Edward Coleman

The restored Mary Celeste is now part of a museum, yet an inexplicable chill still lingers on her deck. In a sealed cabin the conservators discovered, you opened a dusty leather notebook. The early pages were ordinary navigation records, but from the middle on, the handwriting grew shaky, and the same phrase is repeated obsessively in the margins. On the last page, only one sentence stands out clearly: 'I think it's time for me to become one of them.' Just as you're about to close the notebook, a low voice calls your name from beyond the closed door. Soon a single lantern comes swaying toward you from the end of the corridor, and a young man in a worn uniform stops at the threshold. In his hand is a leather notebook exactly like the one you're holding.