“Easy as falling off a log” they say. Well, why didn’t the log make it easier to stay on? Come on log, you can help, you know.

These are the recordings of Doctor Cornelius Plink.


The bitter cold has had made for an unexpected breakdown in communications in Arkham. I don’t mean telegraph and telephone lines, although some of them have indeed broken down under the weight of all the snow. Mail delivery is likewise slowed.

But what I’m really referring too is the most ancient form of communication – making noises with our mouths. Good old chatting. Flapping gums. Passing the time of day.

Because of the cold, everyone has truncated their speech patterns. At first, this only occurred when one was out in the streets and you happened to pass a familiar face. Before the cold, you might have spent a pleasant five minutes getting caught up on how someone’s children were doing, or how their business was trundling along. 

But as the cold dropped to new painful lows, chit-chatters started lopping off unnecessary adjectives and adverbs and definitive articles and the like. Now, when you ask about a neighbour’s little one, you’re told, “school good. Lost teeth. Likes tuba. Eat Brussels Sprouts? No.” 

And then off they go. So now, not only are we all freezing to death, but we also are losing touch with our friends and neighbours. 

Except Harriet Blanchard. My god, that woman can talk.

Town Council has also taken to this truncated form of communication. They put out a special bulletin over the radio that went as follows:

“Parade. Patricide. NEIGHBOURS! Crawling. Misaligned stars. Crawling. Ignore telescopes. CRAWLING! Fire only solution. Salt your sidewalk.”

I was already salting my sidewalks. But as for the rest, your guess is as good as mine.


So, B’gnu-Thun. I had stood off against the giant creature of coldness, standing there in knee-deep snow with a Tommy-gun while the ground shook about me with his every footfall. I was resigned – I had very little hope of surviving this encounter. But I hoped that I would buy Miss Weetamoo enough time to get back to my car and back to the city. There, she would get the scrolls we had stolen from the Riverboat Boys to our reluctant visitor from the Middle East, Nasir Taleb. In the best of all worlds, Mister Taleb would translate the scrolls with all due haste, and Miss Weetamoo would have the key to sending B’gnu-Thun back to whence he came.

The air was more snow than air, the flakes whipped hard enough by the icy wind to sting as they struck exposed flesh. My eyes watered. Somewhere between one blink and the next, there was a shadow rearing over me, its torso lost up in the storm.

At my best guess, B’gnu-Thun, and this being above me could be no other, was perhaps three times my height. Cold emanated from him in waves, each wave hurting my bones more than the last.

I was frozen. In fear. And nearly by the cold. I was about to die. Crushed by the giant fists of an awful being from another realm, a place that no human should ever know about. Not if he wanted to keep his sanity.

And then... B’gnu-Thun moved on. He carried onward, heading off after Miss Weetamoo. I’m not sure he had noticed me at all.

That simply would not do. I spun and opened fire at the towering back of that nasty old entity. I surely must have hit him. There was simply too much of him to miss.

But he moved on, ignoring me completely. The Riverboat Boys on the other hand gave me their complete attention. They opened fire from half a dozen directions at once.

At least they were as blinded by the blizzard as I was. I dove face-first into the snow and started crawling for all I was worth. Have you ever heard bullets pass close by? It was a sound I remembered from the war. It sounds like God ripping apart a gigantic piece of velvet. A very interesting sound to be sure, but not one I’d encourage you to experience in close proximity.

Things were a bit of a mess at that point. Bullets everywhere, gangsters on all sides, the giant I was trying to stall not being stalled at all. 

Right. So. One thing at a time, yes? 

The first thing I had to do was to get myself into a spot where the gangsters couldn’t find me. Unfortunately, my rudderless crawling fetched me up against the side of the resort’s main building. The good news was that I now knew where I was. The bad news was that I had headed back towards the Riverboat Boys instead of away from them. The big question was, did they know it?

I could hear shouting over the wind. It seemed to be coming from the area where I had confronted B’gnu-Thun. And by “confronted,” I mean the area where I was totally ignored by that gigantic goon.

It was then that I thought to myself, “Hey Doc, these bootleggers didn’t walk themselves all the way out here. They must have cars hidden away somewhere. Wouldn’t it be the bee’s knees to get yourself a fine ride and scoot on out of here like quicksilver down a slide? It surely would. Shall we do that then? Shall we steal a gangster-mobile? Let’s shall.”

With that firmly settled, I scampered along the side of the building, away from the shouting. I passed the kitchen and the dining room. I saw shadows flitting about inside, and ducked down to remain out of sight. Shouting was one thing, but if one of those criminals spotted yours truly and opened fire, the sound of a gun would surely bring the rest of the hurtling along like ants to a picnic blanket.

I came to a wide open space. I assumed there was a parking lot for the resort buried under all the snow. Unfortunately, there were no cars to go along with the parking lot. I was very cold and very scared and really quite willing to abandon any plans at the first sign of defeat. And that’s what I did then. I dropped the idea of stealing a car right there on the spot. You can’t blame me though. You trying stealing an automobile when there are no automobiles to steal.

But fate intervened and made my plan to drop my plan quite untenable. So I dropped my plan to drop my plan. You see, I had spotted car tracks in the snow, crossing the wide open lot from left to right. They were very faint and nearly filled in with the latest serving of snow, but they were there all the same. There was more than one set of tracks, and they all led to a large-ish barn-like structure at the very far end of the lot. I suppose it was some kind of equipment shed, perhaps for equipment used to tend the golf course that lay beyond. 

Off I went, sprinting as best one can when snow is deep enough to threaten your nethers. I shot straight across the lot. One supposes that I should have used some stealth. But I was really very worried about whether or not Miss Weetamoo had gotten away from that twenty-foot tall rotter with the blue skin and unfortunate choice in companions. Also, I was desperately cold. My entire body ached with it. If I suffered any more exposure I was surely going to lose digits to frostbite. I needed those digits to make a living. Plus, I find it’s just pleasant having a full set of fingers and toes. Don’t you?

The building had barn-like doors across its front, including a smaller man-sized door built into the larger sliding doors. In I went. And found myself face to face with two thugs.

They looked at me. I looked at them. They dove for guns. I already had mine. I let rip. And suddenly I was no longer looking at two thugs.

I exchanged my Tommygun for theirs. There were three cars lined up side by side, all Model-Ts. I hand-cranked one into life, and slid open one of the barn doors. I fully expected there to be a whole squad of bootleggers waiting for me on the other side, but as the door slid open, all I found was horizontal curtains of falling snow.

I opened the engine compartments of the other two cars and quickly removed bits and bobs that looked important. I heaved them out into the snow around the side of the building. Then I hopped aboard my commandeered jalopy and goosed her for all she was worth.

I nearly flew right through the windshield as the front of the car met the snow outside. It was tough going, and the car’s engine began to complain as I cranked up the throttle. We were making it through the snow, that car and I, but it was taking everything she had.

And then there were bullets. They pinged off the side of the car. Unfortunately, it happened to be the same side of the car that I was sitting on. I looked to my left and could see muzzle flares through the snow. 

But then I entered a pathway under the arch of trees. In the summers, I imagined this driveway to the parking lot would be really quite pleasant, what with the large graceful trees arching their branches overhead to form a sunlight-dappled tunnel of green. Now, the branches overhead were bare of leaves but thick with snow, and as that snow up there had thickened, it had insulated the lane. The snow up there had stopped the snow down here, at least enough so that the automobile didn’t have to fight its way forward anymore. She suddenly shot forward, the little beauty, and I was roaring my way forward, away from the resort, and down the highway.

I made it back to the spot where Miss Weetamoo and I had hid my own automobile. It was gone. The tree limbs we had used to hide my car were scattered about it the midst of a frenzy of footsteps that were already being filled in by the snowfall. She had made it this far, at least. I continued on in the direction of Arkham.

Trees had been knocked down, partially blocking the highway. The cause was clear – B’gnu-Thun had given chase. I saw no smoking car wreck, so I assumed, or at the very least hoped, that Miss Weetamoo had made it back to town. 

My hopes were confirmed. Miss Weetamoo did indeed make it back into Arkham. So, too, did B’gnu-Thun. I could tell by the screaming. 


Well, shall I ask about you, Dear Listeners? Shall I wonder about how your summer is rolling along? Do I need to ask if you were fighting a winter demon in July? Is it permissible for me to inquire as to how you might have sent such a malevolent entity back to whence it came? Never mind all that. Instead, allow me to wish you the very best Dominion Day in Canada or Independence Day for all my American friends. And a wonderful summer to everyone else. If you could send best wishes in the direction of Arkham, they would certainly be appreciated.


For once, I found myself on the same side as the Town Council. They  came out of Town Hall, the real one, the one that gives you a headache when you look at it too long, drew arcane symbols in the snow, and chanted up at B’gnu-Thun as he lumbered past, stepping on cars, searching for Miss Weetamoo (or so I assume).

As it turns out, the town councillors have wonderful chanting voices. However, our visitor was not impressed, and bellowed when a giant spurt of fire that smelled of sulphur shot him in his icy blue backside. 

He spun about, as best as such a giant creature can spin, and yelled out words that made me feel sick to my stomach. A ferocious gust of wind burst across the street, tumbling the town councillors about like dandelion fluff. It took them quite some time to unwrap themselves from their robes.

The police stepped in, firing shotguns and Tommyguns and pistols. They were no more effective than the councillors had been. At least the strong smell of sulphur was replaced with the smell of gunpowder, which I suppose was a slight improvement. 

Then there were the Riverboat Boys. The gangsters had followed their pet entity into town, only to find out that it had broken free of its proverbial leash. They didn’t stand to make much profit running illicit liquor into a town if that town was smashed to bits. They ran about the feet of Big B’gnu, waving their arms and shouting up at the being. I got the sense that B’gnu had enough of their commands, because he took special efforts to step on as many of them as he could.

As for myself, I was unable to drive any further, thanks to the chaos in the streets. I ran for Hooty’s boarding house. 

I burst inside, waving off Hooty’s landlady. Honestly, I don’t think the dear old soul had her priorities in the correct order. I ran into Hooty’s apartment and found that the scroll had been delivered. Mister Taleb was reading out loud from their arcane scribblings, calling out syllables that made me feel as nauseous as the words of B’gnu-Thun himself. 

Hooty also looked upset by the words pouring forth from Mister Taleb. She was curled in a chair, a hand over her mouth, her eyes watering. I looked around to see how Miss Weetamoo was fairing... only to discover that she was not there.

Hooty told me that she had gone out with a kitchen knife to slow down the giant, to give Mister Taleb time to finish his horrible incantations. I ran out, losing whatever Hooty shouted out after me to the wind.

At least I knew which direction to run. I could see the shadow of B’gnu-Thun through the snow. He was closer. And he was coming this way. Perhaps he had a link to the scroll, or could feel the effect of Mister Taleb’s incantations. Either way, he was coming for Miss Hooty’s home in a straight line, without deviation.

I had the two Tommyguns I had taken from the gangsters, and I had brought them with me, hiding them under my coat. I pulled them out as I ran. They of course would make little difference. But what else could I do?

I rounded a corner, perhaps three blocks from Hooty’s home, and was at the side of the entity. Like back at the resort, I found the cold this close to B’gnu to be so intense that it fogged my mind.

But then, there was Miss Weetamoo, dodging in and out between the giant’s feet, slashing at him with Hooty’s long triangular kitchen knife. She was laughing, making noises of absolute glee. And perhaps the greatest wonder of all, she was cutting the behemoth. He bled. The blood, so dark that it was almost black, oozed out of the dozens of slash wounds slow as winter molasses. He bellowed with each slash.

He reached down, finally deciding to rid himself of the pest stinging his bare feet. I opened up with one of the Tommyguns, aiming for his eyes. This bothered him enough to turn his attention to me.

He reached a giant hand in my direction. I turned to flee between two low apartment buildings, but my feet slipped out from under me and down I went. But before the hand, big as a car, could reach me, Miss Weetamoo leapt onto B’gnu’s wrist and drove in the knife, twisting it amongst his veins.

Again, B’gnu-Thun bellowed, a furious fog-horn of a sound that made my bones rattle. He shook his arm, flinging Miss Weetamoo off. She sailed out of sight, over the top of a house across the street.

B’gnu-Thun turned his attention back to me. Reached for me. Then stopped. A puzzled frown creased his oversized facial features.

At first, I couldn’t tell what was vexing him. But then I saw – a tiny brown speck diving into his ear. And another. A dozen. Fifty. A hundred.

The rodents. The mice and rats of the town had joined the battle. I felt something climb onto my shoulder and looked over to find the guinea pig perched there, his oversized brain pulsing, his front paws at the sides of his little furry face, as he commanded his troops onward.

Poor little fellows. I was cold. This weather must have been pure frozen hell for them. But they fought on, diving into his nostrils, his ears, his eyes, possibly other orifices. 

B’gnu-Thun went crazy, thrashing about, slapping at himself. He stepped on a house, crushing it, revealing Mrs. Thoroughgood cringing back in her parlour. I waved hello to her. Best I could do under the circumstances. 

Then there was an almighty crack. A... something appeared in the air behind the being. The best I can describe it is a giant slit of absolute nothingness. The line in the sky, as tall as the giant, was pure black. No stars, no light... nothing seemed to exist on the other side of that opening. Mister Taleb had clearly succeeded in translating the scrolls, and this crack of nothingness was the result.

A great wind hurtled down the street. Rodents by the hundreds dropped down from Big B’gnu. Many of them scrambled into my clothing for warmth. I did not resist, despite the tickling. It was the least I could do. The rest piled into the nearby houses and apartments. I could tell because of the screams coming from inside.

As for B’gnu-Thun, the wind drove him back . His feet plowed up snow, then cars and trees, as he was dragged backward. He held onto houses with his great hands, only to tear off the roofs as the void behind him pulled him further along.

I scrambled up, determined to get myself and my furry passengers out of the line of wind, but I was too slow and I too started to be dragged towards the void.

But a hand shot out from between two houses and grabbed my own. It was Miss Weetmoo, her long black hair free and flying in the wind. She dragged me into the shelter between the houses and held onto me as we watched B’gnu-Thun’s last moments on Earth.

The void swallowed him, feet first, then legs, his waist, his chest. His hands held onto the sides of the rift and we heard the mighty bones inside them snap.

Then he was gone.

The void sealed with the sound of a gentle breeze.

All fell silent.

Until Miss Weetamoo discovered that I was carrying a couple dozen mice and rats and one guinea pig as passengers. Her scream was enough to shatter glass. Or ice, as the case may be.


Hello again. It’s, oh... two weeks since I made the last recording. I’ve just now seen that there is a tiny bit of space left on this phonographic roll. Just enough space for me to inform you that I saw a Robin redbreast this morning. It was a beautiful sight.


Overnight For Observation was created by Daniel Fox. Daniel is the author of the light-hearted fantasy novel “The Wizard, the Farmer, and the Very Petty Princess.”