The cult of the Great Mother is well-established here in Oxmoor, and the investigators need to find out whom they can trust. The notes written by Professor Ragnarsson’s murderer indicated that the cult is seeking a book at the Westmont estate. Finding that book will be the key to the investigators’ next steps, but time is of the essence: the cult is preparing to summon an eldritch horror from ages long forgotten.
This section includes the Westmont Estate, notes on the book, and other locations around Oxmoor.
(All page numbers refer to the Seventh Edition of the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook, published 2015 by Chaosium, Inc. I am in no way affiliated with Chaosium or the writers of the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game system. Content notes for this chapter: violence, death, murder, cult activity including blood sacrifice and implied forced pregnancy.)
Westmont Estate
The estate is visible from the town center where it sits at the top of the hill. It is about a half-hour’s walk from Oxmoor. While the garden wall and the exterior of the house are in good repair, the grounds are looking a little overgrown, and ivy covers the building.
The estate was converted from an abbey early in its history, and it maintains the solemn, contemplative air of the original structure. The original de Westemond family, ancestors of the modern Westmonts, had an estate close by, but it was abandoned in favor of the abbey shortly after the latter was granted to the family and no longer exists. The first floor consists of an entry hall, the kitchen and enormous dining room, and a sitting room. There is a grand staircase up to the second floor, which has the family’s bedrooms and a sizable library, as well as a study. The third floor has a few more bedrooms as well as the servants’ quarters. Antique weapons, tapestries depicting fairy tales and medieval festivals, and portraits of ancestors line the walls, and heirloom suits of armor stand guard at the corners of hallways. Aurelia, a lonely and eccentric child, named all the suits of armor: they are Franklin, Godfrey, Wilbert, Ferdinand, Armando, Lancelot, and Percival.
Aurelia is the only surviving Westmont living at the estate. She is eighteen years old and lives with only the sizable staff. She was orphaned at a young age (a boating accident) and raised by her grandparents, Lord Gordon and Lady Elizabeth Westmont, who have recently passed away as well.
The butler, Jonathan, answers the door. Inside, the austere atmosphere of the estate is broken up by concentrated bursts of activity as the staff works to prepare the house for Aurelia’s debut ball in the spring. The carpets must be cleaned, the tapestries mended, the swords, armor, and cutlery polished, and the entire house dusted from top to bottom. It has not yet been decided whether the hedges will be pruned in time. Aurelia divides her time between helping with the household preparations and the endless dress fittings and dancing lessons that must be completed before the event.
Many centuries ago, this branch of Westmonts were prominent cult members and magic users, wielding their position in society to gather victims for the cult, including their own daughters and daughters-in-law. One such daughter, Estrilda de Westemond, rebelled against the cult and used magic to seal the well on the island in the late 1200s, which stopped the cult for several centuries. Her actions also caused her descendents to abandon the cult, and by the time the family moved into the current estate, they had disavowed any connection to it. Now, after the Great War and the stars coming into alignment again, the cult is regathering and the well has been reopened. Her spell is replicated in the Westmont text, which is the book that the cult is seeking in Oxmoor. The investigators will need to find it first.
Aurelia Westmont, eccentric heiress
Aurelia is delighted to have visitors (particularly her cousin Eloise), and will be eager to show the investigators around the estate. She is a charming young woman whose hairstyle and clothing are at least ten years out of date—both her hair and her dress are very long.
Her Aunt Eleanor from York is arranging her debut, and visits once a month or so to check on her progress. While Aurelia is eager to participate, she seems much too young to be thinking about marriage—in fact, she seems only somewhat aware that a debut is supposed to lead to a marriage and is not just an enormous party. The preparations are a welcome break from the monotony of her usual life, and that seems to be her primary focus.
Aurelia will at first be skeptical that a mysterious, evil cult could be working in Oxmoor, of all places, but she is inclined to find the investigators trustworthy. She has no idea what the cult could be searching for at the estate, but will help find it as best she can. She is terribly lonely and bored, and will want the investigators to stay for dinner.
Facts and Clues:
- Aurelia was kept deliberately ignorant of her family’s history, as are most Westmont descendants (including any investigators bearing the name). Her grandfather Gordon was one of the last few who knew about the cult and the book.
- She has very little interaction with the townsfolk, so she can offer few clues about Oxmoor itself or any cult activity there. Her grandparents kept her incredibly sheltered.
- Aurelia has never been to the Oxmoor parish church. Her grandfather used to observe Sundays and holidays by leading the family in prayer, and since his death, she has had no religious observance. Her Aunt Eleanor disapproves.
- She has at least looked at all the books in her grandfather’s library, and should be able to narrow down the selection based on any clues the investigators can provide.
- Outlandish guesses (bound in human skin, written in blood, any of the more lurid descriptions of Mythos tomes) will result in Aurelia not knowing what the investigators mean, and possibly thinking they are crazy or playing a prank.
- Odd symbols, occult diagrams, or encoded text are more helpful clues.
- Lord Gordon’s library contains a couple occult texts she will suggest to you: Isis Unveiled and The Witch-Cult in Western Europe (p. 236)
- The book the investigators are looking for, along with a number of others, was sent into town for repairs. Aurelia can give investigators a business card for the shop, called “MacDonald and Son, sales and repair.”
- The text is actually just a few pages, stitched into the back of a different book (a treatise on Gnosticism in medieval Christianity, Islam, and Judaism by a Lord William Westmont). Mentioning flowers/ “green grows the lily” can make Aurelia remember this particular book. Otherwise the investigators will have to search the entire library here before heading to the bookshop.
- When it is time for the summoning, cultists will attack the manor, kill everyone in their way, and ransack the library.
- The day before the summoning, Aurelia will notice strange men lurking outside as the cult cases out the place.
The Westmont Text
Bookshop
MacDonald and Son is a small shop on Oxmoor’s main street. There is a small desk near the door, and the rest of the space is devoted to a large work table, racks of leather and stacks of heavy paper, as well as shelves holding spools of thread, bottles of glue and ink, and jars of needles and pens. There is a small selection of books for sale up front, but the majority of the space is devoted to binding and repair. A door on the back wall leads upstairs to a small apartment.
James MacDonald, friendly neighborhood bookbinder
James is the “son” in Macdonald and Son, and he is in his early 30s, bespectacled and bookishly handsome. He served in the war as a medic, being an avowed pacifist, and his father retired and left him the shop when he returned. He does not have the same head for business as his father, but he does have an even greater love for old books.
Having traveled around Scotland and England, and abroad during the war, he finds Oxmoor very quaint, though he enjoys the peace and quiet of small-town life. He makes his living mostly by repairing family Bibles and other heirlooms from Oxmoor and the surrounding villages, as well as selling a few popular titles he has shipped from York (these can include Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan the Terrible, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Flappers and Philosophers, Baroness Orczy’s The First Sir Percy, and Aldous Huxley’s Crome Yellow).
James may find himself smitten with an investigator.
Facts and Clues:
- James received the book in question, along with several other volumes from the Westmont estate last week, and he has just finished the repairs.
- He will remark on the unusual addendum to the Gnostic text, but point out that it was added almost as long ago as the original text was printed.
- The addendum, James believes, has been copied and recopied again and again over the centuries. This version is perhaps a hundred or a hundred fifty years old, and he guesses that the original was a manuscript, though he cannot estimate a date for it with the information he has. He thinks of himself as the latest in a line of craftsmen to work on this book, and he is very honored.
- The new binding is rich brown leather, plain and respectable. When he received it, it was little more than a collection of loose papers between two crumbling covers.
- He will remark on the unusual addendum to the Gnostic text, but point out that it was added almost as long ago as the original text was printed.
- Though he is accustomed to reading archaic prose and old-fashioned typesetting and handwriting, he made little sense of the addendum to the text, as it seems so incongruous with the rest of the book. He can go over it again with the investigators if they ask him.
- After raiding the Westmont estate for the book and not finding it, the cultists will then raid the bookshop and the upstairs apartment, killing James if he is present.
The Westmont Text
The title page names this book “Gnostikos and the Mysteries,” and its author as Lord William Westmont. It is a rambling, often-incoherent treatise of questionable historicity, though an investigator willing to struggle through it may gain some insights on Gnostic ideas such as salvation gained through knowledge and ignorance (rather than sin) denying someone that salvation, in case they were thinking of remaining blissfully ignorant of the Cthulhu Mythos.
The last page shows a simplistic floor map of the temple under the island, overlaid with a geometric diagram of a five-pointed star contained in a pentagon, placed inside a six-pointed star contained in a hexagon. Inside this diagram is the illustration of a blooming lily. Each vertex of the diagram has a runic character inscribed beside it, and these characters are repeated in the left and right margins of the page.
The text around the diagram reads:
“A curse is upon my house, upon my father and my brothers, and upon me, for we have turned away from God the Creator and followed a path of death. By the will of my father I traveled to the hollow island, and by his will six times I drank from the well beneath the temple. Six times I have committed a mortal sin in the eyes of God and my father, but I could not allow the creatures to live. As penance I have rung the temple bell every sunset for all the years that I lived there. I have sealed the well by means of my craft, but I fear that in enough time and the efforts of evil men it may be opened again.
“The marks must be placed in the temple. The key of the hierophant is needed to unlock the inner chambers. When the marks are placed, all that is needed is to ring the temple bell, once for each year of my imprisonment.
“This is now my penance: to tell my tale to all who have ears to hear, so that if the day comes that the well is opened no others may suffer as I have suffered. May the flower planted in this terrible place bloom again when it is needed.
“May God have mercy on us all.”
Westmont Text
- Sanity Loss: 1d4
- Cthulhu Mythos: +2/+5
- Mythos Rating: N/A
- Study: 1 day/1 week
- Spells: Estrilda’s unnamed spell to seal the well.
Though the text is more or less benign, the spirit of a powerful witch is still connected to it. Estrilda tries to contact anyone who reads or attempts to perform her spell, but the connection is not clear; affected investigators will experience one or more dreams as listed in Part One of this chapter as Estrilda makes an effort to share her experiences with them. (See p. 225 of the Keeper Rulebook for more information on Mythos tomes.)
Other Oxmoor Locations
The investigators can visit different locations in Oxmoor to try to find more clues, though cultist villagers will be reluctant to speak with them and may try to encourage or threaten them to leave. It is also possible for investigators to choose not to look around and instead barricade themselves and any non-cultist residents they have found into Westmont Manor, which is what Kurt, Eloise, Iskandar, and Ernest did. [1] The Keeper should encourage players to at least investigate a little, because if they choose to hide, the summoning will take place and they will not be there to stop it. In that instance, not even the manor will be safe.
Police Office
Occupying only a single one-story building, the police precinct of Oxmoor is incredibly small compared to Scotland Yard. At this time, it only staffs three officers in addition to the sheriff, but the village is so small that it does not need any more. With the entire town being more or less under cult control, policing is not much of a concern anyway. Three of the four policemen are cultists, and they will be particularly concerned with keeping the cult’s secrets safe from outsiders. While the filing system seems thorough and well-organized, anything having to do with cult activity has been removed (or never filed in the first place). The records seem incredibly sparse, even for such a small town.
Ben became a policeman after his brother Bobby’s death a year ago, inspired by the idea of finding missing persons and protecting citizens, and has a faith in justice that borders on the naive. He has no idea that all his fellow officers are cultists, attributing his sense of being the odd one out to him being the newest and youngest member of the team. He is in his mid-twenties, with brown hair and freckles.
Facts and Clues:
- He remembers seeing the full report of his brother’s disappearance and the subsequent finding of his body, but when he looks in the files for it, it will not be there. This will be his first substantial clue that all is not as it seems in the police department.
- Bobby Corey was an intrepid amateur investigator, and he stumbled on the cult surrounding him while investigating the disappearance of a young woman from a neighboring village.
- He does acknowledge the men lurking outside the shelter, but he attributes it to a lot of people being out of work.
- Ben can be an ally to the investigators if they can convince him that they are working toward justice more so than the cult-affiliated police. Depending on how long the investigators are in town and how persuasive they are in convincing him that things are not as they seem, he may decide to join forces with the investigators. He can send them messages and arrange meetings.
Oaks is a high-ranking cult member, second only to the vicar. His job is to keep Oxmoor quiet so that the cult can do its work uninterrupted. To that end, he discourages visitors and any newcomers thinking of moving in, especially in the last few years, which is contributing to the town’s steadily failing economy.
He is a heavy-set, solidly built man in his mid-40s, with a stubbly, greying beard. While he is polite to anyone looking for information, he will be fairly obvious in his intention to get them to leave. When the investigators ask him questions, he will deny any sort of strange happenstance ever occurring in Oxmoor, and will direct the investigators elsewhere, to one of the surrounding villages or even to York, the closest major city. He will treat the investigators as though they are here to cause trouble. He is gruff but friendly to the people he knows, and his usual work involves the occasional person being drunk and disorderly, emergency response to fires or injuries, or settling rare disputes between townsfolk.
Facts and Clues:
- Oaks himself was the man who killed Bobby Corey, though he told Ben that his brother’s body was found in a ravine outside the village.
- Oaks has been a cultist most of this life, but the cult was inactive until shortly before Ragnarsson’s discovery of the island and his expedition. Oaks worships the great mother without any Christian syncretism, which is a practice followed by the minority of Oxmoor cultists.
- When settling disputes, he always rules in favor of what is good for the cult.
- While Ben Corey is not slated to be sacrificed, Oaks is looking for an opportunity to get rid of him.
- He believes the women’s shelter does little good, only bringing in outsiders while the town should be taking care of its own.
- He is of the opinion that Claire should be cared for by cultists, disagreeing with Father Whitney’s decision to leave her at the shelter. He pretends, however, that he has no idea who Claire is.
- If asked about the men lurking outside the shelter, he will say that he hasn’t noticed anyone.
Richard Lester and Charles Pick, police deputies
Lester and Pick are low-ranking cultists working under Oaks. Lester is stocky and dark-haired, while Pick is tall and redheaded. They share most of Oaks’s opinions and goals, but they are friendly sorts and will be much nicer about redirecting the investigators; they may even pretend to help. If not at the precinct, they can usually be found patrolling the streets or at the pub.
Boarding House
The only lodging available other than the shelter is a small boarding house near the center of town. It is run by Adelaide West with the help of her ten-year-old son, Tom. Adelaide currently has no other lodgers, so she will be appreciative of the investigators’ custom.
The house is old but well cared for. It was converted from a farmhouse a few decades ago. The investigators can sleep in separate rooms or double up to save money (she asks for a pound per room per night)—there are five rooms available. The furniture is worn, but the house is clean and warm.
Adelaide West, boarding house proprietor
Adelaide and her husband used to run the house together, but he ran off one day about five years ago and did not return. While she used to be able to make enough money from seasonal laborers, travelers passing through on their way to larger cities, and visitors to the Westmont estate, there are not many lodgers passing through Oxmoor these days. She supplements her income by doing laundry for the townsfolk, but is thinking of trying to sell the place soon and move to where the schools are better and there is more work available, but she worries no one would be interested in buying. No one in town has the kind of money she would need to sell for, and no one outside would want to move here.
Facts and Clues:
- Adelaide can tell the investigators about the town and its history, except for anything cult-related, and give you directions as needed.
- She speaks favorably of the Westmonts, even though they are a bit eccentric. Aurelia in particular has been giving Adelaide plenty of laundry business as she prepares for her grand debut.
- Though the women’s shelter might seem like competition, Adelaide thinks it’s an important service. She finds Malati and Jasmine strange and foreign, but considers them nice people. They also have been hiring her to do laundry, which is helping her stay afloat and put food on her table.
- She and her husband moved here when Tom was a baby, and at the time she found the people friendly if a little standoffish. In recent years, the town has become less welcoming of strangers.
- Though the oddity of the town eventually grew on her, Adelaide still finds the church a little creepy, especially its stained-glass windows. She can’t describe exactly what she finds unsettling about them, but they just look a little off. Nevertheless, she does think Father Whitney is a very nice man.
- Living in Oxmoor is peaceful, she says, with the worst thing that happened in recent memory being the disappearance of Bobby Corey, who was found dead about a year ago. “He went out walking after dark, poor thing, and fell in a ditch and hit his head.”
- Besides Jasmine and Malati and a couple of the women staying at the shelter, the only other people who are newer to the town are Ben Corey, a police officer, and Marie Thompson, the girl who works at the telegraph office. This can help the investigators determine who is and is not a cultist.
Tom West, schoolboy and cult sacrifice
Tom will be eager to hear about detective work, life in London, or anything else about what he perceives as the investigators’ exciting lives. He will follow them around as he does his chores, asking for stories. He finds Oxmoor very boring, especially since there aren’t many other children to play with. His mother has not discouraged his notion that his father left to fight in the war and died a hero. When it is time for the summoning, Tom will be one of the ones kidnapped to be sacrificed.
Telegraph Office
The telegraph service mostly exists because of continued support from the Westmonts, who wanted to be able to send messages quickly despite living far from the nearest city. The office has large windows facing the main street and only two rooms. The front room has the telegraph on a small table with a chair, and there is another desk with a typewriter and stacks of papers. The back office is used for filing. Two people work here: Robert Sangford and Marie Thompson.
Robert Sangford, telegraph director
Sangford is a middle-aged man with receding hair who has been running the telegraph office for many years. He hired Marie last summer as a favor to her brother, Daniel, his previous assistant, after Daniel left to go to school in York.
Despite his friendliness to the Thompson family, Sangford is a cultist. He committed fully to the cult just after the war, along with several others in the town. While he is uncomfortable with some of the things the cult does (such as murder and forced magical pregnancy), he is willing to justify these things as they are for the greater good. Like many Oxmoor residents, he combined the cult’s ideology with a Christian idea of the apocalypse—he believes that, after the cleansing process of the “Great Mother,” the new kingdom of God will manifest.
Sangford is a deeply religious sort, and only agreed to work alone with a young, single woman because the office’s large windows do not allow for much privacy. However, Marie is not allowed in the back office, ostensibly for propriety’s sake.
Facts and Clues:
- Sangford usually destroys any cult-related telegrams or transcriptions after he sends them, but there is an unencoded copy of the instructions sent to Milton in the storage room where it fell between two filing boxes.
“The man in question knows too much. Find out where he is hiding the stone and eliminate him. Once this is done report to Oxmoor. We can continue the search for the book from there. It is time to begin preparations in earnest.”
- Sangford is aware that Marie has been selected to be sacrificed, and has been acting strangely toward her for the past few days. He stares at her thoughtfully and remarks on how bright she is in a regretful tone.
- He is suspicious of Jasmine and Malati for being foreign and thus probably non-Christian, and therefore bringing other faiths into Oxmoor. He will also be instantly suspicious of the investigators for being outsiders, especially if they are foreign.
- If asked about cult activity, he will be offended. Weird fringe religions are for foreigners and possibly city folk, not honest, hardworking people like the residents of Oxmoor. He may direct any inquiries to “those Indian girls” on the other side of town.
- Sangford genuinely believes that he and the other Oxmoor cultists are practicing an unusual denomination of Christianity.
- Sangford will not send any telegrams that will help the investigators against the cult, and he may hide any sent to the investigators.
Marie Thompson, telegraph assistant and cult sacrifice
Marie is willowy, blonde, and usually dreaming of adventure. Ever since her brother left Oxmoor for school, she has been making elaborate plans to move to London, Paris, or maybe New York. She isn’t sure what she will do when she gets to any of these places, but she is considering taking up acting.
Marie is usually not the one operating the telegraph, though she does know how to—she normally spends her shifts typing up handwritten notes, answering the door, taking dictation, and other chores around the office. She files papers a few at a time in the front office, as she is not permitted in the back room.
Facts and Clues:
- Marie can tell the investigators about Sangford’s particular religious hangups and recent strange behavior.
- It’s almost like he thinks she’s going to die, but knowing him, he’s probably just worried about her soul or something. Marie argues that she is a very good girl, and goes to church every Sunday even though the stained glass windows creep her out.
- She thinks Sangford’s solution of never allowing her in the back office is very silly, but she doesn’t believe he is hiding anything in there.
- If the investigators discover Sangford is a cultist, they can ask Marie to send any needed telegrams for them, or to keep an eye out for any the investigators need to receive.
- When the time comes for the summoning, Marie will be kidnapped and taken to the cult hideout to be sacrificed.
- She thinks the women’s shelter is a wonderful idea, though she has not had to make use of it herself. She had a friend, Anna, who “got in trouble” and went there for help. Anna has since moved away, increasing Marie’s desire to leave Oxmoor.
- Marie can also tell the investigators about Bobby Corey’s disappearance a year ago. She doesn’t remember what the outcome was, but does remember that the police said he was dead.
Pub
Oxmoor has a single pub, the Old Badger. It is frequented mostly by the farmers, but the other professionals in the town often make an appearance. The owner’s name is Albert Hughes, and he serves a limited selection of food and drink. The establishment is somewhat grimy, and the lights are still gas-powered.
All the patrons of the pub are cultists (as is Mr. Hughes), unless someone like James or Ben decides to stop in. Lester and Pick are also frequent patrons.
Some townsfolk names, should the Keeper need them, are:
- Harry Green
- Bessie Green
- Gerald Brown
- Pauline Jackson
- Walter Jackson
- Frank Hughes (Albert’s brother)
- Mary Hughes (Albert’s wife)
- Henry Wright
- George Davies
- Helen Vardy
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Because of this, my players completely missed the Bobby Corey subplot and did not meet either Marie or Tom before they were abducted to be sacrificed. They did manage to save everyone, though, so I call it a success.
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