Gerald Kersh - The Best of Gerald Kersh

‘Good heavens!’

‘Perhaps you think that I am mad?’

‘No, no. If you had told me that you had merely been seeing things I might have thought so. But if one’s chessboard flies off the table, that is another matter.’

‘Thank you. I know I am not mad. My name may be unfamiliar to you. Are you interested in chess?’

‘Not very. I hardly know the moves.’

‘Ah. If you were you would have heard of me. I beat Paolino, in the tournament at Pressburg. My game on that occasion has gone down in history. I should certainly have been world champion but for that Thing.’

‘Has it been troubling you for long?’

‘My dear sir, it has given me no peace for twenty years. Conceive; twenty years! It visited me, first of all, when I was in Paris training with Ljubljana. I had been working very hard. I think I had been working nearly all night. I took a hasty lunch, and then lay down and went to sleep. When I woke up I had a feeling that something was wrong: a malaise. I went quickly into my study. What did I see? Chaos!

‘All my books on chess had been taken out of the bookcase and dashed to the floor so violently that the bindings were broken. A photograph of myself in a group of chess-players had been hurled across the room, torn out of the frame, and crumpled into a ball. My chess-pieces were scattered over the carpet. The board had disappeared: I found it later, stuffed up the chimney.

‘I rushed downstairs and complained to the concierge. He swore that nobody had come up. I thought no more of it; but two days later it happened again.’

‘And didn’t you ever see it?’

‘Never. It is a coward. It waits until nobody is looking.’

‘So what did you do?’

‘I ran away. I packed my things, and left that place. I took another flat, in another quarter of Paris. I thought that the house, perhaps, was haunted. I did not believe in such things; but how is it possible to be sure? From the Rue Blanche, I moved to the Boulevard du Temple. There I found that I had shaken it off. I sighed with relief, and settled down once again to my game.

‘And then, when I was once again absorbed, happy, working day and night, it came again.

‘My poor books! Torn to pieces! My beautiful notes – savagely torn to shreds! My beloved ivory pieces – scattered and trampled. Ah, but they were too strong for it. It could destroy books and papers; it could destroy thought; it could destroy the calm detachment and peace of mind necessary to my chess – but my ivory pieces and my inlaid ebony board; those, it has never been able to destroy!’

‘But what happened then?’

‘I ran away again. I found that by moving quickly and suddenly, I could avoid it. I took to living in streets which were difficult to find; complicated turnings, remote back-alleys. And so I often managed to lose it for a while. But in the end, it always found me out. Always, when I thought I had shaken it off for ever; when I settled down to calm work and concentration; there would come a time when I would awake, in horror, and find my papers fluttering in tiny fragments; my pieces in chaos.

‘For years and years I have had no permanent home. I have been driven from place to place like a leaf on the wind. It has driven me all over the world. It has become attached to me. It has learned my scent. The time has come when it does not have to look long for my track. Two days, three days, then it is with me. My God, what am I to do?’

‘Couldn’t you, perhaps consult the Psychical Research people?’

‘I have done so. They are interested. They watch. Needless to say, when they watch, it will not come. I, myself, have sat up for nights and nights, waiting for it. It hides itself. And then – the moment comes when I must sleep – and in that moment——

‘Coward! Devil! Why won’t it show its face? How can I ask anybody for help? How can I dare? Nobody would believe. They would lock me up in an asylum. No no, there is no help for me.

‘No help. Look, I ran away from it last night. I came here today. Yet it found me, this evening. There is no escape. It has caught up with me. It is on my heels. Even at this moment, it is sitting behind me. I am tired of running away. I must stay awake, but I long for sleep. Yet I dare not go to sleep. If I do, it will creep in. And I am tired out.

‘Oh, my God, what can I do? It is with me now. This very night. If you don’t believe me, come and see.’

Shakmatko led me out, to the door of his room. There, clinging to my arm, he pointed.

The chessboard lay in the fireplace. The pieces were scattered about the room, together with hundreds of pieces of paper, torn as fine as confetti.

‘What can I do,’ asked Shakmatko.

I picked up the chessmen, and, replacing the board on the table, arranged them in their correct positions. Then, turning to Shakmatko, I said:

‘Listen. You’re tired. You’ve got to get some sleep. You come and sleep in my bed. I’ll watch.’

‘You are a man of high courage,’ said Shakmatko. ‘God will bless you. And you, damned spirit of anarchy——’ He shook his fist at the empty room.

I took him back, and covered him with my blanket. Poor old man, he must have been nearly dead for want of rest! He gave a deep sigh, and was asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow.

I tiptoed to his room and sat down. I did not really believe in ghosts; but for all that, I kept my eye on the chessboard, and turned up the collar of my coat so as to protect my ears in the event of flying bishops.

An hour must have passed.

Then I heard a sound.

It was unmistakably a footstep. I clenched my fists and fixed my eyes on the door. My heart was drumming like rain on a tin roof. A floorboard creaked. The handle of the door turned and the door opened.

I had already steeled myself to the expectation of something white, something shadowy, or some awful invisibility. What I actually saw proved to be far more horrible.

It was Shakmatko. His eyes were wide open, but rolled up so that only the bloodshot white parts were visible. His face was set in a calm expression. His hands were held out in front of him: he was walking in his sleep.

I leapt up. I meant to cry out: ‘Shakmatko!’ but my tongue refused to function. I saw him walk steadily over to the table sweep the pieces off the board with a terrific gesture, and fling the board itself against the opposite wall.

The crash awoke him. He gave a start which shook him from head to foot. His eyes snapped back to their normal positions, and blinked, in utter terror, while his voice broke out:

‘Damn you! Have you found me out again? Have you hunted me down again so soon? Accursed——’

‘Shakmatko,’ I cried, ‘you’ve been walking in your sleep.’

He looked at me. His large, whitish eyes dilated. He brandished a skinny fist.

‘You!’ he said to me, ‘you! Are you going to say that, too?’

‘But you were,’ I said. ‘I saw you.’

‘They all say that‚’ said Shakmatko, in a tone of abject hopelessness. ‘They all say that. Oh, God, what am I to do? What am I to do?’

I returned to my room. For the rest of the night there was complete quiet, but it was nearly dawn before I managed to fall asleep.

I awoke at seven. I was drawn, as by a magnet, to Shakmatko’s room. I dressed, went to his door, and tapped very gently. There was no answer. It occurred to me that he had run away. I opened the door and looked in. Shakmatko was lying in bed. His head and one arm hung down.

He looked too peaceful to be alive.

I observed, among the chessmen on the floor, a little square bottle labelled Luminal.

In that last sleep Shakmatko did not walk.