ALTAR
What’s this? An altar of sorts, not professionally made, but carefully constructed perhaps by someone with a clear purpose in mind. The wood is old, similar to if not the same as the wood comprising the floors and walls of this, the McDermott House. Six weathered photos stand in a semicircle around a red candle. A seventh photo lies beneath the candle, emulating the setup of a ritual used by pagans of old to inflict harm upon a spirit or entity. The photos are all labeled.
You carefully examine the candle. Its hue is unsettling, resembling that of blood. The candle appears homemade, and the tip of a never-lit wick protrudes from the top. Whatever the material may be, it’s heavy, the weight reflecting the atmosphere of the room around you. Beneath the candle is the photo of a young girl.
This is a photo of Elsie McDermott, the daughter of Mr. Charles McDermott and along with six others, the victim of a horrific poisoning that happened here almost a century ago. Police reports from the time indicated that Elsie was the first victim of the poisoning, having succumbed to its effects in her bed. An ineffective investigation at the time failed to come to the conclusion that your own research has revealed: That the poison used was none other than arsenic. Its symptoms? A sudden rush of confusion accompanied by the unmistakable taste of metal, followed shortly by death. It’s hoped that young Elsie died peacefully in her sleep, though the probability of such is bleak.
You carefully examine the candle. Its hue is unsettling, resembling that of blood. The candle appears homemade, and the tip of a never-lit wick protrudes from the top. Whatever the material may be, it’s heavy, the weight reflecting the atmosphere of the room around you. Beneath the candle is the photo of a young girl.
This is a photo of Elsie McDermott, the daughter of Mr. Charles McDermott and along with six others, the victim of a horrific poisoning that happened here almost a century ago. Police reports from the time indicated that Elsie was the first victim of the poisoning, having succumbed to its effects in her bed. An ineffective investigation at the time failed to come to the conclusion that your own research has revealed: That the poison used was none other than arsenic. Its symptoms? A sudden rush of confusion accompanied by the unmistakable taste of metal, followed shortly by death. It’s hoped that young Elsie died peacefully in her sleep, though the probability of such is bleak.
Six photos stand balanced around the candle, each containing a portrait, each meticulously labeled not with a name, but a descriptor, each representing a victim of the McDermott House deaths. You’ve studied them all in great detail, having met them in reports, articles, and books dedicated to what happened that fateful night. Staring at their photos now, you can almost feel their presence. You can select a photo here to recall details about each victim.
This gentleman was a traveling salesman who called himself Otto. Police have long suspected that the name “Otto” was simply an alias, but based on your research he had simply changed the spelling from its original German of “Audo”, a name meaning wealth or prosperity, to something more recognizable for potential customers. He sold toys, notably dolls, and even more notably dolls made to resemble a popular brand of the time. His presence in the house the night of the deaths can be chalked up to one of two circumstances. One – as witness reports at the time suggest, he had stumbled upon the McDermotts’ broken down vehicle and had offered them a ride back to their house, being invited in afterwards to shelter from the impending storm. Or two – his presence in the house was planned, and his intentions more devious and sinister than what most believe. Both could be true, and both could result in the night’s conclusion – death by poison.
One doesn’t often come across a description of Jane, the Aunt, without being bombarded with preposterous claims of what’s known as the McDermott Curse. A “curse” can rather be read as a feeble-minded attempt at explaining that which some find difficult to explain. In Jane’s case, it was the incessant happening of incidents, or rather the improbability of such incidents happening to a single person, which led to the belief of a family “curse”. What happened to Jane? Her husband died, her daughter was kidnapped, and she was poisoned to death. Not all at once, of course, but rather over the span of a few years. The crux, of course, being the taking of her daughter, an event that inevitably led to her being “adopted” into the family home by her brother, Charles McDermott, and therefore placing her in the house in which she would be poisoned one year later. The kidnapping? While never proven, your research has led you to believe the culprit was a man by the name of Bruno Hauptmann, a criminal who would later be executed for the kidnapping of the son of a couple of famous aviators. Of course, the two cases have never been officially linked.
Virgil Weber, aged 14, was the son of Vera McDermott (formerly Vera Weber.) Being a child, not much was known to the public about Virgil outside of his school records, which indicated a highly troubled youth with a penchant for trouble. Personal research, however, recently uncovered a different side to the stepson of Charles McDermott, that of a creative. It was well enough known that young Virgil liked to write, having been keen on keeping a daily journal, but personal effects collected from the house over the years reveal that he had quite a knack for storytelling, having authored several short stories depicting a variety of characters, circumstances, and events. Following the kidnapping of Jane’s daughter, a tragedy that occurred in the presence of Virgil, his writings took on a darker tone up until the night he died, poisoned along with the others.
The neighbor is believed to have been an unexpected guest at the house the night of the deaths, and therefore an unfortunate consequence of the events that transpired, leading to her poisoning along with the others. Her name was Birdie, and she lived alone a couple of minutes down the road. Her father had originally built the McDermott House, and Birdie had resided there until selling it to Charles several years before the incident. Birdie had a habit of showing up to the McDermott’s home to lodge complaints against the children of the house, most often accusing them of stealing. Her incessant complaints led many to believe that she held a great grudge against Charles and his family for having taken up residence in her childhood home, but your own research into Birdie leads you to believe that was simply her personality and perhaps the result of having lived alone for too long – the McDermott house being a sort of bridge to companionship, even at the cost of being a bad neighbor.
Sources always seemed torn as to how to present the figure of Emmett, surname unknown, the man renting out a spare room of the McDermott House. It was relatively common for those with larger-than-needed households to bring in a little extra income by letting spare rooms to those who couldn’t afford much else, which it seems Charles McDermott had done. By all accounts, Emmett was the perfect tenant: quiet, clean, respectful, and even willing to help tend the children and the house. You’ve read papers wishing to show him in a favorable light, which tend to focus on how Elsie and her playmates would be endlessly entertained by Emmett’s vast repository of riddles, word games, and puzzles. You’ve also read things that cast him in an unfavorable light by focusing on the sheer multitude of answerable questions about him. Who was Emmett? How did he come to reside in the McDermott House? Why did Mrs. McDermott dislike him so? Why did he seem to be packing to leave abruptly when he was struck down by the same poison that claimed the others in the house?
Many sources spent quite a bit of time focused on Vera McDermott, formerly Vera Weber, and you suspect unfortunately baser motivations for this, looking at her photo. She was a widow with a young son when she met and married the widower McDermott. Though the average person might not realize it, second and even third marriages were fairly common at this time of higher death rates, between the Great War and the Great Depression. However, many sources seem to indicate that this particular marriage caused waves in the small town. Vera McDermott was a contentious figure amongst town residents for her forceful personality. Though everyone agreed she adored Charles, you wonder, could this have been a classic case of the “evil stepmother” archetype? Or was Vera just too self-possessed in a small town fueled by gossip? Your sources seem to place her character all across the spectrum. Either way, poison cut her second attempt at building a family short that night.
This gentleman was a traveling salesman who called himself Otto. Police have long suspected that the name “Otto” was simply an alias, but based on your research he had simply changed the spelling from its original German of “Audo”, a name meaning wealth or prosperity, to something more recognizable for potential customers. He sold toys, notably dolls, and even more notably dolls made to resemble a popular brand of the time. His presence in the house the night of the deaths can be chalked up to one of two circumstances. One – as witness reports at the time suggest, he had stumbled upon the McDermotts’ broken down vehicle and had offered them a ride back to their house, being invited in afterwards to shelter from the impending storm. Or two – his presence in the house was planned, and his intentions more devious and sinister than what most believe. Both could be true, and both could result in the night’s conclusion – death by poison.
One doesn’t often come across a description of Jane, the Aunt, without being bombarded with preposterous claims of what’s known as the McDermott Curse. A “curse” can rather be read as a feeble-minded attempt at explaining that which some find difficult to explain. In Jane’s case, it was the incessant happening of incidents, or rather the improbability of such incidents happening to a single person, which led to the belief of a family “curse”. What happened to Jane? Her husband died, her daughter was kidnapped, and she was poisoned to death. Not all at once, of course, but rather over the span of a few years. The crux, of course, being the taking of her daughter, an event that inevitably led to her being “adopted” into the family home by her brother, Charles McDermott, and therefore placing her in the house in which she would be poisoned one year later. The kidnapping? While never proven, your research has led you to believe the culprit was a man by the name of Bruno Hauptmann, a criminal who would later be executed for the kidnapping of the son of a couple of famous aviators. Of course, the two cases have never been officially linked.
Virgil Weber, aged 14, was the son of Vera McDermott (formerly Vera Weber.) Being a child, not much was known to the public about Virgil outside of his school records, which indicated a highly troubled youth with a penchant for trouble. Personal research, however, recently uncovered a different side to the stepson of Charles McDermott, that of a creative. It was well enough known that young Virgil liked to write, having been keen on keeping a daily journal, but personal effects collected from the house over the years reveal that he had quite a knack for storytelling, having authored several short stories depicting a variety of characters, circumstances, and events. Following the kidnapping of Jane’s daughter, a tragedy that occurred in the presence of Virgil, his writings took on a darker tone up until the night he died, poisoned along with the others.
The neighbor is believed to have been an unexpected guest at the house the night of the deaths, and therefore an unfortunate consequence of the events that transpired, leading to her poisoning along with the others. Her name was Birdie, and she lived alone a couple of minutes down the road. Her father had originally built the McDermott House, and Birdie had resided there until selling it to Charles several years before the incident. Birdie had a habit of showing up to the McDermott’s home to lodge complaints against the children of the house, most often accusing them of stealing. Her incessant complaints led many to believe that she held a great grudge against Charles and his family for having taken up residence in her childhood home, but your own research into Birdie leads you to believe that was simply her personality and perhaps the result of having lived alone for too long – the McDermott house being a sort of bridge to companionship, even at the cost of being a bad neighbor.
Sources always seemed torn as to how to present the figure of Emmett, surname unknown, the man renting out a spare room of the McDermott House. It was relatively common for those with larger-than-needed households to bring in a little extra income by letting spare rooms to those who couldn’t afford much else, which it seems Charles McDermott had done. By all accounts, Emmett was the perfect tenant: quiet, clean, respectful, and even willing to help tend the children and the house. You’ve read papers wishing to show him in a favorable light, which tend to focus on how Elsie and her playmates would be endlessly entertained by Emmett’s vast repository of riddles, word games, and puzzles. You’ve also read things that cast him in an unfavorable light by focusing on the sheer multitude of answerable questions about him. Who was Emmett? How did he come to reside in the McDermott House? Why did Mrs. McDermott dislike him so? Why did he seem to be packing to leave abruptly when he was struck down by the same poison that claimed the others in the house?
Many sources spent quite a bit of time focused on Vera McDermott, formerly Vera Weber, and you suspect unfortunately baser motivations for this, looking at her photo. She was a widow with a young son when she met and married the widower McDermott. Though the average person might not realize it, second and even third marriages were fairly common at this time of higher death rates, between the Great War and the Great Depression. However, many sources seem to indicate that this particular marriage caused waves in the small town. Vera McDermott was a contentious figure amongst town residents for her forceful personality. Though everyone agreed she adored Charles, you wonder, could this have been a classic case of the “evil stepmother” archetype? Or was Vera just too self-possessed in a small town fueled by gossip? Your sources seem to place her character all across the spectrum. Either way, poison cut her second attempt at building a family short that night.