




                            RATTLE of BONES

                          BY ROBERT E HOWARD

           [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
                        Weird Tales June 1929. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
         the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] "Landlord, ho!" The shout broke the lowering silence and reverberated
through the black forest with sinister echoing. "This place hath a forbidding aspect, meseemeth." Two men stood in front of the forest tavern. The building was low,
long and rambling, built of heavy logs. Its small windows were heavily
barred and the door was closed. Above the door its sinister sign showed
faintly--a cleft skull. This door swung slowly open and a bearded face peered out. The owner of
the face stepped back and motioned his guests to enter--with a grudging
gesture it seemed. A candle gleamed on a table; a flame smoldered in
the fireplace. "Your names?" "Solomon Kane," said the taller man briefly. "Gaston l'Armon," the other spoke curtly. "But what is that to you?" "Strangers are few in the Black Forest," grunted the host, "bandits
many. Sit at yonder table and I will bring food." The two men sat down, with the bearing of men who have traveled far. One was a tall gaunt man, clad in a featherless hat and somber black
garments, which set off the dark pallor of his forbidding face. The
other was of a different type entirely, bedecked with lace and plumes,
although his finery was somewhat stained from travel. He was handsome
in a bold way, and his restless eyes shifted from side to side, never
still an instant. The host brought wine and food to the rough-hewn table and then stood
back in the shadows, like a somber image. His features, now receding
into vagueness, now luridly etched in the firelight as it leaped and
flickered, were masked in a beard which seemed almost animal-like in
thickness. A great nose curved above this beard and two small red eyes
stared unblinkingly at his guests. "Who are you?" suddenly asked the younger man. "I am the host of the Cleft Skull Tavern," sullenly replied the other. His tone seemed to challenge his questioner to ask further. "Do you have many guests?" l'Armon pursued. "Few come twice," the host grunted. Kane started and glanced up straight into those small red eyes, as if
he sought for some hidden meaning in the host's words. The flaming eyes
seemed to dilate, then dropped sullenly before the Englishman's cold
stare. "I'm for bed," said Kane abruptly, bringing his meal to a close. "I
must take up my journey by daylight." "And I," added the Frenchman. "Host, show us to our chambers." *       *       *       *       *

Black shadows wavered on the walls as the two followed their silent
host down a long, dark hall. The stocky, broad body of their guide
seemed to grow and expand in the light of the small candle which he
carried, throwing a long, grim shadow behind him. At a certain door he halted, indicating that they were to sleep there. They entered; the host lit a candle with the one he carried, then
lurched back the way he had come. In the chamber the two men glanced at each other. The only furnishings
of the room were a couple of bunks, a chair or two and a heavy table. "Let us see if there be any way to make fast the door," said Kane. "I
like not the looks of mine host." "There are racks on door and jamb for a bar," said Gaston, "but no bar." "We might break up the table and use its pieces for a bar," mused Kane. "_Mon Dieu_," said l'Armon, "you are timorous, _m'sieu_." Kane scowled. "I like not being murdered in my sleep," he answered
gruffly. "My faith!" the Frenchman laughed. "We are chance met--until I overtook
you on the forest road an hour before sunset, we had never seen each
other." "I have seen you somewhere before," answered Kane, "though I can not
now recall where. As for the other, I assume every man is an honest
fellow until he shows me he is a rogue; moreover, I am a light sleeper
and slumber with a pistol at hand." The Frenchman laughed again. "I was wondering how _m'sieu_ could bring himself to sleep in the room
with a stranger! Ha! Ha! All right, _m'sieu_ Englishman, let us go
forth and take a bar from one of the other rooms." Taking the candle with them, they went into the corridor. Utter silence
reigned and the small candle twinkled redly and evilly in the thick
darkness. "Mine host hath neither guests nor servants," muttered Solomon Kane. "A strange tavern! What is the name, now? These German words come not
easily to me--the Cleft Skull? A bloody name, i'faith." They tried the rooms next to theirs, but no bar rewarded their search. At last they came to the last room at the end of the corridor. They
entered. It was furnished like the rest, except that the door was
provided with a small barred opening, and fastened from the outside
with a heavy bolt, which was secured at one end to the door-jamb. They
raised the bolt and looked in. "There should be an outer window, but there is not," muttered Kane. "Look!" The floor was stained darkly. The walls and the one bunk were hacked in
places, great splinters having been torn away. "Men have died in here," said Kane, somberly. "Is yonder not a bar
fixed in the wall?" "Aye, but 'tis made fast," said the Frenchman, tugging at it. "The----"

A section of the wall swung back and Gaston gave a quick exclamation. A
small, secret room was revealed, and the two men bent over the grisly
thing that lay upon its floor. "The skeleton of a man!" said Gaston. "And behold, how his bony leg is
shackled to the floor! He was imprisoned here and died." "Nay," said Kane, "the skull is cleft--methinks mine host had a grim
reason for the name of his hellish tavern. This man, like us, was no
doubt a wanderer who fell into the fiend's hands." "Likely," said Gaston without interest; he was engaged in idly working
the great iron ring from the skeleton's leg bones. Failing in this, he
drew his sword and with an exhibition of remarkable strength cut the
chain which joined the ring on the leg to a ring set deep in the log
floor. "Why should he shackle a skeleton to the floor?" mused the Frenchman. "_Monbleu!_ 'Tis a waste of good chain. Now, _m'sieu_," he ironically
addressed the white heap of bones, "I have freed you and you may go
where you like!" "Have done!" Kane's voice was deep. "No good will come of mocking the
dead." "The dead should defend themselves," laughed l'Armon. "Somehow, I will
slay the man who kills me, though my corpse climb up forty fathoms of
ocean to do it." *       *       *       *       *

Kane turned toward the outer door, closing the door of the secret
room behind him. He liked not this talk which smacked of demonry and
witchcraft; and he was in haste to face the host with the charge of his
guilt. As he turned, with his back to the Frenchman, he felt the touch of cold
steel against his neck and knew that a pistol muzzle was pressed close
beneath the base of his brain.