The Terrible Old Man by H.P. Lovecraft
The Terrible Old Man by H.P. Lovecraft Written 28 Jan 1920
It was the design of Angelo Ricci and Joe Czanek and Manuel Silva to call on the
Terrible Old Man. This old man dwells all alone in a very ancient house on Water
Street near the sea, and is reputed to be both exceedingly rich and exceedingly
feeble; which forms a situation very attractive to men of the profession of
Messrs. Ricci, Czanek, and Silva, for that profession was nothing less dignified
than robbery.
The inhabitants of Kingsport say and think many things about the Terrible Old
Man which generally keep him safe from the attention of gentlemen like Mr. Ricci
and his colleagues, despite the almost certain fact that he hides a fortune of
indefinite magnitude somewhere about his musty and venerable abode. He is, in
truth, a very strange person, believed to have been a captain of East India
clipper ships in his day; so old that no one can remember when he was young, and
so taciturn that few know his real name. Among the gnarled trees in the front
yard of his aged and neglected place he maintains a strange collection of large
stones, oddly grouped and painted so that they resemble the idols in some
obscure Eastern temple. This collection frightens away most of the small boys
who love to taunt the Terrible Old Man about his long white hair and beard, or
to break the small-paned windows of his dwelling with wicked missiles; but there
are other things which frighten the older and more curious folk who sometimes
steal up to the house to peer in through the dusty panes. These folk say that on
a table in a bare room on the ground floor are many peculiar bottles, in each a
small piece of lead suspended pendulum-wise from a string. And they say that the
Terrible Old Man talks to these bottles, addressing them by such names as Jack,
Scar-Face, Long Tom, Spanish Joe, Peters, and Mate Ellis, and that whenever he
speaks to a bottle the little lead pendulum within makes certain definite
vibrations as if in answer.
Those who have watched the tall, lean, Terrible Old Man in these peculiar
conversations, do not watch him again. But Angelo Ricci and Joe Czanek and
Manuel Silva were not of Kingsport blood; they were of that new and
heterogeneous alien stock which lies outside the charmed circle of New England
life and traditions, and they saw in the Terrible Old Man merely a tottering,
almost helpless grey-beard, who could not walk without the aid of his knotted
cane, and whose thin, weak hands shook pitifully. They were really quite sorry
in their way for the lonely, unpopular old fellow, whom everybody shunned, and
at whom all the dogs barked singularly. But business is business, and to a
robber whose soul is in his profession, there is a lure and a challenge about a
very old and very feeble man who has no account at the bank, and who pays for
his few necessities at the village store with Spanish gold and silver minted two
centuries ago.
Messrs. Ricci, Czanek, and Silva selected the night of April 11th for their
call. Mr. Ricci and Mr. Silva were to interview the poor old gentleman, whilst
Mr. Czanek waited for them and their presumable metallic burden with a covered
motor-car in Ship Street, by the gate in the tall rear wall of their host’s
grounds. Desire to avoid needless explanations in case of unexpected police
intrusions prompted these plans for a quiet and unostentatious departure.
As prearranged, the three adventurers started out separately in order to prevent
any evil-minded suspicions afterward. Messrs. Ricci and Silva met in Water
Street by the old man’s front gate, and although they did not like the way the
moon shone down upon the painted stones through the budding branches of the
gnarled trees, they had more important things to think about than mere idle
superstition. They feared it might be unpleasant work making the Terrible Old
Man loquacious concerning his hoarded gold and silver, for aged sea-captains are
notably stubborn and perverse. Still, he was very old and very feeble, and there
were two visitors. Messrs. Ricci and Silva were experienced in the art of making
unwilling persons voluble, and the screams of a weak and exceptionally venerable
man can be easily muffled. So they moved up to the one lighted window and heard
the Terrible Old Man talking childishly to his bottles with pendulums. Then they
donned masks and knocked politely at the weather-stained oaken door.
Waiting seemed very long to Mr. Czanek as he fidgeted restlessly in the covered
motor-car by the Terrible Old Man’s back gate in Ship Street. He was more than
ordinarily tender-hearted, and he did not like the hideous screams he had heard
in the ancient house just after the hour appointed for the deed. Had he not told
his colleagues to be as gentle as possible with the pathetic old sea-captain?
Very nervously he watched that narrow oaken gate in the high and ivy-clad stone
wall. Frequently he consulted his watch, and wondered at the delay. Had the old
man died before revealing where his treasure was hidden, and had a thorough
search become necessary? Mr. Czanek did not like to wait so long in the dark in
such a place. Then he sensed a soft tread or tapping on the walk inside the
gate, heard a gentle fumbling at the rusty latch, and saw the narrow, heavy door
swing inward. And in the pallid glow of the single dim street-lamp he strained
his eyes to see what his colleagues had brought out of that sinister house which
loomed so close behind. But when he looked, he did not see what he had expected;
for his colleagues were not there at all, but only the Terrible Old Man leaning
quietly on his knotted cane and smiling hideously. Mr. Czanek had never before
noticed the colour of that man’s eyes; now he saw that they were yellow.
Little things make considerable excitement in little towns, which is the reason
that Kingsport people talked all that spring and summer about the three
unidentifiable bodies, horribly slashed as with many cutlasses, and horribly
mangled as by the tread of many cruel boot-heels, which the tide washed in. And
some people even spoke of things as trivial as the deserted motor-car found in
Ship Street, or certain especially inhuman cries, probably of a stray animal or
migratory bird, heard in the night by wakeful citizens. But in this idle village
gossip the Terrible Old Man took no interest at all. He was by nature reserved,
and when one is aged and feeble, one’s reserve is doubly strong. Besides, so
ancient a sea-captain must have witnessed scores of things much more stirring in
the far-off days of his unremembered youth.