inkspired Inkspired Stories

The Demon Spell was written in the year 1894 by Hume Nisbet.


Horror Nicht für Kinder unter 13 Jahren. © Public Domain

#Demons #horror
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The Demon Spell

It was about the time when spiritualism was all the craze in England,

and no party was reckoned complete without a spirit-rapping seance

being included amongst the other entertainments.

One night I had been invited to the house of a friend, who was a great

believer in the manifestations from the unseen world, and who had

asked for my special edification a well--known trance medium. 'A

pretty as well as heaven-gifted girl, whom you will be sure to like, I

know' he said as he asked me.

I did not believe in the return of spirits, yet, thinking to be

amused, consented to attend at the hour appointed. At that time I had

just returned from a long sojourn abroad, and was in a very delicate

state of health, easily impressed by outward influences, and nervous

to a most extraordinary extent.

To the hour appointed I found myself at my friend's house, and was

then introduced to the sitters who had assembled to witness the

phenomena. Some were strangers like myself to the rules of the table,

others who were adepts took their places at once in the order to which

they had in former meetings attended. The trance medium had not yet

arrived, and while waiting upon her coming we sat down and opened the

seance with a hymn.

We had just furnished(sic) the second verse when the door opened and

the medium glided in, and took her place on a vacant set by my side,

joining in with the others in the last verse, after which we all sat

motionless with our hands resting upon the table, waiting upon the

first manifestation from the unseen world.

Now, although I thought all this performance very ridiculous, there

was something in the silence and the dim light, for the gas had been

turned low down, and the room seemed filled with shadows; something

about the fragile figure at my side, with her drooping head, which

thrilled me with a curious sense of fear and icy horror such as I had

never felt before.

I am not by nature imaginative or inclined to superstition, but, from

the moment that young girl had entered the room, I felt as if a hand

had been laid upon my heart, a cold iron hand, that was compressing

it, and causing it to stop throbbing. My sense of hearing also had

grown more acute and sensitive, so that the beating of the watch in my

vest pocket sounded like the thumping of a quartz-crushing machine,

and the measured breathing of those about me as loud and nerve-

disturbing as the snorting of a steam engine.

Only when I turned to look upon the trance medium did I become

soothed; then it seemed as if a cold-air wave had passed through my

brain, subduing, for the time-being, those awful sounds.

'She is possessed,' whispered my host on the other side of me. 'Wait,

and she will speak presently, and tell us whom we have got beside us.'

As we sat and waited the table moved several times under our hands,

while knockings at intervals took place in the table and all round the

room, a most weird and blood-curdling, yet ridiculous performance,

which made me feel half inclined to run out with fear, and half

inclined to sit still and laugh; on the whole, I think, however, that

horror had the more complete possession of me.

Presently she raised her head and laid her hand upon mine, beginning

to speak in a strange monotonous, far away voice, 'This is my first

visit since I passed from earth-life, and you have called me here.'

I shivered as her hand touched mine, but had not strength to withdraw

it from her light, soft grasp.

'I am what you would call a lost soul; that is, I am in the lowest

sphere. Last week I was in the body, but met my death down Whitechapel

way. I was what you call an unfortunate, aye, unfortunate enough.

Shall I tell you how it happened?'

The medium's eyes were closed, and whether it was my distorted

imagination or not, she appeared to have grown older and decidedly

debauched-looking since she sat down, or rather as if a light, filmy

mask of degrading and soddened vice had replaced the former delicate

features.

No one spoke, and the trance medium continued: 'I had been out all

that day and without any luck or food, so that I was dragging my

wearied body along through the slush and mud for it had been wet all

day, and I was drenched to the skin, and miserable, ah, ten thousand

times more wretched than I am now, for the earth is a far worse hell

for such as I than our hell here.

'I had importuned several passers by as I went along that night, but

none of them spoke to me, for work had been scarce all this winter,

and I suppose I did not look so tempting as I have been; only once a

man answered me, a dark-faced, middle-sized man, with a soft voice,

and much better dressed than my usual companions.

'He asked me where I was going, and then left me, putting a coin into

my hand, for which I thanked him. Being just in time for the last

public-house, I hurried up, but on going to the bar and looking at my

hand, I found it to be a curious foreign coin, with outlandish figures

on it, which the landlord would not take, so I went out again to the

dark fog and rain without my drink after all.

'There was no use going any further that night. I turned up the court

where my lodgings were, intending to go home and get a sleep, since I

could get no food, when I felt something touch me softly from behind

like as if someone had caught hold of my shawl; then I stopped and

turned about to see who it was.

'I was alone, and with no one near me, nothing but fog and the half

light from the court lamp. Yet I felt as if something had got hold of

me, though I could not see what it was, and that it was gathering

about me.

'I tried to scream out, but could not, as this unseen grasp closed

upon my throat and choked me, and then I fell down and for a moment

forgot everything.

'Next moment I woke up, outside my own poor mutilated body, and stood

watching the fell work going on--as you see it now.'

Yes I saw it all as the medium ceased speaking, a mangled corpse lying

on a muddy pavement, and a demoniac, dark, pock-marked face bending

over it, with the lean claws outspread, and the dense fog instead of a

body, like the half formed incarnation of muscles.

'That is what did it, and you will know it again.' she said, 'I have

come for you to find it.'

'Is he an Englishman?' I gasped, as the vision faded away and the room

once more became definite.

'It is neither man nor woman, but it lives as I do, it is with me now

and may be with you to-night, still if you will have me instead of it,

I can keep it back, only you must wish for me with all your might.'

The seance was now becoming too horrible, and by general consent our

host turned up the gas, and then I saw for the first time the medium,

now relieved from her evil possession, a beautiful girl of about

nineteen, with I think the most glorious brown eyes I had ever before

looked into.

'Do you believe what you have been speaking about?' I asked her as we

were sitting talking together.

'What was that?'

'About the murdered woman.'

'I don't know anything at all. Only that I have been sitting at the

table. I never know what my trances are.' Was she speaking the truth?

Her dark eyes looked truth, so that I could not doubt her. That night

when I went to my lodgings I must confess that it was some time before

I could make up my mind to go to bed. I was decidedly upset and

nervous, and wished that I had never, gone to this spirit meeting,

making a mental vow, as I threw off my clothes and hastily got into

bed, that it was the last unholy gathering I would ever attend.

For the first time in my life I could not put out the gas, I felt as

if the room was filled with ghosts, as if this pair of ghastly

spectres, the murderer and his victim, had accompanied me home, and

were at that moment disputing the possession of me, so instead, I

pulled the bedclothes over my head, it being a cold night, and went

that fashion off to sleep.

Twelve o'clock! and the anniversary of the day that Christ was born.

Yes, I heard it striking from the street spire and counted the

strokes, slowly tolled out, listening to the echoes from other

steeples, after this one had ceased, as I lay awake in that gas-lit

room, feeling as if I was not alone this Christmas morn.

Thus, while I was trying to think what had made me wake so suddenly, I

seemed to hear a far off echo cry 'Come to me.' At the same time the

bedclothes were slowly pulled from the bed, and left in a confused

mass on the floor.

'Is that you, Polly?' I cried, remembering the spirit seance, and the

name by which the spirit had announced herself when she took

possession.

Three distinct knocks resounded on the bedpost at my ear, the signal

for 'Yes.'

'Can you speak to me?'

'Yes,' an echo rather than a voice replied, while I felt my flesh

creeping, yet strove to be brave.

'Can I see you?'

'No!'

'Feel you?'

Instantly the feeling of a light cold hand touched my brow and passed

over my face.

'In God's name what do you want?'

'To save the girl I was in tonight. It is after her and will kill her

if you do not come quickly.'

In an instant I was out of the bed, and tumbling my clothes on any

way, horrified through it all, yet feeling as if Polly were helping me

to dress. There was a Kandian dagger on my table which I had brought

from Ceylon, an old dagger which I had bought for its antiquity and

design, and this I snatched up as I left the room, with that light

unseen hand leading me out of the house and along the deserted snow-

covered streets.

I did not know where the trance medium lived, but I followed where

that light grasp led me through the wild, blinding snow-drift, round

corners and through short cuts, with my head down and the flakes

falling thickly about me, until at last I arrived at a silent square

and in front of a house which by some instinct, I knew that I must

enter.

Over by the other side of the street I saw a man standing looking up

to a dimly-lighted window, but I could not see him very distinctly and

I did not pay much attention to him at the time, but rushed instead up

the front steps and into the house, that unseen hand still pulling me

forward.

How that door opened, or if it did open I could not say, I only know

that I got in, as we get into places in a dream, and up the inner

stairs, I passed into a bedroom where the light was burning dimly.

It was her bedroom, and she was struggling in the thug-like grasp of

those same demon claws, and the rest of it drifting away to

nothingness.

I saw it all at a glance, her half-naked form, with the disarranged

bedclothes, as the unformed demon of muscles clutched that delicate

throat, and then I was at it like a fury with my Kandian dagger,

slashing crossways at those cruel claws and that evil face, while

blood streaks followed the course of my knife, making ugly stains,

until at last it ceased struggling and disappeared like a horrid

nightmare, as the half-strangled girl, now released from that fell

grip, woke up the house with her screams, while from her releasing

hand dropped a strange coin, which I took possession of.

Thus I left her, feeling that my work was done, going downstairs as I

had come up, without impediment or even seemingly, in the slightest

degree, attracting the attention of the other inmates of the house,

who rushed in their nightdresses towards the bedroom from whence the

screams were issuing.

Into the street again, with that coin in one hand and my dagger in the

other I rushed, and then I remembered the man whom I had seen looking

up at the window. Was he there still? Yes, but on the ground in a

confused black mass amongst the white snow as if he had been struck

down.

I went over to where he lay and looked at him. Was he dead? Yes. I

turned him round and saw that his throat was gashed from ear to ear,

and all over his face--the same dark, pallid, pock-marked evil face,

and claw-like hands, I saw the dark slashes of my Kandian dagger,

while the soft white snow around him was stained with crimson life

pools, and as I looked I heard the clock strike one, while from the

distance sounded the chant of the coming waits, then I turned and fled

blindly into the darkness.

THE END

30. Juli 2016 18:49 1 Bericht Einbetten Follow einer Story
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