“Get me home, quick, and let me be. That fluid I got in my arm by mistake . . . heart action . . . this damned excitement . . . too much . . . wait . . . wait . . . don’t think I’m dead if I seem to . . . only the fluid—just get me home and wait . . . I’ll come to later, don’t know how long . . . all the time I’ll be conscious and know what’s going on . . . don’t be deceived. . . .”
As his words trailed off into nothingness old Dr. Pratt reached him and felt his pulse—watching a long time and finally shaking his head. “No use doing anything—he’s gone. Heart no good—and that fluid he got in his arm must have been bad stuff. I don’t know what it is.”
A kind of numbness seemed to fall on all the company. New death in the chamber of death! Only Steve Barbour thought to bring up Thorndike’s last choking words. Was he surely dead, when he himself had said he might falsely seem so? Wouldn’t it be better to wait a while and see what would happen? And for that matter, what harm would it do if Doc Pratt were to give Tom Sprague another looking over before burial?
Crazy Johnny was moaning, and had flung himself on Thorndike’s body like a faithful dog. “Don’t ye bury him, don’t ye bury him! He ain’t dead no more nor Lige Hopkins’s dog nor Deacon Leavitt’s calf was when he shot ’em full. He’s got some stuff he puts into ye to make ye seem like dead when ye ain’t! Ye seem like dead but ye know everything what’s a-goin’ on, and the next day ye come to as good as ever. Don’t ye bury him—he’ll come to under the earth an’ he can’t scratch up! He’s a good man, an’ not like Tom Sprague. Hope to Gawd Tom scratches an’ chokes for hours an’ hours. . . .”
But no one save Barbour was paying any attention to poor Johnny. Indeed, what Steve himself had said had evidently fallen on deaf ears. Uncertainty was everywhere. Old Doc Pratt was applying final tests and mumbling about death certificate blanks, and unctuous Elder Atwood was suggesting that something be done about a double interment. With Thorndike dead there was no undertaker this side of Rutland, and it would mean a terrible expense if one were to be brought from there, and if Thorndike were not embalmed in this hot June weather—well, one couldn’t tell. And there were no relatives or friends to be critical unless Sophie chose to be—but Sophie was on the other side of the room, staring silently, fixedly, and almost morbidly into her brother’s coffin.
Deacon Leavitt tried to restore a semblance of decorum, and had poor Thorndike carried across the hall to the sitting-room, meanwhile sending Zenas Wells and Walter Perkins over to the undertaker’s house for a coffin of the right size. The key was in Henry’s trousers pocket. Johnny continued to whine and paw at the body, and Elder Atwood busied himself with inquiring about Thorndike’s denomination—for Henry had not attended local services. When it was decided that his folks in Rutland—all dead now—had been Baptists, the Reverend Silas decided that Deacon Leavitt had better offer the brief prayer.
It was a gala day for the funeral-fanciers of Stillwater and vicinity. Even Luella had recovered enough to stay. Gossip, murmured and whispered, buzzed busily while a few composing touches were given to Thorndike’s cooling, stiffening form. Johnny had been cuffed out of the house, as most agreed he should have been in the first place, but his distant howls were now and then wafted gruesomely in.
When the body was encoffined and laid out beside that of Thomas Sprague, the silent, almost frightening-looking Sophie gazed intently at it as she had gazed at her brother’s. She had not uttered a word for a dangerously long time, and the mixed expression on her face was past all describing or interpreting. As the others withdrew to leave her alone with the dead she managed to find a sort of mechanical speech, but no one could make out the words, and she seemed to be talking first to one body and then the other.
And now, with what would seem to an outsider the acme of gruesome unconscious comedy, the whole funeral mummery of the afternoon was listlessly repeated. Again the organ wheezed, again the choir screeched and scraped, again a droning incantation arose, and again the morbidly curious spectators filed past a macabre object—this time a dual array of mortuary repose. Some of the more sensitive people shivered at the whole proceeding, and again Stephen Barbour felt an underlying note of eldritch horror and daemoniac abnormality. God, how life-like both of those corpses were . . . and how in earnest poor Thorndike had been about not wanting to be judged dead . . . and how he hated Tom Sprague . . . but what could one do in the face of common sense—a dead man was a dead man, and there was old Doc Pratt with his years of experience . . . if nobody else bothered, why should one bother oneself? . . . Whatever Tom had got he had probably deserved . . . and if Henry had done anything to him, the score was even now . . . well, Sophie was free at last. . . .
As the peering procession moved at last toward the hall and the outer door, Sophie was alone with the dead once more. Elder Atwood was out in the road talking to the hearse-driver from Lee’s livery stable, and Deacon Leavitt was arranging for a double quota of pall-bearers. Luckily the hearse would hold two coffins. No hurry—Ed Plummer and Ethan Stone were going ahead with shovels to dig the second grave. There would be three livery hacks and any number of private rigs in the cavalcade—no use trying to keep the crowd away from the graves.
Then came that frantic scream from the parlour where Sophie and the bodies were. Its suddenness almost paralysed the crowd and brought back the same sensation which had surged up when Luella had screamed and fainted. Steve Barbour and Deacon Leavitt started to go in, but before they could enter the house Sophie was bursting forth, sobbing and gasping about “That face at the window! . . . that face at the window! . . .”
At the same time a wild-eyed figure rounded the corner of the house, removing all mystery from Sophie’s dramatic cry. It was, very obviously, the face’s owner—poor crazy Johnny, who began to leap up and down, pointing at Sophie and shrieking, “She knows! She knows! I seen it in her face when she looked at ’em and talked to ’em! She knows, and she’s a-lettin’ ’em go down in the earth to scratch an’ claw for air. . . . But they’ll talk to her so’s she kin hear ’em . . . they’ll talk to her, an’ appear to her . . . and some day they’ll come back an’ git her!“
Zenas Wells dragged the shrieking half-wit to a woodshed behind the house and bolted him in as best he could. His screams and poundings could be heard at a distance, but nobody paid him any further attention. The procession was made up, and with Sophie in the first hack it slowly covered the short distance past the village to the Swamp Hollow burying-ground.
Elder Atwood made appropriate remarks as Thomas Sprague was laid to rest, and by the time he was through, Ed and Ethan had finished Thorndike’s grave on the other side of the cemetery—to which the crowd presently shifted. Deacon Leavitt then spoke ornamentally, and the lowering process was repeated. People had begun to drift off in knots, and the clatter of receding buggies and carry-alls was quite universal, when the shovels began to fly again. As the earth thudded down on the coffin-lids, Thorndike’s first, Steve Barbour noticed the queer expressions flitting over Sophie Sprague’s face. He couldn’t keep track of them all, but behind the rest there seemed to lurk a sort of wry, perverse, half-suppressed look of vague triumph. He shook his head.
Zenas had run back and let crazy Johnny out of the woodshed before Sophie got home, and the poor fellow at once made frantically for the graveyard. He arrived before the shovelmen were through, and while many of the curious mourners were still lingering about. What he shouted into Tom Sprague’s partly filled grave, and how he clawed at the loose earth of Thorndike’s freshly finished mound across the cemetery, surviving spectators still shudder to recall. Jotham Blake, the constable, had to take him back to the town farm by force, and his screams waked dreadful echoes.
This is where Fred Peck usually leaves off the story. What more, he asks, is there to tell? It was a gloomy tragedy, and one can scarcely wonder that Sophie grew queer after that. That is all one hears if the hour is so late that old Calvin Wheeler has tottered home, but when he is still around
he breaks in again with that damnably suggestive and insidious whisper. Sometimes those who hear him dread to pass either the shuttered house or the graveyard afterward, especially after dark.
“Heh, heh . . . Fred was only a little shaver then, and don’t remember no more than half of what was goin’ on! You want to know why Sophie keeps her house shuttered, and why crazy Johnny still keeps a-talkin’ to the dead and a-shoutin’ at Sophie’s windows? Well, sir, I don’t know’s I know all there is to know, but I hear what I hear.”
Here the old man ejects his cud of tobacco and leans forward to buttonhole the listener.
“It was that same night, mind ye—toward mornin’, and just eight hours after them burials—when we heard the first scream from Sophie’s house. Woke us all up—Steve and Emily Barbour and me and Matildy goes over hot-footin’, all in night gear, and finds Sophie all dressed and dead fainted on the settin’-room floor. Lucky she hadn’t locked the door. When we got her to she was shakin’ like a leaf, and wouldn’t let on by so much as a word what was ailin’ her. Matildy and Emily done what they could to quiet her down, but Steve whispered things to me as didn’t make me none too easy. Come about an hour when we allowed we’d be goin’ home soon, that Sophie she begun to tip her head on one side like she was a-listenin’ to somethin’. Then on a sudden she screamed again, and keeled over in another faint.
“Well, sir, I’m tellin’ what I’m tellin’, and won’t do no guessin’ like Steve Barbour would a done if he dared. He always was the greatest hand for hintin’ things . . . died ten years ago of pneumony. . . .
“What we heard so faint-like was just poor crazy Johnny, of course. ’Taint more than a mile to the buryin’-ground, and he must a got out of the window where they’d locked him up at the town farm—even if Constable Blake says he didn’t get out that night. From that day to this he hangs around them graves a-talkin’ to the both of them—cussin’ and kickin’ at Tom’s mound, and puttin’ posies and things on Henry’s. And when he ain’t a-doin’ that he’s hangin’ around Sophie’s shuttered windows howlin’ about what’s a-comin’ soon to git her.
“She wouldn’t never go near the buryin’-ground, and now she won’t come out of the house at all nor see nobody. Got to sayin’ there was a curse on Stillwater—and I’m dinged if she ain’t half right, the way things is a-goin’ to pieces these days. There certainly was somethin’ queer about Sophie right along. Once when Sally Hopkins was a-callin’ on her—in ’97 or ’98, I think it was—there was an awful rattlin’ at her winders—and Johnny was safe locked up at the time—at least, so Constable Dodge swore up and down. But I ain’t takin’ no stock in their stories about noises every seventeenth of June, or about faint shinin’ figures a-tryin’ Sophie’s door and winders every black mornin’ about two o’clock.
“You see, it was about two o’clock in the mornin’ that Sophie heard the sounds and keeled over twice that first night after the buryin’. Steve and me, and Matildy and Emily, heard the second lot, faint as it was, just like I told you. And I’m a-tellin’ you again as how it must a been crazy Johnny over to the buryin’-ground, let Jotham Blake claim what he will. There ain’t no tellin’ the sound of a man’s voice so far off, and with our heads full of nonsense it ain’t no wonder we thought there was two voices—and voices that hadn’t ought to be speakin’ at all.
“Steve, he claimed to have heard more than I did. I verily believe he took some stock in ghosts. Matildy and Emily was so scared they didn’t remember what they heard. And curious enough, nobody else in town—if anybody was awake at the ungodly hour—never said nothin’ about hearin’ no sounds at all.
“Whatever it was, was so faint it might have been the wind if there hadn’t been words. I made out a few, but don’t want to say as I’d back up all Steve claimed to have caught. . . .
“‘She-devil’ . . . ‘all the time’ . . . ‘Henry’ . . . and ‘alive’ was plain . . . and so was ‘you know’ . . . ‘said you’d stand by’ . . . ‘get rid of him’ and ‘bury me’ . . . in a kind of changed voice. . . . Then there was that awful ‘comin’ again some day’—in a death-like squawk . . . but you can’t tell me Johnny couldn’t have made those sounds. . . .
“Hey, you! What’s takin’ you off in such a hurry? Mebbe there’s more I could tell you if I had a mind. . . .”
The Hoard of the Wizard-Beast
Written in 1933 with R. H. Barlow
Originally published in The Hoard of the Wizard-Beast and One Other, 1994
There had happened in the teeming and many-towered city of Zeth one of those incidents which are prone to take place in all capitals of all worlds. Nor, simply because Zeth lies on a planet of strange beasts and stranger vegetation, did this incident differ greatly from what might have occurred in London or Paris or any of the great governing towns we know. Through the cleverly concealed dishonesty of an aged but shrewd official, the treasury was exhausted. No shining phrulder, as of old, lay stacked about the strong-room; and over empty coffers the sardonic spider wove webs of mocking design. When, at last, the giphath Yalden entered that obscure vault and discovered the thefts, there were left only some phlegmatic rats which peered sharply at him as at an alien intruder.
There had been no accountings since Kishan the old keeper had died many moon-turns before, and great was Yalden’s dismay to find this emptiness instead of the expected wealth. The indifference of the small creatures in the cracks between the flagstones could not spread itself to him. This was a very grave matter, and would have to be met in a very prompt and serious way. Clearly, there was nothing to do but consult Oorn, and Oorn was a highly portentous being.
Oorn, though a creature of extremely doubtful nature, was the virtual ruler of Zeth. It obviously belonged somewhere in the outer abyss, but had blundered into Zeth one night and suffered capture by the shamith priests. The coincidence of Its excessively bizarre aspect and Its innate gift of mimicry had impressed the sacred brothers as offering vast possibilities, hence in the end they had set It up as a god and an oracle, organising a new brotherhood to serve It—and incidentally to suggest the edicts it should utter and the replies It should give. Like the Delphi and Dodona of a later world, Oorn grew famous as a giver of judgments and solver of riddles; nor did Its essence differ from them save that It lay infinitely earlier in Time, and upon an elder world where all things might happen. And now Yalden, being not above the credulousness of his day and planet, had set out for the close-guarded and richly-fitted hall wherein Oorn brooded and mimicked the promptings of the priests.
When Yalden came within sight of the Hall, with its tower of blue tile, he became properly religious, and entered the building acceptably, in a humble manner which greatly impeded progress. According to custom, the guardians of the deity acknowledged his obeisance and pecuniary offering, and retired behind heavy curtains to ignite the thuribles. After everything was in readiness, Yalden murmured a conventional prayer and bowed low before a curious empty dais studded with exotic jewels. For a moment—as the ritual prescribed—he stayed in this abased position, and when he arose the dais was no longer empty. Unconcernedly munching something the priests had given It was a large pudgy creature very hard to describe, and covered with short grey fur. Whence It had come in so brief a time only the priests might tell, but the suppliant knew that It was Oorn.
Hesitantly Yalden stated his unfortunate mission and asked advice; weaving into his discourse the type of flattery which seemed to him most discreet. Then, with anxiety, he awaited the oracle’s response. Having tidily finished Its food, Oorn raised three small reddish eyes to Yalden and uttered certain words in a tone of vast decisiveness: “Gumay ere hfotuol leheht teg.” After this It vanished suddenly in a cloud of pink smoke which seemed to issue from behind the curtain where the acolytes were. The acolytes then came forth from their hiding-place and spoke to Yalden, saying: “Since you have pleased the deity with your concise statement of a very deplorable state of affairs, we are honored by interpreting its directions.
The aphorism you heard signifies no less than the equally mystic phrase ‘Go thou unto thy destination’ or more properly speaking, you are to slay the monster-wizard Anathas, and replenish the treasury with its fabled hoard.”
With this Yalden was dismissed from the temple. It may not be said in veracity that he was fearless, for in truth, he was openly afraid of the monster Anathas, as were all the inhabitants of Ullathia and the surrounding land. Even those who doubted its actuality would not have chosen to reside in the immediate neighborhood of the Cave of Three Winds wherein it was said to dwell.
But the prospect was not without romantic appeal, and Yalden was young and consequently unwise. He knew, among other things, that there was always the hope of rescuing some feminine victim of the monster’s famed and surprising erotic taste. Of the true aspect of Anathas none could be certain; tales of a widely opposite nature being commonly circulated. Many vowed it had been seen from afar in the form of a giant black shadow peculiarly repugnant to human taste, while others alleged it was a mound of gelatinous substance that oozed hatefully in the manner of putrescent flesh. Still others claimed they had seen it as a monstrous insect with astonishing supernumerary appurtenances. But in one thing all coincided; namely, that it was advisable to have as little traffic as possible with Anathas.
With due supplications to his gods and to their messenger Oorn, Yalden set out for the Cave of Three Winds. In his bosom were mixed an ingrained, patriotic sense of duty, and a thrill of adventurous expectancy regarding the unknown mysteries he faced. He had not neglected such preparations as a sensible man might make, and a wizard of old repute had furnished him with certain singular accessories. He had, for example, a charm which prevented his thirsting or hungering, and wholly did away with his need for provisions. There was likewise a glistening cape to counteract the evil emanations of a mineral that lay scattered over the rocky ground along his course. Other warnings and safeguards dealt with certain gaudy land-crustaceans, and with the deathly-sweet mists which arise at certain points until dispersed by heliotropism.
The Complete Fiction Page 187