Kent leaned forward in his chair as his friend broke off. “Yes?” he prompted. “And then, after a while, something happened?”
Roberts nodded. “You won’t believe this, but I started hearing voices, as though coming from the water.” He caught the other’s disbelieving glance. “I don’t mean actual voices. But they were sounding in my head. They were asking me to come down.”
“Down where?”
“Down below. Into the water. I know you will think me mad and that my experiences are the result of some mental aberration, but it isn’t so. I’m as sane you are.” He stared at Kent grimly. “You don’t believe me?”
Kent inclined his head. “Of course I believe you. But the strain of your long hours of work... Might it not be some mental stress...?”
“It’s not a mental problem. I went to see an eminent specialist in London, one of the most highly recommended in Europe. He gave me the most exhaustive tests and I spent several hours with him. He could find nothing wrong—no trace of pathological disease—and gave me a clean bill of health in every way.”
“Then what is the problem?” Kent asked slowly.
Roberts’ face was set in a hard mask. “Something terribly real. There’s something evil in this house which is reaching out to claim me for some purpose.”
Kent rose from the chair. “You can’t really mean that?” he said incredulously.
Roberts got up too. “I certainly do. This constant repetition in my head. Come to us. An invitation to what? It will really drive me mad if something isn’t done.” He sat down again abruptly. “Several times I opened the hatch and stared down into the water. There was nothing, of course, but the constant rush seemed like distorted laughter.”
Kent felt a sudden frisson of something he couldn’t clearly define. Not fear, but coldness as though his friend’s words had struck a chill to the soul, if such a thing were possible. Then he became businesslike. “Let’s go down below and look at this sinister hatch of which you speak.”
Roberts became agitated. “Please don’t say that. It may sound like provocation.”
Kent chose to ignore this extraordinary statement. He said nothing further, but followed his host down to the studio.
The room was a huge chamber and Kent had not seen it before in its final form. Though it was in close proximity to the water, it was quite warm as Roberts had installed central heating here also in case damp from the stream might affect his canvases.
There was an enormous wooden hatch, bound with iron bands, about six feet square, in the far corner. Owing to the huge weight, it was raised by a steel cable fastened to a metal ring, which ran through a pulley block bolted to a massive beam above and raised by a small metal windlass secured to the floor. The cable ran almost noiselessly through the pulley block as Roberts turned the handle of the windlass and then secured it with the brake as soon as it was fully open.
There was a sudden rush of cold air, mingled with various odours that Kent found difficult to place. It was true that the stream which ran foaming and clear about eight or ten feet below made a disturbing sound as it raced through, and such was its power that Kent could feel a faint vibration beneath his feet, as the water swirled round the piles which supported the building. He guessed that in the dim past flat-bottomed barges had rested beneath to take sacks of corn on board. Sunlight filtering through made a dappled surface of the wavelets below, and now and then the silver belly of a small fish slid in and out of view on its way downstream to the distant sea.
He turned to Roberts, the latter surveying him with a hopeful expression on his face. “I can see nothing unusual. A powerful surge round the building from time to time, but that is quite normal.”
“Ah, but you are never here at night,” Roberts said.
Kent gave him a blank look. “You don’t mean to say that you paint down here at night? I thought natural light was necessary for all artists?” He broke off at the expression on the other’s face.
“I do some of my best work at night,” Roberts said. Then he changed his manner to one more placatory. “What I mean to say is that I retouch portraits and so on, and make plans for future canvases.” And with that he turned on his heel and led the way upstairs.
Kent declined his friend’s invitation to tea. When he left the mill house he was a very troubled man.
VII
From Roberts’ Personal Diary.
Is Kent right and that I am becoming over-imaginative in being alone so long in this huge house?
Or am I going mad? God forbid. But these events, though somewhat intangible, are nevertheless real in the still of the night. Still of the night? I use the term loosely for, goodness only knows, the house is never silent. The creaking of the beams, the furtive movements as though there are muffled footfalls in various rooms, and the distant trickle of water. For in truth one can hear the stream quite clearly, especially at night as we sleep with the windows open in this current hot weather. And the voices! Dear God, the voices! For these insistent whispers in my ears seem to say: Come to us! The water is beautifully clear and cool. Stay with us in the rippling embrace of the flow, which has existed throughout all eternity. Iä! Iä! Cthulhu fhtagn!
I put my pillow over my ears, but the voices still continue, which proves that they are inside my head. Sweet Jesus, where will it all end? We could leave this place, but I am convinced these cursed voices would still continue to plague me. For I have heard them when staying in my London hotel. This agony cannot continue much longer...
VIII
For a fortnight Roberts worked furiously on a new painting, and his labours completely absorbed him for his dread fantasies seemed to fade away. He was more cheerful altogether when he met Kent for lunch at The Three Horseshoes, which was a great relief to his old friend.
In addition, Gilda had rung several times, once from Chicago and on another occasion from Washington. She was making the rounds of private art galleries and dealers and the prospects were extremely good.
Mrs Summers had also noted the change in her employer and was greatly relieved when Kent ran across her in the village one afternoon.
Kent had a book launch in London the following day, so he was not present when certain events unfolded. He stayed on for three more days with his fiancée and her family in St. John’s Wood.
The night he arrived back in the village it was quite late so he did not call on Roberts. Not that it would have made any difference to the outcome. Roberts had been in a good mood that brilliantly sunny day and had even attended a cricket match on the village green. But after dinner he felt some of the old malaise creeping over him. The housekeeper had long gone home and he could not settle to his accounts in the study.
It was a bright, clear night with the moon riding high, and he had the windows open to the faint breeze. Then suddenly, without warning, he felt the same insidious voices in his ears. Come to us! There is deep peace below. You are one of us and we are reclaiming you! It is good and peaceful where we are. We have slept for countless aeons and now we are gathering strength. Come down and be at peace for all time... Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah-nagl fhtagn!
Roberts felt cold sweat pouring down his cheeks, despite the heat of the night, and although he clapped his hands over his ears the persistent coaxing went on as though inside his head.
Mechanically and blindly Roberts found himself descending to the ground floor, walking like a drunken man. Then he found himself in the studio and the insistent susurration of the water had now assumed a more soothing aspect. The voices in his head went on, caressingly, insistently, as though a lover was welcoming a long-awaited partner.
Roberts sank to his knees on the heavy wooden floor, found his hands operating the windlass. The hatch opened silently and then he was gazing down into the dark stream, which seemed to fascinate him.
Come! Eternal life awaits! Iä-R’lyeh! Cthulhu fhtagn! Iä! Iä! The words rose to a crescendo, and then it happened.
The darkness of the
water parted and something white and obscene floated to the surface. Roberts found himself staring into a loathsome visage, neither human nor fish. A pair of large unblinking eyes glistened in the dim light as the thing surveyed him with an alien stare. Its huge slit mouth lined with jagged green teeth opened in an obscene smile. Then two webbed claws reached up and plucked him effortlessly down into oblivion. The water boiled white and Roberts let out scream after scream as the torrent turned briefly scarlet and the surge swept him under.
IX
Kent was roused from a deep sleep by the insistent jangling of the telephone on his bedside table. As he came to full consciousness he glanced at his wristwatch and saw it was 3:00 a.m. Thinking it might be Gilda, he picked up the phone, but it was a man’s voice, full of urgency.
“Carson here, Mr Kent. Something terrible has happened at The Mill House. I know it’s an unearthly hour, but could you come over here right away? It really is imperative.”
At first Kent could not place the voice, but then he remembered it was a CID Inspector based at Lewes, who had read a number of his crime novels and had given him invaluable advice about police procedures. From that a friendship had evolved. “The Mill House?” Kent said, still half-asleep. “Is Roberts...”
Carson interrupted him. “It’s about your friend,” he said gently. “I understand his wife is in New York, so I thought of you. I hope you don’t mind?”
“No, of course not, but I still don’t understand.”
“A local man was walking past the place at midnight when he heard terrible screams coming from the building,” replied Carson. “He tried the bell and there were lights on in the house, but no one answered. The local police had a list of key holders and they had to get his housekeeper to open up. What they found was so shocking that they contacted us. You really must come. Now.”
Kent was already out of bed. “I’ll be there in a quarter of an hour,” he said grimly.
X
When Kent arrived at the mill the place was a blaze of light. There were three police cars with their headlights on and an ambulance. Several police officers in uniform were clustered around the open front door, smoking.
After Kent had identified himself, he hurried upstairs and was met by Carson coming down. The Inspector was a big, impressive-looking man in his early forties, broad-shouldered and athletic.
“A bad business, Mr Kent,” he muttered. “A bad business.” He put his hand on the other’s shoulder as they went up to Roberts’ study. “I’m afraid your friend is dead.”
At first Kent could not take this in and stammered something banal and fatuous.
“It’s true,” the CID man said, ushering Kent into the study and motioning toward the whisky bottle and glasses on the desk. “You’d better have a peg. I’m afraid you’re going to need it.”
“I can’t understand it,” Kent said bewilderedly. “He was all right when I last saw him a few days ago, though a little troubled in his mind.” Now that the whisky was beginning to take effect, his faculties were beginning to function normally. “It wasn’t suicide?”
Carson shook his head.
Kent gave him an incredulous look. “Not murder?”
“Not that either. At least not as we understand it,” Carson said grimly. “As I said, you’d better drink the rest of that glass. You’re going to need it.”
Half-dazed, Kent was led downstairs. As they descended to the last level, just above the mill-race, cold damp air was on his face.
The place was full of light, from portable lamps set about the floor, which was wet and interspersed with reddish stains. The hatch was wide open and gaping, but it was the huddled mass under the green canvas sheet that arrested his attention. A police surgeon, a small sandy-haired man with gold pince-nez dominating his face and wearing a dirty white smock, was kneeling by the shrouded mass.
Two other plain-clothes men sat on stools at the far side of the room, smoking and with stolid expressions on their faces. Nobody spoke for a moment.
Kent licked suddenly dry lips but Carson’s strong hand was beneath his elbow and steered him to the high stool that Roberts sometimes used when spending long hours before his easel. That too was in the far corner, its surface covered by a white sheet.
The surgeon stood up. “Quite outside my experience,” he said in a terse voice. “We’ll know more when we get him down to the mortuary... or perhaps not,” he added after a slight pause.
“Are you ready?” Carson asked. “Just a formality and I’m sorry to have to put you through this, but it will save the widow much grief.”
Kent could not suppress a shudder at the crumpled mass of eviscerated flesh with hands and legs slashed and gouged as though by razor-sharp knives. There was such a look of horror on what was left of the dead face that Kent remembered it for the rest of his life. His legs were giving way and he sank thankfully back on to the stool.
“Beats your novels, eh, Mr Kent?” Carson said. The two men were on Christian name terms, but Carson was on familiar ground now and using his official manner in the presence of his subordinates.
“No blood,” revealed the surgeon, whose name was Snaith.
“The water would wash it down, surely,” Kent said.
The little man shook his head. “Even in cases where bodies are recovered from water after being gashed, say, by the propeller of motor boats, they retain most of their blood.”
“But who could have done this?” Kent asked desperately.
“Nothing human, that’s for sure,” Carson put in.
“So it’s not murder?”
Snaith shook his head. “That’s the damnable thing. How are we going to explain this to high authority?”
“But it must be murder,” Kent went on.
Carson shook his head. “Quite impossible. The house was securely locked for the night. As I said on the phone, we had to get the key from the housekeeper. We made extensive searches from top to bottom of the mill. No one had been here apart from Roberts.”
“But the water,” Kent went on desperately. “Perhaps the mill wheel...”
One of the plain-clothes men stepped forward. “We had a frogman under there, sir. That wheel has been inoperable for at least thirty years. It is secured by steel bolts and great chains.”
Kent persisted in his questions though he knew he was being ridiculous. He turned back to Carson. “Could something like a shark have escaped from an aquarium and come down the stream?”
The Inspector would have laughed had the situation not been so macabre and horrific in its implications. “Quite impossible. Even if you were correct, nothing large enough to have inflicted such terrible injuries. There are massive iron grilles each side of the mill. They go right down to the bed of the stream. The steel has no rust and the grilles would merely let small fish get through. The water’s only about eight or ten feet deep anyway.” He resumed his brisk manner. “You chaps carry on. We’ll try to sort out all this mess later. Mr Kent has had a shock and it’s necessary to get him back to normal surroundings.”
A dazed Kent was led gently upstairs and into the familiar study where he took another tumbler of whisky with as little effect as though it had been water. His sane, everyday world had collapsed about him. He was seized by a sudden fit of trembling and almost fell into the leather chair to which Carson led him.
He was not to know at that stage of Roberts’ obscene diary entries hidden in a recess of the desk or of the vile painting of some loathsome thing under the sheeted canvas in the studio.
And thereafter he could never bear the sound of running water.
ANOTHER FISH STORY
by KIM NEWMAN
IN THE SUMMER of 1968, while walking across America, he came across the skeleton fossil of something aquatic. All around, even in the apparent emptiness, were signs of the life that had passed this way. Million-year-old seashells were strewn across the empty heart of California, along with flattened bullet casings from the ragged edge of the Wild West and occasional s
ticks of weathered furniture. The sturdier pieces were pioneer jetsam, dumped by exhausted covered wagons during a long dry desert stretch on the road to El Dorado. The more recent items had been thrown off overloaded trucks in the ’30s, by Okies rattling towards orange groves and federal work programs.
He squatted over the bones. The sands parted, disclosing the whole of the creature. The scuttle-shaped skull was all saucer-sized eye-sockets and triangular, saw-toothed jaw. The long body was like something fished out of an ash-can by a cartoon cat—fans of rib-spindles tapering to a flat tail. What looked like arm-bones fixed to the dorsal spine by complex plates that were evolving towards becoming shoulders. Stranded when the seas receded from the Mojave, the thing had lain ever closer to the surface, waiting to be revealed by sand-riffling winds. Uncovered as he was walking to it, the fossil—exposed to the thin, dry air—was quickly resolving into sand and scraps.
Finally, only an arm remained. Short and stubby like an alligator leg, it had distinct, barb-tipped fingers. It pointed like a sign-post, to the West, to the Pacific, to the city-stain seeping out from the original blot of El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora de la Reyna de los Angeles de Rio Porciunculo. He expected these route-marks. He’d been following them since he first crawled out of a muddy river in England. This one scratched at him.
Even in the desert, he could smell river-mud, taste foul water, feel the tidal pull.
For a moment, he was under waters. Cars, upside down above him, descended gently like dead, settling sharks. People floated like broken dolls just under the shimmering, sunlit ceiling-surface. An enormous pressure squeezed in on him, jamming thumbs against his open eyes, forcing liquid salt into mouth and nose. A tubular serpent, the size of a streamlined train, slithered over the desert-bed towards him, eyes like turquoise-shaded searchlights, shifting rocks out of its way with muscular arms.
Weird Shadows Over Innsmouth Page 10
