CHAPTER NINE STARTS FROM THIS POINT (cont. 7)

I felt a light blow as one end of the rope fell across me. Peter was going to take no chances on midnight ghosts. _He was going to tie us all firmly to the slabs!_

Whistling to keep up his courage, he proceeded with his task. In a few minutes I was firmly bound. I could not have moved if I dared.

Then he cut away the remaining piece of rope and proceeded to truss up Chic in the same way. He had to struggle to make the two ends of the cord meet.

There was none left for the real corpse, and, though he hunted diligently in all parts of the room, he could find no more.

He surveyed the two of us, bound firmly to the slabs, and evidently felt reassured. He decided to take a chance on the third body remaining still and retired to his room, closing the door and leaving us alone in the creepy, moonlit mortuary.

How I cursed Chic as I lay there unable to move, listening to the gradually deepening breathing of Peter as he dropped into a sound sleep. What if he should leave us bound until the professors arrived in the morning? What a fine row there would be!

These, and other unpleasant thoughts running through my mind, were suddenly checked by a slight sound which turned me cold from head to foot. Horrified, I gazed through the small chink in my covering. I could not believe my eyes.

_The corpse of the maniac had moved!_

* * * * *

There came a faint rustle of his covering shroud, and the body moved again ever so slightly. I wanted to shriek in terror, but I was paralyzed.

The shroud moved again, this time more noticeably. My scalp tightened, and I could feel the gooseflesh rising all over my body.

Then, with one sudden motion, the maniac sat bolt upright and threw the shroud from him.

He was clothed only in a long, hospital nightgown. His thin hair stood up in tangled wisps, and his eyes blazed like those of a cat in a dark room.

Slowly he surveyed his surroundings, and then burst into the most hideous laughter I have ever heard. His big, yellow teeth seemed like the fangs of a wild animal. I could imagine them rending my flesh.

The echo of his hideous mirth had hardly died away when Peter burst from his room, clad in his night clothes. His knees almost gave way as he took in the dreadful scene. Horror was apparent in every line of his body, and I had an inexplicable desire to laugh. But by a supreme effort I fought off this hysteria.

Quite calmly the madman swung his legs down from the slab and sat there on its edge, transfixing poor Peter with his terrible gaze. He chuckled.

Peter commenced to back toward his room. In an instant the madman was at him.

Then commenced a wild chase around the room, of which I could only catch fleeting glimpses as they passed on one side of my slab. Once the maniac rested bony hands on my body as he prepared for a new rush at Peter, whom I could hear breathing near by.

Bound hand and foot, Chic and I were unable to make a move, even if terror had not prevented us.

Untiringly, cunningly, the madman pursued his prey. Peter dodged and squirmed in terror. Perspiration poured from his face. But his efforts were futile. He was penned in a corner, at last, where a door led directly to a stairway in the corridor.

Step by step, the madman approached him, his long fingers outstretched like talons, and a low, gleeful laugh came from his lips. Peter backed desperately away from him, as though he hoped to press through the great oaken door. The maniac’s fingers were almost at his throat, when the door swung back suddenly and Peter tumbled from the room, his body bumping and thudding on the stairs outside.

Startled by the sudden disappearance of his victim, the madman halted a moment. The door automatically swung shut again, firmly this time. Apparently, it had not been tightly closed before.

The insane creature flung himself at it. It repelled him. He shrieked and tore at it, but to no avail, and he finally turned away.

His eyes, now wilder than ever, swept the room. They rested on our bound figures. Swiftly, he passed over to where I lay. The rope puzzled him, and he was still for a moment.

Suddenly he grasped it and snapped it as though it had been thread. I was free, but I did not move. I waited for him to seize me, but his footsteps shuffled away. He was beside Chic now. I heard the rope which bound him snap.

In desperation, I rolled from the slab and rose trembling to my feet. The noise attracted the crazed being. He turned and faced me.

His features were distorted into a horrible grin. His sharp, cruel teeth gnashed as if in expectation of a bloody feast. He leaped at me, clearing the slab, on which I had lain, at one bound.

I was too weak to dodge, but I tried grimly to clinch with him, as I had seen groggy boxers do when they were sparring for time. I was in his arms. His eyes blazed not a foot from mine. Foam flecked his mouth. His weight pressed against me. It grew heavier and heavier.

Then my overwrought nerves gave way, and I became unconscious.

* * * * *

When I awoke I was outside in the cool night air. Chic was bathing my brow with muddy water from a roadside pool. The madman had collapsed at the same moment as I had. In a daze, Chic had laid him again on the slab and had dragged me from the building.

Poor Peter we forgot, until he was found the next morning, haggard, white-haired and unable to utter an intelligible word.

Too vivid an imagination, wrought into a frenzy by the uncanny surroundings, was the way the doctors diagnosed his strange case. Chic and I were too dazed to shatter the theory.

As for the madman, he had really died, after the short spell of suspended animation and temporary revival. I know this because his gaunt skeleton was one of the principal decorations at our graduation dance.

But, even with this assurance, I sometimes wake at night in a cold sweat, and feel for the butt of the revolver under my pillow.

Arrest Woman Accused of Witchcraft

Popular rumors of a sorceress in the Logan Square district of Chicago led to the arrest of Mrs. Emily Elhert for practising medicine without a license. The woman styled herself a spiritualist and claimed the ability to heal any disease. She would make mysterious passes over her patients, and applied an evil-smelling salve, the composition of which is not known. Each visit cost the patient two dollars, and Mrs. Elhert is said to have made very good money until the police interfered with her career.

_An Electrocution, Vividly Described By An Eye Witness_

THE CHAIR

_By_ DR. HARRY E. MERENESS

_Former Physician at Sing Sing Prison_

Dr. Harry E. Mereness, who wrote this realistic description of an electrocution, was attending physician at Sing Sing Prison for six years, and during that period he attended, in his official capacity, sixty-seven executions in the Electric Chair—a record that has never been equaled. Among the many noted executions he witnessed were those of Lieut. Becker of the New York Police Department and the four gunmen in the Rosenthal case. Prior to their death, he attended the prisoners in the condemned cells.

“The average prisoner, approaching the moment of execution,” says Dr. Mereness, “is in a mental haze or wild delirium produced by the fear of death. In two instances, however, this was lacking. Both men, after being strapped in the chair, said: ‘Good-by, Doc!’”

The minute hand on my watch indicates 5:44 a. m. I am standing in a direct line with the chair.

My gaze is directed to the left side of the room and down a short, narrow, heavily-walled corridor that forms the communication between the condemned cells and the execution chamber. There are a number of guards standing quietly about, and on my right, back of a rope stretched across the room, sit the witnesses.

There is a tension in the very air of the chamber. Absolute quiet prevails. A few seconds pass, eternally long they are.

Then comes a sound—a muffled “Good-by, all.” The sound reaches the ears of the witnesses, and involuntarily they straighten up on their stools; there is some scuffling of feet, and one witness, possibly a trifle more nervous than the rest, clears his throat. Everyone is now keenly alert.

I hear the chant of the priest—the response of the condemned man—the low, quavering and broken response, “Have mercy on me.”

The little procession now enters the corridor. I see the condemned man—stocking-footed, and with his right trouser leg flapping, grimly ludicrous, for it has been slit up to the knee in order to facilitate the application of the leg electrode. He is between the deputy warden and his assistant, each supporting an arm as they slowly enter the death chamber.

At the sight of the fateful and fatal chair, the condemned man involuntarily shrinks back, but the guards are prepared for this, and their hold becomes a little firmer. There is no halt in their step, and but five paces away, inanimate, portentous and ominous—the chair!

After the first sight—after that sharp, quivering intake of breath—the gaze of the condemned man shifts about the room. His expression haunts one. You feel that it is both all-seeing and unseeing. The fear of death—a definite emotion—is here portrayed in a fashion that but few have beheld. There is utter finality in that look.

His eyes rest upon you. You feel that he sees you, but that you are simply one of the images in the general make-up of the last picture that is conveyed to his brain. There is no recognition in the glance—just a vague, hopeless and apparently vacant stare, but one which you feel discerns the sharp outlines of the persons and objects in the room, without recognizing features or details.

To me, that quick survey of his surroundings, that final glance of the unfortunate being on the very threshold of his meeting with his God, is the most harrowing of all the gruesome details connected with the administration of man-made Law’s decree.

My watch indicates 5:45 a. m. The condemned man is seated in the Chair. The guards work quickly, two at either side and one at the head of the Chair. The arm straps are buckled fast, the leg straps next, then the face strap, which has an opening for the chin, and the upper part of which mercifully blindfolds the eyes.

The cap, a soft, pliable thing made of a fine copper mesh and lined with sponge, which has been moistened in salt water, is placed upon the head and moulded to fit its contour. To a binding-post on the cap is adjusted the heavy wire that conveys the terrific current from the dynamo in a distant part of the prison. To the bare right leg, another electrode is applied and connected up.

A full minute has elapsed since I heard the “Good-by, all.” The guards have completed their task. My notes now read: “Entered 5:44:10. Chair and strapped 5:45:00.”

“Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world have mercy on me,” chants the priest. And: “Have mercy on me,” comes the broken, almost inaudible and inarticulate response.

I retain my position, note-book and watch in my left hand. I am standing on the right side of, and in the same direct line with, the Chair. The Chair and its occupant, the electrician and myself, form a right angle. I occupy the angle, for at the ends of the lines, which make up that angle, are the two things that demand my undivided attention—the electrician and the condemned. From my point of vantage I can see them both. My eyes are on the condemned man.

I feel the eyes of the electrician upon me. I have a new, bright yellow pencil—freshly sharpened. It is quite necessary for my notes. I hold it vertically on my note-book, and watch the occupant of the Chair. The overwhelming mental tension, coupled with the knowledge of the proximity of death, has a fearsome reaction upon the Chair’s victim. With each rapid inspiration, there is a slight elevation of the shoulders, and as expiration takes place the shoulders sag. This is the very instant I have awaited—the lungs are practically free from air. I dip my pencil quickly from the vertical toward the horizontal.

There is a sudden _click_, the body in the Chair straightens, and from the mouth comes a low, sibilant _hiss_; the straps creak, and you feel that if the straps should break the body would be catapulted over the rope and amidst the witnesses.

For ten seconds the high current of eighteen hundred and fifty volts and eight to nine amperes is on; then, for forty seconds, the voltage is dropped to two hundred.

During this period the body sags perceptibly; at the end of forty seconds the current is again increased, and the body again straightens and strains against the straps. After the final ten seconds of the fatal minute, the current is switched off.

The body in the Chair actually shrinks before your very eyes! I step up to the Chair; a guard tears open the shirt and bares the chest. As I place my stethoscope over the heart I am conscious that the body is intensely hot. I know from experience that the heat generated by the rapidity of the passage of the current has raised the temperature from sub-normal to between 120 and 130 degrees.

I hear a racing, tumultuous _rat-a-tat-tat_—possibly I can count the heart beats. I lift the face strap, and with thumb and forefinger separate the lids. The eyes are glazed, but the pupils are small. I feel the great arteries in the neck. I continue to get a pulsation that tells me that the vital forces have not yet ceased.

My notes now read: “First contact—one minute—5:45:10—5:46:10.”

I step off the rubber mat and nod to the electrician; the current is again thrown on, this time for five seconds. When I now listen over the heart, I am reminded of a clock that is running down; the heart beats are fainter—they become slower—they commence to skip—I fail to feel the pulsation in the neck—there is a heavier glaze over the eyes—the pupils, small and contracted a moment before, are now widely dilated. The head rests on the shoulders, and the face is directed toward the chandelier with its many lights, but there is no reaction of the pupil as the bright light strikes the eye—it remains wide and big. The muscles of the face are set, and saliva drools from the angles of the mouth.

I again place my stethoscope upon the chest, but no sound reaches my ear. I listen for five—for ten—for twenty seconds. There is nothing; all the vital reactions have disappeared.

Physicians among the witnesses are invited to listen; they take their time, for there is no reason for hurry now. After the last one finishes I make a final examination. It is as before—nothing.

My notes now state: “Second contact—5 seconds—5:47:00. Pronounced dead at 5:52:00.”

I turn toward the Warden and say, “I pronounce this man dead.”

The law has been obeyed.

The general attitude of tenseness is relieved. The guards quickly unbuckle the straps and carry the body to the autopsy room, and after placing it upon the stone-topped table begin to remove the clothes. The hum of conversation becomes general. The witnesses are departing.

I commence the autopsy, feeling that my report will be, “Autopsy upon the body of ⸺ No. ⸺, convicted of murder, first degree and today executed at this prison, showed all organs and tissues to be normal.”

As I begin my long sweeping incision, the thought always strikes me: “This must also be done because it is the Law,” and the invariable question comes, “Is it really the Law, or is it to insure the carrying out of the Law?”

In other words, if the Chair fails, the post mortem succeeds.

* * * * *

There is little left to tell. The evening papers will state that “So-and-so, convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to death, was electrocuted at Sing Sing Prison early this morning.” They will rehearse the grewsome history of the crime and will tell how the murderer, with firm step, entered the execution chamber at 5:44:10 a. m., and was strapped in the chair at 5:45:00 a. m.

These details are quite correct. I can vouch for them, for I let the reporters take my notes, which are official, and they copy the data and embody it in their stories.

They invariably dress up the “first contact,” however, so their stories read about like this, “At 5:45:10 Warden Blank threw the switch, pressed the button, or dropped his handkerchief, as a signal” (it is always one of these three).

Well, I’m rather glad that they credit it to the Warden, and I really feel better that I and my new, bright yellow pencil, freshly sharpened, have been overlooked.

Rare Music Disappears Mysteriously

Caslav Albrecht, a Chicago violinist, recently made a trip to Europe and brought back about thirty-five rare pieces of violin manuscript, which cannot be duplicated. Many of the compositions were original copies and the whole is valued at $5,000. The music disappeared at a party given by Frank Steiner, another musician, which Albrecht attended. He says he had the music with him when he came, and left it in the cloak-room during the festivities, and that it was gone when he was ready to leave for home. Although Albrecht was sure the manuscripts were merely mislaid, no trace of them could be found.

The Cauldron

_True Adventures of Terror_

CONDUCTED BY PRESTON LANGLEY HICKEY

While most of the material in =WEIRD TALES= is, of course, fiction, we are of the belief that there are innumerable persons who have lived through experiences as weird, terrible and horrifying as anything ever chronicled by a fictionist. This belief, and the fact that =WEIRD TALES= deals exclusively with the bizarre and unusual, has resulted in the establishment of =THE CAULDRON=.

Readers who have had a hand in strange adventures, or who have been victims of experiences of a startling and terrifying nature, are cordially invited to send accounts of them to =THE CAULDRON=. A concrete idea of what is desired may be ascertained by reading this month’s contributions. Manuscripts may be as horrible and hair-raising as it is in the power of the author to make them, but they must be clean from a moral standpoint. Those accepted will be paid for at our usual rate. Tell your story clearly and briefly. Double-spaced, typewritten manuscripts are preferred, but those in long hand will be considered if legibly written. No manuscript will be returned unless accompanied by a stamped and self addressed envelope.

THE GHOST OF DEATH

Editor of The Cauldron: There are those who are as firmly convinced in the existence of ghosts as they are that day follows night. I have heard intelligent men and women discuss ghosts seriously and tell of this and that spiritualistic seance that they attended where, before their very eyes, misty forms of long departed dead have been materialized before their very eyes. To me all this appears more or less ridiculous. During the past fifteen years I have made a very thorough study of the “phenomena” of spiritualism, and my findings have resulted in my becoming skeptical on this subject. It is because of my emphatic disbelief in the supernatural, as far as its direct relation to human man is concerned, that I submit the following as one of the most inexplicable and terrifying things that has ever occurred to me:

During the summer of 1906, my wife and I were residing in the township of North Lamoine, Maine, a fishing village situated on Frenchman’s Bay, an arm of the Atlantic which extends some miles inland. Our first born, then twenty months old, had not been well for some time, and we thought perhaps a summer in the open country close to the sea would be beneficial.

For a time the little one appeared to rally, but failed to put on the weight or to assume the healthy look that a normal baby of her age should. Then came a day when my wife struck terror to my heart by telling me that she had a premonition that something would happen—that the child would not live.

I scoffed at the notion and cheered her as best I could, but there was a great weight on my heart. I had begun to feel the same way, and the fact that my wife mentioned it only intensified my grief.

Just two days after this conversation there occurred the manifestation of which I write. My work kept me up later than usual, and it was not until after midnight that I finally retired. Worn out as I was from the activities of the day, and though late the hour, it was some time before I could compose myself to sleep.

The baby, who slept with my wife at the other end of the room, moaned. A heavy electrical storm raged outside—the wind lashing the rain against the window panes in unabating fury—and my thoughts were in a turmoil.

Finally I began to doze and, I believe, was about to fall asleep when, with a start, I found myself staring wide eyed at the ceiling. No one had spoken, and, save for the baby’s moans and the storm, there had been no sound, but something had impelled me to open my eyes. A moment later a cold perspiration broke out over my body.

At first, nothing was visible and then, even in the almost pitch darkness of the room, a filmy though strangely luminous grayish white object began to take form close to the ceiling just above my wife’s bed. It became clearer and clearer until finally it moved.

As rigid as a marble statue I lay. Though not exactly afraid, to have saved my life I don’t believe I could have moved at that moment. Gradually this indescribable object began to settle over the other bed. Just as it seemed to merge itself with the faint whiteness of the covers, the baby cried out, to be followed an instant later by a piercing scream from my wife.

“Back! back!” she gasped. “No! no! you shall not! For God’s sake _back_!”

I remained motionless but an instant, long enough, however, to see the specter gather itself into a compact form, flash upward and disappear. Then, with a mighty effort, I pulled myself together and bounded out of bed.

“Oh,” my wife cried, sitting up, “did you see it?”

“See what, dear?” I asked.

“Just now something white seemed to come down, with arms outstretched, as if to take little Helen away. I am sure I was not asleep.”

“You must have been,” I answered. “I was wide awake all along and did not see anything. The room is quite empty.”

“Ugh,” she shuddered, “what a terrible dream!”

There was no sleep for me the rest of that night. For hours I sat in the living-room, trying to fathom the mystery that I had beheld. I knew it could not have been imagination, for my wife had seen it also. There was no accounting for it.

And I am just as much in the dark now as I was then. God only knows what it was that my wife and I saw that night! Perhaps it was a matriculated spirit from the Valley of Death, after all.

In any event, Baby Helen died the next day.

OWEN KING.

Editor of The Cauldron: During the street car strike in Denver in 1919, I was a reporter on the _Times_. On the night when the strikers and “Black Jack” Jerome’s “breakers” met in deadly conflict, I was assigned to the East Denver barns, in which Jerome’s men were fortified.

Toward midnight, the strikers stormed _en masse_ and, during the melée, I dropped with a bullet in my chest. Regaining consciousness, I found myself in the City Hospital. Kneeling beside my bed was my wife—Estelle. I tried to move.

“Lie still, dear,” she said, rising. “You must keep very quiet. They are going to probe for the bullet.”

Upon reaching the operating room, the ether instantly choked me into unconsciousness. Then occurred the strangest thing I have ever experienced. I seemed suddenly transported into a great hall, with tall, shining pillars. All around me were people clothed in white. From afar came the sound of soft music.

But what attracted me was a raised section at one end on which sat a benevolent-looking old gentleman. In his eyes there seemed to be all the sorrow and suffering of a wicked world’s countless centuries. He beckoned to me. When I had come before him he spoke, and in his voice there was the golden ring of perfectly tuned chimes.

“My son,” he said, “you have been brought to judgment. At present you are no longer a part of the earth’s sphere. Back there science is fighting for your life. Whether science succeeds is determined by this court of justice. What have you to say for yourself?”

I trembled and became afraid. Where was I? Was I dead and in some spiritual sphere far removed from the earth?

Then I spoke. I recall, distinctly, that I rambled on at great length, attempting to make a good impression. As I spoke he listened intently, occasionally nodding his head slowly and sadly.

When I finished, he resumed:

“Words and actions mean nothing here,” he said. “In passing judgment we consider only motives. They are everything. Remember that. It is the motives behind all actions that are important.”

So saying, he turned to an aged man, who was writing in a book, and asked: “Any prayers?”

“Yes, a young woman kneels at his bed.”

“You shall return to earthly existence for a time then,” the judge said, raising his hands. “Heed well my words.”

Then I saw a great light swell from some invisible source, and, as I looked, there seemed to be ragged scars in his palms that ran red.

When finally I opened my eyes I was again in my little bed, with Estelle and the doctor standing by. Eventually I recovered from my serious wound.

The weird vision that I had while on the operating table, though, has always been a great mystery to me. Dreams are nothing unusual for me, but this was so entirely different from anything that I have ever experienced before! I have spoken of it many times and to many people. They have not laughed, but have listened in astonishment.

What was it, I wonder? Was it the effect of the anesthetic upon my weakened system? Was it the wild distortion of my brain or, when life is flickering on the brink of eternity, are we actually brought face to face with our Creator? Will this question ever be answered in life? I wonder!

OTIS TREVOR.

THE DEATH PLUNGE

Editor of The Cauldron: I am an expert riveter. When beams are hoisted into place on buildings I hang suspended in space on a swinglike seat and rivet the sections together. Had I followed any other pursuit I probably would never have had the distinction of being the only man to fall twelve stories and live. It was during the construction of an eighteen story bank building that I experienced this extraordinary adventure.

I was working in front on the twelfth story. At this particular time I was directly under the crane which hoisted the great girders. Happening to glance down, I saw an exceptionally large load coming up. There were five. It is seldom that more than three are hoisted at once. I watched them ascend, interested in the process of landing so many. When they had almost reached the level of the fifteenth story, the roof-man gave the signal to slow down. Mistaking his motions, the crane operator pulled his reverse and the great beams swung inward.

Seeing that collision between the front of the structure and the beams was unavoidable, I attempted to get out of the way in the event anything happened. I was not quick enough. With a crash, the girders smashed into the building right over the heavy rope from which I hung, cutting it as though it were string.

Things happened so fast then that my memory of them is confused. Instantly I was precipitated downward. I do not know what sensations a drowning man experiences, but have heard that a whole life time is flashed across the victim’s mind. That is just what happened in my case. Everything I ever did came before me in those terrifying moments.

Though stricken with horror, I tried to keep my mind clear. Far below me I could see clusters of people gazing at me, horror stricken, as I fell, turning over and over.

In a moment’s time I was within four stories of the pavement. My breath was almost gone. Insane with the thought of the terrible fate that awaited me, I shut my eyes. Then, with a great roaring in my ears, I struck, and, though almost dead, knew that it wasn’t the street. For an instant I was aware of great pain and then ... nothingness.

Within an hour I had regained consciousness. Fate was with me that day. Just as I fell a big open truck, piled high with cardboard boxes, had stopped beneath me. In this I landed; my fall was broken by these boxes, and I escaped a most horrible death.

Upon examination, it was found that I suffered four fractured ribs, a compound fracture of the left leg, two breaks in my right arm and a break in my left wrist in addition to severe cuts about the body and head. That is my story. I call it a narrow escape.

JOHN BURKHOLZ.

THE EYRIE

The time has come to talk of cats and Chinamen, and rattlesnakes and skulls—and why it is these things abound in yarns for WEIRD TALES. Particularly cats and Chinamen. Believe it or not, every second manuscript we open (and that’s placing the average rather low) is concerned with one or the other, or both, of these.

Why is this? Is it because a cat and a Chinaman suggest the mysticism of the Orient, and thus seem excellent “props” for weird fiction? Or is it merely because both mind their own business, imperturbably pursue their destinies, and thereby create the impression that there’s some deep-laid mystery here? We ask you that.

Whatever the reason, it’s an odd and curious fact that when an author sets out to tell a weird tale his mind turns, as if instinctively, to cats and Chinamen. And then, for good measure, he not infrequently throws in a few rattlesnakes and a skull or two.

Sometimes the result is interesting. And sometimes it is awful! And again, sometimes, it is a ludicrous thing, unconsciously funny.

We have no prejudices against Chinese characters in fiction, and we have none whatever against cats. For that matter, we haven’t any prejudices of any sort. We’ve published a good many stories about Chinese, and quite a large number about cats, and not a few that featured skulls and rattlesnakes. You’ll find some in this June issue.

But we didn’t accept those stories because of the aforementioned features, nor yet in spite of them. We accepted them solely because they were GOOD stories. We observe one rule, and one rule only, in selecting stories for your entertainment. We think we’ve mentioned this before, but we’ll say again that our only requirement is: The thing MUST be interesting!

If a story interests us it will likewise interest others, or so we believe. And if it doesn’t—Thumbs Down! And it doesn’t matter a good gosh darn whether the hero, or villain, has yellow skin and oblique eyelids, or flaxen hair and sky-blue eyes, or whether or not a green-eyed cat howls atop a grinning skull. The story’s the thing!

All the same, though, we would like to know why all these cats and Chinamen are slinking mysteriously through our manuscripts. We read eight before breakfast this morning (chosen quite at random), and we hope to die if there wasn’t a Chinaman in every last one of them!

* * * * *

And still the letters pour in from delighted readers—plenty of them! Manifestly, it is quite impossible to print more than a fractional part of them here, but we can’t refrain from quoting at least three that concern Paul Suter’s story, “Beyond the Door,” which appeared in the April WEIRD TALES.

We take it you remember this story and will therefore be interested in these comments. The first letter comes from R. E. Lambert, secretary of the Washington Square College of New York University, New York, and reads as follows:

“Dear sir: Just as Woodrow Wilson used to say during his most trying days in the presidency that when he wanted to get his mind completely off his work he would turn to a detective story, so I turn for my own relaxation to the horror story.

“I suppose it would take exhaustive questioning by a psychoanalyst to discover why this sort of literature appeals to me, but the fact is it does so appeal. While there are hundreds of others like me in this respect, I doubt whether the number is great enough to make such a venture as yours a considerable financial success—therefore, the more praise to you for your courage in launching WEIRD TALES.

“What particularly impelled me to write this letter is the story in the current issue, entitled ‘Beyond the Door.’ One reason why I single this one from such a congeries of thrilling, weird tales is that, with all its mystery and suggestion of the supernatural, the dénouement and everything that leads up to it are discovered at the end to be logically and physically ‘possible.’ So often, in mystery stories, we are called upon to accept much that simply is not naturally possible, and we turn from them, duly horrified, but unpersuaded that the tale is more than a figment of a morbid imagination.

“From the standpoint of construction, I have read few stories that so faithfully adhere to the trinity of short story tradition—unity, coherence and mass. Especially on the score of unity, the most important of the trinity, do I find this tale worthy of much praise. Not a situation, not a paragraph, nor a sentence, but which has a direct bearing on the unfoldment of the plot. And I find no single instance where the choice of words seems to have resulted from a straining for effect. Of how many stories, whether horrific or any other kind, can this truly be said?

“Then, too, very few tales are really brought home to the reader’s own intimate experience of life. Yet here we shudder at the terrors created by a guilty conscience, and approve, while we shudder, of the terrible punishment that is meted out for the wrong-doing. How very real it thus becomes to all of us!

“Finally, the author dares to do, and admirably succeeds in doing, what so few writers of fiction attempt—and mostly bungle when they do attempt. I refer to the linking of his story in the closing paragraphs to man’s inevitable, age-old uncertainty as to what is to come in the hereafter. This alone elevates ‘Beyond the Door’ out of the ordinary run of fiction.

“Here’s wishing you a well-merited success!”

The next one was written by Rev. Andrew Wallace MacNeill, minister of the Bethlehem Congregational Church, International Falls, Minnesota:

“Gentlemen: I have read with much interest and pleasure the April number of your new magazine, which I believe will make a distinctive and acceptable place for itself in magazine literature.

“I am particularly interested in the story by a new writer, Paul Suter, ‘Beyond the Door’ proving exceptionally appealing and gripping. I hope you will publish more work by this writer, as I believe if he maintains the standard of this story your readers will make quite a popular response.”

And the third letter, which arrived in the same mail that brought the first two, came from the author himself:

“Dear Mr. Baird: I take it that even editors enjoy an occasional pat on the back, in the midst of the many black looks they receive, so I am presuming to express my appreciation of the way in which you printed my story, ‘Beyond the Door,’ in your April issue.

“There is a story which might easily have been rendered monotonous by unintelligent press work—because the effect of slowly undermining horror, which I had to attain, is akin to monotony. You avoided that pitfall by change of type—and (this to me is the remarkable thing) I can tell by the way in which you ran in those changes that you got absolutely every subtle suggestion which I concealed in that story—and I buried quite a lot of them there. You must have read my manuscript with a microscope. May I take the liberty of expressing my opinion that as an editor you are emphatically THERE?

“Cordially yours,

“J. Paul Suter.”

We almost dislike to print this last one—it’s too much like pinning a medal on our coat—but we can plead, in extenuation, that the excellence of Mr. Suter’s story was not due to our editing, or printer’s directions, or anything of the sort, but solely to his splendid craftsmanship. He wrote a good story and we published it, and no amount of editing could have made it any better.

If you failed to read “Beyond the Door” we earnestly recommend that you do so now. In either case, don’t miss his next story. It is called “The Guard of Honor,” and is fully as “creepy” as the first—and you will find it in the next issue of WEIRD TALES.

Suter is a coming writer. No doubt of that. And since he tells us, “I would rather write horror stories than anything else,” we hope to publish the best of his work.

* * * * *

We’ve ransacked a bale of Letters to the Editor in an effort to find some not sweet with praise! and we’ve found only two, and here they are:

“Dear sir: I have purchased two copies of your new magazine, have read the stories, and also the praise liberally supplied by friends and readers. I think it is time to offer a few words of criticism, since applause and praise of this kind does not mean much. The public lauds any new effort; it applauds anything, even moving pictures.

“The stories you have printed so far can be grouped under three general headings: Ghost Stories, Snake Stories, Insanity Stories. In your first issue you printed a story called ‘Ooze’ which approached the type of semi-scientific stories that are liked intensely by all those who are fond of the unusual, and if you would publish at least one story of this type in each issue of your magazine I am sure that your efforts would register larger sales.”—Conrad A. Brandt, 563 West 150th Street New York City.

“My dear Mr. Baird: At last it arrived—that second volume. If you play that slow trick again on us we shall send one of our aviators to Chicago to get the so strenuously desired copy.

“Allow me to tell you which story in the April number I liked best and which I hate best. ‘The Scar’ by Dr. Carl Ramus was a gem. Plausible, scientifically correct, well told, no words wasted. ‘The Whispering Thing’ is the acme of foolish, silly, nonsensical, high-school girl, bucket-of-blood story. If you waste more paper on such rotten stuff I predict failure in caps.”—Adeline Jugol, Covina Apartments, Los Angeles.

Ouch!

Luckily, though, not all our readers disrelished “The Whispering Thing.” For instance:

“Dear sir: Having recently read the second issue of WEIRD TALES, I cannot refrain from expressing my congratulations on your rare fiction taste as an editor. I enjoyed reading the novelette by Harold Ward, but the authors who wrote ‘The Whispering Thing’ have an imagination which is extraordinary. I happened to read this story late at night, and I began to look for ‘spooks.’ Talk about horror and terror combined! This story is nothing short of a marvel.

“I sincerely believe that you have an innate tendency for selecting stories of this type, and if you keep this class of stories running you will, without the least doubt, be a success.”—O. R. Hamilton, 4002 Avenue F, Austin, Texas.

With regard to the poetic effusion that follows, we’re not sure whether “Witch Hazel” is spoofing us or having a spasm of ecstasy. At any rate, we’ll take a chance and print the thing just as she wrote it:

“Dear Editor: No words can express how much I enjoy your magazine. Here is what I think of it:

“Oh, what is more pleasure than a show, A party, bon bons, or even a beau? Well, here’s the answer (all readers take heed); WEIRD TALES and a nice quiet place to read!

“It’s my favorite magazine, and I can hardly wait for each number to come out. I think it is the most wonderful magazine in the world, as it is so different, so extremely interesting—but there! I can never say enough in its praise. As my little verse says, ‘I like it better than anything,’ and I’ve often said I wished some editor would publish just such a magazine, and thank you, Mr. Baird (you Good Fairy) for doing so. I can hardly wait for the next issue. Thank you for filling a long felt need, and good luck!”—Witch Hazel of St. Louis.