CHM August 2020
Author: CHM LLC
Date: 2020-08-03 05:00:00+00:00
Description: Mondays by Paul Scheerbaum The Oak Tree by C.B. Jones Berlin Bargain by Lee Emmons The Song of the Monster: The Dream by Alexis M Davis One Mind by Emil Pellim The Horla by Guy de Maupassant (1887)

Copyright © 2020 by CHM LLC

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Cover Art: Toeken (https://atoekeneffort.weebly.com/)

Art for The Horla: Luke Spooner / Carrion House

Cosmic Horror Monthly
www.cosmic-horror.net

Greetings dear reader,

Thank you for joining us for our second issue of Cosmic Horror Monthly. We are glad to see you back. Or maybe this is your first foray into our special breed of cosmic terror. If so, welcome!

This month, the usual 9-2-5 monotony becomes anything but in Mondays, then a desperate horror writer looks for inspiration in his dreams and finds an unimaginable nightmare instead in The Oak Tree. A war criminal makes a choice with ultimate consequences in Berlin Bargain before 2 college students get entangled in the local hive mind in 1 Mind. Lastly, we’ll rediscover an old tale called The Horla that will have you looking over your shoulder at every turn.

So, light some candles and check at least 3 times that the doors and windows are all locked. If we must stay indoors, lets get lost in a horror story. Just be wary of things that dwell unseen in shadowy corners at night.

C.R.

*~*~*

Mondays

By: Paul Scheerbaum

At the House

My eyes cracked open at the beep of the alarm and I jolted out of bed. It was 7:00 a.m.—a half hour after I was supposed to be up, and I still needed at least an hour to make the morning commute. Luckily, Mondays usually meant heavier traffic and I was already late. I decided to take my time and enjoy a shower. My tardiness wouldn’t matter; everyone else took their time on the first day of the week. I did have to skip breakfast, though—let me rephrase that: I didn’t skip anything since I never had time to indulge in that most-important-meal-of-the-day. I assume this was how most Mondays began for every other sorry soul here.

It seemed we were all used to going to work tired, hungry, and behind schedule. We worked at a disadvantage and our batteries were constantly running low. The weekend did nothing for our recuperation and it was only long enough for the slightest whiff of relaxation right as it ended. Then come Monday, millions of alarms signaled an end to the “break” and heralded in another dreadful five days of trying to add sand to the hourglass. It was too bad the vessel emptied at a rate too fast for anyone to keep pace. We all knew the futility of trying to make up for lost time, but there would always be just enough carrot dangling at the end of the stick for us to accept our fate and put in another two weeks.

At least my car started on the first try.

The Morning Commute

Traffic was terrific. There was an accident that shut down the right lane for two miles after my on-ramp. Nothing helped pass the time in gridlock. Music lost its emotion. By the time the congestion cleared up, it was close to eight and I still had clogged surface roads to seep my way through. I was nearly an hour late to work.

Another laughable start to a Monday.

At the Office in the Morning

It didn’t matter. My boss habitually showed up to work around eleven, so he would hardly notice my tardiness. I decided to take my time and break myself in for the week using the little freedom I had in this place. The urge to start work tended to have more to do with how much time was left in the day rather than how much was on my plate.

I had resigned myself to this method long ago and I was used to it. I spent the first hour and a half looking through emails that had been collecting since Friday evening. Most of it was procedural stuff—pointless reminders of this and that. There were countless meetings planned for this week—all senseless. It was a lot of garbage to sift through before reaching job-related information, but a portion of each day was always dedicated to cleaning out the inbox, especially on Mondays.

It wasn’t long before the familiar electric buzz of the office began to get to me. The incessant hum was agitating, and I felt suffocated. Occasionally, less intelligible exchanges between my co-workers would help alleviate the pressure in my ears, but the tension always remained there in the background to punctuate the dull interactions. Sometimes I would resort to having conversations in my head to drown it all out. This morning was different. I heard every cough, wheeze, and fart over the steady electrical din. I could no longer hear my own internal pleas for quiet while the dissonance of fallen humanity filled my ears. It was as if all logical and articulate conversation had been muffled and our true nature as mere beasts desperate to maintain our illusion of superiority was revealed through the voiceless pall.

We used to be great, but it wasn’t good enough—nothing was ever good enough. So, we morphed ourselves into troublesome creatures of madness and mediocrity. Of course, those dubious traits fed into one another and a cycle of foolishness sent us spiraling out of control. Our progress somehow became inextricably linked to the conquest of the Earth and all her wild ferocity. We spayed and neutered the menace from the world. There was no place we hadn’t gone, no climate to which we could not adapt, and no prey we could not claim. We used to worship the ground we walked on and then we bound the Earth in asphalt chains.

What was left to pacify in the world once the master had mastered all? I believed I knew the answer to this question, and I feared what it meant for humanity if I was correct in my presumption. Yet here we sat—in a pen that’s in a box that’s in a cage of steel and concrete—unknowingly waiting for absolute judgment. Meanwhile, all I really wanted to think about was what I’d have on my lunch break.

Fucking Mondays.

In the Afternoon

I couldn’t remember what I’d brought for lunch. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that for once in this place, no one took it upon themselves to bother me while I ate. The relative peace allowed me to collect myself and recover from the previous four hours of tedium. There were no half-hearted conversations about the events of the weekend; there was no awkward sports talk. My boss didn’t even pop in to fire off any one of the six Monday-isms he kept at the ready for unsuspecting diners. The lack of these repetitive performances was refreshing, if not slightly odd, but I think I appreciated the quiet more than I ever had before.

I left the break room and sat down at my desk. I began typing away once more, this time sending empty replies to my bosses and their bosses and their bosses and whoever the hell rested atop the ever-growing mountain of nonsense. Before long, I drifted back into the muted boredom of the office. Time stood still, but I was unaware. Time sped up, and I didn’t even flinch. Time morphed and molded itself around me.

*~*~*

My mind was still reeling in the hazy aftermath of the weekend. I was not quite in the present nor was I in the past. Time was lost and then found again. Mondays were meant for playing catch-up, so I began typing away, desperate to stay ahead of the reaper’s scythe.

The keystroke chorus took on a menacing rhythm and I was compelled to join in with the unseen hands in the office. I started to sweat, but I didn’t wipe at it for fear of spoiling the primordial tempo with the sudden gesture. They would know that I was the one who stopped, and I knew the consequence for quitting was death.

I soldiered on.

I did not recognize the characters appearing on the screen; their order did not match with my input of the keys. The same grouping of characters appeared over and over with cold precision. I tried to stop typing but I couldn’t. I tried to type something else and I couldn’t. I tried to get up from my desk and...

*~*~*

I opened my heavy eyes and stared at fresh drops of blood on the keyboard. Immediately, I pressed my hand under my nose and looked around my cubicle to make sure that no one had watched me doze off or could see me bleeding out. Pulling my hand away revealed even more fresh, red blood which then began to coagulate and stick to my fingers. I had never zoned out like that before, let alone experienced a random nosebleed. The whole episode made me uneasy.

When I finally managed to regain focus and stem the flow of blood from my nostrils, I saw that I had been typing for some time. Four single-spaced pages of the repeating letters VC shone on my blinding white monitor. On the surface, the final product was mundane—simple letters in a word processor. However, the meaning behind those letters was something else entirely. It appeared that the solution to our self-imposed existential dilemma had been provided, and from the Scorched One, no less. My presumption was correct.

What a Monday.

Underneath the Imbricated Moon

I got up from my desk and made my way through an office that no longer resembled the one at which I arrived this morning. Everything was tinted with a pale cerulean glow and the only sound was my heart thumping in my chest. I looked out the nearest window and the blue-green haze reminded me of the northern lights. However, if I had ever actually seen them, I would have known that the comparison was inaccurate, for there was something different about the way the color spread across the sky. It seemed to be emerging from a single point, and my gut told me this colorful energy had never before been seen in this universe.

On my way out of the office, every empty cubicle presented the same scene: VC across computer screens illuminating droplets of blood on abandoned keyboards. Some more creative individuals had smeared VC in gory pairs onto random walls; the turquoise-tinted gloom caused the characters to radiate an eerie purple intensity. The drying letters tugged at me and I meandered out of the office rather than walk with any purpose. As I got closer to the exit, the letters morphed into odd, geometric glyphs which I had no way of deciphering. When I made it to the lobby, it became clear that the fragile will of humanity was being tested and the actions of my co-workers were not entirely within their control.

I knew this because my own actions had belonged to something else from the moment I opened my eyes at my desk. I was able to look around and contemplate what I was being shown, but my body was paralyzed by a compelling outside force. The feeling of meaninglessness that this manifested within my consciousness was terrifying. The ethereal strand linking mind to body had been severed and the thought of myself—my true self—drifting further and further away from my physical body was worrisome to say the least. Who knew what was out there in the endless ocean of space? Who knew how long I would be able to last before I drowned and sank beneath the waves of time?

At this point, my only recourse was to wish for those questions to be answered swiftly as I approached the revolving entry doors. There would be no redemption.

*~*~*

The entire lobby was cast in that blue-green glow, except here it made everything glisten and I could almost feel its weight. I was moved through the congealing atmosphere and out a revolving door where I was placed on the edge of a stupefied mass of bodies.

The whole campus was already filled with the dazed occupants of office buildings, so I remained at the back of the crowd.

We must have been quite a sight, my co-workers and I, all dressed up in our finest business-casual with matching fresh blood stains trickling over our chins and down to our chests. I saw that all of their heads were slightly tilted toward the sky as if they were basking in sunrays on a chilly autumn afternoon. I looked up and joined my brothers and sisters. It was bright, but my eyes did not burn. A glowing moon from elsewhere emitted its cerulean radiance while it eclipsed our native satellite. The new god was a silhouette against the beaming imposter and our trial was set.

*~*~*

As I stood baffled by the false moon and her master, I began to anticipate what I was about to witness, and a rank wave of dread washed over me. As the dark tide crashed into me, I felt the same unseen panic ripple throughout the congregation. By that point it was too late, and we all remained in our positions resigned to our collective fate. We would be the first to receive the sacrament of judgment, but we would not be the last. After all, the being above had been able to find this time and place out of an infinite number of possibilities. There would be no escaping the penalty for our crimes of so-called “progress” against the universe; crimes of wasted endeavor and misplaced grandiosity. However, despite our impending annihilation, the greatest terror was knowing that it was us, the cult of the Modern Age, that had unwittingly greeted this agent of destruction with open arms. The blood that will suffocate the advancement of humankind will be on our hands.

And there shall be no more Mondays.

End.

THE OAK TREE

By: C.B. Jones

The words wouldn’t come. He stared at the screen of his laptop, nothing but empty space on his word processing program except for a lone “the” he’d managed to write. His fingertips brushed at the keys, but never committed. It was like…like trying to squeeze a drop of piss out for a urine sample at the doctor’s when you’d already gone that day, he thought. Yes, it had gotten that bad and that was the best he could come up with: a urine sample metaphor.

For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what was going to happen or how he was going to start the final installment of his Vampire Villa saga. He did know that Tucker, the noble half-breed who had a penchant for eating bloody steaks, would have a final showdown with L’Troneous, the evil overseer of the night who sought to rule the human world. He also had to figure out what to do with Shiba, the nymphomaniac vamp who straddled the fence between the human and vampire worlds and whose true loyalties remained unknown. And what about Tucker’s forbidden werewoman love interest Valia?

The Vampire Villa saga had been moderately successful for Eddie Palomar (Edward Palomar to his readers) in the genre of vampire fiction. It was by-the-numbers vampire stuff: blood sucking, vampire vixens, dark lords, evil beasts, but it paid the bills and the fans ate it up. The series had netted him a living and all sorts of strange ass from adoring female fans at various book signings across the country.

What Eddie hadn’t garnered from Vampire Villa was any amount of respect from the literary community, his colleagues, or his former classmates from the University of Iowa. He didn’t rightly care. One of his friends had once told him that “you had to pay your dues before you paid the rent”, but Eddie needed to pay the rent and Vampire Villa had been a pleasant meal ticket. Plus, he was doing what he loved—more or less. Sure, it wasn’t intellectually satisfying, but maybe he could venture on to more stimulating projects after he’d wrapped up the saga. First, he had to finish up this damned finale.

He rubbed his temples vigorously, continuing to stare at the nothingness on his screen. He was exhausted and spent. It was hopeless; nothing was going to come out, at least not at the moment anyway.

“Fuck it,” he sighed and shut off the computer, pushed his chair away, and stood up. It was time for a walk and a drink to clear his mind, sort stuff out.

He started off down Grant Street, the sun melting into the horizon as it slipped from view. He walked past the old white frame houses that were characteristic of his street. Most of them were in pretty good shape. Some could use a new paint job. The lawns were mostly yellow with barely any green showing—a late summer drought and the cool nights of autumn the cause.

He hoofed it for a couple more blocks and then turned onto Main Street, all the while sorting details out in his head. He spoke out loud every now and then.

“Okay, so we want Tucker to ultimately end up with Valia. And should he find a cure for the werewolfness? Or is he gonna have hot hairy animal sex every full moon? Or maybe Tucker should end up with Shiba. Shit. Make up your mind Eddie,” he said to himself.

Presently, he came to the only pub in the town of Anodyne Springs. The sign outside read: The Underwood, a nod to the large population of writers that lived in the town.

Anodyne Springs was a creative haven for writers, like one of those writing retreats where authors went for a week to get the inspiration flowing. The only difference being that Anodyne Springs was a permanent residence for them. That was part of the reason Eddie had decided to purchase real estate there. Most of the creative residents were horror novelists and purveyors of dark fiction, but there were others too. There had to be some invisible creative force that flowed through the town, especially with that many writers living there, being so close to one another. Maybe the thoughts flew around via osmosis from person to person, like water within a cell.

If ever there was a time when Eddie felt ashamed of the subject matter he’d chosen as a writer, it was while tooling around the town of Anodyne Springs. Eddie wrote generic vampire novels; while just two blocks from his own house lived Jeremiah Tolles, an author who was reinventing the horror fiction genre with stream-of-consciousness short fiction. Mark Walsh lived just across the street and was constantly publishing investigative journalism pieces in prestigious national magazines and winning multitudes of awards. Tiera Willis also lived in town and wrote some of the best romance novels that Eddie had ever read, and he hated romance novels.

Most of the residents in town had read, or at least skimmed through Eddie’s work. It was an unspoken courtesy in Anodyne Springs to do so. Eddie had made notes while reviewing the others’ work and felt that his own was the most pedestrian in the whole town.

Eddie worried about this as he entered The Underwood. What writer that he felt inferior to would he run into today? As of right now, the bar was empty except for the bartender. Eddie ordered a beer and sat at the bar while the portly bald man behind the counter struck up a conversation.

“How’s the book coming along?”

“Meh. Got a little case of writer’s block,” Eddie replied.

“Well, it’ll come to you. They all come here every now and then. Even the best. Although you’re not the first I’ve had this week.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I guess it’s been bad here lately. I’ve had a few complaining of writer’s block. I’m sure they wouldn’t appreciate me telling on them, but you’re not the only one.”
Eddie agreed. He wouldn’t want anyone in Anodyne Springs knowing about his creative drought. How hard is it to finish that thing, Palomar? You just have the good vampire win and get the girl, they’d laugh.

Light burst into the bar. Eddie squinted to see who it was. Long toned legs sprouted from underneath a dark mini skirt, tapering down to arched heeled feet. Feminine hands with soft pink fingernails removed a pair of sunglasses from a pretty face. It was Tiera Willis in all her blonde glory.

“Well, well, well. If it ain’t my little bloodsucking friend,” she said playfully.

“How’s it going Tiera?” Eddie said.

“Well, and yourself? How’s the latest installment? Oooh…isn’t this the big finale?” she asked as she sat on a stool beside him.

“It sucks,” he replied.

“Ha! Is that a pun? Are you getting clever on me?”

Eddie eyeballed her from the ankles up, made sure she noticed. “I’m gonna be getting something on you,” he said. He knew her well enough that this remark wouldn’t offend her.

She laughed but didn’t appear embarrassed. “Touché, Mr. Palomar. Why don’t you buy me a drink for that chauvinistic statement?”

Eddie acquiesced, ordered another beer and a vodka gimlet for the romance novelist. They continued their playful banter for a while. Eddie wanted to get to the meat though. He wanted to know if she was experiencing any writer’s block.

“Um, so how’s your writing going?” he asked between swallows of his beer.

“Oh, had enough flirting? You wanna talk shop now?”

“Yes.”

“It’s going…I’m trucking right along. Will be finished with this one by next week or so.”

“Hmm,” Eddie said.

He had been hoping that she was experiencing the same problem, and maybe they could work it out together. He looked up at her long blonde hair, her pale blue eyes, her lips. Maybe they still could work it out together. He always figured her as a tease, but she wrote her novels like a gal with experience. He didn’t know why he’d never made an approach before, but their interaction today certainly led him to believe that he could keep up with the little romance writer. They’d never had such a flirty interaction like this before. Maybe because Eddie had never encountered her alone. She’d always been with other writers when he’d talked to her and he’d never had her full attention. Today was different, and Eddie figured he just might have a chance

He took that chance.

“How about tomorrow night I take you out for a celebration?”
”Oh, a celebration, huh? And what exactly is it that we are celebrating?”

“We are celebrating the fact that by tomorrow night I will be done with the first chapter of the last vampire book that I am ever going to write.”

But the laptop’s keys remained untouched the whole night long and on into the next morning.

*~*~*

He awoke in the middle of the night—back stiff as a board, upright in bed. His heart rattled around in his chest like an activated alarm clock. He flicked the lights on and looked around the room, breathing heavily. What a nightmare that was, he thought. I’m still in my room and everything’s okay, just a dream. What was the dream though? The images of his nightmare began to evaporate. Quick, got to write that down! I can use it.

He jumped out of bed and searched frantically through his office for a piece of paper and a pencil. While disoriented and still half asleep, he began scrawling the remnants of his dream down onto a piece of paper, yet remained unaware of anything he wrote. He seemed as if he was still dreaming or perhaps he was possessed. His frantic scribbling slowed to a halt. He looked down at what he had written and collapsed at his desk, deep in slumber.

The next morning, he woke up with his head still resting on the desk, confused as to how he got there. He hadn’t drunk that much at the bar. He remembered going to sleep in his bed. He had a vague memory of writing something in the night. He looked down at the piece of paper on his desk. There were no words, just a drawing of a craggy oak tree with a thick trunk and gnarled leafless limbs.

*~*~*

“Gotta do this right. Gotta do it the old-fashioned way,” Eddie said to himself as he looked around the office. “I just need the right tools.”

He slammed the front door on his way out and rambled off to the grocery store, running halfway and spending the other half catching his breath. They had a small office supply section situated by the cleaning supplies. Here he picked up five bottles of ink, a calligraphy pen, and a pad of line-free paper. He bolted back to his house, eager to start.

*~*~*

He sat at his desk, holding his newly purchased pen gingerly. The drawing from his dream sat next to the pad of paper on the desk. He'd made gentle strokes with the pen like an artist with a brush, but all he had written was a title for the new book. "VAMPIRE VILLA: THE MILLENNIUM OAK" was etched on the paper pad in a flowing old English font. He pantomimed writing motions, tracing letters in the space above the paper. Still nothing would come. His eyes shifted over to the drawing of the tree. The dream—the nightmare, that was the key. There was something there and in his sleepy stupor last night, he had known this. He had tried to capture it and failed. He would have to dream again, and this time get the dream onto paper and recorded forever.

He looked at his watch to see how much time he had before bed. He was far from tired and it was only 6:00 in the evening. 6:00? Shit. He still had to get ready for his date with Tiera and meet her down at Rustler's Steak House at seven.

He launched himself from the desk, took a shower, shaved, and got dressed. He kept his appearance casual, but slightly dressy. He figured that this would help his chances.A little before 7, he drove down to Rustler's Steak House, the only restaurant in town and a damn good one at that. It wouldn’t be a fancy date—eating at Rustler’s was a rustic affair with aged wooden planks for floors and cowboy western stuff hanging on the walls. However, you’d be hard pressed to find a better cooked steak in these United States.

He was slightly early, so he took a table for two and waited for Tiera. Soon, she was through the front door marching up to the table as if she already knew exactly where he was. Eddie stared at her as she walked up. She was wearing tight jeans and a black top, radiating. Damn, he thought. She sure was something to look at.

“Oh, I need a drink. I was absolutely worthless today. I didn’t get a single fucking thing done. Not a word,” she said as she sat down.

“Well, I hope you like your drinks cold and in brown bottles, because that’s all they’ve got.”

“Anything with alcohol. I’ll take whatever. You know sometimes you just don’t have it. Sometimes the words just don’t come.”

Eddie grimaced as she said the last line. The conversation then moved on to other things from here and he was grateful. He didn’t want her to know that he hadn’t gotten anything accomplished, that they didn’t have any reason to celebrate. In fact, she may have forgotten that they were supposed to be celebrating and that this was just a simple date.

They ordered a pail full of ice with bottled beer in it and a couple of steaks. Unlike his protagonist, Tucker, Eddie liked his steaks well done, like shoe leather. Tiera had a go at him with this, told him that he was wasting a perfectly good cut of meat. She wasn’t shy in the food department either and ordered a rib eye, served a little bit rare. He got a little hot watching her eat it and wondered how she kept her figure. He knew the answer to that question as soon as it arose. He had seen her plenty of times jogging up Grant Street, wearing nothing but shorts and a sports bra. Cocktease indeed.

They finished up dinner and Eddie paid. It had been a pleasant enough night. All talks of writing had ceased after the initial greeting and they kept things light and playful like before. He walked her to her car, and she turned to him. He kissed her hard on the mouth, tasting the breath mints they had picked up from the cash register, moved his hand to the small of her back.

Eddie declined her offer of a nightcap back at her place. He had work to do and he knew what a drink with her would lead to. If he fell asleep at her place the dream might not come. He wanted to keep everything like before, a recreation of the same environment he was in when the nightmare came, and he needed his own bed.

She seemed disappointed, but he told her he’d take a rain check for tomorrow.

He went home and watched TV until he began to feel tired. He then carefully set a pad of paper and his pen and ink on the nightstand. He knew that what he was planning was practically impossible. How many awesome dreams had he awoken from to which he’d wanted to return? Too many to count and this wasn’t a dream. This was a nightmare, and these things reoccurred all the time. Didn’t they?

The sleep wouldn’t come and so the dreams didn’t come. Inevitably, the words didn’t come.

*~*~*

He spent the next day depressed and tired. He hadn’t slept all night long and this was now his longest running case of writer’s block. He caught a few half naps throughout the day, but he was never fully asleep. He sat on his porch and smoked cigarettes, a habit of which he’d been tapering off. Not today, he thought. He drank a couple of beers, skimmed through some of the earlier installments of his series, and watched the clock. The time dripped by slower than his thoughts. He was absolutely miserable. What the hell was he supposed to do now?

Evening crept up on him and the air turned twilight blue. The lights of the neighborhood began to flicker on. Another day and nothing, he thought. He would have punched his fist through a wall had he not felt so utterly defeated.

There was an urgent knock on his door. He answered and was greeted by a heavenly vision. Tiera Willis stood there in a long coat, clutching the fabric across the front of her body. She had done something special with her hair and makeup, and while he was no expert on such matters, he could tell she was made up differently than normal. Her face looked even more striking and bold than it had at dinner the night before. With her lips big and soft, different shades of makeup drew out the color of her eyes. Her hair shimmered in the porch light.

“I,” she announced, “need some inspiration.”

She stepped into the doorway and he scooted back. He felt himself getting aroused. She cast the coat aside and let it fall to the ground to reveal she was wearing nothing but lingerie underneath. It was black and lacy and sexy and who was he kidding trying to resist any longer?

*~*~*

It was the best sex of his life. She didn’t write the passionate love scenes in her romance novels, she merely copied down the events from her own life onto the page. She must have. This was even better.

They moved together quick and hard and everything flowed together and when they finished, he could do nothing but fall onto the bed, exhausted. Sleep at last, perchance to dream.

*~*~*

The first thing that reached his awareness was a dull, mechanical humming. He only saw blackness, but he could hear the humming perfectly. The blackness soon brightened, light hit his eyes, and a scene came into view. Sitting on the top of a hill was the thick black oak tree with the jagged naked limbs from his drawing. It was juxtaposed against a sick looking sky, illuminated by the rays of a sunset. Clouds filled the air like tufts of pastel pink insulation. They seemed to pulse rhythmically and that’s when Eddie noticed the sound. What sounded like a metronome in a bag of Jell-O joined the ubiquitous mechanical humming. It was loud, like a big squishy heartbeat in Eddie’s ears. His own pulse was out of control, but the rhythmic beating continued slowly and steadily.

There was no free will in this dream—he couldn’t look behind him, couldn’t turn and run. Eddie was only along for the ride as he felt himself walk up the hill towards the oak tree. The oak was all that there was. He inched closer and closer and then kneeled before the tree.

At the juncture of the tree trunk and where the branches divided, there was a spot. The tree’s black bark was peeling back and graying at the edges, revealing the green of the unexposed tree underneath. In the meat of the new tree there was a slit that looked like a wound. A viscous, sap-like substance the color of lava oozed out and ran down the side of the tree.

Eddie reached out and touched the wound. It was warm and wet, the texture of the tree felt like skin. He stuck his fingers into the hole. It felt more like something one would find on an animal or human than a plant, an orifice of some kind. The insides of the hole were smooth and shiny like a wet Zip-Loc bag. He dug his fingers deeper into the hole until his whole hand was swallowed. Then he stuck his other hand in and began to peel the slit apart. The wound stretched and grew until it was an opening maw, big enough for a person to crawl through. Strings of the orange sap stretched between both sides of the opening.

The hole didn’t extend to the other side of the tree as one might expect. It opened up into someplace entirely different. Eddie peered into the vastness the opening revealed, his eyes wide and his heart catching in his throat.

*~*~*

He awoke just as he had the other night: upright in bed, heart pounding violently, disoriented. This time, however, he was prepared. He snatched up the pen and pad of paper. Ink was flung all over the bed as he clumsily opened the bottle and dipped the pen in. He began to write, not knowing exactly what he was writing, possessed like he’d been before. The words were no more than a smeared scrawl, but they were legible, the dream stuff being recorded to the page. He continued his frenzy of writing until there was no more left to write.

Eddie didn’t read over what he’d written. He simply left the pad at the foot of the bed. He collapsed into sleep once again, the nightmare recorded onto the pages and out of his head for the moment.

*~*~*

There was a crash at the kitchen table, the breaking of glass. The sunlight sifted through the blinds and Eddie rolled over groggily, tangled up in the sheets. Tiera was not at his side. She must have gotten up and made some coffee, possibly dropping a mug in the process. Eddie managed to get out of bed and make his way into the kitchen. He felt he could use a cup of coffee himself. That would wake him up. He also wanted to see Tiera and see what she had to say, maybe some validation about the night before.

He staggered down the hall into the kitchen. The first thing that he saw was his pad of paper open and sitting on the kitchen table. The black inky letters looked menacing.

Sonuvabitch! The dream transcription, he thought. He vaguely remembered writing it but couldn’t remember at all what had gotten scribbled. Had she read it? How embarrassing. No telling what I wrote in the wee hours of the night. His eyes moved down the floor and traced up the pair of crooked legs that connected to Tiera Willis. The pale legs were bent at an odd angle over the seat of the overturned chair. There was a spilled cup of coffee at her side. Her head was facing the wall with her face flat on the hardwood floor, an inch or so of tongue resting out of the corner of her mouth. The veins in her forehead were showing, slightly bulged. Her eyelids were halfway open, revealing only the whites.

Eddie rushed over to her side, yelled her name. She didn’t move. He felt her neck for a pulse, not really knowing what he was doing. Her skin was cold—freezing actually—like she’d been in a freezer. He gave her a little shake, repeated her name.

“Oh God,” he said, standing up.

He had to call someone.A fucking ambulance might be a good start.

He started towards the phone, but his eyes caught the pad of paper that sat on the kitchen table. What was in it? What had happened to Tiera? Had she started to read any of it before she collapsed? How far did she get? Eddie reached out for the paper, held it up to his face, and began to read.

*~*~*

It had been three days since anyone had seen them. They were last seen at Rustler’s Steak House, enjoying a nice steak dinner together. Normally, there would be no assumption of foul play, but things had been different around Anodyne Springs lately. Now there was a report of two authors missing and with the neighbors reporting a smell emanating from the Palomar residence.

Detective Elliot Jordan drove down Grant Street towards Edward Palomar’s house. He cursed himself for having the misfortune of being handed this job from the Chief. He had never been a fan of driving out to the bohemian haven of Anodyne Springs. The town gave him the creeps, all of those horror writers buzzing around. Who knew what freaky shit they were up to behind closed doors?

He pulled into the driveway of the Palomar residence, parking behind a gray sedan. He walked up the porch, knocked on the door and rang the doorbell for good measure. There was no answer. He knocked harder, called out Mr. Palomar’s name.

He tried the doorknob. It was open. As he stepped inside, his nostrils were assaulted by the rank smell of death. It was going to be bad. His stomach turned and he felt lead in his guts. He readied his firearm—just in case. He crept through the living room and saw nothing. The smell grew stronger the further he got into the house. The silence that filled the air may have made him feel worse. He made his cautious trek into what looked like a dining room that opened up into the kitchen. He saw a body lying on an overturned chair.

It was obviously Tiera Willis, one of the missing persons. She was wearing a man’s T-shirt and it was clear that she was wearing nothing underneath, the fabric pooling around her midsection as her body lying twisted on the floor. Her skin was a pallid blue and void of any other color. Her jaw was agape, and her blank eyes stared at the wall. Areas of her face were turning dark and gray. He was thankful that the past few days hadn’t been too hot.

He continued to search the house and walked down the bedroom hall. The bedroom revealed nothing except an unmade bed and a lacy black bra on the floor. There was still one room left in the house to check.

He found Edward Palomar with his forehead resting on the oak desk in his office. There were black markings like tattoos all over his arms and face. Scratches too. Smudges of what looked like oil and dried blood were smeared all over his skin.

The lines of the ink tattoos that had been carved into Palomar’s skin formed bizarre characters and letters. If they were from a language, it was one he had never seen.

What did it all mean?

A spilt bottle of ink was on the desk, wet ink all over the place. The ink was in Edward’s hair, down his unshaven cheek, and a lot had dripped on the floor. There was something embedded into Palomar’s right eye, a shaft of some sort that stuck out only a couple of inches. Leaning closer to investigate he found out what it was, a pen. It was dark dried blood, not ink, that stained most of Edward’s face.

Something was sitting in Palomar’s lap.

A pad of paper? Suicide note, perhaps? Who kills themselves with an ink pen to the eye?

He bent down, careful not to touch anything and examined it. He reached into his pocket and grabbed a handkerchief and used it as a buffer to carefully excise the pad of paper from his lap. Something clattered to the floor as he grabbed it. He jumped and looked down. Another bottle of ink. Empty.

The pad felt heavy and wet as he set it in on the desk, like it had been soaking in something. He opened the cover and saw what it was. The pages were all stuck together with a sticky substance, covered in a shiny black. More ink. He tried to pry the pages apart with a paperclip, but they were smudged and soaked as well. Nothing was legible in the entire pad. He would not be able to read what Edward Palomar had written.

End.

Artist: Martin Blanco (http://www.martinblancoart.com/)

COSMIC-HORROR.NET/SUBSCRIBE

Berlin Bargain

By: Lee Emmons

In his dreams, Hans was twenty-two again. It was dark in the streets. He huddled behind a burned-out car in the ruins of Berlin. The Russians had advanced to a position only a few meters away. He could hear the screams of the Hitler Youth defenders as they lay dying and wounded nearby. Fires raged among the still-standing buildings, casting distorted, monstrous shadows among the rubble.

Hans had removed all SS medals and insignia from his uniform. He knew that men with his background were shot on sight by the Russians. Wiping the grime from his face, he contemplated the end of his life. Surrender was unthinkable. He would rather die than submit to Soviet captivity. Pulling out his pistol, he placed it firmly against his temple.

Against all hope, Hans had believed the tide of the war would again turn in the Fuhrer's favor. But now, surrounded by the hated enemy, the reality of the war had come crashing down. There would be no miracle weapons, no division of the Allies, only more death and misery. Hans had killed many people; in that he took some small drop of solace.

As he was about to pull the trigger, a soft voice called out to him in German. "Don't do that, Lieutenant." The voice belonged to a tall, emaciated figure in civilian clothing. Dark, hypnotic eyes bore into him. Rotting, yellowed teeth were visible in a ghoulish mouth.

Hans pointed the pistol at the man. Only a lunatic would appear out in the open amid house to house fighting. "The Russians are right over there. Quiet down or die here with me."

The man chuckled. "The Russians are everywhere! I have no interest in dying today. If you come with me, you may live as well."

He beckoned Hans with a long, bony finger. The German soldier got up as if drawn by an invisible force. The man led him down a debris-strewn side street between two collapsed buildings. Bracing for a hail of gunfire from the Russians, Hans walked unmolested into the shadows.

The strange man stopped and looked Hans over. After a moment of deliberation, he suddenly snapped his fingers. "They will see you again now. You must move quickly."

Hans ducked down as a Soviet shell crashed nearby. The ground shook as if stomped by a prehistoric beast. "Who are you? What do you want?" He had to yell over the din.

"You can think of me as the friend you desperately need. I want nothing now, but we'll meet again." Flashing a grin that chilled Hans' heart, the man handed over a small felt bag.

Hans took the bag with trembling hands. Inside, he could see dozens of diamonds and colored gems. Looking back up where the man had stood, Hans saw nothing but the empty alley. He was alone.

Getting up, Hans slowly navigated his way to the relative safety of a cratered apartment building. From there, he worked his way back to the edge of the fighting. The boundary of the Third Reich was four teenage defenders holding anti-tank weapons. He called out to them in German. Seeing a lieutenant, they smartly saluted.

Hans ignored their pleading looks and kept walking. Staying in the shadows, he moved away from any human, German or otherwise. The encounter with the strange man had given him hope that he may yet survive the war. He didn't get far. An SS detachment, looking for deserters to kill, had set up a position two buildings down.

As Hans watched, they shot two men and began stringing their bodies from the nearest lamp post. He hid in the ruins of what had once been a dressmaker's shop, taking refuge between two wooden racks.

*~*~*

The dream ended there as the old man woke, gasping for air. He wiped the sweat from his clammy skin. Outside, it began to thunder. Looking out the rain-hammered bedroom window, he could see a flicker of lightning in the distance. Standing on ancient legs, he tried to maneuver his way across the hall to the bathroom. At ninety-seven, it was getting hard to move at all.

After completing his business, the man formerly known as Hans climbed back into his bed. His body ached from the effort. Another flash of lightning illuminated the dark corners of the room. He was not alone. A figure emerged from the gloom.

The voice cut across three-quarters of a century. "Good evening, Hans. Or should I call you Peter? It's a pleasure to see you after all this time."

The old man felt an unfamiliar panic rising in his throat. "How are you here?" He stammered the words.

Stepping forward, the strange man leered at him. "You always knew I'd come calling. I helped you escape Berlin, now it's time to pay the debt."

Losing control of his bladder, the ancient man began trembling. "What do you want?" His voice was barely a whisper.

The skeletal man let out a mirthless laugh. "You're almost dead. I want nothing from you now. But I will take something." Clutching a photograph of Hans' twenty-year-old grandson, the visitor laughed maniacally.

The old man screamed. The sins of the past had finally come home.

End.

Berlin Bargain by Luke Spooner/ Carrion House

Cthulhu's Codex

Cthulhu's Codex

Abandon all hope who enter here...

For assistance in translating this ancient scroll, all you need is to go back to the beginning, six numbers there for winning. Then find something between cap and control, a man named Blaise might know.

*~*~*

The Song of the Monster: The Dream

By: Alexis M Davis

Gases of Delphi drift through my unconsciousness.

Through my skull they work their black magic,

Tilting my perception.

My head falls through sleepy soot past the realms of the awake.

I enter Apollo’s realm. Or is it Hypnos?

Is this Cassandra’s foresight, or a sleepy lie?

She was there, my lover, my dove.

Graceful steps she takes, among lake pebbles,

Moonlit and streaming the length of my mind.

The water parts for her, curls high above our heads,

Like Moses’ biblical sea.

Was she, is she, a religion?

Her hair forms familiar messy halos, drifting in moonmilk white,

Shining like pearls do, glimmering at the bottom of a tumultuous water.

She hits me full force. She was running.

No, swimming. The water falls around us and we are swimming,

We are lovers, swallowed whole.

Is this power hers, or mine?

Now we are merpeople, mermaids, tangled seaweeds.

Fins for our legs and scales refracting rainbow hearts along the seabed.

She sings a siren song, the death march of men.

I am immune to its power, but I draw closer still.

Siren or no, I swim after her.

I follow her into the depths of the sea of my secrets.

One Mind

By: Emil Pellim

The boy and girl entered the supermarket, passing signs that advertised the student discount valid every Tuesday, which had brought them there tonight. They had spent the entire day working on a thermodynamics problem set. The mundanity of their weekly grocery shopping was a needed break. At least for Millie.

“So, if molecular oxygen at forty degrees Kelvin is compressed adiabatically—”

“Shut up, Ian.”

Millie was tired. She wanted to get her Pop Tarts, Mr. Noodles and Sugar Crisp, and get out of there. She stuffed her basket quickly and carried it to the line in front of the register, comprised almost entirely of university students. Ian followed behind with slightly healthier choices in his basket. Still processed and instant though.

The line shrank fast. Most of the students didn’t have much money to spend. A girl near the front was forced to decide between a pack of smokes and a prepackaged salad. She settled on the cigarettes; they killed appetite anyway. The cashier scanned the items of an older man, just ahead of Millie in the queue.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Pause.

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

The scanner was uncharacteristically rhythmic, hypnotizing, like a composed song. Millie raised her head and looked at the cashier. He scanned eight cans of peach compote. Then eight cans of black beans. Eight tubs of yoghurt. Millie was getting impatient. Eight potatoes. Eight Cubanelle peppers. Eight freshly baked buns of rye bread. Eight small lemons. He carefully packed the ingredients in the canvas bags that the older man handed him.

“Looks like he’s making lemon-eight.”

“Shut up, Ian.”

As the man slowly wobbled toward the exit under the weight of the bags, Millie approached the register and paid for her items. She waited for Ian to do the same. They walked out of the store and paused outside in temporary silence. Ian stared at the ground.

“Would you like me to walk you home, Millie? It’s late. I don’t mind, really.”

“That’s all right, Ian. I can walk myself home. Have a good night."

Ian mimicked a smile and said goodnight. He walked off in the same direction as the old man and wobbled like a penguin behind him to match his gait. He turned around to see if Millie was watching, and she was. Watching, and laughing. Ian smiled a real smile and headed home with a happy heart.

*~*~*

Millie placed her problem set on top of the messy pile of paper that had formed on the professor's desk. She was last to do so, waiting to see if Ian would finally come. It was unlike him to miss a class. Even more so to not hand in graded work. She hoped everything was all right.

It took a second day of missed classes for Millie's worries to grow to dread. She contacted Ian's roommates, none had seen him over the past two days. She had no number to reach his parents back home. The police report she filed was in turn filed under runaway teens. 'Sure. He wouldn't do that.’ As if they hadn't heard that before, from addicts and the abused, from single mothers and prom kings, and yes, even physics students.

*~*~*

Another Tuesday night, another food run. Millie walked through the supermarket, tracing a path among the aisles identical to the one Ian and she had taken the last night she had seen him. It made her feel like she hadn't given up on him.

She brought her basket of variously shaped sugars to the register. There was only one customer ahead of her, a woman with a large cart full of groceries. Millie waited, deep in thought. The thought—beep—of Ian, and where he—beep—might be—beep—now. Beep—whether she—beep—would—beep—see him—beep—again. She—beep—hoped she—beep—would.

The last beep shook her out of her thoughts of Ian. Some subconscious process, probably a relic meant to count approaching predators, had counted the sounds from the register. Nine beeps. Pause. Nine beeps. Pause. Nine. Nine. Nine.

Millie stealthily looked at the mound of bags that was filling up on the counter. Peach compote cans. Potatoes. Tubs of yoghurt. And finally, nine lemons. The woman smiled politely at the clerk, picked up her bags, and walked out of the store.

“Are you going to move or not?”

The clerk was annoyed with Millie, who had followed the woman with her eyes instead of approaching the register. Upon hearing his voice, she took a step forward, hesitated, threw her basket on the counter and walked out without buying her midnight fuel.

The parking lot in front of the store was already dark. Millie looked around, hoping to find the woman with the bags full of nine. She only saw several cars sitting empty and silent, their owners probably perusing the aisles inside. One of the cars suddenly filled with life and light, attracting Millie’s attention.

Instead of the woman, the driver seat was occupied by an unfamiliar man. Millie sighed; she thought the woman was gone. But then the car passed her by as it exited the parking lot, creating a gust of wind that made her coat dance, and signaled a right turn. Its headlights illuminated the houses on the opposite side of the road with a spot of light that moved like a projector as the car turned. For a split second, a large shadow appeared in the spotlight. Tall, with many bulbous growths at the bottom. A woman carrying overfilled bags.

The car drove off, and darkness returned to the street.

Millie followed the woman from afar, walking slowly, letting the rustles of bags guide her in the near-complete darkness until her eyes adjusted. The woman moved in the same direction as Ian’s place, the same direction the old man with the funny walk was headed last week. She entered a one-story house barely five doors before Ian’s. Millie saw a small square sign above the door. It was not professionally made. In the darkness, she struggled to make out what was written on it.

One Mind

All can,
and should,
join.

She walked up to the window near the entrance and tried to investigate the innards of the house, careful not to be detected. She saw an open kitchen door in the distance. The woman was in there. She occasionally disappeared out of view, reappeared with groceries in her hands, and brought them over to the other side of the room where she disappeared out of view again. It looked like she was putting the purchased food in the refrigerator.

When finished, she turned off the light, exited the kitchen, and retreated down a hallway leading to the back of the house. She paused suddenly, and spoke without turning, her voice carrying through the front door and reaching Millie.

“You can come in if you’d like.”

Millie ran.

*~*~*

The alarm woke her early. She had class at ten, so she wanted to be back by nine thirty at the latest. Not that she cared about missing any material— it just made her feel safer to make plans for after. Following a late and pensive night, Millie had decided to return to the house.

She left her apartment at dawn. The house was only a twenty-minute walk from where she lived, but she took twice as long to get there, constantly doubting if she should go on. She arrived while the sun was still low over the horizon. The larger, taller homes in the neighborhood were already bathing in morning light, but this tiny one-story house was left in the shadows yet.

Millie looked through the front window again. The hallways were tranquil, dark. Before knocking, she decided to examine the outside, to see if the other windows revealed anything. She walked to the back, passing a sunroom full of books but empty of people. Near the rear of the structure, she noticed a slightly open window, an entry point for the fresh autumn air to seep into the house. She figured it was a bedroom, and approached it expecting to see the woman.

The glass reflected the trees from the backyard, creating a green curtain which made it difficult to see what was inside. Millie could only peek through the very thin opening of the window, restricting her to examining the room bit by bit. She swayed left and right, checking every corner, and saw no furniture anywhere. About to give up, she noticed something near the floor. She stood on her toes and looked straight down. A very old lady, with graying hair and prune-like skin, lay on a large mat. Her wide-open eyes stared at the ceiling.

Millie ducked instinctively, afraid of being seen. She heard no changes in the room, so she braved a second look. The grandmother still looked like a corpse engaged in a staring contest with paint. Millie turned her attention to the rest of the floor. Just a foot away from the old lady was the woman from the grocery store. Her unmoving body implied sleep, but her open eyelids contradicted it.

Another foot away, a girl no older than Millie had assumed the same position, her doe eyes fixated on nothing. Then the wobbling man, two other males, and two females, all laying parallel with each other, agaze. Millie’s eyes traveled past them and reached the corner, where a ninth body lay. Ian.

Surprise and relief were cut short. The sun had finally climbed high enough to send direct rays into the room. As the first of them hit the bodies, one of the unfamiliar men rose mechanically and walked out the room, leaving a gap in the set of parallel humans. Millie ran to the front of the house, wanting a clean escape path to the street. No one was following her; no one exited the house.

She looked through the front window again. The man had gone into the kitchen. She watched him preparing food from the groceries bought the previous night. He arranged nine platters, identical in ingredients, with varying portion sizes. He carried them out one by one and set them on a dining table in an alcove near the kitchen.

At the exact moment the final plate was placed, the eight others entered the room, as if they had rigorously practiced the timing. Ian appeared focused yet peaceful. All of them did. They sat and began to eat from their plates in silence, chewing slowly. It was like an awkward family dinner, only lacking in dejection. Fear missing from Ian’s face made Millie’s own fear dissipate. She could no longer stand to play the role of voyeur and grabbed the handle of the front door. It opened easily.

Millie ran toward Ian and hugged him, both out of happiness to see him and to try to drag him out. He hugged her back with one arm, but resisted her attempt to remove him, continuing to take bites out of his food with his free hand. The others paid no mind to her for now.

“Ian! Are you all right? What’s happening, why are you here?”

“Sorry Millie, it was not our intention to worry you.”

He finished off a small glob of yoghurt in the centre of the plate.

“Our?”

“I guess I mean my intention. No, actually, I do mean our.”

He threw a peach slice into his mouth. His poise annoyed her. How can he go missing for days and be so nonchalant about it?

“I have no idea what you’re saying! Are you on drugs? I saw you in the bedroom, why were you just staring?”

The seated people finished most of their food. Only slices of lemon remained on each plate.

“We were in stasis, resting. Unconsciousness severs the connection, it would be catastrophic, too much to handle. Sleep is no longer allowed. We have to recharge in our own way, together, conscious and connected.”

“Wow, Ian, you are on drugs, aren’t you?”

Ian and the rest of the group picked up the lemon pieces one by one, sucking them dry. Their faces grimaced as the sour juices enveloped their tongues, but they kept eating. When finished, they rose from the table, and eight of them headed toward the sunroom while the man who had prepared breakfast stayed behind to clean up. Not knowing what to do, Millie followed Ian.

The group of eight, soon to be joined by their ninth companion, grabbed a different book each from the stacks in the sunroom. Quantum Mechanics. Modern Medicine. Ancient World History. They sat on the floor, soaking up the light, and reading. Millie watched them for a few minutes. The only sound was that of pages turning. She positioned herself in front of Ian, and tried to close his book, but Ian prevented it with his steady grip.

“We need to learn, Millie. Everything. And we are already filling up to capacity. We hope for more shared storage soon.”

Ian knocked on Millie’s head with his knuckle.

“Please, Ian, can we leave? I just want to speak to you in private.”

All heads in the room turned toward her.

“You are not getting it, are you Millie? There is no more private.”

The volume of these words startled her. They were not solely Ian’s.

“One mind. All can, and should, join.”

This time, Millie noticed that every single person in the group spoke in unison. Perfect timing, perfect sync.

“Ian, I’m scared. Did you guys rehearse this? Stop it!”

All voices rose again.

“Category, please.”

The girl seemed confused. The choir clarified.

“Name a category of objects.”

Millie hesitated, not sure she understood.

“...vegetables?”

The nine began, simultaneously.

“Endive, sorrel, asparagus, leek, sea grape, yam…”

Not a single misstep among them, not a single sound lagging behind the bulk.

“...taro, jicama, carrot, radicchio. Unrehearsed enough for you, Millie?”

The girl was overwhelmed. Her brain could not process what was happening. She needed to get out of the house that very instant, and she was taking Ian with her, whether he liked it or not. She reached out to one of the piles of books, and picked the biggest of the bunch, a German-English dictionary. She raised it above her head using both hands, and delivered a heavy blow to Ian’s head. He fell to the ground, unconscious.

Millie tried to grab him by the hand and drag him out. All others let out a painful scream. They jumped off the floor and rushed toward Ian and Millie. She thought they were going to hurt her. Instead, the more powerful of them held Ian’s arms behind his back. The older and weaker ones started ransacking the room, looking for something.

They spoke together again, this time with panic, pleading.

“Please help us, look for something we can restrain him with.”

Too late. Ian’s consciousness returned. To his own body only. He started to wail in intense pain, as loud as his voice box was capable of. Short phrases were buried among animalistic sounds.

“Two eyes only. Two ears.”

He thrashed on the ground as if having a seizure.

“Oh God, the void.”

The adrenaline from his state of shock helped him overpower all the clearly able-bodied men and women.

“Loneliness. Please. Stop.”

He shook loose from the remaining grips and ran toward the kitchen. The others followed behind, but they could not match his speed.

Ian grabbed one of the breakfast plates which were drying in the dish rack. He smashed it into the kitchen counter, breaking it into pieces, the largest of which remained in his hand. He touched the jagged piece to his neck. Millie cried for his attention as she ran toward him. He pressed the broken porcelain into his jugular and jerked it sideways in a controlled motion. A red waterfall dripped from his neck and drained all the suffering and loneliness from inside before the other eight could reconnect him.

End.

The Horla

By: Guy de Maupassant

Originally Published in 1887 1907

May 8.

What a lovely day! I have spent all the morning lying on the grass in front of my house, under the enormous plantain tree which covers and shades and shelters the whole of it. I like this part of the country; I am fond of living here because I am attached to it by deep roots, the profound and delicate roots which attach a man to the soil on which his ancestors were born and died, to their traditions, their usages, their food, the local expressions, the peculiar language of the peasants, the smell of the soil, the hamlets, and to the atmosphere itself.

I love the house in which I grew up. From my windows I can see the Seine, which flows by the side of my garden, on the other side of the road, almost through my grounds, the great and wide Seine, which goes to Rouen and Havre, and which is covered with boats passing to and fro.

On the left, down yonder, lies Rouen, populous Rouen with its blue roofs massing under pointed, Gothic towers. Innumerable are they, delicate or broad, dominated by the spire of the cathedral, full of bells which sound through the blue air on fine mornings, sending their sweet and distant iron clang to me, their metallic sounds, now stronger and now weaker, according as the wind is strong or light.

What a delicious morning it was! About eleven o'clock, a long line of boats drawn by a steam-tug, as big a fly, and which scarcely puffed while emitting its thick smoke, passed my gate.

After two English schooners, whose red flags fluttered toward the sky, there came a magnificent Brazilian three-master; it was perfectly white and wonderfully clean and shining. I saluted it, I hardly know why, except that the sight of the vessel gave me great pleasure.

May 12.

I have had a slight feverish attack for the last few days, and I feel ill, or rather I feel low-spirited.

Whence come those mysterious influences which change our happiness into discouragement, and our self-confidence into diffidence? One might almost say that the air, the invisible air, is full of unknowable Forces, whose mysterious presence we have to endure. I wake up in the best of spirits, with an inclination to sing in my heart. Why? I go down by the side of the water, and suddenly, after walking a short distance, I return home wretched, as if some misfortune were awaiting me there. Why? Is it a cold shiver which, passing over my skin, has upset my nerves and given me a fit of low spirits? Is it the form of the clouds, or the tints of the sky, or the colors of the surrounding objects which are so change-able, which have troubled my thoughts as they passed before my eyes? Who can tell? Everything that surrounds us, everything that we see without looking at it, everything that we touch without knowing it, everything that we handle without feeling it, everything that we meet without clearly distinguishing it, has a rapid, surprising, and inexplicable effect upon us and upon our organs, and through them on our ideas and on our being itself.

How profound that mystery of the Invisible is! We cannot fathom it with our miserable senses: our eyes are unable to perceive what is either too small or too great, too near to or too far from us; we can see neither the inhabitants of a star nor of a drop of water; our ears deceive us, for they transmit to us the vibrations of the air in sonorous notes. Our senses are fairies who work the miracle of changing that movement into noise, and by that metamorphosis give birth to music, which makes the mute agitation of nature a harmony. So with our sense of smell, which is weaker than that of a dog, and so with our sense of taste, which can scarcely distinguish the age of a wine!

Oh! If we only had other organs which could work other miracles in our favor, what a number of fresh things we might discover around us!

May 16.

I am ill, decidedly! I was so well last month! I am feverish, horribly feverish, or rather I am in a state of feverish enervation, which makes my mind suffer as much as my body. I have without ceasing the horrible sensation of some danger threatening me, the apprehension of some coming misfortune or of approaching death, a presentiment which is no doubt, an attack of some illness still unnamed, which germinates in the flesh and in the blood.

May 18.

I have just come from consulting my medical man, for I can no longer get any sleep. He found that my pulse was high, my eyes dilated, my nerves highly strung, but no alarming symptoms. I must have a course of shower baths and of bromide of potassium.

May 25.

No change! My state is really very peculiar. As the evening comes on, an incomprehensible feeling of disquietude seizes me, just as if night concealed some terrible menace toward me. I dine quickly, and then try to read, but I do not understand the words, and can scarcely distinguish the letters. Then I walk up and down my drawing-room, oppressed by a feeling of confused and irresistible fear, a fear of sleep and a fear of my bed.

About ten o'clock I go up to my room. As soon as I have entered I lock and bolt the door. I am frightened - of what? Up till the present time I have been frightened of nothing. I open my cupboards, and look under my bed; I listen - I listen - to what? How strange it is that a simple feeling of discomfort, of impeded or heightened circulation, perhaps the irritation of a nervous center, a slight congestion, a small disturbance in the imperfect and delicate functions of our living machinery, can turn the most light-hearted of men into a melancholy one, and make a coward of the bravest? Then, I go to bed, and I wait for sleep as a man might wait for the executioner. I wait for its coming with dread, and my heart beats and my legs tremble, while my whole body shivers beneath the warmth of the bedclothes, until the moment when I suddenly fall asleep, as a man throws himself into a pool of stagnant water in order to drown. I do not feel this perfidious sleep coming over me as I used to, but a sleep which is close to me and watching me, which is going to seize me by the head, to close my eyes and annihilate me.

I sleep - a long time - two or three hours perhaps - then a dream - no - a nightmare lays hold on me. I feel that I am in bed and asleep - I feel it and I know it - and I feel also that somebody is coming close to me, is looking at me, touching me, is getting on to my bed, is kneeling on my chest, is taking my neck between his hands and squeezing it - squeezing it with all his might in order to strangle me.

I struggle, bound by that terrible powerlessness which paralyzes us in our dreams; I try to cry out - but I cannot; I want to move - I cannot; I try, with the most violent efforts and out of breath, to turn over and throw off this being which is crushing and suffocating me - I cannot!

And then suddenly I wake up, shaken and bathed in perspiration; I light a candle and find that I am alone, and after that crisis, which occurs every night, I at length fall asleep and slumber tranquilly till morning.

June 2.

My state has grown worse. What is the matter with me? The bromide does me no good, and the shower-baths have no effect whatever. Sometimes, in order to tire myself out, though I am fatigued enough already, I go for a walk in the forest of Roumare. I used to think at first that the fresh light and soft air, impregnated with the odor of herbs and leaves, would instill new life into my veins and impart fresh energy to my heart. One day I turned into a broad ride in the wood, and then I diverged toward La Bouille, through a narrow path, between two rows of exceedingly tall trees, which placed a thick, green, almost black roof between the sky and me.

A sudden shiver ran through me, not a cold shiver, but a shiver of agony, and so I hastened my steps, uneasy at being alone in the wood, frightened stupidly and without reason, at the profound solitude. Suddenly it seemed as if I were being followed, that somebody was walking at my heels, close, quite close to me, near enough to touch me.

I turned round suddenly, but I was alone. I saw nothing behind me except the straight, broad ride, empty and bordered by high trees, horribly empty; on the other side also it extended until it was lost in the distance, and looked just the same - terrible.

I closed my eyes. Why? And then I began to turn round on one heel very quickly, just like a top. I nearly fell down, and opened my eyes; the trees were dancing round me and the earth heaved; I was obliged to sit down. Then, ah! I no longer remembered how I had come! What a strange idea! What a strange, strange idea! I did not the least know. I started off to the right, and got back into the avenue which had led me into the middle of the forest.

June 3.

I have had a terrible night. I shall go away for a few weeks, for no doubt a journey will set me up again.

July 2.

I have come back, quite cured, and have had a most delightful trip into the bargain. I have been to Mont Saint-Michel, which I had not seen before.

What a sight, when one arrives as I did, at Avranches toward the end of the day! The town stands on a hill, and I was taken into the public garden at the extremity of the town. I uttered a cry of astonishment. An extraordinarily large bay lay extended before me, as far as my eyes could reach, between two hills which were lost to sight in the mist; and in the middle of this immense yellow bay, under a clear, golden sky, a peculiar hill rose up, somber and pointed in the midst of the sand. The sun had just disappeared, and under the still flaming sky stood out the outline of that fantastic rock which bears on its summit a picturesque monument.

At daybreak I went to it. The tide was low, as it had been the night before, and I saw that wonderful abbey rise up before me as I approached it. After several hours' walking, I reached the enormous mass of rock which supports the little town, dominated by the great church. Having climbed the steep and narrow street, I entered the most wonderful Gothic building that has ever been erected to God on earth, large as a town, and full of low rooms which seem buried beneath vaulted roofs, and of lofty galleries supported by delicate columns.

I entered this gigantic granite jewel, which is as light in its effect as a bit of lace and is covered with towers, with slender belfries to which spiral staircases ascend. The flying buttresses raise strange heads that bristle with chimeras. with devils, with fantastic ani-mals, with monstrous flowers, are joined together by finely carved arches, to the blue sky by day, and to the black sky by night.

When I had reached the summit. I said to the monk who accompanied me: "Father, how happy you must be here!" And he replied: "It is very windy, Monsieur"; and so we began to talk while watching the rising tide, which ran over the sand and covered it with a steel cuirass.

And then the monk told me stories, all the old stories belonging to the place - legends, nothing but legends.

One of them struck me forcibly. The country people, those belonging to the Mornet, declare that at night one can hear talking going on in the sand, and also that two goats bleat, one with a strong, the other with a weak voice. Incredulous people declare that it is nothing but the screaming of the sea birds, which occasionally resembles bleatings, and occasionally human lamentations; but belated fishermen swear that they have met an old shepherd, whose cloak covered head they can never see, wandering on the sand, between two tides, round the little town placed so far out of the world. They declare he is guiding and walking before a he-goat with a man's face and a she-goat with a woman's face, both with white hair, who talk incessantly, quarreling in a strange language, and then suddenly cease talking in order to bleat with all their might.

"Do you believe it?" I asked the monk. "I scarcely know," he replied; and I continued: "If there are other beings besides ourselves on this earth, how comes it that we have not known it for so long a time, or why have you not seen them? How is it that I have not seen them?"

He replied: "Do we see the hundred-thousandth part of what exists? Look here; there is the wind, which is the strongest force in nature. It knocks down men, and blows down buildings, uproots trees, raises the sea into mountains of water, destroys cliffs and casts great ships on to the breakers; it kills, it whistles, it sighs, it roars. But have you ever seen it, and can you see it? Yet it exists for all that."

I was silent before this simple reasoning. That man was a philosopher, or perhaps a fool; I could not say which exactly, so I held my tongue. What he had said had often been in my own thoughts.

July 3.

I have slept badly; certainly there is some feverish influence here, for my coachman is suffering in the same way as I am. When I went back home yesterday, I noticed his singular paleness, and I asked him: "What is the matter with you, Jean?"

"The matter is that I never get any rest, and my nights devour my days. Since your departure, Monsieur, there has been a spell over me."

However, the other servants are all well, but I am very frightened of having another attack, myself.

July 4.

I am decidedly taken again; for my old nightmares have returned. Last night I felt somebody leaning on me who was sucking my life from between my lips with his mouth. Yes, he was sucking it out of my neck like a leech would have done. Then he got up, satiated, and I woke up, so beaten, crushed, and annihilated that I could not move. If this continues for a few days, I shall certainly go away again.

July 5.

Have I lost my reason? What has happened? What I saw last night is so strange that my head wanders when I think of it!

As I do now every evening, I had locked my door; then, being thirsty, I drank half a glass of water, and I accidentally noticed that the water-bottle was full up to the cut-glass stopper.

Then I went to bed and fell into one of my terrible sleeps, from which I was aroused in about two hours by a still more terrible shock.

Picture to yourself a sleeping man who is being murdered, who wakes up with a knife in his chest, a gurgling in his throat, is covered with blood, can no longer breathe, is going to die and does not understand anything at all about it - there you have it.

Having recovered my senses, I was thirsty again, so I lighted a candle and went to the table on which my water-bottle was. I lifted it up and tilted it over my glass, but nothing came out. It was empty! It was completely empty! At first I could not understand it at all; then suddenly I was seized by such a terrible feeling that I had to sit down, or rather fall into a chair! Then I sprang up with a bound to look about me; then I sat down again, overcome by astonishment and fear, in front of the transparent crystal bottle! I looked at it with fixed eyes, trying to solve the puzzle, and my hands trembled! Some body had drunk the water, but who? I? I without any doubt. It could surely only be I? In that case I was a somnambulist - was living, without knowing it, that double, mysterious life which makes us doubt whether there are not two beings in us - whether a strange, unknowable, and invisible being does not, during our moments of mental and physical torpor, animate the inert body, forcing it to a more willing obedience than it yields to ourselves.

Oh! Who will understand my horrible agony? Who will understand the emotion of a man sound in mind, wide-awake, full of sense, who looks in horror at the disappearance of a little water while he was asleep, through the glass of a water-bottle! And I remained sitting until it was daylight, without venturing to go to bed again.

July 6.

I am going mad. Again all the contents of my water-bottle have been drunk during the night; or rather I have drunk it!

But is it I? Is it I? Who could it be? Who? Oh! God! Am I going mad? Who will save me?

July 10.

I have just been through some surprising ordeals. Undoubtedly I must be mad! And yet!

On July 6, before going to bed, I put some wine, milk, water, bread, and strawberries on my table. Somebody drank - I drank - all the water and a little of the milk, but neither the wine, nor the bread, nor the strawberries were touched.

On the seventh of July I renewed the same experiment, with the same results, and on July 8 I left out the water and the milk and nothing was touched.

Lastly, on July 9 I put only water and milk on my table, taking care to wrap up the bottles in white muslin and to tie down the stoppers. Then I rubbed my lips, my beard, and my hands with pencil lead, and went to bed.

Deep slumber seized me, soon followed by a terrible awakening. I had not moved, and my sheets were not marked. I rushed to the table. The muslin round the bottles remained intact; I undid the string, trembling with fear. All the water had been drunk, and so had the milk! Ah! Great God! I must start for Paris immediately.

July 12. Paris. I must have lost my head during the last few days! I must be the plaything of my enervated imagination, unless I am really a somnambulist, or I have been brought under the power of one of those influences - hypnotic suggestion, for example - which are known to exist, but have hitherto been inexplicable. In any case, my mental state bordered on madness, and twenty-four hours of Paris sufficed to restore me to my equilibrium.

Yesterday after doing some business and paying some visits, which instilled fresh and invigorating mental air into me, I wound up my evening at the Theatre Francais. A drama by Alexander Dumas the Younger was being acted, and his brilliant and powerful play completed my cure. Certainly solitude is dangerous for active minds. We need men who can think and can talk, around us. When we are alone for a long time, we people space with phantoms.

I returned along the boulevards to my hotel in excellent spirits. Amid the jostling of the crowd I thought, not without irony, of my terrors and surmises of the previous week, because I believed, yes, I believed, that an invisible being lived beneath my roof. How weak our mind is; how quickly it is terrified and unbalanced as soon as we are confronted with a small, incomprehensible fact. Instead of dismissing the problem with: "We do not understand because we cannot find the cause," we immediately imagine terrible mysteries and supernatural powers.

July 14.

Fete of the Republic. I walked through the streets, and the crackers and flags amused me like a child. Still, it is very foolish to make merry on a set date, by Government decree. People are like a flock of sheep, now steadily patient, now in ferocious revolt. Say to it: "Amuse yourself," and it amuses itself. Say to it: "Go and fight with your neighbor," and it goes and fights. Say to it: "Vote for the Emperor," and it votes for the Emperor; then say to it: "Vote for the Republic," and it votes for the Republic.

Those who direct it are stupid, too; but instead of obeying men they obey principles, a course which can only be foolish, ineffective, and false, for the very reason that principles are ideas which are considered as certain and unchangeable, whereas in this world one is certain of nothing, since light is an illusion and noise is deception.

July 16.

I saw some things yesterday that troubled me very much. I was dining at my cousin's, Madame Sable, whose husband is colonel of the Seventy-sixth Chasseurs at Limoges. There were two young women there, one of whom had married a medical man, Dr. Parent, who devotes himself a great deal to nervous diseases and to the extraordinary manifestations which just now experiments in hypnotism and suggestion are producing.

He related to us at some length the enormous results obtained by English scientists and the doctors of the medical school at Nancy, and the facts which he adduced appeared to me so strange, that I declared that I was altogether incredulous.

"We are," he declared, "on the point of discovering one of the most important secrets of nature, I mean to say, one of its most important secrets on this earth, for assuredly there are some up in the stars, yonder, of a different kind of importance. Ever since man has thought, since he has been able to express and write down his thoughts, he has felt himself close to a mystery which is impenetrable to his coarse and imperfect senses, and he endeavors to supplement the feeble penetration of his organs by the efforts of his intellect. As long as that intellect remained in its elementary stage, this intercourse with invisible spirits assumed forms which were commonplace though terrifying. Thence sprang the popular belief in the supernatural, the legends of wandering spirits, of fairies, of gnomes, of ghosts, I might even say the conception of God, for our ideas of the Workman-Creator, from whatever religion they may have come down to us, are certainly the most mediocre, the stupidest, and the most unacceptable inventions that ever sprang from the frightened brain of any human creature. Nothing is truer than what Voltaire says: 'If God made man in His own image, man has certainly paid Him back again.'

"But for rather more than a century, men seem to have had a presentiment of something new. Mesmer and some others have put us on an unexpected track, and within the last two or three years especially, we have arrived at results really surprising."

My cousin, who is also very incredulous, smiled, and Dr. Parent said to her: "Would you like me to try and send you to sleep, Madame?"

"Yes, certainly."

She sat down in an easy-chair, and he began to look at her fixedly, as if to fascinate her. I suddenly felt myself somewhat discomposed; my heart beat rapidly and I had a choking feeling in my throat. I saw that Madame Sable's eyes were growing heavy, her mouth twitched, and her bosom heaved, and at the end of ten minutes she was asleep.

"Go behind her," the doctor said to me; so I took a seat behind her. He put a visiting-card into her hands, and said to her: "This is a looking-glass; what do you see in it?"

She replied: "I see my cousin."

"What is he doing?"

"He is twisting his mustache."

"And now?"

"He is taking a photograph out of his pocket."

"Whose photograph is it?"

"His own."

That was true, for the photograph had been given me that same evening at the hotel.

"What is his attitude in this portrait?"

"He is standing up with his hat in his hand."

She saw these things in that card, in that piece of white pasteboard, as if she had seen them in a looking-glass.

The young women were frightened, and exclaimed: "That is quite enough! Quite, quite enough!"

But the doctor said to her authoritatively: "You will get up at eight o'clock to-morrow morning; then you will go and call on your cousin at his hotel and ask him to lend you the five thousand francs which your husband asks of you, and which he will ask for when he sets out on his coming journey."

Then he woke her up.

On returning to my hotel, I thought over this curious seance and I was assailed by doubts, not as to my cousin's absolute and undoubted good faith, for I had known her as well as if she had been my own sister ever since she was a child, but as to a possible trick on the doctor's part. Had not he, perhaps, kept a glass hidden in his hand, which he showed to the young woman in her sleep at the same time as he did the card? Professional conjurers do things which are just as singular.

However, I went to bed, and this morning, at about half past eight, I was awakened by my footman, who said to me: "Madame Sable has asked to see you immediately, Monsieur." I dressed hastily and went to her.

She sat down in some agitation, with her eyes on the floor, and without raising her veil said to me: "My dear cousin, I am going to ask a great favor of you."

"What is it, cousin?"

"I do not like to tell you, and yet I must. I am in absolute want of five thousand francs."

"What, you?"

"Yes, I, or rather my husband, who has asked me to procure them for him."

I was so stupefied that I hesitated to answer. I asked myself whether she had not really been making fun of me with Dr. Parent, if it were not merely a very well-acted farce which had been got up beforehand. On looking at her attentively, however, my doubts disappeared. She was trembling with grief, so painful was this step to her, and I was sure that her throat was full of sobs.

I knew that she was very rich and so I continued: "What! Has not your husband five thousand francs at his disposal? Come, think. Are you sure that he commissioned you to ask me for them?"

She hesitated for a few seconds, as if she were making a great effort to search her memory, and then she replied: "Yes - yes, I am quite sure of it."

"He has written to you?"

She hesitated again and reflected, and I guessed the torture of her thoughts. She did not know. She only knew that she was to borrow five thousand francs of me for her husband. So she told a lie.

"Yes, he has written to me."

"When, pray? You did not mention it to me yesterday."

"I received his letter this morning."

"Can you show it to me?"

"No; no - no - it contained private matters, things too personal to ourselves. I burned it."

"So your husband runs into debt?"

She hesitated again, and then murmured: "I do not know."

Thereupon I said bluntly: "I have not five thousand francs at my disposal at this moment, my dear cousin."

She uttered a cry, as if she were in pair; and said: "Oh! oh! I beseech you, I beseech you to get them for me."

She got excited and clasped her hands as if she were praying to me! I heard her voice change its tone; she wept and sobbed, harassed and dominated by the irresistible order that she had received.

"Oh! oh! I beg you to - if you knew what I am suffering - I want them to-day."

I had pity on her: "You shall have them by and by, I swear to you."

"Oh! thank you! thank you! How kind you are."

I continued: "Do you remember what took place at your house last night?"

"Yes."

"Do you remember that Dr. Parent sent you to sleep?"

"Yes."

"Oh! Very well then; he ordered you to come to me this morning to borrow five thousand francs, and at this moment you are obeying that suggestion."

She considered for a few moments, and then replied: "But as it is my husband who wants them - "

For a whole hour I tried to convince her, but could not succeed, and when she had gone I went to the doctor. He was just going out, and he listened to me with a smile, and said: "Do you believe now?"

"Yes, I cannot help it."

"Let us go to your cousin's."

She was already resting on a couch, overcome with fatigue. The doctor felt her pulse, looked at her for some time with one hand raised toward her eyes, which she closed by degrees under the irresistible power of this magnetic influence. When she was asleep, he said:

"Your husband does not require the five thousand francs any longer! You must, therefore, forget that you asked your cousin to lend them to you, and, if he speaks to you about it, you will not understand him."

Then he woke her up, and I took out a pocket-book and said: "Here is what you asked me for this morning, my dear cousin." But she was so surprised, that I did not venture to persist; nevertheless, I tried to recall the circumstance to her, but she denied it vigorously, thought that I was making fun of her, and in the end, very nearly lost her temper.

There! I have just come back, and I have not been able to eat any lunch, for this experiment has altogether upset me.

July 19.

Many people to whom I have told the adventure have laughed at me. I no longer know what to think. The wise man says: Perhaps?

July 21.

I dined at Bougival, and then I spent the evening at a boatmen's ball. Decidedly everything depends on place and surroundings. It would be the height of folly to believe in the supernatural on the Ile de la Grenouilliere. But on the top of Mont Saint-Michel or in India, we are terribly under the influence of our surroundings. I shall return home next week.

July 30.

I came back to my own house yesterday. Everything is going on well.

August 2.

Nothing fresh; it is splendid weather, and I spend my days in watching the Seine flow past.

August 4.

Quarrels among my servants. They declare that the glasses are broken in the cupboards at night. The footman accuses the cook, she accuses the needlewoman, and the latter accuses the other two. Who is the culprit? It would take a clever person to tell.

August 6.

This time, I am not mad. I have seen - I have seen - I have seen! - I can doubt no longer - I have seen it!

I was walking at two o'clock among my rose-trees, in the full sunlight - in the walk bordered by autumn roses which are beginning to fall. As I stopped to look at a Geant de Bataille, which had three splendid blooms, I distinctly saw the stalk of one of the roses bend close to me, as if an invisible hand had bent it, and then break, as if that hand had picked it! Then the flower raised itself, following the curve which a hand would have described in carrying it toward a mouth, and remained suspended in the transparent air, alone and motionless, a terrible red spot, three yards from my eyes. In desperation I rushed at it to take it! I found nothing; it had disappeared. Then I was seized with furious rage against myself, for it is not wholesome for a reasonable and serious man to have such hallucinations.

But was it a hallucination? I turned to look for the stalk, and I found it immediately under the bush, freshly broken, between the two other roses which remained on the branch. I returned home, then, with a much disturbed mind; for I am certain now, certain as I am of the alternation of day and night, that there exists close to me an invisible being who lives on milk and on water, who can touch objects, take them and change their places; who is, consequently, endowed with a material nature, although imperceptible to sense, and who lives as I do, under my roof -

August 7.

I slept tranquilly. He drank the water out of my decanter, but did not disturb my sleep.

I ask myself whether I am mad. As I was walking just now in the sun by the riverside, doubts as to my own sanity arose in me; not vague doubts such as I have had hitherto, but precise and absolute doubts. I have seen mad people, and I have known some who were quite intelligent, lucid, even clear-sighted in every concern of life, except on one point. They could speak clearly, readily, profoundly on everything; till their thoughts were caught in the breakers of their delusions and went to pieces there, were dispersed and swamped in that furious and terrible sea of fogs and squalls which is called MADNESS.

I certainly should think that I was mad, absolutely mad, if I were not conscious that I knew my state, if I could not fathom it and analyze it with the most complete lucidity. I should, in fact, be a reasonable man laboring under a hallucination. Some unknown disturbance must have been excited in my brain, one of those disturbances which physiologists of the present day try to note and to fix precisely, and that disturbance must have caused a profound gulf in my mind and in the order and logic of my ideas. Similar phenomena occur in dreams, and lead us through the most unlikely phantasmagoria, without causing us any surprise, because our verifying apparatus and our sense of control have gone to sleep, while our imaginative faculty wakes and works. Was it not possible that one of the imperceptible keys of the cerebral finger-board had been paralyzed in me? Some men lose the recollection of proper names, or of verbs, or of numbers, or merely of dates, in consequence of an accident. The localization of all the avenues of thought has been accomplished nowadays; what, then, would there be surprising in the fact that my faculty of controlling the unreality of certain hallucinations should be destroyed for the time being?

I thought of all this as I walked by the side of the water. The sun was shining brightly on the river and made earth delightful, while it filled me with love for life, for the swallows, whose swift agility is always delightful in my eyes, for the plants by the riverside, whose rustling is a pleasure to my ears.

By degrees, however, an inexplicable feeling of discomfort seized me. It seemed to me as if some unknown force were numbing and stopping me, were preventing me from going further and were calling me back. I felt that painful wish to return which comes on you when you have left a beloved invalid at home, and are seized by a presentiment that he is worse.

I, therefore, returned despite of myself, feeling certain that I should find some bad news awaiting me, a letter or a telegram. There was nothing, however, and I was surprised and uneasy, more so than if I had had another fantastic vision.

August 8.

I spent a terrible evening, yesterday. He does not show himself any more, but I feel that He is near me, watching me, looking at me, penetrating me, dominating me, and more terrible to me when He hides himself thus than if He were to manifest his constant and invisible presence by supernatural phenomena. However, I slept.

August 9.

Nothing, but I am afraid.

August 10.

Nothing; but what will happen to-morrow?

August 11.

Still nothing. I cannot stop at home with this fear hanging over me and these thoughts in my mind; I shall go away.

August 12.

Ten o'clock at night. All day long I have been trying to get away, and have not been able. I contemplated a simple and easy act of liberty, a carriage ride to Rouen - and I have not been able to do it. What is the reason?

August 13.

When one is attacked by certain maladies, the springs of our physical being seem broken, our energies destroyed, our muscles relaxed, our bones to be as soft as our flesh, and our blood as liquid as water. I am experiencing the same in my moral being, in a strange and distressing manner. I have no longer any strength, any courage, any self-control, nor even any power to set my own will in motion. I have no power left to WILL anything, but some one does it for me and I obey.

August 14.

I am lost! Somebody possesses my soul and governs it! Somebody orders all my acts, all my movements, all my thoughts. I am no longer master of myself, nothing except an enslaved and terrified spectator of the things which I do. I wish to go out; I cannot. HE does not wish to; and so I remain, trembling and distracted in the armchair in which he keeps me sitting. I merely wish to get up and to rouse myself, so as to think that I am still master of myself: I cannot! I am riveted to my chair, and my chair adheres to the floor in such a manner that no force of mine can move us.

Then suddenly, I must, I MUST go to the foot of my garden to pick some strawberries and eat them - and I go there. I pick the strawberries and I eat them! Oh! my God! my God! Is there a God? If there be one, deliver me! save me! succor me! Pardon! Pity! Mercy! Save me! Oh! what sufferings! what torture! what horror!

August 15.

Certainly, this is the way in which my poor cousin was possessed and swayed, when she came to borrow five thousand francs of me. She was under the power of a strange will which had entered into her, like another soul, a parasitic and ruling soul. Is the world coming to an end?

But who is he, this invisible being that rules me, this unknowable being, this rover of a supernatural race?

Invisible beings exist, then! how is it, then, that since the beginning of the world they have never manifested themselves in such a manner as they do to me? I have never read anything that resembles what goes on in my house. Oh! If I could only leave it, if I could only go away and flee, and never return, I should be saved; but I cannot.

August 16.

I managed to escape to-day for two hours, like a prisoner who finds the door of his dungeon accidentally open. I suddenly felt that I was free and that He was far away, and so I gave orders to put the horses in as quickly as possible, and I drove to Rouen. Oh! how delightful to be able to say to my coachman: "Go to Rouen!"

I made him pull up before the library, and I begged them to lend me Dr. Herrmann Herestauss's treatise on the unknown inhabitants of the ancient and modern world.

Then, as I was getting into my carriage, I intended to say: "To the railway station!" but instead of this I shouted - I did not speak; but I shouted - in such a loud voice that all the passers-by turned round: "Home!" and I fell back on to the cushion of my carriage, overcome by mental agony. He had found me out and regained possession of me.

August 17.

Oh! What a night! what a night! And yet it seems to me that I ought to rejoice. I read until one o'clock in the morning! Herestauss, Doctor of Philosophy and Theogony, wrote the history and the manifestation of all those invisible beings which hover around man, or of whom he dreams. He describes their origin, their domains, their power; but none of them resembles the one which haunts me. One might say that man, ever since he has thought, has had a foreboding and a fear of a new being, stronger than himself, his successor in this world, and that, feeling him near, and not being able to foretell the nature of the unseen one, he has, in his terror, created the whole race of hidden beings, vague phantoms born of fear.

Having, therefore, read until one o'clock in the morning, I went and sat down at the open window, in order to cool my forehead and my thoughts in the calm night air. It was very pleasant and warm! How I should have enjoyed such a night formerly!

There was no moon, but the stars darted out their rays in the dark heavens. Who inhabits those worlds? What forms, what living beings, what animals are there yonder? Do those who are thinkers in those distant worlds know more than we do? What can they do more than we? What do they see which we do not? Will not one of them, some day or other, traversing space, appear on our earth to conquer it, just as formerly the Norsemen crossed the sea in order to subjugate nations feebler than themselves?

We are so weak, so powerless, so ignorant, so small - we who live on this particle of mud which revolves in liquid air.

I fell asleep, dreaming thus in the cool night air, and then, having slept for about three quarters of an hour, I opened my eyes without moving, awakened by an indescribably confused and strange sensation. At first I saw nothing, and then suddenly it appeared to me as if a page of the book, which had remained open on my table, turned over of its own accord. Not a breath of air had come in at my window, and I was surprised and waited. In about four minutes, I saw, I saw - yes I saw with my own eyes - another page lift itself up and fall down on the others, as if a finger had turned it over. My armchair was empty, appeared empty, but I knew that He was there, He, and sitting in my place, and that He was reading. With a furious bound, the bound of an enraged wild beast that wishes to disembowel its tamer, I crossed my room to seize him, to strangle him, to kill him! But before I could reach it, my chair fell over as if somebody had run away from me. My table rocked, my lamp fell and went out, and my window closed as if some thief had been surprised and had fled out into the night, shutting it behind him.

So He had run away; He had been afraid; He, afraid of me!

So to-morrow, or later - some day or other, I should be able to hold him in my clutches and crush him against the ground! Do not dogs occasionally bite and strangle their masters?

August 18.

I have been thinking the whole day long. Oh! yes, I will obey Him, follow His impulses, fulfill all His wishes, show myself humble, submissive, a coward. He is the stronger; but an hour will come.

August 19.

I know, I know, I know all! I have just read the following in the "Revue du Monde Scientifique": "A curious piece of news comes to us from Rio de Janeiro. Madness, an epidemic of madness, which may be compared to that contagious madness which attacked the people of Europe in the Middle Ages, is at this moment raging in the Province of San-Paulo. The frightened inhabitants are leaving their houses, deserting their villages, abandoning their land, saying that they are pursued, possessed, governed like human cattle by invisible, though tangible beings, by a species of vampire, which feeds on their life while they are asleep, and which, besides, drinks water and milk without appearing to touch any other nourishment.

"Professor Don Pedro Henriques, accompanied by several medical savants, has gone to the Province of San-Paulo, in order to study the origin and the manifestations of this surprising madness on the spot, and to propose such measures to the Emperor as may appear to him to be most fitted to restore the mad population to reason."

Ah! Ah! I remember now that fine Brazilian three-master which passed in front of my windows as it was going up the Seine, on the eighth of last May! I thought it looked so pretty, so white and bright! That Being was on board of her, coming from there, where its race sprang from. And it saw me! It saw my house, which was also white, and He sprang from the ship on to the land. Oh! Good heavens!

Now I know, I can divine. The reign of man is over, and he has come. He whom disquieted priests exorcised, whom sorcerers evoked on dark nights, without seeing him appear, He to whom the imaginations of the transient masters of the world lent all the monstrous or graceful forms of gnomes, spirits, genii, fairies, and familiar spirits. After the coarse conceptions of primitive fear, men more enlightened gave him a truer form. Mesmer divined him, and ten years ago physicians accurately discovered the nature of his power, even before He exercised it himself. They played with that weapon of their new Lord, the sway of a mysterious will over the human soul, which had become enslaved. They called it mesmerism, hypnotism, suggestion, I know not what? I have seen them diverting themselves like rash children with this horrible power! Woe to us! Woe to man! He has come, the - the - what does He call himself - the - I fancy that he is shouting out his name to me and I do not hear him - the - yes - He is shouting it out - I am listening - I cannot - repeat - it - Horla - I have heard - the Horla - it is He - the Horla - He has come! -

Ah! the vulture has eaten the pigeon, the wolf has eaten the lamb; the lion has devoured the sharp-horned buffalo; man has killed the lion with an arrow, with a spear, with gunpowder; but the Horla will make of man what man has made of the horse and of the ox: his chattel, his slave, and his food, by the mere power of his will. Woe to us!

But, nevertheless, sometimes the animal rebels and kills the man who has subjugated it. I should also like - I shall be able to - but I must know Him, touch Him, see Him! Learned men say that eyes of animals, as they differ from ours, do not distinguish as ours do. And my eye cannot distinguish this newcomer who is oppressing me.

Why? Oh! Now I remember the words of the monk at Mont Saint-Michel: "Can we see the hundred-thousandth part of what exists? Listen; there is the wind which is the strongest force in nature; it knocks men down, blows down buildings, uproots trees, raises the sea into mountains of water, destroys cliffs, and casts great ships on to the breakers; it kills, it whistles, it sighs, it roars, - have you ever seen it, and can you see it? It exists for all that, however!"

And I went on thinking: my eyes are so weak, so imperfect, that they do not even distinguish hard bodies, if they are as transparent as glass! If a glass without quicksilver behind it were to bar my way, I should run into it, just like a bird which has flown into a room breaks its head against the windowpanes. A thousand things, moreover, deceive a man and lead him astray. How then is it surprising that he cannot perceive a new body which is penetrated and pervaded by the light?

A new being! Why not? It was assuredly bound to come! Why should we be the last? We do not distinguish it, like all the others created before us? The reason is, that its nature is more delicate, its body finer and more finished than ours. Our makeup is so weak, so awkwardly conceived; our body is encumbered with organs that are always tired, always being strained like locks that are too complicated; it lives like a plant and like an animal nourishing itself with difficulty on air, herbs, and flesh; it is a brute machine which is a prey to maladies, to malformations, to decay; it is broken-winded, badly regulated, simple and eccentric, ingeniously yet badly made, a coarse and yet a delicate mechanism, in brief, the outline of a being which might become intelligent and great.

There are only a few - so few - stages of development in this world, from the oyster up to man. Why should there not be one more, when once that period is accomplished which separates the successive products one from the other?

Why not one more? Why not, also, other trees with immense, splendid flowers, perfuming whole regions? Why not other elements beside fire, air, earth, and water? There are four, only four, nursing fathers of various beings! What a pity! Why should not there be forty, four hundred, four thousand! How poor everything is, how mean and wretched - grudgingly given, poorly invented, clumsily made! Ah! the elephant and the hippopotamus, what power! And the camel, what suppleness!

But the butterfly, you will say, a flying flower! I dream of one that should be as large as a hundred worlds, with wings whose shape, beauty, colors, and motion I cannot even express. But I see it - it flutters from star to star, refreshing them and perfuming them with the light and harmonious breath of its flight! And the people up there gaze at it as it passes in an ecstasy of delight!

What is the matter with me? It is He, the Horla who haunts me, and who makes me think of these foolish things! He is within me, He is becoming my soul; I shall kill him!

August 20.

I shall kill Him. I have seen Him! Yesterday I sat down at my table and pretended to write very assiduously. I knew quite well that He would come prowling round me, quite close to me, so close that I might perhaps be able to touch him, to seize him. And then - then I should have the strength of desperation; I should have my hands, my knees, my chest, my forehead, my teeth to strangle him, to crush him, to bite him, to tear him to pieces. And I watched for him with all my overexcited nerves.

I had lighted my two lamps and the eight wax candles on my mantelpiece, as if, by this light I should discover Him.

My bed, my old oak bed with its columns, was opposite to me; on my right was the fireplace; on my left the door, which was carefully closed, after I had left it open for some time, in order to attract Him; behind me was a very high wardrobe with a looking-glass in it, which served me to dress by every day, and in which I was in the habit of inspecting myself from head to foot every time I passed it.

So I pretended to be writing in order to deceive Him, for He also was watching me, and suddenly I felt, I was certain, that He was reading over my shoulder, that He was there, almost touching my ear.

I got up so quickly, with my hands extended, that I almost fell. Horror! It was as bright as at midday, but I did not see myself in the glass! It was empty, clear, profound, full of light! But my figure was not reflected in it - and I, I was opposite to it! I saw the large, clear glass from top to bottom, and I looked at it with unsteady eyes. I did not dare advance; I did not venture to make a movement; feeling certain, nevertheless, that He was there, but that He would escape me again, He whose imperceptible body had absorbed my reflection.

How frightened I was! And then suddenly I began to see myself through a mist in the depths of the looking-glass, in a mist as it were, or through a veil of water; and it seemed to me as if this water were flowing slowly from left to right, and making my figure clearer every moment. It was like the end of an eclipse. Whatever hid me did not appear to possess any clearly defined outlines, but was a sort of opaque transparency, which gradually grew clearer.

At last I was able to distinguish myself completely, as I do every day when I look at myself.

I had seen Him! And the horror of it remained with me, and makes me shudder even now.

August 21.

How could I kill Him, since I could not get hold of Him? Poison? But He would see me mix it with the water; and then, would our poisons have any effect on His impalpable body? No - no - no doubt about the matter. Then? - then?

August 22.

I sent for a blacksmith from Rouen and ordered iron shutters of him for my room, such as some private hotels in Paris have on the ground floor, for fear of thieves, and he is going to make me a similar door as well. I have made myself out a coward, but I do not care about that!

September 10.

Rouen, Hotel Continental. It is done; it is done - but is He dead? My mind is thoroughly upset by what I have seen.

Well then, yesterday, the locksmith having put on the iron shutters and door, I left everything open until midnight, although it was getting cold.

Suddenly I felt that He was there, and joy, mad joy took possession of me. I got up softly, and I walked to the right and left for some time, so that He might not guess anything; then I took off my boots and put on my slippers carelessly; then I fastened the iron shutters and going back to the door quickly I double-locked it with a padlock, putting the key into my pocket.

Suddenly I noticed that He was moving restlessly round me, that in his turn He was frightened and was ordering me to let Him out. I nearly yielded, though I did not quite, but putting my back to the door, I half opened it, just enough to allow me to go out backward, and as I am very tall, my head touched the lintel. I was sure that He had not been able to escape, and I shut Him up quite alone, quite alone. What happiness! I had Him fast. Then I ran downstairs into the drawing-room which was under my bedroom. I took the two lamps and poured all the oil on to the carpet, the furniture, everywhere; then I set fire to it and made my escape, after having carefully double locked the door.

I went and hid myself at the bottom of the garden, in a clump of laurel bushes. How long it was! how long it was! Everything was dark, silent, motionless, not a breath of air and not a star, but heavy banks of clouds which one could not see, but which weighed, oh! so heavily on my soul.

I looked at my house and waited. How long it was! I already began to think that the fire had gone out of its own accord, or that He had extinguished it, when one of the lower windows gave way under the violence of the flames, and a long, soft, caressing sheet of red flame mounted up the white wall, and kissed it as high as the roof. The light fell on to the trees, the branches, and the leaves, and a shiver of fear pervaded them also! The birds awoke; a dog began to howl, and it seemed to me as if the day were breaking! Almost immediately two other windows flew into fragments, and I saw that the whole of the lower part of my house was nothing but a terrible furnace. But a cry, a horrible, shrill, heart-rending cry, a woman's cry, sounded through the night, and two garret windows were opened! I had forgotten the servants! I saw the terror-struck faces, and the frantic waving of their arms!

Then, overwhelmed with horror, I ran off to the village, shouting: "Help! help! fire! fire!" Meeting some people who were already coming on to the scene, I went back with them to see!

By this time the house was nothing but a horrible and magnificent funeral pile, a monstrous pyre which lit up the whole country, a pyre where men were burning, and where He was burning also, He, He, my prisoner, that new Being, the new Master, the Horla!

Suddenly the whole roof fell in between the walls, and a volcano of flames darted up to the sky. Through all the windows which opened on to that furnace, I saw the flames darting, and I reflected that He was there, in that kiln, dead.

Dead? Perhaps? His body? Was not his body, which was transparent, indestructible by such means as would kill ours?

If He were not dead? Perhaps time alone has power over that Invisible and Redoubtable Being. Why this transparent, unrecognizable body, this body belonging to a spirit, if it also had to fear ills, infirmities, and premature destruction?

Premature destruction? All human terror springs from that! After man the Horla. After him who can die every day, at any hour, at any moment, by any accident, He came, He who was only to die at his own proper hour and minute, because He had touched the limits of his existence!

No - no - there is no doubt about it - He is not dead. Then - then - I suppose I must kill myself!

End.

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Table of Contents

- Greetings dear reader,
- Mondays
- THE OAK TREE
- Berlin Bargain
- Cthulhu's Codex
- The Song of the Monster: The Dream
- One Mind
- The Horla