A late 19th century British middle class family man receives a gem from a Persian beggar that allows him to go back in time. Despite protests from his wife he uses it…
Lovecraft was very literary. The writer he admired most was Lord Dunsany, a British aristocrat who had success writing plays. Lovecraft became obsessed with ritual fetish thinking that merely sets up plot twists like this play about an imaginary ten years that is supposed to take place in a single day starting with something a character wished he had done differently. Taking a train a hundred years ago could make Lovecraft think of some weird adventure that might not please the crowds that saw this play.
Lovecraft might have been frightened by the play IF at the end of 1921 if he thought of it as collective hypnosis about money that had already been spent for the control of a deathly ratline.