Eastlick and Other Stories Read online

  The thought returned him to his surroundings. The fire was nearly out, and the coalscuttle was low; Mrs. Lamblittle must have retired once more.

  “A truly fascinating tale, Shrewsbury,” Rutherford said, pouring a bit more brandy into each of their glasses. “But I find no evidence within it to explain your earlier assertion.”

  “What assertion do you mean?”

  “That this nightly torment you endure is well deserved?”

  “Ah yes, of course,” Shrewsbury muttered, gazing downward. His prideful reminiscences collapsed and fell away. “I shall hasten to the point, then, so that we may both have hope of at least a few hours slumber before dawn.”

  “Do not rush on my account!” Rutherford leaned back in his overstuffed chair. “But tell me: did you not undergo the experiment yourself? Or was Lord Frost unable to perform this extraction of your own nightmares?”

  “Ahhh…” All unknowing, and from entirely the wrong way ’round, his host had hit upon the dark heart of it. “No, more’s the pity; I never did. Had I experienced anything resembling an overt nightmare during those last fateful months, I’d doubtless have been bolted into Lord Frost’s collection device as fast as you could say Wee Willy Winkie, and that would have been the end of it.”

  “The end of what?” his old friend asked with visibly rekindled interest.

  “If only I had seen the truth in time,” Wendell lamented, “I’d likely enjoy a station far loftier than yours by now.” Rutherford’s smile dimmed somewhat, but Shrewsbury gave it no thought as he fell deeper into reverie. “Alas. No such happy fortune is accorded me.” He took a larger draught of brandy than good manners might have countenanced, and heaved a sigh of resignation. “Here’s the awful truth of it, then.”

  Rutherford set his brandy down, and leaned forward in his chair to listen.

  “I must assume,” Wendell said, “that one of these fiendish creatures somehow glimpsed the nature of our activities while sorting through the contents of my own mind at nights. Not only that, but it apparently then had the cunning to conduct itself in ways not recognizable to me as nightmare... Not then. No...”

  “I am ... not sure I take your meaning,” Rutherford said, in a stiff voice. Wendell glanced up at him. The shadows of the dying fire played upon his old friend’s face unpleasantly, though Rutherford smiled as if anticipating some reassuring explanation.

  In for a penny, in for a pound, Wendell thought, gripped now by the determination to unburden himself completely of this dreadful secret. “I believe it infects me still.”

  “What? ... One of these parasites you speak of?”

  “The very creature whose tender ministrations you so mercifully interrupted earlier this evening,” Shrewsbury acknowledged.

  Rutherford withdrew into the shadows of his plush chair, and raised the snifter to his lips, obscuring his expression.

  “Once they are housed in the skull,” Shrewsbury explained, “such creatures can live and grow, apparently, watching and waiting, biding their time…”

  “You speak of these ... parasites ... as if they had intelligence,” Rutherford observed.

  Wendell leaned forward, gazing at his friend. “But they do—it does! These are no mere automatons, mindlessly feeding and breeding and dying like so many other members of the animal kingdom. They think. They plan, and scheme,” he whispered, half forgetful of his friend, “but subtly, oh so subtly.”

  “So this nightmare you’ve been suffering is not just a living organism lodged within your mind, but actively contriving some enduring plan to harm you?” Rutherford asked.

  Shrewsbury nodded miserably, aware that he had finally outpaced his host’s credulity.

  “But why?” Rutherford pressed. “I too have nightmares from time to time. Who does not? They do not remain after waking to keep waging some campaign against me. Even if you are correct, and these dreams really are the work of some elusive organism, what purpose could a parasite have in persecuting the host from whom it presumably benefits?”

  “Revenge, I assume,” Shrewsbury replied with a desolate shrug. “We persecuted others of its kind, and would certainly have done as much to it if we had guessed in time that it was there. Having used me to defeat my mentor, it now seems to derive more pleasure from my extended torment than from just dispatching me as it contrived to do to poor Lord Frost.”

  Rutherford set his snifter down abruptly and lurched forward in his chair. “Surely you’re not claiming that this insubstantial ... insect is somehow responsible for Lord Frost’s death!”

  “It ... and I,” Shrewsbury murmured, once again unable to look anywhere but into the dying fire.

  “I do not believe it,” Rutherford said. “I would sooner think you mad, old friend, than a murderer of any kind. I will help in any way I can, financially if necessary, and, of course, you may count on my absolute discretion, but I think you must seek help immediately in regard to this delusion that you suffer.”

  “That is very generous,” Shrewsbury said in disappointment, “but I am quite certain that this is no delusion. Would that it were! I am well aware of how incredible these claims must sound, but the entity of which I speak is, sadly, all too real. You have not seen its cousins in the laboratory as I have. You ... were not there ... that night…”

  Elsewhere in the house, Wendell heard footsteps and the muffled thump of a closing door. Mrs. Lamblittle, no doubt, up again for something. He hoped she might consider coming in to replenish the coal.

  “What did happen ... that night?” Rutherford pressed, if less enthusiastically than before.

  That night... Wendell thought despondently.

  “It started well before then,” he said at last. “Having discerned the threat we posed to it before we discerned its threat to us, the pernicious demon refrained from inflicting any overt nocturnal terror. Rather, it simply hid within my mind, subtly manipulating both my thoughts and dreams to induce within me a growing urge, first to prove and later to aggrandize myself before Lord Frost. It exploited my propensity for pride, my vanity and weakness for conceit. No gentler description is merited, I fear. I found myself increasingly compelled to pretentious displays of zeal for meticulous detail and obsessive perfection in my work, not that I found anything strange in such behaviour. What young man does not seek the attention and approval of his employer in hope of advancement? Unfortunately, this new proclivity soon proved so insatiable that I began inventing opportunities to demonstrate my usefulness by fixing things that were not broken—first between myself and the lesser members of Lord Frost’s staff and household, then between myself and Lord Frost himself, and eventually presuming to improve upon the lab’s equipment and devices themselves…”

  “What sorts of improvement?” Rutherford asked.

  “Small things. Trivial, in fact ... at first.” Shrewsbury sighed. “Needless attention to parts I thought wanted lubrication or polishing to remedy some rough edge or improper motion. Things meant to have no real impact beyond that of impressing upon Lord Frost what a careful, knowledgeable, important resource I was. Indeed, Lord Frost was initially delighted by my industrious attention to detail—which just encouraged my evolving mania.” Wendell gazed bleakly at his host, who stared back in silence. “How is one to know he builds a weapon, Rutherford, if he never sees more than the one small piece he’s given to contribute at a time?”

  “I ... could not say,” his friend answered carefully.

  “They are diabolic creatures, these nightmares,” Wendell said. “This one, anyway. By this excessive maintenance, it learned at least as much as I did about our equipment’s every part and function. I saw nothing then save my own good works, and cannot say, even now, exactly when I shifted from inconsequential meddlings to more significant attempts to usurp both the direction and implementation of Lord Frost’s research. No longer content merely to magnify myself as his assistant, I now hoped to engineer recognition and reward as a peer and co-author of the breakthroughs we pursued.”

/>   “Had you even any medical degree yet?” Rutherford asked.

  “I ... am still accorded the MA (Cantab),” Shrewsbury admitted with chagrin. It was as if the tale were telling him now, rather than the other way ’round, but Wendell felt compelled to make Rutherford see this was no mere madness to be coddled and contained at some gentle sanatorium. If even his old friend could not be made to see the truth, then what purpose had there been to this whole exercise?

  “Under the devious influence of my invasive parasite, I had become convinced that practical experience trumped any mere certificate bestowed by tired old wine-soaked dons. I imagined myself Lord Frost’s right hand man, and merely sought to help others, including himself, recognize the fact.” He shook his head in self-disgust.

  “On the fateful night in question, I arrived at the laboratory hours earlier than necessary—as had been my overeager practice for so many months by then—and, predictably, found myself alone there. I lit the lamps, reviewed Lord Frost’s most recent notes, and set about preparing the materials and devices for that evening’s procedure. It was to be a challenging extraction. The subject was a deeply troubled young woman.” Wendell shook his head sadly. “She had sought us out on the advice of Lord Frost’s cousin in Dorset where they both resided. Her dreadful and relentless nightmares had brought her to fear sleep itself. Much like…” He trailed off with a small shudder. “We were, of course, earnestly determined to free her of this affliction.

  “As I ignited the device’s engines, and adjusted output levels, it suddenly seemed to me that stronger frequencies than normally applied were surely called for in a case of this severity.” As the dreadful reminiscence grew more vivid, Shrewsbury became all but unaware of his rapt audience. “I can still recall how the machine hummed to life under my fingers, as if eager for my commands... I turned the knobs higher, strangely convinced that the apparent strength of that night’s quarry demanded strength in return, and that my employer’s usual practices were overly cautious, perhaps to the point of endangering our subject.” The recollection filled Wendell with an urge to sob, which he manfully suppressed. “I assured myself that Lord Frost would examine the machine himself, once he arrived, and override my decisions if he chose to.

  “My preparations were barely concluded, however, when I heard a tentative knock at the laboratory’s inner door. I went to see who it could be and found Miss Ingleside, our unfortunate client, arrived at least an hour early. The housekeeper, it seemed, had simply escorted her up and left her at the laboratory door. I remember thinking she should be reprimanded for such conduct. In retrospect, Miss Ingleside’s premature arrival seems uncannily well timed to facilitate what was about to happen. I have sometimes wondered since if these creatures may be capable of some communication over distance with others of their kind. Could her parasite have conspired with mine?” Wendell bowed his head. “This is yet another question we will likely never answer, now.” He sighed deeply.

  “I recall that Miss Ingleside was dreadfully pale. There were dark, greenish patches below her sallow eyes. Her dress hung off her thin, brittle frame as if off a broomstick. She asked timidly if I were Lord Frost, and I told her, no, that I was his associate. Flooded with compassion for the poor creature, I invited her to sit down in the room’s only chair, to which she would be later strapped for the procedure.” Wendell reached once more for his brandy glass, which Rutherford had quietly topped up. “She sat there shivering, though the laboratory was quite comfortable. Only when she declined the offer of a blanket did I realize that she was trembling with fright, if not exhaustion too, rather than from cold.

  “My heart filled with the tender, urgent desire to assist her at once. I felt bizarrely certain that Lord Frost would heartily approve of my decision not to make her wait a moment longer for relief. I had performed this sort of procedure countless times by then, or at any rate assisted Frost in doing so, which seemed much the same thing to me at that ill-fated moment.”

  Rutherford made a small, apprehensive noise, and rose to set the last few coals onto the fire, nudging them into place with a long wrought-iron poker.

  “Have I been wrong to tell you this?” Shrewsbury asked.

  “Of course not,” his host replied, settling back into his chair. “It is just ... not the kind of tale to be listened to in darkness.”

  “Of course. Quite right,” said Shrewsbury. “It was foolishness. Utter madness. Lord Frost was a meticulous researcher, always careful to maintain precise records and complete control of each experiment. Though I’d been permitted to maintain and calibrate the engines and delivery systems, and pump out the collection jars upon capture of an organism, there was never to be any hand but his on that final switch... He had made that very clear.” Shrewsbury gripped his glass, fairly quivering with outrage at his own disastrous arrogance. “Yet, after months, I now surmise, of my nightmarish handler’s grooming, I somehow felt myself perfectly qualified to help this poor girl without waiting for Lord Frost, whom I did not expect for some time yet.”

  Rutherford sat in silence, his face blank of any readable reaction to such hubris.

  “I bade Miss Ingleside make herself as comfortable as possible, and adjusted the chair’s restraining belts to her small frame, then fastened her delicate arms into the leather straps upon its own. Lord Frost and I had quickly discovered how forcefully the distressed parasites could cause our subjects to thrash about in pursuit of escape once the procedure began.

  “She quavered a bit, as I finished my work, but I had explained the treatment to her very carefully before strapping her in, so she did not complain. I placed the extraction bell over her head, and sealed it around her neck, made sure her breathing-tube was functioning properly, and, after giving her a final, reassuring pat, stepped to the controls.”

  Shrewsbury put his head into his hands in abject misery. “I wish I could claim to have hesitated before placing my hand upon that lever ... but I did not. All was ready and checked two or three times over. I was fully confident of all my calculations.

  “I threw the master switch.

  “Steam billowed from exhaust portals just outside the laboratory windows, as usual. Miss Ingleside gave a small shriek, muffled by the diving bell and breathing tube, which, as I’ve mentioned, was not unusual either. I cautioned her to be still, but she responded by writhing even more aggressively against her constraints. Seeing how mercilessly the beast within drove her, I surmised it must be very powerful indeed. Motivated by this speculation, I increased the frequencies yet another notch—hoping to drive her tormentor out the faster.”

  “I do not think I like where this tale seems to lead,” Rutherford murmured.

  “Nor should you,” Wendell answered sadly. “As you’ve clearly guessed, guided by my own still undiscovered passenger, I kept finding reasons to turn the dials further up, just the merest nudge. Miss Ingleside began to thrash about so wildly that she actually managed to free one of her wrists from its strap, and, a second later, her upper arm. So much strength in such a tiny frame! I thought, rushing to stop her as she began to rip the other straps away with her freed hand. I grappled with her, but her strength proved truly superhuman, and I found no way of gaining ground against her efforts without risking harm to her myself. I had no idea what to do.

  “Even more unfortunately, the panel of controls was close enough to the chair that as we struggled with each other, she was able to reach out and slap frantically at its knobs and dials, apparently attempting to stop the procedure. All she succeeded at was boosting half the frequencies to levels I would never have employed in any state of mind. Worse yet, as they were knocked completely out of calibration, the sonic instruments began to generate dissonant vibrations that rattled half the objects in the room, including my own teeth.

  “I still see that moment, with such dreadful clarity, as the bell jars began to shatter from the sound.”

  “The nightmares!” Rutherford gasped. “Did they escape?”

  “Oh yes. B
ut not just to flee, I soon discovered. Abandoning the struggling woman, I leapt for the collection of vibrating jars, attempting to contain the damage, but had hardly started before the air seemed filled with terrifying sounds.” Wendell brought his hands up to the sides of his head. “I barely heard Miss Ingleside begin to scream anew as the room filled suddenly with monstrous forms. I felt pressed about with filthy, sweating, stinking bodies. I cried out, trying to push them back, but they simply pressed in harder.

  “Panic turned to terror in my head and chest. The air became rank, entering my lungs like viscous, septic syrup. I no longer saw the laboratory at all—but the interior of a crowded passenger-coach, loaded with convulsing corpses. It careened down a narrow, winding street, rocking wildly as all of us inside it cried in panic, gouging, scratching, kicking to get out. I tasted blood, felt it coat and clog my throat!

  “Gasping, I groped desperately around me for a pull-cord to alert the driver—but everywhere I reached, I just felt more putrescent flesh, more rotting, blood-drenched clothing, matted hair, ragged fingernails... When my hand at last found what I was sure must be the cord, I yanked upon it with all my strength, and was rewarded with a flash of light and heat, as if the very coach around me had exploded.

  “Amidst this maelstrom, I heard the shouts of my employer. As if punctured by his voice, the illusory coach vanished, and I found myself lying on the floor as Lord Frost struggled nearby to free the now unconscious Miss Ingleside from her remaining restraints. The laboratory was engulfed in flames! Hoses had been torn away, spewing the highly combustible experimental fuels we used to heat our boilers all about. These had somehow ignited. Gazing about in horror, I saw that all of the laboratory’s accoutrements had been scattered and demolished! Had I caused all this damage flailing at imagined corpses?