That, at any rate, was the consensus of the time.
Lately there has been speculation by trustworthy philosophers that there is a realm where beings like me flourish. But I’m digressing again. Let me backpedal to the point of my entry into the village square.
One side of the space, the side directly facing me, was formed by the bulk of a vast and ancient tavern, a higgledy-piggledy edifice with crazy wild boars for the piggles and demented crocodilians for the higgles. This tavern was none other than the notorious Nameless Tavern in which so many of Lladloh’s dark, odd, curiously peculiar and contrived deeds were first plotted, then enacted and finally analysed, a labyrinth of beery doom and wormy trepidation.
And gathered in front of the door was a motley collection of faded characters that had all the appearance of people on the way to becoming phantoms while still alive. Rather, they were like fictional personages in books that are rarely read, that are hardly known enough even to be forgotten.
One of them was a man who creaked and whirred like a skeleton clock as he stepped forward to intercept me; but I had already come to a dead halt and posed no threat to this etiolated mob. Then another man, burly but slack of skin, shook jowls as grey as the jackets of boring business suits flapping on a clothesline and roared a greeting at me, the typical Lladloh welcome.
“Who the heck are you?”
“I am Sadulsor Raleigh and I seek my father.”
“Go look for him in a bicycle shop, you squeaky imbecile. You won’t find him here. We are conducting a ritual of astounding complexity and importance. In fact we might utilise you as the sacrifice.”
“Is a sacrifice necessary?” I asked.
He nodded. “Yes, yes! In fact we were going to employ Megan here for the task, but she’s a very fine barmaid and we are loath to lose her when an alternative presents itself. You will do. Don’t resist!”
This flabby threat was noisily approved by the others.
“What gives you the right?” I growled.
“Why, I am none other than Emyr James, landlord of this pub.”
“And that gives you the right?”
“Yes, yes, of course. Doesn’t it? If not then—”
“And I,” gibbered another figure, “am Catrin Mucus; and this fellow is Phil the Liver; and that one is Iolo Machen.”
“Dennistoun Homunculus is my name,” said a gimp.
“Neifion Napcyn, that’s me.”
“Tee hee! They call me Pumpkin Hewin’ they do!”
“Aye, and I’m Bigamy Bertha.”
I grimaced and honked my horn. “I have no desire to know who any of you are. I seek only my father, my inventor.”
“You wouldn’t be referring to Mondaugen, would you?”
“Yes, I am! Is he among you?”
The man who resembled a skeleton clock now moved forward another tick and he rolled his large stained eyes at me. And then he spoke. He said six words in total but not as any ordinary man would say them. Each time he uttered one of the words, his head opened up like a lotus flower to reveal a smaller head inside; six blossoming heads mouthed a single sentence.
The sentence was: “I am Herr Doktor Karl Mondaugen!”
The sequence of shrinking heads was so disturbing in part because each head was rather beautiful, like that of a porcelain doll, a doll from some culture that was vaguely oriental but also childlike and brash.
But I merely said, “Atrocious!”
“He is such a good inventor he has invented himself!” chuckled Emyr James and his jowls made a horrid rustling sound.
“He is mechanical?” I gasped.
“Not entirely, no. But how did you get past the guard?”
“To be absolutely candid—”
“I didn’t ask about Absolutely Candid, whoever he is, but about the sentinel, Perfectly Frank. Did you slaughter him?”
“He let me through because we might be brothers.”
“It matters not. You shall die.”
And the pallid crowd chuckled like feathers that tickle themselves, with very little conviction or mirth; and then Mondaugen’s head, already smaller than a head had any right to be, blossomed again, and again, as it embarked on an occult chant designed to summon Ootoo from his cosmic tomb, from a hellish reality parallel to our own dimension, from one nightmare to another; and I watched in horror as that head grew smaller and smaller and smaller.
It was as if I was watching a traveller moving away over a landscape until he was just a speck, but one who had neglected to take the majority of his body with him on the journey, a ludicrous oversight!
“Namyllis Yrev Asaw t’Farcevol Enod Dnadias S’llanehw...”
The words were beyond endurance.
But they were effective. One moment the village square was empty.
The next it was filled... By Ootoo.
Yes, it is true. Ootoo appeared in person. One of the Old Ones. He was just a head, a massive head, a gruesome and monumental head. I’m sure he was more than that really, much more, intolerably more, but nothing else was visible. I could see only a head, a head so large it filled the square entire, pushing against the buildings that framed it, so that we had to retreat quickly to avoid contact with the glacially cold flesh of the lips and chin, which were at our end.
“That is Ootoo,” said Emyr.
“I took that for granted,” I answered boldly.
“And now we will give you to him; he will devour you and swallow you and digest you and excrete you and flush you.”
“He has a clear agenda,” I said.
“Yes; and why not? He is Ootoo, and what Ootoo wants, Ootoo gets, apart from on those occasions when he doesn’t.”
“He is a minor old one?”
“Perhaps, but what does that mean? Even the least significant old one is far older and far more of a ‘one’ than the most important gentleman in any armchair in any country on this planet. Ootoo he is. That is all you need to worry about. Ootoo and you. That is the nature of this scene.”
“Why did you summon him?”
“To replenish our flagging spirits, to inject us with higher purpose. Can’t you see how faded we are, like the ink of antique pages in rotting books? We are barely more substantial than fog. There is no fire in our veins. We are weary and indistinct and stale, going through the motions but never feeling or tasting anything. We care not if whole populations are annihilated now, that is none of our concern, but we do want to be alive again, to be three dimensional.”
I felt an abrupt desire to be cruel, to strike back with words. “I doubt the fact of your fading away can ever be reversed.”
“We shall see. Goodbye forever, boneshaker!”
“My name is Sadulsor...”
“Do you have a puncture, buffoon?”
“It is my mouth that hissed. My tyres are solid rubber that continually grows. No caltrap or pin can ever stop me in my tracks. This power was a gift of whoever made me, whether Mondaugen or not.”
“Enjoy it for your remaining few seconds!”
Almost as if responding to a cue, Ootoo opened his mouth wide, jaw gaping to an even greater extreme than that of Perfectly Frank, so that the god resembled a serpent preparing to devour a serpent who already is gaping as wide as it can. And the gathering of spectral villagers moved closer to me. They intended to hurl me in the mouth. But I had no intention of being a victim. I would embrace my destiny in my own way, as I had always been fated to do.
I accelerated forwards, heading straight for that maw!
“What a rascal!” shouted Emyr.
“He’s no son of mine,” grated Mondaugen.
Ootoo’s cakehole loomed huge.
And into it I went, leaping the bottom front teeth, landing on the tongue and hurtling down the throat, ducking my head to avoid striking it on that dangly thing with the name I can rarely rightly recall, the uvula or whatever, that pink and fleshy clapper like the teat of a oral udder that can be milked only for sounds. And then I was racing along the wi
ndpipe and still accelerating. And something peculiar began to happen. It stopped being organic anatomy.
It changed into something more geometric and hard. Into a labyrinth with an impossible number of diverging passages; and I selected my route at random, like a daytripper Theseus, my handlebars gleaming in the phosphorescent light of pulsing walls, seeking a Minotaur who was nothing but a case of indigestion somewhere in the endless turns of this gastric maze. And—
I came to a doorway but one without a door. It had merely a tattered tapestry covering it and I rode straight through it and found myself in a familiar office facing a man I already knew, who stood up abruptly from his chair, leaned on his desk and cleared his throat before speaking these words:
“Ootoo has already enrolled. It explains why our quota of monsters is filled forevermore. He plans to study theology.”
“That’s rather self-indulgent, don’t you think?” I wheezed.
There was a pause and then at last...
The Dean of Lampeter University tugged his nose.
THE CAWL OF CTHULHU
Bob Lock
I was born and raised on the Gower and although I thought I knew much of its history I was surprised to hear of Granny Folvercat and her small house overlooking Rhossili Beach – which is on the southwestern tip of the peninsula. Gower is notorious for its rugged coastline, upon which a great many ships have met their doom and never reached port. Rhossili is one such place, and apart from the famous ‘Dollar Ship’ which foundered with a princess’s dowry of silver in the seventeenth century numerous other vessels have been lost, never to be seen again.
‘The fire cleansed a great part of the common overlooking the beach. Mamgi Folvercat’s long-house can be seen again. It’s been some years since that place came to light. I saw it last, oh...’ Tom Jenkins took a last gulp from his almost empty beer glass and eyed me enquiringly. I took the empty pint from him and waited for him to finish his sentence. ‘Has to be about seventy years ago. I was a mere slip of a lad of thirty-something, I was.’
‘Same again, Tom?’ I asked, he nodded and gave me a toothless smile. Cathy shook her head at me when I ordered another round from her.
‘You shouldn’t encourage him, Bryn Evans, you should know better than that. He’ll be shouting and singing next and you’ll not be the one having to put him out when time is called. Even though he’s over a hundred the old bastard can still kick up one hell of a fuss,’ Cathy said. We’d known each other since primary school and whenever she added my surname to any conversation it was always to chastise me over something or other. I took the two pints from her, sipped a mouthful of mine and gave her a grin.
‘One word from you Cathy and we’ll all be running for the door, you know that, as well as I do.’
‘You make me sound like a witch or harridan. Why are you even listening to the old fart?’ she asked, ‘you know all of his stories are bloody-well made up. If you were English I’d understand the fascination but you know the coast as much as he does.’
‘True enough,’ I said with a nod, ‘but I’ve never heard of the wreck he spoke about or the Folvercat long-house. There can’t be many ancient long-houses down on the beach and he reckons there was a stone circle in the back garden of it too. I’ve been down there hundreds of times and never seen it.’
‘I’ve never seen it either and I’ve been down on the beach a lot more times than you. You were too busy gallivanting off to London to get that archaeology degree you found so important. Got fed up of the big city, did you?’
I didn’t really want to get into it, how I’d had my heart broken in London and had come back to Wales to lick my wounds and lose myself, recuperating in the wilds of Gower, so I just shrugged.
‘Got homesick – wanted a good pint – a good yarn and a good woman nagging at me. Where else was I supposed to come other than here?’ I ducked as she threw the wet bar cloth at me and I took the beer back to our table. Tom smacked his lips at the sight of the pint and favoured me with a gummy smile.
‘You’re a good lad, Bryn, a good lad.’
‘No problem Tom, can’t let you get parched when telling me the story now can we?’ I answered with a grin of my own and then Tom continued.
He told me that it seems no-one really remembered where or when Mamgi Folvercat, or Granny Folvercat as the English visitors used to call her, first appeared on Gower. But one thing was sure, she was a popular old woman, revered by the locals and visitors alike, and there had been many visitors. She lived alone but took in people for bed and breakfast during the holiday season and was always booked up. Her cottage was called ‘Bullion Barn’. It was supposedly built from the proceeds salvaged from a wreck that had gone down long before any of the locals could recall. Her breakfasts were renowned the peninsula over as being substantial and capable of keeping you going for most of the day. But her pièce de résistance was her cawl.
Dating back to the 14th century, cawl is unofficially recognized as the national dish of Wales. It’s a broth made from leeks, vegetables and meat. Some use lamb, other use salted bacon or even beef. Mamgi’s recipe was a secret.
‘People used to queue from her house down onto the beach when she had a cauldron of cawl on the go,’ Tom said with a glazed longing in his eyes and a dribble of spittle running down the side of his mouth. ‘A lovely crust of bread and a chunk of cheese with it made it food for the gods.’
‘I haven’t had a decent cawl for years,’ I answered.
‘Aye, you haven’t been in Wales for years, have you boyo?’ Tom replied.
I nodded. ‘True, but I’m back now. So, what happened to Mamgi Folvercat?’ I asked. Tom shrugged his bony shoulders. ‘No-one really knows. One day she was there, next day she was gone. Much like how she first appeared. Damn, how we missed her cawl. Someone once said she walked into the sea fully clothed and The Kraken took her up and ate her.’
I laughed. ‘The Kraken? Like a sea monster?’
‘Don’t laugh about it man,’ Tom said, all serious now.
‘This coast has seen some strange things. A headless horseman galloping along the sands at midnight, the sea horse that swims off Falls Bay with a long neck and flowing mane and how do you think there are so many wrecks, eh?’
‘Bad weather, hidden rocks, poor navigation?’ I answered flippantly.
‘Aye, those too, but when a beast from beneath the waves rears up and drags your ship down with tentacles the size of an oak, then weather, rocks and poor navigation are the least of your worries. That’s what dragged the American here,’ Tom said and drained his glass again.
‘Another, Tom?’
‘Nay, lad,’ he said shaking his head. ‘I’ve put myself in a foul mood now talking about ghosties and ghoulies. I’m off home, Bryn.’ I nodded and then asked.
‘What American, Tom?’
‘That Lovecraft bloke. He came the summer of ’25 he did. Never liked him; drank shandy or light ale. I was but a youngster and could still drink him under the table. He wanted to see the Kraken he reckoned. Stayed at Mamgi’s for a month or two,’ he said and then tottered out and I watched him go with my mouth open in wonder.
‘Good grief,’ Cathy said as Tom closed the door behind him, ‘What did you say to him, Bryn?’
‘Nothing, was just talking about Mamgi’s house on the beach,’ I replied, ‘I can’t believe what he just said, he reckons H. P. Lovecraft was here in the summer of 1925. I never knew he even came to the UK let alone here. Tom must be wrong.’
Cathy gave a little shiver. ‘That bloody place,’ her voice had a slight tremor in it. ‘It’s bloody haunted is that area. You don’t want to be talking about Mamgi and you certainly don’t want to be visiting the place.’
I shrugged. ‘I wasn’t going to, but now I’m interested. What do you mean it’s haunted?’
‘Strange lights around the old house,’ she answered.
‘Kids probably. That’s what started the gorse fire I bet. Kids drinking and partying in the dark,’ I sai
d. ‘What about Lovecraft, have you heard the rumour he was here?’
She shook her head. ‘Never heard of him and no kids go there, ever. They’ve more sense than that. Not after the sixth one went missing.’
I looked at her. ‘What? When was this?’
‘First was years and years ago, too far back for me to know much about it. But there’s been five more lately and the last was a couple of years back. Some kid who used to come down here surfing. From Newport he was, him and a bunch of his friends camped on the beach. Coppers said the kids reported they saw lights in the water and went to look, but didn’t see anything. When they paddled their boards back to the beach one of them was missing. The kid was never found again but his board turned up. All shattered and broken with huge circular marks on it like something had sucked pieces out of it,’ Cathy said and she shivered again.
‘Creepy,’ I said, ‘want to come for a picnic on the beach tonight?’
‘In your dreams Bryn Evans,’ she replied and this time the wet bar cloth caught me full in the face.
My tent was a small pop-up type, no need for fiddling around, you just threw it on the ground and it erected itself. The sun had just gone down and I’d managed to find Mamgi’s house whilst there was still enough light. Sure enough a big gorse fire had cleared a large area of the common just up from the beach. It had uncovered the huge stones set in a crude circle at the back of a dilapidated house whose walls had crumbled to tooth-like features rising up from the blackened earth. I camped within the circle, sheltered from the wind off the sea and beach by the ruined walls. Once ensconced in my tent and wrapped warmly up in my sleeping bag I booted up my iPad and started searching for Lovecraft’s visit to Britain. Internet access was surprisingly good and I guessed it was due to the tall mobile-phone repeater mast I’d noticed in the pub’s car-park. Twenty minutes of searching proved fruitless. Lovecraft was never mentioned as being in Britain and I imagined Tom must have been mistaken, although the date of 1925 would have been just before he had his story ‘The Call of Cthulhu’ published, so that, at least, seemed to make some sort of sense. I dialled up a colleague and a life-long fan of all things Lovecraftian back in London and a minute later we were Skyping.
Cthulhu Cymraeg Page 5