King Arthur Movie Tristan

title: In the Dark

author: Edith Nesbit

genre: short story/supernatural/horror

published: 1910

first line: It may have been a form of madness.





In this short story by Edith Nesbit, the narrator, named Winston, and Haldane are best friends. They both dislike a fellow classmate named George Visger for being a know-it-all. Once the friends are grown men and off to college, they are still in contact. When Winston studies abroad for a year and returns, he finds Haldane is sickly and depressed. Haldane is packing and will be moving out of his apartment.
He won't tell Winston what's wrong with him, but leaves the next day, leaving no new address where he can be found.






When Winston finally sees him again, it is another year later, and Haldane looks worse. Over breakfast Haldane tells Winston that he is going to kill himself and wants to explain why.



Haldane tells him that he and Visger got into an argument over lies Visger told Haldane's girlfriend. Apparently the girlfriend died inexplicably afterwards. He wound up killing Visger himself by strangling him. He won't tell Winston where he put the body.

I had said nothing. It is not easy to think at once of the tactful and suitable thing to say, when your oldest friend tells you that he is a murderer.

Now Haldane insists Visger has been haunting him. He says before he killed him, Visger told him 'you won't be able to get rid of the body'. Haldane sees Visger everywhere he goes and is terrified he will die in the dark.



Winston tells Haldane it's all in his mind, there is no ghost, and takes Haldane away to try to help him forget. The two travel, and it seems Haldane is better.
He tells Winston that he is leaving everything to him in his will. Winston sees that Haldane isn't better at all, he is still afraid he will die in the dark soon.




They wind up staying at an Inn called Grande Vigne, with the initials G.V. stitched in large red letters on the bedsheets. The same initials as George Visger.


Haldane is very jumpy and is still fearful of Visger's ghost. He wants to get a glass of water in the middle of the night, but refuses to go alone and refuses to stay alone while Winston goes and gets it. They set off together to get the water, then return to their room.



When they get into bed, Haldane complains to Winston that his sheets are all missing and that he is freezing. He starts to freak out and yells for Haldane to light the candle.

'Light the candle, light the candle,' he said, and his voice broke, as a boy's does sometimes in the chapel. 'If you don't, he'll come to me. It is so easy to come at anyone in the dark. Oh Winston, light the candle, for the love of God! I can't die in the dark.'

Haldane starts yelling that Visger is in the bed beside him. Once Winston finally lights the candle, he sees Haldane dead on the bed, with another dead man beside him. It turns out the two friends came back to the wrong room after getting the cup of water, and Haldane got into bed in the dark, with the corpse of a man who died of a heart attack in that room recently.



Shortly after the death of his friend, the police deliver Winston a large metal box, left for him by Haldane. He opens the box in private, only to discover the body of Visger is inside the box alongside the body of another dead man.



I like Edith Nesbit's creepy short stories, this is my third time reading her and I think she's pretty good. However, In the Dark was definitely scary and had me really interested in what was going to happen next, but also a bit confusing. I didn't like how Haldane's girlfriend mysteriously dies with no explanation. And I didn't like how in the end there was a second corpse inside the large metal box. I felt it wasn't explained fully and I ended up re-reading a few bits of the story to see if I could understand it. Another thing that bothered me was how Winston simply accepts that his friend is a murderer and wants him to move on with his life.



But then again, the last lines in this story do let the reader know this one is left up to interpretation:

Explain it as you like. I offered you, if you remember, a choice of explanations before I began the story. I have not yet found the explanation that can satisfy me.

All in all, a good, creepy short story, if you don't mind an unresolved ending.





You can read In the Dark free online here.

English poet, journalist, and short-story writer, perhaps now best-known for her children's books (the twice-filmed Five Children and It, The Railway Children and The Wouldbegoods) and the over-anthologized horror tale "Man-Size in Marble." She also published works under the joint pseudonym (with her husband) "Fabian Bland."


-quoted from The Literary Gothic

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