Murder in Babbage - part eight

What an evening! Yesterday seems to be one of that days when no matter what you do, everything is wrong... I attended art cafe party at Loki's Absinthe house yesterday, I even showcased one smaller photography of the place itself. My first mistake was my dress, I choose an old gown in deep green, thought it would be good idea for “Absinthe evening”. Sure. I haven't realized the gown was a little too old, even for those most formal events in Caledon. I couldn't move, I couldn't breathe and I looked like some big green thing from the deep (especially after I fell into the canals at one moment). Only tentacles was missing...


My second mistake was letting Eggberta, editor-in chief of New Babbage Cog, to publish excerpts from my diary in her newspapers. It would do no good for my searching, it has become too popular, people were reading it as an amusement story, and of course, it has attracted attention to me. I realized it fully when I met Prof Nishi, she apparently presumes Bow Street Police has closed her workshop according to my discovery there and I wasn't able to convince her it was closed before I even had written about it... Besides, she now thinks I work for the papers. And although she invited me to her laboratory, I'm sure her behavior towards me is several degrees below zero now... So it was great evening, when I messed whatever I could.
Victor Wunderlich, a boy whose name is also on the list, appeared on the event, only for the moment, and than vanished again. He was scared of “bad man”... could it be Jason Moriarty? Jason, sending death threads to mayor Sprocket, hiding somewhere in the Arcade shops (according to urchins),... and hanging a painting on the wall of Absinthe gallery!


Yes, there was a disturbing picture, painted by Jason Moriarty, hanging just next to my photography (what an irony)... And while Prof Nishi was talking about the mystical symbols on the canvas, I was wondering if anybody else has noticed it's actually painting of Prof Eliot's device, only as a part of some bigger machinery, and with human face in place of “Babbage mark 6” part. And finally, Miss Li discovered another note, on the back of the canvas, a letter from prof Elliot to Jason! He reasons him, kindly, to stop his experiments, and his letter is so warm-hearted that Loki pointed out Prof. Eliot probably cared more for this Jason than for his own grandson... I felt sorry for the boy...
“The thirteen” seems now as some society interested in science, and Prof Elliot was one of them, that's finally one clear thing from all this mess. Jason tried to sabotage their effort, and they wanted to prevent him from doing it, probably kill him. Prof Eliot tried to warn him... And there is something about Jason's affection to the destiny and old gods...
I'm tired, and maybe a little paranoid – I see clues everywhere, but don't know their meaning. There are drawings on the walls in the Opera house attic, with the same symbols that appeared on the Jason's painting, at least one seems to be made by the same hand – Jason's hand. There is another Elliot's device, locked in the Bow Street office – looks exactly like the one at Miss Nishi's table. And for a while, I found myself staring at Miss Li's feathered hat yesterday at the event, wondering what if poor Mr. Canning wasn't true Caledon contact...
I need some rest. For the next week, I'll be mostly traveling, and I don't know If I'll be able to return to Babbage soon and continue with my searchings... but I hope so.
(to be continued)