The Ghost of Winn Peterson

4. Winn

15 August

No need for another year, dearest journal. It should be a curious thing indeed, to have an entire cycle of the Earth pass without my knowledge, but I am confident no such mysteries have occurred. I do, however, have others to share!

My jaunt around the house ended with nightfall, and how swiftly does the sun set! All night long, the ferocious washing of the sea against the cliffs below kept me awake. Birds and various unseen animals seemed to rush at the house in the safety of night. Every direction I rolled in bed contained the sound of hundreds of small feet rushing up and down the walls and furniture. I am sure there is a rat problem. Trapped in this state of sleeplessness, I wanted desperately to get up and continue my exploration of the house, but such a desire was squashed when I recalled how very little of my candles I had in my possession. To wait until daylight, and oh, what a miserable thing! I awoke, as I'm sure you can imagine, in utter disarray.

Upon my hopeful journey into the kitchens for breakfast, I discovered that whatever had been inside the night before had consumed all of the cheese and bitten into the bread. It was a glum bowl of porridge for breakfast, but my hopes weren't dashed entirely through - I would be fueling my curiousity and imagination with the contents of a house much older than I, whose walls were sure to contain a mystery or two. Such delights for the day quite erased the drab taste of my food, and I finished my meal with this little book and quite the number of pens in hand (I had the strong feeling I would be dropping more than a few, and no doubt into some dark and hairy crevice I did not wish to expunge the pen from).

First to explore in my new home was the ground floor. From what I could see on a quick observation of the outside, there were three floors to work through, the third being nearly the smallest as there were really only one or two rooms to access up there. The ground floor appeared the most expansive, and I assumed that it would take the better part of a week, given my proclivities to poor health and allergies, to mush my nose through. How thrilling! The rain had begun to fall before I could make any sort of crude map of the outside, so my investigations began a little half-heartedly. I would not be deterred! With markedly less lighting at my disposal (how wonderfully dark the clouds were!), I began to peek into the rooms surrounding my chambers. Equipped with an abysmal sense of direction, I knew not which way I faced when approaching the first room upon entry to the house, but it was smallish, quaint, and covered in dust. It was my mistake not to cover my face with a cloth, because I was reduced to a sneezing mess the first few minutes I overturned furniture and coverings. Nothing much to note about the room, save for a painting on an otherwise bare wall, depicting a rather majestic view of the seas below as I could see it from the edge of the house. I, lowly little Winn Peterson, had stood in the steps of inspiration! The thought filled me with such joy that my sneezing made no dent on my mood henceforth, but spurred me onto the next room.

This one appeared simply a spare bedroom, and possessed neither any charms, nor evidence that another person had ever maintained themselves within it.

Situated next to my own resting place was an observation room built almost entirely up of windows and candle-holders. How spectacular! I suspected that I would spend many a day within the walls of this fine locale, and took several minutes out of my investigation to observe the rain through the fine window. I could visualise hanging various plants from the nooks and shelves around the room, and was wrapped up in the fantasy of the future for quite longer than a few moments. I did find one thing of note in the room, tucked under the lid of the window seat, and this a handwritten note detail what appeared to be the various shops in town. The handwriting was exceedingly hard to make out (how familiar I should have been with it, given my own awful penmanship) but revealed at least the name of an apothecary, and a meagre post office. I resolved to visit town within the week and send home my findings for the day to my parents and a general update on my health.