Behind the Mask

"Behind the Mask" is a Cthulhu Mythos short story by Lin Carter, first published in 1987 in the magazine Crypt of Cthulhu. It serves as a direct sequel to August Derleth's short story "The Return of Hastur".
==Synopsis==
In 1928, the library at Miskatonic University receives a collection of rare occult books from the recently deceased Amos Tuttle, donated as per the dead man's request. Librarian Cyrus Llanfer delegates the cataloging of the items to his assistant, Bryant Hoskins, who is quick to notice a copy of the exceedingly rare R'lyeh Text, bound in human skin and written in the R'lyehian language.
Studying Tuttle's notes and letters, Hoskins finds references to the Plateau of Leng, and to a region of Tibet described as "Tcho-Tcho country", where some kind of document was to be delivered to "the Tcho-Tcho lama". Hoskins consults one of his teachers, a folklorist named Wilmarth, who informs him that the Plateau of Leng is the location from which the Great Old Ones once ruled the world, according to the Necronomicon of Abdul Alhazred. Due to a curse placed by the Elder Gods (the Great Old Ones' enemies), it is now a barren land where nothing human could live. The Tcho-Tchos, however, are not human, and while their civilisation is centered in the Plateau of Sung in Burma, they are also found in other parts of Asia and are known to worship the Great Old Ones, therefore a Tcho-Tcho lama in Leng wouldn't be out of place.
Hoskins notices that some passages of the R'lyeh Text have been translated by Tuttle, and searches the man's papers for a glossary that would allow him to translate the rest of the book. Meanwhile, he finds more information about Leng in the Necronomicon, according to which the location of the plateau might be in central Asia, the South Pole, or the Dreamlands. Alhazred believed that Leng functioned as a bridge between worlds, and speaks of an Elder Hierophant wearing a mask of yellow silk. That night, Hoskins actually sees the plateau in his dreams.
After searching extensively through Tuttle's documents, Hoskins finally locates the "R'lyehian Key", and takes the R'lyeh Text home to start working on its translation. He works through the entire night and sleeps through the next day, once again dreaming of Leng. This time, however, he notices that the sky is filled with unfamiliar constellations, and sees a stone tower with a high circular window from which a light flashes out, like a lighthouse.
Over the next days, as Hoskins continues to work on the text, the meaning of words and phrases seem to become intuitively clear to him, and he learns all he can about the Great Old Ones and their servitor races. His dreams of Leng persist, always showing the stone tower with the light beam flashing from its upmost window. As his unrestful dreams prevent him from getting proper sleep, Hoskins seeks help from a physician, Dr. Ephraim Sprague, who also alerts Llanfer. Seeing his subordinate in such a state of agitation, Llanfer instructs Hoskins to take a vacation, but the thought of interrupting his research is unbearable to the young scholar.
At last, Hoskins decides to steal the R'lyeh Text, along with the translation key, and take them to his father's cabin in the woods, where he can continue his work undisturbed. When he runs short of the drugs that Dr. Sprague had prescribed to him, Hoskins experiences a nightmare in which he actually enters the stone tower of Leng and sees the Hierophant: a bloated, corpulent figure clad in silken robes that appear to conceal an inhuman anatomy, and whose face is hidden by a mask of yellow silk.
Some weeks go by before Llanfer notices that the R'lyeh Text is missing and finds the location of Hoskins' cabin. The police finds Hoskins insane and sends him to the local asylum, where he screams and laughs maniacally about the face behind the yellow mask, which has putrid holes instead of eyes, a tentacular proboscis for a nose, and no mouth. Hoskins dies a few months later and the R'lyeh Text is returned to Miskatonic.
Category:Expanded Mythos Works
Category:Lin Carter works