This story was kind of a mess and I wouldn’t consider it well written by any stretch of the imagination. And yet, whether it was the proto-Lovecraftian nature of it or just that I read it in a good mood, I really dug it nonetheless. This is Lovecraft before Lovecraft. And much like in Lovecraft, the mystique comes from vague, secondhand accounts of strange happenings and characters telling you that they are horrified and not elaborating much further. But it has a vibe to it.

Arthur Machen’s prose is dogshit though.