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He had not lived long after his return, said his wife, the sea events in 1925 had broken him. He had told her no more than he told the public, but had left a long manuscript – of “technical matters” as he said – written in English. During a walk near the Gothenburg dock, a bundle of papers falling from an attic window had knocked him down. Two sailors at once helped him, but before the ambulance could reach him he was dead. Physicians said that his death occurred due to a heart trouble and a weakened constitution.
I persuaded the widow that I had to get her husband’s “technical matters”. I bore the document away and began to read it on the London boat.
It was a naive sailor’s effort at a diary – to recall day by day that last awful voyage.
Johansen, thank God, did not know quite all, even though he saw the city and the Thing. I shall never sleep calmly again when I think of the horrors that lurk ceaselessly behind life in time and in space, and of those blasphemies from elder stars which dream beneath the sea.
Johansen’s voyage had begun just as he told it to the vice-admiralty. The Emma had left Auckland on February 20th, and had felt the full force of the earthquake-born tempest. Once more under control,[93] the ship was making good progress when held up[94] by the Alert on March 22nd, and I could feel the mate’s regret as he wrote of her bombardment and sinking. He speaks with significant horror of the swarthy cult-fiends on the Alert. Then, driven ahead by curiosity in their captured yacht under Johansen’s command, the men saw a great stone pillar sticking out of the sea, and in S. Latitude 47°9’, W. Longitude 123°43’, came upon a coastline of mingled mud, ooze, and weedy Cyclopean masonry which can be nothing less than the tangible substance of earth’s supreme terror – the nightmare corpse-city of R’lyeh, that was built in measureless ages behind history by the vast, loathsome creatures that came down from the dark stars. There lay great Cthulhu and his hordes, hidden in green slimy vaults and sending out the thoughts that spread fear to the dreams of the sensitive. The thoughts called imperiously to the faithful to come on a pilgrimage of liberation and restoration. All this Johansen did not suspect, but he soon saw enough!
I suppose that only a single mountain-top, the hideous monolith-crowned citadel whereon great Cthulhu was buried, actually emerged from the waters. Johansen and his men were awed by the cosmic majesty of this dripping Babylon of elder demons, and probably guessed that it was nothing of this planet. Awe at the unbelievable size of the greenish stone blocks, at the height of the great carven monolith, and at the identity of the colossal statues and bas-reliefs with the queer image found in the shrine on the Alert, is visible in every line of the frightened description.
Johansen and his men landed at a sloping mud-bank on this monstrous Acropolis, and clambered slipperily up over titan oozy blocks. Even the sun seemed distorted.
It was Rodriguez the Portuguese[95] who climbed up the foot of the monolith and shouted of what he had found. The rest followed him, and looked curiously at the immense carved door with the squid-dragon bas-relief. It was, Johansen said, like a great barn-door; and they all felt that it was a door, though they could not decide whether it lay flat like a trap-door[96] or slantwise like an outside cellar-door. As Wilcox said, the geometry of the place was all wrong. One could not be sure that the sea and the ground were horizontal, because the relative position of everything else seemed phantasmally variable.
Briden pushed at the stone in several places without result. Then Donovan[97] studied the edge, pressing each point separately. He climbed along the grotesque stone moulding – and the men wondered how any door in the universe could be so vast. Then, very softly and slowly, the acre-great lintel began to go down; and they saw that it was balanced.
Everyone watched the queer recession of the monstrously carven portal. In this prismatic distortion it moved in a diagonal way.
The aperture was black. The odour rising from the newly opened depths was intolerable. Everyone listened, and everyone was listening still when It appeared and gropingly squeezed Its gelatinous green immensity through the black doorway into the tainted outside air of that poison city of madness.
Of the six men who never reached the ship, two died immediately. The Thing ca
Three men were swept up by the flabby claws before anybody turned. God rest them, if there be any rest in the universe. They were Donovan, Guerrera, and Angstrom.[100] Parker slipped as the other three were ru
Slowly, amidst the distorted horrors of that indescribable scene, the Alert began to sail; while on the masonry of that shore great Cthulhu slid greasily into the water and began to pursue. Briden looked back and went mad. He kept on laughing till death found him one night in the cabin while Johansen was wandering deliriously.
But Johansen had not surrendered. Knowing that the Thing could surely overtake the Alert, he set the engine for full speed, and reversed the wheel. The brave Norwegian drove his vessel head on against the pursuing jelly. Johansen drove on relentlessly.
There was a horrific bursting as of an exploding bladder, a stench as of a thousand opened graves, and a sound that the chronicler could not put on paper. For an instant the ship was hidden by an acrid green cloud, and – God in heaven![101] – the distance widened every second as the Alert gained impetus from its mounting steam.
That was all. After that Johansen only watched the idol in the cabin and prepared some food for himself and the laughing maniac. He did not try to navigate, for he was completely exhausted. Then came the storm of April 2nd, and he lost his consciousness.
One day came rescue – the Vigilant, the vice-admiralty court, the streets of Dunedin, and the long voyage back home to the old house. He could not tell – they would think him mad.[102] He wrote of what he knew before death came. Death would be a boon if only it could delete memories.
That was the document I read, and now I have placed it in the tin box beside the bas-relief and the papers of Professor Angell. This record of mine will be placed with them. I do not think my life will be long. As my uncle went, as poor Johansen went, so I shall go. I know too much, and the cult still lives.
93
once more under control – снова подчиняясь управлению
94
when held up – когда бы остановлен
95
Rodriguez the Portuguese – португалец Родригес
96
trap-door – дверь-люк
97
Donovan – Донован
98
what wonder – что же удивляться
99
to claim his own – заявить свои права
100
Donovan, Guerrera, and Angstrom – Донован, Геррера и Ангстром
101
God in heaven! – Великий Боже!
102
they would think him mad – его бы сочли за сумасшедшего