The Ghost of Winn Peterson

17. Winn

6 October

Watching my fate rush away in the window of the carriage filled me with a sense of sadness quite unlike any I'd experienced before. How differently the situation I was in from my leaving America, to the departure from the Thomas house. Though my own home was a great deal smaller and more shabby than the family home of my friend, I still longed to be wrapped in its halls and cozy rooms. That I could curl up on the window seat of my observatory room and write without fear of isolation. I could almost have pictured Evie, covered in dirt and her trousers rolled up at the ankles, bringing in some new plant that had grown.

Alas, the real Evie sat beside me and possessed such a look of overwhelming misery that my own lamentations seemed quite paltry by comparison. The curious lustre of her golden eyes was gone, replaced with a dark colour that suited her black hair. Of course, I still missed her original expressions of endless enthusiasm, but if Evelyn Thomas was to be imprisoned in a life she did not want, at least she would look the part of a respected man's wife. Of course, the nature of her husband-to-bed was entirely debatable, but we wouldn't actually know for certain until our ride was over. Seeing as how Evie had only met Dr. Radcliffe at a run-down church where he'd been mysteriously stationed (forgive me for thinking it a mystery, but when in doubt and fear, everything becomes a mystery of desperate dimensions that must be picked at and solved to retain my sanity), it was an extremely unknown fact of what this doctor was like in person. The clinicians of Dorset only knew the man was good at what he did, seemingly curing people of that which they believed permanent fixtures on their lives, and nothing more. Surley, a man who kpet hard at work and held no negative reviews on his person was acceptable? Still, the worm of intuition and doubt were ceaseless in Evie's mind, and she confessed before we'd stepped foot in the carriage of our imminent doom her misgivings.

It was the doctor himself who drove us towards our ill-fated futures. He'd sent for the carriage a handful of days prior and appeared quite determined to see us personally into his home. As he snapped a whip on the unfortunate back of the horse who pulled us along, Evie and I clung to each other and winced at every lurch the carriage made. As though fleeing some violent crime, or perhaps rushing towards one, our driver pulled us out of Dorset as quickly as he could without killing the horse, thought I doubted he would care much if he had succeeded in ending the beast's life. So quickly did we rush past the town that it became useless to leave the window open, and we shut the curtains before long.

Eventually, the uncertain misery of now knowing where we were headed came to a close when the sky was dark enough to suffocate the carriage. Evie had lifted the curtain some odd hour into our journey and was dismayed to see that the sun was as far away as her home now was. Turning to me with a face full of knit brows and forehead wrinkles, she clutched my arm tightly and pleaded with me not to let her die here. 

"You must ensure we escape wherever we are going. Do not let me perish in this horrible place!" Her eyes were frantic and wide, darting from my face back to the window. I wished I could have consoled her, but I was just as frightened as her. 

"What if I can't," I whispered, desperate not to let the doctor hear me. "If I should fail, what will we do?"

"You cannot fail, Winnifred, you cannot." She muttered these words over and over, until her breath came out like cold bursts of snow and she could only stutter. I'd forgotten the weather (as ridiculous as that may be), and only for the first time considered the effects it would have on my friend and I. If this new destination was homely and small, perhaps the violence of the weather could be forgotten, or even a factor in improving the coziness of life. Would fire and hot drinks not be more appreciated in this climate? My optimism was dashed before I could fool myself into believing it; we had pulled up to the house, and from the vague shapes we could make out through the dirty glass, there was something decidedly un-warming about what we saw.