Murgunstrumm and Others

by Cave, Hugh

  Yes, she loves me. She has always loved me. As for my returning that love, I am not so sure. How can a man's heart be concerned with love when it is full of bitterness? These vile arms of mine have robbed me of all human thoughts.

  June 3. What did I say in the line above this? "These vile arms of mine have robbed me of all human thoughts?" That is true. But they have not robbed me of all inhuman thoughts! This morning, while I stared across the breakfast table at Helen, a thought came to me so horrible and hideous that Helen asked me what had frightened me. Frightened me! Great God, the thing is even now growing in my brain—growing malignantly, terribly. It is driving me mad.

  June 4. What am I—a monster? All day long I have allowed this hideous new thought of mine to prey upon me. I have even attempted to convince myself that it is not hideous. I, Peter Maxon, have deliberately and viciously considered the business of murder. Well, why not? The God of "goodness" and "mercy" had no compunctions about murdering me. Why should I not have the last laugh?

  June 5. I am going to do it. Monster, am I. Very well then, I shall be a monster. As a matter of fact, I shall be doing her a favor. I shall be relieving her of the necessity of looking longer at the vile body of the man she loves. She will be happier dead, loving me as she does.

  I have sent for DiAngelo. He can be trusted. I know enough about him to put him behind prison bars; be will ask no questions, nor will he talk afterwards.

  Tonight, when he has come, I shall ask Helen to make coffee for us. The rest will be easy.

  August 8. It is a long time since I last wrote in this book. Now I am able once again to use my hands. No, not my hands, but Helen's. Yes, I have done it. God help me, I am a murderer. But I have had the last laugh.

  It was not an easy thing to do, despite the cold-blooded preparations I had made. She died quietly, from the morphine which I placed in her coffee, and because she died that way, without pain, her lips were smiling at me all the time I worked over her.

  No, it was not easy. Had I been a less skillful surgeon, the result might well have been death for me, too. As it was, I owe my life to DiAngelo. He was indispensable. Now, after weeks of agony, I am able to use these new arms of mine.

  As for Helen, they took her away and she is at peace. That, too, was carefully arranged, and in attending to the details DiAngelo did me the greatest favor. No one knows, except us two, that the woman who was quietly laid away to rest was laid away without arms. No one knows, either, that she was not my wife. The neighbors pity me. It is all very strange and complex.

  But I have arms again—strong, straight arms, thanks to DiAngelo's surgical skill. In a few weeks more they will be healed, and the world will never know.

  August 16. It is four A.M. and I am sitting here at the desk because I am afraid. Something unforeseen has happened. An hour ago I awoke in bed and my arms were moving and I was not moving them. They were pulling me toward the window; when my first sensation of horror had subsided, I realized that the window was open. I left my bed and strode slowly toward it, and stood there, and then I realized something else. That window faces south—and it was on a country road, directly south of this house, that Helen was laid away in the small, rural cemetery of DiAngelo's choosing. Not until I had closed the window did my arms become quiet again.

  What strange thing is this that has happened? Could I have been dreaming, or have my arms really a will of their own? Great God, do these arms still belong to Helen?

  August 31. I have hired a housekeeper, an elderly lady whose name is Mrs. Wilkes. I did not want her, but I was afraid to live alone any longer. I am convinced now that I am in grave danger.

  These arms of mine are not mine. A hundred or more unimportant things have happened in the past few days to convince me that they possess a will of their own. Yesterday, for instance, I looked at a magazine in a news store and was attracted to it by the very lovely illustration of a woman on the cover. The man in the store wrapped the magazine for me and would have handed it to me; and my hand refused to go into my pocket for the money with which to pay him! For more than a minute I stood there, attempting to force my hand to do as I wished. And in the end I found it necessary to stammer my apologies and walk out of the store.

  What does this mean? Can it be that Helen is jealous, or is it something more serious? Is it possible that she is merely showing me the extent of her power over me, in order to prepare me for what is to come?

  I do not know the answer, and I am afraid. So I have hired Mrs. Wilkes to take care of me.

  September 7. Helen is jealous of Mrs. Wilkes. At first I attributed this thought to my own imagination and to the condition of my nerves. Now I know better. Today, while the lady was sitting in the living-room, I found myself being drawn toward her. Had she not suddenly turned to stare at me, I should have tiptoed to the back of her chair and seized her.

  Now she is threatening to leave me. What am I to do?

  September 17. Mrs. Wilkes has again threatened to leave me. Today, while she was serving me my dinner and bending over me, my hands suddenly dropped knife and fork and moved toward her. They moved of their own volition; I had nothing to do with it. Fortunately, the good lady stepped backward in time!

  Fortunately, too, Mrs. Wilkes does not suspect the real reason for my strange antics. She misunderstands my motives entirely, and believes I am desirous of embracing her. She told me today that she would tolerate no more of it, and that if I did not "alter my ways" she would give up her position.

  My God, what have I become? These arms of mine are becoming more and more sinister in their movements. They give me no peace!

  If they can overcome my will while I am awake, what hideous acts may they not perform when I am asleep? When I consider the fearful possibilities, I am terrified!

  October 7. The worst has happened. Last evening I was in the best of spirits. For several days the strange power that possesses my arms had been dormant and I had almost succeeded in assuring myself that I had at last obtained a measure of peace. Because I was in such good spirits, I asked Mrs. Wilkes to accompany me to the neighborhood theater and she accepted.

  We returned to the house about eleven o'clock, and before midnight we had both retired for the night. Almost immediately after getting into bed, I fell asleep.

  When I awoke, I was in Mrs. Wilkes' room, bending above her. My fingers were locked in her throat. She was dead.

  God help me, I have murdered her! Even now, as I sit here, the good lady is lying dead in the room above me—strangled by my own bands! What will become of me?

  October 9. I have done the only thing possible. I have told the neighbors that Mrs. Wilkes left me, and I have hidden her body in the cellar, behind some boxes. In truth, I would not care much if she were found there. They would condemn me to death. But what good is life to me when my soul is not my own?

  Did I say "Life"? My God, what mockery that word contains! I know, now, what can happen in the hours of darkness when I am asleep. Nothing can be worse; not even the thought of being branded and put to death for murder. Yet I am not so sure. Perhaps I no longer care what becomes of me, so long as God be merciful enough to mete out my punishment quickly!

  This evening I awoke from an early nap and found myself in the bathroom at the end of the hail. Found myself standing stiff as stone before the medicine cabinet. What was I doing there? At first, in bewilderment, I did not comprehend; then a realization of the hideous truth came to me. I knew the answer. And, as if in grim corroboration of my thoughts, the hall clock downstairs suddenly chimed the hour—the same hour at which Helen had left me forever with a smile of contentment on her dying lips!

  I think I know now what the end will be—for me.

  October 14. Today I met John Andrews, an old friend and classmate of mine. Because he insisted, I invited him to the house. Perhaps if I can find courage enough to tell him the whole truth, he will be able to help me, though how I can be helped at this late date I do not know. At any rate, he is coming here t
his evening and I am hopeful for the best.

  October 15. John is here. I think be suspects me of being mad. Last evening, when he called, I suggested that he remain with me during his stay in Westhaven. He agreed and went back to his hotel to get his things. While he was gone, I became suddenly possessed of the fear that he would discover Mrs. Wilkes' body, and I hurriedly planned a way to dispose of it more securely.

  Whether I misjudged the time or not, I do not know. After dismembering the corpse and burying it in the far corner of the cellar where the ground is soft and damp, I came upstairs to await John's arrival—and there he sat, staring at me! And I still held the trowel and knives and other tools with which I had been working!

  I did my best to appear nonchalant, but I am afraid John entertains queer thoughts concerning me. How much is it safe to tell him?

  October 16. I am afraid again. Last night, while I lay awake in bed, a horrible desire came over me to go to John's room at the other end of the hall. My hands were twitching, just as they twitched after they had murdered Mrs. Wilkes. Can it be that Helen is jealous of John, too? Can it be that she intends to punish me for my sin by forcing me to live forever alone, with no friends whatever? Is that to be my torment?

  John has gone out now, for a walk. He promised to return, but I wonder if he will. If he does, I shall tell him everything—or better still, I shall let him read this book. Then he will understand, and unless be condemns me for the horrible things I have done, he may perhaps discover a way to help me.

  Yes, I shall hand him this book when he returns. And I shall tell him to lock his door tonight. Dear God, let him not hate me! Let him understand!

  There the diary ended. There its pages of horror and agony came to a close, and I, John Andrews, shut the book slowly and stared at its black covers. More than an hour had passed since I had laboriously read the first lines of that terrible volume.

  The room was quiet, deathly quiet. Above my head burned the unshaded light, throwing its ghastly glare over floor and walls and ceiling. Like a dead man I sat there, propped up in bed, staring—staring at nothing, yet seeing the whole parade of horrors which had come out of the book before me.

  How long I sat there I do not know. Not long, surely, for the room terrified me and the silence of the house filled me with dread. When at last the horror-parade marched away from me, leaving me to myself, I flung back the bedspread and groped erect.

  Hurriedly I discarded my pajamas and got into my clothes, knowing only that I wanted to breathe clean sweet air again, to put Peter Maxon's house of evil far behind me and get away from the hideous book he had permitted me to read. But, as I regained control of my nerves, those mad thoughts were displaced by a realization that I must stay.

  No matter what sin he was guilty of, Peter was my friend. I had accepted his hospitality; I owed him the decency of doing my best to help him in this hour of despair. Furthermore, I owed it to myself to investigate. If I departed from this horror-house without doing that, I should be something less than a man.

  With these thoughts driving me, I moved silently toward the door.

  And then I stopped, aware suddenly of a sinister noise in the corridor beyond the locked barrier. Nearer it came, and louder, and it was the slow shf . . . shf . . . shf of slippered feet.

  I stood motionless, unable to shake loose the fear that came to seize me. Slowly, methodically the footsteps approached the door of my room, and there they ceased. I stepped backward, repressing the scream on my lips. As I stared at the scarred panels, the knob began slowly to turn.

  At that moment I was mortally afraid. Trembling from head to foot, I moved backward step by step until the wall ended my retreat. The panels of the door trembled to a soft, insistent knocking, and a voice was audible. Soft words came through the barrier to whisper in the room where I stood rigid.

  "Let me in, John," the voice pleaded. "It's only Peter. I—I want to talk to you."

  I made no answer. My fists were clenched; my chest was heaving with a mighty ebb and flow of breath. A cold bead of perspiration trickled slowly down the side of my face and splashed on the back of my half-raised hand.

  Plaintively the voice moaned from behind that locked door. "Please, John! Please open the door, so we can talk. I—I haven't much longer. In a few minutes it will be too late—"

  I could feel the blood drain from my face. Could feel my eyes widen with utter horror. Too late? It was already, too late! That voice, speaking to me and entreating me to open the door, was not Peter Maxon's voice, not the voice of my friend! It was a woman's voice! It belonged to the woman whom Peter Maxon had once loved!

  And yet it was not completely that, either. Unmistakably it contained a masculine quality, as of a man consciously impersonating a woman. Good God

  Then, for the second time I regained control of myself. No matter what happened in this house of madness, I must remain sane! No matter how irrational everything and everybody else in it might be, I must act rationally. I could take care of myself, at least against such creatures as I knew were in the house with me. That much I was sure of. I must fight against terror and be calm!

  Slowly I stepped forward, and again the door before me vibrated to the thumping of a heavy fist. That strange voice, half Maxon's and half hers, shrieked at me in delirium.

  "I've got to talk to you, John! God above, I haven't much time left! I want to tell you—"

  There the voice reached its peak of shrillness, and died. The hammering on the door ceased abruptly. I heard a heavy scraping of feet and then a low moan—and then, beyond the barrier, something thudded to the floor of the corridor.

  Even before the echoes of that thud had died away, I had the door open and was stumbling forward!

  I lurched three steps, jarred to a halt, and stared down with eyes full of horror. At my feet lay the pajama-clad body of Peter Maxon, sprawled in a contorted heap on the floor. I thought he was dead.

  He was not. On my knees beside him, I bent closer and caught the low sigh of his labored breathing. The feeble rays of a street-lamp filtered through the window of the room behind me and slanted palely across the threshold, illuminating Peter's face. And that face was a mask of strange contentment.

  On the verge of death, Peter Maxon smiled up at me and tried to speak. The words that whispered from his lips were barely audible. Surely they were not coherent.

  "It—finished, John. All—finish now. I knew she would—do it—that way. Don't think—too badly of me—"

  His eyes fluttered toward me and his glassy stare clung to my face. With a sudden sob I took him in my arms, tried to still the trembling of his body. And in my arms he died, with a ghastly rattle in his throat and, paradoxically, a smile of utter peace on his lips.

  Gently I lowered him to the floor and swayed erect. Then I saw what I had not seen before. The fingers of his right hand were curled about a small brown bottle whose cork had been removed. I stooped to remove the thing from his grasp, and my eyes went wide with sudden comprehension.

  Black letters glared up at me from the bottle's label. Those letters formed the word MORPHINE.

  That is all. Since that night I have done much thinking, much wondering. I think now that I understand the full meaning of the smile that curved Peter Maxon's dying lips.

  With morphine he had murdered her. With morphine she had murdered him. He knew, and was glad.

  Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps Peter Maxon's conscience and better nature drove him mad, and, suffering from hallucinations, his demented mind led those unholy hands of his to perform a ritual of death in keeping with the death he had meted out to her. If so, it was a just retribution, conceived by a lost mind in torment.

  But I am not sure. There are things that lurk beyond the pale of human understanding. One may only grope blindly in darkness, and hope to find truth.

  Dead Man's Belt

  The particular wheel of industry of which Mulvahey and Jum Peters were morose and perspiring spokes, stopped its revolutions, year in a
nd year out, approximately one hour after sundown when the city dump got too dark to be further fruitful. At this hour Mulvahey and Jum Peters plodded wearily and intricately through the sodden ashes and tin cans and rotted papers and corroded metals to the uncouth shanty which squatted, beetle-like, at the southern extremity of the dump yards.

  Here the accumulated filth of the dump proper merged reluctantly into layers of expanding black sand and ran away for ever and ever into a waste expanse of emptiness. As far as the eye could follow, this untrodden tract of bleak shadow extended until the sky fell into it. "Nuttin' Ian' " Mulvahey called it, because Mulvahey had imagination. Jum Peters merely scowled, and frowned at it and sometimes cursed it, and all the time hated it.

  The dump yard was the end of the city, far beyond car-track terminals and paved roadbeds. This other land was the end of everything, peopled only by scavenger dogs and sand crawlers and slate-colored rats and sometimes slinking, low-bellied cats. Jum Peters hated it because it was too near and because it was always there, never retreating, never relenting.

  "Debbie dark!" he cursed it. "You'm de debble hissel', jus' a-waitin' an' awaitin' foh nih creep up 'n' swaller wot am' belong tuh yuh! Debbie sh' 'nough is wot you is!"

  The shanty was all there was. It clung to the dividing line between Mulvahey's and Jum Peters' terrain and the "out-there" stretch of nothing-land. The shanty and all in it had been born of the dump. Mulvahey and Jum Peters and Mulvahey's woman had scraped it out of the dump yard's buried wombs and forced it together with black, callous, insensible hands.

  Sheet tin, ragged on its edges and grimly streaked with red-brown rust, gripped hold of itself tenaciously and made four deformed, shapeless walls like an angular long-dead waterbug whose legs were curled under and out of sight. The roof, set atop it, was a bulging camera shutter of the same metal, interleaved and again interleaved, where pointed contumacies stuck their jagged necks over the edge to keep watch on the disorder of muck below.