Note_MansionDresser
June 24th 1899
In my dreams, I see a man, dressed in jaguar skins and feathered like a blooded saint. What came from the heart lubricated us, it crushed evil under its tread and liberated us all. The foetid heat of the jungle, mirrored somewhere behind my forehead. My temple pounds, the blood boils in my skull. It feels as if there is something alive there; a rat, a damn rat gnawing through my brains, eating its way out into the world. Even the laudanum will not quell its endless hunger. I hear my children playing in the attic but it fills me with terror, not love. What desperate thoughts are these?
Note_MansionAtticMap
February 14th 1899
Yes, he said, I know these ruins.
He was a shabby fellow, all rotten with some malodorous disease. I caught him looking at me strangely, as if what he really wanted to know was how I knew of them. Biting back the temptation to box his ears for the impudence, I simply smiled and told him that my family's library contained intriguing travel books. The illiterate oaf did not understand that of course. He agreed to lead us anyway.
I have told the children, truly, this will be an extraordinary adventure. If those old stones hold the financial benefits I predict, it will be merely the first of many.
Note_MansionKillingRoom
Clockwork and the Soul
Replacement is dissatisfactory. So like a pump.
Better the intestinal canal, like a tapeworm, already hosting intrusion and the breed. Brass better than copper, more resistant. Filaments sewn to bone hold.
Marrow pipe removal with needle potential. Composite replacement straightforward, will respond to electromagnetic inducement to increase yield rate, serum provides accelerated resetting resulting in naturalised movement within two to three days. Subjects still require severing of frontal lobes to reduce emotional distress upon reactivation.
Damn, damn it. Damn this wretched soul. If only it were clockwork.
Note_MansionChildrenAttic
Edwin and Enoch's diary, October 11th 1899
Daddy says there won't be a Christmas this year, he is much too busy. Nanny says we must not disturb him, he is ever so busy. He is gone for work before she wakes us and often we are asleep before he returns. We found a bird in the garden with a broken wing. We gave it to Nanny, who said it was a filthy thing and hit it with a rolling pin. Later, we crept downstairs to bury the body when everone was asleep. There was a pig in the garden, we heard it snuffling about. Then Daddy came and said we had to come inside straight away. He was furious, but we think he'd been crying again.
Note_MansionPiano
Dieses Herz
Schlaf mein Kind, schlaf
Dein Herz schlägt unter meiner Hand
Und ich wiege Dich
in diesen offenen Wunden mein
Dieses Herz
Sanft weiter durch mich
Und Dein Herz gehört mir
Und ich wiege Dich
in dieser verdenden Liebe
Dieses Herz
Träum diese heilige Wunde
wird bluten
und die Engel trauern
nur um Dich schlafen zu sehen
Mein Kind, schlaf und ich
werde Dich wiegen.
Note_MansionTrophyRoom
December 20th 1899
I am to have a visitor, the distinguished Professor A. He is come to ascertain my mental wellbeing after my prolonged absence from the club. But I am not stupid. He is here to spy for them. When they stalked The Ripper, he was often called to pontificate upon lacerations and missing organs. And now he comes to me, to doff and wheedle and 'my dear sir' and 'but you must still grieve' and 'perhaps just a quick look at your engines, the triumph of the age'. He knows nothing of loss, nothing of sacrifice.
But to refuse? That would simply poke the hornet's nest, invite a swarm of interlopers and thieves. I must entertain this buffoon and submit to his intrusion. Perhaps I should show him the tripery. See whether his stomach, so trained by rummaging in the innards of clumsily vivisected whores, is strong enough to stare into the real engines of his golden age. I may even introduce him to Jack, or his sons at least. We have stronger locks on the windows now, and we bring their toys to them.
Note_MansionBear
Edwin and Enoch's diary, October 3rd 1899
Daddy says we're not allowed to play with the animals anymore. We were playing hide and seek with Cook and he came and shouted at us, just as we were going to hide behind Mr Grumpy Teddy. Cook says it's because of the guns in there, but he always lets us help polish them, so it can't be that. Anyway, that room is haunted. If you sneak around there at night, you can hear the ghosts in the walls behind the cases. They are often angry, or that's how it sounds. We think that's why you can hear them rattling their chains and slamming doors and things like that. We don't like it in there anyway.
Note_MansionOffice
November 7th 1898
The bank is refusing credit, the ignorant swine. I sit alone at night and weep, once the children and servants are safely asleep, when they cannot hear me. My darling, how I need you now. They say I have squandered my fortune, that my investment in these latest machines has ruined the family name. What? That I was to remain a local butcher?
What are these two arms compared to the multitude that can be applied, without pay, without tire, by adapting the mechanisms we find in the looms and the mills. But, if the bank has its way, it will all come to nothing. If they come for the house I swear I will kill them. I will kill them all. I will take my rifle... my rifle...
Note_MansionBackOffice
November 29th 1898
Of the few books to survive after those degenerate peasants fired my Great Uncle's castle were his travel diaries. He talks of archaeological digs in Siam, Arabia, which yielded treasures of quite extraordinary worth. And, most interestingly, he hints at those yet to be found, in the Americas where civilisations were consumed by the jungles. Of course, it all makes sense - those conquistadors were only driven so far by their faith - El Dorado did the rest. And yet, there is more. "Find the Temple of the Stone Moon", he writes, "and the world will never more be hungry, and neither shall you."
My mind is made up. Damn the creditors. I shall leave my work unfinished and I shall take to the Americas, and I will return with my soul richer and my pockets bulging.
Note_MansionRockingManRoom
Old Sallie i' the Doll's Cottager
O, She come a-snuffling by night round ye door
With her pretty apron right down to the hoof
And her ringlets are fair and her eyes china blue
Like a half-buried hand in the wintery snow-o
Like a hand in the wintery snow
And she'll beg you for apples through the window ajar
Her face be all hidden but her eyes shine aflame
And though you'll be tempted her bosom so fair
She'll snatch you and catch you and eat out your heart-o
She'll catch you and eat out your heart
So look to your manners come the eve of the year
Lest Sallie comes calling for apples my dear
And know that some doors ne'er should open wide
Take heed of your father and keep safe inside
Disobedient children make Sallie her pies-o
And warm Sallie's beastly insides
Note_MansionSwitchboard
House Systems
1, Bathwater Electrification
2, Marrow Disposal
3, Opiate Dispensers
4, The Lord Austin Dean Innard Scoop
5, Iron Butler
6, Billiard Room Snare
7-8, The Gag Throttles
9, Vanity Cosh
10, Master Bedroom Tenderiser
11-12, Teeth Removal Spoons
13, Upper Window Lockdown
14, Mr Nilsson's Intestinal Clampings
15, Charnal Chute
16-18 Draining and Hosing
19, Anal Parasol Extender
20, The Howell Anti-Puckering Pump
21-22, Bolster Blades
23, Piano Lid Finger Snare
24, Old Sallie in the Doll's Cottager
25, Tramp Catcher