Tarnhelm: The Best Supernatural Stories

by Hugh Ealpole

  It was a pretty place in the English style, with cosy rooms and a charming garden at the back with a small pool, a badminton court, some large banana trees and fine mimosa bushes. Her drawing-room and dining-room were in white with some good etchings. Everything was in admirable taste, but a little like herself, quietly aesthetic, rather without personality, gently hospitable. On a certain afternoon he found himself sitting at the end of the dark blue sofa, very close to her, as she asked him whether he would have tea or a highball. When he said a highball, she asked whether he preferred Scotch or Bourbon. It was all very restful, very friendly, almost intimate.

  ‘Say, do you know what I’ve been thinking?’ And he leaned over the end of the sofa and with one hand touched her arm.

  ‘No, what?’

  ‘Wouldn’t it be a grand idea to go down to San Diego for a night or two? There’s the Fair, and we’d get one or two more— Barney, the Thwaites and Lucille. We’d have a grand time.’

  ‘Yes, I think I should like that,’ she said in her quiet English way. ‘The Fair ought to be amusing. I loved them at home when I was a child.’

  He looked on her face so steadily that she glanced up and looked back at him, questioningly, as though she would say: ‘Aren’t you a little different today? What’s happened?’ And he felt different. He thought for the first time since he had known her that he would like to take her in his arms and kiss her. He wondered why he had never wanted to do this before. He did not know that once a plan begins to work in your brain, it gathers about it aid, assistance. It amuses itself with cheating you a little.

  ‘We’ve been grand friends,’ he said, ‘a long time now. I heard an Englishman say the other day that Americans were superficial, but I don’t think so, do you?’ And he touched her hand for a brief instant; almost stroked it, and then sat back on the sofa, turning away from her a little. She looked at him with her mild blue eyes, smiling gently, a little maternally. She was thinking: ‘He’s a nice boy. I like him better today than ever before.’ She said, ‘Yes, I think you are superficial, most of you. English people take friendship very seriously. When they have a friend it’s for life.’

  ‘That’s the matter with the English,’ he answered. ‘They’re altogether too serious. They can’t have a good time and then forget about it.’ He turned and looked at her very gravely indeed. ‘But you’re not like that with me, Grace. You mean a hell of a lot to me, you do, indeed. I like you being quiet, cautious. American girls aren’t quiet any more.’

  ‘I’m glad our friendship means something to you,’ she said gently. ‘I’ve never quite known.’

  ‘Well, you know now,’ he answered. ‘You’re just about the best friend I’ve got.’

  He finished his highball reflectively. What would she do if he should kiss her? English women are so strange. They lead you on and then pretend that they know nothing about it. And the trouble is that they really are surprised. They complain bitterly that you’ve ruined a beautiful friendship, and very often they really do value the friendship more than the passion.

  What would Grace be like if she should surrender? And would he be feeling the same about her if she hadn’t a penny? Yes, he believed he would. He felt quite a holy feeling stealing over him, and he asked for another highball. All the same, it was pleasant to think that she was so wonderfully wealthy. And then he noticed the cat. He had never really thought of it before, except that it had occurred to him once and again that women without husbands, lovers or children were apt to waste a great deal of emotion on animals. If he had thought about the cat at all, he’d have been aware of its odd devotion to Grace. Odd, he thought, because cats are always aloof. They lived their own lives and despised human beings.

  But this cat, a very large and pure white Persian (or was it a Persian? He’d never seen a Persian so large and so white. He must ask her, some time, its breed)—this cat, Penelope, seemed really to be devoted to Grace. He had noticed that, when Grace left the room, the cat sank into a kind of cold neutrality. He had sometimes attempted to win it over, not because he liked cats, but because he believed in that old adage that animals and children were fond of only good men. Any little proof that he was good, he eagerly accepted. But Penelope would never have anything to do with him at all. It wasn’t that she disliked him, it was rather that he did not exist. And he had felt on one or two occasions, when he was waiting in the drawing-room for Grace, that under the icy grey stare Penelope caused him to sink into nothing.

  This afternoon, however, was the first occasion on which he was aware that the cat quite definitely regarded him. As he touched Grace’s hand for that brief instant, the cat, that had been lying in a great white mass near the window, raised itself ever so slightly. The big handsome head turned in his direction.

  ‘That’s the best-looking cat I’ve ever seen,’ he said. ‘How old is it? Have you had it always?’

  ‘Yes, from a tiny kitten. How old is it? Oh, I don’t know— eight or nine years, perhaps.’

  ‘Seems damn fond of you.’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘That’s strange. One gets to thinking that cats have no feelings for anyone but themselves.’

  Grace Ferguson smiled. ‘Oh, that’s quite untrue. Come here, Penelope.’

  The cat raised itself at once, and, with great delicacy for so large an animal, softly crossed the floor. It stood with its back arched a little against Grace’s leg. It purred very gently. Then for a moment the purr ceased. It raised its head and looked at Thornton.

  ‘You know,’ he said, laughing, ‘I don’t think that cat likes me.’

  ‘Perhaps it doesn’t,’ she replied. ‘Penelope can be jealous.’

  ‘Jealous?’ This was altogether a new idea to him. ‘I don’t think,’ he said, ‘that cats care that much. They think only of themselves.’

  ‘It’s very easy,’ she answered, ‘to explain affection by love of personal comfort. I suppose cats are selfish, but Penelope isn’t an ordinary cat.’

  It was after this little conversation that Thornton began to be involved in strange personal experiences. We all know what it is to enter on a certain day into a new atmosphere. We pass into a world where everything seems to go perversely. Letters that we need do not arrive, appointments are broken, a fog, especially on this Californian coast, comes up and obscures the sun, the ground seems to quiver right beneath our feet. It was so now with Thornton. In the first place he had a strange sense of urgency—as though someone whispered to him, ‘Lose no time over this or it will be too late.’

  Hollywood is a nervous, hysterical place. Nothing is sure from day to day for anyone. Even the principal stars, who are supposed to live in such settled glory, do not know from picture to picture how their reputation may be affected. And this uncertainty spreads outside the actual studios into the surrounding world. While Thornton had money in the bank he could defy the sudden unexpected demands on his purse. There is a kind of careless extravagance in the air and with it forgetfulness, so that one is constantly exposed to expenses that one cannot pay. And because everyone else is suffering from the same economic uncertainty, emotional explosions are quite common. The air seems thinner here and nerves more frequently exasperated.

  Thornton’s rooms were the upper part of a strange, rather desolate little wooden building on Sunset Boulevard, the lower half of which was occupied by a lady who evidenced each night in brilliant electric lights that she gave psychic readings. These rooms had seemed smart and elegant when he first occupied them, but everything becomes easily shabby and worn in Hollywood because of the brilliant sunshine, unless it is carefully looked after. He had decorated his rooms in Mexican fashion . . . Mexican rugs and hangings of very bright colours, and then, contrary to these, a roll-top desk at which he had hoped to write for the films, a modern armchair that swirled round when you sat on it in a surprisingly disconcerting fashion, a settee of brown plush, which clung to you as though in a bad temper when you wanted to leave it. He had photographs of film stars in si
lver frames and hoped that his friends would consider them intimate gifts. But he did not care for the silver. The sudden sense that his surroundings were shabby and ominous was one thing that made him want to hasten into Mrs Ferguson’s arms. The sooner that he was in her beautiful house the better.

  He developed a kind of obsession, not so much for herself as for her possessions. And yet, he thought himself that he loved her; that he couldn’t have conceived such tenderness for her simply because she was wealthy. This was in all probability true. He looked forward to seeing her, and when he saw her he at once imagined her in his arms, and a sense of comfort and affection stole about him. For the first time he began to pity himself and to wonder why it was that, with such good brains, he had not gone further. Some guys have all the breaks, he told himself. But now perhaps, with her at his side always encouraging him, showing him what it was that he could do best he would astonish the world with his gifts.

  So the afternoon came, a foggy, cold afternoon, with a mist that seemed gloomily alive; to have arms and tentacles and a sort of weeping dreariness like a tiresome friend who must always insist on being comforted. Her drawing-room was cheerful, a log fire was blazing, and he noticed again, as of late he had so often done, how brilliant and fresh her pictures and curtains and furniture were. When he entered the room, the white cat was asleep in front of the fire. The Chinese man-servant said that his mistress would be down in a few minutes. He was alone with Penelope.

  He sat down, picked up a copy of Time, wondered how those boys could be so brilliant week after week and also so unkind to practically everybody, tried to think of world politics and to believe himself a man of affairs, but was aware that his heart was beating with such an agitation that he was unable to think of anything but himself.

  That was because within another half-hour he would propose to Grace Ferguson, and would, in all probability, be as good as married before he left that room. He had no doubt but that she would accept him.

  But was it only that?

  Looking about him he felt that something in the room was discomforting, and then was conscious, to his own extreme surprise, that he hated to be alone with the cat. The animal had not moved, and then quite suddenly it stretched out a lazy paw and scratched the carpet. The sound made him shiver.

  ‘Don’t do that!’ he said aloud, as though he were speaking to a living person. The cat very slowly turned its head. He noticed then for the first time how intense were its large grey eyes. And even as he looked at them, the heavy lids obscured them. It was as though the cat were looking at him with twice the intensity through that blinded vision. Nothing in the room moved, and yet it seemed to him that the cat had come closer and grown larger. The whole room was filled with a sort of warm furry odour, almost as though he would soon be stifled with it.

  Grace came in and he gave a little sigh of relief. He had his highball and she had her tea. Then he said, his voice shaking a little: ‘Grace, I want to tell you . . . I’ve been wanting to for weeks. I’m in love with you.’ She turned and looked at him with so kindly a maternal expression that he felt for a moment like a little boy who had asked to be taken to the circus.

  ‘That’s very sweet of you,’ she said softly, ‘dear Thornton. But you can’t be in love with an old woman like me.’

  ‘Old!’ he laughed. ‘Why, Grace, you’re wonderful! You’re no age—you’re every age. You’re the woman I love and I want you to marry me.’ At the same time he put out his hand and caught hers. She said nothing and he began to be uneasy.

  ‘We are neither of us children,’ he said. ‘I’m not much. I haven’t anything to offer, except devotion and loyalty. I’ll be as good to you as I know how.’ (He had a ridiculous notion that he was quoting something from a story in a magazine.) She did not take her hand away, she even pressed his a little.

  ‘I’ve been married once, you know,’ she said. She laughed. ‘There are two kinds of widows: those who believe in marriage and those who don’t. It depends, I suppose, on what their experience has been.’

  ‘Well?’ he asked, drawing his chair a little nearer to hers.

  ‘Well—I don’t know. I was very happy with Egbert. The only thing I had against him really was his name. I like you very much, Thornton. I think we would get on very well together. I’ll confess to you that I’m often very lonely. I can’t think of anyone I’d be better friends with, but—’

  ‘But?’ he said eagerly.

  ‘I’ve got accustomed to my life as it is. It isn’t perfect. Nobody’s life is. But on the whole, it’s safe. And I’m not quite alone. There’s Penelope.’

  ‘Penelope!’ he said mockingly.

  ‘Oh, you don’t know. You’d be surprised if you did.’

  ‘Now come.’ He put his arm around her gently, but he spoke with a sudden masterful decision. ‘You can’t pretend you won’t marry me because of a cat. I could do more for you than a cat can. I love you, and that’s what you haven’t got in your life.’

  ‘Yes.’ He noticed that she didn’t move away from him, that she came, if possible, a little closer. ‘I know.’ She looked at him. ‘I like you so much.’

  He thought that the moment had come. He drew her to him and kissed her, as he hoped, passionately. Still she did not withdraw. She returned his kiss, but a little as though he were her boy who had just told her that he had won a prize at school. Well, after all, did he want passion? He thought that on the whole he did not.

  ‘Marry me, marry me!’ he said urgently, kissing her eyes. ‘You’ll be so happy, Grace. I’ll see that you are. I can’t live without you.’ He coughed suddenly. He felt as though his mouth were full of fur. He choked. ‘I’m so sorry. Wait a moment.’ He drank a little of his highball. ‘Something in my throat.’

  Then he turned to her, his whole being urgent with the necessity of her submitting. ‘Listen, say yes. I don’t know what I should do without you now. You can save me—make something of me. I’ll serve you so faithfully.’

  He actually fell on his knees beside her, put his arms round her just as he had so often seen people do in the theatre. He felt her response. For a moment it was as though she were going to yield to him completely. Then she drew back.

  ‘Let me think it over, Thornton. Leave me to myself for a day or two.’ She looked at him again, curiously, anxiously. ‘Do you think Anglo-American marriages ever work? Isn’t there something both so friendly and antagonistic between the two countries that we can never really be comfortable together? And I’m not very interesting. I’m terribly ordinary. One of the millions of middle-aged Englishwomen who have to content themselves with the little things. I’m afraid you might find me very dull.’

  ‘You dull!’ he cried. And now he was entirely sincere. ‘Why, we’ve never had a dull moment together; you know that’s true. It’s because we’ve been such companions. We like so many of the same things, and I want to guard you, protect you. I feel that you’re so defenceless.’

  It was then that he saw the cat rise very slowly from its place in front of the fire and walk across the room. It was a strange thing, but both of them turned and stared at it. It walked as though it saw neither of them, and yet Thornton felt that it enclosed him; tightened the air about his nose and throat and mouth. All that Thornton knew was that, for this moment at least, the scene was ended. He got up.

  ‘All right, I’ll give you your day or two, but don’t refuse me. For God’s sake be kind.’ And with a splendid masterful action, he strode from the room.

  Three days later she said that she would marry him. ‘After all,’ she admitted, her cheek pressed against his, ‘it’s only Penelope who’ll object.’

  ‘That damn cat,’ he said, drawing away from her ever so little; ‘you’re always mentioning it.’

  ‘Well, you see, it’s been the important thing in my life for so long. She’s not an ordinary cat. She’s done such strange things. There was Mr Mangan, for instance—’ She hesitated.

  ‘Well?’ asked Thornton, feeling, from he
knew not where, a strange tremor down his spine.

  ‘Percy Mangan. It wasn’t anything really, only he flirted a little, you know—and next morning he wrote me such a strange letter. He was going back to New York, because of a nightmare, he said. I never saw him again, but I know it was something to do with Penelope.’

  ‘Listen, darling.’ He took her face firmly between his hands and was a little annoyed with himself that he should be thinking of her money rather than of her proximity. ‘You’re not to have exaggerated notions about this cat. That’s one of the things I’m going to stop when we’re married.’

  Grace shook her head. ‘Yes, I know. All the same, Penelope can’t bear that anyone should be fond of me. She scratched Benjie Cooper’s face once so that he couldn’t go about in public for weeks.’

  Thornton felt a chill in the room. He looked about him, but the cat was not there. ‘This is all nonsense,’ he said. ‘Rather than have that cat make our lives miserable, I’ll have it chloroformed.’

  She gave him then such a strange, clear look. ‘I don’t think you could,’ she said. ‘Penelope’s an extraordinary cat. If she didn’t want to be chloroformed, she wouldn’t be, whatever you might do.’

  In fact, he went away from the house that evening less happy than he should be. He did not know what was the matter with him. He ought to be radiant. He was not in love with Grace, but he was very fond of her. They were excellent companions. Financially, he was safe for life.

  It was one of those lovely evenings when the sunlit air bathes all the strange little bungalows and untidy lots and oil-pumps and new petrol stations and temporary homes of the ventriloquists or psychic readers, psychology interpreters and soul-healers, and transmutes them all into a lovely film-like iridescence. So much more unreal, so much more exhilarating and depressing at the same time, than true sunlight. He went home. He opened his door, entered his sitting-room. There, staring at him, was the white cat. He looked again. It was not there. ‘Now this is absurd,’ he told himself. ‘That cat is beginning to get on my nerves. There is no cat there.’ But he felt in his nostrils a warm, furry, stifling sensation. He went and had a shower and changed his clothes.