Collected Fiction Volume 3 (1931-1936): A Variorum Edition
Page 38
219. realised,] realized, B, C, D
220. Cyclopean] cyclopean C, D
221. abnormal] om. B, C, D
222. earth] Earth B, C, D
223. alone,] alone D
224. clamoured] clamored C, D
225. realised] realized B, C, D
226. earth,] Earth, B, C, D
227. Snake-Den] Snake Den A, C, D
228. slope] slope, B, C, D
229. Arkham—] Arkham; C, D
230. earth’s] Earth’s B, C, D
231. trans-dimensional] transdimensional C, D
232. Carter] Carter, C, D
233. credibility. “Carters”] credibility; “Carters” B; credibility; Carters C, D
234. earth’s] Earth’s C, D
235. “Carters”] “Carters” B; Carters C, D
236. “Carters”] “Carters” B; Carters C, D
237. continua. Spores] continua; spores C, D
238. dream,] dream; C, D
239. fascinating,] fascinating A, B, C, D
240. realisation,] realization, C, D
241. earthly] om. B, C, D
242. thought)] thought!) B, C, D
243. or] of D
244. coexistent . . . coterminous] co-existent . . . conterminous C, D
245. localism, identity,] localism and identity B, C, D
246. paralysing] paralyzing C, D
247. Space-Time] space-time B, C, D
248. earth have] Earth had C, D
249. YOG-SOTHOTH,] YOG-SOTHOTH, B; Yog-Sothoth, C, D
250. Sign] sign B, C, D
251. realised] realized C, D
252. BEING] BEING B; Being C, D
253. that followed, . . . swaying] that followed, with certain definite swaying B [erroneously corr. by HPL to that parallelled [sic] in an unearthly rhythm the curious swaying]; that paralleled in an unearthly rhythm the curious [curios D] swaying C, D
254. beyond-the-gate] Beyond-the-Gate C, D
255. IT . . . “MY] it . . . “my C, D
256. earth] Earth B, C, D
257. shew] show C, D
258. void,] void; C, D
259. BEING] Being C, D
260. abyss: ¶] abyss: B, C, D
261. BEING] Being C, D
262. MIND] Mind C, D
263. shewn] shown C, D
264. gods of earth,] earth gods, B; Earth gods, C, D
265. connexions] connections B, C, D
266. loves,] loves A, B, C, D
267. Nature.] nature. A, B, C, D
268. size,] size A, B, C, D
269. PRESENCE] Presence C, D
270. “Carters”] Carters C, D
271. strength,] strength C, D
272. cube] cube, B, C, D
273. dimensions that] dimensions, that B; dimensions which C, D
274. ’Umr at-Tawil] ’Umr-at-Tawil A
275. reality] reality, B, C, D
276. motion, . . . change,] motion . . . change B, C, D
277. present,] present C, D
278. godlike] god-like C, D
279. shapes] Shapes B, C, D
280. parabola,] parabola C, D
281. cannot] can not B, C, D
282. fragmentary,] fragmentary B, C, D
283. ’Umr at-Tawil] ’Umr-at-Tawil A
284. Silver Key] silver key C, D
285. aeons] eons C, D
286. BEING] Being C, D
287. young man, old] om. B, C, D
288. ancestors] ancestors, B, C, D
289. wizard] wizard, C, D
290. Kythanil,] Kythamil, B, C, D
291. Kythanil] Kythamil B, C, D
292. Shonhi,] Stronti, B, C, D
293. in the . . . circle.] in . . . cycle. B, C, D
294. ultimate abyss] Ultimate Abyss B, C, D
295. BEING] Being C, D
296. forbears] forebears C, D
297. SUPREME ARCHETYPE.] Supreme Archetype. C, D
298. IT.] It. C, D
299. ENTITY] Entiy C, D
300. those] these B, C, D
301. bodily] bodily B, C, D
302. Silver Key] silver key C, D
303. Key] key C, D
304. earthly or extra-earthly,] earthly or extra-terrestrial, B [erroneously corr. by HPL to terrestrial or extra-terrestrial,]; terrestrial or extra-terrestrial, C, D
305. ENTITY] Entity C, D
306. PRESENCE] Presence C, D
307. multi-coloured] multicoloured A; multicolored C, D
308. dizzy] dizzily B [changed to dizzy by Price], C, D
309. pulsing] pulsing, B, C, D
310. BEING] Being C, D
311. IT] It C, D
312. PRESENCE] Presence C, D
313. Silver Key,] silver key, C, D
314. BEING,] Being, C, D
315. Its] ITS B; its C, D
316. alien] om. B, C, D
317. star] star, B, C, D
318. colour] color C, D
319. narrative,] narrative B, C, D
320. draught-swayed] draft-swayed C, D
321. negro] Negro D
322. laboured] labored C, D
323. colour;] color, C, D
324. Silver Key] silver key C, D
325. grasp—] grasp, C, D
326. awaked] awakened C, D
327. BEING—an] BEING—and A; BEING—the Bc; Being—the C, D
328. “Randolph Carter”] Randoph Carter B, C, D
329. persistent,] persistent B, C, D
330. his light-beam envelope.] light-beam envelope [changed to envelopes by Price] B; light-beam envelopes. C, D
331. Silver Key] silver key C, D
332. Tablets of Nhing] Tablets of Dzyan A; tablets of Dzyan Bc; tablets of Nhing C, D
333. half-despair,] half despair, B, C, D
334. Wizard] wizard B, C, D
335. earth,] Earth, B, C, D
336. time-units] time units B, C, D
337. laboured] labored C, D
338. shew] show B, C, D
339. Shonhi] Stronti B, C, D
340. twenty-eight] 28 A; twenty eight B
341. aeons] eons C, D
342. Silver Key] silver key C, D
343. bleached,] bleached B, C, D
344. earth] Earth C, D
345. practice] practise C, D
346. buzzing,] om. C, D
347. Silver Key] silver key C, D
348. earth;] Earth; C, D
349. Silver Key,] silver key, C, D
350. BEING] Being C, D
351. utilise] utilize B, C, D
352. ENTITY.] Entity. C, D
353. uppermost,] uppermost D
354. hundred] hundreds of B, C, D
355. earth] Earth B, C, D
356. aeons] eons C, D
357. earthward,] Earthward, C, D
358. aeons] eons C, D
359. across incredible] om. A; across Bc
360. earth] Earth C, D
361. earth,] Earth, C, D
362. Key’s] key’s C, D
363. aeon] eon C, D
364. aeon-long] eon-long C, D
365. immunise] immunize B, C, D
366. earth] Earth B, C, D
367. earthward] Earthward C, D
368. practiced] practised C, D
369. marvellous] marvelous C, D
370. black, dead] dead, black B, C, D
371. earth] Earth C, D
372. Silver Key,] silver key, C, D
373. ages] years B, C, D
374. Yaddith] Yaddith, C, D
375. shewn] shown C, D
376. thousands of years . . . miles—] uncounted billions of earthly years— A, Bc; thousands of years . . . miles C, D
377. earth] Earth B, C, D
378. aeon-long] eon-long C, D
379. earth] Earth C, D
380. Jupiter] Jupiter, B, C, D
381. Cyclopean] cyclopean C, D
382. disc.] disk. C, D
383. earth] Earth B, C, D
/>
384. those] these D
385. earth’s] Earth’s C, D
386. western hemisphere.] Western Hemisphere. C, D
387. Snake-Den] Snake Den A, B, C, D
388. timber-lot] timber lot A, B, C, D
389. Snake-Den,] Snake Den, A, B, C, D
390. practicing] practising C, D
391. work] working C, D
392. St.] Street. B, C, D
393. Naacal] Naacal, B, C, D
394. R’lyehian,] Senzar, A, Bc
395. earth] Earth C, D
396. earth . . . ago.] earth 18,000 years ago by the Lords of Venus. A, Bc; Earth by the spawn of Cthulhu countless ages ago. C, D
397. cannot] can not B, C, D
398. rumours] rumors B, C, D
399. him, . . . here.] him. C, D
400. outside] outset B
401. hypnotised,] hypnotized, B, C, D
402. recognise] recognize B, C, D
403. recognise] recognize B, C, D
404. shewn?”] shown?” C, D
405. Silver Key] silver key C, D
406. half-crazy] half crazy B, C, D
407. demeanour.] demeanor. C, D
408. Phillips—] Phillips, C, D
409. all. . . . again. ¶] all. ¶ . . . again. C, D
410. Silver Key] silver key C, D
411. shout . . . tracks.] shout. C, D
412. God,] God! B; Heaven! C; Heaven D
413. his] the B, C, D
414. surprise.] surprize. C, D
415. deeper,] deeper A, B, C, D
416. coffin-shaped] coffin shaped A
417. against—that] against. That B, C, D
418. queer] queer, B, C, D
419. dark] dark, B, C, D
420. has] om. Bc, C, D
421. connexion] connection B, C, D
422. envelope”,] envelope,” C, D
The Thing on the Doorstep
I.[1]
It is true that I have sent six bullets through the head of my best friend, and yet I hope to shew[2] by this statement that I am not his murderer. At first I shall be called a madman—madder than the man I shot in his cell at the Arkham Sanitarium. Later some of my readers will weigh each statement, correlate it with the known facts, and ask themselves how I could have believed otherwise than as[3] I did after facing the evidence of that horror—that thing on the doorstep.[4]
Until then I also saw nothing but madness in the wild tales I have acted on. Even now I ask myself whether I was misled—or whether I am not mad after all. I do not know—but others have strange things to tell of Edward and Asenath Derby, and even the stolid police are at their wits’ ends to account for that last terrible visit. They have tried weakly to concoct a theory of a ghastly jest or warning by discharged servants,[5] yet they know in their hearts that the truth is something infinitely more terrible and incredible.
So I say that I have not murdered Edward Derby. Rather have I avenged him, and in so doing purged the earth of a horror whose survival might have loosed untold terrors on all mankind. There are black zones of shadow close to our daily paths, and now and then some evil soul breaks a passage through. When that happens, the man who knows must strike before reckoning the consequences.
I have known Edward Pickman Derby all his life. Eight years my junior, he was so precocious that we had much in common from the time he was eight and I[6] sixteen. He was the most phenomenal child scholar I have ever known, and at seven was writing verse of a sombre,[7] fantastic, almost morbid cast which astonished the tutors surrounding him. Perhaps his private education and coddled seclusion had something to do with his premature flowering. An only child, he had organic weaknesses which startled his doting parents and caused them to keep him closely chained to their side. He was never allowed out without his nurse, and seldom had a chance to play unconstrainedly with other children. All this doubtless fostered a strange,[8] secretive inner life in the boy, with imagination as his one avenue of freedom.
At any rate, his juvenile learning was prodigious and bizarre; and his facile writings such as to captivate me despite my greater age. About that time I had leanings toward art of a somewhat grotesque cast, and I found in this younger child a rare kindred spirit. What lay behind our joint love of shadows and marvels was, no doubt, the ancient, mouldering,[9] and subtly fearsome town in which we lived—witch-cursed, legend-haunted Arkham, whose huddled, sagging gambrel roofs and crumbling Georgian balustrades brood out the centuries beside the darkly muttering Miskatonic.
As time went by I turned to architecture and gave up my design of illustrating a book of Edward’s daemoniac[10] poems, yet our comradeship suffered no lessening. Young Derby’s odd genius developed remarkably, and in his eighteenth year his collected nightmare-lyrics made a real sensation when issued under the title “Azathoth and Other Horrors”.[11] He was a close correspondent of the notorious Baudelairean poet Justin Geoffrey, who wrote “The People of the Monolith”[12] and died screaming in a madhouse in 1926 after a visit to a sinister, ill-regarded village in Hungary.
In self-reliance and practical affairs, however, Derby was greatly retarded because of his coddled existence. His health had improved, but his habits of childish dependence were fostered by overcareful[13] parents;[14] so that he never travelled[15] alone, made independent decisions, or assumed responsibilities. It was early seen that he would not be equal to a struggle in the business or professional arena, but the family fortune was so ample that this formed no tragedy. As he grew to years of manhood he retained a deceptive aspect of boyishness. Blond and blue-eyed, he had the fresh complexion of a child;[16] and his attempts to raise a moustache[17] were discernible only with difficulty. His voice was soft and light, and his pampered,[18] unexercised life gave him a juvenile chubbiness rather than the paunchiness of premature middle age. He was of good height, and his handsome face would have made him a notable gallant had not his shyness held him to seclusion and bookishness.[19]
Derby’s parents took him abroad every summer, and he was quick to seize on the surface aspects of European thought and expression. His Poe-like talents turned more and more toward the decadent, and other artistic sensitivenesses and yearnings were half-aroused[20] in him.[21] We had great discussions in those days. I had been through Harvard, had studied in a Boston architect’s office, had married, and had finally returned to Arkham to practice[22] my profession—settling in the family homestead in Saltonstall St.,[23] since my father had moved to Florida for his health. Edward used to call almost every evening, till I came to regard him as one of the household. He had a characteristic way of ringing the doorbell[24] or sounding the knocker that grew to be a veritable code signal, so that after dinner I always listened for the familiar three brisk strokes followed by two more after a pause. Less frequently I would visit at his house and note with envy the obscure volumes in his constantly growing library.
Derby went through Miskatonic University in Arkham,[25] since his parents would not let him board away from them. He entered at sixteen and completed his course in three years, majoring in English and French literature and receiving high marks in everything but mathematics and the sciences. He mingled very little with the other students, though looking enviously at the “daring” or “Bohemian” set—whose superficially “smart” language and meaninglessly[26] ironic pose he aped, and whose dubious conduct he wished he dared adopt.
What he did do was to become an almost fanatical devotee of subterranean magical lore, for which Miskatonic’s library was and is famous. Always a dweller on the surface of phantasy and strangeness, he now delved deep into the actual runes and riddles left by a fabulous past for the guidance or puzzlement of posterity. He read things like the frightful “Book of Eibon”,[27] the “Unaussprechlichen Kulten”[28] of von Junzt, and the forbidden “Necronomicon”[29] of the mad Arab Adbul Alhazred, though he did not tell his parents he had seen them. Edward was twenty[30] when my son and only child was born, and seemed pleased when I named the newcomer Edward
Derby Upton, after him.
By the time he was twenty-five Edward Derby was a prodigiously learned man and a fairly well-known poet and fantaisiste,[31] though his lack of contacts and responsibilities had slowed down his literary growth by making his products derivative and overbookish.[32] I was perhaps his closest friend—finding him an inexhaustible mine of vital theoretical topics, while he relied on me for advice in whatever matters he did not wish to refer to his parents. He remained single—more through shyness, inertia,[33] and parental protectiveness than through inclination—and moved in society only to the slightest and most perfunctory extent. When the war came both health and ingrained timidity kept him at home. I went to Plattsburg for a commission, but never got overseas.
So the years wore on. Edward’s mother died when he was thirty-four, and for months he was incapacitated by some odd psychological malady. His father took him to Europe, however, and he managed to pull out of his trouble without visible effects. Afterward he seemed to feel a sort of grotesque exhilaration, as if of partial escape from some unseen bondage. He began to mingle in the more “advanced” college set despite his middle age, and was present at some extremely wild doings—on one occasion paying heavy blackmail (which he borrowed of me) to keep his presence at a certain affair from his father’s notice. Some of the whispered rumours[34] about the wild Miskatonic set were extremely singular. There was even talk of black magic and of happenings utterly beyond credibility.
II.
Edward was thirty-eight when he met Asenath Waite. She was, I judge, about twenty-three[35] at the time; and was taking a special course in mediaeval metaphysics at Miskatonic. The daughter of a friend of mine had met her before—in the Hall School at Kingsport—and had been inclined to shun her because of her odd reputation. She was dark, smallish, and very good-looking except for overprotuberant[36] eyes; but something in her expression alienated extremely sensitive people. It was, however, largely her origin and conversation which caused average folk to avoid her. She was one of the Innsmouth Waites, and dark legends have clustered for generations about crumbling, half-deserted Innsmouth and its people. There are tales of horrible bargains about the year 1850, and of a strange element “not quite human” in the ancient families of the run-down fishing port[37]—tales such as only old-time Yankees can devise and repeat with proper awesomeness.
Asenath’s case was aggravated by the fact that she was Ephraim Waite’s daughter—the child of his old age by an unknown wife who always went veiled. Ephraim lived in a half-decayed mansion in Washington Street, Innsmouth, and those who had seen the place (Arkham folk avoid going to Innsmouth whenever they can) declared that the attic windows were always boarded, and that strange sounds sometimes floated from within as evening drew on. The old man was known to have been a prodigious magical student in his day, and legend averred that he could raise or quell storms at sea according to his whim. I had seen him one or twice in my youth as he came to Arkham to consult forbidden tomes at the college library, and had hated his wolfish, saturnine face with its tangle of iron-grey[38] beard. He had died insane—under rather queer circumstances—just before his daughter (by his will made a nominal ward of the principal) entered the Hall School, but she had been his morbidly avid pupil and looked fiendishly like him at times.