From the diary of Moira Baker, April 28, 1923
"One of Arkham's up-and-coming antique dealers, Mr Jules Pollack, held this wonderful soirée in his studio the other night. It was indeed a rather eclectic mix of New England's population, and I had a most invigorating conversation with a Fred Spaulding, a quite amusing 'mystic and sooth-sayer'. As far as I am concerned such things are mere legerdemain with tea leaves, but it is fun distraction. Mr. Pollack also introduced me to the amusing Ms. "Mackie" McNamara, an Egyptologist by profession, and the somewhat quiet but interesting Mr. Henry Chester, an author who had recently arrived to Arkham to do some research for a coming literary project. The event was great fun, and we are all all supposed to have lunch on May 1. We all need to eat, so why not?"
An excerpt from the notebook of Mr. Henry Chester, probably early May, 1923
(illegible)
Hastily scribbled down comments from Mr. Jules Pollack, the late evening of May 6, 1923
I am still shaking as I sit in the chaise lounge, and my hip flask is by now woefully empty. What did we see? I may have blacked out before being brought to by Mackie, and I can only recall those eyes, everywhere! What deviltry introduced itself in our midst? I cannot even attempt to grasp what really happened, and I could never, ever have imagined that a simple attempt to help Mr. Biron would have such dire consequences. Professor Wyndham is dead, killed in a most brutal way, and we seem to have been invested by a most horrendous apparition from the depths of time itself. My God, what it did to poor Henry Chester, and just to think that there might be more such aberrations around the world, in places like remote Tibet and hoary Egypt! How will I even be able to enter the basement of my own house, dreading that that black nemesis of mankind might be lurking there, ready to steal my soul and feed it to some loathsome horror called Yog-Sothoth!
From the diary of Ms. Moira Baker, early, May 7, 1923
It is difficult to describe what happened between May 1 and May 6, but I am jotting down some quick notes, just to make sure that we retain our bearings, and perhaps, out purity of essence. Being asked to investigate the house of Mr. Biron's manservant led us to a very recently abandoned Victorian, save for that half-crazed inbred, Ignatius Hernandez. The basement seems to have been a place of occult worship of the Santoria practice, and they were seemingly dreading the impending arrival of a "Guardian". The man-beast Ignatius had to be committed, and while we were attempting to uncover what actually might have transpired, an Arumbaya fetish from Wyndham's and Jones' expedition was stolen, only to materialize next day next to the mangled body of Dr. Wyndham. But as it turned out, this fetish was a fake. There were clearly other, greater powers at foot in Arkham, and as we feverishly worked through arcane tomes to understand what might be the cause of all this, we witnessed what can only be described a s a truly supernatural event. I did not for second imagine that I would be firing an old shotgun at the violent and vile sprectre that seemed to be draining all life out of the rigid, yet contorted, body of Henry Chester, but I did.
There is so much that needs to be understood? Why are there mathematical formulae in Otto Hernandez's notebok? Who stole the Arumbaya fetish? Where is it, and has it become the abode of something unnatural? Is all of this simply a cruel hoax?
Some comments by Ms. "Mackie" McNamara on the evening of May 6, 1923
- By Jove, we never had events like these in Egypt.
