The ascending succession of horror was fast paralyzing my will and consciousness, for the eyes that now glared toward me from that hellish head were the grey phosphorescent eyes of my host as they had peered at me through the darkness of the kitchen. —C.M. Eddy & H.P. Lovecraft (The Ghost-Eater)
“And a strange spirit stalks
When the red surr has set.
And the soul of the watcher is filled
With faint pictures he fain would forget”.
—H. P. Lovecraft (The House)
“You asked me to explain why I am afraid of a draught of cool air; why I shiver more than others upon entering a cold room, and seem nauseated and repelled when the chill of evening creeps through the heat of a mild autumn day. There are those who say I respond to cold as others do to a bad odour, and I am the last to deny the impression. What I will do is to relate the most horrible circumstance I ever encountered, and leave it to you to judge whether or not this forms a suitable explanation of my peculiarity.”–H. P. Lovecraft
“The very darkness seemed alive, incredibly remote from the life of Providence which swirled all around it.”–The Survivor
Vision or nightmare it may have been—vision or nightmare I fervently hope it was—yet it is all that my mind retains of what took place in those shocking hours after we left the sight of men. And why Harley Warren did not return, he or his shade—or some nameless thing I cannot describe—alone can tell.–H. P. Lovecraft
“What do we know,” he had said, “of the world and the universe about us? Our means of receiving impressions are absurdly few, and our notions of surrounding objects infinitely narrow. We see things only as we are constructed to see them, and can gain no idea of their
absolute nature. With five feeble senses we pretend to comprehend the boundlessly complex
cosmos, yet other beings with a wider, stronger, or different range of senses might not only
see very differently the things we see, but might see and study whole worlds of matter, energy, and life which lie close at hand yet can never be detected with the senses we have. I have always believed that such strange, inaccessible worlds exist at our very elbows, and
now I believe I have found a way to break down the barriers. I am not joking. Within twenty-four hours that machine near the table will generate waves acting on unrecognized sense organs that exist in us as atrophied or rudimentary vestiges. Those waves will open up to us many vistas unknown to man, and several unknown to anything we consider organic life. We shall see that at which dogs howl in the dark, and that at which cats prick up their ears after midnight. We shall see these things, and other things which no breathing creature has yet
seen. We shall overleap time, space, and dimensions, and without bodily motion peer to the bottom of creation.”–H.P. Lovecraft
The creeping introduction of “Fane of the Black Pharaoh” as stated by Weird Tales says:
“Those eyes shone through the shadows; unwinking, unchanging, omniscient in this little world of the dead.”
But…Robert Bloch’s introduction brought more blood and fang:
“Terrible was the fame of Nephren-Ka, and more terrible still was the destiny that Captain Cartaret read on the walls of the red-litten underground corridors.”
The aged mariner may proclaim, “And on the first winter breaker…of Grand Isle’s coldest winter, Pierre Santiny plunged into the sea and was seen no more.”
Then, the teller of the tale may pause with haunting eyes as the fires crack in the bonfire, the sea roars, and the wind howls with possibly an ancient chime. With a whispering voice on the third crash of a wave they may even say, “But none on the island will ever say he died.”–JL
A legend haunts the town of Grand Isle. Aged mariners proclaim by roaring bonfires along the coast, “And on the first winter breaker…of Grand Isle’s coldest winter, Pierre Santiny plunged into the sea and was seen no more.”
Then, the teller of the tale may pause with haunting eyes as the fires crack in the bonfire, the sea roars, and the wind howls with possibly an ancient chime. With a whispering voice on the third crash of a wave they may even say, “But none on the island will ever say he died.”
Will Marty Santiny—son of Pierre Santiny, discover what really happened to his father? Or will the town continue to fear the legend of “The Mariner of Caminada Pass”?
I would not die, and leave no name behind. Three centuries have passed since I quaffed the fatal beverage: another year shall not elapse before, encountering gigantic dangers–warring with the powers of frost in their home–beset by famine, toil, and tempest–I yield this body, too tenacious a cage for a soul which thirsts for freedom, to the destructive elements of air and water–or, if I survive, my name shall be recorded as one of the most famous among the sons of men; and, my task achieved, I shall adopt more resolute means, and, by scattering and annihilating the atoms that compose my frame, set at liberty the life imprisoned within, and so cruelly prevented from soaring from this dim earth to a sphere more congenial to its immortal essence.
The man was Halpin Frayser. He lived in St. Helena, but where he lives now is uncertain, for he is dead.–Ambrose Bierce
That was the train the drunks and the sinners rode — the gambling men and the grifters, the big-time spenders, the skirt-chasers, and all the jolly crew.
In that same silver paradise of shimmering night, as an alligator bellowed, mosquitoes hummed, and green tree frogs chirped….a million crickets rubbed their wings together and sang.–JL
Can Old Masson dig to the secret of the graveyard rats? Or will his feud with them be another game of cat and mouse?
Stately, stoic is said of thee,
Wisest of the wise may he be…
Jeffrey LeBlanc 