Brian Lumley [Titus Crow 01] The Burrowers Beneath (retail)

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.”While chanting these incredible mouthings Sir Amery’s feet had started to pump up and down in a grotesque parody of running.Suddenly he screamed anew and with startling abruptness leaped past me and ran full tilt into the wall.The shock knocked him off his feet and he collapsed in a heap on the floor.I was worried that my meager ministrations might not be adequate, but to my immense relief he regained consciousness a few minutes later.Shakily he assured me that he was “all right, just shook up a bit,” and, supported by my arm, he retired to his room.That night I found it impossible to close my eyes.I wrapped myself in a blanket instead, and sat outside my uncle’s room to be on hand if he were disturbed in his sleep.He passed a quiet night, however, and paradoxically enough, in the morning, he seemed to have got the thing out of his system and was positively improved.Modern doctors have known for a long time that in certain mental conditions a cure may be obtained by inciting the patient to relive the events which causes his illness.Perhaps my uncle’s outburst of the previous night had served the same purpose—or at least, so I thought, for by that time I had worked out new ideas regarding his abnormal behavior.I reasoned that if he had been having recurrent nightmares and had been in the middle of one on that fateful night of the earthquake, when his friends and colleagues were killed, it was only natural that his mind should become temporarily—even permanently—un—hinged upon awakening and discovering the carnage.And if my theory were correct, it also explained his seismic obsessions ….ivA week later came another grim reminder of Sir Amery’s condition.He had seemed so much improved, though he still occasionally rambled in his sleep, and had gone out into the garden “to do a bit of trimming.” It was well into September and quite chilly, but the sun was shining and he spent the entire morning working with a rake and hedge clippers.We were doing for ourselves and I was just thinking about preparing the midday meal when a singular thing happened.I distinctly felt the ground move fractionally under my feet and heard a low rumble.I was sitting in the living room when it happened, and the next moment the door to the garden burst open and my uncle rushed in.His face was deathly white and his eyes bulged horribly as he fled past me to his room.I was so stunned by his wild appearance that I had barely moved from my chair by the time he shakily came back into the room.His hands trembled as he lowered himself into an easy chair.“It was the ground … I thought for a minute that the ground ….” He was mumbling, more to himself than to me, and visibly trembling from head to toe as the aftereffect of the shock hit him.Then he saw the concern on my face and tried to calm himself.“The ground, Paul, I was sure I felt a tremor—but I was mistaken.It must be this place.All this open space.The moors.I fear I’ll really have to make an effort and get away from here.There’s altogether too much soil and not enough cement! Cement surroundings are the thing ….”I had had it on the tip of my tongue to say that I too had felt the shock, but upon learning that he now believed himself mistaken I kept quiet.I did not wish to needlessly add to his already considerable disorders.That night, after Sir Amery had retired, I went through into his study—a room which, though he had never said so, I knew he considered inviolate—to have a look at the seismograph.Before I looked at the machine, however, I saw the notes spread out upon the table beside it.A glance was sufficient to tell me that the sheets of white foolscap were covered with fragmentary jottings in my uncle’s heavy handwriting, and when I looked closer I was sickened to discover that they were a rambling jumble of seemingly disassociated—yet apparently linked—occurrences connected in some way with his weird delusions.These notes have since been delivered permanently into my possession and are as reproduced here:HADRIAN’S WALL.A.D.122-128.Limestone Bank.(Gn’yah of the G’harne Fragments?) Earth tremors interrupted the diggings, which is why cut basalt blocks were left in the uncompleted ditch with wedge-holes ready for splitting.W’nyal Shash.(MITHRAS?)The Romans had their own deities—but it wasn’t Mithras that the disciples of Commodus, the Blood Maniac, sacrificed to at Limestone Bank! And that was the same spot where, fifty years earlier, a great block of stone was unearthed and discovered to be covered with inscriptions and engraven pictures! Silvanus the Centurion defaced it and buried it again.A skeleton, positively identified as Silvanus’ by the signet ring on one of its fingers, has been lately found beneath the ground (deep) where once stood a Vicus Tavern at Housesteads Fort—but we don’t know how he vanished! Nor were Commodus’ followers any too careful.According to Atullus and Caracalla they also vanished overnight—during an earthquake!AVEBURY.(Neolithic A’byy of the G’harne Fragments and Pnakotic Manuscript???) Reference Stukeley’s book, A Temple to the British Druids—incredible! Druids, indeed! But Stukeley was pretty close when he said snake worship! Worms, more like it! COUNCIL OF NANTES.(9th Century.)The Council didn’t know what it was doing when it ordered: “Let the stones also which, deceived by the derision of the demons, they worship amid ruins and in wooded places, where they both make their vows and bestow their offerings, be dug up from the very foundations, and let them be cast into such places as never will their devotees be able to find them again ….” I’ve read that paragraph so many times that it’s become imprinted upon my mind! God only knows what happened to the poor devils who tried to carry out the Council’s orders … !DESTRUCTION OF GREAT STONES.In the 13th and 14th Centuries the Church also attempted the removal of certain stones from Avebury, because of local superstitions which caused the country folk to take part in heathen worship and witchcraft around them! In fact some of the stones were destroyed—by fire and douching—“because of the devices upon them.” INCIDENT.1320-25.Why was a big effort made to bury one of the great stones at Avebury? An earth tremor caused the stone to slip, trapping a workman.No effort appears to have been made to free him … ! The “accident” happened at dusk and two other men died of fright! Why? And why did the other diggers flee the scene? And what was the titanic Thing which one of them saw wriggling away into the ground? Allegedly there was a smell ….By their SMELL shall ye know them ….Was it a member of another nest of the timeless ghouls?THE OBELISK.Why was the so-called Stukeley Obelisk broken up? The pieces were buried in the early 18th Century but in 1833 Henry Browne found burned sacrifices at the site … and nearby, at Silbury Hill ….My God! That devil-mound! There are some things, even amid these horrors, which don’t bear thinking of—and while I’ve still got my sanity Silbury Hill had better remain one of them!AMERICA: INNSMOUTH.1928.What actually happened and why did the Federal Government drop depth-charges off Devil Reef in the Atlantic coast just out of Innsmouth? Why were half Innsmouth’s citizens banished—and where to? What was the connection with Polynesia and what also lies buried in the lands beneath the sea?WIND WALKER [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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