The House on Blackstone Moor (The Blackstone Vampires) (2 page)

“Your aunt is ill.”

“Yes, she is dying.” Suddenly, I remembered my mother telling me to go and I got choked up and found it impossible to go on. “Please, sir.”

He reached over and touched my arm gently as a friend would. I found the gesture reassuring and I smiled. “It is so hard.”

That, as they say, was the last straw for suddenly I collapsed in a paroxysm of tears and sobs. I was quite wild and unmanageable.

The attendant reappeared.

“Rose, I am giving you something. It will help to relax you.”

Everything became a pleasant blur but I did hear Dr. Bannion
’s voice say,
“I shall remove her to Marsh where she can get the best care.”

*

He told me Marsh was a place where I could rest, where he’d help me get better. “You’ll see, Rose. It’s in the country in a lovely location. I run it and I am certain you will benefit greatly.”

I had questions I wished to ask him but since I didn’t feel as though he wished me to ask him anything, I didn’t.

I wonder still what he would have said if I had.

“We shall take the train. Huddersfield is a long way from London.”

“In Yorkshire, sir?”

“Yes, the West Riding
and it’s quite beautiful there.”

I remember bits and pieces of this day. I remember smelling the rain and him helping me into the carriage.

“Kings Cross, please!”

The cab jerked forward to oblige. 

“It won’t be long now.”

I had so many questions but not the sense or ability to ask them, for he had given me another injection before we left.

“Yes that’s right, you close your eyes.”

In and out, sleeping one minute and awake the next.

The cab stopped and we were there—Kings Cross.

He had already explained that we would have to change trains a few times. “Don’t
worry
,
I shall take care of everything.”

How comforting that was to hear. I began to trust him and to rely on him then.

As for the trip itself, I can only recall it as a muddle of steam and groaning metal, of sharp whistles too, so loud I covered my ears.

“That’s alright, Rose.”

The calming voice, again. I smiled for I was comforted.

I slept most of the time, barely noticing being guided gently from one train to another, with his voice always soothing me: “Yes, just this way now. There you may sit down now, Rose.”

And then later as if I was a sleepwalker waking from a dream, I heard him say, “You really have slept most of the way, we should be arriving fairly soon.”

He looked pleased and because he did I felt pleased, too. “Truly, I never meant to sleep so much.”

The train screeched to a stop and we disembarked like two weary travelers nearing the end of an expedition. And perhaps it was, as it was a quest to get better… or so I thought.

I was not prepared for the tumult. I cringed at the hustle and bustle of so many people rushing this way and that.

But he calmly ushered me along. “Just this way, Rose, you’re doing splendidly.”

I was proud and felt my spirits soar.

A line of cabs and a cab man called out. “Any place. Fair rates!”

“Marsh, please.”

A startled look from said cabbie. “Marsh, sir? The town or--!”

“The asylum, if you please.”

“Rightie oh, sir!”

Asylum?
A madhouse? Why hadn’t I asked, why hadn’t I known? But what difference could it have possibly made?

“There it is, Rose.” he nodded, looking at me encouragingly.

I looked out to see a forbidding place with granite walls and towering gates, implacable barriers to be reckoned with and the words strung across the archway:

MARSH LUNATIC ASYLUM.

I had come home, at least for now.

“
It is a self-sustaining place
,
Rose, more like a village than a
—” The word hung on his lips, ominously.

Madhouse.

He cleared his throat noisily and went on to explain with great pride how the institution was a veritable village of workshops and kitchens, stables and bakery. “There is even a small farm where we grow our own food.”

I nearly burst out laughing when he said that. I think I thought then that it was a sure sign of madness. I know now that it was proof of my being well.

We arrived in a heavy downpour. I began to grow increasingly distraught. Dr. Bannion noticed. “Don’t
worry
,
you need rest, that’s all it is.”

If my first impressions were less than favorable, the ones that followed were consistent with that—the place looked frightening, grim and forbidding. I hoped I wouldn’t stay long. I was, in short, prepared to lie if I had to in order to get out—whatever the cost to me.

We stepped into a vestibule and then into the building itself. There was no high desk here as there was in Bedlam.

Ah! Do forgive me, I am sorry! I didn’t tell you it was Bedlam, did I? Yes, the hospital I had just left was Bethlehem, infamously known as Bedlam.

If I found it horrible, and I did, I now shuddered to think what it must have been like in its worst days.

“Rose, as it is late, I am sure you’ll want to go to bed. You may have a wash if you like.”

He led me over to a door and told me to go inside and wait, which I did. “Inmates are bathed here to soothe their nerves. It’ll do for you now.”

A severe woman, I took her to be an attendant, looked up in a most hostile manner.

“I am to have a bath please.” I tried to sound as pleasant as I could but she clucked her tongue and hurried outside as if to check. When she returned she had two buckets of water with her which she dumped into a metal tub.  She then sat down, facing me. “Hot water from the kitchen, you were lucky.”

She wasn’t going to stand there, was she? When I realized she had no intention of leaving
,
I began to remove my clothes. I hesitated a moment before stepping into the bath whereupon she manhandled me. “Go on! I have other things to do, I ain’t your maid you know!”

The water was hot and I nearly cried out. Thankfully, I didn’t. It seemed that my sense of self-preservation had surfaced to help me to cope.

I began to wash myself as best I could but she jumped to her feet, grabbed a bar of soap, and began pushing me this way and that. “Best get this filth off of you!”

“It stings!” I cried, for this time I could not help myself.

She shook her head. “You’ll be washed and washed quickly. Just you behave.”

I began to cry for I could not help myself, though I tried not to be noisy about it.

And then, mercifully, it was over and she hurried away to get something. When she came back, she had a coarse looking gray colored shift draped over her arm. “Put this on.”

My skin felt raw and the shift was rough and irritated my skin yet, I neither cried out nor said one word. I am, if nothing else, a fast learner.

After I was dressed I was told to sit. My nerves were pretty bad. Don’t be misled by the evenness of my dialogue. For you to appreciate the state I was in I think is impossible. Suffice it to say my moods were not static but ever changing, going from bad to worse.

I was filled with doubts. I doubted if I ever would be well despite Dr. Bannion’s reassurance—yet I could not bear to even contemplate the alternative.

The attendant returned. “Dr. Bannion wants to see you. Hurry up!”

The halls seemed to stretch for miles. There were terrible smells and the unmistakable scent of disinfectant that rose over them, trying unsuccessfully to mask them.

“These are the wards.” She startled me when she spoke, for I hadn’t expected it. “The violent cases are kept in a separate building in the back where the cemetery is.”

Looking back on it now, I think she took great joy in telling me these things. I think she was sadistic.

I was in time to hold that opinion about much of the staff.

We passed many sad-faced and disturbed looking creatures. Some reached out to touch me as if greeting a long lost friend or relative. For the most part they seemed harmless, although I remained cautious lest one attack me.

If I had any questions, the attendant’s stern manner and off-handed attitude ensured I would not pose them to her.

At last, we stopped before a great door. Three firm knocks and the door opened to reveal Dr. Bannion. “A little talk now Rose, and then I shall take you to your room.”

Room! That did sound promising as I thought he might have said
ward
otherwise.

I took a seat. His desk was massive and filled with all manner of ledgers and papers and inkwells scattered about.

He picked up a pen and held it mid-air as he spoke. “I do want to just get some facts. I’m afraid these questions are going to sound silly, but there are reasons for them, I assure you. Now then, do you know what year it is?”

“1868, sir.”

“And the month?”

“March and—”

“And if you would be so kind as to tell me where in London you live?”

Live?
Was he joking? I may have been distraught and muddled in my mind but truly, I did have sense enough to know I would not in all likelihood be going back there ever again!

“Notting Hill, sir.”

His hand moved down the page. “And the street?”

That did it, as they say. The street! I saw them all—dead. Butchered, covered in caked blood, blood that had turned their pale colored nightclothes crimson.

“Rose!”

I must have fallen to the floor for I remember nothing but him leaning over me and saying, “You’ve fainted, that’s all. I shall have you taken to your room.”

*

The room was tiny, no bigger than a cupboard, but who was I to complain? After glancing around and smelling the place, I was more than happy to find myself alone.

Dr. Bannion did bid me goodnight. “Rest and we shall talk more in the morning.”

I stared at the closed door for a long time. I remember feeling so many emotions—sadness, upset, grief, fear but, most of all, dread.

Yes, dread and fear are different. Dread is beyond fear, I think. Dread knows fear was correct in the first place and it just intends to sit and wait for the worst to happen, which will happen because dread, if nothing else, is sure of itself.

So what did I dread? The answer is a great many things
,
but mostly I dreaded the future.

Emotional pain is, I believe, worse than physical pain. No part of my body hurt, yet I was suffering more than I ever had in my life. Here I was, barely seventeen, without family. My poor Aunt Maude was soon to die, that was for certain.

If that was the case, where would I go when I was well? I would need employment and a place to live, too.

But who would have me? I couldn’t very well lie about my incarceration in an asylum. My father’s mad act ensured that what he did would be spoken about for a long time to come.

But there was a daughter, dear—remember? Rose something, wasn’t she put away in a lunatic asylum? Sad that, but to be expected, wouldn’t you say?

No point in lying, I was done for, without hope. Dr. Bannion could do as he liked but it wouldn’t matter.

In a way this realization was calming, for hopelessness brought about resolution and closure. Perhaps there was no reason to dread anything!

My life was as good as ended.

With that in mind, I decided to go to sleep and if I didn’t wake up, what did it really matter?

I fell into a heavy sleep but woke during the night. I had the distinct impression that someone had entered my room—no doubt a genuine lunatic.

I recalled the words of the grim-faced attendant who told me about the violent ones who were kept in a separate building.

Had they grown tired of staring at the cemetery? Had they in fact somehow escaped their ward and were now standing in my room watching me, ready to hack me to pieces?

I did hear breathing. Not even breathing either, but heavy breathing—a man’s breathing.

I shall just lie here and not open my eyes. Not challenge him
,
perhaps he’ll go out…

I heard him move. That is, I heard a footstep, then another. The breathing became louder—he was closer.

No! Please go away. Don’t hurt me.

Was this lunatic holding a knife or a razor perhaps? When would I feel the slashing?

Suddenly, I felt fingers upon my neck. Not in a grip but softly touching me. No, not
me
, I realized—they were touching the collar of my shift to draw it down!

And as it was pulled down I felt the chill in the air as my body became exposed. A hand then—hot, probably with misplaced passion, touched my breast, held it and squeezed it.