Ekaterina Zabolotskih
Whisperer in the Dark – the Sequel
Wandering gloomy thoughts, he looked again at the starry sky. For a moment it seemed that one of the luminous dots was suddenly approaching. Wilmarth shook his head – no, he was wrong. It was several more hours before his eyelids drooped and he fell into a restless sleep.
The next morning started surprisingly well with a letter back from his brother. The letter said that he and his wife would be happy to host Wilmarth, and the family had just moved into a house on the farm, so there was room for everyone. And until the burnt-out man decided what to do next, he could help with the household chores.
It was a great chance to escape to a secluded place. The proximity of the mountains and the warm climate were all that was needed for the nerves. So the young man paid the innkeeper and headed for the port. His ship was due to set sail in an hour, so the young man deftly made his way between the streets on the shortest route. At some point, Wilmarth realised that he was lost. He turned around and tried to find the road he had taken to his destination, but could not recognise any of the houses or streets around him. He panicked – he was known among his friends as a real expert at orienteering, knew all the places in Arkham, but now he was standing there like a lost kitten.
He looked around at several houses that looked as if they had been abandoned for decades. Broken windows and moldy tiles did not create a pleasant atmosphere.
Having assessed the situation and checked his watch (there was about 15 minutes to sail), he decided to look for signs on the houses – perhaps if he knew the name of the street he could get his bearings. He chose the least destroyed house and began to look around. There was nothing outside that looked like a sign, so he decided to go inside (the boys in the yard could pick it up and drag it inside for their games). Willmarth made his way through the pile of planks – all that was left of the former front room – and stepped inside. It smelled damp. There was a lot of stuff on the floor, and the wallpaper was peeling off the walls. He was shoveling through the piles of rubbish, the belongings of the previous tenants and the broken-down walls, hoping to find something that looked like a plank, when suddenly there was a knocking sound from above. Wilmarth listened for a moment. The knocking kept shifting. It seemed as if someone was walking on their heels.
"What could a decent girl be doing in this wreck?" – thought Wilmarth. But at the same moment he came to the conclusion that he himself was an honorary professor of philology, and decided that it might well be a wayward wayfarer like himself.
"Excuse me, lady, hello! Are you lost too? My name is Albert Willmarth, I'm trying to find a street sign here, are you too?".
The pounding stopped. Instead, it was as if a multitude of mice were scurrying up the stairs – such was the shuffling that reached the young man.
"I'll be right up, wait!" – Willmarth decided to check what was going on after all, confident that as he climbed the stairs he would see the frightened lady.
But what appeared before him on the first floor was no lost townswoman at all. Wilmarth's eyes widened and his mouth opened with a heavy sigh – Henry Ackley stood before him.
"P-P-Professor, is that you?" – Stammering, the young man asked. "B-but your consciousness has been displaced…"
"Quite right," the professor interrupted him, "Ackley's consciousness was transferred to one of the devices you saw in his house, I believe you called them cylinders then," his lips curved into an unnatural smile that made Willmarth flinch. Please forgive me, I have not yet mastered these parts perfectly.The others decided it would be better if I appeared to you like this. Anyway, I'm not here to make small talk," Ecklie, or rather whoever was pretending to be him, turned sharply to Wilmarth. He stared at him in exhaustion, slowly sliding down the banister.
“Don't panic, Albert, I'm not here to scare you – I have a message to pass on. First of all, we apologise for your flat – it was a necessary part of the plan, the manuscript should never have fallen into anyone's hands. We are glad that you were not harmed. But now for something else. Mr Noyes invites you to the Eckley Manor for some… negotiations," his hand twitched, arching back. It took the stranger several times to strain it to bring it back to normal. "As I said before, the parts aren't entirely subject to me… So, Mr. Wilmarth, are you ready to pay a visit?"
The young man stood in a daze. Agree? Then the nightmare would become a life. Refuse? To be killed on the spot.
Spreading his lips, dry with fear, Wilmarth squeezed out: "Yes."
"Fine!" – the fake Eckley seemed to exhale with relief – "Then let's set off immediately! The car is already waiting downstairs, follow me."
The men left the building and got into an old Ford (Wilmarth recognized it immediately – a month after that fateful night the car had disappeared without a trace; he thought it had been stolen, but it was much worse). The car started up and drove the company to the Arkham exit. Wilmarth was on his way back to Vermont.
Chapter 3
There was a dead silence in the old farmhouse. In fact, that was how Wilmarth remembered it. No animals, no people, only the wind rustling the leaves. It might have been the only traffic for a few dozen kilometers. The Ford pulled into the barn that had served as Eckley's garage, where Wilmarth had raced just over a year earlier. As he got out of the car, the young philologist felt the chill of the machine gun at his back and, guided by the driver, he headed towards the house. Every step was difficult, not because the ten hours in the car made his legs ache irritably, but because he had no idea what might be waiting for him inside. And even if he had, the assumptions were too terrifying for Willmarth's psyche.
A step, a second – with each second the inevitable drew nearer. The young man's heart was beating frantically. Perhaps he would have been glad if it had been ripped from his chest: at least then he would not have to go through this death row…
But suddenly something flashed through the boy's mind: "Run… Anywhere but this house. He glanced at his escorts: False Eckley was walking ahead and hardly looking back, the driver was still holding his gun to Wilmarth's body. There was only one chance to get out of the predicament, but he had to wait until the delegation got close enough to the house that Wilmarth had time to circle the building and duck under the protection of the woods.A moment for action… "In the range between despair and hope," thought the would-be fugitive. "Now!" – With a sharp movement he knocked the gun out of the hands of the one who was holding it and dropped it to the ground, then fired three times at the one in front of him and rushed towards the saving treetops.
"Just a little more, push on!" – he shouted to himself, struggling to get to the right point as fast as he could. His left foot had already crossed the edge of the forest when someone grabbed him by the waist and lifted him up. A terrified scream echoed through the nearby mountains. Wilmarth collapsed to the ground.His consciousness slowly faded away. The last thing he saw was a creature about three meters tall, with an indecipherable build and many extensions that were alternating arms and legs. It held the young man by the scruff of the neck and dragged him towards the house. "The end," thought the young man.