A Study in the Color of Ravens' Feathers (which i guess was a parody of A Study in Scarlet. What it has to do with the actual thing is beyond me. The title is awkward for sure, but what can I do?)
-A record of M.D. W-
Once, I was worried about a certain person’s well-being.
While normally my friend – let us call him Mr. H – would reserve his abundant curiosity to only a professional level, it was a private investigation for a man who has helped us up until several years ago. Though Mr. H is not as young as some of the youths who would spend their pocket money in back alleys, he is still far younger than us. Though he has reached adulthood a while ago, he still gives an impression of a youth.
I was introduced to this person through a mutual acquaintance, a writer, and I am greatly under the impression that he is a quite likable young man. Even at one glance, I knew that he was a pleasant person with overflowing talent and kindness, and he has made quite a reputation for himself in the newspapers as a well-mannered philanthropist. While he does have doctorates in medicine, economics and law and is a member of the Royal Society, he is especially well-versed in pharmacy.
Once, I have met Samuel Johnson and Herbert Spencer, who were praised as great scholars by our society – not many people have the honor to call themselves that. While he was still young, he was expected to be able to rival his predecessors one day, and I regarded him as a person of brilliant intelligence worthy of the title of great scholar.
His name is Henry Jekyll.
A person for whom the reputation of a gentleman is not unfounded.
While he does research as a college professor, he also participates in philanthropic work; a man of superior intellect and insight, and so expected to have an innately good personality – the request of assistance with private investigations to Mr. H came in a certain spring. Harry has always been someone with a good moral compass. It goes without saying that Harry was Dr. Jekyll’s nickname. For the time we have known each other – which is quite a while – I have always thought of him as a younger brother.
He, like Mr. H and me, is living in London. He owns a mansion on the shopping district, his spacious residence houses a surgical room and laboratory, and the estate extended to the back alley. The Jekyll residence cannot be any more different compared to the back alley, though I do think that the horribly deteriorated doorway gives off an impression of an eerie fortress. But I digress.
In the first place, what influenced him was just a trivial thing – a follow-up investigation which he helped us out with a while back.
Perhaps I should start over from the beginning. My friend, Mr. H, run a business as a private detective in London. He has handled many requests, and has definitely gotten a fair share of serious cases from the London Metropolitan Police Department [Scotland Yard] some of which even involved the English government. I would love to proudly say that it was a prestigious job, but in truth I would only avert my eyes from the incidents reeking of blood.
Of course, we capture the bad people who have committed criminal acts but, in actuality there are scoundrels who managed to escape from their sins. While I have a right to be proud, I cannot deny the reality that living in this London metropolis is equivalent to, and as mentally exhausting, as fighting a fierce battle in Afghanistan. Mr. H has an unusually sharp level of reasoning as well as the spirit to go along with it, and I was once a drafted soldier. Even if I have grown used to an ordinary life, I will not flinch before corpses that have been brutally slaughtered – which, for any other unprepared person, would naturally be quite a burden.
The requests for investigation from Dr. Henry Jekyll was, until then, not anything serious, and as far as the involved persons and the ones who suffered damages are concerned, those were hardly anything but just handling minor offenses of little importance.
...Or, at first, that was all there was to it.
“Regarding the whereabouts of the dissolved □□□□ Company’s secret accounts, □□□□ circulation in □□□, and the young lady of □□□□ House’s running away from home, there is a list of conspiring families. Though these cases have been resolved, if we investigate further, some kind of mystery or secret is bound to come up.” He said, in a slightly proud tone. In Mr. H’s absence, I was looking after his neglected lodging. Taking a sip of the black tea a certain landlady brewed for us, I answered.
“How Mr. H goes about investigating that, I can only guess.”
That is not a lie, but entirely the truth.
The me of this time could not understand the truth of Mr. H's deductions.
“No, confirming the truth of these incidents was quite a heart-pounding adventure. Still, all of these are just trivial cases. I should think that they would give Mr. H more important major cases to solve.”
“Hmm. Then, do you really want to deal with even the trouble those important cases create?”
I expected him to be caught off guard by those words but, Harry’s expression brightened, his eyes glittering with inquisitiveness, and his cheeks flushed. He himself isn’t an amateur. This young man who is full of enthusiasm for the research into the unknown attracts a lot of interest but, at the same time there is also a sense of dark, hidden danger in him. Even though I spared no words trying to quell his expectations, in the end they weren’t enough to sway his spirit.
“I want to be useful to you. I have no intention of asking what Mr. H was looking for in his follow-up investigations. I believe it is for the public good.”
“Even if you say so. It’s probably hard for you to make time outside of your teaching job.”
“Aren’t you also the same, Doctor W?”
I have neglected to mention this but, in this memo I am not referred to as Mr. W but Dr. W. This memo is just a whimsical document, or maybe a notebook, maybe nothing more than a patched-up fragment of Jekyll’s truth and my vast regret. Even so, taking into account the essential differences in this work of my patched-up daily life, if by any chance in the future someone were to look at these notes, in order to avoid confusion, I will proceed to refer to myself and my friend using these aliases.
In the end, I could not stop Harry. Once I relayed Harry’s words to Mr. H, who has just returned, his personal impression was “Is that young man someone you should really get too involved with? Why would he tear apart the bright future and quick wits of his youth to such an extent?” He added but, just as expected, while I don’t know what Mr. H thought of it, after that the requests for investigations from Harry died down and completely disappeared after two months.
For a while, I was reassured.
It was not a rational worry but, it would weigh heavily on my conscience if this gentleman with a bright future were to have it taken away from him. More so since I can’t help but worry greatly if he were to meddle in those bloodstained disasters and traverse into the – not just dark, but pitch black – affairs of the criminal world. Either way, I was able to completely tuck my worry away into a corner of my mind.
Or, that was what I thought at the time.
And yet, my secret was so easily exposed.
A certain month in 18□□, I suddenly received word from him – a polite invitation for me to visit the Jekyll residence. Led by a well-dressed elderly servant, after passing by a low, wide ceiling into a spacious hall, my dear friend Jekyll greeted me with a charming smile.
I could see his clear, shining eyes through the thin pair of spectacles.
“I have finally achieved it, Dr. W. I invited you here tonight for a little toast.” Standing by the brightly burning red flames of the fireplace, he told me.
“Wait, Harry. What in the world did you accomplish?”
“Of course! I have finally been acknowledged by the extraordinary great detective, Mr. H!"
What kind of devotion is this, I wonder. Aah, this youth, this reputed gentleman, when he should have stayed away from the darkness of the criminal world, he continued to crave the thrill of risk and adventure, to the point that even with my obstruction he did not lose heart and continued to ask for investigations, to go above and beyond to win Mr. H’s favor. And it’s no longer just justice in solving minor offences, he even got involved in murderers and serious crimes.
He has already been sucked in.
To that pitch-black world.
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Originally Posted by Altima of the Gates
