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Page 1 : WIDDERSHINS by OLIVER ONIONS 1911 "From Ghaisttes, Ghoulies and long-leggity Beasties and Things that go Bump in the night-- "Good Lord, deliver us!" NOTE I have pleasure in acknowledging the courtesy of the proprietors of "Shurey's Publications" by whose permission "The Cigarette Case" is included in the present volume. Also it has been suggested that a definition should be given of the word that forms the volume's title. That word means "contrary to the course of the Sun." O.O. CONTENTS I. THE BECKONING FAIR ONE II. PHANTAS III. ROOUM IV. BENLIAN V. IO VI. THE ACCIDENT VII. THE CIGARETTE CASE VIII. THE ROCKER IX. HIC JACET THE BECKONING FAIR ONE I The three or four "To Let" boards had stood within the low paling as long as the inhabitants of the little triangular "Square" could remember, and if they had ever been vertical it was a very long time ago.

Page 13 : "It's no good, Elsie. I'm responsible for the way I go, and you must allow me to go it--even if it should seem wrong to you. Believe me, I am giving thought to it.... The manuscript? I was on the point of burning it, but I didn't. It's in that window-seat, if you must see it." Miss Bengough crossed quickly to the window-seat, and lifted the lid. Suddenly she gave a little exclamation, and put the back of her hand to her mouth. She spoke over her shoulder: "You ought to knock those nails in, Paul," she said. He strode to her side. "What? What is it? What's the matter?" he asked. "I did knock them in--or, rather, pulled them out." "You left enough to scratch with," she replied, showing her hand. From the upper wrist to the knuckle of the little finger a welling red wound showed. "Good--Gracious!" Oleron ejaculated.... "Here, come to the bathroom and bathe it quickly--" He hurried her to the bathroom, turned on warm water, and bathed and cleansed the bad gash.

Page 25 : He walked slowly for a reason, twice turning away from the house within a stone's-throw of the gate and taking another turn of twenty minutes or so. He had a very ticklish piece of work now before him; it required the greatest mental concentration; it was nothing less than to bring his mind, if he might, into such a state of unpreoccupation and receptivity that he should see the place as he had seen it on that morning when, his removal accomplished, he had sat down to begin the sixteenth chapter of the first Romilly. For, could he recapture that first impression, he now hoped for far more from it. Formerly, he had carried no end of mental lumber. Before the influence of the place had been able to find him out at all, it had had the inertia of those dreary chapters to overcome. No results had shown. The process had been one of slow saturation, charging, filling up to a brim. But now he was light, unburdened, rid at last both of that Romilly and of her prototype.

Page 37 : "I'd seen her with him ... they was often together ... she came into my shop and said it was for him ... I thought it was all right ... 111333 the number was," the man was saying. The people seemed to be very angry; many police were keeping them back; but one of the inspectors had a voice that Oleron thought quite kind and friendly. He was telling somebody to get somebody else into the cab before something or other was brought out; and Oleron noticed that a four-wheeler was drawn up at the gate. It appeared that it was himself who was to be put into it; and as they lifted him up he saw that the inspector tried to stand between him and something that stood behind the cab, but was not quick enough to prevent Oleron seeing that this something was a hooded stretcher. The angry voices sounded like a sea; something hard, like a stone, hit the back of the cab; and the inspector followed Oleron in and stood with his back to the window nearer the side where the people were.

Page 49 : The inn was only a roadside beerhouse--I have forgotten its name--and all its sleeping accomodation was the one double-bedded room. Over the head of my own bed the ceiling was cut away, following the roof-line; and the wallpaper was perfectly shocking--faded bouquets that made V's and A's, interlacing everywhere. The other bed was made up, and lay across the room. I think I only spoke once while we were making ready for bed, and that was when Rooum took from his black hand-bag a brush and a torn nightgown. "That's what you always carry about, is it?" I remarked; and Rooum grunted something: Yes ... never knew where you'd be next ... no harm, was it? We tumbled into bed. But, for all the lateness of the hour, I wasn't sleepy; so from my own bag I took a book, set the candle on the end of the mantel, and began to read.

Page 61 : We spent the morning there, with dozens of doctors coming and going. Then we left. All the way home in the cab Benlian chuckled to himself. "That scared 'em, Pudgie!" he chuckled. "A man they can't X-ray--that scared 'em! We must put that down in the diary--" "Wasn't it ripping!" I chuckled back. He kept a sort of diary or record. He gave it to me afterwards, but they've borrowed it. It was as big as a ledger, and immensely valuable, I'm sure; they oughtn't to borrow valuable things like that and not return them. The laughing that Benlian and I have had over that diary! It fooled them all--the clever X-ray men, the artists of the academies, everybody! Written on the fly-leaf was "To My Pudgie." I shall publish it when I get it back again. Benlian had now got frightfully weak; it's awfully hard work, passing yourself. And he had to take a little milk now and then or he'd have died before he had quite finished.

Page 73 : They sat down at a corner table not far from the slowly moving four-bladed propeller. "Now we can talk," Romarin said. "I'm glad, glad to see you again, Marsden." It was a peculiarly vicious face that he saw, corrugated about the brows, and with stiff iron-grey hair untrimmed about the ears. It shocked Romarin a little; he had hardly looked to see certain things so accentuated by the passage of time. Romarin's own brow was high and bald and benign, and his beard was like a broad shield of silver. "You're glad, are you?" said Marsden, as they sat down facing one another. "Well, I'm glad--to be seen with you. It'll revive my credit a bit. There's a fellow across there has recognised you already by your photographs in the papers.... I assume I may...?" He made a little upward movement of his hand. It was a gin and bitters Marsden assumed he might have. Romarin ordered it; he himself did not take one.

Page 85 : "We were round at the restaurant by half-past nine. The case wasn't there. I'd known jolly well beforehand it wasn't, and I saw Rangon's mouth twitching with amusement. "'So we now seek the abode of these English ladies, hein?' he said. "'Yes,' said I; and we left the restaurant and strode through the village by the way we'd taken the evening before.... "That vigneron's smile became more and more irritating to me.... 'It is then the next village?' he said presently, as we left the last house and came out into the open plain. "We went back.... "I was irritated because we were two to one, you see, and Carroll backed me up. 'A double door, with a grille in front of it,' he repeated for the fiftieth time.... Rangon merely replied that it wasn't our good faith he doubted. He didn't actually use the word 'drunk.'... "'Mais tiens,' he said suddenly, trying to conceal his mirth. 'Si c'est possible... si c'est possible...

Page 97 : But suddenly he had opened them, and the next moment had sat up on his pillow. He had striven to draw his hand from mine. "Who are you?" he had suddenly demanded, not knowing me. I had come close to him. "You know me, Andriaovsky--Harrison?" I had asked sorrowfully. I had been on the point of repeating my name but suddenly, after holding my eyes for a moment with a look the profundity and familiarity of which I cannot express, he had broken into the most ghastly haunting laugh I have ever heard. "Harrison?" the words had broken throatily from him.... "Oh yes; I know you!... You shall very soon know that I know you if... if..." The cough and rattle had come as Maschka had rushed into the room. In ten seconds Andriaovsky had fallen back, dead. II That same evening I began to make notes for Andriaovsky's "Life." On the following day, the last of the fourth series of the Martin Renards occupied me until I was thankful to get to bed.

Page 109 : I waited, but nothing happened. It seemed that if this was my attempt to justify myself, the plea was certainly not disallowed. But neither had I any sign that it was allowed; and presently it occurred to me that possibly I had couched it in terms too general. Perhaps a more particular claim would meet with a different reception. During the earlier stages of the book's progress I had many times deliberated on the desirability of a Preface that should state succinctly what I considered to be my qualifications for the task. Though I had finally decided against any such statement, the form of the Preface might nevertheless serve for the present occasion. I took another sheet of paper, headed it "Preface," and began once more to write. I covered the page; I covered a second; and half-way down the third I judged my statement to be sufficient. Again I laid down my pen, leaned back, and waited. The Preface also produced no result whatever. Again I considered; and then I saw more clearly.