"Douglas does seem like the most likely place to find more information."

Mordred is not saying out loud that all of this seems like a ridiculously overconfident set of guesses but he sure is thinking it.

The next morning, they read the letters from Douglas Henslowe.

Dearest Walter,

I am so glad to hear that you made it back safely. I got back to Savannah almost immediately. I’ll cut straight to the chase, my old friend. I need some corroborating evidence from you to set me back on the right track.

I have tried to piece together the events of last summer and recount them, but it is still sketchy in places and I see eyebrows begin to rise at some of the story. Perhaps they could hear it from you as well?

Please write back with your account of what happened. My doctors simply will not believe me. 

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

I apologize for writing again. I left it as long as I was able before requesting your help once again. I understand your reluctance about being drawn into this business again and it is not what I am asking for.

What I need is someone to back up my story to prove that the things I saw were indeed true and not some figment of my subconscious. That is what my doctors are saying. Don’t worry, I haven’t told them where any of this was and I won’t. 

You don’t even have to put your name to it if you don’t want to but I could really use your help.

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

Well, it’s been a year since I last attempted to contact you, old friend. I’ll admit things haven’t been going well for me of late and I keep thinking of that summer of 1924. 

It has been playing on my mind and often I wake up in a cold sweat thinking of our friends. Tell me they didn’t die for nothing. Tell me they didn’t get away with it! Just some reassurance from you would let me sleep a little more easily.

I need to hear from a friend about now so if you could spare me a few moments to drop me a note I’d appreciate it. 

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

They still won’t listen to my story. Perhaps you could send word to my doctors? I just keep going over it, that August. Five years haven’t dulled the pain. I just keep asking myself whether if they’d followed me out of there they’d still be alive. 

Why didn’t I make them? Why didn’t they just follow me? Is there more I could have done? These questions and others rob me of my sleep and leave me drained to my very soul. They won’t listen. Their answers seem to come from a bottle of pills. 

Please write back, Walter. I need to hear from you. I need to prove I’m not crazy!

Yours sincerely, 

Douglas

Walter,

I understand your reluctance to get involved but I have run out of options. If you would just send word telling your version of events perhaps the doctors would believe you and me. 

If not, my only other recourse is to take their pills and pretend like this is all a fantasy. That is what they want to hear, naturally. I’m sure they will be pleased to hear that I have given up insisting that my ‘story’ is truth. 

If only you could see to helping me out on that score, for old time’s sake. I’m begging you.

Yours,

Douglas

Dearest Walter, 

Perhaps it is for the best that I have finally submitted to never being able to tell the truth of that night. The doctors are pleased with the progress I have made since I began to refrain from my insistence that the events of August 1924 happened as I have been describing for all of these years.

Are you ignoring me, Walter? Perhaps this is your way of helping me? Your silence echoes when I think you’re trying to tell me something. I think I finally understand. Some things are better left alone. But like a frayed cuff of a jacket, I cannot help but worry at the loose threads. One day perhaps I will rest.

I live in hope that one day you may change your mind and write to me. 

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

I have managed to clear my troubled mind, at least in my waking hours. I think maybe I’m free of that day at last. The dreams still haunt me but things are better here.

The trees swaying in the breeze, the chatter of the birds in their low-hanging branches flitting between the moss, and the constant drone and thrum of fat-bellied insects bring me a sort of calm I have not felt in quite some time. 

I hope you too are able to find some peace. It would be good to know that all is well with you, Walter, it has been so long. 

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

I find myself again drawn to reach out to you, my old friend, perhaps to close a chapter of our story together. The doctors told me I had to move on and look to the future and begin to set aside thoughts of the past.

August 1924 is something I will never forget. It is etched onto my memories like the carved names driven deep into the headstones of my distant family. I am truly sorry I haven’t left you in peace all of these years. A part of me still wanted you to support me to prove I wasn’t mad. 

I have come to terms with it now, old friend. I won’t write again. I wish you all the best in your life and hope you have found some degree of happiness. 

Your Friend,

Douglas

Dear Walter,

I remember in my last missive I had said I would not write to you again, yet once again I feel compelled to write. I felt there was something you should know.

I made a book, a journal of sorts. It contains everything I remember and completing it just last week I have hidden it away. It felt good to get things off my chest and commit them to paper. 

You only have to ask if you would like to know where it is. I will tell you as I trust you more than I trust myself. 

Yours sincerely,

Douglas

Walter,

It’s been so long now. I know. But I don’t think I’ll ever be able to escape what happened. If you could just write with your side of the story. Please my old friend. I really need for you to write back to me now. 

I await your letter,

Douglas

Walter,

Why won’t you write to me, my old friend, after all of these long years? I have reached out for your help and there is nothing but silence. I am starting to believe that I made the whole thing up and that is why you don’t write to me. 

It wasn’t real? Perhaps it wasn’t real. They tell me it wasn’t real. It was all in my head. I’ve come to believe in the lie, they say, as I told myself the story over and over in my waking hours and in my dreams. 

If it wasn’t real I am sorry I frightened you with these letters. Please let me know we are at least at peace. 

Douglas

Walter,

Do you even remember what happened anymore? That August of 1924. I can never forget. Did they die for nothing? I need to hear from you. Just a note or a telegram even. Please, Walter. I’m begging you. I wonder if you’ve even opened my letters after all this time. 

Douglas

Mordred... well. Mrs. Winston-Rogers contacted him specifically because of his writing on asylums. To say that he's unhappy about the contents of the letters would be an understatement.

And she is curious what the man's journal contains. Certainly more than his doctors were willing to accept. (She can't say she's taken aback by the rest of the content. Obviously people in power will try to convince you you're wrong about reality.)

"If there's any surprise it's that Mr. Winston didn't write back. Can't say I put much stock in doctors but -- I would hope most people can afford more trust than that to their friends."

"It's especially odd that he clearly read them, and looked for some sort of meaning in them, but doesn't seem to have cared for the sender at all... Douglas seems to have considered Mr. Winston a friend but I wonder if Mr. Winston would have said the same." She flips through the letters. "I wish I could interpret these numbers... or the little notes here and there. 'it’s hopeless', 'nyarlathotep?', 'I got it!' - what could they refer to? Maybe Douglas would know?"

Even if he wasn't a friend, how heartless do you have to be to--

"It seems like it would be worth asking, at the least."

"It looks like he mostly sent the letters from the West Hensley Street address, but the one where he mentions the journal is from Old Hope Road."

"Maybe he had another reason not to write back. Perhaps he thought there was some danger."

"Even if Mr. Winston suspected that someone else would read the letter, he could have at least sent something bland and uninformative, couldn't he have? It's like he didn't even want to acknowledge a connection to Mr. Henslowe."

"Perhaps he feared provoking something. Maybe something besides doctors."

"...I suppose that's also possible. In fairness I have -- stronger feelings on the matter than most, it isn't actually that strange for someone to drop an acquaintance who's been declared insane, I just don't think much of it."

This, too, is profoundly an understatement.