An Enquiry into the Paranormal events of 1981

Dear J.W.K.

Here, I have attached a transcript of my interview of John Doe. I would have given you his actual name, had he told it to me. That was the one piece of information he refused to give up.

I hope the information contained herewith will be of use to you for your research.

Sir, if I were to ask you some questions about your experiences from six months ago, would you be willing to answer them?

Yeah, okay. They said I was free to talk about any of that with whoever I wanted. But they said to give my name as John Doe. Now, I aint threatening you or anything, but if I were you I would do as they said.

So that must mean you're afraid of return visits from them.

Damn right, I'm afraid. You would be too, if you were here. If you saw what happened to Laura and Peter (I'm sorry, J, but I had to withhold these names as well).

Can you start at the very beginning?

I was at the Jones' house. This was maybe eight months ago. January, If my memory don't (sic) fail me. They used to live right next door, back then. They were good kids. Just got married the previous year. They were distant relatives of mine.

Really?

Yep. My wife, Rachel – she died four years ago. Cancer- was second-cousins with Peter's mother. I'd met him once or twice, you know. Weddings, and get-togethers and all that. He was a weird kid. Always into astronauts and airplanes and such...

I suppose that's why he got a job at NASA.

Anyway. I was at their house last year, eating some of Laura's chilli – That girl made amazing chilli, God rest her poor soul. I was chatting with Peter about something. I don't remember. I think it was about his job or something.

How exactly was Peter occupied?

He was, what'd he say? He was in a chief administrative position at NASA.

He wasn't a scientist there?

He got a degree in something like that. Aeronautical engineering or somesuch. But that wasn't what he was doing there. Is all this important?

Very much, Mr. Doe. What about Mrs. Jones? Was she occupied?

She was a veterinarian. God knows a town like this needed a vet. She was pretty busy up here. You see Mr. King, this is the kind of small town where everybody has a dog, and more than half of the folks have cows or goats or something.

Alright.

So, as I was saying, I was at their house, when this strange foreign car rolls up their driveway. It was one of those big, expensive ones. You know. The English ones.

A Rolls-Royce?

That's the one. It was all black.

Did you look at the licence plate?

As a matter of fact, I did. They were foreign. I don't know which country, exactly. But they were foreign.

And then?

And then the strangest man pops out of that car. He was wearing a three piece suit. Right in the middle of the summer. He even had one of those pocket watch things dangling from his pocket. And a huge tophat.

He climbed up the driveway, and me and Peter, we stand up. Laura was inside at the time.

When he reached the porch he kind of smiled a bit and bowed for both of us. It would have been kind of funny, if it hadn't been for his smile.

That man smiled like as if he had to learn how to do it by practicing in front of the mirror. He smiled all right, I suppose, but there was something strange underneath all that. Like as if he was just empty. Like there was nothing under that three piece suit of his. Just thin air.

Did you notice any strange odours or noises?

He smelled like rotten eggs. He perfumed himself up and all that, but underneath everything, you could smell it. Rotten eggs.

Go on.

So as I was saying, he smiled, and bowed and stood straight. He was a tall, tall man. Maybe even six foot, five. He was as thin as a stick. His face looked young enough, maybe thirty-five or forty. But his eyes were terribly old. Maybe older than my eyes. I hope you understand what I mean. He introduced himself as Fisk. Jacob Fisk.

Is that his real name?

No, I don't think so. But that's what he told us then.

His voice was a bit breathless and wheezy, like as if he was asthmatic.

Did he have a local accent?

He sounded American enough. A bit ivy league, maybe.

Anyway, me and Peter, we introduces ourselves and we shook hands. His hands seemed regular enough. They were warm. So warm your hand almost starts to burn. But he wasn't sweaty.

He told us he was headed to the parsonage, that he was an old friend of the Reverend.

We showed him the way, and he thanked us kindly enough.

Then he asked for a glass of water. He said he had to take some pills. Peter called for Laura who came out to meet our new guest. I realized that neither of these kids were feeling what I was feeling

What were you feeling?

Fear. I felt like a little kid again, scared of monsters in the closet.

Laura brought him some water and he drank half of it in one gulp. Then he pulled out a little, gold box from his inner pocket and pulls out one, silvery looking pill. He swallowed it.

Then he said, sorry to impose and all, but would we mind giving his cat some water.

Laura said she would be happy to. The man walked back to his car and came back with a cat, a black one, with a white patch over its left eye.

Laura filled a basin with water and put it out in the yard. The man put the cat down and it practically bathed itself in the water.

Mr. Fisk laughed. He said something about a long drive. But I was too busy watching the cat. Once it stopped drinking, it went round Laura's legs, purring and licking.

Laura loved the thing, almost immediately. You couldn't blame her. She always loved cats.

Anything strange about the cat's eyes?

I don't remember.

Anyway, the man looked at his pocket watch and said he had to leave. Then he asked whether we would mind keeping the cat for a few hours, until he came back from the Reverend's.

Laura agreed immediately. I felt like saying something, but I didn't. I didn't think it was my place to object. I'll have hell to pay for that, I suppose.

The man left, and he never came back.

You didn't watch for his car?

Course I did. It didn't come back. And I know what you're thinking. That's right. This road is the only road in and out of here. It's just woods after this. This is a dead end.

So where did Jacob Fisk go?

I pray to the Lord every night that I never have to find out.

The next week, we went to church. We found out 'bout the Reverend. Lord rest his soul.

I told the kids then. I told them that it was probably the man in the foreign car. They laughed at me then. Can't blame them. I would've laughed at me if I were their age.

How exactly did Reverend Hodgson die?

He died of a heart attack. Four days after that man came by our house.

So what happened to his cat?

Laura kept it. I didn't think there was anything strange about that cat at first. Peter and Laura used to go on these long road trips, so I even sat it once or twice. It was a bit too quiet, for a cat. But other than that, I didn't think there was a thing wrong with it.

It was maybe about a month after that that the cows started to die.

It started slow. One of Nellie Mears' cows. The called Laura straight over there when they found out. Peter was out so I drove her there. I remember Laura and I were talking about it while we drove there. She asked me whether I should start chaining my dog up.

The cow was lying side flat on the dirt. It was drained of blood. There wasn't any blood anywhere around. There weren't even any puncture marks. Laura didn't know what to make of it.

Then the numbers kept going up. All of Nellie Mears' cows were dead in a week. The cops got involved. Laura called in some experts from the university and they dragged off most of the corpses. We still haven't really heard from them.

That's when that cat started acting up. It wouldn't eat. Slept all day. Barely moved, barely even looked alive. Laura tried everything she could, but that cat was almost a vegetable.

Then one night I woke up for a glass of water. I heard a strange noise on my window. A kind of regular tapping sound. And then I suddenly feel afraid. Really afraid. And I can't explain why. But then I can't stop walking. I go up to the curtain and pull them open.

It was Jacob Fisk's cat. It had the same, white circle around the eye. Except now, the whole eye was white. Like there was no eyeball. And blood was dripping from the cat's mouth. It saw me, and licked the window and looked at me through the blood. I realized then that I felt more sick than scared. I felt like I wanted to throw up. But I couldn't leave. I just had to stand there, watching it.

Then it left and I wasn't afraid anymore.

How do you know you hadn't hallucinated the whole thing?

The blood was real, for one thing. I had to wipe it off my window the next morning.

You didn't show it to the police?

Of course not. I didn't know what blood that was. And I sure as hell couldn't tell them a cat licked it all over my window.

So you must have told the Jones' then.

Strange things were happening to those two. Laura stopped coming to town. She'd only look at animals if they were brought to the house. Peter left early and came back late.

Talk around the town is he was having an affair.

If only

I was busy at the time. Some old commitments and things got in the way. The cat didn't slip my mind, of course. Things like that never can. But I didn't visit them. I still regret that, friend. To this day, I still regret that.

That's when I started noticing the stars. There were lights in the sky. Shooting stars, but they were never mentioned in the radio. Sometimes I saw the buildings catch on fire. You know, the grocery store, the post office, places like that.

I went down to the local quack. He told me I was getting old. I suppose anyone would, so I can't blame the kid.

I stayed in most of the time. Kept to myself. Got some reading done. I'd see the cat sometimes, sitting outside the gates, pawing at the bars. I got that same sense of fear then.

But then I felt something else. I couldn't describe it. I felt like the cat was boxing me in. Like it didn't want me to leave.

Then, maybe a couple weeks later, the news broke. The Joneses were gone. All of us poked around the house. The sheriff wasn't the paranoid type. He let us into the house while they were doing the investigation.

Peter's coffee was half finished on the table. The shower was still running. The T.V was on. The car was still in the driveway.

Then there was some strange stuff. Some paintings were upside down. A cabinet was turned with the drawers to the wall.

And the cat?

The cat lived on my porch. I was too scared to touch it, heck I was even scared to look at it. It did the window thing again a couple of nights after that.

And then it left, I suppose. A lot of the cows were dead, most of the townsfolk were all scared and my best friends were vaporized or something like that.

After that, Mr. Doe didn't say much, despite my prodding. He mentioned something about vampires, and then shut up. I tried my best, but he told me he was charged not to say any more by NASA and the United States Air Force. 

I think this, in addition to the case in Norway and the one in Bengal, gives enough concrete evidence to prove our point. I visited the farmhouse. The hay was definitely tainted with our substance. The hallucinations of fire and cosmic activity only confirms it further.  

I shall be in this town for another couple of days, so call me if you want me to investigate further.

Yours

King