Click, Hello.

I suppose I should clarify my stance on this matter. With a little luck it'll stop half the town considering me a neglectful parent for not wanting Miss Gold's blood spilled and the other half from calling me a monster for not forgiving her within seconds.

Miss Gold has every right to live in this town without being harassed or harmed by others and I will fight for her to keep that right to live without fear if I must. I will fight for that right not because I am particularly fond of her but because she is a human and if we deny one person the right to live in safety then others will deny us the same right. Those who have threatened her and burned her home are no better than the people who are derailing trains and setting bombs.

On the other hand, I have the right to feel however I please. I and every other parent in this town have been decieved by Miss Gold. Those who are angry with her have every right to be and those who have forgiven her clearly have more capacity for forgiveness than I but they have the right to do that. I personally would be happy never to see her face again but I would never harm her and I would stand between her and those that would given the chance.

So everyone shut up about it.

Nell's schooling is not an issue anymore. She seems to have a natural talent for smithing.

I saw the crowd outside the school this morning. I...tried to disperse them but they would not be moved and to be honest they had every right to be as angry as they were. Regardless of whether it affects her work it is...innappropriate.

I am not angry. I am somewhat disapponted.

...Nell will become my apprentice.

After two half-days, Nell seems to like school. I suppose it wasn't too early after all. She claims that she doesn't find the work too difficult but I have doubts. I know homework is set at the end of the day and so she's not been getting it, but would it be possible to assign her homework so I can see what she's doing and make sure she's not struggling too much?

She doesn't like being on her own, I've been having to walk her into school until we run into little Peter and go find Peter at lunchtime to collect her from him. She's not being too much of a bother to him, is she?

She seems a lot happier, at least. I'm glad.

Business is going a lot better than it has been, though I feel a little guilty. People are buying a lot more guns now and I can't help but feel it's a result of the explosion. People are wanting to defend themselves. I feel bad profiting off something that hurt so many people.

Jane, if I need to leave the house outside of school hours would your mother be okay with me leaving Nell to play with Peter? She doesn't like being left alone so she'll follow me otherwise.

[Private to Jane]

I need to speak to you at some point, somewhere where the company's men won't be able to hear. I have...suspicions...and if they are true I don't trust this book to keep them secret. I doubt there will be much you can do about it even if it is true, but I can't let it happen without telling someone.

[Private to Self]

School fees are...expensive. If it weren't for the sudden boom in business I wouldn't be able to afford this.

I suppose failing all else I can take her back out of school and teach her myself. I had a decent enough education to teach her enough to function as an adult and if I teach her how to work metal then she'll at least always have a respectable job. She won't be able to speak to other children, though, and I want her to have friends.

When did I start thinking of her as a daughter anyway? This...limits my options. I only meant to take her in for a few days. I don't want my actions to be able to affect another person's life so much. It makes me less free.

She's speaking. She's not speaking much, but she's speaking.

I've been getting more concerned about her, she gave me money a few nights ago. It wasn't much, less than most drinks cost, but I wanted to know how she'd got hold of it. I know now, though, and I have a good idea of where she's been runnng off to. I didn't manage to follow her, she's quite good at evading me, but this afternoon someone from there followed her to my shop. He was just outside, he had his hands around her neck.

Apparently he gave her money for sex and she ran away with it. I will speak to her about how she aquired the money she gave to me later once she has calmed down. She's still shaking.

I think I may have hurt him more than I intended to. I'm no doctor but his nose looked broken. I apologise if this causes trouble for you, Jane. If he goes to you then I am happy to pay him back the handful of coins that Nell took from him but if he claims that I assaulted him I feel it justified in light of the fact that he was strangling my daughter.

She spoke to me, though. She said thank you.

And if the shop's locked up, please knock. We're still open, I'm just having to keep all the doors locked, she's scared he'll come back.

At least I know now. At least nothing happened.

The night of the bombing a young girl followed me home. I took her out into the streets and shouted for her mother and father but we found nobody. It was far too late to search so I fed her and she slept in my reading chair. I resolved to help find her home in the days after but I became caught up in the effort to rehome the afflicted.

More than a week has passed now and still nobody has come looking for her. I fear the worst has happened to her family. She hasn't spoken to me at all in this time. She doesn't respond when I try to talk to her, the only thing that'll get a reaction out of her is food. She vanishes in the morning before I wake up and comes back in the evenings and waits to be fed.

At first I thought she'd breathed in some dust or something, I was going to take her to the doctor. But I think that this is something else. I think it's something in her head. Dust in her throat would affect her voice but she'd still be able to make eye contact or even just react to anything at all.

There's a tag on her coat that says she's called Ellen. I've been calling her Nell, it's shorter. I'm not good at guessing ages but I'd say she was about 10.

Ugh, I'm not good with kids. Even less so when they don't talk. I feel bad treating her like a dog but I'm not sure what else to do.

Oh, and due to the current circumstances I'll now be open on Wednesdays until further notice.

This is disgusting.

Whoever these people have business with, they should attack their enemies and not innocents. I saw the corpses of women and children in the ruins of those buildings.

This is not how men fight. Men do not fight by attacking the helpless. Men do not fight by striking at those who are not their enemies.

To the wretch responsible for this, start fighting your enemies instead of those who cannot retalliate. Fight like a man.

To Miss Savannah, how are you? I do not recall seeing you amid the chaos, though I admit I have quite deliberately forgotten many of the things I saw amid the chaos. Are you well? I hope you were not harmed.

To all the families this incident has destroyed at this of all times of the year, you have my condolences.

Ugh, horseshoes. I am beginning to detest the things. They’re so simple and crude, just a lump of metal. There’s no beauty in them at all and they are all I have made in the last month, excluding my personal projects.

I shouldn’t complain. The horseshoes pay for food and coal. If there was a real farrier in this part of the town I’d starve. Work’s work I suppose.

Someone brought in a pocket watch a few days ago. It was nowhere near as beautiful as my guns but it was something new. Still, it’s a whole different specialism! In that case it was a minor problem and I managed to fix it easily enough but the mechanisms are not similar at all. Just because they are made of metal does not mean I can work them.

I am not a farrier and I am most certainly not a watchmaker. Maybe some day I’ll be able to do my own job rather than a little of everyone else’s.