Scary Stories

The Tap - Arthur Edwards Chapman copy

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Duration:: 19m
Broadcast on:: 22 Jun 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

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Visit www.soulgoodmedia.com today and start your free trial. That's S-O-L-G-O-O-D-M-E-D-I-A.com. The Tap by Arthur Edwards-Chappen. Mentally I cursed the Tap. If I had risen once to turn it off, I had risen a half a dozen times during the last quarter of an hour, and still, the disconcerting drip-drip-drip continued. This was the first night in my new flat, and after Mrs. Biggs, who had come to do the cleaning and prepare my meals, had wished me good night, I had settled down to run off a short article which had been promised to deliver by morning. The words had flowed from my pen with scarcely an effort, and probably for this very reason the incident stands out in my memory more vividly than would otherwise have been the case. I recollect that I had paused in my writing to consider more deeply a certain point in my article. Glancing up at the clock, I had noticed the hands indicated a quarter to eleven, and as I looked up at my pen afresh I heard that drip-drip-drip of the Tap in the bathroom. For a few minutes I paid no attention to the sound and continued writing, but presently it became so loud and so insistent that I found myself counting the drops inconsistently. "Drip-drip-drip." "A loose washer," I said to myself, "I'll get a plumber tomorrow." Rising, I proceeded to the bathroom and turned the Tap off so far as I was able. Then I went back to my desk, but barely had I picked up my pen when the sound recommenced. "Drip-drip-drip." I tried to ignore it, but without success. The very quietness of the building seemed to intensify the sound until, to listen to it, became painful. I must have gone at least four times to try to screw the confounded thing off, and as surely as I returned to my chair, having I had fixed it, just as surely would that dripping begin anew. With an exclamation of annoyance I rose to my feet once more, and then, suddenly, I became aware that the drip-drip-drip was changing slowly, gradually, to a full rush of water as though someone were turning on the Tap to its fullest extent. In surprise, I hurried to the bathroom, and as I approached the door I heard the little window blow open with a loud bang, and a great gust of air enfolded me. Air of so icy a coldness that I shivered involuntarily. Grumbling about the carelessness of Mrs. Biggs in leaving the window unfastened, I closed it hastily, and made it secure. Shooting home the tiny bolt that a previous tenant had for some reason placed on the bottom frame. After stopping the tap, which, by some strange freak had turned itself on, I closed the bathroom door and returned to my work, with a renewed resolve to send for a plumber in the morning. It was some time, however, before I was able to concentrate again, for I kept breaking off to listen for that drip-drip-drip. I listened in vain, for the tiresome sound was not renewed, and, though I wrote for at least an hour longer, I did not hear it again that night. Next morning I put my resolve into practice, and in due course my friend the plumber arrived. After spending considerable time in the bathroom, he came in to report to me. "Didn't seem to be anything wrong, sir," he assured me. "But I put a new washer on, and it'll be right enough now, sir. I'll bob it again, though, just to see it's a goin' proper." Apparently he was right, for I did not hear the tap at all during the day. Once, after Mrs. Biggs had gone, I visited the bathroom to inspect the job, and was quite convinced that the dripping would not cause me furthering convenience. Also I took the opportunity of seeing that the bathroom window was securely fastened, and thus satisfied, I returned to my study. I had got thoroughly warmed up to my work, and was totally oblivious to everything but the scratch of my pen, as it sped along the smooth surface of the paper. All else seemed wrapped in quietness, like that of a tropical night. A quietness, paradoxically, emphasized by a multitude of familiar sounds, that, strangely enough, failed to impress themselves upon one's mind, solely by reason of their very insistence. The ticking of the clock on the wall before me, the falling of an occasional coal from the great. These and other commonplace noises served only to heighten the deadly stillness of my room. Then suddenly, as I wrote, I became conscious of a new sound, and accompaniment, it seemed, to the scratch of my pen. Drip, drip, drip. It pierced the silence like a rapier pierces a heart. It forced itself upon me so harshly that I dropped my pen and stuffed my fingers into my ears, to shut it out. As I did so, I raised my head and found myself gazing with a feeling akin to fear at the clock. It was exactly a quarter to eleven. For an instant I started, and a cold shiver ran down my spine. Was it merely coincidence, or was there something uncanny about the tap? A quarter to eleven. Slowly, fearfully, I turned my head toward the door, half expecting to see some awful apparition come gliding through. Then I laughed somewhat nervously I must admit, at my childish dread, and got sharply to my feet. Hang it all. My nerves were all on edge. I was working too hard. A rest would do me. Drip, drip, drip. Nothing strange about that, surely, I thought. I would have it out with my friend the plumber, all the same. Meanwhile, I must try and check the dripping. As I entered the bathroom, the tap, seeming to protest against my interference, began to drip faster, and I reached out my hand to stop it. Then I felt a peculiar stinging, burning sensation, of intense cold across the backs of my hands, as though some one were passing a piece of ice over them, and the knob of the tap began slowly to unscrew itself. It was weird, uncanny. I cannot adequately describe it. I tried to resist that unseen force, but was powerless against it. Nor could I withdraw my hands from the tap. They were numb with the icy coldness, and pressed as if by invisible fingers against the metal, while the screw slowly turned round and round before my very eyes. And the drip, drip, drip, became a swift dribble. And then an awful, nameless terror took possession of me. I strove to flee, but could not. I turned my head away, but some strange power impaled me to return my gaze to the tap that kept on slowly turning. My heart beat madly against my ribs. I was hot and cold, alternately. I think I went mad and struggled wildly to escape that horrible influence. Then, as the screw reached its limit and the water gushed forth, the little window suddenly was flung open, and an icy blast met me, and sent me staggering back against the wall. For a minute, I leaned there, striving to steady my rack nerves, and collect my scattered wits. But now, all was still and quiet, save for the rushing of the water. Mechanically, I crossed to the basin and turned the tap off, afterward closing and fastening the window. Now I was able to think more calmly, and endeavored to probe the mysteries of this strange happening. But, try as I would, I could not explain it. I have always been a skeptic when its spiritualism was concerned. And yet... The next day passed quite as usual, and, though on several occasions, I entered the bathroom, there was no indication of anything out of the ordinary about the place. The tap was behaving just like any self-respecting tap should. During the evening I received a visit from an old college chum. Ralph Gattrix. In the old days we had fought many a wordy battle on matters related to psychic research. But Gattrix was a keen student of the subject; whereas I, as I have intimated, was openly a scoffer. Remembering this, I took the opportunity of telling him of my experience of the previous night. When I finished my tale Gattrix was silent for a space. Then he turned and looked at me clearly and said, rather irrelevantly, I thought, "Do you remember the Goldstone murder which created such a sensation some six months ago?" I said, "I had a slight recollection of the affair. A certain theatrical manager of the name of Goldstone had murdered his wife in a fit of jealousy, wasn't it?" "Yes," Gattrix agreed slowly. "Well, the crime was committed in this flat." Now it was my turn to stare curiously. "In this flat," I repeated, taking out my cigarette case and offering it to him, Gattrix nodded. "Let me refresh your memory a little," he said lightly. "This Goldstone was known to be insanely jealous of his young wife." It was said that he suspected her of being unduly interested in a certain actor who was then playing lead in Goldstone's company. Well, one night, a Sunday it was, Goldstone was returning to his flat when he passed the actor in the street. Immediately Goldstone's jealousy was aroused. In his mind there was but one explanation. His wife had taken advantage of his absence to receive her lover. "Oh, I seem to remember that," I interrupted. It was proved afterward that the actor had just left some friends further up the street, in whose company he had been all evening. "Wasn't that so?" "Yes, you're right," Gattrix said. "But Goldstone didn't know that. All he thought of was the supposed faithlessness of his wife. His previous suspicions seemed to be more than justified, and he entered the flat with murder in his heart. His wife was just retiring and had gone into the bathroom for a glass of water which she was in the habit of taking last thing at night. She had just turned on the tap, marked this well, and was reaching for the glass when Goldstone burst in upon her. Gattrix paused and glanced at the fireplace. "That would be some time just before eleven," he said reflectively. "Just before eleven, I shut the question suddenly. That's the time the tap starts to drip." My friend nodded his head slowly and continued. She hadn't time to fill the glass before Goldstone had her by the throat. You know the rest. A policeman heard her scream and forced an entry, but it was too late. He finished speaking and bent to poke the dying fire into a last despairing flame. I gazed at him half-doubtfully. "I believe," he said deliberately, "that the spirit of the dead woman is seeking to complete the action which the mind conceived, but the body was unable to carry out." You mean that thought upmost in the woman's mind when death overtook her was to obtain a glass of water, and that the spirit will not rest in peace until this thought becomes translated into action? "Yes," he said, and then stopped short, listening intently. I had heard the sound also, and knew that the hour had come. Glancing quickly at the clock, I saw that it was quarter to eleven, and as the drip-drip-grip slowly became louder, I felt something of that fear of the previous night returning. Gatrix rose sharply and flung his half-consumed cigarette into the fireplace. A strange far-off look in his eyes. "Come," he said quietly, "I followed him, not without some misgivings, to the bathroom. As he pushed open the door my eyes instinctively sought out the tap, and I saw that it was slowly turning, turning. For an instant my friend watched in silence, then suddenly he crossed to the basin, and taking a glass from the shelf above, held it under the tap, which now was running swiftly. Wonderingly I watched him shivering a little as I felt an icy wave passed by me. But Gatrix did not appear to notice anything. And, placing the glass, now full, on the basin, he came quickly to my side. "Watch," he said simply. "Together we gazed at the glass of water, and then with a shock I realized that it was moving. Slowly, almost imperceptibly at first, it began to float upward as though raised by an invisible hand." Fascinated, horrified, I watched its upward course, and I think I would have rushed forward had not my companion held me back with a warning arm. Higher the glass went, and that invisible hand began to tilt it, so that it seemed as if the contest must be spilled to the floor. No drop fell, however. Instead I saw the water slowly disappearing, vanishing into the air, until the last drop was gone. I felt my head throbbing, my heart began to race, I could stand it no longer, and with a cry I flung aside my friend's restraining hand, and darted wildly forward. With a loud crash the window burst open, and as I fell back before the fierceness of the inrush of air, the glass, freed from the invisible power, tumbled to the floor where it shattered in a hundred fragments. With an effort I calmed myself and turned to Gattrix, who was still standing with his back against the wall, how they can look in his eyes and a faint smile of understanding and relief on his lips. "What? What was it?" I stammered. "What does it mean?" Quietly he answered as he turned toward me. "It means that an unexpressed thought has become an actuality. The spirit will trouble you no more." My friend the plumber came, as he had promised, to see how his job had gone on. "Well, sir," he said, "I dare bet as how the tap ain't drippin' now, eh?" I smiled thoughtfully. "No," I replied slowly. "It doesn't drip now. I thought as how I'd fixed it," he exclaimed with professional pride. "What I don't know about taps ain't worth wasting breath on." The End of The Tap by Arthur Edwards Chapman Hey there, listeners. Are you ready to unlock a world of captivating stories, soothing sounds, and enlightening lectures? At Sall Good Media, we believe in the power of audio to enrich your life, and now we're offering you a chance to experience it all for free. For a limited time, you can get a one-month free trial to our premium, ad-free service. Imagine having unlimited access to over 500 audiobooks, meditative sounds, and exclusive shows, all at your fingertips. Just head over to Sall Good Media dot com and sign up to start your free trial today. No ads, no interruptions just pure, immersive audio content. Don't miss out. Transform your listening experience with Sall Good Media. Visit Sall Good Media dot com and start your free trial now. We can't wait for you to join our audio community. Happy listening! [MUSIC PLAYING]