By Michael Benge, United Kingdom

From its tempestuous nursery over the North Sea it came; a vast and formless fury that snarled and bared its chattering teeth over of the trembling flatlands of East Anglia. It swept over darkening fields and country lanes, and its shadow fell without mercy upon the cowering inhabitants of the towns and the villages that lay in its path.

On the evening of the twenty third day of May 1866 the storm reached London and fell upon the city like a wild beast upon a lamb, feeding and slavering and rejoicing in a cataclysm of noise and brilliance. The rain fell in dense, rhythmic waves. It beat upon the drooping rooftops of the houses and fell in gushing waterfalls from the gables and the gutters until the surface of the streets ran in glistening, quicksilver rivers that churned and danced beneath a billion jabbing fingers. Occasionally its anger would relent, slightly, drawing breath and surveying its work before renewing its attack with yet more ferocity, as if unsatisfied with what it saw.

Emaciated hounds, their eyes rolling in terror, loped down dripping alleyways in search of shelter, but every doorway, archway and sewer was already a refuge for equally sodden and whimpering human forms, huddled together in sad rags against the vicious wind that showed no more compassion than the rain. The trees buckled before it, twisting themselves in a violent ecstasy of thrashing movement that was hidden in the darkness, only revealing itself when a sudden flash of lightning would freeze them for a heartbeat, and then they would be plunged again into the rain-swept darkness as the thunder spoke like the voice of Jove, rattling windowpanes and the bones of the dead as they lay restless in their waterlogged graves.

From the warm sanctuary of my study, safely surrounded by its towering bookcases and the comforting solidity of its walls, I, Hieronymus Black, heir to a fortune founded on the blood of slaves, watched the storm unfurl its misery through the curtains.

As I stood there transfixed, for much of the time all I could see was my own face staring back at me from the darkness, pale and nervous, but then the lightning would rend the air, and for an instant I would vanish, and the white, gasping faces of the houses opposite would stare back at me, hideously distorted by the rain that streamed down the outside of the window, while above them the tops of the trees in the Regent’s Park quivered against the storm and, dotting the horizon, the silhouettes of innumerable steeples pointed accusingly at the blasphemous sky.

I fought to control my fear. You may call me a coward, but I’m not ashamed. There are all manner of things in this world of which men should be afraid but which hold no fear for me. And then there are storms, and my blood runs cold, and every shadow shifts and moves in the corners of my eyes. I offer no apologies. It was, in fact, an act of uncommon bravery that I was stood at the window at all and wasn’t buried beneath my bed sheets with a copy of the bible and a prayer on my lips. I exaggerate of course, for I have not prayed since childhood, but what I mean to say is that cowardice is defined by a man’s actions in the face of fear, not by the presence of fear itself.

And so for a full hour I mastered my terror at that window and watched as the world tore itself to pieces. And finally, having proven something to myself, I turned back to the warmth of my study. I threw myself down into the old leather armchair that had served three generations of the Black family and tried desperately to forget about the events transpiring outside. In vain I attempted to calm my nerves by burying my thoughts in a book of verse. The mantel clock plodded out its steady rhythmic march towards doomsday, and though the fire crackled and popped, drawn madly by the wind rushing over the chimney high above me, all seemed calm and tranquil. Every so often, however, that wind would hurl itself against the window pane, or a crack of thunder would rumble across the city, and each time it did my breath would catch and my mind would be sucked away from the words on the page and the fear would rush in to fill the void. After the fourth or fifth time this happened I resigned myself to the fact that I was unable, under such circumstances, to conjure up the gentle imagery of Wordsworth’s poetry, and so I set the book aside, picked up my pipe, and tried to calm my frayed nerves with long, deep draughts upon its slender stem. The thick grey smoke curled upwards towards the ceiling, the nicotine’s gentle caress flowed through my veins, and just when I was beginning to think that I might, perhaps, be able to pass the night in something other than abject terror, the noises started.

A creak, as from a footstep whining in the darkness just outside my study door. That was all, but it was enough. My heart stopped, my breath caught in my throat and I strained every fibre of my body to listen to mumblings of the house. Silence for long moments with only the lashing of the rain filling my ears. Had I imagined it? It was, after all, only a creak, and the whole house must surely be grumbling in this storm. Yes, that was all it was. But no! It came again! Clearer this time, more distinct. Oh God! Get a hold of yourself you fool, I cried, as I leapt to my feet and with a quivering hand reached out and picked up the heavy iron stoker from beside the fire and forced myself to start breathing. And again it came! The door to the drawing room had opened, I was sure: I had lived in the house for long enough to know the pitch and cadence of that particular groan.

Picking up the oil lamp that burned and flickered on the writing desk I advanced across the study and stood with my ear pressed to the panelling. No further sound could be heard, but I was certain that something was creeping about out there, something nameless and awful.

I pushed open the door and the light from the study fell across the darkened hallway. Nothing stirred until a sudden burst of lightening broke outside and a grotesque trapezium of light flashed across the floor from under the front door and then was gone. I moved slowly onward. My heart beat like a mad thing, battering against my ribs just as the storm battered my windows. With each step I took the floorboards spoke, and each time they did I winced, but still I pressed on.

As my eyes swept the darkness I noticed a thin strip of light glowing under the drawing room door and my stomach turned: now there could be no doubt; now I knew that there was more at work here than my fevered imagination being stimulated by the storm; someone or something was in there. But what could it be? What fell creature had gained access to my home and was now, at this very moment, prowling over my Italian rugs and French-upholstered furniture? And creating light, for God’s sake? Did that mean it was human? Or was this some light from beyond the grave?

I moved silently across the hallway, the stoker poised to strike. The oil lamp pushed back the shadows and found the pictures that hung on the walls filled with faces that stared at me with mute horror. From the landing I could hear the old Grandfather clock plodding away so much slower than my heart. A bead of cold sweat ran down my spine as I got halfway to the drawing room door and my eyes were fixed upon its handle, praying that it didn’t move. I could hear no sound from the other side, but the roar of the blood in my ears would have drowned out a massacre. I paused again, and listened. And listened. There it was! A shuffling sound, disjointed, inhuman – like something lost.

Finally my nerves could take no more. Something snapped within me and I decided that if I was to die then I would sooner die then and there than endure another minute of this terrible suspense.

I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and broke into a run. I covered the rest of the hallway in a mad dash, burst through the drawing room door and, with the stoker held high above my head, I roared, “Begone! Begone!”

A flash of movement came from the far end of the room as something whirled to face me. My eyes took a second to adjust to the scene and in that moment I heard the smash of glass and a piercing inhuman shriek that split the air just as another blaze of lightening illuminated the curtains and a cannonade of thunder burst upon the world. My courage deserted me and before I could see what I had confronted I hurled myself to the floor behind the chaise-long and lay panting, gasping, biting my lip to prevent a scream of my own escaping. Although I had seen only the merest glimpse, I had caught its vague, hideous form as it had whipped around at my voice. Had it eyes? Had I seen eyes?

I listened over the thundering of my heart and for long moments there was nothing, just two combatants hidden in silence at either end of the room, waiting for the other to make the first move.

And then it spoke.

“Hieronymus?”

My heart fluttered. I frowned. There was something eerily familiar about its voice. Had it sounded irritated?

“Who’s there?” I demanded, but my voice shook and quivered. No answer. I lay for a few moments more, and then mastering myself I pushed myself up. Slowly, inch by inch, I lifted my head above the back of the chaise-long.

Across the length of the room the bewildered face of my housekeeper stared back at me, a bottle of gin lay smashed at her feet and an empty glass was clutched in her frail hand.

“Doris?!” my voice betrayed the sudden and overwhelming relief that filled me to bursting, “My God, Doris, is that you?” I asked, although I already knew the answer, and suddenly a sickening feeling turned my stomach as I realised that not only that I had been defeated by my intruder, but that my intruder was a seventy year-old woman with nothing more demonic about her than her occasional tempers and her unnatural memory for baking recipes.

TO BE CONTINUED…