E.F. Benson Stories Pt. II Article by Matt Cowan

This month we return to the works of E.F. Benson to take a look at some more of his great tales of terror. My previous article on him included a bit of his background as well as a brief synopsis of his stories. “Caterpillars” (1912), “Terror by Night” (1912), “The China Bowl” (1916),“The Passenger” (1917), “Mrs. Amworth” (1923), and “Bagnell Terrace” (1928) “The Witch-Ball” (1929) were all featured therein. It can be found at http://www.vintagehorror.com/node/41 .

1-“The Other Bed” (1908) - A man travels to Switzerland just before Christmas to spend time at a resort enjoying its snowy sloops. Unfortunately terrible weather prevents him from being able to do much. Despite his being there alone, he is given a room with two beds. He has an ill feeling about one of the beds and refuses to sleep in it. Strange things begin to occur, as the bed often looks slept in, a hotel attendant keeps bringing him whiskey he claims was ordered for the room, and he starts to have disturbing dreams. It turns out the room has a dark history to it.

2-“Outside the Door” (1910) – A woman gives her theory on ghosts being similar to radio transmissions and then recounts an evening she spent in a haunted house and its ghostly sounds.

3-“The Room in the Tower” (1912) – A young man has a recurring nightmare of visiting a school friend’s house to stay. He is told he will be given the room in the tower to stay in by the friend’s mother. For reasons he does not understand, he dreads going to that room. He always wakes up before he can find out what terror this room holds. When a day comes where he finds himself at that friends house for real, everything progresses as it had in the dream. He is given the tower room and soon finds out for real what his dreams had been warning him about.

4-“The Light in the Garden” (1921) – A man inherits his uncle’s house that is in bad need of repair. He stays in a nearby lodge where he can see the house and its garden from the window. He is saddened to hear the family butler died shortly before his arrival. Soon afterwards he begins to see a lantern light moving through the garden when no one should be there. He also hears knocking at his door, which when opened reveals no one. Other strange phenomena occur which unveils a long lost secret.

5-“The Horror Horn” (1922) – A man vacationing at a ski resort finds himself forced to stay inside due to bad weather. There another man, who is an avid mountain climber, tells him how he encountered some small, stout, hairy man-creatures while atop a nearby area referred to as The Horror Horn. The legends of these sub-human creatures speak of horrible fates that befall anyone caught by them. Later, the man has an encounter of his own with the dreadful things.

6-“Negotium Perambulans” (1922) - An old church in the secluded, difficult to reach village of Polearn contains carved and painted wooden panels which are used to form an altar rail. The panels displayed the angel of Annunciation, the angel of Resurrection, the witch of Endor, and the last depicts a scene with a hooded priest holding a cross toward a hideous slug-like creature. Below it was written, “Negotium perambulans in tenebris” from the 91st Psalm which translates to “the pestilence that walketh in darkness.” A legend claimed the panels were originally part of an ancient church that sat nearby until an evil man tore it down to build himself a house out of its materials. He used the altar as a table to dine and play dice upon. One evening he screamed and was found a withered heap, dying on the floor quoting the same scripture as is below the panel. A large shadow crawled across the floor and out of the room. The main character of the story moves to Polearn which he had fond memories of from childhood visits. He is informed that another man died in a house built from the old church in a similar fashion. He even broke into the church and smashed the panel showing the creature in an attempt to rid himself of the dark thing he claims was stalking him. However, the panel was found reformed and undamaged. The man’s death followed soon afterwards. An artist has since moved into the house and shows the protagonist his paintings that depict the world through nightmarish eyes. This story comes to a swift conclusion after a great build up. It feels like an M.R. James story to me.

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