" For seven days now her office had
been filled with strangers, relatives of the missing, and weary rescue workers.
So she hardly looked up that afternoon when two men entered. They seemed almost
like twins, she recalled later. Both were short and wore black overcoats. Their
complexions were dark, somewhat Oriental, she thought.
"We hear there's been a lot of
flying saucer activity around here," one of them remarked. She was taken
aback. The bridge disaster had dominated everyone's thoughts for the last week.
Flying saucers were the furthest thing from her mind at that moment.
"We have had quite a few
sightings here," she responded, turning her chair to pull open a filing
cabinet. She hauled out a bulging folder filled with clippings of sighting
reports and handed it to one of the men.
He flipped it open, gave the pile of
clippings a cursory glance, and handed it back. "Has anyone told you not
to publish these reports?" She shook her head as she shoved the folder
back into the drawer."What would you do if someone did order you to stop
writing about flying saucers?" "I'd tell them to go to hell,"
she smiled wanly.
The two men glanced at each other..
She went back to her lists and when she looked up again they were gone.
II.
Later that same afternoon another
stranger walked into Mrs. Hyre's office. He was slightly built, about five feet
seven inches tall, with black, piercing eyes and unruly black hair, as if he
had had a brush cut and it was just growing back in. His complexion was even
darker than that of the two previous visitors and he looked like a Korean or
Oriental of some kind. His hands were especially unusual, she thought, with
unduly long, tapering fingers. He wore a cheap-looking, ill-fitting black suit,
slightly out of fashion, and his tie was knotted in an odd old-fashioned way.
Strangely, he was not wearing an overcoat despite the fierce cold outside.
"My name is Jack Brown,"
he announced in a hesitant manner. "I'm a UFO researcher."
"Oh," Mary pushed aside the pile of papers on her desk and studied
him. The day was ending and she was ready to go home and try to get some sleep
at last.
After a brief, almost incoherent
struggle to discuss UFO sightings Brown stammered, "What— would—what would
you do—if someone ordered—ordered you to stop? To stop printing UFO
stories?"
"Say, are you with those two
men who were here earlier?" she asked, surprised to hear the same weird
question twice in one day.
"No. No—I'm alone. I'm a friend
of Gray—Gray Barker."
Gray Barker of Clarksburg was West
Virginia's best-known UFO investigator. He had published a number of books on
the subject and was a frequent visitor to Point Pleasant.
"Do you know John Keel?"
His face tightened. "I—I used
to think—think the world of K—K—Keel. Then a few minutes ago I bought a—a
magazine. He has an article in it. He says he's seen UFOs himself. He's—he's a
liar."
"I know he's seen things,"
Mary flared. "I've been with him when he saw them!" Brown smiled
weakly at the success of his simple gambit. "Could you—take me
out—t—t—take me where you— you and K—K—Keel saw—saw things?"
"I'm not going to do anything
except go home to bed," Mary declared flatly. "Is K—K—Keel in P—
P—Point Pleasant?" "No. He lives in New York." "I—I think
he m—m—makes up all these stories." "Look, I can give you the names
of some of the people here who have seen things," Mary said wearily.
"You can talk to them and decide for yourself. But I just can't escort you
around."
"I'm a friend of G—G—Gray
Barker," he repeated lamely.
Outside the office a massive crane
creaked and rumbled, dragging a huge hunk of twisted steel out of the
river."
- The Mothman Prophecies, John Keel (1975) pp. 6
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