The River Elves

== THE RIVER ELVES ==
=== By Peter W. Mills ===
(In Tribute to H. P. Lovecraft)
Published in StoryStar 2015
I, James Martin of Hawthorn Cottage, Priory Lane in the Parish of St.
Michael and All Angels, Roxwell Village in the County of Essex, England, hereby
swear upon my sacred oath as a gentleman and a scholar that the detailed
account I shall herein set down in writing is the Truth, the Whole Truth, and
nothing but the Truth, so help me God and all His ministers of Grace.
I make this transcript in pen and ink, in my own hand, appended by my
signature and tomorrow’s date, the third of October 1929, since I shall be
writing long into the night before I finish that which I hold to be my bounden
duty to record. It is necessary for me to write as quickly as I may, for I know
not what the morrow will bring, or how much time I may have remaining to me in
which to set pen to paper. 
This testament is an account of the involvement of my friend Parker
Crichton in those particular circumstances which culminated in his subsequent
disappearance today, after which I can predict that no trace of him whatsoever
will be recounted by any human witness. Since it is known by sundry persons in
the neighbourhood that I was a close friend of Parker, it is likely that local
gossip will link me with his sudden vanishing. I therefore also have need to
forestall this theory, nipping such rumours in the bud before they can bloom. 
Fortunately, Parker Crichton kept a commonplace book in which he made
entry of his discoveries, theories and investigations into that subject in
which he was passionately interested; indeed, devoted. I now have this journal
or scrap-book in my possession, for I removed it from his study in order to
preserve it from… from that which would eagerly have taken and destroyed it,
had I left it where it was. I shall place this journal, together with this
testament I now write, in my iron safe in my study, where these items shall be
protected from harm until they may be discovered, for it is certain my cottage
will be searched thoroughly by the police should I disappear in like manner to
Parker, and the police have ways of opening locked safes and will undoubtedly
not neglect to do so should I, too, suddenly vanish without trace.
I shall, in addition to keeping it free from any harm, have another
reason for placing Parker’s commonplace book in the safe with this personal
statement, since it seems to me that it is only by a careful study of the items
he chose to include in it that a more complete sense of what has transpired
will emerge. Thus, this account I am now writing is, in addition to a record of
my own experiences and growing conclusions or dreadful suspicions, also
more-or-less my own interpretation of his pasted cuttings and notations which,
without such a linking commentary, might well be dismissed or regarded as
irrelevant by serious-minded practical investigators such as the police
authorities.
But both Parker and myself were also practical and serious-minded
people. We were neither frivolous nor undisciplined, and we both enjoyed good
incomes from our associations with family businesses, on his part fruit and
conserve bottling and marketing, on mine motor-car manufacturing and design. We
each had additional interests which diverted us and amounted to hobbies; for me
it was astronomy and for Parker it was archaeology and folklore. We both
belonged to national associations for promoting these interests and each would
accompany the other as guest to meetings and dinners held by them. We each
revolved within our individual social lives and, since we had been friends from
schooldays in Winchester and now found ourselves living outside the same
village, we associated much together and had some share in each other’s
interests. This much explains our solid backgrounds and our close friendship.
As I sit here at the desk in my study I can open Parker Crichton’s
commonplace book of pasted cuttings and scribbled notes and gaze upon its first
page. This, and the next several pages, are quite innocuous to the casual
observer, as they once were, indeed, to me. They consist of a selection of
articles cut from newspapers and magazines during the previous five years. But
however innocent these cuttings may appear at first sight, each of them may
perhaps be viewed as footprints on a path leading in a direction which, as the
journey continues, becomes increasingly apparent, increasingly specific.
The first dozen pages contain pasted clippings from various national
newspapers and periodicals reporting upon assorted strange phenomena from
around the United Kingdom. Clearly, but for some unknown reason, Parker had
become interested in such matters about five years ago and had begun to make a
point of collecting them. They seemed on these early pages to be, as it were,
somewhat generalised, unfocused, consisting of the typical range of short
tongue-in-cheek reports which editors often make use of to fill any empty
spaces in their new editions and are often termed “Silly Season Stories” by
editors and reporters.
As a typical example, one of these pasted-in by Parker was a newspaper
report concerning an elderly couple in a cottage by Loch Morar north of
Scotland’s Great Glen, who had claimed to have seen a strange creature or
animal of some unknown variety swimming in the water at twilight a considerable
distance from where they were standing. Beneath this was a section cut from a
copy of a religious tract which described how Saint Adomnán of Iona in his 7th
century Life of Saint Columba related how the Irish monk Columba when
travelling through Scotland came upon some local people by the River Ness -
Parker had jotted a note that this was some 20-25 miles south-east of Loch
Morar and near to the point where the Ness flows into the large loch of the
same name - and that these local Picts had just lost a colleague who had been
killed by some kind of “water beast”. The Picts told the monk they had immediately
launched a boat to rescue the unfortunate man, but had managed only to retrieve
his badly mauled corpse.
On the next page, it could be seen that Parker had evidently become
sufficiently intrigued to have conducted some little research into the same general
subject, and there was pasted-in a sheet of paper bearing more notes in his own
meticulous handwriting. He describes a piece of Scottish mythology regarding a
creature called a Kelpie, or “Water Horse”. This was supposed to be some
terrible fairy spirit of the waters that attacked and drowned unwary travelers,
but if placated, or if in a less sanguine mood, might also be of help to
millers by turning their mill-wheel for them when the water level dropped. He
then mentions the Each Uisge, a mythical supernatural creature of the Highlands
which, according to local legends, was a shape-shifting uncanny thing usually
taking the form of a terrifying aquatic horse which would drag its victim down
and devour them.
Then he quotes a short passage from the romantic book Sketches of
Perthshire by Patrick Graham, published by Ballantyne in 1812, which he
obviously found sufficiently relevant to his train of thoughts to perceive as
significant. “…Every lake has its Kelpie or Water-Horse, often seen by the
shepherd sitting upon the brow of a rock, dashing along the surface of the
deep, or browsing upon the pasture on its verge…” Immediately following this,
Parker wrote: 
“The Water-Horse or Kelpie seems to have a very ancient history, and the
legend or rumor of it is not confined to one region alone, or even one country.
It is always described as a form of supernatural creature which kills lone
human beings, eating them if not interrupted by the arrival of other people;
but if somehow calmed through suitable overtures will sometimes befriend one
who knows how to accomplish this.”
He goes on to record here that similar myths or legends occur throughout
the British Isles. In Wales the creature is sometimes called the Afanc and
Edward Williams, the famous Welsh antiquarian who died in 1826 and who used the
pen-name Iolo Morganwg, writes that the ancient Welsh hero Hu Gadarn -- Hu the
Mighty -- as mentioned in a 12th century manuscript, trapped an Afanc in a lake
at Llyn Llion and hauled it out with a team of oxen so that he was able to kill
it, since the creature was weakened by distance from water. This mythological
creature could also be called a Nwyvre in other regions of Wales, and one such
was supposed to haunt the lake Llyn Cynwch north of Dolgellau.
Finally in this pasted page, Parker writes that there is also an
undercurrent of folklore in England that includes such creatures, like the
“Grindylows” of Yorkshire who ate children, dragging the unwary into deep water
with long fingers; the slimy “Eachy” of the Lake District whose very name
derives through Middle English “iker” or “eker” from the original Anglo-Saxon
“nicor” meaning “water spirit”; the “Mari-Morgans” or “Morgans” of Somerset and
South-West England who live in water and lure men to their death; the “Knuckers”
or “Water-Wyrms” of Sussex, their name also deriving from Anglo-Saxon “nicor”.
These notes evidently betray a certain direction or theme into which
Parker Crichton’s attentions were for some reason becoming drawn. This is, I
believe, proven and exemplified by the fact that on the next page is pasted an
article from a Kent periodical -- the Saltwood Gleaner of May 15th 1925 -- in
which is detailed a local myth of a spectral creature called a “Shellycoat” who
was believed in older times to haunt marshes and travel along water-filled
drainage dykes, lunging at lone travelers with slimy long-fingered hands and
devouring them, so that only their skeletal remains were discovered. 
Then beneath this is placed another article, this time cut from our
local Essex newspaper the Malham Observer which Parker had evidently discovered
while searching some old loft, for it bears the date August 2nd 1919. This
article reports upon the mysterious death of one Saul Binney, a miller of Dene
Cross which is a small hamlet no great distance from Roxwell, perhaps three
miles. This person worked in the employ of the mill owner Arnold Mallet, who
was charged with Saul Binney’s murder. 
The facts of the case were described briefly thus: Mr. Binney’s wife
came to the mill about noon with a wrapped pasty in a basket for her husband’s
luncheon and let herself into the milling floor where the stone grinding wheel
was turned by the power of the mill-race. Looking round for her husband, she
discovered his dead body near the open door to the turning water wheel and had
run screaming in shock and terror to the house of Major Treadwell several
hundred yards from the mill, he being the nearest figure of some authority the
poor woman could think of in her panic. The major telephoned the police station
at Malham who at once dispatched a motor car to investigate.
When the police arrived at the water mill, they confirmed the presence
of the dead body of Mister Binney, and apparently two of the policemen were
immediately sick. A search soon found Mister Mallet in an upper room, seated on
the floor amid a mess of slashed flower sacks which had spread their contents
everywhere including all over Mister Mallet himself, and hugging to his chest a
great razor-sharp sickle whilst chanting the Lord’s Prayer repeatedly.
The evidence pointed to Arnold Mallet having murdered and butchered Saul
Binney with the sickle. However, all the police could get from Mallet’s own
mouth was a series of blurted and disjointed statements which were attributed
by the medical examiners to be the result of genuine insanity which had
inexplicably descended upon Mallet and, as time proved, descended permanently.
Parker notes that Mallet spent the rest of his days in a straight-jacket in a
padded cell at Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum in Berkshire. These last
details had been ascertained by Parker via an exchange of letters with the
Malham court clerk.
The newspaper article reported that, when questioned about the death,
Mallet had screamed somewhat incoherently about “Bloody bones! Bloody bones!”
and: “I saw bloody bones!” and “It was all bloody bones!” These cryptic remarks
were put down to the frightful condition to which Mister Binney had been
reduced, hacked to pieces and stripped of his flesh, and the incoherent
statements were used as evidence of the murderer’s insanity, especially in view
of the fact that Mister Mallet seldom ceased screaming them at the padded walls
throughout the remainder of his waking life.
My friend Parker Crichton, however, included a piece of his own research
after this ten-year-old article. I quote it here so that the reader may judge
its impact and relevance -- if any -- for themselves. It may well be purest
coincidence, nothing more. That is probably what a rational person should
believe. Here is what Parker has written beneath the piece of newspaper.
“From ‘Myths and Folktales of the British Isles’ by the Reverend Langley
Cuddingham. 
‘Throughout much of England there are repetitions of the folktale
concerning the unpleasant hobgoblin called Bloody Bones or Bloodybones, and in
the south, especially Sussex, Surrey and Hampshire, named Limblod. He is
mentioned by the great philosopher John Locke in his 1693 treatise ‘Some
Thoughts Concerning Education’. The legend can probably be dated to a much
earlier period still, for the name ‘Limblod’ is simply the Anglo-Saxon for
‘bloody-bones’. The folktale is found in regions as far apart as Somerset and
Lancashire, and would appear to be a Saxon version of the Celtic ‘Kelpie’ or
‘Water-Horse’, for the antics of Bloody Bones are the same; to lurk in pools,
rivers and lakes and drag human victims to their doom, stripping the flesh from
the bones to devour it. Like the Water-Horse, Bloody Bones would seem to be a
primitive native water elf or elemental, of a sort common in widespread
European and Slavic mythology, as in the Wasserspriggan or Water-Leaper from
Germany, which can be linked linguistically to the Spriggan, an elf of Cornish
myth.’” 
On the page following this Parker has added another short note. “See
also West-Country Folkelore by Ruth Lange (published 1920, Stephens &
Smith), page 27, describing the elfish creature Bloody Bones: ‘…It was common
for local children to be frightened into good behaviour by tales of the goblin
called Bloodybones who lived in pools, streams and rivers and would creep,
dripping water, into dwellings during the night, hiding behind doors. If you
dared to open a door alone at night, you might see the dreadful crouching
creature, with blood running down its face, seated on a pile of raw bones that
had belonged to children who told lies, said bad words or pried into places
they should not be.’” 
There were then several pages of similar pasted extracts from books and
periodicals treating of such ancient and fearful folkelore in other lands,
including Germany, Scandinavia, Hungary, and the regions of the Transylvanian
Alps. Where necessary, Parker had himself translated these into English from
their native tongues. There is little point in my duplicating them in my
transcript, for they are all more-or-less a reflection of the same kind of
ancient superstitious beliefs revolving about the concept of that which the
ancient Romans named as Undines and Camoenae and the even more ancient Greeks
as Crinaeae, and the Teutons as the Lorelei -- a race or species of dread
supernatural creatures of indeterminate intelligence living in fresh water and
slaying lonely and unwary humans either for defence or for food. 
There is one more notation by Parker Crichton that I shall include in my
account, however (it is to be found pasted on page 27 of his commonplace book),
for I believe it has a certain specific relevance to the matter and I wish to
draw the attention of my reader to it. This concerns the usage of the word
“elf” in our folklore. 
In many regions, these same mythological and seemingly almost vampyric
water-creatures are known simply as “the River Elves.” This term, in today’s
world, seems to create an automatic impression of sweet little water pixies,
perhaps reminiscent of Kingsley’s Water Babies and certainly of the great stock
of average “fairy tale” books produced for young children.
Do not let these modern bowdlerized conceptions deceive you! The genuine
elf has an entirely different connotation, as Parker recorded from his own
research upon the subject. I shall quote from his own record.
“I have found through a little research in libraries that the term ‘elf’
has no connection with the small mischievous fairy it has been reduced to by
modern usage. The word ‘elf’ comes down into more modern times from the ancient
Anglo-Saxon word ælf, also ielfe (pronounced like ‘yelf’) and the name is
connected linguistically to ælfadl which is ‘nightmare’ and also to ælfæle,
‘poison’ and to eal-felo and ælfremde, ‘dire’ and ‘hostile’. From these
original meanings of the ancestral words, it is apparent that in earlier times
the ordinary people believed in such beings and also believed themselves to be
afflicted by them in what was usually a very hostile fashion, although it also
seems probable that very occasionally a human might actually make friends with
such a terrible being. This, though, was very definitely the exception, not the
rule.
“If one weighs together all the many and various reports that have been
handed down to us from past times, it seems to me to become increasingly
apparent that the elves (of their various species, of which the River Elf is
but one example) more-or-less occupied the same position in less developed
countryside in previous eras which the lion or the tiger occupy in the jungles
and savannahs of today. It is extremely rare for European visitors to be eaten
by a lion or tiger, but it is not altogether unheard of, especially if one
considers a span of many centuries rather than a mere few years. And, to boot,
these supernatural creatures are possessed of a degree of human-like
intelligence, for it is recorded that they can speak the language common to a
region and that they are capable of reason. 
“And if there are such advanced and spiritual supernatural beings as
angels, and such debased and animalistic supernatural beings as demons, why
should it then be perceived as a strange notion that there must also be
intermediary supernatural beings who have a place between those two extremes,
exactly as Darwinism implies that the savage but intelligent Neanderthal is a
natural being with a place between the animal ape and the modern human?”
“I am convinced that a thorough attempt ought to be made to investigate
the reality of these creatures, particularly the Water or River Elves since,
judging by the multitude of legends and stories, it is these which seem to have
survived in some number through the ages. It is already my educated guess that
the River Elves require fresh water and do not like, or perhaps cannot exist
in, sea water which, of course, has its own plethora of other kinds of
semi-mythical beasts and beings (one thinks of tales of ‘mermaids’ dragging
sailors to their deaths). Also, because there is hardly a single area inhabited
by humans where flowing fresh water is not found either above or below ground,
this fact would seem to offer a realistic explanation regarding why the
sightings of such creatures are common in practically identical terms throughout
Britain and, seemingly, throughout the rest of Europe, for they have the
benefit of a gigantic continent-wide network of aqueous roads and byways.
“I shall continue to make a study of these matters.”
This is the final item pasted into Parker Crichton’s commonplace book,
which I found on his desk when I visited his house and which I considered it
expedient to remove into my own care. However, it is not the last I heard from
my friend, for I received three letters from him, each one delivered by hand to
my letterbox whilst I was away for a week in Coventry attending board meetings
held to discuss the new Mark V Velox Tempest motor car which I had just
designed for the family firm.
It is, more than anything else, these letters that have brought me to my
present dire situation, from which I do not expect to emerge alive! My major
concern now is to warn and inform the world of the things our scientific
experts have dismissed as primitive folktales with no substance to them; for
the substance of them may not be open to full scientific inspection, yet
substance exists.
Here is my transcript of Parker’s first letter, which was dated on the
Monday of my week away from home. It was written -- as can be seen from the
original which I will place inside his scrapbook in its envelope -- in somewhat
of a hurry, judging by the rather careless method of writing. Usually, Parker
Crichton was a punctilious and grammatical writer, even of casual notes.
“James, I have come up with something that I am growing a bit afraid of.
I tried to use the Rox Stream which flows through my rear garden in order to
send a signal to any preternatural creatures that might inhabit it, or inhabit
the River Darkwater into which it eventually runs. I based my experiment on
everything I had pieced together from my research into the River Elves (I will
show you my commonplace pastings next time I see you, these will help to
explain) and formed a possible theory about how I could make contact with them,
if any existed at all, and if any existed within several miles downstream of my
cottage. I desperately need your help now, because I am not sure I can handle
this situation. You were not at home this morning, so I wrote this note and
will put it in your letterbox. I can’t remember when you were supposed to be
going up to Meriden about your new motor design, it might be this week? I hope
not. I shall keep trying to knock you up. If you read this later today, or any
time, please drop everything and come round, I think matters are growing
urgent! Parker”
As I sit here writing this account, my eyes mist with tears because, by
mere circumstances, it chanced that I could not be near Parker Crichton when he
needed my help. My tears spring faster now, because I must now transcribe his
second letter to me (the original of which I will also place in between the
pages of his book). The second letter was dated for the Thursday of my week
away.
“James, I now know this must be your week in Coventry, as you are still
not at home and there were no lights in your house last night when I came
round. If by any chance you get back early, please come at once. My experiment
seems to have worked. 
“A few weeks ago I started to drop quantities of blood, purchased from
Simms the Butcher in Malham, into the stream in my garden, several pints at a
time, and always at exactly sunset. My idea was that this might attract the
attention of any reasoning creatures who lived in the watercourse within the
range before the blood was diluted beyond trace. If there were such creatures,
they might follow the trail of regular blood-spills out of general interest, as
any creature will home-in on a potential source of food. If they were of any
kind of intelligence, they would also work out the timing of the spills,
especially as their upstream journey brought them closer to my home and they
could then begin to associate the timing with the sunset.
“For a few weeks there was no kind of development and my experiment
remained academic. But last Saturday I heard terrible, terrifying news! I pray
that you will return in time to help me, for everyone else will think I am
obviously insane. In Saturday’s Malham Observer the front page headline reads:
‘Bloody Murder in Radley Green!’ I will fold the front page and enclose it with
this letter so you can see why I am growing frightened -- the Rox Stream flows
through Radley Green only three miles downstream from my house. Please -- come
quickly! This is really Urgent, Parker.”
The newspaper report was, indeed, included with this letter. Here it is,
word-for-word as you will find it in the envelope when I place it, too, in the
scrapbook. I have already given you the lurid headline. This is what followed
beneath it.
“Mr. Gordon Threadwell, a farm labourer of Smollet’s Cottages in Radley
Green, was found hideously murdered on Friday morning. His remains were
discovered by Samuel Thomson, a retired bank clerk, who was looking for a good
‘lie’ from which to conduct some fly fishing in the Rox Stream which flows past
the rear of Smollet’s Cottages. Mr. Thompson immediately ran to the Red Dragon
Inn and attracted the attention of Donald Bishop, the innkeeper, who telephoned
the police.
“Detective Inspector Atwell of the Malham CID is investigating the
incident, and beyond stating that it was definitely not an accidental death he
is not yet willing to reveal any further information, except that it is the
expert opinion of both himself and the Malham coroner, who, unusually, came to
the site of the crime in person, that the murder was committed by a very
dangerous and violent psychopath.
“This indeed would seem to be the case, for the Malham Observer was able
to speak to Mr. Bishop the landlord of the Red Dragon, who advised us that from
an upstairs window overlooking the meadow through which the river flows he
witnessed the coroner and some assistants removing the unfortunate victim’s
body to a nearby ambulance in several small boxes. Mr. Bishop also states that
he noticed two of the coroner’s assistants near the bank of the stream retching
heavily.
“During Friday afternoon, the Chief Constable of the Essex Police Force
issued an official warning to all residents and travelers within a fifty mile
radius of Radley Green to ensure all house doors are locked for the night, not
to walk alone in the open, and to be on the alert and telephone 999 at once in
the event of any strange occurrence.”
At once I saw the terrible yet inescapable conclusion that must be drawn
from this hideous development. That the River Elves actually existed I could no
longer doubt. That they inhabited fresh water and made use of rivers, streams
and subterranean aquifers to travel from one end of the country to the other,
doubtless making relatively short journeys across intervening countryside,
seemed now to be an obvious conclusion. That they may not actually be evil, but
considered human beings as a source of food, was seemingly apparent. That they
were an extremely dangerous supernatural threat to any who came within their
reach I now understood thoroughly.
And that one or more of these creatures of dark mythology was lurking in
the Rox Stream, and that it was making its way from point to point following
the scent of the abattoir blood which Parker Crichton had poured into the Rox
each sunset for some days, was an unavoidable deduction. And a further fact disturbed
me greatly -- the same pleasant gurgling Rox Stream flowed through the bottom
end of my own garden less than a mile after it had wound past Parker’s house. I
told myself that I had done absolutely nothing to attract the attentions of the
creatures as Parker had; but neither had the retired bank clerk Samuel Thompson
whose remains had sickened the police at Radley Green.
But on my front doormat when I returned from my business at Meriden near
Coventry there were three envelopes from Parker. I have related the contents of
the first two. The third contained a shorter and more urgently written missive.
“James, come at once as soon as you get back, for God’s sake! Parker.”
This plea, then, is the explanation of why I drove to the front door of
Parker Crichton’s cottage within ten minutes of my return home. It was late
evening -- about 11.30 -- and dark, some hours after sunset. Parker’s house was
set in its own small grounds some distance from the nearest neighbour, maybe
five hundred yards. There were no lights showing at the windows and there was a
strange silence all about. I had taken one precaution, which was all I could
think of at the time; I carried my twelve-bore sporting shotgun, both barrels
loaded. As I picked it up from my car in its “broken” safety position I jerked
my arm and snapped it together ready for use. I must admit that I was
frightened, maybe even terrified, but I was also severely conscious of my duty
to a friend and aware that I must see this horrific matter through to its conclusion,
whatever it may be. 
Parker’s front door was not locked, nor bolted from inside which was his
usual habit when indoors. His cottage was lit by gas and I started the hall
light with a match. Apart from the darkness, the unlocked front door and the
general feeling of emptiness, nothing else was obviously out of place;
everything in the hall and lounge seemed neat and orderly. Parker’s study was
at the end of the hallway before the door to the kitchen and the rear door into
the garden. Upstairs were only two small bedrooms and an even smaller bathroom.
Walking silently down the hall I tried the door of the study, which was
unlocked and in darkness. Again I reached up and lit a gas light. Everything
seemed normal at a glance.
I took a few silent paces to the side of Parker’s huge green-leather
surfaced oaken desk in order to see whether he had left any message here, and
there was, indeed, an ordinary white envelope laying on the blotter with my own
name written on it. He had left me a message -- but in fact he had not! When I
examined it, the envelope was empty. Clearly he had been about to put some note
into the envelope and then been distracted from his purpose by… by something
which evidently drew him out of the study. It did not seem likely that he had been
abducted or forcibly taken in any way, for there were occasional tables, stools
and glass display cases standing upon the carpet which had not been damaged or
upset. He had left the room by his own choice, then, yet had not returned to
finish the message he was evidently writing to me.
Attempting to follow this line of reasoning, I slowly and quietly left
the study, leaving the light on and the door open. A few steps later I tried
the closed kitchen door, which opened with a slight creak. Despite the shadowy
light emanating from the study doorway I again had to reach up and light a gas
mantle in order to see the room properly. Now, for the first time since I
entered Parker’s house, I saw things which disturbed me, and disturbed me
profoundly.
The back door to the garden was open. Upon the large wooden kitchen
table lay a single ball of screwed-up paper, as though it had been tossed there
by someone. To pick it up, I had to walk to the side of the table, from where I
came into sight of the stone floor near the open back door. Upon the stones
were five or six clearly visible damp footprints, as might be made by someone
with wet feet. These made a trail in the direction of the door to the carpeted
hallway down which I had come, but they faded before leaving the kitchen as
though the feet that had made them were drying on the way.
But it was the nature of the clearer and still-wet footprints on the
threshold of the back door which made my heart jump in a surge of almost
blinding terror. They were not the prints of human feet. The feet that had left
these still-drying wet stains were longer and narrower, and it could clearly be
seen that they were both webbed and clawed! Even in this grip of sudden dread I
realized that, had I put off my visit until the morning, those wet footprints
would have dried and vanished.
Forcing myself to remain rational, if not calm, I further reasoned --
hoping I was right! -- that the silence and unoccupied feeling of the house
indicated that whatever had left these dreadful prints had come and gone again
before I had arrived. The fact that by halfway across the kitchen floor the wet
prints were already drying and disappearing, seemed to suggest that perhaps
half an hour had passed since they had been made. Raising my 12-bore, I forced
myself to walk out of the rear door into the darkness of the garden. A stone
path led to the end of the property, where the Rox Stream -- actually a small
rapid river -- ran past. All was quiet except for the soft rippling of the
waters and I could see nothing out of place as I stood on the bank straining my
eyes and ears.
I walked softly back toward the open kitchen door and its welcoming haze
of yellow light, but when I was half way up the path there was a very great
single splash from the stream. This was no water-vole or jumping fish. It was
the product of something very large either entering or leaving the river with a
loud “cloop” of displaced water.
By pure terrified instinct, nothing more, I turned in the dark and fired
both barrels in the direction of the Rox Stream, then ran into the house,
slamming and bolting the door behind me. I cursed myself for neglecting to
bring with me any more ammunition for the shotgun, although I did not know
whether firearms would have any effect upon whatever kind of creature seemed
now to be stalking my friend’s cottage and grounds. I snatched the screwed-up
paper from the kitchen table, then dashed into the study and picked up Parker’s
commonplace book, ran down the hall, raced from the front door and leaped into
my car, driving away with a crunching of gears that made me wince and shocked
me into realizing that I, a designer of motor cars and their gear boxes, had
reacted in nothing but blind, unreasoning panic. I forced myself to calm down.
And so I returned to my own study and carefully unfurled the ball of
screwed up paper, which was the last note I ever received from Parker Crichton.
It was a hasty, ungrammatical and almost indecipherable scrawl in pencil. It
read simply;
“James they have come. They have minds. They can reason. They are hungry
and savage. They are coming up the path from the river. I think this will be
the last thing I write. See scrapbook if you find it here. It will help
explain…” And that was all.
I immediately set about writing this detailed account, and now I have
written everything. I do not know what may follow. I shall place the
commonplace book with Parker’s letters and this deposition of mine, as I stated
at the beginning, into my iron safe. I remember reading somewhere that,
according to legend, supernatural creatures, or hobgoblins or elves or whatever
you may choose to call them, do not like iron and cannot use it. Therefore - if
this is indeed so - these documents may be found by the police at some future
time when they have forced the safe. On the other hand, if I am still alive, at
some future date I will open the safe and present them to the police myself, hoping
that I will not be confined to a lunatic asylum as a result.
I do not really think I shall end up branded as a lunatic, however. 
Because I can now hear the stealthy splashing of watery sounds outside
my own back door…
END
Category:StoryStar
Category:Mills
Category:Web-published