Walter let go of her. “How could you not mention this?” he said, his voice angry. “You have a husband and it never occurred to you to tell me?”
“It was a very long time ago,” Jane said. “Honestly, I’d forgotten all about him until a few moments ago.”
“You wound me,” said Joshua, placing his palm against his chest.
“Oh, shut up,” Jane snapped. “Who put you up to this anyway?”
Joshua’s eyes grew wide, like a very sad spaniel’s. “Whatever do you mean?”
“Someone told you to come here,” said Jane. “Who was it?”
“It was my heart,” Joshua said. “You called out to it and I came. I’ve missed you, Jane.”
“Nonsense,” Jane said. She turned to her fiancé, who was looking from her to Joshua and back again. “Walter, listen to me. I married Joshua when I was very young.”
“Not that young,” said Joshua. “Actually, many people thought of you as a spinster.”
Jane stopped him with a glance. “I was very young,” she repeated. “It was only for a few days and I thought it was taken care of.”
Walter looked at her. “I don’t know what to say, Jane. You want me to believe that you completely forgot about marrying him? I know you can be forgetful sometimes, but I find it difficult to believe that even you could forget having a husband.”
Jane desperately wanted to tell him that the marriage was almost two centuries in the past, that she’d married Joshua only because she feared she would otherwise be alone forever. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t because she’d never been truthful with him about who—and what—she really was.
“Yes,” she said weakly. “That’s what I want you to believe.”
“Well, I don’t believe it,” Miriam said, snorting.
“I don’t care what you think!” Jane shouted. She advanced on Miriam. “You’ve done nothing but try to come between us since the day you heard about me. Well, I’ve had enough.”
She felt her fangs click into place, and she opened her mouth. Because her back was to everyone else, only Miriam saw.
“You wouldn’t,” she said, taking a step back.
“She’s a vampire!” cried a boy’s voice. “That’s how come she can hear us.”
“She’s probably come looking for Crispin’s Needle,” said the other.
Jane’s fangs retracted and she whirled around. “What did you say?” she said.
“Who? Me?” Joshua and Walter said simultaneously.
“Not you two,” she said. “The other ones.”
“Us?” said Lucy and Ben in tandem.
Jane waved them away. “Shh,” she said. “I’m waiting for them to answer me.”
“She’s lost her mind,” said Miriam. “She’s hearing voices. I knew she was unstable.” She pointed at Walter. “I told you.”
Jane looked at Joshua. “You can hear them too, can’t you?”
“I don’t hear anything,” Joshua replied.
Jane didn’t know whether she believed him or not. His face gave nothing away. I suppose it’s possible he’s as bad at being a vampire as I am, she thought.
“Jane, we have to talk about this,” Walter said.
Jane focused her attention on him. “I know,” she said. “And we will. I just have to sort some things out and then it will all be fine. We’re still getting married. Just perhaps not today.”
Walter shook his head. “No,” he said. “Not today. And maybe not ever.”
Jane couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Walter’s voice sounded not only sad, but cold, as if he’d reluctantly come to a decision he didn’t want to make.
“Please, Walter,” she said. “Just trust me. This”—she indicated Joshua—“is nothing.”
“I am not nothing,” Joshua said, sniffing.
Jane ignored him. “Walter, why don’t you and your mother go back to the hotel. I need to speak to Joshua and see if we can clear this up. I promise I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
“She’s going to run off with him,” Miriam declared. “Mark my words.”
“No, she won’t,” Lucy said, giving Miriam a stern look. She began herding everyone ahead of her and out of the chapel. “Now come on. Let’s go get a drink. For some reason I feel like a Bloody Mary.” She looked at Jane. “Are you going to be okay?”
Jane nodded. “Try to talk to Walter for me,” she said.
When Jane and Joshua were alone Jane said, “First, what are you doing here? Second, what do you know about Crispin’s Needle?”
“Working back to front,” said Joshua, “nothing, and I couldn’t let another man have you.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Jane said. “We haven’t laid eyes on each other in almost two hundred years.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t still be in love with you,” said Joshua. “Remember, you’re the one who left me without so much as a goodbye.”
“You know as well as I do that it was a foolish mistake,” Jane told him. “We were never going to be suited to each other. Why, we never even … you know,” she said.
“Walked in the garden of love?” leered Joshua.
Jane made a face. “Now I remember why I couldn’t go through with it. You’re a lovely man, but then you start to talk and it all goes to pieces. What was it you said to me on our wedding night? Oh, yes, it’s all coming back to me now.” She cleared her throat and in an obvious imitation of Joshua said, “ ‘Let my key unlock your treasure chest and I will string for you a necklace of rarest pearls.’ ”
“That’s sublime!” Joshua exclaimed.
“It’s filthy!” Jane countered.
“You just don’t appreciate poetry,” said Joshua. “You never did. Now I’m starting to remember a few things about you. You never were supportive of my poems.”
“Because they were terrible,” Jane said. “I only fell for you because you reminded me a bit of Byron.”
“You’re a cruel woman, Jane Austen,” Joshua said. “Your heart is cold as winter’s breath.”
“Don’t call me that!” Jane barked. “And stop it with the metaphors. They’re unnecessary. Everyone knows what cold is.”
“Yes, but it’s the degree of coldness,” Joshua argued.
Jane rolled her eyes. “I’m not having this argument again,” she said. “The point is, after two hundred years we can’t be married. I mean technically yes, we can be, but surely there’s a statute of limitations on these things. It’s not as if we can apply for a divorce after all this time. They’ll think we’re insane.”
“Then I suppose we’ll just have to stay married,” said Joshua. “Tough break for you and that Walter fellow. He seems nice, by the way.”
“He is,” Jane said. “And I love him. That’s why we’re going to figure a way out of this. But right now I want to talk about Crispin’s Needle.”
“I told you, I don’t know what it is,” Joshua said.
“But they do,” said Jane, looking around.
“Who?” Joshua asked.
“The boys,” said Jane. She cleared her throat. “All right, boys. You can come out now. I just want to talk to you. I promise I won’t hurt you.”
The sound of giggling filled the chapel. A moment later the figures of two boys appeared before Jane. One appeared to be about ten years old, the other slightly older. Both were thin, with flowing blond curls and angelic faces. They were dressed alike in black velvet tunics, black hose, and black shoes.
“That explains it,” Jane said. “Ghosts.” She looked at the boys more carefully. “I’ve seen you somewhere before.”
The boys struck a pose so that the smaller one clutched the larger’s right hand with his left. Turning his hips to the side, he placed his right hand on his brother’s shoulder while the taller boy held in his left hand a velvet cap. Both boys opened their eyes wide so that they took on the appearance of frightened angels.
“The painting!” Jane exclaimed. “The one by Millais. You’re—” She tried very hard to remem
ber, but the names escaped her.
“Prince Edward the Fifth of England,” said the taller boy, shaking his head.
“And—” began the second.
“Richard of Shrewsbury!” Joshua cried out. “First Duke of York.”
“That is correct,” said the smaller boy, bowing.
“I would have gotten it in a moment,” said Jane when they gave her dirty looks. “I was just a little bit flustered.” She turned to Joshua. “So you can see them, then?”
“Yes, yes,” said Joshua. “And they do look remarkably like the painting.”
“We should,” said Edward.
“We posed for it,” Richard explained.
“Millais could see ghosts?” Jane asked. “How novel.”
“To be truthful, he thought we were hallucinations brought on by laudanum,” said Edward. “He never could get used to seeing spirits.”
“I must say, this is rather exciting, isn’t it?” Jane remarked to Joshua. “So Gothic. I feel just like Catherine Morland, only this is real and I’m not a fool. Oh, I have so many questions. First off, who murdered—”
“We thought you wanted to know about Crispin’s Needle,” Richard interrupted.
“Can’t I ask about both?” Jane asked.
“It depends on our mood,” said Edward. “Best ask the most important question first.”
Jane sighed. “Very well,” she said. “What can you tell me about Crispin’s Needle?”
Chapter 8
Tuesday: London
Jane could hardly blame Walter for being a little standoffish. After all, discovering that she had once been married—however briefly—was a shock, and that she had forgotten all about it was difficult to believe, particularly when he remained unaware of her condition. Then too there was the necessity of once again postponing their wedding.
To Jane’s surprise, and thanks largely to Lucy’s intervention, he was handling it rather well. There had been some terse words back at the hotel, but in the end Walter had accepted Jane’s sincere apologies. She in turn assured him that she would remedy the situation as quickly as possible and that Joshua would be no more than a momentary nuisance.
Unsurprisingly, Miriam was not as forgiving. She had apparently spent the hour between leaving the Tower and Jane’s return to the hotel trying to convince her son to sever the engagement and return immediately to America, where, she’d assured Walter, they could find a nice woman who would give him not a minute’s trouble. A nice Jewish woman. A nice Jewish woman who wasn’t insane, at least not beyond the boundaries of reason.
Now, seated at one end of a large table in the Lord and Lamb, Jane saw Miriam glaring at her from the other end. Miriam, catching her eye, picked up a steak knife and mimed plunging it into the table. Jane in turn picked up a roll and slowly bit into it. Unfortunately, she choked on the dry bread and began to cough. Lucy thrust a glass of water into her hand and Jane drank, avoiding Miriam’s mocking stare.
“Tell me again about the rhyme,” Lucy said when Jane had composed herself. Ben and Walter had gone to the bar to order some pints, and the two women were alone at their end of the table. Chumsley Faber-Titting was regaling Miriam and Orsino Castano with a seemingly endless story, and so it was an opportunity to discuss Jane’s encounter with the princes in the Tower.
Given how they’d gone on about it, Jane had expected the ghostly boys to tell her all about Crispin’s Needle. However, their knowledge of it had proved to be disappointingly limited, confined primarily to the sharing of a rhyme. Jane repeated it for Lucy.
Cursed creature of the night,
foul fiend with no soul,
pierce your heart with Crispin’s Nail
and be once more made whole.
Lucy selected a piece of Irish soda bread from the basket on the table and liberally applied butter to it. “That’s not much to go on,” she said. “I suppose you’re the foul fiend.”
“No doubt,” Jane agreed.
“And you’re supposed to pierce your heart with Crispin’s Needle, whatever that is.”
“Gosebourne had a bit more information about that,” Jane told her. “Apparently Crispin was a medieval monk. He dabbled in alchemy and was a bit obsessed with the occult. Somehow or other he got the idea that he could reverse the process that turns one into a vampire.”
“Unmake you, in other words,” said Lucy.
Jane nodded. “Exactly.”
“How would that work?” Lucy asked.
“That’s the problem,” Jane said. “Nobody really knows. The legend says that he invented an object of some kind—”
“Crispin’s Needle,” said Lucy.
“Yes,” Jane said. “And supposedly it’s capable of restoring the human soul.”
Lucy wiped her fingers on her napkin. “So you’re supposed to drive this so-called needle through your heart?”
“I’m guessing that’s the idea,” said Jane. “Only instead of killing you it gives you back your soul. A reverse staking, if you will.”
“No offense,” Lucy said, “but it sounds like a load of crap. My guess is that it’s a trick to get unhappy vampires to kill themselves.”
“Possibly,” Jane agreed. “But Gosebourne doesn’t think so.”
“If this thing has been around since the Middle Ages, why are you only just now finding out about it?” Lucy asked.
“Apparently it’s something of a vampire urban legend,” said Jane. “I gather that believing in it is looked upon a bit like believing in Santa Claus is. No one wants to admit they think it’s real, but at the same time there’s this fascination with it. Still, it seems that one doesn’t admit to believing in it if one runs in educated circles.”
“Good thing you don’t run in educated circles,” Lucy said.
“Indeed,” said Jane. “I was hoping the princes could tell me exactly how it works. But they don’t know.”
“Where did they learn the rhyme?” Lucy asked.
“They say they learned it from another vampire,” said Jane. “But of course they can’t remember who it was. Between us, I think they’re a little mad.”
“Did you find out how they died?” Lucy said.
Jane shook her head. “They were asleep when it happened. But there are no knife marks on their throats, so they weren’t slit. I’m guessing they were smothered.”
“So we still don’t know who did it?” said Lucy.
“Sadly, no,” Jane said. “They have some guesses, but they’re the same ones people have been making since their deaths. Again, a bit of a disappointment.”
“May I join you ladies?”
Jane looked up to see Orsino standing beside them. “By all means,” she said, indicating the seat beside her.
Orsino sat. “Thank you,” he said. “I had to get away from Chumsley. If I had to listen to one more story about what a cow Enid is, I was going to scream.”
“You like Enid, then?” asked Jane.
“Heavens, no,” said Orsino. “She’s horrible. Which is exactly why I don’t want to hear about her.” He took a sip from the glass of wine he’d carried over with him. “I prefer to discuss pleasant topics.”
Well then, you came to the wrong end of the table, Jane thought.
“I like your name,” Lucy said to Orsino. “It’s from Twelfth Night, right?”
Orsino nodded. “Indeed it is. My mother was a professor of literature at the Università degli Studi di Firenze. She adored Shakespeare.”
“It’s one of my favorites of his plays,” said Lucy.
“I’ve never read it,” Orsino told her.
“Really?” Jane said, shocked. “How extraordinary.”
Orsino laughed. “I suppose it seems so,” he said. “The truth is, I haven’t read it because I fear I won’t like my namesake. How awful to go through life named after someone you don’t care for.” He turned to Jane. “For instance, suppose your mother adored Charlotte Brontë and you had been named after Jane Eyre, yet you found the character stupid
and tedious.”
“Doesn’t everyone?” said Jane, earning her a stern look from Lucy.
“Of course, there are many Janes in literature,” Orsino mused. “You could always choose one of the others and pretend that she was the inspiration. There are not so many Orsinos.”
“Just the one, as far as I know,” Lucy said. “But just so you know, Orsino is a very likeable character.”
“I’m pleased to hear it,” Orsino said. “I sometimes tell people that my mother named me Orsino because in Italian it means ‘little bear.’ As you can see, I do in fact resemble the animal.” He stroked his beard and held up his hands, the backs of which were covered in the same black hair.
“Very clever,” Jane said. “I think that’s what I will call you. Little Bear.”
“Most of my lovers do,” said Orsino.
“Are you suggesting we become lovers?” Jane teased.
Orsino laughed. “I’m afraid my inclinations lie elsewhere,” he said. “I prefer the company of other bears.”
“Ah,” Jane said. “I understand. And I’m sure there are a great many of them who prefer your company as well.”
“A few,” Orsino said, smiling.
“Are you trying to steal my fiancée?”
Walter appeared, carrying in each hand a glass of ale. Ben, likewise encumbered, took the seat beside Lucy and handed her a glass. “Boddington’s Ale,” he said. “The cream of Manchester.”
“You will be happy to know that your fiancée has deflected all of my attempts to make her fall in love with me,” Orsino told Walter. “I am utterly defeated.” He winked at Jane, who hid her smile in her beer.
“I’m relieved to hear it,” Walter said. Jane detected a note of anger in his voice, and her heart sank as she was reminded that despite appearances he was deeply hurt.
“This beer is amazing,” said Lucy, changing the subject, for which Jane was thankful.
“Brodie recommended it,” said Ben.
“Where is our Australian friend?” Orsino asked.
“Still at the bar,” said Walter. “He ran into some other Aussies and they’re having a drink.”
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