A Haunted Island
A lone law student, left behind on a small Canadian lake island after the rest of the party departs in late September, settles in to catch up on neglected legal reading. Alone in the two-storey cottage with only a canoe and a farmer's weekly visits for company, he explores the emptied house, feels the lingering imprint of the summer's voices in its creaking boards, and chooses a small bedroom over the verandah as his own. Ten days into his solitude he wakes with an inexplicable, mounting dread of that bedroom, unconnected to any specific incident there. The feeling only intensifies through the day, so that evening he moves his bed down into the sitting-room instead, telling himself it is merely a precaution to secure good sleep for his reading. That night, under a heavy, storm-charged stillness, he finds himself unable to concentrate on his books, compulsively checking doors, windows, and lamps for a wrongness he cannot locate, then noticing an unnatural chill despite the warm evening. Standing on the verandah, he twice sees a large, old-style birch-bark canoe with high curving bow and stern glide across the lit path on the water and vanish into darkness, paddled by two Indians, one the steerer a huge man. Realizing the canoe is circling the island rather than being three different craft, and that a landing seems imminent, he retreats to the house, extinguishes all six lamps, and takes up his rifle in a corner facing the door. He hears the canoe land and the two Indians steal onto the verandah; the giant steerer presses his face to the glass door, scanning the darkened room, before both figures silently enter. The narrator finds himself paralyzed, unable to raise his weapon, as the pair pass within inches of him — the smaller one dragging some unseen burden behind him on a branch — and mount the stairs to the room that had been his bedroom. From above comes a long shriek of terror and pain, then a heavy thud. As the storm finally breaks with rain and lightning, the two figures descend, dragging their now-heavier burden, and pass close by the narrator again. A double lightning flash illuminates everything: the huge leader's fierce, aquiline profile, and the burden being dragged by the smaller Indian on a cedar branch — the scalped, blood-streaked body of a white man, whose face the narrator recognizes as his own. He lunges forward with a cry and collapses unconscious. He wakes in daylight to the farmer arriving with bread, and is helped up, disoriented and barely coherent. A thorough search of the house turns up nothing, and he spends his remaining ten days at the farmer's before departing, his reading finished and his nerves restored. On his last day, paddling out to revisit the island before catching the steamer, he tours the house without incident, but on re-embarking sees a canoe with high curving bows and two Indians glide around the island, paddling swiftly toward him when he alters course. He flees by canoe himself, and looking back as sunset reddens the water, sees the same canoe and its two occupants still circling the island before darkness and a rocky bluff finally cut off his view.
By Algernon Blackwood · First published 1908 · Genre: Horror, Fantasy, Paranormal · 8,780 words
First lines
The following events occurred on a small island of isolated position in a large Canadian lake, to whose cool waters the inhabitants of Montreal and Toronto flee for rest and recreation in the hot months. It is only to be regretted that events of such peculiar interest to the genuine student of the psychical should be entirely uncorroborated. Such unfortunately, however, is the case.
Our own party of nearly twenty had returned to Montreal that very day, and I was left in solitary possession for a week or two longer, in order to accomplish some important "reading" for the law which I had foolishly neglected during the summer.
What this Textopian page supports
A Haunted Island is listed on Textopian as a short story by Algernon Blackwood, dated 1908 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Short story
- Author: Algernon Blackwood
- Date: 1908 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Horror, Fantasy, Paranormal, Adventure
- Length: 8,780 words
- Structure: 1 section, 77 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Difficult (10th-12th Grade)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for A Haunted Island by Algernon Blackwood
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
- Readability and classroom-planning context
- Passage-specific claims should cite the exact /read/ URL for the relevant chapter or paragraph
Discussion starters
- What should a reader notice first when entering A Haunted Island?
- How does this short story by Algernon Blackwood fit its genre, period, or classroom use?
- Where does Horror first become important in the reading?
Similar titles
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Genres
- Horror — This book features supernatural entities and ominous situations, which are key components of the horror genre.
- Fantasy — Its narrative incorporates elements which exist outside the realms of the real-world, suggesting the genre is fantasy.
- Paranormal — The title suggests an encounter with entities or occurrences beyond the scope of scientific understanding, common in the paranormal genre.
- Adventure — The protagonist's journey and experiences suggest elements of adventure.
Tags
ghost story · supernatural · horror · mystery · thriller · island setting · paranormal · psychological · suspense · atmospheric · eerie · spooky