'The Chapel of Infernal Devotion'

 This is a running review of the book Spirits of the Dead. Find out more here.

My opinion on the penultimate story in this collection has not changed since I first came across it 2015 in a collection of works inspired by Arthur Machen. So...

Ron Weighell's 'The Chapel of Infernal Devotion' is not just an erudite horror story but an extended essay on Machen's cultural significance. It follows a book collector who fails to secure a particular illustration at an auction. His researches reveal a link between the mysterious artist, who used the name Adam Midnight, and Machen. Midnight, whose real name was Philip Youlden, seems to have had a more than purely aesthetic interest in the occult. Our hero is inspired to try and find out more.

Thus begins an odyssey that takes the protagonist from the relatively comfortable world of book dealers to the strange house of Plas Gwyllion, where an elderly musician guards Youlden's bizarre and dangerous legacy. Along the way we encounter Sixties counter-culture and a sly reference to that noted Machen fan, H.P. Lovecraft. 'The White People' casts its spell, as does 'The Great God Pan'. There is more intense physicality in Weighell's approach to Machen's legacy, with the enduring theme of miscegenation between humans and other, older races.

And thus we near the end of this collection, and another previously unpublished story will round things off!