The Van Helsing Conjecture – Excerpt No. 166

23 February 2025

Clara woke up the next morning freezing. While she had to pee, Clara had no desire to encounter a john. Instead she used a chamber pot, while her thoughts lingered on the decrepit outhouse.

“That’s where papa died.”

The memory of that night to centre stage. Clara remembered the blued lips, and the black blood from coal dust all over his long johns. Clara had to pee then too, which was why she tried to wake up her father… he was already gone.

A moody and atmospheric photograph of a deceased man in his forties, slumped over on a wooden bench, wearing worn and faded long johns, inside an enclosed outhouse with wooden planks and a corrugated iron roof, surrounded by old lanterns, scattered tools, and rusty equipment, set amidst a foggy and misty 1915 Canadian coastal mining town, with dark greens and browns dominating the muted color palette, capturing the grit and hardship of the era, with the man's weathered face, worn leather boots, and disheveled hair telling a story of a life of toil and struggle.

Disclaimer: This novel is an work in progress and readers may encounter grammatical errors and inconsistencies. Please view this a draft and not a published work.