"Beetles" (1938) by Robert Bloch
“I prefer not to be sure.”
[....] My work at the time was very exhausting—I was doing a series of Egyptian stories for a magazine—and my mental state was a bit odd. During the day I sat in my quiet room and gave my mind over to images of Nyarlathotep, Bubastis, and Anubis; my thoughts were peopled with the priestly pageantries of olden times. And in the evenings I walked unknown amidst thoughtless throngs more unreal than the fanciful figures of the past.
"The Secret of Sebek" (1937) by Robert Bloch
Readers unfamiliar with "Beetles" may prefer to read these notes only after reading the story.
Reading, researching, and rereading Conan Doyle's 1892 short story "Lot No. 249" recently led me to references for other Egypto-horror tales. Several lists in Cardin's Mummies Around the World: An Encyclopedia of Mummies in History, Religion, and Popular Culture (2014) proved useful in this.
Early in his career, Robert Bloch carved out a "Weird Egypt" story gimmick for himself. Numerous of these Egyptian stories were included in the 1981 Zebra paperback Mysteries of the Worm. [This was the first Lovecraft-related book I purchased, while in high school in the year of publication. I have been an intermittent reader of Bloch ever since.] "Beetles" (1938) was not included in Mysteries since it was not part of his Ludvig Prinn mythos.
"Beetles" is a slick and robust tale of the grotesque; of "body horror" in today's jargon.
[....] Those who remembered Arthur Hartley in the days before his expedition abroad were naturally quite cut up over the drastic metamorphosis in his manner. Hartley had been known as a keen scholar, a singularly erudite field-worker in his chosen profession of archeology; but at the same time he had been a peculiarly charming person. He had the worldly flair usually associated with the fictional characters of E. Phillips Oppenheim, and a positively devilish sense of humor which mocked and belittled it. He was the kind of fellow who could order the precise wine at the proper moment, at the same time grinning as though he were as much surprised by it all as his guest of the evening. And most of his friends found this air of culture without ostentation quite engaging. He had carried this urbane sense of the ridiculous over into his work; and while it was known that he was very much interested in archeology, and a notable figure in the field, he inevitably referred to his studies as “pottering around with old fossils and the old fossils that discover them.”
Consequently, his curious reversal following his trip came as a complete surprise....
Bloch avoids locating the Western city where "Beetles" takes place, a smart choice for an untravelled author. Our narrator, mulling the mystery of Arthur Hartley's self-exile, tries probing the mystery. It turns out Hartley was not the most ethical of Egyptologists.
“But I forgot,” said Hartley. “You don’t know about it. The plague, I mean. And the curse.” He leaned forward and his white hands made octopus-shadows on the wall.
“I used to laugh at it, you know,” he said. “Archeology isn’t exactly a pursuit for the superstitious. Too much groveling in ruins. And putting curses on old pottery and battered statues never seemed important to me. But Egyptology—that’s different. It’s human bodies, there. Mummified, but still human. And the Egyptians were a great race—they had scientific secrets we haven’t yet fathomed, and of course we cannot even begin to approach their concepts in mysticism.”
Ah! There was the key! I listened, intently.
“I learned a lot, this last trip. We were after the excavation job in the new tombs up the river. I brushed up on the dynastic period, and naturally the religious significance entered into it. Oh, I know all the myths—the Bubastis legend, the Isis resurrection theory, the true names of Ra, the allegory of Set——”
His voice was a drone that frightened me.
“We found things there, in the tombs—wonderful things. The pottery, the furniture, the bas-reliefs we were able to remove. But the expeditionary reports will be out soon; you can read of it then. We found mummies, too. Cursed mummies.”
Now I saw it, or thought I did.
“And I was a fool. I did something I never should have dared to do—for ethical reasons, and for other, more important reasons. Reasons that may cost me my soul....”
“Yes, I did it, I tell you! I read the Curse of the Scarabæus—sacred beetle, you know—and I did it anyway. I couldn’t guess that it was true. I was a skeptic; everyone is skeptical enough until things happen. Those things are like the phenomenon of death; you read about it, realize that it occurs to others, and yet cannot quite conceive of it happening to yourself. And yet it does. The Curse of the Scarabaeus was like that.”
I wish my tale could end there, but it cannot. There is a hideous conclusion to be drawn. It must be revealed so that I can know peace once more.
"The Secret of Sebek" (1937) by Robert Bloch
Hartley's maddened descent -- even insecticide doesn't halt the nighttime march of beetles in his bedding and over his face -- ends with our narrator's examination of his corpse:
[....] There was something wrong with the body on the bed. When I had lifted the corpse it seemed singularly light for a man of Hartley’s build. As I gazed at him now, he seemed empty of more than life. I peered into that ravaged face more closely, and then I shuddered. For the cords on his neck moved convulsively, his chest seemed to rise and fall, his head fell sideways on the pillow. He lived—or something inside him did!
And then as his twisted features moved, I cried aloud, for I knew how Hartley had died, and what had killed him; knew the secret of the Scarab Curse and why the beetles crawled out of the mummy to seek his bed. I knew what they had meant to do—what, tonight, they had done. I cried aloud as I saw Hartley’s face move, in hopes that my voice would drown that dreadful rustling sound which filled the room and came from inside Hartley’s body.... [Emphasis in original]
Whatever the narrator's diagnosis of Hartley -- "phobia, accompanied by hallucinations. Hartley’s feeling of guilt over stealing the mummy haunted him. The visions of beetles resulted." -- cannot stand as a permanent bulwark of sanity:
[....] Just as I fainted I saw Arthur Hartley’s dead lips part, allowing a rustling swarm of black Scarabaeus beetles to pour out across the pillow. [Emphasis in original].
Jay
7 January 2023
Funny, how Egypt kept recurring in the course of the evening!
"The Secret of Sebek" (1937) by Robert Bloch
Robert Bloch is one of my literary role models. His sardonic approach to horror, replete with humor and twist endings, gave me an example to shoot for in my own work.
Ack, bugs crawling all over! It’s horrific in its simplicity! Great post!