Is that a Death? and are there two?

I do not know how clear these words will be. I have lost I know not how many days in a haze of alcohol and laudanum and damned futile experimentations. Last night, I placed the envelope containing this typescript in a tin box, determined that I would cast it into the sea. And perhaps I thought I might throw myself in, afterwards. But, though I carried the box to the western sea wall on the edge of the Park, at the last my resolve faltered. The envelope is once again hidden away in its drawer, where only Captain Susenko and myself may find it. I have not written of having asked him to see to the disposition of these pages in the event of my death or disappearance, and of his kindly agreeing to see that they would reach Mr. Oolon Sputnik. How many days ago now was that? Shortly before Miss Paine's murder, but more I can not guess.

If there is some heretofore undiscovered secret allowing for the reanimation of the dead, I have failed utterly to find it, and I fear there is no time now left to me and the search must end. Although I have taken all imaginable precautions against the inevitable decay of Artemisia's body, and have stored it on ice in the cellar when not engaged in my efforts to revive the corpse...though I have tended it as well as any butcher ever might...deterioration was inevitable and is reaching a stage...I can not write these things. I simply can not. I am trying to find within myself the strength to surrender body to the undertaker and make an end to this.

I would try to write of the events immediately proceeding Miss Paine's death, for there are certain facts and comments I should like placed on record, even if the record is not public. There are things which I would say for my own good. To have them out, for they hound and gnaw at me. The worst of these was the reaction of some portion of the residents of Caledon's Tanglewood district immediately after Miss Paine's murder. Upon hearing that Capt. Susenko, Col. Scaggs, and others had called a hunt for the beast, with the intent of ending, once and for all, its predations, and of avenging Artemisia's death, there came an outcry in defence of the monster! Disbelieving, my hands and clothing still red with her blood, I confronted this rabble, and to my dismay was myself pronounced guilty of her death. I do not exaggerate these accusations. I faced the mob only briefly, a contingent of the Sidhe, I believe, who perceived the news that the fiend would be brought down as a persecution of their race. Presuming me human, I was cast as merely another intolerant and hysterical xenophobe. I did not bother to disabuse them of their misapprehensions, for my history is my own, goddamn it, and, at any rate, the truth would not, I believe, have swayed them in their blind outrage. But the irony stings me still. I have never suffered fools gladly, and if this marks me as intolerant than so be it.

However, it is also true that I must admit that I am not entirely blameless, and on that terrible night suffered hysteria of my own, though it was born of loss and the horror I had witnessed and not from misguided ideas of persecution. As I have heard reported, it is true that after I called for a doctor, as Miss Paine lay dying at my feet, that I would not allow anyone to approach her. But they were not doctors, those who claimed they could help, and I would not have her subjected to so-called magic as her life drained away into the snow. Yes, I held them back at gunpoint. Yes, that is true, though it shames me to admit such a thing. And I would also report that one among the crowd, a young Mr. EllisDee, assumed the form of a huge crow or raven and asked to devour her eyes while she still lived! In the face of such madness, is my own madness not comprehensible?

It is also true that, after the hunt had been called, I lay in wait at the dance, anticipating the arrival of Mr. Lucius Sin, whom I had previously determined to be the beast's human counterpart or host. I did so with the intention of killing him myself. I approached him with my derringer drawn. Before all assembled, I named him the werewolf and accused him of Miss Paine's murder. But never have I taken a human life, and I feared, besides, that the bullets in my pistol would likely have no effect upon the eldritch Mr. Sin. I retreated, leaving behind a bewildered crowd, and returned to Babbage, where I have remained since.

It was only small consolation to learn that the man...the murdering beast...met his or its end only scant meters from the spot where I accused him, brought down by Miss Gustafson's arrow and dispatched by blades wielded by Miss Gustafson and Miss Beaumont. No one else shall ever fall prey to the fiend, and I have endeavored to take solace in this certainty. I have read that its corpse was removed to the Royal Academy of Natural Sciences in Tamrannoch, to be preserved and studied, and I do hope that rational men and women of science may gain some knowledge to prevent similar depredations in the future.

Father, I must find some way to bring this to a close. I have sat with the muzzle of my pistol to my own head, but can not find in me the requisite courage even to pull the damned trigger. And through all these waking terrors, the dreams have not let me be. Whatever stalks my sleep, that other me, the doppelgänger, that demon of light and insatiable hunger, she haunts me still. Indeed, I begin to believe that my pain is making it all the easier for her find me. So, it may pass that she will do just that, and perhaps very soon she will come while I am awake to do what I am unable to do. I no longer believe this warped and tattered life worth living, and, beyond a proper burial for Miss Paine, I see no purpose left to me.

One last thing I would now note, as it confounds me and seems another irony. It is said that the blades that felled the lycanthrope were made by the Fay! Is this true? If credence may be lent to this tale, then there must be some division or schism within the Sidhe. I confess, these occult matters are unfathomable to me.