The Portal To Power by Greye La Spina

Book Details

The Portal To Power by Greye La Spina is a serial novel about a cult of Devil worshipers in a hidden valley in the Rocky Mountains. They seek the Philosopher’s Stone, as well as a Priestess to bring the Ancient Gods back to this plane of existence.

The Portal To Power was first published in Weird Tales in four installments from the October, 1930 issue through the January, 1931 issue.

Fanny Greye Bragg La Spina, writing as Greye La Spina (1880-1969) was one of the founding female authors of the modern horror story.

The Portal To Power has 4 illustrations.

Files:

1. LaSpina-PortalToPower.epub

Excerpt: The Portal To Power

Chapter 1

THERE was a slim horned moon sailing through the murky sky, across which ragged gray clouds scudded as if bent on secret missions. The dry October air was full of the subdued whistling of windy gusts that burst unexpectedly from one side or another, whipping the mantled cloak of the old doctor away from his meager, wiry body. Underlying those occasional sibilant whines of tearing wind was a boding silence that John Peabody disliked.

Fifty years of medical service to all sorts of people under every possible condition had intensified his natural intuitiveness; he had become peculiarly sensitive to psychic impressions. To him the night was uncanny. Upon its beating wings the wind bore dark influences from which the old man shrank distastefully. Nor did the appearance of Hannah Wake’s place serve as a sedative to his tingling nerves.

The tumbledown shanty that had, in wretched fashion, sheltered the old woman as far back as the doctor could remember looked more than ordinarily eery under the dim, reluctant light of that fragile moon, precariously hurdling the clouds in the dark sky. The hovel, once a pretty cottage covered with innocent climbing roses (just as Hannah Wake had once worn the graces of vivacious, charming girlhood), was now reduced to ugliness by age, neglect, and other subtler forces, at thought of which the old man winced; for he had seen that pretty young Hannah altered horribly by the same mysterious powers into a hideous and loathsome hag, pointed at in the village as a witch, and avoided by all save evil-dispositioned persons whose malevolent personal motives drove them to brave the night terrors of that grinning warlock in her own background.

The doctor had walked; his modest coupé was undergoing repairs, and it was less than a mile out of the village. He was carrying his black bag and was further burdened by a small brown paper parcel such as small-town stores use for wrapping food. He paused at the broken-down gate, that creaked dismally on its broken hinges, gave an impatient sigh, and scowled at the unpleasantness of his surroundings.

“Dirty night,” commented the doctor aloud, and grunted with disgust as he picked his way through the tall weeds that covered his mantle with burrs and stickers as he pushed among those usurpers of the once neat flagstone path. His footsteps echoed dully, making a kind of ominous clamor in the hushes of the whistling gale.

At his approach, the door of the hovel swung silently open, disclosing a yawning and oppressive gulf of blackness beyond the threshold. No sound greeted the doctor’s ears. He hesitated perceptibly before plunging into that heavy murk, apparently untenanted. His feet dragged reluctantly, but his powerful will swept him along. As he stepped inside he spoke, scornful protest in his level tones.

“Hannah! It is quite unnecessary to play your silly tricks on me. I know you too well.”

A kind of hysterical gurgle welled uncannily out of the inner murk. “Hush . . .” was pushed at him. Then the door slammed at his very heels.

At sound of the bolt sliding home, the doctor started violently and whirled about, thrusting his right hand out to grasp the person who had shut off his retreat. The swirling of the close air as he moved told him that his groping hand had been purposely evaded. Again he spoke sharply:

“Hannah! Don’t be an utter fool.”

The reply was the crackle of a match struck briskly, and the individual who lighted the candle standing on a rickety table in the middle of the room paid no attention to her guest, but shielded the flickering flame’s slow growth with solicitous hands. From under her left elbow, which held the beast strained to her side, a thin black cat squawled querulously. In one shadowy corner a dog yelped eerily. The growing light swelled up behind gross fingers, illuminating with play of shadow and high-light the hideous countenance of the old woman bending above it.

Doctor Peabody pushed his shell-rimmed bifocal spectacles farther up on his aristocratic nose and cast a flashing glance about that miserable room, taking in with that shrewd look of comprehension the pallet of old rags upon a mattress of straw; the handful of picked-over nuts on the table; and the wretched, starved-looking black cat that mewed occasionally as if in protest, from its dangling position over the old woman’s left arm.

“On a blustering night like this, after I’ve had a trying day, you send for me, Hannah,” reproached the doctor, still standing near the door, the black bag on the floor at his feet. “Had I found you sick—”

“Sickness would be nothing in comparison with my reason for calling you here tonight,” Hannah Wake defended herself with heavy significance. Her thick lips parted over toothless gums as she added in a hoarse whisper: “Tonight . . . the messenger comes.”

Excerpt From: Greye La Spina. “The Portal To Power.”