by H P Lovecraft
I
have lately had another odd dream--specially singular because in it I possessed
another personality−a personality just as definite and vivid as the Lovecraft
personality which characterises my waking hours.
My name was Dr. Eben Spencer, and I was dressing
before a mirror in my own room, in the house where I was born, in a small
village of northern New York state. It was the first time I had donned civilian
clothes in three years, for I was an Army surgeon with the rank of 1st Lieutenant.
I seemed to be home on a furlough--slightly
wounded. On the wall was a calendar reading Friday,
July 8, 1864 I was very glad to be in regular attire again, though my
suit was not a new one, but one left over from 1861.
After carefully tying my stock, I donned my coat
and hat, took a cane from a rack downstairs and sallied forth upon the village
street. Soon a very young man of my acquaintance came up to me with an air of
anxiety and began to speak in guarded accents. He wished me to go with him to
his brother−my professional colleague Dr Chester−whose actions were greatly
alarming him.
I, having been his best friend, might have some
influence in getting him to speak freely−for surely he had much to tell. The
doctor for the past two years had been conducting secret experiments in a
laboratory in the attic of his home, and beyond that locked door he would admit
no one but himself. Sickening odours were often detected near the door, and odd
sounds were at times not absent.
The doctor was aging rapidly. Lines of care−and of
something else−were creeping into his dark, thin face, and his hair was rapidly
going grey. He would remain in that locked room for dangerously long intervals
without food and seemed uncommonly saturnine. All questions from the younger
brother were met with scorn or rage−with perhaps a little uneasiness, so the
brother was much worried, and stopped me on the street for advice and aid.
I went with him to the Chester house, a white
structure of two stories and attic in a pretty yard with a picket fence. It was
in a quiet side street, where peace seemed to abide despite the trying nature
of the times. In the darkened parlour, where I waited for some time, was a
marble-topped table, much haircloth furniture and several pleasing whatnots
covered with pebbles, curios and bric-a-brac. Soon Dr Chester came down−and he
had aged. He greeted me with a saturnine smile, and I began to question him, as
tactfully as I could, about his strange actions.
At first he was rather defiant and insulting. He
said with a sort of leer, ‘Better not ask, Spencer! Better not ask!’
Then when I grew persistent (for by this time I
was interested on my own account) he changed abruptly and snapped out, ‘Well,
if you must know, come up.’
Up two flights of stairs we plodded, and stood
before the locked door. Dr Chester opened it, and there was an odour. I entered
after him, young Chester bringing up the rear. The room was low but spacious in
area and had been divided into two parts by an oddly incongruous plush red
portiere. In the half next to the door there was a dissecting table, many
bookcases, and several imposing cabinets of chemical and surgical instruments.
Young Chester and I remained here, whilst the doctor went behind the curtain.
Soon he emerged, bearing on a large glass slab
what appeared to be a human arm, neatly severed just below the elbow. It was
damp, gelatinous and bluish-white, and the fingers were without nails.
‘Well, Spencer,’ said Dr Chester sneeringly, ‘I
suppose you’ve had a good deal of amputation practice in the army. What do you
think, professionally, of this job?’
I had seen clearly that this was not a human arm,
and said sarcastically, ‘You are a better sculptor than doctor, Chester. This
is not the arm of any living thing.’
And Chester replied in a tone that made me blood
congeal, ‘Not yet, Spencer. Not yet!’
Then he disappeared again behind the portiere and
emerged once more, bringing another and slightly larger arm. Both were left
arms.
I felt sure that I was on the brink of a great
revelation, and awaited with impatience the tantalisingly deliberate motions of
my sinister colleague.
‘This is only the beginning, Spencer,’ he said as
he went behind the curtain for the third time. ‘Watch the curtain.’
And now ends the fictionally available part of my dream, for the residue is grotesque anti-climax. I have said that I was in civilian clothes for the first time since ‘61−and naturally I was rather self-conscious. As I waited for the final revelation, I caught sight of my reflection in the glass door of an instrument case and discovered that my very-carefully-tied stock was awry. Moving to a long mirror, I sought to adjust it, but the black bow proved hard to fashion artistically. And the whole scene began to fade−and damn the luck! I awaked in the distressful year of 1920, with the personality of H.P. Lovecraft restored. I have never seen Dr Chester, or his young brother, or that village since. I do not know what village it was. I never heard the name of Eben Spencer before or since. Some dream!
And now ends the fictionally available part of my dream, for the residue is grotesque anti-climax. I have said that I was in civilian clothes for the first time since ‘61−and naturally I was rather self-conscious. As I waited for the final revelation, I caught sight of my reflection in the glass door of an instrument case and discovered that my very-carefully-tied stock was awry. Moving to a long mirror, I sought to adjust it, but the black bow proved hard to fashion artistically. And the whole scene began to fade−and damn the luck! I awaked in the distressful year of 1920, with the personality of H.P. Lovecraft restored. I have never seen Dr Chester, or his young brother, or that village since. I do not know what village it was. I never heard the name of Eben Spencer before or since. Some dream!
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