Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Brontë (30 page)

“What are you talking about?”

My idea sprang full-fledged into my mind while I spoke. “We assumed the weapon was a gun. But what if it's some completely new kind of device for killing?” Slade looked puzzled, and I rushed on: “No matter that his theory is ridiculous, Niall Kavanagh demonstrated that he could cultivate a substance that causes disease and use it to make people sick. Maybe he discovered how to do those things on a larger scale, how to affect more than one person at a time.”

“One couldn't apply his animalcules to enough people to make a difference in the outcome of a war. Besides, the disease he gave those women isn't fatal.”

“Other diseases are,” I said, convinced by my own logic. “Fevers, cholera, typhoid, consumption—they kill thousands of people. And what if Kavanagh invented another way to spread the agents that cause those diseases?”

“That's preposterous. You've been writing fiction for so long that you've started to believe—” Sudden, dismayed recollection and enlightenment stopped Slade. “The fans. The bicycle with the bellows. That's what they're for—to spread diseases through the air. Damnation. You're right.” Horror filled Slade's eyes. “If Niall Kavanagh has perfected a weapon of that sort, it could start a plague!”

It hardly bore imagining. “What should we do?”

“
We
aren't going to do anything. You're going home. I—” Slade paused.

“What?”

He put his finger to his lips. Now I heard the sound of footsteps approaching the house, and the gate creaking. Slade blew out the lamp. We hastened to the window and saw, far below us, three men coming up the front walk.

“Who in the devil?” Slade muttered.

They carried lanterns, but we couldn't see their faces. They mounted the stairs and disappeared under the roof of the porch. A moment later there came a loud knocking.

“Kavanagh!” one of the men called. “If you're in there, open up!”

“It's Lord Eastbourne,” I whispered. “I recognize his voice.”

“Lord Eastbourne!” Slade's profile, illuminated by the moonlight, showed surprise. “What is he doing here?”

Now was the time to fill Slade in on the remainder of what I'd learned in Whitechapel. I told him about the letter written by Lord Eastbourne. “He furnished the laboratory. Dr. Kavanagh is working for him.”

“My, my, you're just full of surprises.” Slade regarded me with amusement.

“But I still don't understand why, if Kavanagh is working for the British government, Lord Palmerston didn't know about him and the invention.”

“Lord Eastbourne is an ambitious man,” Slade said. “He must have learned about the invention and gone behind Palmerston's back to hire Kavanagh.”

“But why?” I heard shuffling and muttered conversation from Lord Eastbourne and his men on the porch.

“Maybe he didn't know whether the weapon would work, and he wanted to wait until Kavanagh came up with a successful model, and then reveal it to Lord Palmerston and the Queen. That would have done wonders for his career.” Slade thought a moment. “He may even be planning to encourage a war between Britain and Russia. That would give him a chance to demonstrate Kavanagh's weapon, and a victory for Britain would make him a hero.”

“Now I understand why he left me in Newgate Prison. He didn't want me to tell anyone about Dr. Kavanagh and the invention and have it come out that he'd hired Kavanagh without official sanction.”

“Now I understand what became of the letter I wrote to Palmerston,” Slade said grimly. “Lord Eastbourne must have intercepted it. When he read it, he had a choice: show it to Palmerston, warn him about Wilhelm Stieber, and come to my defense; or protect his secret.”

Outside, Lord Eastbourne called, “Kavanagh!” and pounded on the door. I heard a key rattling in the lock, and the door opening.

“They're coming in!” I whispered.

Footsteps clattered in the entryway. Lord Eastbourne said, “Search the house.” I heard him and his companions mounting the stairs.

“We can't let him find us,” Slade whispered.

He urged me under Niall Kavanagh's bed and slid in after me. We lay facedown, side by side, while the footsteps marched through the house. Despite my terror, I was intensely attuned to Slade—his breathing, his scent, the warmth of his body. I felt an almost overpowering impulse to touch his hand. He lay still and rigid. Light spread across the floor of the tower as one of the men entered. Slade and I held our breath. The man muttered, “Filthy pig,” then left. His footsteps hurried down the stairs, and he called, “Kavanagh's not here. The house is empty.”

Slade and I exhaled.

“Then we'll proceed,” Lord Eastbourne said.

His voice came from the direction of the kitchen. I heard him moving around, and splashing noises; then he and his men exited the house. Slade scrambled out from under the bed. I followed. As we peered out the window, we heard rustling noises in the bushes alongside the house, then more splashes. Through the window drifted a sharp, pungent, oily odor.

“I smell kerosene,” I whispered.

Slade turned to face the door and sniffed. “I smell gas. Lord Eastbourne must have opened the taps.”

We looked at each other in sudden, appalled realization. A loud
whump
came from outside the house; then a roaring, crackling noise. An orange glow of flames lit the night. Slade grabbed my hand. We ran for the stairs, only to find them blocked by flames that coiled along the floor like a dragon and leaped up the walls where Lord Eastbourne and his men had poured kerosene. Slade said, “We'll have to climb out a window.”

“Why would Lord Eastbourne want to burn down the house?” I asked as we sped from room to room. Flames licked at all the windows; the outside of the building was on fire.

“To destroy the evidence of Niall Kavanagh's work and anything that could tie it to him,” Slade said.

“Maybe he knows Kavanagh killed those women in Whitechapel. If his relationship with Kavanagh became public, what a scandal there would be!”

“Here's another possible reason,” Slade said, hurrying me up the stairs. “What if Lord Eastbourne realized that the weapon was too dangerous to use? He wouldn't want to be associated with it.”

“If he knew that he'd managed to trap two witnesses in the fire, he would be delighted.”

“This is what you get for refusing to leave when you had the chance!”

Smoke pervaded the house; we coughed and choked. We reached an attic, and Slade threw open a window. The air that poured in was hot and smoky, and I could hear the flames roaring louder. Slade climbed out the window and dropped some ten feet to the roof of a cupola. “Jump!” he shouted, arms raised.

I offered up a silent prayer and jumped. For a brief, terrifying moment I fell, my skirts ballooning, my heart in my mouth. Then Slade's arms were tight around me. He set me on the roof. We looked down, in dismay. The ground was more than thirty feet beneath us, and there were no trees near enough to climb down. The entire main story of the house was ablaze. I heard bells ringing in the distance, calling out the fire brigades, but they surely wouldn't arrive soon enough. We were doomed.

“Miss Brontë!” a voice called from below.

I had heard that voice too often for my liking. Astonished, I peered down. “Mr. Heald?”

“Yes, it's me!”

“Who?” Slade said.

“Oliver Heald,” I said. “An acquaintance of mine.”

Accompanied by scraping, bumping sounds, Mr. Heald appeared amid the trees and smoke. “At your service, Miss Brontë.” He looked up at me with his usual, cheery smile. He was dragging a ladder.

“What's he doing here?” Slade asked.

“He must have followed me. Again.” Once again I hadn't spotted him, even though he must have trailed me all the way from Haworth to the Lake District to London to Tonbridge, as unlikely as it sounds. And Slade had been too distracted to notice Mr. Heald lurking in our vicinity. I laughed, because once I could have smacked Mr. Heald for his nerve, but now I could have kissed him.

“Is there anything else you want to tell me?” Slade said.

Mr. Heald positioned the ladder against the cupola. Slade made me go first. Mr. Heald held the ladder steady while I descended. Its base was so close to the flaming wall of the house that my skirts were singed. But I landed safely, and so did Slade, a moment later.

“Thank you,” I said to Mr. Heald.

“Anything for my favorite author,” he said with a little bow.

“Run!” shouted Slade.

He hurried us away from the house. As we ran across the weedy grass, the gas ignited and the house exploded. The boom was louder than the loudest thunder. A great wave of force rose up under me, lifted me off my feet, and slammed against my back. We crashed flat on the ground. I looked over my shoulder. The house was a mass of flames. They roared and spewed; they stained the night sky orange. Black smoke writhed around the chimneys, which toppled as the roof caved in. Windows shattered. Glass fragments blew out. Flying debris pelted us.

Slade was on his feet, pulling Mr. Heald and me to ours. “Come on!”

We hastened toward the edge of the property. My right knee had hit the ground hard when I fell. Supported by Slade and Mr. Heald, I limped. Trees loomed between us and the wall that enclosed the workhouse. I heard a series of smaller booms. At first I thought they were more explosions inside the house. Then something hit the ground in front of me. Dirt flew up.

“Gunfire!” Slade said. “Take cover!”

“Who's shooting?” Mr. Heald said as we raced toward the trees. He looked terrified. I felt sorry for him because all he'd wanted was to be near me, and he hadn't bargained on this.

“It's Lord Eastbourne and his men,” I said. “They must have stayed to make sure the house was destroyed. They saw us. They can't allow us to live.”

“Who is Lord Eastbourne?” Mr. Heald said.

“I'll explain later.”

The trees seemed miles away. I hobbled as fast as I could. More shots boomed, kicking up more dirt around us. They came from our left. I looked that way, and so did Slade. He said, “It's not Lord Eastbourne.”

A man was running toward us, a pistol raised in his hand. His blond hair gleamed in the firelight. He was Wilhelm Stieber's minion, the athletic one. Just before we reached the trees, he fired again. Slade knocked me down on the ground. The bullet hissed over us. Another shot blared from our right. Mr. Heald shrieked, spun in a circle, and stumbled.

“He's been shot!” I cried.

“Get inside the woods!” Slade ordered. He caught Mr. Heald before he could fall. “Go!”

As I crawled beneath the trees, I glimpsed a man near the barn. He stood in darkness, the barn screening him from the fire. The moonlight silvered the barrel of his gun, reflected in his pale eyes. It was Wilhelm Stieber.

That glimpse lasted only a second, but I knew Stieber had seen me and recognized me. I burrowed into the woods like a rabbit hiding from a hawk. Slade followed, dragging Mr. Heald. We stopped by the wall. Slade laid Mr. Heald on the ground.

I bent over Mr. Heald. I called his name. “Where were you shot?”

He groaned. Moonlight sifted through the foliage, and I saw that his face was deathly gray, his eyes and mouth wide open as he gasped for air. The front of his shirt was drenched with blood.

“Stay calm,” I urged. “We're going to help you.”

Slade ripped open Mr. Heald's shirt. His chest was awash in blood that flowed from a hole at his right breast. The hole made a sucking, gurgling sound every time he breathed.

“The bullet went in his lung,” Slade said. “There's nothing we can do.”

“Then we must take him to a physician!”

Mr. Heald's gasps weakened. I seized his hand. It gripped mine in a convulsive spasm. He stared pleadingly up at me. His lips formed my name. Then his breaths ceased; his hand went limp, his gaze vacant.

“He's dead,” Slade said.

“No!” I cried. Sorrow magnified all the gratitude and guilt I felt toward Mr. Heald. He'd saved my life, and I'd never even signed his beloved copy of
Jane Eyre
.

In the distance, the fire still roared; crashes came from the house as it collapsed. Footsteps crunched through the woods toward us. Slade dragged me away from Mr. Heald. “Stieber and his men are coming. We have to go.”

W
E MADE OUR WAY INTO TOWN ALONG A CIRCUITOUS ROUTE. When we reached the high street, it must have been near nine o'clock; no other people were about. The buildings were dark, although the sky glowed orange from the burning workhouse. Slade stopped short of the Rose and Crown. “We'll say goodbye here.”