Fantasy Flight Games did a wonderful job
bringing the Cthulhu mythos to the global arena in their board game Eldritch
Horror. Set in 1926, players send their investigators all over the world,
chasing down clues, solving mysteries and encountering mind-rending horrors in
their efforts to discover and forestall the awakening of one of the dreaded
Ancient Ones. And while the game captures Lovecraft’s visions beautifully, the
only element I wasn’t a fan of is that during the setup, the players are
supposed to choose which Ancient One will be coming to wreak havoc upon the
earth. What? I get to pick? As a player, I did not want to know which colossal
Evil was going to awaken and threaten the world. It felt like peeking at your
present before Christmas morning. I wanted my investigator to have to figure
this mystery out, through all the convoluted clues, blind alleys and dead ends.
For my own sake, I set about to rectify this. This variant is the result, which
I share with anyone interested.
Link
to the file at BoardGameGeek.com: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/3448578/a-very-different-way-to-play-no-ancient-one-chosen
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"The Thing on the Doorstep" Re-Envisioning Complete!
After Circle of Spears Production Company in the UK finished the live performance of my stage play, they decided they wanted to produce it as a radio play as well 😄 I happily undertook the project - not only to give new life to the piece, but also for the challenge of writing for a medium that I had never before. The process was super enjoyable, and results were fantastic! I did not give them exclusive rights, so the radio play is available to any other production group that wants to put it on (especially since Circle of Spears has not yet moved forward far on the production of it yet). Let me know if you'd like to peruse the radio script - I'm happy to share!
__________________________________________________________
Here's a short story I wrote that was published in the Halloween Anthology in 2018 - my goal was to write something that would seem to share the same universe as Lovecraft's Elder Gods mythos - I think I succeeded! Enjoy, and let me know!
The Commission
By
Steven Reinagel
It is a singularly
futile musing that desires to trace back the most calamitous of events to its
humble inception. Yet men forever pursue this folly, as if knowing the
beginning of a thing could possibly alter its destined conclusion. Consider the
errant stroke of a pen which alters a letter and thus changes the meaning of a
word. A word, when read out of context
by the wrong reader, inflames rage and ignites a war, taking the lives of
thousands. Ponder a tiny rivet that is missed on the iron plate of a steamship,
allowing a fine spray of seawater to strike a red-hot boiler which causes it to
explode, sending hundreds to their death. Or muse upon an insignificant pebble
that starts an avalanche which lays waste to the village below. Could the catastrophe have been averted if,
by chance, the pebble had caught the eye of a causal hiker who picked it up and
placed it in his pocket? Would not countless lives in the valley below be
spared? Questions with no answers; or perhaps more rightly, ones that should
not be asked, for they are the fodder of madness.
For me, perhaps that pebble was the
insistent knocking at my door one evening a month ago. Or perhaps the pebble
came before that. What led to the knocking? It came from the finding of a tiny
statuette, which was only found because I sought distraction within a friend’s place
of business. And why the need for distraction? To escape a grief which
oppressed my soul. And the source of the grief? The loss of my beloved fiancé,
stricken down by consumption. And from whence came the fatal disease? There is
no answer. As I said: futile musings. The source of destiny’s threads cannot be
found out, nor their convoluted intertwining undone.
But expediency compels me to begin my tortured
tale somewhere, and since anguish forbids me from venturing back to the...that
time of loss, I will begin within the dusty and intriguing establishment of
Stewart Blakely. A place of great distraction.
Blakely ran a customs clearinghouse not
far from the port town of Marshfield. Being very adept at financial matters and
making business contacts – things I was never skilled in - he expanded his sphere into the acquisition of
works of antiquity from across the globe. These he auctioned off to museums.
This arrangement was most expeditious; it unburdened museums from financing
costly expeditions and freed archeologists to spend more time in the field. I
tried to visit Blakely once every few weeks, and on this occasion several
crates had just recently arrived from eastern Europe. Stewart had gotten as far
as removing the lids. I strolled down the aisle, peering inside at the
treasures, hoping to find the illusive distraction. Blakely feigned immersion
in the paperwork before him, but I knew he was keeping half an eye on me. Not
out of fear that I would abscond with some relic, but out of general concern
for my wellbeing. He knew of my recent loss.
“How goes the progress on your latest
experiments?” he called out.
I shrugged. “No progress. It’s all a
dead-end at the moment.”
There was a forced cheeriness in his tone
as he said: “Well, I’m sure you’ll get a breakthrough soon. You always solve
the problem.”
Within one of the open crates, my eyes
fastened upon a small figurine nestled in a bed of straw. It was about the same
size as my hand and looked ancient and valuable, but most of its features had
been ground away by harsh elements or by time itself, leaving the subject of
the artwork open to question. At one time it may have been a broad-shouldered
man adorned with an oversized mask, or perhaps a fierce animal rearing on its
hind legs. The color was brownish and streaked like marble, but pitted like a
sedimentary rock - a mineral I could not readily identify, and so immediately
piqued my scientific bent.
“Stewart, what is this item?” I picked it
up, and as I did so, experienced a slight tingle. The sensation was similar to
touching a wire that had a slight electrical charge through it. The tingling
ceased immediately, but still, startled as I was, caused me to nearly drop it.
“Be careful with that piece,” he replied,
not looking up. It’s bound for a museum in Boston.”
“Where did it come from?”
“Tell me the designation on that crate.”
“Lot 47, Crate 126, Item 43.”
He dug through a sheaf of papers and
lifted one free. “Grunendeich, Germany. Why?”
Stewart looked up at me as I studied the artifact.
“It’s intriguing,” I replied. “Never seen anything quite like it.”
“Would you like to borrow it for a while? Do some tests?"
I returned his gaze, hoping the surprised, inquisitive response in
my eyes would mask the other deeper emotions. “You’d let me do that?”
“I can lose it in the paperwork for a little while,” he continued.
“Besides, it’s been buried for thousands of years. I think the museum can
afford to wait an extra week or two. And if you learn anything, I’m sure
they’ll appreciate whatever you find. It’ll save them some research. You just
have to promise me you’ll take good care of it.”
“I will. Thanks.”
I walked the hour back to my town of Heraldshaw beneath a warm September sun. The statuette made the journey in my right jacket pocket, and I found I had to resist the urge to reach inside and stroke it. Doing so would only contribute to its timeworn state. I arrived at my small house, which lay on the outskirts of town, and circled around to the rear where a smaller attached structure served as my workshop.
I closed the door behind me and looked around at the scattering of mismatched parts on my workbenches. I hoped that some time away in a different environment would give me fresh eyes to see a new usefulness or combination to them when I returned. My mind remained blank.
I took the ancient object out of my pocket
and placed it in the only cleared space, which was a corner of the table that
also held a framed photograph. My hand moved to the ornate, silver frame. I
lifted it and looked on the beautiful, smiling face. I remembered that day: the
photographer told her not to smile - it would be impossible to hold the
expression still for the long duration the process took. He didn’t know her.
Her face was made to smile. He said he’d never taken a photograph that
marvelous.
“Corianne,” I whispered, touching the
glass covering her face. “It’s not fair. Why did you have to go?”
I pressed the photograph to my cheek and
squeezed my eyes tightly closed. Tears still found a way of escape. I removed a
handkerchief from my pocket and dried the wet streaks from photo.
“Wherever you are,” I choked out. “I hope
it’s a better place. A place with no pain, no bitter memories. It has to be
better than here...”
I returned the photograph to the space on
the table and forced my eyes away. Back to the statuette. I stared at it,
hoping that the new addition to the surroundings would spark an inspired
thought, but still nothing. If anything, putting a museum piece amongst the
machine parts only created a visual confusion even harder to reconcile.
I sighed and pulled my stool underneath
me. At the least, I could get something off my to-do list. I needed to prepare
a few more cooling fins for a motor that was suffering from an overheating
problem. The copper strips needed to be thinner. I grabbed a hammer and got to
work.
An odd sight caught the corner of my eye,
over where I placed the figurine. The table was sprinkled with iron shavings
from a previous project, and my rhythmic pounding had caused them to shake and
vibrate. A pattern had formed - lines of radiating oscillation, the epicenter
of which was the curious relic. Startled, I put the hammer aside and immediately
tested the statue for any magnetic qualities, but it proved to be nonferrous.
Remembering the electrical sensation I felt when I first touched it, I thought
perhaps that was the cause, but another test revealed the object held no charge
whatsoever.
Now absorbed by the mystery, I applied
more tests - any I could think of, but all were inconclusive. Eventually, I
knew I would need to study a fragment under the scopes. I decided to remove the
smallest piece possible from its underside, but the mineral proved to be of
very stubborn stuff. Only the greatest effort succeeded in dislodging a chip,
but the task left me more perplexed than ever: to wear away stone this hard to
the level of decay it exhibited would’ve required the effort not of thousands of years, but millions.
What was it that I held in my hand?
Determined to solve the enigma, I devoted
myself to the task. Five days’ and a hundred experiments later, the relic now
sat in the center of a shallow copper bowl, crisscrossed by glass tubes that
held liquid mercury. The silvery fluid raced through the tubes, turning gears in
halting revolutions and erratically driving small pistons that I had attached
at the corners. The arrangement also seemed to generate, or perhaps reveal, some
type of field around the relic. When I attempted to adjust its position in the
bowl, the field neither attracted nor repelled me, but created a feeling of
discomfort that amplified as I drew close. The machine lived, but I was still
no nearer to discovering the impelling power within.
Late that night, there was a knock at my
workshop door.
The delicate complexity of the machine,
and its perpetually puzzling nature, gave me sufficient reason to ignore the
intrusion. But my genial nature has never allowed me such callous disregard, so
with an irritated sigh I pushed myself away from the table. I opened the door
to face a man, several inches taller than myself, and ensconced in a voluminous
black cape and wide brimmed hat. A pervasive odor clung to him that reminded me
of old, musty earth and rotted wood. His dark, stained clothes bore holes that
looked to have been eaten away by time, and would crumble at a touch. His skin,
such that I could see in the darkness beyond my door, had an ashen color to it,
but that could’ve been attributed to the very pale moon light. At first I
thought he was merely a beggar, in search of a hand-out. He bowed his head
slightly, deepening the shadows that already obscured much of his features. He
spoke in a slow, even-measured voice, and though he stood only a few feet in
front of me, it sounded as if it came from the far end of train tunnel.
“Are you Adam Pritchard?” he asked.
“I am,” I replied, startled. “And you,
sir?”
He flicked away my question with a subtle twitch
of his head. “I have a business proposition to discuss with you. I am aware of
your current efforts and, as it happens, it coincides with my needs.”
“How do you who I am, and what I’m working
on?”
A smile, or something that resembled one,
crept across his face. “Your name is known abroad. Your inventions have gained
you a considerable reputation. The one you’re working on now holds great promise.”
“But I’m only experimenting with various
components,” I replied. “I don’t know what the end result will be, or even if
it will work. I ask again, sir: how do you know about my project? Are you a
spy, perhaps sent from a company?”
He chuckled, and the sound was like a
distant rumbling. “Although still very rudimentary, your machine is already emitting
a unique energy pattern. I have detected it, but have deduced from its erratic
spikes and fluctuations that you are plagued with complications regarding its
construction. I’m not surprised; what you are attempting has barely been
conceived, much less put forth in practicality. You won’t succeed if you
continue to follow your current line of thought.”
I crossed my arms. “Then pray, enlighten
me; what do I need to do?”
He shoved a folded piece of paper in my
direction. “This is a list of the parts and elements you will need.
“I
would like to commission you to build the machine for me.”
I quickly surveyed the list of items.
“This will not be cheap,” I muttered.
“That does not present a problem. Hold out
your hand.”
I did so, hesitantly, and he opened his
fist over it. Into my hand fell a glittering assortment of gemstones; diamonds,
rubies, emeralds and several gold coins, stamped with unusual inscriptions.
“This will more than cover the costs.”
My eyes shot wide at the dazzling sight. “Yes,
I’m sure. But I still don’t know...”
He took a step closer into the doorway.
“Your
mind is going down paths of straight lines and right angles,” he whispered. “You
must step off the path, and embrace the curvature. Contemplate the coil, gaze
upon the funnel, stare into the vortex, and let them guide you into new
revelations.”
“But I won’t know how to assemble these
components,” I stammered. “The design of the machine...”
He reached out, splaying long gray fingers
near my left temple and touched the center of my forehead with his thumb.
“You will know. It will come to you, in
dreams, in visions. Embrace them, and do not be afraid. I will return soon.
Work in earnest. The waiting has already been too long.”
He turned and walked away, letting the
night swallow him. I closed the door and looked again at the gold and jewels I
now held. More wealth than I ever envisioned. Stewart could arrange the sale of
the gemstones, and I could begin acquiring what I needed. I inspected the list
in my other hand again. Some of them...made no sense to be part of a machine...
The dreams began that night.
I will not attempt to relate them to you,
since what I experienced as I was conveyed through dimensions and exposed to
maddening colors, sounds and shapes would defy any effort to force them into a
coherent narrative. And I have no desire to dwell on the brooding sensation of
the twisted, malevolent intelligence that lurked just beyond my perception.
Needless to say, I awoke thoroughly unnerved by impressions I couldn’t rightly
define, but which left me with palpable images seared into my mind. I knew what
I needed to do.
The following days were filled with work
at a fevered rate, with frequent visits to Blakely to arrange the financing as
well as the ordering and receiving of the necessary exotic components. He gave
me wary looks, but complied to my every request, perhaps thinking my new mania
was a needful diversion.
The dreams returned every night, taking me
to new, but always strange and frightening, alien places. I awoke, beaded with
sweat, able to see less and less of the world around me, crowded out by
relentless visions of twisted equations and darkly-inspired schematics. The machine
grew and took shape in my workshop, consuming an entire worktable.
A fortnight later, the knocking came
again. I threw open the door to my dark benefactor.
“I
need to know,” I blurted, forgoing pleasantries. “What will this machine do?
For what purpose have I made it?”
“It will create a breach,” he replied very
matter-of-factly with his tunnel voice. “And allow me to travel where I need to
go - where those who dwell there are expecting my return. My work here has long
been accomplished, but I’ve had to wait for the progress of your world to reach
a point where such inventions were possible. But it will serve your purpose as
well.”
“My purpose? But I’m building this for
you.”
“Once I’ve taken my leave, I’ll have no
more use for it. I will leave it behind for you - to help you find what you
search for.”
“How do you know what I search for?”
He formed the artificial smile again. “The
anguish of your longing is writ on your soul. You are tormented by grief and
loss. You seek a place as well - a place where sorrow does not crush you in its
embrace. A place where you can...forget. The machine can open that place for
you.”
“How—“. I turned and looked upon the
machine with new wonderment.
“One thing remains,” he continued. “There
are symbols that must be engraved onto the surface. You will learn their shape.
You have five days to complete your work. That will be All Hallows’ Eve. On
that day, take the machine to the center of your town and turn it on.”
“Why that day in particular?” I asked,
turning back, but all I saw was an empty doorframe.
That night, the dreams showed me new things...
Dawn arrived on All Hallows’ Eve. I had
worked without stop, night and day blending into one, but now the machine sat
completed before me. The copper dish had become a fully enclosed container,
with the statuette in the very center, suspended in a smaller globe of a
mercury-cesium colloidal mixture. Disturbingly, the formula called for a small
quantity of my own blood to be infused with the colloidal solution.
A control panel was bolted to the outer
surface and held a dial and a lever. Six large copper tubes wormed out from the
interior of the container at even intervals and extended upwards along the
side, curving around it as they ascended. Between each pipe I had etched,
according to my nightmares, curious symbols with an acid wash. I assumed they
were merely a decorative touch, for they surely couldn’t have affected the
operational purpose of the machine, but I still wished I hadn’t been required
to add them. Their harsh bold lines and cross-strokes were too consciously
arranged to be merely random, and hinted of a once-used language, now long
dead. They disturbed some primal level of my mind, and I wished now that I had
researched the meanings of the odd markings, but there wasn’t time now. I
loaded the machine onto a cart and pulled it towards the town. The day was
cloudy, but there was no threatening look of rain to them.
There was a small square in the center or
town, a grassy lawn where picnics and public announcements often took place. Several
townsfolk were out, going about their business. I attracted no more than a
curious glance or two as I hefted the machine off the cart and set it on the
ground.
My activities drew a little more attention
of the single policeman in town, Officer Carnile, casually making his rounds.
He strolled over and tapped the side of the drum with the tip of his baton. “So,
Mr. Pritchard what is this new contraption?”
I stood and put a protective hand against
the housing. “Please, Carnile: have a little care. This is very sensitive.”
“Not dangerous, is it?” he glowered at me
beneath his eyebrows. “Because, you know, we can’t have that in the center of
town. You’d better tell me what it does.”
“It’s a weather machine. Or I should say a
weather-controlling machine.”
“Well, that would be something,” Carnile
replied, rocking back on his heels. “The farmers here would be very happy if it
worked. But do you have to do this today? With All Hallows’ Eve, children are
going to be out going from house to house tonight.”
“Don’t worry - I’ll be done before then.”
I moved my hand onto the lever. “You might want to take a step or two back,
just as a precaution.”
He did so, and I threw the lever. Nothing
happened except a slight breeze that disturbed the tree tops. But in a few mere
heartbeats, it grew frighteningly fast to a screeching gale-force strength.
Carnile looked wildly about, then headed
for the machine. “You need to turn this thing off!”
Just as he reached the lever, a fierce
eddy of wind snatched him up and pulled him into the air. But I was untouched.
I looked around to see the reason. A cyclone had burst into being around me,
and I was in the dead calm of the eye. But everywhere the maelstrom was
wreaking destruction. Trees had been plucked as easily as daisies, buildings
were torn from their foundations, and people tumbled helplessly. I watched
aghast and frozen, not only at the sudden destruction, but also at the
inconceivable thing I was witnessing occur within it. The men, the women, the
children, even the town’s dogs and cats - something was happening to them.
Their bodies were being misshapen; they were being...stretched beyond physical
tolerance, beyond a breaking point. They should’ve been torn apart, but they
weren’t. I wanted to believe what I saw was a hallucination, brought on by days
and nights of over-exertion and no sleep, but their howls and screams were all
too real and beyond any sound my imagination could’ve conjured. No, this was
real.
One of the townsfolk, Jason Huddelwitt,
swept close by, his entire body deformed into an impossibly obscene proportion
and his face twisted in pain. Above me, the extreme ends of Mrs. Wilkins caught
up with each other within the circumference of the vortex.
Then a new dreadful sight assaulted me.
The town’s structures, instead of being wrenched into disproportion, succumbed
to the unnatural force and were smashed and splintered into jagged lengths. But
as the pieces twisted and tore through the air, they would collide and
coalesce, for a fleeting moment, into a sort of pattern. At first I didn’t
trust my eyesight, but as I watched for the patterns and picked them out as
they emerged, I realized, to my growing horror, they were identical to the
enigmatic symbols I had etched into the copper drum. It was as if the entire
town had become the machine and I, like the rigid ageless stone statue, stood
in the very center.
I could take no more. I stopped up my eyes
and ears against the horrors that swirled around me. I had done this. I had
built the machine that was tearing the town apart and its people into grotesque
forms. I had to stop it. My hand found the lever, and I franticly threw it in
an attempt to stop the devastation. The roar did not abate. I threw it again,
and again and again.
A voice came clear above the tumult, as if
through a protected tube.
“Ah, it is done.”
I opened my eyes and saw, walking toward
me unhindered and unaffected through the maelstrom, the man in the black coat
and hat.
“Look! Look what your machine is doing! It’s
killing them all!” I yelled. “I can’t stop it. I can’t shut it off!”
“No, it will not stop until it’s fulfilled
its purpose.”
“And what purpose is that?”
“As I’ve already told you: to open a
breach to my realm, where my ancient masters await.”
“But I didn’t know this would happen. It’s
horrific!”
“Yes, but their sacrifice is necessary.
Their sundered souls will form the paving stones for my return journey, their
pain and torment will be the mortar that holds the pathway stable.
“Soon I’ll be gone, and the machine will
be yours. See the dial you built onto the side? It is a tuner, much like one on
your people’s radios. When you next activate the machine, turn it until you see
the realm of forgetfulness you crave. Then simply step into your new world, and
leave this wretched one gratefully behind. And you would be wise leave it. My
work here was to help prepare for the arrival of my masters. And when they
arrive, well, I will only say your small town received the first taste of what is
to come.” He turned and walked into the storm, looking back only to say:
“My
thanks to you. Fare thee well, Adam Pritchard. Enjoy your paradise.”
As I watched, he levitated up into the
soul-fed vortex. With arms outstretched, he began to spin, faster and
faster...until he vanished. Instantly the maelstrom ceased.
I collapsed onto my knees. Pieces of the ruined
town crashed to earth and came to rest. Then a terrible quiet settled around
me. There were no bodies scattered among the wreckage. No screams of the dying,
no cries for help.
I sat in the center of the decimation
which had now become a graveyard. A graveyard bereft of corpses. A ghost town
without a single wandering spirit. There was nothing for me here now.
Everything I wanted was but a flip of a switch away. With shaking hand, I reached
up to the control panel and turned the dial to the other end of its range. I
threw the switch again. A shimmering field appeared only a short distance away.
Within it was a realm of beauty, a serene sanctuary. My mind screamed at me to
escape this ravaged place, to flee it, and the role I had played in bringing it
to pass. To leave this silent, mocking peace that held not a shred of
peacefulness. My mind begged for release. It pleaded with me - get up, walk to
the door, step through, forget; such a simple act.
But
still I sat...
____________________________________________
One of the theatrical groups my daughter
performs with wanted to bring some gothic horror to the stage. My mind
immediately jumped to the scariest stuff I’ve ever read; the works of HP
Lovecraft. Now, most of his stories could never be depicted on a stage (if
you’ve ever read his stuff, you’ll know what I’m talking about - or just look at the pictures below!),
so I took this as a challenge. Could I turn one of his stories
into a stage play? As I perused his stories, one stood out as a possibility. I
tackled the project, and as a result, ended up having a great time adapting it.
There were inherent problems - the result of the difference between the
framework of a book and the limitations of a stage, but solving them was a fun
mental exercise. And I think I succeeded. The play is based on Lovecraft’s “The
Thing on the Doorstep” (now public domain), and since other acting companies
may want to perform it, I am posting a portion of Act I below. If a group is interested in performing it, contact me and I’ll provide
the script. It’s a full-length 2-act play, a labor of love, and I humbly think
it’s one of the best stage adaptations of an HP Lovecraft story. Enjoy!
THE THING ON THE DOORSTEP
By
H.P.LOVECRAFT
1933
Stage Adaptation by
Steven Reinagel 2011
ACT I
INT. LIBRARY. SPOTLIGHT CENTER-STAGE
DAN UPTON stumbles into spotlight from stage left.
His clothes are disheveled and blood-spattered. He is carrying a revolver.
DAN
UPTON
It is true that I have
sent six bullets through the head of my best friend, and yet I hope you will
come to believe that I am not his murderer. At first I shall be called a madman
- madder than the man I shot in his cell at the Arkham Sanitarium. Some day
others will weigh each statement, correlate it with the known facts, and ask
themselves how I could have believed otherwise than I did after facing the
evidence of that horror - that thing on the doorstep.
Stage lights come up.
EDWARD DERBY casually strolls in from stage right and stands, looking around
him. Dan turns to look at him.
DAN UPTON
So I say that I have
not murdered Edward Derby. Rather have I avenged him, and in so doing purged
the earth of a horror whose survival might have loosed untold terrors on all
mankind.
(begins backing up stage left, continuing to
look at Edward)
There are black zones
of shadow close to our daily paths, and now and then some evil soul breaks a
passage through. When that happens, the man who knows must strike before
reckoning the consequences.
(exits stage left)
Edward’s father enters
and looks around, clearly pleased. Edward’s mother enters last, slowly, hugging
herself and looking uncertain.
MR. DERBY
A good choice, Miskatonic
University. See, you don’t have to go to Harvard to get a degree in, um...
EDWARD
English and...
MR. DERBY
English and French
literature. And so close to home you can walk - which will be good for you. Isn’t
that right, dear?
MRS.
DERBY
Yes, certainly. It will be good to have you staying
near by.
EDWARD
Well, they do have an excellent library here. It
should be a great help to my poetry.
MR. DERBY
Yes, and didn’t your friend Dan say he would even
illustrate your poetry book for you?
EDWARD
Oh, he’s given that idea up. He really can’t draw.
MR. DERBY
But isn’t he going to school for architecture?
EDWARD
Well, he can draw buildings, just not draw...the
things I write about.
Edward finds a book on a shelf and seems very happy
about his discovery, but hides it from his parents. He places it carefully on
top of the shelf.
MRS. DERBY
(looking about)
And speaking of Daniel
- where is he? I thought he was going to stop by and say goodbye before he
left.
DAN UPTON rushes in
from stage right.
DAN
I’m here! All packed.
My train leaves in twenty minutes. So Ed, what do you say?
EDWARD
(looks around, then smiles at
Dan)
I’ll have this place
licked in three years!
DAN
That’s the spirit! I
wish I could feel the same about Harvard.
MR. DERBY
Dan, tell me; how is
your father these days?
DAN
Not so well, I’m
afraid. This New England weather takes such a toll on his respiratory system.
We may have to move him south before long.
(He suddenly looks at his watch)
I can’t stay. Just
came for a quick goodbye.
MR. DERBY
Let us drive you to
the station.
MRS. DERBY
Oh, yes, We’ll be
happy to. Come on, Edward.
EDWARD
You go ahead. I want
to stay and prowl about a bit.
(He walks over to Dan. The two grasp each
other’s arms)
Best of luck, old
chum.
DAN
Same to you. Be sure
to mail me some of your poetry.
Dan and Mr. and Mrs.
Derby exit. Edward retrieves the book. He continues scouring the bookshelves,
rounds a corner and slams into ASENATH WAITE, a young, dark-haired woman.
ASENATH
Damnation and hell!
EDWARD
Oh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t see...forgive me.
ASENATH
(Calms
and looks intently at him)
No, pardon me. You must be new here.
EDWARD
Yes, starting classes this fall.
(Awkward silence follows. She slowly extends a
hand)
ASENATH
I’m Asenath Waite.
EDWARD
Um, Edward. Edward Derby. A pleasure to meet you. Hmmm...Waite...You’re
from Innsmouth, aren’t you?
ASENATH
Yes, the fishing village. My family has lived there
for generations.
EDWARD
I remember your father - Ephraim. I used to see him
passing through town. He would visit this very library.
ASENATH
On occasion. There are some volumes here that can’t
be found anywhere else. What book do you have there?
EDWARD
This? The Book of Eibon.
ASENATH
Good book.
EDWARD
You’ve read it?
ASENATH
Indeed. You could say I know it forwards and
backwards.
(She
slides the book from his hands and opens
it to a page)
‘And on
hands and knees I toiled along the slick and fetid corridor that wound through
the Vale of Pnath, past the mountains of bones, all the while aware of vengeful
eyes that longed only to consume me. Between the Peaks of Thok the temple lay,
its chiseled horns upraised to receive its sacrifice - the spot into which all the ghouls of the waking world
cast the refuse of their feastings’.
(She returns the book)
So, this kind of stuff
interests you?
EDWARD
Oh, I’ve always been
curious about arcane lore, mythology - you know, the old gods. Probably comes
from being locked up inside for most of my childhood. Had to find some means of
escape. So it became books.
ASENATH
Locked up? How sad.
EDWARD
Oh, I don’t mean
literally. It didn’t help that I was an only child, and certainly not the
healthiest one, at that.
ASENATH
Didn’t let you out of
their sight, huh?
EDWARD
Not a chance. And when
they did let me outside to play, I had to have my nurse with me. But I write,
too - that’s been my other back door - my gateway to some freedom.
ASENATH
Really? What do you
write?
EDWARD
Poetry, mostly. I’m
building my compilation, hope to have it printed some day. It’s called ‘The
Shadow of Azathoth and Other Horrors’. Sounds disturbing, I know.
ASENATH
Oh, not really. I
think I can understand it little, looking at where you grew up. I thought my
town was chilling, but Arkham - sagging gothic roofs, crumbling edifices, hanging
over the banks of the cold, dark Miskatonic River. And the legends I’ve heard -
intriguing, I could say, to put it nicely.
EDWARD
Innsmouth isn’t
without its share of tales, either.
ASENATH
Tall tales. You know, if you really want to study
books like this, (she digs through her purse and produces a pencil and piece of
paper) books that don’t shy away from addressing the peculiar and arcane, we’re
having a gathering of "intelligentsia" in one of the student rooms
next week. (she writes something down and tears the page out) Here is the room
number. I think we’ll be talking about the nature of consciousness and about
its independence of the physical frame. I do hope you can come. (she gives him
a strangely intense gaze)
EDWARD
(Looking from the note to her)
Oh, certainly. I...I
look forward to it.
ASENATH
And you should. I think
your education here will be...most illuminating.