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Title: Wailing Well
Author: James, Montague Rhodes (1862-1936)
Date of first publication: 1928
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   "The Collected Ghost Stories of M. R. James"
   (New York: Longmans, Green;
   London: Edward Arnold, 1931)
   [first edition]
Date first posted: 25 May 2013
Date last updated: 25 May 2013
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #1077

This ebook was produced by:
Delphine Lettau, Mary Meehan, Mark Akrigg
& the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
at http://www.pgdpcanada.net






                             WAILING WELL


                            By M. R. JAMES




In the year 19-- there were two members of the Troop of Scouts attached
to a famous school, named respectively Arthur Wilcox and Stanley
Judkins. They were the same age, boarded in the same house, were in the
same division, and naturally were members of the same patrol. They were
so much alike in appearance as to cause anxiety and trouble, and even
irritation, to the masters who came in contact with them. But oh how
different were they in their inward man, or boy!

It was to Arthur Wilcox that the Head Master said, looking up with a
smile as the boy entered chambers, "Why, Wilcox, there will be a deficit
in the prize fund if you stay here much longer! Here, take this
handsomely bound copy of the _Life and Works of Bishop Ken_, and with it
my hearty congratulations to yourself and your excellent parents." It
was Wilcox again, whom the Provost noticed as he passed through the
playing fields, and, pausing for a moment, observed to the Vice-Provost,
"That lad has a remarkable brow!" "Indeed, yes," said the Vice-Provost.
"It denotes either genius or water on the brain."

As a Scout, Wilcox secured every badge and distinction for which he
competed. The Cookery Badge, the Map-making Badge, the Life-saving
Badge, the Badge for picking up bits of newspaper, the Badge for not
slamming the door when leaving pupil-room, and many others. Of the
Life-saving Badge I may have a word to say when we come to treat of
Stanley Judkins.

You cannot be surprised to hear that Mr. Hope Jones added a special
verse to each of his songs, in commendation of Arthur Wilcox, or that
the Lower Master burst into tears when handing him the Good Conduct
Medal in its handsome claret-coloured case: the medal which had been
unanimously voted to him by the whole of Third Form. Unanimously, did I
say? I am wrong. There was one dissentient, Judkins _mi._, who said that
he had excellent reasons for acting as he did. He shared, it seems, a
room with his major. You cannot, again, wonder that in after years
Arthur Wilcox was the first, and so far the only boy, to become Captain
of both the School and of the Oppidans, or that the strain of carrying
out the duties of both positions, coupled with the ordinary work of the
school, was so severe that a complete rest for six months, followed by a
voyage round the world, was pronounced an absolute necessity by the
family doctor.

It would be a pleasant task to trace the steps by which he attained the
giddy eminence he now occupies; but for the moment enough of Arthur
Wilcox. Time presses, and we must turn to a very different matter: the
career of Stanley Judkins--Judkins _ma._

Stanley Judkins, like Arthur Wilcox, attracted the attention of the
authorities; but in quite another fashion. It was to him that the Lower
Master said with no cheerful smile, "What, again, Judkins? A very little
persistence in this course of conduct, my boy, and you will have cause
to regret that you ever entered this academy. There, take that, and
that, and think yourself very lucky you don't get that and that!" It was
Judkins, again, whom the Provost had cause to notice as he passed
through the playing fields, when a cricket ball struck him with
considerable force on the ankle, and a voice from a short way off cried,
"Thank you, cut-over!" "I think," said the Provost, pausing for a moment
to rub his ankle, "that that boy had better fetch his cricket ball for
himself!" "Indeed, yes," said the Vice-Provost, "and if he comes within
reach, I will do my best to fetch him something else."

As a Scout, Stanley Judkins secured no badge save those which he was
able to abstract from members of other patrols. In the cookery
competition he was detected trying to introduce squibs into the Dutch
oven of the next-door competitors. In the tailoring competition he
succeeded in sewing two boys together very firmly, with disastrous
effect when they tried to get up. For the Tidiness Badge he was
disqualified, because, in the Midsummer schooltime, which chanced to be
hot, he could not be dissuaded from sitting with his fingers in the ink:
as he said, for coolness' sake. For one piece of paper which he picked
up, he must have dropped at least six banana skins or orange peels. Aged
women seeing him approaching would beg him with tears in their eyes not
to carry their pails of water across the road. They knew too well what
the result would inevitably be. But it was in the life-saving
competition that Stanley Judkins's conduct was most blameable and had
the most far-reaching effects. The practice, as you know, was to throw a
selected lower boy, of suitable dimensions, fully dressed, with his
hands and feet tied together, into the deepest part of Cuckoo Weir, and
to time the Scout whose turn it was to rescue him. On every occasion
when he was entered for this competition Stanley Judkins was seized, at
the critical moment, with a severe fit of cramp, which caused him to
roll on the ground and utter alarming cries. This naturally distracted
the attention of those present from the boy in the water, and had it not
been for the presence of Arthur Wilcox the death-roll would have been a
heavy one. As it was, the Lower Master found it necessary to take a firm
line and say that the competition must be discontinued. It was in vain
that Mr. Beasley Robinson represented to him that in five competitions
only four lower boys had actually succumbed. The Lower Master said that
he would be the last to interfere in any way with the work of the
Scouts; but that three of these boys had been valued members of his
choir, and both he and Dr. Ley felt that the inconvenience caused by the
losses outweighed the advantages of the competitions. Besides, the
correspondence with the parents of these boys had become annoying, and
even distressing: they were no longer satisfied with the printed form
which he was in the habit of sending out, and more than one of them had
actually visited Eton and taken up much of his valuable time with
complaints. So the life-saving competition is now a thing of the past.

In short, Stanley Judkins was no credit to the Scouts, and there was
talk on more than one occasion of informing him that his services were
no longer required. This course was strongly advocated by Mr. Lambart:
but in the end milder counsels prevailed, and it was decided to give him
another chance.

       *       *       *       *       *

So it is that we find him at the beginning of the Midsummer Holidays of
19-- at the Scouts' camp in the beautiful district of W (or X) in the
county of D (or Y).

It was a lovely morning, and Stanley Judkins and one or two of his
friends--for he still had friends--lay basking on the top of the down.
Stanley was lying on his stomach with his chin propped on his hands,
staring into the distance.

"I wonder what that place is," he said.

"Which place?" said one of the others.

"That sort of clump in the middle of the field down there."

"Oh, ah! How should I know what it is?"

"What do you want to know for?" said another.

"I don't know: I like the look of it. What's it called? Nobody got a
map?" said Stanley. "Call yourselves Scouts!"

"Here's a map all right," said Wilfred Pipsqueak, ever resourceful,
"and there's the place marked on it. But it's inside the red ring. We
can't go there."

"Who cares about a red ring?" said Stanley. "But it's got no name on
your silly map."

"Well, you can ask this old chap what it's called if you're so keen to
find out." "This old chap" was an old shepherd who had come up and was
standing behind them.

"Good morning, young gents," he said, "you've got a fine day for your
doin's, ain't you?"

"Yes, thank you," said Algernon de Montmorency, with native politeness.
"Can you tell us what that clump over there's called? And what's that
thing inside it?"

"Course I can tell you," said the shepherd. "That's Wailin' Well, that
is. But you ain't got no call to worry about that."

"Is it a well in there?" said Algernon. "Who uses it?"

The shepherd laughed. "Bless you," he said, "there ain't from a man to a
sheep in these parts uses Wailin' Well, nor haven't done all the years
I've lived here."

"Well, there'll be a record broken to-day, then," said Stanley Judkins,
"because I shall go and get some water out of it for tea!"

"Sakes alive, young gentleman!" said the shepherd in a startled voice,
"don't you get to talkin' that way! Why, ain't your masters give you
notice not to go by there? They'd ought to have done."

"Yes, they have," said Wilfred Pipsqueak.

"Shut up, you ass!" said Stanley Judkins. "What's the matter with it?
Isn't the water good? Anyhow, if it was boiled, it would be all right."

"I don't know as there's anything much wrong with the water," said the
shepherd. "All I know is, my old dog wouldn't go through that field, let
alone me or anyone else that's got a morsel of brains in their heads."

"More fool them," said Stanley Judkins, at once rudely and
ungrammatically. "Who ever took any harm going there?" he added.

"Three women and a man," said the shepherd gravely. "Now just you listen
to me. I know these 'ere parts and you don't, and I can tell you this
much: for these ten years last past there ain't been a sheep fed in that
field, nor a crop raised off of it--and it's good land, too. You can
pretty well see from here what a state it's got into with brambles and
suckers and trash of all kinds. _You've_ got a glass, young gentleman,"
he said to Wilfred Pipsqueak, "you can tell with that anyway."

"Yes," said Wilfred, "but I see there's tracks in it. Someone must go
through it sometimes."

"Tracks!" said the shepherd. "I believe you! Four tracks: three women
and a man."

"What d'you mean, three women and a man?" said Stanley, turning over for
the first time and looking at the shepherd (he had been talking with his
back to him till this moment: he was an ill-mannered boy).

"Mean? Why, what I says: three women and a man."

"Who are they?" asked Algernon. "Why do they go there?"

"There's some p'r'aps could tell you who they _was_," said the shepherd,
"but it was afore my time they come by their end. And why they goes
there still is more than the children of men can tell: except I've heard
they was all bad 'uns when they was alive."

"By George, what a rum thing!" Algernon and Wilfred muttered: but
Stanley was scornful and bitter.

"Why, you don't mean they're deaders? What rot! You must be a lot of
fools to believe that. Who's ever seen them, I'd like to know?"

"_I've_ seen 'em, young gentleman!" said the shepherd, "seen 'em from
near by on that bit of down: and my old dog, if he could speak, he'd
tell you he've seen 'em, same time. About four o'clock of the day it
was, much such a day as this. I see 'em, each one of 'em, come peerin'
out of the bushes and stand up, and work their way slow by them tracks
towards the trees in the middle where the well is."

"And what were they like? Do tell us!" said Algernon and Wilfred
eagerly.

"Rags and bones, young gentlemen: all four of 'em: flutterin' rags and
whity bones. It seemed to me as if I could hear 'em clackin' as they got
along. Very slow they went, and lookin' from side to side."

"What were their faces like? Could you see?"

"They hadn't much to call faces," said the shepherd, "but I could seem
to see as they had teeth."

"Lor'!" said Wilfred, "and what did they do when they got to the trees?"

"I can't tell you that, sir," said the shepherd. "I wasn't for stayin'
in that place, and if I had been, I was bound to look to my old dog:
he'd gone! Such a thing he never done before as leave me; but gone he
had, and when I came up with him in the end, he was in that state he
didn't know me, and was fit to fly at my throat. But I kep' talkin' to
him, and after a bit he remembered my voice and came creepin' up like a
child askin' pardon. I never want to see him like that again, nor yet no
other dog."

The dog, who had come up and was making friends all round, looked up at
his master, and expressed agreement with what he was saying very fully.

The boys pondered for some moments on what they had heard: after which
Wilfred said: "And why's it called Wailing Well?"

"If you was round here at dusk of a winter's evening, you wouldn't want
to ask why," was all the shepherd said.

"Well, I don't believe a word of it," said Stanley Judkins, "and I'll go
there next chance I get: blowed if I don't!"

"Then you won't be ruled by me?" said the shepherd. "Nor yet by your
masters as warned you off? Come now, young gentleman, you don't want for
sense, I should say. What should I want tellin' you a pack of lies? It
ain't sixpence to me anyone goin' in that field: but I wouldn't like to
see a young chap snuffed out like in his prime."

"I expect it's a lot more than sixpence to you," said Stanley. "I expect
you've got a whisky still or something in there, and want to keep other
people away. Rot I call it. Come on back, you boys."

So they turned away. The two others said, "Good evening" and "Thank you"
to the shepherd, but Stanley said nothing. The shepherd shrugged his
shoulders and stood where he was, looking after them rather sadly.

On the way back to the camp there was great argument about it all, and
Stanley was told as plainly as he could be told all the sorts of fools
he would be if he went to the Wailing Well.

That evening, among other notices, Mr. Beasley Robinson asked if all
maps had got the red ring marked on them. "Be particular," he said, "not
to trespass inside it."

Several voices--among them the sulky one of Stanley Judkins--said, "Why
not, sir?"

"Because not," said Mr. Beasley Robinson, "and if that isn't enough for
you, I can't help it." He turned and spoke to Mr. Lambart in a low
voice, and then said, "I'll tell you this much: we've been asked to warn
Scouts off that field. It's very good of the people to let us camp here
at all, and the least we can do is to oblige them--I'm sure you'll agree
to that."

Everybody said, "Yes, sir!" except Stanley Judkins, who was heard to
mutter, "Oblige them be blowed!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Early in the afternoon of the next day, the following dialogue was
heard. "Wilcox, is all your tent there?"

"No, sir, Judkins isn't!"

"That boy is _the_ most infernal nuisance ever invented! Where do you
suppose he is?"

"I haven't an idea, sir."

"Does anybody else know?"

"Sir, I shouldn't wonder if he'd gone to the Wailing Well."

"Who's that? Pipsqueak? What's the Wailing Well?"

"Sir, it's that place in the field by--well, sir, it's in a clump of
trees in a rough field."

"D'you mean inside the red ring? Good heavens! What makes you think he's
gone there?"

"Why, he was terribly keen to know about it yesterday, and we were
talking to a shepherd man, and he told us a lot about it and advised us
not to go there: but Judkins didn't believe him, and said he meant to
go."

"Young ass!" said Mr. Hope Jones, "did he take anything with him?"

"Yes, I think he took some rope and a can. We did tell him he'd be a
fool to go."

"Little brute! What the deuce does he mean by pinching stores like that!
Well, come along, you three, we must see after him. Why can't people
keep the simplest orders? What was it the man told you? No, don't wait,
let's have it as we go along."

And off they started--Algernon and Wilfred talking rapidly and the other
two listening with growing concern. At last they reached that spur of
down over-looking the field of which the shepherd had spoken the day
before. It commanded the place completely; the well inside the clump of
bent and gnarled Scotch firs was plainly visible, and so were the four
tracks winding about among the thorns and rough growth.

It was a wonderful day of shimmering heat. The sea looked like a floor
of metal. There was no breath of wind. They were all exhausted when they
got to the top, and flung themselves down on the hot grass.

"Nothing to be seen of him yet," said Mr. Hope Jones, "but we must stop
here a bit. You're done up--not to speak of me. Keep a sharp look-out,"
he went on after a moment, "I thought I saw the bushes stir."

"Yes," said Wilcox, "so did I. Look ... no, that can't be him. It's
somebody though, putting their head up, isn't it?"

"I thought it was, but I'm not sure."

Silence for a moment. Then:

"That's him, sure enough," said Wilcox, "getting over the hedge on the
far side. Don't you see? With a shiny thing. That's the can you said he
had."

"Yes, it's him, and he's making straight for the trees," said Wilfred.

At this moment Algernon, who had been staring with all his might, broke
into a scream.

"What's that on the track? On all fours--O, it's the woman. O, don't let
me look at her! Don't let it happen!" And he rolled over, clutching at
the grass and trying to bury his head in it.

"Stop that!" said Mr. Hope Jones loudly--but it was no use. "Look here,"
he said, "I must go down there. You stop here, Wilfred, and look after
that boy. Wilcox, you run as hard as you can to the camp and get some
help."

They ran off, both of them. Wilfred was left alone with Algernon, and
did his best to calm him, but indeed he was not much happier himself.
From time to time he glanced down the hill and into the field. He saw
Mr. Hope Jones drawing nearer at a swift pace, and then, to his great
surprise, he saw him stop, look up and round about him, and turn quickly
off at an angle! What could be the reason? He looked at the field, and
there he saw a terrible figure--something in ragged black--with whitish
patches breaking out of it: the head, perched on a long thin neck, half
hidden by a shapeless sort of blackened sun-bonnet. The creature was
waving thin arms in the direction of the rescuer who was approaching, as
if to ward him off: and between the two figures the air seemed to shake
and shimmer as he had never seen it: and as he looked, he began himself
to feel something of a waviness and confusion in his brain, which made
him guess what might be the effect on someone within closer range of
the influence. He looked away hastily, to see Stanley Judkins making his
way pretty quickly towards the clump, and in proper Scout fashion;
evidently picking his steps with care to avoid treading on snapping
sticks or being caught by arms of brambles. Evidently, though he saw
nothing, he suspected some sort of ambush, and was trying to go
noiselessly. Wilfred saw all that, and he saw more, too. With a sudden
and dreadful sinking at the heart, he caught sight of someone among the
trees, waiting: and again of someone--another of the hideous black
figures--working slowly along the track from another side of the field,
looking from side to side, as the shepherd had described it. Worst of
all, he saw a fourth--unmistakably a man this time--rising out of the
bushes a few yards behind the wretched Stanley, and painfully, as it
seemed, crawling into the track. On all sides the miserable victim was
cut off.

Wilfred was at his wits' end. He rushed at Algernon and shook him. "Get
up," he said. "Yell! Yell as loud as you can. Oh, if we'd got a
whistle!"

Algernon pulled himself together. "There's one," he said, "Wilcox's: he
must have dropped it."

So one whistled, the other screamed. In the still air the sound carried.
Stanley heard: he stopped: he turned round: and then indeed a cry was
heard more piercing and dreadful than any that the boys on the hill
could raise. It was too late. The crouched figure behind Stanley sprang
at him and caught him about the waist. The dreadful one that was
standing waving her arms waved them again, but in exultation. The one
that was lurking among the trees shuffled forward, and she too stretched
out her arms as if to clutch at something coming her way; and the other,
farthest off, quickened her pace and came on, nodding gleefully. The
boys took it all in in an instant of terrible silence, and hardly could
they breathe as they watched the horrid struggle between the man and his
victim. Stanley struck with his can, the only weapon he had. The rim of
a broken black hat fell off the creature's head and showed a white skull
with stains that might be wisps of hair. By this time one of the women
had reached the pair, and was pulling at the rope that was coiled about
Stanley's neck. Between them they overpowered him in a moment: the awful
screaming ceased, and then the three passed within the circle of the
clump of firs.

Yet for a moment it seemed as if rescue might come. Mr. Hope Jones,
striding quickly along, suddenly stopped, turned, seemed to rub his
eyes, and then started running _towards_ the field. More: the boys
glanced behind them, and saw not only a troop of figures from the camp
coming over the top of the next down, but the shepherd running up the
slope of their own hill. They beckoned, they shouted, they ran a few
yards towards him and then back again. He mended his pace.

Once more the boys looked towards the field. There was nothing. Or, was
there something among the trees? Why was there a mist about the trees?
Mr. Hope Jones had scrambled over the hedge, and was plunging through
the bushes.

The shepherd stood beside them, panting. They ran to him and clung to
his arms. "They've got him! In the trees!" was as much as they could
say, over and over again.

"What? Do you tell me he've gone in there after all I said to him
yesterday? Poor young thing! Poor young thing!" He would have said more,
but other voices broke in. The rescuers from the camp had arrived. A few
hasty words, and all were dashing down the hill.

They had just entered the field when they met Mr. Hope Jones. Over his
shoulder hung the corpse of Stanley Judkins. He had cut it from the
branch to which he found it hanging, waving to and fro. There was not a
drop of blood in the body.

On the following day Mr. Hope Jones sallied forth with an axe and with
the expressed intention of cutting down every tree in the clump, and of
burning every bush in the field. He returned with a nasty cut in his leg
and a broken axe-helve. Not a spark of fire could he light, and on no
single tree could he make the least impression.

I have heard that the present population of the Wailing Well field
consists of three women, a man, and a boy.

The shock experienced by Algernon de Montmorency and Wilfred Pipsqueak
was severe. Both of them left the camp at once; and the occurrence
undoubtedly cast a gloom--if but a passing one--on those who remained.
One of the first to recover his spirits was Judkins _mi._

Such, gentlemen, is the story of the career of Stanley Judkins, and of a
portion of the career of Arthur Wilcox. It has, I believe, never been
told before. If it has a moral, that moral is, I trust, obvious: if it
has none, I do not well know how to help it.




[End of Wailing Well, by M. R. James]
