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 psychical 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.
It was late in September, and the
big trout and maskinongé were stirring themselves
in the depths of the lake, and beginning slowly to
move up to the surface waters as the north winds and
early frosts lowered their temperature. Already
the maples were crimson and gold, and the wild laughter
of the loons echoed in sheltered bays that never knew
their strange cry in the summer.
With a whole island to oneself, a
two-storey 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 verandah 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 verandah through the trees to the boat-landing,
the island was densely covered with maples, hemlocks,
and cedars. The trees gathered in round 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 four you could not see an inch
before 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 verandah. 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 favourably. 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 it 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 black-beetles 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 colour 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
ice-house, and that to-morrow 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 sub-consciousness. 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 ice-house.
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 growing cold.
Yet the day had been oppressively warm, and evening
had brought no relief. The six big lamps, moreover,
gave out heat enough 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 on to the verandah.
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 verandah 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 birch-bark, with
high-crested bows 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 recognised
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 be
no longer 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 pleasant intercourse.
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 defence
in that corner. Without an instant’s hesitation
I ran up to the verandah, 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 verandah, and as quickly as possible turned
out every one of the six lamps. To be in a room
so brilliantly lighted, 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 verandah, became specially 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 psychical 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
passage-way led to the kitchen, and the stairs leading
to the bedrooms above commenced in this passage-way,
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 verandah, so stealthy that it seemed an impression
directly on my brain rather than upon the nerves of
hearing. Immediately afterwards 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 cheek-bones 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 off 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, paralysed
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 the
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 roll 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 round 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 cat-like 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 backwards
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 some time, and almost before I
knew it the figures had passed me and had their feet
upon the lower 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 neighbourhood 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 now 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 the 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 as 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 flood-gates 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 anæsthetic, 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 half-way down the
stairs when I was galvanised 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 round 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
cheek-bone, 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 paralysed 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 recognised 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 re-embarked, I saw a
canoe gliding ahead of me around the curve of the
island. A canoe was an unusual sight at 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 round 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-coloured 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 a corner, and a projecting
bluff of rock hid from my view both island and canoe.