The Night Phantom

Journal Entry - Three

December 26, 1861

I can remember my first thought quite vividly when I saw the dead bodies. Poison. Just like my old case with "The Prince of Poisoners." Eventually, I did find out I was wrong. At the crime scene, there was a body of a girl who a family member identified, telling us her name was Cora. William inspected the scene as well as there were no clues or anything, so we told them to give her an autopsy so we can at least identify the cause of death. Right when we got back to the police station from the crime scene, we were notified that has been another death just like it, so we had to go to the other side of town and inspect the scene. It turned out to be just like the other. No obvious cause of death, no clues, just a dead body in the snow. "What are you thinking?" William asked me, he appeared to be confused. "Poison possibly," I answered simply adding in a shrug.
After waiting a few hours for the autopsy results, we were told that there were literally no causes of death in each body. "How could that be?" William thought aloud. I just shook my head, it didn't make any sense, I've never had a case start off this difficult. "Would you fancy getting something to eat for lunch, relax, freshen our minds?" William suggested with a quiet sigh. "I suppose," I replied and we walked out of the station to get lunch, freshen our minds, and relax, just like William said.
We talked for while as we ate. Surprisingly, we actually found out we had a lot in common along with differences, but it balanced out. He made me chuckle with his jokes and I made him see the world in a different way and gave him some tips and advice for his detective work. After we ate, the both of us went back into the police station to receive news that another body has been located, similar to the previous two. We examined the scene and there was no clues or leads, which I expected. "I need the documented records of all this person activities for the past week," I said, "Get them to my office when you get them," I added before leaving the scene with William.
"Look through Cora Wright's records, I'll look at the other two," I advised while leaning back into my chair. "Hm... Harrison was going to be a passenger on a train, the train crashed, but he missed it, could that mean anything?" I asked, talking more to myself. "Wright booked a spot on that train too, but also ended up not boarding it," William said shocked. "What about Edwards?" the rookie asked referring to the most recent victim. I looked through his records and nodded. "Yes, he ended up skipping that train ride too."
After finding out what the three of them had in common, we did further research into it, but couldn't find anything. We had to face the fact that we might have to wait for another murder in order to get more clues. Waiting was the worst part of the job, letting people be in danger. We let a few other detective help, but the only thing they found was about the train situation.
We ended up not getting much sleep, staying awake to try and figure something out. A few hours past midnight I could tell my partner wasn't used to staying up that late, "You can leave, Will, get some rest," I told my partner. He refused at first, but he decided to go home and rest a couple minutes after.