An Off-Season in Cornwall
This short story in the horror genre was published in the eighth issue of Thin Ice. Story copyright 1990,
William D. Cissna.


He hadn't been there long when he realized he was out of his league altogether.
It had sounded so charming in the brochures: rent your own cottage in the wilds of Cornwall. He'd never left
the wilds of southern California but had always dreamed of going overseas. He never thought it would be
much different from the broad avenues of Beverly Hills.
Robert Stewart arrived at Gatwick, jetlagged into mindless dullness, picked up the miniature automobile,
survived the long drive on increasingly narrower roads, and found the woman who kept the key to the cottage.
Exhausted, he maneuvered five more miles down a steep lane barely wide enough for a single car. At its
abrupt end, he found the place: a tiny white-washed building topped with dark, intertwined reeds.  Home for
the next two weeks.
Unloading the car as the October late afternoon sun lowered in the west, he felt the silence like a blanket
laid over the little valley, broken only by the ocean crashing a quarter mile down the muddy footpath across
from his door.
After ten years just off La Cienega, he wasn't sure he could handle two weeks of peace. Alone, no traffic, no
streetlights, no sirens. The nearest and only pub five miles away.
He might miss the job, although it had seemed boring and repetitive, restrictive -- closing in on the creative
spark. But mostly he missed her. No way to share this strange beauty, this peculiar quiet. After all the years,
she'd just left. It made him sad. But it also made him angry.
By the end of the process of installing his suitcases in the single bedroom, he had learned to duck at every
doorway. Cornish cottages weren't built for people over six feet tall.
He nursed a headache by popping a cold ale and wandering up the path behind the cottage. In the failing
light, he marveled at the thickness of the undergrowth, the trees shaped toward the east by unceasing wind,
the power of the stream crashing down from hills at the end of the valley. Though he felt like an alien from
another galaxy, his goal of finding something "different" had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.
He reached a point where the path turned steep and branched, the main trail heading straight, and a lesser
one angling right. At its end, between the trees, he could see crumbling walls, a collapsed, shingled roof. The
remains, he had no doubt, of the ancient manor house.
The brochure in the cottage told the story of a well-to-do family, huge holdings of land in this county, loss of
privilege in Cromwell's time, great power and a much closer tie to London after the Restoration. The original
family lands were all but forgotten; the house fell slowly into ruin. Only the town, and the age-old land
itself, remained.
Faced with the hill, he could feel weariness flow over him like a wave. As he turned to retrace his steps, he
caught a faint glimmer in the corner of his eye. Off to the right, a light flickered in the distance. He
wondered briefly what it could be: another cottage deep in the woods, a farmer wandering with his "torch?"
(He'd been informed that, in England, flashlights were called, like so many other things, by another name.)
Or perhaps a campfire? It seemed more like an open flame.
Exhaustion overruled curiosity. After closing himself inside the silent cottage and collapsing in the short bed,
the light in the woods was forgotten.
When he finally roused himself, the morning had nearly ended. Not hungry, he hiked down to the ocean. By
the rough boulders on which the surf crashed -- so unlike the Malibu beaches -- he sat for nearly an hour,
watching, letting his mind wander. He had never felt so alone in his life.
In the cottage, he read a book as the afternoon waned.  Rising to look out on the coming of dusk, he realized,
to his relief, his appetite had returned. He ground the gears of the little Fiat as he coaxed it up the steep hill,
out of the valley and across the winding, narrow road into town -- such as it was.
The village of Grenland sat at a crossroads, but neither road was significant. It consisted of a one-aisle
grocery store, a small bakery featuring pasties, a church built in several eras, an ancient graveyard, and
seven stone houses just off the larger road. Where the roads crossed was the public house that had served
Cornish travelers, in one form or another, for at least five hundred years.
The Crown and Trumpet, announced the hanging sign in front, which might not have been painted since the
fifteenth century. He pulled into a small, tight car park alongside the building and squeezed in between two
Vauxhalls. Business must be good.
As he approached the side door, he heard the throb of voices, then a rousing cheer. The smell of fried food
assailed him as he tried to operate the latch on the door. It suddenly sprang open and he nearly fell into the
place.
A hush fell over the pub as if a wake had just been declared in session. To his left, the upper level of the pub
was taken up with a long bar and four circular tables with rickety wooden chairs. To the right, down three
stairs, a skittles bowl was crowded with men.
He felt sure they stared at him. Then the moment passed, and they turned back to their game. The silence
was punctured by the rolling ball and crashing pins, but the conversation and shouting did not resume.
He ordered a draught ale and a chicken and chips at the empty bar, paid, and took the beer to a table. After a
time, the barman brought his food. He ate in silence, feeling eyes upon him -- unfriendly eyes.
Draining the last of the ale, the barman appeared at his side. "All done now?" he asked quietly.
"Yes, thank you."
"You'll be going then?" It sounded more like an order than a question.
He'd been thinking about a second draught, but it didn't seem a good idea now. "I suppose so. Good dinner."
"You staying around here?"
"Yes. Down by the ocean, in the Rose Cottage."
"I know it. You'll be staying in tonight, of course?"
"What do you mean?"
"Weather, why, the weather, of course. Storm brewing out over the ocean, coming to us. Besides," the man
threw a glance at the skittles players and lowered his voice, "it's not a good night to be about. The thirty first
and all."
"The thirty first? What of it?"
If anything, the man looked even more nervous. "You don't know?"
"Sorry. American, you know."
The man smiled so briefly Stewart wasn't sure he'd even seen it. "I guessed that, man. October 31. All
Hallow's Eve."
"And what's your point?"
"It's called a borderline night, between the seasons. Might sound funny to a Yank, but the good people still
take it seriously. Spirits on the loose and such."
"Thanks for the advice," Stewart said, but he didn't leave a tip.
It struck him as he made his way back down the narrow lane: no women. Not a woman in sight in the pub.
That wasn't what he'd heard about English pubs.
And what was the barman doing, warning him? Were these people of Cornwall that superstitious? Did they
still believe in all that crap about spirits rising, witches stealing souls and ghosts afield?
All the same, he'd stay away from the church graveyard, thank you very much.
When he arrived at the road's end and shut off the car, he cursed himself for leaving the flashlight inside the
cottage, forgetting to leave on a light. Blinded by the inky darkness, he felt his way to the door and clumsily
clattered the key against it until he found the lock.
He adjusted his body to the minimal comforts of a sitting room chair for the length of two more bottled ales
from the little refrigerator, until he caught himself thinking: What the hell, why be scared out of a walk in
the woods by some low grade employee of a crappy bar? He felt pent up anger rise into his throat. No more
restrictions. No more traps. That's what he came here to escape.
Careful to leave the lights blazing, he stomped up the path again, torch in hand. It was slow going: the light
was feeble against the impenetrable dark. Only a few hundred feet away, and the cottage was nearly invisible.
This time, he continued past the fork in the path and went straight to the top of the hill. Ten minutes later,
panting, he welcomed the flatness that led for another fifty yards before ending at a wooden fence with a gate.
Beyond, the trees gave way to an open area and a muddy, furrowed field that, in the torch's light, appeared
impassable to traverse without heavy boots. Overhead, he saw no stars or moonlight, just a solid black, barely
different from the ground even if marginally lighter than the woods.
But in the trees along the edge of the field, he heard the rising whine of the wind. The storm was coming.
He had started back down the trail when he first noticed a sound that nearly blended with the wind. A voice
was moaning, slowly, rhythmically. He stood still to listen. No, it was more than one voice, a chorus of voices,
deep, male, chanting.
He moved slowly downhill, tracing the chant, now louder, now softer. To the right, he concluded. If he hadn't
been looking, he would have missed the faint path altogether. He cupped the torch with his hand and headed
to the right into the thick woods.
The chorus was louder now and, ahead, he could see the same flickering light he'd noticed the night before.
He broke unexpectedly into a small clearing. At its end, the way was closed by a huge block of stone. He
clicked off the light and stared. On top of the stone, a fire glared brightly.
In the dancing shadows, he crept forward to the dark stone. It rose above him by several feet. He felt along it
until he found the edge. He could faintly see that the path continued around its side. As he came around it,
he felt he had dropped onto another planet, or into a different time.
Before him, a larger clearing was filled to overflowing with long, low stone benches and a mass of robed
figures, some holding fiery cloth wrapped boughs. As he watched, afraid to breathe, the men took seats on the
long benches and halted the chant that had resonated through the woods in an ancient tongue he could not
comprehend. With them, he looked toward the apex of the clearing, where a hooded man in colorful robes
stood before a foot high stone rectangle of the same material of the larger block in whose shadow he stood.
On the long stone were three huge baskets of a woven material, something like wicker. As the man began to
preach to the crowd, he gestured frequently at the baskets. "It is now the time of year, my brethren," he said,
"that I, as the wisest of the wise, must conduct, as the ancients have decreed from the earliest days of these
islands, the Ceremony of the Three. We have gathered thus for many years on this special eve to honor the
spirits that rule our lives from above and beyond. It is our most secret, and our most sacred, duty.
"As is our custom, we have chosen by vote of the Selected, three of our brethren to give of themselves for the
common good. The Selected will now come forward to conduct this sacred ritual."
Standing on tiptoes, Stewart saw three men who sat, blindfolded and tied, on the ground next to the stone. As
he watched, eight men from the front bench stood and moved forward.
Each of the three was lifted up onto the low stone. A lid was removed from each basket and the men,
struggling, were placed inside.
Stewart watched with awe as the hooded man spoke a lengthy oration in the unrecognizable tongue. Then, as
the seated men took up the chant once more, he took a flaming bough from a man by his side. "Let the
Ceremony of the Three begin," he shouted to the crowd and touched the stick to the side of the basket on his
right. Instantaneously, the basket burst into flames, and a bloodcurdling scream rent the night air.
"No!" came the involuntary protest from Stewart's throat. Then, as the faces of the men turned toward him,
showing surprise and diabolical hatred, he realized his mistake.
As if with the mind of one, they crowded into the aisles to race toward him. He scrabbled around the stone
and stood, stock still, in behind it. The crowd rushed past him and down the little path into the woods.
Bravery had never occurred to him before, but now he peeked around the stone into the clearing. Other than
the three baskets, one in flames, it was empty. He raced up to the altar of death, trying to ignore the horrible
sounds from the basket on the right. With all his might, he pushed the middle basket until it swayed and fell
off the stone. The man sat dazed on the ground.
"You've got to hurry," Stewart whispered, removing the blindfold and struggling with the ropes around the
man's ankles. When they were off, he pushed him toward the woods, moved to the next basket.
He had just started to shove it when strong arms grabbed him from behind. He was spun around to see a
crowd of faces; many he recognized from the pub. There was a hushed consultation in the middle of the
clearing, then the hooded man was before him. "An intruder has broken the circle," he announced, "and one
of the Chosen has gone. The Selected have decided a replacement must be made."
Stunned with disbelief, Robert Stewart felt the bonds tighten around him, and the blindfold being tied in
place. It wasn't until after he was in the basket, heard fire crackling on both sides, that he began to fight and
struggle. Worries about restrictions, jobs, shattered love affairs were suddenly paltry and meaningless.
As the chant rose to a deafening pitch, the heat flowed up around him, and the immense, terrifying, searing
pain began.
"My brethren, the Ceremony of the Three ... is now complete," said the deep voice from beyond Stewart's
world. The last words he ever heard.
***
In his small rooms above the Crown and Trumpet, the proprietor closed and locked the cabinet containing a
hooded robe. The intruder was a nuisance, he thought, but thousand-year-old traditions were nothing to be
tampered with. At his desk, he wrote out the names of the strongest men, in their original Celtic names.
They would be placed on guard duty next year.
Then he began the more important task: editing the short list of the weakest, narrowing down to the magic
number three.
***
Horror shorts -
by Bill Cissna
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