Gaslit Nightmares

by Lamb, Hugh;

  ‘Then to sum up, you are now in a better position – infinitely – both as regards life and property, than the one from which my malignity – ingenuity I think was your word – ah, yes – trickiness – thanks – removed you. Now why cut your career short? Why murder me? Why not live out your life, under better conditions, in luxury and health, and thus be completely revenged on Bernard Heaton? If you are logical, now is the time to show it.’

  Allen rose slowly, holding the pistol in his right hand.

  ‘You miserable scoundrel!’ he cried. ‘You pettifogging lawyer – tricky to the last! How gladly you would throw over your friend to prolong your own wretched existence! Do you think you are now talking to a biased judge and a susceptible, brainless jury? Revenged on Heaton? I am revenged on him already. But part of my vengeance involves your death. Are you ready for it?’

  Allen pointed the revolver at Grey, who had now also risen, his face ashen. He kept his eyes fastened on the man he believed to be mad. His hand crept along the wall. There was intense silence between them. Allen did not fire. Slowly the lawyer’s hand moved towards the electric button. At last he felt the ebony rim and his fingers quickly covered it. In the stillness, the vibrating ring of an electric bell somewhere below was audible. Then the sharp crack of the revolver suddenly split the silence. The lawyer dropped on one knee, holding his arm in the air as if to ward off attack. Again the revolver rang out, and Grey plunged forward on his face. The other five shots struck a lifeless body.

  A stratum of blue smoke hung breast high in the room as if it were the departing soul of the man who lay motionless on the floor. Outside were excited voices, and someone flung himself ineffectually against the stout locked door.

  Allen crossed the room and, turning the key, flung open the door. ‘I have murdered your master,’ he said, handing the revolver butt forward to the nearest man. ‘I give myself up. Go and get an officer.’

  The Beckside Boggle

  ALICE REA

  As always when compiling these Victorian volumes, I come up against authors of whom, at this late date, it is impossible to find out any details. Alice Rea, alas, is one of them. All we know of Miss (or Mrs?) Rea is that she published two books, DALE FOLK, a three-volume novel in 1895, and THE BECKSIDE BOGGLE (1886), of which this is the title story. The latter volume consists of stories of the Lake District, with much local dialect which suggests Miss Rea knew the area. Of the lady herself, we can only judge by the quality of the work and I think you’ll like this one. It starts off in leisurely tone but ends in horror. Miss Rea obviously liked her meat with blood in it.

  But few of the ordinary lake country visitors will be aware of the existence of the small valley which is the scene of this story or tradition. It is a quiet, narrow little dale, situated at the foot of Scawfell, on the west side. Pedestrian tourists, crossing by the mountain track from Eskdale to Wastdale, leave it unnoticed. The black tarn at one side, and the giant fells around, with the treacherous bog beneath their feet, absorb their whole attention. But, to those who do know it, the little dale has an interest all its own.

  A quiet hush pervades the place, different from the undisturbed silence of the wild fells above. There is an air of sadness in its solitude, and as you emerge from the narrow gorge, which forms its head, and follow the sheep track by the beckside, where trees and fields and signs of man appear, the riddle is solved. It is no unexplored nook of Nature’s own keeping, but a once populous little dale, now forsaken and deserted. Here and there you stumble over heaps of stones – all that remains of what was once a cluster of rude cottages, inhabited, perhaps, in the days when the great peat-bog that surrounds the tarn above was a part of the vast forest of Eskdale and Wastdale.

  Further still down the dale a few yards of double walling remain to remind us of the ancient pack-horse road to Kendal.

  Between these low walls, when our grandfathers were young, did the gallant bell-horses of nursery lore and their patient followers trot with their heavy packs, eager to rest their weary limbs in the hospitable stable of the ‘Nanny Horns.’ Of this once busy house of entertainment for man and beast, one gable and a weed-grown garden alone remain.

  Before we reach the ruins of the ‘Nanny Horns,’ however, we come to more hopeful signs of habitation. Here, by the beckside, stands a small farmhouse, with barn, cowhouse, and stable complete. A rude stone bridge spans the stream, and large trees wave solemnly overhead. But one look at the house, and the sense of desolation becomes stronger than before. The closed door, the blank stare of the window-frames, the grass-grown pavement, tell the same story of desertion.

  But here it comes more closely to one’s heart. The old dale folk still speak of the time when this home was alive and busy; we ourselves can almost remember when the smoke curled from its wide chimneys; and now it, too, belongs to the past.

  Let us push open the creaking door and look around. Before us is a short passage, ending in a stone staircase; on the left we see a small ceiled room, evidently the old parlour or bedroom.

  It is quite empty and covered with fallen plaster. To the right is the kitchen. The sun shines brightly through the two glassless windows. A wide, open fireplace occupies the greater part of the end of the room opposite the door. Facing the window are the entrances of the pantry and dairy. In one corner, clearly a fixture in the wall, there is an old oak cupboard – one shaky door hangs by a single hinge, and in it we may still see an old brass lock.

  The most striking piece of furniture, however, if furniture we may name it, is a long freestone slab, or sconce, as dale folk call it, firmly fixed into the wall by the fireplace, which must have made a comfortable fireside couch in olden times, when a huge fire burned in the now empty grate, when the good-wife spun in the opposite corner, and the good-man carded wool in the armchair by her side.

  Let us take our seat now upon the sconce, while I tell you the story of this last desertion, for around this slab of stone the whole tradition clings.

  We need fear no interruption, for few of our neighbours would care to take our place, or, indeed, let a setting sun, such as we now see shining on the opposite fells, find them within a good quarter of a mile of this spot, for fear that their terror should suddenly take shape, and reveal to them the form of the Headless Woman of Beckside. There, the secret is out – the house is haunted.

  Many years ago Beckside was inhabited by a man and his wife of the name of Southward – Joe and Ann Southward. They had been farm servants in their youth, and, being in the main sober, industrious folks, had each saved up a nice little sum of money; so when it just happened that they were both out of situation at the same time, they thought they could not do better than put their two little nest-eggs together. They therefore got married and settled down on this small farm. At this time neither of them was very young, and for several years they had no child; but at last Heaven blessed them with a son, and the whole course of their somewhat monotonous life was changed. I believe there was not to be found in any of the surrounding dales so happy a little family as theirs. They had few wants their farm could not supply, good health, and but one ambition – namely, to save as much money as ever they could to get their son a better start in life than they had had themselves. So they lived on as little as possible, and worked and hoarded until they had a very fair amount put away in an old teapot in the cupboard by the door. Upon the cupboard Joe put a strong lock – a very rare thing in a farm-house in those days – for he was sadly afraid of any harm or loss happening to his little store.

  One autumn Joe Southward had to leave home for a whole day, and hardly expected to be back before the next morning, for he was going to Whitehaven on business. Such a thing had never happened before, although they had been married eight years.

  ‘Thu mun cum back heam as seun as thu can, Joe,’ his wife said, as he mounted his horse, ‘and thu mun mind an’ not cau at ower mony public hooses on t’ way back’ – for though Joe was by no means in the habit of getting drunk, still he had been k
nown to return home now and again from the Eskdale fair, or an occasional sale, just a little more excited than usual, and Ann feared lest in the unwonted dissipation of seeing Whitehaven – a place he had visited only once before, and of which he had told her grand tales – and in the excitement of spending a whole day, and perhaps a night, from home, he might be led on from one extravagance to another.

  ‘Oh, aye, lass, ah’ll coom heam as seun as iver ah can git, but thoo mun nut bide up for me efter nine be t’ clock. If ah’s nut heam be than, ah’ll be stoppen feu t‘neet at Santon or sum udder spot, maybe t’ Crag.’

  ‘Varra weel,’ replied his wife, ‘ah’ll nut waste t’ candle biden up for thee – good-bye. Hes thee got tha muny safe? Ah wish thoo wad let me set a stitch in thee breeches pocket to keep folks’ hands oot. Ah’ve heerd tell on a man ‘at went t’ Whitehebben who had ivery thing ‘at ever he had taken oot uv his pocket, an’ he kent nowt aboot it whatever.’

  ‘Oh, aye, they’re queerish-like folk thear, ah ken, but ah’ll nut heve me pockets sowed up. Hoo does te think ah cud pay t’ tolls, lass? Gie thee fadder a kiss, Joe, me lad. Noo mind thoo tak’s care o’ the sell, me lass. Cum up, Charlie,’ and he set off at a steady pace on his heavy brown horse over the little stone bridge and down the valley.

  Ann, taking her child, a strong little fellow of fifteen months, in her arms, followed her husband as far as the bridge, and stood watching him till he was out of sight, and then, turning back, re-entered the kitchen. There was not much time for her to waste that day, for they had killed a sheep for their winter supply of meat, and Joe had cut it up the day before, ready for salting; so what with that and her ordinary work, and a good many extra things that generally fell to Joe’s share, the afternoon was nearly over before she had time to think of her loneliness. But when she had finished cleaning her kitchen and made up the peat fire to boil her kettle she felt a great want of something she could not exactly tell what.

  So long as she had been making plenty of noise herself she had never noticed the unusual quiet around her, but now, as she sat to rest for a moment or two in the armchair, not a sound was to be heard but the tick tock of the clock. Joe the younger was asleep. She longed intensely for something other than herself to break the silence.

  Just as it was becoming insupportable a little bantam cock in the yard gave a shrill crow, and Ann heaved a great sigh of relief as she heard it.

  ‘Dear, dear,’ she thought, ‘I dunna ken what’s coom ore me, but I do feel lonesome-like someway. Folks ’ud say as I was feelin’ t’ want o’ Joe, but him and me is nut o’ that mak’ to be sae daft-like. Not but what he’s weel enough, an’ when yar’s lived wi’ yan body for seven, going on eight, year, and scarce iver seed any udder body, you, maybe, do feel a bit queer like when they gangs off. I mind when I was servant lass at Crag there was a girt black cat as allus followed me ivery spot where iver I was at, but it got catcht in t’ trap wun day. I quite felt t’ loss o’ it for a bit. I was short o’ summut for a day or two, and I’s sure ’twas no for love on’t, for it hed nowt to crack on in t’ way o’ leuks. It had lost half on t’ tail in t’ trap afore, and its ears were maist riven off wi’ feetin’, yet I quite miste it loike. Now,’ she continued, rising, ‘I’s just wesh me and lash me hair, then when I’s had me sup o’ milk and bread, and finished t’ milking, I’s melt down all that sheep fat and git a lock o’ seives1 peeled ready for dipping. I mun mak a lock o’ candles this back end.’

  By the time the cows were milked and Ann had had her sup of milk and bread (tea of course was not known in these parts in those days), and ‘lal Joe’ had been put comfortably to sleep in his clumsy wooden cradle, the sun had nearly set, and Ann crossed the yard to the little bridge to see if there was any sign of her husband returning home.

  The valley looked very beautiful, lit up by the last rays of the setting sun, which was dipping behind the shoulder of the Screes.

  At the head of the dale Scawfell stood out bold and broad, bathed from base to summit in the glowing light, while the purple heather and golden bracken of the surrounding hills gave a warmth of colour to the scene which made it very lovely to behold.

  Ann, however, regarded neither gold nor purple, light nor shade, but, turning her back to the king of the valley, Old Father Scawfell, gazed rather longingly (though she would on no account have owned to the feeling) along the rough fell road, which wound by the side of the beck towards the open country. There she stood, her fingers busily engaged knitting a blue wool stocking for her husband, and her eyes fixed upon the road, till the sun, entirely disappearing, left the valley in a hazy shade, and the light, gradually retreating up the fell-sides, robbed the brackens and heather of their glory as it bid them good-night.

  Just as she was slowly leaving the bridge she happened to turn her eyes to the Screes side of the valley, and there she was sure she saw some one advancing towards her, yet not quite towards Beckside itself, for the person, whoever it might be, was coming along the old pack-horse road from Keswick, which crossed the dale half way between Beckside and Bakerstead, the next little. farm, then without a tenant.

  At the point where the old road passes the two houses, stood the ‘Nanny Horns,’ which was, even at the time I am telling you of, quite a ruin; but the garden belonging to it kept Ann supplied with gooseberries and rhubarb all the summer and spring.

  It was when passing this ruin that the person disappeared. For some time Ann stood watching. Presently the figure emerged from the ruin and advanced quickly towards her. She could distinguish now that it was a woman, and that she seemed very tired. As soon as Ann perceived she was making direct for her house she went back and shut the door, for she did not at all like to have a stranger calling at that time of the evening when she was alone.

  She had hardly turned from the door and crossed the kitchen towards the fireplace before she felt a shadow pass the window, and, turning suddenly round, she caught a glimpse of a muffled-up face peeping through. It was withdrawn immediately, and at the same moment there was a sharp tap at the door. Going to the window, she could see the woman knocking with a good stout stick. Ann opened the door and asked her what she wanted, rather sharply.

  ‘If you please,’ said the woman, ‘can you give a poor body a night’s lodgings? I’s coom a lang way, and I’s tired to death. I could na walk another mile to save me life, my feet are that cut wi’ t’ stones.’ And she showed her boots, all burst out and cut, and her swollen feet, which were seen through them.

  ‘well, ye ma’ coom in,’ Ann said at last, though with no very good grace. ‘I suppose there’s na place else ye could gang til to neet. Where’s ta coom fra? Tha’ none fra these parts, I reckon.’

  ‘Na,’ she answered, seating herself on a bench that ran along by the table under the window. ‘Na, I’s a Scotchwoman, and I coom fra Penrith. I’s going to Ulverstone to see my son; he’s got a gude bit o’ wark there; I kent some folks in Borrowdale, so I came this way, but I did na ken it wad be sic a road as it is.’

  ‘It’s a terrible bad road you’ve coomt, and ye look real tired out, but draw up to t’ fire now ye is here,’ Ann said, feeling more kindly disposed when she heard the stranger had friends in Borrowdale, for her own people came from there. ‘Will ye not take yer shawl off, when ye’re sae near t’ fire?’ she asked; for the woman had a small woollen shawl which she kept pinned over her head and the lower part of her face.

  ‘Na, na, if ye’ll excuse me,’ she answered, ‘I’s got a bad pain in my teeth, and this warm shawl makes it a wee bit better.’

  ‘It’s a nasty loike thing is toothache,’ said Ann: ‘I niver hed it mysel’, but I mind my maister had a spell on’t once, and he were fairly driven half daft we’ it.’

  ‘Your maister’s not at home, maybe,’ the woman suggested, looking round the room.

  Ann thought her eyes rested longer than they need have done on the cupboard, in the door of which the new lock showed rather conspicuously.

  ‘Oh, yes,�
� she answered, ‘he’s been off t’day, but I should nut wonder if he be home gaily seune.’

  Ann was very soon busy preparing the fat of the sheep they had killed for melting down to make candles and rushlights for their winter store.

  First she brought in a very large three-legged pan and swung it upon the crook in the chimney, then a basket of peat and a good bundle of sticks, which she put down by the hearth, so that she might keep the fire well up under her pan without having to go out again in the dark. She next asked the woman if she would have a ‘sup o’ poddidge’ with her, for she meant to take hers while the fat was melting; but, to her surprise, the woman declined, alleging as a reason that her teeth ached so badly, anything hot would drive her wild.

  She took a handful of oat-cake, however, and munched away at that as well as she could under her shawl.

  It had now grown quite dark outside – indeed it was after eight o’clock, very nearly nine – but the kitchen looked bright and cheerful by the light of the fire.

  ‘I canna offer ye a bed,’ Ann said to her visitor, as she poured out her milk porridge, ‘but ye mun choose whether ye had rather sleep in t’ barn or t’ hayloft.’

  ‘Weel, since ye are sae kind,’ she answered, ‘wad ye mind if I slept here on this sconce? It will be nice and warm by the fire, and I’m that tired I’s niver ken whether it be hard or soft.’

  ‘Aye, weel,’ said Ann, ‘thee can sleep thear if thee’s a mind to, but I’s likely keep ye awake a bit. I wants to git all this fat melt down, all what’s in t’ pan and on this dish too; and, to tell t’ truth, I don’t think as Joe wad be sae weel pleased to see ony strange body sleeping here when he comes heam.’

  ‘Oh,’ she continued, ‘I’d sune get up and away into the barn if he came hame; but it’s ower late for him to be coming now, is it not?’ And she looked keenly over at Ann, who was standing stirring her porridge, to cool it, by the table.