by Byron Craft
“And having located the machine and the amulet,” I cried, “What then? I’m not sure I’ll want to use them.”
“The choice may not be yours.” He looked at me for a moment, smiled gently and died.
***
I am reluctant to tell you what occurred next. The events that followed will always be with me. I doubt that anything will be able to remove them from my memory no matter how minute the details. And those grim recollections will sour every moment in my future.
I stood up and backed away from the body of Milton Armitage. I ran from the place, not even taking time to blow out the lamp, slamming the door behind me. The latch was missing of course and the door bounced away from the frame swinging inward again.
Outside the fog was very thick. I stopped and shouted for Jim. I was unnerved to discover that he was still not answering. Looking across the lawn I started toward where the car had been parked. I rushed to what I took to be the middle of the yard. I didn’t get very far however. A rock that lined our drive sent me sprawling and I slid across the wet grass.
To add to my uneasiness my ears detected a sound, a fleshy sound, like the licking of lips. It might have been water dripping, yet it seemed too irregular and muffled. When I picked myself up I could make out the front fender of the car and Jim’s outline through the rising swirls of mist. The moonlight struggled through the clouds and I could see him leaning against the fender. His manner was relaxed, almost careless, after all that had happened to stare at me so calmly over his shoulder.
I called to him as I approached saying that I hoped the car was fixed because I was ready to leave. Under the scant moonlight he looked very pale staring back at me grinning with a ghostly expression on his face. He was facing me, though his shoulder was turned away. For a moment I thought that it was a contortionist trick he had practiced to disgust his friends. I realized that the sound was much louder...it was something dripping.
Up close I could see that Jim Ruttick was still at his place. He hadn’t altered his position in quite a while. He was bent over the front fender of the car just as I had left him an hour before, except his head had been twisted around. His neck was half torn from his shoulders and the spine, broken and protruding from the skin gushed with a mixture of blood and spinal fluid.
I let out a yell and backed away. The M1 lay on the ground, the barrel bent in half. I looked frantically around me for a hidden assailant until it dawned on me what the course of events must have been. The creature, that monster VonTassell called a night gaunt must have stopped here before entering the summer house. It took revenge for the bullet wound it had suffered earlier and poor Jim never saw it coming.
I touched his arm and his body slid sideways along the car’s fender, falling to the ground. The twisted corpse laid on its side staring up at me with a contorted grin.
I couldn’t locate the flashlight in the dark. Striking several matches I saw that the battery was in place and one cable still remained to be hooked up. Hammering the cable on to the post with my fist I slammed the hood and jumped behind the wheel. The engine started immediately. Throwing the gear shift lever into reverse I backed the car across the lawn up to the rear porch and ran inside to get Janet.
If there was an impending apocalypse, the world was going to have to face it without me.
Janet was impossible to wake up. No amount of prodding would revive her from the sedative. I had to struggle to get her to her feet wrapping her in a couple blankets, then carried her downstairs. I sat her in the chair next to the fireplace so that I could run back up and get our bags.
I talked to her trying to make her understand that we were leaving. Realizing that she was beyond reach, I gave up and hurried to get the suitcases.
When I came back down she was staring blankly into the fire mumbling. The flames illuminated her features and for a brief moment I felt as if I was seeing her for the very first time. She seemed distantly familiar and for that short period I couldn’t remember her name, I couldn’t even recall that we were husband and wife. She was a stranger...something was tugging at my brain. My conception of time...my ability to distinguish between living in that old house and notions about being in another scene were distorted...chaotic visions disturbed me ... there was a clawing, knocking...Uncle Heinrich...R’Lyeh...the gate...my head ached... something was trying to get possession of my thoughts!
I grabbed the blade of the dagger that hung below my belt and squeezed its sharp edge into my palm. The knife drew blood and the pain snapped me back to this world. I shook myself free of the feeling and rushed to the backdoor with the bags. I yelled over my shoulder to Janet that I was going to put them in the trunk and would be back. I was scared. I had never felt like that in my life. I tried not to think about it, afraid it would begin to make sense. If it did I might start accepting everything the Doctor...I mean Armitage, said as true.
When I reached the kitchen I stopped and dropped the suitcases. The walls reflected an orange glow coming from outside. I advanced slowly towards the door. Through the screen I saw our car roaring in flames. The side window was open, flames shot out of it like an erupting volcano and the upholstery, the seats and the dash board gradually melted out of view.
I stared at our car in panic. A cold chill ran through me and sweat poured down my forehead. I knew how the fire was started. The cans of kerosene I kept on our back porch to fuel our kitchen cook stove were missing.
Just beyond the blaze, moving quickly down the driveway spewing gravel in its wake, was a long black limousine. Hypnotized, I watched the stretch drive away from the house and out the side drive. I followed its course dumbfounded. First watching it through the opened backdoor and then as it wound around the schloss and passed the kitchen window on my right. The black tinted glass that wrapped the upper half of the car in privacy flickered and glared orange back at me, reflecting the fire. It was impossible to see inside. Nevertheless, as it left I new that Falbridge was at the wheel and that slimy thing that called itself Ephraim Pryne was in the back.
I spun away from the door and went back into the parlor. Forgetting that the phone was out of order I attempted to call out. No number came to mind so I tried reaching the operator. A high-pitched wail came over the receiver as I lifted it to my ear. At first I thought it was an electrical malfunction but the disturbance on the line was a lamenting, a half-human voice echoing from a great depth. I dropped the receiver and it swung back and forth, emitting the wailing sound.
Then the television came to life. The picture tube lit up and the sound of static filled the room. A blue, distorted image formed and reformed on the screen. In the flashes of clarity, I saw a mass of crawling, thrusting flesh and a clusters of eyes.
I rushed to the set and tried to turn it off but the knob came loose in my hand. The image remained constant.
Janet was sitting in the chair between the fireplace and the television oblivious to what was happening. She had wrapped a portion of the blanket in front of her as if she had a child in it. The blue light of the television flickered across one side of her face while the flames from the hearth illuminated the other giving her an insane look. She muttered to herself. “It’s all right...pretty baby...so cold, we’ll sit by the fire.”
Behind me the telephone still screeched and the voice on the receiver eerily coincided with the fluctuating movements on the screen. I snatched the phone off the table ripping the cord loose from the wall and forcefully threw it into the picture tube. The screen exploded in a white flash and the image vanished hissing as the electronic parts of the set fused together.
Then the lights went out. A fuse blew when the wires in the television set shorted. The gloom only took a second to get used to. It didn’t become completely dark. The fire in the hearth helped a bit and a few of the candles that were lit earlier that evening had remained as flickering stubs.
Outside, thunder crashed and I heard deep hollow rumbling sounds. The house shook violently for a moment. I spoke reassuringly to Janet
telling her everything was going to be all right, knowing deep inside that I was trying to convince myself as well. She hardly saw me. I couldn’t worry about that now. I had to do something, anything, even if I didn’t believe in it. I thought frantically, the last dying words of Armitage hummed in my head, “get the amulet..the gatekeeper’s voice must be stilled...”
Maybe death was far better than facing a world of monster-gods and a dark brotherhood dedicated to bringing them back to life. Looking at Janet I couldn’t allow myself to believe that. I knew what grizzly job had to be done.
I was going to need a light. It was too dark out there to see more than a couple feet. The other flashlight was in the cellar where I had left it.
The house rattled and shook on its antique foundation and I almost fell down the rickety stairs. By the light of my last match I groped my way in the dark through the vast cellar and made my way to the workbench and the flashlight. The instant I switched it on, and the beam cut through darkness, a loud splintering and crushing jarred me. A handful of boards atop the crevice erupted and were scattered by a tremendous force. The crevice was exposed again.
A rank odor filled the cellar. The same smell I had detected before, coming from the cracks in the floor, only now stronger. I turned my flashlight on an exposed square yard of gaping blackness...the stench came from there.
I stepped forward then, back with a start when greeted by an uncanny noise. A moaning varied at brief intervals by a slippery thumping. As my light shown down, the moaning changed to a series of guttural tones. I crept cautiously forward once more, again came the sound of blind, futile scrambling and thumping. I trembled, unwilling even to imagine what thing might be lurking in that hole, but in a moment mustered up the courage to peer over its rough edge.
A dark groping mass of eyes and ooze welled up, back and forth, too large to fit through the crack. It was like the thing I saw on the television set. A multitude of unblinking eyes glared back against the light. I squinted to get a better look at the moving thing. A huge snake lashed up from the depths and whizzed by me. In the beam of my light I saw that it was a tentacle, like that belonging to a great sea creature. It uncoiled and slammed into the rafters. Blindly it banged around the floor joists to the upper level. Then the tentacle whipped around toward me. I backed away and tried to fend it off with the flashlight. It struck me knocking the light from my hand sending me backwards. The flashlight fell undamaged to the floor. The slippery, tentacle coiled around it and dragged it below. For an instant I could see the tentacle and the light perched on the edge of the crevice, receding into the blackness, then nothing. I was in total darkness.
I rolled desperately away over the damp concrete. Crawling on all fours I tore my hands on rough, loose stones and many times bruised my head against several of the upturned boards. I was overcome by the utter blackness and stench. Then at last I slowly came to my senses. I staggered to my feet regretting bitterly the loss of my flashlight. It wasn’t difficult to figure out what had happened to it. The sound of crunching teeth and breaking glass told me of its fate at the bottom of the pit.
I looked wildly about for any gleam of light in the damp cellar. My sense of direction had been scrambled. The inky blackness made it impossible to tell my position within the cavernous basement. The black granite that was used originally to construct the old foundation just added to the darkness. I couldn’t see the staircase. I had no means of producing light. All my matches had been used up and I was afraid to blunder ahead fearing I might collide into some unseen object or stumble into the uncovered crevice...or worse meet up with that groping tentacle in the dark. I strained my eyes in every direction for some faint glint or reflection of light that might be left in the kitchen upstairs.
After a while I thought I detected the hint of a glow above me and getting back down on my hands and knees I crawled toward it in agonizing caution. Then my hands touched something I knew to be the steps and presently I was running blindly up the stairs. In a moment I reached the top and stood once more in the kitchen. Trembling with relief I watched the last sputtering of the candle I left on the table. The kitchen wall clock read fifteen minutes to twelve.
The thunder rose to a deafening clamor. Compelled by a madness that was only delayed while I caught my breath, I dashed outdoors and ran back to the summer house.
The windows and open door still radiated from the light of the lantern and I felt reassured by its warm glow. Inside I once again came face to face with the crumpled form of Milton Armitage, the man I had known as Doctor Peter VonTassell. The green serpent man hadn’t moved from its spot amongst the clutter.
A shovel leaned against the open studded wall. Grabbing it, and snatching up the kerosene lamp, I headed for the door. Seized by an idea I stopped. The only weapon I had with me was the dagger in my belt. About to leave, I found myself wishing that I had a better weapon.
It was then that I remembered Amitage’s tale about the gun. The German Luger my great uncle had written about. In the weeks that I had lived there I had been over the old house from top to bottom and never turned up the gun. Possibly it was stored here in the summer house.
I tore through the single room searching every box, crevice and drawer all the while trying to avert my eyes from the human and inhuman corpses. I was about to give up when every place had been searched, except one.
Summoning up the courage I slid the drawer out from under the library table where the putrid remains of the Night Gaunt rested. The barrel of the automatic stuck out from between two sheets of paper. I checked the clip in the handle and it was loaded. Slipping it in my belt, along with the ancient dagger, I ran out into the night.
Lightning sliced continually at the night sky. For brief intervals the white of the lightning became black and the black of the night became light. I kept going in the direction of the field but slowed down the pace. I couldn’t believe my own eyes. The lightning actually seemed dark and the dark seemed light. It must have been a retinal after-impression left by the flashes. I thought of the cosmic alignment and wondered if this was an effect of it.
The wind steadily grew and the flashes of lightning became even more frequent. I didn’t stop to wonder or think of turning back but plodded on as if to some ancient rendezvous, assailed by grotesque compulsions and memories.
As the cemetery drew nearer, I heeded its wooded side, more than its sparsely marked graves. The trees loomed up so dark and foreboding that I wished they could keep their distance. An elder fate had manipulated my life and others to this very point. My great uncle, the Doctor, my wife and even Jim had all been masterfully controlled, the overall extent of which I had only then become fully aware. A noise in the brush caught my attention but when I raised the lantern nothing came to view only the gray aspect the light played upon the leaves and shrubbery.
I came to the grave marked by the unusual headstone. It seemed taller, towering and the black stone darker. It faced the north end of the glade and the cemetery. Previously I thought the position of my relative’s resting place was situated to over look the graves of his wartime comrades but standing out like a marker against the burning fog of green phosphorescence I could see that it was in direct line with the knoll.
At that moment, millions of miles from earth, the giant planet Jupiter was slowly rotating into alignment with the other planets. Not known to me at the time, the predicted effect was taking place.
I started to dig. The ground was soft, the burial had taken place less than six months before and the earth was still loose.
Occasionally the shovel would strike a small stone and the sound it made in the surrounding woods bouncing off the headstone, had the effect of coming from other directions. When this would happen I would stop and look around wildly searching for phantoms. Turning up the wick of the lamp I got a hold of myself and ignored my frustration, scooping the earth into huge piles alongside the family plot.
I was down a few feet digging furiously, no longer concentrating on the soun
d of the shovel strokes when I heard ticking. Not the glancing blows of the shovel. It was at consistent intervals. I was bent over and my ear was next to the tombstone. I froze, staring into the blackness in front of me, and listened, trying to figure out the source of the sound. I didn’t move but the ticking kept on. I jumped back when I realized where it was coming from. It was the clock. The clock in the belly of the headstone had started up. It wasn’t operating before. The single hand on its face to my knowledge had never moved and now it was ticking!
I knew it could mean only one thing and hoping to halt time itself I smashed the crystal and clock works with one blow of the shovel.
Time was running out. It gnawed at my insides. My muscles worked heavily against the damp earth. I was like a machine, the end of the spade handle the extension of my arms and legs, casting heaping shovels full of dirt into the air. Suddenly my spade struck something harder than earth. I scraped away more dirt. The surface I uncovered was moldy and rough. I scraped further and saw that it had shape. The exposed area was long and planked with crude boards. It looked like a packing crate. I scraped more. I leaped out of the hole and got ready to throw back the lid on the roughly hewed pine box.
I tossed the shovel aside, the coffin was unearthed. I laid a shaky hand on the lid then quickly withdrew it. As unexpectedly as the ticking of that morbid timepiece I heard a click followed by a soft whir. I thought it was the clock at first. A gear or cog still caught up in the final movements of the mechanism. I narrowed the sound down to a slab of stone on the base of the grave marker.
It moved. I sat on the edge of the excavated grave and watched it turn and slide horizontally on a corner pivot. Beneath it lay a small circular hole. The whirring started up again and the windlass...the gold machine...my great uncle’s gateway device surfaced above the granite base. It glittered softly in the fog and stood out stark, gleaming bright yellow in the flashes of lightning. It was beautiful, a systematic blend of art and technology. It was hypnotically beautiful... compelling... I fought an urge to get closer to it.