The Derring-Do Club and the Empire of the Dead

by David Wake

  He slipped a ring off his right hand and slipped it over the middle finger of Earnestine’s left hand.

  “I’m free to go?”

  “You are free of me, if you wish,” Pieter replied. “But the others will try to stop you.”

  He clicked his heels together, bowed smartly, turned and walked out.

  Earnestine put her fingers to her lips, touching where his mouth had been to try and elicit the sensation again.

  And then she ran.

  Miss Georgina

  “Ladies first,”? said Merryweather.

  “You first, Merry. I think the experienced climber should go first to discover any obstacles to our ascent,” said Georgina, very much aware that she was wearing a dress and not wanting to be vulnerably placed above this man. He might see an ankle or… perish the thought.

  “Georgina, my dear, if you go first then I can catch you if you fall.”

  “But I don’t want to be responsible for knocking you off, so you should go first.”

  “We’ll be tied together to be safe.”

  Georgina tilted her head to one side like a governess until Merryweather realised he wasn’t going to win. The officer stretched out the end of a rope and tied it expertly around his waist. He handed the other end to Georgina, who looped it around herself and then fiddled as she made a few abortive attempts to attach it.

  “Here,” said Merryweather, taking it off her, “let me tie the knot.”

  He looped it back around her waist, reaching around her with his strong arms, and for some unknown reason Georgina felt quite breathless. And they hadn’t even started climbing yet. Merryweather’s expert fingers inveigled the rope and a quick jerk checked it was secure.

  “We’re attached now,” he said.

  “Until death do us part.”

  Georgina regretted the joke immediately: there was the perilous drop as well as the shaming embarrassment of suggestion.

  “I– I–”

  Without another word, Merryweather turned to the rock face, selected a good starting position and then began climbing. Carefully and methodically, he made rapid progress tugging the rope as he went. The loops of rope at Georgina’s feet uncoiled until the final one rose from the ground, straightened and gently tugged Georgina towards the mountain.

  “Miss, if you can keep some slack in the rope,” he called down, “and don’t look down.”

  “I will directly,” Georgina shouted back.

  Here goes, she thought, taking grip of the cold stone. The sharp edges bit into her hands, loose dirt caused her fingers to slip, and her boots felt awkward, but she too was making progress. Concentrating on each step took all her faculties until climbing became everything.

  The mountain was steep, but not vertical and the rock itself was split and shattered by the elements, so although it looked difficult, some sections were almost as easy as climbing a ladder. This gave her a false confidence until a chunk of rock came away under the pull of her hand in a shower of gravel. She closed her eyes and hung on, hearing the falling rubble bounce and careen below her. The debris bounced off the path, a ledge really, and continued its descent down the cliff.

  “Georgina, are you all right? Georgina? Georgina?”

  “I’m–” she had to spit the grit from her mouth in a most unladylike fashion. “I’m well.”

  “Do take care.”

  Oh, why didn’t I think of that, she thought. Charlotte had died on this mountain and she had nearly done the same.

  Georgina started up again, carefully, but something grabbed her, pulled her down savagely: her dress was caught. It would be ruined. Once she felt secure, she reached down and ripped it off a jagged outcrop.

  Upward again, moving to the left, guided by the rope that went up to Merryweather, which perplexed her until she saw how much easier the going was on that side.

  Looking up, she saw that there was enough slack, so she paused to regain her breath and recruit herself. Behind her, the view was spectacular with magnificent snow–capped mountains, it was awe inspiring, and below her was–

  Every limb gripped harder, the knuckles on her hands went white and her toes pinched into the crevice with force. She pushed her face against the cold stone, held her body as close as it would go and breathed, rapidly, her lungs expanding uncontrollably, and each intake threatened to fling her from the cliff face and plunge her into the ravine.

  “Bally hell!”

  She couldn’t move, frozen as she was to the spot, and the cold stone leached out more of her resolve with every desperate second.

  The rope tugged, the yank making her look up and the jolt making her climb, it was instinctive, calming even, but it was a very long way to fall and Georgina made a point of not looking down again.

  Miss Charlotte

  “I have something for you,”? the Gräfin announced.

  “Ooh,” squealed Charlotte.

  They were in her suite in the castle, where the Gräfin had taken her to change before meeting the Crown Prince. The dowager showed her a small box, the sort that hinged open to reveal a piece of jewellery. “This was my great grandmother’s ring, it’s a ruby.”

  Charlotte picked up the box and opened it to reveal the big, chunky ring: “Ooh.”

  “Put it on.”

  Charlotte did so, feeling its weight and the way the light shone through the red stone. Tiny slivers of light, like blades, shivered up the far walls cast there by the gem as it took charge of the candlelight.

  “You have it on the wrong finger, my dear.”

  Charlotte looked at the old woman with a quizzical expression. The Gräfin raised her own left hand, her fingers splayed, and counted along with her right index finger.

  “A ring on your first finger means you are available, your middle finger means you are engaged, third finger is when you are married and the little finger…”

  “The little finger?”

  “When you are an old maid.”

  Charlotte could not stop herself glancing down: the Gräfin’s little finger contained a huge blue stone rammed on in such a way that it looked like it would never be removed.

  “Yes, my lot has been to see that my family are all married.”

  Charlotte nodded, not knowing what else to do. Despite finding officers to be fascinating, soldiers to be interesting and cadets to be fun, she found other boys to be rather boring; however, she didn’t want to be an old maid as old maids smelt of sherry and did nothing but play bridge. She’d heard Georgina crying once that Earnestine was a monster for not marrying and that she, Georgina, would end up on the shelf as an old maid. Ness, Georgina had complained, you are nearly twenty–one, people are going to wonder what’s wrong with you.

  Charlotte moved the ring to her middle finger and it went on easily, loose, but she thought it would stay on.

  “There,” the Gräfin croaked, “now change.”

  “I’d prefer my uniform,” Charlotte said, gesturing to the aerial officer’s tunic and trousers hanging on the wardrobe handle.

  “A dress for your wedding, my dear.”

  “The men get to wear uniforms.”

  Charlotte waited, but the old woman didn’t move. The dress was there, a light blue staid thing.

  “Now!”

  Under the gaze of the harridan, Charlotte took her beloved uniform and placed it back in the wardrobe and then, her back turned, stripped naked before dressing in a fresh shift. A maid appeared to tighten the bindings of her corset, a jerk forcing all the air from Charlotte’s lungs just as she was about to ask for it to be tied loose.

  “Tighter!” the Gräfin commanded.

  Suddenly there were tears in Charlotte’s eyes.

  “Short breaths,” the maid whispered.

  “Quiet!”

  Charlotte panted like a dog as the blue creation was deposited over her, done up and fussed over. Soon, she was the picture of perfection and paraded before a standing mirror.

  “You’ll do,” said the Gräfin, not unkindly.


  Charlotte smiled.

  The Gräfin clapped her hands: “Come!”

  Charlotte was led in procession along the corridors of the castle. As they passed, servants and underlings bowed or curtsied as the Gräfin passed, deference shown at every stage, and then Charlotte, out of the corner of her eye, noticed their reaction to her own passing: they bowed and scraped too, but they looked away and some – too many – crossed themselves as Catholics do.

  They were afraid!

  Of her?

  Surely they could not be frightened by a small girl like herself. It would be the Gräfin, but their fear of that old crone was manifest in their bowing. For Charlotte it was different… they were afraid for her.

  When they reached a pair of large wooden doors, the Gräfin halted.

  “I will see that everything is in order,” she said. “Wait here.”

  Charlotte waited.

  Left with her was a senior maid. Charlotte glared at her, moved slightly, forcing the woman to take more and more extreme measures to avoid eye contact, until finally it was impossible. The woman looked: she had brown, almost black eyes, wide, with the whites visible all the way around. She crossed herself, quickly, an impulsive protective gesture.

  “Do you speak English?”

  The woman nodded, desperately, twisting to avoid her.

  “What is it?” she whispered.

  The woman shook her head.

  “What?”

  “Poor child,” the maid whispered, “for you is a fate worse than death.”

  The big doors opened.

  The Gräfin clapped.

  Charlotte went in to a small chapel, a wonderfully familiar sight with wooden pews, a font, pulpit and far ahead, an altar below a shining stained glass window depicting the last supper.

  Everyone stood for her.

  She walked down the aisle: she was so important, the centre of attention with servants and people bowing as she passed. If only her sisters could be there to see her, she thought, then they’d realise how mean and horrid they had been.

  Ahead, on her right and facing the congregation, the Crown Prince – her Crown Prince – sat upon a throne on a raised dais surrounded by rings of functionaries. The outer circle consisted of uniformed military, then came the officials and finally the inner ring of family. Charlotte was led forward and, as she got closer to the great man, he seemed to shrink, his finery took on the air of costume and pretence, his bones were clear through his stretched skin and his eyes were yellow and watery. His head lolled to one side and he drooled.

  “He’s really not well,” said Charlotte. “He needs medical help.”

  “He has the best medical help in all of Europe,” said the Graf. “Can you not see the leeches all around?”

  On both sides of the room, men in white coats stood waiting, their pockets bulging with stethoscopes and steel instruments. Doctor Mordant was there too.

  Charlotte’s shoe caught on the top of the dais, her toe striking the stone and she nearly stumbled. The Graf caught her arm and lifted her onto the platform.

  “I’m all right,” she said.

  “May I present His Royal Highness, the Crown Prince,” the Vögte announced. “The King!”

  Everyone dropped to one knee except Charlotte.

  This was the man she was supposed to marry? He was at least a hundred and fifty, she thought, and…

  She nearly gagged, the smell was vile.

  “Come closer,” the Vögte whispered as oily as his slicked back hair.

  The Graf, keeping Charlotte between him and his father, pushed her forward. She put her hand out to steady herself and brushed across the Crown Prince’s hand. He was cold, icy cold, absorbing the heat from her like metal on a winter’s night.

  The Vögte gestured with his long, bony fingers and Charlotte leaned forward, turning her face away from the foul abomination when she saw things crawling through his scalp.

  “This is the Princess,” the Vögte crowed. “Isn’t she lovely, a beauty, strong of limb and healthy? She will bear you many sons and daughters.”

  Charlotte thought she was going to throw up.

  “See, see,” the Vögte twittered excitedly, “His Royal Highness speaks.”

  The old man’s mouth moved and spittle spilled forth to dampen the crusting that stained collar.

  “The Crown Prince asks for your hand in marriage,” translated the Vögte for all. He gazed around the room to pass on this wonderful news and dare anyone to contradict.

  Charlotte’s flesh seemed to shrink back, almost as if her vital organs were huddling together to create a space between her body and her corset.

  The Vögte sneered: “Your Royal Highness, what is your gracious answer?”

  Bile rose in Charlotte’s throat.

  “Yes?” he asked again.

  Charlotte voice seemed to come from nowhere: “Yes?”

  The sigh of relief around the room was louder than the half–hearted cheer.

  “Good, good,” said the Vögte. “We will have a quick wedding now, a service before God, and then you will consummate the marriage.”

  “Wedding now?”

  “Ja,” the dowager replied.

  Charlotte pulled away and put the back of her hand against her mouth swallowing the taste of her recent meal back into her gullet. The ‘does anyone know just cause’ couldn’t come soon enough, she thought, and then she’d just tell them.

  The priest spoke in German addressing the crowd and then paused: there was an agony of silence and then he carried on. He seemed to be deliberately stretching it out as a form of torture.

  The Graf stepped forward with a gold ring, he gestured in front of the jerking form of his father and then grabbed Charlotte’s left hand. She pulled away as he twisted and screwed the band onto her third finger.

  Oh Lord, she thought, I’ve missed the ‘just cause’. It was then, when the Priest had paused, when the dust had frozen in the pale light from the tall stained glass window. She was lost.

  The Gräfin jabbed her in the small of her back: “Now!”

  Charlotte cried out.

  “I do,” said the Gräfin.

  “I do?” said Charlotte.

  “She does,” the crone cackled.

  The Priest faced the congregation and announced something, words that flowed quickly and each syllable edged with relief. When he finished, he looked at the squirming bride.

  “What?” Charlotte said.

  “You may kiss your husband,” the Gräfin said, her spindly fingers gripped Charlotte’s hair as she yanked her head around and forced the young girl to bend towards the corruption of flesh that twitched in front of her. Charlotte’s hair was pulled at the roots drawing back her skin and her lips were forced into a rictus. The Crown Prince’s body below her went into spasms and still Charlotte was pushed closer.

  A yard, a foot, an inch…

  The Crown Prince spewed a mass of yellow bile, a splatter striking Charlotte in the face. She wrenched back, retching herself, as the monster contorted.

  An orderly tried to hold him down, but the writhing creature found strength: it snapped up with its teeth and took a bite out of the man’s neck. Blood spurted, washing the vile puke from the ruined uniform. The man fell back, his hand over the gushing wound and he called for help, coughing blood across the stone floor.

  More technicians entered the fray to hold their Crown Prince down. The struggle increased, full of kicks and jerks. Charlotte looked away: saw the horror on everyone’s faces, the shadows struggling and fighting on the wall, her own shaking hands.

  Suddenly it stopped.

  The technicians stepped away to reveal the Crown Prince: a corpse, ashen and grey, and the smell of death was upon the cadaver already.

  Charlotte’s gasping drew in enough air and she opened her mouth to–

  The dowager Gräfin struck her across the face, a sharp unbelievably sudden shock. Charlotte’s jaw was numb, her eyeballs felt loose in their sockets.
By the time Charlotte recovered enough to look back, Doctor Mordant, complete with magnifying goggles swooped down to put her fingers to the corpse’s throat.

  “The King is dead,” she said.

  Charlotte’s surge of relief was so great and, in contrast to her former revulsion and horror, it felt like joy.

  “The King is dead!” the Graf shouted. “The King is dead!!!”

  The orderlies sprang into action and unceremoniously lifted the body as others brought a gurney forward. They dumped the dead King down and wheeled him away.

  Charlotte went over to the Princes standing forlorn by the tapestry.

  “I’m so sorry,” she began, “but–”

  The Graf gripped her arm vice–like and pulled her away.

  “Excuse me,” Charlotte managed.

  “Ignore them,” the Graf said. “They are nothing.”

  “Are you the new Crown Prince now?”

  “Nein,” Zala replied.

  “Your brother… surely younger.”

  “Your wedding night is only delayed.”

  “To whom am I to be married now?” Charlotte asked. “You or your brother, Pieter?”

  “You are married already.”

  “Only until death do us part.”

  “Nein.”

  The Graf marched out, his stride barely affected by the English girl he dragged in his wake. They went down a corridor with mirrored doors on all sides and then into a dungeon. That’s what it looked to Charlotte until her eyes became accustomed to the dark. The Crown Prince’s body had already been placed upon an altar at the far end and above, in some strange parody of a crucifix, a brass shape like a giant ‘V’ overshadowed everything.

  A noise, unlike anything Charlotte had ever heard, sparked into being as lightning played between the two arms of the brass mechanism. This was a laboratory similar to Doctor Mordant’s high up in the tower. An iron taste dried Charlotte’s mouth and the hairs on her forearms tried to crawl.

  The Graf came to a stop, far too close to this horror for Charlotte, but although she twisted and struggled, she couldn’t get free.

  “Mordant!”

  The Doctor didn’t move: “Turn away.”

  “This is no time for secrets.”