As I have said, my uncle’s neighbors believed him to be comfortably well off, but I knew the place was mortgaged to the limit, so that the income from the fertile acres was practically absorbed by overhead expenses and interest.
Had my uncle been a business man in the true sense of the term, no doubt he could have been wealthy. But he was a scientist and dreamer, inclined to let the farm run itself while he devoted his time to study and research. His hobby was psychic phenomena. His thirst for more facts regarding the human mind was insatiable. In the pursuit of his favorite study, he had attended seances in this country and abroad with the leading spiritualists of the world.
He was a member of the London Society for Psychical Research, as well as the American Society, and corresponded regularly with noted scientists, psychologists and spiritualists. As an authority on psychic phenomena, he had contributed articles to the leading scientific publications from time to time, and was the author of a dozen well-known books on the subject.
Thus, grief-filled though I was, my mind kept presenting to me memory after memory of Uncle Jim’s scientific attainments and scholarly life, while the rumbling car wheels left the miles behind; and the thought that such a man had been lost to me and to the world was almost unbearable.
I arrived in Peoria shortly before midnight, and was glad to find Joe Severs, son of my uncle’s tenant, waiting for me with a flivver. After a five-mile ride in inky darkness over a rough road, we came to the farm.
I was greeted at the door by the housekeeper, Mrs. Rhodes, and one of two men, nearby neighbors, who had kindly volunteered to “set up” with the corpse. The woman’s eyes were red with weeping, and her tears flowed afresh as she led me to the room where my uncle’s body lay in a gray casket.
A dim kerosene lamp burned in one corner of the room, and after the silent watcher had greeted me with a handclasp and a sad shake of the head, I walked up to view the remains of my dearest friend on earth.
As I looked down on that noble, kindly face, the old lump, which had for a time subsided, came back in my throat. I expected tears, heartrending sobs, but they did not come. I seemed dazed--bewildered.
Suddenly, and apparently against my own reason, I heard myself saying aloud, “He is not dead--only sleeping.”
When the watchers looked at me in amazement I repeated, “Uncle Jim is _not dead_! He is only sleeping.”
Mrs. Rhodes looked compassionately at me, and by a meaning glance at the others said as plainly as if she had spoken, “His mind is affected.”
She and Mr. Newberry, the neighbor whom I had first met, gently led me from the room. I was, myself dumfounded at the words I had uttered, nor could I find a reason for them.
My uncle was undoubtedly dead, at least as far as this physical world was concerned. There was nothing about the appearance of the pale, rigid corpse to indicate life, and he had, without doubt, been pronounced dead by a physician. Why, then, had I made this unusual, uncalled for--in fact, ridiculous--statement? I did not know. I concluded that I must have been crazed with grief--beside myself for the moment.
I had announced my intention to keep watch with Mr. Newberry and the other neighbor, Mr. Glitch, but was finally prevailed upon to go to my room, on the ground that my nerves were overwrought and I must have rest. It was decided, therefore, that the housekeeper, who had scarcely slept a wink the night before, and I should retire, while the two neighbors alternately kept two-hour watches, one sitting up while the other slept on a davenport near the fireplace.
Mrs. Rhodes conducted me to my room. I quickly undressed, blew out the kerosene light and got into bed. It was some time before I could compose myself for sleep, and I remember that just as I was dozing off I seemed to hear my name pronounced as if someone were calling me from a great distance:
“Billy!” and then, in the same far-away voice: “_Save me, Billy!_”
I had slept for perhaps fifteen minutes when I awoke with a start. Either I was dreaming, or something about the size and shape of a half-grown conger eel was creeping across my bed.
For the moment I was frozen with horror, as I perceived the white, nameless thing, in the dim light from my window. With a convulsive movement I threw the bedclothes from me, leaped to the floor, struck a match, and quickly lit the lamp. Then, taking my heavy walking-stick in hand, I advanced on the bed.
Moving the bedclothing cautiously with the stick and prodding here and there, I at length discovered that the thing was gone. The door was closed, there was no transom, and the window was screened. I therefore concluded that it must still be in the room.
With this thought in mind, I carefully searched every inch of space, looking under and behind the furniture, with the lamp in one hand and stick in the other. I then removed all the bedding and opened the dresser drawers, and found--nothing!
After completely satisfying myself that the animal I had seen, or perhaps seemed to see, could not possibly be in the room, I decided that I had been suffering from a nightmare, and again retired. Because of my nervousness from the experience, I did not again blow out the light, but instead turned it low.
After a half hour of restless turning and tossing, I succeeded in going to sleep; this time for possibly twenty minutes, when I was once more aroused. The same feeling of horror came over me, as I distinctly heard a rolling, scraping sound beneath my bed. I kept perfectly still and waited while the sound went on. Something was apparently creeping underneath my bed, and it seemed to be moving toward the foot, slowly and laboriously.
Stealthily I sat up, leaned forward and peered over the foot-board. The sounds grew more distinct, and a white, round mass, which looked like a porcupine rolled into a ball with bristles projecting, emerged from under my bed. I uttered a choking cry of fright, and the thing _disappeared before my eyes_!
Without waiting to search the room further, I leaped from the bed to the spot nearest the door, wrenched it open, and started on a run for the living-room, attired only in pajamas. As I neared the room, however, part of my lost courage came back to me, and I slowed down to a walk. I reasoned that a precipitate entrance into the room would arouse the household, and that possibly, after all, I was only the victim of a second nightmare. I resolved, therefore, to say nothing to the watchers about my experience, but to tell them only that I was unable to sleep and had come down for company.
Newberry met me at the door.
“Why what’s the matter?” he asked. “You look pale. Anything wrong?”
“Nothing but a slight attack of indigestion. Couldn’t sleep, so I came down for company.”
“You should have brought a dressing-gown or something. You may take cold.”
“Oh, I feel quite comfortable enough,” I said.
Newberry stirred the logs in the fireplace to a blaze, and we moved our chairs close to the flickering circle of warmth. The dim light was still burning in the corner of the room, and Glitch was snoring on the davenport.
“Funny thing,” said Newberry, “the instructions your uncle left.”
“Instructions? What instructions?” I asked.
“Why, didn’t you know? But of course you didn’t. He left written instructions with Mrs. Rhodes that in case of his sudden death his body was not to be embalmed, packed in ice, or preserved in any way, and that it was not to be buried under any consideration, until decomposition had set in. He also ordered that no autopsy should be held until it had been definitely decided that putrefaction had taken place.”
“Have these instructions been carried out?” I asked.
“To the letter,” he replied.
“And how long will it take for putrefaction to set in?”
“The doctors say it will probably be noticed in twenty-four hours.”
I reflected on this strange order of my uncle’s. It seemed to me that he must have feared being buried alive, or something of the sort, and I recalled several instances, of which I had heard, where bodies, upon being exhumed, were found turned over in their coffins, while others had apparently torn their hair and clawed the lid in their efforts to escape from a living tomb.
I was beginning to feel sleepy again and had just started to doze, when Newberry grasped my arm.
“Look!” he exclaimed, pointing toward the body.
I looked quickly and seemed to see something white for an instant, near the nostrils.
“Did you see it?” he asked breathlessly.
“See what?” I replied, wishing to learn if he had seen the same thing I had.
“I saw something white, like a thick vapor or filmy veil, come out of his nose. When I spoke to you it seemed to jerk back. Didn’t you see it?”
“Thought I saw a white flash there when you spoke, but it must have been imagination.”
The time had now arrived for Glitch to watch, so my companion wakened him, and they exchanged places. Newberry was soon asleep, and Glitch, being a stoical German, said little. I presently became drowsy, and was asleep in my chair in a short time.