I will recount the events of the last week in this place so that those who have access to these reports will know of the horrors that my companions and I have encountered over the last week. I was called north to Liverpool to attend the funeral of an old childhood friend, Robert Tyler, by his mother Jennifer Monroe Tyler. Robert had been killed in a car accident in Liverpool the week before, and conversations at the funeral discovered that his body had been burnt in the accident, beyond recognition as it later turned out. Mrs. Tyler was extremely distressed, as would be expected at the funeral of her own son, although it also transpired that her relationship with Robert had deteriorated in the weeks and months before his death; it was even commented on that he appeared to be having a nervous breakdown of some kind.

The funeral was initially disrupted when a disreputable tramp attempted to force his way into the service at the Old Mill Cemetery, but he was speedily ejected by the owner, Mr. Myers. Mr. Myers was however powerless to prevent the second interruption. When Mrs. Tyler paid her respects to the coffin, she broke down completely and refused to let go of it. In the ensuing confusion, the coffin was jostled and fell off the platform. As it hit the ground it broke open and revealed that it contained not Robert but a pile of bricks.

Obviously at that point the place collapsed into pandemonium. Mr. Myers rapidly took charge and the police were summoned. When they arrived, a detective sergeant and two uniformed constables they asked the crowd to leave and started interviewing Mr. Myers.

Leaving the funeral home, I fell in with a set of other friends of Robert's from long ago. One of the, a journalist named Marilyn Mason, confided that Mrs. Tyler has requested to her that she should try to find out what had happened to her son's body. Another, a private investigator named Thomas, disclosed that in his opinion, My Myers was not as surprised as he might have been under the circumstances. We returned to my hotel and discussed what we could do in this most curious situation.

Marilyn and Thomas decided to drive over to the Tyler house to try to talk at more length to Mrs. Tyler, especially in the light of this reported break down of Robert's. I was persuaded, against my better judgment to return to the funeral home and conduct my own interview with Mr. Myers, along with Declan, a driver I had borrowed from the cousin of another friend, and Bill, another friend of Robert's.

Driving back to the funeral home, we arrived after dark to find that the police detective was still present. As we approached he spoke to us and asked us not to bother the Myers that evening. I was insistent and he became quite forceful. At this point Declan indicated to me that he felt that all was not right. As I continued to insist to the policemen that I had a perfect right as a law-abiding citizen to talk to Mr. Myers, the sergeant pulled a pistol on me. As he walked me back towards my car, Declan punched him from behind. The gun went off, but fortunately missed me entirely. The policeman had dropped to the floor and as he did so Bill fired from behind the car, hitting him in the stomach. As he died he muttered something about Robert being back with his family.

Declan said that had noticed a stain on his trouser hem which turned out to be blood. While Declan removed the body, we entered the vestibule of the funeral home. The chapel was empty and its two side doors locked. Leaving Declan at the foot of the stairs, Bill and I ventured up. The bathroom and dining room upstairs were empty, as was the study. A door from the study led into a bedroom and lying in the centered of the bed spread-eagled we saw the body of Mr. Myers, a knife thrust into his chest and blood pouring onto the floor. As Bill and I entered the room, there was a terrifying scream and a woman burst from a cupboard and slashed at Bill with a dagger. I turned and shone my torch into her face to blind her; Bill, already carrying his pistol, reflexively shot her straight through the forehead, killing her instantly.

The knife turned out to be similar to that in Mr Myers chest and was of a curious, bone-handled form. The bone was almost certainly human and this artifact is now deposited in the Foundation collection (FR99870). The woman, who we decided was probably Mrs. Myers was wearing a nurse's uniform from the Holy Cross hospital. A picture hung upon the wall above the bed, depicting a naked woman twined with snakes hanging upside down from a tree above a swamp.

At this point Declan, who had joined us upon hearing the noise of the shot, thought he heard a noise from the lower floor of the building. I opened the window of the building and looked out, but could see nothing. We proceeded to the head of the stairs and again all of us thought that we could hear the sound of stealthy movement downstairs. We were all understandably shaken up by what we had seen and by the death not only of a woman but of a policeman as well, no matter that he was obviously implicated in the events upstairs. In this frame of mind we were anxious not to be apprehended at the scene of this crime, where our explanations to the contrary, we would almost certainly be accused of a most grisly set of murders. Our conviction would have been almost inescapable and the murder of a policeman would no doubt carry the gravest sentence itself. Under these circumstances I think we can be forgiven for having 'hot-footed it' from the premises as rapidly as possible. As it turned out, being arrested for murder might have been preferable to what might have awaited us had we remained.

Returning to our hotel, we discovered that the other two had not returned from Mrs. Tyler's, so we proceeded in that direction despite the hour. We found them in possession of the house, Mrs. Tyler having retired for the night and the housekeeper not being present. They had their own discoveries to recount, less active than ours but no less interesting.

Mrs. Tyler had not been very forthcoming over her relationships with her son, but had allowed us the run of the house while she was in the Lake District, whence she intended to proceed the following morning. Her son's door was locked and she had no key, but a search discovered a copy on the housekeeper's spare bunch in the kitchen. His room, which we re-examined when we were reunited, provided a number of clues. In the wastepaper basket were a number of burnt fragments of paper, including his birth certificate (all these fragments have been deposited in the archives TR66542). There were a number of names on these fragments including Albe(rt) (Mr Myers' first name), Wilkins and (Old) Mill Cem(etery). On the windowsill were five almost finished pots of face cream. On his bookshelf were a number of occult tomes, either concentrating on Changelings and Doppelgangers, or on Necrophagia and Ghouls.

Discussion of the events of the day occupied us most of the night, and thus we slept late. When we awoke, a brief scan of the papers revealed that no hue and cry had been raised over the murder of a policeman and the only item relating to our activities was a piece about the disappearance of Mr. and Mrs. Albert Myers, of the Old Mill Cemetery. The disappearance of so many bodies in such a short time, coupled with the noises we had heard as we fled and the reading matter of the late Robert Tyler produced a conclusion in our minds almost too horrific to contemplate. We were forced into the putative conclusion that the cemetery was itself a haven for these ghouls that lived upon the flesh of the dead and that Robert Tyler had either become one of their victims or, given the dying words of the policemen, had become one himself. Such a conclusion was not to be borne without further evidence and so we once more returned to the increasingly sinister Old Mill Cemetery.

It was mid-afternoon by the time we arrived and having discovered that the area was unpopulated, we proceeded to search the cemetery for other tombs of the Tyler family, or given the information that Thomas had gleaned from Robert's books on the subject, any tomb that might conceal an entrance to the subterranean realm of these necrophagites. The search was interrupted however by Thomas spotting the old tramp that had attempted to gain entry to the funeral. Suspecting that he might be linked to the affair we gave chase to him, but he proved to be almost inhumanly agile as he loped across the tombs and over the cemetery wall. Thomas, who had been closest to him, confirmed that indeed he had given a most bestial snarl as he was spotted and it was difficult to avoid the conclusion that we might just have escaped an encounter with one of these ghouls. By the time we reached the wall ourselves he (or it) had completely disappeared.

We now determined to continue a search of the funeral home that had been interrupted the previous evening. The home was now locked but Thomas proved adroit at removing that obstacle and we easily entered. The upper floor proved little different from the previous night, saving the absence of all three bodies, although a brown stain upon the bedroom carpet showed that we had not dreamed the whole episode. The picture, although disturbing, proved otherwise unremarkable.

Downstairs, the two side doors from the chapel, which had been locked the previous evening, proved to be open. The right hand door merely gave upon a janitor's closest by the left hand revealed a spiral staircase descending into the depths. Nervously mindful that we were entering the natural domain of our foe we descended. The first room we entered was obviously intended for the normal preparation of cadavers for display to grieving relatives. Off this was a storeroom containing a number of empty coffins and barrels of formaldehyde, also the mechanism for cranking caskets into place upon the dais in the chapel above. The last room was an office; three filing cabinets contained mundane records of burials. At this point we decided that there appeared to be little of interest here and it would be better to return to Liverpool, as the evening was drawing on and we had had little sleep the previous night. As we left the building we became aware that we were not alone. Several pale and indistinct shaped could be seen lurking or moving through the bushes on either side of the path. Our nerves at full stretch we realised that it was very likely that these creatures we the ghouls we feared and that they had decided that we knew too much and it was time to eliminate us. With weapons drawn we rapidly moved to our cars. Our position became even worse when we discovered that our cars had been broken into. A quick look revealed that the engines had been sabotaged. We were trapped with these demons of the night. We considered the walk through the rain to the next habitation and whether we would survive the attack that must come upon the lonely moor. The funeral home, vulnerable as it was next to their stronghold, must be more defensible. Screwing our courage to the sticking point we ran the gauntlet of these horrific creatures whose inhuman twittering could now be heard from every side as we returned to the house. The first floor of the house was rapidly discarded as a fortress; there were too many windows and these creatures had already shown that they could climb with ease. The only refuge was the basement. There was only one entrance that we knew of and it was narrow and easily defended. The only worry was that the ghouls had secret passages or could burrow in. To this end, leaving Declan to guard the foot of the staircase, we carefully examined the rooms we had only cursorily examined earlier. A shallow depression in the wall turned out to be a switch that allowed the filing cabinets to pivot out from the wall, revealing an entrance. We entered and were confronted by a chamber whose horror cannot be reproduced in words. Marilyn collapsed from the terror and was carried from it. The floor underfoot was carpeted with human bones. The walls were festooned with skin and entrails. Two bodies hung from hooks in the ceiling, decomposing and suppurating; obviously these creatures preferred their meat tender. An altar constructed of broken tombstones stood at the back of the room, next to a walled up passageway; upon it rested two candles and a book. Feverishly, my curiosity overcoming my fear, I recovered the book. Its cover, I detachedly noticed, was covered with what was almost certainly human skin, its condition was tattered and poor. The title was upon the first moldering page - Culte des Ghoules and the rest of the book also unfortunately turned out to be in that tongue, which I had not learnt in my quest for more obscure languages. Still I took it and placed it upon my person, for it was obviously a tome of importance. I have it before me now as I write this and I have placed it in the Foundation library for safekeeping; its translation into a more useful language will hopefully be a priority for the Foundation (catalogue number ZS00451).

We rapidly left this chamber, fearing an attack from the ghouls, but not before Thomas had noticed that all the gravestones that formed the altar were from the same family, the Wilkins family, a name familiar from the burnt scraps of paper in Robert Tyler's wastepaper basket. We tried to re-lock the secret door but were unable to, the locking catch obviously being hidden to our perception, so we pressed the desk up against it in an effort to prevent ingress by that route. Thus equipped we spend a watchful night, in fear of our lives for every moment.

The next morning we were amazed to find ourselves unassaulted and thus we cautiously made our way through the deserted but almost certainly watchful graveyard to our cars. Repairing one, we returned to Liverpool thanking God for our miraculous escape. Marilyn was much improved but it was obvious that her nerves would not stomach another shock. We therefore placed her upon the morning train to London, with instructions to proceed to the Registry of Births, Marriages and Deaths and obtain a copy of Robert Tyler's birth certificate. We spent the morning asleep and the afternoon in the local library where we discovered that the Wilkins had been a notable local family and that they had a mausoleum at the Old Mill Cemetery, one of the earliest in fact.

That afternoon, Marilyn telephoned from London with the most interesting information. She had obtained a copy of the birth certificate and there were two interesting facts. The doctor who had attended the birth was his uncle, Thomas Tyler, and more significantly, the witness was a certain Margaret Myers, nurse at the Holy Cross hospital. Here was a link indeed. The very same woman appeared to be intimately involved in both his birth and death. A visit was made to the Holy Cross hospital but little was found that was out of the ordinary.

The next morning therefore we proceeded once again to the Old Mill Cemetery. We easily found the Wilkins tomb and quickly gained entry past the rusting lock. The tomb itself was empty of coffins or sarcophagi but we easily found a concealed hatch under a pivoting paving stone in the floor. A passage was revealed to us, no doubt leading to the lair of these dreadful creatures, but at this point our courage failed us. The thought of once more confronting them, not in the open air but in these closed tunnels, in the dark and on their home territory was too much for us. Heaven knew how many of these creatures there were down there, we felt we had discovered enough.

The conclusions were inescapable. Robert Tyler's reading matter and his birth certificate, the changes wrought upon him in the last few months of his 'life' pointed to him not being Robert Tyler at all, but the offspring, generated by who knows what foul method, of these creatures, these ghouls, swapped at birth or soon after by Mrs. Myers, the nurse supposedly dedicated to the preservation of life but in fact worshipping these creatures of death. Whether or not her husband knew of her activities we knew not; his ritual death suggested that he was an innocent front man for her activities who had then been eliminated when he had started to guess at the truth, whatever that was. The policeman must also have been part of the cult, whether it was chance or plan that meant that it was he who answered the call from the cemetery we never investigated. The two human protagonists were dead; justice, of a sort, had been served. The ghouls we had not confronted but we knew not what magics would required, what silver bullets or charmed water we would require. Perhaps the Culte des Ghouls, when translated, will answer such questions and then another group, better prepared than us and more served with courage in the face of the inhuman could clean this scourge from the earth.

Mrs. Tyler, obviously, we could not help. The truth, as we saw it, about her son would either be too incredible for her to believe and thus she would think we were mocking her in her mourning, or if she did believe would be the final blow that would shatter what grip on life and happiness she had. Better by far, although she could not realise it, that she should remain in ignorance of the fate of her son; let her believe his body stolen and misused, she could never conceive anything as terrible as the misuse it was suffering; let her even believe him still alive and even hope that he might return. We could of course have lied and contrived some story that might have satisfied her as to his fate, to do such, however kind it might seem in the circumstances, would have been a course of action I could never have allowed myself to take.

The books and artifacts associated with this account are now deposited by my hand here at the Foundation. Due to the confessions contained in this document as to activity which, no matter how justified in the name of divine justice and common decency, would be misconstrued by the authorities, I will decline to attach my name to this account, lest it should fall into the wrong hands. You may however rest assured on the word of a gentleman, no matter how obscured, that all the events I have recorded are the honest truth, no matter how fantastic they may appear. I can only hope that the accompanying artifacts will help to verify my claims.

Given by my own hand on this fourteenth day of November in the year of Our Lord 1921.

It was the autumn of 192- when I received a letter from an old friend of my uncle’s who had known him since Oxford days. I was in Boston at the time for the establishment of the Joplin house as the American headquaters of the Foundation and the letter was postmarked from Montreal in Canada. The author, who I vaguely knew from when I was very young, announced that he had taken holy orders recently and was now the resident of the parish of St Cutis in the city of Montreal. He declared that he needed investigative skills such as my uncle had possessed. He was aware that the foundation that bore his name was dedicated to such endeavours and so asked us to come to Montreal and aid him in the uncovering of a mystery that he thought would amaze and astound us.

Although there was much to organise at the Joplin House, my curiosity was somewhat piqued. I rapidly chose a small investigative party from the assembled notables. I took Declan O’Saunassey, my uncle’s faithful manservant and chauffeur, to provide that protection that any lady should have while travelling in the wilds of the colonies. Sebastian Ashley was unfortunately delayed in England, but two recommendations of his were now members of the Foundation. Although inexperienced, I decided that this investigation would be a good chance for them to develop their interests and abilities. In addition a Southern gentleman, an aquaintance of Henry Goulding’s, also accompanied us, although I found his manner and familiarity rather overbearing after a while.

We took the Canadian Pacific railway (or railroad to our American cousins) from Boston to Montreal. Our journey was brief, but not altogether without incident. During the journey, we became aware of a fracas between a young lady, obviously of some bearing, and a large and brutish man in the clothing of a conductor employed by the railway. The altercation appeared to be proceeding to violence, so I requested that Declan and the others should intervene in order to ensure that no harm was done to a member of our fairer sex. When they intervened, the conductor turned upon them and beat them off with almost inhuman strength, or so I am assured. As he sought to make his escape down the carriage, I was fortunate to have upon me a small revolver, which I carry for just such occasions. I ‘let off a couple of rounds’ as the Americans would say, and was fortunate not to hit any bystanders. The conductor leapt from the moving train, hitting the ground without injury, and hobbled off into the trees.

The young lady was considerably distressed by the attack that had taken place and I hastened to comfort her, assisted a little to closely by our American cousin who had obviously taken a certain shine to the young lady (as indeed he appeared to do to any young lady of more than average prettyness). As the young lady recovered, she thanked us for our kindness in rescuing her and explained that she was Celine Lavoie. When this appeared to make little impression, she explained that she was an actress of some repute in North America and that her family, the Lavoies, controlled the McTavish distillery, one of the largest in Canada. It was Marilyn who pointed out, sooto voce, that it was also regarded as one of the main bootleggers of illicit spirits into the tiresomely dry United States. Celine appeared overcome by gratitude and insisted that we should pay a call when we arrived in Montreal.

Upon arrival in Montreal a friend of Father Philip McBride, our correspondant, met us. He explained that we would be staying in the parish house, attached to the parish church of St Cutis.

New York was swinging, despite Prohibition. If you knew where to find it liquor was easy to find, and I knew where to find it. I wasn’t meant to be in New York, but in Boston, my sister had invited me, but Boston didn’t swing like the Big Apple did. Without Major Westland around, life was a ball. Unfortunately, like all good things, it had to come to an end. In this case it was yet another telegram from my sister, this time from Montreal, which at least made a difference from the pile I had accumulated from Boston. This time too it sounded a lot more desperate. The other ones had been orders to attend, the way only a big sister can. This was more of a plea for help, or so it sounded to me. Call me a sucker but family is family, especially in times of need. I caught the next sleeper to Montreal.

I had never been to Canada before, but Montreal looked quaint. And the men were swoonsomely French, with the accent and everything. Obviously there was stuff going on as well, because when I caught up with Adele she was convalescing after having been beaten up in a fight outside a nightclub. A nightclub and Adele, it really didn’t sound likely, especially the sort of nightclub run by mobsters where fights are part of the evenings entertainment. Maybe Montreal wouldn’t be that boring after all. Turned out as well that she had hit it off with some liquor heiress name of Celine Lavoie. That couldn’t be all bad either I though, although Adele reckoned she didn’t all add up and nor did her family. It all sounded terribly exciting – gun battles and giant hounds and eeriely preserved bodies and human sacrifice. Just the sort of stuff a girl needs to keep boredom from the door. Adele was in no fit state to have a bath let alone a ball, so I guessed that I had better just take her place.

The friends that she was with were all from the Foundation. Declan was there, strong and silent as usual. A couple of new guys, Bill and Thomas, from England. And an American,, name of Jonah, who reckoned he was kind of a hit with the ladies. I thought I would wait and see how he measured up. Plus he seemed to be trying to get involved with Celine Lavoie. She didn’t seem to measure up to much but then I guess you don’t have to when you own half of Canada, for what that’s worth. It turned out that they had got involved with some old friend of Uncle Mark’s, name of Father Philip McBride. He had dug up some old body in his church, which he reckoned was a saint. Then he had disappeared, as had the body. Some guys had broken in to the paridh house one night and carried it off. Declan had chased them but reckoned that the elephant man attacked him out of the mist and his bullets just bounced off. Another guy had tried to break into the safe in the study, but Bill had shot him. Bang…dead! I like a guy who doesn’t just stand aroud and think for a change.

The police arrived after that – a detective called Deroz. He was pretty uptight over the stiff but we kept our never and he cooled down after a while. We didn’t mention the elephant man in case we ended up locked up. The moment he was gone we checked out and checked into a hotel down the block, with the heart from the safe.

That night we got a message and a visit at the hotel. The message was from some crazy named guy called ***. All textbook mystery stuff, fearing for his life, too dangerous to speak on the phone and the rest, but he reckoned he knew where Philip was, and would be waiting for us at the Café Minuit at 10 am the next morning. The visitor was pretty mysterious too, but then what wasn’t here. He was an old fashioned gentleman and again asked us to meet him at the hotel the next morning. He also reckoned he knew where Philip was.

Obviously I couldn’t make two meetings the next morning, so I went to the Café Minuit with Bill, leaving Thomas and Declan to meet the tall dark stranger at the hotel. The café turned out to be a cellar behind a steel door and our contact an arab. He said he had joined the Blood a few months earlier and now he wanted out. He thought it was just for fun, but had discovered it was deadly serious – I knew what it was like having been there myself. He didn’t know where Philip was, that was just a hook, but he did know that the Blood was desperate to find something called the Blessed Blade of Tsang. Apparently they wanted it for a ritual that they called the Reunion and it had the power to destroy any heart, which sounded like a useful thing to have in the present conditions. He had been asked to look for it and had discovered that a collector called DesJardin had owned it in the 1850’s. That was as far as he had got and now he was on the next train out of here. Turned out that he wasn’t though. At that point, a couple of guys and a dame came in from the back of the shop. *** went to speak to them, but we were out of our seats and through the door as he reached them and the dame slit his throat. Lucky thing we were jumpy.

The Blessed Blade of Tsang gave us a lead, so Bill and Thomas hit the library looking for information on this DesJardins character.

When we got back to the hotel, it turned out that our other visitor had stood us up. This time we got a name though, Jean-Paul Valentin, and a date for the next morning in the Place Vegen. We were running short of leads, so the guys decided that the time had come to pay another visit on the enigmatic Robert Powell. We went to his shop around dusk, to find that he had closed for the day. We tried to get in round the front by asking him about McBride, but he wouldn’t talk. Declan and Bill went around to the back and broke down the back door and Thomas broke in the front door. Inside they found Mrs Powell as well but when they tried to question Powell, things started to go wrong. From what they said, Powell started possessing them, and when he possessed them they started shooting each other. Finally the gunned Powell into unconsciousness and did a runner as the police arrived, but Declan had shot up Jonah pretty badly. The only thing they brough back was a diary of Powell’s that had been lying on the desk.

The diary entry gave us a couple of leads, but I had an appointment with M. Valentin so Declan, Tom, Bill and I set off for that while Skellan went down to the maritime archive to have a look for ship records from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to set if there was any trace of the Blood’s arrival in Montreal.

When we arrived at the Place we had an uncanny feeling that we were being watched, so we split up to cover the square while I went to speak to M. Valentin. We exchanged pleasantries and I asked after Philip McBride. M. Valentin informed me that he was safe but in the Verdun Mental Hospital. We were discussing what he knew of the Blood and the Lords when suddenly he realised that someone across the square was observing us

Afternoon to the Mental Hospital

Key to heart stolen from Declan

Tom finds DesJardin will

Knife found at antiquarian shop

Tom and Bill break into Canterbury club

Ship manifest found at maritime archive

Address of warehouse

Heart is stolen

Next day

Check out owner of warehouse

Scout warehouse

Valentin’s warning

Case warehouse

The showdown