They allow me a window here at Arkham Sanatorium. How I wish they would "allow" me to forgo that particular privilege. Part of my mania, they say: paranoid with delusions of grandeur. How do they expect me to get well when every day, without cessation, I can hear the polite prattle through that cursed portal? I'll tell you how: they don't expect me to get well. I begged, I pleaded. Commitment is not the problem. Living out my days in captivity is not the problem. The problem is these cursed people! I wonder: if those who plied the waves for their livelihood were aware of that which makes those waves move, would they be so quick to leave the safety of their harborage? Ha! ha!! If they knew what I have come to know in the last few weeks, would they sail the waters of the world so blithely? Humankind should leave the seas to those who dwell within them!

Merciful God, why Arkham? Why here of all places? Ah, what is the use? Succor is denied me and I am trapped, fallen into the clutches of my terrible keepers. You scoff! Kindly keep your derision to yourself until you have heard my tale through. I can understand your disbelief. I am not, however, insane! Every word I say is true. EVERY WORD!

My name is Richard Daniel Upton. My father was Edward Derby Upton and my grandfather was Daniel Upton. Grandfather, you see, was the originator of this horrid family inheritance: all due to a secret his father before him had, which lead to everything else that followed.

I don't remember my grandfather at all. He died in his seventies when I was still a small child. When I was old enough, my father told me of the circumstances surrounding that awful night in my grandfather's life. I remember father saying how incredible it was that grandfather simply went on with his life afterward, as though nothing had happened. We didn't know then, you see. Father had not made that horrible discovery yet. That didn't happen until years later.

My father had grown up here in Arkham, Massachusetts. When he was forty he met my mother and married her here. Two years later, in 1954, I was born. When I was still small, five years old, about a year after grandfather's death, father accepted a position with a company in the Great Lakes area. Grandfather's house was closed up and we left Arkham.

Before leaving Arkham, my father retained a solicitor here to maintain the property entailed in grandfather's house and grounds. For many years we heard from him once a year in the form of annual reports in January. Then, last year, this stopped.

In April of last year, we received an unscheduled letter from our solicitor informing us that someone had inquired about purchasing the house and land. Father had been considering the sale of the property for sometime. When we received the letter father decided that the best course of action would be for him to journey to Arkham and look over the estate before giving an answer. I agreed with this plan. Though he was in his eighties, he was in excellent health and had a sharp mind for getting his money's worth. It seemed simple enough. By the first of June he was in Arkham.

I heard from father only sporadically during his time in Arkham and then only about the most mundane of details. That is, until his last communication. Were I able, I would like to wipe the memory of that call from my mind. The horror, the terror in my father's voice. . . . To hear him scream: "Son, the box, destroy the box and all that's in it. . . They come, damn them, they come. They've found me. Dear God, Richard, the door. . . ."

Those were my father's last words to me.

Directly after the line went dead, I hung up and dialed the police in Arkham, then arranged transportation for myself. I arrived in Arkham the next morning at 7:00 A.M. and, after securing lodging for myself, proceeded to grandfather's house.

The house, when I arrived, was a shambles. The furniture, which had been left behind, was in match-sticks throughout the downstairs portion of the house. In grandfather's study there were books and files strewn across the floor. Apparently, someone had ransacked the house searching for something. Oddest, and hardest to explain of all, was a noxious, foetid odor which pervaded the air of the place.

It was then that I recalled the first thing father had said to me that last night on the phone: "The box," he had said. Could that box have been the item the ransackers, and presumably his murderers, were searching for? More importantly, had they found it before the police arrived? I began my own search, not only for the box father mentioned, but for the answers to many stressing questions. Where was he? What had happened to him? Was he alive? Or was he dead?

I searched the first two floors thoroughly over the next day and a half and found nothing, with the exception of some odd reading material in grandfather's study. Grandfather had apparently been something of an amateur anthropologist or ethnologist, though by profession he had been an architect.

Rising early in the morning the third day, I determined that I would search the attic and the basement and hoped that whatever this box was, father had the foresight to secret it in one of these two extremities of the house.

I began with the attic. The room was hung with a years worth of cobwebs and the accumulated dust and muskiness made it difficult to breathe. As far as I could ascertain, no one had ascended those stairs nor stood in this room for many years. It was then that I noticed that faint trail of tell-tale footprints in the dust heading off deeper into the attic. I followed them and wound through a lifetime of my grandfather's belongings ending up behind a large, high chest. Scanning the floor with my flashlight, I saw it. I could tell from the dust disturbed around it, that this was the only thing in the attic that had been examined at any great length.

"Box" really wasn't quite accurate. Chest would have been more appropriate. A great carven chest made from one of the harder woods. Too heavy to be moved, necessity dictated that I, like my father, examine it where it stood. If only I had heeded my father's instructions and destroyed the thing on sight. Had I done that and not opened the cursed thing's lid! Oh. . . . but open it, I did.

The first thing I saw when I lifted the lid was an envelope bearing my name in my father's characteristic spidery scrawl. Within was a note from my father:

Dear Richard:

If you are reading this, then the worst is true and something terrible has happened to me. Ah son! This was supposed to be a simple journey to my father's house. Inspect the property, speak to the attorney, and return home. Now I fear it might be the death of me.

When I arrived in Arkham, it occurred to me that if we were to sell the house, father's personal effects that were left in the house would have to be gone through. That was my intent in coming into the attic. Here it was that I found this cursed, haunted box, and all that it contains. Richard, for the love of God, DO NOT examine the contents of this box AT ALL! Destroy it and ALL that it contains! Since I have been in this house, horrible things have happened. I have been followed, watched, and today I was accosted on the street!

Son, I beg you, destroy this evil thing and all of the abominable artifacts and information it contains. Good luck, my son. Godspeed.

Your father.

Well! You can imagine my state of mind. I should have destroyed the thing right then. Instead, I decided to play detective and see whether or not anything in the box would be helpful in tracking down those responsible for the disappearance, and presumed death, of my father. From the contents of the chest it became clear to me that my grandfather had known of the existence of a band of cultists in the area who worshiped some monstrous sea deity named "Cthulhu." Grandfather then went on to cite references throughout the literary history of the world dealing with this "Cthulhu." He gave as examples quotes supposedly from the Necronomicon, the Celaeno Fragments, and the Ponape Scripture. Grandfather listed personal run-ins with cultists here on the streets of Arkham and elsewhere. He told of the icthyic and batrachian features of the minions of Cthulhu, of ancient, profane rituals attended at Dagon Hall in nearby Innsmouth; of the dread goings on at a place called Devil Reef and, strangest of all, of the shunned town of Kingsport. All of these things and more, I learned from grandfather's notes and journals: journals which started on that dread night, long years ago, on the night that his best friend, or his best friend's wife, died, journals that went even further back to his father and his uncle. As to who it was that crawled up to grandfather's door on that fateful night, whether his friend or his friend's wife, was not clear. It was not so much the existence of this "Cthulhu Cult" that was our family secret, nor were my grandfather's dealings with this cult necessarily bad and, as I read through the papers in the box, this became more and more clear. Nor was the "big family secret" something anyone in this day and age would be ashamed of. But, I'm jumping ahead.

My grandfather, Daniel Upton, had a very close friend named Edward Pickman Derby. Edward was something of a child prodigy to whom my grandfather took a liking. While my grandfather pursued his career in architecture, an ability he seemed to have been innately endowed with, his friend Edward pursued literature and metaphysics. When Edward was 38 years old and immersed in further studies of the arcane, he met a 23-year-old woman going to Miskatonic University. Her name was Asenath Waite. Edward fell in love with her, and they were married. Edward then suffered from a psychotic disorder wherein his personality seemed to change, or so it sounded like this to me as I read my grandfather's notes. Apparently, after less than four years of marriage, he and his wife fought so badly that he murdered her. He was then committed to Arkham Sanatorium.

Asenath Waite hailed from Innsmouth, a town said to be the local center of the "Cthulhu Cult." Her father had arranged for her to be made the ward of the principal of Hall School, in Kingsport. She was somewhat of a bully in that school, given to frightening the other children with tales of magic and even shows of magic, but not trickery: genuine magic. After coming of age, she went to Miskatonic University where she was introduced to Edward. According to grandfather, she wanted Edward's body: literally, not romantically. Also, according to grandfather, Asenath was not entirely human, she was "half of the blood of Dagon," as grandfather put it, which posed a danger for Kamog. Here is where the notes get confusing, and deal with my own family.

What of Kamog? Well, he was not of the Cthulhu Cult! Kamog was a man, entirely human, a man whose name came to be Ephraim Waite. Waite was (and is) a big name in Innsmouth, so Kamog moved in easily. Therein, he married a local woman in his old age. They had a baby daughter and named her Asenath. It was no secret that he cursed her for being a baby girl. He wanted a boy. Shortly thereafter, Ephraim became incoherent, making noises a child would make, and Asenath, the sometimes precocious child, became quite mature. Then Ephraim died, locked away in his own attic, raving. Asenath proved to be a very clever child, as if wise in childhood. My grandfather theorized that Kamog has switched bodies with the child and had taken her over. That is, that all those years it was Kamog, not Asenath Waite, that everyone knew. Many of the Cthulhu Cult were opposed to this, and they watched Asenath. The Gilmans especially, a powerful Innsmouth family, were convinced that she poisoned Ephraim before locking him in the attic to die. Others feared her. In Kingsport there were Others, things or people related to the Cult of the Worm that were familiar with the doings of Kamog, and they were prepared to either watch over Asenath/Kamog, or spy on her.

Who was Kamog? My own great-granduncle! Our big family secret seems to have been that my grandfather's father was Jewish! He was one Bezalel Yehuda ben-Daniel. He had a brother Khemosh Ephraim ben-Daniel. They were Jewish, yet not entirely Jewish in the religious sense. They were of a mysterious tribe known of old as Kenites, yet they traced their matrilineal Hebrew descent from the tribe of Dan through Bilhah, and in this chest were the records to prove this! While the tribe of Dan is well known, the same can not be said of the Kenites. Kenites, which in Hebrew means "builders," were famed architects, which is probably where grandfather inherited the ability he pursued as his own career. They were also known to be Ophitic or Obic people. Ophite referred to the Serpent of Wisdom, or Satan; whereas Ob referred to an even more ancient term "Ub-aur" or "Ubb" and was related to a most ancient cult of Worm Idolatry, perhaps akin to the Ouroboros: "The Worm Ouroboros."

The ben-Daniel family settled in New York City on the lower east side of Manhattan in 1854. There the two brothers, Bezalel and Khemosh, went to public school, and at home pursued traditional Hebrew studies along with the esoteric studies of their own particular tribe. There was speculation among these people as to whether or not the famed King Solomon himself was in fact one of them, since he was a diabolist of note. Hiram Abiff, another shadowy character who is not of traditional Jewish lore at all, was one of them from Dan's brother, Naphtali, through Bilhah. He was the most skilled architect that ever lived, according to the notes I read, and he built the great temple for King Solomon. The two brothers grew up amidst rampant anti-Semitism, which caused them to take two completely different paths in life.

Bezalel Anglicized his name, after moving into an area in uptown Manhattan, to Daniel Upton. He rejected his own Jewish background, and cut off ties to his own people and family. He married a Christian woman of considerable means, and then bought a home, this very house, on Saltonstall Street in Arkham, Massachusetts. He raised his son of the same name, Daniel Upton, my grandfather, in this home, and to all appearances they seemed to be a well-off English, Christian family. His son went to Harvard University, which was known to have had its start as a Christian Theology School for Puritan Ministers. My grandfather studied architecture there, studied further in a Boston architect's office, also married a Christian woman and returned to this very house. His father then retired to Miami, Florida which had later become the favorite place of retirement for many other Jews. I wondered if in Miami he reclaimed his heritage.

Khemosh, whom everyone called Ephraim, pursued studies in diabolism. The act of naming the boy Khemosh in itself was considered diabolic within the Jewish community, though no one outside of this would ever know this type of thing even existed. Khemosh was the name of the Moabite national deity, and the Moabites were infamous worshipers of Dagon, to whom they made human sacrifices. It is from this, from his very name, that Ephraim pursued studies of Dagon, which lead him to the "Cthulhu Cult," and from there to Innsmouth. The name "Waite" he adopted for two reasons: the term referred to "He Who Waits," namely, Cthulhu, and the name was well known in Innsmouth as a legitimate family name, English in origin. Kamog was just a corruption or alternate "Americanized" pronunciation of Khemosh which was also rendered Chemokh, and Khemokh. Ephraim did not go to Innsmouth to help this Cthulhu Cult. He went there for his own selfish purposes, to accomplish a horrendously evil deed.

Ever since he was a child, he was obsessed with the idea of becoming someone else. This started out as a complex about being Jewish caused by the cruel anti-Semitism surrounding him. The idea occurred to him later, as he became insane with hatred and bitterness, that if he could accomplish an actual exchange of bodies he could live forever. To this end, he practiced meditation and learned how to prepare various potions he used to drug people he "swapped bodies" with. He performed blood sacrifices of animals to various Goetic Demons that were known to King Solomon, and even tried (and failed) to invoke the Lord of Darkness!

As I read this, a tear came to my eye. I could see clearly how my own great-grandfather accomplished this identity change through more normal channels. He changed his name and pretended to be a Christian. But these were my ancestors, and as such they were part of me. I was denied this rich heritage due to the hatred of small, bigoted minds. I thought about my own life and who I liked. I always got along with Jewish people and the first time I heard music from Israel something deep inside me came completely alive. I hated the "regular people." By that I refer to the majority of white Anglo-Saxon Americans. I liked the ethnics too, though they tended not to like me very much and wrongly considered me an Anglo. Rage welled up within me, and I felt a pain so strong that I choked. Tears filled my eyes almost obscuring the words on the notes I was reading. For the moment, I even forgot my possibly dead father. But I was determined to read on, fueled now by curiosity, and by rage.

Ephraim perfected his body-exchange. His subjects were always men. Men had larger brains per body weight than women, but they used far less of their brains than women did and had far less intuition. Historically, women were witches and, as the Holy Kaballa stated, are on a much higher Spiritual Plane than men because they are inborn with Shekhina, the Highest Form of Deity as Goddess. Ephraim knew of the dangers confronting one who violated such a High Holy Spirit, as did my great-grandfather whose notes I read explaining this. The ideal subject would be a son of his own flesh. Yet Ephraim was old when Asenath was born. He was too old to try for another child, a boy. He did that which set the Guardians of Shekhina against him. It was by sheer coincidence, or perhaps it was by the Hand of the Highest God, that my own grandfather's best friend ended up marrying Asenath and by this, Kamog was finally laid down.

Edward Pickman Derby killed his wife Asenath, or rather he killed Kamog. He then buried the body and invented a story that Asenath went away. Soon thereafter, and not able to deal with this horror, Edward was institutionalized. But Kamog was not exactly dead. He had become like the Djinn: a terrible Demon with a Will and Purpose too strong for normal death to lay down. Kamog began to switch bodies with Edward, and Edward would find himself in the rotting corpse of dead Asenath and worse, buried alive. I can not imagine the strength it must have taken for Edward to claw his way out of the grave and crawl to grandfather's doorstep in the rotted body of Asenath. For that is what knocked on grandfather's door that fateful night: Asenath's body, rotted, putrid and stinking, with Edward Pickman Derby imprisoned inside it, whose last words to my grandfather were a plea to kill his body with Kamog in it, kill it and burn it before it leaves the institution as "sane" and wanders again in the world.

My grandfather, though I'd have never known this from my own father, collected the remains after the police and coroner were finished examining them. He then said Kadesh for his friend, his dearest, closest friend, after whom he named my own father. I can not imagine how my father could not have known of this: he was 22 years old and living in the same house when this happened! Grandfather then set out on a "hunt," as he called it, armed with the ancient, magical implements of our people: the Single Eye surrounded by Golden Rays used by Hiram, symbol of the Most High Unborn Causeless Cause; the six-pointed "Adonai" or Necromantic Star of King Solomon; and the five-sided house surrounded by the five blazing angles, or "Pentacle of the East. " It was then that he ran into members of the Waite and Gilman families, from Innsmouth, who had been searching for the missing Asenath Waite, their cousin! They knew what happened and the other Waites never quite trusted Ephraim. With his long, wolfish face and heavy facial beard, he did not look like one of their own kind. It was one of the Cthulhu Cult from Kingsport, not a fish-man but something more like a worm, that explained that the real Asenath was dead, that she had perished as a child when Kamog stole her body and murdered her young soul. Once at the Hall School, in Kingsport, they had tried to exorcise Kamog from Asenath's body. It was then that they realized that there was no Asenath anywhere to return to the body. Kamog murdered one of their own people when she was just a child. They considered Kamog some sort of demon. His actions spoke for themselves: he insinuated himself in with the Waite family, tried to pass himself off as a relation, had a child of the blood of Dagon, stole her body for himself and killed her soul. For years he had been walking around as Asenath Waite, looking like and passing for one of their own kind. But he was decidedly not of their kind and his actions were hostile. He could have been a spy out to destroy them: they had no way of knowing. Whereas Edward Derby, if anything, seemed quite amicable. He was also another victim of Kamog's. Their reasoning states that if two people have the same enemy, then those two can be friends. If they could have gotten to Asenath with Edward's consciousness intact inside her, they'd have offered him solace and accepted him into their fold. He would have been almost like one of their own. On numerous occasions, they told grandfather, they had tried to approach Edward when "he was himself," but he fled from them in terror. All Edward knew was that they were Cthulhu Cultists and he wrongly thought that the Cthulhu Cult was working with Kamog. Now they agreed to help grandfather capture Kamog once and for all. It was arranged that the Cult would get Kamog into grandfather's house: by any means necessary!

Grandfather left his home and set out with a determination born of fanaticism and righteousness. He entered Arkham Sanatorium and there, face to face, he shot Kamog-in-Edward's-body six times in the head. He wrote in his journal of how he should have heeded the advice of the Kingsport worm-folk, whom he now referred to as "Yuggya." Had he done this, the police would not have been involved, he would not have had to try to explain what surely looked like premeditated and cold-blooded murder, nor would the body have ended up delayed in a coroner's office. Be that as it may, this is what grandfather did. In his rashness, he forgot that normal death would not be enough to stop Kamog, but as it turned out, the Yuggya could stop him, or at least prevent him from further swapping bodies. They had an instinct natural to them involving the swapping of consciousness: it was part of their own natural survival instincts. Aside from that, someone would have to steal the body from the coroner's office before an autopsy was begun. I could find nothing in grandfather's journal explaining how he managed to extricate himself from the charge of murder. The entire matter just seemed to "blow over," as far as the authorities were concerned. I figured that it was probably money that paid for silence.

One week later, at 2:00 A.M. in the morning, grandfather finished making the Magic Circle two-fold out of a salt paste. Within the circle was the six-pointed Solomonic Star, and within its center was the five-pointed Blazing Star of the East, facing eastward with two points up. In the very center of it all was a small, lead box with the same markings on it as were on the floor in salt. The diagrams were carefully copied down with instructions and the warning: should anyone open this small box, and he see nothing happen, he should perform the ritual herein described and bind the spirit of Kamog. I wondered what that meant: see nothing happen.

At 3:00 A.M. the Cult brought Kamog before grandfather, bound and gagged, struggling and frantic, even in death! As predicted, he was trying to leave the dead body and make an exchange. The Yuggya held him fast inside the corpse lest he escape. Thereupon, grandfather began the rite:

"I, Daniel Upton, am a Serpent at the roadside. I am a Horned Snake at the wayside, and I bite the heel of your horse so that you, Kamog, fall backward. I have salvation before me in the name of the Most Holy Yat-Zebaoth.

"I do command you evil spirit Kamog, by the most glorious symbols of the Most High, to depart from the body of Edward Pickman Derby quickly and without delay. I command you and constrain you by the names of Those Nehushtan that guard the most Holy Shekhina, by the names of Azazel and Samael I command you, by the Star of Adonai and the Throne of Binah Sephira I command you into this vessel of lead as did our ancestor King Solomon confine the evil Djinn before me.

"And know, oh brother of my father, that this fate is merciful; and that if you should ever seek to escape and work your evil on The Innocent, that Another, the most Ineffable Unknown and UNHOLY Aspect of the Most High that no mortal may look upon, shall come for you. I command you now, by the Tetragrammaton and the Highest Kether-OB-AUR to depart the body of Edward Pickman Derby and enter into this vessel now, or be confined to Gehenna forever!"

There was a flash of light so strong it knocked over the Cultists holding the corpse of Edward Pickman Derby. The spirit Kamog entered into the lead box in the center of the salt-made sigils. Then, if I am to believe grandfather's account, the salt itself that formed the lines of the star diagrams lifted and coiled upward toward the lead box. Then, the salt went into the box and the lid closed shut. Grandfather then melted down pure silver and sealed the crack where the lid of the box closed. He then placed the box into the chest with this account. It was in here all those years, locked away, kept secret. He burned the remains of his beloved friend Edward, and threw the ashes to the wind.

These things, I confess, sorely unsettled me. All of this was too much for me: learning of my own heritage, a heritage that was denied to me, learning of the existence of such magic, learning of the existence of people who are not-people living alongside us. Casting my mind back, I recalled that noxious, foetid odor which had lingered here when I first entered the house. What was this odor? Was it the odor of the Cthulhu Cult? Was it the odor of bigotry? Was it the odor of Christianity that Philip Roth spoke of? I thought this, as my fingers fiddled with forbidden things.

I left. Where I was going, I knew not. Where I eventually found myself was on Water Street, south of the railroad: drunk, bloody, and penniless. The police found me there: incoherent, in shock, soaked with blood, reeking of alcohol, with an emptied gun still in my hand. They took me to the station-house, hand-cuffed. Ha! I saw the looks on their faces when they saw the blood, I heard the things they said to each other, I saw how they tried to talk nice to me, I saw them trying to act polite. Too late! Too late I realized the seriousness of my mistake. I didn't mean to pry open the box. I wanted to SEE. I SAW. I saw what came. I saw The Awful. I saw what no mortal may see. I SAW! .

The next day I was transported here. The orderlies, who are both from Innsmouth, are friendly but they say they don't know who I am. They say the police brought me here. Don't know who I am?

I am the son of the son of the son of the son of the Mighty King! Who I am? I AM THAT I AM! The psychiatrist I am forced to sit across from every day? He's a murderer, he is the cause of my ancestor turning to the devil for succor. He wears the death-cross in disguise without the hooks! He sits in his soft chair with his thin lips and that little moustache. I know what he thinks. I know his kind.

The orderlies? They tell me to keep quiet, to settle down. Settle down? I hear the nurses and doctors, their terse, polite voices, day in and day out through the door. The only solace I have is at night when the two orderlies sing their own version of that hateful, atrocious "Glory, Glory Hallelujah" bigot's garbage. GARBAGE! I had to learn that song of hate in school: "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."

WHICH LORD? WHOSE LORD? The lord responsible for the Holocaust? THEIR LORD? Hallelujah they want to do a pogrom? War, war, they always want to make war. War on me, war on my ancestors, war on my people.

The only friends I have for the rest of my life are the two orderlies. They teach me their song and say: "Have Faith!" They carry messages outside for me. I love their song. I sing it! I sing it with good words:

YOU SEE! I'm NOT CRAZY! It was Hiram that built Ur'lyeh! That's Ur and that's Nimrod's city and that means it is MY city, MY heritage! Only Hiram knew the Divine and Sacred Geometries!

And my beautiful people, they only wanted to have a party and love and sing and dance, and they all kill us for this! They hate us for this!

And my father, he was not murdered, he was fine. They just explained things to him. But I hate my father, he lied to me. All my life he denied me the truth, he robbed me of my heritage. He lied to me, HE LIED TO ME!

The orderlies sneak in the newspapers. The newspapers say that I wandered out to Armitage Street by the newspaper office. A small group of local students in the White Student's Alliance were staging a political rally or protest. One uniformed member of some American Nazi Party outfit and two white-robed Ku Klux Klan members were there with the local students. They were handing out leaflets. I ran into their crowd and killed a bunch of them, right there, out in the open. But they were not people! They only looked like people! The orderlies call them "Ossies!" Ah ha! The orderlies laugh at the Ossies. The orderlies are my friends.

Yes! I shall be the Messiah and lead my true people to Freedom with a NICE God, not the Awfulest Awful, not that THING dissolving creation, not WHAT CAME for Kamog and took him to Gehenna. How it ate his spirit! NO!

Nice Gods, normal Gods, like Cthulhu.

The orderlies said they would help me to do this if I can calm down, if I can keep quiet. I shall say no more. I will keep quiet.

I AM THAT I AM! I AM THE GLORY OF CTHULHU ELOHIM!!!

Oh no. O.K. I will be a patient patient. AHHH ha! Such a pretty God, all green and glowing! Such a pretty city only Hiram can build such a city!

Shshshsh.