Dear Prof. G. Savage
"If a tree were to fall in the forest, with no-body around to hear, does it make a sound?"This oft-quoted conundrum has eluded proof in either direction since its conception. It remains a purely philosophical quandary as any scientific study would render the experiment pointless by definition. Whilst my understanding of deep philosophy is limited it is to such a problem my mind moved on this investigation. As such the situation eludes a captivating explanation but is readily observable and, I am pleased to say, has caused little in the way of misfortune. It is hence with curious mental invigoration and high spirits that I convey to you the case of the Appleby family and 'The Never-Where'.
The Appleby Siblings
On the evening of the eighth of July my studies of the smoke procured from Saint Leonard's Chapel were interrupted by Mr. Standler, research assistant to Dr. Keplar, with an offer of curiosity. My work with you and it's associated curios has led the department to project on me a unique reputation and to direct my attention to any ethereal or unexplainable happenings they may encounter. Mr. Standler was a close acquaintance of Mr. Eustace and Miss Summer Appleby, siblings who lived together in Little Lodge Cottage to the North of the city. There they resided with a small staff, living upon the money provided by the orchards attached to the land, inherited from their father at his untimely death three years prior. As I understand it was the brother who handled the business aspects of the inheritance whilst the sister managed the estate.
On the morning of the Fourth the house woke to find Mr. Appleby absent, without prior warning and quite apart from his usual routine. By the evening he had not returned and the household began to concern themselves with his whereabouts. Two further nights had passed, his details passed onto the local constabulary, when the house began to encounter strange disturbances. The staff talk of the soul of the deceased Mr. Appleby haunting the premises, with items in his bed-room moving when unobserved. Mr. Standler offered my name to the distraught Miss Appleby in an attempt to decipher this sepulchral event for what it is, and the lady indicated that any help would be most welcome. Hence, that afternoon, I arrived at the door of Little Lodge Cottage, entourage in tow, to aid the investigation.
When we arrived we were greeted at the door by the groundsman Peterson, who warned us of the delicate state of Miss Appleby. He informed us that the siblings were very close and the disappearance alone was ample ammunition to rattle the nerves of the lady, quite aside from the subsequent disturbances. I assured the man that I would be as delicate as I may and with this I was shown into the sitting room, where Miss Appleby stood staring through the bay window and onto the grounds. She was of fair stature and complexion, a lady of youth and purpose, yet her eyes bore the marks of restless nights in worry. I introduced myself and my three fellows and in a subdued but deliberate tone she offered what information she had.
Mr. Appleby had been his usual self the evening prior to his disappearance: a man of optimism and forward-thinking he retired for the night with plans for the following month's harvest in mind, having expressed his enthusiasm at the dinner before. The household retired as per their routine by ten in the evening and no movement nor untoward activity was noticed throughout the night. By the morning the staff and Miss Appleby awoke to find the house-master missing, and no sign of him has been found since despite their best efforts. Enquiries in the town have provided little in the way of information, no inns nor rest-houses have taken him on and no local cab-men admit to his transportation.
At this point Miss Appleby turned to face us and in a stern voice assured that her brother is alive and well and that she does not believe in ghosts or hauntings - whether for our benefit or hers is unclear. She had called us there to explain, by natural means, the occurrences since his disappearance so that she may move on and focus her attentions to his location. With that we were directed through the house and duly shown to his bed-room.
Modestly furnished with bedding, writing-desk and two standing wardrobes the room was largely unremarkable. The room seemed to take pride most in its floral decoration, a variety of flowers in wide hue adorned the majority of available surfaces. The lady invited us into the room, asked that we remember its layout as best we can without disturbing it, and then promptly led us out. We were taken downstairs, intrigued by this unusual activity and waited in the hall for seemingly no objective. A few minutes had passed before we were led back to the room, wherein we found a number of changes had occurred in our absence: the heavy wood and leather chair at the desk had retracted, some of the flowers had been rearranged and the bedding had been slightly disturbed. From the hall we could see the bed-room door and so we were sure the room could not have been entered in our absence, yet the disturbances were undeniable.
Miss Appleby confessed that this occurs consistently, that significant changes occur whenever nobody is present in the room, as if something is hiding waiting to emerge and cause mischief unnoticed. And with this Miss Appleby offered us free roam of the house and grounds to investigate and de-bunk the haunting concept, and promptly left to manage her estate.
Light Rain
We spent some time examining the room for openings, concealed areas or hidden drawers. The Boy acted as test subject for concealment, Miss Watson surveyed for hidden latches and compartments, whilst Mr. Brimley offered his not unsubstantial hand in the more force-defined activities. After some time's fruitless searching we repositioned the objects, recollected the space as it stood, and led ourselves from the room to convene and discuss. The conversation relied heavily on the assumption that a haunting was not taking place, that this was not the effect of the departed Mr. Appleby and instead focused on more literal and plausible explanations for the events. The Boy, with his enviable imagination, conjured all manner of theories from a stray cat passing through the room to heavy drafts amplified through the halls, yet all fell through flaws. It was indeed our charge to explain away the happenings, but I confess this approach did not intrigue me. I gave instructions for my entourage to survey the house for potential surreptitious activity or concealment, including the perimeter and its architecture, and repeat the experiment noting each and every change upon iteration.
I retired to the house gardens and sat by the base of a twisted oak tree, ostensibly surveying the grounds for architectural exploitations, though in reality resting my body to better exercise my mind. Whilst initially entreated to analyse the occult happenings at the house, it seemed my focus had been diverted to develop a rational explanation with which to brush the sepulchral aside. This interested me nought and so I permitted my mind to drift back to the implausible.
From this vantage the state of security of the house was transparent: the grounds were such that no man nor beast could enter the house without being seen to approach it. It is enough for me to presume that if the eye of Miss Watson cannot detect a hidden latch or compartment in the room then no such concealment exists. The conclusion which arises is that, whatever the cause of the room's disturbance, it's origin was within. The change is too precise for stray wind, too forceful for concealed wildlife and isolates itself to accessible areas and oft-used objects. Hence I proposed to myself that the disturber was sentient to some degree, yet imperceptible to our own senses. The further my reasoning continued, the faster my thoughts drifted back to haunting. Thus I elected to distract myself from the matter and simply observe my surroundings, to cleanse my suppositions.
By now the eclectic summer weather had begun to turn, releasing a fine spray of rain upon the greenery, tangible to the hand yet delicate to the sight. So sparse was this precipitation that it had been present some time before it drew my attention, so gradual its effect that the eyes' natural imperfections mixed with it to render it invisible. The newly ripening apples in the orchards held visible their small glistening beads, yet oscillated in the wind as if to deliberately disguise the minute change.
Stories of the great men of science and art detail their wondrous discoveries garnished with a sudden burst of enlightenment, alongside a physical or verbal flourish: a proverbial 'Eureka'. When fortune gifts such moments to me they approache more subtly, with gradual revelations and explanations, as if through whisper in my ear. That day was such a case, as the climate whispered to me its metaphor for the strange case of Appleby house. As gradual as the effect of the misty rain on the eye was the effect of Mr. Appleby upon his room, that only by distracting the attention can one see the impact. Perhaps that may not seem clear, and still the concept remains somewhat alien to me, yet I shall endeavour to explain in context.
I returned to the house, dampened by inspiration and excited to turn hypothesis into positive revelation. I sought Miss Appleby and asked her hand for experiment. With my entourage in tow we proceeded to the cursed room, my excitement perceptibly lifting the spirits of our employer. I instructed the lady to sheathe herself in the emerald wingback at the writing desk and write upon the paper a note to her brother. I asked her to portray a genuine plea for his attention and ask of him a reply, in which he should include a tell, a piece of information that only he could know. As the plea and reply may be personal I assured our host that we would not ourselves read them should she desire, and it shall be kept between her and the mystery effector. I instructed her that once she had written the note she was to leave it in plain sight, a fresh leaf of notepaper and writing implements beside it and follow me to the sitting room downstairs.
With that me and my collective left Miss Appleby to her correspondence, whereupon I gave my confederates their instruction: Mr. Brimley and Miss Watson were to house themselves in the rooms which bestride the subject and The Boy was to position himself in the gardens to take vigil at the back side of the house with his sharpened eyesight. This was to ensure there was no disturbance or forced entry into the room by an unknown interloper, isolating the variables, as it were. I remained in the hall landing awaiting Miss Appleby, playing in my mind the bizarrity of the situation and the distrust I would earn should this far-fetched experiment fall awry.
In due time Miss Appleby emerged, emblazoning a hopeful yet perplexed expression - more befitting than the tiring concern of before - as I led her down the stair to the sitting room, wherein we took our seat in such a fashion that we could see directly through the hall and to the door of the room. For five minutes we sat in un-engaging yet deliberate silence. Once elapsed I invited her back up the stair and to the bed-room entrance. Outside we stood as I called to my fellows in the adjacent rooms that we were to enter. They emerged and informed me that neither saw nor heard anything enter or exit the room.
I asked Miss Appleby to enter first, in order to protect the sacrosanct nature of her letter and the hopeful response. As she opened the door, her eyes were directed to the writing desk, and almost immediately she emitted a gasp. She clasped her hands to her face and stood back from the frame wide-eyed. Concerned I went to her aid, asking her the matter and holding her now shaking body. I looked over to the desk and there sat a white carnation lain across the letter she had penned, and a new note beside. Without a word she approached the letter and began to read. In time she sat, re-read the letter a number of times and muttered "It is Eustace". She admitted to us that in her youth her mother was fond of her garden and that as a child Eustace enjoyed carnations more than any other. She asked him to pick from the vases of mixed flowers the one she would know him by, and duly the carnation was chosen and placed on the letter. This, to me, was convincing and I decided in decency not to read the letters myself. I then took the time to explain what I understood of the situation to Miss Appleby and how we may go about finding out more.
I explained that Miss Appleby can communicate with her brother in precisely the same manner as before - without the need to observe the door - and that her brother is ostensibly alive and safe. She seemed bemused but could offer nought but thanks and praise for the good news. Although she could not understand the situation the evidence of her experience was enough to qualm her concerns and raise her spirits. Reason can go hang for the prevalence of hope. With this she offered her thanks for having cleared up the happenings in the house as best we may and allowing her to talk with her brother hereafter, and we left her to her new routine of the touching yet irregular. We have returned subsequently to ask questions of Mr. Appleby and his predicament that allows us to study his situation, which I have dubbed 'Never-where'.
The Study: The Never-Where
Emerging in the east currently are mathematical theories of bizarre origin and consequence, those of exotic spaces and strange geometries which have developed concern in the minds of philosophers as to how we perceive the space in which we live. Theories of alternative realities acting alongside one another have been proposed in the more extreme end of theory. It is my tentative belief that somehow this relates to the situation in which the poor Mr. Appleby has found himself, having somehow jumped from the island of our current understanding of space into somewhere other, his room acting as a metaphysical bridge. In this space it seems time takes effect at the same rate but can only be experienced in this space when the two are not explicitly interacting, i.e. when there is nobody there to observe it. In practical terms Mr. Appleby has never left the room but has simply left where the room is in our space. He remains there but only when he cannot be observed to be there, where we know him to be but only when we are not. He is simultaneously always where he is and never where he is, hence my naming the space the Never-Where.
Precisely how this occurred may forever elude us, however from our communications with him he is known to have been an associate of the Prendergast family, and so a connection with the late Doctor may not be beyond plausibility. I am, however, not certain of this, as while production of curios and strange devices is one matter of skill, transportation from our space to a Never-Where is another.
Mr. Appleby himself seems unharmed physically and mentally. He was of good wit and focus, a great deal more than I would expect of a man in his predicament. He claimed his surroundings are near identical to that of our space, although hazy to observe and slightly off-hue, discoloured in a peculiar manner. Not having access to his eyes this is the best description we can muster. He has no company, the Never-Where devoid of other life, and his sole form of social communication seems to be through our letter-writing.
As for study there is little more I see we can achieve. Any tests we may take on the room itself return unremarkable data - perhaps precisely due to the 'no effect with observation' property, making any direct study literally impossible. Hence the comparison to form would be that of the aforementioned conundrum,
"If a tree were to fall in the forest, with no-body around to hear, does it make a sound?"This question is, naturally, unanswerable in practise as the act of observation renders the result meaningless. I seem to have exhausted my search for tactile information from Mr. Appleby as his experience of the matter was simply to awake in a hazy world devoid of life after an unremarkable day. I offer to you the location of the house in the contained documents, alongside the full correspondence between us and Mr. Appleby.
Miss Appleby has since inherited the estate from her Brother who, in the observations of the uneducated law, is presumed dead. She officially manages the estate and business under the direct instruction of her brother, and the two correspond daily as normal. As I understand her social interactions have endured something of a set-back, her seclusion to her writings unexplainable to the general public. Whilst her esteem has apparently dropped in her neighbours' opinion she remains in high spirits, content with herself, her brother and her situation.
I trust this finds you well and you find all relevant materials enclosed to your professional liking. If you need further information Mr. Appleby is of an amiable disposition and I am sure he will be glad of your enquiry.
Yours,
Dr Nicholas P. Henderson
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