Rendezvous with Horror & Nightmare Tales (2 in 1) Read online

  A note on some of the unfamiliar names in this collection: R. Edison Page, besides being a novelist, was the author of a philosophical work, The Religion of the Life Force (1922), not easily found today. Oscar Cook was for many years a district official in British North Borneo. 'Ganpat' was the pseudonym of a mysterious Englishman who wrote a number of historical novels under that name. E.H. Visiak and John Gawsworth, both Edwardian poets, brought a lyrical quality to their co-authoring of the story, "The Uncharted Islands", one of my own favourites. Alice Perrin, the wife of an official, spent many years in India. As did C.A. Kincaid, a Commissioner in Sindh, Rajputana and Kathiawar; he was one of the few who "stayed on" in India after retirement.

  Time and again, their themes were of the unknown, the uncanny, the supernatural, the black arts—the white man threatened by the powers of darkness and often succumbing to that darkness. This is what gives their stories a nightmarish quality and makes them readable today when other, more mundane literary efforts have been forgotten.

  Of course, the real threat came from that fierce mid-day sun and the various afflictions—cholera the most deadly—that it helped engender.

  Charles Kingsley's poem, "Soldier's Widow in India" draws a pathetic picture of early mortality in the East:

  "I had his children—one, two, three.

  One week I had them blithe and sound

  The next beneath this mango tree

  By him in barrack burying ground.

  'Tis I, not they, am gone and dead.

  They live; they know; they feel; they see;

  Their spirits light the golden shade

  Beneath the giant mango tree."

  But there were also lighter moments, and one of these was provided by my Aunt Mabel, a fussy, elderly lady who believed that her special mission in life was to "mother" sick soldiers. She told her friends that she knew there were Russians in India because, she said, "I met one."

  "He was looking very ill and I went up, smoothed his pillow, brushed his hair and moustache, told him he would look much better if he had his hair cut, asked him if he was married and how many children he had, when was he wounded and was it very painful, and wondered if he would prefer a Bible or a Prayer Book to keep under his pillow, and then asked him his name.

  "Poppoffyerbitch," he said, so I knew then that he was Russian!"

  Ruskin Bond

  Mussoorie

  October 2003

  The Uncharted Islands

  By E.H. Visiak and John Gawsworth

  Heddlestone,

  April 27th, 1763.

  Reader,

  The manner of my preservation, with two companions, from the uncharted islands, as well as other particulars, may seem to many incredible; and some, perhaps, will not stickle to brand the whole relation as a fabulous tale.

  I can only say, and I do aver it, that herein I have set down nothing but what really fell out in my experience, described nothing but what I really saw in my brief sojourn on one of the group; which is a misfortune one way, leaving some things inevitably obscure.

  As to what happened to us after our escape in our ship, 'tis beyond the drift of my relation, since nothing further transpired concerning the islands themselves. Indeed, like one drunk, our ship drove in fair weather and foul, with only her topsails aboard, our course (if a course it can be called), being generally westward. At length after several months, and when both our drink and victuals were near consumed, we drove blundering ashore, by the mercy of God, upon one of the Nicobar Islands.

  Here, was a Dutch ship about to sail and we went on board of her.

  From Amsterdam we got us a passage to Plymouth; and so came I home to Heddlestone, where I dwell unto this day.

  Richard Roach.

  I

  No remarkable passage in our voyage befell after our going from the Indian Seas on January 10th, 1724, at a latitude of 40° S., and entering the Southern Ocean. Accordingly, I pass to the period when we did anchor close in shore 'twixt some uncharted mountainous islands (the subjects of my tale) and our Captain did adventure ashore alone.

  Upon the first night in this anchorage, as I well remember, I was pacing softly up and down, feeling—nay, possessed and overcome by a sense of solemnity and awe and adoration. It seemed to me, indeed, that the deck, and the night, were haunted by a presence, immanent, inscrutable, ineffable.

  I looked about me. The illumining moon made the faces of the sleepers one in peace and in glamour with the face of a man who had died dreaming of his childhood. A watchman stood silent at either bulwark amidships, in the bows, and on the poop. The decks lay in a wonder-work of moonshine and shadow. The sea-birds slept, and nothing moved on the moon-gazed expanse of the shore. Only the breakers lapped and gurgled beneath the broken bulwarks, and an eerie and dolorous sound came intermittently from a mountain on the nearest island.

  The hour was about midnight. I continued to pace the decks; but, as I came aft, the watchman there turned and beckoned to me. He was the man who had begged Captain Blythe to let him accompany him on shore; and he said in a whisper:

  "Take my place here, will ye? I'm a-going ashore. The Cap'n thinks as I'm afeared. He'll come to no good out yonder. There's devils there, I tell 'e! I heard tales of this-yere coast; and I know 'tis so. But I'm a-going to follow him. Look'e here, do you see this?" As he spoke, he pulled out a silver locket that hung from a cord round his neck. "There's a piece of the holy cross in there, which is a certain-sure protection—a certain-sure protection," he repeated impressively, "against devils. So I'm a-going to protect the Cap'n—d'ye see? I'm a-going ashore, while you takes my place."

  He stared at me with wide, blue eyes that shone as clear as glass, and clutched hold of my arm with his horny hand. There was an intensity and urgency in his voice, and on his face a look past description. To have scoffed at such sincerity, though never so homely expressed, were unworthy and really profane. On another occasion, and in another mood, perhaps, I might have scoffed (for I was only a boy); but now I heard him seriously, agreeing to take his place, yet endeavouring to dissuade him from going. But when I found him resolved, it was borne in upon me (I know not how against my inclination) that I should accompany him. So I told him I would go with him, and that we should wake one of the others to act as watchman. He demurred, hinting at all manner of ghostly objections; but I overbore them by mention of his infallible relic. So we proceeded to rouse up one of the sleepers, who, after some natural vexation at his awakening, consented, for a reward, to take watch.

  Then, the seaman, being armed with a great blunderbuss (not to speak of his infallible relic!), and I with a pistol, we went ashore, and advanced towards the sandhills, going with the utmost vigilance. But I began to be much afraid, a prey to panic imaginations, full of repentance for having set forth, ashamed to return. Nor was the seaman, apparently, one whit more courageous—which did not tend to hearten me! Continually glancing about him, his face tense or twitching, he seemed beside himself. His motive in venturing was plain: he desired to vindicate his courage; and, despite his timidity—or rather, because of it—he really did do so. But what my motive had been, unless it were sheer perversity, I am not philosopher enough to determine.

  We scaled one of the outer sandhills, which were very high and like in character to a hummocky mountain range, and began to struggle over the shifting slopes, while the dreadful groaning sound grew sensibly louder. Suddenly the seaman gave a shuddering cry. "Look!" said he, pointing to the sand; and, there, among the long, straggling grass, almost at our feet, was a human skull.

  It was the first time in my life that I had seen such a thing, save in sculptured representations in churchyards; and, being part in shadow, it appeared to grimace at me in the moonlight. I clutched the seaman's arm; and his blunderbuss went off.

  The stupendous report was echoed from the mountains; and (the blunderbuss having been charged with small shot and bearing slopingly upon the ground) there went up about us a great column of sand-dust which envelo
ped us for many moments. But when it cleared, and I had cleared the sand out of my eyes (for I was near blinded with it), instead of one skull, I saw three, together with bones sticking forth where the shot had uncovered them in the sand. I showed them to the seaman, who was still rubbing his eyes. The blast of sand had stung my face a good deal, but he had received the brunt of it, and he raged, indeed, very passionately, taking no notice of the skulls.

  "You cursed swab," he cried, picking up his blunderbuss, which had leaped from his hand, and looking fearfully round, "you've gone for to do a brave thing, you have! What was you feared of, you swab, you? If a skull scares ye, or a skelinton, what'll you do when you comes across them as made the skull be here? I wish I hadn't took you along, that I do! What if you've roused 'em on us? Look round. Do you see any of 'em? What's that yonder, by the wood there?"

  He pointed to the shoulder of a long, ragged wood that stood as a hedge beyond the sandhills. But I saw nothing, save straggling trees, the dense-leaved branches of which were strangely contorted. And, when I had told him so, he seated himself upon a knoll of sand, and bade me keep watch while he cleaned his gun; which he proceeded to do with his neckcloth. When he had removed every grain of sand from the muzzle (lest, as he told me, it should burst on firing), he charged it; then, gave it to me to hold while he unloaded, cleaned, and recharged my pistol. This done, and the blunderbuss returned to him, he had a look at the skulls and bones in the sand.

  "It do scare me!" said he presently.

  "What scares you?" asked I.

  "Them," said he, pointing, apparently, to the skulls.

  "But you said, didn't you, that I ought not to be afraid of a skull?"

  "It's not the skulls I'm feared on, though it's them, too. It's them," said he, pointing, "Don't you see them shells?"

  I had seen them, without thinking them worth notice. "Why, they are but shells. It looks as if someone had been feasting off shell-fish here. There's nothing dreadful in that."

  "Oh, a'n't there? And, who's been a affeasting off the skulls and the skelintons, think ye?"

  His meaning came to me with a thrill of horror. "Cannibals!" I cried. "You think there are cannibals here!"

  "Ay," said he, getting to his feet. "Cannibals, and worse, and I shouldn't wonder. But the sound's stopped!"

  It was true. The groaning sound was no longer audible. We waited, hearkening intently, but it did not recur. It had become, as it were, native to the scene for us; and its cessation was even the more daunting, as a syncope and sign of death. The seaman looked furtively at me; and I think the thoughts that flitted through my mind were in his also. Here was justification—or, at least, pretext—for returning to the ship: since the seaboard appeared to be deserted, and the sound which had directed us inland ceased, the reason of our venture might be said to have ended; and the Captain was even then returning in all likelihood, if, indeed, he were not already safe on board. Fear is selfish; and these considerations in me doubtless, discovered a shallow heart. Love and gratitude (such as I ought to have had for such a benefactor and friend as Captain Blythe had been to me) are not so soon contented; and I should have been moved by quite another fear.

  "We can do nothing here," said I. "We don't know where to go now the sound's stopped; and the Captain has probably returned by this. You don't want to meet with cannibals, do you?"

  The words were ill-chosen. "D'ye think, then, as I'm afeared?" cried he, drawing himself erect and puffing his chest out. "No. Do you return, but I goes on! It shall never be said, nor thought (what's more!), that Joseph Yates flinched from his dooty, nor turned aside from the path what was set afore him. Cannibals or worse, I goes on! Cannibals, or devils, or monstrosities, or goblins, or ghouls; it's all one to me: I goes on!"

  Fanning up his courage thus with a bravado, he started off across the sand-hollow; but, coming abreast the wood, he stopped dead, and I also, arrested by a dim glimpse of a face in the moonlit skirts of the trees.

  It was a dreadful face, very high and narrow in the forehead. A sort of dusky red it seemed to be; and there were broad bands of blue round the eyes and joined across the bridge of the nose as monstrous spectacles. It stared at us for a moment, with sloe-black, venomous-looking eyes, and then withdrew—or rather, vanished; for it made no sound, not a rustle of the undergrowth.

  "Ah, what was that?" I cried; but the seaman took the locket from his neck, and held it swaying from the string, muttering papist prayers. His face gleamed ghastly in the moonlight; and, ceasing to pray, he stood mumbling and licking his dry lips. As for me, I felt verily, that, if I made no effort, I should go stark mad; and I began to beseech him instantly to go with me back to the ship. "Let us run! At once! At once! I can't go alone. Oh, put away that locket——"

  I broke off; for, from beyond the wood, there came a weird humming sound, being all upon one low note; which grew nearer and louder, coming soon in a sort of short, rapid measure, pronounced with demoniac violence, and sometimes accented with a prolonged, hoarse, rasping hiss, which yet was not a hiss, but something far more dreadful.

  Still the seaman made no move; and a sort of numbness stole over me, so that I stood, as it were, conscious in a swoon. And, mercifully it was so, or my reason could not have endured; for, of a sudden, there came a sound that tore the night, the sound of many bestial and savage voices yelling and snarling as in a frenzy of unspeakable hate.

  I heard it, I say, as in a trance; and an impulse, which was the veriest instinct, sent me dashing into the thicket of the wood, burrowing under the fern, as a child, affrighted by some imagined terror of the night, buries himself beneath the bedclothes. The seaman followed suit, dropping his blunderbuss; and we lay almost together in the undergrowth, panting and gasping, worming our bodies deeper and deeper. But we went too far—at least, I did—taking no heed of the direction, which lay across the angle of the wood; and, unwittingly poking my head into the moonlight, I lay staring and staring through an opening in the branches.

  There was a throng of dusky red, savage figures advancing beside the wood; and, from the kilts of long grass (as it seemed) about their naked bodies, the plumes of feathers upon their heads, and their weapons of a sort of long axes, or of clubs, I might have taken them for mere savages. But their faces were as infernal masks, hideously contorted, and striped or patched black, bloody, and blue; their eyes rolled until the whites alone were visible; their tongues hung lolling from their mouths. They went in a close column four deep, dancing and leaping, twisting their axes and clubs, and rolling their eyes all in time; and there stood, a little on one side, a figure clad to the ankles in a glossy dark cloak, who seemed to be the leader, yet had unquestionably a feminine appearance, though her contorted face was no whit less hideous and dreadful than the others. It reminded me for all the world of a frightful Hindu idol depicted in the book of missionary travel which, home at Heddlestone, I had taken from my grandfather's library. This creature it was that spied me in the thicket; and, uttering a weird screech, she pointed directly to the place where we lay.

  Instantly, the night became hushed and silent, the massed lines of terrors standing motionless. Then, while I waited in numb suspense, two of them sprang from the ranks. One seized me as with a grip of iron; and, dragging me forth, laid me prostrate at the leader's feet; the other dashed headlong after the seaman, who had escaped. I looked shudderingly up at the face of the leader—and was amazed! For, her contorted muscles had relaxed; her features had become smooth and delicately shapen, the twisted mouth straight, the pupil-less eyes full, dark, and lustrous; and, though the copper-dark skin was daubed with red, and there were lines of blue about the lips, it was the face of a young and comely woman!

  Now, she spoke a word in a strange tongue; and there stepped forth a creature whose nose and chin were flaming yellow on a red ground. Brandishing his long-hafted axe, he roared out a string of words, and was answered from the ranks by a ferocious clamour, while I shut my eyes, expecting death, wondering in a daze whether the pain
would be greater than I could bear; and when the leader gave a sudden and sharp cry, I made sure that the time had come. Yet, still it tarried; and, on opening my eyes, they met those of the woman, who gazed steadfastly down upon me, and with such a look as heartened me with with a gush of hope.

  But there arose a stir and hubbub in the ranks, which immediately began to be broken up, the creatures coming crowding round us; and one of them, whose massive form was daubed with red from head to foot, began to speak in harsh, grating tones, addressing the woman, and apparently reproaching and railing at her, pointing fiercely at me, the while, with a sort of broad double-bladed axe of transparent green stone in shape like a battledore. The others formed a ring about us; and he began to run up and down as he spoke, taking several paces in either direction, but always with his face towards the woman. His axe shone in the moonlight with great beauty as he brandished it; and I found myself watching the sheeny arcs it made, as a babe watches a bright and moving object. He ended suddenly, dropping his axe, which hung suspended from his wrist, and stood as if waiting for the woman to reply.

  But she did not so much as look upon him, or upon any of them, gazing fixedly upon the ground. Then, still silent, she took two paces and a stride, stepping right over my prostrate form; and, lifting her head erect, she looked around with a defiant and majestic gesture, crying:

  "Tapu!"

  Suddenly, one of those who stood outermost gave a shout; and, in the stillness that followed, I caught a distant humming sound like to that which had frightened me in the beginning. The woman spoke sharply and rapidly; and immediately the column formed again; the terrible staccato chorus broke forth anew, interspersed with yelling sounds, which, if it were possible, were even more daunting than before. Dancing and leaping in time, with twisting axes and clubs, and with their eyeballs hideously rolling, the army—for there were hundreds of them—advanced evidently to battle.