Creeps by Night: Chills and Thrills

I turned, and the skirt of the light coat into which I had crammed myself flew up with the speed of my turning. Flew up and brushed against the basket...

It was only the ghost of a creaking sound, so slight as to appear disembodied. But in my present state, it was enough. Ah oath tore itself out of my throat. Tore itself savagely, and savagely fled into the dimness of the room’s corners. I struck out behind me with my left hand. I can still feel, on the left side of my fist, the impression of the wicker...

With a squeaking, rattling, bumping little thud, the thing slid off the table and fell to the carpet.

I meant to go on to the door. I wanted to go on to the door. But I turned round. The basket was lying open. I could see that upon the farther side from me the lid had come away from the rest. A force which was not mine moved my legs. I took a step forward. I stood looking down.

And I looked at the face of Claire... The face of Claire — and the head of Claire and the hair of Claire. The hair of Claire lay spread out in a dusky, misty, glistening cloud upon my gray carpet. And from the head of Claire there came small and dull and sluggish dark streaks to stain my gray carpet...

The Spider by Hanns Heinz Ewers

Translated by Walter F. Kohn

When Richard Bracquemont, medical student, decided to move into Room No. 7 of the little Hotel Stevens at 6 Rue Alfred Stevens, three people had already hanged themselves from the window-sash of the room on three successive Fridays.

The first was a Swiss traveling salesman. His body was not discovered until Saturday evening; but the physician established the fact that death must have come between five and six o’clock on Friday afternoon. The body hung suspended from a strong hook which had been driven into the window-sash, and which ordinarily served for hanging clothes. The window was closed, and the dead man had used the curtain cord as a rope. Since the window was rather low, his legs dragged on the ground almost to his knees. The suicide must consequently have exercised considerable will power in carrying out his intention. It was further established that he was married and the father of four children; that he unquestionably had an adequate and steady income; and that he was of a cheerful disposition, and well contented in life. Neither a will nor anything in writing that might give a clue to the cause of the suicide was found; nor had he ever intimated leanings toward suicide to any of his friends or acquaintances.

The second case was not very different. The actor Karl Krause, who was employed at the nearby Cirque Medrano as a lightning bicycle artiste, engaged Room No. 7 two days after the first suicide. When he failed to appear at the performance the following Friday evening, the manager of the theater sent an usher to the little hotel. The usher found the actor hanged from the window-sash in the unlocked room, in identically the same circumstances that had attended the suicide of the Swiss traveling salesman. This second suicide seemed no less puzzling than the first: the actor was popular, drew a very large salary, was only twenty-five years old, and seemed to enjoy life to the utmost. Again, nothing was left in writing, nor were there any other clues that might help solve the mystery. The actor was survived only by an aged mother, to whom he used to send three hundred marks for her support promptly on the first of each month.

For Madame Dubonnet, who owned the cheap little hotel, and whose clientele was made up almost exclusively of the actors of the nearby vaudevilles of Montmartre, this second suicide had very distressing consequences. Already several of her guests had moved out, and other regular customers had failed to come back. She appealed to the Commissioner of the IXth Ward, whom she knew well, and he promised to do everything in his power to help her. So he not only pushed his investigation of reasons for the suicides with considerable zeal, but he also placed at her disposal a police officer who took up his residence in the mysterious room.

It was the policeman Charles-Maria Chaumié who had volunteered his services in solving the mystery. An old “Marousin” who had been a marine infantryman for eleven years, this sergeant had guarded many a lonely post in Tonkin and Annam single-handed, and had greeted many an uninvited deputation of river pirates, sneaking like cats through the jungle darkness, with a refreshing shot from his rifle. Consequently he felt himself well heeled to meet the “ghosts” of which the Rue Stevens gossiped. He moved into the room on Sunday evening and went contentedly to sleep after doing high justice to the food and drink Madame Dubonnet set before him.