Kerberos 12/19/2011

From Victor Knight's Case Files

While returning from a case (an interesting little vignette having to do with a misplaced cigar holder and an observant butler) I stumbled upon an unusual scene: a lady's carriage was stopped before a street walker collapsed in the street. A lady leaped from the carriage and ran to the woman to aid her, and enlisted me to help get the woman on her feet and to a local midwife, since the poor woman had collapsed in labor in the middle of the road. The lady, one Angelina Durless, is studying to be a doctor and bustled around with the midwife attempting to be in charge... too many cooks, but I don't think that's what caused the child when born to look dead and withered, despite being perfectly mobile and healthy otherwise. The Lady Durless brought the baby and its mother, one Eva Grainger, back to her place: Eva of course was in hysterics, thinking that her baby was cursed. Lady Durless merely saw a child in need. I saw something Strange, and so tagged along. After seeing her home, I went back to my flat and to bed.

The next day I went to the Club and met up with Lincoln, who had come across a murder while escorting a lady home. The Lady Eliza Ashdown had picked Lincoln up in a bar, and while escorting her home they came across her fiancee Collin lying dead in the street. He had an emblem of a lion impressed into his palm and Lincoln heard an uneven clomping sound moving off. He, Sophronia, and I went to the Durless's place to check in on the child: Angelina had whipped up a contraption to keep the baby fed since her mother was still squeamish about touching it. Lincoln doted on the the child, and held forth at great length about the need for human contact, and how being ugly didn't make the child less human. I convinced Angelina (it wasn't hard) to come with us to look at the body of Collin and see what we could determine: there was an interlude in which Lincoln had to go get permission from the Ashdowns and Sophronia and I showed Angelina to the club: she found a copy of Da Vinci's Vivasections in the stacks and was immediately at home. Lincoln returned, mentioning that the lion was the Ashdown family crest. We went to examine the body, and the only odd thing besides the hand imprint was that the bullet that had killed him was small, but not of a size one would expect from a lady's pistol. It was obvious it could have come from a gun built into a cane, and with the imprint on his hand it was the work of moments to verify that Eliza's brother, Lord Dudley Ashdown, walked with a limp and had a cane with a hidden gun that had been fired recently. I passed this information on to Lincoln who confronted Dudley. He'd done it to protect his sister from the poor match her fiance would be (he beat her), but this doesn't excuse murder and the constables took him away.

While all of this was going on, Alice was engaged to Clarence. Clarence is an investment banker, far below her class, but he somehow convinced Alice's cousin to promise to the match. He also tried to force himself upon her, and was wearing a grecan helment that she only noticed after resisting some attempt of his to manipulate her. Clearly something Strange was going on, and she managed to get out of her house and to the Club to meet us. I looked in the stacks while Sophronia visited the British Museum (trading a drawing of and information about the Judas dagger) and we learned that the helmet was a Helm of Minerva, an item of sacred magic that makes its wearer supernaturally persuasive. It also indicates that Clarence is a mage, since only one schooled in such arts can use the helm. This explains his success in business, and the unusual strength and speed Alice observed in him. Alice imposes on Lincoln to talk some sense into her relatives, and while he is easily charming enough to undo Clarence's arguments, Alice's cousin had already given his word and so the engagement was still on.

During this, Alice and Lincoln heard of a party planned by the Lady Summerville to resurrect her dead husband. Curious, we attended, and of course the presiding mystic (named Mr. Madrigal) was John Murray, the fraud Alice had encountered long before when she was beginning her dabblings in the occult, and who had been known as Dr. Janosch to the foolish group attempting to free the spirit bound in the table. The resurrection, to all appearances, worked, but I made a quick examination and despite his visible life Lord Summerville was actually dead and had in a few places skin that was grey and withered, like that of Eva's baby.

GM's Last Week On

Alice has three suitors:

• Bookish Douglas Matthews-Highgate, somewhat below her station, tried, ineptly, to protect her, fainted in her arms.
• Charismatic, close to her in rank, but black sheep, Robert Doyle, who's led a colorful life. His cousin, Henrietta, want to marry him herself, but her brother, Michael, doesn't want anyone marrying his sister, so wants Alice to marry Robert.
• Uriah Clarence, too old, of the wrong social class, but a mage who bewitched her cousin into agreeing to the match. Mr. Lincoln made him realize this was absurd, but he Gave His Word. However, if there were Evidence of Clarence being Utterly Unsuitable...

Abraham Lincoln dealt with a murder:

• Lord Dudley Ashdown killed his Colin Rufus Palmer, fiance of Lord Ashdown's sister, Eliza. Colin pretended to be a good man in public, but privately, struck his footloose fiance, and badmouthed her, and otherwise enjoyed the thought of getting a lot of money for a woman he could safely abuse, as public sympathy would be with him.
• Lord Dudley was arrested, although it's an interesting question as to what his fate will be. He is a noble, and it was accidental homicide, as there was a struggle and the gun went off. Also, he was protecting his sister. Plus, he's lame, having lost the use of the leg years ago, saving his sister from a fall. As far as my research goes, capital punishment is on its way out, so he's not likely to be killed. He could stand on privilege if he's a peer, but this was actually very rare. The leg gets in the way of service based punishments. That leaves fine, imprisonment, and pardons, and I'm leaning towards imprisonment for a time, never mind realism.