"The First Bank of Long Beach is almost certainly in Los Angeles."

"Sounds right. Do we have other business here, or should we read the materials and head to Los Angeles in the morning, if there's nothing else?"

"I would strongly prefer not to leave Henslowe and Aarons in the asylum but that might not be particularly tractable."

"Short of me buttering up Mrs. Henslowe for the remainder of her days such that she gives me power of attorney over her son in the event of her passing, I have no ideas on how to get either of them out of that dreadful place."

"I don't think we can get them out in a day. We may be able to contact Mrs. Winston-Rogers and see if she can be any assistance in moving them out, but it'd take time, and I don't know that there's much reason to stay here in the mean time."

"- I think if we do try to help them out of it, it would be worth figuring out the details of when the mouth stains are or aren't contagious first? I was thinking that if we did find any of the names of Mr. Aarons's associates while we were researching, it might be worth writing to him, since not remembering seemed to be causing him some distress? Was there anything that seemed like it might be similarly helpful to Mr. Henslowe?"

"- although the lack of stains at this estate seems at least promising, in that regard."

"I don't think it is? He's hardly spent any time there."

"It seems likely that Aarons would remember more if he were on fewer medications and not in the presence of a doctor, which would be useful as well as being good in its own right."

"All it means is that the mouths don't show up in, like, a month, or that if they do they don't afterwards stick around for two more years."

"I meant to ask when that cat started biting people. Not that it's unusual cat behavior."

"The good news is that he wasn't violent to anyone but himself while he was out, which I would think might make it easier for a lawyer to argue that he can be safely moved somewhere else. Not that I know a lot about this."

When Mordred was working on his article about asylums, he snuck into the asylum and found records, which often contained information the doctors wouldn't tell people. It seems like this would be useful in this situation.

"I can probably prove that he wasn't violent if I could access the asylum records. Which doesn't help Aarons much but it's something."

"That sounds like it would require crimes, which in turn sounds like it would be dangerous and like it'd probably take a lot of time. It's not like they're going anywhere? We can always come back to this later."

"Yes. And in any case it's not a project for tonight."

"Possibly we could licitly get access to the records in question? But it might take a while, and possibly whatever we find in Los Angeles would help."

Beneath the letter, wrapped in plastic, is Douglas Henslowe’s notebook. Tucked inside the cover is a small key.

Anemone reads the notebook.

Walter will know what to do…

Kullman knows occult. We are armed with secret knowledge to fight the cancer in society.

Evidence gathering is slow business but piece by piece it is all starting to fall into place!

LA is critical!!!!!

At Walter’s insistence we have formed a little band of detectives. Walter and I were joined by Kullman, Katherine Clark, and Mr. Stack. Following trail of a group with evil intentions.

Need photographs/recordings…

Vincent room 225! DON’T FORGET!

Katherine knows, her camera doesn’t lie… she has seen… when?

Are they dead?

It was the cult’s fault, feeding it to draw it close… I must not see…

The mouths follow me…

How they sicken me… abusing the weak and vulnerable, sacrificing the helpless, children--

Abhorrent mouths…

I cannot feel it close. Real? 

Real?

Must get back home, away from it…

It should not exist in the world… 

To my friend Walter Winston, 1924. Walter organized flight… BA airfield 1924

So many mouths to feed its desires.

Thing with the mouths, they are trying to bring it here… Think dammit!! 

Why LA?? Thousand mouths incarnation…

Vincent has brought bombs to destroy the barn and the thing they have brought.

I ran from it like a dog…

Why us? What happened? Mouths in my brain when???

It… I?

Beyond our mortal understanding… against nature with its mouths…

Why? Did it get them?

It is not right… why did it feed?

I cannot hear my thoughts clearly, only fractures. 

The notebook also includes some quite good drawings of the other investigators and a tentacled being covered with mouths.

Anemone passes it to the other investigators. "Man, I have no idea what any of this means. Anyone else who wants to look can."

"Douglas, I would rather have had your original notes than whatever this is supposed to be."

"We don't have any evidence his original notes were better."

"Okay but these suck."

"To be fair, from the letter it looked like he was trying to make sure the originals wouldn't be found, it makes sense that whatever he replaced them with would be opaque."

"At least there's still some information in it. "Vincent Room 225" seems important?"