23

June 24

No one likes the idea of having to move. Frank Philips called a village meeting in the church tonight. He’s talking about going to London and handing in a petition to Downing Street. Father, of course, is dead set against the idea. He can only see the profit and good that will come from the dam. But then he and CS are making far too much money from this venture to want it stopped.

The weather is more than a little unusual for June. Thick fog sweeps off the mountains each evening, blanketing the village all night, clearing only with dawn’s first light.

Despite our misgivings and objections, work continues on the dam, day and night. Some are calling it Close’s Folly. Many a true word spoken in jest.

We are settled into our cottage opposite the church. I use the rooms to the side as a surgery. It has its own door and waiting area. It isn’t perfect, but it will do for now. Both of us are enjoying being away from the manor with all the stresses and strains that brings with it.

Mabel’s morning sickness has now eased, and she’s adapting to being ‘a lady of leisure’ although I get the impression she would rather be doing work of some sort. Perhaps I’ll let her help out with the receptionist’s duties in the surgery.

July 3

Another accident at the dam site. Once again in the fog. That’s the tenth in as many days. A fatality this time—John Perkins, a young lad of only nineteen—crush injuries. There was nothing I could do other than suggest to the foreman he ceases work under the cover of darkness and fog, but he will not listen to a “mere doctor who stands against progress and construction.”

He seems to forget who will be squire after my father’s passing.

My beloved Mabel, bless her, wants us to leave this cursed place and take a position somewhere miles from here. She says the babe within her is uneasy. Leaving is exactly what Father wants of me.

He will never forgive me for marrying Mabel. He often tells me that I married beneath me and am, thus, not fit to be his heir.

If I could find a position elsewhere, leave all this behind, I would do so. But with Frederick perishing on the Titanic and William’s death in a car accident, I am the one remaining son. I have no choice but to stay.

July 10

The march in London accomplished nothing. The flooding of Abernay and Finlay will go ahead on the completion of the dam in September. The resulting conflagration will be the Aberfinay Dam and Reservoir. Father is talking about adding the necessary modifications to make it one of the new hydroelectric power stations. This would make him even more money.

The foggy nights continue. No one can remember weather like this before. On my way home from delivering the Fletcher baby, a girl they called Melissa, I found the body of Frank Phillips. There was no doubt he’d been murdered as the back of his head had been caved in with a sharp object. I alerted the local constabulary, but they do not think they will find the person responsible. Sgt. Johns thinks it was a vagrant, a robbery as Frank’s wallet was missing.

How many vagrants carry hammers? A simple mugging would have resulted in Frank’s wallet being taken. There is no doubt in my mind this was deliberate, as with the investigation into Frank’s death, the protest against the dam will likely fold.

~*~

Lou glanced up. Rising, she padded across the room and gazed across the foggy courtyard. Lights glowed from the wing opposite. Who could be over there? That part of the manor was usually in darkness. She closed the curtains and reached to grab her sweater from the chair. She tugged it over her head and threaded her arms through the sleeves as she walked back to the bed.

She climbed in and snagged the covers over her.

Despite the journal’s many missing pages and sections too faded to read clearly, the account was chilling.

~*~

August 13

Plague. I had hoped, prayed, I was wrong. Tommy Philips, Frank’s boy, died just before ten o’clock this morning. More cases come by the hour. I am unprepared for such great numbers.

Food supplies are being left beyond a barrier half a mile away. We have no contact with the outside world at all. Strangely there is no mention of our plight on the wireless. Perhaps they do not wish to alarm anyone. I fear something more sinister is afoot.

August 20

I have quarantined all those infected in a building on one side of town. But numbers are rising, and I fear it may be too little too late. I am treating the patients myself, along with Nurse Mount. Not that there is much I can do. I lack the proper medication or facilities. It has been a week since the first case, and the deaths are increasing to a point where the dead outnumber the living. I am dog tired and long to see Mabel but cannot risk infecting her.

~*~

The next few entries were in a different hand, each signed R.M., so Lou surmised they must have been written by Nurse Mount. Each consisted of a list of names and ages, presumably those who had succumbed to the disease.

Tears tracked down Lou’s cheeks unattended.

Whole families wiped out, so many children taken by so cruel a disease. It certainly explained the barrier that Professor Cunningham had mentioned.

Lou made out the words Dr. Close and sick, so he too had succumbed to the plague.

Strange that Evan never mentioned it. She knew he didn’t die, as Evan had said he remained in Dark Lake and lived in the manor after the village was flooded.

September 1

Finally I am well enough to write. It is thanks to Nurse Mount that I am recovering, albeit weaker than I have been for some time. Mabel has also been helping out, though I now fear for her. She looks pale and tired. Over half the village is now sick. CS says it is fortuitous as only those who oppose the construction of the dam and flooding of the villages are sick. He took my illness as proof that I also am opposed, but as the person treating the afflicted, I am at most risk of infection.

September 5.

Mother is sick. I have moved her from the manor. Father wanted her to remain there with him, but it is best she does not stay there and infect any more of the servants. Her lady’s maid, two of the parlour maids, and a cook are already sick. One of the gardeners is showing symptoms, so I have moved him to the outer cottage here. That way, if he does turn out to be infected, he will not be putting the lives of his family at risk also.

September 7

My father is numbered amongst the sick as are all the servants who remained. The manor lies empty. The servants I was caring for here are dead.

My mother died early this morning. Father is unaware of this, and I shall not tell him. So much wasted time. So much I wish I could tell her, that now I never can.

Mabel is yet untouched. I pray she will remain so. I cannot lose her, too.

September 10

Father died this morning. This means I now own the house and land and the burden of the dam. I do not want it. If I could revoke the planning permission I would do so, but I fear it would be too late if not impossible. CS is impossible to work with and becoming more and more demanding. He wants access to the manor for some papers of Father’s, but the whole village is sealed, and I will not allow him to enter the building until I have a chance to go through Father’s papers myself. I am no longer sure of what CS is capable of doing. The dam is complete. All that remains is for the flooding to take place once the epidemic is over and the bodies burned, the ashes buried deep in a concrete vault underground.

September 20

Finally, it looks as if the plague is over. There are around twenty of us left alive from the original 200 that lived in Abernay. We are exhausted, our eyes sore from shedding tears, faces reddened with grief. I should have been able to save them, but I failed in my duty as a doctor, in my calling, and as a result the village is lost.

The old rhyme never spoke a truer word. It says for the want of a nail the shoe was lost, the horse was lost, the battle was lost, the kingdom was lost. So for the want of a decent doctor the village was lost.

September 27

A fire began almost simultaneously in five parts of the village shortly after seven o’clock tonight. At almost the same time, fog rolled in off the dam and off the mountains, shrouding Abernay and Finlay. With so few of us left, there is little we can do to fight so many fires. It is spreading quickly.

Mabel thought she heard explosives, but I did not. We are safe here in the manor. We have with us the remaining survivors. As I write this, it is just past midnight. There are only ten of us. The others, we hope, escaped by other means, rather than being caught in the flames. We will not know until morning or until the fires die down.

Sept 30th

It’s done.