Dreadfully Ever After

by Steve Hockensmith

  “I think the time for picnicking has past,” Mary said.

  Mr. Quayle’s box creaked again, though at a slower, more mournful pace.

  “Be careful, Miss Bennet.”

  “And you, Mr. Quayle.” Mary turned to the dogs. “And you, Ell. And you, Arr.”

  The wagging of the mutts’ stubby tails put a small smile on Mary’s face. There was something to be said for this levity business, she was finding. Perhaps it was easier to appreciate when no one tagged a “La!” onto the end of every quip.

  Moments later, she was circling around the block to approach the hospital from the main road, past the front gate. It would hardly do for Miss Mary Godwin to be seen walking out of a deserted brewery. And it was Miss Mary Godwin—of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Lunatics and Village Idiots—who was expected to pay a call at Bethlem Royal Hospital that afternoon.

  In the course of her walk, Mary had to brain one zombie with a brick and scramble up the side of a building to avoid a flock of ten more. Eventually, though, she was walking up to the hospital wearing her most unctuous look of disapproving piety—which, being so well practiced, would have done any prude in England proud.

  Once Mary coaxed the attendant at the entrance from behind his guard box (where he spent most of his time cowering so as not to be spotted by passing zombies), the man unlocked the gate with frantic fumbling fingers and waved Mary through. He was so anxious to shut the gate again, he nearly slammed it on her rump, and within seconds he was scrambling back to his hiding place.

  “You can just follow the drive up to the front door, Miss,” he whispered from behind the guard box. “They’re expecting you.”

  “Thank you.”

  Despite the squalor and chaos just outside the gate, the hospital grounds were immaculately manicured, with a wide, lush lawn and flowerbeds exploding with gay spring color. As she strolled up to the column-studded portico of the hospital’s central facade, Mary could have been approaching the home of a blueblooded country squire—a friend of Mr. Darcy’s or Mr. Bingley’s, perhaps. And, indeed, a well-dressed gentleman stepped out of the building to watch her approach, the condescending smile of a lord of the manor on his face. Drawing near, Mary could see that he was an unhealthy man, gray and gaunt, and if not for his smirk she might have worried that he was about to have a go at her brains.

  “Sir Angus MacFarquhar, I presume?”

  The gray man’s smirk grew smirkier. “No. Sir Angus is occupied elsewhere today. I am Dr. Sleaford, assistant administrator of Bethlem Royal Hospital. And you would be Miss Godwin of the SPCLVI?”

  “That is correct.”

  “I received the note you left with my subordinates yesterday demanding a tour of our facilities. I’m sorry no one was available to accommodate you at the time, but I’m happy to see that you returned, as promised. I’m certain you will find that Bethlem lives up to the high standards of your fine organization.”

  “So you will allow me to inspect the hospital? With no restrictions?”

  “If that is still your wish, Miss Godwin. We have been at cross purposes with the SPCLVI too many times in the past. It is the sincerest wish of both Sir Angus and myself that such quarrels should be put behind us. Despite its reputation, Bethlem is a happy place for all, whether they be merely a tad overeccentric or violently insane. I would urge you to take my word for this as reassurance enough, for despite the good cheer of life inside these walls, it can still be a shocking thing to see. If it makes a patient’s day a little brighter to spend it sans clothes, for instance, we don’t force the issue. Nor do we stand on ceremony if someone wishes to, say, smear themselves with feculence and chicken feathers and pass the time in spirited clucking. Quisquis no vestri navis, those are our watchwords here. ‘Whatever keeps your vessel afloat.’ It is a humane philosophy, but one that is not always the most pleasant to see in practice. Do you still wish to come inside?”

  “I feel it is my duty.”

  “I see. Come this way, then.”

  Dr. Sleaford turned and headed toward the front door, and Mary started up the steps after him. How she would separate herself from him and locate Sir Angus’s laboratory, she still didn’t know. Yet it was thrilling to have the chance, at last, to improvise.

  Dr. Sleaford opened the door and then stepped aside with a bow. “After you.”

  “Thank you.”

  Mary crossed the threshold into Bedlam.

  The net came down over her head the second she was inside.

  “I got ‘er!” a man yelled.

  A steely ring clamped around Mary’s waist, pinning her arms to her sides, and she was jerked forward as the door slammed shut behind her.

  Though her eyes had yet to adjust to the dim light, Mary could tell what was happening: Someone was trying to trap her with a zombie-catching net. She groped for the pole that led off from the binding ring at the bottom of the net, and, when her fingers found it, she grabbed hold and launched herself into a Whirlwind Kick that sent her spinning up into the air.

  She heard several gratifying crashes and yelps as the pole was ripped from her attacker’s grasp and whipped in a circle around the room, smacking anyone in range at more or less chin height.

  “She’s a flippin’ tigress!”

  “Dr. S said she might be tough, but oi!”

  Mary followed the sound of the men’s cries and, using the net pole like a battle staff, managed to jab one in the stomach and sweep the other off his feet.

  “Gorblimey, Styles. What are you waitin’ for?”

  Mary’s vision returned just in time for her to see that Styles was, apparently, the big bristle-faced man coming at her with another zed net. He brought it down over her and snapped it tight before she could dodge aside. When she tried to spin away this time, he was ready: The big man managed to keep his grip. Mary twisted as far as she could to one side, lining Styles up for the Fulcrum of Doom, when she noticed someone else darting in behind her.

  “Not too hard, Topsy! Dr. S wants her brains still in ’er head!” And then Topsy brought down his sap just hard enough, and once again Mary couldn’t see … or hear or smell or think or feel.

  It was the smelling, of all things, that returned first. Mary became aware of the stench of excrement and mold and wet straw. Sound came next. She heard screaming and wild shouts and distant … clucking? Which brought back thinking, of a sort. Enough for her to wonder Where am I? And that’s what opened her eyes.

  She found herself in a dark, cell-like room. Along one wall was a long shelf topped with beakers and vials and what might have been either medical instruments or weapons, it was hard to tell which, for she saw the glint of metal blades both large and small, jagged-toothed and smooth. Across from all this was a squat door with a barred window through which passed the sounds of shrieking and moaning and insensible raving.

  She remembered. She was in Bethlem Royal Hospital. And she wasn’t leaving anytime soon.

  She was lying on a large tilted table, her wrists and ankles held tightly by leather cuffs bolted to the wood. She began testing her strength against the restraints, but they were too thick to snap and too tight to writhe out of, even with all her Shaolin training. As she struggled with the manacles and fetters, the table beneath her wobbled and even seemed to roll a few inches across the floor.

  “I see you have returned to us,” someone said. “I am so glad.”

  Dr. Sleaford walked around the table to face her. Here, out of the sunlight, he looked even more cadaverous, though he still wore the strained smile of a patronizing host.

  “I’ve been anxious to continue our conversation,” he said.

  “I can assure you that this is hardly necessary for conversation,” Mary replied, nodding at the strap around her right wrist.

  “Oh, I’m sure, I’m sure. But would the conversation be forthright?”

  “Why shouldn’t it be?”

  “Because we have friends inside the SPCLVI, and they’ve never heard of any Mary
Godwin.”

  “I am from the Hertfordshire branch. We are unaffiliated with the London office. Their standards have grown too lax, perhaps because they are overly friendly with the likes of you, Doctor.”

  “An honorable parry, Miss, but not convincing. You wish me to believe that you are such a zealot, you would travel all the way here, to Section Twelve Central, and not be frightened all the way back to Hertfordshire by the bloody turmoil of our streets?”

  “Yes. I am just such a zealot.”

  “I do not believe you.”

  “What an ungentlemanly thing to say.”

  “Yet it is true, and I shall tell you why. It strikes me as odd—very odd—that a busybody spinster reformer should have mastered the so-called deadly arts.”

  “What makes you think I have?”

  “What my warders tell me, and the bruises and abrasions all over their bodies.”

  Mary tried to shrug but found, with her hands pinned, that she could not.

  “I resisted when your men first tried to net me, it is true, but any injuries they sustained were merely the result, I’m sure, of their own clumsiness.”

  “Again, I might be inclined to believe you but for one thing. I have seen such injuries more than once in the past: on the soldiers who’d captured ninjas sent to infiltrate this hospital.”

  “Soldiers? I have seen no soldiers here, though surely you could use a few, with Twelve Central in its current state. Why were they here before and where have they gone now?”

  Dr. Sleaford’s gray eyes lit up with glee in a way that told Mary she had, once again, walked into a trap of his setting.

  “I am asking the questions here!”

  The way the man said it, it was obvious he enjoyed it—and that he’d had some practice at it.

  “Now,” he went on, “we know that someone has taken an untoward interest in us. What we do not know—and what you must tell me—is who that someone is.”

  “I will not,” Mary said simply. She’d never much cared for amateur theatrics, and anyhow, the time for keeping up pretenses seemed to have passed.

  Dr. Sleaford leaned in close (though not close enough for Mary to butt him or bite off his nose). “It would be so much more pleasant for everyone if you told me.”

  “No.”

  “Please.”

  “No.”

  “Really. Please. I beg you.”

  “No.”

  Dr. Sleaford straightened again. “Well, I did ask nicely.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “I’m afraid I must be a little less than nice now.” Dr. Sleaford turned toward the door. “Turvy! Bring in Subject Seven, if you please!”

  Turvy had apparently been waiting in the hall, for the door immediately opened, and a man came in pushing a small cart upon which was strapped a glistening red skull and spine—both writhing.

  Subject Seven was a zombie stripped to its essence. Just the central nervous system and some muscle and bone to hold it together. No hair, no skin, no organs but for the brain. It didn’t even have a tongue, though Mary suspected that was by its own doing. The thing was madly gnashing its teeth, snapping at everything, as if it wished to devour all the world.

  Turvy steered the cart to Mary’s side. When he stopped, she and Subject Seven were only inches apart.

  The dreadful locked its lidless eyes on Mary and began chomping at her frantically. Just one more push, the most minor adjustment of its trolley, and the thing’s big yellow teeth would be sinking into Mary’s hand or thigh or head.

  “Anything to say?” Dr. Sleaford asked.

  Mary considered for a moment and then nodded at the zombie.

  “I should think that the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Zed-dash-dash-dash-dash-dashes would object to this. It is lucky for you that I am not a member.”

  She knew it wasn’t as clever as whatever Elizabeth would have said in the same situation. Yet still she derived some satisfaction from it. If these were to be her last words, they were brave enough, if rather fatuous, and her only disappointment was that no one whose good opinion she valued was nearby to hear them. Mr. Quayle would have been particularly appreciative, she thought, and it saddened her that by the time he returned to rescue her with her sisters and father, she would be on her way to becoming a drooling ghoul capable of no speech at all.

  “You do not relent?” Dr. Sleaford asked.

  Mary just shook her head. Her last words were said.

  “I anticipated as much,” Dr. Sleaford said, sighing. “None of your predecessors were any more inclined to cooperate. You’re all so anxious to ‘die with honor,’ you people! Fortunately, this time I have a little extra leverage. Styles! Our other guest, thank you!”

  The door opened again, and in came the burly unshaven warder who’d managed to capture Mary not so long before. He, too, was pushing a small gurney upon which was secured a limbless form. This one, however, was graced with a full torso, clothed—not to mention skin and hair and a face that it seemed at pains to keep turned toward the far wall.

  “Mr. Quayle!” Mary gasped. “Is that you?”

  So much for her cool and composed final words. She’d never gasped in her life, and now her spotless record was spoiled with, most likely, just minutes to go.

  “Over here, I think,” Dr. Sleaford said, stepping away from Mary. “Both of them, lined up together. Where she can see.”

  As Turvy and Styles situated the trolleys side by side, Subject Seven took to nipping at Mr. Quayle’s stubby body. Mr. Quayle, for his part, merely kept his face pointed away and said nothing.

  Mary found herself straining to get a look at the man who had, till then, been just a voice from a box. She’d expected him to be scarred, disfigured, but the chin and temple and ear she saw seemed flawless—and strangely familiar. A band of white stretched from his mouth over his cheek.

  He’d been gagged.

  “Your friend made the most foolhardy attempt to come after you,” Dr. Sleaford said. “If you care for him half as much as he apparently cares for you, then you’ll tell me what I want to know, and quickly. I think the poor fellow’s already lost every protuberance a man can lose … with one exception, perhaps. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to see Subject Seven make a meal of that, now, would you?”

  “Oh ooh ee, Ahhee,” Mr. Quayle said.

  “Oh, capital. Capital! Styles, Turvy. Do remove the gentleman’s gag so that his pitiful pleas for mercy will provide further persuasion for the lady. You are offering up a pitiful plea for mercy, aren’t you, Mr.… Quayle, was it?”

  Being careful to keep himself from Subject Seven’s snapping jaws, Styles slowly moved in and lifted Mr. Quayle’s head. As he held it steady between his big hairy hands, the other warder worked to unknot the strip of linen tied tightly around the prisoner’s mouth.

  For the first time, Mary was able to look straight into Mr. Quayle’s eyes. And before the gag even came away, she knew that they weren’t Mr. Quayle’s eyes at all. Because she recognized those eyes, and there was no Mr. Quayle.

  When Styles and Turvy darted away again, it was Geoffrey Hawksworth, her first master, who gazed back at her.

  “I was saying, ‘Don’t do it, Mary.’ ” Hawksworth smiled sadly. “As you know so well, I am not worth it.”

  CHAPTER 30

  As Mr. Bennet and Lizzy and Sir Angus finished making arrangements for the next day—arrangements that would bring the Bennets into the presence of the loftiest lords and ladies in the land—Kitty sat silently beside Bunny and Brummell and brooded. Her soul was roiling, and though it was good to know she had a soul to roil (she’d sometimes wondered), it wasn’t a pleasant experience.

  Nor was it entirely a new one. Her soul had stirred first, if not churned, when Lydia ran off to become Mrs. George Wickham, leaving her sister with no clear idea who Miss Kitty Bennet was. And now Bunny MacFarquhar, of all people, had provided an answer. One she didn’t like.

  Miss Kitty Bennet was the kind of woman who kis
sed men she didn’t love and loved men she couldn’t kiss.

  Well, “loved” was too strong a word. How could she love a man she barely knew? How could she love a man she could never know?

  She was mistress; he was servant. She was Shaolin; he was Shinobi. She was English; he was Other. There were so many walls between them, she shouldn’t have even noticed that she was a woman and he was a man. Yet notice she had, apparently, for when she’d been kissed by Bunny MacFarquhar—just the sort of fool she would have expected to fall for—she’d found herself thinking of Nezu.

  Little Nezu, of all people! Even beyond the scandalous fact of his race, any match would be absurd. Love blossomed between kindred spirits. Lizzy and Darcy, Jane and Bingley, Lydia and Wickham—all were perfectly suited for each other because they were each other (with the necessary exception of certain anatomical details). One didn’t add oil to water or axle grease to tea or zombies and ninjas to a romance. Like belonged with like.

  And Nezu couldn’t be more unlike Kitty. The man was stiff, distant, humorless, haughty. And agile, exotic, handsome, and very, very standing right in front of her.

  Kitty was so lost in thought, she barely registered that goodbyes were being spoken or that she was walking out of the MacFarquhars’ and up the street with her sister and father. Not until Nezu joined them, gliding out of whichever shadowy corner he’d been hiding in, did she stop brooding and start hearing and seeing again.

  “One of you I saw flipping out of a window,” the ninja said as he fell into step with the Bennets. “Another maiming two men in order to retrieve a rabbit and an urn. With such indiscreet public displays, I fear to even ask what went on inside.”

  “Well, don’t then!” Kitty blurted out. “What matters is that Sir Angus is taking us to the recoronation tomorrow!”

  “And he definitely has a cure for the strange plague,” Lizzy added. “I saw a letter that confirmed it.”

  “So we may have been indiscreet, Nezu, but, more important, we were successful,” Mr. Bennet said. “We can now be certain that Sir Angus has what we want—and trusts us enough to offer an opportunity to take it.”