The gardens of Eden
Excerpts from Joel Goldschmidt's Journal
August, 8th 1833
This afternoon Aurélie came in my laboratory: she asked me what were doing two baby girls there, if I applied to a children's merchant. I told her the truth, as always, I told her what my intentions are: she didn't judged me, she has never done that, she merely replied that both of them are entitled to a decent life and that my idea of bringing one of them in a natural enviroment could have serious consequences.
Personally, the only result I see is to find myself with a new Victor1, except that it would be a chiropteran and not a human being. Only one thing is left to decide: which one will be raised in a natural enviroment, brown-eyed or blue-eyed?
August, 15th 1833
Today we verified if the blood of a Queen is really poisonous for the other one: having only two specimens, we have just taken a blood sample of each and mixed them. If it's just-spilled blood, when they come into contact both turn into a crystal-like, diamond-hard substance, but one hour after the samples are taken, there is no reaction.
Amshel suggeste to inject blood samples into some rabbits, but as I've not found any reference about this in the Blóðdrottningbók2 I cannot foresee what the result may be, and I'm not so sure I want to find it out.
August, 17th 1833
Today I haven't spent one single moment in the lab, since my brother-in-law and his wife came for dinner. They proposed to put David up at their place, in Bordeaux, arguing that the Goldschmidt and Dubourg's heir needs not only the best education, but also to build the network that will allow him to suceed in life. Honestly, I'm not sure of what to do: I feel more comfortable knowing that he is in a boarding school, I don't want anything to happen to David (after all there are some wild beasts here), but on the other hand he would become a fine assistant once he grow up, he would learn a lot of thing you don't find in school books and that most teachers ignore. I'll take a decision after talking about that with Aurélie, but not now: given her current state, I don't want to upset her.
September, 6th 1833
Aurélie is dead and the child she carried is born too soon: neither Dr Morel, nor Mrs. Playford are optimistic about his survival, and I feel totally useless. I'm here, sitting in my laboratory surrounded by my unfinished experiments, and I wonder what is the use of spending time and money in this quest for a higher form of life if I don't have my wife who rejoice for my discoveries? And I wonder if Aurélie really thought that this lab was more important than her for me, since she herself ordered to not seek me?
Maybe I was just a bad and selfish husband and perhaps even a worse father, and perhaps for the best thing for David is to let Maxence take care of him.
September, 10th 1833
Right after the funeral, I took refuge in my laboratory. I don't care if people think that I'm insensitive, but this is the only place where I can let myself go, where nobody dares bother me - even Amshel leaves me alone, he knocked just once to ask if he had to move the babies in another room for a while. I didnt replied and he went away.
I don't know how long I've watched them sleep, wondering what to do, until one awakened, looking at me with her blue eyes: Aurélie wanted that both were given the same opportunities, but I cannot, I cannot... One of them has eyes the same color as Aurélie's and if I keep her at my side, she would always remember me all my faults.
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1. Victor: a feral child found in the Pyrenees in 1790 e 1800.
2. Blóðdrottningbók: "Book of the Bloody Queen". As we don't know how Joel Goldschmidt made his theories about chiropterans, I've made up a sort of mythological poem about them.