My dear family,
I was kidnapped by Mr. Manwaring and am at his country home near Litmore. I am unaware of the name of the little town where I am, but I hope the postmark may provide some clue. I am alive and well and will escape if it is ever possible. Know that I love you and miss you all. I am sure we will be reunited someday. Papa, do not let Mr. Manwaring win, for I am sure his purpose in taking me was to defeat you in some way.
I pray daily for you all and send my love,
Helen
Her throat catching, she forced back more tears as she dripped candle wax to seal her note. She addressed it, then put the letter in a thrice-patched pocket. Carefully, she cleaned up the desk, removing any evidence of her crime, and then blew out the candle, returning it to the mantle exactly where she had found it. She checked for the match which she had forgotten, and laid it in the hearth. Quickly, she crept out of the window, reclosing it.
Taking a deep breath, a smile came for the first time in months. Keeping to the shadows, she moved back towards the barn as a large shadow moved to block her.
“Oh!” Helen jumped back. There was a flicker of light, and she realized it was Barker smoking. “Barker, you startled me.”
“I know.” He leaned against the barn door.
Her hands now fists, she protested, “I need to get inside.”
“I got a proposition for ya.” He shifted his boots.
“A what?” Concern at a new horror made her back up.
“Ya need ta send a letter.”
“I…what?”
Moonlight caught the smoke trickling out of his mouth. “I’ll send it for ya.”
Her hands loosened. “I…don’t understand.”
“Which part?”
“Any of it. All of it. How…?”
“The master and his daughter are gone and each of us has plans. It didn’t take much ta figure out yours.” He scratched his crotch. “I expected ya ta run first.” Helen put her hand up to her neck. Barker shook his head as he dropped his cigarette, toeing it out. “It’s best ya didn’t.”
She let her hand drop.
“I’ll send it. For a price.”
“What price?”
“What will ya give me?”
“I have nothing, same as you.” Angry, she tried to shove her way past him, but he grabbed her arm.
“You’ll never get it sent. No one else’ll send it for ya.”
“Then why would you do it?”
“Because I need summat.” He let go.
“Stop talking in circles, and tell me.” She rubbed her arm, which was already beginning to bruise.
“Manwaring knows my name. I need ya ta find out what it is.”
“We all know your name, Barker.”
“Ya don’t.”
There was a sound as Missy came out the back door on her way to the privy. Barker hissed and pushed her into the barn, shutting the door behind him. “Give me the letter and I’ll send it. Ya find out my name.”
She whispered now, caught up in the confusion. “But I don’t understand. How can he have your name, but you don’t know it?”
“I woke up a coupla years ago with a headache. When he realized I couldn’t remember, he laughed and said it was just as well, cause now I didn’t know nothing ‘bout what he’d done.” He folded his arms over his chest.
Helen frowned, shifting hay with her foot. “And the name ‘Barker’?”
“A man came by once. Asked ‘im the name of the dogs. He pointed out Charger, Biter, and then pointed ta me and said, ‘Barker’. They laughed about it, and damn if it didn’t stick.”
Helen watched him, engrossed in this story of the crusty man who constantly made her nervous but now seemed almost vulnerable. “And you’re sure Manwaring knows your real identity?”
“I’m sure. I never know what’s real though. He’ll say summat, but I dunno what’s true. Your knack works on ‘im, don’t it?”
She hesitated, not wanting to commit to anything. “Sometimes. But, I think he lies so often that it almost doesn’t matter.” She paused. “But what about you? What’s your knack?”
“I can tell things about people. What they’re gonna do next, I think. It don’t work on ‘im, though. At least not much.”
So many of her past punishments made sense now, and she was tempted to tell him to ‘rot in hell’. But Helen watched him for a moment, the possibility of hope pushing so strongly, that it burst out, “I’ll do it.”
“I know.” He looked at her again, and even though she couldn’t see his expression in the shadows, she shivered.
“When?”
“Tomorrow I’m headed ta town.”
“Thank you, Barker.” She handed him the envelope, which he folded and stuck in his back pocket. She caught her breath. “What if it slips out? Or gets dirty, or…?”
He grunted, “Find out my name, girl.” then moved to leave.
Frustrated with Barker and depressed at her predicament, she moved to her loft where her dreams swayed from house to house as her ghost looked for someone who knew her.
***
The house had eventually metamorphosed into a ramshackled place until one day Miss Rose and her father came home. The carriage was slow, and even the horses looked defeated as they plodded to a stop and waited to unload their burden. Manwaring exited first, his face a pattern of anger and determination.
Helen gasped as Rose stumbled out, her face pale, her body thin and worn, her eyes bleak. Manwaring zeroed in on Helen.
“You, girl. Take Rose up to her room and care for her until the nurse arrives.”
Helen helped Rose take step after step through the house and up the stairs, her father watching with the seven deadly sins in his eyes. Sympathy filled her as she helped the girl lay on her bed to fall into a sleep that seemed much too quiet. Helen sat in a wooden chair at her side and watched as one pale hand slowly fell from the covers to dangle over the side of the bed.
Slowly, she reached forward to hold Rose’s soft cold hand. Her own was calloused, but warm and filled with life and in this moment, Helen felt pity for her enemy. It seemed, she thought, the worst of fates to be born to a man like Manwaring and be raised in a home such as this. With each similar thought, Helen’s sorrow grew, and for the first time in months, she felt compassion for her mistress.
“Get up, girl. Who said you could sit?” Manwaring slapped her face awake, and she stumbled to a stand, staggering backwards until she felt the wall and finally the doorway. Turning, she ran down the stairs and back out to the barn, shaking at the abrupt anger.
She felt an anticipation building; the dreaded moment waited all day, creeping up on her until finally Manwaring stood at the bottom of her ladder. She made her way down knowing better than to wait for the command.
“Your father ruined the water machine.” His voice dripped with malice, his face set with accusation.
Helen’s eyes shot up. “Not the Clearwater machine. He wouldn’t.”
A gruesome slice of a grin spread across Manwaring’s face. “He ruined mine.”
Helen thought of all the inventions he had changed and looked back up to meet her master’s eyes. “I wouldn’t have thought he would, not even for you.”
“But he did, girl, and it nearly killed my Rose.”
Helen held her breath, his intent now clear. She would be the whipping boy in place of her father. The thought gave her courage, and she stood up straighter.
Manwaring eyed her, his lips coming to a point. “Rose’s efforts with your water have had the excellent result of bringing you to heel while still keeping you alive. However, I have decided from now on your water will not come from anywhere but the now incorrectly named Clearwater machine.” He leaned forward, his eyes narrowed. “If you get sick and die, it will only be justice. In fact,” he leaned back, a high pitched laugh in his throat, “I think I’ll write your father when it’s all over, to tell him how he murdered his own child trying to destroy me. It’s really rather funny
, isn’t it?”
His laugh echoed in her ears all that night and into the next day, and each time she took a drink, she prayed it would be a quick death.
***
Despite Manwaring’s prediction, six more months passed, and with it, any hope she had of her letter helping her. Barker had nodded as he returned that day, and she had lived on that hope for weeks. Too often she was punished with lack of food or beatings or both, and soon she looked as ragged and pathetic as Rose had been.
One day, a man came to visit. His stay was short, and at the end of it, her master walked him to the carriage, their talk of trade and business unfamiliar. She was weeding the flowers by the side of the house, making her movements small so as not to draw attention.
“Your skills have been very useful, Manwaring, so you needn’t worry we won’t include you.”
“I never thought it possible, my lord.”
The guest stopped in his tracks as he saw Barker come around the side of the house. “I say, your servant looks remarkably familiar, Manwaring. Has he been with you long?”
“Oh, ages. I picked him up at the orphanage in Litmore when he was a boy. It’s better to give them an occupation than leave them in those awful places, you know?”
“Ah, ever the softy, Manwaring. You’ll let me know how it goes with the permits?”
“Of course. I would never take a step without you, my lord.”
“Excellent, excellent. I say, he really does look like George, doesn’t he?”
Truth. Helen looked up, the weeds forgotten.
“No, no, you remember George is much taller than this fellow.”
“Ah yes, he was quite tall. And my eyesight is not so good anymore.” With that deprecation, he stepped into his carriage, received farewells and left.
Helen, now well versed in survival, had immediately stepped behind a bush so as to avoid punishment for whatever imagined infraction she had incurred. Barker had returned to the barn, and at the first opportunity, she hurried to find him, the unfamiliar excitement giving her strength.
Checking behind her for anyone eavesdropping, she exclaimed, “Barker! Did you hear that?”
He stood there, leaning again against a post.“Aye. But there’s no proof the man knows me, is there? Manwaring may have been telling the truth for all I know.”
“But he can’t have. For the other man, whoever he is, was telling the truth. He was fairly ringing with it. You look exactly like this ‘George’, and it was only Manwaring’s lies that made him believe otherwise, for you’re as tall as any man I’ve seen.”
Barker looked at her, his lips thin. “So you think I’m this George then?”
“I do. And I think…” She turned and started to pace. “I think I just might have an idea.”
Their grand plan required Barker to steal a few pennies for post while Helen pretended to gossip with Cook for two hours before finally finding out that Lord Everton was the name of the man who’d had three servings of her apple tart. She was beaten for being behind on her chores, but this time, she felt the thrill of success give her strength. Missy, who had long had her eye on Barker, who sneered at her pockmarked face, was prevailed upon to provide him with a few sheets of paper and a fountain pen that would not be missed. There was a moment of agony as they decided what to write that could be seen as a casual question but serious enough to warrant a reply.
Finally one day Barker returned from town with a reply from Lord Everton. His grandson George Norcott had disappeared a few years ago leaving behind a wife and child. His distress at his grandson’s abandonment of them almost matched his disdain that George had married so far beneath his precedents, but he included an address for the family in case the curious friend should want to see them for any reason.
Barker’s face glowed as he read it, and shoving the reply in his pocket turned to Helen. “I have a name! A real one, not some idiot mutt’s name. George Norcott. George Norcott.”He looked up at the sky to glory in his knowledge, and when he looked back at her, his face held a sturdiness that had never been there before. “I’ll be off tonight then, for I think the weather will hold.”
“Bar – George, there never was a reply for me at the post office, was there?”
“A what? Oh, no.”
Truth. “But you did send it.”
He laughed. “I said I would, didn’t I?”
Helen thought a moment, wondering how she’d missed the sly deception. “You didn’t actually say you did, only that you were going to town...you avoided me knowing you weren’t really going to send it, didn’t you?”
He laughed again, an awkward noise that left him coughing. Tears fell despite her best efforts to hold them back, and as she walked away, despair settled its heavy chains about her shoulders.
He left that night, his silhouette growing smaller as the shadows grew deeper. She had wondered if she should try to leave too, for it might be her best opportunity. However, she forced herself to return to her loft, for she knew deep down they’d find her, and the dogs…she held her hand to her throat.
The nightmares were stronger that night and in the morning, despite her regrets, she was glad she hadn’t been foolish.
Helen had just finished milking the cow when the barn door opened. Forgetting for a moment, she called out, “George, did…” She stopped, realizing her mistake as the morning sun spilled across the ground.
“So you did help him.” Manwaring leaned over Daisy’s back to look down at her. “I think we need to have a talk.”
She stood, moving slowly away from Daisy’s uncanny hind legs, finally placing herself in front of him.
He looked down at her, his lips pursed with a disturbing smile. “Your crimes are quite numerous. Stealing, going behind my back, breaking into my house. You cannot honestly think I would never have found out.” He slapped his walking stick into his palm.
“It was worth it.”
“What was that?” His bark rang in her ears as he leaned forward, and she swallowed.
“I said it was worth it to free one person from your grasp.”
He laughed, and it sang of practice. “George Norcott beat his wife so hard she had her child early, and both would have died if he hadn’t left them to help me with, hmm…a little project. His memory loss was really incredibly convenient. If you had not helped him, he would never have returned to his little wife to force her into an early grave.” He leaned even closer now, whispering in her ear. “Helping George Norcott return to his family will haunt you for the rest of your days.”
‘Truth’ his words sang as he brought down his cane. She counted to seventy-nine before he stopped, and she laid in her own filth for two days before she rose again.
Sleeping Beauty
My dear family,
How wonderful it is to receive your letters each week and hear how you are.
I am doing very well – Cook says my appetite is ‘something to behold’, but I tell her it is only a compliment to her cooking.
Jack dear, I agree that having a machine to shoot you straight up into the air sounds like a lot of fun. However, perhaps you ought to make sure there’s a way to get back down without breaking both your legs? The next time Mary comes by and you want to impress her, you should try showing her the vase that Papa made Mama a long time ago. You remember, don’t you? The one that when you put flowers in it, they keep them living until you take them out again? I think Mary would like that invention a lot more than the one that shoots peas hard enough to bruise. Or perhaps she’s the type of girl to enjoy shooting peas at you, in which case I expect a full confession of the details in your next letter.
Dearest Pa, when you take your walk to visit Mama, please give her my love. I used to bring roses from the little bush by the shed, but you are perfectly right, the lilies are much more suitable.
Paul – I have enclosed my latest story, which Luke says isn’t my best, but I think he means to say he’s frustrated that everyone didn’t end up the way he hoped they would.
Love to you all,
Helen
***
One morning, when she realized time had blown by without stopping, Helen awoke in the window seat of the library once again having made a midnight foray and having fallen asleep in the middle of a book. She woke to the smell of bacon, and sat up to see the breakfast cart being unloaded onto the table.
Luke entered and walked over to her, sniffing her hand. “You didn’t have a nightmare last night.”
“That’s true, how did you know?” Her hand rested on his nose for a moment then moved to wrap a blanket around her as she came to the table.
“You smell different when you’ve had a nightmare.”
“I do? What do I smell like?” She paused to grab a corner of the blanket that had fallen.
“Fear.”
“What does fear smell like?”
He stared at the sky before answering. “When you are standing under a crowd of black thunderclouds but the air is dry. The sky quivers with the heat of unshot lightning, and the perfume of something burning is so intense that you can taste it.”
She shivered.
“Like that.”
They were content to eat for a while and again he waited until she finished before he made his request.
“I was wondering what you had planned for today.”
She smiled and placed her napkin next to her plate. “You seem as if you have an idea of what I should do.”
“I would enjoy another story if you wouldn’t mind.”
She smiled wider and looked down, thinking for a moment, dismissing the usual stories her brothers had begged for. And then she remembered the sleeping princess and the prince they had left without a bride. “I do, but isn’t it your turn to tell a story?”
The Unbreakable Curse: A Beauty & the Beast Retelling Page 7
