The Fontana Book of Great Horror Stories (1966)

After having spent a twelve-month of my life cobbling together the pages of my Pandaemonian blog, I found I really rather missed the routine I had gotten into of reading a story of an evening (occasionally more than one, less occasionally just a bit of one), penning my scribbles during my lunch break at work, to be uploaded into the blog after tea.  And then repeating (and repeating and repeating) the process.

So, in order to somehow extend the fun, I decided to repeat the process with the perhaps rather less well-celebrated Fontana Book of Great Horror Stories series.  I noted the presumptuous interjection of the word “Great” into the series title.  I would be the judge of that, I felt.    

Whilst I did feel at times that revisiting the PBoHS series was a touch like hooking up with an old flame from my teenage years, before commencing this lot I did wonder if reading these Fontana ones may be rather more like a date with my old flame’s rather dowdy sister.  For the Fontana series, for whatever reason, never enjoyed quite the same allure as Bertie’s collection back in the day.  It was the covers, perhaps – they just appeared at times to be trying too hard.  Bertie’s were effortlessly gross.

I did have a couple of the Fontana series within my teenaged library; the Fifth perhaps and certainly the Seventh, but looking at the story titles within those collections today, few of them (the memorably odd Tcheriapin, a stark exception) rang any bells, far less jogged any memory as to their respective narratives.  So: Virgin Territory in many ways.

When reviewing Pan1 I had expressed surprise that Bertie had not opened his maiden volume with one of the rather better known short stories of the genre (Bram Stoker’s The Squaw, was one I had suggested.)  And blow me down, here we had Christine Bernard (compiler of the inaugural Fontana Book of Horror Stories - or Font1 as I shall call it for brevity in future) opening with just that very tale.  And, with a further odd twist, Ms. Bernard choosing to end her debut collection with the same author (the cerebral Joan Aiken) with whom Bertie had opened his series.

It is notable (if perhaps not surprising) just how many authors appear in Font1 who had pitched up in the early PBoHS volumes.  Aside from the aforementioned Stoker and Aiken there was Robert Aickman, Algernon Blackwood, Ray Bradbury, Agatha Christie, L.P. Hartley and Nigel Kneale.  Add to this list the gothic heavyweights Hugh Walpole and Saki, and clearly Fontana was going for the same highbrow status Bertie had aspired to during his opening few volumes.  

It would be interesting to discover, as I meandered through the series, how long these lofty ideals were upheld.

THE SQUAW

By Bram Stoker

A newly married, and already bickering, couple are glad to fall in tow with a brash American tourist during their honeymoon in Nurnburg.  When their new friend accidentally kills a kitten, he laughs off the mother cat’s attempts to get even.  But this is a particularly resourceful feline, and content to bide her time.

Although Bran Stoker is best known for Dracula; his rather po-faced examination of sexual frustration, I am sure he is having a little fun with us with this one.  His tongue must surely have been wedged firmly in his cheek when he had the newly married groom state “My wife and I being in the second week of our honeymoon, naturally wanted someone else to join our party”.  

For apparently, not only did the gooseberry stop the lovers quarreling, but the bride took to subsequently advising “all her friends to take a friend on the honeymoon”.  Perhaps old Bram’s own honeymoon in Paris in 1878 had been a similar disappointment?

Whilst the titular cat, which coincidentally starred on the cover of the original print run of Pan1, was a memorably feisty beast, the real star of this yarn is the American Elias P Hutcheson.  Yet he is painted in such large brush-strokes, and is heard spouting such clichéd Wild West-isms and frankly unlikely tales - “slept inside a dead baffler” - that surely Stoker was drifting into parody here. 

And do not forget for all his bluff geniality and tall tales, Hutcheson also had a rather nasty side.  He tells a tale of a squaw whom he “wiped out” for flaying a man – a man whose skin Hutcheson claimed to have had made into the cover for his pocket book!

Whilst The Squaw is on the surface a Poe-faced revenge tale, I cannot help but feel Stoker’s prime motivation for writing the thing was to have a poke at our transatlantic cousins.  The one in this story brought to heel partly through the actions of a little ole puddy tat, but mostly through his own arrogant stupidity.

NO STRONGER THAN A FLOWER

By Robert Aikman

Despite claiming it is for her and not for him, within a few months of their wedding Curtis is dropping hints to his wife Nesta that she should “do something about her looks”.  Cue a visit by Nesta to the enigmatic Mrs. De Milo.  The changes are initially subtle, but become more marked as the months go on - both in Nesta’s appearance and behaviour.

I am touch unsure what exactly to make of this one, as the author deliberately left many aspects of the narrative unexplained; not least the form Nesta’s treatment actually took.  But, I suppose, from the point of view of progressing the plot that did not really matter.  It is the significance of the rampantly growing fingernails (although we only have Nesta’s word for this) which defeated me.  And just where did all her newly-acquired wealth come from?

After a second reading of the story, I decided it was one of those Careful-What-You-Wish-For fables, with Curtis getting far more than he bargained for with his upgraded spouse.

I did wonder if Curtis' insistent “suggestions” to his Wife were in some way linked to his obsession with a former lover – he having “in his early twenties loved a woman of great beauty”.  He wished his plain-jane wife to look more like his ex perhaps?  But what the formidable Mrs. De Milo somehow achieved was a literal transformation of Nesta’s body and soul into that of Curtis’ former paramour.  This would shed a ray of light on Nesta’s enigmatic assertion “I’m not out of my mind…Out of my body perhaps”

Whatever has occurred, what is apparent is that proceedings swiftly degenerate into a rather one-sided psychological battle of the sexes, with the hapless Curtis hopelessly outgunned.

Note:  One upside to the story was that in reading it I added a new word to my vocabulary: Maenads.  Although quite how I am going to introduce it into everyday conversation I have not yet worked out.

TARNHELM

By Hugh Walpole

It is 1890 and, as his parents are off helping to run The Raj, the narrator finds himself farmed out to Cumbria to a pair of elderly uncles over the Christmas holidays.  Uncle Constance, although likeable is a bit of a wet, totally dominated by his creepy elder brother Robert who lives alone in a tower on the estate.

Accepting an invite from Robert to look around his apartments changes the narrator's life forever.

A most enjoyable, if a touch formulaic gothic horror story this one, featuring a selection of the usual ingredients: a rambling old house, family secrets and goings-on which may or may not be supernatural.  Some of the descriptive scene-setting prose is beautifully evocative though:

“The naked, unsystematic hills, the freshness of the wind on which birds seemed to be carried with especial glee…”

The motivations behind Uncle Robert’s shenanigans are never made clear, but I suppose the fact that they clearly were not benign is all that matters.  If I do have a criticism, it is that Uncle Constance finally overcoming his fear of his elder brother does close the action out rather too conveniently.  

There is a strong homo-erotic element to the relationship between the narrator and the house servant Bob, for they are never done jumping into each other’s beds for the narrator to enjoy a bit of “comforting arms”, “the warmth of his breath” or the “protection of his strength”.  I may have put this down to writing from more naïve times, were it not for the fact I knew Walpole to have been gay himself.

Numerous other (now largely forgotten) authors are mentioned in the narrative: Robert and Elizabeth Browning, Elizabeth Barratt and William Ainsworth.  Perhaps this sort of name-checking was standard practice back in the day, but today it reads like an early form of product-placement.  

THE GIPSY

By Agatha Christie

Dickie Carpenter has long had an aversion to gipsies – a consequence of a recurring childhood dream in which a female gipsy would ominously pitch up.  His subsequent adulthood encounters with gipsies (possibly the same gipsy in each case) all entailed being given some thinly-veiled yet maddeningly-vague warning.  Which Dickie invariably ignored - the final one, fatally so

His friend Mcfarlane, in whom he had earlier confided his woes sets out to get to the bottom of things.

A delightful reminder for any of us who needed reminding that there was far more to the writings of the redoubtable Ms. Christie than Poirot, Tommy and Tuppence and Carry On Up The Vicarage murders.  For the lady could certainly pen a creepy tale; her 1933 collection The Hound of Death from which The Gipsy is taken being a prime example.

This one weaves fate, reincarnation, second-sight and star-crossed lovers to grand effect. 

A CASE OF EAVESDROPPING

By Algernon Blackwood

Jim Shorthouse is down on his luck “in a large American city”, so has offered his services as a reporter to the local rag, in order to finance his spartan single-room accommodation.

One night after coming in late, he overhears a row between a father and his son in the room next door.  But all goes eerily silent when he raps on the door of the apartment. 

A tolerable enough ghost story, this one, but hardly one which would stand up to repeated readings.  The tension in the yarn builds well until the introduction of the worm-thingy into the narrative, which makes no real sense at all.  In fact, it almost appears as if the author had run out of ideas so decided to inject a monster into proceedings.

An older and more worldly-wise version of Jim Shorthouse appears  in Algernon Blackwood’s tale “The Strange Adventures of a Private Secretary in New York” (in Pan3), which is a far more satisfying read.  Although in both, when I think about it, the bulk of the action takes place when the unfortunate Shortman’s attempts to get some shut-eye are thwarted by weird goings on.

This younger Shortman is actually a bit of a dullard, and is effortlessly upstaged by his delightfully potty landlady, who takes all the ghostly business in her stride.   

It is interesting to note perhaps that Blackwood actually lived for New York for a period, employed (amongst many other things) both as a reporter and later as a private secretary.

THE POND

By Nigel Kneale

The old man (we never learn his name) just loves his amateur taxidermy; capturing and killing frogs from the pool near his house, then to stuff, dress and pose them as humans.  But when he takes the last frog, The Pond decides the old man deserves a taste of his own medicine.

The Hoist with His Own Petard revenge tale is a pulp horror staple, and this is an enjoyable one such served up a la Weird Tales by Nigel “Quatermass” Kneale.  Indeed it is a yarn which almost cries out to be told in picture form; Graphic Novels do they call them these days?   Although, in the prose, the nuts and bolts of how The Pond actually did what it did are glossed over. 

I did like the way the old man was lured to his fate by The Pond (somehow) mimicking the croaking of frogs, in a similar manner to how he had enticed his own victims.  Also, the rather less subtle touch of the position in which he was left posed.  

WILLIAM AND MARY

By Roald Dahl

Recently widowed Mary receives from her solicitor a letter written by her husband just before his death.  Reading it she learns William had agreed to be the subject of a bizarre experiment in which his brain - with a single, seeing eyeball still attached - was removed from his body immediately after death, and is now a sentient entity.

Initially indignant, then curious, Mary toddles along to be reunited with what remains of her husband, before deciding she would perhaps rather like to take him home.

  

Although, as with most of his stories-for-adults, written with a twinkle in his eye, it is clear Dahl put in a deal of medical research here, in an attempt to produce a remotely credible background to the preposterous premise of the tale.

Although he, perhaps wisely chose to forego explaining how exactly the brain was going to be kept supplied with both oxygen and glucose, and also how it was going to be maintained infection-free without the aid of an immune system.

But ultimately, the whole brain business is naught but a prop to the real plot.  Which has the previously downtrodden Mary not only getting to indulge in those things previously forbidden to her (television, cigarettes etc.), but being able to do so in full view of her disapproving husband.  Or at least part of him.

Ignore the wonky science if you can, and what remains is an extremely entertaining yarn.  But is it a horror story?  I am not so sure.

  

As an aside; Irvine Welsh took the premise of the plot a stage further in his rather less successful short story Vat 96

THE TWO VAYNES

By L.P. Hartley

Vayne owns a lot of statues, which he houses each in their own little nook (or temenos, as he calls them) in the garden of his country house.  Amongst all the “gods and goddesses, nymphs and satyrs” he also keeps one in his own likeness, with which he enjoys startling his guests.  

When he attempts, with the aid of the narrator, to play the trick on Fairclough, another house-guest, things do not go quite as planned.

A pleasingly disorientating journey this one, particularly those two passages where Hartley interjects the bath business seemingly at random points in the narrative.

Running through the text is all manner of linguistic wordplay - indeed the narrator himself states at one point "I adore puns".  We have the obvious play on the statue-owner's name, then there is the little stand/lie joke later made by the narrator.  Also, slightly more oddly, the narrator when reprimanded for picking at the loose plaster on the statue's stocking, somewhat incongruously retorts: “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pull your leg”.

The hide-and-seek scene, I found a touch dizzying what with all those footprints in the wet grass.  But my interpretation is that Vayne, with the aid of the booby-trapped bath, murdered Postgate before covering the body in plaster and moulding the features to resemble his own, then setting the “sculpture” in place in his collection.  Two years later, the corpse perhaps fed up at being used as a prop to frighten guests, somehow re-animates and does for Vayne.

THE NEXT IN LINE

By Ray Bradbury

Middle-aged couple Joseph and Marie are on vacation in a “small colonial Mexican town”.  Joseph is keen to visit the local cemetery where mummified corpses are on display; the bodies of individuals removed from their graves when relatives found themselves unable to pay the taxes on the plot.

Marie is, perhaps understandably less keen, particularly so after having just witnessed the funeral procession of a child.  Her experience in the vault sets in place a series of events which will result in Joseph driving home alone a few days later.

  

I have to own up to having been completely wrong-footed by this one, when I first read it some years back.  For I was sure, after Joseph’s offer to buy one of the mummies was rebuffed, there was going to be an attempt to steal one – the failure of which would result in Joseph (or Mary, or both) being added to the collection.  Had this tale been written by one of the PBoHS regular authors, I am sure that would have been how it panned out.  However, this is a Bradbury, and that means subtlety. 

Next in Line is such a well-known story of Bradbury’s that it has already been discussed to death on the web, so I am not really going to attempt to add to the oeuvre.  Such in-depth examinations lie outwith the remit of my superficial scribblings anyway.

What I will say is that, although the narrative explores such areas as communication failure within a failed relationship, the changes ageing imparts upon all our bodies, and the differing cultural attitudes to death, what we really have here I think is a murder story.

Marie’s descent into madness and (we may assume) subsequent death is at the heart of the tale.  Joseph’s smile as he leaves the town suggesting this had been his scheme all along.     

IN THE STEAM ROOM

By Frank Baker

The narrator is enduring, (rather than enjoying) a session in the steam room of a Turkish bath, until he finally decides he can bear the heat no longer.  As he is leaving he glances at the only other occupant and is alarmed to see a stream of blood emanating from the other’s head.  Moving closer to investigate, he finds there is actually no-one there at all!

Shaken, he decides a massage is what is required to “erase the discomfiture”.

A endearing time-slip ghost story this one, spoiled a touch by the author’s dated verbosity.  Which I found particularly odd, given this tale was written (or at least first published) as late as 1966.  Baker also appeared to be a bit of a name-dropper as Socrates, Pontius Pilate and Francis Bacon all find themselves rather incongruously dragged into the narrative.

THE INTERLOPERS

By Saki

The Znaeym and von Gradwitz families have been bickering over a disputed strip of forest in the Carpathian Mountains for three generations.  When Ulrich von Gradwitz catches Goerg Znaeym poaching on his land, it seems the feud is likely to reach a deadly conclusion.  But a falling tree intervenes, pinning both men to the ground.  An initially uneasy truce breaks out between the two, before each eventually come to realise the foolishness of their ways and vow to forgive and forget.

But there are others nearby, who are about to pitch up to pointedly remind both men just who truly owns the forest and who are the real interlopers.

I have not read many short stories by Saki (H.H. Munro), but any I have encountered I have always enjoyed the author’s crisp characterisation and intriguing plot lines.  Barely a word is wasted in this short 6½ pager – as opposed to the flannelly waffle of the previous entry.  That being said, one could argue the Deus ex Machina which puts the feuding pair in the pickle they find themselves in, does stretch the reader’s credulity more than a touch.

But ultimately this unlikely event is merely a tool to drive the narrative towards its unforgettable final-word climax.

   

THE CAT JUMPS

By Elizabeth Bowen

Rose Hill, an impressive Thameside property has lain empty since a brutal murder took place there two years earlier.  Enter the scientifically pragmatic Wrights who purchase the place without a qualm.  However, a housewarming party to which they have invited five friends does not go to plan.

This was my first encounter with Elizabeth Bowen, and I was struck by her eccentric, perhaps even unique prose style.  Although dating from between the wars, her dry sense of humour had at times much more of a Sixties feel to it, whilst at other points the narrative drifted into the realm of some sort of lower-middle class comedy of manners.  

The scene where she has the seven adults sitting around discussing and reading from “Freud, Forel, Weiniger, and the heterosexual volume of Havelock Ellis” is surely a chunk of vicious satire.

The actual climax to the story is more than a touch vague, and one could argue nothing supernatural or even sinister has gone on, beyond a loopy woman padding about in the night locking everyone into their bedrooms.  Good fun – but a horror story?  Not in a million years.   

THE BOARDED WINDOW

By Ambrose Bierce

Murlock has lived for what appears like forever alone in his remote forest shack.  When he is found dead, the narrator recalls an incident many years earlier when a very much in love Murlock lost his wife.

Rather like The Interlopers earlier in this volume, The Boarded Window relies upon a jarring final sentence to inject true horror into what had hitherto been an eminently readable, if horror-free yarn.  It fails, however, to hold quite the power of Saki’s tale due to the fact Murlock’s wife is so lightly sketched by the author.  We do not even get to know her name and hence her passing, and method thereof, does not quite impact upon the reader as it might.    

MARMALADE WINE
By Joan Aiken

Small-time journalist and aspiring poet Blacker whilst out on a woodland stroll comes across a remote cottage; the weekend retreat of famous surgeon Sir Francis Deeking.  Whilst over-indulging in Deeking's hospitality (and potent marmalade wine), Blacker spins a tale of having vague clairvoyant powers, which he may occasionally use to good effect at the races or on the stock-market.

Deeking, slightly financially embarrassed following his poor-health imposed early retirement, decides Blacker would be a useful chap to have around so takes steps (ha-ha) to ensure he cannot leave.

Aiken’s prose is never less than immensely readable, although I am not ashamed to admit to on two occasions (with “Tartarus” and “Threnody”) having to resort to an online dictionary to help me out.  

She opens the story by painting a picture of a veritable Eden; scattering anemones, hazels and dog’s-mercury throughout the scenery, as well as throwing the almost obligatory cuckoo.  But it is the jarring sight of a dead male pheasant in all its courting regalia which foreshadows the encounter to come.

Of course, the journalist has no gift of foresight; otherwise he would have turned tail and fled as soon as he saw the “small, secretive flint cottage”.  And once this fact finally becomes apparent to the unhinged Sir Francis, one can only imagine Blacker will be losing rather more than just his feet.