An unusually handsome lithe young fellow, and an unusually handsome lithe girl; much alike; both very dark, and very rich in colour; she of almost the gipsy type; something untamed about them both; a certain air upon them of hunter and huntress; yet withal a certain air of being the objects of the chase, rather than the followers. Slender, supple, quick of eye and limb; half shy, half defiant; fierce of look; an indefinable kind of pause coming and going on their whole expression, both of face and form, which might be equally likened to the pause before a crouch or a bound. The rough mental notes made in the first five minutes by Mr. Crisparkle would have read thus, verbatim.

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It is said, that Sir John Browning, the governor of Hong Kong in 1850s, having read Chapter I of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, sent Dickens a letter criticising the opium smoking experience for being described unrealistically. Sir John claims in that letter, that smoking pipes made of ink-bottles is a complete nonsense, while the proper Chinese pipes consisted of a brass sphere, where opium was placed with a hollow bamboo stick attached to the middle. He also included a sketch of such a proper pipe along with the letter. Charles Dickens in his response thanks Sir Browning for paying such a careful attention to detail, but also states that in his novels he only describes things he has seen with his own eyes, and that is true regarding both objects and characters.

Indeed, many researchers, me included, have found a number of similarities between his characters and real people, whom Dickens used as prototypes. Canon Whiston, who served as a clergyman in Rochester Cathedral in 1842, became Septimus Crisparkle; the loud Luke Honeythunder character was based on John Bold, the Quaker reformer; the mayor of Maidstone (a neighbouring town of Rochester) known as Thomas Edmett became Sapsea, a bumpkin mayor of Cloisterham, while the famous mistress of an opium Den in London Mother Abdallah was remodelled into a niggardly and vengeful Princess Puffer. It goes without saying, that all other characters of The Mystery of Edwin Drood were taken from real life, at least their physical appearance if not the details of their biography.

I have also introduced a theory in one of my previous articles, that even the plot of The Mystery of Edwin Drood is no more than a remake of Anthony Trollope’s The Warden adapted to a detective genre—there are just too many similarities between events and details of the two novels. Trollope himself is portrayed in Dickens’s novel as a buzzing and arrogant loafer Bazzard, a clerk and the author of an unsuccessful play The Thorn of Anxiety. Anthony Trollope had spent seven years working as a clerk in a post office before starting his literary career. According to his own Autobiography it was very unhappy and unsuccessful time. He once wrote a play called Did he Steal It?,—a good for nothing play, that even his actor friends gave it a rather negative critical reception. That play has never been staged, just like the Bazzard’s play.

Clerk Bazzard has, as we know from the story a rather hot-tempered father, and as Grewgious describes him, ‘Bazzard's father, being a Norfolk farmer, would have furiously laid about him with a flail, a pitch-fork, and every agricultural implement available for assaulting purposes, on the slightest hint of his son's having written a play.’ This is another parallel between real life and the novel, as young Anthony also had a father who was a farmer notorious for his bad temper. In the continuation to the novel that I am currently writing, it is Bazzard Senior, who plays a role of Datchery. Even though, he might not be fully fit for the job, considering peculiarities of his personality and behaviour, there is always a chance that Grewgious simply tries to make a witty remark which slightly exaggerated the flaws of his good old friend.

We have learnt from the story Grewgious tells us, that young Bazzard has a conflict with his father as soon as he comes of age, leaves the farm and determines to pursue his destiny in the capital city. However, the young fellow is doomed to failure, having neither talent nor useful connections, Mr Grewgious basically saves the wretched lad from starvation, giving him a job in his own office and paying his wages out of his own pocket. Despite all the kindness of the old lawyer, this type of behaviour does not seem very likely, unless Bazzard Junior is indeed his old acquaintance’s and probably the one and only friend’s son—it is not a coincidence that Bazzard Senior sends him a fat turkey every Christmas, it could only be a sign of gratitude for being so kind to his son. There is a high probability of Bazzard Senior paying Grewgious a visit during his business trip to London, he learns from Grewgious about his suspicions regarding John Jasper, becomes enraged, while his wrath if further fortified by a glass of red wine (as we know Mr Crisparkle catches Grewgious with a glass of red wine in his hand, which may be an indicator of him just recently having a guest) and as a result volunteers to keep an eye on the Choirmaster in Cloisterham, and this is where he departs immediately. I believe this is what the old lawyer is hinting at as he says ‘When one is in a difficulty, or at a loss, one never knows in what direction a way out may chance to open,’—since if Grewgious were to hire a detective himself or assign his clerk Bazzard to the tasks that phrase would make no sense, thus that help must have been unexpected for Hiram.

However the contradiction between the characters of Mr Bazzard Senior and Datchery kept bothering me, and I asked myself, — ‘didn’t Anthony Trollope (the prototype of clerk Bazzard) have any other relatives more suitable for the role of a detective in disguise?’ And I came to a conclusion that Thomas Trollope, the writer’s older brother and a good old friend of Charles Dickens, could easily be that person. Thomas Trollope, an accomplished writer himself, was five years older than Anothony. He even wrote articles for the Dickens’s magazine and what’s more important, they met each other in the summer of 1843, in other words, the exact moment when Datchery makes his appearance in The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Their encounter took place in Florence, Italy, and since that time Thomas Trollope had kept a positive opinion about the author, calling him ‘a man with the biggest and kindest heart I have ever known.’ It’s not surprising at all, for it was Charles Dickens who introduced him to Theodosia Garrow, his future wife.

And now it is time to begin my story of Helena Landless.

Theodosia Garrow, a young lady of 25 years of age at the time, had a rather noteworthy and mysterious personality. Firstly, she had a quarter of Indian blood in her veins—her grandmother ascends from a noble Indian family which belongs to the highest varna (class) of Brahmins and whose name was Sultana. This Indian princess became a lawful wife to an English officer Joseph Garrow (this type of marriage was unique for that period) and gave birth to a son, whom they also called Joseph. Young Joseph lost both of his parents at the age of three and therefore was forced to move to England where he was raised by his single aunt Eleonora Garrow, from whom he inherited one thousand pounds. This sum of money allowed him to pay for his education, become a lawyer and even a member of The Inns of Court in London, although he never was in need of money apart from that occasion, since he had a successful marriage when he was only twenty two—he married a wealthy widow Theodosia Fisher, who was fifteen years his senior (some even say twenty four), she had two daughters from a previous marriage: Theodosia, the older daughter and the younger one called Harriet, who eventually became a cause of trouble.

It’s necessary to make a certain remark here. Most of the characters of the story I am telling you have identical names, there are two Josephs and even three Theodosias. We only have one Harriet, but there are more to come. Therefore, we need to give each a number, just ot avoid the confusion.

Thus, Joseph I married Sultana and they gave birth to Joseph II. Theodosia I (born Abrams) was a singer and made her living by giving concerts, she married Captain Thomas Fisher with whom they had two daughters—Theodosia II and Harriet in 1809, whose second name was also Theodosia, but let’s omit this fact otherwise we are going to mess things up completely. So, Harriet Fisher the younger daughter had an affair with her stepfather Joseph II when she was as young as sixteen years of age (some even suggest she was fourteen). As a result of this relationship a child was born in 1823 and her name is Theodosia III, who happened to have a quarter of Indian blood inherited from her grandma Sultana.

Of course, Theodosia I (Theodosia Abrams Fisher Garrow) was not very happy to have such an addition to their family. So, in order to conceal this disgraceful matter, she was forced to register her granddaughter as her daughter, despite being good fifty nine years old at the time of the child’s birth, which complicated the matter, but she didn’t have any choice. Although, the neighbours were not tricked by such manipulation, the details of Theodosia III’s birth were not a secret to anyone, but Harriet, the young lecherous lass still kept her distance, furthermoe during the next census of population she added a couple of years to her true age, while her grandmother Theodosia I officially became younger by a dozen years (people simply did not have passports to prove their age at the time). Thus, the minimum decencies were observed. At the time of the child’s birth, Joseph, the passionate father was thirty four years old, while his wife was almost sixty, and having two young and attractive Lot's daughters around meant only one thing—the incest was inevitable. And we can’t blame them.

All the manipulations and substitutions resulted in a compete chaos so that nobody could be certain about their age or birthdays. Theodosia III was allegedly baptized in 1812, while she was born only in 1823 and Harriet was only six in 1812, while her step-mother Theodosia I was 48 and considered relatively fertile. As Theodosia III got older, the natural desire to appear younger made her reduce her age, which resulted in her date of birth being shifted to 1825. The only thing we know for certain is their death dates, while their age will always remain a subject for speculation. In any case, Theodosia had always been extremely cold and strict towards her so-called daughter Theodosia III, while Harriet, on the other hand, loved her dearly and even left her all her money after her death.

Theodosia III’s loving husband Thomas Trollope, describes his future wife in his memoirs as being unfashionable even untidy, but graceful and well-proportioned young lady, who was dark of skin with dark greyish eyes and a gorgeous waterfall of chestnut hair reaching down her waist. Her features were more Indian than European, that is why Thomas could hardly call her handsome (he even thought she was unattractive at first), but soon he fell head over heels for her, partially due to her bright intelligence, elegance and grace. In his later memories he also mentions her moral traits, perfectly fitting his own nature the way a glove fits a human hand. As young Thomas recollected he was so swayed by their conversation with that pretty and barbaric Theodosia during their first meeting that completely neglected all other young ladies in the hall (and needless to say, there were many beauties amongst them), which of course, irritated them to the point that some of them were forcefully taken to the outside garden by their parents to avoid the conflict.

Being in love Thomas was not bothered about the unclarity concerning the official age of his darling at all. He desperately wanted to marry that woman by all means. Charles Dickens, who was his age-mate also supported him in this matter. It would be fair to say, that Charles Dickens played a role of a matchmaker, since it was his idea to invite The Trollopes to that notable party where they met The Garrows (the party was in Florence). However, Theodosia I, the bride’s stepmother did not share their enthusiasm and forbade their marriage, supporting her decision with the fact that Trollope did not have sufficient funds. Trollope himself admitted it, saying that the only wealth he had was ‘a farm under his hat’—in other words, his brilliant head and all the talents concealed within it for the time being. However, Theodosia III herself was not astoundingly wealthy—all the dowry she possessed at the time of their wedding was a sum of a thousand pounds as well as 250 pounds of annual income, which she got from the shares, which in turn were registered under her name, and to which her husband did not have access. Nonetheless, Thomas persevered and after five years of agonising suspense they finally got married in 1848.