Minutes of the Lovecraft Studies Institute (# 5) [Cthulhu]

LOVECRAFT STUDIES INSTITUTE

xxx WELLESLEY STREET EAST, # xxx (BUZZ xxx)

TORONTO, ON M4Y 1H5

MINUTES OF DECEMBER 4, 2010 MEETING

ATTENDANCE: Patrick, Bloch, King, Joshi, Cannon (Members). Three Guests.

2:03 P.M Meeting Convened

2:05 P.M. Approval of Minutes for Meeting of November 6, 2010

2:05 P.M. Chair proposes reading of "Harbingers" manuscript Chapter 5 ("To a Danger Far or Near"). UNANIMOUS

6:15 P.M. Reading concludes.

6:16 P.M. Chair proposes open discussion. UNANIMOUS

[FULL TRANSCRIPT FROM AUDIO]

PATRICK: [inaudible] beer? Thanks. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming. As you just heard, this chapter represents a turning point in the story. Until now, the protagonists have spent most of their time in the strangely successful town of Aylesbury, Massachusetts. At the end of this chapter, however, after a long period of debate, they seem committed to making the short drive to the infamous village of Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror. We'll have to wait until the next installment is decoded to learn whether or not this actually takes place or whether Lovecraft has misled us once again.

JOSHI: We've all noticed that previous chapters have often involved a variety of genres: horror, mystery, pulp adventure, gangster, etc. After careful consideration, I would like to theorize that Harbingers may reflect a conscious attempt by Lovecraft to meld these disparate avenues of storytelling into an original synthesis. This chapter, in particular, serves as a perfect example: we have the mystery of Hoyt Symmes' strange book comprised of metallic sheets; Father Murphy's clever but narrow escape from a demented terror; a tense stand-off with so-called "gunsels", and more.

CANNON: I think we need to wait before making any grand pronouncements, but you may be on to something, Joshi. After all, Lovecraft tried to meld police fiction with horror fiction in the much-maligned The Horror at Red Hook.

KING: I'm not convinced. A horror novel can include all sorts of material and still remain at its core a horror novel. Just cause I put some funny dialogue and a love scene in a book doesn't mean I'm writing romantic comedies.

JOSHI: True, but--

PATRICK: Gentlemen, perhaps we can agree to wait until further chapters are deciphered to resolve this debate? For now, I think we should focus on the chapter in front of us. As Joshi alluded to, this chapter begins with Hoyt Symmes waking from the fit he fell into in Chapter 4. Symmes finds himself in his bedroom at Gilchrist House, disoriented by the memory of the three-headed symbol spinning in his mind. After his thoughts clear, he realizes it's nighttime and struggles for a lantern on the bedstand. Stumbling for his dressing-gown, he notices that one of his trunks that he was careful to always keep locked is sitting there with the lid open a crack. A quick search reveals that one of his most prized possessions is missing--a strange book obtained years ago, consisting of thin metallic leaves held secure by a clasp that Symmes has never managed to pry open.

BLOCH: I'll take it from here--this is a classic mystery set-up. Symmes makes his way down the hallway and sees flickering light under the partially-cracked door of the drawing room. Pushing it open, he's stunned to see that Zeituni is standing before the fireplace, scribbling furiously into a notebook. There, in the flames, sits Symmes' strange book, unclasped. Its "pages" glow red hot, but markings are clearly visible--tiny French script, the symbols that Symmes has been dreaming about, and a single large word: Carcosa! Zeituni realizes Symmes is there and, startled, hides his notebook and dashes out of the room. Symmes retrieves his stolen book and confronts Zeituni. At first, Zeituni claims that Symmes must have dreamt the entire encounter, but eventually Zeituni confesses to having stolen the book out of curiosity. He claims that the three-headed insignia etched throughout the house is a "good luck charm" from his native tribe in Kenya, the Kikuyu. Before he can be pressed further on this dubious claim, however, both men hear the loud honking of a car outside.

PATRICK: Further evidence, in my opinion, that Zeituni is untrustworthy. After all, he could have simply asked Symmes to look at the book. And how did he know that the writing on the metallic plates would be revealed by fire? Or was he actually trying to destroy the book?

BLOCH: In any event, the car is Joe Bick's taxi. He tells Symmes that Barnabus Gallowsong never returned from his dangerous expedition to the sugar mill and must be in trouble. Symmes learns that both Father Murphy and Jacob Blackstone are still hospitalized, and decides to head there immediately to get help.

KING: I quite liked what happened next--keep the tension high, I always say. The scene shifts and we see Father Murphy waking up in the hospital, groggy from the sodium pentathol injected into him by the gangsters a chapter or two ago. He hears the squeaking wheel of a hospital cart coming down the hallway towards his room. It's dark and lonely, and the flickering lights make the hospital seem a desolate place. Murphy makes it to the doorway of his room and sees the candy striper pushing the cart; it takes a moment, and then a memory slams into place--the woman pushing the cart looks exactly like one of the women pushing the concessions cart on the train to Aylesbury. Murphy starts to run, but the creepy, cackling laugh behind him fills him with terror. The woman's face contorts, her bones crack and distend, and long claws grow from her fingertips. She lopes towards Murphy like some kind of ghastly hound. Finally, Murphy finds courage to dash for the stairwell. He slams the door behind him, and, thinking quickly, speculates that the creature might track as much by scent and sound as by sight. He removes a shoe and throws it down the stairwell and then run up the stairs. Seconds later, he hears what sounds like the door being torn off its hinges; the next moments are agonizing until he realizes his deception may have worked. Murphy cautiously returns to the hallway and, turning the corner, almost runs straight into Scarlett Warren.

PATRICK: I think you forgot a key aspect of that encounter; the creature uttered something in its demonic voice--"Companions of the Harbingers are under His protection; but perhaps He wouldn't begrudge me just a taste."

BLOCH: A nice touch. However, we're here to discuss the chapter, not recount it in its entirety. To summarize some of the next scenes, Warren and Murphy are soon met at the hospital by Hoyt Symmes. The three listen to Joe Bicks' description of what happened and decide they should try to rescue Barnabus, especially since there's no police presence in Aylesbury. In the car, Warren explains a little about what she thinks is going on--while living in Boston, she secretly (or so she thought) saw a local mob kingpin named Dexter Underhill murder a thug named "Pretty" Eddie Spinetti. It seems that Spinetti's body was recently fished out of the bay, and now Underhill suspects (quite wrongly) that Warren ratted him out and has sent his boys to bring her back to Boston for "questioning."

JOSHI: To be precise, there is some law enforcement presence in Aylesbury. We're told the State Police have cordoned off the roads out of Aylesbury in a manhunt for the criminals responsible for the shoot-out at City Hall. However, given the events on the train, at the Gilmore Farm, and elsewhere, it seems logical that the protagonists would seek to avoid any further entanglements with law enforcement.

BLOCH: In any event, the trio convince Bicks to drive them out to the old sugar mill. They find some tracks and other clues leading them in the direction of the hills behind the mill and bravely continue further. Gunshots suddenly ring out, but, with the rain and the darkness, miss by a mile. The protagonists keep their cool, and, instead of shooting back, shout that they're not police and only here to find their kidnapped companion. Father Murphy is especially convincing, particularly when he offers to trade himself for Barnabus. The gangsters know that, as hostages go, a priest is more valuable than a circus dwarf, and agree to the trade. Barnabus, unconscious from a serious gunshot wound to the chest, is rolled down the hill to where his companions are waiting. Father Murphy, meanwhile, is taken to a small cave the mobsters have found for temporary shelter from the rain. When the rain lets up, they drag him with them a few more miles on foot until they feel safe from the State Police patrols and let him go with a message for Scarlett Warren: come back and explain things to "Dexter" voluntarily, or things will get even worse for your and your friends.

CANNON: Was this a realistic portrayal of how hardened hit men would react?

KING: I'm not sure--I suppose we could give Lovecraft the benefit of the doubt; these mobsters are cold, tired, and on the edge. Their car has been burned to embers, the State Police are looking for them for the murder of cops, and they see figures approaching them in the darkness. It probably comes as some relief to realize that one of them is a priest who could actually aid in their getaway attempt. Of course, had Scarlett Warren made her presence known, then a very different, bloody result could have occurred.

CANNON: I'm still not 100% convinced, but everything seemed to work out okay for the protagonists; Murphy is found by a police patrol and returned to Aylesbury the next morning. The others have already returned and taken Barnabus to the hospital.

PATRICK: I think what happens later that day is significant. Without re-reading the chapter, I don't recall exactly how it takes place, but the protagonists continue to investigate the gold-colored puzzle box they received as an unintentional bequest from Abraham Gilmore in a previous chapter. Noticing that one side of the puzzle box contains symbols in an unknown language, they scour Zeituni Wankiju's library of theosophical writings and stumble upon a book that seems to include a discussion of the very same odd symbols: The Kranorian Annals, Fact or Fallacy, by Garson Casterwell. Casterwell, a private school teacher in Boston, writes about an ancient scroll he claims to have discovered in the dusty storeroom of a museum. According to Casterwell's book, the scroll is the key to the language of an eons-old lost civilization: Hyperborea, and a possible colony of that civilization, right under the investigators feet in northern Massachusetts, named Kranoria.

JOSHI: Although Hyperborea is referenced elsewhere in Lovecraft's fiction, we should remain cognizant that, for the characters in Harbingers, the existence of Hyperborea may seem a mere fable, on par with Atlantis or (to be slightly anachronistic) Shangri-La.

PATRICK: Fable or not, they're quite proactive in trying to figure out how to open the puzzle box. They immediately telegram Casterwell, and the man is so intrigued by the report of another Hyperborean artifact that he telegrams plans of his arrival in Aylesbury the next day. While they wait, the protagonists discuss what they should do next. Scarlet Warren is, at first, tempted to head to New Orleans and meet with the mysterious man who has been placing advertisements in the classified section of the newspaper, claiming to know a way to remove the symbol that has been branded onto the backs of the Harbingers. However, avoiding populated areas would make for a long, difficult, and expensive trip; but even more problematically, Symmes still has not had the charges against him dropped and cannot leave the county without becoming a fugitive Since Symmes and Warren cannot distance themselves too far from each other without growing lethargic and anxious, wherever they go, they have to go together.

CANNON: The compromise they strike seems a sensible enough one. Since Judge "Hangin' Tom" Mathis is not holding court until the next week (due to the shoot-out at the court house), they have nothing to gain from staying in Aylesbury. However, Zeituni is planning an immediate expedition to Dunwich (which is within county limits) to find his missing team of investigators (one of which, alas, has already been identified as the dead "hobo" in a previous chapter). Zeituni is going to go with or without help, but if the protagonists come with him, he offers an enticing package: $ 4 a day per person, letters of introduction with other branches of the Gilchrist Trust throughout the world, and the use of a small "puddle-jumper" plane to take them directly from an airfield near Aylesbury to New Orleans once Judge Mathis clears them to leave the county.

BLOCH: As Zeituni makes preparations for the "expedition" (and he succeeds in making the 12-mile drive to Dunwich seem like a major undertaking), Garson Casterwell arrives. The protagonists are, by this point, somewhat paranoid, and only let him examine a rubbing of the symbols on the puzzle box. The man is as excitable as kid on Christmas, and confirms that the symbols are Hyperborean. After several hours, he's only able to complete a rough translation--apparently, the script talks about "gates between colonies", travel across vast distances in the blink of an eye (perhaps even between worlds or dimensions of existence!), and references the name "Ezdagor" as the creator of the puzzle cube. Casterwell takes the rubbings with him back to Boston to perform a full translation, and promises to contact the protagonists when he's finished.

JOSHI: Gentlemen, I believe you have overlooked a short scene that may be a vital clue to solving the mysteries of Harbingers. In short, I refer to Mr. Hoyt Symmes encounter with the rival encyclopedia salesman, Dustin Weller.

KING: He was a creepy fellow, and he said some odd things, but I'm not sure what you're getting at, Joshi.

JOSHI: Perhaps you drifted off during the reading, Mr. King, but I can assure you that I did not. Dustin Weller was on the train during the prologue to this story. He was, it must be assumed, one of the victims of the hound-like creatures attacks, one of the participants in the off-putting mannerisms and concerted speech that so marked every voyager of that train as odd when it reached the station. The fact, then, that Weller seems so enthusiastic to meet Symmes again, whom Weller knows is a "Harbinger", and says that he dreams of him, is therefore evidence that the passengers on that train could, at its arrival in Aylesbury, be sorted into four groups: those completely unaffected, like Father Murphy and Jacob Blackstone; those who have been branded with what I shall refer to as the Mark of the Harbingers; those simply killed, like the porter; and those attacked by the hound-like creatures, partially drained of cerebral fluid, and somehow instilled with awareness of, and subservience to, the so-called "Harbingers." Weller is an exemplar of this last group, which could number in the hundreds from just that single train. I see our time is running short, and I have yet to address how this relates to the strange dreams our Harbingers have been having; and the very different dreams the others have been having. For now, the question I leave you with gentlemen, is what is the malevolent purpose behind the creation of this servile class of Harbinger-devotees? And what implications does this hold, then, for our quite unwilling Harbingers?

10:27 P.M Motion to Adjourn [UNANIMOUS]