A H a u n t e d I s l a n d
by Algernon Blackwood
THE FOLLOWING EVENTS OCCURRED on a small
island of isolated position in a large Canadian lake,
to whose cool waters the inhabitants of Montreal and
Toronto flee for rest and recreation in the hot months.
It is only to be regretted that events of such peculiar
interest to the genuine student of the psychic should be
entirely uncorroborated. Such, unfortunately, however,
is the case.
Our own party of nearly twenty had returned
to Montreal that very day, and I was left in solitary
possession for a week or two longer, in order
to accomplish some important reading for the law,
which I had foolishly neglected during the summer.
With a whole island to oneself, a two-story
cottage, a canoe, and only the chipmunks and the farmer's
weekly visit with eggs and bread to disturb one,
the opportunities for hard reading might be very great.
It all depends!
The rest of the party had gone off with many
warnings to beware of Indians and not to stay late enough
to be the victim of a frost that thinks nothing of forty
below zero. After they had gone, the loneliness of the
situation made itself unpleasantly felt. There were no
other islands within six or seven miles, and though the
mainland forests lay a couple of miles behind me, they
stretched for a very great distance, unbroken by any signs
of human habitation. But, though the island was completely
deserted and silent, the rocks and trees that had echoed
human laughter and voices almost every hour of the day for
two months could not fail to retain some memories of it all,
and I was not surprised to fancy I heard a shout or a cry as I
passed from rock to rock, and more than once to imagine that
I heard my own name called aloud.
In the cottage there were six tiny little bedrooms
divided from one another by plain unvarnished partitions of
pine. A wooden bedstead, a mattress, and a chair stood in each
room, but I only found two mirrors, and one of these was
broken.
The boards creaked a good deal as I moved about,
and the signs of occupation were so recent that I could
hardly believe I was alone. I half expected to find someone left
behind, still trying to crowd into a box more than it would hold.
The door of one room was stiff and refused for a moment to open,
and it required very little persuasion to imagine someone was
holding the handle on the inside, and that when it opened, I should
meet a pair of human eyes.
A thorough search of the floor led me to select
as my own sleeping quarters a little room with a diminutive
balcony over the veranda roof. The room was very small, but the
bed was large and had the best mattress of them all. It was
situated directly over the sitting room where I should live
and do my reading, and the miniature window looked out to
the rising sun. With the exception of a narrow path which led
from the front door and veranda through the trees to the boat
landing, the island was densely covered with maples,
hemlocks, and cedars. The trees gathered in around the
cottage so closely that the slightest wind made the branches
scrape the roof and tap the wooden walls. A few moments
after sunset the darkness became impenetrable, and ten
yards beyond the glare of the lamps that shone through
the sitting-room windows - of which there were six - you
could not see an inch beyond your nose, nor move a step
without running up against a tree.
The rest of that day I spent moving my belongings
from my tent to the sitting room, taking stock of the
contents of the larder, and chopping enough wood for the
stove to last me for a week. After that, just before sunset,
I went round the island a couple of times in my canoe for
precaution's sake. I had never dreamed of doing this before,
but when a man is alone, he does things that never occur to
him when he is one of a large party.
How lonely the island seemed when I landed again!
The sun was down, and twilight is unknown in these northern
regions. The darkness comes up at once. The canoe safely
pulled up and turned over on her face, I groped my way up the
little narrow pathway to the veranda. The six lamps were
soon burning merrily in the front room, but in the kitchen,
where I dined, the shadows were so gloomy, and the lamplight
was so inadequate, that the stars could be seen peeping
through the cracks between the rafters.
I turned in early that night. Though it was calm and
there was no wind, the creaking of my bedstead and the
musical gurgle of the water over the rocks below were not
the only sounds that reached my ears. As I lay awake, the
appalling emptiness of the house grew upon me. The corridors
and vacant rooms seemed to echo innumerable footsteps,
shufflings, the rustle of skirts, and a constant undertone of
whispering. When sleep at length overtook me, the breathings
and noises, however, passed gently to mingle with the voices
of my dreams.
A week passed by, and the reading progressed
favorably. On the tenth day of my solitude, a strange thing
happened. I awoke after a good night's sleep to find myself
possessed with a marked repugnance for my room. The air
seemed to stifle me. The more I tried to define the cause of
this dislike, the more unreasonable it appeared. There was
something about the room that made me afraid. Absurd as it
seems, this feeling clung to me obstinately while dressing,
and more than once I caught myself shivering, and conscious
of an inclination to get out of the room as quickly as possible.
The more I tried to laugh it away, the more real I became, and
when at last I was dressed, and went out into the passage,
and downstairs into the kitchen, it was with feelings of relief,
such as I might imagine would accompany one's escape from
the presence of a dangerous contagious disease.
While cooking my breakfast, I carefully recalled
every night spent in the room, in the hope that I might in some
way connect the dislike I now felt with some disagreeable
incident that had occurred in it. But the only thing I could recall
was one stormy night when I suddenly awoke and heard the
boards creaking so loudly in the corridor that I was convinced
there were people in the house. So certain was I of this, that I
had descended the stairs, gun in hand, only to find the doors and
windows securely fastened, and the mice and cockroaches in
sole possession of the floor. This was certainly not sufficient
to account for the strength of my feelings.
The morning hours I spent in steady reading, and
when I broke off in the middle of the day for a swim and
luncheon, I was very much surprised, if not a little alarmed, to
find that my dislike for the room had, if anything, grown
stronger. Going upstairs to get a book, I experienced the most
marked aversion to entering the room, and while within I was
conscious all the time of an uncomfortable feeling that was
half uneasiness and half apprehension. The result of it was that,
instead of reading, I spent the afternoon on the water, paddling
and fishing, and when I got home about sundown, brought with
me half a dozen delicious black bass for the supper table and
the larder.
As sleep was an important matter to me at this
time, I had decided that if my aversion to the room was so
strongly marked on my return as it had been before, I would
move my bed down into the sitting room and sleep there. This
was, I argued, in no sense a concession to an absurd and fanciful
fear, but simply a precaution to ensure a good night's sleep. A
bad night involved the loss of the next day's reading - a loss I
was not prepared to incur.
I accordingly moved my bed downstairs into a
corner of the sitting room facing the door, and was moreover
uncommonly glad when the operation was completed and the
door of the bedroom closed finally upon the shadows, the
silence, and the strange *fear* that shared the room with them.
The croaking stroke of the kitchen clock sounded
the hour of eight as I finished washing up my few dishes and,
closing the kitchen door behind me, passed into the front room.
All the lamps were lit, and their reflectors, which I had polished
up during the day, threw a blaze of light into the room.
Outside the night was still and warm. Not a breath
of air was stirring; the waves were silent, the trees motionless,
and heavy clouds hung like an oppressive curtain over the heavens.
The darkness seemed to have rolled up with unusual swiftness,
and not the faintest glow of color remained to show where the
sun had set. There was present in the atmosphere that ominous
and overwhelming silence which so often precedes the most
violent storms.
I sat down to my books with my brain unusually
clear, and in my heart the pleasant satisfaction of knowing that
five black bass were lying in the icehouse, and that tomorrow
morning the old farmer would arrive with fresh bread and eggs. I
was soon absorbed in my books.
As the night wore on, the silence deepened. Even the
chipmunks were still, and the boards of the floors and walls
ceased creaking. I read on steadily till, from the gloomy shadows
of the kitchen, came the hoarse sound of the clock striking nine.
How loud the strokes sounded! They were like blows of a big
hammer. I closed one book and opened another, feeling that I was
just warming up to my work.
This, however, did not last long. I presently found
that I was reading the same paragraphs over twice, simple
paragraphs that did not require such effort. Then I noticed that
my mind began to wander to other things, and the effort to recall
my thoughts became harder with each digression. Concentration
was growing momentarily more difficult. Presently I discovered
that I had turned over two pages instead of one, and had not
noticed my mistake until I was well down the page. This was
becoming serious. What was the disturbing influence? It could
not be physical fatigue. On the contrary, my mind was unusually
alert, and in a more receptive condition than usual. I made a new
and determined effort to read, and for a short time succeeded in
giving my whole attention to my subject. But in a very few
moments again I found myself leaning back in my chair, staring
vacantly into space.
Something was evidently at work in my
subconsciousness. There was something I had neglected to do.
Perhaps the kitchen door and windows were not fastened. I
accordingly went to see, and found that they were! The fire
perhaps needed attention. I went in to see, and found that it was
all right! I looked at the lamps, went upstairs into every
bedroom in turn, and then went round the house, and even into
the icehouse. Nothing was wrong; everything was in its place.
Yet something *was* wrong! The conviction grew stronger and
stronger within me.
When I at length settled down to my books again and
tried to read, I became aware, for the first time, that the room
seemed to be growing cold. Yet the day had been oppressively
warm, and evening had brought no relief. The six big lamps,
moreover, gave out enough heat to warm the room pleasantly.
But a chilliness, that perhaps crept up from the lake, made itself
felt in the room, and caused me to get up to close the glass door
opening onto the veranda.
For a brief moment I stood looking out at the shaft of
light that fell from the windows and shone some little distance
down the pathway and out for a few feet into the lake.
As I looked I saw a canoe glide into the pathway of
light, and immediately crossing it, pass out of sight again into
the darkness. It was perhaps a hundred feet from the shore, and
it moved swiftly.
I was surprised that a canoe should pass the island at
that time of night, for all the summer visitors from the
other side of the lake had gone home weeks before, and the
island was a long way out of any line of water traffic.
My reading from this moment did not make very good
progress, for somehow the picture of that canoe, gliding so dimly
and swiftly across the narrow track of light on the black waters,
silhouetted itself against the background of my mind with
singular vividness. It kept coming between my eyes and the
printed page. The more I thought about it, the more surprised I
became. It was of larger build than any I had seen during the past
summer months, and was more like the old Indian war canoes with
the high curving bows and stern and wide beam. The more I tried
to read, the less success attended my efforts, and finally I closed
my books and went out on the veranda to walk up and down a bit
and shake the chilliness out of my bones.
The night was perfectly still, and as dark as imaginable.
I stumbled down the path to the little landing wharf, where the
water made the very faintest of gurgling under the timbers. The
sound of a big tree falling in the mainland forest, far across the
lake, stirred echoes in the heavy air, like the first guns of a
distant night attack. No other sound disturbed the stillness that
reigned supreme.
As I stood upon the wharf in the broad splash of light
that followed me from the sitting-room windows, I saw another
canoe cross the pathway of uncertain light upon the water and
disappear at once into the impenetrable gloom that lay beyond.
This time I saw more distinctly than before. It was like the
former canoe, a big birchbark, with high-crested bow and stern
and broad beam. It was paddled by two Indians, of whom the one
in the stern - the steerer - appeared to be a very large man. I
could see this very plainly, and though the second canoe was much
nearer the island than the first, I judged that they were both on
their way home to the government reservation, which was
situated some fifteen miles away upon the mainland.
I was wondering in my mind what could possibly bring
any Indians down to this part of the lake at such an hour of
the night, when a third canoe, of precisely similar build, and
also occupied by two Indians, passed silently round the end of the
wharf. This time the canoe was very much nearer shore, and it
suddenly flashed into my mind that the three canoes were in
reality one and the same, and that only one canoe was circling
the island!
This was by no means a pleasant reflection, because,
if it were the correct solution of the unusual appearance of the
three canoes in this lonely part of the lake at so late an hour, the
purpose of the two men could only reasonably be considered to be
in some way connected with myself. I had never known of the
Indians attempting any violence upon the settlers who shared the
wild, inhospitable country with them; at the same time, it was not
beyond the region of possibility to suppose . . . But then I did not
care even to think of such hideous possibilities, and my
imagination immediately sought relief in all manner of other
solutions to the problem, which indeed came readily enough to my
mind, but did not succeed in recommending themselves to my reason.
Meanwhile, by a sort of instinct, I stepped back out
of the bright light in which I had hitherto been standing, and waited
in the deep shadow of a rock to see if the canoe would again make
its appearance. Here I could see, without being seen, and the
precaution seemed a wise one.
After less than five minutes, the canoe, as I had
anticipated, made its fourth appearance. This time it was not
twenty yards from the wharf, and I saw that the Indians meant to
land. I recognized the two men as those who had passed before,
and the steerer was certainly an immense fellow. It was
unquestionably the same canoe. There could no longer be any
doubt that for some purpose of their own the men had been going
round and round the island for some time, waiting for an
opportunity to land. I strained my eyes to follow them in the
darkness, but the night had completely swallowed them up, and
not even the faintest swish of the paddles reached my ears as the
Indians plied their long and powerful strokes. The canoe would be
round again in a few moments, and this time it was possible that
the men might land. It was well to be prepared. I knew nothing of
their intentions, and two to one (when the two are big Indians!)
late at night on a lonely island was not exactly my idea of a
pleasant encounter.
In a corner of the sitting room, leaning up against
the back wall, stood my Marlin rifle, with ten cartridges in
the magazine and one lying snugly in the greased breech. There
was just time to get up to the house and take up a position of
defense in that corner. Without an instant's hesitation I ran up to
the veranda, carefully picking my way among the trees, so as to
avoid being seen in the light. Entering the room, I shut the door
leading to the veranda, and as quickly as possible turned out
every one of the six lamps. To be in a room so brilliantly lit,
where my every movement could be observed from outside, while
I could see nothing but impenetrable darkness at every window,
was by all laws of warfare an unnecessary concession to the
enemy. And this enemy, if enemy it was to be, was far too wily
and dangerous to be granted any such advantages.
I stood in the corner of the room with my back
against the wall, and my hand on the cold rifle barrel. The
table, covered with my books, lay between me and the door, but
for the first few minutes after the lights were out, the
darkness was so intense that nothing could be discerned at all.
Then, very gradually, the outline of the room became visible,
and the framework of the windows began to shape itself dimly
before my eyes.
After a few minutes the door (its upper half of glass)
and the two windows that looked out upon the front veranda
became especially distinct, and I was glad that this was so,
because if the Indians came up to the house, I should be able
to see their approach and gather something of their plans. Nor
was I mistaken, for there presently came to my ears the
peculiar hollow sound of a canoe landing and being carefully
dragged up over the rocks. The paddles I distinctly heard being
placed underneath, and the silence that ensued thereupon I
rightly interpreted to mean that the Indians were stealthily
approaching the house. . . .
While it would be absurd to claim that I was not
alarmed - even frightened - at the gravity of the situation
and its possible outcome, I speak the whole truth when I say
that I was not overwhelmingly afraid for myself. I was
conscious that even at this stage of the night I was passing
into a psychic condition in which my sensations seemed no
longer normal. Physical fear at no time entered into the
nature of my feelings, and though I kept my hand upon my
rifle the greater part of the night, I was all the time
conscious that its assistance could be of little avail against
the terrors that I had to face. More than once I seemed to feel
most curiously that I was in no real sense a part of the
proceedings, nor actually involved in them, but that I was
playing the part of a spectator - a spectator, moreover, on a
psychic rather than on a material plane. Many of my sensations
that night were too vague for definite description and analysis,
but the main feeling that will stay with me to the end of my
days is the awful horror of it all, and the miserable sensation
that if the strain had lasted a little longer than was actually
the case, my mind must inevitably have given way.
Meanwhile I stood still in my corner, and waited
patiently for what was to come. The house was as still
as the grave, but the inarticulate voices of the night sang
in my ears, and I seemed to hear the blood running in my veins
and dancing in my pulses.
If the Indians came to the back of the house, they
would find the kitchen door and window securely fastened.
They could not get in there without making considerable
noise, which I was bound to hear. The only mode of getting
in was by means of the door that faced me, and I kept my
eyes glued on that door without taking them off for the
smallest fraction of a second.
My sight adapted itself every minute better to
the darkness. I saw the table that nearly filled the room
and left only a narrow passage on each side. I could also
make out the straight backs of the wooden chairs pressed
up against it, and could even distinguish my papers and
inkstand lying on the white oilcloth covering. I thought of
the gay faces that had gathered round that table during the
summer, and I longed for the sunlight as I had never longed
for it before.
Less than three feet to my left, the passageway
led to the kitchen, and the stairs leading to the bedrooms
above commenced in the passageway but almost in the
sitting room itself. Through the windows I could see the dim
motionless outlines of the trees: not a leaf stirred, not a
branch moved.
A few moments of this awful silence, and then I
was aware of a soft tread on the boards of the veranda, so
stealthy that it seemed an impression directly on my brain
rather than upon the nerves of hearing. Immediately afterward
a black figure darkened the glass door, and I perceived that a
face was pressed against the upper panes. A shiver ran down
my back, and my hair was conscious of a tendency to rise and
stand at right angles to my head.
It was the figure of an Indian, broad-shouldered
and immense - indeed, the largest figure of a man I have ever
seen outside of a circus hall. By some power of light that
seemed to generate itself in the brain, I saw the strong dark
face with the aquiline nose and high cheekbones flattened
against the glass. The direction of the gaze I could not
determine, but faint gleams of light as the big eyes rolled
round and showed their whites told me plainly that no corner
of the room escaped their searching.
For what seemed fully five minutes, the dark
figure stood there, with the huge shoulders bent forward
so as to bring the head down to the level of the glass;
while behind him, though not nearly so large, the shadowy
form of the other Indian swayed to and fro like a bent tree.
While I waited in an agony of suspense and agitation for
their next movement, little currents of icy sensation ran up
and down my spine, and my heart seemed alternately to stop
beating and then start up again with terrifying rapidity.
They must have heard its thumping and the singing of the
blood in my head! Moreover, I was conscious, as I felt a
cold stream of perspiration trickle down my face, of a
desire to scream, to shout, to bang the walls like a child,
to make a noise, or do anything that would relieve the
suspense and bring things to a speedy climax.
It was probably this inclination that led me
to another discovery, for when I tried to bring my rifle
from behind my back to raise it and have it pointed at the
door ready to fire, I found that I was powerless to move.
The muscles, paralyzed by this strange fear, refused to
obey the will. Here indeed was a terrifying complication!
There was a faint sound of rattling at the brass
knob, and the door was pushed open a couple of inches. A
pause of a few seconds, and it was pushed open still
further. Without a sound of footsteps that was appreciable
to my ears, the two figures glided into the room, and the
man behind gently closed the door after him.
They were alone with me between four walls.
Could they see me standing there, so still and straight
in my corner? Had they, perhaps, already seen me? My
blood surged and sang like the rolls of drums in an
orchestra, and though I did my best to suppress my
breathing, it sounded like the rushing of wind through a
pneumatic tube.
My suspense as to the next move was soon at an
end - only, however, to give place to a new and keener
alarm. The men had hitherto exchanged no words and no
signs, but there were general indications of a movement
across the room, and whichever way they went, they would
have to pass round the table. If they came my way, they
would have to pass within six inches of my person. While I
was considering this very disagreeable possibility, I
perceived that the smaller Indian (smaller by comparison)
suddenly raised his arm and pointed to the ceiling. The other
fellow raised his head and followed the direction of his
companion's arm. I began to understand at last. They were
going upstairs, and the room directly overhead to which
they pointed had been until this night my bedroom. It was
the room in which I had experienced that very morning so
strange a sensation of fear, and but for which I should then
have been lying asleep in the narrow bed against the window.
The Indians then began to move silently around
the room; they were going upstairs, and they were coming
around my side of the table. So stealthy were their
movements that, but for the abnormally sensitive state of
the nerves, I should never have heard them. As it was, their
catlike tread was distinctly audible. Like two monstrous
black cats they came round the table toward me, and for the
first time I perceived that the smaller of the two dragged
something along the floor behind him. As it trailed along over
the floor with a soft, sweeping sound, I somehow got the
impression that it was a large dead thing with outstretched
wings, or a large, spreading cedar branch. Whatever it was, I
was unable to see it even in outline, and I was too terrified,
even had I possessed the power over my muscles, to move my
neck forward in the effort to determine its nature.
Nearer and nearer they came. The leader rested a
giant hand upon the table as he moved. My lips were glued
together, and the air seemed to burn in my nostrils. I tried to
close my eyes, so that I might not see as they passed me, but
my eyelids had stiffened and refused to obey. Would they
never get by me? Sensation seemed also to have left my legs,
and it was as if I were standing on mere supports of wood or
stone. Worse still, I was conscious that I was losing the power
of balance, the power to stand upright, or even to lean
backward against the wall. Some force was drawing me
forward, and a dizzy terror seized me that I should lose my
balance and topple forward against the Indians just as they
were in the act of passing me.
Even moments drawn out into hours must come to
an end sometime, and almost before I knew it the figures had
passed me and had their feet upon the lowest step of the
stairs leading to the upper bedrooms. There could not have been
six inches between us, and yet I was conscious only of a
current of cold air that followed them. They had not touched
me, and I was convinced that they had not seen me. Even the
trailing thing on the floor behind them had not touched my feet,
as I had dreaded it would, and on such an occasion as this I was
grateful even for the smallest mercies.
The absence of the Indians from my immediate
neighborhood brought little sense of relief. I stood shivering
and shuddering in my corner, and, beyond being able to breathe
more freely, I felt no whit less uncomfortable. Also, I was
aware that a certain light, which, without apparent source or
rays, had enabled me to follow their every gesture and
movement, had gone out of the room with their departure. An
unnatural darkness filled the room and pervaded its every
corner so that I could barely make out the positions of the
windows and the glass doors.
As I said before, my condition was evidently an
abnormal one. The capacity for feeling surprise seemed, as
in dreams, to be wholly absent. My senses recorded with
unusual accuracy every smallest occurrence, but I was able
to draw only the simplest deductions.
The Indians soon reached the top of the stairs,
and there they halted for a moment. I had not the faintest
clue as to their next movement. They appeared to hesitate.
They were listening attentively. Then I heard one of them,
who by the weight of his soft tread must have been the giant,
cross the narrow corridor and enter the room directly overhead -
my own little bedroom. But for the insistence of that
unaccountable dread I had experienced there in the morning, I
should at that very moment have been lying in the bed with the
big Indian in the room standing beside me.
For a space of a hundred seconds, there was
silence, such as might have existed before the birth of
sound. It was followed by a long quivering shriek of terror,
which rang out into the night and ended in a short gulp before
it had run its full course. At the same moment the other Indian
left his place at the head of the stairs and joined his companion
in the bedroom. I heard the "thing" trailing behind him along the
floor. A thud followed, as of something heavy falling, and then
all became still and silent as before.
It was at this point that the atmosphere, surcharged
all day with the electricity of a fierce storm, found relief in
a dancing flash of brilliant lightning simultaneously with a
crash of loudest thunder. For five seconds every article in the
room was visible to me with amazing distinctness, and through
the windows I saw the tree trunks standing in solemn rows. The
thunder pealed and echoed across the lake and among the distant
islands, and the floodgates of heaven then opened and let out
their rain in streaming torrents.
The drops fell with a swift rushing sound upon the
still waters of the lake, which leaped up to meet them, and
pattered with the rattle of shot on the leaves of the maples and
the roof of the cottage. A moment later, and another flash, even
more brilliant and of longer duration than the first, lit up the
sky from zenith to horizon, and bathed the room momentarily in
dazzling whiteness. I could see the rain glistening on the leaves
and branches outside. The wind rose suddenly, and in less than a
minute the storm that had been gathering all day burst forth in
its full fury.
Above all the noisy voices of the elements, the
slightest sounds in the room overhead made themselves heard,
and in the few seconds of deep silence that followed the shriek
of terror and pain, I was aware that the movements had
commenced again. The men were leaving the room and
approaching the top of the stairs. A short pause, and they began
to descend. Behind them, tumbling from step to step, I could
hear that trailing "thing" being dragged along. It had become
ponderous!
I awaited their approach with a degree of calmness,
almost of apathy, which was only explicable on the ground
that after a certain point Nature applies her own anesthetic,
and a merciful condition of numbness supervenes. On they came,
step by step, nearer and nearer, with the shuffling sound of the
burden behind growing louder as they approached.
They were already halfway down the stairs when I
was galvanized afresh into a condition of terror by the
consideration of a new and horrible possibility. It was the
reflection that if another vivid flash of lightning were to come
when the shadowy procession was in the room, perhaps when it
was actually passing in front of me, I should see everything in
detail, and worse, be seen myself! I could only hold my breath
and wait - wait while the minutes lengthened into hours, and
the procession made its slow progress around the room.
The Indians had reached the foot of the staircase.
The form of the huge leader loomed in the doorway of the
passage, and the burden, with an ominous thud, had dropped
from the last step to the floor. There was a moment's pause
while I saw the Indian turn and stoop to assist his companion.
Then the procession moved forward again, entered the room
close on my left, and began to move slowly round my side of
the table. The leader was already beyond me, and his companion,
dragging on the floor behind him the burden, whose confused
outline I could dimly make out, was exactly in front of me,
when the cavalcade came to a dead halt. At the same moment,
with the strange suddenness of thunderstorms, the splash of
the rain ceased altogether, and the wind died away into utter
silence.
For the space of five seconds, my heart seemed
to stop beating, and then the worst came. A double flash
of lightning lit up the room and its contents with merciless
vividness.
The huge Indian leader stood a few feet past me
on my right. One leg was stretched forward in the act of
taking a step. His immense shoulders were turned toward
his companion, and in all their magnificent fierceness I saw
the outline of his features. His gaze was directed upon the
burden his companion was dragging along the floor; but his
profile, with the big aquiline nose, high cheekbones, straight
black hair, and bold chin, burnt itself in that brief instant into
my brain, never again to fade.
Dwarfish, compared with this gigantic figure,
appeared the proportions of the other Indian, who, within
twelve inches of my face, was stooping over the thing he
was dragging in a position that lent to his person the additional
horror of deformity. And the burden, lying upon a sweeping cedar
branch which he held and dragged by a long stem, was the body of
a white man. The scalp had been neatly lifted, and blood lay in a
broad smear upon the cheeks and forehead.
Then, for the first time that night, the terror that
had paralyzed my muscles and my will lifted its unholy
spell from my soul. With a loud cry I stretched out my arms
to seize the big Indian by the throat and, grasping only air,
tumbled forward unconscious upon the ground.
I had recognized the body, and _the face was my own!_
It was bright daylight when a man's voice recalled
me to consciousness. I was lying where I had fallen, and
the farmer was standing in the room with the loaves of bread
in his hands. The horror of the night was still in my heart, and
as the bluff settler helped me to my feet and picked up the rifle
which had fallen with me, with many questions and expressions
of condolence, I imagine my brief replies were neither
self-explanatory nor even intelligible.
That day, after a thorough and fruitless search of
the house, I left the island and went over to spend my last
ten days with the farmer, and when the time came for me to
leave, the necessary reading had been accomplished, and my
nerves had completely recovered their balance.
On the day of my departure, the farmer started
early in his big boat with my belongings to row to the point,
twelve miles distant, where a little steamer ran twice a week
for the accommodation of hunters. Late in the afternoon I went
off in another direction in my canoe, wishing to see the island
once again, where I had been the victim of so strange an
experience.
In due course I arrived there and made a tour of the
island. I also made a search of the little house, and it was not
without a curious sensation in my heart that I entered the
little upstairs bedroom. There seemed nothing unusual.
Just after I reembarked, I saw a canoe gliding ahead
of me around the curve of the island. A canoe was an unusual
sight this time of the year, and this one seemed to have
sprung from nowhere. Altering my course a little, I watched
it disappear around the next projecting point of rock. It had
high curving bows, and there were two Indians in it. I
lingered with some excitement, to see if it would appear
again around the other side of the island, and in less than
five minutes it came into view. There were less than two
hundred yards between us, and the Indians, sitting on their
haunches, were paddling swiftly in my direction.
I never paddled faster in my life than I did in
those next few minutes. When I turned to look again, the
Indians had altered their course and were again circling the
island.
The sun was sinking behind the forests on the
mainland, and the crimson-colored clouds of sunset were
reflected in the waters of the lake, when I looked round for
the last time and saw the big bark canoe and its two dusky
occupants still going round the island. Then the shadows
deepened rapidly, the lake grew black, and the night wind blew
its first breath in my face as I turned the corner, and a
projecting bluff of rock hid from my view both island and canoe.
"A Haunted Island" Copyright © _The Pall Mall Magazine_, Apr 1899
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