Monday 11 June 2012

Part II
The Scholar

I arrived in Ambridge late on the Tuesday evening, under a gibbous moon, accompanied by the preternaturally loud sounds of sheep in a nearby field, unsettled by some as yet invisible disturbance. It seemed ominous, as if presaging unspecified disaster, and despite my natural cynicism, I am forced to admit that, if truth be told, it filled me with a sense of nameless dread. The weather was satisfactory for the time of year, as I am told is so often the case in this seemingly sleepy village, and I pulled into the car park of the local public house with mixed feelings. This should, I reminded myself, be a fairly simple case; all I had to do was check out some leads, and reassure the grieving Mrs Pargeter that there had been nothing untoward about the death of her husband, and that the only conspiracy involved in the accident was that between wind and gravity. I foresaw resistance to this, but I was confident that confronted with the evidence, or rather the lack of same, she would finally find closure and would eventually stop tormenting herself with her weird imaginings.

Bearing a garishly-painted sign featuring the animal which gave it its name, The Bull was a fairly traditional Old English pub, seemingly having managed to avoid the despicable trend for gentrification which has befallen so many of our public houses in recent years. Although the food on offer was hearty and varied, there was nothing of the "gastropub" about it. A shabby dart board, a beer-stained pool table- these were the limits of its entertainments, although a garishly-painted sign pointing up the stairs indicated the possibility of the occasional musical event. In short, it was a real pub, selling real beer. I arranged reasonably-priced accomodation with the landlady, a rather anxious-looking woman, though attractive for her age, and with a flighty air which, I rather suspected, hid a capacity for ruthlessness. She showed me to my room, which was well-enough appointed, and there I unpacked my case before returning to the saloon bar for a well-deserved drink.

Being a local village pub, it was not long before the presence of an outsider began to attract attention, and I soon found myself enjoying a pint of the local cider with two older men, a father and son who lived nearby. The son introduced himself as Eddie, and tried to sell me a wheelbarrow; an offer which I politely refused, having neither the need nor the desire for such an item. The father, on the other hand, old Joe Grundy- he provided far more in the way of useful conversation. After buying both he and his son a drink, I settled back to hear his tales of village life, on which subject he was very loquacious indeed. It seemed this village was indeed a hotbed of mystery and passion; although it also seemed to me that for a man such as Joe, living in a somnolent village such as this, the twin arts of mythologising and exaggeration would prove invaluable in his self-appointed role as village elder. I realised it would be of little use to try to question him directly, and instead contented myself with sitting back and letting his tales of rural intrigue was over me until he mentioned Lower Loxley Hall.

This was my entry point. "Wasn't there some sort of accident there? I'm sure I recognise the name from the Borsetshire Post."

His face darkened. "Ooh yer, poor Nigel. Tragedy, that was. Mind you", and at this he leaned in closer, "there's them as say there was more to it than we was told, you know".
His son interjected.

"Dad, Mr Shanks here don't want to hear about all that nonsense." And then, apologetically, to me: "'E always gets a bit weird when 'e's 'ad a few. Don't mind 'im." And so the conversation returned to its previous state, all infidelity and prize-winning marrows.

Eventually Eddie got up to use the facilities, and I pressed Joe once more on what his words had meant. "Oh, I probably shouldn't say anything, really... just that poor Nigel had been gettin' interested in some very queer stuff. 'E'd been spending a lot of time in Borsetshire, at the library, so they say. But I wouldn't know much about that. Never really been much of a library sort of man meself. Sayin' that, though, 'ere comes one now!" He gestured towards an elderly, distinguished-looking gentleman, who was just being poured a drink. "Professor!" he called. "Come and 'ave a word with this fella. Wants to know about libraries".

I tried to correct his misconception, but it was too late. After a brief handshake, this "Professor" (who inteoduced himself as "Jim") sat at the table with us, and began holding forth on the wide variety of old books kept in a special room at Borsetshire Library. Being, as he told me, a staunch Atheist, he was quick to pooh-pooh them as folklore, but apparently they were a fascinating store of the bizarre. Books like the Necronomicon of the Mad Arab Alhazred, Ludwig Prinn's De Wermis Mysteriis, or the Unausprechlichen Kulten of von Junzt.

It soon transpired that I was to learn little of any use here, but the combination of the local cider and the scholar's learned tales provided a welcome distraction. After all, I surmised, I couldn't be expected to be on duty twenty-four hours a day. Mrs Pargeter would surely forgive me setting aside a couple of hours to unwind after the journey before beginning my investigation proper in the morning.
When the landlady rang the bell for "time", Jim was in mid-sentence.

"For Kadath in the Cold Wastes hath known them, and what man knows-"

"Time to go home, Jim, stop boring the poor man with all your book-larnin'" called a voice from behind the bar. Reluctantly the scholar retrieved his coat, and he and the two Grundys made for the door, Joe slowly bringing up the lead. When he was sure the other two were out of earshot, he turned to me and said in a low voice:

"Talk to Jack Wooley, up at The Lodge. 'Im and Nigel were 'avin'... meetin's".

At last, something of some use to show for the evening! In improved cheer, I bade goodnight to the landlady, and went to my room.

My sleep was at first fitful, my dreams haunted by terrible things that moved in the trees, and tentacles reaching up from the Am to dwarf the buildings of the village... but eventually I gave myself up fully to the arms of Morpheus, and the night passed uneventfully.

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