Johannes Cabal: The Fear Institute - Jonathan Howard

He paused: Cabal was holding one index finger up in a gesture of enquiry. ‘The Fear Institute?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it named after a Mr Fear?’

‘No.’

Cabal laughed, a dry, cynical noise that stirred and died in his throat. ‘There is nothing mealy-mouthed about you, is there, gentlemen? Good. I approve.

‘To the Fear Institute, then, I offer my services.’

Chapter 2

IN WHICH THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ARE VISITED, THOUGH BRIEFLY

Neither were the claims of Shadrach, Corde and Bose unfounded. Money was requested, and money was forthcoming. They travelled by train to a major port, and there took passage across the Atlantic. Corde suggested they travel by aeroship, but Johannes Cabal made a face, said that air travel was very overrated and that he would prefer to go by surface ship. Thus, forty-eight hours after their first meeting with Cabal, the party was steaming across the ocean, due for arrival at New York in eight days.

‘From there, we take the New Haven railroad service to Boston, and thence . . .’ Bose consulted the back and front of a train timetable for some moments, dropping it to the table in the lounge in favour of another before going back to the first ‘. . . and thence a short trip, also by train, to Arkham station, which is in, ah . . .’ he read the fine print carefully ‘. . . Arkham.’

Shadrach and Corde nodded sagely at this intelligence. Cabal, for his part, had left his cabin only out of boredom, and was now considering this a folly. The journey so far had been low in incident and high in planning. While a staunch proponent of at least some preparation, Cabal had long since learned the utility and frequent necessity of extemporisation. Once one went beyond that, however, one effectively hobbled oneself, leaving oneself vulnerable and liable to one becoming zero, and one wouldn’t like that. Contingency plans were all well and good, but they were going into a very incognita sort of terra; it all seemed like just so much wasted effort.

When Cabal made a comment along those lines, however, Shadrach said, ‘We must expect the unexpected,’ before laying out his scheme to deal with pirates riding stilt-legged elephants to the others. It was a good plan, as it happened, but then, so had been the plans to deal with giant platypuses and killer begonias. Cabal wondered if they were simply going through the dictionary and evolving procedures to deal with every noun they came across. He hardly cared, having belatedly realised that the more planning they did, the less he had to talk to them.

He also realised, and this he kept to himself, that the Animus travelled with them. These men were afraid, so they planned for the silliest eventualities simply because it kept them occupied. They denied themselves pause for reflection, because fear breeds in the quiet moments.

Cabal also had a small fear: that eight days of their nonsense would drive him insane. He was regretting having been quite so efficient in his preparation that it left him few distractions. He had copies of two very rough maps and a notebook filled with the distilled wisdom of any number of laudanum-enhanced poets with respect to useful knowledge of the Dreamlands. It was a very thin notebook.

He was flicking through it when the others finally agreed on a plan in case of attack by soft furnishings, and Corde asked, ‘What was that creature you were speaking of the other day, Cabal? The gog, was it?’

‘Gug,’ replied Cabal, without looking up. ‘It’s called a gug.’

‘Well, I was just thinking, gentlemen,’ said Corde, addressing Shadrach and Bose, ‘that we should also plan for known threats in the Dreamlands. After all, it is that sort of information that Mr Cabal has at his fingertips.’ The others agreed, with much humming and stroking of chins, that addressing real threats might be a good idea. Having secured their agreement, Corde turned back to Cabal. ‘So, what can you tell us about this gug fellow, then?’

Cabal merely flicked through his notebook until he came to a sketch, and passed it over to them. He was gratified by their sudden pallor and widened eyes.

‘Yes,’ said Shadrach, finally. ‘Well . . . that looks . . . manageable.’ And the three of them started muttering about deadfalls and bear pits.

Cabal made a mental note that ‘manageable’ could apparently be applied as a euphemism for a furry monstrosity with too many forearms, a vertical slit for a mouth, poor dental hygiene and an uncritical worship of dark gods so debauched that even other dark gods would blank them at dark-god parties. He also decided not to burden them with the knowledge that ‘gug’ was the name of a race and not an individual, or to point out that the sketch bore no scale and so their assumption that a gug stood only at about man-sized was profoundly optimistic. He would wait until they had finalised their plan before politely enquiring how the gug would react on finding itself shin deep in their trap or, indeed, how any of its many friends might.

The eight days of the sea crossing became more bearable as the Institute members grew by degrees both bored of their over-planning, and cognisant of its futility after Cabal had dropped a few more bombshells into their sessions.

The final straw was when Cabal innocently enquired of them, ‘What is your plan for cats?’

‘Cats?’ said Shadrach.

‘Cats?’ echoed Corde. ‘Are we likely to be set upon by cats?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Cabal. ‘That rather depends on your plan.’

Bose, the least enthusiastic of the three when it came to covering every conceivable contingency, tapped the box file that lay on the table. It was stuffed with plans, and there were another four just like it in Shadrach’s cabin. ‘Which plan?’ he asked morosely.

‘Your plan for cats.’

Shadrach frowned. If Johannes Cabal had not previously demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that he was disinclined to frivolity, then Shadrach would have been sure that they were being made fun of. ‘Do I understand you correctly, Mr Cabal? Our plan for cats, which has not yet been formulated, depends upon our plan for cats?’

Cabal nodded sadly. ‘It might.’

Shadrach and Corde looked at one another for a long moment. Then, with a heavy heart, Corde took up his pen and wrote upon a virgin sheet of paper, ‘Cats’. He had barely had time to underline it when it was whipped out from beneath his nib by Bose, who tore the sheet into halves, then quarters, then eights, before letting them flutter on to the table. ‘I am having a drink,’ he declared. ‘And I do not mean tea.’

They watched him go off in the direction of the bar, so did not notice Cabal’s quiet smile of triumph before it vanished behind a two-day-old newspaper.2

On the eighth day, New York appeared on the western horizon, glittering monoliths caught in the morning sun. As the ship approached and the famous skyline became more distinct, Cabal’s expression became more sour. Finally, he declared it the most phallocentric conurbation he had ever seen or even heard of, and that they should escape from it as quickly as they could because ‘These subcultures get ideas of incipient superiority, combined with decadence across the social strata that make them psychologically inhuman. They will be tribalised and not subject to recognisable norms. We may even have trouble communicating with them. Mark my words, if we don’t escape that hive as soon as we possibly can, things could go badly.’

Neither did their subsequent experiences undermine Cabal’s expectations. The customs official they met on landing used ‘youse’ interchangeably for not only the singular and plural second-person personal pronouns, but also for the nominative, accusative, dative and possessive forms. A man they asked directions of also claimed to be a native, but his speech drawled on as if he were giving a running commentary on glacial shift. In contrast, the woman in the ticket kiosk at Pennsylvania station spoke rapidly and without pause for almost three minutes, leading Cabal to suspect that she was simultaneously inhaling through her mouth and talking through her nose.

Only when they were safely aboard the Boston train and it was en route did they relax. ‘I feel that much more prepared for the Dreamlands, now,’ commented Corde.

‘I don’t know,’ said Bose, as he watched New York thin out around them. ‘It didn’t feel that alien.’

‘You can’t get a decent bacon sandwich there, you know, old man.’

‘What?’ gasped Bose, scandalised. He glared at the slowly diminishing tall buildings. ‘Barbarians . . .’

Their first impression of Boston was that it had a far more European air about it, and was therefore patently more civilised and much more to everyone’s taste. As it was already mid-afternoon, they decided to break their journey there and find a hotel. They would reach Arkham the next day, and that would be soon enough.

That evening after dinner, they repaired to a private room, taking a large pot of coffee with them. Corde, Shadrach and Bose ranged themselves along one side of the table, cups and notebooks to hand, while Cabal stood opposite them in the manner of a lecturer.

‘It has been said,’ he began, ‘that what you do not know cannot hurt you. This would come as a revelation to many, if it were not for the fact that what they did not know had already torn them to shreds and giblets.’

‘I’m not sure that’s the context that—’ began Shadrach, a little prissily, but Cabal was not listening.

‘Our motto for this expedition, then, is forewarned is forearmed,’ he continued, neglecting to mention that his personal motto for this expedition was The devil take the hindmost. He paused, wondering where would be a good place to start and, as he did so, he saw Bose’s sheep-like expression and decided that brevity was the best policy.

‘The Dreamlands are an inexact quantity. A cartographer’s and a demographer’s nightmare – or perhaps jobs for life – because the Dreamlands are constantly changing. Slowly, I grant you, but their tectonics are as hummingbirds compared to those of the waking world. I have maps, but their reliability must be suspect to a degree. Thus, we ask, and we ask often. Which brings us to the people.

‘As we have already discussed, there are two ways for a mortal to enter the Dreamlands – corporeally or incorporeally. In the former case, their body accompanies them and all is straightforward. In the latter case, it is not clear where the matter comes from to form the dreamer’s new Dreamland body, or where it goes to when the dreamer awakes. Many dreamers, of course, never return. Either due to accidents in the mundane world while they sleep, or by dint of the injudicious use of drugs to bring them into the Dreamlands in the first place, they die here, yet live there. It is impossible to be sure, but it seems likely that the indigenous population are all – or largely – immigrants from here. No, Herr Bose,’ for Bose was looking around, startled, ‘not specifically from this hotel. I mean from Earth and Earth’s prehistory.’

‘Wouldn’t they be a bit . . . you know, old, by this time, Cabal?’ asked Corde.

‘Time is a more flexible asset there, Herr Corde, but I take your point. The current natives of the Dreamlands were born and bred there from ancient dreamers who either could not or would not return.’

‘Is that fact, Mr Cabal?’ asked Shadrach, making copious notes in a flowing cursive hand. ‘Or supposition?’

‘The latter,’ said Cabal unabashed. ‘It is difficult to explain the localised racial traits if it is true, but not impossible. Perhaps, millennia ago, immigrants from Ancient Greece or lost Mu came there and settled close together. That is human nature, after all. And so those populations naturally have Grecian or Muite characteristics to this day. It is impossible to be sure. The Dreamlands are . . .’ he waved at his folder of notes, his distaste very evident ‘. . . very woolly.’

Corde, who felt too much orientation would dull the romance of it, was happy to change the subject. ‘Then let us simply be on our guard and meet the Dreamlands as they meet us. We shall pick up the gist of them quickly enough, I have no doubt. Now, Cabal, the Gate of the Silver Key. You have its exact location.’

‘Oh, yes.’ Cabal was languid as he put the loose notes carefully back into their folder. ‘I know precisely where the keyhole is.’

‘Then . . . ?’

‘But I cannot give you a precise location.’

There was a silence, finally broken by Bose whispering to Shadrach, ‘He’s doing that thing again, like he did with the cats.’

‘I thought you had cast lots or some such . . .’ Corde resisted the urge to say ‘nonsense’ and instead said ‘. . . as a method for determining the current location of the Gate.’

‘I have, indeed,’ said Cabal, ‘and my findings have been precise and unambiguous. We shall catch the train to Arkham tomorrow morning and locate the Gate by evening.’

‘Why leave it so late?’

‘Because there will be less chance of witnesses.’

Shadrach regarded Cabal with the uncertain air of censure one might expect from a headmaster confronted by a boy who has smashed the atom, and the school with it. ‘You mean to say, we shall have to break into somewhere?’

‘No,’ said Cabal. Then he thought for a moment longer and added, ‘Yes. But no.’

‘Are you being deliberately obscure, Cabal?’ said Corde, his smile fading.

‘Partially, but – pace, gentlemen – the answer is obscure in itself. Explaining it will . . . Suffice it to say that you hired me for my ability to deal with certain situations with a certain professionalism. I must ask you to trust me when I say that this is one such situation. I could give you a more exact answer, but in doing so I would endanger the success of the mission. You must trust me.’

And so, with ill-grace but no alternative, they did.

Oxford has its dreaming spires, and Paris its lights and love, but neither place exerts quite the same influences upon the poetic and susceptible as Arkham, the city of shadows. Shadows, literal and figurative, that lie upon the homes and upon the minds of that strange town’s inhabitants. By European standards, of course, Arkham was a new town, not even half a millennium old, yet an air of ancient decrepitude had fallen upon the place scarcely after the first house was raised that baffled expectations and raised the hackles.

The land on which it had been built had been bought from the indigenes for the usual trinkets, but in this case there had rapidly grown an unspoken suspicion that the former owners had got the better part of the deal. At first glance, there was nothing wrong with the land: it stood green and promising, rising gently from the sullen waters of the Miskatonic river that ran through it. Plots were quickly drawn up and dispersed, and eager settlers arrived to make new lives there. Soon, however, their eagerness tarnished and faded, replaced by an uncertain feeling that all was not well. But the land was good, and the location perfect, and practicality overcame vague doubts. Soon, other settlements were established, like Kingsport to the south-east, Innsmouth to the east, and Dunwich inland to the west. Soon after, the rumours began.