The Place Called Dagon by Herbert Gorman

Name: The Place Called Dagon
Author: Herbert Gorman

Doctor Daniel Dreeme, a young physician who has practiced for two years in the isolated, taciturn New England community of Marlborough, is roused one night to attend Jeffrey Westcott, a reclusive farmer who has shot himself. The Westcott farm has always been avoided by the townsfolk, and Dreeme finds Westcott a cultured but unsettling man with a strangely cloven skull, surrounded by an extensive library of arcane books; Westcott claims the wound was the result of an "experiment" and warns the doctor against curiosity. Dreeme also meets Westcott's young, hauntingly magnetic wife, Martha, who seems both entranced and imprisoned, and who asks him strange questions about noises in the night. Dreeme's old mentor, Doctor Humphrey Lathrop, hints that Marlborough's original Puritan settlers carried some "mixture of ethical and Dionysiac madness" that still colors their descendants, but refuses to say more, warning Dreeme that curiosity is dangerous. Lathrop recounts the history of the Carrier family — the wicked Captain Uriah Carrier, his melancholic son Peleg, and Peleg's daughter Martha, who was raised by Jeffrey Westcott (rumored to be of Carrier blood himself) after Peleg's death, and later married him. Dreeme grows obsessed with the mystery he senses pervading the valley, spying on the Westcott farm and watching Martha at the well. Mrs. Slater's orphaned niece, Deborah Morton, arrives in town and is sent to work at the Westcott farm; she flees back to Dreeme in terror the next morning, describing an oppressive supper, wax dolls with pins stuck in them, and Jeffrey Westcott appearing silently in her bedroom doorway at night, his eyes conveying visions of ancient horror. She also overheard Westcott speak of "the place called Dagon." Dreeme intervenes to keep Deborah from being sent back, defying Westcott openly. That same day, Westcott's hired man, Wagner, is found murdered by the river, his eyes gouged out and pegged, clutching a scrap of paper marked with a goat's head. The local farmers and officials close ranks and refuse to investigate, leaving Dreeme frustrated and isolated. That night Martha Westcott summons Dreeme to the ruined mill, where she speaks of her loveless imprisonment and a philosophy of total license, and where they are both nearly discovered by the sinister, hymn-humming Reverend George Burroughs. The next evening Dreeme returns to the mill expecting Martha but instead finds Jeffrey Westcott, who warns him again to leave the valley, then lapses into a raving fit invoking "the Master" and "the place called Dagon" before recovering and expounding a mad philosophy: that Satan and the unchecked will are the true forces of creation, that the valley's farmers are bound to some ancient seed planted two centuries ago, and that Deborah is meant to serve his design. Walking home, Dreeme declares his love to Deborah, who reveals her surname is Morton and gives him a family brooch — which he is startled to see is engraved with the same goat's-head emblem found on the murdered Wagner. Returning home, Dreeme finds his study door ajar and Martha Westcott waiting inside for him.

By Herbert Gorman · First published 1927 · Genre: Gothic Fiction, Mystery, Psychological Horror · 28 chapters · 86,339 words

First lines

Doctor Dreeme, turning sleepily on his pillow, heard the clatter of a horse's hoofs coming down the steep Leeminster Road. The steely clash on the rock-path tore abruptly through his semi-trance and he opened his eyes, scowling vaguely at the milky blur of ceiling. The horse stopped with a rough grating of hoofs below the window and the doctor sighed. Marlborough was like that. It was undoubtedly another farmer with a pain in his back who might just as well wait until morning. It was at night that his taciturn neighbors were most obsessed with the somber consequences of their lonely ailments. In daylight they would bear them with the dumb equanimity of animals, sitting behind drawn curtains or plodding painfully over their stony fields. But they were horribly afraid of dying at night. The bell clanked feebly. The doctor threw back his quilted coverlet of great square patches, rose in the darkness of the room, and strode over to the window. He leaned out, straining his eyes to see who stood in the gray mist of the moon outside his door.

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The Place Called Dagon is listed on Textopian as a novel by Herbert Gorman, dated 1927 CE.

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Work type: Novel
Author: Herbert Gorman
Date: 1927 CE
Language: English
Genres: Gothic Fiction, Mystery, Psychological Horror, Literary Fiction, Supernatural Fiction
Length: 86,339 words
Structure: 28 chapters, 1,285 paragraphs
Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)

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Genres

Gothic Fiction — The work embodies core Gothic elements: an isolated farmhouse shrouded in mystery, an atmosphere of psychological dread, a labyrinthine setting, and morally ambiguous characters. The narrative prioritizes mood and unease over conventional plot mechanics.
Mystery — The central narrative arc follows Dreeme's compulsive investigation into the secrets of the Westcott farm and the hidden nature of Marlborough itself. The plot is driven by the gradual revelation and concealment of information.
Psychological Horror — The work generates fear through atmosphere, implied malevolence, and psychological tension rather than explicit violence. The horror emerges from Dreeme's growing obsession and his perception of evil emanating from the Westcotts and their environment.
Literary Fiction — The prose is deliberately artistic and introspective, employing stream-of-consciousness passages, elaborate descriptive language, and thematic exploration of human psychology, isolation, and existential dread over conventional plot.

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