In The Grip of Terror, page 8
From behind me came a sudden puff of wind, which shook the frozen snow from the drooping pine-branches, and swept away the mists as a broom sweeps the dust from the floor. Radiant above me were the unclouded skies, already charged with the red of the sunset, and in front I saw that I had come to the very edge of the wood through which I had wandered so long. But it was no valley into which I had penetrated, for there right ahead of me rose the steep slope of boulders and rocks soaring upwards to the foot of the Ungeheuerhorn. What, then, was that cry of a wolf which had made my heart stand still? I saw.
Not twenty yards from me was a fallen tree, and leaning against the trunk of it was one of the denizens of the Horror-horn, and it was a woman. She was enveloped in a thick growth of hair grey and tufted, and from her head it streamed down over her shoulders and her bosom, from which hung withered and pendulous breasts. And looking on her face I comprehended not with my mind alone, but with a shudder of my spirit, what Ingram had felt. Never had nightmare fashioned so terrible a countenance; the beauty of sun and stars and of the beasts of the field and the kindly race of men could not atone for so hellish an incarnation of the spirit of life. A fathomless bestiality modelled the slavering mouth and the narrow eyes; I looked into the abyss itself and knew that out of that abyss on the edge of which I leaned the generations of men had climbed. What if that ledge crumbled in front of me and pitched me headlong into its nethermost depths?…
In one hand she held by the horns a chamois that kicked and struggled. A blow from its hindleg caught her withered thigh, and with a grunt of anger she seized the leg in her other hand, and, as a man may pull from its sheath a stem of meadow grass, she plucked it off the body, leaving the torn skin hanging round the gaping wound. Then putting the red, bleeding member to her mouth she sucked at it as a child sucks a stick of sweetmeat. Through flesh and gristle her short, brown teeth penetrated, and she licked her Ups with a sound of purring. Then dropping the leg by her side, she looked again at the body of the prey now quivering in its death convulsion, and with finger and thumb gouged out one of its eyes. She snapped her teeth on it, and it cracked like a soft-shelled nut…
It must have been but a few seconds that I stood watching her, in some indescribable catalepsy of terror, while through my brain there pealed the panic-command of my mind to my stricken limbs, “Begone, begone, while there is time.” Then, recovering the power of my joints and muscles, I tried to slip behind a tree and hide myself from this apparition, but the woman—shall I say?—must have caught my stir of movement, for she raised her eyes from her living feast and saw me. She craned forward her neck, she dropped her prey, and half rising began to move towards me. As she did this, she opened her mouth and gave forth a howl such as I had heard a moment before. It was answered by another, but faintly and distantly.
Sliding and slipping, with the toes of my skis tripping in the obstacles below the snow, I plunged forward down the hill between the pine-trunks. The low sun already sinking behind some rampart of mountain in the west reddened the snow and the pines with its ultimate rays. My knapsack with the skates in it swung to and fro on my back, one ski-stick had already been twitched out of my hand by a fallen branch of pine, but not a second’s pause could I allow myself to recover it. I gave no glance behind, and I knew not at what pace my pursuer was on my track, or indeed whether any pursued at all, for my whole mind and energy, now working at full power again under the stress of my panic, were devoted to getting away down the hill and out of the wood as swiftly as my limbs could bear me. For a little while I heard nothing but the hissing snow of my headlong passage, and the rustle of the covered undergrowth beneath my feet, and then, from close at hand behind me, once more the wolf-howl sounded and I heard the plunging of footsteps other than my own.
The strap of my knapsack had shifted, and as my skates swung to and fro on my back it chafed and pressed on my throat, hindering free passage of air, of which, God knew, my labouring lungs were in dire need, and without pausing I slipped it free from my neck, and held it in the hand from which my ski-stick had been jerked. I seemed to go a little more easily for this adjustment, and now, not so far distant I could see below me the path from which I had strayed. If only I could reach that, the smoother going would surely enable me to outdistance my pursuer, who even on the rougher ground was but slowly overhauling me, and at the sight of that riband stretching unimpeded downhill, a ray of hope pierced the black panic of my soul. With that came the desire, keen and insistent, to see who or what it was that was on my tracks, and I spared a backward glance. It was she, the hag whom I had seen at her gruesome meal; her long grey hair flew out behind her, her mouth chattered and gibbered, her fingers made grabbing movements, as if already they closed on me.
But the path was now at hand, and the nearness of it I suppose made me incautious. A hump of snow-covered bush lay in my path, and, thinking I could jump over it, I tripped and fell, smothering myself in snow. I heard a maniac noise, half scream, half laugh, from close behind, and before I could recover myself the grabbing fingers were at my neck, as if a steel vise had closed there. But my right hand in which I held my knapsack of skates was free, and with a blind backhanded movement 1 whirled it behind me at full length of its strap, and knew that my desperate blow had found its billet somewhere. Even before I could look round I felt the grip on my neck relax, and something subsided into the very bush which had entangled me. I recovered my feet and turned. There she lay, twitching and quivering. The heel of one of my skates piercing the thin alpaca of the knapsack had hit her full on the temple, from which the blood was pouring, but a hundred yards away I could see another such figure coming downwards on my tracks, leaping and bounding. At that panic arose again within me, and I sped off down the white smooth path that led to the lights of the village already beckoning. Never once did I pause in my headlong going: there was no safety until I was back among the haunts of men. I flung myself against the door of the hotel, and screamed for admittance, though I had but to turn the handle and enter; and once more as when Ingram had told his tale, there was the sound of the band, and the chatter of voices, and there, too, was he himself, who looked up and then rose swiftly to his feet as I made my clattering entrance.
“I have seen them too,” I cried. “Look at my knapsack. Is there not blood on it? It is the blood of one of them, a woman, a hag, who tore off the leg of a chamois as I looked, and pursued me through the accursed wood. I—”
Whether it was I who spun round, or the room which seemed to spin round me, I knew not, but I heard myself falling, collapsed on the floor, and the next time that I was conscious at all I was in bed. There was Ingram there, who told me that I was quite safe, and another man, a stranger, who pricked my arm with the nozzle of a syringe, and reassured me…
A day or two later I gave a coherent account of my adventure, and three or four men, armed with guns, went over my traces. They found the bush in which I had stumbled, with a pool of blood which had soaked into the snow, and, still following my ski-tracks, they came on the body of a chamois, from which had been torn one of its hindlegs and one eye-socket was empty. That is all the corroboration of my story that I can give the reader, and for myself I imagine that the creature which pursued me was either not killed by my blow or that her fellows removed her body…
Anyhow, it is open to the incredulous to prowl about the caves of the Ungeheuerhorn, and see if anything occurs that may convince them.
NIGHT DRIVE
by Will F. Jenkins
Madge was ready to leave the house and in the act of turning out the lights when the telephone rang. She picked it up, and Mr. Tabor identified himself. He sounded as if he had a bad cold, although Madge hardly knew him well enough to identify his voice anyway. He said apologetically that he’d heard that Madge—he called her Mrs. Haley, of course—was driving over to Colchester tonight. It was an imposition for him to ask, but it would be a great favor if she could take a passenger with her. His niece, Eunice, who was in town for the day for the first time, wanted to go over there to get the train home.
Madge felt uncomfortable. When anyone in town mentioned Colchester and the Colchester Road, you felt uncomfortable these days. But to hear Mr. Tabor say it was even more disturbing.
“I was just about to leave,” Madge said, “but if she can be ready fairly soon, I’ll be delighted to take her along.” “She’s ready now, Mrs. Haley,” Mr. Tabor said faintly, as if from far away. “She’ll be waiting on the porch. I have to leave, so I’ll thank you now on her behalf.”
He hung up, and Madge turned off the lights and went out to the car, still feeling uneasy. No woman liked to be reminded of what had happened to Mr. Tabor’s wife. She’d been murdered while driving alone over the. Colchester Road at night. The same thing had happened to another girl, too, but that wasn’t quite the same as someone you knew being murdered. Nobody in town knew the other girl. But Madge and Mrs. Tabor were nodding acquaintances in the town’s supermarket and on Main Street.
The car started briskly, and Madge guided it two blocks ahead and one to the right. Through the gloom, she saw a figure waiting on the steps of Mr. Tabor’s unlit house. Madge opened the right-hand door.
“You’re Eunice?” she called cheerfully. “I’m Mrs. Haley.”
“It’s very good of you,” the girl answered in a flat voice. *1 hope this doesn’t put you out.”
“Nonsense!” said Madge. “I’m glad to have company! Climb in. And toss your bag in back.”
The girl obeyed silently. She was a little bit angular and a little bit clumsy. Her hat was severely plain. She wore spectacles that seemed to Madge to be tinted, although it was hard to tell in the faint glow from the street light up the block. She sat primly, her hands folded in her lap, as Madge turned and headed out of town.
Presently, the houses grew farther apart. Street lights no longer appeared. And on either side of the road, fields stretched out and dark masses of woodland showed beyond them. The road flowed smoothly toward them as Madge settled down for the forty-mile run to Colchester. It was really a beautiful evening; the pungent smells of growing things that rose out of the spring dark made Madge very glad to be young and alive and driving to meet her husband tonight. And at that, Madge was reminded again of Mrs. Tabor. One reason Mrs. Tabor’s death had been especially horrible was because she was a bride and Mr. Tabor had been so happy and so proud of her.
“It’s nice having someone with me,” said Madge. “I really don’t like driving at night. But my husband gets into Colchester at ten tonight, and if he waited for a bus he wouldn’t get home until after three in the morning. We have dreadful service here The girl was silent for a second, then said, “Yes” Madge’s ear was caught again by the flat, low-pitched tone of Eunice’s voice; it had no human quality at all. Eunice added, as if in apology for being curt, “But it isn’t bad in the daytime.”
“No,” Madge agreed. She was silent for a space, then said, “How did Mr. Tabor know I was driving over?”
The girl hesitated before she answered. “I guess somebody mentioned it.”
“They’d hardly—” Then Madge stopped. She realized that although she never would speak of the Colchester Road to Mr. Tabor, for fear of hurting him, others might not feel the same. “I got the gas and oil and tires checked today…I guess I mentioned to Bob—the filling-station attendant—where I was going. I guess that’s the answer.”
The girl said, “Probably,” and sat quietly, her hands in her lap. The road made a sharp bend and woodland closed in on them. The air was chilly among the trees, and then it warmed again as the woods dropped away and they were on a clear stretch once more.
“Mrs. Haley,” the girl said suddenly, “do you carry a pistol when you drive at night?”
Madge jumped a little. She laughed, although not quite with ease.
“Good heavens, no. Why?” Then she said, “But I suppose your uncle thinks women should.”
She felt queer. She was going to drive over the highway on which Mrs. Tabor had been killed twelve months before. There had never been any clue to the killer. It was just assumed that somehow Mrs. Tabor—who also had been on her way to meet her husband—had been persuaded to stop her car and pick up someone. The car was found later. It had been sprinkled with gasoline and set on fire, and any clues it might have yielded were destroyed. Mrs. Tabor, meanwhile, had been found bludgeoned to death. There were other details, but that was the way the local paper : phrased it.
She heard herself saying with morbid interest, “How long had your uncle and—Mrs. Tabor been married?”
“About three months,” the girl said. She added in the same expressionless manner, “We’re near the turnoff, aren’t we?”
“Why, yes,” said Madge. She grew confused. One doesn’t expect a newcomer to know such things. She didn’t remember Mr. Tabor’s niece ever having visited him before, and she’d more or less assumed that she was a complete stranger. As far as that went, Mr. Tabor wasn’t a longtime resident himself. He’d come to town about a year and a half ago to accept a rather good position. And after three months he married and brought his bride to town.
Only three months after that, Mrs. Tabor had started to drive to Colchester one night, and the murder had occurred. Madge remembered clearly and uncomfortably the first time she’d seen Mr. labor after the murder. He was a small man, and he’d looked shrunken and mummy-like by then. But he didn’t go away. He stayed on, living in the -house in which he’d spent his honeymoon. Madge couldn’t understand his doing that.
The car came to the turnoff. There was nothing conspicuous about it. It was just a secondary road that branched off the main highway and wound across country to Colchester. In thirty-five miles you could see on it only one small country store and maybe four or five farmhouses, set far back from the highway. Most of its length the road cut . straight through heavy woods.
Madge turned into it. The air was fragrant with the aromatic smell of pine. It was cooler, too. But one no longer liad the feeling of being in open space. Above and ahead there was a narrow ribbon of sky in which stars shone brightly. The headlights stabbed on and showed pine-tree trunks alongside, and more pine-tree trunks. There was a bare screen of underbrush at the road’s edge.
The angular figure beside Madge said, “Lonely in here, isn’t it?”
Madge pressed harder on the accelerator. The car picked up speed.
“One thing’s certain,” she said, trying to smile, “nobody could make me stop to pick them up on this road!”
“Mrs. Tabor—Aunt Clara, I suppose I should call her,” Eunice said, “didn’t pick up people, either. But that night she did.”
Madge set her lips and drove. Presently she said awkwardly, “Eunice, has Mr. Tabor ever had any idea of who—who killed Mrs. Tabor?”
Eunice said impassively, “There’s always the chance that the man who did it will be caught.” There was a slight pause. “Another girl was killed six months later, you remember.”
Madge suddenly regretted deeply that she had not made some excuse to avoid riding with Eunice. It was bad to be reminded of Mrs. Tabor. But to be reminded at the same time of that other battered body of an unknown girl made it worse. The police were never able to find out even so much as her name. All that was known was that she had been dead six weeks or so when her body was found by some local hunters.
“Your uncle,” said Madge, “is staying in town, then, in the hope of catching his wife’s murderer?”
Eunice answered quickly, “The same man killed that other girl. There was a scorched road map under her body when they found it. Apparently she was driving, too. Only the killer got rid of her car. It’s never been found. But obviously it was the same man. The crimes were identical.”
‘
Madge said, shocked, “But that means—”
“That the killer is still around,” said the flat voice. “His name was even given to the police. But they didn’t believe it for an instant. He’s too well thought of.”
“You—you talk as if you know who the killer is!” protested Madge.
Eunice said, almost scornfully, “Of course.”
The car swept past a small field of shoulder-high weeds. Just before the woods enveloped them again, there was a sudden sweetness in the air. Honeysuckle. Then the damp, aromatic smell of pine once more. Madge was sensitive to odors. Consciously or otherwise, she associated some scent with everyone she knew. All her friends, certainly. Now she suddenly realized one of the things that made this girl Eunice seem strange. She did not use scent. Not even a scented soap.
