Visions of the Dark

My grandmother passed away after a prolonged illness.  My grandfather died when I was a small child.  My memories of him were scarce.  I was close to my dear grandmother and her illness affected my family greatly even though we foresaw the inevitable decline of her health.  The fatal day arrived when she could fight no more and her frail spirit faltered.  At such times it is a natural reaction to attempt to come to grips with the loss and rationalize that the suffering had finally come to an end.  While this might be true it doesn’t really make the passing of a loved one any less upsetting.

Next followed the tasks of making the funeral arrangements, the burial, and the reading of the will.  The estate was to be divided equitably between my mother and her brother.  So began the task of sorting through my deceased grandmother’s possessions.  Her house had been in the family for many generations and was a large house.  I was assigned the job of sorting through the basement.

The stairs were steep, and the basement was dank and small.  I could not imagine it being used for anything other than storage.  Many of the boxes contained holiday items such as Christmas ornaments, Easter baskets, and Halloween pumpkins.  There were numerous boxes of old clothing and outdated periodicals.  Amongst all these boxes there were pieces of furniture.  A couple of these pieces of furniture appeared to be antiques, which had been covered with sheets to protect them.  They included an old chair, a bureau, and a mirror.  It was after weeding through most of these things that I discovered an old worn trunk.  In this trunk there were many old items of family memorabilia.  I perused through these things looking at pictures and reading old newspaper articles of weddings and other various announcements.

The wall in the back of the cellar was lined with shelves, which contained cans and jars of non-perishable foods.  I was rummaging through these shelves when something caught my eye.  One of the boards of the wall had become dislodged which revealed something metallic behind it.  I moved away the jars, took off the shelf and removed the wooden panel to reveal an old safe hidden in the wall.  I looked at it for several moments wondering who would have knowledge of the combination.  If my grandmother was the last person to have this information, then the safe’s contents might never be known again.  Then I recalled that I had seen an old instrument resembling a screwdriver beside the trunk.  It was certainly a long shot but worth an attempt, nevertheless.

I retrieved the instrument and returned to the safe.  With very little force I was able to pry open the safe.  It was obviously a very old safe and put up very little resistance.  Now, knowing what I know, I wish the safe would have put up a tougher fight and held fast, for it was the safe that contained the horrifying memoirs of my great grandfather.  There were no other contents in the safe besides the small journal.

I read the first few pages and was so taken by his tale that I decided to take it home and read it.  I didn’t tell any of the other members of my family about my discovery.  I had planned to keep the story a secret, but circumstances have forced me to write this confession.  I have already been affected by it; but before I describe my encounter, I must tell you about my great grandfather.

My great grandfather’s name was Albert Jennings.  He was a somewhat eccentric man who learned one of the more unusual trades of our species.  It was he who is the basis of the third local legend I have already related to you.  The version I told was scant in its telling.  The truth of the story was more intriguing than any fiction could manufacture.

Why someone would want to become a mortician is quite beyond me, but this was the path Albert Jennings took.  His memoirs recount the entire tale of his supernatural ordeal.  It is this tale I will now explain.  His memoirs begin with the events of how he came to meet Lilith Morgan, the alleged witch residing in the Sadler Plantation Home.  This meeting was the result of the death of Seth, the widow Morgan’s son.  Albert described how the boy had become quite defiant towards his mother and had been sneaking away from the house on frequent occasions.

Seth would usually keep to the woods around the local area of the house but there were times when he would be seen about town.  He was shunned by everyone, and he wouldn’t do more than just make the folks in town uncomfortable.  Immediately the rumors would be re-ignited and small groups of whisperers would form, watching him sidelong.

On one particular day Seth wandered about town and headed for the General Store.  Just as he walked past Jesse Brown’s wagon the horses grew uneasy and one tore loose from the hitching post.  The horse began to buck and rear in its panic to distance itself from Seth as its large, equestrian eyes rolled back in its head.  The poor boy, who desperately wished for normalcy, tried to calm the beast but this only caused the horse to plunge deeper into its fear.

By the time the townsfolk began to witness the unfolding of this whole display, the horse had struck the boy square in the head with a wild kick.  The sound produced was a sickly thud and blood flew.  Mr. Brown emerged from the store and managed to gain control of his horse while Clarence Wilford, the store manager, ran to the fallen boy’s side.

The boy was still alive but there was no doubt that the blow would be fatal.  Clarence later said that he could see skull and gray matter in the mix of blood and hair.  Doctor Grenier was summoned along with the authorities.  They removed the boy from the street and carried him to Dr. Grenier’s office.  By the time they arrived there, the Doc had pronounced the boy dead.  The authorities sent two officers to the Sadler House to notify Mrs. Morgan of her son’s situation.  This was accomplished by the drawing of lots – even then there was much arguing and bribing.

In the meantime, Dr. Grenier and Sheriff Doss carried the body to my great grandfather’s funeral home.  Albert asked Dr. Grenier and Sheriff Doss to please remain behind until the news was delivered to Mrs. Morgan.  They agreed to do this.  Albert placed the body in the basement of the funeral home where he did the grisly task of preparing corpses for burial.  The Doc and the Sheriff waited in the parlor while Albert cleansed the blood and other tissue from the wound so that when the widow beheld her son it might be more tolerable.

After he finished this he adjourned to the parlor with the other two gentlemen.  They anxiously awaited the arrival of the widow and speculated on her reaction to such terrible news.  Eventually the two officers arrived with the widow.  Contrary to the expected hysterics, she was quite composed.  Albert described her demeanor being more disturbing than if she had been moaning and wailing.  She was somber and made little show of emotion while the Sheriff explained all that had transpired.  The widow asked to see the corpse and Albert escorted her downstairs as requested.  She asked Albert not to begin the embalming process and told him that there was a very rational reason for doing this.  Albert thought this request rather unusual but assured her that he would wait until she gave him permission.

After this she excused herself and returned home.  The men commented on her strange behavior, but this was typical of Lilith and should have been expected.  Shortly thereafter the men departed.

That night Lilith came to Albert’s house and asked to speak with him alone.  The two went over to the funeral home after Lilith suggested that after they talked, she would like to see her son one more time.  Albert recounted that conversation in some detail in his memoirs.

What transpired then was a secret so demonic that it has lived only in the memoirs of my great grandfather in the forgotten safe until I happened to discover it.  Lilith wanted to remove her deceased son, Seth, back to the old Sadler House.  Albert thought that she had the intentions of burying her son in the old cemetery that was on the property.  Lilith, however, made Albert promise that he would never speak of the night and what had transpired.  She also made him promise that no matter what should happen afterwards, he must never speak of the death of her son again.

He felt very confused and uncomfortable about the things she asked; but he finally relented to her request and agreed to what she asked.  Why he did this is a matter of mystery to me.  He never explains in his memoirs why he agreed to this.  I suspect that he had no choice.  He described her as being a woman who possessed an aura of profound power.  It is very likely that she had cast some sort of magical charm over him, and he had no will to resist her.  Whatever the case, the deal was made between them, and Lilith left that night with the dead corpse of her son, Seth.

Several days later there was a report by a neighbor of Lilith’s that the boy had been seen about the Sadler House quite alive.  This neighbor was Samuel Baylor.  He came into town and this rumor spread in a matter of hours.  Most people thought that Samuel’s eyes were obviously deceiving him.  But it was just a matter of days before several other people confirmed his story.

When the news of this reached Albert, his reaction was to fabricate a story of how the boy had regained consciousness.  The Sheriff came by to get a statement from Albert.  He retold his story, and the Sheriff just shook his head in disbelief.  He found the story to be too fantastic to believe but he really had no choice but accept it.  While he had never heard of such things, he was no undertaker and had very little experience with corpses.  The Doctor was a different story altogether.  He was completely at a loss for an explanation.  His only comment was that he had heard of all manner of medical anomalies but this one was, by far, the strangest he had ever heard before.  He was sure the boy was quite dead.

About a week after this was when there occurred an encounter between a neighbor and Seth.  Maude Laslow was walking down a dirt road close to her home when she saw the boy lumbering towards her.  Although she had the urge to avoid Seth, there was really no place for her to go.  She said that the boy looked wild and was acting erratically.  When Seth got close to her, he began to growl at her and claw at his head.  She became so afraid that she began to scream.  This caused the boy to begin moaning and whimpering and then he abruptly turned and fled into the woods.  It was several weeks before anyone reported seeing the boy again.

The reports of encounters with Seth grew fewer and fewer as the months went by.  Many people reported seeing him in the woods around Roupes Creek close to the Tannehill area.  It is obvious to me now that Seth grew into an adult and continued to live in the woods around Tannehill.  The infrequent sightings of Seth surely were the source of the legend of the Tannehill Monster.

Albert did mention that Lilith descended into a deep depression after Seth disappeared.  She rarely came to town and when she did, the townsfolk shunned her as if she were invisible.  She apparently didn’t seem to mind because she never made any effort to talk to anyone.  A couple of years passed, and the entire incident of Seth’s strange recovery faded from everyone’s memories.

Then, one afternoon, a terrible accident befell my grandmother’s oldest sister.  Albert had four children.  The oldest was my grandmother’s sister Sarah.  She was nine years old when the accident that claimed her life occurred.  My grandmother would have been only a year old.  The children were playing near the house in the woods by a creek.  Sarah lost her footing on the moss-covered rocks and fell hitting her head with a tremendous force.  She lost consciousness but didn’t die immediately.  The children went to get their parents for help and Sarah was removed to her room.  Dr. Grenier was summoned but there wasn’t much that could be done.  Brain swelling continued throughout the night and Sarah finally passed away in the early hours of the morning.

As bizarre as it sounds, Albert faced the grim task of preparing his own daughter’s body for burial.  Albert hadn’t forgotten about Seth though.  Albert decided that it was time for Lilith to pay back the favor of keeping her dark secret.

You must remember that this was never known beyond Albert and Lilith.  Albert kept this secret till the day he died.  The only place it was ever revealed was in Albert’s memoirs that I found.

Albert went to see Lilith and asked her to perform the same ritual on Sarah that she had done on Seth.  Lilith refused, however.  She explained to Albert that Seth had somehow changed and wasn’t the same child.  But Albert was racked with grief and refused to listen.  All he wanted was his precious daughter back.  They continued to argue until things escalated into a heated exchange.  Lilith continued to refuse Albert and he became so consumed with emotion that he attacked her.

Albert recounts that he used the poker from the fireplace to kill Lilith.  His blows were wild, so Lilith didn’t receive the fatal blow at first.  She was able to ward off his blows long enough to issue a vile and terrible curse upon Albert.  Hearing her arcane and disturbing words, Albert at first laughed at her and then he flew into an even more violent fit of rage.  He struck her square across the forehead, and she crumpled to the floor dead.

Albert knew that if someone found her, she would be brought to him for preparation for the burial.  He wanted to be done with Lilith Morgan forever.  He waited till the cover of night and removed her body to the woods where he buried her in the soft dirt by Roupes Creek.

The people of the town thought that it was the fact that Albert prepared his daughter for her burial that drove him mad.  It surely affected him but not to the point of insanity.  No, that was the work of Lilith.  Albert recounts the manner in which she exacted her revenge.

It is quite plausible to suggest that it was Albert’s task that drove him mad and that he was merely imagining the things that took place thereafter.  But there is one thing that convinces me otherwise.  I have proof.  Let me finish the tale of my great grandfather so that you might better understand the meaning of the thing I saw.

In the basement of the funeral parlor was the embalming room where Albert prepared the bodies.  The room was long and narrow and contained two embalming tables along the side walls.  At the far end of the room was a table with all manner of tools and vials upon it.  Hanging on the wall above this table was a large mirror.  Next to the table was a narrow alcove that was actually a small, manually operated elevator that was used for raising the bodies to the second floor after the embalming had been completed.

Sarah lay upon one of the embalming tables covered by a sheet.  Albert sat before the table at the back of the room, drinking whiskey, sobbing, and preparing himself for the horrendous task that lay before him.  Hearing the voice of his daughter, he glanced up into the mirror to behold Sarah sitting upon the table.  He whirled around only to see that it was some cruel trick of his imagination.  He returned to his drink.  Then, clearly, he heard her say, “Daddy, she’s coming”.  He looked up into the mirror and once again Sarah sat upon the table looking at Albert in the mirror.  This time Albert didn’t turn around.  He continued to watch his beautiful and animated daughter in the looking glass.

“Who’s coming, Sarah?” Albert asked.

“The bad lady who wants to kill you.”  Before Albert could respond to this strange reply, he heard the sound of someone walking down the stairs very slowly.  Sarah’s expression changed into one of fear and she moved with her back against the wall and the sheet pulled up tight about her face as if she were trying to protect herself from whatever was coming down the stairs.  Her eyes were wide with fear, and they were riveted to the stairs just beyond the door.

It took Albert a mere second to behold the cowering form of Sarah.  He wheeled about in his chair only to see the lifeless and covered corpse of his daughter still lying in the same position as he had left her the night before.  Albert attributed this strange occurrence to the whiskey.

The next day the body of Esther Ingram was delivered to the funeral home.  She was placed on the table opposite Sarah and covered in the same fashion with a white sheet.  Esther was an elderly woman who had been battling ill health for several months.  She had finally grown too frail to fight anymore and had succumbed to death’s thin embrace.

That night Albert once again adjourned to the small embalming room to attempt the job of embalming Sarah.  And once again he sat at the small table sipping whiskey and sobbing.  Two hours passed and Albert finally worked up enough nerve to begin the task.  He gathered and arranged his tools, postponing the grisly task as long as possible.  He thought that it might make the task somewhat easier if he prepared the bodies of both Sarah and Esther at the same time.  He rose from his chair and went to retrieve his instruments when he heard Sarah speak again.  “Daddy,” she said, in the childish voice that could not be mistaken.  He turned to look but there was no one there – just the still and lifeless forms of Sarah and Esther.  Then he turned and looked into the mirror.  The sight he beheld made him freeze in terror.  Sarah sat up on the table with her legs swinging as she looked in the mirror at her father and smiled.

“Sarah, is it really you?” he sobbed.

“Of course, Daddy,” she giggled.

“What’s happening?” Albert moaned.

“What do you mean, Daddy?” Sarah said naively.

“Sarah, are you hurting, Darling?”

“No, Daddy, but I am worried about you.”  She replied.

“Why?”

“Because the bad lady wants you.”

“What bad lady?” Albert asked.

“The one with the blood on her face.  She’s so mean and scary.  Uh oh, she’s coming again, Daddy!”  Then Albert heard someone walking down the stairs again.  The instruments fell from his hands to scatter across the floor, and he struggled to remain standing.  Although every ounce of his being screamed for him to turn around, he continued to stare into the mirror.  Once again Sarah crawled across the table, up against the wall, and pulled the sheet tight about her as she watched in abject horror at whatever it was that made its way down the stairs.  Albert noticed that Esther remained inert upon her table.

Albert continued to watch, struggling to overcome the fear that so gripped him.  Whatever was coming down the stairs was almost to the doorway.  Slowly the footsteps approached.  The door creaked open.  And then the hideous form of Lilith entered the room.  She was pale and her hair was in disarray.  Her face was covered with dry blood and the wound Albert had inflicted with the fire poker was plainly visible across her forehead. Her face was twisted into a grotesque and evil expression of hate.  But it was the eyes that caused Albert the most distress.  They were locked onto his eyes.  She walked deliberately in his direction.

Albert could stand no more.  Upon beholding the apparition of Lilith, he spun around and once again there was nothing there.  No one stood in the doorway and the two bodies lay covered as before.  Albert cautiously approached the stairs.  Once he was sure that no one was upon the stairwell he ran home.

When Albert arrived home, he poured himself a drink and sat down in the living room.  Albert’s wife, Emily, entered and asked him if the task had been completed.  He admitted that it had not, but he didn’t tell her about the apparition in the mirror.  He thought that she would think him crazy.  The death of Sarah was enough to strain their emotions and this news only made matters worse.  A fight ensued and the alcohol only served to make the matter worse.

The next day Albert could wait no longer.  Sarah’s visitation was to be the following evening, so he had no choice but to complete the embalming of Sarah.  Albert descended the stairs slowly and reluctantly.  The atmosphere of the embalming room was so charged with apprehension that he decided to return to the house, sneak a bottle of bourbon into his coat, and return to the stairwell only after a few swigs.  He resumed his slow descent, all the time hugging the bottle of liquor close to his chest.  He had already made up his mind that he would refrain from looking into the mirror.

Albert knelt on the floor and retrieved his scattered tools from the day before.  He rose, took a deep breath, and then he set to work.  It was beyond difficult.  One can’t imagine the pain involved in the work of preparing your own daughter for burial, for it is such a bizarre profession that most of us are thankful to have no gauge to fuel our imaginations into the realm of horror that Albert inhabited.

At one point Albert paused to regard the quiet, peaceful face of his young child.  He began to cry and stroke her hair.  His sobs intensified until he found himself cradling her to his breast.  So involved in his grieving he had become that he unconsciously wiped his eyes and looked into the mirror.  He saw himself embracing his daughter, not in death, but in the living form of his child.  “Why are you crying, Daddy?” Sarah asked.

“Because I miss you dear,” he said through tears.

“But I’m right here, silly.”

“I know, Dear. I know.”

“Daddy, the bad lady is coming again.  Please don’t leave me alone,” she pleaded as she clung to her father for protection.

“I won’t.”  Already the sound of her slow descent down the stairs could be heard.  Albert held Sarah and watched the mirror.    The door creaked open again.  This time Lilith was full in the room and walking at a slow, determined pace, with her hands outstretched straight for Albert.

Albert waited till her hands were just about to close around his neck and at the last moment Albert gasped and turned to defend himself.  The sudden release of Sarah caused her to fall back to the table with a loud thump just as Albert realized that his hands were raised to protect himself from nothing but empty air.  Albert became sickened by the careless way he had let Sarah fall and this gave way to rage at the old crone, Lilith.  It was a rage just like the night he had taken the fire poker to her.  He reached for the bottle of bourbon and made to throw it at the mirror, but something kept him from going through with the act.  He couldn’t shatter the mirror because of Sarah.  He regarded himself in the mirror with the bottle raised above his head.  His gaze fell on the lifeless form of Sarah.  Although it was but a moment, he had seen her alive again.  Even though it was in the most unnerving grip of terror, she had been alive.  Albert lowered the bottle and took a long drink.

Finally, the task of embalming Sarah was completed.  Throughout the remainder of the procedure Albert kept looking up into the mirror.  A part of him wanted to see Sarah alive again, but another part loathed the possibility of seeing the form of Lilith with her distorted expression, cloven forehead, outstretched hands, and piercing eyes that burned into his mind.

The visitation was a bleak and mournful event.  The entire town came by to pay their respects and console the family who had lost one of their dearest and sweetest children.  Emily cried and screamed the entire time.  She cursed the God who let such cruel and unjust things happen in this world.  Dr. Grenier was on hand to administer a sedative.  As for Albert, he stood by stoically with a rather blank expression upon his face.

After the visitation there was a large gathering at the Jennings’ residence.  Family and friends came by with food and kind words, as is the usual custom when a loved one has passed away.  The sedatives finally took hold and Emily dozed while Albert listened to the endless litany of comforting comments that didn’t serve their intended purpose.  Finally, all the guests departed, and Albert left the other three children in the care of a relative.  He explained that there were preparations he needed to make with Sarah at the funeral home and then he excused himself.  The real reason was that Albert dearly wanted to see his daughter in the mirror again before the funeral.

Albert arrived at the funeral home and proceeded to wheel Sarah’s casket to the elevator.  He slid the coffin in the narrow shelf that was just large enough to hold the casket and then he lowered her down with the hand crank.  Next, he removed the bottle of bourbon concealed in his coat and took a strong belt before descending the stairs.

Esther still lay upon the one table with the sheet concealing her corpse.  Albert went to the back of the room and opened the elevator door, slid the coffin out, and removed Sarah to the other table.  Then he sat sipping whiskey and watching the mirror.

How long he waited he wasn’t sure, but he found himself waking up to the sound of Sarah’s voice.  “Daddy, are you going to stay with me?” she was saying as Albert looked up into the mirror to see her sitting on the table.

“I’m here, Sarah.  I’m here with you now,” Albert said thinking of the burial that would be arriving soon.

“Is Mommy still sad?”

“Sarah, when I’m not around what do you do?” Albert asked.

“Mostly I sleep but sometimes I hear people talking.  I try to wake up or move but I can’t.  And then, sometimes the bad lady says things to me.”

“What kind of things?”

“Things about you, Daddy.  She hates you and wants to hurt you.  It scares me but I don’t think she can hurt me unless you’re around.  That’s why she always comes when we’re talking,” Sarah said glancing nervously at the doorway and the stairs beyond.

“Is she coming?” Albert asked noticing Sarah’s agitation.  But before Sarah could answer the sound of a footstep on the stairwell answered Albert’s question.

“Daddy, please don’t leave me again,” Sarah pleaded.  “Stay with me or make her go away, Daddy!”  Albert got up and backed up to Sarah so that he could keep her reflection in sight the entire time.  He put his arms around Sarah and comforted her.

“It’ll be all right, Darling.  I’m right here.”  Then the emaciated form of Lilith entered the doorway.  Sarah began to sob and clutch Albert.  He stroked her hair and continued to meet Lilith’s scathing glance in the mirror.  She made her way across the room with her hands raised to lock around Albert’s neck.  Albert could see that her hands were marked with blood and dirt.  He waited until the last possible moment and just as he felt the touch of Lilith’s hands upon his neck he turned around.  Lilith was gone.  He looked down at the lifeless corpse that he still held in his arms.  Albert broke down and began to cry.

The last entry in my great grandfather’s memoirs is at this point of the tale.  The last thing he wrote was about how heartbreaking and difficult it would be to inter Sarah and give her up to the cold and bitter sleep of death.  His very last statement was that the pain was too much to bear, and he had resolved to see Sarah one final time before the burial but this time he would not turn from the mirror.  He would face the mirror till the end.

This left me wondering about whatever happened to him.  I have never heard anyone in my family mention that he died in any mysterious or bizarre manner.  I did, however, recall the local legend of the undertaker who talked to the dead and was found murdered amongst the dead bodies awaiting preparation for burial.

I decided to question my mother under the pretense of being curious about many of the people pictured in the photo albums that were in my grandmother’s basement.  When we got to the subject of her grandfather, I asked how he had died.  She told me that he died of liver disease when she was a child.  This only served to confuse my assumption that he had died when my grandmother was still a small child.  I then asked her what he did for a living.  She said that he used to be a mortician until her Aunt Sarah died.  After she died, he began drinking and had a nervous breakdown.  Apparently, they sold their house for the money and the family moved into the former funeral home.  My great grandfather then got a job at a lumber mill where he worked till he retired.   I certainly didn’t expect the answer my mother gave me to the next question I asked.  I asked her what had ever happened to the funeral home.  She told me that it was the same house where Grandma was living when she died.

I thought about this for a few moments and then I realized that the basement room where I had found my great grandfather’s memoirs was the very room where he had embalmed my great aunt’s body.  This was a bit unsettling to say the least.  Just reflecting on the fact that such a bizarre thing should have occurred in a place where I had so recently been standing sent a shiver down my spine.

My mind was preoccupied with my great grandfather’s tale for the rest of the evening.  I wondered what had happened after the funeral and why he had so suddenly quit writing.  And then I remembered the mirror that was still in the basement.  I wondered whether or not it was the same mirror.  Even though the room had taken on an eerie aspect in my mind, I couldn’t wait till the next day to go and inspect the mirror.  I didn’t really know why I felt this way or how I could even tell if it was indeed the same mirror, but I felt the impulse to inspect it anyway.

The following day we returned to my grandmother’s house to continue the job of sorting through her belongings.  I stood for several moments at the doorway leading to the stairwell down into the basement and gathered my nerves.  The knowledge that the basement room had been the embalming room of Albert Jenkins was, to me, a disconcerting piece of knowledge that filled me with a feeling of apprehension of descending the stairs.  I doubt that I could have done it if it were night.

I did manage to go down the stairs, however.  The first thing I did was try and imagine what the room would have looked like according to Albert’s descriptions.  Next, I went to the mirror again.  Removing the sheet that covered it, I inspected the size and craftsmanship of the mirror.  It was large and appeared to have been hand crafted.  Then, I stepped back a few feet and regarded myself in the glass.  The sound of a voice startled me.  It was the muffled sound of a small girl’s voice that said, “Daddy?”  I turned around but there was nothing there.  Although the voice was soft, there was no doubt in my mind that I had heard it.  I turned back to the mirror, and I decided that I would control my nerves and refrain from turning around.

Once again, I heard the unmistakable sound of a small girl’s voice coming from, what sounded like, the far corner.  “Daddy?” and then the words were too muffled to make out.  I heard something about “the darkness” and once again the words couldn’t be made out.  I continued to listen to the sound trying to discern from where it originated.  It sounded like the voice was coming from inside the wall in the far corner.  Then I heard a creaking noise and faint knocks that grew louder.  Then the voice grew louder and more intense.  “Daddy, It’s so dark!  Why won’t you let me out?”  My heart was thundering in my chest and my legs were shaking.

I was just about to turn around when I heard a footfall on the steps.  At this I nearly fainted and it was all I could do to control my urge to turn around.  The voice inside the wall was louder now.  I could make out the words of “bad lady” and pleas for “Daddy”.  I clutched the edges of the mirror, my knuckles turning white.  I forced myself to watch the smooth surface of the mirror with the doorway reflected in its shiny glass.  The steps on the stairwell were growing closer.  I imagined the apparition that would enter the room.  The cries were growing more strained as the steps descended.  And then the form of Lilith entered the room.  My breath froze in my body.  She was shrouded in a discolored, long dress.  Her hair was in disarray and her filthy hands were outstretched towards me.  But it was her face that I shall be haunted by in my dreams.  Twisted into a grotesque grimace of hatred and clotted with blood and dirt; the mangled head wound was clearly visible upon her forehead.  Our eyes met and I could feel the hatred searing into my soul.  I could take no more and I whirled about with the mirror still clutched in my hands and threw it at where she would have been; but there was no one there.  The heavy mirror flew a few feet and crashed onto the floor shattering into a million shards.  And then I fainted.

My mother and my uncle rushed downstairs upon hearing the loud crash of the old mirror.  They found me lying on the floor in a swoon and assisted me back upstairs where they attended me.

After I recovered my senses I recounted the entire story of the previous day, night, and recent ordeal.  They listened patiently while I explained all the horrific details of Albert’s memoirs.  They were skeptical but my Uncle Lawrence still was intrigued enough to go and investigate the room while my mother tended my recovering anxiety.

He went back downstairs to explore the wall from whence the voice had originated.  It was behind the wall that he discovered the old lift that had been concealed for so many years.  Inside of the lift he found the coffin that contained the mummified body of my great aunt.  She was finally buried two weeks after her sister who died at eighty-two years of age.

It is said that fear feeds on itself.  I don’t doubt this to be true, but being equipped with such wisdom doesn’t diminish in the least any amount of fear once it has begun to feed.  Even though the rational part of the mind understands the unwarranted reason for such trifling feelings of uneasiness, it is the subconscious portion that whispers that such justifications are mere Potemkin villages erected by the mind in an effort to preserve all sanity.

You will think me mad, no doubt, to hear me confess that the doll was alive.  That is your right, but I advise such rash criticisms to be checked before hearing my testimony.  For no man is above such horrors when they grow so imperceptibly slow.  Yes, I would advise my story to be a warning of such slow gnawings of fear that eventually escalates into irrational outbursts of horror.

Not only did I suspect the doll to have a life of its own, but I also knew it plotted against me.  It was all very mental, you see.  Whether it was an evil force working through the guise of a doll or my own convoluted paranoia, the effect was still the same; and, of these two choices, I cannot honestly say which is more horrifying if proven to be the truth.

The first time I toured my elderly aunt’s house the doll had no effect on me at all.  I didn’t even notice the damn thing, to be honest.  My dear aunt was ill, you see, and I made arrangements to assist her in her convalescence.  The poor dear couldn’t manage by herself.

It was my first time to behold her exquisite manor.  I never had the opportunity to visit her on any happier occasion.  My aunt showed me around, but even this wore her out to the extreme.  I helped her return to her chambers and she drifted to sleep almost immediately.  So, I quietly closed her door and went downstairs to unpack and rest.

On the tour of the house she showed me to the spare bedroom, which I would be occupying during my stay.  The room had once belonged to my cousin, and my aunt had preserved it for all these years.  It appeared just as it had when Clara was a child.  The doll sat on a small child’s chair in the corner of the room closest to the foot of the bed.  It was a porcelain doll with brown hair in pigtails, tied with blue bows.  The bows matched the dress, which was frilly and lace adorned.  It wore white stockings and shiny black shoes.  It was about two-foot tall and sat on the chair slumped down to one side with its big glass eyes staring straight at the bed.  The effect wouldn’t have been so unsettling if it weren’t for the sinister, little smile upon its rosy-cheeked face.  It was truly an evil expression.

I didn’t notice it until I had been busy unpacking my suitcase for many minutes – hanging my clothes in the closet and placing them in the bureau.  It was then that, all of the sudden, I had the strangest feeling that I was being watched.  I instinctively turned to the door but there was no one there.  Then my eyes came to rest upon the doll.  I regarded it with little more than a cursory glance and resumed my unpacking.  I next went around the bed and retrieved my alarm clock and a couple of books in order to place them on the nightstand.  Again I chanced a look at the doll.  I placed no importance or second thought into these glances, but each time I moved to a different part of the room I stole a glance at the doll.  Its eyes followed me wherever I happened to be in the room.  It was really not such a fantastic thing.  Portraits are notorious for this quality if the artist captures the angle right.  And they are mere two-dimensional objects.  A fully three-dimensional doll should, theoretically, possess this quality in even greater range.  But it still gave me the creepiest feeling that I was being watched.

The remainder of the evening was spent with dear Aunt Sophie.  She awoke after her nap and came downstairs whereupon I prepared dinner for the two of us.  After dinner we adjourned to the living room to talk and catch up on family affairs.  The night was chilly so I stoked a healthy fire so that Aunt Sophie would be comfortable while we reminisced about my childhood escapades.  It was about this time that Aunt Sophie began talking about Clara’s death.  Poor Aunt Sophie broke down in tears talking about how much she still missed Clara, even after all these many years.  Clara and I were close in age until Clara passed away at the tender age of eleven.

I let her sorrow run its course while offering an occasional consoling word or phrase, but the cheeriness of our reunion was thoroughly quelled by the gloominess of the atmosphere that hung in the house after evoking the memory of Clara.

The subject changed to other things in an effort to lift the sadness but it wasn’t long lived.  I helped Aunt Sophie to her chambers once again.  She smiled at me and thanked me for taking time out of my busy schedule to help her through her lingering illness.  I assured her that it was the least I could do to assist my favorite aunt and then we said goodnight.  I returned to the living room and sat reading for a short time, waiting for the fire to burn low.  I was tired from my travels so I decided to retire to the bed and resume my reading.

I washed, donned my nightclothes, retrieved my book, and crawled into bed.  And there sat the doll – glaring at me.  I attempted to read but my concentration was destroyed.  I barely got through a paragraph before I was compelled to peer over the top of my book right into the face of that little fiendish expression.  I was being irrational, I told myself.  It was just a doll for God’s sake.  Just a child’s doll!  But its eyes tore right into me.  Its eyes would not stop imploring something of me.  Accusing me of something I could not name or know.  I became irritated and closed my book with a snap, extinguished the light, and rolled over to go to sleep.

Sleep didn’t come, as it should to a person who has been traveling all day.  I refused to look at the doll.  But I knew it was there.  It was still there watching me.  Knowing that I only pretended to sleep.  Knowing that I only pretended it didn’t bother me; but it knew all right.  It knew because it witnessed my annoyance.  It had the satisfaction of seeing my display of annoyance by slamming my book closed.

I awoke three times that night.  Each time I tried to resist looking at the doll but it was futile.  I couldn’t fight it and I looked to see the eyes staring right at me – the face smirking at my misery.  I wanted more than anything to just get up and reposition the doll where its face was turned away from me; but I kept telling myself that a grown man of sound mind wouldn’t bother with such inane actions.  Those were the acts of a child or a superstitious fool, not a grown man of mental soundness such as myself.  But, somehow, I endured the night.  When I awoke the next morning I expected the sunlight to have a calming effect.  The morning light is notorious for converting strange night thoughts into laughable embarrassments.  This wasn’t the case, however.  The doll’s expression was still there in the corner gazing at me in accusation.  So, I busied myself with changing clothes and grooming and such, trying my best to ignore the doll.  It was a useless attempt.

Finally, I couldn’t take any more of the eyes upon me and decided to reposition the doll.  Once I decided this course of action I immediately felt in control of the situation.  I promptly marched over to the chair and reached down to grasp the doll, but my hands stopped short.  I felt repulsion at the thought of touching it, like a person might feel at touching a maggot-ridden corpse of an animal.  I didn’t stop to analyze why this might be so. Instead, I reached down and grabbed the leg of the chair and turned the entire chair, doll and all.  The doll, which was already leaning over, fell from the chair and I instinctively reached out and caught it by the arm.  I was so repulsed by its touch that I quickly flung it back onto the chair.  So quick and sporadic were my actions that its arm nearly ripped completely off.  I felt ashamed of how ridiculous I was acting.  It was just a stupid doll!

At breakfast I decided to tell Aunt Sophie about the doll’s arm.  Of course I didn’t tell her how it really happened.  She would have thought me a lunatic.  I told her I accidentally bumped the chair on passing and tried to catch the doll.  She immediately got up and rushed into Clara’s room to see the doll.  I followed, a bit confused at her overreaction.

She picked the doll up and cradled it like an infant while investigating the damage.  I found this to be so repulsive that I had to restrain myself from slapping the nasty little thing out of her arms.  The doll knew I felt this way.  It stared at me the whole time with its smug little grin.  I knew that it was already plotting its revenge.

Then my aunt revealed to me the reason why the doll had caused her to react in such haste.  The doll was very dear to Clara’s heart and it was her closest companion all the way up till the moment of her death, which was in the very bed where I had slept last night.  I was completely unaware of the fact that Clara died in her bed.  I just assumed she passed away while in the hospital.  This knowledge laid upon me a new uneasiness, which only served to compound the sinister atmosphere of the doll.  Aunt Sophie said that Clara had named the doll Tiffy, which was a children’s pronunciation of Tiffany.  And now, suddenly, the object of my derision had a name – Tiffy.

Aunt Sophie took the doll away to her sewing room and commented that she would have to repair the damage later.  She assured me there was no harm done since the rip had occurred along the seam and could be mended without any indication that it had ever occurred.  I apologized and conveyed my relief that no permanent damage was done.  Of course these were bald-faced lies and I merely acted like I was concerned for Tiffy’s well-being when, in reality, I was rather sorry I hadn’t done worse.

I was, nevertheless, glad of the fact that the doll was removed from Clara’s room.  As long as the doll wasn’t around, my rest would be much better.

That evening after dinner Aunt Sophie and I once again adjourned to the living room before the fire.  I was enjoying an after dinner drink as we talked.  Then Aunt Sophie remembered the doll and retrieved it from her sewing room along with a needle and thread.  When she entered the room and I saw what she intended to do, my spirits plummeted.  The evening I thought would be relaxing and free of the presence of the doll, now turned out to be doubly stressful.  For, I not only had to endure its presence in Clara’s room, but also its presence in the living room as well.

As she worked on mending the arm of the beast it stared at me relentlessly.  Aunt Sophie talked as she concentrated on her sewing and was oblivious to my anger.  Conversation was strained because I was so furious.  I longed to snatch the doll from her hands and hurl it into the fire.  Its stare was so reprehensible.  As the needle went in and out of its arm it just looked at me and smiled as if to point out the fact that it was impervious to physical pain.  No, I knew what it meant even though there were no words.  That was the point see?  Its power was mental in nature.  It projected its grotesque and evil aura through the eyes straight into the mind.  And though you might think that the little beast was but an inanimate object and my hatred was misplaced, I tell you, there was most assuredly life there.  It may not have possessed life like you or I possess but there was a life present, an unnamable and unwholesome life that resided behind that atrocious smile and those accusing eyes.

I just prayed that Aunt Sophie wouldn’t finish the job.  But my hopes were soon dashed as Aunt Sophie announced her completion of the job, even going so far as to rise and offer the doll for my inspection.  I attempted a smile and commented on her handiwork but made no move to touch the creature.  The doll obviously thought this was befitting because it mocked me with its nasty little smile of triumph.  Then, to my horror, Aunt Sophie proceeded to take the thing back into Clara’s room and deposit it right back upon the chair.

I prolonged the inevitable all that I could, but I eventually resolved to go to bed.  Aunt Sophie had dismissed herself some hours prior and I passed the time reading.  I dreaded the thought of being in the same room with the doll again.  No matter how much I tried to convince myself of the absurdity of such fears, it still gnawed at my brain.  Finally, I decided to exert my true courage and go in the room without looking at the doll and go straight to bed.  And this is what I did.

I couldn’t go to sleep though.  I lay there knowing her big, glassy eyes were locked on me.  What manner of vile being could she be, I wondered?  A child’s toy! Oh No!  There was something much too sinister in it to be a mere child’s plaything.  She wanted something of me and that was certain, but what?  Why was she conducting the undoing of my sanity?  It couldn’t be the rending of her arm.  That came after it all began.  But I swear that as I flung her into the chair, she grabbed back!  I felt it and there is nothing that can remove that certainty from my head.

I could take no more.  My thoughts were swarming in intensity.  I couldn’t resist!  Knowing that her eyes were piercing me like knives!  I peeked out from beneath the covers and the sight was so horrible that I sat bolt upright in bed!  The horrid little beast had moved!  By God it had moved!  I sat staring at it, my breathing fast and hard, and my heart thumping so fast I thought I would pass out.

It occurred to me then that the doll hadn’t actually moved, but that Aunt Sophie had replaced it in a different position more erect in its sitting posture upon the chair.  I wiped my brow and tried to gain control of myself.  What a fool I had become.  I took a long, deep breath and regarded the doll.  “Tiffy.”  I said the name out loud, almost spitting the name from my mouth in disgust.

It may not have actually moved but its expression had changed.  I tried to convince myself that it was just because the doll was sitting more upright than before, but this, of course, was not true.  Its mouth was more twisted than the angle could account for.  For whatever reason why it plotted against my sanity, it was getting angrier the longer it took to accomplish my undoing.

I tried one more time to ignore the thing and go to sleep but it was useless.  I couldn’t bear the test of wills any longer and rose from the bed with a rush, growled at the little monster, and went into the living room to sleep on the couch.  I immediately fell into the most relaxing and comfortable sleep.

Then I was being awakened!  The doll’s hands were upon me and its eyes were no farther away than a foot!  I was had!  The beast had me!  I moaned in distress and came to my senses.  And there, replacing the doll’s devilish face, was Aunt Sophie.  She had risen in the middle of the night to find me asleep on the couch.  Thinking I had dozed off unintentionally, she awoke me and told me to go to Clara’s room and get into bed.  I couldn’t tell her the truth so I played along with her assumption and went to the room.

I was so tired that all I wanted to do was return to the world of sleep from which Aunt Sophie had snatched me from to deposit me once again in this tormented hell.  I could hear Aunt Sophie go in the kitchen to get something to drink.  I crawled under the covers and turned to my nemesis.  She mocked me like never before and I became furious.

“What – do – you – want – from – me?”  I said each word forcefully but quietly.  I thought to myself that eventually I would grow so tired that not even the doll could keep me from sleep.  But sleep did not come.  Only thoughts of those eyes ripping into my mind!  I prayed for sleep.  Even the sleep of death would be better than this agonizing torture upon my senses.

Thoughts of death made me think of Clara and her deathbed.  That is when it hit me – the realization of the doll’s motive.   Aunt Sophie said that Tiffy was Clara’s companion until the last moment of her life.  Obviously she saw me as an intruder on her mistress’ property.  The connection to the deathbed was such a strong psychical bond that an interloper would only breed ill will.  But my anger only grew.  Even with this realization I continued to stew in my hatred.

Exhaustion, fear, anger, and repulsion all mixed together in a maddening blend of psychotic rage that erupted from me uncontrollably.  The smirk on the damned thing had changed again and the eyes finally succeeded in affecting my mental breakdown!  I rose from the bed with a scream and threw the covers off.  I grabbed the little demon up and began shaking it back and forth as I screamed, “Stop staring at me you damn little beast!  Stop staring at me!”  I shook and cursed and ranted as all of the pent up rage boiled out of me.  I couldn’t shake it hard enough I tell you!  I continued cursing and screaming until finally I caused Aunt Sophie to come running.  And just as she arrived in the doorway I took the doll by the feet and swung it round.  As I screamed, “Go be with your precious Clara!” I dashed the doll to the floor and raised my foot to stomp in its hideous, porcelain head.  But before I could deliver the fatal blow I noticed Aunt Sophie staring in horror at the scene before her.  Before I could do anything further she fainted to the floor, crumpling in a heap.

I regained my senses and rushed to her side.  The poor dear must have thought me a lunatic!  For that is exactly what I had become!  My condition was only a temporary malady, but how was she to know this?  She didn’t know the tortures I had endured from the demonic little imp.

I picked her up and placed her on the bed.  I checked for breathing signs.  Although faint, she was, thankfully, still alive.  The strain had been too much for her feeble condition.  My outburst must have appeared like shear madness to her!  But it wasn’t really me who caused this, no!  It was the doll!  The damn doll!

“It was the doll!” I cried.  I turned to finish the deed I had started, but I froze at what I beheld.  Tiffy’s eyes no longer watched me!  The eyes were now looking at the swooning form on Clara’s bed.  The eyes now looked at Aunt Sophie.

The entire nightmare culminated on an unusually cool night in August.  That was the night the scarecrow got his revenge on Uncle Nash.  I didn’t understand what was going on until after that night.  You see, I thought the scarecrow was after me.  Aunt Leda caught me one day after Uncle Nash’s death standing in the burnt spot where the scarecrow used to stand just gazing at the house.  It freaked her out pretty bad because she knew my preoccupation with the scarecrow. She didn’t believe that it was the scarecrow that killed Uncle Nash and thought I was crazy for talking about such things.  I guess she thought that I was really crazy standing there after the scarecrow was gone.  I can’t blame her, but I wasn’t crazy.  I was just on the verge of figuring the whole thing out.  All I was doing was trying to see the house from the scarecrow’s vantage in order to determine whether or not he could see inside the house.  When I realized that he couldn’t see inside the house that’s when I knew that he hadn’t been after me.  I was scared for my life and didn’t even think that it was Uncle Nash he was after all along.

I guess I should start from the beginning in order to give you the whole story.  You probably agree with Aunt Leda and think I’m talking a bunch of nonsense.  The first thing I need to tell you is how I came to live with my aunt and uncle way out here in the middle of Indiana.  My mother died when I was just a little baby so I never even knew her.  She got real sick when I was about to turn a year old and the illness killed her.  My dad tried to raise me the best he could but he had a hard time.  He traveled a lot with his job and was always leaving me with this or that person.  I didn’t have a very stable parental figure in my life those first several years.  Finally, my mom’s oldest sister Leda offered to take me in.  Dad used to come by and visit pretty regular but as the years went by I saw less and less of him.  Sometimes it makes me mad but he and I never really saw eye to eye on much anyway.

I remember the day Uncle Nash built the scarecrow.  I watched in fascination as he fabricated the creature right in front of my very eyes.  I helped where I could but he did most of the work.  He started with an old pair of coveralls and an old flannel shirt.  We stuffed the hay and patted, bent, and kneaded the straw until the body was the shape he wanted.  Then he took a ratty pair of boots and attached the feet.  Next he gave his creation hands in the form of old gardening gloves.  He took an old burlap bag and made the head.  The first thing he did was cut out two eyeholes, then he drew on the nose and mouth, and finally, he stuffed more hay into the bag.  The first time I beheld the face I thought it looked odd.  Not odd in a scary way because the expression looked like a happy expression.  It was weird in a lot of ways.  It didn’t look real, yet it didn’t look fake, either – almost like it was both alive and dead at the same time.  I can’t really describe it any other way.  But it did look happy at first.

Uncle Nash attached the scarecrow to a cross with its arms outstretched and then we hauled it out of the barn and stood it up in the spot I told you about earlier.  My bedroom was on the first floor of the house and I could look right out of my bedroom window at the scarecrow.  It was about 50 or 60 yards across the lawn and just inside the cornfield but that was plenty close enough for me to see it staring in my window.  At least I thought it could see in my window.

Uncle Nash and I stood back from the newly erected scarecrow and admired his creation.  “Billy, it needs one more thing to make it complete,” he said to me after a moment.

“What’s that, Uncle Nash?”

“A hat.  Run to the barn and fetch me that old straw hat hanging by Trixie’s stall,” he instructed.  Trixie was one of our milk cows.  I hurried off and returned with the straw hat in a matter of seconds and he hoisted me up so that I could place the hat on its head.  While I was up there my face was just a few inches from the scarecrow’s face and that’s when I saw something strange in the scarecrow’s eyes.  Something I can only describe as sadness.  When Uncle Nash lowered me down and I was able to behold the final product I noticed the entire expression had changed.  It no longer looked like the smiling, happy face in the barn.  Now it had drooped a bit and taken on a horrible look of anger.  It made me feel very uncomfortable.

I had drapes on my window, thank God.  I never used to close them until after Uncle Nash put the scarecrow up.  The first few nights weren’t too bad and I didn’t really even pay much attention to the scarecrow.  There were a couple of times that I happened to look out the window and see him there at the edge of the corn.  I didn’t look long because I felt my skin crawl.  It was like he was staring at me.

It was probably on the fourth or fifth night that I looked out the window and thought I saw him move.  At least, that was my first impression; and you know what they say about first impressions.  But, then I just told myself it was the wind that did it.  Well, the next night I couldn’t resist watching him again.  I hid behind the drapes and peeked out because I felt for sure he wouldn’t move if he knew I was watching him.  It wasn’t long before I saw him moving his arms; and there was no mistaking that it wasn’t the wind because the corn was as still as a rock.  Boy, did I ever have a tough time trying to go to sleep that night.

It was the next day that we found the first dead crow.  I was following Uncle Nash and he happened to walk right near the scarecrow.  I didn’t like walking that close to the thing but as long as Uncle Nash was with me I did it.  He would’ve thought me a pansy if he new I was scared of his scarecrow.  Anyway, we were walking by it and I was making an effort to keep my eyes away from its face.  That’s when I saw the mutilated crow.  I pointed it out to Uncle Nash and he knelt down to take a closer look.  Its wings and head had been ripped clean off of its body.  Uncle Nash grunted in confusion and mumbled something about a wildcat in the cornfield then we left.  But the strange thing is that I saw Uncle Nash glance back at the scarecrow.

That wasn’t the only crow we found torn apart like that.  After that we started finding them all over the place.  At first they were always close to the scarecrow but one day I walked upon one a good hundred yards or so from the scarecrow.  I froze stiff as a board and stared at it thinking of the implications of what I was seeing.

Then one night I peeked out the window and saw the scarecrow’s cross was empty.  It took a second for my brain to register what I was seeing but then I saw a boot disappearing into the corn and I screamed.  It scared me so bad I went running to Uncle Nash and Aunt Leda and told them about how scared I was of the scarecrow and how I thought he was alive.  Of course they thought I was a certified loon.  Uncle Nash was a stern man and he wouldn’t entertain any non-sense at all.  He was going to make me go back to bed but thankfully Aunt Leda intervened.  After that I was allowed to sleep in their room on the floor whenever I got too scared, which was pretty much every night.

I should mention that I never went to church until I moved in with Aunt Leda and Uncle Nash.  Since living with them I had started going with them to Sunday School like clockwork.  It was a ritual that I enjoyed quite a bit because I love good stories and we always came home to the best meal of the week.  I mean, I loved Aunt Leda’s cooking all the time, but on Sunday she put a little extra effort into her cooking.  Anyway, it was the stories I had heard at Sunday School that affected me most about the making of the scarecrow.

While we were making the scarecrow I kept thinking about God making Adam.  I know that the Bible says God blew into a bunch of dust but seeing Uncle Nash building a straw man made me think about it all the same.  It was like Uncle Nash was creating new life.  That’s why the scarecrow looked happy.  But then, when we built the wood cross and mounted the scarecrow on it I began to think of Jesus and how he was crucified.  And that’s why the scarecrow looked sad.

Now I’ve finally figured it all out and I realize that the reason he was angry and wanted revenge on his creator was because he was crucified so soon after being born.  It’s like he was enslaved the moment he was born.  Stuck up on that pole unable to do anything but watch and plot.

Keep in mind that I hadn’t figured all this out at the time.  I was just plain scared of the thing without really being able to explain why.

Aunt Leda’s sister, my Aunt Peggy, lived in Cincinnati and she came down with a real bad illness.  Aunt Leda volunteered to go and help her out for several days.  I begged her to take me but she wouldn’t let me.  I had to go to school and help Uncle Nash with chores.  Well, as I said, Uncle Nash wouldn’t put up with any craziness like being scared of scarecrows and sleeping on the floor at the foot of their bed so I had to return to my room.

The next few nights I didn’t sleep very well at all.  It was all I could do to keep from running upstairs to Uncle Nash.  Then, on the third night after Aunt Leda left was when everything came to a head.  That’s the night the scarecrow killed Uncle Nash.  I was lying in bed with the light on trying my best to keep my mind off of the scarecrow.  I remember I was reading a comic book.  It was probably about 11:30 or so when I suddenly heard a noise outside.  I’m telling you my heart sunk and a chill spread over my whole body.

I figured that I could either sit and be scared or I could peek out the window just to be sure that there was nothing there.  Slowly I crept to the side of the window and peeked around the edge of the drape.  And there was the scarecrow with his face pressed right up to the glass searching the room with his vacant eyes.  I jumped back and screamed as loud as I could.  My mind was yelling at me to run but I was frozen solid.  The scarecrow disappeared from the window just moments before Uncle Nash burst into the room.  I was crying a flood and trying to explain to him what had happened but he would have none of it.  He took a look out of the window, closed the drapes, and said, “The scarecrow is right where he’s always been out in the cornfield.  Now I want you to quit talking this childish nonsense about that darn scarecrow and go to bed.  It’s late and you gotta get up and go to school tomorrow.”

He turned and left and I thought to myself that he had been lying.  The only way to see the cornfield was to turn my bedroom light off so I knew that he didn’t see the scarecrow when he looked outside.  After Uncle Nash left my room I shut the door and locked it.  Then I climbed in the corner of my closet and hid trying the best I could not to cry too loud.  It was about ten or fifteen minutes later when I heard Uncle Nash scream.  I didn’t move, though.  I was in too big of a shock to do anything but sit and rock and try to keep my whimpering as quiet as possible as I waited for the scarecrow to arrive.

The next morning I was roused from my torpor by a policeman breaking down my door.  Everything was a flurry of faces and questions.  I remember telling the authorities about the scarecrow and asking about Uncle Nash.  Of course they thought I was delusional and that I was making up the story to compensate somehow from the shock of discovering my Uncle Nash’s lifeless body in his bed and having to spend the night alone with his corpse.  Then, the next thing I remember was being in Uncle Nash’s room with a whole bunch of people.  Uncle Nash was lying on the bed with a physician over him.  I could see his eyes staring dead and vacant at the ceiling.  His old, wrinkled face was frozen into an openmouthed look of horror.

The doctor announced to no one in particular that it appeared he had died of a heart attack but I knew that he had really died of fright.  That’s when my eyes came to rest on the straw on the floor and I knew that it was the scarecrow.  I retreated from the room unbeknownst to all of the officials.  There was only one thing for me to do – destroy the scarecrow.

I went directly to the barn and retrieved a can of gasoline and matches then proceeded to march out to the cornfield.  I had to work fast because if the police discovered that I was missing from the house they would stop me.  I half expected the scarecrow to be gone never to return, but as I crossed the yard I could see him upon his cross.  My steps slowed and a wave of apprehension spread through me.  The fear rose in me making my hands shake so bad that I nearly dropped the gas can.  I thought about Uncle Nash’s face frozen in that final scream I had heard echoing in my mind all night and his eyes now vacuous like a dead fish’s eyes.

Tears began to stream down my face but thinking of the scarecrow killing Uncle Nash succeeded in replacing the fear with anger.  I unscrewed the cap and as soon as I arrived before the scarecrow I began splashing the gas onto him.  I looked into his face and I saw that now his expression was one of evil satisfaction.  A devilish and hateful grin mockingly jeered at me, for he had finally completed his hell-spawned mission of killing Uncle Nash.  

As I circled him splashing as much gasoline onto the ratty coveralls as I could his head turned to watch me.  Then his arms began to move as he worked at disengaging himself from the cross.  I made a trail of gasoline from him across the dirt and once the can was empty I dropped it and stepped back.  He had nearly freed himself by the time I pulled the box of matches from my pocket.  I kept glancing from the matches to the scarecrow trying to hurry and get a match out of the box.  He was freeing his legs.  I struck a match and dropped it but nothing happened.  The match had gone out.  The scarecrow dropped from the cross.  I struck a second match cupping my hands around it as I lowered it to the ground. Then there was a resounding whoof as the gas erupted in flames and raced across the dirt.  The scarecrow was advancing towards me.  He looked at the fire not comprehending what it meant until it was too late.

The scarecrow burst into a roaring conflagration.  The flames caught on the dry hay that was his body and threw up great licking flames along the cross.  I stood and watched in amazement, oblivious to anything else.  I took great pleasure in seeing the scarecrow thrash about in pain.  It was screaming a high-pitched whine that didn’t belong to any creature I had ever heard.

Finally, it fell to all fours and tried to crawl towards me.  I just stared at its blackened face and backed away slowly.  Then it fell to the ground and tried to make one last effort to reach out a hand towards me.  Then, it died.

I kept staring at the burning remains of the scarecrow until a voice of one of the policemen broke my attention.  I looked up to behold a sight stranger than anything I dared imagine.  In a circle about the scarecrow, the cross, and myself – filling every available inch of the cornstalks – were thousands of crows watching the scarecrow burn in perfect silence.

The old man said it would happen.  He said that Simon would forget the route to the bay.  Now, in the early morning dawn, Simon clambered across the rock-strewn shore straining his gaze into the bay for a glimpse of the isle; but it was too dim to discern anything through the thick fog.  All that he could see was the glass-like surface of the calm, dark water receding into the wispy mist.  He cared little for routes now.  The destination was the sole focus of his mind.

Simon looked like a figure from a by-gone era traversing this rugged shore in a long, woolen, white cloak.  He looked closer to an ancient druid than a well-to-do gentleman.  The old man was adamant about the cloak – going so far as to supply the garment himself.  He said it was the only attire that would ensure the meeting would take place.

Simon was beginning to wonder if he had discovered the wrong inlet when he spotted the boat mooring about fifty yards down the pebble-ridden shoreline.  He turned in its direction and picked up his pace in anticipation.  Arriving at the mooring, he quickly began to inspect its ancient structure.  The wood was aged, but timeless.  Not of any tree that had grown on this Earth for an unimaginable epoch of time, it appeared dark and shiny.  The metallic fastenings and accoutrements were of a metal no man could have identified.  They had a luster completely alien to anything Simon had ever seen.  He rubbed his hands over the wood and the metal fascinated by their texture and timelessness.

As he exercised his sense of touch, his gaze once again strained for the island.  Still concealed by the copious amounts of fog, it was useless to strain the eyes.  It was not like growing accustomed to a darkened environment.  No amount of re-focusing or iris adjustment would penetrate the cottony, ghost-like haze rising from the surface of the dark waters.  But it didn’t matter to Simon.  Oh no, he knew by the mooring, which his hands still caressed, that this was the destination he so longed for.  But now it was time to find a hiding place, for Death would be arriving soon to meet the Ferryman with another load of his precious passengers and this was the spot where the transfer of cargo would take place.

Simon picked his way up the eastward slope of the bay to find a place of concealment amongst the large boulders.  He wanted to find the perfect vantage point to witness both the island and the boat landing.  Finding a low spot behind a large rock outcropping, Simon squatted down into the cool shadows and tried to find a comfortable position to wait for the dawn’s events.

Simon turned his gaze from the misty bay towards the inland direction from which Death would be coming.  He tried to imagine in what form Death would appear.  Would it be as the Grim Reaper, with his black, hooded cloak and harvest sickle poised above his head like the antithesis of a halo, walking slowly in front of the dead as a shepherd leading its doomed flock?  Or would he be riding some nightmare steed and come with the long line of the dead, shackled in tow?  And then it struck Simon that he had never asked the old man in what form that ghastly apparition called Death would appear.  How very odd this seemed to him now.

Simon had more-or-less stumbled across the eccentric old man while in transit aboard The Juleinder from America to Scotland.  That particular night was a pleasant night – neither too cold nor too muggy.  A cool breeze was blowing out of the North Atlantic.  Simon went out onto the promontory bow for a cigar to complement his cognac after dinner.  He was enjoying the cool, night air when the old man joined him uninvited.  Rather than being put off by the intrusion, Simon was more than welcome for the company. “Delightful night is it not?”  The old man announced in a Scottish accent as he looked out across the sea.  He could have been talking to anyone, but Simon was the only one within earshot.

“Yes, sir, it is that.  Would you care for a cigar my good man?”  Simon offered out of politeness.  “They are from my farm in Winston-Salem.”

“That would be magnificent,” the old man replied.  Simon produced another cigar and assisted the old man with the lighting.  The old man took a long draw on the cigar, smacked his tongue and lips as if tasting a piece of cake then he exhaled the smoke and nodded in approval to Simon.

“Excellent cigar, lad.  So, you own a tobacco farm you say?”

“Yes, sir, it is a family business my father started, and I am now the chief executor of the estate and the family business.  The name is Simon Bancroft,” Simon said offering his hand in formal greeting.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance.  I am the Earl Roland McDermott.”

“Ah, a nobleman.  I am honored by your company,” Simon said in surprise.  He didn’t expect this elderly gentleman to be more than common folk.  Simon leaned his back against the railing of the ship and regarded the old man.

“Yes, but I am afraid it is little more than a title in this day and age.  I was out of my homeland for quite some time on business and upon my return I was saddened to discover that my family had mismanaged my estate and land holdings.  But, I am happy to announce that I have made great strides in the recovery of my estate and am just now returning from a very productive business venture in the United States.”

“Well,” said Simon growing more intrigued by this mysterious old man of royal blood, “I am pleased to hear of your recovering good fortune.  As I said, my business is the tobacco business, but my pleasure is something entirely different; and, while it is your business that brings you to my homeland, it is my pleasure that brings me to yours.  I should very much like to talk to you about my hobby so that maybe you can assist me on my trip.  I am quite a bibliophile, and I am going to Scotland in search of some antiquarian books.”

“Oh, you are a collector of classical texts then?” the old man said, his eyes lighting up with interest. 

“Well, in a sense, yes; but, to be more precise – books that are of an occult nature,” Simon said cautiously, not sure exactly how the elder gentleman would receive this.

The old man’s face broke into a broad grin and he said, “My son, I believe now it is me who must congratulate you on your good fortune.”

The two men talked through the night until the first tentative rays of light topped the distant, unobstructed horizon.  They did not even pause to enjoy the beautiful sunrise, so enthralled in tales of the arcane and forbidden.  The Earl told stories of ancient and forgotten locales that so intrigued Simon that Simon could swear the man had actually been there.  It wasn’t until late into the night, and several cognacs later, that the old man finally told of his intimate knowledge of the Isle of the Dead.  While at first Simon was skeptical of this tale, he was more than impressed with the Earl’s knowledge of the occult and especially rare books.

After making landfall the Earl invited Simon to his estate just north of Perth.  He promised him that it would be worth his time and promised fine hospitality.  Simon had several appointments in Edinburgh with book dealers but promised to rendezvous with the Earl at his estate in four days’ time.

Any doubts Simon had about the Earl’s integrity were quickly abolished upon beholding the Earl McDermott’s impressive library.  At first, he was thinking of avoiding the estate altogether but something in the old man’s mannerisms had arrested his intrigue.  The old man seemed to be a man out of place in the current day even more so than the average elderly person who is not “with the times” – almost as if the old man were from a bygone era of time.  Fortunately for Simon he decided at last to visit the estate, partly out of disappointment in his book hunting in Edinburgh and partly out of a peaked interest in the vague timelessness of the old man.

Upon beholding the rare and well-preserved texts in the library at the McDermott Estate the two men once again descended into conversations of the occult and arcane.  It was on this evening that the Earl McDermott swayed the conviction of Simon in regards to the existence of the Isle of the Dead.  The old man had been there himself!  Not only did the old man discover the location and visit the exact spot where Simon now waited amongst the rocks, he had met with Charon!  Yes, the old man had met with Charon, the Ferryman of the River Styx; and the Earl promised Simon that he too could make that same journey!

Simon was, of course, skeptical in the fashion of any man with sound reason.  That was when the Earl escorted Simon into the underground tunnels that led through secret, subterranean passageways, which appeared to have been carved from the rocks under the Scottish soil in ancient and mythical days.  Through twisting labyrinths of lichen and niter covered stone they progressed until they arrived at the Earl’s hidden prize – a small, circular room lined with ancient tomes.

“Here you will find the most forbidden and ancient works, dating back through the epoch of the human soul into the distant and remote infancy of our race.  There have existed many dark and secretive societies throughout time.  From the most sinister tribes of the darkest jungles to the most horrific and power mad dynasties.  What is represented here very few men would believe and even fewer have seen,” the old man spoke in a delicate whisper as if speaking his words too loud would invite the presence of ill forces.

Simon browsed the books without touching them in an awe he had never felt in his life.  The old man said, “It’s all right, go ahead and touch them.  I encourage you to read them.  Many are in languages that this Earth has not heard for eons of time; but these here are in Arabic, Sanskrit, Latin, and Greek.  These here are the ones that have been translated into English.”  Simon reverently touched the thirty or so books the old man had indicated.

“I will leave you to read now,” he said preparing to return to the main part of the mansion above ground.  “I shall return to retrieve you when dinner is ready and we shall discuss the things you have read.”  The old man left, the light of his lantern creating a flickering orb of light on the stone walls that slowly disappeared into the darkness of the tunnel.  Simon watched the old man go and then he began to devour the books like a stray dog on scraps.

It was in these forbidden and ancient texts that Simon discovered the most shrouded and clandestine knowledge ever uncovered by the human species.  Forces of such magnitude and mystery that most men would laugh in disbelief should they be touted in a public forum.  But here, here in these books, Simon found indisputable reason, logic, explanation, and even proof of things many cultures had only hinted at and few had directly encountered.  The ramifications of these things were mind-boggling, terrorizing, and even maddening.  When the old man returned to announce that dinner was ready, Simon was swarming with questions.  His entire outlook on reality had altered and he viewed the world in a new and radically alien comprehension.  The Earl smiled as one being “in the know” of some inside joke.

“You have plenty of time to read to your heart’s content.  Come now and let us eat and talk about the things you have read thus far.”

It was over dinner that the Earl offered to arrange the meeting between Simon and Charon.  “It was many years ago that I learned the name of Charon – his real name I mean.  It is essential to the task of meeting him to obey certain rites.  Charon used to be a mortal just like you or I and he has a mortal’s name.  It is imperative to speak his name when the time is right or else he will not heed you.  Charon is descended from the Germanic tribes and his name is Wilhelm Fruehling.  You must call to him his full name in order for him to be lured back to the shore,” the old man said pausing to take a long sip from his wineglass.  Simon had never had such exquisite wine pass his lips before.

“What do you mean, lure him back to the shore?”  

“You must wait till Death has delivered his cargo and departed,” the old man explained.  “Charon will come from the isle to the shore to meet Death when Death comes.  You must wait till Death has departed.  Death must not see you.  Must not.  As soon as Death leaves, you must hurry to call to Charon.  He has to prepare his cargo, but it doesn’t take long.  He will push back out into the waters, and you must call to him before he gets too far.”

“Will I be able to ride with him into the Underworld?” Simon asked.

“Yes,” said the old man.  “You must also wear a cloak like the one Charon wears on this journey.  You must be as inconspicuous as possible in the Underworld or else suspicions will be raised.  If you’re discovered, you may not ever return to this world.”  Simon leaned back heavily in the ornate and high-backed chair.  The thought of actually taking such a journey had his head spinning.  This on top of the knowledge gleaned from the books in the Earl’s secret repository was too much for one evening.  The Earl recognized this and saved the trouble of an excusal.  “My servants have prepared a room for you.  You have had quite an eventful day.  Get some sleep and we will have plenty of time to continue talking tomorrow.”  Then, just as the Earl was about to ring a bell sitting on the tabletop, he paused and said, “One more thing you must promise.  Never, ever, mention one word of the passages below my manor to anyone.  There are very few people in the world that know of their contents.  Do you swear to never tell a soul about it?”

“I promise.  On my word as a scholar and a gentleman, I promise,” Simon said looking the old man straight in the eyes.  “I thank you for allowing me into your confidence.  You are a most gracious host.”

“You’re quite welcome Mr. Bancroft.  I see something in you that I haven’t seen in anyone for quite some time. A trait that is very rare and very unique.  I think it is a combination of curiosity, fortitude, and a desperate need to know the truth.  Now I bid you goodnight and sleep well.”  Then the old man rang the bell and a servant arrived to escort Simon to his room.

“Goodnight, Earl McDermott.”

It seemed like an eternity but was really only about fifteen minutes before Simon realized that the sun was beginning to burn through the fog.  Instead of a roiling mass of fog above the water there were now thick columns of fog.  It was still very dark since the sun was just rising and was still obstructed by the overcast skies.  

Then Simon thought he heard the sound of water.  Could it be?  Yes! There again was the unmistakable sound of water being disturbed!  Very faint but it was there.  It was the rhythm of an oar dipping into the water.  Simon strained once again to locate the origin of the sound.

It continued for several minutes, slowly getting closer and closer, louder and louder.  And then, finally, the ferryboat emerged from the fog far out in the bay – a ghostly figure standing in the boat.  Its gaunt body draped in a white cloak just like the one Simon wore.  A long pole was in its thin hands, and it rowed with the slow precision of a dead leaf falling from a tree in autumn.   Charon’s face wasn’t visible.  The cowl of the hood hid any trace of a form beneath.  Simon’s heart was racing.  He beheld the boat and its occupant the way an old woman would behold an apparition in the night.  He forced himself to swallow hard and tried to regain his composure.  He was shaking and his breathing was labored and irregular.

Could he still go through with it?  Did he possess the will to rise from his haven amongst the rocks and approach this being that radiated such gloom and utter despair?  He seriously doubted if he could.  He could not tear his gaze from this figure.  He watched for many minutes as Charon made slow but deliberate progress to the boat mooring.

Simon was completely oblivious to the gradual increase in the brightness of the morning.  As Charon continued to get closer to the boat mooring Simon suddenly realized that the day had dawned and that the fog had lifted.  He turned his gaze back into the bay and beheld the awesome sight of the Isle of the Dead.  It was the most enigmatic and majestic terrestrial object he had ever beheld.  Most of the isle was a U-shaped, granite cliff.  The height and sheer vertical surface was staggering.  Simon estimated that these cliffs must be about forty or fifty feet high, but it was difficult to gauge such dimensions due to the distance and with no reference for measurement.  The inside of the “U” formed a small lagoon that was enclosed by a wall.  This wall was made of large rocks stacked in such a way as to form a barrier that extended from the tips of both arms of the “U” and met in the middle in two pillars of stacked rock that formed an entrance, or doorway into the lagoon.  In the very middle of the isle grew gigantic Cypress trees that towered over the lagoon.  These large Cypress trees cloaked the lagoon in an ominous darkness and prevented the eyes from penetrating that which the lagoon contained.  The most mysterious and strangest aspect of the isle was the queer doorways in the cliff walls at infrequent intervals.  No two doorways were at the same height and there appeared to be no steps or ladders with which to access these openings.  Each one looked as if it were designed with a different architecture from a different epoch of time.  One appeared to be in the Greek fashion with large, ornate columns flanking the arched aperture while another was little more than a hole in the cliff face.  Simon could not determine the purpose of these openings, but he knew that the isle was the gateway into the Underworld.

A noise of rattling chains aroused Simon from his hypnotic inspection of the isle.  Turning to determine the source of this sound his eyes found Charon reaching the boat mooring.  Simon thought that the sound was coming from Charon and the small boat, but this was not the case.  The sound was coming from further up the shore.  The squeaking, jangling sound was coming from the crest of the hill.  It was a wagon.  The wagon was black and square.  Simon had seen a similar looking wagon one time when a huckster had come through his town selling some kind of magical elixir.  But this wagon looked far more disturbing than the huckster’s flashy wagon.  Two thunderous black steeds with long flowing manes hauled this wagon; and the driver of the wagon was none other than Thanatos, Prince of the Dead.

Charon reached the boat mooring before the wagon of Thanatos but did not exit the boat.  The figure of Charon began to prepare a large burial shroud upon a platform inside the boat.  Meanwhile, the ebony wagon of Thanatos continued its rattling descent from the hill until it halted before the ancient pier.  The horses shook their massive heads and snorted steam into the clammy dawn.  Thanatos sprung off the wagon surprisingly quick – his black cloak swirling about but not revealing his form beneath.  He went around the back of the wagon and just as he was about to be lost from Simon’s point of view he stopped and turned.  Simon’s heart twisted in his chest as he froze in fear.  His breathing halted and his skin crawled with a million chemical needles of terror.  The eyes of Thanatos could clearly be seen beneath the cloak cowl, red and searching.  The moment lasted for only a brief second but to Simon it was the end of all perceived time – an eternity of doubts and fears in one agonizing second.  Then Thanatos disappeared behind the wagon to retrieve his cargo.

A large, amorphous mass of undulating souls was herded from the wagon.  Distinct body parts could occasionally be seen emerging from the main body of the mass as Thanatos, the Reaper of Souls, nipped around them as sprightly as a dog about sheep.  They were driven onto the pier and then aboard the ship.  Once onboard the boat they were wrapped in the shroud that Charon had prepared, at which point they became as still as the bodies which they had so recently vacated.  Upon completing the placement of the shroud the souls took on the form of one, single dead body lying on the platform in the boat – still and lifeless.  Thus they were set for their final journey into the Underworld.

Thanatos, having delivered his cargo, bounded back across the mooring, swung into the driver’s seat, and set his steeds in motion.  The wagon lurched and began to climb the hill.  Charon, having settled the souls, untied the boat, picked up a long pole, and pushed away from the pier.  Simon watched the wagon receding, his heart thundering in his chest as he waited for the right moment to emerge from his concealment.  The boat was drifting further out into the bay, and it seemed as if the wagon would never disappear.  Simon feared that his window of opportunity would be lost and that he would never have this chance again.  The moments were tense, and his gaze kept flitting back and forth between the wagon and the boat, trying to determine the right moment.  Finally, he could not endure another second, so he cautiously rose and began a low run towards the boat mooring.  The wagon was just cresting the hill.  He reached the mooring and ran to the edge.  He looked back to see the wagon disappear, and then he turned, raised his hands to his mouth and began to call out, “Wilhelm!  Wait!  Wilhelm Fruehling, come back!”

He kept calling, not knowing if his cries were reaching the vessel when finally, the figure turned and looked back.  He heard!  Charon heard his real name!  The boat began to slowly turn under the guidance of the mysterious figure.  Simon tried with all of the ocular intensity he could muster to penetrate the darkness of Charon’s cowl, but to no avail.  Slowly the boat made its way back to the pier and Simon grew more and more uncomfortable.  The morning fog had now completely lifted but the sky remained overcast and gloomy.  The sunlight only served to provide a sickly, yellow glow giving a surreal aura to the day.

The boat reached the mooring for the second time with a soft thump.  Simon still could not see the face of Charon.  An awkward moment passed as the two figures stood in silence and then Simon began to speak.

“My name is Simon Bancroft, and I am an acquaintance of the Earl McDermott.  He told me how to get here and that you could take me to the Underworld.  He said that I should call your real name and wear this cloak and that I…”

Simon trailed off into silence as Charon lifted one skeletal hand in a gesture of silence.  Then Charon extended his hand and motioned for Simon to board the vessel.  This was it!  Simon’s mind was flooded with conflicting impressions. Excitement, trepidation, and bewilderment all fought for superiority of Simon’s emotions.  He went to lift one foot towards the boat and was suddenly struck as if he were embedded in a thick viscous fluid.  His foot was sluggish and felt as if it weighed a hundred pounds.  This physical feeling was accompanied by a similar psychological feeling of weightiness.  It was as if this decision to climb aboard carried with it great ramifications and a strong will to continue was required.  There was no doubt for Simon though.  His mind resolved long ago to attend this journey.

The feeling passed as quickly as it arrived, and Simon’s foot reached its destination in the boat.  Once aboard, Simon stood just a few short feet from Charon – the body of the dead souls lying between them.  Charon leaned forward as if studying Simon’s face then he raised his hands to his hood and pulled it back to reveal his skull.  Simon stared transfixed into the dark orbits of Charon’s eyes – so vacant yet, so full of life.  The two regarded each other for several moments.  Simon couldn’t help but feel a sense of the macabre as he gazed upon the grinning visage of the Ferryman to the Underworld.  But, strangely, he felt in no danger from this deathly form.

Charon straightened back up and offered Simon one of his skeletal hands.  Simon looked at the hand.  Did Charon intend to shake his hand in greeting?  Simon found this normal gesture so out-of-place in this fantastic setting that he hesitated in confusion for a second.  Then he lifted his hand and wrapped it gently around the frail hand of Charon and said, “Nice to meet you Wilhelm.”  But the hand of Charon was not as frail at it appeared.  The bones of the hand locked around Simon’s hand in a grip that was inescapable.  Simon at first winced and then he tried to pull away, but it was useless.  What was happening?  Simon’s eyes darted back and forth between Charon’s face and their locked hands.

“What is the meaning of this?  Let go!  Let go of me you beast!”  Simon shouted and pleaded trying to free himself desperately from the clutch of Charon.  His struggle was met only with the demonic grin on the skull of Charon.  Simon continued to scream and fight until something altogether unexpected occurred.

Simon fell into a shocked silence as the transformation began.  The tissue of Charon began to reform around the bones.  Tendons, ligaments, vessels, and muscles all weaving and knitting together at an incredibly fast rate.  Simon was so transfixed by the regenerating man in front of him that he didn’t notice the opposite happening to himself.  By the time he realized, his hand was nothing more than exposed muscle and veins.  The air was filled with the wet, sticky sound of tissue and blood churning and roiling along the two men’s bodies.  The horror of the situation struck Simon as he realized what was happening.  But now he was helpless to do anything.  He couldn’t even speak now that his mouth was no more than a bony smile.

The transformation ended and Wilhelm stood before Simon as he looked before he became Charon.

“Vell Mr. Bancroft,” Wilhelm said with a thick German accent, “I bet you are regretting coming to zis place now.  No?”  Simon looked at his skeletal hands, turning them back and forth.  “It vas a long time ago that I vas in your place and your Earl McDermott vas here vhere I am now,” Wilhelm continued massaging his newly formed face.  “Don’t vorry zough, one day I shall find you a suitable replacement and send zem here.  But, until zen, enjoy your living hell in ze Undervorld.”

With this he began to laugh uproariously as he climbed out of the boat.  Simon tried to follow him, but he was overcome with the same feeling of extreme heaviness that gripped him before.  This time, however, he didn’t possess the strength to fight it.  Wilhelm saw him struggle and turned to say, “Don’t bozer trying to get out Mr. Bancroft.  It is a fruitless effort.  Believe me I tried for years; and now I must be gone but not before I have zanked you for freeing me from zat God forsaken damnation.”

He danced down the pier and began to jog up the hill.  Simon watched him go, helpless to do anything about it.  All Simon could think about was the brewing hatred he felt for the Earl McDermott.  When he got out of this accursed state, he would murder that deceitful bastard!  That was a promise he intended to carry out and all of the legions of Hell could not stop him!

Wilhelm halted part-way up the hill and called back, “In case you are vondering how long I vas in your current state I must tell you I lost count after about twenty years!  But, if I vas to guess, I vould say fifty years is about right!  Oh, and don’t vurry about Earl McDermott!  After I find him and kill him myself, you vill get your revenge vhen Thanatos brings him back here!  Goodbye Mr. Bancroft!”

Simon watched him until he crested the hill and was lost from sight.  How would he recognize the Earl in that amorphous conglomeration of souls?  Simon looked at the sheet covering the communal body in the boat and wondered.  He reached down and slowly raised the corner to peer at what was underneath.  The sight he beheld would come to be a common sight for him over the years that followed.  But the first time a person beholds a sight so disturbing there can be no words to describe the torment and disgust.  Simon recoiled from the body in shock.  It was a writhing mass of contorted faces groaning and pleading for mercy.  Some were gaping open, and others were twisted in grief and pain.  It was their eyes!  The utter hopelessness of their damnation was reflected in their eyes!  But every day in the years that followed Simon would force himself to take inventory of everyone, looking each one in the face until he found the man who had sentenced him to this demented prison.

When Wilhelm got out of sight of Simon, he began to talk to himself.  After all, it had been quite a long time since he had exercised his vocal cords – or had any for that matter.

“Poor Mr. Bancroft.  His hell is only just beginning.  I haven’t the heart to tell him that Earl McDermott rode the boat vith me yesterday.”

________________________________________________________

The artwork that inspired this story was originally done by the Swiss artist Arnold Böcklin. He did several versions of the same image with slight variations. The following are three of his versions:

Several artists have creation their own versions of the picture. Here is a version done by H.R. Giger (of Alien artistry fame).

The artist Guang Yang did this variation that incorporates Cthulhu in it.

Finally, this next image is a panel from the graphic novel Dune done by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. The illustrators of this are Raúl Allén and Patricia Martín. Notice what picture is hanging on the wall.

The Russian artist Ksenia Svincova, who goes by the name Iren Horrors, created this image of the ferryman Charon.

These next images are results from the AI Artist program Wonder with prompts “The Isle of the Dead” and “Charon”.

Chapter 13: VIRTUTEM SUPERANDI MORTUIS

June 16^th, 2013

Inspector Simpkins,

My name is Jonathan Spencer and I must first explain to you that it was not I who stole your case file on Milo Brecklin. The person who stole it was Tanner Wallace and I’m sorry to report that he is now dead. Every page is accounted for and you’ll notice that I’ve included one additional letter. It is the letter I received from Tanner Wallace requesting my help, dated March 24^th, 2013. The reason I include this letter is so that you’ll see that Wallace was already close to uncovering the thing that you were no doubt trying to uncover yourself.  My only knowledge of Brecklin goes back to the original letter I wrote to him at Wallace’s and his behest. Brecklin responded with some vague response that said he may at some later point contact me depending on certain outcomes to information he was looking into. I never heard from either one until Wallace contacted me this past March. Oh that I had never responded to Wallace’s wild entreaties to help. But I was curious about the mad suggestions in his letter and thought that it couldn’t hurt to at least hear him out. How wrong I was.

I will set down here the events of what happened and maybe the holes will be filled, the questions answered, and the whole story explained. It is a mad tale to tell and, while I think we have incurred a major victory over those vile forces of ancient chaos, I believe that the war is ultimately a futile struggle. The reason I tell you this story is so you’ll understand and continue the work that Milo Brecklin went to his grave pursuing. I cannot do it. I have seen things that have shaken my soul and left me despondent, morose, and full of hopelessness. I have become a shell of man who wallows in depression and believes that the cosmos is a bleak and cold place where mankind will meet its inevitable doom. Our time will be brief, meaningless, and forgotten under the tread of forces much too great to comprehend fully. Once you have received this, I will be long gone so don’t even bother trying to find me.

After receiving the letter from Wallace, I replied back and told him I would be interested in meeting with him. We agreed to meet in Boulder at Brecklin’s estate. Of course I was skeptical about him saying I had this power he called Virtutem Superandi Mortuis. But what happened in Fiji was still an unanswered mystery that I had never fully come to grips with. The first thing that Tanner did to bring me around was to produce the case file that you and Division 212 were compiling. You have no doubt wracked your brain trying to figure out how someone broke into your high security facility and stole the files. Tanner said that it was actually easier than you might think. After all, he was in a Special Forces unit that specialized in going into places where they weren’t supposed to be and getting out undetected. After reading the case file and hearing him explain many other questions I had, I began to understand that this was something much more complicated than I had first thought. The fantastic nature of so many things made the talk of strange powers over the dead seem like just another element in a convoluted web of incredible and clandestine conspiracies of dark magic and paranormal phenomena. After talking for quite a while, he told me that he had exhumed Mr. Brecklin’s remains.

Tanner showed me to a room in the basement where Mr. Brecklin’s coffin was sitting on a large table. He asked me if I wanted to look inside and I gave him an emphatic “no”. I wanted to wait until the time was at hand before looking in there. We spent another day waiting on the Devon Schottenreich to arrive because we were clueless as to how to proceed. I had only used my so-called power once and that was completely by accident. Tanner apparently had a similar story. He didn’t even know if he really had the power for sure.

The next day Devon arrived and he and Tanner talked for quite some time while I mostly listened and asked questions. Maybe you expected to find out that Khalid al Fasid to be Brecklin’s murderer but I learned from them that Fasid had been dead for many years. Apparently, it was Devon and Tanner, with the orchestration of Brecklin, who had been Fasid’s downfall. This was all a part of the retribution from the Ain Hith incident and the end result was the death of Fasid, the then High Priest of Cthulhu. Tanner and Devon had also secured the metallic meteor taken from them on that expedition. Then who had killed Brecklin? Tanner and Devon had theories but didn’t know for sure.

I also learned why Tanner was in Antarctica and why he was so affected when Brecklin was killed. Tanner had gone to Antarctica to retrace the path of the Peabody Expedition^[i] in order to discover those strange ruins that lay somewhere in the nether mountain ranges of that frozen wasteland. It was another attempt of Brecklin’s to discover answers to the metal and the Spawn of Cthulhu for purposes which none of us could completely figure out. The strangest part of the whole expedition was that Tanner and Brecklin were linked through some strange sorcery so that Brecklin’s mind inhabited Tanner’s body remotely. Brecklin could explore the ruins firsthand but still be back in Boulder. Apparently, whoever killed Brecklin knew that he was vulnerable and chose it as the right time to strike. The resulting sudden abandonment of Brecklin’s mind from Tanner’s body was a psychic shock to Tanner’s mind and that is why it took him so much time to recover.

Devon gave Tanner and I a crash course in magic that left me reeling from the inundation of knowledge I never dreamed existed. I made sure to copy down some of the names of the arcane tomes that he used to educate us in our task of raising Milo: The Book of Azathoth^[ii], The Necronomicon, Ghorl Nigral^[iii], Cultes des Goules, De Vermis Mysteriis^[iv], and Las Reglas de Ruina^[v]. Inspector, you might be quite familiar with these abominable texts, but if you’re not, I would recommend approaching them with the utmost caution. Their forbidden knowledge holds the key to some of the most deeply disturbing mysteries of our place in the cosmos. To this day, I am still struggling to come to grips with just the limited amount of information that I was exposed to. Unfortunately, I don’t think I can square that knowledge with any worldview that doesn’t leave me wallowing in the depths of depression and I feel the only escape is of a final sort.

Once Devon felt that we were sufficiently prepared, he set about preparing the room where Milo reposed in his coffin. He explained that the use of our powers was augmented by certain signs, symbols, and other artifacts. Finally, the evening arrived when he declared that everything was in order and we adjourned to the basement. I must say that the candles, symbols adorning the walls and floor, and open tomes felt like we were going into the most blasphemous of black masses. What really gave me a shock was the body of Milo Brecklin laid out on the table. He was mottled with discolored splotches and bloated quite a bit. Rigor Mortis had set in and his arms were locked out at wholly unnatural angle. It was my first time beholding a corpse in such a condition and my mind immediately went back to Fiji. I thought of Tevita’s cousin George and thanked the Lord that I never beheld that shambling nightmare that I had unwittingly unleashed on that poor village. I only hoped that Devon and Tanner were right in their assessments of what this mysterious power of Virtutem Superandi Mortuis could achieve. What really left me worrying was the fact that Devon had taken the precaution of placing a loaded double-barrel shotgun near at hand just in case things didn’t go quite as planned.

Devon began by reciting from The Necronomicon and Tanner and I would echo certain phrases that Devon had coached us on – their alien pronunciations were barely expressible in many places and I wondered if the language was even invented by humans. The rhythm and pace of the incantation began to take hold of me and I drifted into some type of hypnotic state – partially aware and partially dream-like. Time took on a convoluted quality and I can’t really say how long this went on for, but at some point Devon gave me the nod to begin my portion. I placed my focus on Milo and began to recite the passage Devon had me memorize. Over and over I said it and a change began to occur with my vision. Everything became blurry and colors started to coalesce together. I reached out a hand and placed it on Milo and a faint light began to radiate from him. It slowly grew in intensity until it filled the room. There was a wobbling kind of shimmer in the light and a low moan escaped from his mouth. And then, suddenly, the moan turned into a great scream of anguish. I recoiled in surprise and my vision returned to normal. I felt weak; drained of all energy and thought I would collapse. Devon was beside me, helping me to remain standing as he yelled at Tanner, “Now, Tanner! Now! The spell!”

Tanner rushed over and clutched Milo while he chanted a different incantation that he had memorized. The screaming subsided and slowly Milo began to change. His body morphed, undoing the process of decay in just mere moments. Devon had assisted me to a chair and I sat there in my enfeebled state staring in disbelief at the transformed Milo Brecklin. His eyes fluttered open, he gazed around the room in bewilderment for a few seconds and then a huge smile spread across his face followed by peals of deep, full laughter. The laughter was infectious and pretty soon Tanner and Devon were laughing too; I just stared with my mouth hanging open and wondered if I had just lost my mind.

Later, we sat around Milo’s large dining room table listening to him recount the last weeks of his life as he gorged himself on a dinner fit for a king. His resurrection had left him famished. Milo explained that it was Saul Lupov who had replaced Fasid as the new High Priest of Cthulhu and the two were in a battle to accumulate as many of the Star Spawn of Cthulhu as possible – Lupov wanted them to hasten the awakening of Cthulhu and Milo wanted them to prevent Lupov’s mad plans. From what I gathered, the Star Spawn of Cthulhu were artifacts which act as a gateway for consciousness of the ancient Deep Ones. These Star Spawn came from the deepest reaches of space in some long forgotten epoch of time with the Deep Ones. They appear in various guises but most people would mistake them for strange metals.

Milo thought he was winning the chess match with Lupov because he had managed to secure many of these artifacts, but Lupov was well aware of Milo’s location and chose the opportune moment to attack him and take the artifacts from his mansion. Tanner asked Milo if he had any idea where Lupov might be taking them. I don’t know how he knew it, but he replied, “The Wetumpka impact crater.” And within the hour Milo, Tanner, and I were driving to a local airstrip where Milo kept his private jet. Devon remained at Milo’s estate to pore over those accursed tomes in search of something Milo had instructed him to find. We flew to Alabama and landed at a small airport just outside of Coosada. On the way Milo laid out his plan to us. The plan seemed insane to me but the previous forty-eight hours of my life had been one madness piled atop another. I asked him what made him so sure that Lupov would be there. He explained that he had learned why the crater was so important to the Cthulhu cult. It was the location where the Great Cthulhu and his Star Spawn had landed on Earth in the dark, distance past. He further explained that if his assumptions about the moon phases were correct, Lupov would be active this night – it was the 25^th of May; a full moon.

Milo had an SUV waiting for us at the airstrip. Before setting off to Wetumpka, Milo phoned Devon and the two conversed for nearly a half-hour. The entire time, Milo wrote copious notes filled with strange words, symbols, and diagrams. It took us less than thirty minutes to snake our way through the backwoods of Wetumpka that led to the caldera of the impact crater.  Tanner drove and we navigated by his GPS. Milo directed Tanner to pull over at the bend of a dark road and we all got out. Tanner rummaged through a backpack with God knows what gear in it and produced two flashlights. He also pulled out a machete and a pistol. Milo said, “We’re going to need a different sort of weapon tonight.” Tanner didn’t even acknowledge the comment as he shoved the pistol into the small of his back and thrust the backpack at me. With me carrying the backpack, Milo carrying his notes, and Tanner leading the way hacking the foliage with the machete, we set off into the thick woods.

After what seemed like an eternity of steady progress through the thick forest, we eventually saw a light emanating through the woods in the distance. Milo ordered us to quench our flashlights and we began to creep forward as quietly as possible. Painstakingly slow and stealthy we inched forward until we could finally behold a small fire burning atop a large stone altar. The flickering light from the fire illuminated what could only be the figure of Saul Lupov draped in a large cloak. He was kneeling before a large, ornate book reciting some foul spell of conjuring in the wispy, hissing syllables of a grotesque dead language. As he chanted, he rocked back and forth with his hands raised to the night sky.

Scattered about Lupov were numerous objects of various shapes and sizes. All of them appeared to be metallic and many of them reflected the firelight in shimmering dances of light which had me mesmerized; colors that no man had yet seen or named. These were, of course, the Star Spawn of Cthulhu. And, as I watched, I saw these strange metallic objects begin to change and morph and even move across the ground as if imbued with life!

We watched from the cover of the trees for several minutes and then Lupov reached up to the cowl covering his head and pulled back the hood. What I beheld sent a shock through my body and I reflexively gasped in horror nearly giving away our position. Where there should have been hair upon his head, there was a mass of writhing, churning tentacles. They were long and slimy and the skin was lumpy and venous. Each one ended in a sort of rudimentary mouth that seemed to suck or grope the air as if searching for something to latch onto. The effect was made all the more nightmarish by the flickering lights cast by the fire, the shimmering colors of the metallic objects and the sickly, yellow glow cast by the full moon high above.

I stared bewildered by the shock of what I beheld and tried to control my nerves, but things suddenly took a drastic turn for the worse. Suddenly, my attention was drawn to another figure entering the circle of firelight and I realized that it was Milo Brecklin. He had heard something in that alien babbling that had alerted him to the fact that it was now time to strike. The only recognizable words I could make out were “Cthulhu” and “R’lyeh” from Lupov. Milo held the notebook beneath the beam of one of the flashlights and began to chant a different but just as alien phrase while casting what appeared to be a fine powder before him. I felt a tugging at my back and spun around in fright swinging wildly. Tanner ducked the haymaker I had sent his way and grabbed me shaking me to my senses. He was merely trying to get the backpack from me. While removing the backpack Tanner and I were startled by a piercing shriek. It was Lupov howling in fury like some wild monster. He had finally seen Milo.

Lupov left off his chant for a moment as the rage spread across his deformed face. He started up another phrase that was thick and low, apparently trying to counter what Milo was conjuring. Then he broke into a full run and slammed into Milo, smoothly tackling him and driving him to the ground. Tanner leapt away towards them pulling something from the backpack that looked like a large, cruel dagger of some unknown substance.

It was at this moment that I first noticed the smoke. It was low to the ground and seemed to be forming a great circle around the stone altar. Dark and sinuous, it began to coalesce and swirl in an increasing counterclockwise motion. Lupov drove several strikes into Milo’s face but Milo continued to chant the weird phrase through the blows. Then Lupov lowered his face to Milo’s and the tentacles shot forth and latched onto Milo’s head. Milo howled in tormented pain. Tanner arrived just then and grabbed Lupov by the back of the head and raised the dagger high. The smoke had begun to thicken considerably and the last thing I saw of the three men before the smoke completely enveloped them was the Star Spawn of Cthulhu wash over them like a liquid, metal wave and Tanner driving home the dagger into Lupov’s back.

It’s hard to say whether it was Lupov or Milo who had succeeded in their respective spells because whatever demon that crawled forth from the abyss at that moment didn’t choose sides. All three men were taken indiscriminately back into the void from which it crawled. The smoke had formed a huge pillar that completely shut out the firelight and a loud rumble announced the arrival of the beast. It was as if the earth were violently heaving forth some massive behemoth. I wasted no time in hanging around to behold much more. I ran out of primitive, naked fear through the dark woods not even noticing the briars and branches that tore at my body. A cold wind rushed past me and I glanced back one last time to behold a malformed, giant appendage emerge from the smoke. It had to be nearly ten feet long and looked like the antennae of a giant insect. At the tip of it was a massive compound eye that scanned the darkened woods and I swear to God that it locked on me! But then I heard the final cry from Milo Brecklin through the chaos of the blackest insanity I have ever known. “Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!”^[vi] And then I ran and never looked back again.

Once I was out of that accursed forest, I entertained the idea of contacting the local authorities, but what would I tell them? So, I just drove. After a while I decided to call Devon and explain to him what had happened. After hearing my frantic retelling of the night’s events, he told me that there was no use contacting the police. He assured me that they would find no trace of the three men.

I suppose that there is nothing more to tell. My testimony, along with this box of documents, gives the entirety of the tale. I trust that you will have the fortitude and the resources to take this information and continue the work of Milo Brecklin, for now I see just how important his work was.

And finally, as for me, don’t bother trying to find me. The chaos and the fear have enveloped me to the point that I can longer escape their sway. By the time you read this, I will have ended this madness!

Good luck and Godspeed, Inspector!

Jonathan Spencer

^[i] This is a reference to At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft.

^[ii] This is a reference to The Book of Azathoth Tarot Deck created by Nemo.

^[iii] A Cthulhu Mythos invention by Willis Conover and used by Lin Carter.

^[iv] A Cthulhu Mythos invention by Robert Bloch that translates to “Mysteries of the Worm”.

^[v] A Cthulhu Mythos creation by Joseph S. Pulver which translates to “The Laws of Ruin”.

^[vi] A reference to The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe and At the Mountains of Madness by H.P. Lovecraft.

Chapter 12: LETTER FROM TANNER WALLACE

24 Mar 2013

Jonathan,

You may not remember me but I sought you out on behalf of Milo Brecklin in order to encourage you to write him and tell him the details of your brush with the paranormal while in Fiji. I’m not sure whether or not you and Mr. Brecklin stayed in touch with each other but Mr. Brecklin passed away this past December. The things I’m about to tell you may or may not come as a surprise to you – depending on how much Mr. Brecklin has told you – but I believe that your help could be of the greatest importance to stopping something that could unleash untold horror upon the world.

To begin with, I believe your experience in Fiji was not the result of the old witch on Bat Island. I’ve come across information that suggests it was in fact you who caused (albeit unintentionally) the resurrection of that drowned Fijian. I also believe Brecklin suspected this and that is why he sent me to seek you out. I worked for him for many years and failed to realize that he was seeking out people like you (and now I see I’m one too). There were others he had recruited who knew of their power and I witnessed them use it. What is this power? It’s called Virtutem Superandi Mortuis, or The Power to Control the Dead. There were twins girls who had it and I knew them. They were murdered back in 1989.

I’m not completely sure what sort of power I possess but I believe it is similar to yours. There was an incident that happened to me back in the Army during the early 80’s. I was a part of a highly specialized Special Forces unit. On one particular mission a good friend in my squad accidentally caught our Captain selling valuable, Classified intelligence to a known terrorist. It was an elaborate mission in Yemen in an area where we weren’t supposed to officially be operating. The mission was supposed to be to assassinate this terrorist leader. Tuck burst in on the Captain to tell him that we had enemies closing in and witnessed the dirty deal going down. The Captain turned his pistol on Tuck and shot him. That’s when I came in and found Tuck bleeding and thought he was dead. I rushed to his side and, miraculously, he came to and was apparently completely healed. Not a scratch on his body, but still covered in blood. So he comes to and begins screaming about the Captain shooting him and that he was selling State secrets and all kinds of crazy stuff. I was confused and panicked because the enemy had begun to engage our guys outside. The Captain, meanwhile, is claiming that Tuck is out of his mind and that it was the terrorist leader that shot Tuck. We had to get the hell out of there right then and there and as we’re making it to our egress point, Tuck gets shot again. But this time I wasn’t able to get to him. We had to leave him. After that I was confused about what happened. I didn’t realize until just recently that Brecklin suspected that Tuck was telling the truth and the Captain really did kill Tuck only to have me cure him.

I don’t think I can heal anyone that’s been dead too long, though. Looking back on it, I think Brecklin suspected this too. If I am right, you can bring the dead back to life, but they still are in the condition they were in just prior to being resurrected. It’s like you can call their life force back into their body. I, on the other hand, can restore the dead, but only if a certain amount of their life force remains in them.

Jonathan, if I’m right, together we can bring Milo Brecklin back to life and he can finish what he started.

I NEED YOUR HELP!

Desperately,

Tanner Wallace

Chapter 11: NEWS OF THE BIZARRE

News of the Bizarre – July 27^th, 1996

Priest Claims Meteors Cause of Demonic Possession

Father Jonathan Baldwin^[i] is a priest with a hobby for stargazing. The amateur astronomer claims that his interest in the starry void began when he heard the story from a death row inmate of how the murder the condemned was accused of committing was really caused by an alien that had taken possession of his wife after a meteor strike in their backyard.

Father Baldwin admits that the story was a tough pill to swallow, but it spurred him to investigate the occurrence of reported possessions by demons that followed the occurrence of meteor sightings. The data was what was too compelling to ignore. After years of collecting data and building charts and tables of such possessions and meteor activity, the priest turned astronomer is convinced that some sort of alien intelligence is tampering with humans in an effort to study them.

Most interesting of all the discoveries was the fact that a meteor shower immediately preceded the outbreak of the Salem Witch Trials. Mere coincidence? One can only hope.

^[i] This is a reference to the story entitled “The Juggernaut” I wrote in Tome of Horror.