Ghouls of the Miskatonic (The Dark Waters Trilogy) by Graham McNeill Page A

that something was just…off. I know that probably sounds stupid.”
    “Don’t sound stupid at all,” said Rita. “I feel it, too. I felt it as soon as I stepped off the train from Boston. It’s like this place is sick and nobody knows it. Or they know it, but they don’t want to admit it. If Mama Josette was here, she’d say this town has got itself some bad mojo.”
    “Who’s Mama Josette?”
    “A mambo from New Orleans,” said Rita. Seeing Amanda’s confusion, she added, “It’s like a voodoo queen, but a good one. The mambo only use good magic; it’s the bokor who turn it to evil.”
    “Magic?”
    “Yeah, I know what you’re going to say, but back in Louisiana it’s as real as you and me. This whole town’s got bad mojo right down to its bones. It’s sick to its heart.”
    “So why do you stay here?”
    Rita snorted with grim amusement. “Where the hell else I got to go? I either make it here or I go back to being dirt poor on the banks of the Mississippi. Anyways, don’t be giving me no hard time about this. You just told me you know this place is bad, too. Those dreams prove it.”
    “I don’t want to talk about that just now,” said Amanda, swinging her legs off the bed.
    Rita grabbed her arm and said, “Your dreams. You never had them till you came to Arkham. We both know this town stinks worse than a Mississippi slaughterhouse at low tide.”
    “I don’t know…”  
    But Rita wasn’t convinced.
    “Don’t try and back out on me, Mandy,” she warned, smiling to mask her seriousness. “I’m your friend, but I will knock you upside the head if you lie to me.”
    “You’re right,” said Amanda at last. “Ever since I got lost on the way to Professor Grayson’s class and I saw…something. A painting, I think. I don’t remember, like I tried to blot it out or something. It’s weird.”
    “Uh-huh,” said Rita, nodding. “Bad mojo.”
    * * *
    Finn pushed the mansion’s door with the barrel of his gun. It creaked open on rusted hinges, just as he knew it would, and silver light illuminated a dusty hall of warped floorboards and cloth-draped furniture. The whole house creaked and a puff of powdered plaster dust fell from the ceiling as Finn stepped inside, his pistol sweeping left to right in case anyone was lying in wait for them.
    “Kind of creepy, huh?” said Jimmy.
    “Yeah, creepy is what it is,” agreed Finn. He could hear a faint background hum, an electrical buzz like what could be heard from the ground when a trolley car was coming around the corner. He tried to pinpoint the source, but gave up when it seemed to be coming from all around him. It felt strongest when he tilted his head to the ceiling, but it was hard to be sure.
    It was just a noise, but it raised the hackles on Finn’s neck with its strangeness. He’d never heard anything quite like it, and wasn’t sure he was keen to learn what was producing such a quietly menacing noise.
    “So d’you want to tell me what we’re looking for?” asked Jimmy.
    Finn shushed him, and looked toward the grand staircase in the center of the wide hallway they now stood in. Wide doors led off to either side, but Finn ignored them, climbing to the second floor and a landing carpeted in a thick layer of dust. The humming was stronger here, and he wondered if there was some kind of machinery stored in one of these upper rooms.
    “Do you hear that?” he whispered to Jimmy.
    “Hear what?”
    “That buzzing noise. Or a hum, I’m not sure.”
    “I don’t hear nothing, but I ain’t got the sharpest lugs.”
    “Among other things,” muttered Finn, moving on.
    The ceiling creaked, like there was something moving in the attic above. That made sense. That was where Finn had seen the pale pink blob in the window, and whoever he’d seen was still there.
    “Find a way up,” said Finn. “Stairs, attic ladders, something.”
    Jimmy nodded and took the left portion of the landing. Finn moved down the shadowy hallway on the