Ghouls in My Grave Read online

  GHOULS

  IN

  MY

  GRAVE

  Jean Ray

  Berkley

  1965

  Gold Teeth

  The Shadowy Street

  I Killed Alfred Heavenrock

  The Cemetery Watchman

  The Mainz Psalter

  The Last Traveller

  The Black Mirror

  Mr. Glass Changes Direction

  Gold Teeth

  Abel Teal

  Silas Humblett

  roller

  coffin: thick oak

  Screwdriver no. 3

  lid fastened with eight octagonal screws & two spring hinges

  crowbar

  vault closed by means of lateral flat slab & Portland plaster (not cement)

  Electric torch

  cause of death: cancer of the intestine

  Rubber gloves

  rapid decay

  formalin

  start work at 11 p.m.

  night watch: last round at 9:15 a.m.

  barometer variable, thick clouds likely

  This here little list?

  Mr Silas Humblett is the deceased party, whereas I, Abel Teal, am still very much alive. As I’m into all kinds of weird humour as well, I could just as easily say that S. H. is the goldmine and I the proprietor. Patience, dear people, eventually you’ll see the light.

  I always draw up a list like that before I go to work. In this respect I’m a worthy disciple of Doctor Wheeler, my old Methodology Instructor at Cambridge; in those merry days I thought I wanted to become a teacher. The goal had been different then, but the principle the same—“Don’t waste any time and reduce unfavourable probabilities to a strict minimum.” I like to act from principle, see, and this one has served me in good stead a great many times when the success of a particularly hazardous enterprise, not to mention my own safety, depended on it.

  The papers’ obituary sections are my favourite reading matter. Too, I’m a regular visitor of the city’s more distinguished hospitals, which I enter under a variety of pretexts. As a manner of course I familiarize myself with the names of the terminally ill. The goes for the ‘first class’ sections of the regular clinics—Westminster Hospital in Broad Sanctuary, Royal Free in Gray’s Inn Road, and King’s College in Portugal Street. I pay particular attention to what goes on in the waiting rooms of the posh metropolitan dental surgeries. As for the various cemeteries—they’re an open book to me.

  How come? By Jove, I should have stated it at the outset, with all this dilly-dallying I’d nearly forgotten all about it. To be plain, I’m after the dead, or rather after their precious gold teeth. I don’t think the Lord can be very cross with me either, for surely putrefying corpses are no longer in need of gold, plastic, or even their own teeth.

  Now, Silas Humblett lies buried in Brompton Cemetery. He as a patient of Doctor Marden’s, and I have it on good authority he took an especially valuable set of solid good teeth with him. The Humblett plot is located in the western part of the cemetery; it is surrounded by larches and stunted conifers; not too far from the outer wall, in fact, which greatly facilitates the job. I fully intend to be done before the moon waxes bright; with a bit of luck I shall leave the necropolis in possession of several ounces of eighteen-carat gold.

  Now pray do not think I purport to initiate you in the fine art of body snatching, but those ornate tombs which look so much like mausoleums are actually very easy to break into. One merely has to shovel away a few cubic feet of earth in order to get at a vertical slab which serves as the main entry. As for the concessions in perpetuity—those tombs are seldom located underground —the aperture is simply bricked up and plastered over, and then the vault itself is sealed with the slab. When the plaster is still wet those bricks are removed easily enough. As for the coffin—that’s another matter.

  Thanks to a device of my own invention, largely based on an apparatus which received an honourable mention at the Concours Lepine in Paris, the task is accomplished without great difficulty. It consists of two thin steel rods set in motion by a crank, and an iron lip which is shoved under the coffin. A few quick turns and the heavy receptacle gently slides forward, while a reverse action accomplishes the opposite effect.

  The #3 screwdriver enables me to remove wight heavy screws in about four minutes; fastening them takes even less time—I have it done in less than two minutes.

  The four millimetre lead sheet encompassing the occupant usually needs a bit of work, but by and large a hole of about ten square centimetres just above the mouth suffices. The rest is a piece of cake.

  Death, then, provides me with a substantial income, and I like to think our partnership is based on mutual respect. From time to time she will play nasty tricks on one, as is her wont, like that time with old Tottery. By the time I got to work on the lid I was in a cold swear; the screws had been inserted in a happy-go-lucky fashion, and the lead must have contained antimony, for I lost my favourite #1 blade in the cutting process. When I finally got to the bugger’s dentures, they proved to be fashioned out of an entirely worthless sort of ersatz metal. Confound the avaricious sods who pull a fast one on an honest worker!

  Right after that disaster, however, my supernatural partner made amends with a precious gift.

  Lady Bollingham’s mortal remains had been deposited in a dormitory close to the Groves. Her once beautiful mouth, which had once been so full of filth and venom, contained no less than sixteen golden nuggets. Unfortunately her Ladyship had been wrapped in zinc rather than a lead blanket: a drawback of the first magnitude, because it entails the use of a blowtorch. This is one of the instances where a certain amount of unpleasantness is involved: the flame comes into contact with the flesh and partly scorches it, which allows for a stomach-turning stench. In this case there was not a lot left to be grilled, mind, and the reward was ample enough. But then in the blue glare I had seen several more scintillating items. By Jove! The noble shrew had been laid to rest on a veritable bed of diamonds! I had an inkling then there might be other surprises in store, so I reignited my blow-lamp. I was right: four heavy rings festooned with brilliants provided a bracelet consisting almost entirely of enormous emeralds. That night I earned some twenty thousand pounds, albeit my appetite was ruined for the rest of the week.

  It marked the beginning of a new chapter in my chequered career. I left my furnished room in Stoke-Newington, hired an adorable little abode in Bury Square, and acquired a Morris. The latter served me well in the course of my nocturnal expeditions; I always parked it far from the actual work area, preferably in front of a night club or ballroom.

  I also had to hire me a housemaid, a well-nigh wholly extinct species in Albion. But I was lucky to find a Miss Margaret Blockson, a stour, coarse, and uncouth female who had trouble finding a new position because eh had been a regular guest at Pentonville and Scrubbs. She thanked me profusely when she entered into my service, and I never had any reason to complain.

  She had no friends or relatives, never went out, did her shopping in a huff and a puff, and always went to sleep at eight. Her cooking was passable, she was taciturn and only interested in the job. A minor quibble—she always wore the same dirty apron, and an enormous Greenaway she had probably found in a dustbin somewhere. A pearl among women.

  If pearls are truly sisters to flowers, as the poets say, then let me now introduce you to one of them: Ruth Conklin.

  She and an older sister called Elsa live in Bury Square, close to my place. I made their acquaintance under rather romantic circumstances.

  They had been to the butcher in Bloom Street and were on their way home when they were suddenly attacked bu one of those big hounds prowling around the district. Without much ado the beast set out to ta
ke stock of the ladies’ shopping bag. I sprang forward and hit it squarely on the muzzle with my umbrella; yelping, it let go of its prey, and disappearing in the fog. I saluted the ladies, and introduced myself.

  “Abel Gregory Teal, at your service.”

  “Elsa Conklin, Miss Ruth, my sister.”

  It started to rain just then, so I provided them shelter under my umbrella.

  ‘You are a courageous man, Mr Teal: that dog could have bitten you,” Miss Elsa offered.

  “Or eaten you,” Ruth concurred shiveringly, but nonetheless trying a smile. The seductive smile of a beautiful woman usually reveals a set of pearly whites, but in this case I was treated to a flash of golden lightning.

  “My, but what big teeth you have,” I mused. From a professional point of view it had to be allowed that the lady’s cheeks were quite pale too. Tuberculosis?

  “Mr Teal,” Elsa continued, “unless I’m mistaken you’re still a trifle out of sorts. It’s quite cold, and that rain... Would you care to join us in a hot toddy with rum?”

  And so it went. The draught was thoroughly enjoyable, and the easy chair in their seedy but comfortable little parlour couldn’t have been softer. I became a regular visitor.

  Miss Elsa, who is pushing fifty, is a robust woman with a stem countenance, and cold, calculating eyes. Her hair is a fiery red, and she always smells of fresh linen and lavender.

  Her sister, who is much younger, has auburn hair, the grace of a Tanagra statuette, doesn’t wear scent, but is quite exciting to look at. She’s the Cinderella of the household, in charge of the kitchen, laundry, cleaning, sewing, and patching up.... Her sister, on the other hand, has a good head on her shoulders; she reads Latin, and is partial to Chaucer and Shakespeare, whom she not only pemses but also comprehends, which you’ll agree is unusual.

  My predilection for fragile Ruth had not escaped her, but I’m confident she approved. She left us alone from time to time, and as a matter of course the inevitable happened. I was head over heels in love, which is only human, I suppose; but who would have thought that I, Abel Teal, would dedicate self-scribbled stanzas to a lady of thirty-five? (Admittedly I borrowed some from Southey and Burns, but the marvellous creature never noticed.) Hadn’t Miss Elsa called me a courageous man? I probably am when facing a rabid dog coming in for the kill, but when loves comes into play...

  Nonetheless I resolved to proceed, and one fine evening bluntly asked Ruth for her hand in marriage.

  “We have to talk to my sister,” she replied, teeth ablaze like so many flames in a splendid sunset.

  I had to down two or three whiskys to steady my nerves, and opened my heart to Elsa, who looked me up and down with those piercing eyes of hers.

  “This is a serious matter, not to be decided upon in an offhand fashion. I want to think it over.”

  From that day on I considered myself Ruth’s fiancé.

  ***

  Hell’s bells! And everything was going so well...

  The night was deliciously dark, and the wind showed great promise. The roads and byways leading up to the old Brompton cemetery were as thoroughly deserted as a group of islands in the Pacific.

  The larches and the conifers around the Humblett Plot provided excellent shelter, so it only took a few deft strokes to remove ot protective layer of earth. The coffin hardly needed any persuasion and let itself be carried gently on the steel rods. The screws had been fastened ni exemplary fashion, and it was truly a breeze cutting through the leads sheet. But then....

  Hell’s Bells! When I pried out Silas’s cold lips open, I encountered nothing but air—I might as well have searched a sparrow’s beak for dentures. How could I have made a mistake like that? I knew the Humbletts well enough to know they wouldn’t have removed the old geezer’s teeth themselves....

  Then I noticed the thin groove running along the sheet’s surface—the tell-tale mark left by an electric blowtorch. On closer inspection I discovered traces of oil on the screws. In short, someone had been taking the wind out of my sails! Someone who worked as silently and diligently as me, without identical or even more refined tools.

  I left the premises trembling like an autumn leaf. In my chagrin I went to bed immediately, weeping with rage and frustration.

  I am beaten!

  Colonel James Gaskett - Hackney Marsh Cemetery, new section.

  Dane Janet Furlong - Bromley Cemetery.

  Ebenezer Sharp - Dulwich Burrying Ground.

  Ruben Goodwin - Foly Cross Churchyard

  Lionel Chapman - small Groves cemetery.

  Gustav Petersen - Ladywell Graveyard.

  Seven empty jaws in three weeks! Seven minutely prepared but completely fruitless expeditions! Seven times I have been preceded by a being as horribly mysterious as it is thoroughly professional—faster than I shall ever be and much better equipped! No, I’m not prepared to enter into technical detail, in spite of my considerable experience I am quite at at loss to understand Worse on every single occasion I have had the nagging feeling I was being closely watched from behind a nearby tomb, watched by my erstwhile supernatural partner in crime.

  Our partnership had come to an end.

  I sought oblivion in the company of my new friends Ruth and Elsa: the mocking shadows and spectres did not follow me to their cosy, pink litten little parlour—or so I thought. But let us not anticipate.

  ***

  The lunch had been exquisite that day: turbot followed by a sirloin of steak followed by a raspberry pudding. We remained seated for a while longer, while Elsa shovelled a second delicious helping onto our plates. All of a sudden she turned to her sister.

  “Ruthie dear, guess who was buried at Stoke-Newington this morning?”

  “Abney Cemetery?” I routinely asked.

  “Oh, is that what it is called?” Elsa reciprocated.

  “Indeed. It’s where I used to live.”

  “None of than old Gold Beak, that imbecile of a Gaston Drum who had all his teeth pulled in America, and had them replaced with a set of gold dentures so big he could hardly chew. Surely you remember him, Ruth?”

  “Well, sort of...”

  “An impossible brute. May God have on his soul, though” Elsa concluded, and went back to her pudding.

  Frowning, I slowly felt a very bad feeling rising within me. Of late I had been negligent: my notebooks were full of gaps which I didn’t even try to ill in anymore, so I wasn’t surprised that Gaston Drum’s demise had passed me by unnoticed. Nonetheless I resolved to have at least one more go. I swiftly finished my coffee, and took my leave of the Conklin sisters.

  I drove up and down the joyless Stoke-newington streets. In under three hours I got the facts straight.

  Abney Park Cemetery is not exactly a rich people’s resting place, so it has no naught watch. Located in one of the lateral lanes close to the mortuary, the Drum plor is easily accessible, but hidden from view by an impressive tangle of holly.

  The first quarter of the moon was liberal inundating the crest of the nearby trees with silvery streaks, but I was not overly concerned, for the deserted area was protected by a thick fog creeping from the numerous pools bordering on the cemetery.

  The Abney Park gravediggers are notoriously lazy, so I was not surprised to find the individual sections divided by mere wooden partitions. The narrow access hand’t been closed up either; it took only a couple turns to lever the coffin out of the vault; the screws behaved in exemplary fashion, and the spring hinges offered no resistance the zing casing, not yet soldered, proved no match for my trusty crowbar. I didn’t even need any artificial light, for the rising moon proceeded ample illuminating. Even good old Gaston himself was entirely accommodating: his wide open trap glittered prettily. Humming, I reached inside.

  Snap!

  I howled with terror. The dead man’s mouth had inadvertently closed round my fingers! In spite of my rubber gloves the pain was considerable. Try as I might, I couldn’t pry them loose. I forcibly shook the deceased man’s head to
and fro, to the point that the vertebrae snapped , but to my mounting horror and despair the teeth wouldn’t let go.

  “Let go, you don of a bitch, or I’ll cut off your head!” I ride, cropping for my tool case.

  Hell and damnation! It was beyond reach, I continued to pull, but only succeeded in becoming more and more entrapped. From the shadows came the titter of a nocturnal scavenger. Several rats were busily inspecting my body—the blasted vermin were the only creatures to have acknowledged my cry for help.

  Already a resignation was invading my senses. I was a prisoner, restrained by a set of dentures... My deliverance would spell the end of my career and hopes, for surely I would end up doing a long stretch, involving sessions on the dreaded treadmill.

  Presently something stirred behind the hedge of conifers. A calm voice said:

  “Don’t bother, you’ll hurt yourself. It’s a wolf trap,”

  It couldn’t be anyone but my mysterious rival. Sure enough, not three feet away from the tomb I now perceivers a tall silhouette emerging from the creeping fog.

  “A miniature wolf trap, but just as efficient as the full-sized counterpart,” the voice offered.

  “Release me and I won’t interfere with you anymore!” I implored.

  “I’m afraid you’ll have to agree to my conditions.”

  That peculiar-sounding inflection rang a bell.

  “Miss Elsa!”

  “Indeed it is, dearest Abe. But unless you want to remain Sir Drum’s prisoner it shall b Elsa Teal soon.”

  “And that is your condition?” I stammered.

  “I expect an unequivocal reply: yes or no.”

  “YEEES!!” I howled. Not even a seven-headed dragon could have made me change my mind at that point. A minute later I scampered to a clearing behind the hedge; there Miss Elsa examined my painfully lacerated hand.