Alone with the Horrors.
The Great Short Fiction of Ramsey Campbell 1961-1991.
Ramsey Campbell.
Introduction: So Far
Some horror stories are not ghost stories, and some ghost stories are not horror stories, but these terms have often been used interchangeably since long before I was born. I"m in favour of this. Many horror stories communicate awe as well as (sometimes instead of) shock, and it is surely inadequate to lump these stories together with fiction that seeks only to disgust, in a category regarded as the deplorable relative of the ghost story. Quite a few of the stories collected herein are ghost stories, and I hope that at least some of the others offer a little of the quality that has always appealed to me in the best horror fiction, a sense of something larger than is shown. stories, but these terms have often been used interchangeably since long before I was born. I"m in favour of this. Many horror stories communicate awe as well as (sometimes instead of) shock, and it is surely inadequate to lump these stories together with fiction that seeks only to disgust, in a category regarded as the deplorable relative of the ghost story. Quite a few of the stories collected herein are ghost stories, and I hope that at least some of the others offer a little of the quality that has always appealed to me in the best horror fiction, a sense of something larger than is shown.
In 1991 I"d been in print for thirty years, and had these thirty-seven tales to show for them--at least, these are most of the ones my editor at Arkham House, the late Jim Turner, and I thought were representative. One of Jim"s criteria was that the contents should be stuff only I could have written, a flattering notion that excluded such tales as "The Guide", which otherwise I would have put in. For the record, the book incorporates my British collection Dark Dark Feasts, Feasts, with the solitary exception of "The Whining", no significant loss. with the solitary exception of "The Whining", no significant loss.
I"ve made one subst.i.tution. Previous editions of Alone with the Horrors Alone with the Horrors have led off with "The Room in the Castle", my earliest tale to be professionally published. The idea was to show how I began. Here instead is something rarer to perform the same service. It too dates from when I was doing my best to imitate Lovecraft, but "The Tower from Yuggoth" (1961) demonstrates how I fared before August Derleth took me under his editorial wing. It was published in have led off with "The Room in the Castle", my earliest tale to be professionally published. The idea was to show how I began. Here instead is something rarer to perform the same service. It too dates from when I was doing my best to imitate Lovecraft, but "The Tower from Yuggoth" (1961) demonstrates how I fared before August Derleth took me under his editorial wing. It was published in Goudy, Goudy, a fanzine edited by my friend Pat Kearney, who later wrote a greenbacked history of Olympia Press. It was ill.u.s.trated by Eddie Jones, another old friend but sadly a late one. At the time it felt very much like the start of my career as a writer; now it looks more like a phase I needed Derleth to rescue me from. At least it"s eldritch--it keeps saying as much-- and it also offers cackling trees and curse-muttering streams. The reader may end up knowing how they felt, and my notion of how Ma.s.sachusetts rustics ------------------------------------com12 a fanzine edited by my friend Pat Kearney, who later wrote a greenbacked history of Olympia Press. It was ill.u.s.trated by Eddie Jones, another old friend but sadly a late one. At the time it felt very much like the start of my career as a writer; now it looks more like a phase I needed Derleth to rescue me from. At least it"s eldritch--it keeps saying as much-- and it also offers cackling trees and curse-muttering streams. The reader may end up knowing how they felt, and my notion of how Ma.s.sachusetts rustics ------------------------------------com12 spoke may also be productive of a shudder. Had I conjured him up from his essential salts for an opinion, Lovecraft would undoubtedly have pointed out these excesses and many other flaws. And watch out for those peculiar erections in the woods! I used the term in utter innocence, not then having experienced any of them while awake. No doubt a Christian Brotherly promise of h.e.l.l if one encouraged such developments helped.
Substantially rewritten as "The Mine on Yuggoth", the story appeared in The Inhabitant of the Lake, The Inhabitant of the Lake, my first published book. In 1964 I was several kinds of lucky to find a publisher, and one kind depended on my having written a Lovecraftian book for Arkham House, the only publisher likely even to have considered it and one of the very few then to be publishing horror. In those days one had time to read everything that was appearing in the field, even the bad stuff, of which there seems to have been proportionately less than now, but I"ll rant about this situation later. Suffice it for the moment to say that much of even the best new work--Matheson, Aickman, Leiber, Kirk, as vastly different examples--was being published with less of a fanfare than it deserved. my first published book. In 1964 I was several kinds of lucky to find a publisher, and one kind depended on my having written a Lovecraftian book for Arkham House, the only publisher likely even to have considered it and one of the very few then to be publishing horror. In those days one had time to read everything that was appearing in the field, even the bad stuff, of which there seems to have been proportionately less than now, but I"ll rant about this situation later. Suffice it for the moment to say that much of even the best new work--Matheson, Aickman, Leiber, Kirk, as vastly different examples--was being published with less of a fanfare than it deserved.
I mentioned imitation. I"ve made this point elsewhere, and I do my best not to repeat myself, but this bears repeating: there is nothing wrong with learning your craft by imitation while you discover what you want to write about. In other fields imitation isn"t, so far as I know, even an issue. It"s common for painters to learn by creating studies of their predecessors" work. Beethoven"s first symphony sounds like Haydn, Wagner"s symphony sounds like Beethoven, Richard Strauss"s first opera sounds remarkably Wagnerian, and there"s an early symphonic poem by Bartok that sounds very much like Richard Strauss, but who could mistake the mature work of these composers for the music of anyone else? In my smaller way, once I"d filled a book with my attempts to be Lovecraft I was determined to sound like myself, and Alone with the Horrors Alone with the Horrors may stand as a record of the first thirty years of that process. may stand as a record of the first thirty years of that process.
In 1964 I took some faltering steps away from Lovecraft and kept fleeing back to him. Among the products of this was "The Successor", one of several tales I found so unsatisfactory that I rewrote them from scratch some years later. In this case the result was "Cold Print" (1966/67), whose protagonist was to some extent based on a Civil Service colleague who did indeed ask to borrow my exciting (Olympia Press) books but found Genet dull as ditchwater, in the old phrase. I had also just read the first edition of Robin Wood"s great book on Hitchc.o.c.k"s films, hence the way the tale accuses the reader of wanting the coda, as though I hadn"t wanted it myself. ------------------------------------com13 Another 1964 first draft was "The Reshaping of Rossiter," a clumsy piece rewritten in 1967 as "The Scar." Looking back, I"m struck by how even at that age I was able to create a believable nuclear family from observation, though certainly not of my own domestic background. Perhaps I can also claim to have been writing about child abuse long before it became a fashionable theme in horror fiction. Certainly the vulnerability of children is one of my recurring themes.
I had my first go at "The Interloper" in 1963 and a fresh one in 1968. In the first version the boy tells his tale to a child psychiatrist who proves to be the creature of the t.i.tle. My memory is that the psychiatrist was none too convincing a character, even though I was taken to see one at the age of seven or so, apparently because I rolled my eyes a lot and suffered from night terrors. By contrast, the final draft of the tale was a strange kind of revenge on the sort of schooling I"d had to suffer at the hands of Christian Brothers and their lay staff (not all of either, I should add--Ray Thomas, my last English teacher, had a genius for communicating his love of the language and literature); the incident involving the teacher and the poetry notebook actually happened, and the red-haired mathematics teacher was fully as much of a stool as I portray, though the book in question was the first draft of The Inhabitant of the Lake. The Inhabitant of the Lake.
All this rewriting, and other examples too, had made me surer of myself. "The Guy" (1968) saw just one draft. It was an attempt to use the traditional British ghost story to address social themes. Geoff Ryman has suggested that M. R. James"s ghosts were attempts to ignore the real terrors of life; whatever the truth of that, I saw increasingly less reason why my stories should (though it can be argued that my Lovecraft imitations did). My tales were becoming more autobiographical, and "The End of a Summer"s Day" (1968) has its roots in a very similar bus trip I took to such a cave with my exfiancee of the previous year. I"ve heard quite a few interpretations of the story. For the record, I"ve always taken the man in the cave to be a projection of Maria"s fears about her husband, which of course doesn"t mean the encounter can be explained away.
The Chicago and San Francisco tales of Fritz Leiber were now my models in various ways. I wanted to achieve that sense of supernatural terror which derives from the everyday urban landscape rather than invading it, and I greatly admired--still do--how Fritz wrote thoroughly contemporary weird tales that were nevertheless rooted in the best traditions of the field and drew some of their strength from uniting British and American influences. One of mine in which I used an actual Liverpool location--"The Man in the ------------------------------------com14 Underpa.s.s"--has a special significance for me: it was the first tale I wrote after having, encouraged by T. E. D. Klein"s exegesis of Demons by Daylight of Demons by Daylight and by my wife, Jenny, stepped into the abyss of full-time writing in July 1973. To begin with I wrote only on weekdays. Lord, did I need to learn. and by my wife, Jenny, stepped into the abyss of full-time writing in July 1973. To begin with I wrote only on weekdays. Lord, did I need to learn.
"The Companion" dates from later that year, and is set in New Brighton, just along the coast from me as I write, in all but name. The town did indeed contain two fairgrounds, one derelict, for a while, but I fiddled with the geography a little for the purposes of the narrative. Of all my old stories-- there are many--that I keep being tempted to tinker with, this may well be the most frustrating. The second half seems effective enough to make me wish I could purge the earlier section of clumsiness. Damon Knight looked at the story for Orbit Orbit and declared that he didn"t know what was going on in it half the time. I admit it was one of those tales it seemed more important to write than to understand, but then ever since my first viewing and declared that he didn"t know what was going on in it half the time. I admit it was one of those tales it seemed more important to write than to understand, but then ever since my first viewing of Last Year in Marienbad of Last Year in Marienbad I"ve felt that an enigma can be more satisfying than any solution. Too many horror stories, films in particular, strike me as weighed down by explanation. I"ve felt that an enigma can be more satisfying than any solution. Too many horror stories, films in particular, strike me as weighed down by explanation.
Admittedly there"s nothing enigmatic about "Call First" or "Heading Home," both from early 1974. They"re perhaps the best of a handful of pieces written for a Marvel comic that originally proposed to print terse tales of traditional terrors with a twist as text "twixt the strips. By the time this proved not to be, I"d had fun writing stories in emulation of the EC horror comics of the fifties. I"ve long felt that a story that ends with a twist needs to be rewarding even if you foresee the end, and I hope that"s true of this pair.
"In the Bag" (1974) is a ghost story I submitted to the Times Times ghost story compet.i.tion, though it wasn"t written with that in mind. I rather hoped it might appear in the anthology derived from the compet.i.tion, but the judges (Kingsley Amis, Patricia Highsmith, and Christopher Lee) must have decided otherwise. However, it did gain me my first British Fantasy Award. As David Drake has pointed out, the punning t.i.tle is inappropriately jokey--a lingering effect of writing the horror-comic tales, perhaps--but I try not to cheat my readers by changing t.i.tles once a story has been published. ghost story compet.i.tion, though it wasn"t written with that in mind. I rather hoped it might appear in the anthology derived from the compet.i.tion, but the judges (Kingsley Amis, Patricia Highsmith, and Christopher Lee) must have decided otherwise. However, it did gain me my first British Fantasy Award. As David Drake has pointed out, the punning t.i.tle is inappropriately jokey--a lingering effect of writing the horror-comic tales, perhaps--but I try not to cheat my readers by changing t.i.tles once a story has been published.
"Baby" (1974) is set around Granby Street in Liverpool, later one of the locations for The Doll Who Ate His Mother. The Doll Who Ate His Mother. It owes its presence in this book to my good friend J. K. Potter, who designed and ill.u.s.trated the Arkham House edition. He expressed amazement that Jim Turner and I had omitted the tale, and provided an image to justify his enthusiasm. It owes its presence in this book to my good friend J. K. Potter, who designed and ill.u.s.trated the Arkham House edition. He expressed amazement that Jim Turner and I had omitted the tale, and provided an image to justify his enthusiasm.
"The Chimney" (1975) is disguised autobiography--disguised from me at the time of writing, that is. Was it while reading it aloud at Jack Sullivan"s ------------------------------------com15 apartment in New York that I became aware of its subtext? It was certainly under those circ.u.mstances that I discovered how funny a story it was, though the laughter died well before the end. Robert Aickman described it as the best tale of mine that he"d read, but his correspondence with Cherry Wilder betrays how little he meant by that. Still, it gained me my first World Fantasy Award, and Fritz Leiber told me this was announced to "great applause." Harlan Ellison (also present, I believe) had no time for it. "It was a terrible story," he wanted the readers of Comics Comics Journal Journal to know, "and should not have won the award." to know, "and should not have won the award."
"The Brood" (1976) had its origins in the view of streetlamps on Princes Avenue from the window of Jenny"s and my first flat, which we later lent to the protagonists of The Face That Must Die. The Face That Must Die. When my biographer, David Mathew, recently attempted to photograph me in front of the building, a tenant demanded to know what we were up to. This was one of the rare instances where I found myself a.s.suaging someone"s paranoia. When my biographer, David Mathew, recently attempted to photograph me in front of the building, a tenant demanded to know what we were up to. This was one of the rare instances where I found myself a.s.suaging someone"s paranoia.
"The Gap" (1977) indulges my fondness for jigsaws. You"ll find me playing cards and Monopoly too, not to mention Nim, at which only my daughter can beat me. Role-playing games (I leave aside the erotic variety) have never tempted me, however, though in my inadvertent way I generated a book of them (Ramsey Campbell Campbell "so Goatswood) published by Chaosium. As for the tale, it depressed Charles L. Grant too much for him to publish, although he did anthologise some of the others herein. "so Goatswood) published by Chaosium. As for the tale, it depressed Charles L. Grant too much for him to publish, although he did anthologise some of the others herein.
"The Voice of the Beach" (1977) was my first concerted attempt to achieve a modic.u.m of Lovecraft"s cosmic terror by returning to the principles that led him to create his mythos. The setting is a hallucinated version of the coast of Freshfield, a nature reserve almost facing my workroom window across the Mersey. Recently I made a book-length attempt at the Lovecraftian in The Darkest Part of the Woods. The Darkest Part of the Woods. I continue to believe that the finest modern Lovecraftian work of fiction--in its doc.u.mentary approach, its use of hints and allusions to build up a sense of supernatural dread, and the psychological realism of its characters--is I continue to believe that the finest modern Lovecraftian work of fiction--in its doc.u.mentary approach, its use of hints and allusions to build up a sense of supernatural dread, and the psychological realism of its characters--is The Blair Witch Project. The Blair Witch Project.
"Out of Copyright" (1977) had no specific anthologist in mind, but Ray Bradbury thought it did, and enthused about it on that basis. "Above the World" (1977) derived much of its imagery and setting from my one wholly positive, not to mention visionary, LSAID experience. The hotel is the very one where Jenny and I spent our belated honeymoon and some other holidays. In the early nineties, a short independent film, Return Return to to Love, Love, was based on the story, though without reading the final credits you mightn"t realise; indeed, the t.i.tle gives fair warning. ------------------------------------com16 was based on the story, though without reading the final credits you mightn"t realise; indeed, the t.i.tle gives fair warning. ------------------------------------com16 "Mackintosh w.i.l.l.y" (1977) was suggested by graffiti within a concrete shelter in the very park the story uses. When I approached I saw that the letters in fact spelled MACK TOSH w.i.l.l.y. Close by was an area of new concrete, roped off but with the footprints of some scamp embedded in it, and these two elements gave birth to the tale. When J. K. and I were visiting Liverpool locations for the first edition of this book I took him to the shelter, but alas, the legend had been erased from it.
The entire location of "The Show Goes On" (1978)--the cinema, I mean--is no more. It was the Hippodrome in Liverpool, and I thought I"d failed to do it justice in an earlier tale, "The Dark Show". It was built as a music hall, and behind the screen was a maze of pa.s.sages and dressing-rooms, as I discovered with increasing unease one night when I missed my way to a rear exit. Eventually I reached a pair of barred doors beyond which, as I tried to budge them, a dim illumination seemed to show me figures making for them. Homeless folk, very possibly--they didn"t look at all well--but when, years later, I was able, as a film reviewer, to attend the last night of the cinema and explore its less public areas, I never managed to find those doors again.
Only global warming is likely to do away with the location of "The Ferries" (1978), though the spring tides drive small animals out of the gra.s.s onto the promenade--at least, we must hope they"re small animals. "Midnight Hobo" (1978) also had a real setting, a bridge under a railway in Tuebrook in Liverpool. As for Roy and Derrick, they were suggested by a relationship between personnel at Radio Merseyside: Roy was my old producer Tony Wolfe, and Derrick--well, I really mustn"t say. Roy"s grisly interview with the starlet was based pretty closely on one I had to conduct with a member of the cast of a seventies British s.e.x comedy. According to the Internet Movie Database, she made one more film.
Angela Carter has suggested that the horror story is a holiday from morality. It often is, especially when it uses the idea of supernatural evil as an alibi for horrors we are quite capable of perpetrating ourselves, but it needn"t be, as I hope "The Depths" (1978) and others of my tales confirm. I"ve always thought of this one as a companion piece to my novel The The Nameless. Nameless. Jaume Balaguero"s fine film demonstrates how much of that can be stripped away, but I think the central metaphor of giving up your name and with it your responsibility for your actions and your right to choose is more timely than ever--indeed, perhaps it"s time I wrote about it again. "The Depths" is concerned with the process of demonisation, another way of finding someone else to blame. I"m sure I"m guilty of it myself; the worst writing in my field gives me any number of excuses. ------------------------------------com17 Jaume Balaguero"s fine film demonstrates how much of that can be stripped away, but I think the central metaphor of giving up your name and with it your responsibility for your actions and your right to choose is more timely than ever--indeed, perhaps it"s time I wrote about it again. "The Depths" is concerned with the process of demonisation, another way of finding someone else to blame. I"m sure I"m guilty of it myself; the worst writing in my field gives me any number of excuses. ------------------------------------com17 "Down There" (1978) very nearly joined my other unfinished short stories. I tried to write it when our daughter was just a few weeks old. I felt compelled to write even under those circ.u.mstances, but my imagination couldn"t grasp the material for several days. I was about to abandon the effort when the image of a fire escape viewed from above in the rain came alive, and so did the tale. The early pages of the first draft had to be taken apart and thoroughly reworked, but there"s no harm in that--in fact, it has become increasingly my way. Alas, it wasn"t when I wrote "The Companion".
With a little more s.e.xual explicitness "The Fit" (1979) might have found a place in Scared Scared Stiff Stiff (two stories from which have been deleted from the present book, but you can find them in the expanded Tor edition of my tales of s.e.x and death). Whereas those stories explore what happens to the horror story if s.e.xual themes become overt, "The Fit" may be said to squint at the effects of Freudian knowingness. f.a.n.n.y Cave indeed! I"d originally written "The Depths" for my anthology (two stories from which have been deleted from the present book, but you can find them in the expanded Tor edition of my tales of s.e.x and death). Whereas those stories explore what happens to the horror story if s.e.xual themes become overt, "The Fit" may be said to squint at the effects of Freudian knowingness. f.a.n.n.y Cave indeed! I"d originally written "The Depths" for my anthology New New Terrors, Terrors, but when Andrew J. Offutt sent in a story that seemed to share the theme, I wrote "The Fit" as a subst.i.tute for mine. but when Andrew J. Offutt sent in a story that seemed to share the theme, I wrote "The Fit" as a subst.i.tute for mine.
My memory suggests that "Hearing is Believing" (1979) was an attempt to write about a haunting by a single sense. "The Hands" (1980) came out of an encounter in the street with a lady bearing a clipboard. I"m reminded of the slogan on the British poster for Devils Devils ofMonza: ofMonza: "She was no ordinary nun." Indeed, the real lady wasn"t one at all--I suppose some lingering Catholicism effected the transformation for the purposes of the tale. This seems as good a point as any to mention my forthcoming novel "She was no ordinary nun." Indeed, the real lady wasn"t one at all--I suppose some lingering Catholicism effected the transformation for the purposes of the tale. This seems as good a point as any to mention my forthcoming novel Spanked Spanked by by Nuns. Nuns.
"Again" (1980) appeared in the Twilight Twilight Zone Zone magazine under T. E. D. Klein"s editorship, although I gather Rod Serling"s widow took some persuading. One British journal found the tale too disturbing to publish, while a British Sunday newspaper magazine dismissed it as "not horrid enough." Who would have expected Catherine Morland to take up editing? The story saw a powerful graphic adaptation by Michael Zulli in the adult comic magazine under T. E. D. Klein"s editorship, although I gather Rod Serling"s widow took some persuading. One British journal found the tale too disturbing to publish, while a British Sunday newspaper magazine dismissed it as "not horrid enough." Who would have expected Catherine Morland to take up editing? The story saw a powerful graphic adaptation by Michael Zulli in the adult comic Taboo, Taboo, which was apparently one reason why the publication was and perhaps still is liable to be seized by British Customs. which was apparently one reason why the publication was and perhaps still is liable to be seized by British Customs.
Two novels occupied my time for the next three years, to the exclusion of any other fiction. While picnicking with the family in Delamere Forest to celebrate having finished Incarnate Incarnate I thought of the basis for "Just Waiting" (1983), and the genesis of a new short story felt like a celebration too. My touch here and in "Seeing the World" (1983) is lighter than it used to be, or so I like to think. That doesn"t mean what"s lit up isn"t still dark. ------------------------------------com18 I thought of the basis for "Just Waiting" (1983), and the genesis of a new short story felt like a celebration too. My touch here and in "Seeing the World" (1983) is lighter than it used to be, or so I like to think. That doesn"t mean what"s lit up isn"t still dark. ------------------------------------com18 "Old Clothes" (1983) was an attempt to develop the notion of apports. I"m as loath as Lovecraft ever was to use stale occult ideas, but I think this one let me have some fun. In 1984 Alan Ryan asked me for a new Halloween story, and "Apples" was the result. It became the occasion of one of my more memorable encounters with a copy-editor, though only after the American edition had respected my text. The British paperback version of the tale proved to have suffered something like a hundred changes. The excellent Nick Webb, the managing director of Sphere, had the edition withdrawn and pulped. Had I not written "Out of Copyright" by then, I might well have turned it into a tale about a copy editor. Of course not all such folk are interfering b.l.o.o.d.y fools, but perhaps an example of what befell "Apples" is in order. Where I"d written: His dad and mum were like that, they were teachers and tried to make him friends at our school they taught at, boys who didn"t like getting dirty and always had combs and handkerchiefs ...
The copy editor thought I should have written His mum and dad were like that. They were teachers and tried to make friends for him at our school, where they taught boys who didn"t like getting dirty and always had combs and handkerchiefs ...
I rest my case, and my head.
"The Other Side" (1985) was an attempt to equal the surrealism of J. K. Potter"s picture on which it was based. The last thing I wanted to do was end the story with his image, since the combination would have had much the same effect as the infamous Weird Weird Tales Tales ill.u.s.tration that gave away one of Lovecraft"s best endings. The image can be found on page 97 of J. Kdd"so superb Paper Tiger collection ill.u.s.tration that gave away one of Lovecraft"s best endings. The image can be found on page 97 of J. Kdd"so superb Paper Tiger collection Horripilations, Horripilations, which also contains (among much else) his ill.u.s.trations for the aborted limited edition of which also contains (among much else) his ill.u.s.trations for the aborted limited edition of The The Influence. Influence.
Kathryn Cramer asked me to write a story in which the building in which it took place would (I may be paraphrasing) itself figure as a character. She certainly didn"t mean her letter to potential contributors to be disconcerting, but she pointed to several stories of mine as epitomising her theme, which made me feel expected to imitate myself and daunted by the task. I struggled to come up with an idea until circ.u.mstances gave me one, as happens often enough to let me believe in synchronicity. The Campbell family had just moved into the house in which I now write, but we hadn"t yet sold ------------------------------------com19 the previous one, to which I daily walked. I forget how long it took me to notice that here was the germ of "Where the Heart Is" (1986).
"Boiled Alive" (1986)--a t.i.tle I hoped folk would recognise was meant to be intemperate--was also conceived in response to an invitation, this time from David Pringle of Interzone. Interzone. When I try to write science fiction my style generally stiffens up, and so I attempted to be ungenerically offbeat instead. That isn"t to say I don"t think it"s a horror story: I think all the stories in this collection are. I"d certainly call "Another World" (1987) one, and it too was invited, by Paul Gamble ("Gamma") when he worked for Forbidden Planet in London. His idea was an anthology of tales on the theme of a forbidden planet, though when Roz Kaveney took over the editorship she chose stories simply on the basis that the author had signed at the bookshop. I had, but I cleaved to the theme as well. When I try to write science fiction my style generally stiffens up, and so I attempted to be ungenerically offbeat instead. That isn"t to say I don"t think it"s a horror story: I think all the stories in this collection are. I"d certainly call "Another World" (1987) one, and it too was invited, by Paul Gamble ("Gamma") when he worked for Forbidden Planet in London. His idea was an anthology of tales on the theme of a forbidden planet, though when Roz Kaveney took over the editorship she chose stories simply on the basis that the author had signed at the bookshop. I had, but I cleaved to the theme as well.
As for "End of the Line" (1991), what can I say? It is, but may also have begun a lighter style of comedy in my stuff. Whatever the tone, though, it"s still pretty dark in here. I hope the jokes are inextricable from the terror. However, it was less with laughter than with a sneer that a hypnotist who claimed to reawaken people"s memories of their past lives once advised me to study his career for when I "started writing seriously," rather as if those responsible for The The Amityville Amityville Horror Horror had accused, say, Shirley Jackson of having her tongue in her cheek when she wrote had accused, say, Shirley Jackson of having her tongue in her cheek when she wrote The Haunting of Hill House. The Haunting of Hill House. I see no reason why dealing with the fantastic requires one to write bulls.h.i.t, and I submit this collection as evidence. I see no reason why dealing with the fantastic requires one to write bulls.h.i.t, and I submit this collection as evidence.
In the thirty years covered by this book I saw horror fiction become enormously more popular and luxuriant. I use the last word, as tends to be my way with words, for its ambiguity. There"s certainly something to be said in favour of the growth of a field which has produced so many good new writers and so much good writing. One of its appeals to me, ever since I became aware of the tales of M. R. James, is the way the best work achieves its effects through the use of style, the selection of language. On the other hand, the field has sprouted writers whose fiction I can best describe as Janet and John primers of mutilation, where the length of the sentences, paragraphs, and chapters betrays the maximum attention span of either the audience or the writer or more probably both. There are also quite a bunch of writers with more pretensions whose basic drive appears to be to outdo one another in disgustingness. "It is very easy to be nauseating," M. R. James wrote more than sixty years ago, and the evidence is all around us. However, I hope that in time the genre will return to the mainstream, where it came from and where it belongs. ------------------------------------com20 What to do? Nothing, really, except keep writing and wait for the verdict of history. The field is big enough for everyone, after all. I came into it because I wanted to repay some of the pleasure it had given me--particularly the work of those writers who, as David Aylward put it, "used to strive for awe"--and I stay in it because it allows me to talk about whatever themes I want to address and because I have by no means found its limits. Perhaps in the next thirty years, but I rather hope not. I like to think my best story is the one I haven"t written yet, and that"s why I continue to write.
Ramsey Campbell Wallasey, Merseyside
The Tower from Yuggoth
I.
Of late there has been a renewal of interest in cases of inexplicable happenings. From this it seems inevitable that further interest be shown in the case of Edward Wingate Armitage, who was consigned to St Mary"s Hospital, Arkham, in early 1929, later to be taken to an inst.i.tution. His life had always been, by choice, the life of an outcast and recluse; for the greater part of his life outside the inst.i.tution he had been interested in the occult and forbidden; and his supposed finding of incontrovertible evidence in his research into certain legendary presences outside Arkham, which sent him into that period of insanity from which he never recovered, might therefore have been a seeming triviality, portentous only to his already slightly deranged mind. Certainly there were, and still are, certain Cyclopean geological anomalies in the woods toward Dunwich; but no trace could be found of that which Armitage shudderingly described as set at the highest point of those strange slabs of rock, which admittedly did bear a certain resemblance to t.i.tan stair-treads. However, there undoubtedly was something more than the vast steps that Armitage glimpsed, for he had known of their existence for some time, and certain other things connected with the case lead an unbiased outsider to believe that the case is not quite so simple as the doctors would have it believed. From this it seems inevitable that further interest be shown in the case of Edward Wingate Armitage, who was consigned to St Mary"s Hospital, Arkham, in early 1929, later to be taken to an inst.i.tution. His life had always been, by choice, the life of an outcast and recluse; for the greater part of his life outside the inst.i.tution he had been interested in the occult and forbidden; and his supposed finding of incontrovertible evidence in his research into certain legendary presences outside Arkham, which sent him into that period of insanity from which he never recovered, might therefore have been a seeming triviality, portentous only to his already slightly deranged mind. Certainly there were, and still are, certain Cyclopean geological anomalies in the woods toward Dunwich; but no trace could be found of that which Armitage shudderingly described as set at the highest point of those strange slabs of rock, which admittedly did bear a certain resemblance to t.i.tan stair-treads. However, there undoubtedly was something more than the vast steps that Armitage glimpsed, for he had known of their existence for some time, and certain other things connected with the case lead an unbiased outsider to believe that the case is not quite so simple as the doctors would have it believed.
Edward Wingate Armitage was born in early 1899 of upper-cla.s.s parents. As an infant, nothing peculiar may be noted concerning him. He accompanied his parents to their weekly attendance at the Congregationalist church; at home he played, ate, and slept with regularity, and in general acted as a normal child would. However, the house"s welfare was naturally attended by servants, most of which, in the manner of servants, had a tendency to talk more to children than the elder Armitages; and so it was that a three-yearold was noted to show unaccountable interest in what fell out of s.p.a.ce on the Gardner farm in that year of 1882. The elder Armitages were forced to speak ------------------------------------com24 more than once to the servants on the subject of what was fitting for discussion with Edward.
A few years later, after a period in which Edward declined to leave the house except for walks with his parents, a change was seen to occur. It was in the summer of 1886 that this became particularly noticeable. He would indeed leave the house, but could not be seen playing anywhere nearby, though servants often saw him leave with a book from the house library under his arm--that library which had been partially built up of books from the inherited property of a grandfather. Certain of these books were on subjects occult and morbid, and Edward had been warned not to touch them--his father often considering their destruction, for he was a definite Congregationalist, and disliked such books" being in the house; but never did he put this idea into practice. None of these books appeared to be missing while Edward was away, but the father was unsure quite how many there were; and the boy was never met returning, so that he might have returned whatever books he had taken. He invariably said that he had been "out walking"; but certain newspaper items, dealing with curious signs found scratched in the soil of graveyards, and certain peculiar erections, together with bodies of various wild creatures, found in the woods, gave the parents cause to wonder.
It was at this time, also, that the boy began to be avoided by all the children in the vicinity. This inexplicable avoidance began immediately after a young girl had accompanied Edward, or rather followed him, on one of his silent trips. She had seen him enter a grove of trees outside Arkham, where a peculiar arrangement of stones in the centre, somewhat resembling a monolith, caught her eye. Characteristic of the cold-bloodedness of children in those times, she did not cry out when he procured a small rat, tied helpless near the monolith, and slit its throat with a pocket-knife. As he began to read in some unknown and vaguely horrible language from the book, an eldritch shadow seemed to pa.s.s across the landscape. Then came a sinister m.u.f.fled roaring sound; sinister because, the girl swore, the roaring followed the syllables shrieked by Edward Armitage, like some hideous antiphonal response. She fled, telling her friends later but not her parents. Both the parents of the various children and Edward"s parents inquired into the resultant avoidance, but could elicit no information. Only tales handed down through various families now make this tale available, and it is doubtful how much of it can be believed.
As time pa.s.sed, Edward"s father contracted typhoid fever, further complications a.s.sured that it would be fatal, and in 1913 he was taken to St Mary"s ------------------------------------com25 Hospital (later to see another Armitage"s consignment there) where, on the twelfth of May, he died.
After the funeral, Edward was left in the care of his mother. Bereaved of her husband, she had now only her son on whom to lavish affection. Edward"s upbringing after this stage was much less strict: he was able to read and use whatever books in the library he wanted; his mother did not object to this, but she disliked his frequent trips at night, whose destination he refused to reveal. It was noticeable that after one of these nocturnal trips the morning paper would be missing; and Edward, who rose before anyone else in the house, denied that it ever arrived on these occasions. One maid who showed a tendency to speak of certain nocturnal atrocities reported in the missing papers, was dismissed after the boy had told his mother of certain thefts which could only have been committed by this maid.
It was in 1916 that Edward left home to enrol at Miskatonic University. For a short time he gave most of his leisure up to study mathematics; but it was not long before he gained access to the restricted section of the library. After this step, his former leisure studying was eclipsed by a feverish perusal of those books residing in the library and about which so much has been written and conjectured. The h.e.l.lish Necronomicon Necronomicon engulfed his attention in particular; and the amount of time which he spent in taking notes and copying pa.s.sages from this tome of terror was only cut short by the repeated adjurations of his tutors to devote more time to his mathematical work. engulfed his attention in particular; and the amount of time which he spent in taking notes and copying pa.s.sages from this tome of terror was only cut short by the repeated adjurations of his tutors to devote more time to his mathematical work.
However, it is obvious that he still found time to peruse these monstrous volumes; and toward such evidence is the curiously hinting tale of his tutor. Calling at the student"s study while he was away, the mathematics tutor was constrained to enter and examine a few notebooks scattered over the bed. One of these was taken up with notes on the orthodox studies Edward was following; the tutor glanced through this, noting the care with which the notes had been prepared. A second was composed of pa.s.sages copied from various sources--a few in Latin, but most in other, alien languages, set off by certain monstrous diagrams and signs. But the notebook which startled the tutor more than the cabalistic signs and non-human inscriptions was that containing certain speculations and references to rites and sacrifices performed by students at Miskatonic. He took this to the princ.i.p.al, who decided not to act as yet, but, since there were numerous references to an "Aklo Sabaoth" to be performed the next night, to send a party of tutors to spy on these proceedings.
The next night certain students were observed to leave their rooms at different hours and not to return; several of these were followed by tutors tutors asked ------------------------------------com26 asked ------------------------------------com26 by the princ.i.p.al to report on that night"s proceedings. Most of the students made their way by devious routes to a large clearing in the otherwise almost impenetrable woods west of the Aylesbury Road. Edward was noted to be one of those who seemed to be presiding over the strange gathering. He and six others, all wearing strange and sinister objects around their necks, were standing on a huge, roughly circular slab in the centre of the clearing. As the first ray of the pallid crescent moon touched the slab, the seven standing upon it moved to stand on the ground beside it, and began to gibber and shriek strange half-coherent ritual invocations.
It is only believed by one or two of the watching professors that these invocations, in languages meant for no human tongue, elicited any response. Undoubtedly it was a disturbing sight, those seven students yelling sinister syllables at that slab of stone and moving further from it on each chorused reply from the encircling watchers. This being so, the impressions of the hidden tutors may be understood. Probably it was simply an atmospheric effect which made the vast slab appear to rise, slowly and painfully; and it must merely have been nervous tension which brought one savant to hint at a huge scaly claw which reached from beneath, and a pale bloated head which pushed up the slab. It must certainly have been the marks of something natural which were found by the next day"s daylight party, for such marks would lead one to believe that the reaching claw had seven fingers. At a chorused shriek from all the partic.i.p.ants, a cloud pa.s.sed over the moon, and the clearing was plunged into abysmal darkness. When the place was again illuminated, it was totally empty; the slab again was in position; and the watchers stole away, disturbed and changed by this vague glimpse of nether spheres.
The following day saw a terrible interview with the princ.i.p.al, by Edward, among others. His mother, perplexed, was summoned across the city; and after she and Edward had visited the princ.i.p.al"s office, when the door was locked, they left the university, never to return. Edward had to be escorted from the office by two of his former, non-decadent fellow-students, during which he screamed curses at the unmoved princ.i.p.al, and called down the vengeance of Yog-Sothoth on him.
The crosstown trip was utterly unpleasant to Mrs Armitage. Her son was continuously mumbling in strange accents and swearing that he would see the princ.i.p.al "visited." The disturbing interview at Miskatonic University had brought on a sickening faintness and weakness of her heart, and the pavement seemed to hump and roll under her feet while the houses appeared to close in on her and totter precariously. They reached their extensive house on High Street only barely before the woman collapsed in her ------------------------------------com27 reaction to that terrible interview. Edward, meanwhile, left her in the front room while he repaired to the study. He seemed to be bent on discovering a certain formula; and he returned in a rage when all the forbidden books in his library would not yield it.
For some days after Armitage, now eighteen years old, went about the house in a state of morbid introspection. From various hints dropped in what little conversation he had, it became obvious that he was mourning his loss of access to the blasphemous Necronomicon. Necronomicon. His mother, who was fast succ.u.mbing to that heart weakness started by the unpleasant affair at the university, suggested that he should take up research into things a little nearer reality. Showing contempt at first for his mother"s naivete, he began to perceive possibilities, apparently, in this system, and told her that he might pursue research "a mite closer to home." His mother, who was fast succ.u.mbing to that heart weakness started by the unpleasant affair at the university, suggested that he should take up research into things a little nearer reality. Showing contempt at first for his mother"s naivete, he began to perceive possibilities, apparently, in this system, and told her that he might pursue research "a mite closer to home."
It was perhaps fortunate that, on November 17, Mrs Armitage was rushed to the hospital, taken with a bad fit of heart failure, the aftermath of Edward"s dismissal. That night, without regaining consciousness, she died.
Freed from her restraining influence, unaffected by long university hours, and having no need to work because supported by the extensive estate he had inherited, Edward Wingate Armitage began that line of research which was to lead to the revelation of so many unsettling facts, and, finally, to his madness in 1929.
II.
Christmas 1917 saw Edward Armitage "so mourning period end. After the New Year holidays were ended, pa.s.sers-by would notice him, now equipped with a small sports car--the only luxury he had bought with the recently inherited estate--driving in the direction of the countryside end of High Street. At such times he would start out in the early morning, and not be seen to return until late evening. When met out on the rough country roads outside Arkham, he was seen to drive at the highest speed he could drag out of the car. More than one person recollects that he turned off the road into an even more primitive driveway to a decrepit, ancient farmhouse. Those who were curious enough to inquire as to the owner of the archaic homestead were told that the old man was reputed to have an amazing amount of knowledge concerning forbidden practices in Ma.s.sachusetts and was even reputed to have partic.i.p.ated in certain of these practices. ------------------------------------com28 "so mourning period end. After the New Year holidays were ended, pa.s.sers-by would notice him, now equipped with a small sports car--the only luxury he had bought with the recently inherited estate--driving in the direction of the countryside end of High Street. At such times he would start out in the early morning, and not be seen to return until late evening. When met out on the rough country roads outside Arkham, he was seen to drive at the highest speed he could drag out of the car. More than one person recollects that he turned off the road into an even more primitive driveway to a decrepit, ancient farmhouse. Those who were curious enough to inquire as to the owner of the archaic homestead were told that the old man was reputed to have an amazing amount of knowledge concerning forbidden practices in Ma.s.sachusetts and was even reputed to have partic.i.p.ated in certain of these practices. ------------------------------------com28 From the notes in that capacious notebook which he always carried, Armitage"s trip may be reconstructed. The drive through the brooding country, unchanged for incredible aeons before the advent of civilisation in New England, is recalled in detail in the first pages, as if Edward was afraid that something might prevent him from remembering the route. The exact position of the turning off the Innsmouth road is marked on a small sketch-map.
At this point, the biographer can only imagine Armitage"s route. The walks up the muddy pathway to the farmhouse, between tottering, clawing, moss-covered trees, and the reaching of the leaning building on a slight rise, may be conjectured. One can but imagine Armitage"s turning to stare back across the undulant fields, colourless under the glaring sun and first mist of morning. Far off could be seen the steeple of the Arkham Congregational church, towering over the glistening gambrel roofs of the busy town. In the other direction, unseen over the horizon, would lie Innsmouth, with its half-human inhabitants, avoided by normal Arkham folk. Armitage would look out across the lonely landscape, and finally turn to batter on the door of the farmhouse before him. After repeated summonses, the shuffling footsteps of Enoch Pierce, the half-deaf owner, would be heard down the oak floorboards of the pa.s.sage.
The aspect of this man at their first meeting somehow startled the visitor. He had a long beard, a few straggling strands of hair falling over his forehead. He fumbled senilely as he spoke, but a certain fire in his eyes belied his appearance of senility. But the attribute which so startled Armitage was the curious air which hung about this primitive rustic, of great wisdom and unbelievable age. At first he tried to close Armitage out, until Armitage p.r.o.nounced certain words in a pre-human language which seemed to satisfy Pierce. He ushered the visitor into the spa.r.s.ely furnished living-room, and began to question him as to his reason for visiting. Armitage, making certain that the old man"s sons were occupied out in the fields, turned his own questions on the old rustic. The man began to listen with growing interest, sometimes mixed with unease.
Armitage, it appeared, was desperately in need of a certain mineral, not to be found anywhere on earth except under the ice in certain sunken cities in the Arctic, but mined extensively on Yuggoth. This metal had various peculiar characteristics, and he felt that if he could discover where the crustacean beings of the black world had their outpost on earth, he could have traffic with them by virtue of the most potent incantation in R"lyehian, using the hideous and terrific name of Azathoth. Now that he had lost access to the Miskatonic copy of the Necronomicon, Necronomicon, he would first be trying the ------------------------------------com29 he would first be trying the ------------------------------------com29 surrounding country before visiting Harvard to attempt to peruse their copy. He had a feeling that perhaps the ancient rustic, with his reputed store of forbidden knowledge, might enlighten him, either as to the incantation or the location of the Ma.s.sachusetts outpost of the race from Yuggoth. Could the man a.s.sist him?
The old man stared unseeingly at his visitor, as though his vision had suddenly opened on the abysmal, lightless vacuum of outer gulfs. He seemed to recollect something unpleasant from out of the far past. Finally he shuddered, and, now and then stretching forth a bony hand to grip his listener"s lapel, he spoke.
"Listen, young Sir, "tain"t as if I haven"t ben mixed up in turrible doin"s. I had a friend onct as would go down to the Devil"s Steps, an" he swore as he"d soon have them Yuggoth ones about him, ministerin" at every word he spoke. He thaought he had words as would overcome them that fly over the steps. But let me tell yew, he went too far. They faound him out in the woods, and "twas so horrible a sight that three of them as carried him wasn"t never the same since. Bust open, his chest and his throat was, and his face was all blue. Said as haow it was unG.o.dly, them from Arkham did. But those as knew, they said those up the steps flew off with him into s.p.a.ce where his lungs bust.
"Don"t be hasty naow, young Sir. "Tis too dangerous to go and seek up them Devil"s Steps. But there"s something out in the woods by the Aylesbury Road that could give you what you want, mebbe, and it ain"t so much a hater of men as them from Yuggoth nohaow. You may"ve ben to it--it"s under a slab of rock, and the Aklo Sabaoth brings it--but mebbe ye didn"t think of asking for what ye need? It"s easier to hold, anyhaow--ye don"t even need Alhazred for the right words. An" it might get things from them from Yuggoth for ye. "Tis worth a try, anyhaow--before ye gets mixed up in what might kill ye."
Armitage, dissatisfied, could gain no more information concerning the outpost at Devil"s Steps, that vast geological anomaly beyond Arkham. He left the farmhouse in an uncertain frame of mind. A few nights later, he records, he visited the t.i.tan slab in the woods west of the Aylesbury Road. Seemingly the alien ritual had little effect, needing a larger number of partic.i.p.ants; at any rate, he heard sounds below as of a vast body stirring, but nothing else.
The next recorded trip is that to Harvard University, where he searched the pages of their copy of Alhazred"s ma.s.sive hideous blasphemy. Either theirs was an incomplete edition, or he was mistaken in thinking that the volume contained the terrible words, for he came away enraged and convinced that ------------------------------------com30 he needed the R R "lyeh Text, the only copy of which, he was aware, resided at Miskatonic University. "lyeh Text, the only copy of which, he was aware, resided at Miskatonic University.
He returned the next day to Arkham, and proceeded to call at the Enoch Pierce homestead again. The old farmer listened uneasily to Armitage"s tale of his lack of success, both in raising the daemon in the clearing and at Harvard. The recluse seemed to have had an even greater change of heart since his visitor had last seen him, for at first he even declined to aid the seeker in raising the thing in the wood. He doubted, so he said, that it would be able to supply Edward with the necessary incantations to subdue the crustaceans from Yuggoth; he also doubted that even two partic.i.p.ants would be capable of stirring it from below its slab. Also, quite frankly, he was slightly disturbed by the whole proceedings. He disliked to be connected with anything concerning those Armitage ultimately wished to contact, even so indirectly as this would concern him. And, finally, he might be able to tell Armitage where to procure the incantation.
Armitage, however, was adamant. He meant to call up that below the slab off the Aylesbury Road, and he would try this before following any more of the venerable rustic"s doubtful recommendations; and since it was unlikely that anyone else would accompany him to this ritual, it would be necessary to ask the aid of Pierce. When the man further demurred, Armitage spoke a few words, of which only the hideous name Yog-Sothoth was intelligible. But Pierce (so the other recorded in that invaluable notebook) paled, and said that he would consider the suggestions.
The Aklo Sabaoth only being useful for the invocation of daemons on nights of the first phase of the moon, the two had to await the crescent moon for almost a month. 1918 was a year of mist and storm over Arkham, so that even the full moon was only a whitish glow in the sky in that month of March. But Armitage only realised the necessity of deferring the ritual when the night of the first quarter arrived moonless, a definitely adverse condition.
These unfortunate meteorological conditions did not end, in fact, until early 1919, Armitage now being twenty years of age. Not many of the neighbours realised he was so young--the monstrous wisdom he had acquired from reading the forbidden books in his library and that at the Miskatonic-- and those who knew about his real age somehow did not dare to speak what they knew. That was why n.o.body was able to stop him as he left the house at dusk, one night in April 1919.
The wind howled over the countryside as the sports car drew up at the end of the driveway to the Pierce farmhouse. The countryside, in the lurid light across the horizon with faint threads of mist rising from the marshy ------------------------------------com31 field, resembled some landscape out of hideous Leng in central Asia. A more sensitive person might have been uneasy at the brooding eldritch country; but Armitage would not be affected by this, for the sights he was to see that night were far more horrible, such as give threats to sanity and outlook. Muttering certain words at the not-yet-risen sliver of moon, he pounded on the oaken door.
The old man mumbled affrightedly at the sight of his visitor, and tried to turn him away with pleas of something to be done that night which was very pressing. But he had promised Armitage that he would accompany him, and his visitor held him to that promise though it had been made over a year before. He escorted Pierce out to the waiting sports car, in which they drove off across the grim, primeval landscape. All too soon they turned off to reach the Aylesbury Road. The drive down it was a nightmarish affair of close half-demolished lichenous brick walls, gra.s.sy verges with huge darkly-coloured pools, and stunted trees, twisted into grotesque shapes which creaked in the screaming wind and leaned terrifyingly toward the road. But however morbid the drive may have seemed, it could have been no consolation to Pierce when the car drew off the road near an especially dense belt of forest.
The trip down the pathway between the towering trees may only be imagined. But the walk through the fungoid-phosph.o.r.escent boles and pathblocking twisted roots soon widened out into a clearing--the clearing of that horrible survival from aeons before humanity occurred. Armitage waited impatiently as the moon"s thin rays began to trickle across the boundary of the clearing. He had insisted that Pierce stand near the slab of vast mineral, and that person now shuddered as he watched the accursed sliver of moon creep up toward the zenith.
Finally, as the first beam of pallid light struck the circular stone, the searcher began to shriek those mercifully forbidden words in the Aklo language, the terrified farmer joining in the responses. At first, no sound could be heard except certain movements far off among the trees; but as the moonbeams progressed across the pitted grey expanse both Armitage and his disturbed companion began to hear a sound far below in the earth, as of some Cyclopean body crawling from unremembered abysses. The thing scrabbled monstrously in some black pit under the earth, and so greatly was the sound m.u.f.fled that it was not until the slab began to creak upward hideously that the watchers realised the nearness of the alien horror. Enoch Pierce turned as if to flee, but Armitage screamed that he should hold his ground, and he turned back to face whatever monstrosity might rise from the pit. ------------------------------------com32 First of all came the claws and arms, and when Pierce saw the number of arms he almost screamed outright. Then, as these dug into the soil around that hole into nether deeps, the thing raised itself almost out of the hole, and its head came into sight, pressing up the impossibly heavy slab of unknown material. That bloated, scaly head, with its obscenely wide mouth and one staring orb, was in view for but an instant; for then the arm of the hideousness shot out into the moonlight, swept up the hapless Pierce, and whipped back into the blackness. The stone slab crashed back into place, and a ghastly shriek from the victim yelled out beneath the stone, to be cut off horribly a second later.
Then, however, Armitage, shaken by the horror he had seen but still mindful of his mission, p.r.o.nounced the final invocation of the Sabaoth. A terrible croaking rang out in the clearing, seeming to come across incredible gulfs of s.p.a.ce. It spoke in no human tongue, but the hearer understood only too perfectly. He added a potent list of the powers which he had called out of s.p.a.ce and time, and began to explain the mission on which he had sought the abomination"s aid.
It is at this point in the notes of Edward Wingate Armitage that an air of puzzlement is remarked by all commentators. He recounts, with a growing air of disbelief and definite unease, that he explained to the lurker below the slab that he wished to learn the long invocation of the powers of Azathoth. On the mention of that monstrous and alien name, the shambler in the concealed pit began to stir as if disturbed, and chanted hideously in cosmic rhythms, as if to ward off some danger or malefic power. Armitage, startled at the demonstration of the potency of that terrific name, continued that his reason for wishing to learn this chant was to protect himself in traffic with the crustacean beings from black Yuggoth on the rim. But at the reference to these rumoured ent.i.ties, a positive shriek of terror rang out from below the earth, and a vast scrabbling and slithering, fast dying away, became apparent. Then there was silence in the clearing, except for the flapping and crying of an inexplicable flock of whippoorwills, pa.s.sing overhead at that moment.
III.
One can learn little more about the ways of Edward Wingate Armitage for the next few years. There are notes concerning a pa.s.sage to Asia in 1922; the seeker apparently visited an ancient castle, much avoided by the neighbouring ------------------------------------com33 the next few years. There are notes concerning a pa.s.sage to Asia in 1922; the seeker apparently visited an ancient castle, much avoided by the neighbouring ------------------------------------com33 peasantry, for the seemingly deserted stronghold was reputed to be on the edge of a certain abnormal Central Asian plateau. He speaks of a certain tower room in which something had been prisoned, and of an awakening of that which still sat in a curiously carved throne facing the door. To this certain commentators link references to something carried on the homeward pa.s.sage in a stout tightly-sealed box, the odour of which was so repulsive that it had to be kept in the owner"s cabin at the request of other pa.s.sengers. But nothing could be gleaned from whatever he brought home in the box, and it can only be conjectured what was done with the box and its contents; though there may be some connection with what a party of men from Miskatonic, summoned by an uneasy surgeon at St Mary"s, found in Armitage"s house and transported out to a lonely spot beyond Arkham, after which they poured kerosene over it and made certain that nothing remained afterward.
In early 1923 Armitage journeyed to Australia, there being certain legends of survivals there that he wished to verify. The notes are few at this point, but it seems likely that he discovered nothing beyond legends of a shunned desert stretch where a buried alien city was said to lie. Upon making a journey to the avoided terrain, he remarked that frequent spirals of dust arose in the place for no visible reason, and often twisted into very peculiar and vaguely disturbing shapes. Often, also, a singular ululation--a fluted whistling which seemed almost coherent--resounded out of empty s.p.a.ce; but no amount of invocation would make anything appear beyond the eldritchly twining clouds of dust.
In the summer of 1924 Armitage removed