II - THE PLAIN OF
SILENCE
I am an old man. I live here in this ancient
house, surrounded by huge, unkempt gardens.
The
peasantry, who inhabit the wilderness beyond, say that I am mad. That is
because I will have nothing to do with them. I live here alone with my old
sister, who is also my housekeeper. We keep no servants - I hate them. I have
one friend, a dog; yes, I would sooner have old Pepper than the rest of
Creation together. He, at least, understands me - and has sense enough to leave
me alone when I am in my dark moods.
I
have decided to start a kind of diary; it may enable me to record some of the
thoughts and feelings that I cannot express to anyone; but, beyond this, I am
anxious to make some record of the strange things that I have heard and seen,
during many years of loneliness, in this weird old building.
For a
couple of centuries, this house has had a reputation, a bad one, and, until I
bought it, for more than eighty years no one had lived here; consequently, I
got the old place at a ridiculously low figure.
I am
not superstitious; but I have ceased to deny that things happen in this old
house - things that I cannot explain; and, therefore, I must needs ease my
mind, by writing down an account of them, to the best of my ability; though,
should this, my diary, ever be read when I am gone, the readers will but shake
their heads, and be the more convinced that I was mad.
This
house, how ancient it is! though its age strikes one less, perhaps, than the
quaintness of its structure, which is curious and fantastic to the last degree.
Little curved towers and pinnacles, with outlines suggestive of leaping flames,
predominate; while the body of the building is in the form of a circle.
I
have heard that there is an old story, told amongst the country people, to the
effect that the devil built the place. However, that is as may be. True or not,
I neither know nor care, save as it may have helped to cheapen it, ere I came.
I
must have been here some ten years before I saw sufficient to warrant any
belief in the stories, current in the neighborhood, about this house. It is
true that I had, on at least a dozen occasions, seen, vaguely, things that
puzzled me, and, perhaps, had felt more than I had seen. Then, as the years
passed, bringing age upon me, I became often aware of something unseen, yet
unmistakably present, in the empty rooms and corridors. Still, it was as I have
said many years before I saw any real manifestations of the so-called
supernatural.
It
was not Halloween. If I were telling a story for amusement's sake, I should
probably place it on that night of nights; but this is a true record of my own
experiences, and I would not put pen to paper to amuse anyone. No. It was after
midnight on the morning of the twenty-first day of January. I was sitting
reading, as is often my custom, in my study. Pepper lay, sleeping, near my
chair.
Without
warning, the flames of the two candles went low, and then shone with a ghastly
green effulgence. I looked up, quickly, and as I did so I saw the lights sink
into a dull, ruddy tint; so that the room glowed with a strange, heavy, crimson
twilight that gave the shadows behind the chairs and tables a double depth of
blackness; and wherever the light struck, it was as though luminous blood had
been splashed over the room.
Down
on the floor, I heard a faint, frightened whimper, and something pressed itself
in between my two feet. It was Pepper, cowering under my dressing gown. Pepper,
usually as brave as a lion!
It
was this movement of the dog's, I think, that gave me the first twinge of real
fear. I had been considerably startled when the lights burnt first green and
then red; but had been momentarily under the impression that the change was due
to some influx of noxious gas into the room. Now, however, I saw that it was
not so; for the candles burned with a steady flame, and showed no signs of
going out, as would have been the case had the change been due to fumes in the
atmosphere.
I did
not move. I felt distinctly frightened; but could think of nothing better to do
than wait. For perhaps a minute, I kept my glance about the room, nervously.
Then I noticed that the lights had commenced to sink, very slowly; until
presently they showed minute specks of red fire, like the gleamings of rubies
in the darkness. Still, I sat watching; while a sort of dreamy indifference
seemed to steal over me; banishing altogether the fear that had begun to grip
me.
Away
in the far end of the huge old-fashioned room, I became conscious of a faint
glow. Steadily it grew, filling the room with gleams of quivering green light;
then they sank quickly, and changed - even as the candle flames had done - into
a deep, somber crimson that strengthened, and lit up the room with a flood of
awful glory.
The
light came from the end wall, and grew ever brighter until its intolerable
glare caused my eyes acute pain, and involuntarily I closed them. It may have
been a few seconds before I was able to open them. The first thing I noticed
was that the light had decreased, greatly; so that it no longer tried my eyes.
Then, as it grew still duller, I was aware, all at once, that, instead of
looking at the redness, I was staring through it, and through the wall beyond.
Gradually,
as I became more accustomed to the idea, I realized that I was looking out on
to a vast plain, lit with the same gloomy twilight that pervaded the room. The
immensity of this plain scarcely can be conceived. In no part could I perceive
its confines. It seemed to broaden and spread out, so that the eye failed to
perceive any limitations. Slowly, the details of the nearer portions began to
grow clear; then, in a moment almost, the light died away, and the vision - if
vision it were - faded and was gone.
Suddenly,
I became conscious that I was no longer in the chair. Instead, I seemed to be
hovering above it, and looking down at a dim something, huddled and silent. In
a little while, a cold blast struck me, and I was outside in the night,
floating, like a bubble, up through the darkness. As I moved, an icy coldness
seemed to enfold me, so that I shivered.
After
a time, I looked to right and left, and saw the intolerable blackness of the
night, pierced by remote gleams of fire. Onward, outward, I drove. Once, I
glanced behind, and saw the earth, a small crescent of blue light, receding
away to my left. Further off, the sun, a splash of white flame, burned vividly
against the dark.
An
indefinite period passed. Then, for the last time, I saw the earth - an enduring
globule of radiant blue, swimming in an eternity of ether. And there I, a
fragile flake of soul dust, flickered silently across the void, from the
distant blue, into the expanse of the unknown.
A
great while seemed to pass over me, and now I could nowhere see anything. I had
passed beyond the fixed stars and plunged into the huge blackness that waits
beyond. All this time I had experienced little, save a sense of lightness and
cold discomfort. Now however the atrocious darkness seemed to creep into my
soul, and I became filled with fear and despair. What was going to become of
me? Where was I going? Even as the thoughts were formed, there grew against the
impalpable blackness that wrapped me a faint tinge of blood. It seemed
extraordinarily remote, and mistlike; yet, at once, the feeling of oppression
was lightened, and I no longer despaired.
Slowly,
the distant redness became plainer and larger; until, as I drew nearer, it
spread out into a great, somber glare - dull and tremendous. Still, I fled onward,
and, presently, I had come so close, that it seemed to stretch beneath me, like
a great ocean of somber red. I could see little, save that it appeared to
spread out interminably in all directions.
In a
further space, I found that I was descending upon it; and, soon, I sank into a
great sea of sullen, red-hued clouds. Slowly, I emerged from these, and there,
below me, I saw the stupendous plain that I had seen from my room in this house
that stands upon the borders of the Silences.
Presently,
I landed, and stood, surrounded by a great waste of loneliness. The place was
lit with a gloomy twilight that gave an impression of indescribable desolation.
Afar
to my right, within the sky, there burnt a gigantic ring of dull-red fire, from
the outer edge of which were projected huge, writhing flames, darted and
jagged. The interior of this ring was black, black as the gloom of the outer
night. I comprehended, at once, that it was from this extraordinary sun that
the place derived its doleful light.
From
that strange source of light, I glanced down again to my surroundings.
Everywhere I looked, I saw nothing but the same flat weariness of interminable
plain. Nowhere could I descry any signs of life; not even the ruins of some
ancient habitation.
Gradually,
I found that I was being borne forward, floating across the flat waste. For
what seemed an eternity, I moved onward. I was unaware of any great sense of
impatience; though some curiosity and a vast wonder were with me continually.
Always, I saw around me the breadth of that enormous plain; and, always, I
searched for some new thing to break its monotony; but there was no change - only
loneliness, silence, and desert.
Presently,
in a half-conscious manner, I noticed that there was a faint mistiness, ruddy
in hue, lying over its surface. Still, when I looked more intently, I was
unable to say that it was really mist; for it appeared to blend with the plain,
giving it a peculiar unrealness, and conveying to the senses the idea of
unsubstantiality.
Gradually,
I began to weary with the sameness of the thing. Yet, it was a great time
before I perceived any signs of the place, toward which I was being conveyed.
"At
first, I saw it, far ahead, like a long hillock on the surface of the Plain.
Then, as I drew nearer, I perceived that I had been mistaken; for, instead of a
low hill, I made out, now, a chain of great mountains, whose distant peaks
towered up into the red gloom, until they were almost lost to sight."
III - THE HOUSE IN
THE ARENA
And
so, after a time, I came to the mountains. Then, the course of my journey was
altered, and I began to move along their bases, until, all at once, I saw that
I had come opposite to a vast rift, opening into the mountains. Through this, I
was borne, moving at no great speed. On either side of me, huge, scarped walls
of rocklike substance rose sheer. Far overhead, I discerned a thin ribbon of
red, where the mouth of the chasm opened, among inaccessible peaks. Within, was
gloom, deep and somber, and chilly silence. For a while, I went onward
steadily, and then, at last, I saw, ahead, a deep, red glow, that told me I was
near upon the further opening of the gorge.
A
minute came and went, and I was at the exit of the chasm, staring out upon an
enormous amphitheatre of mountains. Yet, of the mountains, and the terrible
grandeur of the place, I recked nothing; for I was confounded with amazement to
behold, at a distance of several miles and occupying the center of the arena, a
stupendous structure built apparently of green jade. Yet, in itself, it was not
the discovery of the building that had so astonished me; but the fact, which
became every moment more apparent, that in no particular, save in color and its
enormous size, did the lonely structure vary from this house in which I live.
For a
while, I continued to stare, fixedly. Even then, I could scarcely believe that
I saw aright. In my mind, a question formed, reiterating incessantly: 'What
does it mean?' 'What does it mean?' and I was unable to make answer, even out
of the depths of my imagination. I seemed capable only of wonder and fear. For
a time longer, I gazed, noting continually some fresh point of resemblance that
attracted me. At last, wearied and sorely puzzled, I turned from it, to view
the rest of the strange place on to which I had intruded.
Hitherto,
I had been so engrossed in my scrutiny of the House, that I had given only a
cursory glance 'round. Now, as I looked, I began to realize upon what sort of a
place I had come. The arena, for so I have termed it, appeared a perfect circle
of about ten to twelve miles in diameter, the House, as I have mentioned
before, standing in the center. The surface of the place, like to that of the
Plain, had a peculiar, misty appearance, that was yet not mist.
From
a rapid survey, my glance passed quickly upward along the slopes of the
circling mountains. How silent they were. I think that this same abominable
stillness was more trying to me than anything that I had so far seen or
imagined. I was looking up, now, at the great crags, towering so loftily. Up
there, the impalpable redness gave a blurred appearance to everything.
And
then, as I peered, curiously, a new terror came to me; for away up among the
dim peaks to my right, I had descried a vast shape of blackness, giantlike. It
grew upon my sight. It had an enormous equine head, with gigantic ears, and
seemed to peer steadfastly down into the arena. There was that about the pose
that gave me the impression of an eternal watchfulness - of having warded that
dismal place, through unknown eternities. Slowly, the monster became plainer to
me; and then, suddenly, my gaze sprang from it to something further off and
higher among the crags. For a long minute, I gazed, fearfully. I was strangely
conscious of something not altogether unfamiliar - as though something stirred
in the back of my mind. The thing was black, and had four grotesque arms. The
features showed indistinctly, 'round the neck, I made out several light-colored
objects. Slowly, the details came to me, and I realized, coldly, that they were
skulls. Further down the body was another circling belt, showing less dark
against the black trunk. Then, even as I puzzled to know what the thing was, a
memory slid into my mind, and straightway, I knew that I was looking at a
monstrous representation of Kali, the Hindu goddess of death.
Other
remembrances of my old student days drifted into my thoughts. My glance fell
back upon the huge beast-headed Thing. Simultaneously, I recognized it for the
ancient Egyptian god Set, or Seth, the Destroyer of Souls. With the knowledge,
there came a great sweep of questioning - 'Two of the - !' I stopped, and
endeavored to think. Things beyond my imagination peered into my frightened
mind. I saw, obscurely. 'The old gods of mythology!' I tried to comprehend to
what it was all pointing. My gaze dwelt, flickeringly, between the two. 'If -'
An
idea came swiftly, and I turned, and glanced rapidly upward, searching the
gloomy crags, away to my left. Something loomed out under a great peak, a shape
of greyness. I wondered I had not seen it earlier, and then remembered I had
not yet viewed that portion. I saw it more plainly now. It was, as I have said,
grey. It had a tremendous head; but no eyes. That part of its face was blank.
Now,
I saw that there were other things up among the mountains. Further off,
reclining on a lofty ledge, I made out a livid mass, irregular and ghoulish. It
seemed without form, save for an unclean, half-animal face, that looked out,
vilely, from somewhere about its middle. And then I saw others - there were
hundreds of them. They seemed to grow out of the shadows. Several I recognized
almost immediately as mythological deities; others were strange to me, utterly
strange, beyond the power of a human mind to conceive.
On
each side, I looked, and saw more, continually. The mountains were full of
strange things - Beast-gods, and Horrors so atrocious and bestial that
possibility and decency deny any further attempt to describe them. And I - I
was filled with a terrible sense of overwhelming horror and fear and
repugnance; yet, spite of these, I wondered exceedingly. Was there then, after
all, something in the old heathen worship, something more than the mere
deifying of men, animals, and elements? The thought gripped me - was there?
Later,
a question repeated itself. What were they, those Beast-gods, and the others?
At first, they had appeared to me just sculptured Monsters placed
indiscriminately among the inaccessible peaks and precipices of the surrounding
mountains. Now, as I scrutinized them with greater intentness, my mind began to
reach out to fresh conclusions. There was something about them, an
indescribable sort of silent vitality that suggested, to my broadening
consciousness, a state of life-in-death - a something that was by no means
life, as we understand it; but rather an inhuman form of existence, that well
might be likened to a deathless trance - a condition in which it was possible
to imagine their continuing, eternally. 'Immortal!' the word rose in my
thoughts unbidden; and, straightway, I grew to wondering whether this might be
the immortality of the gods.
And
then, in the midst of my wondering and musing, something happened. Until then,
I had been staying just within the shadow of the exit of the great rift. Now,
without volition on my part, I drifted out of the semi-darkness and began to
move slowly across the arena - toward the House. At this, I gave up all
thoughts of those prodigious Shapes above me - and could only stare,
frightenedly, at the tremendous structure toward which I was being conveyed so
remorselessly. Yet, though I searched earnestly, I could discover nothing that
I had not already seen, and so became gradually calmer.
Presently,
I had reached a point more than halfway between the House and the gorge. All
around was spread the stark loneliness of the place, and the unbroken silence.
Steadily, I neared the great building. Then, all at once, something caught my
vision, something that came 'round one of the huge buttresses of the House, and
so into full view. It was a gigantic thing, and moved with a curious lope,
going almost upright, after the manner of a man. It was quite unclothed, and
had a remarkable luminous appearance. Yet it was the face that attracted and
frightened me the most. It was the face of a swine.
Silently,
intently, I watched this horrible creature, and forgot my fear, momentarily, in
my interest in its movements. It was making its way, cumbrously 'round the
building, stopping as it came to each window to peer in and shake at the bars,
with which - as in this house - they were protected; and whenever it came to a
door, it would push at it, fingering the fastening stealthily. Evidently, it
was searching for an ingress into the House.
I had
come now to within less than a quarter of a mile of the great structure, and
still I was compelled forward. Abruptly, the Thing turned and gazed hideously
in my direction. It opened its mouth, and, for the first time, the stillness of
that abominable place was broken, by a deep, booming note that sent an added
thrill of apprehension through me. Then, immediately, I became aware that it
was coming toward me, swiftly and silently. In an instant, it had covered half
the distance that lay between. And still, I was borne helplessly to meet it.
Only a hundred yards, and the brutish ferocity of the giant face numbed me with
a feeling of unmitigated horror. I could have screamed, in the supremeness of
my fear; and then, in the very moment of my extremity and despair, I became
conscious that I was looking down upon the arena, from a rapidly increasing
height. I was rising, rising. In an inconceivably short while, I had reached an
altitude of many hundred feet. Beneath me, the spot that I had just left, was
occupied by the foul Swine-creature. It had gone down on all fours and was
snuffing and rooting, like a veritable hog, at the surface of the arena. A
moment and it rose to its feet, clutching upward, with an expression of desire
upon its face such as I have never seen in this world.
Continually,
I mounted higher. A few minutes, it seemed, and I had risen above the great
mountains - floating, alone, afar in the redness. At a tremendous distance
below, the arena showed, dimly; with the mighty House looking no larger than a
tiny spot of green. The Swine-thing was no longer visible.
Presently,
I passed over the mountains, out above the huge breadth of the plain. Far away,
on its surface, in the direction of the ring-shaped sun, there showed a
confused blur. I looked toward it, indifferently. It reminded me, somewhat, of
the first glimpse I had caught of the mountain-amphitheatre.
With
a sense of weariness, I glanced upward at the immense ring of fire. What a
strange thing it was! Then, as I stared, out from the dark center, there
spurted a sudden flare of extraordinary vivid fire. Compared with the size of
the black center, it was as naught; yet, in itself, stupendous. With awakened
interest, I watched it carefully, noting its strange boiling and glowing. Then,
in a moment, the whole thing grew dim and unreal, and so passed out of sight.
Much amazed, I glanced down to the Plain from which I was still rising. Thus, I
received a fresh surprise. The Plain - everything had vanished, and only a sea
of red mist was spread far below me. Gradually as I stared this grew remote,
and died away into a dim far mystery of red against an unfathomable night. A
while, and even this had gone, and I was wrapped in an impalpable, lightless
gloom.
