The Second Wish"

by Brian Lumley
Originally published New Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos, 1980

Harry is something of a gigolo, and he's hooked up with Julia, a wealthy, still-attractive woman in her 40's.  They're taking a pleasure trip through Hungary, stopping over at Stregoicavar.

In the village, they are warned away from a nearby castle.  So needless to say, they go there.  A crazy, scruffy old man who lives there shows off his collection of rare books (guess what he has in his library?).  Then shows them his prize possession: the mummified bod of a woman he identifies as the remains of the high priestess of the cult of which he is perhaps the last remaining member.  He invites them to take the hand of the mummy and make a wish.  In order to shut him up and get them out of there, Harry takes him up on it, wishing that he could see the mummy as she was when she was alive.

With Julia rattled by the day's events and sleeping it off, Harry heads out for a local carnival and meets a hot chick named Cassilda.  She talks him into going back to her place, but blindfolds him en route.  While making out with her, he realizes where he is, and who she is, and flees.

Julia wakes up to find a naked Harry beside her, and Cassilda's familiar bouncing around the room.  Harry is bitten and dissolves into a pool of goo.

Apparently, Lumley rewrote the ending when this was published in New Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos in 1980, at the request of editor Ramsey Campbell.   I have a copy of New Tales, and I first read this way back in `81 or so.  But I have no specific memory of the ending, and my copy is packed away at the moment.  So I don't recall it nor have it handy to compare.  We will, therefore, take Lumley's intended ending as the official one.

This story is very reminiscent of editor Campbell's works - far more so than anything else in the Lumley oeuvre, or anything Lovecraftian.  And that is, I suppose, it's great strength.  It's one of the most mature stories to come from Lumley's hand and this is all to the good, because the tale is a complete success.  The evil atmosphere of the castle, Cassilda's up-front sexuality - Lumley manages to spin a completely modern, contemporary setting, and then introduce a very traditional, classic, fully-realized bit of supernatural horror into it.  And he does it perfectly.  This is an effectively chilling story and easily one of Lumley's best.  Probably his best Lovecraftian tale.