The Shadow Over Innsmouth | Page 3

was
really the Captain that gave the bad reputation to the reef.
"That was before the big epidemic of 1846, when over half the folks in
Innsmouth was carried off. They never did quite figure out what the
trouble was, but it was probably some foreign kind of disease brought
from China or somewhere by the shipping. It surely was bad enough -
there was riots over it, and all sorts of ghastly doings that I don't
believe ever got outside of town - and it left the place a awful shape.
Never came back - there can't be more'n 300 or 400 people living there
now.
"But the real thing behind the way folks feel is simply race prejudice -
and I don't say I'm blaming those that hold it. I hate those Innsmouth
folks myself, and I wouldn't care to go to their town. I s'pose you know
- though I can see you're a Westerner by your talk - what a lot our New
England ships used to have to do with queer ports in Africa, Asia, the
South Seas, and everywhere else, and what queer kinds of people they
sometimes brought back with 'em. You've probably heard about the
Salem man that came home with a Chinese wife, and maybe you know
there's still a bunch of Fiji Islanders somewhere around Cape Cod.
"Well, there must be something like that back of the Innsmouth people.
The place always was badly cut off from the rest of the country by
marshes and creeks and we can't be sure about the ins and outs of the
matter; but it's pretty clear that old Captain Marsh must have brought
home some odd specimens when he had all three of his ships in
commission back in the twenties and thirties. There certainly is a
strange kind of streak in the Innsmouth folks today - I don't know how
to explain it but it sort of makes you crawl. You'll notice a little in

Sargent if you take his bus. Some of 'em have queer narrow heads with
flat noses and bulgy, starry eyes that never seem to shut, and their skin
ain't quite right. Rough and scabby, and the sides of the necks are all
shriveled or creased up. Get bald, too, very young. The older fellows
look the worst - fact is, I don't believe I've ever seen a very old chap of
that kind. Guess they must die of looking in the glass! Animals hate 'em
- they used to have lots of horse trouble before the autos came in.
"Nobody around here or in Arkham or Ipswich will have anything to do
with 'em, and they act kind of offish themselves when they come to
town or when anyone tries to fish on their grounds. Queer how fish are
always thick off Innsmouth Harbour when there ain't any anywhere else
around - but just try to fish there yourself and see how the folks chase
you off! Those people used to come here on the railroad - walking and
taking the train at Rowley after the branch was dropped - but now they
use that bus.
"Yes, there's a hotel in Innsmouth - called the Gilman House - but I
don't believe it can amount to much. I wouldn't advise you to try it.
Better stay over here and take the ten o'clock bus tomorrow morning;
then you can get an evening bus there for Arkham at eight o'clock.
There was a factory inspector who stopped at the Gilman a couple of
years ago and he had a lot of unpleasant hints about the place. Seems
they get a queer crowd there, for this fellow heard voices in other room
- though most of 'em was empty - that gave him the shivers. It was
foreign talk' he thought, but he said the bad thing about it was the kind
of voice that sometimes spoke. It sounded so unnatural - slopping like,
he said - that he didn't dare undress and go to sleep. Just waited up and
lit out the first thing in the morning. The talk went on most all night.
"This fellow - Casey, his name was - had a lot to say about how the
Innsmouth folk, watched him and seemed kind of on guard. He found
the Marsh refinery a queer place - it's in an old mill on the lower falls
of the Manuxet. What he said tallied up with what I'd heard. Books in
bad shape, and no clear account of any kind of dealings. You know it's
always been a kind of mystery where the Marshes get the gold they
refine. They've never seemed to do much buying in that line, but years

ago they shipped out an enormous lot of