- Joined
- Nov 13, 2012
Margaret Oliphant: "A Beleaguered City and Other Tales of the Seen and the Unseen" (Re-read) - Supernatural stories.
Extract from 'A Beleaguered City':
This recalled me to myself, and I followed Lecamus, who stood waiting for me holding the door a little ajar. He went on strangely, like - I can use no other words to express it - a man making his way in the face of a crowd, a thing very surprising to me. I followed him close; but the moment I emerged from the doorway something caught my breath. The same feeling seized me also. I gasped; a sense of suffocation came upon me; I put out my hand to lay hold upon my guide. The solid grasp I got of his arm re-assured me a little, and he did not hesitate, but pushed his way on. We got out clear of the gate and the shadow of the wall, keeping close to the little watch-tower on the west side. Then he made a pause, and so did I. We stood against the tower and looked out before us. There was nothing there. The darkness was great, yet through the gloom of the night I could see the division of the road from the broken ground on either side; there was nothing there. I gasped, and drew myself up close against the wall, as Lecamus had also done. There was in the air, in the night, a sensation the most strange I have ever experienced. I have felt the same thing indeed at other times, in face of a great crowd, when thousands of people were moving, rustling, struggling, breathing around me, thronging all the vacant space, filling up every spot. That was the sensation that overwhelmed me here - a crowd; yet nothing to be seen but the darkness, the indistinct line of the road. We could not move for them, so close were they round us. What do I say? There was nobody - nothing - not a form to be seen, not a face but his and mine.
Note: I think I should mention that these aren't really "horror" stories, but stories about life, and death, and the demarcation between - or, as Margaret Oliphant would put it, the seen, and the unseen.
Extract from 'A Beleaguered City':
This recalled me to myself, and I followed Lecamus, who stood waiting for me holding the door a little ajar. He went on strangely, like - I can use no other words to express it - a man making his way in the face of a crowd, a thing very surprising to me. I followed him close; but the moment I emerged from the doorway something caught my breath. The same feeling seized me also. I gasped; a sense of suffocation came upon me; I put out my hand to lay hold upon my guide. The solid grasp I got of his arm re-assured me a little, and he did not hesitate, but pushed his way on. We got out clear of the gate and the shadow of the wall, keeping close to the little watch-tower on the west side. Then he made a pause, and so did I. We stood against the tower and looked out before us. There was nothing there. The darkness was great, yet through the gloom of the night I could see the division of the road from the broken ground on either side; there was nothing there. I gasped, and drew myself up close against the wall, as Lecamus had also done. There was in the air, in the night, a sensation the most strange I have ever experienced. I have felt the same thing indeed at other times, in face of a great crowd, when thousands of people were moving, rustling, struggling, breathing around me, thronging all the vacant space, filling up every spot. That was the sensation that overwhelmed me here - a crowd; yet nothing to be seen but the darkness, the indistinct line of the road. We could not move for them, so close were they round us. What do I say? There was nobody - nothing - not a form to be seen, not a face but his and mine.
Note: I think I should mention that these aren't really "horror" stories, but stories about life, and death, and the demarcation between - or, as Margaret Oliphant would put it, the seen, and the unseen.