Oh Whistle and I'll Come to You My Lad

James, M.R.

'I suppose you will be getting away pretty soon, now Full term is
over, Professor,' said a person not in the story to the Professor of
Ontography, soon after they had sat down next to each other at a feast in
the hospitable hall of St James's College.
The Professor was young, neat, and precise in speech. 'Yes,' he said;
'my friends have been making me take up golf this term, and I mean to go to
the East Coast - in point of fact to Burnstow - (I dare say you know it) for
a week or ten days, to improve my game. I hope to get off tomorrow.'
'Oh, Parkins,' said his neighbour on the other side, 'if you are going
to Burnstow, I wish you would look at the site of the Templars' preceptory,
and let me know if you think it would be any good to have a dig there in the
summer.'
It was, as you might suppose, a person of antiquarian pursuits who
said this, but, since he merely appears in this prologue, there is no need
to give his entitlements.
'Certainly,' said Parkins, the Professor: 'if you will describe to me
whereabouts the site is, I will do my best to give you an idea of the lie of
the land when I get back; or I could write to you about it, if you would
tell me where you are likely to be.'
'Don't trouble to do that, thanks. It's only that I'm thinking of
taking my family in that direction in the Long, and it occurred to me that,
as very few of the English preceptories have ever been properly planned, I
might have an opportunity of doing something useful on offdays.'
The Professor rather sniffed at the idea that planning out a
preceptory could be described as useful. His neighbour continued:
'The site - I doubt if there is anything showing above ground - must
be down quite close to the beach now. The sea has encroached tremendously,
as you know, all along that bit of coast. I should think, from the map, that
it must be about three-quarters of a mile from the Globe Inn, at the north
end of the town. Where are you going to stay?'
'Well, at the Globe Inn, as a matter of fact,' said Parkins; 'I have
engaged a room there. I couldn't get in anywhere else; most of the
lodging-houses are shut up in winter, it seems; and, as it is, they tell me
that the only room of any size I can have is really a double-bedded one, and
that they haven't a corner in which to store the other bed, and so on. But I
must have a fairly large room, for I am taking some books down, and mean to
do a bit of work; and though I don't quite fancy having an empty bed - not
to speak of two - in what I may call for the time being my study, I suppose
I can manage to rough it for the short time I shall be there.'
'Do you call having an extra bed in your room roughing it. Parkins?'
said a bluff person opposite. 'Look here, I shall come down and occupy it
for a bit; it'll be company for you.'
The Professor quivered, but managed to laugh in a courteous manner.
'By all means, Rogers; there's nothing I should like better. But I'm
afraid you would find it rather dull; you don't play golf, do you?' 'No,
thank Heaven!' said rude Mr Rogers. 'Well, you see, when I'm not writing I
shall most likely be out on the links, and that, as I say, would be rather
dull for you. I'm afraid.'
'Oh, I don't know! There's certain to be somebody I know in the place;
but, of course, if you don't want me, speak the word. Parkins; I shan't be
offended. Truth, as you always tell us, is never offensive.'
Parkins was, indeed, scrupulously polite and strictly truthful. It is
to be feared that Mr Rogers sometimes practised upon his knowledge of these
characteristics. In Parkins's breast there was a conflict now raging, which
for a moment or two did not allow him to answer. That interval being over,
he said:
'Well, if you want the exact truth, Rogers, I was considering whether
the room I speak of would really be large enough to accommodate us both
comfortably; and also whether (mind, I shouldn't have said this if you
hadn't pressed me) you would not constitute something in the nature of a
hindrance to my work.' Rogers laughed loudly.
'Well done. Parkins!' he said. 'It's all right. I promise not to
interrupt your work; don't you disturb yourself about that. No, I won't come
if you don't want me; but I thought I should do so nicely to keep the ghosts
off.' Here he might have been seen to wink and to nudge his next neighbour.
Parkins might also have been seen to become pink. 'I beg pardon. Parkins,'
Rogers continued; 'I oughtn't to have said that. I forgot you didn't like
levity on these topics.'
'Well,' Parkins said, 'as you have mentioned the matter, I freely own
that I do not like careless talk about what you call ghosts. A man in my
position,' he went on, raising his voice a little, 'cannot, I find, be too
careful about appearing to sanction the current beliefs on such subjects. As
you know, Rogers, or as you ought to know; for I think I have never
concealed my views - '
'No, you certainly have not, old man,' put in Rogers sotto voce.
' - I hold that any semblance, any appearance of concession to the
view that such things might exist is equivalent to a renunciation of all
that I hold most sacred. But I'm afraid I have not succeeded in securing
your attention.'
'Your undivided attention, was what Dr Blimber actually said,'(1)
Rogers interrupted, with every appearance of an earnest desire for accuracy.
'But I beg your pardon. Parkins; I'm stopping you.'
'No, not at all,' said Parkins. 'I don't remember Blimber; perhaps he
was before my time. But I needn't go on. I'm sure you know what I mean.'
'Yes, yes,' said Rogers, rather hastily - 'just so. We'll go into it
fully at Burnstow, or somewhere.'
In repeating the above dialogue I have tried to give the impression
which it made on me, that Parkins was something of an old woman - rather
hen-like, perhaps, in his little ways; totally destitute, alas! of the sense
of humour, but at the same time dauntless and sincere in his convictions,
and a man deserving of the greatest respect. Whether or not the reader has
gathered so much, that was the character which Parkins had.

On the following day Parkins did, as he had hoped, succeed in getting
away from his college, and in arriving at Burnstow. He was made welcome at
the Globe Inn, was safely installed in the large double-bedded room of which
we have heard, and was able before retiring to rest to arrange his materials
for work in apple-pie order upon a commodious table which occupied the outer
end of the room, and was surrounded on three sides by windows looking out
seaward; that is to say, the central window looked straight out to sea, and
those on the left and right commanded prospects along the shore to the north
and south respectively. On the south you saw the village of Burnstow. On the
north no houses were to be seen, but only the beach and the low cliff
backing it. Immediately in front was a strip - not considerable - of rough
grass, dotted with old anchors, capstans, and so forth; then a broad path;
then the beach. Whatever may have been the original distance between the
Globe Inn and the sea, not more than sixty yards now separated them.
The rest of the population of the inn was, of course, a golfing one,
and included few elements that call for a special description. The most
conspicuous figure was, perhaps, that of an ancien militaire, secretary of a
London club, and possessed of a voice of incredible strength, and of views
of a pronouncedly Protestant type. These were apt to find utterance after
his attendance upon the ministrations of the Vicar, an estimable man with
inclinations towards a picturesque ritual, which he gallantly kept down as
far as he could out of deference to East Anglian tradition.
Professor Parkins, one of whose principal characteristics was pluck,
spent the greater part of the day following his arrival at Burnstow in what
he had called improving his game, in company with this Colonel Wilson: and
during the afternoon - whether the process of improvement were to blame or
not, I am not sure - the Colonel's demeanour assumed a colouring so lurid
that even Parkins jibbed at the thought of walking home with him from the
links. He determined, after a short and furtive look at that bristling
moustache and those incarnadined features, that it would be wiser to allow
the influences of tea and tobacco to do what they could with the Colonel
before the dinner-hour should render a meeting inevitable.
'I might walk home tonight along the beach,' he reflected - 'yes, and
take a look - there will be light enough for that - at the ruins of which
Disney was talking. I don't exactly know where they are, by the way; but I
expect I can hardly help stumbling on them.' This he accomplished, I may
say, in the most literal sense, for in picking his way from the links to the
shingle beach his foot caught, partly in a gorse-root and partly in a
biggish stone, and over he went. When he got up and surveyed his
surroundings, he found himself in a patch of somewhat broken ground covered
with small depressions and mounds. These latter, when he came to examine
them, proved to be simply masses of flints embedded in mortar and grown over
with turf. He must, he quite rightly concluded, be on the site of the
preceptory he had promised to look at. It seemed not unlikely to reward the
spade of the explorer; enough of the foundations was probably left at no
great depth to throw a good deal of light on the general plan. He remembered
vaguely that the Templars, to whom this site had belonged, were in the habit
of building round churches, and he thought a particular series of the humps
or mounds near him did appear to be arranged in something of a circular
form. Few people can resist the temptation to try a little amateur research
in a department quite outside their own, if only for the satisfaction of
showing how successful they would have been had they only taken it up
seriously. Our Professor, however, if he felt something of this mean desire,
was also truly anxious to oblige Mr Disney. So he paced with care the
circular area he had noticed, and wrote down its rough dimensions in his
pocket-book. Then he proceeded to examine an oblong eminence which lay east
of the centre of the circle, and seemed to his thinking likely to be the
base of a platform or altar. At one end of it, the northern, a patch of the
turf was gone - removed by some boy or other creature ferae naturae. It
might, he thought, be as well to probe the soil here for evidences of
masonry, and he took out his knife and began scraping away the earth. And
now followed another little discovery: a portion of soil fell inward as he
scraped, and disclosed a small cavity. He lighted one match after another to
help him to see of what nature the hole was, but the wind was too strong for
them all. By tapping and scratching the sides with his knife, however, he
was able to make out that it must be an artificial hole in masonry. It was
rectangular, and the sides, top, and bottom, if not actually plastered, were
smooth and regular. Of course it was empty. No! As he withdrew the knife he
heard a metallic clink, and when he introduced his hand it met with a
cylindrical object lying on the floor of the hole. Naturally enough, he
picked it up, and when he brought it into the light, now fast fading, he
could see that it, too, was of man's making - a metal tube about four inches
long, and evidently of some considerable age.
By the time Parkins had made sure that there was nothing else in this
odd receptacle, it was too late and too dark for him to think of undertaking
any further search. What he had done had proved so unexpectedly interesting
that he determined to sacrifice a little more of the daylight on the morrow
to archaeology. The object which he now had safe in his pocket was bound to
be of some slight value at least, he felt sure.
Bleak and solemn was the view on which he took a last look before
starting homeward. A faint yellow light in the west showed the links, on
which a few figures moving towards the club-house were still visible, the
squat martello tower, the lights of Aldsey village, the pale ribbon of sands
intersected at intervals by black wooden groynes, the dim and murmuring sea.
The wind was bitter from the north, but was at his back when he set out for
the Globe. He quickly rattled and clashed through the shingle and gained the
sand, upon which, but for the groynes which had to be got over every few
yards, the going was both good and quiet. One last look behind, to measure
the distance he had made since leaving the ruined Templars' church, showed
him a prospect of company on his walk, in the shape of a rather indistinct
personage, who seemed to be making great efforts to catch up with him, but
made little, if any, progress. I mean that there was an appearance of
running about his movements, but that the distance between him and Parkins
did not seem materially to lessen. So, at least, Parkins thought, and
decided that he almost certainly did not know him, and that it would be
absurd to wait until he came up. For all that, company, he began to think,
would really be very welcome on that lonely shore, if only you could choose
your companion. In his unenlightened days he had read of meetings in such
places which even now would hardly bear thinking of. He went on thinking of
them, however, until he reached home, and particularly of one which catches
most people's fancy at some time of their childhood. 'Now I saw in my dream
that Christian had gone but a very little way when he saw a foul fiend
coming over the field to meet him.' 'What should I do now,' he thought, 'if
I looked back and caught sight of a black figure sharply defined against the
yellow sky, and saw that it had horns and wings? I wonder whether I should
stand or run for it. Luckily, the gentleman behind is not of that kind, and
he seems to be about as far off now as when I saw him first. Well, at this
rate he won't get his dinner as soon as I shall; and, dear me! it's within a
quarter of an hour of the time now. I must run!'
Parkins had, in fact, very little time for dressing. When he met the
Colonel at dinner. Peace - or as much of her as that gentleman could manage
- reigned once more in the military bosom; nor was she put to flight in the
hours of bridge that followed dinner, for Parkins was a more than
respectable player. When, therefore, he retired towards twelve o'clock, he
felt that he had spent his evening in quite a satisfactory way, and that,
even for so long as a fortnight or three weeks, life at the Globe would be
supportable under similar conditions - 'especially,' thought he, 'if I go on
improving my game.'
As he went along the passages he met the boots of the Globe, who
stopped and said: 'Beg your pardon, sir, but as I was a-brushing your coat
just now there was somethink fell out of the pocket. I put it on your chest
of drawers, sir, in your room, sir - a piece of a pipe or somethink of that,
sir. Thank you, sir. You'll find it on your chest of drawers, sir - yes,
sir. Good night, sir.'
The speech served to remind Parkins of his little discovery of that
afternoon. It was with some considerable curiosity that he turned it over by
the light of his candles. It was of bronze, he now saw, and was shaped very
much after the manner of the modern dog-whistle; in fact it was - yes,
certainly it was - actually no more nor less than a whistle. He put it to
his lips, but it was quite full of a fine, caked-up sand or earth, which
would not yield to knocking, but must be loosened with a knife. Tidy as ever
in his habits. Parkins cleared out the earth on to a piece of paper, and
took the latter to the window to empty it out. The night was clear and
bright, as he saw when he had opened the casement, and he stopped for an
instant to look at the sea and note a belated wanderer stationed on the
shore in front of the inn. Then he shut the window, a little surprised at
the late hours people kept at Burnstow, and took his whistle to the light
again. Why, surely there were marks on it, and not merely marks, but
letters! A very little rubbing rendered the deeply-cut inscription quite
legible, but the Professor had to confess, after some earnest thought, that
the meaning of it was as obscure to him as the writing on the wall to
Belshazzar. There were legends both on the front and on the back of the
whistle. The one read thus:

FLA
FUR BIS
FLE

The other:

QUIS EST ISTE QUI VENIT

'I ought to be able to make it out,' he thought; 'but I suppose I am a
little rusty in my Latin. When I come to think of it, I don't believe I even
know the word for a whistle. The long one does seem simple enough. It ought
to mean, "Who is this who is coming?" Well, the best way to find out is
evidently to whistle for him.'
He blew tentatively and stopped suddenly, startled and yet pleased at
the note he had elicited. It had a quality of infinite distance in it, and,
soft as it was, he somehow felt it must be audible for miles round. It was a
sound, too, that seemed to have the power (which many scents possess) of
forming pictures in the brain. He saw quite clearly for a moment a vision of
a wide, dark expanse at night, with a fresh wind blowing and in the midst a
lonely figure - how employed, he could not tell. Perhaps he would have seen
more had not the picture been broken by the sudden surge of a gust of wind
against his casement, so sudden that it made him look up, just in time to
see the white glint of a sea-bird's wing somewhere outside the dark panes.
The sound of the whistle had so fascinated him that he could not help
trying it once more, this time more boldly. The note was little, if at all,
louder than before, and repetition broke the illusion - no picture followed,
as he had half hoped it might. 'But what is this? Goodness! what force the
wind can get up in a few minutes! What a tremendous gust! There! I knew that
window-fastening was no use! Ah! I thought so - both candles out. It's
enough to tear the room to pieces.'
The first thing was to get the window shut. While you might count
twenty Parkins was struggling with the small casement, and felt almost as if
he were pushing back a sturdy burglar, so strong was the pressure. It
slackened all at once, and the window banged to and latched itself. Now to
relight the candles and see what damage, if any, had been done. No, nothing
seemed amiss; no glass even was broken in the casement. But the noise had
evidently roused at least one member of the household: the Colonel was to be
heard slumping in his stockinged feet on the floor above, and growling.
Quickly as it had risen, the wind did not fall at once. On it went,
moaning and rushing past the house, at times rising to a cry so desolate
that, as Parkins disinterestedly said, it might have made fanciful people
feel quite uncomfortable; even the unimaginative, he thought after a quarter
of an hour, might be happier without it.
Whether it was the wind, or the excitement of golf, or of the
researches in the preceptory that kept Parkins awake, he was not sure. Awake
he remained, in any case, long enough to fancy (as I am afraid I often do
myself under such conditions) that he was the victim of all manner of fatal
disorders: he would lie counting the beats of his heart, convinced that it
was going to stop work every moment, and would entertain grave suspicions of
his lungs, brain, liver, etc. - suspicions which he was sure would be
dispelled by the return of daylight, but which until then refused to be put
aside. He found a little vicarious comfort in the idea that someone else was
in the same boat. A near neighbour (in the darkness it was not easy to tell
his direction) was tossing and rustling in his bed, too.
The next stage was that Parkins shut his eyes and determined to give
sleep every chance. Here again overexcitement asserted itself in another
form - that of making pictures. Experto crede, pictures do come to the
closed eyes of one trying to sleep, and are often so little to his taste
that he must open his eyes and disperse them.
Parkins's experience on this occasion was a very distressing one. He
found that the picture which presented itself to him was continuous. When he
opened his eyes, of course, it went; but when he shut them once more it
framed itself afresh, and acted itself out again, neither quicker nor slower
than before. What he saw was this: A long stretch of shore - shingle edged
by sand, and intersected at short intervals with black groynes running down
to the water - a scene, in fact, so like that of his afternoon's walk that,
in the absence of any landmark, it could not be distinguished therefrom. The
light was obscure, conveying an impression of gathering storm, late winter
evening, and slight cold rain. On this bleak stage at first no actor was
visible. Then, in the distance, a bobbing black object appeared; a moment
more, and it was a man running, jumping, clambering over the groynes, and
every few seconds looking eagerly back. The nearer he came the more obvious
it was that he was not only anxious, but even terribly frightened, though
his face was not to be distinguished. He was, moreover, almost at the end of
his strength. On he came; each successive obstacle seemed to cause him more
difficulty than the last. 'Will he get over this next one?' thought Parkins;
'it seems a little higher than the others.' Yes; half-climbing, half
throwing himself, he did get over, and fell all in a heap on the other side
(the side nearest to the spectator). There, as if really unable to get up
again, he remained crouching under the groyne, looking up in an attitude of
painful anxiety.
So far no cause whatever for the fear of the runner had been shown;
but now there began to be seen, far up the shore, a little flicker of
something light-coloured moving to and fro with great swiftness and
irregularity. Rapidly growing larger, it, too, declared itself as a figure
in pale, fluttering draperies, ill-defined. There was something about its
motion which made Parkins very unwilling to see it at close quarters. It
would stop, raise arms, bow itself toward the sand, then run stooping across
the beach to the water-edge and back again; and then, rising upright, once
more continue its course forward at a speed that was startling and
terrifying. The moment came when the pursuer was hovering about from left to
right only a few yards beyond the groyne where the runner lay in hiding.
After two or three ineffectual castings hither and thither it came to a
stop, stood upright, with arms raised high, and then darted straight forward
towards the groyne.
It was at this point that Parkins always failed in his resolution to
keep his eyes shut. With many misgivings as to incipient failure of
eyesight, over-worked brain, excessive smoking, and so on, he finally
resigned himself to light his candle, get out a book, and pass the night
waking, rather than be tormented by this persistent panorama, which he saw
clearly enough could only be a morbid reflection of his walk and his
thoughts on that very day.
The scraping of match on box and the glare of light must have startled
some creatures of the night - rats or what not - which he heard scurry
across the floor from the side of his bed with much rustling. Dear, dear!
the match is out! Fool that it is! But the second one burnt better, and a
candle and book were duly procured, over which Parkins pored till sleep of a
wholesome kind came upon him, and that in no long space. For about the first
time in his orderly and prudent life he forgot to blow out the candle, and
when he was called next morning at eight there was still a flicker in the
socket and a sad mess of guttered grease on the top of the little table.
After breakfast he was in his room, putting the finishing touches to
his golfing costume - fortune had again allotted the Colonel to him for a
partner - when one of the maids came in.
'Oh, if you please,' she said, 'would you like any extra blankets on
your bed, sir?'
'Ah! thank you,' said Parkins. 'Yes, I think I should like one. It
seems likely to turn rather colder.'
In a very short time the maid was back with the blanket.
'Which bed should I put it on, sir?' she asked. 'What? Why, that one -
the one I slept in last night,' he said, pointing to it.
'Oh yes! I beg your pardon, sir, but you seemed to have tried both of
'em; leastways, we had to make 'em both up this morning.'
'Really? How very absurd!' said Parkins. 'I certainly never touched
the other, except to lay some things on it. Did it actually seem to have
been slept in?'
'Oh, yes, sir!' said the maid. 'Why, all the things was crumpled and
throwed about all ways, if you'll excuse me, sir - quite as if anyone 'adn't
passed but a very poor night, sir.'
'Dear me,' said Parkins. 'Well, I may have disordered it more than I
thought when I unpacked my things. I'm very sorry to have given you the
extra trouble. I'm sure. I expect a friend of mine soon, by the way - a
gentleman from Cambridge - to come and occupy it for a night or two. That
will be all right, I suppose, won't it?'
'Oh yes, to be sure, sir. Thank you, sir. It's no trouble. I'm sure,'
said the maid, and departed to giggle with her colleagues.
Parkins set forth, with a stern determination to improve his game.
I am glad to be able to report that he succeeded so far in this
enterprise that the Colonel, who had been rather repining at the prospect of
a second day's play in his company, became quite chatty as the morning
advanced; and his voice boomed out over the flats, as certain also of our
own minor poets have said, 'like some great bourdon in a minster tower'.
'Extraordinary wind, that, we had last night,' he said. 'In my old
home we should have said someone had been whistling for it.'
'Should you, indeed!' said Parkins, 'Is there a superstition of that
kind still current in your part of the country?'
'I don't know about superstition,' said the Colonel. 'They believe in
it all over Denmark and Norway, as well as on the Yorkshire coast; and my
experience is, mind you, that there's generally something at the bottom of
what these country-folk hold to, and have held to for generations. But it's
your drive' (or whatever it might have been: the golfing reader will have to
imagine appropriate digressions at the proper intervals).
When conversation was resumed. Parkins said, with a slight hesitancy:
'Apropos of what you were saying just now. Colonel, I think I ought to
tell you that my own views on such subjects are very strong. I am, in fact,
a convinced disbeliever in what is called the "supernatural".'
'What!' said the Colonel, 'do you mean to tell me you don't believe in
second-sight, or ghosts, or anything of that kind?'
'In nothing whatever of that kind,' returned Parkins firmly.
'Well,' said the Colonel, 'but it appears to me at that rate, sir,
that you must be little better than a Sadducee.'
Parkins was on the point of answering that, in his opinion, the
Sadducees were the most sensible persons he had ever read of in the Old
Testament; but, feeling some doubt as to whether much mention of them was to
be found in that work, he preferred to laugh the accusation off.
'Perhaps I am,' he said; 'but - Here, give me my cleek, boy! - Excuse
me one moment. Colonel.' A short interval. 'Now, as to whistling for the
wind, let me give you my theory about it. The laws which govern winds are
really not at all perfectly known - to fisher-folk and such, of course, not
known at all. A man or woman of eccentric habits, perhaps, or a stranger, is
seen repeatedly on the beach at some unusual hour, and is heard whistling.
Soon afterwards a violent wind rises; a man who could read the sky perfectly
or who possessed a barometer could have foretold that it would. The simple
people of a fishing-village have no barometers, and only a few rough rules
for prophesying weather. What more natural than that the eccentric personage
I postulated should be regarded as having raised the wind, or that he or she
should clutch eagerly at the reputation of being able to do so? Now, take
last night's wind: as it happens, I myself was whistling. I blew a whistle
twice, and the wind seemed to come absolutely in answer to my call. If
anyone had seen me - '
The audience had been a little restive under this harangue, and
Parkins had, I fear, fallen somewhat into the tone of a lecturer; but at the
last sentence the Colonel stopped.
'Whistling, were you?' he said. 'And what sort of whistle did you use?
Play this stroke first.' Interval.
'About that whistle you were asking. Colonel. It's rather a curious
one. I have it in my - No; I see I've left in it my room. As a matter of
fact, I found it yesterday.'
And then Parkins narrated the manner of his discovery of the whistle,
upon hearing which the Colonel grunted, and opined that, in Parkins's place,
he should himself be careful about using a thing that had belonged to a set
of Papists, of whom, speaking generally, it might be affirmed that you never
knew what they might not have been up to. From this topic he diverged to the
enormities of the Vicar, who had given notice on the previous Sunday that
Friday would be the Feast of St Thomas the Apostle, and that there would be
service at eleven o'clock in the church. This and other similar proceedings
constituted in the Colonel's view a strong presumption that the Vicar was a
concealed Papist, if not a Jesuit; and Parkins, who could not very readily
follow the Colonel in this region, did not disagree with him. In fact, they
got on so well together in the morning that there was no talk on either side
of their separating after lunch.
Both continued to play well during the afternoon, or, at least, well
enough to make them forget everything else until the light began to fail
them. Not until then did Parkins remember that he had meant to do some more
investigating at the preceptory; but it was of no great importance, he
reflected. One day was as good as another; he might as well go home with the
Colonel.
As they turned the corner of the house, the Colonel was almost knocked
down by a boy who rushed into him at the very top of his speed, and then,
instead of running away, remained hanging on to him and panting. The first
words of the warrior were naturally those of reproof and objurgation, but he
very quickly discerned that the boy was almost speechless with fright.
Inquiries were useless at first. When the boy got his breath he began to
howl, and still clung to the Colonel's legs. He was at last detached, but
continued to howl.
'What in the world is the matter with you? What have you been up to?
What have you seen?' said the two men.
'Ow, I seen it wive at me out of the winder,' wailed the boy, 'and I
don't like it.'
'What window?' said the irritated Colonel. 'Come, pull yourself
together, my boy.' 'The front winder it was, at the 'otel,' said the boy. At
this point Parkins was in favour of sending the boy home, but the Colonel
refused; he wanted to get to the bottom of it, he said; it was most
dangerous to give a boy such a fright as this one had had, and if it turned
out that people had been playing jokes, they should suffer for it in some
way. And by a series of questions he made out this story. The boy had been
playing about on the grass in front of the Globe with some others; then they
had gone home to their teas, and he was just going, when he happened to look
up at the front winder and see it a-wiving at him. It seemed to be a figure
of some sort, in white as far as he knew - couldn't see its face; but it
wived at him, and it warn't a right thing - not to say not a right person.
Was there a light in the room? No, he didn't think to look if there was a
light. Which was the window? Was it the top one or the second one? The
seckind one it was - the big winder what got two little uns at the sides.
'Very well, my boy,' said the Colonel, after a few more questions.
'You run away home now. I expect it was some person trying to give you a
start. Another time, like a brave English boy, you just throw a stone -
well, no, not that exactly, but you go and speak to the waiter, or to Mr
Simpson, the landlord, and - yes - and say that I advised you to do so.'
The boy's face expressed some of the doubt he felt as to the
likelihood of Mr Simpson's lending a favourable ear to his complaint, but
the Colonel did not appear to perceive this, and went on:
'And here's a sixpence - no, I see it's a shilling - and you be off
home, and don't think any more about it.'
The youth hurried off with agitated thanks, and the Colonel and
Parkins went round to the front of the Globe and reconnoitred. There was
only one window answering to the description they had been hearing.
'Well, that's curious,' said Parkins; 'it's evidently my window the
lad was talking about. Will you come up for a moment. Colonel Wilson? We
ought to be able to see if anyone has been taking liberties in my room.'
They were soon in the passage, and Parkins made as if to open the
door. Then he stopped and felt in his pockets.
'This is more serious than I thought,' was his next remark. 'I
remember now that before I started this morning I locked the door. It is
locked now, and, what is more, here is the key.' And he held it up. 'Now,'
he went on, 'if the servants are in the habit of going into one's room
during the day when one is away, I can only say that - well, that I don't
approve of it at all.' Conscious of a somewhat weak climax, he busied
himself in opening the door (which was indeed locked) and in lighting
candles. 'No,' he said, 'nothing seems disturbed.' 'Except your bed,' put in
the Colonel. 'Excuse me, that isn't my bed,' said Parkins. 'I don't use that
one. But it does look as if someone has been playing tricks with it.'
It certainly did: the clothes were bundled up and twisted together in
a most tortuous confusion. Parkins pondered. 'That must be it,' he said at
last: 'I disordered the clothes last night in unpacking, and they haven't
made it since. Perhaps they came in to make it, and that boy saw them
through the window; and then they were called away and locked the door after
them. Yes, I think that must be it.'
'Well, ring and ask,' said the Colonel, and this appealed to Parkins
as practical.
The maid appeared, and, to make a long story short, deposed that she
had made the bed in the morning when the gentleman was in the room, and
hadn't been there since. No, she hadn't no other key. Mr Simpson he kep' the
keys; he'd be able to tell the gentleman if anyone had been up.
This was a puzzle. Investigation showed that nothing of value had been
taken, and Parkins remembered the disposition of the small objects on tables
and so forth well enough to be pretty sure that no pranks had been played
with them. Mr and Mrs Simpson furthermore agreed that neither of them had
given the duplicate key of the room to any person whatever during the day.
Nor could Parkins, fair-minded man as he was, detect anything in the
demeanour of master, mistress, or maid that indicated guilt. He was much
more inclined to think that the boy had been imposing on the Colonel.
The latter was unwontedly silent and pensive at dinner and throughout
the evening. When he bade good night to Parkins, he murmured in a gruff
undertone: 'You know where I am if you want me during the night.' 'Why, yes,
thank you. Colonel Wilson, I think I do; but there isn't much prospect of my
disturbing you, I hope. By the way,' he added, 'did I show you that old
whistle I spoke of? I think not. Well, here it is.'
The Colonel turned it over gingerly in the light of the candle.
'Can you make anything of the inscription?' asked Parkins, as he took
it back. 'No, not in this light. What do you mean to do with it?'
'Oh, well, when I get back to Cambridge I shall submit it to some of
the archaeologists there, and see what they think of it; and very likely, if
they consider it worth having, I may present it to one of the museums.'
''M!' said the Colonel. 'Well, you may be right. All I know is that,
if it were mine, I should chuck it straight into the sea. It's no use
talking. I'm well aware, but I expect that with you it's a case of live and
learn. I hope so. I'm sure, and I wish you a good night.'
He turned away, leaving Parkins in act to speak at the bottom of the
stair, and soon each was in his own bedroom.
By some unfortunate accident, there were neither blinds nor curtains
to the windows of the Professor's room. The previous night he had thought
little of this, but tonight there seemed every prospect of a bright moon
rising to shine directly on his bed, and probably wake him later on. When he
noticed this he was a good deal annoyed, but, with an ingenuity which I can
only envy, he succeeded in rigging up, with the help of a railway-rug, some
safety-pins, and a stick and umbrella, a screen which, if it only held
together, would completely keep the moonlight off his bed. And shortly
afterwards he was comfortably in that bed. When he had read a somewhat solid
work long enough to produce a decided wish for sleep, he cast a drowsy
glance round the room, blew out the candle, and fell back upon the pillow.
He must have slept soundly for an hour or more, when a sudden clatter
shook him up in a most unwelcome manner. In a moment he realized what had
happened: his carefully-constructed screen had given way, and a very bright
frosty moon was shining directly on his face. This was highly annoying.
Could he possibly get up and reconstruct the screen? or could he manage to
sleep if he did not?
For some minutes he lay and pondered over the possibilities; then he
turned over sharply, and with all his eyes open lay breathlessly listening.
There had been a movement, he was sure, in the empty bed on the opposite
side of the room. Tomorrow he would have it moved, for there must be rats or
something playing about in it. It was quiet now. No! the commotion began
again. There was a rustling and shaking: surely more than any rat could
cause.
I can figure to myself something of the Professor's bewilderment and
horror, for I have in a dream thirty years back seen the same thing happen;
but the reader will hardly, perhaps, imagine how dreadful it was to him to
see a figure suddenly sit up in what he had known was an empty bed. He was
out of his own bed in one bound, and made a dash towards the window, where
lay his only weapon, the stick with which he had propped his screen. This
was, as it turned out, the worst thing he could have done, because the
personage in the empty bed, with a sudden smooth motion, slipped from the
bed and took up a position, with outspread arms, between the two beds, and
in front of the door. Parkins watched it in a horrid perplexity. Somehow,
the idea of getting past it and escaping through the door was intolerable to
him; he could not have borne - he didn't know why - to touch it; and as for
its touching him, he would sooner dash himself through the window than have
that happen. It stood for the moment in a band of dark shadow, and he had
not seen what its face was like. Now it began to move, in a stooping
posture, and all at once the spectator realized, with some horror and some
relief, that it must be blind, for it seemed to feel about it with its
muffled arms in a groping and random fashion. Turning half away from him, it
became suddenly conscious of the bed he had just left, and darted towards
it, and bent over and felt the pillows in a way which made Parkins shudder
as he had never in his life thought it possible. In a very few moments it
seemed to know that the bed was empty, and then, moving forward into the
area of light and facing the window, it showed for the first time what
manner of thing it was.
Parkins, who very much dislikes being questioned about it, did once
describe something of it in my hearing, and I gathered that what he chiefly
remembers about it is a horrible, an intensely horrible, face of crumbled
linen. What expression he read upon it he could not or would not tell, but
that the fear of it went nigh to maddening him is certain.
But he was not at leisure to watch it for long. With formidable
quickness it moved into the middle of the room, and, as it groped and waved,
one corner of its draperies swept across Parkins's face. He could not -
though he knew how perilous a sound was - he could not keep back a cry of
disgust, and this gave the searcher an instant clue. It leapt towards him
upon the instant, and the next moment he was half-way through the window
backwards, uttering cry upon cry at the utmost pitch of his voice, and the
linen face was thrust close into his own. At this, almost the last possible
second, deliverance came, as you will have guessed: the Colonel burst the
door open, and was just in time to see the dreadful group at the window.
When he reached the figures only one was left. Parkins sank forward into the
room in a faint, and before him on the floor lay a tumbled heap of
bedclothes.
Colonel Wilson asked no questions, but busied himself in keeping
everyone else out of the room and in getting Parkins back to his bed; and
himself, wrapped in a rug, occupied the other bed for the rest of the night.
Early on the next day Rogers arrived, more welcome than he would have been a
day before, and the three of them held a very long consultation in the
Professor's room. At the end of it the Colonel left the hotel door carrying
a small object between his finger and thumb, which he cast as far into the
sea as a very brawny arm could send it. Later on the smoke of a burning
ascended from the back premises of the Globe.
Exactly what explanation was patched up for the staff and visitors at
the hotel I must confess I do not recollect. The Professor was somehow
cleared of the ready suspicion of delirium tremens, and the hotel of the
reputation of a troubled house.
There is not much question as to what would have happened to Parkins
if the Colonel had not intervened when he did. He would either have fallen
out of the window or else lost his wits. But it is not so evident what more
the creature that came in answer to the whistle could have done than
frighten. There seemed to be absolutely nothing material about it save the
bedclothes of which it had made itself a body. The Colonel, who remembered a
not very dissimilar occurrence in India, was of opinion that if Parkins had
closed with it it could really have done very little, and that its one power
was that of frightening. The whole thing, he said, served to confirm his
opinion of the Church of Rome.
There is really nothing more to tell, but, as you may imagine, the
Professor's views on certain points are less clear cut than they used to be.
His nerves, too, have suffered: he cannot even now see a surplice hanging on
a door quite unmoved, and the spectacle of a scarecrow in a field late on a
winter afternoon has cost him more than one sleepless night.

1. Mr Rogers was wrong, vide Dombey and Son, Chapter xii.