Zombie Abbey

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

  “What Daniel and Jonathan said, when they were bringing in the dinner things after service.” Fanny answered the question while ignoring Mrs. Owen’s exasperation. She was well used to Mrs. Owen admonishing her. It didn’t mean anything. “About them burying that valet in a back garden.”

  “It’s none of our concern, Fanny. Our concern—”

  “Mrs. Owen is right, Fanny!” a voice boomed.

  Fanny looked up from her work to see Mr. Wright standing there, a small tray with two empty glasses with just dregs of sherry coloring their bottoms in his hand.

  “How dare you question the judgment of His Lordship!” Mr. Wright continued when she initially failed to respond.

  “I only meant—”

  “I know what you meant, Fanny, but it is simply not your place to say it.”

  “But they just killed him and—”

  “And he was trying to attack Lady Katherine! I shudder to think what would have happened if Lady Elizabeth hadn’t acted so quickly.”

  Fanny could well imagine him shuddering. They all knew how Mr. Wright felt about Lady Katherine, the first daughter of the house. Why, sometimes, you’d think he thought she was his daughter!

  “They could have questioned him first before shooting,” Fanny tried again.

  “I doubt there was time.”

  “And to bury him in the garden…”

  “Enough! I’m sure His Lordship was being facetious about that part. You know how humorous His Lordship can be.”

  She did not. Nor did she think he was being so in this case.

  “But if it is true—” she started.

  “Enough!” Mr. Wright said again, more forcefully this time as he held up his hand firmly to stop her going on, and even she could see there was no point in it. “And if you say one word about the Titanic—”

  “I won’t, sir.”

  “That’s settled, then, and we shall speak no more about it.” He put down the tray with its glasses on it, adding it to the pile of things yet to be cleaned. “The footmen have gone up to bed and Mrs. Murphy has gone to her room and now I shall retire, too. Fanny. Mrs. Owen.” With a curt nod, he took his leave.

  “What are we doing about breakfast in the morning?” Fanny asked Mrs. Owen, hoping to make peace with at least one person and seeing as how she knew food was Mrs. Owen’s favorite topic.

  “I don’t know,” Mrs. Owen said with a hearty laugh. “I suspect we’ll be eating it, I suppose! Isn’t that what you do with breakfast?”

  “I meant for them,” Fanny said, gesturing with her chin toward the ceiling and the people who lived their lives above it.

  “Oh, Fanny.” Mrs. Owen sighed. “I can’t even think about that right now, I’m that tired. Let tomorrow take care of tomorrow; we’ll come up with something. No doubt Her Ladyship will go over it first thing with Mrs. Murphy and then we’ll be notified last minute on what they’ve decided.”

  Fanny could see that Mrs. Owen was tired, dead on her feet really. Well, Mrs. Owen wasn’t getting any younger.

  “Why don’t you go on up?” Fanny suggested. “I can finish down here by myself.”

  “Are you sure?” Mrs. Owen looked about with warring expressions on her face: eagerness to rest but reluctance to leave Fanny with so much mess.

  “I’m sure. Sometimes I think I’m better when I’m on my own. It helps me to think.”

  “I know I yell at you a lot, and you mostly deserve it,” Mrs. Owen said, laying a hand briefly on Fanny’s arm before passing her by, “but you’re a good girl, Fanny, and no one truthful could ever say any different.”

  And then Fanny was alone.

  She scrubbed and scoured stubborn stains off all the pots and pans.

  As she performed these duties, she thought some more about the things Daniel had said while bringing in the serving plates from dinner.

  Daniel had said that when they talked about having the valet buried in the garden, they’d mostly all just laughed about it. So maybe Mr. Wright had been judging it accurately, and that part was merely a joke?

  Not that it seemed much of a joke to Fanny. None of it did.

  But Daniel had also said that not all of them had laughed. Lady Grace hadn’t. Nor had Mr. Young or the duke or even that new cousin of theirs, Benedict Clarke. Fanny had only seen the cousin briefly the day before on his arrival and had caught a few glimpses of him since. He was handsome. And if he hadn’t laughed then maybe he was even nice, too. Or, at least, nice for one of them.

  The scrubbing and scouring done, Fanny cleaned off all the countertops until you could eat off them. Then she got out the broom and swept, followed by wet-mopping the whole place until it was so spotless, you could eat off the flagstone floor, too.

  Fanny was just about to finally go up herself—perhaps she could stay awake long enough to look at those medical books she’d secreted in her attic room earlier in the day?—when she felt warm, furry bodies, doing a dance between and around her ankles.

  She looked down to find Henry Clay there, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, too. The latter two didn’t typically go to the kitchen if they could help it—they preferred the posher parts of Porthampton Abbey even though there was all that food downstairs—but even they knew where to go if it was late at night and the rest of the house was asleep.

  “You need to go out one more time?” she asked aloud as though they might answer her. “All right.” She opened the back door for the trio, who initially, suddenly, seemed reluctant to step outside. “Well, go on, then!” she urged. “But be quick about doing your business. Some of us still have to get up and work here in the morning.”

  They scampered.

  As they did so, Fanny herself stepped outside for a breath of fresh air and a look up at the stars. There were so many, and they were so pretty, but it was also so cold and, shivering against it, Fanny rubbed her palms up and down the length of her upper arms for warmth.

  There came a sound some distance away, and Fanny looked toward it, catching a glimpse of a figure moving. Was that a long cloak flapping in the wind? Who was that? Who would be out there this time of night?

  Fanny’s spine stiffened, and she was filled with a sense of alarm. Was this some sort of threat? Something to do with what had happened to Will’s uncle? Was this like the duke’s valet, Parker, who’d tried to attack Lady Katherine and Lady Elizabeth? She remembered what Will had said after the death of his uncle: that there might be more. And he’d been right. There’d been the valet, just that day. And where there was one, and then two, wouldn’t it be logical to conclude that there would, most definitely, be more? Was it that more, coming for her right now? Were the cats in danger? She squinted into the darkness, searching for those furry little bodies, hoping to hurry them inside to safety. If need be, she’d risk herself to save them.

  But then Fanny realized that whoever the figure was, it was moving away from the abbey, not toward it. She let out a long breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding in. That was all right, then. Whatever was out there, so long as it went in the other direction—let it just go away.

  Now the cats were all circling her ankles again, only this time wanting in. She stepped aside to give them access to the house and, as she did so, she saw an envelope lying on the ground a few feet away from the doorway. Perhaps the cats had scattered it when they first scampered out?

  She picked it up, turned it over.

  It had His Lordship’s name on the front of it.

  When had it come? And who had brought it? Fanny shrugged, bringing it inside. Perhaps Ralph, the chauffeur, had come with it during dinner service. Sometimes it got so loud in the kitchen, what with all of them scurrying around to make sure that everything was perfect for Upstairs, you couldn’t even hear your own thoughts, never mind a knock on the back door. Perhaps Ralph had come and, not wanting to wait, had left it there.

  Fanny took the letter to Mr. Wright’s pantry and set it down on his table with another shrug. Let Mr. Wright take care of i
t in the morning, she thought. He’d know what to do.

  Chapter

  Twenty-One

  Lizzy should never have come upstairs so early.

  She hadn’t thought about how many hours she’d need to wait.

  What she had thought was how badly she wanted to talk to the one person who might understand what she was going through and also about how badly she simply wanted to get away from the rest of them.

  How they’d laughed at the barn luncheon and then at dinner! And how she had laughed, mostly, along with them!

  But inside, she hadn’t been laughing at all.

  Oh, Lizzy knew what they all thought of her. She knew none of them believed her to be terribly bright. And she had to admit, most days she didn’t think herself very bright, either. But even she wasn’t dim enough to not realize that something terrible had happened here, something not normal, and yet the rest of them were for the most part behaving as though everything was fine.

  She’d killed a man today.

  No matter the circumstances, how could she not be changed by that fact?

  Oh, how she wanted to talk with the one person who might understand.

  But then she’d escaped to her room, with Becky following soon after, to help her get ready for bed and to draw her bath for her.

  Lizzy hadn’t minded the bath part. How many had she had today? That one made three. There had been the one before breakfast and another after the barn luncheon. She’d really needed that one. It had only been after she’d shot the valet that she’d noticed the stench. Perhaps, when he’d been coming toward her, she’d been too scared to mark it? Well, whatever the case, she certainly had marked it afterward. The stench of something rotting.

  Is that what human death smelled like? She supposed it might be different than with the animals she’d seen. And Dr. Webb had assured them it was all quite normal. But would a body start to rot so quickly? The others hadn’t said anything about it when she’d mentioned it to Dr. Webb, except to place the backs of their hands to their noses, as if they could keep it out.

  But she couldn’t keep it out.

  Maybe it was because she’d been the one to kill him, but it felt as though that rotting stench had permeated her clothes and skin, invaded her very being. Even the second bath after the barn luncheon hadn’t fully eradicated the sense memory in her mind, although the third finally helped.

  Then, after the bath, Becky had assisted her in getting into her nightclothes—her silk gown and velvet robe—and she’d climbed into bed.

  But not before asking Becky to hunt her down another pair of riding breeches—definitely not the ones she’d worn that day, no matter how well they might be laundered; she never wanted to see any of those clothes again—and bring them up to her.

  If Becky found the request odd, she didn’t say, and she had done what was asked of her as she always did.

  Finally, Lizzy had been left alone in bed to wait, for hours if need be, with only the thoughts in her own mind to occupy her.

  Some would have said it wasn’t much of a mind, but it was the only one she had.

  Lizzy worried she might drift off to sleep and miss her opportunity, but she needn’t have worried. There was simply too much for her to think about.

  The hours ticked by, all too slowly for her.

  At last, there came the sounds of footsteps, first just a few and then more, making their way through the house as her family and their guests retired to their rooms.

  Still, Lizzy waited, hoping to give the servants ample time to put the house to rest.

  When she thought she had given it enough time, when she couldn’t wait any longer, she got up from her bed and removed her nightclothes, replacing them with the breeches and a shirt Becky had laid out to go with the breeches. She pulled on boots and, taking up a cloak, threw it around her shoulders, tying it at the neck before putting the hood up.

  It felt odd, dressing herself, but Lizzy supposed a person could get used to it if she had to.

  Then Lizzy stole out of her room, pulling the door closed softly behind her, padded down the grand staircase on cat’s feet, crossed the marble floor, and went out the great front door, closing that softly behind her as well. Then she tore off running until she got around behind the abbey, running faster than she’d ever run in her life, not even stopping when she heard a door open in the distance behind her and the sound of Fanny talking to the cats. She didn’t turn. She didn’t want to be seen.

  Lizzy kept running until she’d gained the farther reaches of the estate, where the cottages of the tenant farmers would be. Which one, though?

  She’d toured this part of the estate before—all the sisters had, with Father. It was something you did from time to time, making sure all the tenant farmers were happy enough, that everything was operating as it should be.

  She thought now that she remembered which one it was. The cottage, right here, with all its lights out.

  That was no surprise. No doubt the whole world was sleeping by now.

  Well, except for her.

  Out of breath and panting, pulse pounding and heart racing in her chest from her run, Lizzy raised her hand to knock. Oh, she did hope she had the right place. If she didn’t, this could get very embarrassing for her very quickly.

  The door to the cottage opened.

  “Lady Elizabeth,” Will Harvey said, wearing what he usually wore about the estate, as though he’d never been to bed at all. “What are you doing here?”

  Chapter

  Twenty-Two

  Will Harvey couldn’t believe his eyes.

  Lady Elizabeth Clarke, standing on his doorstep in the middle of the night as though she’d come for—

  Oh, who knew what she had come for? Nor did he give her time to tell him before he grabbed hold of her arm, all but yanking her inside and then shutting the door and latching it firmly behind her.

  “You silly girl!” he couldn’t stop himself from saying. “Don’t you realize yet that it’s not safe out there?”

  “Of course I realize that,” she said, shaking him off. “Why do you imagine I ran all the way? Now do you think you might turn on a light or something? It is rather dark in here.”

  Will grudgingly obliged, although there was no light to be turned on, only candles to be lit; there was no electricity in the cottages.

  Now that there was some illumination, Will wondered what Lady Elizabeth saw as she looked around the small cottage. His aunt had tried to make it a home for them, in and around the rest of her other work on their plot of land, but he knew it was no doubt meaner than any home the youngest daughter of the house had ever been in. Why, Will had been in the kitchen of the abbey earlier, so very many hours earlier, and he had to admit that his family home couldn’t compare in terms of fineness even to that.

  Oh, well. He certainly wouldn’t apologize for it. Who cared if she didn’t like it? He hadn’t invited her here in the first place!

  “First you call me Lady Elizabeth, then it’s ‘you silly girl,’” she said. “How about we split the difference and make it Lizzy?”

  “I don’t think I can do that.”

  “Oh, do try!” Lizzy urged. “It will be impossible to have this conversation with you if you don’t!”

  Will’s aunt had been known to sleep through just about anything. Jessamine Harvey had slept through the knock at the door and their initial exchange of words. But once Lizzy raised her voice, even Auntie couldn’t sleep through that.

  “What’s going on?” his aunt said, rubbing at her eyes as she came out of her room in her threadbare white dressing gown.

  The cottage only had two bedrooms, his and the one his aunt had shared with his uncle until his death, to go with the one larger room that included kitchen area and sitting area.

  “Oh, Your Ladyship!” his aunt said. “Would you care for some tea?”

  Leave it to Auntie. You’d think she’d be ruffled and rattled by any visitor in the middle of the night, particularly this visito
r, and yet here she was behaving as though being called on thusly was a daily occurrence for her.

  “No, thank you, ma’am,” Lady Elizabeth said, “but please, call me Lizzy. I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”

  “Oh, it’s no trouble for me, Lizzy. Will can get the fire going again in an instant.”

  “Well, if you’re sure…”

  “And would you care for a biscuit with that?”

  “Yes, now that I think about it, I think that tea and a biscuit would be just lovely.”

  As his aunt busied herself with heating this and getting a small plate for that, and he lit the fire, he looked at Lady Elizabeth—fine, Lizzy—more closely, and he could see that she didn’t want tea or a biscuit at all. She’d already refused the first before his aunt pressed her. So what had changed her mind? Perhaps, he conceded grudgingly, she’d seen that refusing Auntie’s hospitality—even if the acceptance of it meant a diminishment in the Harvey family’s own meager supplies—would offend his aunt too much, and it was an offense she didn’t want to give.

  It was possible he was mistaken, but was she being kind?

  “Oh, this is lovely,” Lizzy said, taking a hurried sip when she’d been handed a cup, “perfectly hot, too.”

  He knew it wasn’t—the lovely part. His aunt, for all her strengths as a human being, made perfectly wretched tea. Although how a person could foul up tea, he’d never been able to figure out.

  “Do you mind if I sit down somewhere?” Lizzy asked. “Only, I had such a long run.”

  “Of course, of course,” Auntie said. “Take the chair closest to the fire.”

  He saw Lizzy hesitate. Perhaps she didn’t want to take their very best? But then, no doubt again concluding that refusal was the greater crime, she accepted.

  His aunt sat in the overstuffed chair across from her and he settled on the arm of that.

  “Now you must tell us,” Auntie said. “Why are you here and what can we do for you?”

  “Yes,” Will said urgently, no longer able to contain the question that had been burning inside him since first finding her on his doorstep, “is Kate all right?”