Ch.52Ch.5 – The Dead City Dreams and Waits (7)

In the ruined building, there wasn’t much to salvage. Some parts had melted down to the bare framework, and the completely burned staircase was too frightening to climb.

Despite the city hall abandoning this street, they couldn’t ignore the risk of collapse—a notice fluttered in the wind announcing imminent demolition.

Because of this, Crayfield and I had to question Omeli’s subordinates.

Whether they understood our intentions or Sighfried had given them instructions was unclear, but they answered our questions, albeit curtly.

“The first floor was a clothing store, and the second floor was a tailor shop. The third and fourth floors were residential, and everyone in this building cooperated with Omeli.

But if they were targeted just for supporting the mafia, the entire street should have been wiped out.

Arthur Black Market must have had a specific reason for targeting this building. But why? For what purpose?”

We returned to the street. Oblivious birds crossed the sky and disappeared into the distance. Crayfield’s eyes sparkled as he unconsciously watched them.

“Look at that.”

His finger pointed to the adjacent buildings. The side facing the burned building was scorched, but inside, people were busy removing furniture.

The smell of burning, mold, and the distinctive fishy odor of contaminated water stung our nostrils. Through detached windows, we could see workers applying wallpaper.

“That’s it, Assistant. That’s exactly it. The fire was a distraction. What Black Market and his goons really wanted was the adjacent building. They set fire to this one to draw attention away.”

The workers looked at us warily, but they showed no particular reaction since Omeli’s men were watching us everywhere.

After all, if someone else was there to get angry on their behalf, they had no reason to step up.

So Crayfield walked around the building, even whistling as he did so. To anyone watching, he might have looked like someone interested in acquiring the property.

The first building, the burned one on the left, revealed nothing special. The right building was the same. Still, Crayfield acted energetically.

“Hey, Assistant. Let’s not just complain about how shitty this is. If we think carefully about why it’s shitty, we might catch something.

Maybe we won’t find anything in this building either. But so what? It just means fewer places to search.

There’s definitely an answer. It’s just hidden behind clouds, but eventually it’ll stick out its shiny head.

You know what? The answer has no hair to grab onto. Excuse me, let us through!”

This building remained exactly as it was during the incident.

There were no scorch marks, but the smell of burning clung to the walls, invading our noses, and puddles of water splashed on the floor.

We walked carefully, as careless steps would splash filth onto our trouser cuffs.

“Aha.”

On the wall of the corridor leading from the first to the second floor, there was an empty space. Broken frames and wooden boards were scattered on the landing.

The space was about 30cm by 30cm. What was peculiar was the floor of this space.

“Look. The corners are covered in dust, but this square in the middle shows no trace of accumulation. Something was placed here.

Let’s see, it’s smaller than a palm… about 12cm? That seems about right.

Would it be too much of a stretch to say a Cthulhu statuette was kept here, Arthur Black Market knew about it, and used the fire as an excuse to retrieve it?”

This entire street is very old. And when Main Street—now a slum—was in its prime, the middle class gathered to live right here.

The middle-class families who had served on whaling ships, though not from Pollard Island’s prestigious families, became the foundation of the vigilante group “The Whalers.”

“You there. With the black curly hair. Yes, you. Come here.”

Crayfield called to a curly-haired girl who was watching us from the bottom of the stairs. She was holding a long hammer.

“Talk from there, idiot. I have ears that work just fine.”

“I need to investigate the people who were in this building during the fire. I’m warning you now.

If you don’t cooperate properly, I’ll go into that Irish restaurant and tell your boss that ‘your subordinate refused to help.'”

Though she spat out some rather vulgar curses, she went out to the street anyway.

While waiting, we climbed to the top floor and then came back down to the first floor.

Everything seemed normal except for one thing.

“What do you think about the smell? Isn’t the urine smell a bit strong?”

The problem was the smell. Though the burning odor was so strong it wasn’t very noticeable, there was definitely a urine smell coming from the bathroom.

I didn’t want to look inside, and Crayfield didn’t seem eager to either.

A sign reading “Broken Plumbing – Under Repair” creaked weakly in front of the bathroom door.

When we came down to the first floor, the curly-haired woman and an unfamiliar man were standing there.

He looked as young as she did, but a long scar ran from his forehead down to his chin.

“Nobody’s lived here for a while. Two weeks? Since those monster-heads have been wandering around.”

The man wasn’t wearing Omeli’s insignia.

“What happened?”

“Didn’t you see the bathroom? The plumbing’s busted. The smell was terrible.”

“When did the plumbing break?”

“Well, more than ten days ago. Are you some kind of toilet expert or something? Are you here to fix it?”

Snickering, we headed to the basement. The pipe leading to the building was broken.

“So this is why the monster was wandering around every night.

Interesting, isn’t it? If what the restaurant owner said is true, we’re dealing with a very gentle monster.

It retreats when spotted by witnesses, acts scary enough to frighten people but doesn’t cause any real harm.

At this rate, it’s no different from a signalman warning people to flee before a bombing.

Then it broke the plumbing. Strangers loitering here would have been noticed immediately.

But what about an unidentified beast roaming every night?”

Crayfield knocked on the wall a couple of times with the back of his hand.

“I guarantee you. They were absolutely not ‘beasts.’ Perhaps humans wearing beast disguises.

At least werewolves wouldn’t act so stupidly. Even normal wolves don’t wander around like that, let alone…

How do I know? I’ve fought for my life against them in underground tunnels. So I know their habits.

Assistant, this is human work.”

We returned to the car. Fortunately, the tires hadn’t been removed.

There were a couple of rotten tomatoes on the passenger window, but this hardly counted as terrorism.

Crayfield started the car and headed for 22 Gordhag Street.

* * * * *

May 10, 1929. 4:19 PM

22 Gordhag Street

Crayfield’s Office

When we returned to the office, there was a note slipped under the door.

It was a memo from Catherine Scully, explaining that the entire telephone exchange was being tapped, so if we needed to contact her, we should follow a somewhat complicated procedure.

“Put black paper in an X shape on the window and shine a lantern through it. A classic method.

Is the bob-haired lady spying on our office?

I’ve been suspicious of the telephone exchange for a while, and now it’s confirmed.”

Crayfield opened the cabinet and pulled out a large map. It was a detailed map of Pollard Island showing regions and streets.

We hung it on one wall of the office.

“Paid quite a bit for this one. Now, let’s look at the scrapbooks. Quite a lot, aren’t they?

I should hire a blonde secretary. Someone who looks like Marilyn Monroe but with half the strength of the lady downstairs.

Of course, such a woman probably only exists in Germany.”

We pulled out the scrapbooks. Fortunately, Crayfield had created a separate index book.

He had written tags in the corners of the notebook, recording the volume and page numbers of the scrapbooks below.

Crayfield then opened a drawer and took out colored pencils. I asked him what he was planning to do.

“Look. Our opponents are the city vigilantes, specifically the Whalers. They’ve lived on this island for generations and know how to move organizedly and discreetly.

And they’re Arthur Black’s subordinates. The most threatening opponents aren’t the White Hands or red-haired Omeli, but the vigilantes who have acted as the island’s masters for a very long time.

Let’s see what Arthur Black and the vigilantes are doing. They’re openly committing arson and kidnapping.

But we’re outnumbered, aren’t we? So we need to rely on the power of public opinion.”

Crayfield waved Catherine Scully’s note.

“Through this woman. If it’s the Federal Security Bureau, it should be no problem to pressure the Arkham Times, if not the Pollard Times, to publish an exposé.

‘Serial disappearances occur on Pollard Island, which aims to become a tourist destination!’ That would be excellent pressure.

But they won’t stop. They’ve already secured the Cthulhu statuette. They’ve also kidnapped people.

Of course, I don’t know what the ritual procedure is, but the protagonist may have already arrived on this land.

Isn’t it ironic? The protagonist didn’t come to solve the problem; rather, the problem arose because the protagonist came.

Of course, with you and me here, that will never happen.”

Crayfield picked up a red pencil.

“We don’t yet know where on this island kidnappings will be carried out, but we can narrow down the range.

First, it must be an area where the police don’t respond. This excludes the upper and middle-class areas.

The slums are also excluded. You’ve heard that people there stick together, right?

So the remaining areas are those where vigilantes are responsible for security, and where illegal immigrants or outsiders reside. As far as I know…”

Crayfield circled areas with the red pencil. Streets and blocks. About 2/5 of the city was covered.

“Next, let’s look at my excellent newspaper scrap collection and exclude places where disappearances have already occurred.

Of course, newspaper articles won’t cover all disappearances. But conversely, areas that made it into the news would attract attention.

So the likelihood of kidnappings happening again in those areas decreases. Let’s mark kidnappings with yellow circles. Don’t forget to write the dates next to them.”

There weren’t as many as expected. Disappearances in downtown or tourist areas were extensively covered, but those in marginalized areas received little attention even from journalists.

“Next is black. Buzzwick Street, Whale Backbone Alley. Areas personally identified by our excellent cook, Manager Sighfried.

Mostin Avenue is included again. These guys lurking around means either a crime is about to happen or has already happened.

Ah, let’s also color those two streets yellow. There were disappearances there.”

We did so.

“Now, fire incidents. Let’s use blue for these. Oh, and include arson and riots too.”

There was a lot of blue. About 2/3 of the red circles were also colored blue. Still, once we finished organizing, the range had narrowed considerably.

Crayfield took out two sheets of paper and wrote down the names of areas.

“Here. The left one shows areas with only red circles. Fifteen places, quite a lot. If a new disappearance occurs, it will probably be in one of these.

But we can narrow this list down further. We should exclude Red-haired Omeli’s management areas. They’re on high alert.

The problem is we don’t know which areas are Omeli’s… let’s set this aside for now.”

On the second sheet, he wrote down the areas with yellow and black circles.

“And here. The areas where disappearances occurred and where those masked figures appeared. We need the duty roster of the Whalers who were working in these areas.

Yes, it’s possible all the Whalers are kidnappers. But we need to be specific for Catherine Scully to believe me.

This is something we should ask our protagonist to do… honestly, I’m doubtful of his capabilities.

Look. We’ve found several clues, but what is this James fellow doing now?”

The clock still showed 2 o’clock. Crayfield expressed his disgust.

“Until now, they’ve been too competent, but this guy is too incompetent. He seems to know nothing about this game genre.

Somehow, he talks a lot and looks around everywhere but can’t piece anything together.

No, maybe that’s better? It’s better for setting up the game. When James contacts us, I’ll tell him to get this list.

It would be good if he could also get the list of men who were on duty the day his father-in-law disappeared. Or better yet, bring the entire duty roster.

Meanwhile, I’ll meet with Catherine Scully to exchange information. She’s keeping her mouth shut like a clam,

so we need to gently share what we’ve discovered to get her to open up. In the meantime, Assistant, you have a job to do. It’s dangerous, but you won’t die.”

I asked what it was. Crayfield looked at me with an uncomfortable expression.

“You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. You need to meet that crazy left-handed woman with a flower in hand.”

I was quite surprised by this unexpected suggestion.

“Think about it, my friend. Would Omeli’s men tell us which areas are theirs if we asked? For issues like this, it’s better to go to a rival.

Enemies often know certain aspects of a person better than friends, and White Hand is Omeli’s enemy, isn’t she?

White Hand would know the areas Omeli is targeting, Omeli’s occupied territories, and areas where there have been conflicts.

And clearly, ‘Left Hand’ has a lot of interest in you. So let’s use that.”

Is this a gamble worth taking? I’m doubtful. It’s certain that Aurora has feelings for me. But would she separate personal from professional matters?

Moreover, should we rely on the testimony of an unpredictable person with mental issues?

I posed these questions to Crayfield.

“I’ve thought about it too. In fact, on this matter, I trust Giovanni more than Aurora. As I said, Giovanni is very cold-blooded.

You can’t expect human compassion from him. In some ways, he’s worse than a beast. But if he placed Aurora in an important position,

he must have seen that she has the judgment for it. Even though Giovanni is now old and takes cookies to church on Sundays,

he’s not that kind of person to his own children. And.”

Crayfield slammed his fist on the map, right on the city hall area.

“I don’t like this bastard. Arthur Black. It really pisses me off that he’s trying to take over the game when you and I are here. Let’s show him who’s really running this show, Assistant.”