Speaker 1: Darkness by Charles Hilend Craig I am told that coincidence
Speaker 1: in a story is an element for which editors and
Speaker 1: readers have a dislike, which approaches the sparkling. But if
Speaker 1: a story be thirty three and a third percent of
Speaker 1: each coincidence imagination on the part of the principal character
Speaker 1: and irony, what then Coincidence, which is another name for destiny,
Speaker 1: played its trump early in the life of Graham Fletcher,
Speaker 1: in fact, before his life began, but it was many
Speaker 1: years before the stakes were dragged across the table of
Speaker 1: life and into the lap of a sneering fate. He
Speaker 1: had all started when his father, John Fletcher, was carried
Speaker 1: home after a terrific explosion in which he lost an
Speaker 1: arm and the sight in two perfectly good eyes. His
Speaker 1: young wife fainted at the horror of it, and only
Speaker 1: a week later Graham Fletcher was born into the world.
Speaker 1: While on the wall opposite the mother's bed, a dread
Speaker 1: phantom played hide and seek with the tremendous human eye,
Speaker 1: the half of which was missing, And the years which
Speaker 1: followed baared mute witness that in that terrible hour a
Speaker 1: gargantuan fear was transmitted to the soul of young Fletcher
Speaker 1: a fear of blindness. Two. The daily sight of his
Speaker 1: stricken father had its influence upon the boy as he
Speaker 1: passed through his early youth blindness indelibly there was seared
Speaker 1: on his brain, the fear of it, the horror of it.
Speaker 1: It was when he was fourteen that a prophecy was
Speaker 1: made about him. Now the fortune teller had given ample
Speaker 1: proof that she was just as elaborate a liar as
Speaker 1: the average fortune teller is supposed to be. She didn't
Speaker 1: try to tell his fortune in the orthodox way, however,
Speaker 1: in fact, he didn't want her to tell it. It
Speaker 1: so happened that young Graham was just as full of
Speaker 1: old nick as any boy. It seemed human nature to him, then,
Speaker 1: to hurl pebbles at the horse tied behind the gypsy's wagon.
Speaker 1: He meant no real harm, but that did not prevent
Speaker 1: a jagged pebble from striking an eye of one of
Speaker 1: the horses in such a manner as to cause the
Speaker 1: animal to scream fearfully, while blood spurted from the injured optic.
Speaker 1: The wrath of the woman fell upon the boy. Hoarsely.
Speaker 1: She spoke to him in broken English for that you pay. Hey,
Speaker 1: see you blind this horse. One day you be blind too,
Speaker 1: then you die. No doubt she would have done more
Speaker 1: than prophesy had it not been for the crowd near
Speaker 1: at hand. But it was more than enough. She had
Speaker 1: set her mark upon the so of young Graham Fletcher.
Speaker 1: He would not forget. And so was another coincidence born
Speaker 1: almost an inexcusable one. The years passed deeper and deeper
Speaker 1: into the being of Graham Fletcher pushed that phantom of unrest.
Speaker 1: He had gone home crying after the incident with the
Speaker 1: fortune teller, but he was never to forget. It was
Speaker 1: shortly after that that his imagination began to work. Overtime.
Speaker 1: He had bad dreams. That was the first development. In
Speaker 1: these dreams, he saw a hideous old hag with vulpine
Speaker 1: features and hawk like claws striving to reach his face
Speaker 1: his eyes. Bad dreams at night, if continued, easily, give
Speaker 1: rise to day dreams. Now, day dreams are supposed to
Speaker 1: be pleasant. They are if you sleep well. But Graham
Speaker 1: Fletcher didn't, and so he began to see things even
Speaker 1: in the day. Many things happened which increased his fear.
Speaker 1: There was the time a hard bodied little bug got
Speaker 1: into his eye. It sickened him, but his terror overcame.
Speaker 1: Even the feeling of nausea. A life in utter dark,
Speaker 1: such as that his father was leading, stared him in
Speaker 1: the face. He was afraid. Of course, there had been
Speaker 1: other incidents. Once he had tried to play football, a
Speaker 1: rough tackle which resulted in a black eye, put the
Speaker 1: taboo upon that forever. Then there was the incident of
Speaker 1: the automobile race, when a driver ran through the fence
Speaker 1: and a splinter of board struck Fletcher in the face,
Speaker 1: breaking his glasses and cutting a deep gash under the
Speaker 1: left eye. The whole world, it seemed, was conspiring to
Speaker 1: do with the sight of Graham Fletcher. Thereafter, he never
Speaker 1: attended the races, and though he needed spectacles, he never
Speaker 1: wore them. Fletcher, of course, had his recurrent nightmare. Strange
Speaker 1: to relate. The old gipsy woman failed to appear again. Instead,
Speaker 1: it was something intangible yet quite real, which oppressed him.
Speaker 1: The change made it all the more certain he was doomed.
Speaker 1: He never could figure out his illusion satisfactorily. Sometimes he
Speaker 1: seemed to be crushed under a weight that all the
Speaker 1: power of the world could not move. Again, it seemed
Speaker 1: that he was dropped through infinite space, always though there
Speaker 1: was a sense of his eyes being dragged out of him.
Speaker 1: At first, his awakenings would be with tears, Then as
Speaker 1: he grew older, he would awaken in a state of cold,
Speaker 1: clammy sweat. After the dream, there was little sleep for
Speaker 1: him again the same night. It was when he was
Speaker 1: nineteen that he felt claws on his eyes. Thereafter, he
Speaker 1: left the light burning in his room when he went
Speaker 1: to bed. It was only natural that Fletcher should try
Speaker 1: to find things to keep him occupied, so that he
Speaker 1: would have no time to think of his illusions. He
Speaker 1: kept busy, but the phantoms continued to come. He welcomed
Speaker 1: with avidity the chance to go into the north Woods
Speaker 1: for a short stay with two friends. For a time,
Speaker 1: Fletcher was so busily engaged in the hunt that he
Speaker 1: forgot his troubles. All would have gone well, perhaps, had
Speaker 1: he not been left alone That night in the cabin,
Speaker 1: Jones and Gordon tramped over to the station together to
Speaker 1: get supplies. They promised to be back before dark, and
Speaker 1: Fletcher had no premonition of impending disaster. During the afternoon,
Speaker 1: he had hiked through the woods and later wrote several letters.
Speaker 1: It was when the shadows became a bit flickery that
Speaker 1: Graham Fletcher felt the chill of the bitter cold creep
Speaker 1: through him. Twilight fell. The black shadow among the trees
Speaker 1: had arms, now arms that groped for him, blind arms.
Speaker 1: They were blind. He fled to the safety of the cabin.
Speaker 1: For a few minutes, the light gave him comfort. Then
Speaker 1: he saw the shadows in the cabin, shadows that moved.
Speaker 1: He jerked open the cupboard and took down a flat bottle.
Speaker 1: He tasted the liquid, drank. He tried to read, but
Speaker 1: the shadows kept creeping up one side of the page.
Speaker 1: The shadows sometimes they seemed to form claws, claws that
Speaker 1: reached for his eyes. He drank again and again. Then
Speaker 1: he decided that his partners had stayed over at the station,
Speaker 1: so he went to bed, leaving the light burning on
Speaker 1: the table. He put the flashlight near him. His thoughts
Speaker 1: eased back over other days. He kept his mind from
Speaker 1: the specter, and finally fell asleep. He dreamed. This time
Speaker 1: a new trouble beset him. That bottle whiskey. He had
Speaker 1: read of a number of deaths resulting from the drinking
Speaker 1: of wood alcohol in liquor. Now he tossed feverishly, and
Speaker 1: after a while went to sleep again. The tall, old
Speaker 1: fashioned clock, to which he had paid scant attention, awakened
Speaker 1: him when it struck seven. He lay for a moment,
Speaker 1: thinking seven the sun would be up. And blackness was
Speaker 1: like a pall about him. It was thick, hideous. He
Speaker 1: could almost feel it, hear it, taste it. Blackness. Could
Speaker 1: it be that he had heard wrong? That it was
Speaker 1: still night? No where the lamp had been left burning
Speaker 1: on the table, he could see no light. A cry
Speaker 1: of agonized dismay burst from his lips. His senses reeled,
Speaker 1: but by a powerful effort of his will, he was
Speaker 1: able to reach the flashlight full into his eyes. He
Speaker 1: left it for a long minute. There was no answering glow. God,
Speaker 1: he said, Ah, fool that you are, Graham Fletcher. Had
Speaker 1: you but looked at the oil lamp, you would have
Speaker 1: realized that it would not burn more than an hour?
Speaker 1: And did you not throw away the useless battery in
Speaker 1: the flashlight? Yourself blind? You are not blind, Graham Fletcher,
Speaker 1: but you do not know this. You are moaning softly
Speaker 1: as you reach for the gun beside your bed. It
Speaker 1: is but the work of a moment to put the
Speaker 1: end of the barrel in your mouth and push the
Speaker 1: trigger with your toe. There destiny has raked the table
Speaker 1: clean once more. Jones and Gordon were appalled when they
Speaker 1: saw the body of the suicide stretched out on the floor.
Speaker 1: No possible motive made itself apparent to them. I suggest
Speaker 1: that this was a story or coincidence. There is but
Speaker 1: one thing more. It is for the friends to glance
Speaker 1: at the clock, note that it is five hours fast,
Speaker 1: and buy some hocus pocus, decide at what hour their
Speaker 1: friend took his own life. But they don't look, and
Speaker 1: therein is the irony. The clock will tick merrily on
Speaker 1: until it has run down. The End of Darkness by
Speaker 1: Charles Hill and Craig