“Not exactly. I’ve assembled my own crew and we’ll be filming everything. Depending on how much material we gather, it’ll either be a television special or a full series. We’ll see.”
Aston didn’t bother to hide his scowl. He had no desire to be on television, especially not with this vapid woman. Nor did he care to be associated with her so-called investigations.
“And this is Alvar Laine.” Holloway nodded at the man on his right. “He’s a cryptozoologist and a native of the area in which we’ll be working. He knows more about the background of this project than anyone.”
A brief smile creased Laine’s weathered face. He looked to be in his forties, dressed in jeans, a turtleneck, and a battered army jacket. “Don’t worry. You’re the lead scientist on the expedition,” he said to Aston. He smiled and dragged a hand back over thinning blond hair. He must have seen something in Aston’s eyes because he hurried on. “The only scientist, in fact, but I assure you I take what I do seriously and my work is grounded in a firm sense of skepticism.”
Holloway nodded and rubbed his hands together.
“Well, now that we’ve all gotten to know each other, let’s begin.”
Chapter 5
Holloway led the team into the home theater, a room in itself bigger than Aston’s current apartment. They sat in the front row and were still ten feet from the screen. Aston sighed. A cryptozoologist, a crazy cable TV host, Holloway himself, and legends of a prehistoric lake monster according to the original letter. What a farce. He felt like the dog at a cat orgy. He was a scientist, not a nutcase, and wondered how quickly he could fulfill his role and take his money and run. Hopefully he could do it with whatever professional reputation he held onto still intact.
Holloway produced a remote control with a flourish, cleared his throat, and beamed at his assembled team. “So,” he said, clearly enjoying his audience. “Prepare yourselves to be amazed. Drum roll please?” He grinned, but it faded when the others showed no overt signs of sharing in his enthusiasm. His smile crept back a little as he said, “Skeptical? Just wait and you’ll see.”
Joaquin opened the door behind them, light flooding in from the suite. “You ordered room service, boss?”
“Sure did. Bring it in.”
A low rattle rose behind them as a hotel employee wheeled in a heavily-laden trolley. How much food did the man think they were going to eat? Holloway instructed the woman to leave it and gestured to his party. “Help yourselves, please.”
Aston glanced over the mixed fruit platter, fresh prawns, bread rolls, variety of desserts, and shook his head. “I’m all right, thanks.” He didn’t trust his stomach yet.
Slater took a piece of watermelon and nibbled at it. She had nice lips and a delicate way about her that made her one of those women who could lend a touch of sensuality to the simple act of consuming food. Aston looked away, not wanting to get caught staring. She was a fellow passenger in this clown car, and surely Holloway wouldn’t have hired her if she didn’t have something of value to offer. He returned his attention to their new boss and waited.
“Please, everyone, don’t be shy. Help yourselves.” Holloway smiled weakly, a little disappointed, it seemed, that people weren’t more impressed with his generosity. Aston was glad the others in the room weren’t buying into the billionaire’s ostentatious displays any more than he was. “Okay then,” he said. “I guess I’ll have to whet your appetite with my tantalizing presentation. Let’s begin.”
He clicked the remote and a bird’s eye image of a huge, dark lake appeared on the giant screen. “This is Lake Kaarme, in central eastern Finland,” he said proudly, as if it were his own property. Maybe it was, for all Aston knew. Holloway clicked again and the image began to move, clearly shot from a light plane or helicopter passing low over the water. It was a vast expanse, edged all around with thick pine trees, and dotted here and there with tiny islands, equally forested. The shore cut back and forth, making wide beaches and narrow coves. Rolling hills and shallow valleys surrounded the lake on all sides, and stretched away for as far as the camera’s eye could see.
“It’s gorgeous,” Slater breathed. “I wouldn’t mind taking a little vacation there once the job is done.”
Aston had to agree. It was an impressive sight, and far bigger than any other lake he’d seen. “It’s massive, almost an inland sea.”
Holloway nodded emphatically. “And very deep in places. It could be home to anything!”
Aston resisted the urge to snort in derision. “We’ll have to see about that.” He doubted the place was home to more than mud and fish.
Holloway turned to the Finnish cryptozoologist. “Mister Laine, would you be so kind as to give us an overview of the local legends while we view the presentation.”
Laine cleared his throat. “All right, I can give you a few. Understand, there’s a strong storytelling tradition in this region.” His accent was soft and pleasant to the ear. “Any place like this attracts folklore, of course, but our lake seems to get more than its fair share.
“For as long as anyone can remember, there are stories of sightings. Some huge beast, spotted in the gloom of twilight or dawn, never really seen clearly. People have gone missing regularly. Every town loses people, whether they move away and don’t tell anyone or get abducted, or hike a trail and die of exposure. There are a thousand ways and more to die, and people go inexplicably missing all the time. But our town has a higher number, per capita, of disappearances than anywhere else in Finland. It’s not really a statistic of which to be proud, of course.” He gave a nervous laugh and then went on.
“An old man once told me the story of how he’d watched a beast the size of a bus, covered in grey skin and with a mouth filled with razor fangs, burst from the lake one evening and snatch his dog right from the water’s edge as the hound was taking a drink. He said he ran away in panic and would never go near the water again. It swallowed his pet whole, the man said, and his was a big dog. He was true to his word, refused to ever go near the lake. He moved first to the far side of town and finally left altogether. And he was a local, born and raised. The kind of person you would never expect to abandon his hometown. Old school, you know?”
“Liked a drink or two, did he?” Sam asked. There were a host of natural phenomena in a place like Lake Kaarme that could fool even a sober eyewitness. Add in a few stiff drinks and you had an explanation for a great many ‘monster’ sightings.
Alvar Laine turned a hard eye on him. “Most people enjoy a drink. That doesn’t make them liars.”
Aston held up a hand in apology. “Just asking. I’m a scientist and I believe in being thorough. No offense intended. Carry on.”
“There have regularly been unexplained animal carcasses, or bits and pieces of them, found on the lake shore. More than once I’ve come across such things. Once just a single deer leg, seemingly torn off the body. Another time I found a reindeer hind quarters, the creature taken in half right in front of the pelvis. Imagine the size of a reindeer and think what might be able to create remains like that. The wound was ragged, but the bones were sheared right through.”
Aston narrowed his eyes, reluctant to suggest Laine himself might be a drunk or a liar, but that story certainly raised a number of questions difficult to answer.
“Suffice to say,” Laine went on, “that while any place like this breeds myth, ours seems to breed far more. And they all have a thread of consistency you might not expect. Many of us have seen the kind of evidence I’ve just described. I’m not some lone crazy person.” Laine caught Aston’s still skeptical frown and continued, his tone softer and his head hanging a bit. The wind was a little gone from his sails. “I can introduce you to a dozen people in town who all claim to have glimpsed the beast itself, and their accounts are strangely similar.”