The Collected Fiction of William Hope Hodgson: The Dream Of X & Other Fantastic Visions (40 page)

“The explosive the papers are talking about. Yes, that’s Baumoff’s; that makes it all seem true, doesn’t it? They had the darkness at Berlin, after the explosion. There is no getting away from that. The Government know only that Baumoff’s formulae is capable of producing the largest quantity of gas, in the shortest possible time. That, in short, it is ideally explosive. So it is; but I imagine it will prove an explosive, as I have already said, and as experience has proved, a little too impartial in its action for it to create enthusiasm on either side of a battlefield. Perhaps this is but a mercy, in disguise; certainly a mercy, if Baumoff’s theories as to the possibility of disorganising matter, be anywhere near to the truth.

“I have thought sometimes that there might be a more normal explanation of the dreadful thing that happened at the end. Baumoff may have ruptured a blood-vessel in the brain, owing to the enormous arterial pressure that his experiment induced; and the voice I heard and the mockery and the horrible expression and leer may have been nothing more than the immediate outburst and expression of the natural “obliqueness” of a deranged mind, which so often turns up a side of a man’s nature and produces an inversion of character, that is the very complement of his normal state. And certainly, poor Baumoff’s normal religious attitude was one of marvellous reverence and loyalty towards the Christ.

“Also, in support of this line of explanation, I have frequently observed that the voice of a person suffering from mental derangement is frequently wonderfully changed, and has in it often a very repellant and inhuman quality. I try to think that this explanation fits the case. But I can never forget that room. Never.”

/* */

The Room of Fear

1

W
illie Johnson lay in the big bed very quiet and rigid. He had that day come upon his eighth birthday, and in consequence thereof—beginning to be, as his father had told him at breakfast that morning, a big boy—had been promoted from the night nursery and the company of his little sister Jenny and the baby, to the lonely state of a bedroom all to himself.

He had begged hard to be allowed to stay in the night nursery; but his father had teased him for his babyishness, and his mother had negatived his desire with a few curt words. His nurse, Nanny Josephs, had sat with him for some time to keep him company; for she knew something of the fear of the dark in which the little man had lived all his short days; but his mother, chancing to come in to see how he liked his new bedroom, had ordered her out, telling her that she was but pandering to the cowardice of the boy, which he would have to learn to outgrow, and that she considered nurse’s conduct as nothing more or less than encouraging the boy to rebel against the wishes of his parents.

His mother had stayed with him some few minutes after Nanny had gone, and she had improved the time with some sharp remarks upon her little son’s lack of courage, the which, indeed, hurt her in a very tender place; for, above all sins, she held none so vile as that of cowardice. Then she had given him a cold, reproveful, duty kiss—and gone out into the light of the big corridor, closing the little man in alone with the darkness. Yet she was a good woman, somewhat cold-blooded it is true; yet by no means lacking in steady affection. But she was also a very proud woman, and neither the Johnsons nor the Lemots—her own family—had ever numbered the fear-vice among their many others. And now, here had she given birth to a son who was a coward to his little marrow. Yet he should be cured, or—what! I doubt if she gave even a thought to the alternative. He should be cured. There was nothing more. Certainly he should be cured!

She went downstairs and came presently to her husband. To the big, ruddy man she told in a few words her reprehension of nurse’s conduct, and quoted a fragment of conversation that had passed between them:

“I asked her if she thought Willie would grow into a manly boy if she pandered to him in that manner; and what do you think, John, the foolish woman said: ‘I’m thinkin’, Ma’am, as children do see things as we carn’t.’ I ordered her out of the room instantly. No wonder Willie is afraid to go to bed if she talks after that fashion in his hearing.”

Upstairs, alone in the dark bedroom, Willie lies in the coldness of the big bed—a little rigid, human atom, too frozen by fear even to pull the clothes over his face. He is watching with wide-opened, fixed eyes a great shadow against the lofty, invisible ceiling. It is shaping and shaping in hideous convolutions into the form of a vast hand. The four gigantic fingers are completed, and now the huge thumb sprouts of the, as yet, indefinite palm. And the little man alone in the darkness, seeming a thousand miles from all human comradeship, grows yet more rigid, and his eyes become the more fixedly open and staring. Suddenly, he realizes that the still uncompleted hand has moved downwards bodily, and the fingers are crooked towards him. The whole thing comes lower by perhaps a whole foot and pauses. The child is scarcely breathing, and his feet, spine, hands and forehead are sweating coldly. His senses seem to have become preternaturally sharp, and he hears, unconsciously, a dull regular booming in his ears that seems to fill, and throb through, the great dark room. In his little heart is one vast desire—prayer, that he might get the bed clothes over his head; but he knows that the crooked hand will pounce the instant he moves even one tiny inch. Sixty seconds pass—sixty minutes of immortal agony—such agony as only the fresh nerves of a fearful child can know. Then the staring eyes note a slow movement in the overhanging mass of shadows. It is—receding, slowly, slowly, withdrawing into itself, shrinking, fading; but all the while in constant movement—convoluting. It has risen near to the ceiling, and is become little more than a small shadow. The child on the bed gives a terrific, spasmodic movement, and is under the clothes. The little, relieved heart is sledge-hammering against the frail ribs, so that the curtains of the great bed quiver to each throb. Truly he shall be cured!

Down in the servant’s hall cook and nurse are talking:

“They’re a plucky family is the Missus’s,” cook is saying. “I b’lieve she don’t scarce know what it is to be frightened. An’ I’ve ’eard ’er say as she’s sooner ’ave a thief than a coward.”

“Master Willie ain’t a coward. He’s always been a sensitive child, and I’ll admit he’s afraid of the dark; but all children are. I’ve thought sometimes as they could see more than us grown up. But they grow out of it, an’ so will he if the Missus ’ll give him time.”

“The Missus ain’t one ’s ’ll give time. It’s kill or cure with ’er, an’ always ’as been. She’s more down on cowardice in ’er own flesh an’ blood ’n she would be if ’twas a stranger; but she’s fair an’ straight in ’er dealin’s with folk, an’ kind enough in ’er own fashion.”

“I’m not sayin’ as she ain’t; but she don’t understand Master Willie. Ther’s not a sweeter child anywhere, an’ he’s pluck enough in his own way. It’s not only the dark as he’s frightened of. He’s feared of that there West bedroom in which the Missus has put him. I said to ’er that if he couldn’t stay in the night nursery he never seemed to mind much being in the little room in the East wing. He slept there the time as Miss Jenny had measles. But she told me to hold my tongue, an’ sent me out of the room. She’s got a pretty temper she has when she starts!”

“I don’t see,” remarked cook, “as it matters which room ’e’s in, so long as it’s the dark as ’e’s feared of.”

“I’ve told you, it ain’t only the dark as he’s frightened of. He’s afraid of that there West room, an’ always has been. I don’t know why, I’m sure. It’s a beautiful room; but it seems to me there’s some rooms as children seem to be feared of as soon they put foot inside. I daresay too, it isn’t always without reason. I tried to tell that to the Missus; but it wern’t no good.”

“I don’t know as ever I wer’ feared of a room when I wer’ a young un,” remarked the cook, reflectively, and polishing her red face with her apron.

“Yet you daren’t go down the cellars of this very house unless you’ve someone with you—and you going on for forty-five!” And with this as a parting word, the nurse turned and left her.

2

At breakfast next morning, Willie was quiet and pale; but then he was naturally quiet, and usually pale, so that this attracted no particular notice. His father bantered him good-humouredly upon his lack of appreciation of his new bedroom, and asked him how he would have managed in the old days, if he had wished to be a knight, considering that he would have to have undergone a whole night’s vigil in a great church alone? To which Willie replied simply and truthfully that he would not have liked it, and that he thought he would sooner not have become a knight at all. At this reply, his mother turned and stared at him steadily; but said nothing for some moments. Then:

“I would far sooner see you dead than a coward, Willie!” she remarked with a quiet simplicity. “There has never been a coward in our family on either side till now—” And she paused a moment significantly; then continued: “Can you understand that, Willie? All our men have been famous for their bravery as far back as the Conqueror—Is it not so, John?” she concluded, turning to her husband.

Sir John nodded slowly for reply, and a look of mingled pride and regret came into his eyes—the pride was for his race—the regret that he had lacked chance in his quiet, country life to add to the family traditions of great deeds. Yet, in a moment he was busy again at his breakfast; for he was a hearty, healthy man, fond of sport and outdoor life, and not over given to sentiment. Occasionally, in the course of the meal, he touched genially on his little son’s weakness; but to his direct questions the boy replied no more than “Yes, Sir,” or “No, Sir.” For he was busied with strangely bitter thoughts for so young a child. His mother’s cold, sincere remark had bitten into the brain and heart of the boy, and had roused more than his pride; for Willie loved the somewhat stern woman in a passionate, quiet manner, and with a curious element of reverence, which latter might have been less developed had she shown him more of the mother-side. And because of his love for her, that remark: “I would far sooner see you dead than a coward, Willie,” had, as I have said, roused more than his pride. It had waked a great resolve within him to win her approbation by conquering his fear of the dark and of that room. And if he could not do this, at least, he would hide from her for the future that he was any longer afraid.

And presently, breakfast being ended, he went to his governess.

***

All through the day, the boy has the fear of the night oppressing him, and though he tries manfully to put it from him, and pretends to himself that he is no longer afraid, he is in a tensely nervous state when the evening comes.

Later, when with his nurse he enters the big bedroom, he gives a little shiver of sheer apprehension, and his gaze sweeps quickly round, the action being so full of fear that nurse gives a little start, and steps back a pace.

“How you did startle me, Master Willie!” she remonstrates, as she proceeds to help him into bed. “I thought sure you’d seen something.”

When he is in the big bed, a kindly thought comes to her, and she makes the round of the room, peeping into the great wardrobes, behind the curtains, and under the bed itself! Then she assures him that he has nothing of which to be afraid, that she has been all round, and after that, with a kiss, she leaves him; but purposely leaves the door a little ajar, so that a little light from the lamp outside creeps into the darkness of the room. Yet Willie has no knowledge of this; for, the instant she has started to pull the door behind her, he has dived beneath the clothes, and there his mother finds him, very silent and frightened and wide awake when she comes up to say goodnight to him. She is cross with him, and a little scornful; telling that it is bad for his health, and that he is no safer from his bogy (which is simply cowardice) under the clothes than outside of them. After that, having turned the clothes down so as to leave his face exposed, she kisses him without emotion and goes from the room, shutting the door behind her.

For a time after she has gone, the boy lies there quietly, his eyes tightly closed. Presently, he is tempted to open them; but resists. Yet the temptation becomes stronger, so that he has to screw them up tight to keep them shut, and so a few short, painful minutes pass; then, abruptly, he has opened his eyes and is staring up into the darkness above him. Right above him near to the ceiling there seems a slightly darker patch amid the darkness. As he stares at it with unwilling eyes, it begins to move—convoluting slowly at first; then rapidly. It grows larger and begins to take shape. Again he sees the giant hand form slowly finger by finger. The huge thumb protrudes out from one side of the mass; then the whole thing sinks bodily toward him; but stops with a jerk, maybe, halfway between the ceiling and the bed.

The boy has gone rigid, and his heart is failing in its action. Again there comes that dull booming sound that fills the dark room. Above him the great fingers are all of a-waver. Then, suddenly, the four of them and the huge thumb crook down towards him; and the hand itself drops bodily lower with a jerk. The child is soaked in a cold sweat; but has no knowledge of it; all his faculties are concentrated to keep perfectly still—not to move and bring THAT down upon him. He is pressing down hard against the bed with a fierce, rigid terror, to get as far away from the thing as possible. The booming sound fills the room like thunder, and the child begins to catch for breath. He struggles to keep silent—immovable. If he could only get the clothes over his face! The booming is more persistent. He begins to see two hands—hands everywhere, all blurred and great. Then he sinks down through the bottom of the bed, and the hands have gone.