by Ishbelle Bee
“Yes, yes, it was bizarre. His house is a maze and it appears the Professor dabbles in the occult: he managed to evict myself and Walnut from his property using…” – I pause – “some sort of black magic.”
Waxford looks a little shocked. “Black magic? More like trickery, Percival. They’re all nuts in that village. Especially that bloody Mr Loveheart.”
“Loveheart can be extremely cooperative. You just have to humour him.”
“I’m glad I don’t have to go back there.” Waxford sighs. “It would have driven me mad.”
“I have been reading your journals and they have been most helpful. Is there anything you left out which could aid me now?”
Waxford wiggles his bandaged foot. “I tried to research the Professor and it was very difficult. He has two family members alive. A wife, Lucy, who is in a madhouse. Her full name is Lucy Dewdoll. By all accounts she didn’t go mad until she married him. And guess who one of the doctors was who signed the certificate to condemn her?”
“Hookeye?”
“Yes. And she’s the sixth wife he’s had.”
“Good God, what happened to the rest?”
“I couldn’t find out. I was sure I was being followed at the time. Not a scrap of proof. His brother is Ignatius Hummingbird, who holds a seat in the House of Lords and has influence with the prime minister. I’m afraid Professor Hummingbird is very well protected.”
“Where is his wife now?”
“Well, they are divorced due to her madness and she resides in the Blue-Flower Institution near Blackheath. But she may have information for you which might help. She is the only lead I can think of.”
“Thank you, Waxford. Tell me, what do you think he’s up to, the Professor? What’s really going on?”
“There were a lot of suspicions at the time. The main line of thinking was that Hookeye and Grubweed were providing bodies for experimentation. The question was how they were getting these bodies. But I can’t see the reason for the Professor to have any interest in such a thing. He’s obsessed with his butterflies and his research on the Aztecs. No, in my opinion there is something else going on.”
“I found a little red diary in Icarus Hookeye’s coat pocket. Inside were numerous drawings of butterflies.”
“What meaning could that have, other than a connection to the Professor?”
“That’s what I wondered,” and I help myself to a refill of whisky and top Waxford up.
“Why kill Icarus and Grubweed?”
“Maybe someone is picking them off,” I say instinctively, and suddenly feel quite odd.
“Percival, are you alright?” Waxford leans forward.
“Yes. I just had the strangest feeling.”
The Blue-Flower Institute
I am, I admit, a little drunk after seeing Waxford. He has a more robust constitution for alcohol. I buy some strong coffee and make my way to the reception area of the Blue-Flower Institute, a miserable-looking building. A largely built woman with fierce little eyes examines me at the front desk.
“My name is Detective Sergeant White and I need to see a resident. A woman named Lucy Dewdoll. It is quite urgent and involves a murder investigation.”
I am escorted to a cell where Lucy Dewdoll sits at a small table in a long grey dress. Her hair, loose and falling to her waist, is the colour of dirty sand. Her face is like her name: doll-like, perfect skin and round blue eyes. She turns to look at me.
“Please get me out of here.”
“Miss Dewdoll, I understand that you were married to Professor Hummingbird. I am currently investigating a murder and I need to know whatever you can tell me, anything that might give me some insight into his character.”
“If I do this, can you get me out of here? I am not mad. I have never been mad.”
“I will do everything in my power to help you.”
“If you want any power over him, detective, steal his favourite butterfly. It is his only weakness.”
“My dear lady, what happened to you?” I ask, and then I listen.
“I was living with my stepsister in Whitstable when I met him. The year was 1886. I was twenty-five and our life was peaceful, unremarkable, until a letter arrived from a solicitor in London called Mr Evening-Star, announcing that I had been left a fortune from my eccentric Uncle Lionel, who was an explorer in Mexico. I had become his heiress, owner of a moated castle on the outskirts of London, as well as inheriting his entire collection of artefacts from his explorations. Well, I nearly fainted on the carpet I was so shocked! Winnie thankfully retrieved the emergency brandy from under the cupboard.” A slight smile danced across her face at the memory, and then vanished just as quickly. “The following day I received a visitor, a friend of my Uncle Lionel, who wished to offer his condolences. His name was Professor Gabriel Hummingbird. He was a widower in his fifties and there was something unusual about him, some strange, cool mischief. The way he looked at me – as though he were peering down a microscope, examining my cells, wanting to rearrange them. We talked at length about my uncle’s work in Mexico and then finally about his own research. They had worked together for years teaching at the University in London. My uncle had died while camping on an Inca burial site, slipped and fell off a ravine while drunk on chocolate-wine. His body had been buried out there, the service simple, but in accordance with my uncle’s wishes, according to Professor Hummingbird.
“The Professor informed me that he would be staying in Whitstable for a few weeks as a holiday and hoped we should meet again. Apart from the fact that he was too old for me, there was something else about him that made me concerned. There was something mechanical, something calculating about him. I was persuaded he did not desire me; however, I was an heiress now. Perhaps it was my money, perhaps something else I had acquired, and yet despite all these warning signals I agreed to see him again, and again. It was almost as if I could not say the word ‘No’ to him. The word just would not form on my lips.
“We met for tea and sandwiches and walked along the beach, picking up curious shells. I told him about my quiet but happy life, but thinking about my Uncle Lionel, I realised how little I had actually lived. How empty my background appeared in comparison with the Professor, who regaled me with tales of his hunting for rare butterflies in Peru and getting lost knee deep in a swamp while being chased by local tribesmen.
“On our third meeting he proposed and I accepted. I knew I had made a mistake when I said the word ‘yes’. I knew and yet I said it anyway and did not retract.”
She sobbed and I put my hand in hers, and after some time she regained her composure and wiped her eyes, “We were married in a small church by the sea. Our honeymoon was spent at our moated castle and the…” – she paused – “…the wedding night was…”
She stopped and looked at me, “It is only the butterflies that excite him.”
She continued, “He had every wall in the castle painted red as though we were walking in tunnels of blood and on every wall nothing but his butterflies. Row after row of them. And his favourite he hung in his study.
“One evening we received two guests for dinner: both medical doctors. Icarus Hookeye and Sebastian Crabmouth. I should have known what he was planning. The wine was drugged. I was transported to the Blue-Flower Institution for the insane and have been here for over two years.”
“I am going to get you out of here,” I said.
Mr Angelcakes visits Boo Boo
He has come again to see me. The lovely, mad Mr Angelcakes. He only comes at night. He comes when people are sleeping.
Tonight he starts to carve something into my back. It hurts a lot. He says:
Ssssshhhhhhh
Boo Boo Don’t be afraid. I am the angel man. It’s only a butter
fly
Lady Beetle’s garden party
Nobody knows where Uncle Grubweed is, but I think Mr Loveheart is right. He’s probably dead and his corpse will turn up at some point. Grandpa says we still have to go to the party.
That’s what Uncle would have wanted and we will finally get to meet handsome Horatio. Horatio the prize, Horatio the favourite. I already know I won’t like him. I already know. When I imagine him I think of the red-black juices of overripe tomatoes; squelchy, fat and bloated. There’s something squashed and damaged about him.
We are all dressed up in our best clothes. I had to borrow something from Cornelius and it’s too big, so Mrs Treacle had to sew it. Boo Boo has a little black dress which Prunella used to wear, and Mrs Treacle has added a red ribbon to her hair. Boo Boo and I are to arrive a little later than everyone else as we will be attending with Reverend Plum, who is late as he missed his train.
We sit on the steps of the house with Guardian, whose soft paws rest on my lap, nuzzling me with his nose. Boo Boo keeps scratching her back, says it itches. The policemen are going to the party too. They still haven’t found out who killed Mr Hookeye.
“Boo Boo,” I look at her, “who is Mr Angelcakes?”
She stops scratching and looks at her feet. “I am not allowed to say,” she replies.
“Why not?” But she doesn’t answer and I hear the pony and trap clattering along the path, carrying Reverend Plum, who is waving at us. We gingerly step aboard and Guardian lies by Boo Boo’s feet, his eyeballs staring lovingly up at her as though she’s a delicious chicken leg.
Reverend Plum asks, “How have you been, children? Has anything exciting happened?”
I was tempted for a moment not to answer him.
“Doctor Hookeye got his head cut off in the kitchen and the police from Scotland Yard are here, and they found Boo Boo with the murder weapon and Uncle Grubweed has gone missing, presumed also murdered. We are both well, thank you. How was your trip?”
The Reverend Plum goes into a funny trance for the rest of the journey.
The garden party sits beneath an achingly hot sun. It looks to me like a fried egg sizzling in a pan. A great long table with blackberry-coloured sheets holds plates of wonderful roast pork sandwiches, plum and cream cakes, jellies, overripe peaches and fat strawberries, meat pies and pickles. There is champagne, cider, pink wine and apple juice to drink.
The feast is hovered over by heavy bees, occasionally flicked away by an exasperated manservant. Lady Beetle is wearing a long, pale blue dress and she stands with her son, also in pale blue, in the centre of the gardens. They are chatting to a gentleman I haven’t seen before, a man with stripy trousers. I can see Prunella and Estelle eating jelly, sitting under a tree with their mother, carefully watching Horatio as a blackbird would watch a worm. Looking forward to eating him. Two princesses squabbling over a prince.
Mrs Charm, wearing a huge sun hat with lavender sprigs, is sitting at a table talking with Mr Loveheart, who today is wearing bright orange. So bright is the orange that he is nearly outshining the sun. It almost hurts my eyes to look at him. Red hearts are dotted about his waistcoat and a large slice of cake sits in his hands. Mr Wormhole, lurking in the shadows, is eating a cream cake very happily and chatting to Detective White and Constable Walnut.
Boo Boo and I approach Mrs Beetle as Reverend Plum has wandered off in the direction of the policemen.
“Thank you for inviting us to your party, Lady Beetle,” I say.
She looks at me, rather bored. The older man next to her smiles. He has very odd eyes. They are ancient and full of ghosts. It is like looking into a dead thing.
“Hello,” he says,.“My name is Professor Hummingbird,” and he shakes my hand.
“I am sorry that your friend was decapitated in our kitchen,” I reply, and Mrs Beetle looks mortified.
The Professor smiles, “It’s not your fault. I am sure they will catch the culprit.” He turns his attention towards Boo Boo, who is trying to scratch her back and is red eyed. “Are you alright, little girl?”
“My back hurts,” she says.
“Let me take a look at it.” She turns round and he unbuttons the back of her dress. “It might be a bee sting,” he says, and then opens the back. His hands start to shake. On her back is an inky huge black butterfly with red eyes.
“How did you get this on your back?” He can barely withhold his excitement.
“Mr Angelcakes did it.”
The Professor, containing his emotions, re-buttons her dress and walks off towards Reverend Plum. Boo Boo runs off to play with Guardian. What is happening to her? What can I do to stop it?
Horatio Beetle then steps forward and shakes my hand. The prince in pale blue has black hair and eyes like dark water. “You must be Pedrock. I’ve been away in Cambridge most of the summer. There’s nothing to do much round here anyway. Boring little place.” He yawns. “I think your uncle had some fantasy to marry me off eventually to one of his fat daughters.” And he laughs and I notice a beauty spot below his nose. It occurs to me that he’s marked. I suppose he is really very handsome, much like a prince in a fairy story, but I wouldn’t want my sister to marry him. “My mother tells me you and your sister are poor little orphans. You look like pig-farming peasants! Oink oink! Keep your piggy fingers out of my cakes,” and he laughs. What a shitbag he is.
A scotch egg soars through the air. Smacks him in the face. “Ouch!” he screams, followed by a wail of “MOTHER!”
I look for the person responsible and see naughty Mr Loveheart waving at me, the sunlight bouncing off him, vying for attention. How bright he is. What sort of magic is he?
I step away from Horatio, move out of his orbit.
I help myself to the buffet, piling my plate with an assortment until it wobbles about. Consider throwing it over Horatio’s head. And then I move towards Mrs Charm and Mr Loveheart who are engaged in a deep conversation about apricot jam.
“Hello,” I say.
“Pedrock, darling!” Mrs Charm cries. “Come and sit with us.” And so I plop myself down.
“What do you think of Horatio?”
“Vain and spoilt,” I reply quietly.
“Quite right too. I am going to write him into my novel. Perhaps have him disembowelled. Don’t you think Mr Loveheart looks very fetching today?”
“Will you write him into your novel as well?”
“Of course, he’s something wicked and something wonderful.”
“Hello again,” Loveheart waggles what appears to be a gherkin at me and then pops it into his mouth.
“Mr Loveheart,” the Professor says, standing behind him. “Mr Loveheart, I don’t think we’ve been introduced. But I have heard so much about you.”
“Likewise,” replies Loveheart. They stare at one another, Mr Loveheart remaining seated.
The Professor then glances over to me. “Pedrock, I have spoken to Reverend Plum regarding the sad recent events and we both agree that it would be in Boo Boo’s best interests if she came to live with me.”
I am horrified.
“Would it really?” replies Mr Loveheart, darkly.
“Is it wise to separate a brother and sister?” cries Mrs Charm. “Surely that is not for the best.”
“Pedrock can see Boo Boo whenever he wishes and Reverend Plum is their legal guardian until Mr Grubweed reappears. The decision is made, I’m afraid.”
I am crying and I can’t help it. Mrs Charm puts her arm around me.
“There is no need to be upset, Pedrock.” The Professor’s voice is smooth like velvet.
“There is every reason,” and Loveheart stands up to face him.
“Do we have a problem, Mr Loveheart?”
“Not if you’re dead.”
The Professor momentarily loses his composure and then, quickly regaining it, he says, “I really am quite disappointed in you, I thought you of all people would understand.” And he turns to leave, walking into the shade, the darkness obscuring his features.
“Don’t you worry,” says Mrs Charm, gently. “Mr Loveheart will sort this mess out.”
Mr Loveheart yawns lazily, his feet resting on the table, and waggles his sword in the direction of the Professor, “Disembowelled p
erhaps? Mmmmm…”
I spend the remainder of the party crying into Mrs Charm’s lap. Boo Boo wanders over and puts her hand on my cheek. “Pedrock, please can you take care of Guardian? The Professor won’t let me take him.”
I nod my head sadly and she cuddles me and then leaves, hand in hand with the Professor, a little girl and a monster.
Mrs Charm is muttering, “He’s a villain.”
That night in bed I wait to hear whispering in Boo Boo’s room, but nothing comes. Guardian now sleeps in my room and howls most of the night in sadness. I close my eyes and make a wish that Mr Loveheart will kill the Professor. I wish and wish and wish and when I open my eyes there is a boy sitting on the end of my bed with eyes of black glitter.
“Who are you?” I say, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.
“Death.” His voice is as soft as moth wings.
“What do you want with me?”
“Your sister will be able to take care of herself. You will see her again. Be patient. Be very patient.”
“He’s going to hurt her, I know it,” I cry.
“And someone is going to hurt him.” And the boy smiles and it is the most terrifying smile I have ever seen. “Now go back to sleep, Pedrock, and in the morning you will feel better. Go sailing on the lake. Start to live your life. Stop worrying about your sister. Let the Fates deal with the Professor.”
“What will happen to him?”
The boy pulls a loose thread from his sleeve and examines it, dropping it casually onto the floor. “A taste of his own particular medicine.”
Lucy Dewdoll escapes
I am sitting in my cell, staring at a spider on the wall, its web half done, like a piece of lace, incomplete. There’s a tapping at the barred window. I peer out. A man on a ladder with a hacksaw.