"The Mysterious Ship" and "Old Bugs"

This will be the second or third to last Lovecraft story post of this project, and one of the most lighthearted. These extremely silly short pieces were both published in the 1940 and 50's.

"The Mysterious Ship" was written in 1902. No, this isn't going to be a joke post like "The Little Glass Bottle." While nobody writes anything GOOD at age twelve, I feel like that's around the age where literary talent starts to take shape and show signs of coherence and thoughtfulness. So, there's a chance this might actually show some early seeds of things we'll recognize.

Meanwhile, "The Beast in the Cave," the second story Lovecraft ever published, was written just three years after this. So, we've seen Lovecraft's writing as of age seven, and as of age fifteen. Let's see how his abilities developed during the time between those ages!

This story is an epistolary (hehe, I tried to write one of those when I was around 14 or 15 myself~), and has both a short and a long version that seem to have been published together. Whether or not they're meant to be READ together, we shall see.

The Mysterious Ship (short version)

The Royal Press
1902

Chapter 1.
In the spring of 1847, the little village of Ruralville was thrown into a state of exitement by the arrival of a strange brig in the harbour. It carried no flag, & everything about it was such as would exite suspicion. It had no name. Its captain was named Manuel Ruello. The exitement increased however when John Griggs dissapeared from his home. This was Oct. 4. on Oct. 5 the brig was gone. 

That's...actually pretty damned connected already! Unlicensed ship with a sketchy, non-Anglophone captain associated with murders or disappearances? Make it more racist, slightly more convincing of a journalistic voice and data organization, and seven times as long, and this could be an excerpt from "The Call of Cthulhu" or "The Horror at Red Hook."

Also, "Ruralville" is 10/10. That had to be deliberate irony, even from a 12 year old.

Chapter 2.

The brig, in leaving, was met by a U.S. Frigate and a sharp fight ensued. When over, they* missed a man. named Henry Johns.

*(The Frigate.) 

That's one heavily armed merchant brig. And from the sound of things, they somehow WON; a sailboat isn't going to outrun a steam powered frigate without crippling it first!

I love how this royal press article is divided into tiny chapters.

Chapter 3.

The brig continued its course in the direction of Madagascar, upon its arrival, The natives fled in all directions. When they came together on the other side of the island, one was missing. His name was Dahabea.

The primitive foreigners have a better sense of what's evil and dangerous than the allegedly superior white people do. I guess that's another recurring element that flowered early!

Chapter 4.

At length it was decided that something must be done. A reward of £5,000 was offered for the capture of Manuel Ruello., When startling news came, a nameless brig was wrecked on the Florida Keys.

At length, they decided to take the pirate ship that somehow managed to beat a US navy frigate seriously.

Well, sounds like someone or something else took it out first. That's what you get for only doing this "at length!"

Chapter 5.

A ship was sent to Florida, and the mystery was solved. In the exitement of the fight they would launch a sub-marine boat and take what they wanted. there it lay, tranquilly rocking on the waters of the Atlantic when someone called out “John Brown has dissapeared.” And sure enough John Brown was gone.

I'm going to assume that John Brown was a sailor aboard the American ship...or submarine?...whatever this thing is...that vanished as soon as they came within sight of the wrecked brig.

They were going in expecting a fight, also, which means that even if the brig is wrecked it doesn't appear to be uninhabited.

Let's see the actual solution of the mystery that was just telegraphed now!

Chapter 6.

The finding of the sub-marine boat, and the dissapearance of John Brown, caused renewed exitement amongst the people, when a new discovery was made. In transcribing this discovery it is necessary to relate a geographical fact. At the N. Pole there exists a vast continent composed of volcanic soil, a portion of which is open to explorers. It is called “No-Mans Land.”

Lomar, as the natives call it.~

Chapter 7.

In the extreme southern part of No-Mans Land, there was found a hut, and several other signs of human habitation. they promptly entered, and, chained to the floor, lay Griggs, Johns, & Dahabea. They, upon arriving in London, separated, Griggs going to Ruralville, Johns to the Frigate, & Dahabea to Madagascar.

Wait, what happened to the wrecked brig? What did they find there? Maybe that's only in the long version.

Anyway, three of the four missing people were found imprisoned but alive in this secret north pole base. 

Chapter 8.

But the mystery of John Brown was still unsolved, so they kept strict watch over the port at No-Mans Land, and when the sub-marine boat arrived, and the pirates, one by one, and headed by Manuel Ruello, left the ship, they were met by a rapid fire. After the fight brown was recovered.

Chapter 9.

Griggs was royally recieved at Ruralville, & a dinner was given in honour of Henry Johns, Dahabea was made King of Madagascar., & Brown was made Captain of his ship.

THE END. 

Hmmm, yeah, this "short" version is definitely the suppressed one meant for public consumption. Entire sections are clearly missing.

Let's look at the SCP files now!

[Long Version]

By Anonymus

In the Spring of 1847, the little village of Ruralville was thrown into a state of excitement by the landing of a strange Brig in the harbour. It carried no flag, and no name was painted on its side, and everything about it was such as would excite suspicion. It was from Tripoli, Africa, and the captain was named Manuel Ruello. The Excitement increased, however; when John Griggs, (The magnate of the villiage) suddenly disappeared from his home. This was the night of October 4th—on October 5th the Brig left.

Chapter II
It was 8 bells on the U.S. Frigate “Constitution” when Commander Farragut sighted a strange brig to the westward. It carried no flag, and no name was painted on its side, and everything about it was such as would excite suspicion. On hailing it put up the Pirates Flag. Farragut ordered a gun fired and no sooner did he fire, than the pirate ship gave them a broadside when the Fight was over Commander Farragut Missed one man named Henry F. Johns.

A bit more detail now. And with the anonymous source (I remember Anonymus! He was the prankster from "The Little Glass Bottle!" Well, this account just got much less reliable...), I think Lovecraft meant for this to be the original document that the Royal Press published a doctored version of.

Very SCPish, yeah. And pretty clever for a 12 year old, even if the execution is about as silly as you'd expect.

Chapter III
It was Summer on the Island of Madagascar. And Natives were picking corn, when one cried “Companions! I sight a ship! with no flag and with no name printed on the side and with everything about it such as would excite Suspicion!” And The Natives fled in all directions when They came together on The other side of The Island one was missing his name was Dahabea.

Now I'm wondering if Lovecraft actually meant this as a pure farce. The repetition of that line in all these contexts feels like intentional comedy, even coming from a kid.

"Natives" to Lovecraft at this time seems to have meant "American Indians," going by the Madagascarite cornfields.

Chapter IV
At length it was Decided Something must be done, Notes were compared. Three abductions were found to have taken place Dissapearance of John Griggs, Henry John, & Dahabea, were recalled. Finally Advertisements were issued offering £5000 reward for the capture of Manuel Ruello, Ship, Prisoners, & crew. When exciting News reached London! An unknown Brig with no name was wrecked of The Florida Keys in America!

Chapter V
The People Hurried to Florida and Beheld———. A steel spindle shaped object Lay placidly on the water Beside the shattered wreck of The brig. “A Submarine Boat”! shouted one “Yes!” shouted another “The mystery is cleared” said a wise looking man. “In the excitement of the fight they launch the submarine boat and take as many as they wish, unseen. And———.” “John Brown has disappeared”! shouted a voice from the deck. Sure enough John Brown was gone!

Oh, I see now. I guess Lovecraft discovered Jules Verne pretty early in his life, as this conversation actually sounds a lot like a childish attempt at imitating the early sub-hunting scenes from "20,000 Leagues."

So, the pirates have a miniature sub they can launch for these kidnapping missions while their main ship causes a distraction. And by the time these people spotted the sub, it had already paid them a covert visit.

I wonder if the pirates use old, obsolete brigs here and there to cover for the submarine, their actual main ship? That would explain this "wreck" seeming to act as bait.

Yeah, this figuring out how the monster/cult/etc works thing, and having a wise old guy explain it a bit prematurely, is very signature.

Chapter VI
The Finding of The Submarine boat and the dissapearance of John Brown caused renewed excitement among the People, and a new discovery was made. In relating this discovery It is necessary to relate a geographical Fact:— At the North Pole there is supposed to exist a vast continent composed of volcanic soil, a portion is open to travellers and explorers but it is barren and unfruitful. and thus absolutely Impassable. It is called “No-Mans Land.”

Chapter VII
In the Extreme southern part of No-Mans Land There was found a wharf and a hut &c and every sign of former human habitation. A rusty door-plate was nailed to the hut inscribed in old English “M. Ruello.” This, then, was the home of Michael Ruello. the house brought to light a note book belonging to John Griggs, and The Log of the “Constitution” taken from Henry Johns, and the Madagascar Reaper belong To Dahabea.

Chapter VIII
When about to leave, they Observed a spring on the side of the hut. They pressed it.—A hole appeared in the side of the hut which they promptly entered. They were in a subterranean cavern, the beach ran down to the edge of a black, murky, sea. on the sea lay a dark oblong object—viz another Submarine boat which they entered. There bound to the cabin Floor Lay Griggs, Johns, and Dahabea, all alive and well. They, when arriving in London, separated, Griggs going to Ruralville, Johns, To the Constitution and Dahabea to Madagascar.

Chapter IX
But The mystery of John Brown lay still unsolved. So They Kept strict watch over the port at no-mans Land, Hoping The Submarine Boat would arrive. At length, however, it did arrive bearing with it John Brown. They Fixed upon the 5th of October For the Attack. They ranged along the shore and Formed Bodies. Finally one by one and Headed by Manuel Ruello The Pirates left the Boat. They were (to their astonishment) Met By a Rapid Fire.

Chapter X
Conclusion
The Pirates were at Length defeated and a search was made for Brown. At Length he (the aforesaid Brown) was found. John Gregg was royally received at Ruralville and a dinner was

Dahabea was made King of Madagascar, and Manuel Ruello was Executed at Newgate Prison.

The End 

Ah well. I guess this was less clever than I thought, with a public and redacted version of the same story with the latter revealing the really crazy stuff. The former is just messy compression.

Ah well. Still, this nautical adventure does feel like proto-cthulhu mythos stuff in quite a few regards, and I'm glad I read it.

In 1919, an eighteen year old amateur journalist and friend of Lovecraft's named Alfred Galpin wanted to try booze before Prohibition went into effect. A mutual friend informed Lovecraft of this, and a couple days later young Mr. Galpin received an unsolicited short story in the mail. 

Old Bugs

An Extemporaneous Sob Story
by Marcus Lollius, Proconsul of Gaul 

I wonder if Lovecraft signed all his letters to Galpin that way.~

This story has absolutely nothing to do with the Roman Empire, so this must be some kind of in joke.

Sheehan’s Pool Room, which adorns one of the lesser alleys in the heart of Chicago’s stockyard district, is not a nice place. Its air, freighted with a thousand odours such as Coleridge may have found at Cologne, too seldom knows the purifying rays of the sun; but fights for space with the acrid fumes of unnumbered cheap cigars and cigarettes which dangle from the coarse lips of unnumbered human animals that haunt the place day and night. But the popularity of Sheehan’s remains unimpaired; and for this there is a reason—a reason obvious to anyone who will take the trouble to analyse the mixed stenches prevailing there. Over and above the fumes and sickening closeness rises an aroma once familiar throughout the land, but now happily banished to the back streets of life by the edict of a benevolent government—the aroma of strong, wicked whiskey—a precious kind of forbidden fruit indeed in this year of grace 1950. 

Or maybe in this version of the twentieth century a Neo-Roman Empire emerged sometime in the 1940's. That's also possible.

Sheehan’s is the acknowledged centre to Chicago’s subterranean traffic in liquor and narcotics, and as such has a certain dignity which extends even to the unkempt attachés of the place; but there was until lately one who lay outside the pale of that dignity—one who shared the squalor and filth, but not the importance, of Sheehan’s. He was called “Old Bugs”, and was the most disreputable object in a disreputable environment. What he had once been, many tried to guess; for his language and mode of utterance when intoxicated to a certain degree were such as to excite wonderment; but what he was, presented less difficulty—for “Old Bugs”, in superlative degree, epitomised the pathetic species known as the “bum” or the “down-and-outer”. Whence he had come, no one could tell. One night he had burst wildly into Sheehan’s, foaming at the mouth and screaming for whiskey and hasheesh; and having been supplied in exchange for a promise to perform odd jobs, had hung about ever since, mopping floors, cleaning cuspidors and glasses, and attending to an hundred similar menial duties in exchange for the drink and drugs which were necessary to keep him alive and sane. 

Hey, he's not a bum, he's working!

He talked but little, and usually in the common jargon of the underworld; but occasionally, when inflamed by an unusually generous dose of crude whiskey, would burst forth into strings of incomprehensible polysyllables and snatches of sonorous prose and verse which led certain habitués to conjecture that he had seen better days. 

So, when he drinks enough he starts sounding like the author. Got it.

One steady patron—a bank defaulter under cover—came to converse with him quite regularly, and from the tone of his discourse ventured the opinion that he had been a writer or professor in his day. But the only tangible clue to Old Bugs’ past was a faded photograph which he constantly carried about with him—the photograph of a young woman of noble and beautiful features. This he would sometimes draw from his tattered pocket, carefully unwrap from its covering of tissue paper, and gaze upon for hours with an expression of ineffable sadness and tenderness. It was not the portrait of one whom an underworld denizen would be likely to know, but of a lady of breeding and quality, garbed in the quaint attire of thirty years before. Old Bugs himself seemed also to belong to the past, for his nondescript clothing bore every hallmark of antiquity. He was a man of immense height, probably more than six feet, though his stooping shoulders sometimes belied this fact. His hair, a dirty white and falling out in patches, was never combed; and over his lean face grew a mangy stubble of coarse beard which seemed always to remain at the bristling stage—never shaven—yet never long enough to form a respectable set of whiskers. His features had perhaps been noble once, but were now seamed with the ghastly effects of terrible dissipation. At one time—probably in middle life—he had evidently been grossly fat; but now he was horribly lean, the purple flesh hanging in loose pouches under his bleary eyes and upon his cheeks. Altogether, Old Bugs was not pleasing to look upon.

The disposition of Old Bugs was as odd as his aspect. Ordinarily he was true to the derelict type—ready to do anything for a nickel or a dose of whiskey or hasheesh—but at rare intervals he shewed the traits which earned him his name. Then he would try to straighten up, and a certain fire would creep into the sunken eyes. His demeanour would assume an unwonted grace and even dignity; and the sodden creatures around him would sense something of superiority—something which made them less ready to give the usual kicks and cuffs to the poor butt and drudge. At these times he would shew a sardonic humour and make remarks which the folk of Sheehan’s deemed foolish and irrational. But the spells would soon pass, and once more Old Bugs would resume his eternal floor-scrubbing and cuspidor-cleaning. But for one thing Old Bugs would have been an ideal slave to the establishment—and that one thing was his conduct when young men were introduced for their first drink. The old man would then rise from the floor in anger and excitement, muttering threats and warnings, and seeking to dissuade the novices from embarking upon their course of “seeing life as it is”. He would sputter and fume, exploding into sesquipedalian admonitions and strange oaths, and animated by a frightful earnestness which brought a shudder to more than one drug-racked mind in the crowded room. But after a time his alcohol-enfeebled brain would wander from the subject, and with a foolish grin he would turn once more to his mop or cleaning-rag. 

Yeah, I think we all see where this is going.

Lovecraft's descriptions of the vestiges of his eighteen year old friend's "aristocratic, manly grace" are something though.

I do not think that many of Sheehan’s regular patrons will ever forget the day that young Alfred Trever came. He was rather a “find”—a rich and high-spirited youth who would “go the limit” in anything he undertook—at least, that was the verdict of Pete Schultz, Sheehan’s “runner”, who had come across the boy at Lawrence College, in the small town of Appleton, Wisconsin. 

But wait! If Schultz is the runner, who's Sheehan?

Trever was the son of prominent parents in Appleton. His father, Karl Trever, was an attorney and citizen of distinction, whilst his mother had made an enviable reputation as a poetess under her maiden name of Eleanor Wing. Alfred was himself a scholar and poet of distinction, though cursed with a certain childish irresponsibility which made him an ideal prey for Sheehan’s runner. He was blond, handsome, and spoiled; vivacious and eager to taste the several forms of dissipation about which he had read and heard. At Lawrence he had been prominent in the mock-fraternity of “Tappa Tappa Keg”, where he was the wildest and merriest of the wild and merry young roysterers; but this immature, collegiate frivolity did not satisfy him. He knew deeper vices through books, and he now longed to know them at first hand. Perhaps this tendency toward wildness had been stimulated somewhat by the repression to which he had been subjected at home; for Mrs. Trever had particular reason for training her only child with rigid severity. She had, in her own youth, been deeply and permanently impressed with the horror of dissipation by the case of one to whom she had for a time been engaged. 

...let me guess. Eleanor Wing was Galpin's crush at the time of writing.

Young Galpin, the fiancé in question, had been one of Appleton’s most remarkable sons. 

Yuuuuup. Named him a little too early, Howie. Not that I'm sure he'd have figured out where this was going by now anyway, but still, standards.

Attaining distinction as a boy through his wonderful mentality, he won vast fame at the University of Wisconsin, and at the age of twenty-three returned to Appleton to take up a professorship at Lawrence and to slip a diamond upon the finger of Appleton’s fairest and most brilliant daughter. For a season all went happily, till without warning the storm burst. Evil habits, dating from a first drink taken years before in woodland seclusion, made themselves manifest in the young professor; and only by a hurried resignation did he escape a nasty prosecution for injury to the habits and morals of the pupils under his charge. 

Woodland seclusion, huh? Wonder if he was planning to get drunk at some cabin his family owned or something.

His engagement broken, Galpin moved east to begin life anew; but before long, Appletonians heard of his dismissal in disgrace from New York University, where he had obtained an instructorship in English. Galpin now devoted his time to the library and lecture platform, preparing volumes and speeches on various subjects connected with belles lettres, and always shewing a genius so remarkable that it seemed as if the public must sometime pardon him for his past mistakes. His impassioned lectures in defence of Villon, Poe, Verlaine, and Oscar Wilde were applied to himself as well, and in the short Indian summer of his glory there was talk of a renewed engagement at a certain cultured home on Park Avenue. But then the blow fell. A final disgrace, compared to which the others had been as nothing, shattered the illusions of those who had come to believe in Galpin’s reform; and the young man abandoned his name and disappeared from public view. Rumour now and then associated him with a certain “Consul Hasting” whose work for the stage and for motion-picture companies attracted a certain degree of attention because of its scholarly breadth and depth; but Hasting soon disappeared from the public eye, and Galpin became only a name for parents to quote in warning accents. Eleanor Wing soon celebrated her marriage to Karl Trever, a rising young lawyer, and of her former admirer retained only enough memory to dictate the naming of her only son, and the moral guidance of that handsome and headstrong youth. Now, in spite of all that guidance, Alfred Trever was at Sheehan’s and about to take his first drink. 

You know, I'm still trying to decide if Lovecraft was the most annoying friend ever, or the most entertaining, and this story isn't helping.

“Boss,” cried Schultz, as he entered the vile-smelling room with his young victim, “meet my friend Al Trever, bes’ li’l’ sport up at Lawrence—thas’ ’n Appleton, Wis., y’ know. Some swell guy, too—’s father’s a big corp’ration lawyer up in his burg, ’n’ ’s mother’s some lit’ry genius. He wants to see life as she is—wants to know what the real lightnin’ juice tastes like—so jus’ remember he’s me friend an’ treat ’im right.” 

Ah. "Runner" means something other than I thought it did. Sheehan is indeed the owner of the place, and Schultz is a...pusher? Smuggler? One of those two.

 As the names Trever, Lawrence, and Appleton fell on the air, the loafers seemed to sense something unusual. Perhaps it was only some sound connected with the clicking balls of the pool tables or the rattling glasses that were brought from the cryptic regions in the rear—perhaps only that, plus some strange rustling of the dirty draperies at the one dingy window—but many thought that someone in the room had gritted his teeth and drawn a very sharp breath. 

Come on Bugs! Save the son you never had!

“Glad to know you, Sheehan,” said Trever in a quiet, well-bred tone. 

His tone was well bred. I guess it's like how that alien footprint they found in Antarctica was obviously "degenerate" despite the scientists having no idea what the creature that made it was.

“This is my first experience in a place like this, but I am a student of life, and don’t want to miss any experience. There’s poetry in this sort of thing, you know—or perhaps you don’t know, but it’s all the same.” 

How Epicurian.

“Young feller,” responded the proprietor, “ya come tuh th’ right place tuh see life. We got all kinds here—reel life an’ a good time. The damn’ government can try tuh make folks good ef it wants tuh, but it can’t stop a feller from hittin’ ’er up when he feels like it. Whaddya want, feller—booze, coke, or some other sorta dope? Yuh can’t ask for nothin’ we ain’t got.”

Habitués say that it was at this point they noticed a cessation in the regular, monotonous strokes of the mop.

“I want whiskey—good old-fashioned rye!” exclaimed Trever enthusiastically. “I’ll tell you, I’m good and tired of water after reading of the merry bouts fellows used to have in the old days. I can’t read an Anacreontic without watering at the mouth—and it’s something a lot stronger than water that my mouth waters for!”

“Anacreontic—what ’n hell’s that?” several hangers-on looked up as the young man went slightly beyond their depth. But the bank defaulter under cover explained to them that Anacreon was a gay old dog who lived many years ago and wrote about the fun he had when all the world was just like Sheehan’s. 

Oh god I hate this kid.

“Let me see, Trever,” continued the defaulter, “didn’t Schultz say your mother is a literary person, too?”

“Yes, damn it,” replied Trever, “but nothing like the old Teian! She’s one of those dull, eternal moralisers that try to take all the joy out of life. Namby-pamby sort—ever heard of her? She writes under her maiden name of Eleanor Wing.”

Here it was that Old Bugs dropped his mop.

“Well, here’s yer stuff,” announced Sheehan jovially as a tray of bottles and glasses was wheeled into the room. “Good old rye, an’ as fiery as ya kin find anyw’eres in Chi’.”

The youth’s eyes glistened and his nostrils curled at the fumes of the brownish fluid which an attendant was pouring out for him. It repelled him horribly, and revolted all his inherited delicacy; but his determination to taste life to the full remained with him, and he maintained a bold front. 

Because drinking is innately repellent to his upper class English heritage.

Those English. Such a sober people.

But before his resolution was put to the test, the unexpected intervened. Old Bugs, springing up from the crouching position in which he had hitherto been, leaped at the youth and dashed from his hands the uplifted glass, almost simultaneously attacking the tray of bottles and glasses with his mop, and scattering the contents upon the floor in a confusion of odoriferous fluid and broken bottles and tumblers. Numbers of men, or things which had been men, dropped to the floor and began lapping at the puddles of spilled liquor, 

LOL

but most remained immovable, watching the unprecedented actions of the barroom drudge and derelict. Old Bugs straightened up before the astonished Trever, and in a mild and cultivated voice said, “Do not do this thing. I was like you once, and I did it. Now I am like—this.”

“What do you mean, you damned old fool?” shouted Trever. “What do you mean by interfering with a gentleman in his pleasures?”

Sheehan, now recovering from his astonishment, advanced and laid a heavy hand on the old waif’s shoulder.

“This is the last time for you, old bird!” he exclaimed furiously. “When a gen’l’man wants tuh take a drink here, by God, he shall, without you interferin’. Now get th’ hell outa here afore I kick hell outa ya.”

But Sheehan had reckoned without scientific knowledge of abnormal psychology and the effects of nervous stimulus. 

The guy who runs a bootlegging establishment full of broken people doesn't know that drunk + crazy/desperate = dangerous. Somehow.

Old Bugs, obtaining a firmer hold on his mop, began to wield it like the javelin of a Macedonian hoplite, and soon cleared a considerable space around himself, meanwhile shouting various disconnected bits of quotation, among which was prominently repeated, “ . . . the sons of Belial, blown with insolence and wine.”

The room became pandemonium, and men screamed and howled in fright at the sinister being they had aroused. Trever seemed dazed in the confusion, and shrank to the wall as the strife thickened. “He shall not drink! He shall not drink!” Thus roared Old Bugs as he seemed to run out of—or rise above—quotations. Policemen appeared at the door, attracted by the noise, but for a time they made no move to intervene. Trever, now thoroughly terrified and cured forever of his desire to see life via the vice route, edged closer to the blue-coated newcomers. Could he but escape and catch a train for Appleton, he reflected, he would consider his education in dissipation quite complete.

Then suddenly Old Bugs ceased to wield his javelin and stopped still—drawing himself up more erectly than any denizen of the place had ever seen him before. “Ave, Caesar, moriturus te saluto!” he shouted, and dropped to the whiskey-reeking floor, never to rise again. 

What is WITH the Rome motif in this story I swear...

Subsequent impressions will never leave the mind of young Trever. The picture is blurred, but ineradicable. Policemen ploughed a way through the crowd, questioning everyone closely both about the incident and about the dead figure on the floor. Sheehan especially did they ply with inquiries, yet without eliciting any information of value concerning Old Bugs. Then the bank defaulter remembered the picture, and suggested that it be viewed and filed for identification at police headquarters. An officer bent reluctantly over the loathsome glassy-eyed form and found the tissue-wrapped cardboard, which he passed around among the others.

“Some chicken!” leered a drunken man as he viewed the beautiful face, but those who were sober did not leer, looking with respect and abashment at the delicate and spiritual features. No one seemed able to place the subject, and all wondered that the drug-degraded derelict should have such a portrait in his possession—that is, all but the bank defaulter, who was meanwhile eyeing the intruding bluecoats rather uneasily. He had seen a little deeper beneath Old Bugs’ mask of utter degradation.

Then the picture was passed to Trever, and a change came over the youth. After the first start, he replaced the tissue wrapping around the portrait, as if to shield it from the sordidness of the place. Then he gazed long and searchingly at the figure on the floor, noting its great height, and the aristocratic cast of features which seemed to appear now that the wretched flame of life had flickered out. No, he said hastily, as the question was put to him, he did not know the subject of the picture. It was so old, he added, that no one now could be expected to recognise it.

But Alfred Trever did not speak the truth, as many guessed when he offered to take charge of the body and secure its interment in Appleton. Over the library mantel in his home hung the exact replica of that picture, and all his life he had known and loved its original.

For the gentle and noble features were those of his own mother. 

Well, it wouldn't be a Lovecraft story without the "twist" ending that was obvious by a third of the way in. 

Not sure how Galpin reacted to this, or if it was even remotely effective at keeping him away from alcohol. But, well, it was amusing, if sort of uncomfortably classist. The over-the-topness feels more sarcastic than anything else at times, as if Lovecraft is poking fun at paranoid prohibitionist screeds rather than writing a knowingly silly but earnest one himself.

It honestly makes me think of this more than anything else.