(PC) Let's Play Mystery Case Files: Ravenhearst Part 4
2BRIEFING
Entry #4 (Indecision)
March 16, 1895
I have avoided Charles these past days while I give his proposal its due measure of contemplation. I’ve awaited this experience for as long as I can remember, and yet I find myself wondering how different my life might become.
March 17, 1895
After shedding many a tear, I made up my mind to decline Charles’ proposal. It’s so difficult to be certain that I’ve made the correct decision, yet I feel my adult life is just now beginning to unfold!
March 18, 1895
The delay of my reply, coupled with my melancholy demeanor, must surely have wounded Charles this day. I have denied that which he has so graciously offered.
Time Limit (Standard/Relaxed): 38 minutes/76 minutes
Required Items: 38
Total Items: 40
LOCATIONS
Backyard: 8
Dining Room: 8
Living Room: 8
Music Room (Lock Puzzle #4): 8
Parlor: 8
THE LOCKSMITH
Chapter 4 – Privileged Tumult
Juxtaposed with the opulence he would obtain in his adulthood, Charles’ childhood was mundanely middle class at best, psychologically squalid at worst. Nonetheless, his fledgling years would develop the key foundations for his mental processes.
Charles Nathaniel Dalimar was born on May 28, 1868, to Alistair Dalimar, a clerk for the Columbia Cotton Company in Preston, Lancashire, and Julia O’Shea, a spinner at the same establishment. The two fell in love during a chance encounter during a late shift in July 1866, as Alistair was walking around the production room as part of his professional duties. The romance rapidly progressed, culminating in Charles’ conception just one year later. Out of social pressure, the two married on October 29, 1867, early enough so anyone wouldn’t suspect Julia was with child. Nevertheless, she would try to keep her pregnancy a secret for as long as possible from her coworkers, frantic to accrue enough money to buttress her impending family’s finances before Alistair became the sole breadwinner. After Charles’ birth, she initially planned to retire as a housewife in order to properly focus on raising him. However, financial issues would force her to return to the mill in October 1868, desperate to keep Charles out of poverty.
On Charles’ second birthday, Julia surprised her small family with a unique gift: the prospect of a future sibling. However, it would predicate the first of many watershed moments in his life. Towards the latter half of her pregnancy, Julia was diagnosed with what modern doctors would call pre-eclampsia. Although her doctor gambled that it was merely a mild case, his concerns were incrementally rebutted as her blood pressure continued to climb to dangerous levels as the months progressed. Though she promptly abandoned the mill in order to officially focus her attention on Charles and her health, it was still an uncertainty as to if Julia would even survive by year’s end.
On November 18, 1870, with Julia’s blood pressure reaching critical mass, her doctor realized that drastic action was necessary in order to save her life. Just hours after her final appointment, she was rushed into the operating theater for an emergency Caesarian section. That afternoon, Charles’ brother, Daniel, was born. Unfortunately, the day was also permeated by immeasurable tragedy. Julia, her lungs overwhelmed by pulmonary edema, succumbed on the operating table before she even heard a single cry. Undoubtedly, her condition was further exacerbated by the lung-eroding cocktail of hot, humid, dusty air she endured during her extra hours at the mill. She had just turned twenty-nine.
Though it took some time for the catastrophic gravity of his mother’s passing to sink in, Charles was faced with another formative fount. Forced to juggle his career at the cotton mill with his new role as a single father, he contacted his sister, Abigail Edgewick, on November 27, 1870. Imploding due to a cascade of unimaginable grief and economic uneasiness, he desperately begged her to take care of Charles and Daniel until he could get his affairs in order. Abigail responded compassionately, confiding that she understood his plight and would be delighted to care for his sons while he could sift through the rubble of Julia’s passing. By New Year’s Day of 1871, Charles and Daniel moved to the Edgewicks’ residence in Didsbury, a suburb of Manchester just an hour’s train ride from Preston. As far as they were concerned, Charles and Daniel regarded their aunt as their de facto mother.
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