Haggopian and Other Stories

And Matthew’s studies occupied him completely for the next few days. The hybrid weed he had found atop the knoll was all but forgotten and the possibility that more such fascinating specimens existed in that area was matterless to him. For the moment all his energies were concentrated on his as yet unidentified sample.

One afternoon three or four days after his return, I was sitting in my study checking through some notes on the ailments, real or imagined, of some of my elder patients, when Matthew burst unbidden upon me from the corridor. His eyes were quite wild and he seemed somehow to have aged years. There was a look of absolute puzzlement—or shock—on his face, and his jaw hung slack in undisguised amazement.

“Uncle,” he blurted, “perhaps you can help me. Goodness knows I need help. I just can’t understand it…or don’t want to. It’s not natural. Natural?—why, it’s impossible—and yet there it is…” He shook his head in defeat.

“Oh?” I said. “What’s impossible, Matthew?”

For a moment he was silent, then: “Why, that plant—or thing! It has no right to exist. None of them has. At first I thought I must be mistaken, but then I checked and double-checked and checked again—and I know I’m right. They just can’t do it!”

As patiently as I could, I asked: “Who, exactly, are ‘they’, and what is it that ‘they’ can’t do?”

“The plants,” he told me in an exasperated tone of voice. “They can’t reproduce! Or if they can I’ve no idea how they do it. And that’s only a part of it. In attempting to classify the things I’ve tried tricks that would get me locked up if any conventional botanist knew of them. Why!—I can’t even say for sure that they’re plants—in fact I’m almost certain that they’re not. And that leads on to something else—”

He leaned forward in his chair and stared at me. “Seeing as how I’ve decided they’re not plants, I thought perhaps they might be some obscure animal form—like those sea animals which were mistaken for plants for such a long time—I mean, anemones and the like. I’ve checked it all out, and…no such thing! I’ve got a whole library of books up there,” he indicated with a toss of his head the upstairs room, “but nothing that’s any good to me.”

“So you’re baffled,” I said. “But surely you’ve made some mistake? It’s obvious that whatever they are they must be one or the other, plants or animals. Call in a second opinion.”

“Never!— Certainly not until I’ve done a lot more work on my own,” Matthew cried. “This thing is big, fantastic. A new form of life! But you must excuse me, uncle. I have to get back to work. There’s so much I’ve got to understand…”

Suddenly he paused, seeming uneasy; his manner became somehow, well, furtive. “I’ve especially got to understand that other thing—the structure of the cells, I mean. It’s quite uncanny. How can it be explained? The cell-structure is almost—it’s almost human!” And with that he hurried out of my room.

For a moment I laughed to myself. Everything is fantastic to the young. Matthew had made a mistake, of course, for if those things were neither animals nor plants—then what in heaven’s name were they?

III

The ghastly thing started the next morning, showing first of all in small greenish patches of flaky yet slimy substance on Matthew’s arms and chest. Just a few patches at first, but they refused to submit to the application of antiseptic swabs or the recently introduced fungicidal creams, and within the course of the day a loathsome green network had spread over the boy’s entire frame so that I was forced to confine him to his bed.

I did all I could to reassure and comfort him, and later in the evening hung a notice on my waiting-room door informing my patients, mercifully few and with only trivial complaints, that due to alterations in my work schedule I was forced to holiday early and only very urgent calls would be answered. I added to this the address of a friend of mine in Hawthorpe, a consulting doctor whom I contacted with a similar story of altered work schedules and who willingly accepted my plan for any of my flock who might require medical attention.

All this done I attempted to fathom the horror that had overtaken my nephew, and in this I could only be doomed to failure through the completely alien nature of the thing. The only definite statement of fact I could make about it was that I knew certain of its symptoms: Matthew had hardly eaten at all since his adventure in the pit, neither had I seen him take any sort of drink, and yet he had shown no signs of hunger. I was not to know it but the metamorphosis taking place in his body was one which did not yet require to be fed. A new way of feeding was developing…