The Weird Part 27

I now heard the clamor from much closer, hostile and threatening. I began walking back toward the Mohlenstra.s.se. The scenes went by like the quatrains of a ballad: three little doors and viburnum bushes, three little doors and viburnum bushes...

Finally I saw the first lights of the real world twinkling before me. But the clamor had pursued me to the edge of the Mohlenstra.s.se. There it stopped abruptly, adapting itself to the joyous evening sounds of the populous streets, so that the mysterious and terrible shouting ended in a chorus of children's voices singing a roundelay.

The whole town is in the grip of an unspeakable terror.

I would not have spoken of it in these brief memoirs, which concern only myself, if I had not found a link between the shadowy street and the crimes that steep the town in blood every night.

Over a hundred people have suddenly disappeared, a hundred others have been savagely murdered.

I recently took a map of the town and drew on it the winding line that must represent Saint Beregonne's Lane, that incomprehensible street that overlaps our terrestrial world. I was horrified to see that all the crimes have been committed along that line.

Thus poor Klingbom was one of the first to disappear. According to his clerk, he vanished like a puff of smoke just as he was entering the room containing his stills. The seed merchant's wife was next, s.n.a.t.c.hed away while she was in her sad garden. Her husband was found in his drying-room with his skull smashed.

As I traced the fateful line on the map, my idea became a certainty. I can explain the victims' disappearance only by their pa.s.sage into an unknown plane; as for the murders, they are easy for invisible beings.

All the inhabitants of a house on Old Purse Street have disappeared. On Church Street, six corpses have been found. On Post Street, there have been five disappearances and four deaths. This goes on and on, apparently limited by the Deichstra.s.se, where more murders and disappearances are taking place.

I now realize that to talk about what I know would be to place myself in the Kirchhaus insane asylum, a tomb from which no Lazarus ever arises; or else it would give free rein to a superst.i.tious crowd that is exasperated enough to tear me to pieces as a sorcerer.

And yet, ever since the beginning of my monotonous daily thefts, anger has been welling up inside me, driving me to vague plans of vengeance.

'Gockel knows more about this than I do,' I thought. 'I'm going to tell him what I know: that will make him more inclined to confide in me.'

But that evening, while Gockel was emptying his heavy purse into my hands, I said nothing, and he left as usual with polite words that made no allusion to the strange bargain that had attached us to the same chain.

I had a feeling that events were about to leap forward and rush like a torrent through my tranquil life. I was becoming more and more aware that Saint Beregonne's Lane and its little houses were only a mask concealing some sort of horrible face.

So far, fortunately for me, I had gone there only in broad daylight, because for some reason I dreaded to encounter the shadows of evening there. But one day I lingered later than usual, stubbornly pushing furniture around, turning drawers inside out, determined to discover something new. And the 'new' came of itself, in the form of a dull rumble, like that of heavy doors moving on rollers. I looked up and saw that the opalescent light had changed into an ashy semi-darkness. The panes of gla.s.s above the staircase were livid: the little courtyards were already filled with shadow.

My heart tightened, but when the rumbling continued, reinforced by the powerful resonance of the house, my curiosity became stronger than my fear, and I began climbing the stairs to see where the noise was coming from.

It was growing darker and darker, but before leaping back down the stairs like a madman and running out of the house, I was able to see....There was no more wall! The staircase ended at the edge of an abyss dug out of the night, from which vague monstrosities were rising.

I reached the door; behind me, something was furiously knocked over.

The Mohlenstra.s.se gleamed before me like a haven. I ran faster. Something suddenly seized me with extreme savagery.

'What's the matter with you? Can't you see where you're going?'

I found myself sitting on the pavement of the Mohlenstra.s.se, before a sailor who was rubbing his sore skull and looking at me in bewilderment. My coat was torn, my neck was bleeding.

I immediately hurried away without wasting any time on apologies, to the supreme indignation of the sailor, who shouted after me that after colliding with him so brutally I should at least buy him a drink.

Anita is gone, vanished!

My heart is broken; I collapse, sobbing, on my useless gold.

And yet her house is far from the zone of danger. Good G.o.d! I failed through an excess of prudence and love! One day, without mentioning the street, I showed her the line I had drawn on the map and told her that all the danger seemed to be concentrated along that sinuous trail. Her eyes glowed strangely at that moment. I should have known that the great spirit of adventure that animated her ancestors was not dead in her.

Perhaps, in a flash of feminine intuition, she made a connection between that line and my sudden fortune....Oh, how my life is disintegrating!

There have been more murders and disappearances. And my Anita has been carried off in the b.l.o.o.d.y, inexplicable whirlwind!

The case of Hans Mendell has given me a mad idea: those vaporous beings, as he described them, may not be invulnerable.

Although Hans Mendell was not a distinguished man, I see no reason not to believe his story. He was a scoundrel who made his living as a mountebank and a cutthroat. When he was found, he had in his pocket the purses and watches of two unfortunate men whose corpses lay bleeding on the ground a few paces away from him.

It would have been a.s.sumed that he was guilty of murder if he himself had not been found moaning with both arms torn from his body.

Being a man with a powerful const.i.tution, he was able to live long enough to answer the feverish questions of the magistrates and priests.

He confessed that for several days he had followed a shadow, a kind of black mist, and robbed the bodies of the people it killed. On the night of his misfortune, he saw the black mist waiting in the middle of Post Street in the moonlight. He hid in an empty sentry-box and watched it. He saw other dark, vaporous, awkward forms that bounced like rubber b.a.l.l.s, then disappeared.

Soon he heard voices and saw two young men coming up the street. The black mist was no longer in sight, but he suddenly saw the two men writhe on their backs, then lie still.

Mendell added that he had already observed the same sequence in those nocturnal murders on seven other occasions. He had always waited for the shadow to leave, then robbed the bodies. This shows that he had remarkable self-control, worthy of being put to a better use.

As he was robbing the two bodies, he saw with alarm that the shadow had not left, but had only risen off the ground, interposing itself between him and the moon. He then saw that it had a roughly human shape. He tried to go back to the sentry-box but did not have time: the figure pounced on him.

Mendell was an extraordinarily strong man. He struck an enormous blow and encountered a slight resistance, as though he were pushing his hand through a strong current of air.

That was all he was able to say. His horrible wound allowed him to live only another hour after telling his story.

The idea of avenging Anita has now taken root in my brain. I said to Gockel, 'Don't come any more. I need revenge and hatred, and your gold can no longer do anything for me.'

He looked at me with that profound expression that was familiar to me by now.

'Gockel,' I said, 'I'm going to take vengeance.'

His face suddenly brightened, as though with great joy: 'And...do you believe...Herr Doktor, that they will disappear?'

I harshly ordered him to have a cart filled with f.a.gots and casks of oil, raw alcohol and gunpowder, and to leave it without a driver early in the morning on the Mohlenstra.s.se. He bowed low like a servant, and as he was leaving he said to me, 'May the Lord help you! May the Lord come to your aid!'

I feel that these are the last lines I shall write in this journal.

I piled up the f.a.gots, streaming with oil and alcohol, against the big door. I laid down trails of gunpowder connecting the nearby small doors with other oil-soaked f.a.gots. I placed charges of powder in all the cracks in the walls.

The mysterious clamor continued all around me. This time I discerned in it abominable lamentations, human wails, echoes of horrible torments of the flesh. But my heart was agitated by tumultuous joy, because I felt around me a wild apprehension that came from them. They saw my terrible preparations and were unable to prevent them, for, as I had come to realize, only night released their frightful power.

I calmly struck a light with my tinderbox. A moan pa.s.sed, and the viburnum bushes quivered as though blown by a sudden stiff breeze. A long blue flame rose into the air, the f.a.gots began crackling, fire crept along the trails of gunpowder....

I ran down the winding street, from bend to bend, feeling a little dizzy, as though I were going too fast down a spiral staircase that descended deep into the earth.

The Deichstra.s.se and the whole surrounding neighborhood were in flames. From my window, I could see the sky turning yellow above the rooftops. The weather was dry and the town's water supply was nearly exhausted. A red band of sparks and flames hovered high above the street.

The fire had been burning for a day and a night, but it was still far from the Mohlenstra.s.se. Saint Beregonne's Lane was there, calm with its quivering viburnum bushes. Explosions rumbled in the distance.

Another cart was there, loaded and left by Gockel. Not a soul was in sight: everyone had been drawn toward the formidable spectacle of the fire. It was not expected here.

I walked from bend to bend to bend, sowing f.a.gots, pools of oil and alcohol, and the dark frost of gunpowder. Suddenly, just as I had turned another bend, I stopped and stared. Three little houses, the everlasting three little houses, were burning calmly with pretty yellow flames in the peaceful air. It was as though even the fire respected their serenity, for it was doing its work without noise or ferocity. I realized that I was at the red edge of the conflagration that was destroying the town.

With anguish in my soul, I moved back from that mystery that was about to die.

I was near the Mohlenstra.s.se. I stopped in front of the first of the little doors, the one I had opened, trembling, a few weeks earlier. It was there that I would start the new fire.

For the last time, I saw the kitchen, the austere parlor, and the staircase, which now ended at the wall, as before; and I felt that all this had become familiar, almost dear to me.

On the big tray, the one I had stolen so many times before only to find it waiting for me again the next day, I saw some sheets of paper covered with elegant feminine handwriting.

I picked them up. This was going to be my last theft on the shadowy street.

Vampires! Vampires! Vampires!

So ends the French ma.n.u.script. The last words, evoking the impure spirits of the night, are written across the page in sharp letters that cry out terror and despair. Thus must write those who, on a sinking ship, want to convey a last farewell to the families they hope will survive them.

It was last year in Hamburg. I was strolling through the old city, with its good smell of fresh beer. It was dear to my heart, because it reminded me of the cities I had loved in my youth. And there, on an empty, echoing street, I saw a name on the front of an antique shop: Lockmann Gockel.

I bought an old Bavarian pipe with truculent decorations. The shopkeeper seemed friendly. I asked him if the name of Archipetre meant anything to him. His face had been the color of gray earth; in the twilight it now turned so white that it stood out from the shadows as though illuminated by an inner flame.

'Archipetre,' he murmured slowly. 'Oh! What are you saying? What do you know?'

I had no reason to conceal the story I had found on the dock. I told it to him.

He lit an archaic gaslight. Its flame danced and hissed foolishly.

I saw that his eyes were weary.

'He was my grandfather,' he said, when I mentioned Gockel the antique dealer.

When I had finished my story I heard a great sigh from a dark corner.

'That's my sister,' he said.

I nodded to her. She was young and pretty, but very pale. She had been listening to me, motionless among grotesque shadows.

'Our grandfather talked to our father about it nearly every evening,' he said in a faltering voice, 'and our father used to discuss it with us. Now that he's dead too, we talk about it with each other.'

'And now,' I said nervously, 'thanks to you, we're going to be able to do some research on the subject of that mysterious street, aren't we?'

He slowly raised his hand.

'Alphonse Archipetre taught French in the Gymnasium until 1842.'

'Oh!' I said, disappointed. 'That's a long time ago!'

'It was the year of the great fire that nearly destroyed Hamburg. The Mohlenstra.s.se and the vast section of the city between it and the Deichstra.s.se were a sea of flames.'

'And Archipetre?'

'He lived rather far from there, toward Bleichen. The fire didn't reach his street, but in the middle of the second night, on May 6 a terrible night, dry and without water his house burned down, all alone among the others that were miraculously spared. He died in the flames; or at least he was never found.'

'The story...' I began.

Lockmann Gockel did not let me finish. He was so happy to have found an outlet that he seized upon the subject greedily. Fortunately he told me more or less what I wanted to hear.

'The story compressed time, just as s.p.a.ce was compressed at the fateful location of Saint Beregonne's Lane. In the Hamburg archives, there are accounts of atrocities committed during the fire by a band of mysterious evil-doers. Fantastic crimes, looting, riots, red hallucinations on the part of whole crowds all those things are precisely described, and yet they took place before the fire. Do you understand my reference to the contraction of s.p.a.ce and time?'

His face became a little calmer.

'Isn't modern science driven back to Euclidean weakness by the theory of that admirable Einstein for whom the whole world envies us? And isn't it forced to accept, with horror and despair, that fantastic Fitzgerald-Lorentz law of contraction? Contraction! Ah, there's a word that's heavy with meaning!'

The conversation seemed to be going off on an insidious tangent.

The young woman silently brought tall gla.s.ses filled with yellow wine. Gockel raised his toward the flame and marvelous colors flowed onto his frail hand like a silver river of gems.

He abandoned his scientific dissertation and returned to the story of the conflagration: 'My grandfather, and other people of the time, reported that enormous green flames shot up from the debris. There were hallucinated people who claimed to see figures of indescribably ferocious women in them.'

The wine had a soul. I emptied the gla.s.s and smiled at Gockel's terrified words.

'Those same green flames,' he went on, 'rose from Archipetre's house and roared so horribly that people were said to have died of fear in the street.'

'Mr. Gockel,' I said, 'did your grandfather ever speak of the mysterious purchaser who came every evening to buy the same trays and the same candlesticks?'

A weary voice replied for him, in words that were almost identical with those that ended the German ma.n.u.script: 'A tall old woman, an immense old woman with fishy eyes in an incredible face. She brought bags of gold so heavy that our grandfather had to divide them into four parts to carry them to his coffers.'

The young woman continued: 'When Professor Archipetre came to my grandfather, the Gockel firm was about to go bankrupt. It became rich, and we're still enormously rich, from the gold of the...yes, from the gold of those beings of the night!'

'They're gone now,' murmured her brother, refilling our gla.s.ses.

'Don't say that! They can't have forgotten us. Remember our nights, our horrible nights! All I can hope for now is that there is, or was, a human presence with them that they cherish and that may intercede for us.'

Her lovely eyes opened wide before the black abyss of her thoughts.

'Kathie!' exclaimed Gockel. 'Have you again seen?...'

'You know the things are here every night,' she said in a voice as low as a moan. 'They a.s.sail our thoughts as soon as sleep comes over us. Ah, to sleep no more!...'

'To sleep no more,' repeated her brother in an echo of terror.'

'They come out of their gold, which we keep, and which we love in spite of everything; they rise from everything we've acquired with that infernal fortune....They'll always come back, as long as we exist, and as long as this wretched earth endures!'

Genius Loci.