The Watchman Watches in Vain

Emma watches the unlikely company advance into the inky darkness of the alley.

As they turn into the yard at the building’s rear, Stuckey’s flashlight flickers over a dreadful tableau. Three ghouls perch on a brick wall at the yard’s rear. Bald pated, yet shaggy and hoofed like goats. As Arkhamites, the investigations have heard tales of these creatures since their childhood. The sight of the three monsters feels like a impossible scene from a nightmare. Yet also oddly familiar.

Long tongues lolling, the creatures draw themselves up on their powerful haunches as if to leap at the intruders. They hiss a warning.

"They are right there," gasps Stuckey.

The flashlight trembles in his grasp, casting a quavering beam. He aims his pistol directly at the creatures , but refrains from shooting, clearly doubting the party’s odds of survival if they engage.

The ghouls snarl when Melody refuses to back away. One of the creatures makes a guttural snarl. Then points a bony finger upwards , towards the spire of the old church.

The three horrors scramble from the wall and head westward into the darkness , scrambling yard to yard in the direction of the graveyard.

Stuckey gives an audible sigh.

"You stood your ground, lady? I don’t know whether that makes you brave or crazy. Mr Cowley? Professor? How about you come and join us in here? No medals for you, though."

Once the ghouls have departed, the yard presents a grisly scene. The ground is thick with wet autumn leaves. Yet a severed hand, gnarled and greenish like a cartoon witch’s , is clearly visible in Stuckey’s torchlight. Blood spatters the wall on which the ghouls were resting.

As they search the scene, the investigators also become aware of a low but persistent hum coming from the direction of the church.

Stuckey sees that Melody has been struck with terror and disgust.

He approaches her gingerly and considers offering a her steadying swig from his hip flask. But he looks at the elegant woman and thinks better of it.

"I’m sorry, " he says. " I’d like to say it gets better but it doesn’t."

Ghoul against ghoul? Clancy doubts it. The hand is rubbery and inhuman. Even more so than a ghoul’s bony manus. Turning it over, he sees that horrid suckers pucker in its palm and near its fingertips. The hand of a devil? Or something more alien still?!

Emma also considers the severed hand. Her guess is that the member has been torn from its socket through sheer force. The spillage of dark green blood nearby confirms this. The hand is dull green, rather than brightly luminous like the light that enveloped Harrington.

Green like a toad…suddenly the horrible otherness of the thing strikes her…

Alex and Emma swap notes on the steeple. The old structure soars into the blackness of the autumnal New England sky. Emma knows much already about its structure and the lookout platform within. One odd thing that strikes her is the weather vane at its tip. Perhaps it is a trick of the light, but the distant vane seems to faintly tremble. As though viewed through a shimmer of heat or cold.

Alex also stares and slowly confirms Emma’s impression. Some kind of force—a magnetic field perhaps— is operating around or in front of the steeple’s tip!