Nine Horrors and a Dream

by Brennan, Joseph Payne;

From far away in the woods a faint, mocking echo came back, “Here Toby! Here Toby!”

  Once I thought I caught a glimpse of the bird, high up on a branch in one of the hemlocks. But I couldn’t be sure. It might have been merely a last ray of sunlight glinting briefly against a green bough.

  As I moved away from the road, the hemlock forest became denser. The trees grew closer together; briars and underbrush barred the way.

  Darkness closed in more swiftly than I had thought possible. With it, came cold. In spite of my exertions, I began to shiver.

  When I finally stopped to catch my breath, I was, for the first time, struck with the absurdity of the situation. Here I found myself, at twilight, scrambling through brambles and briars deep in a hemlock wood which stretched for miles—in search of an escaped parrot whose owner I didn’t even know!

  I shrugged and turned to retrace my footsteps. While I hated to go back and admit my failure to the little old lady in the poke bonnet, I felt that I could accomplish nothing by searching further. In a very short time it would be impossible to see anything at all in the woods.

  In a few minutes, however, I pretty much forgot about facing the old lady, because I realized that I was lost. I hadn’t gone far from the road, but for the life of me I couldn’t find it again.

  It got completely dark and became extremely cold. I lost all sense of direction and although I kept assuring myself that I couldn’t possibly be very far from the road, a kind of panic began building up in me. My thin topcoat was not, I knew, designed for overnight wear in cold November woods.

  At length, purely by accident, I stumbled into the road. Luckily, the car was not far away. I climbed into it, stiff and literally aching with cold, and started the motor. As I had expected, the little old lady had left. Probably she had gone home far more concerned about the loss of her parrot than about my own failure to reappear.

  Back at the Inn, I took a hot bath, changed clothes, drank a glass of brandy—and made the dining room only a few minutes late. As had been my custom since returning to the Inn, I seated myself at the table which I usually shared with Colonel Buff, Miss Grover and old Mrs. Spence.

  When Colonel Buff joshed me about my late arrival, my first impulse was to answer testily. I held my temper, however, and presently when the brandy and warm food began to take effect, I decided to reveal the entire ridiculous episode from which I had so recently emerged.

  I soon saw that, oddly enough, even without embroidery, my little narrative was producing an extraordinary stir. From the very start, when I first mentioned the parrot, Colonel Buff stopped eating and laid down his fork as if he didn’t want to risk missing a single word. I thought old Mrs. Spence turned somewhat pale, and Miss Grover appeared unaccountably agitated. She mumbled something about snow and kept glancing at the windows.

  I finished amid a strained silence. At length, Colonel Buff, after exchanging pregnant glances with Mrs. Spence and Miss Grover, cleared his throat.

  “My lad,” he said, “this is as good a time and place as any for you to be informed of a very peculiar and pertinent fact about your, ah, experience.”

  “What fact is that?” I inquired.

  “You must be prepared to be startled.”

  “Well . . . ?”

  “The fact is,” he continued, “that the two chief protagonists in your recent experience—excluding yourself, of course—were—ghosts.”

  He nodded his head at my expression of blank amazement and disbelief.

  “I know it must seem incredible to you,” he went on, “but that little old lady in the poke bonnet disappeared in those hemlock woods eighty-odd years ago.”

  Mrs. Spence nodded, shivering. “It’s a well known story hereabout,” she said. “Leastways, it is to the old folks.”

  After dessert, Colonel Buff lit a cigar and settled back to tell the “well known” local story which I had never heard. I had, meanwhile, eaten my remaining food in such a state of suspense that I hardly tasted a morsel of it.

  “The little old lady in the poke bonnet,” the Colonel began, “was a spinster named Miss Meerchum. At one time her people were moderately prosperous farmers. They occupied a large tract of land bordering the hemlock woods on that dirt road which you came over.

  “Well, to make a long story short, the Meerchums gradually died off until finally only old Miss Meerchum was left. She continued to live on in the farmhouse, eking out a sparse existence.

  “Her only solace was a large green parrot which she kept as a pet. Being alone in the world, she became inordinately attached to the bird. It was said—and this is probably sheer nonsense—that the bird could carry on a sustained conversation and that old Miss Meerchum held lengthy gossip sessions with it. In any case, Miss Meerchum undoubtedly valued the parrot above everything else in her world.

  “Well, one dismal day in late November, in the year 1868 to be exact, Miss Meerchum came stumbling into Winford in a vastly agitated state. Tearfully, she explained to the villagers that Toby, her pet parrot, had escaped into the hemlock woods. She pleaded for help in locating the prized bird.

  “The local menfolk, deeply touched by her piteous appeal, organized a searching party and plunged into the woods in an attempt to retrieve the aged woman’s companion.

  “When they started out, the skies were somewhat overcast but there seemed no threat of imminent storm. The party—men and boys—struck boldly into the hemlocks. Apparently the search, in the beginning, was considered something of a lark.

  “Toward evening, when more than half of the searchers were still far in the woods, a blinding snowstorm struck. It quickly turned into a raging blizzard. A terrific wind roared through the forest, drowning out all other sound.

  “Those men and boys who had already come out of the woods were forced to return to town in order to save themselves. There was no possibility of attempting to save the others. Some of them were not found until the following spring. In all, seven men and four boys perished in the hemlock woods.”

  “And the old lady?” I inquired after a long silence.

  “Contrary to instructions,” the Colonel said, “she followed some of the searchers into the woods, calling out for her beloved parrot. She perished with the others, and to this day her poor bones have never been located. They still lie somewhere in those woods—and whatever might remain of the parrot lies there also, for it, too, was never found.”

  The Colonel relit his cigar. “Since that tragedy over eighty years ago, at least a dozen different people, at different times, have reported an encounter with the little old lady in the poke bonnet. Always in the fall of the year. And, invariably, not many hours after their meeting with the pathetic apparition, a severe snowstorm has settled on the area.”

  Miss Grover looked toward the window. “We’ll be snowed in by tomorrow,” she said resignedly.

  When I looked outside that evening before retiring, I could see stars. I drank another brandy, shrugged, and went to bed. In spite of my experience and Colonel Buff’s story-in-explanation, I slept soundly.

  But the next morning when I got up, I shivered in spite of the warmth of my cozy room.

  The world outside was muffled and heaped with a half foot of snow, and the flakes, driven by a howling wind, were still rushing down.

  CANAVAN’S BACK YARD

  I FIRST MET Canavan over twenty years ago, shortly after he had emigrated from London. He was an antiquarian and a lover of old books and so he quite naturally set up shop as a second-hand book dealer after he settled in New Haven.

  Since his small capital didn’t permit him to rent premises in the center of the city, he engaged combined business and living quarters in an isolated old house near the outskirts of town. The section was sparsely settled, but since a good percentage of Canavan’s business was transacted by mail, it didn’t particularly matter.

  Quite often, after a morning spent at my typewriter, I walked out to Canavan’s shop and spent most of the afternoon browsing among his old books. I
found it a great pleasure, especially because Canavan never resorted to high-pressure methods to make a sale. He was aware of my precarious financial situation; he never frowned if I walked away empty-handed.

  In fact he seemed to welcome me for my company alone. Only a few book buyers called at his place with regularity, and I think he was often lonely. Sometimes when business was slow, he would brew a pot of English tea and the two of us would sit for hours, drinking tea and talking about books.

  Canavan even looked like an antiquarian book dealer—or the popular caricature of one. He was small of frame, somewhat stoop-shouldered, and his blue eyes peered out from behind archaic spectacles with steel rims and square-cut lenses.

  Although I doubt if his yearly income ever matched that of a good paperhanger, he managed to “get by” and he was content. Content, that is, until he began noticing his back yard.

  Behind the ramshackle old house in which he lived and ran his shop, stretched a long desolate yard overgrown with brambles and high brindle-colored grass. Several decayed apple trees, jagged and black with rot, added to the scene’s dismal aspect. The broken wooden fences on both sides of the yard were all but swallowed up by the tangle of coarse grass. They appeared to be literally sinking into the ground. Altogether the yard presented an unusually depressing picture and I often wondered why Canavan didn’t clean it up. But it was none of my business; I never mentioned it.

  One afternoon when I visited the shop, Canavan was not in the front display room and I therefore walked down a narrow corridor to a rear storeroom where he sometimes worked, packing and unpacking book shipments. When I entered the storeroom, Canavan was standing at the window, looking out at the back yard.

  I started to speak and then for some reason didn’t. I think what stopped me was the look on Canavan’s face. He was gazing out at the yard with a peculiar intense expression, as if he were completely absorbed by something he saw there. Varying, conflicting emotions showed on his strained features. He seemed both fascinated and fearful, attracted and repelled. When he finally noticed me, he almost jumped. He stared at me for a moment as if I were a total stranger.

  Then his old easy smile came back and his blue eyes twinkled behind the square spectacles. He shook his head. “That back yard of mine sure looks funny sometimes. You look at it long enough, you think it runs for miles!”

  That was all he said at the time, and I soon forgot about it, but had I only known, that was just the beginning of the horrible business.

  After that, whenever I visited the shop, I found Canavan in the rear storeroom. Once in a while he was actually working, but most of the time he was simply standing at the window looking out at that dreary yard of his.

  Sometimes he would stand there for minutes completely oblivious to my presence. Whatever he saw appeared to rivet his entire attention. His countenance at those times showed an expression of fright mingled with a queer kind of pleasurable expectancy. Usually it was necessary for me to cough loudly, or shuffle my feet, before he turned from the window.

  Afterward, when he talked about books, he would seem to be his old self again, but I began to experience the disconcerting feeling that he was merely acting, that while he chatted about incunabula, his thoughts were actually still dwelling on that infernal back yard.

  Several times I thought of questioning him about the yard but whenever words were on the tip of my tongue, I was stopped by a sense of embarrassment. How can one admonish a man for looking out of a window at his own back yard? What does one say and how does one say it?

  I kept silent. Later I regretted it bitterly.

  Canavan’s business, never really flourishing, began to diminish. Worse than that, he appeared to be failing physically. He grew more stooped and gaunt, and though his eyes never lost their sharp glint, I began to believe it was more the glitter of fever than the twinkle of healthy enthusiasm which animated them.

  One afternoon when I entered the shop, Canavan was nowhere to be found. Thinking he might be just outside the back door engaged in some household chore, I leaned up against the rear window and looked out.

  I didn’t see Canavan, but as I gazed out over the yard I was swept with a sudden inexplicable sense of desolation which seemed to roll over me like the wave of an icy sea. My initial impulse was to pull away from the window, but something held me. As I stared out over that miserable tangle of briars and brindle grass, I experienced what, for want of a better word, I can only call curiosity. Perhaps some cool, analytical, dispassionate part of my brain simply wanted to discover what had caused my sudden sense of acute depression. Or possibly some feature of that wretched vista attracted me on a subconscious level which I had never permitted to crowd up into my sane and waking hours.

  In any case, I remained at the window. The long dry brown grass wavered slightly in the wind. The rotted black trees reared motionless. Not a single bird, not even a butterfly, hovered over that bleak expanse. There was nothing to be seen except the stalks of long brindle grass, the decayed trees and scattered clumps of low-growing briary bushes.

  Yet there was something about that particular isolated slice of landscape which I found intriguing. I think I had the feeling that it presented some kind of puzzle and that if I gazed at it long enough, the puzzle would resolve itself.

  After I had stood looking out at it for a few minutes, I experienced the odd sensation that its perspectives were subtly altering. Neither the grass nor the trees changed and yet the yard itself seemed to expand its dimensions. At first I merely reflected that the yard was actually much longer than I had previously believed. Then I had an idea that in reality it stretched for several acres. Finally I became convinced that it continued for an interminable distance and that if I entered it, I might walk for miles and miles before I came to the end.

  I was seized by a sudden almost overpowering desire to rush out the back door, plunge into that sea of wavering brindle grass and stride straight ahead until I had discovered for myself just how far it did extend. I was, in fact, on the point of doing so—when I saw Canavan.

  He appeared abruptly out of the tangle of tall grass at the near end of the yard. For at least a minute he seemed to be completely lost. He looked at the back of his own house as if he had never in his life seen it before. He was disheveled and obviously excited. Briars clung to his trousers and jacket and pieces of grass were stuck in the hooks of his old-fashioned shoes. His eyes roved around wildly; he seemed about to turn and bolt back into the tangle from which he had just emerged.

  I rapped loudly on the window pane. He paused in a half turn, looked over his shoulder and saw me. Gradually an expression of normalcy returned to his agitated features. Walking in a weary slouch, he approached the house. I hurried to the door and let him in. He went straight to the front display room and sank down in a chair.

  He looked up when I followed him into the room. “Frank,” he said in a half whisper, “would you make some tea?”

  I brewed tea and he drank it scalding hot without saying a word. He looked utterly exhausted; I knew he was too tired to tell me what had happened.

  “You had better stay indoors for a few days,” I said as I left.

  He nodded weakly, without looking up, and bade me good-day.

  When I returned to the shop the next afternoon, he appeared rested and refreshed but nevertheless moody and depressed. He made no mention of the previous day’s episode. For a week or so it seemed as if he might forget about the yard.

  But one day when I went into the shop, he was standing at the rear window and I could see that he tore himself away only with the greatest reluctance. After that, the pattern began repeating itself with regularity and I knew that that weird tangle of brindle grass behind his house was becoming an obsession.

  Because I feared for his business, as well as for his fragile health, I finally remonstrated with him. I pointed out that he was losing customers; he had not issued a book catalogue in months. I told him that the time spent in gazing at that witch’s half
acre he called his back yard would be better spent in listing his books and filling his orders. I assured him that an obsession such as his was sure to undermine his health. And finally I pointed out the absurd and ridiculous aspects of the affair. If people knew he spent hours in staring out of his window at nothing more than a miniature jungle of grass and briars, they might think he was actually mad!

  I ended by boldly asking him exactly what he had experienced that afternoon when I had seen him come out of the grass with a lost bewildered expression on his face.

  He removed his square spectacles with a sigh. “Frank,” he said, “I know you mean well. But there’s something about that back yard—some secret—that I’ve got to find out. I don’t know what it is exactly—something about distance and dimensions and perspectives, I think. But whatever it is, I’ve come to consider it—well, a challenge. I’ve got to get to the root of it. If you think I’m crazy, I’m sorry. But I’ll have no rest until I solve the riddle of that piece of ground.”

  He replaced his spectacles with a frown. “That afternoon,” he went on, “when you were standing at the window, I had a strange and frightening experience out there. I had been watching at the window and finally I felt myself drawn irresistibly outside. I plunged into the grass with a feeling of exhilaration, of adventure, of expectancy. As I advanced into the yard, my sense of elation quickly changed to a mood of black depression. I turned around, intending to come right out—but I couldn’t. You won’t believe this, I know—but I was lost! I simply lost all sense of direction and couldn’t decide which way to turn. That grass is taller than it looks! When you get into it, you can’t see anything beyond it.

  “I know this sounds incredible—but I wandered out there for an hour. The yard seemed fantastically large once I got into that tangle of grass. It almost seemed to alter its dimensions as I moved, so that a large expanse of it lay always in front of me. I must have walked in circles. I swear I trudged miles!”

  He shook his head. “You don’t have to believe me. I don’t expect you to. But that’s what happened. When I finally found my way out, it was by the sheerest accident. And the strangest part of it is that once I got out, I felt suddenly terrified without the tall grass all around me and I wanted to rush back in again! This, in spite of the ghastly sense of desolation which the place aroused in me.