Notes of Professor Paynesworth:
Events of the tragic night on friday has left all involved in a startled state of mind. We are trying to figure out reasons for Jackson’s untimely demise, and the violence of it makes us all edgy. I think every one of us is trying to make some sense in to it all.
We met with Jonah Kensington, the head of Prospero House Publishing. He had presented letters and telegrams sent to him by Jackson along his travels, as well as some of Jackson’s notes. We spent the evening trying to piece together the route of Jackson’s travels and the reasons, findings and consequences of his investigations. It was alarming, how nervous and shaken he appeared to be when in London, according to his letter to Mr. Kensington. I think he believed to have found out something alarming considering the Carlyle Expedition.
I contacted Miriam Atwright, the head Librarian of Harvard University, to whom Jackson had sent a telegram from Nairobi, asking for book in their collection, “Africas Dark Sects” by Nigell Blackwell. She told that the book had disappeared from their collection before Jackson asked for it, in an unfortunate event that left part of the library ruined and filled with a foul smell, possibly rats. My further investigation revealed that the cuts in Jackson’s forehead corresponded to a sign known as the “sign of the bloody tongue” in the negro swahili language.
Mr. Matthew Griswold visited the sister of late Mr. Carlyle, and she was generous enough to give us a collection of four book held in dear value by his brother. The volumes were of alarming nature, describing things obviously made up by insane mind. Billy, Shane and Calvin visited Emerson Imports, where Jackson had been asking about company called Ahja Singh. The lead brought them to Harlem, looking for shipments from Kenya to New York that Jackson was looking into, in a curiosity shoppe called “Juju House”, there they found nothing of interest however. Instead, they found out that some of the previous murder victims with the same kind of hideous mutilation with the bloody tongue sign were connected to some missing Emerson Imports shipments from the Kenya. Lawrence did some inquiries of his own, including asking about Jackson from the people at Penhew foundation. In addition, Basil contacted a visiting lecturer from Australia, Professor Cowles, an expert in myths of the aboriginals of his continent. Jackson had been listening to his lecture the night before his ghastly murder.
Everyone of us are trying to get the answer to the questions: what is the story that Jackson was after, a story that cost his life. Before the funeral, we raised our glasses and decided that we would finish the book, writing of which Jackson paid so dearly for.
