The Axe Will Fall_Lizzie Borden, Zombie Hunter_Book 2

by C. A. Verstraete

  “Here, you carry these. Shall we go?”

  “Yes, take me home. I want to go home. I need to talk to Emma.”

  Lizzie watched him lock the door and walked quietly to the carriage, her mood dark. Despite her training, nothing had prepared her for the emotional upheaval she felt. The months of quiet and rest she’d enjoyed faded. The days of not having to endure the silent stares and unspoken blame from former neighbors and friends or the undead outbreak were now but a memory.

  During her respite and the contentment she’d felt with resuming a near-normal life of reading, writing letters, and sitting on the sun porch, her beloved dog at her side, she’d dared feel that her life would stay quiet and again be normal. What a fool I’ve been.

  She muttered in anger as Pierre helped her into the carriage, the papers on the seat beside her a silent reminder of what her life had become once again—or maybe had always been.

  It had taken less than a day for her sense of peace to fade and disappear.

  Chapter Four

  Q. Was she excited?

  A. She seemed excited to me more than I ever saw her before.

  —Testimony of Bridget Sullivan,

  Trial of Lizzie Borden, June 8, 1893

  O

  nce again in the comfortable, well-appointed kitchen of the beloved three-story home she had named Maplecroft, Lizzie bustled happily about, taking out a plate of tea cakes and sliced lemons from the handsome, polished wood ice box. Her Boston Terrier Laddie gave a small woof as he snuck into the room. He gave Pierre a long look and then ran out again with the small biscuit Lizzie gave him.

  Lizzie crossed the room, opened the basement door, and gave a cheery greeting, “Emma, I’m home. I’ll be down later,” before shutting the door again. She then put a new pot of water onto the cast iron stove to heat, and set out her favorite matching set of cups and saucers painted with sprigs of lavender.

  “None for me,” Pierre said. “I’ll have something stronger, if you don’t mind.”

  She poured him a glass of whiskey and relished the familiar, comforting feel of his arm at her waist. The many months they’d not talked or been in contact, she now realized, had been a mistake. At this point she knew the decision to shut him out of her life had been foolish. She couldn’t do that again as much as she could stop seeing to her sister’s continued comfort. During the outbreaks, and with all the struggles she and Emma had faced, Pierre had been a bedrock and source of strength. And he still was.

  “Liz…”

  Smiling, she turned, daring to let his hands stay clasped around her waist for a moment. “Now, Pierre, you know we have a lot to do, without any, er, distractions.”

  Her steps slow, she moved away and out of reach to get the teapot off the cast iron stove. Pouring herself a cup, she set the pot back and plopped a lemon slice in her tea. The tart smell filled the room.

  “I want you to know I’m glad you’re here,” she reassured him. “Very. It was wrong of me to push you out.”

  He smiled back. “I’ll second that. And…”

  Clearing her throat, she pulled out the carved oak chair, sat, and handed him one of the folders. “And we need to do some work. Shall we?”

  His smirk brought out the deep dimple in his cheek. “All right, all right. I’ll put my mind on… paperwork.”

  She laughed, thankful for the moment of lightness which soon faded as they thumbed through page after page in the pile of folders. Bills of lading, invoices, typewritten, letters, and bunches of numbers swam past in a flurry of paper.

  “This is all so familiar. I feel like time has gone backward.”

  “Indeed.” He sighed and took a sip of his whiskey. “It all looks like things we’ve seen before.”

  Lizzie nodded and shuffled through a few more folders. “Except for this.” She held up a single sheet of paper.

  “What is it?”

  She scanned the page then handed it to him. “It looks like some kind of shipping order for… It’s hard to make out. Some of the letters are faded. No ship name is given, but it looks like it was a package freighter. Whatever it is arrived at the harbor here last year.”

  “Could it be connected to the previous shipments? I thought some of the mayor’s cohorts had gone to Boston, or maybe they came back. It looks like this ship originated in New York.”

  “That puts a new twist on things, doesn’t it?”

  Pierre shrugged and took another sip from his glass. “I guess we shouldn’t be too surprised. One of my police contacts told me that they’ve been fighting an influx of crime by Irish gang members spreading out from New York to Boston. He told me they’ve arrested quite of few of these ruffians for petty crimes, saloon thefts, fights, robberies, that kind of thing.”

  “Irish gangs?

  “They’ve been active in New York since the beginning of the century,” he explained. “Makes sense, I suppose, that the crime wave would spread, especially with the economic crisis. They’ve been having some problems in Boston, too. Many people probably never recovered from all the railroad and bank failures. Criminals are always looking for new opportunities.”

  Lizzie bit her lip in thought. “Hmm, I suppose, they could easily blend in and come here supposedly for a mill job or a domestic situation. We certainly have our share of immigrants.”

  “Like your girl, Bridget Sullivan. Whatever happened to her?”

  “Oh, you mean our former maid? We called her Maggie. She left after the trial ended to find other employment. It was a wise decision. It felt uncomfortable having her here.”

  “Did you give her a character reference?”

  “Of course. She’d worked for our family for nearly three years. I assume she found employment elsewhere. Why do you ask?”

  “Curious, that’s all. It could be easy for a young immigrant woman to fall into the wrong type of situation if she didn’t find a new place.”

  Lizzie sniffed, thinking his comment rather odd. “Whatever choices she made after leaving here wouldn’t be my concern now, would it? I did my part.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  She wasn’t sure what he meant, but had no interest in pursuing it further. What she didn’t dare say aloud was the real reason she felt Maggie had to leave. I wasn’t going to tolerate any more dirty looks from some working girl, Lizzie thought. It had simply gotten too uncomfortable. Every time she turned around, she’d seen those hard, green eyes, staring, judging her. She wouldn’t tolerate it. Not in her own home.

  Annoyed, she sipped her tea, then pushed the cup aside while she sifted through the stack. The room filled with the sound of paper shuffling.

  “You know, there could be a bigger problem,” Pierre explained. “With all the railroads failing, it might be easier to use ships to move goods around without much interference.”

  Lizzie sorted through the papers and began reading another page silently. “I suppose…”

  “I heard of one case where the man arrested had ordered four hundred pairs of trousers at a tailor’s shop. Then he stole all but sixty pairs. Bad news is the police tracked him down when the trousers began showing up at the pawn shops. Stupid bloke put down his real name.”

  “I see…”

  “Then he stole an elephant…”

  She looked up. “He did what?”

  “I wanted to see if you were listening. What’s got your attention there?”

  “This.” She gave a loud sigh. “Here’s another shipping bill from a freighter that sailed from Boston. It seems to have docked here in Fall River. The date is faded, but it looks like it was three months ago. They declare fifty boxes, it says inert goods. Nothing else.”

  “The goods, of course, could be anything,” Pierre remarked.

  “Yes, anything.” She glanced his way and frowned, a shiver hitting her. “Maybe they even found a way to transport some of the creatures they found harbored here to somewhere else.”

  “That would be terribly dangerous.”

  “I know.
It would also be disastrous.”

  Lizzie stared at the paper in front of her and gasped, letting the sheet fall from her hand.

  “What is it?” Pierre asked. “What’s wrong?”

  She slid the paper across the table to him, her eyes wide. “Look at the signature on the last line. It says Andrew J. Borden. Someone forged my dead father’s name!”

  Chapter Five

  Q. Just say what he said to you when you brought the paper.

  A. The Court was going on in the afternoon and Mr. Buck came in and said, “Mrs. Reagan, there is a report going around that there is trouble between Miss Emma Borden and her sister.” I said, “You can’t believe all you read in the paper.”

  —Testimony of Hannah Reagan,

  matron at Central Police Station,

  Trial of Lizzie Borden, June 14, 1893

  O

  nce she recovered from the shock of seeing her father’s signature on a recent document a year after his death, Lizzie realized that she might have overreacted—or not. She pulled the document closer to the light.

  “Look at this. The ink is faded in more than one place, suggesting it’s not a new document.”

  Pierre eyed the paper and nodded. “Well, that’s good in a way.”

  “Yes, but that doesn’t mean my father didn’t sign a blank document a while ago, and someone else used it recently with a current date, or someone did forge his signature.”

  She dug in a drawer and pulled out an old bill, signed and dated by Mr. Borden. Spreading the two papers out on the table, she and Pierre compared the lettering on the date and the signature. It didn’t take long to see the differences.

  “All right, I see it now,” Lizzie said. “The way the letters are connected and the loops are formed are different on both papers. They’re almost the same but not quite.”

  “I see what you mean. It’s so close you wouldn’t notice except in a comparison like we’re doing.”

  “Yes. So, the signature isn’t Father’s. It’s been forged, but why?”

  “We probably should hand it over to the marshal.”

  His comment gave Lizzie pause. She put the old bill put away and looked up in concern. The shipment record went into an envelope. “I suppose, but I dread getting into any conversation again with the marshal. It’s better that he stay away from here.”

  “That may be the case,” Pierre agreed, “but even if they don’t look into it right away, at least you’re covered legally, in case there are other problems. If you like, I can drop it off and explain the situation.”

  “All right. Thank you. That would help. I don’t want to face him again. I’ll let Mr. Jennings know about this.”

  Pierre rose and went to the front door. “In the meantime, I’ll talk to some of my contacts to see if the ship owner can be found and the shipment can be traced to a specific recipient. Maybe they have some warehouse or place of business here.”

  “Or maybe they’ve gone back to one of the old places they used before?” Lizzie wondered, opening the front door. “There has to be a reason why those monsters were in Father’s building again. I thought criminals liked returning to the scene of the crime or something?”

  “You could be right. Once I’m done, I’ll come pick you up. We’ll go take another look at a couple of the warehouses. It can’t hurt to give each of the places a thorough check.”

  “Yes, and if you don’t mind, I think we should return to Father’s building as soon as we can. I don’t want to, but it doesn’t hurt to check around again. Maybe we missed something.”

  After Pierre left, Lizzie went back to the kitchen, filled a tray, and went down to the basement. A glance at the unused workout and training area evoked a feeling of sadness. Emma had tried so hard. She’d gone along with all the exercises and had a pretty good aim.

  But it hadn’t helped. She knew the past couldn’t be changed. Regret gnawed at her for not being more protective. It pained her to see Emma like this. Now all she could do was make sure her sister came to no further harm.

  As expected, the undead Emma began to get agitated. The she-creature paced, its steps shuffling, a continual grimace on its once smiling face. Shiny spots of her skull showed through the ratty, matted black hair. She grunted and banged her rot-pocked hands on the padding covering the walls and bars of the steel cell. Grime and traces of rot encrusted the once-clean pads. Dirt and more grime covered the floor in the space.

  Lizzie knew she’d best not dawdle. She hurried across the room with the tray, holding her breath against the sickening stench of rot. Setting it down close enough for her undead sister to reach from her enclosure, Lizzie hurried back to the staircase, raising her voice to be heard above the sudden commotion of the tray banging and the bowls clanging.

  “Emma dear, did I tell you I’ve seen Pierre again? He’s well and sends his regards. He looks the same as ever, maybe better. I know I said we should break off contact, but I think I was wrong. He’s a good man, and he’ll be very helpful.”

  The noise finally stopped. “The worst news, I’m afraid to say, is there’s been another outbreak. I found something even more troubling, someone forged Father’s signature a few months ago on some shipping document. I don’t know why, or what was shipped. Pierre’s going with me to the warehouses and Father’s business for another look around.”

  The air filled with moans instead of all the banging as Emma finally began to calm down. Lizzie cautiously inched her way to the corner of the room, relieved to see that the edge of the tray stuck out from beyond her undead sister’s confines. Using the garden rake she kept nearby, she made a quick grab, hooked the tray, and pulled it over before rushing back to the staircase, leaving Emma’s odd sounds, and smells, behind.

  Upstairs in the kitchen, she shut the door and stood there. She breathed in the noticeably cleaner and cooler air. How long could she realistically keep doing this? Six months? Another year? Two? She doubted it could go on long-term. Not with Emma’s continued downward spiral.

  But then what? I don’t know. I have no idea what I’ll do then. Of course, she knew what would eventually have to happen. There was only one end in such cases. I can’t think of that yet. I can’t. As she’d done so many times before in the past months, Lizzie washed off the tray and bowl, muttered curses against her father on her lips.

  The ring of the front door chime seemed a welcome interruption. Drying her hands, she went to the door and peeked out the small window, happy to find Pierre waiting there. She opened the door, smiling at him in greeting. “You’re back soon.”

  “Too soon?”

  She felt her face warm. “No, I’m glad to see you.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.”

  He stepped in and pushed the door closed. Before she could resist or object, he sidled near, grabbed her around the waist, and kissed her neck. He pulled her in, and as his kisses became bolder, Lizzie felt herself grow weak in the knees. She clung to him, savoring the feel of his soft lips on her neck and face.

  But even as every inch of her yearned to stay in place, and in his arms, something told her to step away. It wasn’t impropriety that made her feel uncomfortable. After all, society’s rules really didn’t bother her, or apply much to her anymore. She’d remained a social pariah since her arrest in August last year and the trial’s end this past June.

  No matter that she’d been declared not guilty and been acquitted for the murders of her father and stepmother. Never mind how she and Emma had nearly been attacked after discovering their parents had actually become undead.

  As Pierre pressed his lips to hers, Lizzie couldn’t help but respond in kind, even if she wasn’t entirely convinced it was a good idea. She wasn’t quite sure the two of them should go beyond mere friendship. Granted, he cut a fine figure. His handsome face and self-assurance, be it out fighting or elsewhere, only made him more attractive. She knew any woman would welcome his attentions. Any younger woman, you mean.

  She stopped her thoughts from going furt
her, relishing the feel of his lips on hers and his strong, firm body as he pressed her closer to him. Her head spun, yet her mind refused to stop its analysis...

  Oh, what am I thinking? The idea of the two of them being anything but fighting partners and monster hunters was ridiculous. He could easily find someone more suitable and closer in age. He needs a young woman who can give him a family.

  With that in mind, she pulled away and tried to carefully extricate herself from his grasp.

  “Pierre, I-I don’t think this is a good idea. Please, not now.”

  “Lizzie...”

  Despite her heightened excitement, she took another step back. “Please, we shouldn’t. Not now. It’s too distracting.”

  He put a finger under her chin and gently turned her face so she would look directly at him. “I’m glad to hear that, very glad. That means I have your attention. Lizzie, I aim to have your full and complete attention, soon. I can wait. I’ve been waiting. As you know, I’m a pretty patient man.”

  Not knowing what to say, she cleared her throat and picked up the leather satchel again. “Um, yes, well, I’m all packed. Shall we go?”

  He chuckled at her question and opened the door for her. “All right, let’s go find some monsters. There’s nothing else I’d rather be doing this fine afternoon.”

  Lizzie laughed in relief as they went out and he helped her into the carriage. She felt some anxiety over maybe having pushed him away again and too often, but his wink and a quick squeeze of her hand showed he wasn’t angry. Nor had he given up on his pursuit just yet.

  That didn’t help her personal dilemma. While she wasn’t totally sure how, or if, their relationship should unfold, she knew she’d been the one to invite him back into her life, and not the other way around. She had to make up her mind about what kind of future relationship they would have once all this was over. If any, of course.

  Oh, come now, who am I kidding? He’s so attractive and funny and charming, who can resist. Can I? Yes. No. But for how long?