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- Говард Лавкрафт
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- Тень над Иннсмутом
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- Стр. 1/41
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The shadow over Innsmouth
During
the
winter
of
1927
--
28
officials
of
the
Federal
government
made
a
strange
and
secret
investigation
of
certain
conditions
in
the
ancient
Massachusetts
seaport
of
Innsmouth
.
The
public
first
learned
of
it
in
February
,
when
a
vast
series
of
raids
and
arrests
occurred
,
followed
by
the
deliberate
burning
and
dynamiting
--
under
suitable
precautions
--
of
an
enormous
number
of
crumbling
,
worm-eaten
,
and
supposedly
empty
houses
along
the
abandoned
waterfront
.
Uninquiring
souls
let
this
occurrence
pass
as
one
of
the
major
clashes
in
a
spasmodic
war
on
liquor
.
Keener
news-followers
,
however
,
wondered
at
the
prodigious
number
of
arrests
,
the
abnormally
large
force
of
men
used
in
making
them
,
and
the
secrecy
surrounding
the
disposal
of
the
prisoners
.
No
trials
,
or
even
definite
charges
were
reported
;
nor
were
any
of
the
captives
seen
thereafter
in
the
regular
gaols
of
the
nation
.
There
were
vague
statements
about
disease
and
concentration
camps
,
and
later
about
dispersal
in
various
naval
and
military
prisons
,
but
nothing
positive
ever
developed
.
Innsmouth
itself
was
left
almost
depopulated
,
and
it
is
even
now
only
beginning
to
show
signs
of
a
sluggishly
revived
existence
.
Complaints
from
many
liberal
organizations
were
met
with
long
confidential
discussions
,
and
representatives
were
taken
on
trips
to
certain
camps
and
prisons
.
As
a
result
,
these
societies
became
surprisingly
passive
and
reticent
.
Newspaper
men
were
harder
to
manage
,
but
seemed
largely
to
cooperate
with
the
government
in
the
end
.
Only
one
paper
--
a
tabloid
always
discounted
because
of
its
wild
policy
--
mentioned
the
deep
diving
submarine
that
discharged
torpedoes
downward
in
the
marine
abyss
just
beyond
Devil
Reef
.
That
item
,
gathered
by
chance
in
a
haunt
of
sailors
,
seemed
indeed
rather
far-fetched
;
since
the
low
,
black
reef
lay
a
full
mile
and
a
half
out
from
Innsmouth
Harbour
.
People
around
the
country
and
in
the
nearby
towns
muttered
a
great
deal
among
themselves
,
but
said
very
little
to
the
outer
world
.
They
had
talked
about
dying
and
half-deserted
Innsmouth
for
nearly
a
century
,
and
nothing
new
could
be
wilder
or
more
hideous
than
what
they
had
whispered
and
hinted
at
years
before
.
Many
things
had
taught
them
secretiveness
,
and
there
was
no
need
to
exert
pressure
on
them
.
Besides
,
they
really
knew
little
;
for
wide
salt
marshes
,
desolate
and
unpeopled
,
kept
neighbors
off
from
Innsmouth
on
the
landward
side
.
But
at
last
I
am
going
to
defy
the
ban
on
speech
about
this
thing
.
Results
,
I
am
certain
,
are
so
thorough
that
no
public
harm
save
a
shock
of
repulsion
could
ever
accrue
from
a
hinting
of
what
was
found
by
those
horrified
men
at
Innsmouth
.
Besides
,
what
was
found
might
possibly
have
more
than
one
explanation
.
I
do
not
know
just
how
much
of
the
whole
tale
has
been
told
even
to
me
,
and
I
have
many
reasons
for
not
wishing
to
probe
deeper
.
For
my
contact
with
this
affair
has
been
closer
than
that
of
any
other
layman
,
and
I
have
carried
away
impressions
which
are
yet
to
drive
me
to
drastic
measures
.
It
was
I
who
fled
frantically
out
of
Innsmouth
in
the
early
morning
hours
of
July
16
,
1927
,
and
whose
frightened
appeals
for
government
inquiry
and
action
brought
on
the
whole
reported
episode
.
I
was
willing
enough
to
stay
mute
while
the
affair
was
fresh
and
uncertain
;
but
now
that
it
is
an
old
story
,
with
public
interest
and
curiosity
gone
,
I
have
an
odd
craving
to
whisper
about
those
few
frightful
hours
in
that
ill-rumored
and
evilly-shadowed
seaport
of
death
and
blasphemous
abnormality
.
The
mere
telling
helps
me
to
restore
confidence
in
my
own
faculties
;
to
reassure
myself
that
I
was
not
the
first
to
succumb
to
a
contagious
nightmare
hallucination
.
It
helps
me
,
too
,
in
making
up
my
mind
regarding
a
certain
terrible
step
which
lies
ahead
of
me
.
I
never
heard
of
Innsmouth
till
the
day
before
I
saw
it
for
the
first
and
--
so
far
--
last
time
.
I
was
celebrating
my
coming
of
age
by
a
tour
of
New
England
--
sightseeing
,
antiquarian
,
and
genealogical
--
and
had
planned
to
go
directly
from
ancient
Newburyport
to
Arkham
,
whence
my
mother
's
family
was
derived
.
I
had
no
car
,
but
was
travelling
by
train
,
trolley
and
motor-coach
,
always
seeking
the
cheapest
possible
route
.
In
Newburyport
they
told
me
that
the
steam
train
was
the
thing
to
take
to
Arkham
;
and
it
was
only
at
the
station
ticket-office
,
when
I
demurred
at
the
high
fare
,
that
I
learned
about
Innsmouth
.
The
stout
,
shrewd-faced
agent
,
whose
speech
shewed
him
to
be
no
local
man
,
seemed
sympathetic
toward
my
efforts
at
economy
,
and
made
a
suggestion
that
none
of
my
other
informants
had
offered
.
"
You
could
take
that
old
bus
,
I
suppose
,
"
he
said
with
a
certain
hesitation
,
"
but
it
ai
n't
thought
much
of
hereabouts
.
It
goes
through
Innsmouth
--
you
may
have
heard
about
that
--
and
so
the
people
do
n't
like
it
.
Run
by
an
Innsmouth
fellow
--
Joe
Sargent
--
but
never
gets
any
custom
from
here
,
or
Arkham
either
,
I
guess
.
Wonder
it
keeps
running
at
all
.
I
s
'
pose
it
's
cheap
enough
,
but
I
never
see
mor
'n
two
or
three
people
in
it
--
nobody
but
those
Innsmouth
folk
.
Leaves
the
square
--
front
of
Hammond
's
Drug
Store
--
at
10
a.
m.
and
7
p.
m.
unless
they
've
changed
lately
.
Looks
like
a
terrible
rattletrap
--
I
've
never
been
on
it
.
"
