The Whisperers, Ray Bradbury

The Whisperers

The list was long, the need was manifest.

Manifestations of need took many shapes and forms. Some were solid flesh, some were evanescent ambiences which grew on the air, some partook of the clouds, some the wind, some merely the night, but all needed a place to hide, a place to be stashed, whether in wine cellars or attics or formed in stone statues on the marble porch of the House.

And among these were mere whispers. You had to listen closely to hear the needs. And the whispers said: “Lie low. Be still. Speak and rise not. Give no ear to the cannons’ cries and shouts.

For what they shout is doom and death with no ghosts manifest and spirits given heart. They say not yes to us, the grand army of the fearsome resurrected, but no, the terrible no, which makes the bat drop wingless and the wolf lie crippled and all coffins riven with ice and nailed with Eternity’s frost from which no Family breath can suspire to roam the weather in vapors and mist.

“Stay, oh, stay in the great House, sleep with telltale hearts which drum the timbered floor. Stay, oh, stay, all silence be. Hide. Wait. Wait.”

The End