Reanimatrix

by Pete Rawlik

  After two or three minutes they climbed back up the hill. The gun was gone, as were the bodies of the girls. The whole top of Sentinel Hill had been scoured clean. Only the megalithic altar remained. As they turned and walked back down the trail, neither of them spoke, and the night was filled with the sound of tired feet on gravel.

  At the car, Robert opened Megan’s door. “What did you see?”

  But she didn’t answer.

  They drove back to Arkham in silence. At the Griffith House they ate a little food and then went to their separate rooms and slept. Robert emerged on the second morning, and after making himself a hearty breakfast found Megan sitting in the family library. She had a book open on her lap, one that Robert recognized as volume two of Watkins’s History of the Miskatonic Valley. She was staring at an illustration.

  It was a sketch of a family, a stern father stood next to a dour mother who just exuded piousness. In front of them stood three teenage girls, triplets apparently. In the background was a wharf, and beyond that a small village beneath a large cliff. Robert recognized it as Kingsport Head, and realized that the village must have been colonial Kingsport.

  “This is what I saw on top of Sentinel Hill. The village of Kingsport, but not as it is now—as it was when this drawing was made. She went back in time.”

  “You don’t know that for sure. There’s no way of knowing if that’s what she was doing, or even if she made it. Trust me, I know a thing or two about . . . these things.”

  She turned the book around and pushed it toward him. “Read the caption.”

  The Mason Family circa 1953, artist unknown. Captain Roger Mason, his wife Elizabeth (née Talbye), and their daughters Abigail, Hepzibah, and Keziah. Despite the resemblance, only two of the girls are related. The original Keziah Mason had died in 1640 at the age of three. In 1652, following a tremendous storm, a girl child was found on the beach and taken in by the Masons. She was suffering from amnesia, and unable to speak, and Elizabeth Mason gave the mute foundling her dead child’s name. It is hard to believe that these three children would grow up to become such sinister figures in Miskatonic Valley history—Abigail Prinn, Goody Fowler, and Keziah Mason—supplying Arkham with the epitaph “witch-haunted”.

  “Whatever she was trying to do, I think she did it. I think that girl—Keziah Mason—has set things in motion, that she has some sort of plan. What happened up on Sentinel Hill, the death of Wilbur Whateley, and the Dunwich Horror, that wasn’t the end of things—I think that was just the beginning.

  Robert took her in his arms and held her as she sobbed. “What are we going to do, Robert, whatever are we going to do?”

  He pulled back and held her tear-streaked face in his hands. “I have a plan,” he told her. “It’s complicated and devious, and a little illegal, but I have a plan.”

  And then he told her his plan.

  That night she slept in his arms, and lying there felt a little easier, knowing what the future held for them both.

  CHAPTER 36

  “Changing of the Guard”

  From the Case File of HP&L November 20 1928

  Megan and I walked through the dreary streets of Arkham and made our way over to Miskatonic University for my morning appointment. An icy wind had moved in from the north and turned the air of the city frigid. Morning reports said that there was ice on the river. The year seemed determined to end on a bad note. So much had happened, so much horror had been hinted at, hinted at and more, I doubted that Arkham could endure another year like the one that was nearly over. There was hope that something could be done to bring the current round of horrors to a close. Some had an idea to prevent them from ever happening again. This is why we were on our way to see the library staff. We were to speak to learned men who thought that something could be done, and that they were the ones to do it.

  Oddly, to meet with the university library staff, I didn’t go to the library. There isn’t room for them all there. The Old Marsh Library, what they now call the Tabularium, has its main hall mostly filled with files, school archives, and the like, but it can hold one hundred people easily. My plan was to fill it with the entire staff of librarians, their assistants, the clerks, and those members of the campus police assigned to the library. It was a simple request, and it needed to be. Things needed to change, and the powers of this little empire had nominated me to be the one to break the news.

  Cyrus Llanfer, the Acting Director while Armitage recovered, met me at the steps and escorted both me and Megan inside. He was a nervous little man who looked at his watch disapprovingly. “You are late, Detective Peaslee.” His pace was almost frenetic.

  “The cold and wind slowed us down,” I lied. “Is everybody here? I don’t want to have to go through this again.”

  Llanfer nodded. “Everyone is waiting, from Armitage all the way down to that annoying little woman down in receiving. What is her name? Stanley.” He clucked her name. “Some kind of prodigy: a law degree at twenty-two, but she ditches that to work in the pit. Who does that?” The inside of the building was warm. The old library had its own furnace and the old thing was still in fine working order.

  Megan touched my hand. “I’ll wait in the reading room.”

  Llanfer spoke with a condescending tone. “Thank you, Miss Halsey. Be sure not to wander around; there are no clerks or librarians available to help you, and I would hate to see you get lost.”

  I called out to her. “This will take me an hour, not counting questions.” She kissed me on the cheek and I watched as she strutted down the hall while Llanfer took me through the massive double doors of the entrance to what was once the Marsh Library. The room beyond was full of chattering academics. The venerable Doctor Armitage was sitting in a chair off to the side. He looked weak and sad. His actions had thwarted the Dunwich Horror, but while he had been fighting monsters his wife had fallen ill, and eventually passed away. Her funeral had been just two weeks earlier. Behind Armitage was Professor Harper, the former director, who was a little younger than Armitage but not nearly as spry. He was supposedly retired, but still maintained an office and did a little research. Occasionally he served as an academic advisor to graduate students, but only to very promising candidates.

  As I scanned through the crowd I recognized several of the more troublesome members of the staff, ones who were not going to take kindly to what I had to say, or what was going to have to be done. Anthony Alwyn and David Sandwin were in the back, smoking. They were odd birds, younger than most of the others, more talented, more curious, excluding Stanley. Llanfer was right; she was a prodigy, just as talented and curious as any, but quite a bit more cautious. I thought that made her less dangerous—Megan thought the exact opposite.

  Llanfer took the makeshift podium and tried to quiet his subordinates, but no matter what he did the uncontrolled conversation continued. It wasn’t until Armitage rose and tapped the floor with his cane that the normally quiet caretakers of the Miskatonic University Library ceased their babble and gave me their attention. Llanfer fumbled through an introduction and then sheepishly left me to do the talking.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming. Doctors Armitage and Llanfer have asked me to come speak to you today concerning some changes I’ve recommended regarding access to some of the library’s holdings.” A murmur went through the crowd. “I understand that this may be antithetical to your work, to the philosophy behind your profession, but I think most of you might have a clue why these changes are necessary.”

  There was a voice from the back. “I don’t, why don’t you stop being all mysterious and explain what is going on. There has been too much rumor and gossip of late. We deserve some explanations.” It was Goudsward, a junior reference librarian who specialized in geography and genealogy.

  “I don’t disagree,” I responded. “It would take more time than I have to cover things in depth, so I’ll just go over the highlights.” I took a deep breath. “Back in January, graduate student Walter Gilman and Wilbur
Whateley of Dunwich both consulted the Necronomicon, or at least we think they did. In March, Amos Tuttle died, and as part of his bequest to the library his lawyer dropped off a copy of the Necronomicon. Turns out, the one in the case was a very clever copy. In May, a rat ate out Gilman’s heart, and three months later Whateley was killed by one of the library dogs. Dr. Armitage will attest that the events in Dunwich were related to the Necronomicon. Shortly afterward, Dr. Llanfer informed me that he had discovered that someone had broken in and again stolen the Necronomicon, or at least so they thought. Dr. Armitage had taken certain precautions and replaced the real book with the copy. The fire down at the Tuttle place may have been because the wrong book had been stolen. Also, some of you might remember Seth Bishop of Aylesbury—he visited quite often from 1919 through 1923. Late last month, he killed Amos Bowden.” There was an overwhelming silence in the room, but I had to drive it home. “Some of you worked with Bryant Hoskins, one of the junior librarians under Dr. Llanfer. He was assigned to work on the Tuttle bequest. Hoskins was unsupervised and used his access to read portions of the Necronomicon. He stole two books: the R’Lyeh Text and the Celeano Fragments. They found him up in his cabin; he’s been confined to the county asylum at Sefton. The books he stole have been placed on the locked shelves. We are going to place more books on the restricted shelf.”

  Goudsward was outraged. “Why? What gives you the right?”

  Dr. Cyrus Llanfer rose in defiant response. “There are some things man is not meant to know, and some books man is not meant to read.”

  A dull roar filled the room, but once again Armitage rose to quell the disruption. This time he spoke and his voice was filled with emotion. “This is not open to debate. Detective Peaslee has outlined a set of procedures and measures that we are going to begin instituting immediately. If you are unhappy with this decision the university will provide you with a month’s severance and a letter of recommendation.”

  As Armitage sat back down, the crowd settled and I was finally allowed to begin discussing how I was going to make sure that the collection was more secure from both the public and unauthorized staff. Faculty and student use would be limited, controlled by a committee of four with two members each from the faculty and the senior library staff. Locks would be installed on doors, and new, locking cabinets would be used. They would have separate keys, which would be assigned to specific curators. The keys would be of a proprietary design; duplication privileges would be limited to the committee of four. The collection rooms themselves would be redesigned. The books would not be allowed to leave dedicated reading rooms. Books would be viewed by appointment only, and only for limited periods of time. Curating staff would not leave the room while a book was out of a cabinet. The transfer of books from a cabinet to the table and back again would be handled by the curators. No one else was to have access to the storage cabinets. Emergency switches for alarms were to be installed in every room.

  It took an hour to go through my designs and recommendations, and to answer a handful of questions. The obligatory handshaking and thanks came from Llanfer and Armitage, as well as Harper. A scowl of disapproval was directed my way from Goudsward, and another from Alwyn. Miss Stanley went out of her way to catch my attention, but then changed her mind and shuffled awkwardly away. By the time I made my way out of the room, Megan had been free to do whatever she wanted for more than an hour.

  She took my hand and as the hall emptied expertly helped guide me through the crowd of slightly stunned and annoyed library staff. We said nothing, and as the herd left the Tabularium and headed back to the library, we turned in the opposite direction and headed off campus. It was only then that my wife, Megan Halsey, began to smile.

  “They really are just a hypocritical lot of pompous old fools, aren’t they?” she pondered out loud. “There are things man was not meant to know. What they mean is they want to be able to control the information. They want access to it, and to keep it away from everyone else. My father would have slapped the man.”

  “It’s what they believe.” I told her. “At least, it’s what Llanfer believes, probably Armitage, too. They truly think that they are incorruptible, that their education and position as librarians set them above everyone else. They’ve set themselves at the top and by controlling the information they make sure to keep themselves there.”

  “Until somebody like us sneaks in and takes it away from them.”

  I smiled back. “How much were you able to destroy?”

  “Everything that we were looking for—say what you want about librarians, but they are very well organized. Everything was filed exactly where it was supposed to be: West’s thesis, the file on the Whateleys, what they found in the ashes of Hartwell’s house, your father’s papers, Tillinghast’s designs, even the journals of the 1902 Hawks expedition. All of it went into the furnace.”

  “Well done. You’re still comfortable doing this?”

  “It has to be done.” There was a kind of lament in her voice.

  The clock tower chimed and I turned around to look at it. The smoke from the stack above the Tabularium had changed from white to black. I thought about how much we had just destroyed, just a few boxes of papers, and yet so very dangerous. Changes needed to be made. The thought was sobering. Llanfer and Armitage were going to follow my directions. The new security would be put in place. Only a few people would have keys, including myself. Things were going to be different. I would make sure of it. I wouldn’t be able to touch the ancient books; they were too high profile, too noticeable. The other things, journals, accounts, notebooks, things that were just piled up waiting to be properly catalogued, these things could be destroyed quite easily.

  Let the old men have their black-lettered grimoires and illuminated manuscripts full of legends and ridiculous spells which only hint at what might be. It’s the more recent documents that actually tell the truth. This is a new age, with new ideas, and a new morality. Someone must make sure that we don’t end up destroying ourselves. There are things man was not meant to know, but is it really up to a bunch of old librarians to control? Perhaps not, perhaps it is time for someone else to take a turn. Why not Detective Robert Peaslee and Megan Halsey? Why not two people who had suffered as a result of that information and those who had used it?

  I can think of no one better.

  CHAPTER 37

  A Note from the Editor

  January 8 1930

  What you have just completed reading is what I believe to be the truth, as much of it as I have been able to garner from the files left behind by my partners, Robert Peaslee and his wife Megan Halsey-Griffith, who prefers only to use half her maiden name. The vast majority of it cannot be confirmed, but some of it can. Robert Peaslee’s work in Paris and then in Arkham, his casework and transfer, are all matters of public record. Likewise, Megan’s disappearance and sudden reappearance are also easily verified. That she was the body found in the river has been officially noted as an error, and her absence is explained as her being away in Britain, studying.

  Documents on file at the courthouse will prove that the firm of Halsey, Peaslee and Lydecker Consultants was formed in October of 1928 and saw brisk business from the onset. Their files on working with the staff at the university library and the events at the Spooner house are just two of the cases the firm handled, but they serve to explain the tenor of the work they were undertaking. I must beg your forgiveness in changing the perspective throughout these documents, but I thought it would add a bit of flair to our tale. I am not an accomplished storyteller, and can only work with the meager gifts I have been granted.

  Documenting the events that led to the formation of HP&L and two of their adventures would not have been necessary if the senior members of the firm had not vanished in June of 1929. That the couple went missing shortly after the wedding of Asenath Waite and Edward Derby should be considered purely coincidental. The firm had, in its nine months of activity, undertaken a number of cases, and in the process collected a
gallery of individuals and organizations that one would have no choice but to call enemies, not the least of which were various faculty and staff members of Miskatonic University and more specifically the senior librarians.

  But that is an entirely different story.

  Yours,

  Roman Lydecker

  Managing Partner

  HP&L Consultants

  Acknowledgements

  Reanimatrix is an homage to some of my very favorite movies and books, most notably Laura by Vera Caspray, which was made into a fine film directed by Otto Preminger, with Gene Tierney and Dana Andrews. Laura is about a cop who falls in love with a murder victim, and is one of the inspirations for David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, which I also must cite as influential on this book. Other inspirations include the films Auntie Mame and Doctor X, as well as the novels The Great Gatsby, Locus Solus, The Big Sleep, and the entire Philo Vance series. Evident also is my love of Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe books.

  This story relies heavily on the excellent work of Chaosium’s Keith Herber and others, who documented much of the geography I needed to travel through in their roleplaying supplement Return to Dunwich. It is an excellent guide to that rugged and wild terrain full of the strange and unknown.

  As this novel took shape, several of the stories appeared in anthologies, and for this I must thank Mike Davis, Brian Sammons, Glynn Owen Barrass, and Jean-Marc L’Officier.

  My version may be different, but I must also thank Messrs. Gordon, Norris, Paoli, and Yuzna, and Miss Barbara Crampton for bringing the original Megan Halsey to life on the big screen. Without their pioneering work, mine would not exist.

  Pete Rawlik

  Hell’s Gate Point, Florida

  July 25, 2015

  About the Author

  Pete Rawlik has been active in all things Lovecraftian since his father read him “The Rats in the Walls” when he was a child, as a bedtime story. For more than two decades he has run Dead Ink, selling rare and unusual books. Rawlik’s fiction has appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies. His two novels, Reanimators and The Weird Company, were both published by Night Shade Books.