Midnight in Austenland

by Shannon Hale

  Miss Gardenside seemed perkier than usual, sitting up straight and even rising to walk about. She sat at the piano and began to play, drawing a liquid song from the keys, but stopped abruptly and moved to the window. Lightning turned the night briefly silver, throbbing in and out before going dark again, and thunder groaned not far behind.

  “Read some of the book, please, Colonel Andrews,” said Charlotte.

  “Quite right, Mrs. Cordial,” he said, pulling the book from his breast pocket. “Excellent suggestion. There is much to learn of Mary Francis, I believe, and this weather creates the perfect ambience. Now, let’s see, where were we?

  I hear sounds in the girl Mary’s room at nights, my own chamber beside hers. Pacing or scraping. It is unnerving, but whenever I mean to ask her about it come morning, she looks so sad and tired I hold my tongue. The girl Betsy what used to board with her ran off one night and never come back to collect her wages. Cook tells me she feels a cold wind around the girl Mary and to get rid of her. Even if—

  Colonel Andrews stopped reading as the electric lights in the room crackled and flashed, then went dark. Only the glow from the candles and a few kerosene lamps remained, their trembling flares making pockets of uncertain light. Charlotte stood from the couch and instinctively went closer to Eddie. He put a hand on her back.

  “Lights out, Mallery?” he asked.

  Mr. Mallery checked the electric lamps, clicking them on and off without effect. He stepped out and was gone a few minutes. Probably checking a breaker, Charlotte thought with an eerie feeling of déjà vu. He returned, a candle in hand, and shook his head. At least he hadn’t donned a gorilla mask.

  “Quite a storm,” he said. “It has stripped us of all but firelight tonight, I think.”

  Charlotte took several steps closer to Mr. Mallery and his candle. The rain clawed at the window as if looking for a way in. The night storm seemed much closer now that the electric lights didn’t blaze it back. No one spoke for a few moments. It seemed unlikely that anyone was ready for sleep. Charlotte’s own mood was zigging and zapping her pulse.

  “Now what on earth can we do in the dark to pass the time?” Colonel Andrews said, his voice velvety.

  Miss Charming giggled.

  “Indeed,” said Mrs. Wattlesbrook with an offended sniff.

  “I have it!” The colonel’s voice brightened. “Let us play Bloody Murder.”

  “Ooh, the name alone gives one the shivers,” said Miss Gardenside.

  “Bloody Murder,” Mrs. Wattlesbrook said. “That is most certainly not my cup of tea.”

  “Now, Missus—” Colonel Andrews began.

  “I will retire,” she interrupted. “Do not let the ‘murderer’ take refuge in my chamber, and keep things proper, sir, and you young creatures may have your merriment. Good night.”

  Charlotte watched Mrs. Wattlesbrook leave, a candle in hand, and wished she could go too. Which was ridiculous. She was a grown woman, and however ominous the game sounded, it was just a game.

  “How do you play Bloody Murder?” Charlotte asked casually.

  Colonel Andrews smiled. “I approve of your eagerness, Mrs. Cordial! And I shall not leave you in suspense. First we put out all the lights in the house.”

  Colonel Andrews picked up a brass extinguisher and capped three candles on the mantelpiece, then turned off the kerosene lamps. He nodded at Eddie, who licked his fingertips and quenched the candlewicks on the sideboard.

  The room seemed to put on a shawl against the chill of the night. Miss Charming squealed in delighted terror.

  “One of us will be the murderer,” said Colonel Andrews, lifting the last remaining lit candle closer to his face, pushing the shadows up.

  “The murderer hides somewhere in the dark house,” he continued. “After a count of fifty, the rest of us hunt him out—each of us alone, mind you. The first to discover the murderer wherever he hides gives a shout of ‘bloody murder!’ and all the hunters flee for the drawing room. With the shout, you see, the murderer is loosed from his hiding place and can pursue.”

  “And what happens if he catches us?” Miss Gardenside asked, her tone playful.

  “If the murderer touches you, you are dead and fall where you stand. The murderer tries to touch everyone before they can get to the safety of the drawing room. The last one touched will be the next murderer.”

  A hand grabbed Charlotte’s shoulder. She screamed. It was Eddie.

  “Upon my word, Charlotte,” said her brother, “you are providing this game the perfect music.”

  Charlotte took some comfort in the fact that surely no one could see her blush in the dim light. Only Colonel Andrews’s face was strictly visible, though it was flickering like the flame.

  “I don’t really understand,” Charlotte said shyly. “If there were a murderer hiding somewhere in the house, why would we all split up and hunt him out? I mean, wouldn’t we want to stay away? Or together at least.”

  Colonel Andrews clicked his tongue. “You are delightfully practical, Mrs. Cordial. We hunt for the glory of discovering the culprit!”

  “And because it’s fun,” said Miss Gardenside.

  Theoretically, thought Charlotte.

  There was a cracking noise in the dark. Eddie stepped into the circle of candlelight, six matches in his fist.

  “Whoever draws the short stick is the murderer,” he said.

  Charlotte drew first, relieved her match was long. It was the solitude she feared most, going out into that dark house, waiting alone. She would make a horrible murderer, more afraid of her victims than they were of her, a feeble spider trembling on her web. Stay away, flies! Please, stay away!

  The other two ladies likewise drew long sticks. The colonel offered his fist to Mr. Mallery, who hesitated before drawing. His match was half the size of the others.

  “Mr. Mallery is the murderer!” Miss Gardenside shrieked.

  Later Charlotte wondered if she misread his expression, because the gentleman’s face seemed momentarily alarmed—more, even a little frightened. Was it possible that he too hated the dark, the solitude, the waiting? She almost took pity on him and volunteered to be his partner. But he so quickly recovered that she didn’t trust her memory.

  “Very well, then,” said Mr. Mallery. “I suggest you all prepare yourself for a speedy death.”

  Miss Gardenside giggled. Charlotte shivered as if icy fingers were tickling her ribs.

  “A right jolly fright I’ve got,” Miss Charming said with glee.

  “I’ll warn the servants to stay in their chambers or in the kitchen,” said Colonel Andrews. “We shall limit our playground to rooms with open doors, all right?”

  He left, taking the only candle with him.

  “Colonel, the candle—” Mr. Mallery began, but Andrews was already gone, leaving them in darkness. “What a dolt.”

  There was silence. The room was absolutely dark after the departure of that single light. Charlotte didn’t dare move for fear of touching people unexpectedly, and maybe in unexpected places, which would so not be Regency appropriate.

  “Should we sit down?” Miss Gardenside whispered.

  “I fear I would sit on you rather than the sofa,” Eddie whispered back.

  “Why are we whispering?” Miss Charming whispered.

  “Well, we are in a dark room with a murderer,” said Charlotte. “No need to alert him to our presence.”

  “Ho hum, poor me,” Mr. Mallery said somewhere to her left. “A murderer, all alone, and no one to murder. If only a potential victim would speak up and alert me to her presence.”

  Miss Gardenside giggled.

  “Got you!” Eddie said suddenly, seizing the lady’s arm.

  Miss Gardenside screamed. So did Charlotte. Stupid brothers.

  “What? Wait! Do not start without me,” Colonel Andrews said, rushing back in, the candle flame bobbing. He placed the candle in a holder on the mantel. “We are safe. The servants absconded, and the house is ours. Go on, Mallery. W
e will give you till fifty.”

  Charlotte stood close to the candle and watched their elected murderer leave the room, his expression decidedly sneaky. Charlotte put her arm through Miss Charming’s.

  “Want to be hiding buddies?” she whispered.

  “Don’t be silly,” Miss Charming whispered back. “If we’re together, it makes cornering a gentleman and accidentally kissing him on the mouth a lot harder.”

  “Oh. Right, of course …”

  Colonel Andrews took care of the counting. “Fifty” came quickly. Charlotte could see the indistinct figures of Miss Charming and Miss Gardenside bobbing with excitement as they ventured off into the inky house. The colonel and Eddie both wore dark jackets, and the blackness swallowed them up at once.

  Stop it, Charlotte. This is just a children’s game. And you aren’t a child. You’re fine.

  Her heart beat like a fleeing rabbit’s, but she left the safety of the drawing room and its single spark of light. She could hear the creak of steps and hurried breaths of the others, and she tried to make for the sounds, hoping for any companion in the dark. She thought she was on the trail of Colonel Andrews, but when she caught up with him, instead she found her own face in a mirror guarding the dining room.

  “Hello?” she whispered in the black. “Hello? Anyone there?”

  A rustle from the corner. Was it Mr. Mallery? He wasn’t really a murderer, of course. Nothing to fear. And if it was Mr. Mallery, she could yell “bloody murder” and get this game over with.

  She reached out, feeling cloth. Her breath caught. His jacket? No, it felt like velvet. The drapes.

  The sound of running feet upstairs sent her spinning, looking for danger. The drawing room and the safety of its candle felt way too far away. She started to run and slammed her leg into a chair. A cry escaped her lips, and she might have fallen, but hands caught her. She couldn’t scream—her breath was already gone. But the hands were warm and righted her, one holding her hand, one steadying her back.

  “Are you hurt?” Mr. Mallery whispered. She could hear his distinct tone in that whisper, even if she couldn’t make out his face. “Your heart is thumping like a beast.”

  She wasn’t surprised he could feel her heartbeat through her back. She could feel it in her fingernails and eyelashes.

  “You scared me,” she said.

  “Isn’t that the purpose of the game?” he asked. “Truly, I am not certain, so perhaps you could enlighten me.”

  “I’m as much in the dark as you are,” she said, then laughed.

  He didn’t laugh, but his hand moved on her back, a comforting kind of pat. It was so small a gesture but felt like fire on her skin, and instead of calming, the pounding of her chest magnified. A man was holding her in the dark. She sighed at her own pathetic heart.

  “I believe you are obliged to yell ‘bloody murder,’ ” he said.

  “I don’t really want to.” She wanted to stay still. For the briefest moment, the dark felt like a good place to be.

  “Mrs. Cordial …” His hands fell away.

  She took a deep breath and yelled, “Bloody murder!” Then she dropped to the floor. Mr. Mallery rushed off.

  From the carpet in the dining room, she heard the screams and laughs, the pounding footfalls and shouts of warning. When the sounds died out, she stood and moved carefully through the dining room, knowing that Mr. Mallery had left minutes ago but feeling that he was still there, watching her. It was not a comfortable sensation, not as it had been when he’d held her.

  All the players had returned to the drawing room and were recounting their various hiding spots and moments of terror with breathless excitement.

  “There is our murderer!” said Colonel Andrews, smiling at Charlotte.

  “What? I’m the only one he touched?” she said.

  “I missed them all,” Mr. Mallery said. “I was clumsy.”

  Miss Charming giggled. “Right-o! The bloke nearly broke the stairs with his head.”

  Colonel Andrews was smiling at Charlotte, though in the traitorous shadowing of candlelight, the smile seemed full of malice. “Very well then, Mrs. Cordial. You have till the count of fifty.”

  “But—”

  “One, two, three …” Miss Gardenside began.

  Chanting numbers prodded Charlotte from the room, and before she could lose her nerve, she ran into the dark.

  She’d meant to hide somewhere close to the drawing room and get it over with, but as soon as she was alone, she just kept running, passing up dozens of hiding places: the dining room with its voluminous drapes and vast under-table territory; the morning room with its concealing chairs and settees, its windows curtained from the occasional buzz of lightning; the ballroom, large as the moon and echoey as a seashell.

  Up the stairs she went, counting along in her head—thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three—past the gallery and its creepy staring portraits. Charlotte didn’t know she had a plan until she was on the spiral staircase leading to the servants’ rooms, which she found in the dark by memory. The second floor.

  The far window was like a glint of gray water at the bottom of a well. Charlotte could hear distant thumping, feet running. The count was over. They were on the hunt. She pressed her back to the wall and walked along it, her hands running over the wood paneling, her eyes alert to the shifts in the dark, shapes that could be a person, watching.

  Her breath got louder in her own ears. She hated this. She wanted to be wrapped in velvet drapes like Mr. Mallery, not standing naked as a skeleton in the middle of a hall. Hide, hide, hide …

  There was a creak to her right. Her breath startled out of her. She pressed her back harder to the wall, kept moving, her hands sliding over the wainscoting.

  She felt a notch. Her fingers investigated it. And suddenly the wall at her back wasn’t there anymore. She gasped and fell backward, landing on her rear. Something clicked shut.

  Charlotte scrambled to her feet, and her shoulders hit a wall. Where was she? Had she entered one of the upstairs rooms? But she hadn’t turned a doorknob.

  There was a bare window, and the room was filled with murky gray light, thick as oatmeal. This was definitely not the hallway. She pressed her hands to her pounding chest and looked around. There must be a door. Of course there had to be a door. How else did she get in?

  She could not walk without bumping into things. This chamber was filled with objects—a storage room perhaps? She put her hands out, feeling her way around, trying to work toward the window and its pale invitation of light. From there she could find the other walls and search for a door.

  Her fingers drifted over dusty wood, crates, cardboard boxes, glass vases, fringed pillows. Then something cool and fleshy. She paused.

  That is not what it felt like, she told herself.

  Of course not. What a ridiculous notion! She’d just take a closer look then laugh at herself and her prickly imagination. She moved aside what appeared to be a heavy velvet curtain from atop a sofa and peered in the half-light at what lay underneath.

  Lightning filled the window, piercing the room with an X-ray flash. And she saw. It seemed to be … it couldn’t be but it sure looked like … a hand. A cold, dead hand. And in her experience, hands tend to be attached to bodies.

  She saw for just a splinter of a second. The room went postlightning dark, but still Charlotte stared. She stared for the count of three, waiting for her mind to come up with an alternate possibility.

  It didn’t.

  Charlotte screamed. She screamed as if her voice could shatter windows. She screamed as she threw herself back the way she thought she’d come, fingers scrambling at the wall, searching for a way out, an escape. Something clicked, a piece of the wall lurched open as if on springs. She was knocked back. She crawled out the opening and kept screaming.

  The scream lasted as she went down the spiral stairs, down the main staircase, and zipped into the drawing room, though by then it was breathy and restless, a scream that wouldn’t stay pu
t in her throat but kept slipping down into her middle or floating out harmlessly on an exhale.

  The candlelight was a bronze haze hanging in the room, earthy and solid-seeming. The five others were staring at her. Colonel Andrews and Mr. Mallery seemed a little winded, as if they’d only just run into the room themselves.

  “I didn’t hear anyone shout ‘bloody murder,’ ” said Miss Gardenside.

  “Who found you?” asked Colonel Andrews. “Did you touch someone?”

  “I … no,” said Charlotte. Except a dead hand. But she felt supremely silly now that she was back among living people in the security of candlelight. Sure, she thought she’d found a dead body on the second floor, but why couldn’t she be clinical about it? Simply shout, “Hello everyone! There’s a dead body here. Come take a look, please, and someone perhaps should ring the coroner.” But no. Thanks to her brother in a mask, she was a quivering ball of feminine terror.

  “You know you were screaming?” Eddie came up to her, holding the candle. “You do look a bit mad. I suppose that is the point of this game though, eh, Andrews?”

  “There was something, I touched something …” Charlotte looked at Mr. Mallery as she spoke. His eyes were hooded in the dim light, strong arms ill at ease in this setting. They were arms fit for doing, not playing children’s games. The danger of him made her trust him now. A dead body on the second floor was something Mr. Mallery could handle.

  “You are frightened,” he said.

  She nodded. “I think there was a body …”

  Miss Charming gasped. Miss Gardenside tittered nervously.

  Mr. Mallery didn’t respond for a few moments. Then he offered his arm and said, “Mrs. Cordial, if you would, show us what you found.”

  She took his arm and immediately felt safe. Whatever might lurk upstairs, it couldn’t be more dangerous than the man on her arm.

  I’d like Mr. Mallery to rescue me, Charlotte suddenly thought.

  That’s a weird thought, said her Inner Thoughts. You’d never catch me thinking stupid thoughts like that.