Dreadfully Ever After

by Steve Hockensmith

  “I have seen enough to judge.”

  “I must say, you speak to me very freely, Mr.…?”

  There was a long pause—so long, in fact, that Mary threw a questioning glance over at the Man. All she saw, of course, was the flat black top of his box.

  “Quayle,” he said at last.

  “Well, I say again, Mr. Quayle: You speak to me very freely.”

  “And you object?”

  “No!” Mary replied with a fervor that both surprised and embarrassed her. “I mean, no. Why should a man and a woman not converse freely? If discourse were more open and minds less narrow, many an injustice might be undone. What I find surprising is that you should be so very complimentary, given your mistress’s feelings toward my family, which she has made plain through not only her statements but numerous assassination attempts as well.”

  “I may be Lady Catherine’s creature, Miss Bennet, but I am not her,” Mr. Quayle said. “When men and women speak freely together, surely they are free to hold their own opinions of each other as well.”

  “You are right, of course.”

  “As I said, I have much time to think.”

  They continued for a while without speaking. The only sounds were the tap-tap-tap of the dogs’ claws against the cobblestones, along with the occasional burst of distant laughter or screaming.

  How long had she and Mr. Quayle been talking? Mary wondered. Five minutes, at most. Yet she couldn’t remember the last time when a conversation with anyone outside the family had gone on so long. Once upon a time, she’d been able to take her thoughts to the local vicar, the Reverend Mr. Cummings. But then he’d thrown himself off Colne Bridge, and his replacement was always out when she called (even when she’d seen him scuttle into the vicarage just a moment before). Since then, her lengthiest and liveliest discussions had been between herself and whatever straw men she set up in her own mind.

  She had the feeling things weren’t much different for Mr. Quayle. Once they’d moved past his initial reluctance, he seemed keen to talk—and did so with such quick (and, yes, presumptuous) familiarity. It was almost enough to make her think he’d wanted to be caught following her. If she had little experience talking to men, she could only imagine he had even less talking to women, at least since being boxed up in pinewood.

  Why not gratify him? Wouldn’t that be the charitable thing to do? An act of compassion?

  And anyway, she was rather proud of what she’d done. It would be a shame to tell no one.

  “Do you know why I went to Bethlem Hospital today?” she said.

  “I know what it is you seek there,” Quayle told her. “I have no idea, however, how you sought to attain it. Despite our obvious disadvantages, Ell and Arr and I can sometimes manage ‘inconspicuous’; ‘invisible’ remains beyond us. Once you walked through the gates of Bedlam, we could only wait for you to walk out again.”

  “I see. And you have been ordered to assist my family?”

  “I have been ordered to watch your family,” Quayle said, “but I wish to help.”

  For some reason, Mary liked that answer far better than a simple, “Yes.”

  “Good,” she said. “Then I will tell why I went to Bethlem, Mr. Quayle—and why you and I must return tomorrow.”

  CHAPTER 22

  For once, Kitty was glad that the closest thing “the Shevingtons” had to a dojo was the attic. Yes, it was hot and dusty and cluttered, and if she tried a Leaping Leopard or a Flying Dragon she’d probably brain herself on the low ceiling. Yet the fact that it was so cramped was an advantage now, for it discouraged anyone else from coming up to train with her.

  She wanted to be alone with her thoughts. They weren’t good company, but better them than her father or Lizzy.

  The ride back from Vauxhall Gardens had been painful in a way none of her Shaolin training had prepared her for. Shove bamboo under her fingernails, and she would laugh. Slather her in honey and tie her over an anthill, and she would tap her toes and whistle “Oh Dear! What Can the Matter Be?” But thirty minutes in a carriage with two brooding MacFarquhars had proved sheer torture. There had been no more history lessons from Sir Angus, only scowls directed at the son who sat slumped in a corner sullenly stroking his rabbit.

  That left it to the Bennets to smooth over the general unease with small talk. But Elizabeth hadn’t been up to it. In fact, she looked no happier than Sir Angus. So, all the way from Section Four South to Section One North, Kitty had synopsized her favorite romance novel by the writer Mrs. Radcliffe (whom Mr. Bennet usually referred to as “the noted twaddlemonger Mrs. Rotwit”). The outing ended with cursory farewells and no mention—and little hope—of another engagement involving the MacFarquhars and the Shevingtons.

  “Well, it didn’t end on the best note,” Kitty said, “but it could have gone worse.”

  “Indeed,” her father replied. “At least none of us were eaten.”

  And then he and Elizabeth came at her in a crossfire.

  “You couldn’t steer Bunny away from that ridiculous brawl?” said Lizzy on her left.

  “You simply had to thrash all those fops?” said her father on her right.

  “You could think of nothing better to talk about than The Mysteries of Udolpho?”

  “Didn’t you notice me trying to change the subject? I think Sir Angus couldn’t decide whether to hurl you under the carriage wheels or himself.”

  “I’m sorry I’ve ruined everything!” Kitty cried. “But what else would you expect from the silliest girl in all England?”

  She ran into the house feeling sillier than ever. It was a good thing she didn’t encounter Mary as she bolted for the stairs. One more condescending comment and someone was going to get a Striking Viper where it would hurt the most.

  Once Kitty reached the attic, there was no dearth of distractions from which she could choose. Days before, when she and Lizzy and their father had first explored the house, they’d found an entire arsenal up there: ninjatos and nunchucks and hand claws carefully laid out on the floor, throwing stars and daggers pocking the walls. After rushing through a quick warmup, Kitty stalked over to a sword that had caught her eye that first day—a beautifully crafted katana with a white-oak grip and a gently curving Tamahagane blade inscribed with Japanese letters—and began practicing her slices and lunges and spins.

  She was graceful, she knew. She was deadly. Yet did that make her any less silly? Perhaps it just made her more so. She tried to imagine her wizened old Shaolin master, the stern and imperious Liu, simpering and tittering and batting his eyes at … well, whoever a one-hundred-andfive-year-old Chinese man would bat his eyes at.

  She couldn’t picture it. She couldn’t even envision a young Liu doing it. Or a young Oscar Bennet or a young Lizzy Darcy, for that matter.

  Perhaps it wasn’t something a person grew out of. One was either silly or one wasn’t, and Kitty would go from being the silliest girl in England to the silliest woman. No, more than that. She’d be the silliest spinster. One who not only frittered away her own chances for love, but helped doom her sister’s as well.

  “Hoooooooyyyyyyaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!”

  Kitty hurled herself into a furious, twirling butterfly kick that ended with her right foot smashing into—and through—the attic wall.

  “Uhhh … may I join you?”

  Kitty turned to find Nezu watching her warily from the stairs.

  “Yes. Of course,” she said with all the dignity she could muster (the mustering being hindered by the fact that she was ankle-deep in splintered wooden slats and shattered plaster).

  Nezu came up the steps and, with a gallantry Kitty didn’t expect, turned his back to her and pretended to inspect the weapons lined up along the other side of the room. He didn’t face her again until she’d managed to free her foot from the wall.

  “I see you like Fukushuu,” he said.

  “Excuse me?”

  Nezu nodded at the katana Kitty was holding. “Fukushuu. My father’s sword.�
�

  “Oh. Yes. It is truly beautiful.” Kitty admired the long blade and then gave the sword another swing to appreciate its perfect balance. “Of course, I never would have drawn it had I known it was your father’s. Not without your permission. I am not completely without discretion, you know.”

  “I didn’t, actually,” Nezu said. “Which is why I find your reassurances so comforting.”

  Kitty’s grip tightened on the katana. More disapproval. More disdain. But what better way to show the jibe was unjust than to let it pass without losing her temper?

  “La!” she forced herself to chirp. She walked across the room and returned the sword to its scabbard. “A droll ninja! I would have thought that about as likely as a vegetarian dreadful.”

  “Then you have much to learn about ninjas,” Nezu said. “Which is something I did already know.”

  “A-ha! So you don’t deny it! You’re one of Lady Catherine de Bourgh’s assassins!”

  “Why should I deny something I’ve never tried to hide?”

  “Because ninjas are—”

  Sneaky, deceitful little snakes, Kitty was about to say. And dirty, dishonorable, back-stabbing curs, too, if she could have gotten the words out uninterrupted. And maybe even despicable, underhanded, pajama-wearing worms as well, had she really worked up some momentum.

  She stopped herself and changed tack.

  “—not great favorites of ours,” she said instead. She felt quite proud of herself for having managed an understatement, for once.

  “That is no surprise,” Nezu said, “seeing as your sister Elizabeth has killed so many.”

  “Well, there is that, yes.” Kitty picked up a pair of nunchucks and began nonchalantly slinging them around her waist and over her shoulders. “What did you come up here for, Nezu? I have many drills to finish before I retire for the night.”

  “I wished to speak to you about the incident today.”

  “La! You will have to be more specific. We Bennets are unmatched when it comes to generating incidents.”

  “I was thinking of the pleasure gardens. When you attacked those young men.”

  Kitty began flinging the nunchucks around her body so quickly that her back and upper arms would be bruised black and blue. And she didn’t care.

  “You presume to criticize?”

  She stepped toward Nezu, coming so close that the breeze whipped up by the flying fighting sticks ruffled his thick black hair.

  The rest of him, meanwhile, remained utterly still.

  “Yes,” he said blandly. He didn’t retreat or even blink as the nunchucks began swinging past, no more than a foot from his face. “First, it would have been better had you not intervened. And second, your intervention lacked finesse.”

  “Lacked finesse? You try being finesse-ful or finesse-ish or what-have-you while holding a two-stone rabbit!”

  “The word would be ‘subtle,’ and it is not something that is as hard to achieve as you seem to think. For instance …”

  Suddenly, Kitty’s hands were empty. The nunchucks were now whirling around Nezu. He’d snatched them away without once moving his gaze from her face.

  “Impressive,” Kitty said. “If you’ll recall, however, the idea at the time was not to look subtle. I had to appear clumsy, ungainly. Speaking of which—” She leaned to the side to peer past Nezu at the stairs. “Now you, Mary? At this rate, we’ll soon have the whole household up here.”

  Nezu didn’t look over his shoulder. He didn’t have to, though. His one quick peek at the floor—searching for a shadow that wasn’t there—was all the opportunity Kitty needed. She snatched the nunchucks from him and went cartwheeling away.

  “Well, goodness me,” she said as she popped to her feet and began twirling the nunchucks around herself once more. “I seem to have your little sticks again. Who would have thought an oaf like me could manage something so subtle.”

  “I did not say you were an oaf.”

  “Oh, thank you! I stand corrected!”

  Nezu looked chagrined. Somehow Kitty had the feeling it wasn’t just because she’d tricked him.

  “You show remarkable skill. Remarkable potential,” he said. “It is discipline and gravity I do not see in you.”

  “Perhaps you simply are not used to seeing them in moderation.”

  “What does that mean?” Nezu beetled his brow and cocked his head, and Kitty couldn’t help but smile. She was finding she enjoyed cracking through the man’s impassiveness. He hadn’t been wearing a ninja’s hood the past week, but he may as well. Each time she managed to put an actual expression on his face, it was like she was able to peek beneath a black mask.

  “I mean,” she continued, “that you’re so overblessed with gravity, it’s a wonder you can stand up. Tell me, do ninjas never smile? Laugh? Sing?”

  Nezu turned and walked off a few steps and then pulled out one of the throwing stars lodged in the wall.

  “Not Lady Catherine’s ninjas.”

  He idly balanced the six-pronged star on his right index finger. Kitty could see a tiny speck of red where the tip bit into his flesh.

  “What is there to laugh about when you are born and raised only to kill and, inevitably, be killed? Our fathers lived and died at Her Ladyship’s whim, and so it shall be with us. I suppose if any of us could smile, it should be me, for at least I’ve been granted this little holiday with your family first.”

  Nezu tossed the star into the air, caught it by one of the blades, and, with a half-hearted flick of the wrist, threw it across the room. It was a weary gesture, jaded and full of disillusionment. And it didn’t fool Kitty for a second.

  Her eyes were supposed to follow the star’s flight. Instead, she was watching Nezu as he rolled across the floor toward her and sprang up, grabbing for the nunchucks.

  She let him have them, though not in the way he wanted. As he bounced to his feet, Kitty wrapped the nunchucks around him, pinning his arms to his sides and jerking his body against hers.

  “How subtle of you,” she said. “But not subtle enough.”

  “Nicely done, Miss Bennet. Very nicely, indeed.”

  Nezu looked down, avoiding Kitty’s gaze, but jerked his head to the side when he found himself staring into her décolletage.

  “Nezu,” Kitty said, “are you blushing?”

  “You have shamed me.”

  Kitty pulled back harder on the nunchucks, crushing Nezu’s chest more firmly against hers.

  “You’re not going to run off and commit hara-kiri, are you?”

  The flush of color on his cheeks darkened until it looked almost like a bruise.

  “No,” Nezu said. “Even if I were so inclined, that would not be an option. I have too much yet to do. Would you release me now, please?”

  “Well …”

  For some reason, Kitty couldn’t bring herself to let the man go. A part of her wanted to show him—show somebody—that she could be in control. Another part of her … well, another part of her was just enjoying itself too much.

  “Miss Bennet, I know how to break your hold on me, but I’d rather not do so.”

  “Meaning, you don’t want to fight me?”

  “I do not wish to injure you.”

  Kitty laughed. “You’re so sure you could?”

  “Yes, reasonably. And I do not think Bunny MacFarquhar would find you quite as attractive with a black eye and a limp.”

  “Oh, is that what you’re worried about? Me and Bunny? Well, then. Let us strike a bargain. I will let you go if you answer just one question: Why were you following us this afternoon?”

  Kitty could feel Nezu suck in a deep breath.

  “I have been tasked with guiding you, ensuring that either you or Mrs. Darcy forge a quick and intimate bond with one of the MacFarquhars. It was important that I monitor your progress.”

  “Truly? That’s it? You only tagged along because you’re so desperate to see me in Bunny’s arms?”

  “Miss Bennet,” Nezu said, sighing. And t
hen the toes of Kitty’s left foot were squashed beneath his heel. When she jerked forward in surprise, he brought the crown of his head up hard into her face. He kept going as she stumbled back, stripping the nunchucks from her hands while flipping himself backward beyond her reach.

  “I came up here to speak with you about self-control,” he said when he was again flat on his feet. He dropped the nunchucks to the floor and then turned and headed for the stairs. “Unfortunately, I find that I came far too late.”

  Kitty was stunned, nearly blinded with pain—and, for no reason she could say, smiling again.

  “Too late for whom?” she called after Nezu as he started down the steps. “Me or you?”

  He’d already answered her one question, though, and this other he chose to ignore.

  CHAPTER 23

  It was easy for Darcy to wait for Lady Catherine and her servants to retire for the night. Sleep was no temptation for him. He didn’t desire it. He didn’t even feel he needed it anymore. What he wanted was a little time in Her Ladyship’s study. Alone.

  Alone wouldn’t be so simple, however. Not with Anne roaming the house and grounds at all hours. That night, after a long game of piquet in the drawing room (the usual round of Crypts and Coffins being, under the circumstances, in poor taste), she’d asked if he’d accompany her on another of her nighttime strolls. He’d declined. Being treated like a candy cane by a walking corpse had cured him of any desire to wander around out of doors, he explained. Perhaps tomorrow he’d be in the mood again.

  Anne had nodded and patted his hand and said, “I understand,” in a strangely patronizing kind of way, as if being licked by zombies was simply an acquired taste and she felt sad for—and a little superior to—those prudes who couldn’t yet appreciate it. Then they’d exchanged good-nights, and Darcy went to his room … where he stood now, propped against the door, listening intently for any sound.

  He heard nothing, but he knew that was no guarantee where Anne was concerned. She didn’t so much walk along the halls as float, moving with a smooth silence any ninja would envy.