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.The chill and tinderdry end of November: Mr.W.A.Merkel’s tunnel finished on schedule, and the Water Works began laying the two big pipes, forty-two and thirty inches round, that would eventually bring clean drinking water all the way from the new Cahaba Pumping Station.Henry Matthews never went back to the spoil heaps outside the tunnel, never saw Warren Wallace again; the last crate of his Silurian specimens shipped away to Tuscaloosa, and his attentions, his curiosity, shifted instead to the great Warrior coal field north of Birmingham, the smokegray shales and cinnamon sandstones laid down in steamy Carboniferous swamps uncounted ages after the silt and mud, the ancient reefs and tropical lagoons that finally became the strata of Red Mountain, were buried deep and pressed into stone.But the foreman’s pitted chunk of hematite kept in a locked strongbox in one undusted corner of Henry’s room, and wrapped in cheesecloth and excelsior, nestled next to the stone and floating in cloudy preserving alcohol, the thing in the bottle.Kept like an unlucky souvenir or memento of a nightmare, and late nights when he awoke coldsweating and mouth too dry to speak, these were things to take out, to hold, something undeniable to look at by candle or kerosene light.A proof against madness, or a distraction from other memories, blurred, uncertain recollection of what he saw in that last moment before he fell, as the lantern tumbled towards the oilblack water and the darker shape moving just beneath its mirrored surface.All would be well.All would be heavenly—If the damned would only stay damned.—Charles Fort (1919)SourcesWashington Irving: “The Adventure of the German Student”First publication: Tales of a Traveller (London: John Murray, 1824).Text: Washington Irving, Tales of a Traveller, ed.Judith Giblin Haig (The Complete Works of Washington Irving) (Boston: Twayne, 1987).Nathaniel Hawthorne: “Edward Randolph’s Portrait”First publication: United States Magazine and Democratic Review (July 1838).First collection: Twice-Told Tales, revised edition (Boston: James Munroe, 1842).Text: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Twice-Told Tales (The Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Standard Library Edition) (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1883).Edgar Allan Poe: “The Fall of the House of Usher”First publication: Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine (September 1839).First collection: Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (Philadelphia: Lea & Blanchard, 1840).Text: Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe, ed.James A.Harrison (New York: Thomas Y.Crowell Co., 1902), Volume 3.Fitz-James O’Brien: “What Was It?”First publication: Harper’s Magazine (March 1859).First collection: The Poems and Stories of Fitz-James O’Brien, ed.William Winter (Boston: J.R.Osgood, 1881).Text: Fitz-James O’Brien, Collected Stories of Fitz-James O’Brien, ed.Edward J.O’Brien (New York: Albert & Charles Boni, 1925).Ambrose Bierce: “The Death of Halpin Frayser”First publication: Wave (December 19, 1891).First collection: Can Such Things Be? (New York: Cassell, 1893).Text: Ambrose Bierce, The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce (New York & Washington: Neale Publishing Co., 1909-12), Volume 3 (1910).Robert W.Chambers: “The Yellow Sign”First publication: Robert W.Chambers, The King in Yellow (New York: F.Tennyson Neely, 1895).Text: The King in Yellow (New York: F.Tennyson Neely, 1895).Henry James: “The Real Right Thing”First publication: Collier’s Weekly (December 16, 1899).First collection: The Soft Side (New York: Macmillan, 1900).Text: Henry James, The Ghostly Tales of Henry James, ed.Leon Edel (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1949).H.P.Lovecraft: “The Call of Cthulhu”First publication: Weird Tales (February 1928).First collection: The Outsider and Others, ed.August Derleth and Donald Wandrei (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1939).Text: H.P.Lovecraft, The Dunwich Horror and Others, ed.S.T.Joshi (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1984).Clark Ashton Smith: “The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis”First publication: Weird Tales (May 1932).First collection: Out of Space and Time (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1942).Text: Clark Ashton Smith, The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, ed.Steve Behrends (The Unexpurgated Clark Ashton Smith) (West Warwick, RI: Necronomicon Press, 1988).Robert E.Howard: “Old Garfield’s Heart”First publication: Weird Tales (December 1933).First collection: The Dark Man and Others (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1963).Text: Robert E.Howard, The Black Stranger and Other American Tales (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005).Robert Bloch: “Black Bargain”First publication: Weird Tales (May 1942).First collection: Flowers from the Moon and Other Lunacies, ed.Robert M.Price (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1998).Text: Flowers from the Moon and Other Lunacies (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1998).August Derleth: “The Lonesome Place”First publication: Famous Fantastic Mysteries (February 1948).First collection: Lonesome Places (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1962).Text: Lonesome Places (Sauk City, WI: Arkham House, 1962).Fritz Leiber: “The Girl with the Hungry Eyes”First publication: The Girl with the Hungry Eyes, ed.Donald A.Wollheim (New York: Avon, 1949) [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]