Voodoo Tales: The Ghost Stories of Henry S Whitehead (Tales of Mystery & The Supernatural) Read Online Free PDF Page A

her flowered muslin dress of a century ago had chosen to depict the execution of a pirate, and – the pirate could have been none other than Fawcett.
    There could be no doubt about it whatever. That bloody villain was the only pirate that had been executed at St Thomas – except his own two mates who had paid the penalty of their murderous rascality at the same time – and this was a picture of St Thomas, painted photographically, apparently from the deck of some vessel conveniently anchored offshore.
    The costumes, too, were of Fawcett’s period. His execution had taken place in September, 1824, and that, too, fixed the period of the painting.
    High as the colors were pitched, stilted as were the many characters, there was something convincingly lifelike about the thing. Apparently this picture had been painted from actual observation.
    The colors too, on reflection, were not so much exaggerated. Did not one do well here to wear smoked glasses in the middle of the day? Was not the glowing indigo of the Caribbean incredible – the scarlet of the hibiscus painful to the unaccustomed eye?
    I fastened up the canvas with carpet tacks on the wall of my workroom where it would catch the north light. I began at its upper corners, pressing tacks along its upper edge, and then, pulling it down flat, inserted others along the lower edge and up the sides.
    The last tack went through the arm of one of Fawcett’s lieutenants, just where he had hurtled through the air at the end of his rope over at the extreme lefthand of the picture. A little, trailing ‘C. L.’ was the signature.
    That afternoon at Estate Montparnasse, where I had been invited hospitably for tea, I told my kind hosts, the Maclanes, about my find. And I made it an excuse – though none was needed – to ask them to drive in for tea with me the following afternoon.
    When they saw it I think it made the same impression on them that it had upon me, at first. I imagine that only their impeccable courtesy prevented their telling me that I had been gloating over something very like a chromo!
    It was Miss Gertrude Maclane who first began to get the real charm of it. I noticed her leaning close and examining it very carefully.
    Suddenly, as I talked with Mr and Mrs Maclane, there came from Miss Gertrude a little, smothered cry – an exclamation almost like a sigh – but so poignant, though subdued, that her mother turned quickly toward her on hearing it. We both stepped toward her.
    ‘What is it, Miss Gertrude?’ I inquired.
    ‘What is it, my dear?’ echoed her mother.
    ‘It’s this poor creature,’ replied Miss Gertrude Maclane, indicating the fellow whose arm I had transfixed.
    ‘Why – he’s in agony! It’s dreadful, I think! It’s wonderfully done. It quite startled me, in fact. The little figures are wonderfully done, if you look at them closely. I think they must – some of them, anyhow – be portraits, just as you said yesterday, Mr Canevin. This one, certainly, is almost uncanny.’
    We all looked at the dangling fellow. I had not seen him since yesterday. Curious! He was not, as I had supposed, dangling . He was hurtling through the air; had not quite reached the end of that fatal fall from the drop where stood the hangman, a terrible, fierce fellow.
    No – the rope was not yet wholly taut. That knot of seven turns had not broken the poor devil’s neck. He was as alive as any of the spectators.
    But it was not this new interpretation of the artist’s skill, not the look of tortured horror, which had so moved Miss Gertrude. No!
    What caused me to close my eyes in a spasmodic, futile effort to shut out a deeper horror, caused me to lean heavily against the table, fighting to retain some measure of my composure, was the fact that the man’s expression had changed since yesterday . Now out of his horror-shot, protruding, agonized eyes came straight at me a look of strange reproachfulness.
    And down his little, painted arm, from the place where I