Episode 10 - Under the Floorboards - October 6, 2024

Cast of Characters

Player	Character	Background
John	Keeper	Bringer of torment and delights
Todd	Lawrence “Skinny Larry” Simons	Inventor, saxophonist, and engineer
Eric	Father Gerald “Gentleman Jerry” O’Shea	Catholic priest, former bare-knuckles boxer
Cyle	Aaron Winters	Occultist
Eli	Dr. Kenneth Filmore	Wealthy medical doctor and neurosurgeon

Not Present

Player	Character	Background
Scott	Ritter Gunter “Stig” von Stiglitz	Former German POW

Journal

Monday January 19, 1925

From the journal of Lawrence Simons

The Morning

We have finally accepted that our old friend Oxford “Ox” Sykes will not be joining us on our current explorations. However, I learned that Dr. Filmore, the surgeon assigned to the Lyon Field Hospital that I met during the war, was also a friend of Jackson Elias. He arrived in Manhattan today, and we were reacquainted at the Ramsey Law Office. More on that in a bit.

After breakfast, we pursued two parallel lines of investigation.

Jerry went to the New York Public Library in search of any references to the Cult of the Bloody Tongue. But he found none.

Meanwhile, Aaron and I went to the Juju House to scope it out. It’s at 132nd and Ransom Court. Inside was an old man in a red blanket, who we assumed must be Silas N’Kwame, the Mombasan owner we had heard about. He seemed forthcoming enough with information, and we learned that Dr. Mordecai Lemming is a regular buyer of his merchandise. Lemming lives at the Murray Hill Hotel, and is a crackpot. Ahja Singh is his supplier. Some of Juju’s products are local, some imported. The store is open from 9am to 5pm each day except Sunday, and closed from noon to 1pm for lunch. We got the impression that Mr. N’Kwame’s home is adjacent to his shop, through the door we noticed behind the counter.

Unexpected Reunion

After a lunch of pastrami sandwiches, we met at the Ramsey Law Office, and that’s when we met up with Dr. Filmore for the first time in several years. Mr. Ramsey shared a nice bottle of bourbon, to accompany the reading of the will. But rather than reading the will itself, Mr. Ramsey instead read a letter that Elias had written for us, before his death. He sensed he was in great danger, and updated his affairs with his lawyer only a day before he was killed.

The Final Letter from Jackson Elias

Greetings from beyond the grave!

By now you know that all I’ve really left you is a whole heap of trouble. If I were still around to have an opinion on the matter, I would understand if you decided to walk away from it all. Hell, if I’m dead right now, that’s a good indication I should have done the same. But you know me too well, and I know you too well. If you were the kind of person who always did the sensible thing we wouldn’t be such good friends.

You have been there when I needed you in the past and I hope you will be again, even if it’s too late to save me. I’ve been pulling threads all over the world, and while most of them are still unravelling I think I’m onto something big. Carlton and Jonah can fill in more of the details for you - I’ve left some of my papers and notes with them, which should help you work out which hornets nests you need to poke next.

I trust you to bring my killers to justice. Of course, I’m assuming I was murdered - it will be just plain embarrassing if was run over by a trolley car! Follow my investigation to its bloody end, and seek out the truth. I’m not asking you to finish my book — none of you can write worth a damn.

Your friend always,

Jackson

Final Letter from Jackson Elias

The Rest of the Details

Ramsey is now in charge of what remains in Elias’ bank account. Jackson appointed him as a trustee for it, and wants the money to be used by us to continue his investigations. We decided to name this venture The Good Friends of Jackson Elias, Inc..

At this point, we have the following obvious areas of investigation ahead of us:

• Miss Carlyle in NYC
• Break into Juju House to look at the business’ books (and maybe discover who their biggest customers are)
• Visit the Harvard Library to find out more about the missing book
• Prepare for the upcoming eclipse, and another possible murder

That Night

Once things wrapped up at the law office, we went to the Juju House to stake it out. We saw Silas leaving the place, and sent Stig to follow Silas, with instructions to make sure he doesn’t come back in under an hour.

Before breaking into the Juju House, we noticed a locked door in the alley that Aaron was able to pick. We snuck inside and found that it’s the abandoned storefront of a former pawn shop - two rooms with some basic cabinets, desks, etc. There’s nothing of interest here, but it could be a handy place for us to stake out Juju House.

Then we proceeded to the Juju House. Aaron’s lockpicking skills were not on display, and he had to break the lock to get in. Father Jerry stayed outside as a guard, while Aaron, Dr. Filmore (Kenny), and I went into the store. I took the business ledger and stuffed it in my satchel, to be analyzed later. Aaron spotted a fancy Bloody Tongue headpiece, and took that. When he realized the red ribbon had been replaced by a real human tongue, I think he turned even whiter than normal. Kenny found a trap door under the rug, which revealed stone stairs leading 20 feet down.

There were strange runes and symbols carved onto the walls. Kenny took some etchings, while I took a photo or two. That led to a locked reinforced door with straps and bars and some different carvings. Again, Kenny took etchings and I took a photo. Nobody could get the lock open, so we took the pins out of the hingest, allowing us to open the door from the other side.

This led to a large room with a 15’ high ceiling. It was made of very nice dressed stone, and reminded me of a courthouse or Freemason lodge. There were torches on the walls, and a circular stone block on the floor with a cranked chain to lift it. I played the “Skinny Larry” card, and got Kenny and Aaron to lift the block up. It revealed an 8’ diameter pit.

Inside the pit was something unnatural. I didn’t see it, but I heard it. The shrieking was worse than a dozen French soldiers walking into a surprise cloud of mustard gas. Aaron viewed it from above. He later described it a “large, amorphous blob, covered in human faces.” Frankly, I think this… creature, or whatever you want to call it… had an impact on his famously unflappable “there’s a scientific explanation for everything” attitude. He got a couple of photos. I could barely stand the horrible screams from the thing, so we headed out just as quick as we could.

But on the way out, Aaron stirred up four things. People? Creatures? They moved, looked, and smelled like the animated dead. Each of the four had scars on their heads in the same pattern as those that the assassins carved into Jackson’s head on his death bed. I made a quick photograph of them as well. I hope these photographs come out well.

We rushed back up the stairs, and realized that there is really no way to hide the break-in. We couldn’t put the stone lid back on the pit without confronting the undead guardians and the horrible noise. And we didn’t stop to put the door back on its hinges. So, since it’s going to be obvious someone broke in to the Juju House, I decided to try to mislead whoever visits next. I wrote a short note and left it on the counter. It says, “The deal is off. Robson.”

The Deal is Off

Gentleman Jerry’s Conjectures and Musings

Today is the day of the reading of Jackson’s will. The Eclipse is a week away, Monday the 24th. Ach! What a great day that would be for a sacrifice. We need to find a place that evening to lie in wait.

Oh, I returned my two library books. We have a slip of paper describing a book that Jackson wanted, that was missing from the Miskatonic College (?) Library. No details regarding its name, author, nor date of publication.

Some of the others went to the Ju-Ju place, in the mouth of an alleyway, W 137th street. Lots of tenements and a small square. The shop had some pieces of art, masks, and fetishes in the window. They tell me they were served by a short, dark, shriveled old man wrapped in a red blanket. The shop dealt with the sale of “Imports and Art”.

The man described the crazy guy we already knew about, don’t scold me for the spelling. “Murderkeing Lemming”. Maybe some tie to E 40th and Park Ave, the Murray Hill Hotel. This crazy guy was interested in fetishes, anthropology, and religions (of the African Continent, I’d guess).

I think they said the shriveled guy’s name is Silas Kwami. Larry showed me the stuffed snake he bought. I think it’s pretty nice. The shop is open from 9-5 with a break from 12-1, closed Sunday. I wonder if Silas is a church-going man? Oh, we found out he lives in a room in the back of the shop.

Over at Ramsey and his Secretary’s, 124th and Lennox, we all showed up for the reading of the will. Elias had left us a note. He wanted us to investigate and retrace the steps of the doomed Carlysle expedition, and we’d be provided “all paid expenses” - within reason.

Here are the names of the explorers:

• Carlysle
• Anhew (Bert or Brnt - what did I write here?)
• Huskam (Psych)
• Hypatia Master (Archivist)
• Jack Brady (Friend)

We went and waited for Silas to go out that night, and sure enough he did; Stig told us he went out for dinner. Across the alley was a padlocked door that led to a vacant Pawn Shop. I wandered down to the local church while the rest explored it, to pay my respects to the local Padre. I dropped some coins in the poor box and returned to the alley and waited outside in case Silas or that shaved headed guy showed up while my friends were inside the Ju-Ju House. They showed me a headband they found with a human tongue instead of the cloth ribbon. They grabbed his ledger, too. They pulled back the rug and found a trap door, went down stone stairs and popped the hinges on a stout door. It has weird symbols on it which they made a “rub” of and photographed.

They winched up a stone plug, revealing an oily black fleshy thing with shrieking human faces, and were approached by four zombies, disemboweled with that carving thing on their foreheads. They snapped some photos and skedaddled.

I bet the folks that had disappeared over the years were made into zombies or absorbed by the hideous fleshy thing.