The Characters
Sirus Mean, former boxer and hobo
Leslie Cowell, antiques dealer
Hazel Murphy, flapper
Tony Tunacelli, wiseguy
Events
The members of the Arkham Historical Society were contacted by Prof. Richard Ware, whom they had gotten to examine the strange black substance being peddled as a drug in their last investigation. This time it was Ware who had a favor to ask. Convinced that the historical society's members were accustomed to delving into mysteries, Ware wanted them to track down his stepson, James Frazer, who had gone missing. Ware's gut told him that something strange was afoot, something that conventional private detectives wouldn't be able to handle.
Nine days earlier, James had dropped out of Miskatonic University against his parents wishes to go see his sweetheart in Kingsport. The last time Ware had heard from James was a phone call that James made while on route to Kingsport. James claimed to be stopping for the night at a motel between Arkham and his destination. Ware gave them a photograph of James with his physical description, a description of his car, and his car's license plate number written on the back.
Leslie and Hazel visited Travis Bryce, James's former roommate at Miskatonic. Bryce told them that he and James weren't close, and that James spent a lot of his time talking to Emily on the phone. James had packed up most of his belongings; it was clear he wasn't planning on coming back. They also called Emily, who seemed legitimately distraught that James had disappeared.
Consulting a map revealed that if James had taken the most direct route from Arkham to Kingsport, the only place he could have stopped for the night was the Squatters Lake Motel. Hazel used her charm to get a man at the library to do some research for her--he returned with a book that related the local history of Squatters Lake: colonists abandoned their settlement in the area due to poor fishing and hunting, and the settlement was later taken over by vagrants, escaped slaves, and army deserters who gave the area its name. Their encampment was eventually flooded out and was now abandoned.
The group drove out to Squatters Lake and easily found the motel. The motel was certainly out of the way, and interestingly was built on stilts--presumably in case the lake flooded again. Instead of checking in right away, they pulled their car onto the dirt track that wound around the lake and headed north.
On the way, they spotted tire tracks that ended at the lake's edge. As someone involved in the criminal underworld, Tony was fairly sure this was the tell-tale sign of a car having been pushed into the lake to get rid of a body. Hazel volunteered to swim into the lake to see if she could locate a vehicle down there, but there was an oily substance mixed with its water than hampered her visibility. She also realized that the lake was extraordinarily deep and any car would be resting farther down than she dared to venture.
Eventually they came to the ruins of the settlement they had read about. Sirus and Tony both saw a pale, naked man slip behind a ruined wall. Hoping to catch him, they split up and approached the structure from different sides. Unfortunately, Sirus felt the earth give way beneath his feet and plummeted down into the settlement's old well. He hit his head and was grievously banged about by the fall. Tony and the others got a rope and pulled him to safety. However, there was no sign of the man they had seen.
They did find tracks--belonging to a barefoot man missing a big toe--leading from the settlement into the woods. The investigators followed the tracks into the woods, where they spotted the naked man scurry behind a tree. They called out to him. He didn't reply, but he did begin to approach with a shambling, lurching gait. They could now see that he had a horrible wound in his chest and a vacant expression in his eyes. Tony and Sirus wasted no time with parlay--they unloaded their shotguns into the man, putting him down before he could reach the group.
The group then made their way to the motel. They were met in the reception area by a very old man with an English accent named William Brophy. He claimed to run the Squatters Lake Motel with his older brother Robert, but said that Robert spent most days sleeping at his age. Behind William were a number of license plates hung on the wall, but they did not spot James's license plate among them. The investigators rented the motel's four remaining rooms; William and Robert occupied one of the rooms, and there were three other guests currently staying at the motel.
The rooms were fairly nondescript and functional, but Tony pulled back the rug to reveal that there was a trap door set into the floor. It turned out that all of the rooms they rented shared this "feature." Tony also discovered a left-behind notebook in his room; it proved to be the journal of James Frazer, proving that he had indeed stayed at the Squatters Lake Motel!
The group heard a commotion outside. They spied a young, pimply man arguing with William Brophy. The young man was insisting that his friend was to meet him at the motel and was questioning why Brophy was covering up his friends' earlier arrival. Leslie later paid this kid a visit in his room. His name was Jacob Trent, and he had made plans to meet up with his "friend" Abe at this motel. Abe was supposed to arrive first, and Jacob was convinced that Abe wouldn't have stood him up--so something must have happened to him at the hotel. Since Jacob was in much the same boat as the investigators, Leslie suggested they all team up. That suited Jacob just fine. In fact, Jacob suggested breaking into a mysterious room with a padlock that he had found at the back of the motel.
Meanwhile, Sirus was laying low and scoping out the motel from a hiding spot in Hazel's car. He spotted the two other guests: a mafioso-looking man in a black suit and a young woman with curly brown hair. Tony would later make the acquittance of the "wiseguy," Bill Dunston, but figured out that he was merely a guy looking to do some fishing after a bad divorce. Not a "made man" at all!
When the time came for the break in, Leslie picked the padlock to the room in question. Inside they found some strange stuff: two crates that had blankets at the bottom (as if they were some sort of nest), jars of cloudy yellow fluid, jars of long metallic needles, and boxes of jewelry, clothes, and personal items that they surmised came from the people who had met ill ends at the motel. Jacob was stunned when he discovered Abe's jacket among the discarded clothing.
As they discussed their next move, the decided to take a look at the lake to make sure nothing strange was going on there. The three boats they had spotted tied up at the pier were still there, but there were strange yellow lights emanating from the oily waters of the lake. And then...everyone present experienced a vision. In the vision, they were all swimming to the bottom of the lake. As they pushed aside a veil of seaweed, they saw a city of black spires and crooked streets. The streets were lined with the dead bodies of red-shelled, alien creatures. They swam to the center of the city and saw a creature with a metal body and three yellow eyes sequestered behind a wall of warped glass.
When the vision faded, Jacob began to walk, as if in a trance, toward the woods south of the lake. They let the man walk. Deciding that William Brophy and his brother must be killed to stop whatever was going on at the motel, they invaded the brothers' private chambers. They didn't find the brothers, but they did discover James Frazer's license plate--again confirming that he had been at the motel.
Unwilling to follow Jacob to whatever fateful (and probably fatal) meeting awaited him, the investigators decided to use the oil casks they had found earlier to burn the motel to the ground. They spread oil and lit it on fire. Then they went door to door to let the other guests know about the fire. Bill Dunston sped away into the night, but the girl's door was already open--she was gone, possibly also drawn toward the woods by the lake. With no sign of the brothers or James, the characters departed in haste to tell Richard Ware that his stepson was in all likelihood deceased.