Free The Wanderer by Timothy J. Jarvis

pap life. I wished no longer to cower from, but rather to confront my fears, and in so doing perhaps put them to rout. I grew frantic to talk with others who’d suffered as I had, to share my tale with people who wouldn’t sneer or doubt my reason.
    It was then I conceived my plan of placing classifieds in national newspapers, advertisements seeking those who’d seen, as I had, dread things. Sifting through replies was frustrating; I had many, lots mocking, several clearly deranged. In the end, I winnowed them down to just six, the only ones, I believed, in good faith and showing sound mind. I contacted these respondents, arranged a meeting.
    The day set soon came round. It was midwinter, less than a week before Christmas, but though it was cold, and blustery, it was sunny. After lunch, I took a walk across to Hampstead Heath. On top of Parliament Hill, a number of people flew kites, a colourful flock against the clear blue sky. I spent some time gazing out over the city from that spot, seeking landmarks, my eyes returning again and again to the dome of St Paul’s, which looked the top of some bald giant’s head, some bald giant buried to his brows in the silt of the floodplain. Then I went home, continued work on a critical essay on
The Lost World
I was writing for a journal of Conan Doyle studies. I managed a fewparagraphs, but, when the light began to wane, I grew agitated, unable to concentrate.
    Though I’d managed to keep most friends, in spite of the impassivity that was my bulwark against the quailing of my mind, I’d been feeling, sometimes, alone, since I knew all would have met my telling of the diabolical Punch and Judy show with concern or scorn, but not belief. I’d been, then, in previous weeks, filled with joy at the thought of meeting others who might hear and give credence to my tale. But, as the time of the gathering approached, I grew apprehensive, anxious lest the evening be filled with horror. I fought to quell these misgivings. Would that I had not.
    I still, though, had nearly two hours before I needed to leave. So I put on the radio, listened to the tail end of an interesting programme about the Delta blues. But it was followed by a comedy panel show, and the forced drollery twanged my nerves, and I got up to change the station. Turning the tuner knob at haphazard, I happened upon some loud yowling, perhaps a radio play, which startled me, set my heart hammering in my chest. I switched off the radio, went through to the bathroom to splash my face at the sink.
    My flat was on the top floor of a mansion block about halfway up Highgate Hill, 3 a little uphill of the spot where, in the folk tale, Dick Whittington (why is it I can recall this name and not my own?) heard the bells of Bow Church calling him and turned back, and just by the place where, or so the tale goes, William Powell, the Highgate Prophet, passed on, one sunny morning, in April 1798. Powell’s tale is strikingly bizarre. He’d been a parsimonious Treasury clerk till he’d won a sum on a lottery and grown spendthrift, lazy and insolent at work. He’d been sacked from his position, the money had soon run out, and he’d ended up destitute. It was after his fall he became known as the Highgate Prophet; he’d a strange ritual: early every morning, in all seasons, all weathers, he’d walk from the Sloane Streetpoorhouse he lived in, to the foot of Highgate Hill, stand a moment in contemplation, raise up his arms to the sky, then run up the hill. If he was spoken to by a passer-by, or stopped, or looked back, he’d return to the bottom, start again, would keep on till he managed to dash all the way up in one go. He’d explain, should he be asked about his odd behaviour, his conviction the world would end if ever he failed in his rite. Well, that fine spring morning in 1798, he did, dropped dead, heart burst. Of course, the world did not end then, or so, anyhow, it would seem. 4
    Being high up, my flat commanded good views, and