HALLOWEEN SPECIAL: The Hands of Orlac - Maurice Renard

Horror enthusiasts, whether of the written word or the cinematic variety, may recognize the title I'm about to discuss.  Unless you've read the novel, however, you have no idea what Maurice Renard was getting at when he wrote The Hands of Orlac (1920).  Those who may have seen one of its many filmed adaptations have never seen the real vision of the novel which is more than the nightmare of two hand grafts gone terribly wrong.  Though populated with ghosts and occultists, several seances and necromancy and all sorts of supernatural trappings, The Hands of Orlac, in fact, is not a horror novel at all. Rather it is a brilliantly fashioned detective novel wherein a series of impossible crimes are made to appear to be the work of supernatural agencies and a spectral being.

Stephen Orlac is a concert pianist who is travelling back to Paris for a long awaited reunion with his devoted wife, Rosine.  En route to the City of Lights the train crashes and there are multiple casualties. Rosine rushes to the scene of the accident and finds her husband under the body of a man clad entirely in white.  The man in white later appears at various spots throughout the wreckage leading Rosine to dub him Spectropheles.  This ghastly figure will continue to haunt her throughout the novel appearing and disappearing at the most unexpected places.

Unlike the man in white, Stephen has survived but has also sustained terrible injuries and must be rushed to a hospital for immediate surgery. He is operated on by Professor Cerral, a celebrity surgeon specializing in neurology and transplants.  Stephen receives two hand transplants and his torturous recovery and attempt to regain his musical skills are the basis of the plot. Those who know the many movie versions know the secret of those hands and I'll not reveal it here. A fairly overused horror movie trope by now this gimmick of the hands seems to be an original idea of Renard's and he may be the first writer to use it in sensationalized genre fiction. The truth of Stephen's new hands is not revealed until the second half of the novel long after a variety of outrageous events occur ranging from ghostly manifestations, "externalized nightmares", an impossible jewel theft and the equally impossible return of the jewels to a safe in a locked rom, necromancy via a painted portrait as well as a seance complete with table tapping.

Original French edition 1920

The first half of the novel is told through Rosine's viewpoint. Though the novel is named for Stephen Orlac he is almost a minor character in this entire section. Everything we see is through Rosine's eyes and we read only of her perceptions. She is distraught that her husband is haunted by a grueling and painful recovery yet she is also terrorized by Spectropheles who she feels is responsible for a series of break-ins and crimes in their home. When the violence leads to murder the police are called in and the novel takes a sharp turn into the land of French detective novels.

It is here that the influences of French pulp writers Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre, creators of master criminal Fantomas, can clearly be seen. The first half of the novel subtitled "The Portents" has faint whiffs of the popular Fantomas serials so popular only five years prior to the publication of Renard's book.  With its constant reiteration and recap of previous action and incidents the story bears obvious structural similarities to a serial and most likely did appear as one in a French newspaper or magazine. Central plot motifs like the ghost of a murderer being responsible for two deaths and the bizarre idea of a rubber glove bearing fingerprints of another person are two ideas that appear prominently in the third Fantomas serial published in book format in English as The Messengers of Evil (1911).  Renard must have been familiar with that serial. He even includes a mythical gang supposedly behind all the criminal activity. His dangerous group, La Bande Infra-Rouge (The Infra Red Gang), is pure French pulp fiction. Apaches and murderous gypsies roamed the pages of French crime stories as much as Italian thugs and Irish gangs would appear in US pulp magazines. When Inspector Cointre, the egotistical policeman who seems entirely fashioned after Eugene Valmont, begins to fasten onto the idea of faked fingerprints all hope of the supernatural has pretty much been thrown out the window.  Cointre has some of the best dialogue in the novel, too. After ripping apart a sofa and finding puppets and props that were used by the fake medium he expounds: "When dealing with mediums, never get you furniture re-covered, or at least keep an eye on your upholsterer."  

At this point it is almost certain that the crimes, especially the murders, will appear to be the work of human hands and not spectral ones. Renard does what the French do so well in the earliest forms of detective fiction. He adds twist after twist. Stephen meets with the murderer who confesses his crimes. Then Renard dares to reveal that this being is in fact a walking dead man!  But Renard is not finished with his twists until the final paragraphs when Cointre reveals the final solution to all the mysteries with an unexpected announcement.

Second English translation, the better one!
(Souvenir Press/Nightowl Books, 1980)

The Hands of Orlac is one of the finest examples of French sensationalist fiction that one can find.  The English translation by Iain White (Nightowl Books/Souvenir Press, 1980) is the second and better version for (unlike the expurgated previous English translation of 1929) it retains the full lurid details, the relentless melodrama heightened with lightning strikes of exclamation marks on nearly every page, and the nearly hysterical voice of Rosine Renard describing in grisly and horrible detail the living nightmare she is experiencing in her home. Dream imagery floods the novel. Omens are inevitable, practically inescapable. Rosine's dreams are prophetic; much of what she sees while asleep later comes true. The words "portent" and "phantasm" occur with such frequency that one often expects for the ghosts to waft off the pages.

The most surprising element in the novel not seen in any adaptation I've watched is that Stephen's father, Edouard Orlac has become obsessed with spiritism. He and his friend Monsieur de Crochans have been dabbling in communicating with the dead.  Though they are suspected of collaborating with fraudulent mediums and police are investigating their activities. In the climax of the first section one of the necromancy sequences seems to be genuine with a shocking surprise for Stephen when he spells out the name of the spirit they have contacted. And yet for all Renard's fascination with the macabre, the abundance of weird and paranormal activity, he is compelled to rationalize everything that occurred in the first half when he relates the second half entitled "The Crimes."

In the last chapters Rosine and Stephen face the inevitable and horrible truth, something the reader has most likely guessed at even if he has never seen nor heard of the several movie Orlacs. But a French detective novel has never been French without the ultimate surprise saved for nearly the final paragraph. When that gasper comes in The Hand of Orlac it is both satisfying for the reader and a godsend for Stephen and Rosine.

FFB: Thirteen Stannergate - G. M. Wilson

THE STORY:  Someone asks Kate Wheeler for directions to 13 Stannergate and though Kate has never been in this town before she somehow knows exactly where the house is and what it will look like. She can even describe the way house looked decades ago, long before she was born -- from the ivy on the outer walls to the wallpaper in the previously locked and shuttered attic. It's that attic that Kate is drawn to, it's been renovated and waiting for a new lodger. She is compelled to rent the room for her new home. But Kate seems to remember something about the window that she dare not go near, let alone touch. And who was Miss Joanna she seems to think was in the room? Is Kate the reincarnation of a former occupant of the room -- a maidservant from the 19th century who committed suicide by throwing herself out the window?

THE CHARACTERS: Thirteen Stannergate (1958) is the third book in a series of supernaturally tinged detective novels featuring G.M. Wilson's pair of policemen -- John Crawford (a prototype of Fox Mulder) and Inspector Lovick (the skeptical Dana Scully of the duo) -- who have an uncanny knack of uncovering weird crimes with seemingly paranormal events surrounding them. "More spooks!" Lovick scoffs yet again. Not at all what he needs ever since he dealt with a haunted mansion and a cursed fireplace poker that killed without any human agency (Bury That Poker, 1957). Lovick is not at all convinced that Kate has some psychic connection with the past occupants of the house and is sure she has seen photographs of the place or visited it before despite all her protestations to the contrary. When Kate has a near fatal accident falling out the same window in the attic she dare not go near. A mere fall or was she pushed? Richard Clare, who bears a striking resemblance to his ancestor Charles, was in the room with Kate when she fell. Witnesses claim he pushed her while he says he was trying to pull her away from the window. The story enters the realm of the eerie when we slowly learn the story of Charles, the maid Alice, and Miss Joanna and the love triangle that led to Alice's death. Charles apparently was responsible. Kate is not only convinced she is the reincarnation of Alice but that Richard is the new form of Charles and that they are doomed to repeat the past.

The house at Stannergate is packed to the roof with oddballs and suspicious types. There's Mr. Geddes the self professed "pedigree hunter" whose obsession with genealogical leads to his uncovering the complicated past of the Clare clan. Ancient Mrs. Clare, the invalid owner of the house has developed a maternal liking to Kate and may be changing her will in Kate's favor, but is wary of the girl's eerie powers and knowledge of the past.  Lee and Lucille Burney are a caustic married couple. He's a portrait painter and she's a direct descendant of the Clare family with an interest in keeping the house in her name. Kindly Miss Doveland is a spinsterish ex-schoolteacher who becomes Kate's guardian and confidante in her time of trouble. Lil Webster is the manager of the house who along with the usual cadre of gossipy servants provide all sorts of juicy tales about the boarders at 13 Stannergate. One of these people is a would be murderer who is determined to end Kate's life. Greed, jealousy or revenge - which of these is the murderer's motive? Will the police uncover the killer and prevent a second and fatal attempt on Kate's life?

INNOVATIONS: Wilson is masterful at creating tension and developing a creepy atmosphere in her detective novels. This has a very Gothic feel in the true sense of the word, absent of any HIBK trappings that could ruin the tone. Kate is only 19 years old but never comes across vapid like most of the ninny heroines one finds in neo-Gothic suspense novels. John Crawford is aware that Kate is unusual, that she may indeed have a sensitivity to the house's history, an extraordinary way of picking up cues from the past if not possessing an actual paranormal ability. He says anyone would be stupid not to admit that aspect of Kate's fragile mindset and her ability to drift in and out of the past and present so easily. Some of the characters, however, exploit this fact by managing to slyly manipulate the truth in order to make it appear that Kate is mentally ill. Lucille Burney, in particular, comes across as the most sinister of the boarders. For many chapters Wilson builds up a good case of Lucile being the guilty party. But it could never be that obvious ...or could it?

Unlike her previous two books (Bury the Hatchet and I Was Murdered) the element of supernatural in Thirteen Stannergate is not overt. The ambiguity surrounding Kate's apparently psychic powers and knowledge of events from the long past are always open to rational explanation. Until, that is, two uncanny events happen unexpectedly.

Unfortunately, Wilson has a tendency to have her detectives talk about the conventions of mystery novels in her books. I wish she didn't have Lovick say one sentence in this novel. Had he not uttered those words I would never have suspected one character. Because of that one stupid line the ending is fairly ruined. It's an act of self-sabotage that Wilson was probably unaware of. Or maybe she thought she was being clever with a double bluff. It didn't work with me, if that was her intent.

QUOTES:  "...one never knows what may be of use till one has uncovered it. That's one of the fascinations of [genealogical] research, the most enthralling by-ways to be explored at every turn with who can tell what treasure lying at the end of them."

Lucille Burney was a dangerous woman. Jealousy and spite lay very near that over-painted, over-powdered surface...

If Alice Dobson had committed suicide, then the impulse, the "badness" remaining in this room, had been directed towards self-destruction, and it was more than possible that Kate had been driven to attempt death in the same way. But if Alice had been murdered--

Murder waiting here in the hours of darkness... Murder perhaps not by a human hand, not even by a dead hand, but by an influence so powerful that it had created the physical sensations as well as the emotions of that [previous] tragedy. Once the borderline of normality was crossed, anything was possible.

EASY TO FIND? Sometimes I feel I should just skip this section. That's right. Another extremely scarce book. Apparently I bought one of only two copies available in the past two years. That second copy -- the one with the DJ shown above-- is now gone. Someone shelled out a lot of cash for that book, if I recall the listing properly. So sadly there are zero copies for sale from the usual online bookselling sites as of this writing. I suggest hitting up Worldcat.org and checking out library holdings.  Most of Wilson's books are not only difficult to find in used bookstores they seem to have vanished off the face of the Earth. I'd like to see all of them reprinted and would like to get a word out to Dean Street Press. Are you reading this, DSP?