by Cave, Hugh
"It has been given to every new master of this house, sir, for the past thousand years. Many have disobeyed it, and died."
"How do you know that?" I demanded.
"I have seen them go, sir," he said, turning to face me.
"How long have you been here?" I pressed, trying to smile knowingly at Lamoran.
"Always, sir."
"Always, is it? How old are you?"
"I was born," the Oriental said quietly, "hundreds of years before the coming of Christ, at the time of K'ung Tsze and the Chou dynasty. It was I who assisted K'ung Tsze, whom you call Confucius, to inscribe the Ta Hsueh. I was, and I am, the servant of him who rules the universe."
The man was mad. There was no other plausible explanation. Lamoran, however, insisted on putting further questions, evidently for the purpose of confounding him. Lamoran knew more about ancient Chinese lore than any of us.
"What is this Ta Hsueh?" he demanded.
"It is the third of the four books, sir. The first is Lun Yu, containing information about K'ung Tsze; the second is the Book of Mencius, a disciple of K'ung Tsze; the third is the Ta Hsueh, dealing with social and political matters; the fourth is Chung Yung, a thesis on conduct written by K'ung Chi."
"Hm-m. And where did you work with Confucius?"
"In the city of Chung-tu, sir, when the master was made magistrate in the year 498 B.C."
Lamoran nodded, with a half concealed smile, and waved the fellow aside.
Turning about with a positive lack of expression, the Oriental retraced his steps to the service door, and passed through.
"Stark mad," I shrugged. "Else he thinks we are utter fools."
"What he said about K'ung Tsze—was it right?" Macon demanded. "It's a bit over my head."
"It was right," Lamoran admitted. "However, any educated Chinese could supply the same information."
"And this infernal paper?"
"That," Lamoran said darkly, "is beyond me for explanation. Unless—"
But he left the thought unfinished. Thrusting the sinister threat into his pocket, he turned about with a dry laugh and said:
"Come on. Let's have a look at the place. For the time being we'll just let the Iron Door alone. The rest of the house ought to provide enough to keep us occupied."
We walked into the main hail together. Lamoran led the way, with Rojer Macon pacing close beside him. Pell and I stepped into the gloomy corridor with our shoulders rubbing, and Pell, leaning close to mutter into my ear, said significantly:
"It's a damned hoax, Reed, instigated by that Bloody Chink. He's got something in that room that's worth money—some priceless art piece or something. I tell you I'm going to have a look before I leave this place!"
I grinned at that. It was like Pell to be belligerent about such an affair. Whenever Pell's nose caught the scent of an art secret, nothing in heaven or hell could hope to keep him quiet!
I thought little of his threat then. Later I remembered it—acutely. Meanwhile, we set about our tour of inspection.
The hour was long after midnight when we finally returned from our tour of the immense structure. We found nothing; nothing, that is, beyond a most amazing and confusing labyrinth of unused passages and abandoned rooms. The house was constructed in four tiers, with a narrow, evil-smelling tower leading up from the rear. Only those rooms on the lower floor were furnished and revealed any signs of recent occupancy; and of those, only the library held any interest for me.
We were tired and, I imagine, somewhat disappointed, when we filed into the reception chamber. Once again the Oriental servant, Tai-tse-Kiang, fetched drinks for us.
"I suggest we turn in," Lamoran said quietly. "I, for one, am about done for."
"A sign of weakness," Macon grinned. "You should ask the Chinaman how he remains awake for five hundred years!"
"You, Reed?"
"I'd like to have a look at the library," I confessed. "I'll turn in later." Lamoran stood up, emptied his glass, and nodded.
"Felt that way myself," he smiled. "I think you'll find something—interesting. Try the right hand shelf against the farther wall, second from the bottom." I stared at him. He laughed, then turned away.
"You can take one of the candles from the candelabrum here," he suggested. "The sleeping chambers are on the next floor. I pointed them out to you, you'll remember."
He went out then, with Pell and Rojer Macon groping after him. When they had gone, I lifted one of the candles and, holding it face-high before me, prowled through the tomb-like corridors to the library door.
The library itself was a room of huge dimensions, lined completely around with shelves of dust-covered volumes. My boots made rather a thump-thump as I paced across it toward the particular section which Lamoran had mentioned, since the highly polished floor—dusty, of course, but solid nevertheless—was for the most part uncarpeted. A circular rug lay before the dead fireplace, supporting two deep leather chairs. Farther back stood a claw-legged table. Other than that there was nothing.
The unsteady sputter of the candle cast my shadow in grotesque outlines before me as I advanced. I remember looking back and noticing the almost fantastic footprints, like the trail of a ghost-creature, made by my advance. There was another line of them, as well, leading in and out of the room, caused, no doubt, by Lamoran's boots when my host had been here before me. Beyond that the dust was unbroken. I went down on my knees beside a row of stolid bindings and set the candle on the floor.
I intended to have a look at Lamoran's significant shelf first, then seek the books I had come for. In short, I was eager to learn more of the history of this gaunt house and the strange folk who had inhabited it. But as I leaned forward, drawing out one of the large volumes, I saw that my own quest and Lamoran's suggested books were one and the same. The volumes he had told me to have a look at, because they would excite me, were the very volumes I desired to examine!
I opened the book at random, scuffing the pages under my thumb and shifting the candle so that it might throw a better light. In a little while I came upon the following pages:
Lord Burgell . . . mysteriously vanished during the bouts between midnight and dawn. The servant, Tai-tse-Kiang, who had been a devoted guardian of the family for sixty years or more, discovered that Lord Burgell was. . . missing. This occurred on December 4th, 1732.
I read it again, quite unable to believe what I had stumbled upon. Tai-tseKiang-1732. It was impossible! That would make the man more than two hundred years old!
It was, I reasoned, not the same man. Perhaps another of the same name, but most assuredly not the same individual who had poured wine for the four of us less than half an hour past. Many English families kept their servants for generations and—
My head came up with a sudden jerk. Behind me, the library door, which I had cautiously closed upon entering, had swung half open under the pressure of some freakish draft from the outside corridor. Nevertheless I turned on my knees, with my shadow projected on the floor in front of me like a prostrate bat, and watched in fascination.
Then my blood chilled. I heard footsteps—heard them as distinctly as I heard the throbbing of my own heart—and yet there was no living thing within the radius of the candlelight! The book remained clutched in my hands as I crouched rigid. Step by step, mechanically, with deathlike rhythm, the unseen thing advanced across the floor toward me. Then, very abruptly, it halted. The hellish feet were directly beside me. Whatever it was, it stood above me.
I would have moved—would have lurched to my feet and fled from the room in terror—had not the next occurrence happened with such terrifying swiftness. The book was snatched from my fingers and replaced in its niche. A second book was drawn from the shelf, flung open, and placed in my rigid hands. Something indistinct, like a thin pencil of fog, indicated a line halfway down the left hand page.
My eyes fixed automatically on the indicated line, and I read the words. I remember now that the page was done in script, not in print, and that the b
ook was incredibly old. I saw only two things: the name Tai-tse-Kiang and the significant date 1247. Then I heard a soft, throaty laugh at my shoulder, and the book was returned to its place.
Had I wished to then, I could not have risen to my feet. My body was numb with something akin to complete horror. I know that the footsteps receded across the floor with that same damned tread. I know that I stared after them and saw—nothing. Then the door swung shut, clicked, and I was alone.
For an eternity I remained there. My face must have been a ghastly color, stained with sweat. I do not know. I do know that I trembled violently with a sense of cold more intense than any I have ever experienced in the highest roof of the heavens. I do know that when I finally got to my feet, the candle had burned itself to within an inch of the floor, and only a flickering stump, with hanging wick, remained.
I had to walk slowly from the room, in order to keep that feeble light alive. The darkness, had it overwhelmed me at that moment, would have brought a scream from my dry lips. And I noticed one thing more as I paced across the floor—that the undead thing which had crept upon me, and thrust that infernal book into my hands, and laughed at me, had left no footprints in the heavy layer of dust.
When I closed the door of that room of horror and turned back along the corridor to go to my own chamber, there were but four tracks of footprints marring the even surface of the library floor. They were the impressions of my own boots, one set trailing in, the other trailing out, and the older prints made by the boots of James Lamoran.
I slept but little that night. My room was a small one, with a single window and only one door, which opened on the narrow corridor that ran along the second-floor landing. The chamber was stuffy, yet I dared not leave the door wide lest that unnamed, formless inhabitant of the house should creep upon me.
I did not stop to reason that if the thing were truly of another world, a closed door would hardly hinder it—in fact, would only hinder my own escape. When a man is afraid, he seeks to confine himself as securely as possible.
I cannot say how many hours passed before I heard the thing approach. Perhaps two, perhaps three—but no more. This time, when the footsteps drew near along the corridor, they came, not from the direction of the stairway, but from the opposite end of the passage, where lay the rooms of my companions.
I lay quite still, flat against the wall, my fingers twisted around the wooden bedposts in preparation for the sudden leap that would bring me upright. Outside, those hellish footsteps came nearer and nearer—now at the door of my room—now hesitating before entering.
My nerves were on edge. I think I should have screamed to the high heavens if my door had opened at that instant. But the door remained closed. The footsteps began again, moving away, continuing to promenade down the passage. I heard them descend the great staircase; then they grew softer and softer and finally passed from the realm of my hearing.
For another long moment I lay tense. The footsteps did not return. I waited for an eternity, and nothing disturbed the complete silence of the house. In the end, I think, I dropped into a fitful sleep.
I dreamed that I heard a sing-song voice, an Oriental voice, moaning a soft, faraway chant. The sort of monotone that one hears occasionally in distant China, in the temples of Confucius or the shrines of Lao-Tze. After the ordeal I had gone through, the chant was soothing and almost beautiful. But then I did not know the significance of it.
Morning came eventually. The warm sunlight, streaming in a straight line across my bed from the oblong window, woke me. I looked about me then, at the mellow friendliness of the chamber, at the flat, shimmering expanse of moor outside, and laughed at the fears that had gripped me. I lit a cigarette, dressed without haste, and opened the door of my room.
There were footprints in the passage. They were my own, of course, and Lamoran's and Pell's and Macon's, made by us when we had climbed to our rooms on the previous night. I did not expect to find the prints made by the feet of the invisible thing that lurked among us. There were none in the library; there would be none here.
Lamoran and Macon were awaiting me in the reception chamber, which room had been set aside as our dining room. Pell, evidently, had not yet come down. "Did you—inspect the book-shelf I recommended?" Lamoran said dryly.
I nodded.
"I want to talk to you about it," I said.
"Yes? I think I know your questions, old man. I don't know the answers."
"What answers?" Macon demanded, frowning at the one-sided conversation. "Nothing, Rojer. A little historical matter. Where the devil is Pell?"
"Not down yet?" I asked.
"No. He's not used to staying up nights, I reckon."
"Want me to drag him out?" Macon proffered.
"Well—yes. You might as well."
Macon left us. We sat down, Lamoran and I, and I looked at him quizzically. "I found the books," I said. "While I was reading one of them, something came into the library and lifted it from my hands, and laughed."
He didn't smile. On the contrary, he leaned abruptly forward, scowling at my words.
"Something?" he said slowly.
"Something," I shrugged, "is all I can call it. It possessed a voice; it made audible footsteps; yet it had no substance and left no prints in the dust of the floor. I heard it again after I had retired. It crept along the corridor, paused at my door, then descended the stairs."
"I wonder. . . ." Lamoran said grimly. "Reed, do you know anything about the supernatural? That is, beyond the imbecile ideas of the ordinary layman?"
I was about to answer him, about to say that I knew something of Eastern forms of life after death, embracing vampires, mafui, voodoos, and some obscure claims of India's interior, when Rojer Macon returned. Macon's voice, flung out of a crimson, excited face, stifled my reply.
"He's gone! Pell's gone!"
Lamoran stiffened abruptly in his chair. I half rose, then fell back again, staring at Macon's excited, trembling figure.
"What are you saying?" Lamoran demanded in very curt, precise words. "He's gone, I tell you! His bed hasn't been slept in!"
Lamoran's hands clenched on the edge of the table, crumpling the cloth in their grip. I saw his face lose color and his eyes dilate. He got to his feet swiftly and stood to his full height, with one hand still holding the table.
"Come with me, Reed," he said grimly. "I think I know."
I followed him. Rojer Macon, trailing along behind me, muttered and sputtered to himself in an undertone, demanding to know where we were going. Lamoran said nothing more. I thought I knew our destination, but I was in no mood to offer explanations.
We passed through four narrow corridors, all of which we had traversed the night before. At the end of the last one we turned aside and entered a passage which was strange to me. I noticed a single line of footsteps in the dust, leading us deeper and deeper into the gloomy abyss of the great manse.
Finally we reached it: the Iron Door designated in that ghostly message which had been flung upon our banquet table the preceding evening. The trail of footsteps led directly to its massive barrier, and there ended. Lamoran swung about with a grim military precision and faced me.
"You heard the—thing—descending the stairs last night?" he demanded. "I did."
"The thing you heard was Pell. He came here."
I nodded heavily. Lamoran was right; there was no argument. I watched with a strange sense of foreboding as Lamoran flattened himself against the door and seized the latch.
The door was immense. It filled the entire end of the corridor, forming a block of ancient, solid iron more than eight feet in height and at least five in width. How thick it was we could not guess. The latch securing it was as heavy and thick as a bludgeon; it was so ponderous that Lamoran found difficulty in raising it from its grooved runway.
"Give me a hand," he grunted.
I moved forward to assist him. There was room on the bar for both of our hands without crowding; yet, in spite of our combined e
xertions, we could not raise the thing from its grooves.
Lamoran stepped back, wiping his sweating hands on his trouser legs.
"Damned thing is locked somehow," he grunted.
He surveyed the door bitterly, as if he would have liked to smash it down. "Hadn't we better call out?" I suggested. "If Pell is locked in there—"
He nodded. Flat against the door, I called Pell's name in a loud voice, shrill enough to penetrate beyond the barrier. Then I waited—we all waited—for a reply. There was none, unless—was it my imagination, or did I actually hear that same uncanny, mocking laugh that had terrified my senses in the library during the preceding hours of darkness? No, it was not imagination, for as I turned quickly to confront Lamoran I saw him whirl about, with a snarl on his lips, to peer at Rojer Macon.
"What the hell are you laughing at?" he snapped.
"Laughing?" Macon muttered, recoiling. "Good God, Jim, I didn't—"
It came again, cutting into Macon's mumbled protest. Rojer stopped short, with ashen face, and fell back against the wall. Lamoran took a step forward, hesitated, and raised his arm savagely. I did not move.
"The same thing," I said heavily, "I heard last night."
For a full moment no movement passed between the three of us. We stared blankly, fearfully, into each other's tense faces. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, in the corridor with us. Yet those two successive laughs had come from our midst, mocking us, from somewhere within reach of our hands!
Lamoran's uplifted hands fell slowly to his sides. He turned about. His face had faded almost to the bleached whiteness of Macon's. Then, very suddenly, he snapped at me.
"Get away from that door!"
I moved quickly, with my eyes fixed on him. The instant my body was away from the barrier, he flung himself forward. His thick-set shoulder crashed against the metal with the force of a flung battering ram.
The sinister door withstood his attack without so much as a protesting groan. The very force of his onslaught hurled him away from it. He tried again and again with the same lack of results until, holding his shoulder in pain, he staggered back and leaned against the opposite wall of the corridor. "Nothing—but dynamite—will move it," he gasped.
