The Haunted Pampero (Fantasy and Horror Classics)

By William Hope Hodgson

Many of the horror stories of monsters and ghouls, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Read Books Ltd.
• Release date: Sep 6, 2016
• ISBN: 9781473355477

William Hope Hodgson

William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918) was a British author and poet best known for his works of macabre fiction. Early experience as a sailor gave resonance to his novels of the supernatural at sea, The Ghost Pirates and The Boats of the Glen-Carrig, but The House on the Borderland and The Night Land are often singled out for their powerful depiction of eerie, otherworldly horror. The author was a man of many parts, a public speaker, photographer and early advocate of bodybuilding. He was killed in action during the Battle of the Lys in the First World War.

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Pampero

WILLIAM HOPE HODGSON

William Hope Hodgson was born in Essex, England in 1877. He began a four-year apprenticeship as a cabin boy at the age of fourteen, and spent most of his teens at sea. In 1899, having returned to Blackburn, England, he became a well-known bodybuilder, and his first writing endeavours were essays on the subject of fitness and health. He turned his attention to fiction during the early part of the 20th century, and in 1904 published his first short story, ‘The Goddess of Death’. Over the next few years, his fiction spread to the American market, where his ‘Sargasso Sea stories’ were well-received. Hodgson wrote prolifically for the rest of his life, and is best-known nowadays for two novels – The House on the Borderland (1908) and The Night Land (1912) – and the much-anthologised stories ‘The Whistling Room’, ‘The Voice in the Night’ and ‘The Shamraken Homeward-Bounder’. Hodgson was killed by an artillery shell at Ypres in April of 1918.

William Hope Hodgson

THE HAUNTED PAMPERO

[I]

‘Great news!’ cried young Tom Pemberton, as he threw open the door and came quickly into the room where his newly wed wife was busily employed about some sewing. ‘They’ve given me a ship – What ho!’ and he threw his peaked uniform-cap down on the table with a bang.

‘A ship, Tom?’ said his wife, letting her sewing rest idly on her lap.

‘The Pampero!’ said Tom proudly.

‘What! The "Haunted Pampero"?’ cried his wife, in a voice expressive of more dismay than elation.

‘That’s what a lot of fools call her,’ admitted Tom, unwilling to hear a word against his new kingdom. ‘It’s all a lot of rot! She’s no more haunted than I am!’

‘And you’ve accepted?’ asked Mrs Tom anxiously, rising to her feet with a sudden movement which sent the contents of her lap to the floor.