The Asylum (36 page)

“Did you take the key?” he said sternly.

She shook her head wildly.

Caught between the terror of being seen, and the terror of not being able to see him, I dared not move my head. He moved to a panel on the wall and ran his hand across it. All around the room, yellow light sprang from what I had thought were oil lamps, shaded so as to direct their illumination downward, leaving the gallery in near darkness.

He stood in the middle of the floor, surveying his domain, and then began to move around the room, glancing under benches and opening cupboard doors—including that of the closet, which I had, after all, remembered to shut—until he passed directly beneath me. I heard the rasp of sheeting being pulled off the machines below.

My only chance, I thought, is to crawl back to my hiding place as soon as I feel his tread on the stairs, and pray that the sound of his ascent will cover any noise I make. But again the staircase did not move; he reappeared beneath the far end of the gallery and completed his circuit of the room.

Once more he paused beside Lucia, so that his shadow fell across her face. He drew a watch from his waistcoat and considered it, frowning. Then he raised his head, scanning the gallery. I held my breath.

“No,” he said at last, “I must not delay.”

He crossed to the panel. Lights around the room began to go out, one by one, until only a lamp above the vestry door remained. With a mocking sketch of a bow to Lucia, he drew out a bunch of keys, strode to the vestry door, unlocked it and departed, turning the key behind him. The echoes flitted around the chapel, fading into silence.

My first thought was to remain where I was, wait for his return, and try not to make a sound while he was doing—whatever he meant to do to Lucia. Then, perhaps, I could escape when everything was quiet. But he would surely go straight to my room, and then the hunt would be up. And how long could it be before he decided to make a thorough search of the gallery?

No; my only chance was to recover my writing case, find a way out, and hope that Dr. Straker’s clothes were still where I had left them. Dressed as a man, I might pass for one of my pursuers.

I rose stiffly to my feet and moved unsteadily along the gallery and down the stairs.

“Georgina! For pity’s sake, help me!”

I did not look at her but went straight across to the other door I had seen. It was heavy and close-fitting; when I tried the handle, it did not even move against the frame.

Keys. Or an implement; something heavy enough to break open the gallery door. Or to use as a weapon against Dr. Straker. The light was too dim to see into cupboards and drawers. I thought of trying the panel on the wall, but if he was watching from outside and saw the light . . . I moved from bench to bench, ignoring Lucia’s pleas.

“Be quiet,” I said as I passed behind the chair. “If you speak again, I will bind your mouth shut.”

She began to weep instead. I would not look at her.

After a hasty circuit of the room, I had found a hammer, a chisel, a heavy screwdriver, a candle and a packet of vestas. Fury at this woman I had never truly known, except through the pages of my journal, had kept the worst of my fear at bay. I turned to face her at the last.

“Georgina! I did love you, I swear! I would have come back for you!”

“You are incapable of love,” I said. “Or truth.” I stood looking down at her, trying to recover something of those lost weeks, but nothing would come. Terror had blurred the likeness that had deceived so many. Her eyes were glazed; the kohl had run in dark, glistening streaks.

“At least untie me,” she pleaded. “Give me a chance of life.”

“What chance did you give me? I would sooner release a serpent.”

Her head sagged forward; the chair shook to her trembling.

“What will he do to me?” The words were scarcely audible.

“He may tear your heart out and roast it before your eyes, for all I care.” But then I thought, If I leave her thus, I am no better than she is.

“If I escape him, I will save you if I can. For a prison cell.”

“Let me loose for a moment, or I shall soil myself.”

“You have soiled yourself already,” I said, and turned my back on her.

It was so dark in the corner by the desk that I had at last to light the candle. I worked the blade of the chisel into the gap between the drawer and the frame and pounded it with the mallet—the noise was so deafening that I expected Dr. Straker to appear at any moment—until the whole front of the drawer broke loose with a rending of timber. My hands were shaking uncontrollably; it took me an age before the writing case was safely buttoned inside my dress. And then I could not manage the lighted candle as well as the tools; I blew out the flame and dragged myself up the stairs, pursued by Lucia’s cries.

With the tools clutched to my bosom, I was forced to edge sideways into the darkness between the wall and the heaped furniture. I had gone only a few steps when the hammer slipped from my grasp. Stooping blindly to retrieve it, I lost my balance and fell against the stack, dropping the candle.

An ominous tremor ran through the floor. I was scrambling back toward the gallery when the whole pile collapsed with a roar like thunder. Something struck me between the shoulder blades, and I was flung violently forward, into oblivion.

I knew, as the throbbing in my head became too insistent to ignore, that I had been unconscious for a long time. I was lying on my back, in darkness, with one arm against a stack of chairs and the other jammed against a wall.

I grasped the rung of a chair. The whole pile shifted alarmingly as I levered myself onto my side, wincing at every movement, then rose painfully to my feet and tested my limbs. There was a cold, sticky patch on my temple, which stung like fire when I touched it, but nothing seemed to be broken. If I could find another way out, I might still escape.

As I emerged onto the gallery, I heard, far above me, the tower clock striking the half hour. But it was surely much too dark for half past six; it must be half past seven. They would have been hunting me for an hour at least.

On the western side, the windows still glowed with a dim, purplish light, which seemed to float in the upper part of the chamber. All was deathly quiet, except for the pounding of my heart, and a faint singing in my ears. Or was it the vibration I had felt before?

Below, the lamp still burned by the vestry door. Lucia’s white, terrified face peered upward; the marks left by the kohl looked like streaks of blood.

If I were to hide beneath a bench nearby, I might be able to slip out while Dr. Straker was occupied—I shuddered in spite of myself—with Lucia. But I could not descend without her seeing me; she would surely betray me if she thought it might save her life.

No; the safest thing would be to remain hidden up here until he had—finished with her. When daylight came, I might be able to move enough of the debris to reach the gallery door.

The invalid chair creaked. Lucia was fighting to free herself, straining until her eyes stood out in their sockets and the chair rocked back and forth on its wheels. She forced her head forward, struggling in vain to reach the straps with her teeth, and at last collapsed into harsh, choking sobs.

No, I thought, no; I cannot bear it. My feet had carried me to the stairs, without the slightest notion of what I meant to do, and my hand was upon the rail, when I heard a lock turn over. The vestry door flew open; Dr. Straker appeared, and strode across to the panel without so much as a glance at Lucia. Lights sprang up along the wall behind her. He moved on to a black cabinet nearby, opened the door, and reached inside; I heard a series of rapid clicks, like a ratchet, followed by a flash of blue light.

“Well, Miss Ardent,” he said, speaking over her shoulder, “you have caused me trouble enough for one night. Miss Ashton is still at large; we will recapture her soon enough, but I have no more time to spend on you.”

Lucia tried to speak, but it came out as a sob.

“You will feel nothing, I promise you; nothing at all,” he said, turning back to the cabinet. “It may comfort you to know that your death, at least, will serve some useful purpose. Your body—or, as the world will believe, Miss Ferrars’ body—will be found in the wood tomorrow morning. Heart failure—regrettable in one so young, but then her mother had a weak heart. Foolish young women will persist in wandering about strange woods at night, exposing themselves to shocks of all kinds—if you will forgive the expression . . .”

Lucia was making a low, keening sound, like a wounded animal in its death throes. He took the leather coronet in both hands, pressed it down on her head until the outer band was almost covering her eyebrows, and tightened it at the back, with the wires looping down from the chair. Then, from the bench, he picked up a small dark box, with more wires attached to it. He came around the chair and stood looking down at the terrified Lucia, with the wires trailing behind him. Then he raised his right hand in a gesture of finality.

“No!!”
My voice rang through the tower. Dr. Straker spun round, scanning the gallery.

“Miss Ashton, is it not?”

“Yes,” I said hopelessly.

“Pray descend, and join us.
You
have nothing to fear, I assure you.”

I did not reply.

“Now please, Miss Ashton, be sensible. This apparatus is capable of every degree of effect, from a faint tingling sensation in the temples to instant death. I give you my word of honour that you will suffer only the mildest of seizures: you will wake tomorrow and recall nothing of these—unfortunate events. Frederic will have learnt a valuable lesson, and will, I am sure, remain just as devoted to you. Indeed, we may even anticipate your becoming mistress of Tregannon Asylum: a poetic irony I shall savour.

“As for Miss Ardent here, you cannot possibly care what becomes of her. I suggest you avert your eyes.”

Lucia appeared to have fainted with terror; she lay slumped in the chair, her head lolling sideways, her eyes closed. Now that all hope had gone, I felt strangely calm.

“If I escape you,” I said, “you will be hanged for murder.”

“So be it,” he said, and brought his hands together.

Lucia’s body convulsed so violently that I thought her spine had snapped. Whatever sound she made was lost in my own cry of horror and despair.

“Miss Ashton, Miss Ashton, calm yourself. Think of all the lives that may be saved—your own included—by this machine. We must all die, sooner or later, and some lives are not worth prolonging. So long as she lived, my life’s work was in jeopardy. You might even say that she died in the cause of science, that others might live longer and happier lives. The greatest good of the greatest number, Miss Ashton: it is the best we can hope for.”

He bent over Lucia and removed the coronet from her lifeless head. From the wreckage at my feet, I managed to free a piece of wood about three feet long. More lights came on; he tilted one of the shades so that the light caught my face.

“Now really, Miss Ashton, this is sheer foolishness. The last thing I wish is to cause you pain. You shall wake tomorrow, I promise you, feeling better than you did the first time; I shall reduce the current to ensure it.”

I moved closer to the opening in the floor, grasping the piece of wood with both hands, and placed myself so that I could bring it down on his head without striking the railing. My unnatural calm had deserted me; I was trembling more than ever.

“How did you know—the first time?” I said.

“Ah, well . . . I thought it best not to mention that you
did
come to see me, on the night of your arrival, with a most affecting tale about Felix Mordaunt, and the Wentworth sisters—you seemed excessively anxious about your late cousin’s parentage—and their testamentary arrangements. If you had known that Clarissa Wentworth had been blackmailing Edmund Mordaunt for the past twenty years, you might have been more circumspect. I myself knew nothing of this until last spring, when Edmund confessed to me that he had claimed the estate under the terms of a will he knew to be null and void. And, as he soon discovered, Clarissa Wentworth knew it too. She came to him with what appeared to be a copy of Felix Mordaunt’s last will and testament, threatening to produce the original if he did not make her a handsome allowance. To this he agreed, on condition that she lived abroad.

“He never dared called her bluff, but I had no such inhibition. I wrote to tell her that there would be no more money, only the certainty of imprisonment for blackmail if she ever dared contact us again. All would have been well if she and her daughter had not crossed your path, but as it was . . .

“Of course, I could not allow you to leave, and so I brought you here. It was a textbook demonstration of the apparatus; all it lacked was a professional audience. My one mistake was to assume that you had left your writing case in your room, but when that wire arrived, purportedly from your uncle, I saw how the game might be played. I have a gambler’s instinct, Miss Ashton, and am not averse to risk: I chose to play it long. I pretended to believe that Lucia Ardent was indeed Georgina Ferrars; I knew that sooner or later she would have to come here in search of those papers—where
did
you hide them, by the way?—and so it has transpired. Frederic’s falling in love with you did complicate matters rather, but I was able to turn even that to my advantage. He brought Lucia Ardent to me, thinking he was doing your bidding, when in fact he was doing mine: letting her believe that I would be away this afternoon was the surest way of luring her here unannounced.

“All that remains, Miss Ashton, is to relieve you of these unpleasant memories. You will come to no harm, my word upon it. So kindly lay down that chair leg, and descend.”

If you faint, you will die.
I cast frantically around for something, anything that might delay him, and remembered Frederic saying, “Two have died in the past year.”

“Why should I trust you? You have murdered three people already.” My mouth was so dry that I could scarcely form the words.

“What do you mean?” he said sharply, pausing in midstride.