The Thing in the Vault

A darker shade of Noir: Raymond Chandler meets HP Lovecraft in a novella of mystery and terror to delight detective fans and veterans of the Cthulhu Mythos alike.

1927, Chicago: Tough private investigator Ed Jones takes on what looks like a simple assignment to investigate an eccentric German scientist. But Jones knows there's no such thing as easy money...and that there's something his client isn't telling him.

The trail leads Jones to a small town in the New England forest, where he's not the only visitor from Chicago: there are machine-gun toting gangsters, a smooth-talking con artist and an assassin who has a way with a garrotte. And then there's the scientist himself, who is a stranger character than Jones could have imagined. The locals don't seem to like any of them -- but they're more afraid of the mysterious hooded figures deep in the forest.

Jones is forced to team up with his unlikely comrades, on a trail of unsolved murders and in in the face of a gang of criminals who he begins to suspect are not even human...

For those who like their Cthulhu hardboiled, this tale of the roaring Twenties mixes gangland violence with unearthly terror -- and some serious sleuthing as Jones puts together the pieces to figure out what's really going on...

Note: This story is included in the collection Shadows from Norwood.