Haggopian and Other Stories

It was not until later that I found out what happened then. Mercifully my eyes could not take in the whole of the compartment—or what was happening in it. I only knew that Jock’s face, little more than an outline with darker, shaded areas defining the eyes, nose, and mouth at the lower rim of my fixed “picture”, became suddenly contorted; twisted somehow, as though by some great emotion or pain. He said nothing, unable to break out of that damnable trance, but his eyes bulged horribly and his features writhed. If only I could have taken my eyes off him, or closed them even, to shut out the picture of his face writhing and Funny-Mouth staring at him so terribly. Then I noticed the change in Funny-Mouth. He had been a chalky-grey colour before; we all had, in the weak glow from the alternatively brightening and dimming compartment ceiling light. Now he seemed to be flushed; pinkish waves of unnatural colour were suffusing his outré features and his red-slit mouth was fading into the deepening blush of his face. It almost looked as though… My God! He did not have a mouth. With that unnatural reddening of his features the painted slit had vanished completely; his face was blank beneath the eyes and nose.

What a God-awful dream. I knew it must be a dream now—it had to be a dream—such things do not happen in real life. Dimly I was aware of Moustache putting the bread-cakes away and folding the queer table. I could feel the rhythm of the train slowing down. We must be coming into Grenloe. Jock’s face was absolutely convulsed now. A white, twitching, jerking, bulge-eyed blur of hideous motion which grew paler as quickly as that of Funny-Mouth—if that name applied now—reddened. Suddenly Jock’s face stopped its jerking. His mouth lolled open and his eyes slowly closed. He slid out of my circle of vision towards the floor.

The train was moving much slower and the wheels were clacking over those groups of criss-crossing rails which always warn one that a train is approaching a station or depot. Funny-Mouth had turned his monstrous, nightmare face towards me. He leaned across the aisle, closing the distance between us. I mentally screamed, physically incapable of the act, and strained with every fibre of my being to break from the trance which I suddenly knew beyond any doubting was not a dream and never had been…

The train ground to a shuddering halt with a wheeze of steam and a squeal of brakes. Outside in the night the station-master was yelling

instructions to a porter on the unseen platform. As the train stopped Funny-Mouth was jerked momentarily back, away from me, and before he could bring his face close to mine again Moustache was speaking to him.

“There’s no time, Master—this is our stop…” Funny-Mouth hovered over me a moment longer, seemingly undecided, then he pulled away. The others filed past him out into the corridor while he stood, tall and eerie, just within the doorway. Then he lifted his right hand and snapped his fingers.

I could move. I blinked my eyes rapidly and shook myself, sitting up straight, feeling the pain of the cramp between my shoulder-blades. “I say—” I began.

“Quiet!” ordered that echoing voice from unknown spaces—and of course, his painted, false mouth never moved. I was right; I had been hypnotised, not dreaming at all. That false mouth—Walker in Darkness—Monarch of Night—Lord of Hell—the Liturgy to Summanus…

I opened my mouth in amazement and horror, but before I could utter more than one word—”Summanus…”—something happened.

His waist-coat slid to one side near the bottom and a long, white, tapering tentacle with a blood-red tip slid into view. That tip hovered, snake-like, for a moment over my petrified face—and then struck. As if someone had taken a razor to it my face opened up and the blood began to gush. I fell to my knees in shock, too terrified even to yell out, automatically reaching for my handkerchief; and when next I coweringly looked up Funny-Mouth had gone.

Instead of seeing him—It—I found myself staring, from where I kneeled dabbing uselessly at my face, into the slack features of the sleeping Jock.

Sleeping?

I began to scream. Even as the train started to pull out of the station I was screaming. When no one answered my cries I managed to pull the communication-cord. Then, until they came to find out what was wrong, I went right on screaming. Not because of my face—because of Jock…

A jagged, bloody, two-inch hole led clean through his jacket and shirt and into his left side—the side which had been closest to…to that thing—and there was not a drop of blood in his whole, limp body. He simply lay there—half on, half off the seat—victim of “a bleddy heathen ceremony”—substituted for the bread-cakes simply because the train had chosen an inopportune moment to lurch—a sacrifice to Summanus…