September 3, 2025 • 26 mins
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)
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter seven of Sinister House by Leland Hall. This Clebrivox
recording is in the public domain, read by Ben Tucker,
Chapter seven thoroughly ashamed too. That's the word. Books which
teach etiquette of the drawing room had better put in
(00:21):
a special clause to warn students against behaving before their hosts,
as if they were seeing the hideous family specter pass
along the wall of the dwellings in which they are
being entertained. My behavior could hardly have been courteous, and
a look I caught in Giles's eye once or twice
made me fairly cringed with shame. I dared not look
at Julia. Not once during supper did I catch her eye.
(00:44):
As for Eric, he was quiet, but no more so
than usual. Yet I think his smiles were only a
subdued reflection of Julia's excessive merriment. Giles was, of course
the life of the table, life with a good deal
of stinging snap in it. If only I could have
consoled myself with conviction that there was an undercurrent of
something mysterious. But I assure you there was not the
(01:06):
slightest sign of such a thing. Annette thought I wasn't
very well, that's all my sudden understandings and my horrid vision.
I might as well have had a stomach ache just
the same, deep down in my heart or stomach, if
you will, I knew I had not been dreaming, and
also that I had suffered from no ordinary ill turn.
My weird experience was I knew overlaid with my usual
(01:30):
habits of thought and expression, I had been the first
to deny them too. Yet that experience had startled into
shivering sensitiveness, an unfamiliar nerve within me, one of which
I had not learned control, thanks to my own rational
way of living and to the conduct of those about
me at table. The thrill of it was subsiding, but
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it had been laid bare, It had been awakened. It
was tuned to respond to the slightest vibrations, and it
was not to leave me long and quiet. On the
wall of the dining room opposite me there hung a long,
rich curtain. I think I knew there was a door
behind it, though how I knew I cannot say at
any rate. I am not by nature inquisitive, and I
(02:10):
have never wondered into what passage, closet or room it
gave access I found during supper that if I looked
at that curtain, the new nerve trembled within me. This
was inexplicable. There was little enough design on the cloth,
no shape I could recognize, faded, heavy gold embroidery that
stood out only faintly from the deep blue velvet. Yet
(02:33):
I found I could not look at that curtain for
long without beginning to shiver inside. Mind you, I was
crushed enough. I controlled myself. I did not tell anybody
what I felt. Heaven forbid, I didn't even let anyone
catch me looking at it. But once or twice I
caught Eric looking very sharply at it, and very intently,
as if he were trying to place a noise that
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came from behind it. That made me feel queer too. Now,
when we rose from the table, Eric went straight to
that curtain. I began to shudder as with an a dew.
Bobby began to whimper, though he had been well behaved
throughout the meal. Eric drew the curtain a little to
one side. I saw the door knob, and I saw
Eric put his hand on it and turn it. He
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bent his head to the panel of the door, as
if listening. He pushed the door gently, but it did
not open. Suddenly, like a flash, Julia rushed up to him,
put her small hand over his on the knob, and,
laughing but quite pale, said, now, my dear, remember what
you promised me about that room. She couldn't have moved
his hand from the knob, however, Was it because of that?
(03:36):
She began backing slowly from him? Was it because of
that her face took on the haggard look I had
seen on it before. For my own part, I began
to feel cold again, and in spite of all my
efforts to control myself, I shivered so that my teeth chattered.
I could have jumped at Eric and thrown him from
that door. At that moment, Giles caught sight of Eric.
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Where does that door lead to greer, he called out,
going over to stand beside him. I have often been
curious about it. Julius stamped her foot and gave a
shrill laugh. I will not have you men fooling round
that horrid place, she said, And then she told us
that the shape of the room was so ugly that
she could not bear it. That from the first she
had made up her mind never to have it opened.
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That she had thrown a lot of their useless and
broken down furniture into it and locked it up. It
hasn't been cleaned for ages, she said to Giles, and
you would hate it as much as I do. Then
to Eric, why do you think of opening that place
to night? Dear? Let us all go into the other
room and have our coffee. Well, said Eric, I thought
I heard something in there. It was a great relief
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to me to see him take his hand from the knob. Yet,
in spite of my own sensations, I couldn't help wondering
why he should grant Julia's request with such reluctance, For
he was reluctant. He let go the knob very slowly,
and even after he had done so, he still held
the curtain from the door and stood looking very hard
at the panels. Why, said Julia, it's probably a squirrel.
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He won't do any harm in there. Let him run
around a bit. Come away now into the front room,
all of you. She was actually trying to coax him.
Never before had I seen him arry an instant to
grant the least of her requests. He turned to Giles
and said to him with a laugh, that had a
note of grimness in it. Well, I can't get into
it anyhow, so we might as well go on. Then
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it came out, Julia, snatching the story from her husband's
lips and laughing over it, that she had not found
a bolt on this side of the door safeguard enough
against some one's opening it, perhaps quite innocently, and she
had sent to New York for a locksmith to come
and set a Yale lock on it, and she promptly
mislaid the key. Eric concluded all this was in itself
innocent enough, but that new nerve of mine wouldn't cease
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shivering until they had all stepped away from the door.
And then I almost jumped a foot into the air
when Giles roared out the name of Bluebeard. There's another
fearful story for you. Of course, we had told it
to Bobby many times. He was familiar with all the
details of it. I think to my stars that a
net had already made off with him down the corridor
towards the living room. Julia darted ahead of us men
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and joined my wife. We followed them down the narrow
rosy way. Eric was half smiling again, but there wasn't
much lightness face. I remember he told Giles as we
went along that the only irrational thing he had ever
discovered in Julia was her attitude towards that room. Against it,
she had taken a sudden and inflexible aversion for which
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he could conceive of no reason. It wasn't a hideous room,
and it gave on the river too, But she had
even exacted from him a promise never to open the
door of it while she was in the house. When
we were all in the living room, Giles began to
tease Julia a little bit about such things as forbidden rooms.
Julia was very smart and quick with him, and Giles
was splendid at raillery. While they were at it, I
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slipped out quietly into the hall, took a big candle,
and went out to put a patch into the blown
out shoe of my ford. I made no noise, for
I did not want wish to interrupt the others. The
front door closed behind me without a sound, and I
was greatly relieved to be alone. Even in the dark night.
I was glad there was the patchwork to be done.
There's nothing like a familiar, unpleasant job to keep the
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mind from brooding. The little light from the candle I
carried went with me through the black archway of hemlocks
like a warm, though feeble friend. I laughed to hear
myself talk to it. When I set it down on
the running board of the car. I did my work
carefully and well. I put my mind wholly on it.
I knew just what I was up against, and that
was a comfort. Yet I couldn't have been myself, because
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when just as I was making ready to pump up
the mended tire, I thought I heard the sound of
footsteps coming up from under the hemlocks, the cold sweat
broke out all over me. I listened and strained my eyes.
For a hundred dollars, I could not have picked up
the candle and walked to the place where I fancied
the sound had come. I just stood still, thoroughly scared.
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In a moment or two, I heard the same sound again.
It's a wonder to me. I didn't turn and run.
Something white was moving up towards me from the driveway.
The sight of it took all power of motion from
my legs. It took the strength from under my stomach,
and that organ felt as if it had dropped a
foot inside me. When the thing came nearer and I
recognized Julia, I could not speak for the huskiness in
(08:18):
my throat. There I stood beside the ford in my
shirt sleeves, the pump dangling from one hand, and there
she stood beside me in her white evening dress. And
the only light in all the world to shine on us, too,
was from the candle on the running board. Pierre, she said,
without waiting for me to speak, do you think I'm crazy?
I tried to call her name, but a queer noise
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came out of my restricted throat. Do you think I'm crazy?
She repeated, What a question? I said? At last, we
were both hardly more than whispering. Never mind, do you
answer me? For Heaven's sake, of course not, Julia, dear good,
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she said. Then she came very close to me and whispered,
neither do I think you are? I know you saw
something in my house to night. She took my sleeve
and looked up at me, but her face was not
more than a deep shadow. I was afraid her skirt
would catch fire. It was very near the candle flame.
I bent down and moved the candle, and our shadows
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vague and enormous on the mass of foliage behind us
made a gigantic swing. Tell me, she went on, still whispering.
How many did you see? One? I answered, feeling I
don't know why. Shamefaced, I thought, so the woman yes.
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I began to be calmed by her matter of factness.
While I could not but feel she was highly wrought.
Her voice, her manner, and her quiet actions assured me
that she faced whatever the situation was without dismay. It
was a business to make the heart sick, but in
the certainty that it existed, I found something soothing. After
a moment or two of silence, I asked, is there
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more than one? Two? She answered, an old man. Besides,
he isn't so so vile, but he makes it all
the harder for me. She comes first, he comes later.
She shan't do it alone. Ever, Do what Julia alone?
I asked, the words catching in my throat and almost
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strangling me. Kill me, Julia replied quietly. I thought she
might be going to faint. Her voice was so low
that I had better have worried about myself. It was
I who was nearest quaking. My blood was like ice
water in my veins, I longed to run with her
back to the warm house, haunted, though I believed it
to be to sit near warm fire, to escape from
(10:52):
our cold, loneliness and our soundless, grotesque, vast black shadows.
But when she next spoke, her words stiffened me with
the thought that ever again, to escape from this horror
must be at the price of quitting her. They have
nearly done for me. She said, you have come in
the nick of time, for God's sake. Then I cried out,
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leave this dreadful house. It is not the house Pierre.
I don't know what I was thinking of. I had
perhaps no connected thoughts and no suspicion. I just spoke.
I just said Eric, Eric. Julia repeated after me, and
I felt as if my mind had been split from
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my body. So instantly did a million terrible and vague
thoughts spring up and multiply in it. Julia was shivering
against me, and I said, you are cold. Then I
put my coat round her. For ten minutes she talked
to me, not rapidly and consecutively, but in sentences, or
even fragments of sentences, some of which were like sparks
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to the tender of my imagination. While others left me
still in the dark. Julia was proud and high spirited.
It was not easy for her to ask help of
me in her more than distressful situation. I think, however,
she wanted me to understand. She needed, let us say,
my comradeship and what might lie ahead of her As
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to her own conduct up to the present that I
could see had been governed by her entire and unquestioning
love of Eric, which was also the source of that
strength of hers more valiant and enduring than I or
anyone else can appreciate. For instance, she and her husband
had not been settled in the house a week before
she acknowledged to herself that there was an influence in
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the place, not natural and not good, which was trying
to alienate her from her husband's companionship. It was insidious,
but it was real. She had had even a vague
suspicion that the evil something emanated from Eric, but this
was so intolerable that by sheer force of will, she
banished it utterly from her mind. She faced the possibility
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that the house was haunted. This was, she thought at
the time, a grotesque and an unsubstantiated fear. She fancied,
she felt things. That was all. She had bad dreams.
She was in danger of letting her imagination run away
with her. Up to the time that Eric first went away,
she could not say that she had really seen anything,
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just once or twice, the outline perhaps of a woman,
no body, no substance. But this had appeared in the
middle of the night while Eric slept peacefully at her side.
She held his evidence against the soundness of her own mind.
The feebly, restraining touch of cold finger tips on her
face when she turned towards her husband she took as
a symptom of slightly disordered circulation. Never then had she
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thought of telling Eric she should have been ashamed for
one thing after urging him to take that particular house.
Then too, there was it was, something was vile. She
should have suffered almost anything, rather than let Eric even
hear of it. I knew, we all knew that Eric
was to be protected, and I used to think that
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he was protecting her. When Eric went away the first time,
she meant to stay alone in that house and defeat
whatever haunted it. She had already begun to suspect that
the secret ghost of evil had decoyed her into it
in the first place. Decoyed was Annett's word. I remembered.
She was not then afraid. But the ghost had left
her alone. During the time of his absence. She had
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not once felt the pressure of the evil thing. Only
when Eric came back. The thought of this unnerved her somewhat.
She apprehended that what she said might make me think
evil of Eric, whereas there was nothing evil in Eric.
He was entirely without blame. He was entirely innocent. One
of the most terrible things she had had to bear
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was his misunderstanding of her behavior. She had had to
protect herself against violent onslaught. The the thing that had
been most vicious when she tried to approach her husband
had been violent to when her husband approached her. She
had to acknowledge she had become afraid that the nearness
of her husband was becoming more and more dreadful to her.
She had fought thought with all her strength to keep
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beside him, to preserve their intimacy. She couldn't explain to Eric.
It was all unbelievable. She could substantiate nothing. Eric saw nothing.
The greater the effort she made to draw near him.
On the other hand, the more that malevolent thing became incandescent,
she was terrified by the visible appearance she was losing
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her strength. Eric was in an anguish of mind. He
said little, but she knew that he could explain her
conduct only one way. He thought that she was losing
her love for him, that he was unpleasant to her,
And she could do nothing but protest in words, her
will to act, Her insatiable desire to act aborted through fear.
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She simply was powerless to explain to Eric. There was
something so loathsome, the malice of that fiend, that she
could not speak of it to Eric, whose ultra sensitive
nature would have been sickened and revolted beyond endurance. Once
she had tried, I knew the name. She had heard
it too. Yes, once she had mentioned it to Eric,
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the effect upon him was indescribable. She would not speak
of it to him again. No, she would not leave
the house. It was plain to her that the house
was not infected. The source of the evil was in
She couldn't utter that, but I guessed what she had
in mind. Undoubtedly the evil was, for some unknown and
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unimaginable reason, strongest in that house. But what a veil
to go elsewhere with Eric, the secret ghost would follow him.
Did I not remember Annette had said that Eric had
brought nightmares to my son. There would be nightmares everywhere
for Julia. If the horror were to be utterly routed,
then it must be overcome in its strongth what she
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cried out in torment. Has this specter to do with Eric?
And what has Eric to do with this house? She
made a movement of despair with her arms, grotesquely and furtively,
imitated by the huge black shadows on the foliage of
the hemlocks. I believe, Julia, I replied, trying to speak calmly,
that Eric is the final object of its malevolence, that
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Eric is the marked victim. I believe that it is
pursuing the only course that can end in mortal torture
to him. I know it, she said, with a sob
me principally, But everyone who loves him. He has so
few friends, only you. She took me by the arm
and leaned close to whisper in my ear. Children, they
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all used to love Eric. I am insane with fear
for them. You must not bring Bobby to the house again,
I shuddered in a moment's revulsion of feeling, I swore
to myself I would see Eric dead on the gran
elithic walk to my house rather than let him cross
the threshold again. What terrible knowledge and experience had not
these few weeks brought to Julia and to me, Great heavens,
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There was the hellish mockery of our furtive black shadows,
a devilish soundless, lightless burlesque of our gestures before the candle.
But what a reality in our fear and despair. The
feeble restraining drawing of clammy fingers over Julia's cheek had
become the clutch of cold ghost hands at her throat.
(18:31):
They had been at my boy, those hands, and the
suspicion of the source of that evil, once banished, intolerable
to the mind, had become Eric must speak, I called out.
Julia laid her hand over my mouth that blasphemed the
man who, in spite of all she had undergone, remained
to her dearest of all things upon the earth. Don't,
(18:53):
she whispered? Oh, don't perhaps something in his life? You
don't know him as I know him, too terrible, for
I cannot dig him open like a grave. We cannot
rifle him. Say nothing, Say nothing to Eric, and due
time he is great souled, and due time his time.
(19:16):
There was an end to our talk. We started back
to the house, but I had the tire still to pump.
I begged her to go on without me, for the
wind was cold and she was most denly clad, but
she insisted upon standing by while I pumped. The exercise
brought up my spirits a little. I asked her to
try a hand, not wholly jokingly, but knowing the exercise
would warm her as it had warmed me. Yet she
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hardly heard me. She did not speak again until we
went together up the steps to the front door, and
then it was to implore me to respect Eric's dumb grief.
We entered the rose colored hallway. Before we reached the
door to the living room, Eric had come out to
meet us. He looked anxiously at Julia, my dearest girl.
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He said, reproachfully out of doors this cold night without
a rap. Never mind, Eric, dear, I have been helping
Pierre mind the tire. She went gaily into the living room,
and I, rubbing my hands Eric's touch affectionately upon my shoulder,
followed her. It was late, and when Annette saw me
come in, she immediately stood up and prepared to go home.
(20:21):
Julia would have had us all stay. She wanted company. Giles, too,
feeling I dare say that he had been cheated of
Julia's society, was all four settling down into another hour's talk.
But Annette was right, She's always right. We had to
go on for Bobby's sake, for nothing else. All right, dear,
I called out cheerfully, and for a second I could
not believe that the cheerful voice and the homely words
(20:44):
were my own. I had been out in another world.
So we left Julia alone with her husband. What else
we left with her? Only I could imagine. And I
carried into our living room that night for the first time,
a worry that as I took my easy chair grew heavier,
not lighter. Annette betook herself at once upstairs with Bobby.
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Giles began walking up and down, his chin in his
hand automatically. I filled my pipe, and I didn't know
whether I was an idiot, a good fellow, or a conspirator.
I'd left behind me more than a vivid picture. I'd
left a shocking reality. I'd left a delicate, charming woman,
defenseless against powers, bent on doing her mischief, perhaps the
(21:28):
one irremediable mischief. That very night. You will understand that
I was unpleasantly nervous, well, just as if nothing had happened.
Annette came down, lit the fire on the hearth for us,
and brought in some beer from the kitchen. Then she
sat down and said, quite calmly, I will never take
my boy into that dreadful house again. Huh, Giles grunted scornfully.
(21:52):
Are you crazy too? No, I said emphatically, she isn't.
She's perfectly right. But Giles went on, as if I
had said nothing, that boy of yours should be spanked
for behaving as he did, A good whipping now and
then would take such nonsense out of him. So that
was all it meant to Giles, a fit of unruly
temper and a spoiled child. I started to give him
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a call down, Giles, you think your darn smart? That
word tripped me up. Well, go on, what have you
got to say? Nothing out with it? Annette looked at
me anxiously. Once or twice already she had laid her
hand on my forehead to find if I had a fever.
She could see that I wasn't myself. She tried to
(22:36):
change the drift of our talk. I don't think she
said that Robert is the only one who was rude
there tonight. It was hardly courteous of Julie to run
off and leave me alone as she did. And after
her urging me to stay too, don't, Annette, I cried,
for Heaven's sake, don't. I got up and paced the
room a couple of times, and I guess Annette didn't
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know what to make of me. Finally, sitting down again,
I said to Giles as calmly and impressively as I could,
that house is haunted. He merely laughed loudly and called
me a poor simpleton. And I added the ghosts that
haunted are trying to murder Julia Greer. That at last
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impressed him, but not as I had thought it would do.
His face became hard, and fixing me with his eyes,
he said, in a cynical tone, the one word ghosts.
He put a world of meaning into his tone. It
was not ghosts in that house that were hurting Julia.
The fear that I might have betrayed Eric made me
light headed. I loved that man and pitied him. Ghosts,
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I affirmed, who are they? To night, I said, I
heard the name Snart. At that, Annette leaned forward and whispered,
not really, so, cried Giles in a flash. You've heard
that unsavory name before a man named Morgan Snart built
the house, Annett explained, with a troubled look at me. Good,
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said Charles. I've tried to find out from Greer who
built that house. He is not the man to ask
Morgan's Snart. I mustn't forget that he took a little
book from his pocket and wrote the name down in it,
talking to me sarcastically all the time. And of course
he was insane, This Morgan Snart a murderer, a suicide
or something. It's only such unfortunates that come back to earth,
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isn't it, Pierre? Nothing else would do? He scribbled away.
I don't know anything about him, I grumbled, except that
he's dead, Yes, of course dead to That's the perfect
idea of a ghost, isn't it, Pierre? And then, closing
the little book with a slap, he said cuttingly, I
tell you my idea of a ghost is something quite different.
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Dead men rise up, never read even your poets. Ghosts
breed in the living. That's where we'll catch them. He
stood up and started for the little room under the stair,
looking at his watch. What are you going to do, Giles,
I asked, it's only eleven. I'm going to telephone to
a friend of mine in New York, a lawyer. I
(25:11):
don't suppose your ghosts ever walk much before midnight, do they.
Maybe we'll lay this one before the witching hour strikes.
I sprang up. For the love of Mike, Giles, I cried,
stop this damn mockery. You think I'm nuts, all right,
But I tell you there's a woman in that rotten
old house that I have entire confidence in. Julia, he
(25:32):
said coolly. She is a rational and an invincible woman.
You are sure of that, are you, I asked, equally,
calm perfectly. Well, then Julia may have something to say
that will change your opinions. I shall have something to say,
he answered, scornfully that will change yours. End of Chapter
(25:55):
seven
Chapter seven of Sinister House by Leland Hall. This Clebrivox
recording is in the public domain, read by Ben Tucker,
Chapter seven thoroughly ashamed too. That's the word. Books which
teach etiquette of the drawing room had better put in
(00:21):
a special clause to warn students against behaving before their hosts,
as if they were seeing the hideous family specter pass
along the wall of the dwellings in which they are
being entertained. My behavior could hardly have been courteous, and
a look I caught in Giles's eye once or twice
made me fairly cringed with shame. I dared not look
at Julia. Not once during supper did I catch her eye.
(00:44):
As for Eric, he was quiet, but no more so
than usual. Yet I think his smiles were only a
subdued reflection of Julia's excessive merriment. Giles was, of course
the life of the table, life with a good deal
of stinging snap in it. If only I could have
consoled myself with conviction that there was an undercurrent of
something mysterious. But I assure you there was not the
(01:06):
slightest sign of such a thing. Annette thought I wasn't
very well, that's all my sudden understandings and my horrid vision.
I might as well have had a stomach ache just
the same, deep down in my heart or stomach, if
you will, I knew I had not been dreaming, and
also that I had suffered from no ordinary ill turn.
My weird experience was I knew overlaid with my usual
(01:30):
habits of thought and expression, I had been the first
to deny them too. Yet that experience had startled into
shivering sensitiveness, an unfamiliar nerve within me, one of which
I had not learned control, thanks to my own rational
way of living and to the conduct of those about
me at table. The thrill of it was subsiding, but
(01:50):
it had been laid bare, It had been awakened. It
was tuned to respond to the slightest vibrations, and it
was not to leave me long and quiet. On the
wall of the dining room opposite me there hung a long,
rich curtain. I think I knew there was a door
behind it, though how I knew I cannot say at
any rate. I am not by nature inquisitive, and I
(02:10):
have never wondered into what passage, closet or room it
gave access I found during supper that if I looked
at that curtain, the new nerve trembled within me. This
was inexplicable. There was little enough design on the cloth,
no shape I could recognize, faded, heavy gold embroidery that
stood out only faintly from the deep blue velvet. Yet
(02:33):
I found I could not look at that curtain for
long without beginning to shiver inside. Mind you, I was
crushed enough. I controlled myself. I did not tell anybody
what I felt. Heaven forbid, I didn't even let anyone
catch me looking at it. But once or twice I
caught Eric looking very sharply at it, and very intently,
as if he were trying to place a noise that
(02:54):
came from behind it. That made me feel queer too. Now,
when we rose from the table, Eric went straight to
that curtain. I began to shudder as with an a dew.
Bobby began to whimper, though he had been well behaved
throughout the meal. Eric drew the curtain a little to
one side. I saw the door knob, and I saw
Eric put his hand on it and turn it. He
(03:16):
bent his head to the panel of the door, as
if listening. He pushed the door gently, but it did
not open. Suddenly, like a flash, Julia rushed up to him,
put her small hand over his on the knob, and,
laughing but quite pale, said, now, my dear, remember what
you promised me about that room. She couldn't have moved
his hand from the knob, however, Was it because of that?
(03:36):
She began backing slowly from him? Was it because of
that her face took on the haggard look I had
seen on it before. For my own part, I began
to feel cold again, and in spite of all my
efforts to control myself, I shivered so that my teeth chattered.
I could have jumped at Eric and thrown him from
that door. At that moment, Giles caught sight of Eric.
(03:58):
Where does that door lead to greer, he called out,
going over to stand beside him. I have often been
curious about it. Julius stamped her foot and gave a
shrill laugh. I will not have you men fooling round
that horrid place, she said, And then she told us
that the shape of the room was so ugly that
she could not bear it. That from the first she
had made up her mind never to have it opened.
(04:18):
That she had thrown a lot of their useless and
broken down furniture into it and locked it up. It
hasn't been cleaned for ages, she said to Giles, and
you would hate it as much as I do. Then
to Eric, why do you think of opening that place
to night? Dear? Let us all go into the other
room and have our coffee. Well, said Eric, I thought
I heard something in there. It was a great relief
(04:41):
to me to see him take his hand from the knob. Yet,
in spite of my own sensations, I couldn't help wondering
why he should grant Julia's request with such reluctance, For
he was reluctant. He let go the knob very slowly,
and even after he had done so, he still held
the curtain from the door and stood looking very hard
at the panels. Why, said Julia, it's probably a squirrel.
(05:03):
He won't do any harm in there. Let him run
around a bit. Come away now into the front room,
all of you. She was actually trying to coax him.
Never before had I seen him arry an instant to
grant the least of her requests. He turned to Giles
and said to him with a laugh, that had a
note of grimness in it. Well, I can't get into
it anyhow, so we might as well go on. Then
(05:24):
it came out, Julia, snatching the story from her husband's
lips and laughing over it, that she had not found
a bolt on this side of the door safeguard enough
against some one's opening it, perhaps quite innocently, and she
had sent to New York for a locksmith to come
and set a Yale lock on it, and she promptly
mislaid the key. Eric concluded all this was in itself
innocent enough, but that new nerve of mine wouldn't cease
(05:47):
shivering until they had all stepped away from the door.
And then I almost jumped a foot into the air
when Giles roared out the name of Bluebeard. There's another
fearful story for you. Of course, we had told it
to Bobby many times. He was familiar with all the
details of it. I think to my stars that a
net had already made off with him down the corridor
towards the living room. Julia darted ahead of us men
(06:08):
and joined my wife. We followed them down the narrow
rosy way. Eric was half smiling again, but there wasn't
much lightness face. I remember he told Giles as we
went along that the only irrational thing he had ever
discovered in Julia was her attitude towards that room. Against it,
she had taken a sudden and inflexible aversion for which
(06:30):
he could conceive of no reason. It wasn't a hideous room,
and it gave on the river too, But she had
even exacted from him a promise never to open the
door of it while she was in the house. When
we were all in the living room, Giles began to
tease Julia a little bit about such things as forbidden rooms.
Julia was very smart and quick with him, and Giles
was splendid at raillery. While they were at it, I
(06:51):
slipped out quietly into the hall, took a big candle,
and went out to put a patch into the blown
out shoe of my ford. I made no noise, for
I did not want wish to interrupt the others. The
front door closed behind me without a sound, and I
was greatly relieved to be alone. Even in the dark night.
I was glad there was the patchwork to be done.
There's nothing like a familiar, unpleasant job to keep the
(07:13):
mind from brooding. The little light from the candle I
carried went with me through the black archway of hemlocks
like a warm, though feeble friend. I laughed to hear
myself talk to it. When I set it down on
the running board of the car. I did my work
carefully and well. I put my mind wholly on it.
I knew just what I was up against, and that
was a comfort. Yet I couldn't have been myself, because
(07:35):
when just as I was making ready to pump up
the mended tire, I thought I heard the sound of
footsteps coming up from under the hemlocks, the cold sweat
broke out all over me. I listened and strained my eyes.
For a hundred dollars, I could not have picked up
the candle and walked to the place where I fancied
the sound had come. I just stood still, thoroughly scared.
(07:56):
In a moment or two, I heard the same sound again.
It's a wonder to me. I didn't turn and run.
Something white was moving up towards me from the driveway.
The sight of it took all power of motion from
my legs. It took the strength from under my stomach,
and that organ felt as if it had dropped a
foot inside me. When the thing came nearer and I
recognized Julia, I could not speak for the huskiness in
(08:18):
my throat. There I stood beside the ford in my
shirt sleeves, the pump dangling from one hand, and there
she stood beside me in her white evening dress. And
the only light in all the world to shine on us, too,
was from the candle on the running board. Pierre, she said,
without waiting for me to speak, do you think I'm crazy?
I tried to call her name, but a queer noise
(08:40):
came out of my restricted throat. Do you think I'm crazy?
She repeated, What a question? I said? At last, we
were both hardly more than whispering. Never mind, do you
answer me? For Heaven's sake, of course not, Julia, dear good,
(09:01):
she said. Then she came very close to me and whispered,
neither do I think you are? I know you saw
something in my house to night. She took my sleeve
and looked up at me, but her face was not
more than a deep shadow. I was afraid her skirt
would catch fire. It was very near the candle flame.
I bent down and moved the candle, and our shadows
(09:23):
vague and enormous on the mass of foliage behind us
made a gigantic swing. Tell me, she went on, still whispering.
How many did you see? One? I answered, feeling I
don't know why. Shamefaced, I thought, so the woman yes.
(09:44):
I began to be calmed by her matter of factness.
While I could not but feel she was highly wrought.
Her voice, her manner, and her quiet actions assured me
that she faced whatever the situation was without dismay. It
was a business to make the heart sick, but in
the certainty that it existed, I found something soothing. After
a moment or two of silence, I asked, is there
(10:07):
more than one? Two? She answered, an old man. Besides,
he isn't so so vile, but he makes it all
the harder for me. She comes first, he comes later.
She shan't do it alone. Ever, Do what Julia alone?
I asked, the words catching in my throat and almost
(10:29):
strangling me. Kill me, Julia replied quietly. I thought she
might be going to faint. Her voice was so low
that I had better have worried about myself. It was
I who was nearest quaking. My blood was like ice
water in my veins, I longed to run with her
back to the warm house, haunted, though I believed it
to be to sit near warm fire, to escape from
(10:52):
our cold, loneliness and our soundless, grotesque, vast black shadows.
But when she next spoke, her words stiffened me with
the thought that ever again, to escape from this horror
must be at the price of quitting her. They have
nearly done for me. She said, you have come in
the nick of time, for God's sake. Then I cried out,
(11:15):
leave this dreadful house. It is not the house Pierre.
I don't know what I was thinking of. I had
perhaps no connected thoughts and no suspicion. I just spoke.
I just said Eric, Eric. Julia repeated after me, and
I felt as if my mind had been split from
(11:36):
my body. So instantly did a million terrible and vague
thoughts spring up and multiply in it. Julia was shivering
against me, and I said, you are cold. Then I
put my coat round her. For ten minutes she talked
to me, not rapidly and consecutively, but in sentences, or
even fragments of sentences, some of which were like sparks
(11:59):
to the tender of my imagination. While others left me
still in the dark. Julia was proud and high spirited.
It was not easy for her to ask help of
me in her more than distressful situation. I think, however,
she wanted me to understand. She needed, let us say,
my comradeship and what might lie ahead of her As
(12:20):
to her own conduct up to the present that I
could see had been governed by her entire and unquestioning
love of Eric, which was also the source of that
strength of hers more valiant and enduring than I or
anyone else can appreciate. For instance, she and her husband
had not been settled in the house a week before
she acknowledged to herself that there was an influence in
(12:41):
the place, not natural and not good, which was trying
to alienate her from her husband's companionship. It was insidious,
but it was real. She had had even a vague
suspicion that the evil something emanated from Eric, but this
was so intolerable that by sheer force of will, she
banished it utterly from her mind. She faced the possibility
(13:02):
that the house was haunted. This was, she thought at
the time, a grotesque and an unsubstantiated fear. She fancied,
she felt things. That was all. She had bad dreams.
She was in danger of letting her imagination run away
with her. Up to the time that Eric first went away,
she could not say that she had really seen anything,
(13:24):
just once or twice, the outline perhaps of a woman,
no body, no substance. But this had appeared in the
middle of the night while Eric slept peacefully at her side.
She held his evidence against the soundness of her own mind.
The feebly, restraining touch of cold finger tips on her
face when she turned towards her husband she took as
a symptom of slightly disordered circulation. Never then had she
(13:48):
thought of telling Eric she should have been ashamed for
one thing after urging him to take that particular house.
Then too, there was it was, something was vile. She
should have suffered almost anything, rather than let Eric even
hear of it. I knew, we all knew that Eric
was to be protected, and I used to think that
(14:10):
he was protecting her. When Eric went away the first time,
she meant to stay alone in that house and defeat
whatever haunted it. She had already begun to suspect that
the secret ghost of evil had decoyed her into it
in the first place. Decoyed was Annett's word. I remembered.
She was not then afraid. But the ghost had left
her alone. During the time of his absence. She had
(14:32):
not once felt the pressure of the evil thing. Only
when Eric came back. The thought of this unnerved her somewhat.
She apprehended that what she said might make me think
evil of Eric, whereas there was nothing evil in Eric.
He was entirely without blame. He was entirely innocent. One
of the most terrible things she had had to bear
(14:53):
was his misunderstanding of her behavior. She had had to
protect herself against violent onslaught. The the thing that had
been most vicious when she tried to approach her husband
had been violent to when her husband approached her. She
had to acknowledge she had become afraid that the nearness
of her husband was becoming more and more dreadful to her.
She had fought thought with all her strength to keep
(15:14):
beside him, to preserve their intimacy. She couldn't explain to Eric.
It was all unbelievable. She could substantiate nothing. Eric saw nothing.
The greater the effort she made to draw near him.
On the other hand, the more that malevolent thing became incandescent,
she was terrified by the visible appearance she was losing
(15:35):
her strength. Eric was in an anguish of mind. He
said little, but she knew that he could explain her
conduct only one way. He thought that she was losing
her love for him, that he was unpleasant to her,
And she could do nothing but protest in words, her
will to act, Her insatiable desire to act aborted through fear.
(15:55):
She simply was powerless to explain to Eric. There was
something so loathsome, the malice of that fiend, that she
could not speak of it to Eric, whose ultra sensitive
nature would have been sickened and revolted beyond endurance. Once
she had tried, I knew the name. She had heard
it too. Yes, once she had mentioned it to Eric,
(16:17):
the effect upon him was indescribable. She would not speak
of it to him again. No, she would not leave
the house. It was plain to her that the house
was not infected. The source of the evil was in
She couldn't utter that, but I guessed what she had
in mind. Undoubtedly the evil was, for some unknown and
(16:39):
unimaginable reason, strongest in that house. But what a veil
to go elsewhere with Eric, the secret ghost would follow him.
Did I not remember Annette had said that Eric had
brought nightmares to my son. There would be nightmares everywhere
for Julia. If the horror were to be utterly routed,
then it must be overcome in its strongth what she
(17:02):
cried out in torment. Has this specter to do with Eric?
And what has Eric to do with this house? She
made a movement of despair with her arms, grotesquely and furtively,
imitated by the huge black shadows on the foliage of
the hemlocks. I believe, Julia, I replied, trying to speak calmly,
that Eric is the final object of its malevolence, that
(17:24):
Eric is the marked victim. I believe that it is
pursuing the only course that can end in mortal torture
to him. I know it, she said, with a sob
me principally, But everyone who loves him. He has so
few friends, only you. She took me by the arm
and leaned close to whisper in my ear. Children, they
(17:48):
all used to love Eric. I am insane with fear
for them. You must not bring Bobby to the house again,
I shuddered in a moment's revulsion of feeling, I swore
to myself I would see Eric dead on the gran
elithic walk to my house rather than let him cross
the threshold again. What terrible knowledge and experience had not
these few weeks brought to Julia and to me, Great heavens,
(18:11):
There was the hellish mockery of our furtive black shadows,
a devilish soundless, lightless burlesque of our gestures before the candle.
But what a reality in our fear and despair. The
feeble restraining drawing of clammy fingers over Julia's cheek had
become the clutch of cold ghost hands at her throat.
(18:31):
They had been at my boy, those hands, and the
suspicion of the source of that evil, once banished, intolerable
to the mind, had become Eric must speak, I called out.
Julia laid her hand over my mouth that blasphemed the
man who, in spite of all she had undergone, remained
to her dearest of all things upon the earth. Don't,
(18:53):
she whispered? Oh, don't perhaps something in his life? You
don't know him as I know him, too terrible, for
I cannot dig him open like a grave. We cannot
rifle him. Say nothing, Say nothing to Eric, and due
time he is great souled, and due time his time.
(19:16):
There was an end to our talk. We started back
to the house, but I had the tire still to pump.
I begged her to go on without me, for the
wind was cold and she was most denly clad, but
she insisted upon standing by while I pumped. The exercise
brought up my spirits a little. I asked her to
try a hand, not wholly jokingly, but knowing the exercise
would warm her as it had warmed me. Yet she
(19:39):
hardly heard me. She did not speak again until we
went together up the steps to the front door, and
then it was to implore me to respect Eric's dumb grief.
We entered the rose colored hallway. Before we reached the
door to the living room, Eric had come out to
meet us. He looked anxiously at Julia, my dearest girl.
(19:59):
He said, reproachfully out of doors this cold night without
a rap. Never mind, Eric, dear, I have been helping
Pierre mind the tire. She went gaily into the living room,
and I, rubbing my hands Eric's touch affectionately upon my shoulder,
followed her. It was late, and when Annette saw me
come in, she immediately stood up and prepared to go home.
(20:21):
Julia would have had us all stay. She wanted company. Giles, too,
feeling I dare say that he had been cheated of
Julia's society, was all four settling down into another hour's talk.
But Annette was right, She's always right. We had to
go on for Bobby's sake, for nothing else. All right, dear,
I called out cheerfully, and for a second I could
not believe that the cheerful voice and the homely words
(20:44):
were my own. I had been out in another world.
So we left Julia alone with her husband. What else
we left with her? Only I could imagine. And I
carried into our living room that night for the first time,
a worry that as I took my easy chair grew heavier,
not lighter. Annette betook herself at once upstairs with Bobby.
(21:06):
Giles began walking up and down, his chin in his
hand automatically. I filled my pipe, and I didn't know
whether I was an idiot, a good fellow, or a conspirator.
I'd left behind me more than a vivid picture. I'd
left a shocking reality. I'd left a delicate, charming woman,
defenseless against powers, bent on doing her mischief, perhaps the
(21:28):
one irremediable mischief. That very night. You will understand that
I was unpleasantly nervous, well, just as if nothing had happened.
Annette came down, lit the fire on the hearth for us,
and brought in some beer from the kitchen. Then she
sat down and said, quite calmly, I will never take
my boy into that dreadful house again. Huh, Giles grunted scornfully.
(21:52):
Are you crazy too? No, I said emphatically, she isn't.
She's perfectly right. But Giles went on, as if I
had said nothing, that boy of yours should be spanked
for behaving as he did, A good whipping now and
then would take such nonsense out of him. So that
was all it meant to Giles, a fit of unruly
temper and a spoiled child. I started to give him
(22:14):
a call down, Giles, you think your darn smart? That
word tripped me up. Well, go on, what have you
got to say? Nothing out with it? Annette looked at
me anxiously. Once or twice already she had laid her
hand on my forehead to find if I had a fever.
She could see that I wasn't myself. She tried to
(22:36):
change the drift of our talk. I don't think she
said that Robert is the only one who was rude
there tonight. It was hardly courteous of Julie to run
off and leave me alone as she did. And after
her urging me to stay too, don't, Annette, I cried,
for Heaven's sake, don't. I got up and paced the
room a couple of times, and I guess Annette didn't
(22:57):
know what to make of me. Finally, sitting down again,
I said to Giles as calmly and impressively as I could,
that house is haunted. He merely laughed loudly and called
me a poor simpleton. And I added the ghosts that
haunted are trying to murder Julia Greer. That at last
(23:18):
impressed him, but not as I had thought it would do.
His face became hard, and fixing me with his eyes,
he said, in a cynical tone, the one word ghosts.
He put a world of meaning into his tone. It
was not ghosts in that house that were hurting Julia.
The fear that I might have betrayed Eric made me
light headed. I loved that man and pitied him. Ghosts,
(23:43):
I affirmed, who are they? To night, I said, I
heard the name Snart. At that, Annette leaned forward and whispered,
not really, so, cried Giles in a flash. You've heard
that unsavory name before a man named Morgan Snart built
the house, Annett explained, with a troubled look at me. Good,
(24:06):
said Charles. I've tried to find out from Greer who
built that house. He is not the man to ask
Morgan's Snart. I mustn't forget that he took a little
book from his pocket and wrote the name down in it,
talking to me sarcastically all the time. And of course
he was insane, This Morgan Snart a murderer, a suicide
or something. It's only such unfortunates that come back to earth,
(24:27):
isn't it, Pierre? Nothing else would do? He scribbled away.
I don't know anything about him, I grumbled, except that
he's dead, Yes, of course dead to That's the perfect
idea of a ghost, isn't it, Pierre? And then, closing
the little book with a slap, he said cuttingly, I
tell you my idea of a ghost is something quite different.
(24:49):
Dead men rise up, never read even your poets. Ghosts
breed in the living. That's where we'll catch them. He
stood up and started for the little room under the stair,
looking at his watch. What are you going to do, Giles,
I asked, it's only eleven. I'm going to telephone to
a friend of mine in New York, a lawyer. I
(25:11):
don't suppose your ghosts ever walk much before midnight, do they.
Maybe we'll lay this one before the witching hour strikes.
I sprang up. For the love of Mike, Giles, I cried,
stop this damn mockery. You think I'm nuts, all right,
But I tell you there's a woman in that rotten
old house that I have entire confidence in. Julia, he
(25:32):
said coolly. She is a rational and an invincible woman.
You are sure of that, are you, I asked, equally,
calm perfectly. Well, then Julia may have something to say
that will change your opinions. I shall have something to say,
he answered, scornfully that will change yours. End of Chapter
(25:55):
seven
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