PseudoPod 375: The Signalman

“The Signal-Man” was first published as part of the Mugby Junction collection in the 1866 Christmas edition of ALL THE YEAR ROUND. It is The Doctor’s favorite Dickens story and has been adapted many times in many formats, including a radio drama version by Ye Olde Editor when he was in college.

Download “The Three Ghosts” from Gutenberg.

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The Signal-Man

by Charles Dickens

“Halloa!  Below there!”

When he heard a voice thus calling to him, he was standing at the door of his box, with a flag in his hand, furled round its short pole.  One would have thought, considering the nature of the ground, that he could not have doubted from what quarter the voice came; but instead of looking up to where I stood on the top of the steep cutting nearly over his head, he turned himself about, and looked down the Line.  There was something remarkable in his manner of doing so, though I could not have said for my life what.  But I know it was remarkable enough to attract my notice, even though his figure was foreshortened and shadowed, down in the deep trench, and mine was high above him, so steeped in the glow of an angry sunset, that I had shaded my eyes with my hand before I saw him at all.

“Halloa!  Below!”

From looking down the Line, he turned himself about again, and, raising his eyes, saw my figure high above him.

“Is there any path by which I can come down and speak to you?” (Continue Reading…)

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PseudoPod 374: FLASH ON THE BORDERLANDS XIX: Blood On The Tracks – Departure, Transit, Arrival

“Midnight Express” first appeared in This Week, November 3, 1935.

“Destination: Nihil by Edmund Bertrand” had its first appearance in THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST NEW HORROR #20 edited by Stephen Jones.

A slightly different version of “The Terminus” appeared in the fanzine Sheep Worrying in 1981; this version appeared in Fantasy Tales in 1985. “It’s pretty much the earliest story I sold professionally.”

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Show Notes

Going nowhere… faster….

Interstitial music is “Fearless Bleeder” by Chimpy, available from Music Alley.

Train sounds are from SoundJay.com.

Cave drips are from FreeSound.org.

“Midnight Express” by Alfred Noyes

It was a battered old book, bound in read buckram. He found it, when he was twelve years old, on an upper shelf in his father’s library; and, against all the rules, he took it to his bedroom to read by candlelight, when the rest of the rambling old Elizabethan house was flooded with darkness. That was how young Mortimer always thought of it. (Continue Reading…)

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PseudoPod 373: The Metal And Its Mold

PseudoPod 373: The Metal And Its Mold is a PseudoPod original.

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Show Notes

The audience should contemplate their loved ones, what makes their relationship work, and whether power is an aphrodisiac or a bondage dungeon. The complete collected saga of Alecsandri and Olivia will be available soon from NobleFusion Press in The Flesh Sutra.

Previously: In Fin de siècle Boston, The Guru Keresh – whose pursuit of arcane knowledge had led to his death and resurrection into a dwarfish, homunculus form – has joined with lover Olivia Spaulding in a commitment to advance humanity make the world over into their vision. But they themselves are still only human. Previous installments in the saga have appeared in Pseudopod 127: The Garden and the Mirror, Pseudopod 198: The Mother and the Worm and the available-by-donation-only TRIO OF TERROR: Nourished By Chaff, We Believe The Glamor (which will soon be made available again in the upcoming months). Now, listen on…

 

The Metal And Its Mold

by Tim W. Burke

The men backed out the side entrance quietly. Tomorrow, they would tell their political party cadre that Olivia’s guidance was purely theatrical, and remain ignorant of the truth.

The hall was empty except for Olivia and Bostic, and a caretaker snoring in the front office. I stepped from under the table.

The smell of beef and cigars still clouded my nostrils. Before I had been murdered, before I created this body from a man’s tumor, I did not indulge in beef or tobacco. But I did miss having long, complete limbs. I missed wearing a man’s suits, instead of hand-stitched doll’s clothes. I missed lungs that did not ache so.

But then I would be dead, and away from Olivia, and our chance to change the world with a few enlightened leaders, and our chance to be together always.

I considered that Love has many emotions. I was becoming too familiar with Love’s ambivalence.

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PseudoPod 372: Silver And Copper, Iron And Ash

This story originally appeared in the COINS OF CHAOS anthology from EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing, edited by Jennifer Brozek. The book came out in late 2013 and can be purchased from the publisher directly or from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. “It’s not what you’re buying; it’s what you’re willing to pay and how badly you want it. How hungry are you, really?”

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Silver And Copper, Iron And Ash

by Nathaniel Lee

Something was following him. He had enough woodcraft to know that, although he hadn’t been able to catch sight of it. A rogue wolf, perhaps, or a mountain lion; something solitary and hungry, cautious but lured by the smell of blood on him. He’d have to sit up with the rifle for a night or two and make sure the goats didn’t come to harm.

With a final glance at the darkened woods, James hefted his gunnysack and began the final climb down to the fragile safety of walls.

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PseudoPod 371: The Unfinished Room

PseudoPod 371: The Unfinished Room is a PseudoPod original.

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Show Notes

Joshua says “I got the idea for this story after noticing an area along a wall in my rented house where there had once been a door or window. Inevitably, I began to think about sealed doorways – both physical and mental – and what we might see if we were to reopen them.”

The Unfinished Room

by Joshua Rex

‘Do you hear that?’ Adele cut in.

‘What?’

‘That ticking sound.’

James glanced back at the bathroom. ‘Probably the tub dripping.’

‘No, it’s coming from in there…’ Adele stepped through the hole, zigzagged around the maze of unfinished walls and then stopped at one of the cross studs and picked something up. She stood there for a long time, staring down at the object in her palm, then slowly covered her mouth with her free hand.

‘Adele?’

No response. James stepped in, walked to one of the perimeter walls and looked through. The room seemed to float above the lawn without any visible support. Absently he brought the cigarette to his lips, took a pull but got no smoke. He looked at the lit end. The cherry now resembled fossilized bone. He tossed it through the wall and walked over to Adele, who was still staring at the thing in her hand. As he got closer he saw it was a pocket watch.

‘Where did you find that?’

‘Sitting on the wall.’

‘Looks antique. I bet it’s gold. Probably worth a nice chunk of change.’

Adele gave him a horrified look, then carefully set the watch back on the ledge. James went to grab it, but was distracted by something in his periphery. He turned and saw a beach ball, white with yellow stars, drift across the floor and settle gently into a far corner. Seeing it nearly brought him to his knees in terror. Without thinking, he took Adele’s hand and began leading her out of the room.

‘Jimmy -‘

‘Let’s get the fuck out of here.’

Adele hesitated, looking back at the watch, then relented. James nailed a sheet of particle board over the hole and they didn’t speak of the room again for a month.

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PseudoPod 370: Mary

PseudoPod 370: Mary is a PseudoPod original.

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Show Notes

Says Krista “I wrote this story during my first visit to the Salem/Danvers area, trying to sneak one last peek at the great Danver’s Asylum before it was torn down and made into condos. After hearing that the original location of the old witch hanging spot of Gallow’s Hill was lost to history and known only as ‘the highest hill in the town’ I decided for myself that the highest hill I could see was the one upon which the asylum stood, and wouldn’t that make it an extra nasty place to build anything.”

Mary

by Krista Soli Foster

He could scarcely remember a time before there was Mary. His adoration for her grew with every visit, like a well-tended fruit tree. She was his one and only; there had never been anyone before Mary. Time itself was endless while he was gazing into her eyes. At night he would caress her face and she would gasp and moan, and he would thrill with delight at the warmth of her breath and the tears in her eyes. It was her sweet voice alone that controlled the beat of his heart, and it always had been. One day he snuck into her room and she cried out so gleefully that he was driven to dance across the very floor, spinning and spinning late into the night as the angry old man in the next room pounded on the wall, shouting curses to no one that cared.

Mary made him happy.

One day, he found Mary to be swollen and red, her skin stretched over her body like a thin sheet of wax. She cried only a little when he came to see her, because her mouth was held shut by the weight of bloated, cracking ruby lips. She was lovelier then than ever before. He delighted in pressing his cheek against her leg and watching the imprint slowly fade away. When the doctor came, he heard the man tell Mary that they were going to change her medication soon, but wouldn’t be able to for another week until they knew if the swelling would go away on its own. Mary cried a little more. The sound of her voice was like bells.

Mary was the essence of joy.

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PseudoPod 369: Four Views of the Big Cigar in Winter

“Four Views Of The Big Cigar In Winter” placed in a contest held by a publisher called Zharmae and it was to be printed in an anthology due out in the spring of 2014. Zharmae’s editor, Travis Grundy, contacted me saying that he’d scrapped the anthology. A link to the Kindle edition of the story can be found at www.maxavalon.com.

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Four Views of the Big Cigar in Winter

by Charlie Bookout

She watched him tromp away and quickly disappear into the blizzard. Had he survived a little longer, she would have given him the big news he was dreading. But a madman with a hammer would find him that afternoon and mercifully spare him the trouble.

Her tears were starting to freeze on her cheeks. She yawned and looked to the east. Snowflakes swirled against the fragile glow like volcanic ash.

No one would see her. Everyone else was indoors: listening to the weather guy for closings, checking the cocoa supply, planning snow forts. She had observed that Arkansans, as a rule, did not prepare for snow—not like their neighbors to the north—and that the residents of Cedar Hill were particularly myopic. They would weave along slick streets like drunkards. They would entrust their children to the talents of school bus drivers who had established records of vehicular homicide. They would neither chain their tires nor salt their bridges. They would pretend that nothing had changed. But only to a point. When a storm like this one came around, even Cedar Hill gave up and stayed home. Bone-aching winter had assailed the Ozark Plateau like a nocturnal predator, and all the other rabbits were snug in their warrens. No one would see her.

No one but the crow on the branch above her.

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PseudoPod 368: Short & Nasty

“Short and Nasty” was first published in OBSESSIONS edited by Gary Raisor in 1991. It is in his collection TRANSIENTS AND OTHER DISQUIETING STORIES (1993) and was also reprinted in 100 CREEPY LITTLE CREATURE STORIES (ed. Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg, and Martin H. Greenberg (1994)). “While the characters bear no resemblance to persons living or dead, the settings are quite real. The Philadelphia transit system is pretty creepy at night. My friend Lee Weinstein used to live in the house described in the story. But he has moved up in the world and out of that neighborhood long since.”

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Short & Nasty

by Darrell Schweitzer

That was the old way, Henry, when we were young. Remember?

When we two were in college together, when everybody else was reading Hermann Hesse, we were heavily “into” Gothic novels – Monk Lewis, Mrs. Radcliffe, and the ever prolific Anonymous – the early Romantics, De Quincey, Byron, Keats, Mary Shelley – in short anybody who seemed suitably exquisite, melancholy, and doomed for Art’s sake.

Remember how we used to try to top each other’s affectations, just for the fun of it, the outrageous, frilly clothes, the sweeping gestures, the dialogue never heard outside of a bad costume flick: ‘I say, old chap, I think I shall take up opium. It’s so frightfully decadent.

‘I much prefer laudanum, old bean. The visions of Hell are much more vivid that way.’

Neither of us could have fooled a real Briton for a minute, by the way. Our accents were pure college theater. I suppose most of our classmates just thought we were gay.

Ah, with a sweeping sigh. We had joy; we had fun; we had seasons in the crypt.