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Authors: Christine Bell
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It feels like forever, yet no time at all. Today was difficult for me. For a fee, several times a month they allow people fascinated by the macabre to come in and stare at us, even in the curable wing. Today was such a day. I can’t say why it bothered me more today, to have them stare and point. I have heard that the incurables are sometimes poked and prodded with sticks. It is a wonder that these visitors are not required to stay here as well. Wouldn’t it seem that only a wicked mind, a broken soul, could delight in another’s misery so?
Most of the time, it feels as if it all must be a dream, or a nightmare. But I know, too, that this is my punishment. Not for being a lunatic, or diseased, or possessed by demons, or for any of the reasons doctors give for my being here. No, I’m being punished for not saving those children. I had the chance. I could have done something, but fear stopped me. And now, here I am. Unable to search. Unable to convince anyone else to search.
Would that I could close my eyes just once and not see her dirty little face, her oft belligerent, brave countenance in my mind. Would that I might sleep one night through without waking, wondering if they suffered a fate far worse than mine. Would that I…
Bethlehem, November 11, 1823
They tell me that I seem to be responding to treatment. Before last month, it had been limited to mustard plasters or leeches. The leeches are disgusting creatures, but those treatments are mild compared to those of some of the other patients. Because my condition wasn’t improving, the doctors have moved to something entirely new called the tranquilizing chair. I…I do not like it. I will do whatever it is I need to do and tell them whatever it is they want to hear in order to not have it again. If I supply the proper answers to their questions, perhaps there will be an end to this.
I have not seen Mother or Father in quite a while now. I understand their not wanting to be here, and hope, for their sake, that the speculation and gossip of the ton had…run its course. I know I’ve embarrassed them. And I know they fear that I have ruined my chance of ever finding a suitable wife, but I cannot find it within me to mourn that fact.
I just want to go home now. I long for the freedom to ride my horse, to go outside when I choose, to eat what I like. Yet at times I wonder, would freedom be better? Will I even be truly free until I know about what happened to Molly and the boy? I cannot stop my brain from imagining some new horrors that they might be subjected to. If I could just know they were all right, I would be all right.
Bethlehem, November 23, 1823
I’ve settled into a routine of lies for the past month, denying my eyes and what I know to please the doctors here. To the point that I’d almost even convinced myself. I’d begun to hope that, rather than replaying that day over and over, rather than obsessing about it and what I could have done differently, that maybe as time passed, the event would be less affecting, that maybe I could go on as if it never happened. But in a moment of clarity—and they seem to occur less and less of late—I realize that I don’t want to forget. I need to remember, need to write down my thoughts about that day in the event that all these “treatments” make me lose sight of my thoughts altogether, in order to preserve the truth, so that if I ever get out of this place, it will serve as a reminder. But not today. I can’t face it this day. Tomorrow, then.
Bethlehem, November 24, 1823
I suppose I should really start at the beginning, and the beginning was January 2nd of that same year. I hadn’t ever really noticed the urchins on Fenchurch Street. I am sure they’d always been there, but preoccupied with my own import, I’d never truly seen them before that day. They were a part of London, part of the setting, no different than the cobbles or the vendors or the gloomy winter weather, and as such, I paid them no mind.
On this
Most of the time, it feels as if it all must be a dream, or a nightmare. But I know, too, that this is my punishment. Not for being a lunatic, or diseased, or possessed by demons, or for any of the reasons doctors give for my being here. No, I’m being punished for not saving those children. I had the chance. I could have done something, but fear stopped me. And now, here I am. Unable to search. Unable to convince anyone else to search.
Would that I could close my eyes just once and not see her dirty little face, her oft belligerent, brave countenance in my mind. Would that I might sleep one night through without waking, wondering if they suffered a fate far worse than mine. Would that I…
Bethlehem, November 11, 1823
They tell me that I seem to be responding to treatment. Before last month, it had been limited to mustard plasters or leeches. The leeches are disgusting creatures, but those treatments are mild compared to those of some of the other patients. Because my condition wasn’t improving, the doctors have moved to something entirely new called the tranquilizing chair. I…I do not like it. I will do whatever it is I need to do and tell them whatever it is they want to hear in order to not have it again. If I supply the proper answers to their questions, perhaps there will be an end to this.
I have not seen Mother or Father in quite a while now. I understand their not wanting to be here, and hope, for their sake, that the speculation and gossip of the ton had…run its course. I know I’ve embarrassed them. And I know they fear that I have ruined my chance of ever finding a suitable wife, but I cannot find it within me to mourn that fact.
I just want to go home now. I long for the freedom to ride my horse, to go outside when I choose, to eat what I like. Yet at times I wonder, would freedom be better? Will I even be truly free until I know about what happened to Molly and the boy? I cannot stop my brain from imagining some new horrors that they might be subjected to. If I could just know they were all right, I would be all right.
Bethlehem, November 23, 1823
I’ve settled into a routine of lies for the past month, denying my eyes and what I know to please the doctors here. To the point that I’d almost even convinced myself. I’d begun to hope that, rather than replaying that day over and over, rather than obsessing about it and what I could have done differently, that maybe as time passed, the event would be less affecting, that maybe I could go on as if it never happened. But in a moment of clarity—and they seem to occur less and less of late—I realize that I don’t want to forget. I need to remember, need to write down my thoughts about that day in the event that all these “treatments” make me lose sight of my thoughts altogether, in order to preserve the truth, so that if I ever get out of this place, it will serve as a reminder. But not today. I can’t face it this day. Tomorrow, then.
Bethlehem, November 24, 1823
I suppose I should really start at the beginning, and the beginning was January 2nd of that same year. I hadn’t ever really noticed the urchins on Fenchurch Street. I am sure they’d always been there, but preoccupied with my own import, I’d never truly seen them before that day. They were a part of London, part of the setting, no different than the cobbles or the vendors or the gloomy winter weather, and as such, I paid them no mind.
On this
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