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Chapter V. I Discover Skulls · The House of Skulls

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  Chapter five of the House of Skulls by H. Bedford Jones. This LibriVox
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  recording is in the public domain. Read by Ben Tucker, Chapter five,
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  I Discover Skulls. I stopped at the hotel that night, and the next
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  morning departed to my ranch. It lay about twenty miles from town by road,
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  as I had to get around Mount Conochty to reach it by water,
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  it would be much closer. The ranch lay at the edge of the lake,
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  and Ballyol had done his clearing with the eye of an artist. The
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  house itself was built of rough hewn timber and cement, and was admirably situated
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  at the edge of a small bluff over the water. About it stood gigantic
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  white oaks, while the orchards ran back on the other side of the road.
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  Although I had half expected more excitement on my trip, I met with
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  nothing untoward. In Lakeport. I had loaded up with camping supplies, a
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  bit of forethought which came in handy. As I ran down the side road
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  to the house and opened up the gates, I was filled with delighted anticipation.
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  With half an eye I could see the place where a gym of beauty.
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  The gates open, I ran the car inside, then shut the gates
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  again. I was in my own domain at last. Fortunately I had telephoned
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  the electrical people on the previous afternoon, so that I found the electricity turned
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  on. The place was on the power line, which in California gives right
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  to the juice, whether it be in a desert or a mountain canyon.
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  Of course, one expects to get something for ten thousand cash. But as
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  I opened up the house and saw what things were like, I was astounded.
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  Baliol must have laughed in his sleeve at finding me to be an interior
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  decorator. The place was furnished and literally crammed with things which in New York
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  would have been beyond price. They had come over with the Missourians and Prairie
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  schooners, and Balliol had bought them at various farms for a song. There
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  were two rosewood pianos, one and importation from Holland several ancient clocks with original
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  glass and running order. The chairs were fiddlebacks of crotch mahogany. There were
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  two satin wood cabinets, genuine sheratons, and the beds. Each of the
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  two bedrooms was furnished complete in walnut, not the burl walnut of late Victorian
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  days, but the old carved French walnut of the earliest period. All in
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  all, that furniture was a delight to the heart. On the more practical
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  side, the place was ready for use, from the bedding to the electric
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  stove in the kitchen. By the time I had investigated everything and opened up
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  the house, the morning was nearly gone, and it was about eleven o'clock
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  when I descended the short path that ran down the bluff to the lakeside.
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  Here was a boat house with a short dock beside it. When I had
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  gained access to the boat house by means of Ballyol's keys, I found a
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  launch of small size but sturdy construction, and a fine Morris canoe. Fishing
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  tackles strung the walls, and in one corner was a drum half filled with
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  gasoline. I took out my pipe and sat down in the launch. Not
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  only was everything here which Baliol had described, but more, much more.
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  To think of what I had dropped into astounded me. It was much too
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  good to be true. The acres of fruit trees, which must be worth
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  a good sum as income property, could not out be rented to neighbor ranchers.
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  I resolved to see about it at once. All I wanted was this
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  house and what was in it. No gentleman's ranch for mine, but a
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  gentleman's country home. My ideas had changed since seeing the place brought face to
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  face with pear and walnut trees. As it were, I lost enthusiasm.
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  Fishing, tinkering with old furniture, and painting suited my lazy inclination a good
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  deal better. I'll get something to eat, I said, knocking out my
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  pipe into the water. Then I'll try out the launch and visit the neighbors
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  and see about renting the orchard. It has a crop on right now,
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  so it ought to be a good thing. I trudged back up the path,
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  and when I reached the house, I noticed a curious thing. The
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  foundations were of cement, and a low cement wall foundation ran the full length
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  of the front veranda. There were a number of curious projections from that cement,
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  and when I came up to the wall and examined them, I found
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  that they were human skulls. The gruesome find rather staggered me. They were
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  real skulls set in the cement walls so as to project three or four inches,
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  and they were in good condition. I am not superstitious, and I
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  had no objections to this scheme of decorations on personal grounds. But it struck
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  me that Baliol had carried his search for novelty just a bit too far.
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  It's only a step from Beau's art to bizarre, I reflected, My friend
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  Baliol seems to have taken the step. Where did he get him? I
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  wonder two four, six and even half dozen? Wonder if he put any
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  more inside? I didn't notice them. I hastened inside the house, my
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  thoughts on the big hearth and chimney of cobbles, but I confess that,
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  to my relief, I found it was quite lacking in further remains. All
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  the skulls were outside. With that, I paid little more attention to the
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  matter, practically dismissing it from my mind, and for excellent reasons. I
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  passed out on the verandah, meaning to go round to the car at the
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  side of the house and get my provisions. But at the first step I
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  came to a dead halt, with a cold chill at my throat, upon
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  the cement floor of the veranda were wet tracks. They began at the door
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  and ended abruptly in the middle of the floor. Yet the veranda was empty.
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  Those were not the tracks of a man. Something in their very appearance
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  sent queer horror rippling through me, sent my gaze quickly over my shoulder at
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  the empty house. I had been gone not twenty minutes. These tracks were
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  still wet, and whatever had made them must have come from the lake.
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  While I was down there. Undeniably shaken by the mystery of it, I
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  rushed back through the house to the back door. Absolutely nothing was in sight.
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  I ran around the house, past the car and saw nothing. At
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  the edge of the bluff, I could see the shore line below, and
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  it was deserted. I came back to the veranda and stared again at those
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  tracks, now fast drying. They frightened me. There was something about them,
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  vaguely unnatural. Never in my life had I seen anything like them.
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  Of course, I had opened the wide veranda windows, and a bird might
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  have walked in, then flown out and away. But a bird of this
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  size, a bird from the lake. There was no other water except in
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  the well behind the house, from which the house itself was supplied by an
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  electric motor, and were those the tracks of any bird alive? I doubted
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  it. The size was immense, the shape was that of a small central
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  foot with four immense toes, and beyond these the marks of long claws.
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  Unless I were mistaken, what was the thing? Monster or hallucination? I
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  tried to argue that I was self deceived, and I failed miserably. There
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  were the wet prints on the cement before my eyes, slowly drying away.
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  They could not have been made more than a few moments before I returned from
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  the boat house. I felt suddenly prickly cold and very uncomfortable, and turned
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  into the house to go ahead with luncheon was for the moment impossible. I
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  went into the living room, and as I passed one of the two pianos,
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  I suddenly descried a book lying open upon it. I paused a glance
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  at the book. To my astonishment, I saw upon the printed page a
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  cut of the exact print which I had seen on the veranda. Beneath the
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  illustration was the legend fossil imprint of Pterodactyl marsh collection, Vale College. The
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  realization smote me like a blow. As I leaned over the book and read
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  Balliol had left that book open here. Of course, Balliol had seen the
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  same prince, or had he seen the thing itself? Had he seen the
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  living, actual pterodactyl, the creature that had become extinct when the world began,
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  the flying dragon of myth and legend. He had seen the tracks at
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  any rate, just as I had seen them. This proved that I was
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  under no delusion about those prints. But was the thing credible? It was
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  not. The bowl of this lake was an ancient volcano. The whole valley
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  was of volcanic creation. Mineral springs abounded. A few miles distant were a
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  quicksilver mines. The water in my own well was mineralized. Now, I
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  had read stories about prehistoric monsters coming back into the world via extinct volcanoes and
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  bottomless lakes and so forth, stories that is, which were purely fiction.
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  At such a thing really come about here in Lake County, California, upon
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  my own ranch. Not a damn sight, I exclaimed, throwing the book
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  across the room. Balliol was frightfully nervous. I'm not. He may have
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  been frightened out of here by his imagination, But I am going to be
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  shown. Then and there I dismissed the unnatural fears which had shaken me.
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  If the creature existed, I would shoot it if the whole affair were one
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  of those queer mental quirks which come to all men, if the prints were
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  caused by some natural agency, not at the moment obvious to my deduction,
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  well and good, I went around to the car and hauled in my provisions.
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  The electricity was on in the house, and I got the electric range
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  working and managed to make myself a fairly decent meal. At times I found
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  myself desirous of casting quick glances over my shoulder at windows or doors, but
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  I repressed it firmly. I was not going to get into Balliol's condition if
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  I could help it. Lunch over, I dragged a rocker to the veranda
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  and enjoyed a smoke, with the beauties of the lake outspread before me.
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  My reason of a deep inundation of the lake shore. The bluff on which
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  my house was built faced almost due east opposite me. Across the bight,
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  I saw the roofs of a farmhouse, doubtless my nearest neighbor in that direction.
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  It occurred to me that if I wanted to talk business. The noon
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  hour would be an excellent time to do it, so I went down to
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  the boat house again, opened up the water doors, and filled the boat's
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  tank with gas. She was in good shape, and almost with the first
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  turn of the wheel, the spark caught. A moment later, I was
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  chugging out into the lake, feeling intensely pleased with myself, and I headed
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  directly down to my neighbor's dock among the tools and reeds. The neighbor himself
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  I found sitting on his front porch. He was a brawny bearded man of
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  stolidly slow speech, Henry Dawson by name. I introduced myself as the new
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  owner of Balliol's ranch, and was in turn introduced to missus Dawson into strapping
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  Dawson boys. They all eyed me with frank curiosity. I lost no time
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  in setting forth my business. Dawson, like all farmers, was content to
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  let me talk as long as I would. When I cautiously broached the subject
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  of renting my land, however, he nodded his head in slow assent.
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  I'll to rent, he stated, as though he thought just the opposite.
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  Maybe don't know as folks would want the house, though I want that myself.
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  I said, what I want to rent is the fruit Land. Could
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  you handle it at this direct assault? He hemmed and hawed. He was
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  a very decent chap, however, And when I made it clear that I
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  was not after extortion at rental's, he came around quickly. I could see
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  that the house had killed the place for some reason. Just what's the matter
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  with that house? I demanded, While he was making up his mind about
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  rental, Is it those skulls in the well? Blamed? If I know?
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  He rejoined slowly. Reckon. It's that much as anything gives folks a
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  creepy feeling. Why didn't ballyol get along there? He gave me a slow
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  stare got along? Why? I guess he got along all right. He
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  was kind of queer in his ways, you might say, But he got
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  along right. Well, mister Desmond, Where on earth did he get those
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  skulls? Though? Dug them up right on the ground. I heard he
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  done all the work himself on that house, except what he hired done.
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  Guess it was an old engine cemetery. There's a heap of engines here in
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  the old days, quite a bunch here. Yet they sent them to a
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  reservation with the poor devils got homesick, and were lowed back right prosperous farmers,
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  some of them today. Well about that orchard, I reckon, we
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  can manage it if we set along the right terms. We settled in and
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  there at, terms which were satisfactory to both of us. End of Chapter five