02 - Sinister House by Leland Hall

What is it about that old house down the road that unnerves Pierre and his wife, Annette? The owners, Eric and Julia, appear to be a lovely couple, yet an unsettling aura of malevolence surrounds them. While Eric seems to radiate a supernatural darkness wherever he goes, Julia bears mysterious injuries that hint at a deeper horror. Are Erics sinister vibes the true source of her suffering, or is there something even more terrifying lurking within the walls of their home? (Summary by Ben Tucker)

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter two of Sinister House by Leland Hull. The LibriVox
recording is in the public domain, read by Ben Tucker.
Chapter two, No dear, I said to Annette that night
we came from dining with a surprisingly happy bachelor Julia.
I found out nothing more about the house. Some time before,

(00:22):
I may add here we had gleaned from an old
store keeper in Stanton, within the bounds of which it stood,
that it had been built for a summer house by
an eccentric old man, very religious, Morgan Snart by name.
We thought the name had an evil sound, but the
old fellow had been apparently more than respectable, and he
had not been near the place for many years before
he died, not at any rate, since his daughter Holda

(00:45):
had married. Holda was dead too, had died just on
top of her father. According to the old storekeeper, she
had taken to religion even more entirely than her father had,
and he guessed from what he had heard the village
people say, she had seen the light, powerful, strong. Though
the memory of them was rather drab, they were wholly enough,

(01:05):
as Annette said, they were too good to be denied heaven,
and must have been wholly folded up in bliss, a
conclusion disappointing to us, who were given to thinking that
the errant, damned soul of at least a murderer must
be haunting the place. I was rather puzzled to have
my wife bring up the subject of the house again.
We had come to accept the fact that Julia and
Eric loved it, even though we didn't, And thinking of this,

(01:27):
I asked Annette abruptly, whatever had set her to suspecting
the house again? Oh? Nothing, she replied thoughtfully. I wasn't
suspecting Julia's been so attached to it, and what you
said about Eric's leaving her in such a gloomy place,
I suppose. I wonder, Pierre, if you and I are
you remember cousin Giles thought it was a charming old place.

(01:47):
Perhaps we're not educated to see in those old places
what other people see. Let's get some books on architecture
and read it up, and then our eyes will be opened.
Of course, I shouldn't think for a moment of bringing
up my children in such an unsanitary old shanty. I
can't help it. I think it's damp and horrid and
gloomy there now heavens Annette I cried, turning to face her.

(02:09):
What's the matter? I knew that she was quite stirred
up about something. Usually she was gracious enough to refer
to Nettie and little Bobby as our children. Oh nothing,
she said, again, with the airy inflection women use when
they think it hardly necessary to take their husbands into
their confidence. Nonsense, I replied, firmly, but kindly. Something's made

(02:30):
you mad. She turned, surprised round eyes at me. It
has too, I went on, why, Pierre, she said, innocent
as a lamb, just because I suggest that we improve
our minds. But what I asked, surer than ever made
you think of such a thing. Well, it could be done,

(02:51):
couldn't it. Do you think, dear, that I am not
naturally ambitious? This was supreme pity. Do you think that
I do not want the best for my children and myself?
And you, dear? If there's something in architecture more than
we think, we ought to get busy and learn about it.
Cousin Giles tells me that my sense of beauty is undeveloped.
Heaven knows what he'd say about yours, dear, but he's

(03:13):
in the family, and I don't mind him. Now we'll
get to the heart of this, I said, smiling. It's
nothing to get to the heart of Annette went on serenely.
It's simply that old house. I told Julia. I thought
it a horrid old place. Annette, well, not baldly like that,
of course it was. When we came. I well, I

(03:34):
invited Julia to come and stay with us while Eric's away.
You know, I said, we have a nice, sunny, spare room,
and I think it would do you much more good
than to stay shut up in a gloomy old house
like this. Well, that was going some and then she
was very top lofty. No, I interrupted, not top lofty,

(03:54):
not Julia, Yes, Pierre, will you let me finish? I
tell you. She was very top lofty. Oh, she said,
just like that. So you find this house a gloomy,
shut up old place. And since I had gone that far,
I wasn't going to take anything back, and I came
out flat and told her I thought it was horrid.
Then she said, but I love it. Thank you a
thousand times for asking me to stay with you while

(04:15):
Eric's gone. You mustn't think, though, that this house's lonesome.
She gave quite a queer little laugh, and then she
told me that it was a sweet old place, and
she said, you don't think, after all that Eric and
I've done with it, that I want to leave it
for a single night, do you? I know some of
the rooms are shady, but you wouldn't have me drive
from our nest by a shadow, would you? She got
quite excited, so I said, I only thought our house

(04:36):
would be more cheerful for her in Eric's absence, and
I admitted that I didn't see in her old place
what she saw in it. And she just turned her
back on me and said, I suppose not not like that?
I cried for Annette had given the little remark a
most disagreeable, almost an insolent ring. Yes, Pierre, Annette replied

(04:57):
with something like indignation. She was very sharp and rather snobbish.
I know Julia's artistic in all that, but Goodness knows.
Though I may be only a plain, practical woman, I'm
not a country know nothing, and she has no right
to put on airs with me, just because I don't
happen to see in her old house what she sees
in it. I say, frankly, that little else could have

(05:17):
made me sorrier than to have my wife fall out
with Julia Greer. I've never met two persons to whom
I have been so drawn as to Eric and Julia Greer,
and I've heard the Nettes say the same thing. For
her part, they were so good looking and so generous,
and they had such warm voices. While I felt much
the same as a Nette about their house, I could

(05:38):
not help confessing that compared with them, Annette and I
were well, not ordinary, but not extraordinary either. It is,
of course only fair to a Nette to remind you
that the distinguished artist Giles Pharaoh was her cousin, not mine.
For my part, I could name perhaps half a dozen colors,
and could recognize the names of twice as many more

(05:59):
but tons, shades and tints. Not that Julia and Eric
ever talked of such details with me, but Giles used
to talk such stuff with them, and they used to
be very much interested in it. So I told Annette
that Julia had meant nothing, that the tone might easily
be misunderstood, while the words and themselves were entirely innocent.

(06:20):
After all, no one but Julia could be expected to
see in that house just what Julia saw. Annette let
me rave on a while about beauty, and then she
asked me if I too found beauty in that old house. Yes,
I said, valiantly, a certain beauty, Yes I do. But
I blushed as I said it, and it was so
holy sham, so holy manly, Annette said that. We both

(06:42):
burst out laughing. Suddenlynnette stopped, poised a second, and then
fled upstairs in her stocking feet, shouting down at me.
It's raining, great guns, and all the windows are open.
Go out and bring in the baby carriage. It was
raining hard and the wind was blowing a gale. I
got pretty wet hauling the baby carriage back backwards to
the front porch, but once there with it, I was sheltered,

(07:03):
and I stood there a few moments facing north. The
night was absolutely black, for we had as yet no
street lights in the outer parts of Forsby the light
from the bulb on the porch behind me, however, lit
up the heavy drops of rain that fell from the
coping and down the granolithic pathways. I saw long streaks
of rain reflect it back now and then like steel.

(07:23):
Through all the noise of rain and wind, I just
barely heard the whistle of the last train from the city.
The tracks were a couple of miles away. Half past twelve,
I went in and locked up the house for the night.
Oh serenity of the sound new house. At every stage
of my toilet, I thought of it, our neat square
bedroom with its window east and its two windows south,

(07:45):
and all Julia's rooms were queer shaped. Our tiled bathroom,
with its white enamel, its shining nickel, its open plumbing.
And I don't believe Eric had a bit of shining
nickel or open plumbing in his whole place. Our electric
light beside the beds and over the mirror and everywhere
one might want it, And their dingy gas and flickering candles.

(08:07):
My thoughts went on as I brushed my teeth over
the bright nickel toothbrush basin the sanitary equipment. If our
house was up to date and complete, as it always
should be, in a house that shelters young children, If
the Greers had children, now, it wouldn't be so lonesome
over there. But they'd have to clear the place up more,
cut down those rotten old trees, and let the sun
in all day, all round. Funny Julia was as merry

(08:29):
as a lark this evening and looked as she looked
the first day I saw her, before the summer had
well pulled her down, I guess, and she was as
fresh and sparkling as the sun on a brook. Aren't
you ever coming to bed? Annette called to me. I
snapped off the light and went into the bedroom. As
I opened the window, the wind roared in, flapped my
pajamas about my legs, and hurled the rain half way

(08:51):
across the floor. Say Annette, I, I don't know about
opening this window. Come along the other'll be just as bad,
and we'll mop up the floor in the morning. Roll
the rug back, dear, and come to bed. That for
good tight floors. I got into bed and then snapped
out the little table lamp with rose colored shade right

(09:11):
beside me. The room was instantly in darkness, but I
was safe in bed, better than dingy gas and flaring candles. Ah,
old girl. I reached out my hand from the bed
for hers. That sleepy as she might be or dark,
the room never failed to find mine and bridge the
little space between our beds and a good night clasp.

(09:32):
Just the same, she murmured sleepily. I'm going to study
architecture till I see in that house, what Julius sees.
I chuckled and pressed her hand that you'll never do,
my love, good night. I'll never forget how Annette pulled
on my hand when at that very moment, a banging
on the front door resounded through the house. End of

(09:55):
Chapter two.