Curious Warnings - The Great Ghost Stories Of M.R. James

by M. R. James

  “Wasn’t there a message from your father?” said Slim.

  “Oh, yes, of course. ‘If they’re about the house,’ he said, ‘give them horseshoes; if there’s a bat-ball, squirt at it’: he thinks there’s a squirt in the tool-house—Oh, there’s the cat; I must—” After delivering all this in one sentence, he rushed to the edge of the table and took a kind of header into the midst of the unfortunate animal, who, however, only moaned or crowed without waking, and turned partly over on her back.

  Slim remained sitting on a book and gazing soberly at me.

  “Well,” I said, “it’s very kind of Wag’s father to send me a message, but I must say I can’t make much of it.”

  Slim nodded. “So he said, and he said you’d see when the time came. Of course I don’t know, myself: I’ve never seen a bat-ball. Wag says he has, but you never know with Wag.”

  “Well, I must do the best I can, I suppose. But look here, Slim, I wish you could tell me one or two things. What are you? What do they call you?”

  “They call me Slim: and the whole of us they call the Right People,” said Slim; “but it’s no good asking us much, because we don’t know, and besides, it isn’t good for us.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Why, you see, our job is to keep the little things right, and if we do more than that, or if we try to find out much more, then we burst.”

  “And is that the end of you?”

  “Oh, no!” he said cheerfully, “but that’s one of the things it’s no good asking.”

  “And if you don’t do your job, what then?”

  “Oh, then they get smaller and have no sense.” (He said they, not we, I noticed.)

  “I see. Well now, you go to school, don’t you?” He nodded. “What for? Isn’t that likely to be bad for you?” (I hardly liked to say “make you burst.”)

  “No,” he said. “You see, it’s to learn our job. We have to be told what used to go on, so as we can put things right, or keep them right. And the owls, you see, they remember a long way back, but they don’t know any more than we do about the swell things.”

  I was very shy about putting the next question I had in mind, but I felt I must. “Now do you know how old you are, or how long it takes you to grow up, or how—how long you go on when you are grown up!”

  He pressed his hands to his head, and I was dreadfully afraid for the moment that it might be swelling and would burst; but it was not so bad as that. After a few seconds he looked up and said:

  “I think it’s seven times seven moons since I went to school and seven times seven times seven moons before I grow up; and the rest is no good asking. But it’s all right,” upon which he smiled.

  And this, I may say, was the most part of what I ventured to ask any of them about themselves. But at other times I gathered that as long as they “did their job” nothing could injure them. And they were regularly measured—all of them—to see if they were getting smaller, and a careful record kept. But if anyone lost as much as a quarter of his height, he was doomed, and he crept off out of the settlement.

  Whether such a one ever came back I could not be sure; most of the failures (and they were not common) went and lived in hollow trees or by brooks, and were happy enough, but in a feeble way, not remembering much, nor able to make anything. And it was supposed that very slowly they shrunk to the size of a pin’s point, and probably to nothing. All the same, it was believed that they could recover.

  Many other things that you would have asked, I did not, being anxious to avoid giving trouble.

  But this time, anyhow, I felt I had catechised Slim long enough, so I broke off and said:

  “What can Wag be doing all this while?”

  “There’s no knowing,” said Slim. “But he’s very quiet for him; either he’s doing something awful, or he’s asleep.”

  “I saw him with the cat last,” I said. “You might go and look at her.”

  He walked to the edge of the table, and said, “Why, he is asleep!” And so he was, with his head on the cat’s chest, under her chin, which she had turned up; and she had put her front paws together over the top of his head.

  As for the others, I descried them sitting in a circle in a corner of the room, also very quiet. (I imagine they were a little afraid of doing much without Wag, and also of waking him.) But I could not make out what they were doing, so I asked Slim.

  “Racing earwigs, I should think,” he said, with something of contempt.

  “Well, I hope they won’t leave them about when they go. I don’t like earwigs.”

  “Who does?” he said. “But they’ll take them away all right; they’re prize ones, some of them.”

  I went over and looked at the racing for a little. The course was neatly marked out with small lights sprouting out of the boards, and the circle was at the winning-post, the starters being at the other end, some six feet away.

  I watched one heat. The earwigs seemed to me neither very speedy nor very intelligent, and all except one were apt to stop in midcourse and engage in personal encounters with each other.

  I was beginning to wonder how long this would go on, when Wag woke up. Like most of us, he was not willing to allow that he had been asleep.

  “I thought I’d just lie down a bit,” he said, “and then I didn’t want to bustle your cat, so I stopped there. And now I want to know—Slim, I say, what was it you were asking me?”

  “Me asking you? I don’t know.”

  “Oh, yes, you do. What he was doing the other time before we came in.”

  “I didn’t ask you that, you asked me.”

  “Well, it doesn’t matter who asked.” (Turning to me): “What were you doing?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Was it these things I was using” (taking up a pack of cards), “or something like this?” (I held up a book.)

  “Yes, that one. What were you doing with it? What’s it for?”

  “We call it reading a book,” and I tried to explain what the idea was, and read out a few lines. It happened to be Pickwick. They were absorbed.

  Slim said, half to himself, “Something like a glass,” which I thought quite meaningless at the time. Then I showed them a picture in another book. That they made out very quickly.

  “But when’s it going to move on?” said Slim.

  “Never,” I said. “Ours stop just like that always. Do yours move on?”

  “Of course they do—look here.” He lay down on the tablecloth and pressed his forehead on it, but evidently could make nothing of it. “It’s all rough,” he said. I gave him a sheet of paper. “That’s better;” and he lay down again in the same posture for a few seconds. Then he got up and began rubbing the paper all over with the palms of his hands. As he did so a colored picture came out pretty quickly, and when it was finished he drew aside to let me see, and said, somewhat bashfully, “I don’t think I’ve got it quite right, but I meant it for what happened the other evening.”

  He had certainly not got it right as far as I was concerned. It was a view of the window of the house, seen from outside by moonlight, and there was a back view of a row of figures with their elbows on the sill. So far, so good; but inside the open window was standing a figure which was plainly—much too plainly, I thought—meant for me: far too short and fat, far too red-faced, and with an owlish expression which I am sure I never wear.

  This person was now seen to move his hand—a very poor hand, with only about three fingers—to his side, and pull, apparently, out of his body, a round object more or less like a watch (at any rate it was white on one side with black marks, and yellow on the other) and lay it down in front of him. At this the figures at the window-sill threw up their arms in all directions and fell or slid down like so many dolls. Then the picture began to get fainter, and disappeared from the paper.

  Slim looked at me expectantly.

  “Well,” I said, “it’s very interesting to see how you do it, but is that the best likeness of me that you can make?”


  “What’s wrong with it?” said he. “Isn’t it handsome enough or something?”

  I heard Wag throw himself down on the table, and, looking at him, I saw that he had both hands pressed over his mouth.

  “May I ask what the joke is?” I said rather dryly (for it is surprising how touchy one can be over one’s personal appearance, even at my time of life).

  He looked up for an instant at me, and then gasped and hid his face again. Slim went up to him and kicked him in the ribs.

  “Where’s your manners?” he said in a loud whisper. Wag rolled over and sat up, wiping his eyes.

  “I’m very sorry,” he said. “I’m sure I don’t know what I was laughing for.” Slim whistled. “Well,” said Wag, “what was I?”

  “Him, of course, and you know perfectly well!”

  “Oh, was I? Well, perhaps you’ll tell me what there is to laugh at about him?” said Wag, rather basely, I thought. So, as Slim put his finger to his lip and looked unhappy, I interrupted.

  “Get up a minute, Wag,” I said. “I want to see something.”

  “What?” said he, jumping up at once.

  “Stand back to back with Slim, if you don’t mind. That’s it. Dear me! I thought you were taller than that—you looked to me taller last night. My mistake, I dare say. All right, thanks.”

  But there they stood, gazing at each other with horror, and I felt I had been trifling with a most serious subject, so I laughed and said, “Don’t disturb yourselves. I was only chaffing you, Wag, because you seemed to be doing something of the kind to me.”

  Slim understood, and heaved a sigh of relief. Wag sat down on a book and looked reproachfully upon me. Neither said a word. I was very much ashamed, and begged their pardon as nicely as I knew how. Luckily Wag was soon convinced that I was not in earnest, and he recovered his spirits directly.

  “All right,” he said, nodding at me. “Did I hear you say you didn’t like earwigs? That’s worth remembering, Slim.”

  This reduced me at once. I tried to point out that he had begun it, and that it would be a mean revenge, and very hard on the earwigs, if he filled my room with them, for I should be obliged to kill all I could.

  “Why,” he said, “they needn’t be real earwigs; my own tickle every bit as much as real ones.”

  This was no better for me, and I tried to make more appeals to his better feelings. He did not seem to be listening very attentively, though his eyes were fixed on me.

  “What’s that on your neck?” he said suddenly, and at the same moment I felt a procession of legs walking over my skin. I brushed at it hastily, and something seemed to fall on the table.

  “No, the other side I mean,” said he, and again I felt the same horrid tickling and went through the same exercises, with a face, I’ve no doubt, contorted with terror. Anyhow, it seemed to amuse them very much. Wag, in fact, was quite unable to speak, and could only point.

  It was dull of me not to have realized at once that these were “his” earwigs and not real ones. But now I did, and though I still felt the tickling, I did not move, but sat down and gazed severely at him.

  Soon he got the better of his mirth and said, “I think we are quits now.” Then, with sudden alarm, “I say, what’s become of the others? The bell hasn’t gone, has it?”

  “How should I know?” I said. “If you hadn’t been making all this disturbance, perhaps we might have heard it.”

  He took a flying leap—an extraordinary feat it was—from the edge of the table to a chair in the window, scrambled up to the sill, and gazed out. “It’s all right,” he said, in a faint voice of infinite relief; let himself down limply to the floor, and climbed slowly up my leg to his former place.

  “Well,” I said, “the bell hasn’t gone, it seems, but where are the rest? I’ve hardly seen anything of them.”

  “Oh, you go and find ’em, Slim; I’m worn out with all these frights.”

  Slim went to the farther end of the table, prospected, and returned. He reported them “all right, but they’re having rather a slow time of it, I think.”

  I, too, got up, walked around, and looked. They were seated in a solemn circle on the floor around the cat, who was now curled up and fast asleep on a round footstool. Not a word was being said by anybody. I thought I had better address them, so I said:

  “Gentlemen, I’m afraid I’ve been very inattentive to you this evening. Isn’t there anything I can do to amuse you? Won’t you come up on the table? You’re welcome to walk up my leg if you find that convenient.”

  I was almost sorry I had spoken the moment after, for they made but one rush at my legs as I stood by the table, and the sensation was rather like that, I imagine, of a swarm of rats climbing up one’s pants.

  However, it was over in a few seconds, and all of them—over a dozen—were with Wag and Slim on the table, except one, who, whether by mistake or on purpose, went on climbing me by way of my waistcoat buttons, rather deliberately, until he reached my shoulder.

  I didn’t object, of course, but I turned around (which made him catch at my ear) and went back to my chair, seated in which I felt rather as if I was presiding at a meeting. The one on my shoulder sat down and, I thought, folded his arms and looked at his friends with some triumph. Wag evidently took this to be a liberty.

  “My word!” he said. “What do you mean by it, Wisp? Come off it!”

  Wisp was a little daunted, as I judged by his fidgeting somewhat, but put a bold face on it and said, “Why should I come off?”

  I put in a word: “I don’t mind his being here.”

  “I dare say not; that’s not the point,” said Wag. “Are you coming down?”

  “No,” said Wisp, “not for you.” But his tone was rather blustering than brave.

  “Very well, don’t then,” said Wag; and I expected him to run up and pull Wisp down by the legs, but he didn’t do that. He took something out of the breast of his tunic, put it in his mouth, lay down on his stomach, and, with his eyes on Wisp, puffed out his cheeks.

  Two or three seconds passed, during which I felt Wisp shifting about on his perch, and breathing quickly. Then he gave a sharp shriek, which went right through my head, slipped rapidly down my chest and legs and on to the floor, where he continued to squeal and to run about like a mad thing, to the great amusement of everyone on the table.

  Then I saw what was the matter. All around his head were a multitude of little sparks, which flew about him like a swarm of bees, every now and then settling and coming off again, and, I suppose, burning him every time. If he beat them off, they attacked his hands, so he was in a bad way.

  After watching him for about a minute from the edge of the table, Wag called out:

  “Do you apologize?”

  “Yes!” he screamed.

  “All right,” said Wag. “Stand still! Stand still, you bat! How can I get ’em back if you don’t?”

  Wag was back to me and I couldn’t see what he did, but Wisp sat down on the carpet free of sparks, and wiped his face and neck with his handkerchief for some time, while the rest gradually recovered from their laughter.

  “You can come up again now,” said Wag. And so he did, though he was slow and shy about it.

  “Why didn’t he send sparks at Wag?” said I to Slim.

  “He hasn’t got ’em to send,” was the answer. “It’s only the Captain of the moon.”

  “Well now, what about a little peace and quiet?” I said. “And, you know, I’ve never been introduced to you all properly. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to do that, before the bell goes?”

  “Very well,” said Wag. “We’ll do it properly. You bring ’em up one at a time, Slim, and” (to me) “you put your sun-hand out on the table.”

  (I: “Sun-hand?”

  Wag: “Yes, sun-hand. Don’t you know?” He held up his right hand, then his left: “Sun-hand, Moon-hand, Day-hand, Night-hand, Star-hand, Cloud-hand, and so on.”

  I: “Thank you.”)

  This was done, and
meanwhile Slim formed the troop into a line and beckoned them up one by one. Wag stood on a book on the right and proclaimed the name of each. First he had made me arrange my right hand edgeways on the table, with the forefinger out. Then “Gold!” said Wag. Gold stepped forward and made a lovely bow, which I returned with an inclination of my head, then took as much of my forefinger top joint in his right hand as he could manage, bent over it and shook it or tried to, and then took up a position on the left and watched the next comer.

  The ceremony was the same for everyone, but not all the bows were equally elegant; some of the boys were jocular, and shook my finger with both hands and a great display of effort. These were frowned upon by Wag.

  The names (I need not set them all down now) were all of the same kind as you have heard: there was Red, Wise, Dart, Sprat, and so on. After Wisp, who came last and was rather humble, Wag called out Slim, and, after him, descended and presented himself in the same form.

  “And now,” he said, “perhaps you’ll tell us your name.”

  I did so (one is always a little shamefaced about it, I don’t know why) in full. He whistled.

  “Too much,” he said. “What’s the easiest you can do?”

  After some thought I said, “What about M or N?”

  “Much better! If M’s all right for you, it’ll do for us.” So M was agreed upon.

  I was still rather afraid that the rank and file had been passing a dull evening and would not come again, and I tried to express as much to them. But they said:

  “Dull? Oh no, M; why we’ve found out all sorts of things!”

  “Really? What sort of things?”

  “Well, inside the wall in that corner there’s the biggest spider I’ve ever seen, for one thing.”

  “Good gracious!” I said. “I hate ’em. I hope it can’t get out?”

  “It would have tonight if we hadn’t stopped up the hole. Something’s been helping it to gnaw through.”

  “Has it?” said Wag. “My word! That looks bad. What was it made the hole?”

  Some called out, “A bat,” and some “A rat.”

  “It doesn’t matter much for that,” said Slim, “so long as it’s safe now. Where is it?”