The Cthulhu Cult: A Novel of Lovecraftian Obsession

by Rick Dakan

  “And you allege that Mr. Tyree is doing something illegal in his home, which is next door to your own, correct?”

  “Well, your honor, there’s always all kinds of people coming in and out of there at all times of the night. And with that big fence they’ve put up, anything could be going on in there. There are loud noises sometimes. Really loud.”

  “And you’ve complained about these noises to Mr. Tyree? Or filed complaints?”

  “No, your honor. It’s nothing that lasts so long as that. By the time an officer would get out there things would have quieted down so it never made sense to call. To be honest I didn’t think too much of it before I became aware of just what kind of people these are living over there. It’s a cult, your honor. Not my word, mind you, but what I read in the papers. It’s a cult and our neighborhood isn’t the place for activities like that.”

  The judge gave him a stone-faced look. “Help me out here, Mr. Malinowski,” he said. “It’s still not clear to me what exactly the nature of the nuisance is and what you’re seeking an injunction against.”

  “Well, it’s things like they describe in the papers, your honor. These rituals and house parties and what not. They’re beyond unseemly and they bring the wrong element into the neighborhood. You can see for yourself in the articles.”

  The judge turned to Malinowski’s lawyer, who was approaching him with a handful of clippings, and stopped the attorney in his tracks. “You know better than that, Mr. Wallace.”

  I was surprised when Shelby’s lawyer spoke up. “We have no objection to you seeing the articles, your honor. My client has nothing to hide or be ashamed of.”

  The judge gave the slightest raised eyebrow of surprise at this concession from Shelby’s lawyer and said, “All right, let me see the articles.” Malinowski’s attorney handed the clippings from the weekly and daily papers, along with what looked like some printouts of Web sites, and handed them to the clerk, who passed them to the judge. While he looked over the documents, I looked at Shelby, who was sitting statue-still with perfect posture in his seat. The only chink in his calm facade came from his left hand, which was fiddling with some small gold charm or pendant below the table, out of the judge’s sight. I nudged Conrad and pointed it out to him, but he seemed to have already noticed.

  After a few minutes scanning the documents, the judge handed them back to his clerk and said, “Mr. Malinowski, I’m not entirely sure what the relevance of these pages is to your request.”

  “Your honor,” Shelby’s neighbor said, “You can clearly see that he’s some sort of degenerate. These parties he has where he makes people think they’re on drugs, and these weirdo books he’s passing around to schools. It’s not right, your honor. It’s disturbing to our peace and it’s just not right.”

  The judge turned his attention to Shelby’s lawyer. “Counselor, let’s hear from you.”

  Shelby’s lawyer took the podium. “Judge, there’s no basis for granting this injunction and, like you, I’m frankly confused about what it is exactly that they’re trying to get an injunction against. My client has broken no laws and there have been no noise complaints filed against him. As to any activities described in those articles, they aren’t relevant, your honor. You’ll note that none of these so-called ‘house parties,’ at which nothing illegal is even alleged to have taken place by the way, were at my client’s home. So I ask again, what is Mr. Malinowski even asking for here? And as for the statute cited by my colleague Mr. Wallace, he knows just as well as I do, and as I’m sure your honor does, that those statutes were written to curtail brothels and gambling halls, your honor. There have been no allegations of either kind of activity at my client’s home. There’s just nothing here, your honor.”

  “Can I say something else, judge,” Mr. Malinowski interjected, raising his hand. Shelby’s lawyer gave a wry smile and yielded the podium to him. “Judge, we all know what’s going on in there. Sex parties. Drug-taking. We all know that’s what this cult gets up to. They practically ran him out of town last year after what happened at that other where he was living. I’m sure you remember that, judge. He’s doing the same thing now only ten times worse because he’s got this whole Satanic cult of his going and if it isn’t against the law to have a cult in your house having sex parties and taking drugs, then I don’t know what is.”

  Shelby’s lawyer wasn’t about to let these accusations go unanswered. “There is no evidence your honor, none, of my client taking drugs or doing anything else illegal in his home. If Mr. Malinowski has such evidence, we ask that he produce it.”

  “Do you have any evidence of illegal activities, Mr. Malinowski?” the judge asked.

  “Come on, your honor,” the neighbor protested, his voice dripping with disdain as he looked over at Shelby. “We’re all men of the world. We know what’s really going on here.”

  “May I say something, your honor?” called out a clear, commanding voice. It was Shelby, and his request cut through the courtroom like a knife, drawing all of our gazes to him. He stood up and approached the podium as Malinowski backed away.

  “By all means,” the judge said.

  As he took his place, I saw the glint of something metallic still in Shelby’s left hand. It was an irregular, flat piece of gold about a half-inch across. Shelby was running his thumb over its surface tracing the same simple pattern over and over again as he began to speak.

  “Your honor, I am, I shall freely admit, an unusual man. A complicated man. Even a controversial man. But I am also a free man. Free, as are we all, to practice my beliefs and think my own thoughts as long as doing so does no other person any harm. And I have done no harm your honor. Yes, I have started a church, a legally recognized and registered church I might add, with all the papers filed and fees paid. Some call it a cult, but they do so out of prejudice, not understanding. My good neighbor Mr. Malinowski says that what I do isn’t right, that it ‘disturbs his peace.’ I would suggest your honor that it’s not what I do that disturbs his peace and quiet, but rather what I think that disturbs his peace of mind. And, with all due respect, he’s as free to ignore my ideas as I am to have them and tell those that would listen all about them.”

  I’m not sure I took a breath while Shelby talked. His voice boomed through the microphone without yelling, his words, his sentences, his thoughts piercing right into my mind. This whole injunction thing suddenly seemed like a ridiculous ploy, a complete waste of time. We had no proof, and without proof no judge would listen to our complaints. How could he?

  Shelby continued, “If I might quote philosopher and visionary author H.P. Lovecraft on this matter. He wrote, ‘What I had thought morbid and shameful and ignominious is in reality awesome and mind-expanding and even glorious. My previous estimate being merely a phase of man’s eternal tendency to hate and fear and shrink from the utterly different.’ I find my own thoughts and actions to be mind-expanding and maybe even glorious. My neighbor finds them shameful and ignominious. I hope someday that he will overcome his tendency to hate and fear the different, but until that day all I would ask is that I be left to my own thoughts and Mr. Malinowski to his.”

  No one said anything for what seemed like forever, but which was probably only a few seconds, as Shelby finally stopped manipulating his golden charm and sat back down again. After that it was all over. A few more arguments from the lawyers, some vain protests from Malinowski, and the judge’s final decision denying the request for an injunction. We were dismissed, the next group called, and Shelby and his lawyer strode back out the door ahead of us.

  In the hall outside, Conrad and I tried to regroup and figure out what had happened. Malinowski, disgusted with the judge and late for his tennis game, told us both to screw off and marched away, swearing at his lawyer.

  “That’s bullshit,” Conrad said. “I can’t believe that judge ruled like that.”

  “Shelby and his lawyer sure handled that well,” I said, wondering what we were going to do about the ritual now. “We
should have known he’d try some sort of free speech argument. And did you see that amulet thing Shelby was fiddling with?”

  “That golden charm,” said Conrad, staring at the floor as if he’d find some kind of answer there. “I noticed it, but I couldn’t tell what it was.”

  “I think it was an Elder Sign. The same symbol they all have tattooed on them.”

  “Christ! That explains it!” said Conrad, stomping his right foot and screwing his face up in frustration. “That has to be it. We had the neighbor as a witness and the articles from the paper and the law on our side. No way the judge should have ruled against us. But Shelby got to him. With that damned Elder Sign of his he hypnotized the judge somehow.”

  “I don’t think the judge could even see the thing from up where he was,” I protested.

  “Not normal hypnotism, Rick!” He shook his head back in forth in savage, sharp twitches of frustration. “Something else. Something older, more powerful.”

  “You mean magic.”

  “Yes! But not D&D-spells magic. Just something that seems like magic to us. Some ancient techniques he must have learned from the Necronomicon. The same sort of thing he used on you. Sinclair told us there’s good evidence that Sonia Greene and Crowley learned these kinds of things from the Necronomicon — ancient signs and symbols that short-circuit the brain, passed down from civilizations long lost. Possibly even aliens.”

  “Aliens?” I asked, astonished. “When did we start talking about aliens?”

  “Forget the aliens. It’s just one theory. It could’ve been just really smart ancient people. It doesn’t matter. The point is, we’ve seen what Shelby can do. What he did to that judge and what he did to you and what he’s done to all those people following him. And all that as a result of whatever the hell Kym’s done to him. We’ve got to do something, and there’s no one out there who’s going to help us. Certainly not the courts. I see that now.”

  “But for the thousandth time, Conrad, what can we do!” I was exasperated and confused, overwhelmed by the bizarre possibility that Shelby could use occult powers to influence other, worried for Cara, and unsure which way to turn next.

  “I’m not sure,” Conrad said. “But I have some ideas. Some people I need to talk to.”

  “Who do we need to talk to? Who else is there?”

  “I can’t tell you,” Conrad said. I started to object but he cut me off. “I’m sorry, Rick, but I can’t. Not yet. What if he’s still in your mind somewhere? It needs to be a surprise. But I do need you to do something for me. I need you to pick up Sinclair at the airport tomorrow. He’s flying into Tampa. I’ll e-mail you his flight info. Can you do that?”

  “Yeah. Sure I can.” Sinclair’s arrival might give as an advantage of Shelby, finally. Our ace in the hole. “Then what?”

  “Bring him back to your house and I’ll contact you. We need to know everything he knows about the Necronomicon and whatever it is else that Shelby and especially Kym might be capable of. OK? Most of important of all, he said he’s got the letter, and I’ll need you to bring it and him to wherever I am.”

  “OK,” I said, glad to have a task in front of me that I knew I could handle. “I’ll take care of it.”

  “Good,” Conrad said. Then he surprised me by reaching out and embracing me. Then he let me go. “I’ll be in touch.”

  I stood and watched him go, trying to make myself move. It took a few seconds, but finally I took a step, and then I was headed out the door, not at all sure where I was going.

  Chapter 23

  I had over twenty-four hours to kill before I needed to be up in Tampa to pick up Sinclair. I managed to last all of half an hour before I called Conrad to beg him to tell me what he was up to, but he didn’t answer his phone. I thought about driving by the Cthulhu compound myself, just to see what was going on, but I couldn’t summon up the courage to go back there. What if I found not Conrad, but Shelby waiting for me outside? Torn between a desire to somehow help and an equally compelling desire to bury my head in the sand until this whole mess was over, I drove home.

  I was greeted by a message on my answering machine from Lauren. She was angry. “Rick, it’s Lauren. Is Conrad with you? I need to talk to him. I haven’t seen him in days and if he wants a divorce, then you tell him I’ll shove one down his throat, no problem. In the meantime, he needs to stop spending OUR money. I’ve canceled all the credit cards and frozen what’s left of our bank account. Tell him to call me if you see him, but not to bother coming home. I’ve changed the locks.”

  “Fuck,” I said out loud. What the hell had Conrad been doing? I thought back over the spy equipment and the payoff to Ash and hiring the private investigator and probably giving Sinclair the money to buy the Sophia Greene letter. Thousands, maybe tens of thousands of dollars. I tried calling Conrad again, but it went straight to voice mail. I didn’t want to break that kind of news to him in a message, so I just told him that Lauren was looking for him. I thought about trying to call Lauren and talk her down, but I didn’t know what I would say. I hoped that maybe once we got things resolved with Shelby and she learned how serious it all was, then she’d understand why Conrad had done what he’d done. Although, to be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure I understood myself.

  Upstairs I logged on and found a message from Conrad with Sinclair’s flight info. It was from an anonymous e-mail account I didn’t recognize. He really was being careful Shelby didn’t follow his trail. I called Sinclair and left a message telling him I’d meet him outside baggage claim.

  I decided to read up more on Walpurgisnacht, hoping to find some hint of why Shelby was having his big ritual on that particular night. April thirtieth. The date figures in many occult traditions, but none more so than Lovecraft’s own writings. Many of his stories mention the April thirtieth date and the evil associations that it has. It is supposedly a time when contact with the Great Old Ones and other alien powers is easier than at any other time. A prime example is in “The Whisperer in Darkness” where the alien Fungi from Yuggoth celebrate the date with dark rituals and sacrifices to the outer gods. In short, it was a time when really bad shit went down. Perfect.

  The drive up through rush-hour traffic put me even more on edge than I already was. Driving over two long bridges and into the tangle of airport entrances and exits in bumper-to-bumper gridlock left me grinding my teeth. I must have called Conrad a half-dozen times as I drove, but he never answered. I assumed that once he knew Sinclair’s flight had arrived he’d finally pick up the phone, so that was only one of the reasons I was looking forward to finally meeting our Lovecraft scholar. More importantly, I really hoped this letter he’d found would provide some way of saving Cara.

  Sinclair had e-mailed me that morning saying he wouldn’t be checking any baggage, so there shouldn’t be much delay between landing and his being ready to leave. When I arrived at 6:45 I expected to find him standing at curbside. Of course I didn’t have a picture of him to go on, but he said he’d recognize me and that he’d be wearing a brown jacket. I forced my Mazda Protégé through three layers of waiting vehicles and pulled up curbside. I got out and stood by my door to get a better view. I didn’t see anyone that looked like I imagined Sinclair should look, but he recognized me.

  The man in the frayed and stained brown corduroy jacket was younger than I’d expected — I guessed in his early-to-mid–thirties. He had frizzy, unkempt brown hair that curled in on itself in an indistinct but thinning heap on top of his head. He was both spindly and heavy at the same time, with long legs and arms but a prodigious potbelly poking out from beneath his unbuttoned jacket. A warm, friendly smile beamed at me through his thick beard, and his eyes twinkled in excitement behind small, oval-framed glasses. “Mr. Dakan!” he said, lugging a battered leather valise bulging almost to the point of overflowing. “Mr. Dakan, over here!”

  I circled around to greet him and open the trunk for his bag. “Calvin,” I said, shaking his hand. “Thanks for coming. Do you need some help wit
h that?” I asked, reaching for the bag.

  “No,” he said, “I’ve got it.” He heaved the bag into my trunk and I closed it. A few minutes and a little small talk about flights and airport security measures and we were back on the highway headed south.

  “So,” Sinclair said, “Conrad tells me things did not go well in court yesterday?” His voice, which sounded distinguished and educated on the phone seemed out of place coming from this much younger man. I was having a hard time reconciling the two.

  “You talked to Conrad? When?”

  “This morning before I left.”

  That just pissed me off. Conrad was talking to Sinclair but not me? “I see,” I said, trying to hide my annoyance. It wasn’t Sinclair’s fault. “Like he probably told you, it didn’t go well.”

  “Conrad suggested that Mr. Tyree might have employed some sort of manipulation technique on the judge.”

  “That’s what we think, yeah. Although hearing the lawyers actually hash it out, there wasn’t much of a case to begin with.”

  “Of course, if he was using some sort of suggestive power, that’s the impression you would naturally come away with,” Sinclair pointed out. “After all, you’ve already been subjected to such pressures at Mr. Tyree’s hand before.”

  “I suppose,” I said. I hadn’t considered this angle. Could Shelby still be working his mind fuck on me? Not wanting to delve any further into my alleged psychic susceptibility, I changed the subject. “So, tell me how you got the letter.”

  Sinclair shifted in his seat, seeming to grow taller with pride. “It was quite a little adventure for me, I assure you. I’d never been to Chicago before. Indeed, that trip and then this trip to Florida are the first times I’ve ever left the Northeast in my life.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, the life of a collector these days means more eBay and American Book Exchange than anything else. Sometimes days go by without me ever even leaving my home.”