The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror. Volume 10

Kim Newman A Victorian Ghost Story

Among the blessings of civilisation,” began Ernest Virtue, his shrewd glance passing over us, one by one, “can any be more profound and yet simple than oak paneling? Its humble stoutness, derived from the most English of trees, serves us as our forefathers were served by the blockstones of their castles. Observe the play of firelight upon the grain. Does it not seem like armour? In a room lined with oak panels, one is safe, shielded from all harm, insusceptible to all fear. If not for oak paneling, I would not have the fortitude to tell you this story.

“Wondrous indeed is it to plump oneself in a comfortably-stuffed leather armchair in the heart of a metropolis and find oneself at peace, the raucous sounds of the outside world muffled, the pestilential fogs of the capital banished. Add to the picture a roaring fire providing both light and warmth, the after-effects of a hearty meal, generous measures of fine old brandy and healthy infusions of pungent cigar smoke, and one might think oneself transported from the cares of the quotidian world to a higher realm even than that ruled over by our own dear Queen, God rest the soul of her beloved Prince Consort Albert. Without such an Elysian refuge, a man might be maddened by London. For this city is the most haunted place on Earth.”

In the club-room, the topic of the evening had turned to the beyond, and we were telling ghost stories. Colonel Beauregard had conjured the hill-spirits of far-off India, detailing the unhappy fate of a degenerate officer who meddled with the native women and incurred the wrath of a little brown priest. The Reverend Mr Weeks had countered with a story of phantoms in a ruined abbey on an abandoned isle in the Hebrides, and of an unwary delver after treasure driven out of his wits by an intelligence that seemed composed of creeping, writhing kelp.

We were pleasantly stirred from the torpor that follows a substantial meal, awakened by brandy and terror, thirsty perhaps for more of both.

I had not expected Virtue — Mr Ernest Meiklejohn Virtue, of the brokerage firm of Banning, Clinch and Virtue — to enter into the field and contribute a story. I had written him up for the illustrated press some months earlier and had formed the opinion that he was a man entirely of this world. Somewhat past middle age, with a barrel of a body and a generosity of grey whiskers about his chops to compensate for a growing expanse of baldness upon his dome, he was a man of substance. If not for the quality of his clothes, he might pass as an ageing prize-fighter or the chucker-out in a rowdy hostelry. It was said that many who confronted him on the floor of the Exchange yielded for fear that he would extend his financial attacks into the arena of physical assault. Needless to say, away from the bearpit of the stock market, he had a reputation as the most charitable and mild-mannered of souls.

“I have in these last months become victim to a particularly pernicious species of apparition,” Virtue continued. “Gentlemen, you see before you a man persecuted beyond endurance, persecuted by spectres.”

I drew in breath. From his solemn countenance, I could tell Virtue was not joshing us. The Colonel and the Reverend had passed on tales given them by colleagues who were themselves not the primary parties in the events recounted. Both had endeavoured, in the spirit of the thing as it were, to embroider, to add their own details, increasing the horripilating effects of their anecdotes. In comparison, Virtue seemed to offer the uncut, unpolished stone of experience.

Even in the warmth of the club-room, I felt a chill. The brandy I sipped stung my mouth.

“London is full of fog,” Virtue continued. “Sulphurous, clinging, lingering, choking fog. As you know, it makes the streets seem like river-beds and turns us all into bottom-crawlers, probing blindly, advancing step by step. A moment’s lapse of concentration and one is lost. All this is familiar to you. But I tell you there are creatures in the fog, unperceived by all but a few. These entities harbour a singular hostility, a resentment almost, for those of us who enjoy the comforts of the living.”

The Reverend Weeks nodded sagely. Colonel Beauregard’s hand went to his thigh, where, were he in uniform, his pistol would have been.

“I first became aware of these infernal spirits some months ago. I was, I confess, particularly pleased with myself that day. I’d concluded a nice piece of business, manipulating the market in an especially cunning manner so that my own cause was victorious and my rivals routed. I need not trouble you with details, but Weeks — who profited not a little from being let in on my machinations — can testify to the neatness of the trick. It would not be overstating the situation to say that fortunes changed hands that afternoon. The Times noted, somewhat predictably, “Virtue is Triumphant”.

“While I indulged in a celebratory tot with my allies, accepting in all good grace the muttered tributes of fallen foes, the first real fog of autumn gathered in the streets. It rose like a tide of soup around scurrying pedestrians, washing against the thighs of the cabmen perched on their seats, closing over the backs of their horses. It is my custom to walk from the Exchange to my house in Red Lion Square, abjuring the comfort of a hansom for the sake of exercise. It is important to maintain the body, for flesh is the cloak of the soul and clothes should always make a statement, testifying to the man who wears them. I set out, flushed with my success. ”

“. and with good spirits, I’ll be bound,” said Beauregard.

Virtue inclined his head. “A dram of whisky, no more. I have, of course, considered that my experience might have been shaped by an intoxication unperceived by myself. Indeed, this is what I later tried desperately to tell myself. However, that came afterwards.

“I am familiar with my route home. I was often given to expressing the sentiment that I daresay I could find my way to my front door blindfold. This sudden fog, which you might remember being of remarkable consistency, put my rash boast to the test.

“I must have made a misturn, for I walked for some considerable time, far longer than it should have taken me to return myself safely to my own doorstep. The outlines of the buildings that I perceived through the yellow wafting curtain of the fog did not resolve themselves into the familiar contours of Red Lion Square. I was going over and over in my mind the triumph of the day, allowing myself something of the sin of pride in appreciating my own cleverness. Strategic minor purchases like the opening feints of a fencing match diverted those who opposed my interests until I was ready to deliver the elegant killing thrusts that secured my victory. I saw columns of figures piled up like heavenly bricks, and neglected to pay attention to the earthly stones beneath my feet.

“At length, I brought myself up short and looked around.

“It is a very queer sensation indeed to find oneself utterly alone in the middle of London. The fog hung so thickly as to be impenetrable, seeming almost to have coalesced about my person. If I reached out, my hand grew indistinct and then disappeared entirely from my sight. The effects of the fog were by no means restricted to the obscuring of my sense of sight. It was of that singular texture, that dampness and stickiness, that clings to one’s clothes and can sometimes never be washed away, that gums up your eyes and makes your nostrils flow, that tickles the throat, that seems to invade your anatomy and clog your chest and heart. That taste we Londoners can never entirely be free of was strong in my mouth, to the point of vileness. It was as if the fog had targeted me of all the millions of the city, and wrapped me in its woolly, stinking shroud, isolating me from my fellows, holding me fast in one spot.

“I would have continued to walk, but in my unlovely gloating I had lost all sense of direction. The sun was setting, and the yellow of the fog turning to a darker hue, tendrils of brown and black winding through it. But this change of light was general, not from a specific direction that would have enabled me at least to fix a compass point. Dread fingertips touched my heart, coldly caressing. Terror sparked in my brain. It was my impulse to move, to run from the spot, to career blindly into the opaque cloud that clung to the streets, to keep running until I was free of this gathering gloom. Yet I was still Ernest Meiklejohn Virtue, Lion of the City, Master of the Exchange. I have iron in my soul. I resisted the impulse to panic, recognising it from many a hairy moment on the market floor, knowing that if I held fast I would prevail.

“I felt them, first.

“Something brushed past me, about the size of a big dog but clad in damp ragged cloth not sleek smooth fur. Something that went on two shod feet, yet was not what I would consider a child. Something that was all bones and hurry. I was molested slightly, poked and prodded, and had good cause to clamp a protective fist about my gold watch. Then the creature was gone. All I saw of it was a mop-head of twiggy hair, like a flying bird’s nest, at about waist-height, zooming away into the fog. I heard footfalls clatter, and then it was gone.

“What had it been?

“There were others. It was at an intersection, it seems, and these creatures passed every which way at will, jostling me one way and another. I glimpsed sparkling eyes, and felt hard little shoulders. I heard their mewlings, which were not the cries of animals and yet bore little resemblance to the patterns of civilised speech. I was possessed, I admit, with a loathing that went deeper than my intellect. An instinctive revulsion that made me shrink inside my clothes with each rude touch. I was sure their touch left deposits upon my person, and that these substances would prove even less susceptible to cleaning away than the miasmal filth of fog. They chattered and stank and jeered and passed by.

“It could only have taken a minute or so. The creatures were soon gone. I found myself breathing hard, sucking into my lungs yet more of the ghastly fog, which made me cough and splutter all the more. I bent double. I was drowning in the city’s visible stench.”

Virtue took a swig of brandy and sloshed it around his mouth, trying to wash away the remembered taste. He had become quite agitated in the recounting of his experience, offering none of the eye-rolls and leers with which the Colonel and the Reverend had punctuated their tales. His ghost story was of a different quality. I found myself feeling a little of the horror Virtue claimed to have felt, but tempered by a distance, a quarrelsome need to question. I bit my tongue, and let him continue.

“When I straightened up, a miraculous transformation was taking place, as if in answer to a prayer I had not dared to voice. The fog was thinning, as it sometimes does. Good clean transparent air rushed in from somewhere and diluted the muddy clouds, reducing it to streamers of ropy substance and a ground-covering of thin white mist. A draught hurried the worst of the stuff away, and I could again make out something of the situation in which I found myself.

“Naturally, I felt a surge of joy at my deliverance. But it froze in my breast. The scene disclosed was not that which I had expected.

“Simply put, I was transported. From the London we know to another realm entirely, a Stygian parody of the city, entirely loathesome in its crepusculence.

“I stood on a street washed with filth. More mud than stone, more ordure than mud. Buildings stood all around, walls stooped over to make a tunnel of this thoroughfare. The ill-fit bricks bulged in places, allowing foul water to dribble. There were smashed street lamps, none lit. Fires burned in the night, within the buildings or in barrels set on the street, but heat and light were swallowed by the darkness and cold of this unnatural place. A nearby sign was splashed with dirt, unreadable. I knew that I was, in a more profound sense than I could imagine, lost.

“This place was inhabited. That is the worst of it.

“The first ghost I got a good look at inspired me not to horror but to pity. It was a waif-like thing, with huge liquid eyes and a tiny knot of a mouth, clad only in a vest-like singlet that disclosed wasted arms and grubby bare feet. I was unsure of its sex, for it wore a shapeless cap of some rough material over its hair, but I knew that it was not alive as we are. This was some poor lost soul, wandering.

“It saw me and stretched out a hand, palm up, beseeching.

“I had much this creature wanted, I was sure, but nothing I could give. Its eyes grew wetter and its head angled to one side. I heard its painful moan, a wordless begging. I stifled the pity that sprang up unwanted in my breast, and was on my guard against this ghostly thing. I fancied malice in its eye. That this creature loved me not, would do me harm if it could, was not to be trusted.

“There were others, roughly in the shapes of men and women, but clad as even the lowest savage of India would never clothe himself, in the meanest of rags. I was assaulted by details. Rotten teeth, marbled eyes, grimy clawnails, fungus swatches of hair, great scabs, mismatched buttons.

“Had these once been people?

“They came out of their dwellings and gathered around me, like a pack of dangerous dogs.

“You are spirits,” I declared, “and you cannot harm a Christian soul. Begone!”

“My words gave them pause. My mental strength returned. I was better than these creatures. I was alive. They could only touch me if I let them. My moment of weakness was past.

“I still had to escape from this place. And to do so, I would have to turn my back. I believe this is the most courageous thing I have ever done.

“I turned and walked away, loudly reciting the Lord’s Prayer. As I knew they would not, the ghosts did not rush at me from behind. I was too strong for that, and they knew me for their better.

“But I heard barks of laughter, horribly close to human sounds of mirth. As I plunged into a bank of thickening fog, returning I hoped to the world of the living, my cheeks burned with an inexplicable embarrassment. The ghosts mocked me, jeering at my back, possessed by a cruel hilarity that cast me out of their region as surely as my feet carried me away, into the fog again.

“Now, I was running almost, at least walking briskly. I began on the psalms. After some interval, I collided with a police constable in Farringdon Road and was able from there to make my way home.”

The Reverend Mr Weeks nodded sagely, and Colonel Beauregard scowled in sympathy. I felt as if I had myself been transported beyond the rational world, into Ernest Virtue’s hellish half-city.

“I thought, that night as I prepared for my bed, my horrible experience was at an end. I imagined this moment, when I would retell it to good friends within a room of stout oak and know I was beyond the reach of those ghosts. I slept soundly, untroubled by what had occurred. The world was back as it should be, and my place in it was fixed and secure.

“But that laughter had followed me.

“Three days later, in the street outside the Exchange, I heard that laughter again. I looked about, startled, rudely breaking off a conversation. It was broad daylight, if overcast. A great many brokers stood about in groups, discussing the day’s business. Amid so many frock coats and top hats, it was hard to catch a glimpse of the tattered cloak. But it was there, I was sure. The quality of the laugh was not human. It came from the beyond.

“That was not the only incident. I have been certain, always when outside, when on the street, that I have seen a shadow or heard a cry which could only betoken the presence of one or more of that ghostly crew, escapees from that dreadful place abroad in the city of the living. Have they followed me back? Or have they always been among us, unseen by the many, maddening the few cursed souls who have awoken to their presence?

“I have been touched again. Their hands sometimes grip the skirts of my coat as I pass. Their fingers poke and prod. My watch is lost to them. I don’t know when it was stealthed away, but when I found it was gone, I also found a blue bruise on my belly, where the watch must have pressed.

“They love us not, these ghosts. They envy the life we have. They are needy, with a hunger we cannot understand. They would take everything from us if they could. And if they can not have what we have, they will tear us down and destroy all we hold dear, out of spite. I must be strong, must remain strong. Else the world will spin out of its orbit and be lost in the darkness.”

“Now, now, old man,” said the Colonel. “Chin up.”

“Yes, Colonel. I keep my chin up. I keep my back straight. I keep my heart closed. I can resist.”

I expected our clergyman to have something to say, but the Reverend Mr Weeks had nodded sagely off to sleep. In itself, that gave me a chill none of the stories had raised.

“For a while, it was dreadful,” Virtue continued. “Even in broadest daylight and in the most respectable thoroughfares, I was aware of them. They slouch among us, clinging to their gutters and alleys, boldly meeting our glances, trying with their guttural noises to harry our minds. London is thick with these monsters. I was woken up to their presence, and wondered what spell had been cast over me so that I should be cursed with the power of seeing those things that should decently remain invisible. They are parodies of life, loathsome and pitiable, despicable and damned. Their corruption is complete, and yet they yearn even as we do, for the light, for the warmth. I know you must find this hard to credit, for had another tried to persuade me of this before my experience in the fog I would have deemed him mad. But these ghosts are among us. All the time.”

An excitement, almost a rage, had built up in me as Virtue spoke. I had expected one of the others to cut him off, to rend apart his strange misconception. And yet it fell to me.

“Surely,” I began, “your ghosts are nothing supernatural. The place you have described is simply a slum. Sadly, many such are to be found in London. Your ghosts are just the poor, no more.”

Virtue’s eyes fixed me like the lights of a hostile gunboat.

“The poor!” he exclaimed. “The Poor!?!”

There was a terrifying force inside him.

“The unfortunate,” I continued. “Beggars and wastrels, no doubt. The human detritus of our city, those who through birth or inclination have found themselves settling on the bottom.”

“This is London,” Virtue said, with a ferocious certainty. “The most prosperous city in the world. No such creatures exist, not naturally. My dear friend, of this I am sure as eggs is eggs. For me, the curtain has lifted and I have seen a hellish world beyond.”

I was horrorstruck by something new in Virtue’s tone. A spark of pity, for me that I could be so deluded as to believe his phantoms to be people like ourselves.

“Colonel Beauregard, Mr Weeks,” I appealed.

Neither worthy — for Mr Weeks was now awake again — joined my position.

“This is a case of spectral persecution,” Virtue insisted. “It will be resisted. If you ignore them, I have found, they go away. For I am winning my private war. This last week, they have been fainter presences. I can still see them, but I have to weaken and direct my gaze at a fixed shadow to be sure. I have been successful in willing myself free of persecution. By ignoring the ghosts, I deny them substance. Within days, I shall have banished these apparitions entirely. Oak panels are my armour. My mind is my sword.”

Somehow, his conviction swayed me. I came to see his experience as he did himself. I still held in my mind my original assumption, but in my heart I knew I relied too much on my mind.

There were ghosts. This city was spectre-plagued. Mr Ernest Meiklejohn Virtue was haunted.

I added my own story to the collection, to conclude the evening. It was hurried, I confess, a confection of hooded monks and a hook-clawed madman, with lovers united beyond the grave and a villain harried over a cliff by the bloodied floating faces of his victims.

The company broke up, and departed the club to the quarters of the compass.

It was not a foggy night, but it was moonless. I watched Virtue stride off vigorously, down a street ill-lit by faint gaslight. He marched almost, swinging his cane like a lance, looking straight ahead and not into any of the alleys that fed into the street, whistling a hymn that spoke of the rich man in his castle and the poor man at the gate, He made them high and lowly and ordered their estate. In some of the alleys were huddles that breathed and stretched out empty hands. He walked past, unseeing.

For Virtue, the haunting was almost over.

But a horror worse than all the crawling severed hands, floating green shrouds, chattering skulls and ambulant scarecrows pitched in together clung to the stones of this prosperous city, impinging when it had to on the main thoroughfares but festering always in the shadows beyond the gaslight, wrapping the hearts of men and women like you and I in a misery more profound than the sufferings of any wailing spectre bride or seaweed-dripping wrecker’s revenant. I remembered Virtue’s convictions, of his own rectitude and of the strength of oak panels.

I resolved to model myself on him, and walked home, holding my breath in the darks between the pools of lamplight, arriving safely at my own oak-lined fortress.

That night, I saw no ghosts.