The Innsmouth Syndrome (3 page)

She took her drink and her laptop to a corner table and returned to the folder of Innsmouth documents, scrolling through it until she found the autopsy reports on the four dead teens. 

Wayne Ramsgate, the driver of the car:  he had been impaled on the steering column.  The vehicle was old, it had no airbags, and none of the occupants had been wearing their seatbelts.

The toxicology screen had found a significant quantity of methamphetamine in his system, and a blood alcohol level that was way above the legal limit for driving.  At night, in the rain, on a winding road, the crash was starting to look like something of an inevitability.

Shaznay Parker, aged 14.  The impact had thrown her through the windshield and into a tree, killing her instantly.  Her bloodstream was flooded with barbiturates, more of which had been found in her boyfriend, Wayne’s, pocket.  The officers on the scene seemed to think that the disposition of her corpse, where it had rebounded onto the hood of the car, indicated that she had not even been awake at the time of the crash.  Her parents had apparently taken this as evidence that Ramsgate had abducted her against her will. 

Carla scrolled on.  Ramone Ramsgate, Wayne’s step-brother, had also been thrown clear of the car, and drowned, unconscious, in the ditch.  Their step-sister, Kara Ellis, was found in the passenger-side footwell with a broken neck. 

Photos of the accident scene and the post-mortem procedures had not scanned well, and it was hard to make out details amongst the general carnage.  There was a separate folder of pictures of the particular features that had led the county medical examiner to report the teenagers to the CDC.

A shadow fell across her.  “No need to ask if you’re from around here.  I can already tell that y’ain’t.”  It was the salesman.  Great.  Carla decided to give him short shrift.

“Nope.  Hence the hotel.”

“Heh, yeah, I guess that figures.”  He gave a short, mirthless laugh.  “Name’s Alby.  Alby Trent.  Salesman b’trade.”

Carla kept her eyes fixed on the laptop screen.  “You married, Alby?”

The salesman seemed genuinely shocked by the question. “Why, no!  Certainly not!  Look here, I’m not that kind o’ guy.  Just makin’ conversation.  See?  No weddin’ ring.”           He waved a pudgy hand in front of her.  “See?”  He wagged his hand around for a few more seconds.  When Carla didn’t acknowledge it, he dropped it back to his side and turned uncertainly to go.  “Fine.  I’ll, ah ... leave ya be then.” 

He sounded so crestfallen, and so pathetic, that Carla found herself relenting.  She closed the laptop.  “Alby!”  He looked over his shoulder, uncertainly.  “So ... what do you sell?”

Alby brightened instantly.  “Protection, Miss.”

“Protection?  Like the Mafia?”

He sauntered hesitantly back towards the table.  “The Mafia?  No, Miss, protection
from
the Mafia!  Or any criminals!  We sell mace, and alarms, and tasers, and stab vests, and money belts, and safes ... all kinda things to keep a person safe.  I like to say that we sell peace o’mind.”

“Right.”

“Folks – well, a lotta folks – are thinking that crime’s gettin’ to be spirallin’ outta control these days.  Want some extra security.  Well, we can help with that.”

“Right.  And is it?” asked Carla, slightly condescendingly.  “Spiralling out of control, I mean.”

“Oh, sure it is!  Everywhere ya look!  Guy I met last month, some punk murdered his kid just to get his music player, if ya can believe that!  Things on the streets is crazy!  Now, if that kid had himself one of our vests on, he’d still be alive.  Think about it.”

“Do many people want to walk around in a bulletproof vest all the time?”

“Well ... not as many as I’d like.”

Carla laughed at that.  Alby smiled, encouraged.  “Sorry Miss, I didn’t get your name?”

“Carla.”

“Pleased ta meetcha, Carla.  Mind if I ask what you’re doing in town?  Not a competitor, I hope!”

“No.  No, I’m in town on ... business.”

“Jus’ what line o’ business would that be?   If ya don’t mind my askin’?”

“Government work.  I work for the federal government.  So, are you selling much mace in Innsmouth?”

“Government work, eh?”  Alby seemed impressed.  “Well, can’t say as I am.  Been going door to door, offerin’ folks to add some security to their houses, but there ain’t no money in Innsmouth.  Least, not’s far as I can tell.  No-one can afford to have alarms and fancy locks.  Don’ have much worth stealin’ anyway.  Don’t s’pose you’d be int’rested in reinforcin’ yer dwellin’ Miss?” he added, hopefully.

“Er, no.  No thanks.  My car maybe, but not my house.”

“Car?  Bin havin’ trouble, huh?”

“No, no.  Well, yes, but it’s not very serious.  Some kids broke into my hire car and tried to steal the GPS earlier tonight, is all.”

Alby seemed positively distraught at the news.  “Well, ain’t that just the pits?  It’s gettin’ to the stage where decent folk can’t go anywhere in safety.  We don’t do cars, Carla, but I’ll tell ya what ... ya can have one o’these here freebies.  Just in case.  Got dozens in the car.”

He pulled a small canister from inside his jacket, and put it on the table in front of her.  Carla picked it up, gingerly.  It was pepper spray.

“Why, thankyou Alby!  I’ll, er ... I’ll keep it in my handbag.”

“You do that!  Ya can’t be too careful.  Not these days.  That sticker has the number of our shop on it.  You just mention my name if you need anythin’ else in the security line.”

“I certainly will.  Thankyou, Alby.  Here, let me buy you a drink.”

“No thanks, Carla.  It’s time I was turnin’ in now anyway.  Never been much of a night-owl.  Mebbe I’ll see ya tomorrow though.  Gonna make some house calls early, hit the road again in the evenin’.”

“Well, maybe we’ll bump into each other.  It’s been nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.  G’night now.”

“Goodnight, Alby.”

The ruddy-faced salesman nodded – almost bowed – and waddled towards the door.  Carla turned the mace over in her hands.  She had a cupboard full of mugs given to her by drug reps back in her hospital days, and most of her pens had someone’s logo and phone number on them, but this was the first time a rep had given her a chemical incapacitant.  Times just kept changing.

*****

Back in her room, Carla brushed her teeth and took to the bed with her laptop, plugging it in to charge so that it wouldn’t die on her in the morning.  Having removed her contact lenses she was forced to resort to spectacles to resume studying the Innsmouth files.

The medical examiner’s scanned photos were arranged in subfolders by body part, and then again by victim.  She started with Lfoot_EllisK.jpg. 

It wasn’t the most attractive appendage she’d ever seen.  The toes were stubby and – she zoomed in for confirmation – yes, slightly webbed.  All but one of the nails were missing, leaving painful-looking welts, and the one that was left was badly ingrown. 

Rfoot_RamsgateW1.jpg looked even worse.  Unless it was some weird trick of perspective, the toes looked to be about half the length they should be and were connected by livid, bloodless membranes.  The skin between and around them was discoloured, cracked and flaky.  Some kind of fungal infection?  She tabbed back to the M.E.’s report.  No microscopic evidence for any infection. 

The other feet pictured were all similarly deformed, though none as badly as Wayne’s.  She opened the ‘hands’ folder.  Same thing.  Most of the fingers were webbed – two of Wayne Ramsgate’s were completely fused together - and the only one with any fingernails was Kara Ellis, who had three. 

‘Arms and Torso’ was exclusive to Wayne Ramsgate, and full of close-ups of deep, savage-looking scratches, blisters and scabs on his skin.  Carla zoomed right in and peered closely at the screen.  They looked self-inflicted, as if he’d been gouging and burning his flesh.  One on his forearm was deep enough to have exposed a vein.

She’d never seen self-harm quite this dramatic in someone so young, but maybe it could be explained away by his meth habit.  Tactile hallucinations, bugs under the skin, compulsive picking ...

‘Hair’ was a little less grotesque, but was filled with pictorial evidence of premature balding.  It looked like Wayne had shaved his head, maybe in an effort to hide it.  He must have grazed his scalp horrendously in the attempt, judging by the lurid sores and peeling skin.  The girls had large patches of hair missing, as if clumps had just dropped out.

The next folder was filled with photos and X-rays of the children’s teeth – or what was left of them.  Bad dentition was a classic result of crystal meth addiction, but for someone as young as Wayne to have lost all but three teeth already was staggering.  His step-siblings were almost as bad, and the X-rays seemed to rule out it being any consequence of the accident.

Carla had been putting off clicking on the ‘Eyes’ folder.  She wasn’t good with eyes, it was the one thing that she was still squeamish about after her eleven years in medicine. 

Shaznay Parker’s face had been pulverised beyond any hope of recognition, but the other three had been photographed with a short ruler placed across their foreheads, to quantify the immediately obvious abnormality in their facial proportions.  In all three pictures, the distance from the bridge of the nose to the corner of the eyes was unusually large, just over an inch in Wayne Ramsgate’s case.  The eyes themselves looked smaller and rounder than normal, and none of the children had lashes or brows.

Carla closed the laptop with an involuntary shudder.  The rest could wait until morning.  She flicked off the bedside lamp and drew the duvet up to her chin.

*****

She awoke the next day to the sonorous, bassoon note of a foghorn, and a headache.  The thin hotel curtains glowed with milky light, and when she drew them back it was to reveal a thick blanket of early morning mist.  She washed and dressed groggily, then headed for the hotel dining room. 

The Exec Lodge definition of a continental breakfast was a barely unfrozen lump of papery, machined pastry, a tiny foil wrap of butter and an individual pot of runny conserve.  Carla chewed tiredly on it, washing it down with gulps of bitter, stewed coffee.  While she was eating, Oliver trotted up to deliver a message.

“Doctor Ed-ed-ed-Edwards?” he began.  “M-m-m-m-message for you.  Doc-doctor Khalil says he’ll m-m-m-meet you here.  At nine.”

Carla thanked him, abandoned the rest of her croissant, checked her watch and went back to her room to put on some make-up.  Dr Khalil was the medical examiner who had reported the cases to CDC in the first place.  Hopefully, a conversation with him would fill in enough gaps for her to arrive at a workable hypothesis, give her somewhere to begin her investigation.  She had just finished applying lip gloss when the phone rang to tell her he had arrived.