I knew that certain witch-doctors of some of this world's less civilized peoples are known for their habit of serving an intended victim with a warning of his impending doom. The trick is usually accomplished by handing the unfortunate one an evil symbol and — having let him worry himself half to death — the sorcerer then invokes, in the victim's presence or within his hearing, whichever devil is to do the dirty work. Whether or not any devil actually appears is a different kettle of fish. But one thing is sure— the victim nearly always dies . . . Naturally, being superstitious and a savage to boot, he dies of fright . . . Or does he?
At first I believed something of the sort was the case with Symonds and Chambers. One of them, perhaps helped along in some manner, had already worried himself to death and the other was going the same way. Certainly Chambers had been in a bad way regards his nerves when I had seen him. However, my theory was wrong and I soon had to radically revise it. Within a few hours of leaving Blowne House Chambers 'phoned me and he was hysterical.
'I've got one, by God! The devil's sent me one. Listen, Crow. You must come at once. I went for a drink from your place and I've just got in. Guess what I found in the hall? An envelope, that's what, and there's a damned funny looking card inside it! It's frightening the daylights out of me. He's after me! The swine's after me! Crow, I've sent my man home and locked the doors like you said. I can open the front door electronically from my room to let you in when you arrive. 'You drive a Merc', don't you? Yes, thought so. As soon as you say you'll come FIT put down the 'phone and disconnect it. Now, will you come?'
I told him I would only be a few minutes and hung up. I dressed quickly and drove straight round to his house. The drive took about fifteen minutes for his place lay on the outskirts of town, near the old Purdy Water-mill. The house is completely detached and as I pulled into the driveway I was surprised to note that every light in the house was on — and he main door was swinging open! Then as I slowed to a alt, I was partly blinded by the lights of a second M cedes which revved up and roared past me out onto t ,e road. I leapt out of my car to try to get the other vehicle's number but was distracted from this task by the screams which were just starting.
Within seconds, screams of utter horror were pouring from upstairs and, looking up, I saw a dark shadow cast upon a latticed window. The shadow must have been strangely distorted for it had the general outline of a man, yet it was bulky beyond human dimensions — more like the shadow of a gorilla. I watched, hypnotized, as this black caricature clawed frantically at itself — in a manner which I suddenly recognized! The shadow was using the same brushing motions which I had seen Chambers use earlier to brush those leaves from himself in my hallway.
But surely this could not be Chambers? This shadow was that of a far heavier person, someone obese, even allowing for inexplicable distortion! Horrified, I watched, incapable of movement, as the screams rose to an unbearable pitch and the tottering, clawing shadow grew yet larger. Then, abruptly, the screams gurgled into silence, the shadow's diseased scrabbling at itself became a convulsive heaving and the bloated arms lifted jerkily, as if in supplication. Larger still the monstrous silhouette grew as its owner stumbled, seemingly unseeing, towards the window. And then, briefly as it fell against the thinly-latticed panes, I saw it. A great, black imitation of a human, it crashed through the window, shattering the very frame outwards in a tinkling of broken glass and a snapping of fractured lats. Tumbling into the night it came, to fall with a sickening, bone-breaking crunch at my feet.
The broken thing which lay before me on the gravel of the drive was the quite ordinary, quite lifeless body of Cabot Chambers!
When I was able to bring my shrieking nerves under a semblance of control, I dared to prise open the tightly clenched right hand of the corpse and found that which I had guessed would be there. Those stiffening fingers held crushed, brittle shards which I knew had once had the outlines of a card of some sort. On some of the larger pieces I could make out characters which, so far as I know, can only be likened to certain cuneiform inscriptions on the Broken Columns of Geph.
I 'phoned the police anonymously and quickly left the place, for the smell of weird, unnatural death now hung heavily over the entire house. Poor Chambers, I thought as I drove away — seeing that second Mercedes he must have thought his other visitor was I. I tried not to think about the shadow or what it meant.
I did not sleep too well that night. The first thing I did when I awoke the next morning was to discreetly check up on the activities of a certain Mr James D. Gedney. I have many friends in positions which, to say the least, make them extremely useful to me when a bit of detective work is necessary. These friends helped me now and through their exertions my task was made considerably easier. I checked Gedney's telephone number, which was not in the book, and made notes of his personal likes and dislikes. I memorized the names of his friends and the clubs and places he frequented and generally built up my picture of the man. What I discovered only confirmed Chambers' opinion. Gedney's contacts were the worst sort of people and his favourite haunts were, in the main, very doubtful establishments. He had no visible means of support yet appeared to be most affluent — owning, among his many effects, a large country house and, most interesting yet, a brand-new Mercedes. All the other things I discovered about Gedney paled beside that one fact.
My next logical step, having completed my 'file' on Gedney, was to find out as much as I could about that mystical identity 'The Black,' and towards this end I spent almost a week in the pursuit of certain singular volumes in dim and equally singular archives at the British Museum and in the perusal of my own unusual books. At the museum, with the permission of the Curator of the Special Books Department another friend, I was allowed to study at my leisure all but the most secret and hideous of volumes. I was out of luck. The only reference I found — a thing which, in the light of what I later learned, I find of special significance — was, as was that other reference I have mentioned, in one of my own books. Justin Geoffrey supplied this second fragment in his raving People of the Monolith; but apart from these four inexplicable lines of poetry I found nothing more:
On monoliths did ancients carve their warning
To those who use night's forces lest they bring
A doom upon themselves that when, in mourning,
They be the mourned . . .
Then I remembered an American friend of mine; a man wonderfully erudite in his knowledge of folklore and things of dread and darkness. He had studied in bygone years under that acknowledged genius of Earth's elder-lore, Wilmarth of Miskatonic University. We exchanged one or two interesting telegrams and it was this New Englander who first told me of the Ptetholites — a prehistoric, sub-human race who allegedly were in the habit of calling up devils to send against their enemies. At the very beginning of recorded time, if one can believe the legends of Hyperborea, the Ptetholites sent such devils against Edril Ghambiz and his Hell-Hordes, ensconced on the pre-neolithic isle of Esipish in what was then the North Sea. Unfortunately for the Ptetholites they had seemingly forgotten their own warnings, for it had been elders of their own tribe, in even older days, who had inscribed on the Broken Columns of Geph: