September 26 - Oct 22, 1921 - (Skullhouse Date February 2, 2016) Part 1

Loot From Drood –
Copy of “The Black Book”
 A large bell jar containing dead rats.
A dozen small numbered jars containing what appears to be ordinary earth, a veritable spice rack of common and exotic herbs and spices, mostly in similar glass jars.
Several bundles of small bones and half a mummified human foot (probably Egyptian – certainly partly ground up to provide “mummy dust” for some spell or other).
There’s a “toolkit” containing small knives, files, chisels and hammers as well as tongs and a number of metal rods between six inches and a foot in length. There is also what may be a thousand dollars worth of fine platinum wire… (A lot more of this is part of the floor symbol and was left behind when the sanctum was dynamited).
One box (an ordinary wooden cigar box) contains pens, pencils and a number of bottles of variously colored ink.
There are also an assortment of amulets. Ankhs, serpents, symbols of every sort in wood, bone, metal... Some may be of considerable monetary value.
The jars and boxes include a number of pieces of remarkable workmanship and value:
•    A small ivory box of African workmanship with delicate carvings of elephants and trees (contains a mysterious white powder).
•    An ebony box about the size of a cigar box with intricate abstract carvings (Malasia?) - contains a quantity of dried vegetable matter or fungus).
•    A Chinese porcelain urn of considerable antiquity and great beauty – but rather chipped and discolored - half full of some sort of leaves.
•    A small pottery container in the shape of a crouching toad; ?Meso-American? and very ancient – contains a gravely grey substance.
  The papers recovered are a muddle, mostly the diary or ravings of Drood – They are not in any sensible order although some sheaves appear to be bound intentionally together.
Some of the papers appear to contain notes on “The Black Book” and may reward study.  The hand varies from the familiar hand of Drood to a wilder, more difficult to read, scrawl, which, while it is definitely still Drood’s,  is much harder to decipher. The sheets scattered nearer the nasty goo-covered chair in the center of the symbol on the floor seem to be the most recent and the most incoherent: Lots of phonetic gibberish “Phataghn! I’a! I’a! Tsathoggua!” AND “I am BECOMING! On the great day when I am one with the LORD TOAD. I’a! I’a! SAINT TOAD! The spirals are nearing completion…” “Children are such tasty morsels… Food for the soul. My power grows.”   Etc. etc….

The memorial service for the police officers killed at the Blue Fox and for Joseph Linehan occurs and the whole Drood affair is carefully covered up.

In the next week a Catholic priest named Father LeClerque appraches the investigators individually; questioning them about the death of Father Kolvenbach.

On October 10th Jessie Cook and detective Gregory contact the investigators as quickly as possible to inform them that Harry Gray has managed to slip out of town despite ordinary police surveillance. As a result of this the investigators take precautions - generally by leaving their known lodgings.

Pictures from 1906 News Coverage of the Excavation of the "New Spur"

The Black Book - As Discovered by the Investigators.

Prominent among the items recovered from the sanctum of Drood was a copy of the 1939 "Das Buch von den Unaussprechlichen Kulten" by Friedrich Wilhelm von Junzt. The scattered, and often difficult to read, notes of Drood, found at the same time, often seem to refer to that volume and there appear to be a lot of pages of his own translation of it... But... very much scattered and out of sequence.

The Black Book

SPOILERS BELOW - SPOILERS BELOW 

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  I chanced to recall the inclusion of this book in the background of the (now presumably defeated) sorcerer, Charles Aaron Drood and thought I ought to go a ways beyond what was included in the Call of Cthulhu game materials.  I have been going through the horror stories of Robert Howard, whence the book originates, and was looking for pictures and other peoples ideas on the web... When I found this trove of material ready to be used. 

Wewelsberg Castle - fictively important in the background of the author of "The Black Book" - Actually used in the real world as a sort of metaphysical heart of Himmler's SS.

  I usually don't bother to cite the sources I have plundered for game material... But I was very inspired by the quantity and quality of material relating to "The Black Book" (Von Unausspreclichen Kulten OR Of Unspeakable Cults)which was researched and invented (with a seamless combination of the two) by the creator of this site: http://www.rehtwogunraconteur.com/
  I am an an occasional visitor to the site, which is all about Robert Howard, but had somehow missed the six part series on Jon Junzt and Von Unausspreclichen Kulten.

Naturally, I'll be reinterpreting things to suit my campaign...