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Title: The picture in the house
Author: H. P. Lovecraft
Release date: August 20, 2026 [eBook #79405]
Language: English
Original publication: Indianapolis, IN: The Rural Publishing Corp., 1923
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79405
Credits: Greg Weeks and Mary Meehan
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PICTURE IN THE HOUSE ***
The Picture in the House
By H. P. LOVECRAFT
_A Chilling Tale of Horror
By a Master of Weird Fiction._
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Weird Tales, January 1924.]
Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places. For them are the
catacombs of Ptolemais, and the carven mausolea of the nightmare
countries. They climb to the moonlit towers of ruined Rhine castles,
and falter down black cobwebbed steps beneath the scattered stones of
forgotten cities in Asia. The haunted wood and the desolate mountain
are their shrines, and they linger around the sinister monoliths
on uninhabited islands. But the true epicure in the terrible, to
whom a new thrill of unutterable ghastliness is the chief end and
justification of existence, esteems most of all the ancient, lonely
farmhouses of backwoods New England; for there the dark elements of
strength, solitude, grotesqueness and ignorance combine to form the
perfection of the hideous.
Most horrible of all sights are the little unpainted wooden houses
remote from traveled ways, usually squatted upon some damp, grassy
slope or leaning against some gigantic outcropping rock. Two hundred
years and more they have leaned or squatted there, while the vines have
crawled and the trees have swelled and spread. They are almost hidden
now in lawless luxuriances of green and guardian shrouds of shadow;
but the small-paned windows still stare shockingly, as if blinking
through a lethal stupor which wards off madness by dulling the memory
of unutterable things.
In such houses have dwelt generations of strange people, whose like the
world has never seen. Seized with a gloomy and fanatical belief which
exiled them from their kind, their ancestors sought the wilderness for
freedom. There the scions of a conquering race indeed flourished, free
from the restrictions of their fellows, but cowered in an appalling
slavery to the dismal phantasms of their own minds.
Divorced from the enlightenment of civilization, the strength of these
Puritans turned into singular channels; and in their isolation, morbid
self-repression, and struggle for life with relentless Nature, there
came to them dark furtive traits from the prehistoric depths of their
cold Northern heritage. By necessity practical and by philosophy stern,
these folk were not beautiful in their sins. Erring as all mortals
must, they were forced by their rigid code to seek concealment above
all else; so that they came to use less and less taste in what they
concealed. Only the silent, sleepy, staring houses in the backwoods
can tell all that has lain hidden since the early days; and they are
not communicative, being loath to shake off the drowsiness which helps
them forget. Sometimes one feels that it would be merciful to tear down
these houses, for they must often dream.
It was to a time-battered edifice of this description that I was
driven one afternoon in November, 1896, by a rain of such chilling
copiousness that any shelter was preferable to exposure. I had been
traveling for some time amongst the people of the Miskatonic Valley
in quest of certain genealogical data; and from the remote, devious,
and problematical nature of my course, had deemed it convenient to
employ a bicycle despite the lateness of the season. Now I found myself
upon an apparently abandoned road which I had chosen as the shortest
cut to Arkham; overtaken by the storm at a point far from any town,
and confronted with no refuge save the antique and repellent wooden
building which blinked with bleared windows from between two huge
leafless oaks near the foot of a rocky hill.
Distant though it was from the remnant of a road, this house none the
less impressed me unfavorably the very moment I espied it. Honest,
wholesome structures do not stare at travelers so slyly and hauntingly,
and in my genealogical researches I had encountered legends of a
century before which biased me against places of this kind. Yet the
force of the elements was such as to overcome my scruples, and I did
not hesitate to wheel my machine up the weedy rise to the closed door
which seemed at once so suggestive and secretive.
* * * * *
I had somehow taken it for granted that the house was abandoned, yet
as I approached it I was not so sure; for though the walks were indeed
overgrown with weeds, they seemed to retain their nature a little too
well to argue complete desertion. Therefore, instead of trying the door
I knocked, feeling as I did so a trepidation I could scarcely explain.
As I waited on the rough, mossy rock which served as a doorstep, I
glanced at the neighboring windows and the panes of the fanlight
above me, and noticed that although old, rattling, and almost opaque
with dirt, they were not broken. The building, then, must still be
inhabited, despite its isolation and general neglect.
However, my rapping evoked no response, so after repeating the summons
I tried the rusty latch and found the door unfastened. Inside was
a little vestibule with walls from which the plaster was falling,
and through the doorway came a faint but peculiarly hateful odor. I
entered, carrying my bicycle, and closed the door behind me. Ahead rose
a narrow staircase, flanked by a small door probably leading to the
cellar, while to the left and right were closed doors leadings to rooms
on the ground floor.
Leaning my cycle against the wall I opened the door at the left, and
crossed into a small low-ceiled chamber but dimly lighted by its two
dusty windows and furnished in the barest and most primitive possible
way. It appeared to be a kind of sitting-room, for it had a table
and several chairs, and an immense fireplace above which ticked an
antique clock on a mantel. Books and papers were very few, and in
the prevailing gloom I could not readily discern the titles. What
interested me was the uniform air of archaism as displayed in every
visible detail. Most of the houses in this region I had found rich in
relics of the past, but here the antiquity was curiously complete; for
in all the room I could not discover a single article of definitely
post-Revolutionary date. Had the furnishings been less humble, the
place would have been a collector's paradise.
As I surveyed this quaint apartment, I felt an increase in that
aversion first excited by the bleak exterior of the house. Just what
it was that I feared or loathed, I could by no means define; but
something in the whole atmosphere seemed redolent of unhallowed age, of
unpleasant crudeness, and of secrets which should be forgotten.
I felt disinclined to sit down, and wandered about, examining the
various articles which I had noticed. The first object of my curiosity
was a book of medium size lying upon the table and presenting such an
antediluvian aspect that I marveled at beholding it outside a museum
or library. It was bound in leather with metal fittings, and was in an
excellent state of preservation; being altogether an unusual sort of
volume to encounter in an abode so lowly. When I opened it to the title
page my wonder grew even greater, for it proved to be nothing less rare
than Pigafetta's account of the Congo region, written in Latin from the
notes of the sailor Lopez and printed at Frankfort in 1598. I had often
heard of this work, with its curious illustrations by the brothers
DeBry, hence for a moment forgot my uneasiness in my desire to turn the
pages before me. The engravings were indeed interesting, drawn wholly
from imagination and careless descriptions, and represented negroes
with white skins and Caucasian features; nor would I soon have closed
the book had not an exceedingly trivial circumstance upset my tired
nerves and revived my sensation of disquiet.
What annoyed me was merely the persistent way in which the volume
tended to fall open to itself at Plate XII, which represented
in gruesome detail a butcher's shop of the cannibal Anziques. I
experienced some shame at my susceptibility to so slight a thing, but
the drawing nevertheless disturbed me, especially in connection with
some adjacent passages descriptive of Anzique gastronomy.
I had turned to a neighboring shelf and was examining its meagre
literary contents--an eighteenth century Bible, a "Pilgrim's Progress"
of like period, illustrated with grotesque woodcuts and printed by
the almanack-maker Isaiah Thomas, the rotting bulk of Cotton Mather's
"Magnalia Christi Americana," and a few other books of evidently equal
age--when my attention was aroused by the unmistakable sound of walking
in the room overhead.
At first astonished and startled, considering the lack of response to
my recent knocking at the door, I immediately afterward concluded that
the walker had just awaked from a sound sleep; and listened with less
surprise as the footsteps sounded on the creaking stairs. The tread
was heavy, yet seemed to contain a curious quality of cautiousness; a
quality which I disliked the more because the tread was heavy.
When I had entered the room I had shut the door behind me. Now, after
a moment of silence during which the walker may have, been inspecting
my bicycle in the hall, I heard a fumbling at the latch and saw the
paneled portal swing open again.
* * * * *
In the doorway stood a person of such singular appearance that I should
have exclaimed aloud but for the restraints of good breeding. Old,
white-bearded, and ragged, my host possessed a countenance and physique
which inspired equal wonder and respect. His height could not have been
less than six feet, and despite a general air of age and poverty he was
stout and powerful in proportion.
His face, almost hidden by a long beard which grew high on the cheeks,
seemed abnormally ruddy and less wrinkled than one might expect; while
over a high forehead fell a shock of white hair little thinned by the
years. His blue eyes, though a trifle bloodshot, seemed inexplicably
keen and burning. But for his horrible unkemptness, the man would have
been as distinguished-looking as he was impressive. This unkemptness,
however, made him offensive despite his face and figure. Of what his
clothing consisted I could hardly tell, for it seemed to me no more
than a mass of tatters surmounting a pair of high, heavy boots; and his
lack of cleanliness surpassed description.
The appearance of this man, and the instinctive fear he inspired,
prepared me for something like enmity; so that I almost shuddered
through surprise and a sense of uncanny incongruity when he motioned
me to a chair and addressed me in a thin, weak voice full of fawning
respect and ingratiating hospitality. His speech was very curious,
an extreme form of Yankee dialect I had thought long extinct; and I
studied it closely as he sat down opposite me for conversation.
"'Ketched in the rain, be ye?" he greeted, "glad ye was nigh the haouse
en' hed the sense ta come right in. I calc'late I was asleep, else I'd
a heerd ye--I ain't as young as I uster be, an' I need a paowerful
sight o' naps naowadays. Trav'lin' fur? I hain't seed many folks 'long
this rud sence they tuk off the Arkham stage."
I replied that I was going to Arkham, and apologized for my rude entry
into his domicile, whereupon he continued:
"Glad ta see ye, young Sir--new faces is scurce arount here, an' I
hain't got much ta cheer me up these days. Guess yew hail from Bosting,
don't ye? I never ben thar, but I kin tell a taown man when I see
'im--we hed one fer deestrick schoolmaster in eighty-four, but he quit
suddent an' no one never heerd on 'im sence--"
Here the old man lapsed into a kind of chuckle, and made no explanation
when I questioned him. He seemed to be in an aboundingly good humor,
yet to possess those eccentricities which one might guess from
his grooming. For some time he rambled on with an almost feverish
geniality, when it struck me to ask him how he came by so rare a book
as Pigafetta's "Regnum Congo." The effect of this volume had not left
me, and I felt a certain hesitancy in speaking of it; but curiosity
overmastered all the vague fears which had steadily accumulated since
my first glimpse of the house. To my relief, the question did not seem
an awkward one; for the old man answered freely and volubly.
"Oh, thet Afriky book? Cap'n Ebenezer Holt traded me thet in
'sixty-eight--him as was kilt in the war.".
Something about the name of Ebenezer Holt caused me to look up sharply.
I had encountered it in my genealogical work, but not in any record
since the Revolution. I wondered if my host could help me in the task
at which I was laboring, and resolved to ask him about it later on. He
continued:
"Ebenezer was on a Salem merchantman fer years, an' picked up a sight
o' queer stuff in every port. He got this in London, I guess--he uster
like ter buy things at the shops. I was up ta his haouse onct on the
hill, tradin' hosses, when I see this book. I relished the picters, so
he give it in on a swap. 'Tis a queer book--here, leave me git on my
spectacles--"
The old man fumbled among his rags, producing a pair of dirty and
amazingly antique glasses with small octagonal lenses and steel bows.
Donning these, he reached for the volume on the table and turned the
pages lovingly.
* * * * *
"Ebenezer cud read a leetle o' this--'tis Latin--but I can't. I hed two
er three schoolmasters read me a bit, an' Passon Clark, him they say
got draownded in the pond--kin yew make anything outen it?"
I told him that I could, and translated for his benefit a paragraph
near the beginning. If I erred, he was not scholar enough to correct
me; for he seemed childishly pleased at my English version. His
proximity was becoming rather obnoxious, yet I saw no way to escape
without offending him. I was amused at the childish fondness of this
ignorant old man for the pictures in a book he could not read, and
wondered how much better he could read the few books in English which
adorned the room. This revelation of simplicity removed much of the
ill-defined apprehension I had felt, and I smiled as my host rambled on:
"Queer haow picters kin set a body thinkin'. Take this un here near the
front. Hev yew ever seed trees like thet, with big leaves a-floppin'
over an' daown? And them men--them can't be niggers--they dew beat all!
Kinder like Injuns, I guess, even ef they be in Afriky. Some o' these
here critters looks like monkeys, or half monkeys an' half men, but I
never heerd o' nothin' like this un." Here he pointed to a fabulous
creature of the artist, which one might describe as a sort of dragon
with the head of an Alligator.
"But naow I'll show ye the best un--over here nigh the middle--" The
old man's speech grew a trifle thicker and his eyes assumed a brighter
glow; but his fumbling hands, though seemingly clumsier than before
were entirely adequate to their mission. The book fell open, almost
of its own accord and as if from frequent consultation at this place,
to the repellent twelfth plate showing a butcher's shop amongst the
Anzique cannibals. My sense of restlessness returned, though I did not
exhibit it. The especially bizarre thing was that the artist had made
his Africans look like white men--the limbs and quarters hanging about
the walls of the shop were ghastly, while the butcher with his axe was
hideously incongruous. But my host seemed to relish the view as much as
I disliked it.
"What d'ye think o' this--ain't never see the like hereabouts, eh? When
I see this I telled Eb Holt, 'Thar's suthin' ta stir ye up an' make
yer blood tickle!' When I read in Scripter about slayin'--like them
Midianites was slew--I kinder think things, but I ain't got a picter
of it. Here a body kin see all they is to it--I s'pose 'tis sinful,
but ain't we all born an' livin' in sin?--Thet feller bein' chopped up
gives me a tickle every time I look at 'im--I hev ta keep lookin' at
'im--see whar the butcher cut off his feet? Thar's his head on thet
bench, with one arm side of it, an' t'oter arm's on the graound side o'
the meat block."
As the man mumbled on in his shocking ecstasy the expression on his
hairy, spectacled face became indescribable, but his voice sank rather
than mounted. My own sensations can scarcely be recorded. All the
terror I had dimly felt before rushed upon me actively and vividly,
and I knew that I loathed the ancient and abhorrent creature so near
me with an infinite intensity. His madness, or at least his partial
perversion, seemed beyond dispute. He was almost whispering now, with a
huskiness more terrible than a scream, and I trembled as I listened.
"As I says, 'tis queer haow picters sets ye thinkin'. D'ye know, young
Sir, I'm right sot on this un here. Arter I got the book off Eb I uster
look at it a lot, especial when I'd heerd Passon Clark rant o' Sundays
in his big wig. Onct I tried suthin' funny--here, young Sir, don't git
skeert--all I done was ter look at the picter afore I kilt the sheep
for market--killin' sheep was kinder more fun arter lookin' at it--"
The tone of the old man now sank very low, sometimes becoming so faint
that his words were hardly audible. I listened to the rain, and to the
rattling of the bleared, small-paned windows, and marked a rumbling of
approaching thunder quite unusual for the season. Once a terrific flash
and peal shook the frail house to its foundations, but the whisperer
seemed not to notice it.
"Killin' sheep was kinder more fun--but d'ye know, 'twan't quite
_satisfyin'_. Queer haow a _cravin'_ gits a holt on ye---As ye love the
Almighty, young man don't tell nobody, but I swar ter Gawd thet picter
begun ta make me _hungry fer victuals I couldn't raise nor buy_--here
set still, what's ailin' ye?--I didn't do nothin', only I wondered haow
'twud be ef I _did_--They say meat makes blood an' flesh, an' gives ye
new life, so I wondered ef 'twudn't make a man live longer an' longer
ef 'twas _more the same_--"
But the whisperer never continued. The interruption was not due to my
fright, nor to the rapidly increasing storm amidst whose fury I was
presently to open my eyes on a smoky solitude of blackened ruins. It
was due to a very simple though somewhat unusual happening.
The open book lay flat between us with the picture staring repulsively
upward. As the old man whispered the words "_more the same_" a tiny
spattering impact was heard, and something showed on the yellowed
paper of the upturned volume. I thought of the ruin and of a leaky
roof, but rain is not red. On the butcher's shop of the Anzique
cannibals a small red spattering glistened picturesquely, lending
vividness to the horror of the engraving. The old man saw it, and
stopped whispering even before my expression of horror made it
necessary; saw it and glanced quickly toward the floor of the room he
had left an hour before. I followed his glance, and beheld just above
us on the loose plaster of the ancient ceiling a large irregular spot
of wet crimson which seemed to spread even as I viewed it. I did not
shriek or move, but merely shut my eyes.
A moment later came the titanic thunderbolt of thunderbolts, striking
the accursed house of unutterable secrets and bringing the oblivion
which alone saved my mind.
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