mother would go screaming down the stairs! Then I would wrench the door shut, turn the key again, and—
But at that instant I heard the front door open, and my wife's voice called, "Peter! Will you help get the stuff out of the car, please? It's more than I can manage."
I closed the cellar door and went down the hall. Mrs. Callister followed me. Anne, her arms laden, stopped short.
"This is Mrs. Callister, Anne. She—er—is under the mistaken impression that her daughter is here. I've been having a difficult time trying to convince her otherwise."
Mrs. Callister said something under her breath and went past us to the door. Then she stopped. Too late I saw the tiny, frayed handkerchief lying there on the hall table.
She snatched it up and looked at it, turned slowly. Her eyes were slits, yellow with venom. "I know," she whispered. "I know what you've done! You've turned into one of them, like Jim did!" Then, with a shriek, she fled.
"The woman is mad," I said to Anne. "This is the damnedest village, full of the queerest people. Well, she's gone. That's something to be thankful for."
Anne was silent, but the look she gave me was strange. All morning she kept an eye on me. In the afternoon she said, "Peter, why don't you lie down and rest? You've worked so—so hard."
"I think I will."
"Please. You're not yourself, Peter. You—frighten me a little."