Cthulhu Lives!: An Eldritch Tribute to H. P. Lovecraft by Greg Stolze, Tim Dedopulos, John Reppion, Lynne Hardy, Gabor Csigas, Gethin A. Lynes

remain a mystery. During his lifetime, Williamson employed a vast labour force to construct a maze of tunnels beneath the Edge Hill and what is now the city centre of Liverpool. The house which Martineau rented from Williamson came equipped with its own vaulted and brick-lined tunnels, and the Minister was, it seems, quite taken with the constructions.
    Relocating in 1844 to a purpose-built villa on the edge of the newly opened Princes Park, Martineau decided to construct similar tunnels of his own. These catacombs (significantly less extensive than Williamson’s, but no less remarkable) were all but forgotten after Martineau’s death. The house was demolished and the land left, at either his or his family’s request, to grow wild. The city council at the time was happy to let the privately owned area return to its natural state, and it became Park Nook.
    The Nook was famed for its ancient trees, in which much of the park’s wildlife resided. Surrounded by thick, knotted brambles and nettle stalks the height of a man, it was an almost impenetrable fortress to even the most inquisitive visitors and their murderously toothed dogs. In May 1999, the area was suddenly fenced off, much to the bafflement of many park users. In an act of spontaneous community revulsion, a group of locals dismantled the barrier and began a campaign to protect the area from its would-be developers.
    In 2001, I was searching the internet for information about the Nook’s current plight and history. By this time, enraged locals had been joined by bona fide eco-warriors who had taken up permanent residence among the ancient trees, to ensure the wilderness-like centre was kept free of development and vandalism. I found a post on the message board of the Cold Spot Society relating to an “investigation” which had taken place there.
    From what I remember – the site was, as you may know, deleted in 2002, in the wake of the Blackberry Fair tragedy – a small band of ghost hunters gained access to the Nook in the dead of night, intending to visit Martineau’s tunnels. Rumour said that a young mother and her child had taken refuge in one of the tunnels during a Second World War air-raid. An explosion caused a collapse, and the pair were buried beneath the rubble. Indeed, I have heard other stories of the tunnels being used as makeshift bomb shelters during the period, although I’ve found no official record of it. The Coldspotters’ explorations amounted to little more than the usual electromagnetic field and temperature readings. There may even have been a digital photo or two showing the ubiquitous “orbs” which seem so popular with amateur parapsychologists.
    Needless to say, the ghost hunters spooked themselves, causing quite a bit of noise in the process. The resident environmental activists heard them crashing about in the undergrowth and “escorted” them out of the park, presumably believing them to be agents of the developers. One interesting detail about the event sticks with me, however. The Coldspotters had initially been startled by a strange sound issuing from one of the overgrown tunnel entrances. The noises were described as sounding like the desperate cries of a half-smothered infant.
    The “Battle of the Nook” raged for years before eventually drawing to a close in 2004, with developer Cyril Webb emerging as the victor. A block of luxury apartments now occupies the site. High fences erected during construction prevented myself and others from ascertaining whether the historic tunnels were demolished entirely, or merely buried. The day the barriers went up, I recall seeing a large, lean dog fox trotting through our garden, adjoining the park. I assumed that it had been displaced by the works, and wondered if it had previously made its home in the tunnels. As for the somewhat drolly-named “Glade Park Court”, it is with a tinge of regret that I must report that no stories of phantom cries from beneath tenants’ floors