mad_docs_of_lit | The Tangled Thread—Part One: Then by Die Booth

Part One: Then

21st October, 1909

I sit here today to write down in record what is without doubt the most singular experience of my life to date. Whether this tale will interest, prompt doubt or simply entertain its readers I know not; however, I must assure you before going any further that it is entirely and indisputably true.

I like to think myself as level headed and educated as the next man, of a sound scientific background and not given to wild flights of fancy or hysteria. This is why what I am about to recall is so chilling to me, and above all unusual.

I have always cultivated a keen interest in folklore which often stretches, as I am sure with most young men, to the bizarre and the macabre. Although I never did believe in ghosts and still do have my doubts even now as I write this, I have always had a fascination with tales of the supernatural and have long wished that I could have some form of spiritual or other worldly encounter myself, to thereby prove or, more likely, disprove such legends in my own mind.

So when my acquaintance Mr J— contacted me one day this last month with news of a rumoured haunted house, right here in our own London, I naturally arranged to meet him post haste!

It turned out, after further conversation with my friend that the house at R— Street was owned by a landlord, a Mr W—, a man who had been struggling to let the house out for some several years. Upon first purchasing and making the necessary renovations to the property which had as then been empty for many moons, Mr W— had then promptly let it (being situated in a convenient and respectable locale) to a young, professional gentleman of stout constitution and sound mind. The first full month then passed without incident - or so Mr W— believed at the time.

After that first month, Mr J— related to me, the tenant contacted Mr W— in a state of much vexation. He wished to terminate his contract (which was agreed for a full six months) early and nothing could dissuade him from it, nor was he willing or seemed comfortable to give further details for the reasons behind this flight, becoming almost agitated when pressed further. Naturally, Mr W— was displeased by this breaking of their agreement but the tenant, to my friend's knowledge, was so eager to leave that he assured his erstwhile landlord that he would owe and pay the remaining rent in full - no small sum of money indeed. At this, Mr W— was most troubled and of course refused to accept such a gesture, instead taking only the offered severance, and, confused, he put the house out to let again.

Thus started a pattern that proceeded to cause Mr W— consternation for many months to come: no sooner were the rooms successfully let than the new tenants would remove themselves within first weeks and then days, declining to discuss the cause of their dissatisfaction and so the house came to gain its reputation - of being haunted!

I must confess at this point that I was at once amused and my curiosity excited. I did not for a moment believe that there was anything to my friend's tale except the promise of sport. Oh! The naivety of complacent youth! Reader, be warned - in my self-assurance and appetite for adventure, I at once secured the address of Mr W— from my friend and determined to pay him a visit and view this haunted house for myself.

"Here is the door key," Mr W— informed me, "you may pass by and drop it back at my apartment this evening."

"You think I will not spend the night?" I enquired, playfully, but the gentleman merely looked at me somewhat askance and shook his head, less in disagreement than I think now in retrospect, in grim amusement at my bravado.

The house was not entirely what I expected, not being so old or so atmospheric as I fancied. It was a building of about eighty years but much modernised and improved so it stood with its lower storeys freshly whitewashed and door and railings gleaming with new paint in a terraced row of its fellow townhouses - most not quite so smartly renovated, although all clearly desirable. The place was some five storeys tall, as was the fashion of the time. As I opened the door to enter, Mr W— yet hung back and shook his head in refusal at my offer that he should accompany: however I felt upon entering no black feeling or apprehension whatsoever; on the contrary, the house seemed quite charming - then.

Wandering the fully furnished and airy rooms, with gilded sunlight streaming through fine sash windows, I was if anything rather disappointed. Ascending to the first floor and then the second, I was aware of nothing more threatening than the usual slightly off-kilter feeling of walking alone through a strange and unoccupied house. There was none of the miscellanea of day to day life that is usually strewn around all but the tidiest abodes - instruments for letter writing, or reading books set aside on occasional tables - that is, the place seemed more a house than a home, but for all that, not unwarrantedly unwelcoming.

It was on the staircase leading to the uppermost floor that I first had cause to pause. I had stopped to study a wall-mounted botanical print of a Portuguese Armeria Latifolia, when from the room at the top of the stairs I heard a slight and stealthy movement. I do not know what in this small sound prompted me to freeze with heart suddenly hammering: all I can say is that, mouse or bird or settling floorboards though it well could have been I knew unequivocally in that instant that what I had heard was a footfall.

Well - surely to have footsteps, one must have feet, of mortal mass and weight - certainly no ghost! - and I again, yet more carefully, took to ascend the little stairway with a mind to confront the intruder.

I have to confess, I opened that door very cautiously indeed. Not expecting any physical form of foe I had neglected to arm myself and although I am confident in my capacities of self defence, I did not relish the thought of coming up against some armed miscreant preparing to burgle the house. So, when I peered around and into the room, I was at first relieved as well as surprised by what I saw.

The room, unlike all the others in the house, was unfurnished. Bare oak boards and whited walls gave the space a cell-like appearance and, with nowhere to hide, its occupant shrank back against the far wall as if fearing no doubt deserved recrimination. I quickly observed him to be, on appearance, a young man - younger than I by few years; barely a boy. He was also of an uncommonly beautiful appearance, well proportioned and tall with pleasant features and fair, curled hair, like almost to a representation of the Classics, although his shabby clothes spoke of poverty.

"What ho," said I, "what have we here? Come forward, man, so I can see you properly." His gentle appearance - far from the thieving ruffian I had dared to expect - softened me at once. We never expect the beautiful to be capable of evil, after all. But the fellow hung back, cowering like a whipped dog in the shadow cast by the slant of the gable roof. When he spoke, his voice was as melodious and quiet as his appearance suggested.

"Kind sir, if you will forgive me, I will not - for I am a cursed creature, not fit for the company of men! I suppose you have come to rent this house? Then I can only beg you, as I have begged of every tenant before, please lock this room and forget of its existence and you shall never be bothered once during your tenure here."

At this I laughed - the audacity of the lad, somehow so I immediately saw it, hatching a plot to obtain a free room by playing on the superstitions of others. If this was the reason for the departure of the previous string of occupants then they none of them deserved their deposits back!

"What rot," I said, "to give up an entire room in a hired house for some scoundrel whose only curse, I'll warrant, is unlucky circumstances? It's an imaginative scheme, I'll give you that, my lad, but who on earth would fall for such a fairytale? Come here now and stop lurking in the corner like you need your head examined; come and tell me what this supposed curse of yours is then."

The youth looked first surprised and then he looked anxious. When he took a step forward into the light I could not help but myself take a step back for, in the full, bright daylight coming in through the window, he appeared even more unearthly - his eyes, as I observed, very large and of an unnaturally deep blue hue so as to render them almost violet, and his skin with the milky lustre of moonstone.

"I am hideous," he said sadly but quite genuinely to which I replied (a little taken aback still).

"Not a bit of it. Now I can see you, why don't we see what can be done? What are you about, hiding in someone's attic? What is this problem that is so terrible it prevents a fellow going out to seek an honest wage?"
"I am doomed to life in death! Nor can I age or die except that my unclean heart is pierced; nor can I any longer know the love of family or friend for I hunger to feed of the blood of men!"

The man looked so agitated at this juncture, blurting out his fantastic confession in this manner, that I felt the urge to slap him as one would do with an hysteric - however I refrained, determining at once that this poor unfortunate was delusional and knowing of the changeable nature and sometimes prodigious strength of the lunatic, I held back.

"My fellow - why then you clearly need to visit a doctor." (I also refrained from mentioning what discipline of medicine I had in mind), "I cannot help you here; you must come with me directly and seek proper assistance."
But the youth just wrung his hands and sighed in his evident distress.
"But you do not understand!"

"I understand that you are in need of a friend and I understand that you cannot stay rent-free in another man's attic. How did you ever gain access here without being seen?"

The thought had indeed been plaguing me ever since I noted his presence in the top floor room. The house was locked and suitably secure - the window of the room, as far as I could see, shut tight and latched and anyway was on the top storey of the rear of the house, with no obvious balconies, drainpipes or trees nearby that a person could climb. The only way in, thought I, must be via the roof of an adjoining property or else some kind of secret doorway through from a neighbouring house. How wrong I was, dear reader, and what happened next changed me forever!

"I will show you," said the young man, "and then you will understand." And with that his form, before my waking eyes, dissolved into the air in a kind of mist or vapour or rather as a shower of glittering motes caught in the beams of sunlight filtering into the room, so that I feared for my very mind and ran stricken from the house.

For a while I wandered the streets nearby, my head reeling with incomprehension. I wondered at first if my sanity had indeed taken flight and whether it should be I, not the mysterious youth, who needed to seek the attention of a doctor of psychology. Certainly, what I had witnessed had been - or seemed - utterly real. No trickery of even the most skillful stage magician could have created the illusion that I had witnessed, but the more I replayed that afternoon's shocking events, the more I wondered exactly why it was that I had fled. Was I not, after all, a God-fearing Englishman? Should I then return the house keys that evening to Mr W—, confirming his expectations, or should I face down this unnatural monster that very night? I resolved to return to the house!

So it was, later that evening that I arrived once more at the prepossessing doorway of the house on R— Street - but this time I was accompanied by my man, Mr S—, a fellow of stout heart and cheerful disposition, very disinclined to flights of fancy; also my best terrier, a hound aptly named ‘Fearless', and my revolver.

I more than half expected, as we climbed those narrow stairs now in the fading, late summer light, to find the unfurnished room empty. I had thought hard about how much of the true tale to recount to Mr S—, realising how it would make me sound to a layman, however in the end I had decided to trust him with my full confidence and to his credit he doubted me not at all:
"There are more things in this world," said he, "than can be as yet explained by science!" And he agreed to accompany me on my mission, in the event that this unholy creature - a monster by its own admission - might still be present, an intruder in the house.

In the event, it was.

Sending Fearless ahead into the little attic room, the dog at once set up a frenzied barking, his attention focused again into the gathering shadow at the far corner of the room. The creature appeared at first alarmed - surprised by the presence of the animal who could so obviously sense something amiss - but when it caught sight of myself and S—, it assumed at once a cunning facsimile of relief.

"My friend!" It exclaimed, in a tone frightening in its conviction, "You came back! No other person has ever returned after seeing me for what I am."

And with those brazen words still ringing in the air between us, I at once produced my revolver and shot the demon right through its heart.

Gentle readers, it was the poet Baudelaire who once wrote (I translate) "My dear brothers, never forget, when you hear the progress of enlightenment vaunted, that the devil's best trick is to persuade you that he doesn't exist!" And indeed so it passed with this unassuming creature of such lovely countenance and seeming fair temperament, for intelligent it surely was - and well-versed in the trickery of seduction. For what creature borrowed the face of an angel, when I shot it - as my man will solemnly attest though you make him swear on the Good Book Itself - it exploded at once in a shower of fetid dust, leaving behind it almost no trace whatsoever of its blasphemous existence on earth - for it was after all, a foul fiend of the pit!