The Office

It was 3 AM in the morning of Friday, December 10, 1926. Frank Cannon was sitting by his desk in the office of Cannon, Doctorow & Lockwood, Private Investigators. The desk was covered by notebooks and sheafs of paper, most filled with notes in Frank Cannon's blocky handwriting. Several other items were more carefully laid out on a side table: the scroll that Cannon had taken from "Madame LaVerne", the weird psychic that was subsequently arrested for fraudulent behavior, the notebook of Eunice Saunders, the strange jewelry that Bill Lockwood had snatched from the hold of the S/S Ladylove, and a yet unopened bottle of whisky. Frank had been feverishly at work for more than six days, ever since the police intervention following the storming of the Ladylove by the enraged longshoremen. But even before then, Frank Cannon had left Martin's Beach in the middle of the night as he was struck by a moment of terrifying insight into the depths of the many weird situations he had found himself in over the course of the past three years.

Cannon had actually been inside the office for almost a fortnight, maniacally comparing the scroll with the notebook, and he was very much in need of a bath, a good meal, and a good night's sleep. But sleep had eluded him, and Frank Cannon had only dozed fitfully in a reclining chair for what felt like mere minutes. He muttered to himself about everything seemingly being connected as he filled in the lines of one of his weird graphs yet again. Then his head slowly slumped down on the desk. Frank Cannon was finally asleep.

Madame LaVerne's scroll

The notebook of Eunice Saunders.

The strange jewelry from the S/S Ladylove.

A bottle of whisky.

Ladylove Melee!

Friday, December 3, 1926. This is when it all went down, to quote Brad Doctorow. The previous day had been akin to a fog-shrouded limbo. The previous day had also led to a new acquaintance, Elizabeth "Bessie" Coleridge, an antiques dealer from Albany who had ventured to Martin's Beach in search of cheap antiques to refurbish and sell to wealthy New Yorkers. Meanwhile, Frank Cannon remained in Arkham, and attempts to reach Frank over the telephone had only resulted in curt replies, and not Frank Cannon's usual relaxed banter. Was this a cause for concern?

Then there were still all the questions surrounding the S/S Ladylove and the striking longshoremen. Sean Murphy, the union leader in charge of the strike, could really not answer as to why the Ladylove was to unload its cargo without any help of the local longshoremen. Further investigations by Brad Doctorow seemed to indicate that there were one or two fishy things about the process underlying the decision of the Massachusetts Harbor Authority, but there was no firm evidence to be had.

Further conversations with Vernon Wells at the U.S. Post Office in Martin's Beach revealed that Vernon had been kept up by what he assumed were people grunting and carrying heavy items up to the railway station, but a chat with the station master did not reveal any freight being stored at the station. So, what was going on? It was decided to grasp the initiative and take a peek at the S/S Ladylove at dawn next morning while the longshoremen created a raucous tumult on the pier next to the ship. Brendan O'Malley would row Doctorow, Lovecraft and Coleridge up to the Ladylove, and a rope ladder would be used to scale the ship.

That frightful Friday was as foggy as it had been during the preceding days, and the pervading chill made the investigators shiver, despite several layers of warm clothing. Lockwood and Coleridge were dressed in heavy overalls, while Doctorow had donned the clothing of what he supposed was a local dock hand, making him look like a Hollywood approximation of a New England fisherman. Brendan O'Malley was waiting for the investigators outside the Wavecrest Hotel, and his rowboat was tied up at a nearby dock. O'Malley was an expert oarsman, and they glided quietly towards the Ladylove, while the loud noise of twenty or so yelling and booing longshoremen was heard all over the pier and its surroundings. There was a very soft bump when they reached the Ladylove, but that was the only sound to be heard above the shouts of the longshoremen. What the investigators did not realize was that several pairs of beady, alien, eyes were following their progress from just above the waterline. 

Bessie Coleridge

Bill Lockwood was first up the ladder, but fog and sea water had made the rope ladder treacherously slippy. He lost his footing and crashed back into the rowboat, and the sound alerted one of the weird deck hands of the Ladylove. Lockwood made over the railing and flopped onto the deck of the Ladylove, only to be met by a furious attack from a flailing, kicking and screaming sailor of obscure and possibly inbred ethnic origin. Bessie Coleridge decided to throw her blackjack at the sailor, but missed in a most spectacular way, with the blackjack hitting Lockwood instead. She instead decided to try her luck at the ladder, climbing up with much bravado to help Lockwood. Doctorow followed suite, but as he turned around and looked down into the rowboat, he saw a nerve-chilling sight: an abominable aquatic beast had reached up from the sea, grabbing the unsuspecting Brendan O'Malley by his shoulders and dragging him into the depths. O'Malley's terrified cries were drenched by churning water, water that soon turned red from O'Malley's blood and entrails. Doctorow's screams added to the general cacophony, and a wild fight erupted on deck. Bill Lockwood's boxing skills came in handy, but this was not a mere fist fight: guns were soon pulled out of their holsters, and several shots were fired in the dense fog.

Lockwood hadn't realized what kind of alien horror Doctorow had seen devouring O'Malley, but both Bessie Coleridge and Bill Lockwood were about to find out. Was this the same beast or yet another? The abomination reached out for Lockwood, towering above him. Lockwood realized in a moment of mind-blasting biological insight that this was a female member of the species, and the assumption may have been confirmed when the creature hissed "kiss me" at Lockwood, baring fangs, claws, and otherworldly appendages. The beast inflicted grievous wounds on Lockwood as the beast gnawed on him, while Coleridge and Lockwood himself emptied round after round into the remarkably resilient aquatic abomination. However, a couple of well-placed rounds almost disintegrated the upper body of the fish-creature, covering Lockwood in a mix of reeking fish-like viscera and his very own blood.

Finally, Doctorow and Coleridge managed to overpower the strange captain of the Ladylove, and then the longshoremen swarmed up onto the deck. The remaining crew members surrendered as the Kingsport police arrived at the scene. But there was yet more horror to be discovered as the intrepid investigators ventured below deck. The hold turned out to be filled with the valued possessions of passengers from doomed vessels! The crew of the Ladylove seemed to have been part of some piracy venture, luring ships onto the unforgiving New England cliffs so that they could steal their cargoes. Only God knows what happened to the innocent passengers! Lockwood kept several pieces of strange, almost non-human, jewelry of a kind not even Bessie had seen before. The rest of the foul cargo was left for the police.

A meeting between Brad Doctorow, Bessie Coleridge, Bill Lockwood, and Dr. Emile Schaffhausen on Friday, December 10, 1926.

"I am so glad you all could make it! I have had the opportunity to meet Herr Doctorow and Herr Lockwood previously, and I am so pleased that you are on the mend. Well, as you know, there was a confrontation between the longshoremen of Martin's Beach and the crew of the S/S Ladylove. At least some of the crewmen opened fire at the longshoremen, and they subsequently stormed the vessel, Some of the crewmen were killed or wounded. The police gave me the opportunity to talk to the captain, supposedly named Gilberto Aziz. We've had some really frustrating attempts at conversation, since I fear that the man is completely and utterly insane. He keeps telling me, or one of his imaginary friends, in very poor English that 'They know where I am', 'Dwell in glory', 'They will have the jewelry', and every now and then something that sounds like 'fhtagn! fhtagn! in between sentences that I believe may be in Arabic. Now, you wouldn't know anything about this peculiar behavior?

Dr. Emile Schaffhausen

Guilberto Aziz?

The Mist of Martin's Beach

 Doctorow looked at Lookwood over the narrow desk in Lockwood's hotel room at the Wavecrest Inn. It was mid-morning on Thursday, December 2, 1926. The quaint and sleepy seaside town of Martin's Beach that looked so inviting when they drove into town barely two days had become less appealing as cold and thick fog rolled in from the Atlantic last morning, a fog that seemed to blot out much of the daylight as well as muffling sound. The Wavecrest remained a cozy bastion against the December weather. 

"So, what have we got here?" Doctorow looked tense, and far removed from his typical carefree self. "Frank disappears in the middle of the night after some sort of, well, episode. He then resurfaces in Arkham, sounding oddly apologetic over the telephone." Lockwood continued: "Then we have the longshoremen strike. You know, I am all together convinced that their leader, Sean Murphy is a swell fellow, and so is Brendan O'Malley, his right-hand man. Definitely not Commies, despite what Tony DiPaola might claim." Doctorow nodded and lit a cigarette before passing his fancy cigarette case to Lockwood. Lockwood declined, at least for now. "Then there's the adorable little local secret society, 'The Most Enlightened Fellowship of the Star of the Sea.' They also seem to be ok, and the members - Joe Zumwald, Johanna Glover, Vernon Morrison, and Brendan Hill may be more than a little bookish or even weird, but basically nice and helpful. Vernon Morrison, you know the guy with the card trick, did mention that business with the strange and fatal storm here last year, though, but I guess that was just the ocean playing with his imagination"

ARKHAM ADVERTISER

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Storm Ravages Martin's Beach, Kingsport

Sunday, March 8, 1925

The spring storm of March 8 and 9 is feared to have led to the disappearance of M/S Mary P. Benjamin, a fishing vessel from Kingsport, as well as her crew of four. The captain, Jerome K. Philbin, decided to ignore warnings against leaving port during the storm, and it is assumed that the sea swallowed both the vessel and her crew. Elsewhere, several buildings in Kingsport were damaged, while Martin's Beach saw significant damage to the main pier, which also was covered by pieces of foul-smelling fish. Mr. Vernon Morrison and Ms. Johanna Glover of Martin's Beach were swept out to sea, but rescued despite the terrific storm by Mr. Jules Pollack and Ms. Moira Baker of Arkham in an astounding feat of swimming and compassion. 

Joe Zumwald, Vernon Morrison, and Brendan Hill

Johanna Glover

It was Doctorow's turn to continue while Lockwood poured two cups of Joe. Mildred Vaughn, one of the two employees at the Wavecrest Inn, had been most forthcoming, providing meals and ample amounts of coffee as well as other, less legal, beverage alternatives. It all helped keep the damp cold away. The other employee, Herbert Flocks, was perhaps not the sharpest tool in the shed, but quite well-intentioned. "But that self-made lawyer character, Tony DiPaola, he seems rather unsavory. He works for the Silver Star Shipping Line, he does not have the credentials he brags about, not at all, and the Silver Star Shipping Line seems to be shipping booze out of Canada, or something equally illegal. The Silver Star Shipping Line is owned by a guy by the name of Belvedere Gilman, and then there's the strange issue with the ship, the S/S Ladylove, or as was known until recently, the S/S Balrooney of Innsmouth, Massachusetts." 

"Innsmouth?" Lockwood looked quizzical. "Never heard of it". It's an old fishing town with some small-scale manufacturing up the coast. There's a bus line to Innsmouth from Arkham. It is, to the best of my knowledge, a dull and uninteresting place". Doctorow slowly shook his head. "Don't you remember? Eunice Saunders had distant relatives in Innsmouth, and she had that strange diary that's locked in the office safe. Also, I knocked out a stinky man that was supposedly from Innsmouth".

"But why should the captain of a small coastal freighter insist on unloading the cargo without having the local longshoremen handle it? It makes no sense! Did DiPaola really bribe someone in Boston to get this permit? This must be a booze smuggling operation. That would also explain why there seems to be thugs around trying to intimidate us at night. Just wait until I can get my hands on those filthy crooks! Also, did you see the crew of the Ladylove? What a repugnant horde of mongrels!" Lockwood refilled his coffee cup. "Not feeling too sensitive today, are we?" Doctorow grinned at the fuming Lockwood.

Brendan O'Malley

S/S Ladylove