Chapter III: Front Matter (3)

"You probably wouldn't," Lessing replied. He took a fresh cigarette from the box and lit it. "The tale afforded some stray paragraphs in the papers, at different times, much as the periodical accounts of 'authentic' ghosts do, but I don't believe anyone gave the slightest credence to it. The Jersey Devil, to sum up all that I have been able to glean on the subject, was a legendary monster, reputed to have been seen, on the evidence of several persons, at different periods during the past fifty or sixty years. The legend goes back, I believe, to just before the Civil War. According to the story, its appearance gives warning to some national trouble or calamity. It was said to have been seen before Lincoln's assassination, before the Spanish-American War, and before the assassination of President McKinley. It is described as a creature having the body of a bat and the head of a horse--sometimes as a quasi-human head on a winged animal body--and it haunts certain counties of New Jersey, chiefly Monmouth and Ocean counties, and has also been seen as far north as Pennsylvania. The legend goes that it is a changeling, that is to say, a devil which took possession of a child's body at birth and flew off in the shape of a monster. Why it should have developed the sort of national solicitude they claim for it is unexplained. Of course the evidence is almost entirely that of superstitious country people who saw it, or thought they saw it, but the fact remains that the evidence in every case tallies, even after intervals of ten or twenty years.

"We may take it that very legend has somewhere some natural origin, however much it may be subsequently exaggerated or distorted. Why, if this particular legend is purely imaginary, should it be confined to certain districts and not to others? We are not dealing with an apparition reputed to haunt one particular place. It has a pretty wide range of country, on the contrary, and its appearance has been vouched for, almost simultaneously, in places a great many miles apart. Why should it be seen in one certain county and not in the adjoining ones, where the inhabitants are probably equally superstitious? Also it is not seen actually at the time of trouble, when people's minds might be most naturally influenced by superstition, but days and sometimes weeks before the event. That fact in itself I attach no importance to. There is a coincidence, and people naturally connect the two ideas. But I mention it to prove that in no instance was the thing seen because it was expected to be seen; its appearance in each case was entirely without warning or predisposition."

I moved in my chair.

"We've got enough to deal with as the thing stands. If you're going to back it up with any old wives' tales of a bat-winged horse----"

"I'm not backing it up," Lessing retorted. "I'm only asking myself whether the experiences that give rise to the tale of the Jersey Devil have any connection with my own. The details don't matter. I want to get at the origin of the thing."

"The two don't even tally!" I spoke sharply, for I had still uncomfortably before my eyes the vision of the dead cyclist on the stretch of empty road.

"They don't, on this point," Lessing continued coolly. "The Jersey Devil has never, to my knowledge, been credited with any malevolent intent. At the worst, assuming the tales to have some basis of truth, it has merely scared one or two respectable farmers driving home at night. Now the thing that attacked me, attacked me deliberately, and with an almost extraordinary ferocity of onslaught. I don't think there can be any question about that. That fact alone puts the apparition theory out of the game. We are not dealing with any mere visual phenomena. We are dealing with some actual existing menace. There is just one point that can lead up to the connection, if there is one, between the two."

"The attraction of the lamp?"

"Exactly. Those other people may have been carrying a lamp or they may not. In any case, it was probably a lantern of so slight a power as to escape notice. I said that the thing attacked me. But the real object of its attack might very well have been the lamp, and not me at all. I merely happened in each instance to be near it."

"But even admitting," I objected, "for the sake of argument, that the thing was a bat, I am not certain about bats being actually attracted by light. They blunder into it."

"Nor am I. As I say, I give you my only theory. And if you assume a bat, you must assume a bat of sufficient size to strike a man down at one blow. The whole thing's grotesque." He pulled out his watch, and rose abruptly. "I must get back, or Mary will be worrying about me. We'll talk over this another time. If you go into the thing with me, we'll go into it thoroughly. Only you know now why I warned you against cycling with a strong lantern."

"Even to the extent of slitting my bicycle tire?"

"Even to that extent," returned Lessing gravely. "You see, I wasn't taking any risks."

We shook hands, and I followed him out to the porch. There was a clear moon, and the road glimmered white between the black line of the woods. As I watched the swing of his shoulders down the path I was left, I admit, with a definite sense of comfort at the proximity of my own four walls. And before sleep overtook me that night the words of the reporter came back again and again to my mind:

"What's the animal that goes round in these woods that's strong enough to wreck the steel tubing of a bicycle, that attacks with its claws instead of its teeth, and that's quick enough to knock a man down without the chance of a struggle?"

VIII