The Price of Hannah Blake (26 page)

“So what will everyone do?”

The doctor says do nothing. It might not be contagious. It was quick.”

“Thanks, Charles. You helped me. I want to be friends, do you?”

He was rising. The dining room had emptied. “I’m over it, whatever it was, with us. If you are, then we’re friends.”

“Good. Wait, I’m coming. We can’t be late.”

During exercises, she leaped and bent, stretched and twisted, like an automaton. Once, seeing herself as she had not for some time, she felt the absurdity: she was naked, among naked men and women, hair flapping, breasts jouncing, as her whole mind fought off the most terrible imaginings about the man she loved. As the class neared its end, she had repeated to herself David’s words, “believe nothing,” a dozen times—a dozen-dozen—and lost the struggle.

As her feet hit the floor, her knees gave way, her muscles went slack, and she crashed to the floor, the back of her head striking it with a thud, bouncing, and she lay still. “Halt!” snapped Maria, and hurried to her. The others hesitated, looking down at her, and then crowded in.

Maria knelt and said, “Hannah!” The body did not move, lying slack, one arm thrown back, the other to the side. Hannah’s lips were parted and now foam came to them, oozing between the lips. “Hannah!” said Maria, again, and shook her. The eyelids slid open, but the eyes were upturned, showing mostly whites. “Charles, Alan, Edward, pick her up. One at her shoulders, one at her waist, one at her legs; slowly, be careful. Keep her body straight.”

They stooped, got their arms beneath her, and lifted easily. Her nude body across the trestle of arms had no tension, head back, arms dangling. Lilly was whimpering, “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?”

“Come, you’ll have to move sideways,” ordered Maria. “Follow me.”

A few minutes later, Dr. McLeod had closed his door and turned to the nude body on his examining table. He walked over and looked down. He called, “Hannah?”

She opened her eyes. He said, “Good you’ve come round.”

“I had to talk with you,” she Hannah. She began to sit up.

“No, don’t get up. You’ve had some kind of seizure.”

Hannah had sat up and swung her legs over the side. He came forward, arms out to catch her.

“There is nothing wrong. I had to see you.”

“But what happened in exercise?”

“When I was a girl, a man in my town had a fit. It scared me terribly; I never forgot it—his eyes, the foam at his lips. People wouldn’t go near him; they said it was insanity. But my mother called it ‘epilepsy,’ and said the man would wake up by himself. He did.”

The slightest smile was on Dr. MacLeod’s face. “I see. All right. You had to talk with me.”

“What happened to David?” she demanded.

“Didn’t you hear? The students aren’t supposed to be told anything, but somehow these things don’t remain secret.”

“I heard that he died. I don’t believe it. What happened?”

Dr. MacLeod frowned, shrugging slightly, and said, “It happened very quickly. I’ve seldom seen anything like it. Just three days; he lost consciousness the second day. His fever was almost unbelievable. I’m sorry, did you…?”

She was shaking her head, lips compressed; she still watched him intently. He asked, “Well, all right. Why don’t you believe me? I closed his coffin myself and they loaded it and took it to the wharf. People saw. I just don’t understand.”

She said doggedly, “He had been planning to do something, something he waited to do, and that day he was going to do it. Instead, he died. I don’t think things happen that way. Tell me!”

He was scrutinizing her face. He spoke gently. “Do you know what a ‘coincidence’ is, Hannah?”

She shook her head.

“It is when two things happen that have no special reason to happen together. One doesn’t cause the other. And people think it is strange. Do you know that people can get struck by lightning?”

“Yes…I guess so. Yes, I’ve heard it.”

“But it doesn’t happen very often, does it?”

She shook her head. He said, “Do you know a man once got struck and killed by lightning on his wedding day? It’s true.”

“I see…” she said slowly. She began to cry, her face lowered, her shoulders shaking. After a moment, her arms came up and wrapped around her breasts. She felt naked. Dr. MacLeod was silent. Finally, she looked up, passing the back of her wrist across her eyes. “I’ll go back,” she said, and moved to slip to the ground.

“Wait,” he said, quietly. “It’s all right, lay back. I can cover you. You’ll rest.”

“No,” she got to her feet. She looked at him, “What will I tell Maria and the others?”

“Did you hit your head when you fell?”

“Much, much harder than I expected.”

He stepped closer and reached around her head. His fingers slipped beneath her hair. He said, “You sure did! Tell them you fainted, but I don’t think it will happen again. When you fell, you hit your head and were unconscious; that’s why they couldn’t wake you.”

She nodded. “Thank you,” she said, tonelessly, and started for the door.

“What are you going to do, Hannah?”

“Go back to exercise. It’s probably over, by now.”

“No, I mean, you are very upset. What will you do?”

“What can I do? Survive.”

Again, he was watching her closely, a frown on his face. He nodded slowly. “Hannah, keep on doing what you’re doing, all right? Just do it. And remember that things you think will never change, cannot change, do change; that is the nature of life. Don’t assume that what is now will be always, all right?”

“Being dead doesn’t change,” she said, dully. “Thank you, Dr. MacLeod.” She reached for the door handle.

Behind her, he said, “Hannah…”

She turned.

He was shaking his head, eyes closed. “No,” he said. “Nothing.”

She must sleep. But if she slept at the usual time, she might not wake till dawn. There was no way to wake herself. She thought of asking Rachael, but then Rachael would have to stay awake, then break curfew. So, Hannah found a place in the gardens, quiet and shady but where someone would see her on their way to dinner and wake her. That would be three hours, better than nothing. She stretched out on the grass, head on her arm, and ordered herself to sleep. She commanded the thoughts, heartbreak, and fear to go away. For a few minutes nothing happened, but the feelings of that day had drained her as no exercise regimen could. She slept.

It was Charles who shook her awake, looking down at her with a smile. “Dinner,” he said. She smiled back and struggled up, brushing away dried grass. All right, her next assignment was to eat, eat enough, not too much. She felt no hunger; it didn’t matter, she ate.

Back at her room, she looked around. Nothing was hers. They had thrown away the faded gray woolens she wore the day she was taken prisoner. Nothing had any personal meaning. She had the one thing she needed, a silver letter opener. It was incongruous like everything, here. She never had received a letter here and never would, but the opener was in her top drawer along with a silver hand-held mirror, nail files, small scissors. The opener had a sharp point, but a very dull blade—not even a blade, just edges. She might find a way to sharpen them, if she had time, but she didn’t. She tied a cord around the handle, pulled the knot tight, then tied the other end of the cord. She had a loop; she hung it around her neck, so the opener hung between her breasts under her blouse.

That afternoon, as classes ended, Maria had called to her, “Hannah, stay.”

When the others had left, Maria came over. She nodded to Hannah, but her gaze moved down Hannah’s body. Hannah felt no embarrassment, but wondered what Maria intended. Maria said, with what sounded to Hannah like unaccustomed gentleness, “Dress if you wish, before we talk.”

“It’s all right,” said Hannah.

Maria hesitated, then said, “The duke comes tomorrow night. You know that.” It was not a question.

Hannah nodded, but fear brushed her belly.

Maria said, “They will take you to wait in his room. I don’t know how you will be. He has whims—naked, dressed, bound… But listen, I have heard something. The Countess Wittke will be with him. I am told because the show will have a few special things for her. Do you remember who she is?”

Hannah began to shake her head, but stopped. Her gaze rested on Maria’s torso. She said, slowly, “I think so.” How quickly her lips began to tremble, she thought. Seeing the direction in which Hannah looked, Maria nodded. Her hands took the edges of her top and bottom, lifting up the one, pushing down the other. She wore nothing underneath. On the slender, perfectly contoured torso Hannah saw the ghastly, dull red scars that ran up over her breasts, down across her belly. It was what Maria had showed Hannah that first day.

Maria said, “It was the Countess Wittke who did most of this to me, not the duke. I don’t think the duke liked it, but the countess has her way.” She pulled together the garments. “She is startlingly beautiful, even now, a strong face, blond hair—like the Germans of the north. But she is the cruelest woman on Earth and she hates other women. Or she loves them, if she can destroy their beauty.”

Hannah wished she had dressed. Her bare body was what Maria meant; she felt rash to stand here naked. Maria said: “I can’t help you, not very much. Just this: do everything the duke says, everything, immediately. Show no defiance. Try to smile, welcome his advances if you can.”

She studied Hannah’s face, pale now, washed of expression, only the eyes wide with growing terror. She said, “If you give the duke no reason to let the countess punish you, perhaps he will protect you—mostly. From the worst. I defied them; I was proud.. I let the countess have an argument for punishing me.”

She stopped. Hannah moved her lips, swallowing, seemed to start to form words, said nothing.

“Do you understand, Hannah?”

Hannah nodded.

“Perhaps you can save yourself,” said Maria urgently, bending toward her. “Say you understand.”

“I do,” Hannah managed to say. She stepped closer. Her voice was shaking, but she said, “I will never forget what you are doing for me, Maria,” and tears came to her eyes.

“Do not forget what I told you—that is the important thing.”

“Thank you,” she murmured and stepped toward Maria, as if to embrace her.

“Good, then. You may go.”

Before she had finished showering, dressing, Hannah had formed an image of herself running down the dark path through the woods, creeping across the moonlit sand, slipping into the waves without a splash, swimming. And she remembered her dream, that she swam knowing she never would return to the beach, only swim farther and farther from what lay behind her, but with no knowledge of what lay ahead.

“Mr. Prime Minister, permit me to present Mr. David Landau of Scotland Yard and our naval intelligence. Mr. Landau, the Prime Minister.”

The prime minister came from behind the desk, hand extended. He was altogether bigger than David, with the bulky shoulders and massive head, a head more formidable still with its full beard. He clasped David’s hand, staring into his face, the famous eyes like a hunting falcon’s. He turned to the first lord and said, “thank you for opening your home to us, First Lord.”

And then to David: “I need not say, here, how completely confidential this must remain.”

David frowned slightly, nodded, and said, “Of course, Mr. Prime Minister—until the required evidence is in hand.”

The Prime Minister fixed him, again, without speaking for some moments, and then said, “Be seated, be seated,” indicating two chairs before the desk. He retreated behind it, sat heavily, and leaned forward. The bunched shoulders beneath the suit became still more massive. “So you succeeded in extracting yourself from that place. I am relieved. It was by no means certain…”

“No,” interjected the first lord quickly. “By no means, and Mr. Landau tells me his escape might have been long delayed, if possible at all, without the unexpected assistance of the doctor—I mentioned the doctor who disappeared two years ago?”

“Yes, indeed.”

“He is in fact a prisoner of the duke, with little freedom of movement, serving as physician to the prisoners and staff.”

“The doctor himself, the man from Scotland, a prisoner?”

David bowed his head. “Yes, and an angry one, Mr. Prime Minister, who loathes what is done to the young men and women who are prisoners there for life. Knowing his circumstances, I approached him, first by hints, then small confidences on each side, until we achieved trust enough so that I identified myself and he on the spot pledged his assistance.”

“I want your full report, Mr. Landau, and momentarily, but first—how did you escape this place? Was it in fact as fully a prison as the first lord suggests?”

“High walls on the land side, armed guarded around the clock. All gates locked and guarded, and the mansion, where the prisoners live, locked after curfew. Small violations are punished. For defiance or attempted escape, the penalty may be flogging or torture by the guards, usually of a sexual nature. I endured three such days when I arrived.”