Chapter 3: Now It Begins

[Silver Priest]

"Do you know a Nina Williams Hope?" Henry asks, ignoring the man's theatrics.

[HoneyDog]

Harrison, “It’s difficult to estimate his age” says the doctor. “I would say in his seventies, but we’ll know more once he’s able to move around. As for the deformity, it’s probably some kind of birth defect.”

The man’s breathing is shallow, and he begins to cough. The doctor shoos everyone out of the room into the corridor, while he goes to check on the patient.

[Mr. Handy]

"Is Bishop someone's name?" asks Alice. "Or is it a title? Or something else?"

[Philulhu]

OOC, Apologies - I missed the update! :o

Bruce arrived looking somewhat flustered. ”Sorry, I’m late. Had a tutorial session I couldn’t put off. What have I missed?”

[SunlessNick]

"A name I'd guess," Emily says to Alice. "I can't imagine him having run into an actual bishop out there."

"Hi," she says to Bruce. "There's been a murder. A Mrs Hope, and the police think Mr Atwater did it - they have a description. We tried talking to this man again, and he said 'Bishop.'"

[Mr. Handy]

"We can see if there's a Bishop family in Arkham," says Alice. "If there are, they'd probably be in the telephone directory."

[Philulhu]

”That seems as good a place as any to start,” replied Bruce. ”They should have a directory in the main office. Hopefully they’ll allow us to use it.”

[HoneyDog]

A quick search of the telephone directory finds no entries for anyone called Bishop.

[Mr. Handy]

"Maybe we should check the historical records," suggests Alice. "They might not live here any more, but maybe they used to in the past. Or maybe they simply don't have a telephone. There are still folks who don't."

[aine]

“The chap pointed at Alice when he cried ‘Bishop’. Do you have any connection to the clergy, Miss Stanton? Maybe an ancestor in the civil war?” Fort asks her.

[Mr. Handy]

"I think he was more reaching out to me," says Alice. "In any case, I don't know of any clergy in my family. I had great-grandfathers in the Civil War, but most of us probably did."

[Silver Priest]

"This is all so strange," Henry says. "My only suggestion would be looking for churches in the area that have bishops. Perhaps he blames one of them for his plight for some reason." He frowns; he knows it's a long shot and hates it, unaccustomed to not having the answer.

[HoneyDog]

“Did you see any mention of a Bishop in the books in Mrs. Hope’s library?” asks Harden.

[Mr. Handy]

"No, I'd have remembered if I had," says Alice. "Of course, we didn't have time to read through them all. Now that we know what to look for, maybe we can find references by skimming through them, but that would still take time, and it's a longshot."

[Philulhu]

”It’s worth a shot,” said Bruce. ”It must have meant something to him, whoever he is!”

[HoneyDog]

“Head back there, then. I’m going to see if I can find out anything at the station” Harden informs the investigators.

The companions return to the Hope house and its library. The police activity has ceased, although there is still an officer on the door, who lets them in.
The library is as they left it, with the books piled into categories, and the blood splattered pile sitting by itself.

[Mr. Handy]

"Let's start with the bloodstained books," says Alice. "He seemed to be interested in those."

[HoneyDog]

OOC, All can roll Cthulhu Mythos, if you have it.

Most of the books are novels, which Atwater must have picked up just to move them out of the way, but one book in particular has more blood than the others. It is a diary, a century old, with torn and mangled pages resulting from it being flung into a corner. An endpaper identifies it as “The Booke of Thoughts of Ethan Williams, for the Year of Our Lord 1814". The writing is hard to decipher and the language slightly archaic.

OOC, This book will take about 6 hours to read and requires a successful English or INTx3 roll to decipher the text.

[Mr. Handy]

Alice hasn't seen anything like this before. Since she has a degree in English and has mastered the language, she volunteers to read the book. The archaic language is not hard for her to understand.

[Starspawn338]

Reading arcane english texts is something Harrison has a lot of practice in and he makes himself at home and begins going through the books.

OOC:   I don't have Cthulhu Mythos skill yet but I got an extreme success reading.