***
I wonder sometimes, worry even, for the next poor fool who will eventually enter that lost, forgotten town. He might not be so lucky as I. And Innsmouth might once more give birth, like a festering wound, like a sampling of Hell, and all the slithering forms of nightmare will come out of the fogs and mists to bear witness to a new and darker age...
CTHULHU
DAOINE DOMHAIN
by PETER TREMAYNE
HOW SHOULD I start? Do I have time to finish? Questions pour into my mind and remain unanswered, for they are unanswerable. But I must get something down on paper; at least make some attempt to warn people of the terrible dangers that lurk in the depths for mankind. How foolish and pitifully stupid a species we are, thinking that we are more intelligent than any other species, thinking that we are the “chosen” race. What arrogance—what ignorance! What infantile minds we have compared to... But I must begin as it began for me.
My name is Tom Hacket. My home is Rockport, Cape Ann, Massachusetts. My family history is fairly typical of this area of America. My great-grandparents arrived from County Cork, Ireland, to settle in Boston. My grandfather, Daniel, was born in Ireland but had come to America with his parents when only a few years old. Neither my father nor I ever had the desire to visit Ireland. We had no nostalgic yearnings, like some Irish-Americans, to visit the “old country.” We felt ourselves to be purely American. But grandfather Daniel... well, he is the mystery in our family. And if I were to ascribe a start to these curious events then I would say that the beginning was my grandfather.
Daniel Hacket had joined the United States Navy and served as a lieutenant on a destroyer. Sometime in the early spring of 1928, he went on leave to Ireland, leaving his wife and baby (my father) behind in Rockport. He never came back; nor did anyone in the family ever hear from him again. My grandmother, according to my father, always believed that he had been forcibly prevented from returning.
The US Navy took a more uncharitable line and posted him as a deserter. After grandmother died, my father expressed the opinion, contrary to his mother’s faith in Daniel Hacket’s fidelity, that his father had probably settled down with some colleen in Ireland under an assumed name. If the truth were known, he always felt bitter about the mysterious desertion of his father. However, the interesting thing was that my father never sold our house in Rockport; we never moved. And it was only towards the end of my father’s life that he revealed the promise he made to grandmother. She had refused to move away or sell up in the belief that one day Daniel Hacket would attempt to get in touch if he were able. She had made my father promise to keep the old house in the family for as long as he was able.
No one asked that promise of me. I inherited the old wooden colonial-style house, which stood on the headland near Cape Ann, when my father died of cancer. My mother had been dead for some years and, as I had no brothers or sisters, the lonely old house was all mine. I was working as a reporter for the Boston Herald and the house was no longer of interest to me. So I turned it over to a real estate agent thinking to use the money to get a better apartment in Boston itself.
I can’t recall now why I should have driven up to the house that particular week. Of course, I made several journeys to sort through three generations of family bric-a-brac which had to be cleared before any new owner set foot in the place. Maybe that was the reason.
I know it was a Tuesday afternoon and I was sifting through a cardboard box of photographs when the doorbell buzzed as someone pressed firmly against it.
The man who stood there was tall, lean with a crop of red-gold hair and a broad smile. I had the impression of handsomeness in spite of the fact that I noticed he wore an eye-patch over his right eye and, on closer inspection, his right shoulder seemed somewhat misshapen by a hump. When he spoke, it was obvious he was Irish. That did not make him stand out in itself for Boston is an Irish city. But he possessed a quaint old-world charm and courtesy which was unusual. And his one good eye was a sharp, bright orb of green.
“Is this the Hacket house?” he asked.
I affirmed it was.
“My name is Cichol O’Driscoll. I’m from Baltimore.”
“That’s a long journey, Mr. O’Driscoll,” I said politely, wondering what the man wanted. At the same time I was thinking that his first name, he pronounced it “Kik-ol,” was an odd one for an Irishman. “Did you fly up this morning?”
He gave a wry chuckle.
“Ah, no. Not Baltimore, Maryland, sir. But the place which gave it its name—Baltimore in County Cork, Ireland.”
It would have been churlish of me not to invite him in and offer him coffee, which he accepted.
“You are a Hacket, I presume?” he asked.
I introduced myself.
“Then I’m thinking that Mrs. Sheila Hacket no longer lives?”
“She was my grandmother. No. She has been dead these fifteen years past.”
“And what of her son, Johnny?”
I shrugged.
“My father. He died three weeks ago”
“Ah, then I am sorry for your troubles.”
“But what is this about?” I frowned.
“Little to tell,” he said in that curious Irish way of speaking English. “As I said, I am from Baltimore which is a small fishing port in the southwest of Ireland. A year ago I purchased an old croft on Inishdriscol, that is one of the islands that lie just off the coast, to the west from Baltimore. I am refurbishing it to make it into a holiday cottage. Well, one of my builders was pulling down a wall when he found some sort of secret cavity and in this cavity he came across an old oilskin pouch. Inside was a letter addressed to Mrs. Sheila Hacket at Rockport, Massachusetts, with a note that if she no longer lived then it should be handed to her son, Johnny. The letter was dated May 1st, 1928.”
I stared at the man in fascination.
“And you have come all this way to deliver a letter written sixty-three years ago?”
He chuckled, shaking his head.
“Not exactly. I have business in Boston. I own a small export business in Ireland. And so I thought I would kill two birds with one stone, as they say. It is not a long run up here from Boston. In fact, I had to pass by to get to Newburyport where I also have business. I thought it would be fascinating if I could deliver the letter if Sheila or Johnny Hacket survived after all these years. But I didn’t really expect to find them. When the people in the local store told me the Hacket house still stood here, I was fairly surprised.”
He hesitated and then drew out the package and deposited it on the table. It was as he said, an old oilskin pouch, not very bulky. “Well, I guess you have a right to this.”
He stood up abruptly, with a glance at his wristwatch.
“I must be off.”
I was staring at the package.
“What’s in it?” I asked.
“Just a letter,” he replied.
“I mean, what’s in the letter?”
His face momentarily contorted in anger.
“I haven’t opened it. It’s not addressed to me” he said in annoyance.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” I protested. “I didn’t mean to sound insulting. It’s just... well, don’t you want to know what it is you have brought?”
He shook his head.
“The letter is clearly addressed. It is not for me to examine the contents.”
“Then stay while I examine it,” I invited, feeling it was the least I could do to repay the man for bringing it such a distance.
He shook his head.
“I’m on my way to Newburyport. I’ve a cousin there.” He grinned again recovering his good humour. “It’s a small world.” He paused, then said: “I’ll be passing this way next week on my way back to Boston. Purely out of curiosity, I would like to know whether the letter contained something of interest. Maybe it’s part of some local history of our island Inishdriscol.”
“What does that mean?”
“Driscoll’s Island. T
he O’Driscolls were a powerful ruling clan in the area,” he responded proudly.
In fact, I arranged to meet Cichol O’Driscoll the next week in Boston because I had to return there to work on the following Monday morning. I watched him walk off down the drive for presumably he had left his car in the roadway. I remember thinking that it was odd to come across such old-world charm and courtesy. The man must have flown a couple of thousand miles and never once attempted to open the letter he had brought with him. I turned to where it lay on the kitchen table, picked it up and turned it over and over in my hands. It was only then that I suddenly realised the identity of the hand which had penned the address.
How stupid of me not to have realised before—but it is curious how slowly the mind can work at times. The date, the handwriting— which I had recently been looking at in the papers I had been sorting out—all pointed to the fact that here was a letter from my grandfather—Daniel Hacket.
With my hands suddenly shaky with excitement, I opened the oilskin and took out the yellowing envelope. Using a kitchen knife, I slit it open. I extracted several sheets of handwriting and laid them carefully on the flat surface of the table.
Inishdriscol,
near Baltimore,
County Cork,
Ireland.
April 30, 1928.
Dearest Sheila,
If you read these words you may conclude that I am no longer part of this world. Courage, my Sheila, for you will need it if these words reach you for I will require you to make them known so that the world may be warned. You must tell the Navy Department that they were not destroyed, that they still exist, watching, waiting, ready to take over... they have been waiting for countless millennia and soon, soon their time will come.
Today is the feast of Beltaine here. Yes, ancient customs still survive in this corner of the world. This is the feast day sacred to Bile, the old god of death, and I must go down into the abyss to face him. I do not think that I shall survive. That is why I am writing to you in the hope that, one day, this will find its way into your hands so that you may know and warn the world.
But first things first. Why did I come here? As you know, it was purely by chance. You will recall the extraordinary events at Innsmouth a few months ago? How agents of the Federal Government, working with the Navy Department, dynamited part of the old harbour? It was supposed to be a secret, but the fact of the destruction of the old seaport could not be kept from those who lived along the Massachusetts coast. In addition to that operation, I can tell you that my ship was one of several which were sent to depth-charge and torpedo the marine abyss just beyond Devil Reef. We were told it was merely some exercise, a war-game, but there was considerable scuttlebutt as to why the old harbour should be destroyed at the same time that the deeps were depth-charged. Some sailors conjured up visions of terrifying monsters which we were supposed to be destroying. There was talk of creatures—or beings who dwelt in the great depths—which had to be annihilated before they wiped out mankind. At the time, we officers treated these rumours and tales with humorous gusto.
When the operation was finished, and we returned to port, the officers and men who took part in the exercise were given an extraordinary four weeks’ leave; extraordinary for it was unprecedented to my knowledge of the service. I now realise that it was done for a purpose—to stop the men from talking about that strange exercise. The idea being, I suppose, that when they returned they would have forgotten the event and there would be no further speculation about it.
Well, four weeks’ leave was facing me. I had always wanted to see the place where I was born. Do you remember how you insisted that I go alone when it was discovered little Johnny had scarlet fever and, though out of danger, would not be able to make the trip to Ireland and you would not leave him? I was reluctant to go. Ah, would to God I had not done so. Would to God I had never set eyes on the coast of Ireland.
I took passage to Cork, landing at the attractive harbour of Cobh, and set out to Baltimore, where I had been born. The place is a small fishing port set in a wild and desolate country on the edge of the sea. It stands at the end of a remote road and attracts few visitors unless they have specific business there. The village clusters around an excellent harbour and on a rocky eminence above it is the O’Driscoll castle which, I was later told, has been in ruins since 1537. The only way to approach it is by a broad rock-cut stair. Incidentally, practically everyone in the town is called O’Driscoll for this was the heart of their clan lands. When the sun shines, the place has an extraordinary beauty. The harbour is frequently filled with fishing-boats and small sailing ships and there are many islands offshore.
On local advice I went up to the headland which they call the Beacon hereabouts. The road was narrow and passes between grey stone walls through open, stony country. From this headland there is a spectacular view of the islands. The locals call them “Carbery’s Hundred Isles.” Opposite is the biggest, Sherkin Island, on which stands the ruins of another O’Driscoll castle and those of a Franciscan friary, also destroyed in 1537. Beyond is Inis Cleire or Clear Island with its rising headland, Cape Clear, with yet another O’Driscoll castle called Dunanore, and four miles from the farthest tip of Cape Clear is the Fastnet Rock.
Everyone in the area speaks the Irish language, which has put me at a disadvantage and I now wish my parents had passed on their knowledge to me. All I have learnt is that Baltimore is merely an anglicisation of Baile an Tigh Móir—the town of the big house—and that some local people also call it Dún na Séad— the fort of jewels.
There was a certain hostility in the place, for it must be remembered that the War of Independence against England is not long past and that was followed with a bitter civil war which ended in 1923, only five years ago. Memories of that terrible time are still fresh in people’s minds and colour their attitude to strangers until they are able to judge whether the stranger means them harm or no.
Within a few days of arriving in Baltimore I found that I had not been born actually in the village but on one of the nearby islands called Inishdriscol, or Driscoll’s Island. I soon persuaded a fisherman to take me there, it being three miles from Baltimore harbour. It is a large enough island with a small village at one end and a schoolhouse at the other with its overall shape resembling the letter “T.”
I was able to hire a cottage close by the very one in which I had been born. The owners, Brennan told me, were away to America to seek their fortune. Brennan is the only one who speaks English on the island. He is a curious fellow combining local mayor, entrepreneur, head fisherman, counsellor... you name it and Brennan fits the role. Brennan is his first name, at least that is how I pronounce it, for he showed me the proper spelling of it which was written Bráonáin and the English of it is “sorrow.” Naturally, he is also an O’Driscoll and, for the first time, I learnt the meaning of the name which is correctly spelt O hEidersceoil and means “intermediary.” Names mean a great deal in this country. Our own name, Hacket, is—unfortunately—not well respected here for in 1631 two corsair galleys from Algiers sacked Baltimore, killed many of the inhabitants and carried off two hundred to be sold as slaves in Africa. They were guided through the channels to the town by a man called Hacket, who was eventually caught and hung in the city of Cork. Ah, if only I had knowledge of this language, how interesting these arbitrary signs we use would become.
In lieu of any other companion to converse with I have been much thrown together with Brennan and he has been my guide and escort on the island. Indeed I found no close relatives although most people knew of my family and several claimed distant kinship. After a while I settled down to a life of lazy fishing and walking.
It was after I had been on the island a few days that two more visitors arrived, but only for a few hours stay on the island. Brennan told me that one was some representative of the English Government and the other was an official of the Irish Government. Apparently, during the War of Independence, a number of English soldiers and official
s had disappeared, unknown casualties of the conflict. It seems that there had been a small military post on the island. A captain, a sergeant and four men. One night, the captain disappeared. It was assumed that he had been caught by the local guerrillas, taken away and shot. All investigations had proved fruitless in discovering exactly how he had met his end. No one on the island had talked. Nor had the guerrillas, many of whom were now members of the Irish Government, issued any information on the subject. Now, nine years after the disappearance, the English Government, in cooperation with the Irish Free State Government, were attempting to close the case.
I met the English official while out walking one morning and we fell into conversation about the problem.
“Trouble is,” he said, “these damned natives are pretty close.”
He blandly ignored the fact that I had been born on the island and could, therefore, be classed as one of the “damned natives.”
“Nary a word can you get out of them. Damned code of silence, as bad as Sicilians.”
“You think the local people killed this Captain...?”
“Pfeiffer,” he supplied. “If they didn’t, I’m sure they know who did. Maybe it was a guerrilla unit from the mainland. There wasn’t much activity on the islands during the war although there was a lot of fighting in West Cork. A lot of bad blood, too. Political differences run deep. Take these people now... they don’t like the Irish Government official that I’m with.”
“Why not?”
“He represents the Free State. This area was solidly Republican during the Civil War. They lost, and they hate the Free State Government. I suppose they won’t tell us anything. Damned waste of time coming here.”
I nodded in sympathy with his task.
“Well, if you give me your card, perhaps if I hear anything... any drop of gossip which might help... I could drop you a line. You never know. They might talk to me whereas they would not talk to you.”
Shadows Over Innsmouth Page 27