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ChefBilly’s
All Hallows Eve
for Halloween
Enter our realm
Our
night of nights
Our
Halloween respites
OUR GHOULISH, DARK TRADITIONS
Read on
Enter the dark
If
You dare . . .
Are you too
afraid??
Come down to
the dark
Down
AND KNOCK ON THE DOOR
Trick or Treats!
Money or eats!
There are monsters
at the door!
Quick!
Find them something
to eat!
NO!
NOT US!!!
What’s that I smell?
What better then, for ghoulish nights, but fill their mouths with
popped delights and keep them satisfied?
What better on that night of nights to fill your house with monster
theater smell and make the goblins happy?
Get a pot.
Get a pot!
I
hear . . .
Blood-curdling
screams!
Get a heavy-bottomed, 4-quart pot!
Quick!
Measure
out
One-half cup
of
popping corn
And
Three
tablespoons
of
CANOLA OIL
Heat
They’re knocking at the door!
Hurry!
Put the corn and the oil into the heavy pot quick and heat making sure
to cover. Heat over medium heat!
Leave the cover
slightly ajar so the steam can escape!!!
But don’t let the corn pop out!
Corn will begin popping in three or four minutes
If you
can wait that long!
Wait . . .
Someone’s coming up
the stairs!
Down . . .
Shake the pan occasionally while corn pops vigorously, keeping a
hand on the lid so it does not blow off.
When popping slows and almost stops (another 2-3 minutes), remove pot
from heat.
Toss popped corn with salt to taste and a stick of melted
butter.
The goblins love it when they smell the popcorn as they come to your
door. Place individual portions in small
paper bags and distribute one to each goblin.
Make sure the goblins’ parents know who it came from or (and rightly so)
they may throw it away. A nice change
from candy!
The goblins love to nibble the corn on their way out and then they
don’t
Trick you!!!
A nice touch
A
horrifying touch is
to have a
Manikin
or large doll
Looking out the
window next to the door with
A mask of
Frankenstein
on its face.
Down
Down
Down
Down
Where is the
sanity?!!!
By
Edgar Allan Poe
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.
For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the
sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
Here is my favorite Halloween poem.
It should be read very late in the night, in the chill of the Halloween
night, in the golden glow of soft candlelight, in the silver of soul-settling
moon. Nestle yourself in your favorite
chair, and sipping mulled cider, or very old wine, savor these words in the
silence of night, and cover yourself from the cold of the oncoming dawn. Or is it too silent, perhaps, as you wait for
more knocks at your door? More innocent
visitors, just more trick or treaters who may come? Or, more silence will you hear? Except for occasional screams. Pay no attention to the screaming in the
night, lest it interrupt your sleep.
By
Edgar
Allan Poe
Once
upon a
Over
many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I
nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of
some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my
chamber door-
Only
this, and nothing more."
Ah,
distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And
each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly
I wished the morrow;- vainly I had sought to borrow
From my
books surcease of sorrow- sorrow for the lost Lenore-
For the
rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore-
Nameless
here for evermore.
And the
silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled
me- filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that
now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating,
"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door-
Some
late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;-
This it
is, and nothing more."
Presently
my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
"Sir,"
said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the
fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so
faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I
scarce was sure I heard you"- here I opened wide the door;-
Darkness
there, and nothing more.
Deep
into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering,
fearing,
Doubting,
dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before;
But the
silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the
only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore!"
This I
whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!"-
Merely
this, and nothing more.
Back
into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon
again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
"Surely,"
said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice:
Let me
see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore-
Let my
heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;-
'Tis the wind and nothing more."
Open
here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and
flutter,
In
there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore;
Not the
least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed
he;
But,
with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door-
Perched
upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door-
Perched,
and sat, and nothing more.
Then
this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the
grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore.
"Though
thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no
craven,
Ghastly
grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore-
Tell me
what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the
Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though
its answer little meaning- little relevancy bore;
For we
cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever
yet was blest with seeing bird above his chamber door-
Bird or
beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With
such name as "Nevermore."
But the
raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only
That
one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing
further then he uttered- not a feather then he fluttered-
Till I
scarcely more than muttered, "other friends have flown
before-
On the
morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before."
Then
the bird said, "Nevermore."
Startled
at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless,"
said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught
from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed
fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore-
Till
the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore
Of
'Never- nevermore'."
But the
Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,
Straight
I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and
door;
Then
upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy
unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore-
What
this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore
Meant
in croaking "Nevermore."
This I
sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the
fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This
and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the
cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er,
But
whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er,
She
shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen
censer
Swung
by Seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.
"Wretch,"
I cried, "thy God hath lent thee- by these angels he
hath
sent thee
Respite-
respite and nepenthe, from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff,
oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!"
Quoth the Raven,
"Nevermore."
"Prophet!"
said I, "thing of evil!- prophet still, if bird or
devil!-
Whether
Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate
yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted-
On this
home by horror haunted- tell me truly, I implore-
Is
there- is there balm in
Quoth the
Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!"
said I, "thing of evil- prophet still, if bird or
devil!
By that
Heaven that bends above us- by that God we both adore-
Tell
this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It
shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore-
Clasp a
rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore."
Quoth the
Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be
that word our sign in parting, bird or fiend," I shrieked,
upstarting-
"Get
thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave
no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave
my loneliness unbroken!- quit the bust above my door!
Take thy
beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my
door!"
Quoth the
Raven, "Nevermore."
And the
Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the
pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his
eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the
lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the
floor;
And my
soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall
be lifted- nevermore!
1 cup orange juice
2 tablespoons lemon juice
One-half cup sugar
One-half teaspoon cinnamon
One-quarter teaspoon cloves
In a large, flameproof ceramic pot or casserole, stir the lemon and
orange juice into the sugar and spices.
Heat over low flame until the liquid is hot and the sugar is thoroughly
dissolved. Bring to a gentle simmer.
Add:
1 bottle (25 ounces) sweet port wine
When hot, add:
1 cup brandy
Continue to heat over low flame until very warm but not
boiling.
Do not strike a match nearby.
Float on top:
1 very thinly sliced orange
1 very thinly sliced lemon
4 cinnamon sticks
Serve in warm mugs or punch glasses.
For a Halloween party you may want to double or triple the amounts.
Tricks or
treats . . .
money or sweets .
. .
I’m not sure how this tradition got started at our house. Perhaps it is the association of treats and
sweets with Halloween. As long as I can
remember, we have always had gingerbread after dinner on Halloween night. Also, it goes with the scary story of the
wicked witch and the gingerbread house.
Halloween is an ancient holiday, and gingerbread an ancient bread,
one of the oldest sweet breads and, along with honey bread, one of the first to
approximate a cake. The exotic flavors
of the ginger and spices conjure up thoughts of mystery.
Fittingly, this is a very old recipe. This is not the dry, flat gingerbread used to
make houses, but is delightfully moist and fluffy. It is absolutely delicious and easily made.
Ingredients:
½ cup Crisco 1
teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup granulated sugar 1 teaspoon ginger
1 egg, well beaten ½ teaspoon
cloves
2½ cups all-purpose flour ½ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoons baking soda 1 cup Brer
Rabbit molasses*
1 cup hot water
Method:
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Lightly grease a baking pan 9 inches square and 2 inches deep and
line with waxed paper.
Cream Crisco and sugar together until light and fluffy. Stir in the beaten egg. Sift together the flour, baking soda, salt
and spices. Separately, combine the molasses
and hot water. Add the flour mixture in
thirds alternately with the molasses mixture to the creamed Crisco, beating
until smooth after each addition.
Pour into prepared pan. Bake
in the middle of preheated oven about 45 minutes, until risen and browned on
top, and toothpick inserted into the middle of the gingerbread comes out
clean. It is normal for this gingerbread
to crack on top.
Let cool and spread with vanilla cream frosting colored orange for
Halloween. Or follow our tradition and
serve squares of gingerbread, unfrosted, with freshly whipped cream.
This gingerbread is also great served warm for breakfast.
ABOUT 12 SERVINGS.
*Use the Brer Rabbit dark molasses, if you
can find it, for the most authentic flavor.
But you may substitute another brand (not blackstrap) or even dark corn
syrup.
Down
Down
A cat??!
By
Edgar Allan Poe
FOR the most wild, yet most homely
narrative which I am about to
pen, I neither expect
nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to
expect it, in a case
where my very senses reject their own evidence.
Yet, mad am I not
--and very surely do I not dream. But to-morrow I
die, and to-day I
would unburthen my soul. My immediate purpose is
to place before the
world, plainly, succinctly, and without comment, a
series of mere
household events. In their consequences, these events
have terrified --have
tortured --have destroyed me. Yet I will not
attempt to expound
them. To me, they have presented little but
Horror --to many they
will seem less terrible than baroques.
Hereafter, perhaps,
some intellect may be found which will reduce my
phantasm to the
common-place --some intellect more calm, more logical,
and far less
excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the
circumstances I
detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary
succession of very
natural causes and effects.
From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my
disposition. My tenderness of heart was even
so conspicuous as to make
me the jest of my companions. I was
especially fond of animals, and
was indulged by my parents with a great
variety of pets. With these
I spent most of my time, and never was so
happy as when feeding and
caressing them. This peculiar of character
grew with my growth, and in
my manhood, I derived from it one of my
principal sources of pleasure.
To those who have cherished an affection for
a faithful and
sagacious dog, I need hardly be at the
trouble of explaining the
nature or the intensity of the gratification
thus derivable. There
is something in the unselfish and
self-sacrificing love of a brute,
which goes directly to the heart of him who
has had frequent
occasion to test the paltry friendship and
gossamer fidelity of mere
Man.
I
married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition
not uncongenial with my own. Observing my
partiality for domestic
pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring
those of the most agreeable
kind. We had birds, gold fish, a fine dog,
rabbits, a small monkey,
and a cat.
This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal,
entirely black, and sagacious to an
astonishing degree. In speaking of
his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was
not a little tinctured
with superstition, made frequent allusion to
the ancient popular
notion, which regarded all black cats as
witches in disguise. Not that
she was ever serious upon this point --and I
mention the matter at all
for no better reason than that it happens,
just now, to be remembered.
Pluto --this was the cat's name --was my favorite pet and
playmate. I alone fed him, and he attended me
wherever I went about
the house. It was even with difficulty that I
could prevent him from
following me through the streets.
Our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years, during
which my general temperament and character
--through the
instrumentality of the Fiend Intemperance
--had (I blush to confess
it) experienced a radical alteration for the
worse. I grew, day by
day, more moody, more irritable, more
regardless of the feelings of
others. I suffered myself to use intemperate
language to my At length,
I even offered her personal violence. My
pets, of course, were made to
feel the change in my disposition. I not only
neglected, but
ill-used them. For Pluto, however, I still
retained sufficient
regard to restrain me from maltreating him,
as I made no scruple of
maltreating the rabbits, the monkey, or even
the dog, when by
accident, or through affection, they came in
my way. But my disease
grew upon me --for what disease is like
Alcohol! --and at length
even Pluto, who was now becoming old, and
consequently somewhat
peevish --even Pluto began to experience the
effects of my ill temper.
One night, returning home, much intoxicated, from one of my haunts
about town, I fancied that the cat avoided my
presence. I seized
him; when, in his fright at my violence, he
inflicted a slight wound
upon my hand with his teeth. The fury of a
demon instantly possessed
me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul
seemed, at once, to take
its flight from my body; and a more than
fiendish malevolence,
gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame. I took from my
waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it,
grasped the poor beast by the
throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes
from the socket! I blush,
I burn, I shudder, while I pen the damnable
atrocity.
When reason returned with the morning --when I had slept off the
fumes of the night's debauch --I experienced
a sentiment half of
horror, half of remorse, for the crime of
which I had been guilty; but
it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal
feeling, and the soul remained
untouched. I again plunged into excess, and
soon drowned in wine all
memory of the deed.
In
the meantime the cat slowly recovered. The socket of the lost
eye presented, it is true, a frightful
appearance, but he no longer
appeared to suffer any pain. He went about
the house as usual, but, as
might be expected, fled in extreme terror at
my approach. I had so
much of my old heart left, as to be at first
grieved by this evident
dislike on the part of a creature which had
once so loved me. But this
feeling soon gave place to irritation. And
then came, as if to my
final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit
of PERVERSENESS. Of this
spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am
not more sure that my
soul lives, than I am that perverseness is
one of the primitive
impulses of the human heart --one of the
indivisible primary
faculties, or sentiments, which give
direction to the character of
Man. Who has not, a hundred times, found
himself committing a vile
or a silly action, for no other reason than
because he knows he should
not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in
the teeth of our best
judgment, to violate that which is Law,
merely because we understand
it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I
say, came to my final
overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing
of the soul to vex
itself --to offer violence to its own nature
--to do wrong for the
wrong's sake only --that urged me to continue
and finally to
consummate the injury I had inflicted upon
the unoffending brute.
One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose
about its neck and
hung it to the limb of a tree; --hung it with
the tears streaming from
my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my
heart; --hung it because
I knew that it had loved me, and because I
felt it had given me no
reason of offence; --hung it because I knew
that in so doing I was
committing a sin --a deadly sin that would so
jeopardize my immortal
soul as to place it --if such a thing were
possible --even beyond
the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most
Merciful and Most Terrible
God.
On
the night of the day on which this cruel deed was done, I was
aroused from sleep by the cry of fire. The
curtains of my bed were
in flames. The whole house was blazing. It
was with great difficulty
that my wife, a servant, and myself, made our
escape from the
conflagration. The destruction was complete.
My entire worldly
wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned
myself thenceforward to
despair.
I
am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of
cause and effect, between the disaster and
the atrocity. But I am
detailing a chain of facts --and wish not to
leave even a possible
link imperfect. On the day succeeding the
fire, I visited the ruins.
The walls, with one exception, had fallen in.
This exception was found
in a compartment wall, not very thick, which
stood about the middle of
the house, and against which had rested the
head of my bed. The
plastering had here, in great measure,
resisted the action of the fire
--a fact which I attributed to its having
been recently spread.
About this wall a dense crowd were collected,
and many persons
seemed to be examining a particular portion
of it with every minute
and eager attention. The words
"strange!" "singular!" and other
similar expressions, excited my curiosity. I
approached and saw, as if
graven in bas relief upon the white surface,
the figure of a
gigantic cat. The impression was given with
an accuracy truly
marvellous. There was a rope
about the animal's neck.
When I first beheld this apparition --for I
could scarcely
regard it as less --my wonder and my terror
were extreme. But at
length reflection came to my aid. The cat, I
remembered, had been hung
in a garden adjacent to the house. Upon the
alarm of fire, this garden
had been immediately filled by the crowd --by
some one of whom the
animal must have been cut from the tree and
thrown, through an open
window, into my chamber. This had probably
been done with the view
of arousing me from sleep. The falling of other
walls had compressed
the victim of my cruelty into the substance
of the freshly-spread
plaster; the lime of which, had then with the
flames, and the
ammonia from the carcass, accomplished the
portraiture as I saw it.
Although I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not
altogether to my conscience, for the
startling fact 'just detailed, it
did not the less fall to make a deep
impression upon my fancy. For
months I could not rid myself of the phantasm
of the cat; and,
during this period, there came back into my
spirit a half-sentiment
that seemed, but was not, remorse. I went so
far as to regret the loss
of the animal, and to look about me, among
the vile haunts which I now
habitually frequented, for another pet of the
same species, and of
somewhat similar appearance, with which to
supply its place.
One night as I sat, half stupefied, in a den of more than
infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn to
some black object, reposing
upon the head of one of the immense hogsheads
of Gin, or of Rum, which
constituted the chief furniture of the
apartment. I had been looking
steadily at the top of this hogshead for some
minutes, and what now
caused me surprise was the fact that I had
not sooner perceived the
object thereupon. I approached it, and
touched it with my hand. It was
a black cat --a very large one --fully as
large as Pluto, and
closely resembling him in every respect but
one. Pluto had not a white
hair upon any portion of his body; but this
cat had a large,
although indefinite splotch of white,
covering nearly the whole region
of the breast.
Upon my touching him, he immediately arose, purred loudly,
rubbed against my hand, and appeared
delighted with my notice. This,
then, was the very creature of which I was in
search. I at once
offered to purchase it of the landlord; but
this person made no
claim to it --knew nothing of it --had never
seen it before.
I
continued my caresses, and, when I prepared to go home, the
animal evinced a disposition to accompany me.
I permitted it to do so;
occasionally stooping and patting it as I
proceeded. When it reached
the house it domesticated itself at once, and
became immediately a
great favorite with my wife.
For my own part, I soon found a dislike to it arising within me.
This was just the reverse of what I had
anticipated; but I know not
how or why it was --its evident fondness for
myself rather disgusted
and annoyed. By slow degrees, these feelings
of disgust and
annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred.
I avoided the
creature; a certain sense of shame, and the
remembrance of my former
deed of cruelty, preventing me from
physically abusing it. I did
not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise
violently ill use it; but
gradually --very gradually --I came to look
upon it with unutterable
loathing, and to flee silently from its
odious presence, as from the
breath of a pestilence.
What added, no doubt, to my hatred of the beast, was the
discovery, on the morning after I brought it
home, that, like Pluto,
it also had been deprived of one of its eyes.
This circumstance,
however, only endeared it to my wife, who, as
I have already said,
possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of
feeling which had once
been my distinguishing trait, and the source
of many of my simplest
and purest pleasures.
With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself
seemed to increase. It followed my footsteps
with a pertinacity
which it would be difficult to make the
reader comprehend. Whenever
I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or
spring upon my knees,
covering me with its loathsome caresses. If I
arose to walk it would
get between my feet and thus nearly throw me
down, or, fastening its
long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in
this manner, to my
breast. At such times, although I longed to
destroy it with a blow,
I was yet withheld from so doing, partly it
at by a memory of my
former crime, but chiefly --let me confess it
at once --by absolute
dread of the beast.
This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil-and yet I
should be at a loss how otherwise to define
it. I am almost ashamed to
own --yes, even in this felon's cell, I am
almost ashamed to own
--that the terror and horror with which the
animal inspired me, had
been heightened by one of the merest
chimaeras it would be possible to
conceive. My wife had called my attention,
more than once, to the
character of the mark of white hair, of which
I have spoken, and which
constituted the sole visible difference
between the strange beast
and the one I had y si
destroyed. The reader will remember that this
mark, although large, had been originally
very indefinite; but, by
slow degrees --degrees nearly imperceptible,
and which for a long time
my Reason struggled to reject as fanciful
--it had, at length, assumed
a rigorous distinctness of outline. It was
now the representation of
an object that I shudder to name --and for
this, above all, I loathed,
and dreaded, and would have rid myself of the
monster had I dared --it
was now, I say, the image of a hideous --of a
ghastly thing --of the
GALLOWS! --oh, mournful and terrible engine
of Horror and of Crime
--of Agony and of Death!
And now was I indeed wretched beyond the wretchedness of mere
Humanity. And a brute beast --whose fellow I
had contemptuously
destroyed --a brute beast to work out for me
--for me a man, fashioned
in the image of the High God --so much of
insufferable wo! Alas!
neither by day nor by night knew I the
blessing of Rest any more!
During the former the creature left me no moment
alone; and, in the
latter, I started, hourly, from dreams of
unutterable fear, to find
the hot breath of the thing upon my face, and
its vast weight --an
incarnate Night-Mare that I had no power to
shake off --incumbent
eternally upon my heart!
Beneath
the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble remnant
of the good within me succumbed. Evil
thoughts became my sole
intimates --the darkest and most evil of
thoughts. The moodiness of my
usual temper increased to hatred of all
things and of all mankind;
while, from the sudden, frequent, and
ungovernable outbursts of a fury
to which I now blindly abandoned myself, my
uncomplaining wife,
alas! was the most usual and the most patient
of sufferers.
One
day she accompanied me, upon some household errand, into the
cellar of the old building which our poverty
compelled us to
inhabit. The cat followed me down the steep
stairs, and, nearly
throwing me headlong, exasperated me to
madness. Uplifting an axe, and
forgetting, in my wrath, the childish dread
which had hitherto
stayed my hand, I aimed a blow at the animal
which, of course, would
have proved instantly fatal had it descended
as I wished. But this
blow was arrested by the hand of my wife.
Goaded, by the interference,
into a rage more than demoniacal, I withdrew
my arm from her grasp and
buried the axe in her brain. She fell dead
upon the spot, without a
groan.
This hideous murder accomplished, I set myself forthwith, and with
entire deliberation, to the task of
concealing the body. I knew that I
could not remove it from the house, either by
day or by night, without
the risk of being observed by the neighbors.
Many projects entered
my mind. At one period I thought of cutting
the corpse into minute
fragments, and destroying them by fire. At
another, I resolved to
dig a grave for it in the floor of the
cellar. Again, I deliberated
about casting it in the well in the yard
--about packing it in a
box, as if merchandize, with the usual
arrangements, and so getting
a porter to take it from the house. Finally I
hit upon what I
considered a far better expedient than either
of these. I determined
to wall it up in the cellar --as the monks of
the middle ages are
recorded to have walled up their victims.
For a purpose such as this the cellar was
well adapted. Its
walls were loosely constructed, and had
lately been plastered
throughout with a rough plaster, which the
dampness of the
atmosphere had prevented from hardening.
Moreover, in one of the walls
was a projection, caused by a false chimney,
or fireplace, that had
been filled up, and made to resemble the rest
of the cellar. I made no
doubt that I could readily displace the at
this point, insert the
corpse, and wall the whole up as before, so
that no eye could detect
anything suspicious.
And in this calculation I was not deceived. By means of a crow-bar
I easily dislodged the bricks, and, having
carefully deposited the
body against the inner wall, I propped it in
that position, while,
with little trouble, I re-laid the whole
structure as it originally
stood. Having procured mortar, sand, and
hair, with every possible
precaution, I prepared a plaster could not
every poss be distinguished
from the old, and with this I very carefully
went over the new
brick-work. When I had finished, I felt
satisfied that all was
right. The wall did not present the slightest
appearance of having
been disturbed. The rubbish on the floor was
picked up with the
minutest care. I looked around triumphantly,
and said to myself
--"Here at least, then, my labor has not
been in vain."
My
next step was to look for the beast which had been the cause of
so much wretchedness; for I had, at length,
firmly resolved to put
it to death. Had I been able to meet with it,
at the moment, there
could have been no doubt of its fate; but it
appeared that the
crafty animal had been alarmed at the
violence of my previous anger,
and forebore to
present itself in my present mood. It is impossible to
describe, or to imagine, the deep, the
blissful sense of relief
which the absence of the detested creature
occasioned in my bosom.
It did not make its appearance during the
night --and thus for one
night at least, since its introduction into
the house, I soundly and
tranquilly slept; aye, slept even with the
burden of murder upon my
soul!
The second and the third day passed, and still my tormentor came
not. Once again I breathed as a free-man. The
monster, in terror,
had fled the premises forever! I should
behold it no more! My
happiness was supreme! The guilt of my dark
deed disturbed me but
little. Some few inquiries had been made, but
these had been readily
answered. Even a search had been instituted
--but of course nothing
was to be discovered. I looked upon my future
felicity as secured.
Upon the fourth day of the assassination, a party of the police
came, very unexpectedly, into the house, and
proceeded again to make
rigorous investigation of the premises.
Secure, however, in the
inscrutability of my place of concealment, I
felt no embarrassment
whatever. The officers bade me accompany them
in their search. They
left no nook or corner unexplored. At length,
for the third or
fourth time, they descended into the cellar.
I quivered not in a
muscle. My heart beat calmly as that of one
who slumbers in innocence.
I walked the cellar from end to end. I folded
my arms upon my bosom,
and roamed easily to and fro. The police were
thoroughly satisfied and
prepared to depart. The glee at my heart was
too strong to be
restrained. I burned to say if but one word,
by way of triumph, and to
render doubly sure their assurance of my
guiltlessness.
"Gentlemen," I said at last, as the party ascended the steps,
"I
delight to have allayed your suspicions. I
wish you all health, and
a little more courtesy. By the bye,
gentlemen, this --this is a very
well constructed house." (In the rabid
desire to say something easily,
I scarcely knew what I uttered at all.)
--"I may say an excellently
well constructed house. These walls --are you
going, gentlemen?
--these walls are solidly put together";
and here, through the mere
phrenzy of bravado, I rapped
heavily, with a cane which I held in my
hand, upon that very portion of the
brick-work behind which stood
the corpse of the wife of my bosom.
But may God shield and deliver me from the
fangs of the
Arch-Fiend! No sooner had the reverberation
of my blows sunk into
silence than I was answered by a voice from
within the tomb! --by a
cry, at first muffled and broken, like the
sobbing of a child, and
then quickly swelling into one long, loud,
and continuous scream,
utterly anomalous and inhuman --a howl --a
wailing shriek, half of
horror and half of triumph, such as might
have arisen only out of
hell, conjointly from the throats of the
damned in their agony and
of the demons that exult in the damnation.
Of
my own thoughts it is folly to speak. Swooning, I staggered
to the opposite wall. For one instant the
party upon the stairs
remained motionless, through extremity of
terror and of awe. In the
next, a dozen stout arms were tolling at the
wall. It fell bodily. The
corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted
with gore, stood erect
before the eyes of the spectators. Upon its
head, with red extended
mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the
hideous beast whose craft
had seduced me into murder, and whose
informing voice had consigned me
to the hangman. I had walled the monster up
within the tomb!
Read on . . .
Go down . . . .
Go down into the
Darkness,
Deep
Deep into
the darkest
Pit
The screams . . .