Believe in yourself! I’m not going to do it for you. 

These are the recordings of Doctor Cornelius Plink.

I do enjoy a good sunrise. Those first brilliant rays of a new day signify never-ending branches of potential. Will this be the day we take up a new hobby? Or finally speak to a crush? Will we seize an opportunity to become a better man or woman? Will we finally be able to identify that shadowy shape that rises up to try and consume the sun while it’s still young?


I did it! I finally did it! I finally managed to get myself into a town council meeting at Town Hall. The real Town Hall, I mean. The Town Hall that secretes that yellow-brown ichor that smells of spoiled coffee, not the fake Town Hall they put in snow globes for the tourists.

Granted, it wasn’t much of a meeting. It was just a hearing about whether or not Arkham needs to create designated parking spaces for automobiles, since those contraptions don’t seem to be going away any time soon. 

I bet you’re all curious about the interior of the real Town Hall. I certainly was. The main meeting area was a surprisingly large room, with multiple pews for visitors. The Councillors sat behind a large curved desk made of bones.

I can’t describe any of the actual Councillors. I remember they had robes with heavy hoods on... Isn’t that the funniest thing? I watched them for more than an hour, you’d think I’d be able to remember something...

At any rate, the actual minutes of the meeting weren’t of any particular interest. There were maps and sketches of the proposed parking spots along the streets of our shopping districts. I think the most interesting part was that the lead Councillors gavel made a sort of shrieking noise every time he banged it down on the desk.

I’m presuming it was a he. Can you imagine? Women councillors?

It’s strange... now that I think about it, I’m sure I became quite bored of the whole affair. Did I... did I go exploring? I think I did. I think I became curious about other rooms in Town Hall, especially the ones with the guttural chanting...

Am I remembering this? Or imagining it? Did I really stumble across a room with a seat with straps and a man with a watch that he swung back and forth in front of ones eyes to make one forget... forget... forget...

At any rate, the parking spaces were approved. Automobile owners will be happy, so that’s nice.


Work has never been busier. Attendance, mainly by my male patients, continues to rise. I have no choice but to credit Miss Hooty Commonprance with this upturn in trade.

She is a quick learner, is Miss Commonprance. Considering she had no medical knowledge at all before coming to work for me, she has picked up the basics of nursing in no time flat. I think my patients have recognized her dedication both to her new profession, and to their health. Or maybe they have recognized that Miss Commonprance chooses to wear astonishingly short skirts to the office.

No, no... I believe I have a good reputation for delivering solid healthcare to the people of Arkham. Miss Commonprance, despite her... flamboyance, has added to that reputation. She always has the proper instruments I require for a particular patient at the ready, she remembers every patient’s name and greets them like an old friend... and she gives the most soothing neck-rubs at the end of the day.


You may be concerned, or at least curious, about the gangster fellow that returned to me a couple of weeks back. The marks on his torso had developed into what I would describe as “gelatinous sacks”. And within those sacks there appeared to be something residing. Like unhatched eggs.

Naturally, as a man of science, I’m deathly curious myself. Were they really egg sacks? If so, what laid them? And what is on its way to being born?

Unfortunately, the gangster in question has not returned. It has been some days now. Some of his last words to me continue to resonate, that he had completed feeding and was now ready to sleep, perhaps, one surmises, in preparation for giving birth.

If one were to find his place of slumber, one might be in a good position to observe the next stage in the birth cycle. To see something wondrous. Something new to the world. Or, something very old.

So the question is – where does the gangster rest?
 

Multiple parents have brought their children to me for hearing tests. It seems the very young, five years or less, are hearing a sound that is only perceived by tiny ears. Not even dogs are picking up whatever it is the little Misters and Misses are hearing.

The mystery sound, if that is indeed what it is, does not seem to hurt the children any. In fact, quite the opposite. They seem attracted to it, grasping at the invisible notes with their pudgy little hands. More than one parent has told me that their child uttered their first laugh thanks to this audio enigma.

The truly alarming part of all this is that the toddlers that are old enough to, well, toddle, universally do so right in the direction of the kitchen. Apparently there is nothing that stops a parent’s heart quicker than entering a room to find their three-year old joyfully gurgling while testing a carving knife’s sharpness against a chair leg.

Ah children, they’ll get into anything, won’t they? The little rascals.


The warm months are finally upon us! How are you enjoying this season of renewed life, dear listeners? Are you perhaps planting flowers in your garden? Are you out, adding new birds to your bird-watching diary? Are you using the warm weather to hunt for an impregnated violent bootlegger, hoping to find him before he gives birth to God knows what? Let me know how you’re all doing!


I’ve been out hunting for that impregnated bootlegger again. I know it’s not very wise of me. Poking about, looking for violent criminals, is not a particularly healthy habit on the best of days. To go searching for one that might possibly be carrying the spawn of... well, I don’t know what... Let’s just say it doesn’t make for a relaxing evening.

The tension was ratcheted up when who do I run into, out and about in the middle of the night, but none other than my housekeeper, Miss Weetamoo! Alone! She didn’t even have one of her brothers as an escort.

A woman alone, in the middle of the night. A native woman, at that. Arkham has its unfair share of the racist type.

We came across each other in the vicinity of the park at Armitage and Federal, I’m sure you know the one I’m talking about. She explained that she was suffering from a headache and just needed some air to clear her head. She refused to give an explanation as to why her ailing noggin had carried her so far from her people’s reserve.

What was even stranger was that she insisted on walking me home! As if it shouldn’t be the other way around. As you can imagine, it was my manly imperative to insist that I walk her home. There was a great deal of insisting going back and forth, with neither of us giving an inch.

She absolutely refused to let me walk her to safety, and turned and stormed off. I was angry enough at this point to let her have her way. But yes, I did recover enough to remember my place in things and went after her. But she had vanished.

I am recording this particular entry immediately after fruitlessly searching for Miss Weetamoo for the rest of the night. I am both exhausted and worried. If she went and got herself hurt, I’ll strangle her. God preserve us from headstrong women.


It is later. Miss Weetamoo has shown up at her usual time to clean the house. She refuses to talk about the previous night. In fact, the only time my employee deigned to look at me was when I mentioned how worried she had made me on her behalf.

What’s worse... she seems... perky. Full of energy. It’s the insult after the injury, as I am exhausted and still have a full day’s work ahead of me.

This woman seems designed to test me in every way possible.


Miss Commonprance took pity on me at the office. She saw how exhausted I was and told me to take nap in my office. She insisted that she could handle the first appointments on her own, and that she would make sure the gentlemen wouldn’t even know I was gone.

She even went so far as to push me into my chair, swing my feet up onto my desk, and undo my tie. I still would have resisted, but, uh... well, she rubbed my temples with her fingertips and I think I fell almost instantly asleep.

I suspect witchcraft. 


I should just make something clear about my previous entry. I do not actually suspect Miss Commonprance of witchcraft. I was merely using the old saying. One can’t be too careful with loose words in Arkham.


Speaking of loose words, the word “leucocholy” [leu-co-choly) burst free from its holding pen last Wednesday. It caused quite the distraction about town until it was finally tracked down and recaptured.


Town Council put out a notice in yesterday’s Arkham Advertiser that we were not to worry if we could not spot the third star in Orion’s belt this coming evening. They are just borrowing it for the night and promise to have it back before the next sunset.


If you hear a scratching outside of your window tonight, up outside your second floor bedroom, do not, I repeat, do not go to investigate. Don’t do it. Don’t you twitch aside those curtains. You won’t like what you see. Worse still, it won’t like seeing you. Best to just let scratching things scratch.


I came home to find that someone had slipped a smaller mail slot through my mail slot. And through this smaller mail slot someone had slipped a rather fancy invitation. Written in an attractive cursive that does not include crossed letter Ts, the invitation was to a masquerade charity ball. All those invited are requested to dress as the person they hate most in Arkham. Three hundred and thirteen guests are expected to come to the ball. Three hundred and twelve are expected to be able to leave.

Oh! They’re going to have candy-apples!


I got to thinking about that Town Council meeting, and about Arkham’s hierarchy as a whole. I’ve been here some years now, but for the life of me, I can’t recall ever voting for a mayor. Now that I think about it, I can’t remember the current Mayor’s name, or what he looks like, or...

Candy apples!


Have I ever mentioned the widow, Mrs Adelia Saltinspice? She is quite elderly, and quite set in her ways. And her ways do not include practitioners of the medical arts. The only reason she comes for check-ups at my office is because her daughter practically drags her in, kicking and screaming. Even Miss Commonprance can’t charm her. In fact, the widow Mrs Saltinspice refers to Miss Commonprance as a “Man-sneaker wagging her Cupid’s kettledrums all about the place.”

The widow refers to me as a “quack”, and insists that all of us in the medical profession are of a similar nature. When I ask what she used to do back in the day when they faced an ailment or illness, Widow Saltinspice replied, “We screamed at it. Met it head on. We let illness know we weren’t having any of it, good and proper.”

Widow Saltinpsice’s daughter informs me that all of Widow Saltinspice’s siblings died before they reached their teen years.


Ever since I arrived in Arkham, I have heard of a special celebration of the spring equinox. I’ve never been able to find it, or find anyone who has seen it. The rumours insist that the event is held in a darkened space underground somewhere and that slow polka music is played on a slightly out-of-tune accordion.

It all sounds quite depressing, if you ask me. I’ve never heard of a town being quite so bummed out by the coming of spring as Arkham. Especially since this is the place that hands out police notices on papers decorated with stars drawn in crayon.

What a bag of mixed messages.


I’ve just received news that the targeting of Spring has carried over to our schools. William Purchaseshoe, the Grade 3 teacher,  has been arrested for taping up decorations in the shape of a smiling sun and budding petunias around his classroom.

The charge, apparently, was “disrupting a perfectly good case of the morbs”, also known as By-law 12.A, which has been on the books since at least the 1870s.

On the bright side, Teacher Purchaseshoe received one of those colourful police notices, so that’s nice.


Yesterday, I came across crowds of people flocking to the edge of the Miskatonic River. Negotiating my way through, I came upon a horrific sight. Bodies, bloody, beaten, and bitten. Not human bodies though, no, these were the bodies of toads and rodents.

Tiny spears and swords littered the miniature battle field. A Town Hall spokesman was busy telling everyone that some prankster must have placed the tiny weapons there after killing all of these small creatures.

But I know better. I’ve seen the god that the toads worship. I’ve seen the determination in the library guinea pig’s eyes. Yes, this truly was the site of an epic, albeit teeny-tiny, first battle in what I fear may turn into a full-scale war.

I know I should be horrified. And saddened by the loss of life. But really, I just can’t get over how adorable some of those mice looked in their tiny little helmets.

Until next time... 


Overnight For Observation was created by Daniel Fox. Daniel is the author of the horror short story “Lacey Lane Makes Plans For Her Future.”