Link to article: SCP-9000 — Woman in Grey OFFSET 3.
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[[include theme:black-highlighter-theme]] [[include :scp-wiki:theme:scp-offices-theme]] [[div style="border:solid 1px #999999; background:#f2f2c2; padding:5px; margin-bottom: 10px;"]] You are reading **Document 4 of 5**, dated **1921/10/27** to **1921/12/12**. [[/div]] //The following cache of letters was discovered in 2018, as part of RAISA and the Department of Investigative Research's re-evaluation of SCP-9799. It was located in an uncatalogued ancillary section of the HMFSCP archives.// > [[>]] > Helby Hall > > 27th October, 1921 > [[/>]] > > Nicholas, > > I do not know how long it has been - only that I am sorry. I write as if in fever; the electric light is humming above me, casting light out onto the gardens, warming me with its glow. It is four in the morning, and I cannot sleep. > > When we fought, some two decades ago now - how time flies! - I slandered you with all manner of claims. I said you were delusional, cruel, self-indulgent; I called you a liar. I write now to apologise. You were correct, I see now, entirely correct, because I have just seen what I accused you of inventing. > > Let me start at the beginning. You have not seen the house in a long time, but it has changed little. The same grey stone, the same unaccountable mists in the fields and gardens. I have repaired and maintained it but have not altered it; it seemed sacrilegeous, somehow, an insult to Margaret's wishes and memory. > > So life continues very much as it has done; my small complement of servants, my daily walks, those sublime meals Miller makes that gave you such joy in the past. The only real difference is that my grandson, Teddy, has joined us, following Victor's death, which I'm sure you read about in the papers. Teddy gives me a rare joy in my old age; he is so often a happy, bright child, although given to unaccountable fears and low moods at times. > > I tell you all this to emphasise how empty the house has become; for there are no more of our old dinner parties, no great riots in which half the county seem involved. All my friends are dead or dying, and the name of Soames no longer carries the weight it once did. I am quite alone here, but it suits me; the same gardens, the same wild heath, the same grass ridge towering above the house. The past seems less distant, somehow, although I try not to dwell on matters past. > > So you can picture me here, as I was late last night, sitting by the fire in my slippers. The servants had gone to bed; I was trying again with Carlyle, starting - perhaps ill-advisedly - right at the start, with //Sartor Resartus//. I was tired, and the book had a soporific quality, but I was not so tired as to fall asleep. The fire was crackling, and I was feeling entirely comfortable. I put the book down to sip from my glass, and all at once she stood before me. > > You know of whom I speak. Your sister - my wife! - smiling at me, standing before me in her white dress! The same white dress she wore before, so many times, in her later years. Her faces, exquisitely lined just as I remembered; her eyes, blue and grey, the slight tilt in her hair. It was as if no time had passed, the last three decades just an illusion. Her brush was in her hand, her easel behind her; a blank canvas, waiting for her touch. > > I do not know how long I stared; my glass slipped from my hand, and fell to the floor. Whatever force had gripped me broke; I perceived I must be asleep, or that my mind was indulging in some strange phantasy - I never had time for Margaret's spiritualist friends, all that mumbo-jumbo of boards and crepuscular mediums. I looked away, rubbing my eyes, and leant down to pick up the shards of glass. > > But she reached them first; she picked them up - so deftly, so simply! - and placed them on the table. I was lucky, I think, that my heart did not give out entirely. I was not imagining this, or hallucinating; it was her. She tutted at me, affectionately and playfully, and her soft voice - I was taken back entirely, Nicholas, lurched violently as if no interval of years separated now from then, no intervening years to cleave us apart. > > Soon after, she disappeared, without another word. I sat, staring, for what seemed like hours; then I pulled myself together, and went to my bedroom. I sit now at my desk, amazed, knowing I have to write to you - for who else would understand? And to whom else have I acted so monstrously? > > I know I deserve no answer, brother, but for the sake of our long-deprecated friendship, I beg your reply. I am entirely in your power; my mind is a confusion, and I am desperate for someone who can comprhend, who can understand what this means. > > As ever, your humble servant, > Herbert > [[>]] > Helby Hall > > 3rd November, 1921 > [[/>]] > > Dear Nicholas, > > How happy you make me - how happy! To not only reply, but so generously, so swiftly - it is far more than I deserve, I know. I did not ask after you in my last letter - so much has happened since then! - but it is a lapse I must make up for now. > > I was sorry to hear about Catherine - I almost wrote to you, but in my adolescent fury I felt it impossible. It is never a tolerable act, to bury one's wife before their allotted time - that much we both understand. I hope it has not caused you too much hardship in the ensuing years. > > I am glad your girls are all married - and grandchildren! The company of my own dear Teddy has been a salve, a balm, in these sunset days, when everything aches and seems to come and go in hazes - to see young life, so full of affection and simple pleasure, so much the opposite of our own age, our complexities. > > I do worry about him, however - he is so changeable. Those happy moments fade and shift without a moment's warning, and he becomes scared, even confused. A particular problem is how frightened he seems whenever our relatives come; he claims it is their dresses, that he dislikes women in "white shirts"; that they scare him. I do not know where these notions come from. > > I know these things are only phases, but they concern me. He is at the time of life when he should be carefree, without fear or imposture; at his age, I was running through the Sussex woods and fighting battles with imaginary Russians. He seems to want to do little but stare out of the window, to stick to the house like a limpet. > > But here I am, clucking like an old mother hen, when you and I have seen miracles occur! How quickly the extraordinary becomes mundane, weighed down by the cares of the everday and the contempt familiarity breeds. Your account, brother, tallies entirely with my own from that night; the same sad smile, the same voicelessness, the same identical dress and face. I am astonished at the similarity; where has she hidden all these years? > > Well, I can report that she is hidden no longer. My wife has returned to me! Each evening, after Teddy and the servants are abed, she comes to me, the same as she was before. And she speaks! Such words, Nicholas, such reassuring and kind words, asking after me, Teddy, Victor - it was a wrench to tell her of Victor, but she did not seem upset. I suppose, to one such as her, these things take on a different hue. So solicitous, so obliging, just as she was in life! > > She paints as I talk, regaling her with the passing of the years. Such pictures, Nicholas, more vivid and real than I remember her ever creating in life. It is her old subject - the peasants of Helby, their manners and their conditions of life. I thought she might have come upon something else, a new topic, but I think she instead wishes to perfect what she began in life. > > I feel myself young again. To speak, to converse with one's greatest confidant when one thought that avenue blocked forever - I find it harder and harder to parse experience in the present from memories past. When I take my walk, it is as if I am young again, surveying Helby for the first time - that motley collection of sagging cottages, that ruined church - so picturesque! I stand upon the ridge and can almost see it, ripe for picking before me. > > The gardens, too - my nephews and nieces, on their rare visits to these parts, have criticised me for my formal, old-fashioned rows of grass and flowerbeds, accusing me of antiquated tastes even for an old Victorian. But now, walking among them, I see myself again, black-haired, my cane for swishing rather than supporting, at the height of taste. > > It is as if glory is come again upon me! I have begun sitting out again at night, watching the moon quaver over the beech trees, near the copse on the west side - just as we all used to, in those summer days, those halycon days! To see white moonlight bathe the house, the grass, it makes one feel such swelling feelings, Nicholas, such light happiness! In Margaret's face I see the past, I see all that I had thought forgotten. It is as if her presence resurrects it, brings it to the fore. > > I do wish, though, she would tell me of herself - of what she feels, of why and how she has returned. I long to hear of it, of this life beyond the grave. What is it like? I imagine it as a long, unending youth, the light of the moon instead the light of God, and I fresh and whole forever, surrounded by all I have known, all that clutter and detritus that defines any life, even the spiritual. > > But, even for me, I wax purple and poetic; in my enthusiasm, I must bore you, an old man's regrets and hopes. I am in my best mood in years, and hope you will wish me joy of it, Nicholas. You must come down yourself - she must so want to see you again. > > I am, as ever, > Your affectionate friend, > Herbert > [[>]] > Helby Hall > > 17th November, 1921 > [[/>]] > > Nicholas, > > I am sorry to hear about Martha - of course you must attend to her. A grey, sad business, I know - when Margaret died, as you may recall, it was as though I was frozen, unable to speak or listen except in a rote, dead fashion for months on end. To lose one's spouse, one's partner in the prime of life! It is a wretched thing. > > It is strange, Nicholas. It is as if I am imprisoned, unable to escape. I sit in the garden at night, and stare at the moon with such violent emotion that I feel trapped. I grow afraid. It is as if I need to cling on to these moments, these memories; as if they are being wrenched away from me. > > I said as much to Margaret, and she smiled so sadly at me I could hardly contain myself. She talks more, now, and yet less; talking of her work, her perfection. So my habits change; the ridge, the garden, the drawing room in the evening, the copse at night. If I can just preserve this, these memories, against the vicissitudes of time, perhaps my life - all my life - will have been worth something. If I can hold something up against the dark, perhaps that's all I need. > > There are so many holes, Nicholas. So many holes. > > Margaret keeps staring at a painting, one that hangs over the mantelpiece - a woman in grey, a peasant girl in a woollen dress, standing before the old church. Margaret insisted it hang there, before her death. She used to spend so much time on her paintings, but she was never satisfied with any, except that one. It was as if she needed to commit every stroke, every pore of it to her mind, to fix it in place and time so it was not forgotten. > > There is so much to do. So much to fix in place. I write this from my room; I long to be outside, staring at the moonlight before it waxes away. > > As ever, > Herbert > [[>]] > Helby Hall > > 11th December, 1921 > [[/>]] > > Nicholas, > > I should dearly like to see you again, my old friend. I feel I need it, now - I do not wish to tear you away from Martha, of course, but I have this strange need to fix you in my head, too. I have not seen you for so long - your face is obscure, and I have to try to concentrate on specific times and places - your wedding day, dinner at the club, the steamer to Constantinople, the dust on the faces of the women of Jerusalem. God, how long has it been? Why did I keep away so many years? > > I am trapped entirely. The servants seem almost frightened of me, now; I make it a rigid, inflexible ritual to be in that drawing room each night, at the same time, awaiting her. She begins to terrify me. Her smiles have died off; she paints, and paints, and paints, slashing at the canvas, displeased with every stroke. It is like the last days of her life all over agin. I had forgotten - did I wish to forget? Always the same subjects, always ripping the work from the canvas, screaming that it is not good enough. She speaks of duty; but what duty is left to her? She is dead, she is no longer my wife, she is parted by the veil of death. > > Why does she torment me so? All day, I long to see her, and think of nothing else. I had come to terms with her death; I looked forward to seeing her in the hereafter, in that golden land of angels, but to have her thrust in my face again, paint dripping from her brush like blood! After all this time! It is torture, Nicholas, there is no other word for it; I cannot live, I cannot die, I am stuck between two gnashing, wailing things. > > That golden land seems remote, now; a banal, sentimental, faded Victorian portrait, just like me, like how I was. Past, present and future, all jumbled up - I cannot distinguish one from another. But I must go on, Nicholas. I feel the dark lapping up against me, as it must her; that final dark, the extinction of all things, the inevitability. > > Teddy has seen her. He told me so - he says he has seen her these many years. That he sat on her lap as a babe; that she whispered to him at night, that she asked him, over and over again, about faces, about the past. He says he did not understand, could not. I do not know whether to believe him or not. Her dress is white; she sometimes wore a rough white shirt... but she, my Margaret, would not be so cruel to children. > > I must be wrong, Nicholas - mustn't I be wrong? The house, the house is what must cause all this. This place, this cursed structure, dredging up this past, preventing us from rest. Or maybe not - maybe it is her paintings, those damned paintings that she labours and pores over so much. The work of her own two hands! And that one at the mantelpiece, the only one she ever completed. Does it tie her to this place? Is that why she stares at it, now, so much - stares at it and not me, never at me, no more kind words or smiles? > > I will deal with it. I never flinched before. I spent decades fighting the dark we could not understand, and I cannot turn now. I will go to this painting, of the woman in grey, and throw it on the fire. Maybe then she will be free. Maybe then that golden land will return to me. > [[>]] > 12th December > [[/>]] > > Nicholas > > I am sitting at my desk. It is the dead of night. The electric light hums, and I feel tempted to rise up, enter it, become a part of it. I write this, Nicholas, because I don't know what else to do. You have become my refuge, my resort. I am changed entirely, and do not know where to go or who to speak to. > > Tonight, I walked downstairs, and entered the drawing room. I had ordered that the fire should be left; I told them I would be staying later than usual. So I entered the room, and she was not there. I was emboldened, determined; I would kill it now, burn it on the pyre, set our spirits free - her, me, Teddy. We would be as we should be again; no more torments, forever. > > I took down the painting from the mantelpiece. I stared at it, one last time; this relic of her, her as she had been, not her as she was, unnatural and cruel. I was about to throw it, when I felt her arms on mine, her nails clawing at me, her eyes wild, desperate. No! she said. No, no, no! > > Maybe I should have explained. But I was as desperate, as certain, as her. I ripped and clawed at the picture, at her dress, at her eyes. Were we both sobbing, both weeping? No, I don't think so - she was too far gone for that. She wanted it too badly. > > The fire danced between us, as we hurtled around the room; dancing, one last time, under that ashen light. Around the table, I wrenched it free at last; with a snarl of triumph, I rushed towards the fire. But she was too clever, her determination too long-grown. She tripped me; the picture flew across the room; and I flew into the fire. > > You remember the fireplace, Nicholas, I am sure. It is high, and deep; its pits are black, its chimney wide. I fell in, and must have hit my head, impaled or bashed upon the grate; I stood, watching my body, my face, congeal, melt, succumb. I watched me as an object, a thing of flesh and blood, no longer real, finished, done with the world. > > And still I remain. > > I stood with her, watching me die, understanding myself altered. I looked at myself; my body, the same as before; my hands, the fire dancing on them. She looked at me so sorry, so sorrowful, and took my hand; remorse flooded her every feature. Then she took the painting and replaced it, above the mantelpiece, straightening it like it had never been disturbed. > > I don't know where she is, but I don't know where I am, either. I no longer have the straight lines, the contours, that defined the edges of my mind. I am tassles in the wind; I am thread undone. My existence is a marred, spectral one; I feel my memories, that I tried so hard to keep, fly into nothing, into black darkness that cannot be restored. > > I am undone. I fly into nothing. The dark laps at every aspect of my being; it cannot be escaped, cannot be avoided. I will seal this letter; I will place it with the morning post, which will be taken out long before they reach the drawing room and find what's left of me. I am not as strong as her, or as foolish; I know I am lost. I will dwell forever, knowing neither myself nor any other; standing in a dark room, staring lost about me, hoping for release. > > I am, as ever, > Your humble servant, > Herbert //Surviving records show that Herbert Soames's body was found by his grandson, Theodore "Teddy" Soames, on the morning of 12/12/1921. The coroner deemed his death an accident. Nicholas Wells does not seem to have mentioned his brother-in-law again.// @@ @@ [[div style="border:solid 1px #999999; background:#f2f2c2; padding:5px; margin-bottom: 10px;"]] [[=]] **[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-9799/offset/2 Previous document]** | **[https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-9799/offset/4 Next document]** [[/=]] [[/div]]