Jack had spent the afternoon in the kitchen, watching the soda bread Maggie had put up. "Ma'am," he had said, "Since th' sergeant ain't gonna let me leave th' house, could I be o' use watchin' th' bread? Many's th' time I've done it fer my Mam. Back home." He stops, a mist seeming to form in his eyes before he blinked it quickly away.

Now he watches Janey come up to examine him, not daring to speak or even move, lest he spook her and Wilkins take it as further evidence against him. When she says "hair" he realizes he's come out without his hat and touches his hair, nodding in response. When she runs off to hug Murphy and Cleary, he lets out the breath he wasn't aware of holding.

Thomas sees Sgt. Wilkins walk out of the Cleary's house.  Thomas does not recognize the man but is aware of his rank based on his uniform.  Rather than introduce himself the man asked Thomas what time it is.  Thomas is taken aback from the direct question and takes a moment to answer the question.  "Today is December third, 1813, why do you ask Sgt?"

The sergeant comes closer and gives Daniels a hard stare, a little more flushed than the heat would readily account for, having been but recently inside. Eventually he twitches away a fly that had been crawling up his cheek and declares to the others:

"Far as I can tell, 'e's not lying." There was probably a curse muttered somewhere under his breath despite the ladies present. "All right, get down from there." He beckons brusquely to Thomas and points at James.

"You, you must be Gill, if you'd kindly get these beasts put away an' come join us in the kitchen, and you're Cotton," the brief stabbing pointing gesture feels like an accusation, "-because someone could just about mistake yer for Duggan 'ere. Get yerself to the ground, my lad." Mulberry shifts uncertainly under her rider, canting her head to keep the sergeant in easy sight.

Wilkins leaves Henry just enough room to get down. "You ain't seen 'ide nor 'air of the Calder Expedition out there, 'ave you?"

Jack breathes easily for a moment, glad to have the sergeant's attention focussed elsewhere.

Having introduced herself those those that she did not know Brigitte was happy to accept Maggie's offer and departs to another room with her. She took her time sitting for many minutes as her mind raced over what had happened at the "hole", the initial shock had thankfully worn off and no she was left with uncertainty and confusion.

When she did take part in the washing she took her time as the coolness of the water had a somewhat soothing effect on her and at this point she was not really in the mood for making small talk with the men.


-

"It's the fourteenth," Murphy tells Thomas. He looks from the convict to Cleary and Janey. "Sometin strange and terrible has happened - you'd better come in and sit down wit' us."

James looks over, dismounting. "Found something strange out in the bush," he mentions. "Sheep heads 'n such. Others went up and poked at it; I was mostly concerned for our girl and the horses."

Murphy throws Daniels a questioning look, but before he can talk Cleary and the sergeant herd everyone inside. Maggie takes Janey off to wash her a bit and make her wear clothes, if just for the evening. She's a bit reluctant and the others can hear her awkward attempts at speech heading into the depths of the house, seeking reassurance that nobody's going to 'do strange'.

Sitting on the kitchen table is Thomas' original notebook, and a larger one he doesn't recognise.

"Sit," the sergeant instructs the newcomers. He taps the unknown volume. "Would you like to tell me about this first, or whatever it is you found outside?" His tone manages to be gentle but not nice, not at all.

Thomas dismounts and heads into the house following the others.  Thomas looks around the area and notices his original notebook sitting on the table along with a second one.  It takes a moment or two before he recognizes the second notebook.  Thomas moves toward the table and takes his original notebook and thumbs through it to make sure that it really is his.  After ensuring the book is his, Thomas moves to take the second notebook and begins to thumb through  that one also.

After thumbing through the notebook Thomas asks the Sgt.  "If I may know where did you find these two?"


OOC
17:07, Today: Thomas Daniels rolled 47 using 1d100.  INT 75.

[[Keeper edit: message moved to own thread at silly in the morning to avoid confusion]]
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:24, Sat 04 Apr 2020.

Stepping up near the sergeant and handling the books feels like stepping into danger; Thomas feels like perhaps the soldier hasn't had a good day.

Cleary's voice breaks into the tension: "I let them look through your room, Tom. I'm sorry, but it's important. There's been a murder."

"Three murders," the sergeant says, still too soft. His eyes are a smudged shade of blue which Thomas notices because he's being looked at very hard, studied for any twitch or reaction. "Four if the mother dies. Maybe five if Duggan's story - what he's now forgotten - about a Miss Towler being taken off into the mountains by the murderer is true."
This message was last edited by the player at 01:26, Sat 04 Apr 2020.

Jack has found himself a corner to lean in, out of the sergeant's direct gaze and away from the books in question. He's just beginning to relax a bit when his name is linked with another woman. He can't recall ever telling anyone that someone took Sally Jane off.

He takes a hesitant step forward, saying, with extreme reluctance, "I said what now? 'bout Sally Jane? When and t'who?"

He feels like he's going mad.

It's Murphy who literally steps in to answer, having helped James get the horses inside to attend to them. "That would be the convict lass you told Gill the fellow had taken, so stumbling your pursuit o' him some - I remembered her name and told the sergeant when we were setting our horses away earlier."

Time and action seem to be sliding away from those involved like earth during the first stages of a landslide. Jack remembers something, like a dream. Thomas has a smooth blank of nothingness where any idea of what had happened might have been. He thinks.

"What we heard was that you went up after 'er," the sergeant says to Thomas, not looking aside. "Did you bring her back, Mister Daniels? Where is she?" Daniels gets the impression the redcoat knows about the charges brought against him in Bakewell. Murder under temporary insanity.

[[@Jack - see message msg#56 in the Dawn Chorus Thread.]]

Thomas takes a deep breath before answering the Sgt. question.  "I have no idea what you are talking about.  Where was I supposed to have gone up and who did I go after?  I have never left the farm except to go into town on the occasional errand for Mr. Cleary."  After answering Thomas decides to flip through his new note book to look at the first entries in it to see if it brings back any memories.

"I'd imagine you ascended into the Blue Mountains about the place the Calder Expedition did, and as for our killer the most logical suspect from what I've learned presently would be Llewellyn Bowen, a convict Calder took up on account of his knowledge of geology. Only according to Calder 'ere, he's dead."

The sergeant taps Calder's expedition notes, then pushes Daniels' notebook towards him. "-and there ain't no "supposed" about it - unless you deny this is your handwriting in the book we found in your room, what Cleary says is yours and I imagine matches your second volume." The softness is wearing out of the sergeant's tone: Thomas has felt that frustration himself, though the killings that obsessed him had seemed more tantalisingly solveable.

The first entry in Thomas' new book seems to have been written in a time of desperation. It is his handwriting, however. The other entries before today's notes are even less comforting.


-
This message was last edited by the player at 23:24, Sun 05 Apr 2020.

As they'd ridden back toward the farmstead Henry had been feeling cheerful. Sure it was hot, but it was always hot. Better, they'd found Janey and that afternoon he'd almost enjoyed playing childish games with her to keep her occupied on the ride home. I Spy had a wonderful riddling air to it when the partner you played with spoke her own cryptic language.

He'd blinked in confusion though as the Sergeant confronted them on their return, before frowning unconvinced at talk of skipping dates. Then talk of murder...

Now Henry stood by the door to the wide Kitchen confused and concerned as Wilkins glowered at Tom. Without wanting to draw the ire of the red coat he sidled toward Jack and muttered under his breath.
"What happened here? We've only been gone for a day.".

Jack replies quietly to Henry, hardly moving his mouth.

"Sure, that's just what I been sayin' an' th' Countess, an' th' Clearys an' now you lot. But Murphy an' Sergeant say it's two weeks later. 'Tis like time means nothin' an' never will again."

Henry raised a confused eyebrow.
”So you think it’s the third too? Has the sarge been drinking all day?”. He kept his voice quiet, worried he was missing something as the red faced official directed his ire toward Tom.
”What are you guys doing here anyway?”.

"Well," Jack says conversationally, "I'm arrested f'r murderin' a family. I think maybe Daniels's about t'be arrested f'r th' same. Which could be t'my benefit. Not sure that, but maybe."
This message was last edited by the player at 23:40, Mon 06 Apr 2020.

”Oh...”.
Henry blinked, bewildered as the man beside him spoke of murdering a family as if it was an every day thing. He opened his mouth to say something, to call the stranger out on his ‘joke’ but found his tongue stumble and instead hiccuped a fumbled excuse end the conversation.
“Oh, I, uh, didn’t realise.”. Henry lowered his eyes so as not to get murdered himself. ”Tom didn’t do nothing. He was out with Gill and I all day...”.

Suddenly he looked up and back to the red faced sergeant. Unable to stop himself he blurted out as he made the connection.
”Hold on, who is dead? What happened to the Calder expedition?”.
Henry felt a growing dread.

The sergeant's awkwardly-placed chair makes a ghastly scraping sound against the floorboards as he scoots back enough to address the interruption.

"Murphy, fill the lad in on the particulars, would you? As for the expedition-" he does take a moment to glance around the room for ladies, at least "-Hell knows, but I am trying-" he indicates Daniels with a tilt of his head, as though near-certain the man knows more than has been said, "-to find out."
This message was last edited by the player at 23:43, Mon 06 Apr 2020.

In reply to Henry Cotton (msg # 21):

PM

The man addressed as Murphy - a wiry, unpretty man with as many freckles as Henry had ever seen on a human being - gave Henry half a tired smile and stepped a bit closer to explain, offering a hand and proper introduction as he did so. "Charles Murphy, I help them catch th' bushrangers. Away back on the fifth, word got to me where I was workin' that there'd been a massacre up here: father, two little kids, the killer'd tried for the mother but left her, struck down wit' some heavy thing, stabbed light across th' guts and worse in the leg there. Heard Duggan here had driven this feller off, taken to th' mountains after him, and that the feller had stolen a lass away with him."

He takes a deep breath. "This word was sent by Madame d'Anjou, to ensure meself and the authorities would step in if there was no word from her party in a week of this man bein captured. 'Twere a white man - Duggan said he was from th' Calder expedition when he spoke to Gill of the situation whilst in pursuit."

"So I finish me job out at Coal River, there's a week wit' no word whatsoever, an' the Sa- the soldiers an' I  come out here - Wilkins talked to th' mother a little, she's alive yet, God save 'er - and everyone's goin' about like there's none o' it happened. I...don't know what t'make of it. What I can, I don't want to." He shakes his head.

Thomas looks between the man who names himself Charles and the Sgt.  "Henry speaks truly, I have been with Henry and James since this morning.  As far as the Calder expedition and what happened to them, I am willing to help out in what ever capacity I can offer. I was a police detective in a past life and well that is a story for another time."


[[GM edit: name confusion.]]
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:26, Tue 07 Apr 2020.

Daniels has the full focus of Wilkins' attention again. "Until you became obsessed with some local rituals and murdered your friend, yes, I 'eard that. It's what you were doin' before this morning would be more pertinent. Maybe Miss Towler was your friend, too. Where is she, Daniels?"

Cleary leans against the wall and nods to Brigitte as she comes in, breaking into the conversation rather more gently: "What's in that notebook y'have there, Thomas? Did you write down what you found out on the land?"

Thomas looks from the Sgt to Cleary.  "I don't know where Miss Towler is.  And yes Mr. Cleary, I took diligent notes about what I saw once out on the land as you call it.  I will share them with you but I must warn you they are very graphic and difficult to look at.  Henry went up the hill with me and also noticed the...and I use this term loosely...artwork and can validate what we saw."

Holding out the notebook, "Here you go, take a look yourself if you really want to."

The Sergeant's scowl says he doesn't fully believe that, but Cleary comes up to take the notes from Daniels' hand and reads them over, wincing a couple of times in the quiet. "Teeth?" he queries, looking to Henry.

"D'I do playss now?" Janey asks, wandering in. Maggie takes her over to the stove and assures her that yes, she can set out plates in just a moment.

Cleary tilts the copy of the drawing on the rock towards Thomas. "You had a copy of a thing like this in your old notes, too...and one of these twig things was in your room. Do you think you took it from there, or somewhere else?"

The sergeant bristles, clearly sure Thomas has made them himself, but just barely holds his peace at a sign from Cleary. Tom's namesake waits to hear him out.