22 July 1870, Thursday
After yesterday's excitement at the, now destroyed, church, we had planned a quiet morning. Miss Sinclair and Edward went out to the garden to do some sketching while I consulted with Mr Hassan.
Yesterday, I was the focus of some very powerful magik and it would not surprise me if Herr Schmidt was in some way sensitive to such things- not to mention the Lion of Damascus in Mr Hassan's custody.
I was surprised to find that I could hold my ground even as the invulnerable zombie of the recently late Mr McThorne tore though the church. Miss Bertilde was amazing, she went after that thing with sword and knife, and even once she realized that it was damaging her weapons more than she was damaging it, she kept up her attack, as did so many others of my friends and comrades. I single Miss Bertilde out for remembrance because, for a time, we were alone at the base of the tower with the new-created monster and she did not waver, buying me valuable time to complete the first half of my spell.
Happily, an earlier spell that I cast was successful in damaging the mechanisms of the guns of our opponents. I had such a very difficult time devising a spell that would hamper our opponents without injuring our friends. Mr Cuthbert's weapon was, fortunately, not affected. I had cast blessing spells on many of our League's weapons, or in Henri's case, his camera. Apparently Mr Cuthbert's gun still retained some of the blessing's protective influence.
I do not know exactly what Monsieur Ladeau de Neveres was trying to accomplish with his spell before it went wild and summoned every stray spirit in the vicinity to empower the recently deceased Mr McThorne (he had been shot by Mr Cuthbert, whose elephant gun leaves a rather distinctive mark, and had fallen from the bell tower to land in the rubble created by the bells, which had fallen a few seconds earlier). I have noticed that wild spells do seem to build on characteristics of the original spell that was being cast. Madame Zephyrine was summoning some sort of dark monster when Miss Sinclair hit her with the frying pan creating a dark storm that threatened to plunge London in to chaos, I was trying to cast a history spell and it ended up removing from our memories anything related to the subject of the spell and when Mr Ramsey and Mrs Cuthbert tried to fix the problem and that spell went wrong, most of us then forgot who we were, in addition to why we were at the glassworks.
So based on previous experience, and on my observation of the effects of the wild version of the spell. I would guess that Monsieur de Neveres was trying to summon some type of spirit for offensive purposes. Given his condition at the end of day yesterday, it seems that he was engaged in a particularly dark form of magik. Mr Ramsay says that the spell book he mentioned is very dangerous. The local branch of the order of St. Jerome has the address, hopefully they will take Monsieur Ladeau's advice and destroy the book before it can do even more damage.
Under normal circumstances I would prefer that Mr Ramsay or myself be there to assure that the book is safely disposed of. However, given the damage that resulted from yesterday's outing, and the alarming news of this morning, I am not inclined to set foot outside of the consulate just yet.
One other thing about yesterday, before I forget. There was a point during the battle with the zombie of Mr McThorne when I could have sworn I felt Salmalin's presence. He did arrive later along with the rest of the group that had gone to the docks to meet Miss Magda her Watcher at Commander Wooster's ship but it was much earlier and at a very difficult moment in the battle when I felt his presence. How very strange.
Last night, after all the magik of yesterday, Mr Hassan, Mrs Cuthbert, Mr Ramsay, and I cast the variant of the Seal of Solomon on the grounds of the consulate. I was certain that Herr Schmidt would soon catch up with us, if he had not already, and I both feared and hoped that he was so angry at the League that he would forget his duties and come after us first, leaving the Emperor of France for a later target. Sir Cosmo also suggested that the Emperor might have some powerful protection already in place since Admiral LeCoq knew about Herr Schmidt and his capabilities well before the trouble started. I do hope the Admiral received our message and will hurry home to his Emperor. Although from some of the ravings of Monsieur Ladeau, it seems that LeCoq is as much a target as the Emperor.
I found the skills that I had learned talking to the mad Mr Pym during our assignment in the Cape Verde Islands to be most useful yesterday in talking with Monsieur Ladeau. He was literally frightened out of his mind. I used a spell to help him calm down and he was able to give us some information before it wore off. It seemed that a quite tone and an indirect approach were the most successful. Though why I can converse with madmen so patiently I do not know; as I am usually so stiff and uncomfortable around sick people. Visiting Mr Salmalin in the hospital all those months ago was torture. Miss Chigwidgeon does seem to have a gift for hospital visitation, however. An excellent skill for a lady-to-be.
I seem to have gotten rather off track from my original thoughts...
Oh yes, so, last night we cast the Seal on the grounds of the consulate and I slept though the night undisturbed. However, both Mrs Cuthbert and Inspector MacGregor reported having dreams. Mrs Cuthbert seems to have dreamed about the capture of Herr Schmidt's mother, a djinn, and the subsequent meeting of that djinn and a fae man at a castle where the djinn was being held captive. According to Mrs Cuthbert the two found each other mutually attractive and the result was Schmidt. I do not know if this information can help us, but at this point, every scrap helps.
Inspector MacGregor did not go into the details of his dream and I was curiously reluctant to hear them, as the last dream he reported to me had me setting people on fire. He did say something about a coven of witches and an unholy sacrifice. But he was very emphatic in insisting that the dream must have come from outside himself, as it is something he would never contemplate.
I went off to meet with Mr Hassan to learn if he had discovered anything during his researches yesterday. I also checked in on Miss Metzger, she had rested yesterday and was looking better for it. Tattvik seems to have assigned herself to look after Miss Metzger. My young friend certainly has more experience with women entering confinement than I do. I did warn her of some of peculiar difficulties of Miss Metzger's situation. Tattvik, Stuart, and David were home with our charges all yesterday.
While Mr Hassan and I were speaking, Edward came skidding into the room saying that Peony needed to speak with me out in the garden. We had already discovered that a small variant of the fae lived on the grounds. Mrs Cuthbert's granddaughter, Elinore, had been talking to them. Mr O'Flaherty had also seen one of them stealing the bottle of restorative that Mr O'Flaherty carried in his bags.
Elinore's governess showed us a simple charm that can be used to lock a cupboard and we passed the knowledge around to our associates, not, however, before the creatures had made off with Mr Cuthbert and the M de D's private collection of spirits and the shiny brass buttons from Mr Frazer's coat. Miss Sinclair took the opportunity to offer to sew a new set on for him since she had 'nothing else to do' while Edward was napping. I know that I have told Ruth that I will not meddle but if Mr Frazer does not wake up soon to what is under his very nose I will be forced to take action. That an independent minded woman such a Ruth would demurely offer to fix his coat for him should be taken as a clear sign of her affection for him.
However, Mrs Cuthbert has received some intelligence, from a completely unexpected source, that Mr Frazer is not as indifferent to the situation as he appears.
That is in part why I was summoned out to the garden. Apparently the ghost of Mr Frazer's father has been haunting Mr Frazer for some time (Mrs Cuthbert heard them arguing yesterday, and saw Mr Frazer with the ghost of his father and Inspector MacGregor with the ghost of his father when all the them were down at the dock visiting Commander Wooster). Mr Frazer's ghost appeared to Miss Sinclair while she was sketching and gave her quite a fright. A less resolute woman would have given way to a faint I am certain.
I do not know exactly what transpired, but apparently Mr Frazer Senior was as surprised at being seen as Miss Sinclair was at seeing him. He went into the house in search of Mrs Cuthbert, who in her turn brought Miss Sinclair a glass of water and discovered that the bluebird that Miss Sinclair had been sketching was actually one of the fairies Elinore had spoken of. One of the fairies asked Edward which witch was the biggest and that they needed to talk to the big witch. Edward came to get me and Mrs Cuthbert and I talked to the fairies.
Some part of me cannot believe I just wrote that sentence. I will just remind myself that talking to the fairies was not at all frightening, it was what they had to say that was. They wanted to know if we knew what a big angry being that had tried to get into the house last night was. After much going back and forth we determined that they were talking about Schmidt. The fairies had sensed him using his 'fluence,' as they called it, on Inspector MacGregor and had felt Schmidt trying to break the seal we had placed over the consulate.
It was not at all reassuring to hear that he had paid particular attention to the part of the seal that protected my room. I had also cast a smaller ward inside the seal, mostly to keep Mr Frazer senior out, since by that time Mrs Cuthbert had mentioned that he was wandering about. I do not know if that is what kept me from sensing him but I am glad of the night's uninterrupted rest.
It comes down to this. We are under siege from Herr Schmidt, though the fairies say that he is not present at this very moment. One of the more reliable fairies has offered to get a message to the head of the Order of St Jerome, asking him to come to the consulate to consult with us about finding a place where we can have it out with Herr Schmidt where there are fewer innocent bystanders. Mr Ramsey wanted to leave the consulate and travel to the Chapterhouse. We had quite an argument, as I did not want anyone to leave the safety of the protected grounds until we had a plan for dealing with Schmidt.
I don't think he realizes just how quick and dangerous Schmidt is.
After all, Mr Ramsay arrived just as Schmidt left when we had our battle in the streets of Antwerp, and while both Salmalin and I were both badly injured, Mr Ramsay only saw the aftermath, not the desperate battle itself. Again, when we summoned Schmidt to try to bind him during the battle with the Comte de Erlette, Kali snatched him away before he could move on us when our spell failed. After I had explained, several times, that I did not want anyone leaving the protected area until we had a second place to go to he finally gave way. Mrs Cuthbert remembered the way Elinore had gotten a note to us while were in custody after the Church Incident and one of the fairies agreed to go on our behalf.
It occurs to me also, that Mr Ramsay's training was in dealing with vampires, whose movement is restricted during the day, whereas Schmidt can strike anytime, anywhere.
So now we are awaiting the arrival of Monsieur de Marigny. We have reinforced the Seal, so that it will, hopefully, hold against Schmidt even after we leave this place. We are hoping that Monsieur de Marigny will have a suggestion for where we can take this battle to so that we will not endanger the people of Metz, and more importantly, Mrs Cuthbert's darling grandchildren.
Now that I have updated this record, I must seek an audience with Mrs Middleton. I told Mrs Cuthbert that I would explain to her daughter what is going on and the possible danger to her family. Mrs Middleton does not take her mother's ability seriously. I don't have the best of luck at getting people outside the League to take me seriously either, but hopefully just hearing the information from another source will help Mrs. Middleton take appropriate measures to protect her family.
While I have been writing this Miss Sinclair seems to have recovered from her shock at meeting a real live ghost and is now listening intently to the fairies. Edward found some of Caine's 'sobering-up' concoction and gave it to Sweet William, a perpetually drunk fairy, and the force behind the vanishing wine-bottles. It worked surprisingly well. Edward is a surprisingly thoughtful young person some days.
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