2 January 

I would have liked to write more on the first day of the year, but once I'd been roused from my early journey, I hadn't the time nor the energy to commit my pen to paper. If I'm perfectly honest, I am also terrified. When I set out on this journey, I was fully expecting to see a corpse or two at the end of this all (or the beginning, since it will be my house I journey back to first), and the longer I travel towards that destination, the more fearful I am that I'll be right. 

Lord DeCourt is travelling with me for most of the way, though his use is admittedly limited. "I am incapable of combat of any sort, Ms. Peterson," he told me last night before we settled down for bed."You must take care not to involve yourself in any skirmishes!" I had waved away the idea of myself fighting with anyone - was my work not more studious and sneaky? Regardless, the more time I spent going over every possible horrific scenario, the more I considered that the doctor would have had to put in place some protective measures to guard his underhanded life. Either that, or I really was the stupidest person alive, to try and undermine a man of decidedly more influence and means than myself. He was a learned, clever man - perhaps he assumed nobody else would seek to threaten his claim to women, wherever they were hiding in the country. 

Today is going to be a long day, I feel. My bones ache from the cold, and no amount of coats or blankets can keep me warm. I felt horribly for the Lord: as frozen as I was, he was in a state of constant distress. The temperatures appeared to affect his wounded knee and his face was a pinched white from holding in his expressions of agony. If tea had made any sort of physical improvement, I would have offered him endless supplies. 

Currently, we are bobbing along the road through fields covered in a haze of white. I don't know how the driver has any idea where we are. If I had been forced to walk my way back home, Evelyn would have been cursed to be Igor Radcliffe's bride forever! I peer out of the window occasionally, but it will be several hours before the view looks any different. 

Seeing my distress, the Lord leaned forward and began to talk with me. It was largely trivial, but he knew anything more serious would only add to my anxiety. "Tell me about your family, Ms. Peterson." He held a ball of yarn in his gloved hands and was struggling to connect a needle through a messy piece of work with the added resistance of the gloves.  After a moment of my introductory, stuttering details about my parents, he made a noise in the back of his throat and threw the yarn work aside, deciding instead to breathe on his hands and hide them under the safety of his own blanket. "I was never any good," he offered by way of explanation, when I paused to raise an eyebrow. "Alas, I wither away on journeys like this; hours of nothing to do, just staring at the same spot on the ceiling... it's enough to make a man like me go mad!" 

"You didn't have to come along, Lord DeCourt," I smiled, though I knew what he would say. 

"And forsake being a gentleman? I think not!" He sniffed and relented, giving me a smile in return. "I really had no choice in the matter! A woman in distress, seeking to free her dearest friend from unholy bonds? I should sooner die than allow her to perish without as much assistance as I could allow." 

"What if I am wrong, my Lord?" 

"None of that," he waved, though his face did take on a more severe expression. "I suppose... yes, well, we can't do much if you are wrong. I would gladly pay to have you return home, but you are here for a reason, Ms. Peterson. My home is yours as long as you are in England - if you should be turned out of the house for these awful accusations, then it would be my pleasure to ensure this nasty doctor never found you again." I thanked him warmly, but could not shake my sense of discomfort. 

After stumbling over the best way to words my concerns, I eventually asked him how he'd never heard of my despicable doctor. "I don't wish to imply that you've been unobservant or lax in your knowledge of the other gentry in Cambridge," I began slowly, "but... I'm sorry, I just really cannot understand how a man such as Dr. Radcliffe could go unnoticed for so long!"

"My dear," he said, relocating and sitting beside me, "you needn't worry about upsetting me, I must impress that. As to how I failed to notice, well, that's a tricky scenario. When I first laid eyes upon your dark and foreboding house (indeed, have you not noticed that every other home on the street possesses light and colour, and yours does not?), it was well before I met you! I cannot say I knew a man bearing the name of Radcliffe, so I must admit that I am unaware when he began to inhabit the house." He paused and fiddled with the string in his lap, the threads shaking over the surface of the blanket he held. "My family has lived in my house for hundreds of years, and while your friend may have told you of my interests in ancestry and the like, my youth was not spent under such attractions! This doctor very likely moved into the home when I was otherwise occupied by my exercises of free will."

"Would any of your brothers have remembered when the doctor slithered in?" Lord DeCourt laughed at this and shook his head. 

"My brothers are either well-occupied with managing our estate or managing our land from the comfort of distant shores." Unearthing a thin hand to rub his chin, he squinted for a moment. "I suppose I could ask Chester... Although, we might have to know when exactly this doctor moved onto the street before we can bother him about anything.

It was a tricky situation indeed. This journal will prove a necessary reminder to ask the rector if he knows when the doctor was summoned to care for him, as much as care can be debated in his case. Even utilising my own experiences, the healing capabilities of Evie's unfortunate husband were sorely lacking. What a generally awful record! Evie's mother had died after his summoning, and my own lungs were suffering with the passing of each day (not that I truly expected my affliction to be cured. I held more of a disdain for the doctor for thinking he could control my actions under the guise of improvement). 

Our carriage rumbled along as the hours passed, both the Lord and I sleeping in turns as we drove our way through the country. I'm grateful we were able to rest; the journey was made remarkably less painful by our dreaming escapes, though I personally can't recall having dreamt. My sleeping visions are rare, and when they do occur, I can never be trusted to remember them outside of some nagging sense that something was amiss. Thankfully, none of those misgivings followed me out of the carriage when the driver pulled us to a stop and rapped on the roof. How he hadn't completely frozen over, I haven't any idea. Walking out of the cube of warmth and blankets, I was struck at once by how horridly uncomfortable the snow and wind and frost all were - how anyone could sit for hours through it was totally beyond me. 

"Come along, Ms. Peterson, come along. We need to get inside!"

"Where are we?" I recognised neither my house nor a church. 

"Outside of a friend's house," answered the Lord, who was the painful owner of a pinched face and a scowl. The weather and he were in sworn disagreement! "Please, if you will. I'm afraid I can't take much more of this snow, as pretty as it is." We scuttled as quickly as we could to the steps of the house, which resembled something closer to Evie's family home. There was a swinging sign above the door with a mug on it and a great big pile of wood below that, which had been generously sampled from by whoever lived indoors. We, fortunately, didn't have to wait long at the door after knocking for someone to fling the wood open and send the pile of logs toppling. 

At first, I did not recognise that anyone was at the door. Only once my eyes registered that they held a lamp did I see the eyes and then the brilliant smile, bright enough to rival the snow, did I realise I was looking at another coloured person. 

"Carroway!" he exclaimed, thrusting the lamp in my hands for a moment to crush the Lord in a hug so severe I heard bones crack. "You bloody ghost! You were supposed to visit ages ago." Lord DeCourt made a noise in the back of his throat, which prompted the stranger to unleash him from their stunning grasp. 

"Yes, well... Health hasn't been all that forgiving, nor will it be if you leave us outside."

"Right! In, in, then! I'll have a cup for you in a moment; sorry about the logs, love." The stranger spoke quickly and with too much energy for one roused at such an awful hour. He gave me a kind-hearted smile, though, and helped me stumble my way over the mess they'd made. Their exuberance quite cured my uncomfortable countenance. 

Once we were inside, a dangerous amount of candles revealed that we were in a stone house of sorts, a two-story building with horned creatures mounted on every wall and mugs like the one on the sign outside stacked in piles on every table. Whoever this friend of the Lord's was, they were clearly expecting to entertain hundreds of guests. 

"Sit down! Make yourselves happy; I've a fire burning behind the counter, if you need to thaw your bones." He slammed the door shut and came stomping in, the damp carriage driver sloshing in after. "The horses are around the back, no need to worry about them." Lord DeCourt sighed in relief and sank into a seat by what appeared to be a counter of drinks. Indeed, a fire flickered out of sight behind him, though the driver found it soon enough. Within minutes, the whole of our motley party was curled up around the counter, toes baking in the heat of the flames and mugs of spiced tea in our hands. The snow may not have been kind on one's extremities, but it made the fire all the more welcoming for it. 

Sparing me the awkwardness of having to ask, the stranger introduced themselves as Taylor Bakersfield. "I've been all around the world, little lady, with a name for each country. No need to look so surprised that this one doesn't fit, eh?" He winked at me and engaged at once in heated recollections with the Lord, giving me time to study him. While Philadelphia had plenty of coloured people and my own father had introduced me to friends by the dozens with more shades to their skin than stars in the sky, this Taylor was the first person like my own people I had met since arriving in England. I was fascinated! How had they come to be here, in the middle of a forgotten road in Cambridge (were we even still in Cambridge? I must remember to ask where to find this warm little place again!)? Where had they been and what had they seen?

As eagre as I was to hear about this fantastic addition to my stay in the country, the combination of the strong tea and the soothing fire had made me maddeningly drowsy. Once my chin hit the counter, I was roused by the Lord and guided to a room with blankets by the dozens piled on a bed and a lamp glowing softly in the cold darkness. How fortunate I am to have met all of these kind people, and yet, how utterly in despair for being tangled up in the life of that damnable doctor. May my sleep be unbothered by images of the horrid red eyes of the man! 

Until the morning,

Winn