The study was at the opposite end of the house to the storage room that had been a make shift bedroom for her ailing father. It was a massive room with maps and sketches of people lining the walls. To one side was a huge mahogany desk covered in hundreds of papers with writing at every angle. The huge leather chair looked warn but comfortable to sit in.
Roland looked stricken as he held his arm out at the over sized brown leather chair, “Have a seat.”
She nodded, "Where do I start?”
She looked at the mess the office was. She wondered how she could be related to a man who kept his things in such disorder.
Roland turned grabbing a huge pile of journals from the bureau behind him. He slumped them onto the table in front of her. She looked at the dust rise from the collection of decrepit artifacts and sighed, “You want me to read all of these?”
He nodded, “They are the story I cannot tell you.”
She looked up at his old gentle face. She pondered his place in it all for a moment before turning back to the heap of journals.
“They are in chronological order already, top of the pile is book one.”
She shivered still weak and exhausted, “I cannot sit here and read for the two days it will take, my family is probably looking for me. I can't miss Rebecca's funeral. They'll want to question me. I think I'm a witness.”
Roland looked down at her and shook his head, “They are not your family firstly and secondly they are not looking for you my dear, just read.”
She didn’t know what to say. Nothing about the last twenty-four hours seemed like the real world. She reached and picked up the first book as Roland left the room.
The writing was her fathers, he spoke of tests on street cats. Hanna cringed imagining him torturing animals for science. He seemed like a mad scientist in his writings, too passionate about finding the answers he sought. The first journal seemed entirely about his desperate need to create some kind of formula. It would be an amazing creation. It sounded like it would transform a man into something more. She neither saw the need nor the reasoning behind his mad writings. Gasping she looked at the date of the last Journal entry of the first journal, June 7th 1803. She closed the book and looked at the cover again. It did seem as if it were handmade.
She opened the book again and squinted her eyes shaking her head. She took a deep breath and looked at the date again. 1803.
She looked up from the book to see Roland walking into the study with a huge tray.
“1803?”
He put the tray down and nodded, “It gets much more interesting the further you read. 1803 becomes the least of the fantastical things you need to understand.”
She took the fresh steaming cup of coffee and sipped, “How do you know how I like my coffee?”
He smiled, “You’re a teenager, you all like those two sugar two cream coffees. Only later will you discover espresso and its need for only steamed milk to make a perfect cup of coffee.”
She sipped again enjoying it, “I'm not a teenager, I'm almost nineteen. I don’t think age has anything to do with liking espresso. I wont ever like it.”
“Wait five years.” He muttered and left the room silently.
She picked up the second journal. Her father's writing grew more and more fanatical and impassioned. He wrote of destroying his lab with fire, in anger. She noted how he wrote only of his lab work, he seemed to have no life outside of the lab. He wrote of no women, no friends, no relations. She couldn’t imagine what his life was like, living in isolation as he had.
Halfway through the third journal something shifted, she stopped and reread the last few pages to see where the change took place. He seemed free of his lab, he spoke of people. He spoke of a woman, a girl named Mary. He seemed to love her. He went to a ball and danced the night away, with Mary. He was suddenly free of something.
She read feverishly, as the story began to get interesting. He had met a man, a young man, who wanted to discuss his work. His name was Marcus Dragomir, her father noted he was more than he seemed. He was a young unmarried baron, who had helped her father finish the formula. He spoke of trials, but never mentioned animals again.
Her father wrote of a string of murders that concerned him, people ripped to pieces or trampled within the city limits of London. Needless to say the third journal had grown increasingly alluring.
“It’s bed time Miss Hanna, a quarter past one in the morning.”
She looked up as her eyes focused on Roland standing in the hall. Suddenly she felt as if she were inside the story. The Tudor home, the English butler, mysterious journals, a dead father and a woman who killed him then vanished into thin air.
She looked at the tray of dinner dishes in front of her but couldn’t recall having eaten the meal.
She stood bringing the book with her. She wrapped the blanket, she couldn’t recall having around her back, tighter and walked along side Roland.
“Engrossing isn’t it?”
She nodded clutching the book, “Its insane, he was a madman. I feel like I know less about him thus far though.”
“Its gets more divulging.” He opened her bedroom door and smiled kindly, “Try to sleep.”
She nodded closing the door looking at the huge bed, knowing she needed sleep. She put the book on the nightstand and drifted quickly.
She slept soundly again even though her dreams were vivid. She was standing in an alleyway. She watched as her father, dressed in Jane Austen period clothing, stepped out into the alley. He glanced around suspiciously and pulled a vial from his pocket, he drank the vial. Suddenly his clothes became colorful instead of black and white. The dream remained black and white, the only color being her fathers clothing. He smiled and greeted people. He seemed outgoing, not at all like he seemed in his journals in the beginning. He met a woman, she had black hair and a dark dress. The dress was not as dark as her hair, but in a black and white dream color wasn’t easily observed. They walked hand in hand. They laughed and strolled until a young man came upon them. He was devastatingly handsome. Even in black and white it was obvious, he was the most handsome man Hanna had ever seen. She could see nothing in the dream suddenly, as he was the only thing her eyes would acknowledge. He tipped his hat at the lady on her fathers arm. He smiled and spoke, his sensual lips moved slowly, making Hanna’s mind get lost for a moment. He smiled again and said farewell to her father. He walked away slowly. Before turning to mist, he made eye contact with Hanna. It was as if he knew she watched him. He smiled at her a knowing smile filled with a confidence in something she didn’t understand. She knew suddenly he was Marcus, the young baron. She didn’t question how, she just did.
The next day the fourth journal proved to be as engrossing as the third. Her father wrote of successes with his formula and enjoyed his time with Mary. He even wrote more of his blossoming friendship with the young baron. He seemed to be at the top of the world, with the only bother being the amassing deaths in London and the sightings of the horrid monster causing them.
She finished the fourth journal feeling the flourishing romance between her father and the mysterious Mary. The year was 1806 and all was well in the world.
She looked out the window lost in the story, the yard was suddenly full of blossomed cherry trees. Her father was walking hand in hand with the remarkably beautiful Miss Mary. He wore his top hat as she imagined and bowed like a gentleman. He was kind and sweet, caring for the young lady more than anything in the entire world. A pang of jealousy rushed through of her as she wondered what it had been like to have his attentions. She couldn’t remember everything from before her mother's accident but she remembered what it had been like to see him smile genuinely toward her.
The fifth journal again contained a switch, her father seemed to come to some kind of a realization. He awoke with blood on his hands and his clothing torn. She thought back to her own memories, wondering if finally she was at the part she needed to read, to understand her own dilemma.
He again burned the lab, not in anger but in fear and desperation. He ran in terror, unable to understand the changes he had undergone. Somehow he had come to an understanding. He was, without a shadow of doubt, a monster.
He didn’t fully recall how long he had been a monster, but he started to link the numerous deaths in London to his changes. She watched as he traced his vials of elixir with deaths and monster sightings. She trembled reading feverishly.
The symptoms were exact, chills, torn clothing, blood, aching body, memory loss, weakness, exhaustion, and severe hunger. They were all there, every one of her symptoms.
The worst was the missing memories, he seemed desperate to attempt to rekindle his mind with his memories.
He missed Mary. He missed being normal. Slowly he became the same recluse he had been before the magical potion had saved him from himself.
He recalled the smallest details, her lips, her smile. He remembered her eyes as they sparkled, speaking to him while her mouth remained unmoved. He wrote of the way her cheeks flushed when he touched her chin, lifting her face to meet his. His heart broke as his mind cracked.
The ramblings of a madman returned, as he became lost in his work, hiding from the world and himself. He was crazy, insane even.
She recalled her memories painfully. His insanity was no doubt hereditary. She too would lose her mind in it all.
Tears slipped down her cheeks as she read feeling his pain. She knew why Roland had been so adamant for her to read the journals. She couldn’t help but see her father in a different light.
Her father wrote of paranoia and mysteries he couldn’t solve. He was like a man with schizophrenia, who believed the world he lived in existed outside of everyone else. Even when the world tried to reach him and pull him back, he believed in his paranoia over the reality he saw.
One page in hundreds contained sentences she understood, words that made her believe he had come out of his stupor. He would write of love and anger, but in a sensible way she could comprehend.
The sixth and seventh journals were no different than the fifth, he remained lost and alone.
The eighth journal brought back a character from previous journals. He was the same man who had so actively befriended her father. He was the young Baron, Marcus Dragomir. He had searched high and low, traveling everywhere, searching for her father. He found him in Paris, hiding below a church. He had survived on the kindness of a priest, who saw the man behind the madness. Her father's rarely occurring clarity had convinced the priest that he must help him. The priest believed it was possible god was testing him.
