Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë

by Laura Joh Rowland

  The gun clicked. It had run out of bullets.

  As I sighed with relief, he tossed the gun aside and took another from his coat pocket. He’d taken the extra weapon from one of his men before he’d left them. Now he saw, as I did, that the fuse had burned down to a mere inch. The flame flared and sputtered. Stieber dove at it while he fired on Slade again. Slade rolled away from the shot. He kicked out at Stieber with his left leg. His right leg was bleeding from the wound in his thigh. His foot struck Stieber’s knee. Stieber flailed his arms and lost his grip on the gun as he tried to rebalance himself. It flew out of his hand, skittered across the floor, and stopped near the glass fountain. Stieber fell on his buttocks. Slade crawled toward the fuse. I hurried to help him, but Stieber raced up behind me and shoved me away. He and Slade lunged for the bomb. They collided in midair.

  Kavanagh smiled beatifically, as if nothing that was happening could affect him. He seemed ready to die a martyr to his own genius, at peace at last.

  Mr. Thackeray stood by, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, as if he couldn’t decide whether to join the melee or run. His face had the expression of a stray dog I’d once seen wander into Euston Station, panicked by the roaring locomotives and the crowds. He still clutched his glass of lemonade.

  The burning end of the fuse had almost reached the igniting device on the bomb. The flame burned brighter. It crackled and sizzled as it consumed the gunpowder that coated the twine. Slade and Stieber crashed to the floor together, their hands outstretched inches from the fuse. I grabbed the glass from Mr. Thackeray’s hand and dashed the lemonade onto the fuse.

  Sometimes we act best when we act unthinkingly. Sometimes the body takes the initiative when the mind is too fraught with confusion to guide us. I didn’t pause to remember that liquid extinguishes fire. I instinctively put the ancient knowledge to work.

  The fuse hissed and fizzled out. Lemonade splashed Niall Kavanagh. Uttering a startled grunt, he looked from the wet fuse to me. Slade and Stieber were struggling to untangle themselves from each other. Kavanagh giggled, took another match out of the box, and struck it. But the match was drenched. It wouldn’t light. Neither would the next one he struck. Rendered impotent by common sense, the scientific genius wailed.

  Mr. Thackeray and I were so surprised that we stood gaping. Kavanagh flung the matches on the floor. Then he hurled himself, shrieking and sobbing, at me. I was caught off guard. He grabbed me by the front of my dress and shouted, “You spoiled everything!” He shook me so hard that my neck snapped back and forth and my teeth jarred.

  His face was purple with fury, bleared with mucus, his bloodshot eyes burning through his tears. At the corners of his mouth, saliva frothed. He reminded me of Branwell during one of his rages, desperate for opium and liquor. But Branwell had never laid a hand on any of us. I had never feared that he would hurt me except inadvertently. Niall Kavanagh punched my left ear. I cried out as pain shot through my jaw, cheekbone, and temple. The lights in the Crystal Palace shimmied and fragmented, as if behind a pane of shattering glass. Noises echoed weirdly. Through them I heard Slade calling, “Charlotte!”

  My vision cleared, but I was so dizzy that that the world spun. Niall Kavanagh was yelling at me, calling me profane, ugly names. His angry face whirled before me. Nauseated by vertigo, fearing contagion, I turned my head away. I seized his wrists and tried to break his grip on me, but although he was skin and bone, weakened by disease and dissipation, his temper lent him strength. I could not break free.

  Near us, Slade was on the floor with Stieber. Hands gripping each other’s throats, they grunted, shouted, and kicked. Slade rolled on top of his enemy. He lifted Stieber’s head up, then banged it against the floor. He thrashed free of Stieber and sped toward me.

  “I’m all right,” the Queen told George Smith, who hesitated between his duty to assist her and his desire to save me. “Go fetch help.”

  Although clearly reluctant to abandon her and me, George went running. I saw Stieber raise himself to a sitting position. Gasping and coughing, one hand at his throat, he pushed himself onto his knees. He walked on them toward the bomb.

  “Never mind me!” I cried to Slade as I grappled with Kavanagh. “Stop Stieber!”

  Mr. Thackeray recovered his wits. “Go ahead,” he told Slade. “I’ll take care of Miss Brontë.”

  Slade wheeled around and charged at Stieber. Mr. Thackeray took hold of Kavanagh’s collar, said, “Desist, or I’ll be forced to hurt you,” and pulled.

  With one hand still twisted in the folds of my dress, Kavanagh flung his other arm up and behind him. His fist hit Mr. Thackeray’s face. Mr. Thackeray yelped and released Kavanagh. I struck out at Kavanagh, pummeling his face. He seemed not to care, even though blood poured from his nose. He shook me, cursing while I fended off slaps and punches. My vertigo upset my balance; I fell. He crashed upon me, just as Slade tackled Stieber and brought him down.

  Flat on my back, I kicked, but my legs were entwined in my skirts. I struggled to push Kavanagh away, but his weight held me down. He caught my wrists, pinned them to the floor. Mr. Thackeray seized Kavanagh by the arms and heaved. Kavanagh lifted off me like a tiger ripped from its prey. The ruffle on my dress tore off in his hands. He shrieked; his body arched and flailed. As Mr. Thackeray tried to grip him in a headlock, Kavanagh snarled and bit. He assailed Mr. Thackeray like a dervish made of kicks, swings, and punches. He was so consumed by violent urges that he forgot who’d angered him; he didn’t care whom he attacked. Mr. Thackeray clumsily dodged and parried blows. They landed everywhere. His legs caved. I snatched at Kavanagh, but he swerved out of my reach. He lowered his head and rammed it into Mr. Thackeray’s stomach. Mr. Thackeray doubled over, dropped to his knees, and fainted.

  I tried to stand, but my dizziness tilted the floor up at a sickening angle. My ear rang and my head ached from Kavanagh’s blow. I saw the bomb, sitting in a puddle of lemonade, ignored by everyone. I heard the Queen shout, “Miss Brontë, get the bomb! The bomb, you idiot!”

  I dragged myself toward it while Kavanagh hobbled to a standstill. The Queen’s words had penetrated his tantrum; he saw me and realized that he was about to lose his precious invention. He bellowed, ran ahead of me, and snatched up the bomb. He crammed it into the suitcase and secured the lid. The room pitched like the deck of a ship in a storm, but I managed to reach him. I grabbed the suitcase.

  “You can’t have it!” Kavanagh shrilled. “It’s mine!”

  We fought a tug-of-war. He had hold of the handle and I, the wheels. I hung on even though I was sweating and sick. The jars inside the suitcase rattled dangerously. I prayed that shaking the bomb wouldn’t set off the gunpowder.

  Slade wrestled Stieber by the fountain. Stieber’s movements had grown feeble; his strength was waning. Slade straddled his stomach and punched his face again and again. Slade’s expression was merciless as he administered the brutal beating. It seemed as if he dealt Stieber one blow for each of the Russian radicals and British agents executed, one for Katerina’s death, one for his torture in Bedlam, one for mine. Stieber wriggled helplessly, his face a mass of blood.

  I yanked on the suitcase with all my might. At the same moment Kavanagh shoved the suitcase at me. I fell backward. The ceiling undulated; lights twirled. Kavanagh pulled on the suitcase. An attack of retching weakened my grip on the wheels.

  Stieber flung out his hand and groped for the pistol he’d dropped. His fingers grazed it, but it slid out of his reach. Slade saw. Delivering another punch to Stieber’s face, he snatched up the pistol. Stieber pounded his fist against the bullet wound in Slade’s thigh. Slade yelled and convulsed with pain. Stieber grabbed the wrist of Slade’s hand that held the pistol. He and Slade grappled for control of the weapon. It discharged with loud bangs, spewing bullets that ricocheted off the floor

  Kavanagh ripped the suitcase out of my hands. Exhaustion and dizziness overcame me. I collapsed. Kavanagh absconded, the suitcase in tow. He wheezed and coughed, his
steps slowed by exhaustion, his strength sapped by disease: a dead man on his last, desperate flight.

  Slade wrenched the pistol and himself away from Stieber. He rose on his good leg, teetered on his injured one. Stieber sat up, bleeding from his nose and mouth. Slade aimed the pistol at his foe and cocked the trigger. His raw, battered face wore an expression of triumph so unholy that it was frightening. At last he would have his revenge.

  The Queen shouted, “Kavanagh is getting away!” She started after him, hobbled on a sprained ankle, and stopped. “Mr. Slade!” She pointed at Kavanagh, who’d progressed some ten feet down the transept. “Shoot him!”

  Jolted out of his private obsession, Slade looked from Stieber to Kavanagh. His face went momentarily blank as he observed Kavanagh lugging the suitcase that contained the bomb, which needed only a new fuse and new matches to explode. He aimed the pistol at Kavanagh.

  “There’s one bullet left,” Stieber said, his words muffled by cut, bloody lips. “You can shoot him or me. It’s your choice.”

  “Him!” The Queen jabbed her finger at Kavanagh.

  Slade gritted his teeth against the pain of his wound. His trousers were drenched with blood. I watched him realize that if he shot Kavanagh, he would have to kill Stieber with his bare hands, and he hadn’t enough strength left. He swung the pistol around to Stieber.

  “Don’t! That’s an order!” the Queen shouted.

  “You’d better shoot Kavanagh before he’s out of range.” Amusement gleamed through the blood running into Stieber’s swollen eyes.

  Although he knew that Kavanagh and the bomb posed a greater immediate threat than Stieber did, Slade hesitated. I saw his thirst for revenge battling his duty to the Queen and his need to save the world. I was so much in sympathy with my husband that I couldn’t speak, even though my own life hung in the balance. The decision must be Slade’s.

  “Well?” Stieber said with a malicious smile. “Which will it be?”

  Despair shone in Slade’s eyes.

  They met mine.

  Love obliterated the anguish and indecision in his gaze.

  As Kavanagh hobbled farther away, Slade clasped the gun in both hands to steady it, sighted on Kavanagh, and fired. The gun kicked in his hands as it boomed. The force knocked Slade to his knees. Kavanagh twisted, then crumpled. He lay beside the suitcase, writhed, and squalled. Slade had sacrificed his revenge, for my sake.

  Stieber pushed himself to his hands and knees. He crawled, then walked on all fours, then stood up and ran with a lurching, unsteady gait.

  George Smith returned, accompanied by a horde of policemen. The Queen directed them to Kavanagh. The police surrounded the scientist. She said, “Take that suitcase, and be careful with it!”

  Mr. Thackeray awoke and said dazedly, “What happened?”

  I gathered myself up. Still battling dizziness, I faltered over to Slade.

  “Are you all right?” I asked. The sight of all the blood on him horrified me. Could he lose so much and survive? I wrung my hands, not knowing what to do. I embraced him and kissed his cut, bruised face.

  “I’m fine,” Slade gasped out.

  He limped after Stieber, fell, and cursed. Helpless, he aimed the gun at his retreating enemy. He pulled the trigger, and I knew he hoped Stieber had lied about the number of bullets left in the gun. But the gun only clicked. Stieber had spoken the truth. With a roar of enraged frustration, Slade threw the gun at Stieber. It landed on the floor inches short of its target. Stieber reached the crowds still massed at the distant end of the Crystal Palace.

  “Stop him!” I cried.

  No one did.

  43

  A WEEK AFTER THE SCENE AT THE CRYSTAL PALACE, I RETURNED to Bedlam. It was a rare, fine summer morning in London, shortly before eight o’clock. The sky was blue, the air freshened by a cool wind. Pigeons fluttered, their wings flashing white in the sun, above the dome of the insane asylum. The horrors that I’d experienced there still gave me nightmares, but today I felt no fear as I entered Bedlam. Slade was beside me. He limped from the gunshot wound in his thigh and leaned on a cane, but fortunately the bullet had gone straight through, causing no serious damage besides an alarming loss of blood. That he hadn’t died was a testament to his strong constitution and will to live.

  We walked together beneath the shade trees on the grounds of Bedlam. I carried a gift- wrapped box from a confectionary store. We climbed the wide staircase with the other visitors, then proceeded to the criminal lunatics’ wing. I hesitated, my heart suddenly pounding, outside the iron door, that portal to hell.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Slade said, his hand closing warmly around mine. “Everyone who worked for Wilhelm Stieber is gone.”

  “I know.” The police had arrested the doctor who’d tortured us. Wagner was dead, accidentally killed by me. Friedrich had hanged himself in Newgate Prison. We had learned this from a Foreign Office agent who’d come to see us at the hotel where we were staying. But I had to steel my nerves as the matron admitted us to the criminal lunatics’ wing and led us down those dismal corridors. She unlocked a door, put her head in, and said, “You’ve a visitor.”

  While Slade waited outside, I entered the cell. Julia Garrs sat primly on her bed. She smiled, and her violet-gray eyes sparkled with pleasure. “Charlotte! You’ve come back to see me! They said you wouldn’t, but I knew you would.”

  “Hello, Julia.” Tears stung my eyes because she again reminded me so painfully of Anne. “I brought you a present.”

  She tore open the wrappings. “Oh, I love candy! Thank you so much.”

  “I wanted to thank you,” I said. “You saved my life.”

  When Lord Palmerston had sent his troops to Bedlam, Julia had guided them to me. If not for her, I would have been murdered by Stieber.

  She nodded as if she understood, even though I couldn’t tell her what had happened. I said, “If there’s anything I can do for you, please let me know.”

  “Could you find my baby?” she asked. “And tell him that I’ll be with him soon?”

  All I could say was that I promised I would. I pitied her, and I thanked God that Anne was at peace. I bid goodbye to Julia, then joined Slade in the corridor. He said, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “Yes.” I had set off a chain of events, and I felt obligated to witness all the consequences.

  The matron led us to another cell. Slade and I peered in the window. Niall Kavanagh crouched on the floor, dressed in pajamas, his red hair tousled; his spectacles had slipped down his nose. Pen in hand, he scribbled frantically on sheets of paper. His writings and diagrams looked like utter nonsense.

  “He’s been doing that every day,” the matron said. The army had taken Kavanagh straight from the Crystal Palace to Bedlam. The doctors had removed the bullet that Slade had fired into his shoulder and stitched up the wound. They’d also discovered that he was suffering from pneumonia, not wool-sorter’s disease. He wasn’t going to die yet. “His ma and pa came to see him yesterday, and he got so violent we had to tie him up in a blanket gown.”

  I pitied Sir William and Lady Kavanagh. As I wondered what terrible new ideas he was formulating, Kavanagh looked up. His face was puffy, his gaze blurred. He didn’t seem aware of me. Then he bent his head over his papers and continued scribbling. My heart ached because I saw Branwell in him. But I took comfort from the fact that my brother had come to his senses and repented of his sins in the end, while Kavanagh had not.

  “What will become of him?” I asked Slade.

  “He’ll probably spend the rest of his life here.”

  “But shouldn’t he be tried in court and punished for what he’s done?” After all, he’d murdered the three women in Whitechapel, and he’d almost killed the Queen, not to mention millions of other people.

  “Imprisonment in Bedlam will have to be punishment enough,” Slade said. “Kavanagh can’t be put on trial. He can’t go out in public, not even to be hanged. God only knows what he might say. He has t
o stay in Bedlam, where his ravings won’t be taken seriously and the doctors can control him with drugs. Otherwise, the whole story might come out. And the government does not want the story to come out.”

  Queen Victoria had cleaned up after the fiasco at the Crystal Palace with admirable if not gentle efficiency. She sent for the army to restore peace at the Great Exhibition, then ordered Slade, George Smith, Mr. Thackeray, and me to accompany her, Prince Albert, and the royal entourage back to Buckingham Palace. When we arrived, we were given rooms in the guest quarters. The Queen’s personal physician removed the bullet from Slade’s leg and dressed the wound. I kept vigil by his bedside while Slade slept.

  In the morning, after breakfast, a servant escorted me to a chamber where I found George and Mr. Thackeray sitting at a vast, highly polished table beneath a crystal chandelier. They didn’t appear to have slept any more than I had. They had dark shadows under their eyes and the stunned look of people who had wandered into strange territory and didn’t know if they could ever go home. They rose when I joined them. We remained standing while the Queen and Lord Palmerston entered.

  We made our bows; the Queen acknowledged them with a brisk nod. She seated herself across the table from us, motioned us to sit, and said, “I’ve summoned you here to talk about the sorry business at the Great Exhibition.”

  Standing beside her, Palmerston smiled, but with less humor than usual. “We must ask you not to discuss it with anyone, not even among yourselves.”

  I suspected he was sorry to have missed out on the excitement. Perhaps he also thought he could have handled the situation better than we had.