# The Joss: A Reversion/Chapter 8
### CHAPTER VIII.
#### THE BACK-DOOR KEY.

'Look!" I said. “Look!”
“Look at what? What’s the matter with you, Pollie? Why are you glaring at me like that?” “Don’t you see what’s at the end of it?”
She turned the bangle over.
“It isn’t pretty, but—it’s some sort of ornament, I suppose.”
“It’s that thing which was in the scrap of paper, or its double.”
“Pollie! Are you sure?”
“Certain. I’ll back myself to know that wherever it turns up.”
Taking the bracelet from her I eyed it closely. There was no mistaking the likeness; to one end was attached the very double of that painted little horror. Emily criticised it as she leant over my shoulder.
“It looks as if it were meant for a man who mostly runs to head. And what a head it is! Look at his beard, it reaches to what may be meant for feet. And his hair, it stands out from his scalp like bristles.”
“Don’t forget his eyes, how they shine. They must be painted with luminous paint, or whatever they call the stuff, which lights up in the dark. The other night they gleamed so I thought the creature was alive. And his teeth—talk about dentist’s advertisements! I believe it’s meant for one of those heathen gods who are supposed to live on babies, and that kind of thing. He looks the character to the life. But fancy your ​picking it up from the floor! That’s not lain there twenty years. There’s not a speck of rust upon it. It’s as bright as if it had just come off somebody’s arm.”
“Pollie, do you think there’s anybody in the house besides we two?”
“My dear, I haven’t the faintest notion; you can use your senses as well as I can, and are quite as capable of putting two and two together. One fact’s obvious, it’s not long since somebody was in this room. But we’ve the rest of the house to see; I can tell you more when we’ve seen it. Come, let’s go upstairs.”
Putting the bracelet on the table, I left the room. Emily seemed reluctant to follow. I fancy that if she had had her way she would have postponed the remainder of our voyage to later on—a good deal later on. And, on the whole, I hardly wondered, because, directly we began to go upstairs, such a noise came from above, and, indeed, from everywhere, that you would have thought the whole place was alive; and so it was—with rats. I had heard of the extraordinary noises the creatures could make, but I had never realised their capacity till then. Emily stood trembling on the bottom step.
“I daren’t go up, I daren’t.”
“Very well, then; stop where you are. I dare, and will.”
Off I started; and, as I expected, directly I moved, she rushed after me.
“Oh, Pollie, don’t leave me, don’t. I’d sooner do anything than have you leave me.”
On that top floor there were again three rooms. And again, one of them was empty. It was a sort of attic, at the back. So far as I could make out it had no window at all; it was papered over if it had one. But talk of rats! It was a larger room than the one below, and seemed to be still more crowded. We could not only hear them, we could see them. There they were, blinking at the candlelight out of the floor ​and walls, and even celling. It was a cheerful prospect. I had heard of rats, when they had got rid of everything else, eating human beings. We two could do nothing against these multitudes; I felt sure that the mere fright of being attacked would be enough to kill Emily. I said nothing to her, but I thought of it all the same.
The door next to the attic was fastened. Whether it was locked or not I could not make out. It felt as solid as if it never had been opened, and had been never meant to open. When I struck it with my knuckles, it returned no sound. That it was something else besides a mere wooden door was obvious.
“Another treasure room!” I laughed.
But Emily did not seem pleased.
“I don’t like these locked-up rooms. What is there on the other side?”
“I thought you were so fond of mystery.”
“Not mystery like this.” She lowered her voice. “For all we know there may be people inside, who, while we can’t get at them, can get at us whenever they choose.”
I laughed again; though conscious there was sense in what she said.
“Let’s go and look at the other room and see if that’s locked up too.”
But the door of that yielded at a touch. It, also, had had occupants less than twenty years ago—a good deal less. It was furnished as a bedroom. There was a chest of drawers, a washstand, toilet-table, chairs, and a bed. On the latter the bedding was in disorder; sheets, blankets, pillows tumbled anyhow, as if somebody, getting out of it in a hurry, had had no time to put it straight. There was a lamp upon the toilet table, the blackened chimney of which showed it had been smoking; even yet the smell of a smoky lamp was in the air. The drawers were all wide open. One, which had been pulled right out, was turned upside ​down upon the floor, as if the quickest way had been chosen to clear it of its contents.
“It looks,” said Emily, standing in the doorway, looking round her with doubtful eyes, and speaking as if she were saying something which ought to have been left unspoken, “as if someone had just got out of bed.”
Throwing the bedclothes back, I laid my hand against the sheets. It might have been my imagination, but they seemed warm, as if, since someone had been between them, they had not had time to cool. Not wishing to make her more nervous than she was already, I hardly knew how to answer her; more especially as I myself did not feel particularly comfortable. If, as appearances suggested, somebody had been inside that bed, say, within the last half-hour, who could it have been? and what had become of him or her, or them? Crossing to the dressing-table, I touched the lamp-glass. It was hot, positively hot. I could have sworn that it had been burning within the last ten minutes or quarter of an hour. That was proof positive that someone had been there—lamps do not burn unless somebody lights them, and they do not go out unless somebody puts them out. Who could it have been? The discovery—and the mystery!—so took me aback that it was all I could do to keep myself from screaming. But, as Emily was nearly off her head already, and I did not want to send her off it quite, I just managed to keep my feelings under. All the same, I did not like the aspect of things at all.
To stop her from noticing too much, I tried my best to keep on talking.
“This is our bedroom, I suppose. How do you like the look of it? Not over cheerful, is it?”
“Cheerful?” I could see she shuddered. “Does any light ever get into the room?”
Where the window ought to have been were the usual massive and immovable shutters.
​“The person who put up those shutters wasn’t fond of either light or air. But you wait, I’ll have them down, I like plenty of both. You heard Mr. Paine’s story about the shutters having made their appearance in a night? If they did, then there was witchcraft used, or I’m a Dutchman. It took weeks, if not months, to get them there. If the walls have to be pulled to pieces I’ll have them moved. Give me a week or two and you won’t know the place. I’ll turn it inside out and upside down. Because Uncle Benjamin had his ideas of what a house ought to be like, dark as pitch, and alive with rats, not to name blackbeetles, it doesn’t follow that his ideas are mine, so I’ll show him.”
“We can’t do all that, you and I alone together.”
“Catch me trying! Before we’re many hours older I’ll have an army of workmen turned into the house.”
“What about the conditions? No one is to be allowed to enter except us two, especially no man.”
“Bother the conditions! Do you think I mind them? Uncle Benjamin must have been stark staring mad to think that I would. If I’m only to live in such a place as this on such terms as those, then I’ll live out of it—that’s all. By the way, where’s the envelope which was in that box? I took it out of my dress pocket. ‘This envelope is for Mary Blyth, and is not to be opened by her till she is inside 84, Camford Street.’ Well, now Mary Blyth is inside 84, Camford Street—a nice, sweet, clean, airy place she’s found it! So I suppose that now she may open the envelope. Let’s hope that the contents are calculated to liven you up, because I feel as if I wanted something a little chirrupy.”
Inside was a sheet of blue writing paper. It was not over clean, being creased, and thumb-marked, and blotted too. On it was a letter, written by somebody who was not much used to a pen. I recognised Uncle Benjamin’s hand in a moment, especially because I remembered how, in his letters to mother, ​which I had in my box, the lines kept getting more and more slanting, until the last was screwed away in a corner, because there was no room for it anywhere else. And here was just the same thing. He began straight enough, right across the page, but, long before he had reached the bottom, he was in the same old mess.
“I need no ghost to tell me that this is from my venerated uncle. I remember his beautiful neatness. Look at that, my dear, did you ever see anything like those lines for straightness?”
I held up the page for Emily to see. She actually smiled, for the first time since she had been inside that house.
“Now let’s see what the dear old creature says. Do hope it’s something comforting. What’s this?” I began to read out aloud.
“‘Dear Niece,—Now that you are once inside the house, you will never sleep out of it again.’ Shan’t I? We shall see. Nice prospect, upon my word. ‘You may think you will, but you won’t. The spell is on you. It will grow in power. Each night it will draw you back. At your peril do not struggle against it. Or may God have mercy on your soul.’ This is—this is better and better. My dear, Uncle Benjamin must have been very mad. ‘You are surrounded by enemies.’ Am I? I wasn’t till I had your fortune. I’m beginning to wonder if I shouldn’t have been better off without it. ‘Out of the house you are at their mercy. They watch you night and day. When you are out, they are ever at your heels. Sooner or later they will have you. Then again may God have mercy on your soul. But in the house you are safe. I have seen to that. Do not be afraid of anything you may see or hear. There is That within these walls which holds you in the hollow of Its hand.’ That last line, my dear, is in italics. It strikes me that not only was Uncle Bennie mad, but ​that writing novels ought to have been his trade. As you are so fond of saying, this is something like a romance; and I wish it wasn’t. Emily, what’s the matter with you now?”
She had come to me with a sudden rush, gripping my arm with both her hands—I doubt if she knew how hard. I could see that she was all of a tremble.
“I—I thought I heard someone downstairs.”
“Not a doubt of it—rats.”
“It—it wasn’t rats. It sounded like footsteps in the room beneath.”
“When I’ve finished uncle’s letter we’ll investigate; but I think you’ll find it was rats—they’ve got footsteps. Let me see, where was I? Oh, yes—‘Its hand’ ‘Go out as little as you can.’ To be sure. I’m not fond of going out—especially with such a house as this to stop in. ‘Be always back before nine. It is then the hour of your greatest peril begins. Should you ever be out after nine—which the gods forbid—let no one see you enter. They will be watching for you in the front. Go to Rosemary Street at the back. Between thirteen and fourteen there is a passage. At the end there is a wall. Climb it. There are two stanchions one above the other on the right. They will help you. Drop into the yard. Go to the backdoor. You will see a spot of light shining at you. Put the key in there. Turn three times to the left. The door will open. Enter and close quickly lest your enemies be upon you. If they enter with you may God have mercy on your soul. From your affectionate uncle, Benjamin Batters. P.S.—You will find the back door key on the parlour table.’ Shall I? That’s story number one at any rate. I haven’t found any back door key on the parlour table, and I never saw one there. Did you?”
“There—wasn’t one—I noticed—there was nothing on the table—when you put that bangle down.”
​I wished Emily would not speak in that stammering way, as if there was a full stop between each word or two. But I knew it was not the slightest use my saying so just then; that was how she felt.
“Of course. I did leave that bangle on the table, didn’t I? That’s one thing which we’ve found in uncle’s dear old house which seems worth having; and one thing’s something. Let’s go and have another look at it.”
Down the stairs again we went; Emily sticking close to my side as if she would rather have suffered anything than have let me get a yard away from her. One of the pleasantest features of my new possession seemed to be that every time we moved from one room to another about a hundred thousand rats got flurried; it sounded like a hundred thousand by the din they made. And Emily did not like them scurrying up and down the stairs when she was on them; nor, so far as that went, did I either.
When we reached the parlour, I made a dart at the table.
“Why, where’s that bangle? I put it down just there, I remember most distinctly. Emily, it’s gone! Whatever’s this? I do believe—it’s that back-door key!”
It was, at any rate, a key; and bore a family likeness to the one which was attached to the chain which was about my waist. I stared, scarcely able to credit the evidence of my own senses. Between our going from that room and our returning to it a miracle had happened; a transformation had taken place; a bangle—and such a bangle! had become a key. Apparently the back-door key of Uncle Benjamin’s “P.S.!”