Little Vampire Women

by Louisa May Alcott

  Your sincere friend and servant,

  JAMES LAURENCE

  Chapter Thirteen

  LITTLE FAITHFUL

  For two weeks the amount of virtue in the old house would have supplied the neighborhood. It was really amazing, for everyone seemed in a heavenly frame of mind, and self-denial was all the fashion. Relieved of their first anxiety about their father, the girls insensibly relaxed their praiseworthy efforts a little, and began to fall back into old ways. They did not forget their motto to “hope and keep busy,” but hoping and keeping busy seemed to grow easier, and after such tremendous exertions, they felt that Endeavor deserved a holiday, and gave it a good many.

  Jo brought home books on the Inquisition from Gentleman Jackson’s salon and settled in on the sofa to read them for clues as to how her father could have caught the fever. The hefty tomes were filled with so many thrilling stories about brave defenders that she barely got through a book a day and sometimes even forgot the purpose of her study. Amy found that housework and art did not go well together, and returned to her mud pies. Meg went nightly to her pupils, and sewed, or thought she did, at home, but much time was spent in writing long letters to her mother, or reading the Washington dispatches over and over. Beth kept on, with only slight relapses into idleness or grieving.

  All the little duties were faithfully done each day, and many of her sisters’ also, for they were forgetful, and the house seemed like a clock whose pendulum was gone a-visiting. When her heart got heavy with longings for Mother or fears for Father, she went away into a certain closet, hid her face in the folds of a dear old gown, and made her little moan and prayed her little prayer quietly by herself. Nobody knew what cheered her up after a sober fit, but everyone felt how sweet and helpful Beth was, and fell into a way of going to her for comfort or advice in their small affairs.

  All were unconscious that this experience was a test of character, and when the first excitement was over, felt that they had done well and deserved praise. So they did, but their mistake was in ceasing to do well, and they learned this lesson through much anxiety and regret.

  “Meg, I wish you’d go and see the Hummels. You know Mother told us not to forget them,” said Beth, two weeks after Mrs. March’s departure.

  “I’m too tired to go this afternoon,” replied Meg, rocking comfortably as she sewed.

  “Can’t you, Jo?” asked Beth.

  “Too many books yet to read.”

  “Why don’t you go yourself?” asked Meg.

  “I have been every day, but the baby is sick, and I don’t know what to do for it. Mrs. Hummel goes away to work, and Lottchen takes care of it. But it gets sicker and sicker, and I think you or Hannah ought to go.”

  Beth spoke earnestly, and Meg promised she would go tomorrow.

  “Ask Hannah for some nice little mess,25 and take it round, Beth, the air will do you good,” said Jo, adding apologetically, “I’d go but I want to finish my research.”

  “I’m tired, so I thought maybe some of you would go,” said Beth.

  “Amy will be in presently, and she will run down for us,” suggested Meg.

  So Beth lay down on the sofa, the others returned to their work, and the Hummels were forgotten. An hour passed. Amy did not come, Meg went to her room to try on a new dress, Jo was absorbed in her story, and Hannah was sound asleep before the kitchen fire, when Beth quietly put on her hood, filled her basket with odds and ends for the poor children, and went out into the chilly air with a heavy head and a grieved look in her patient eyes. It was late when she came back, and no one saw her creep upstairs and shut herself into her mother’s room. Half an hour after, Jo went to “Mother’s closet” for something, and there found little Beth, looking very grave.

  “Christopher Columbus! What’s the matter?” cried Jo, as Beth put out her hand as if to warn her off, and said quickly…

  “Stand back.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Oh, Jo, the baby’s dead!”

  “What baby?”

  “Mrs. Hummel’s. It died in my lap before she got home,” cried Beth with a sob.

  “My poor dear, how dreadful for you! I ought to have gone,” said Jo, taking her sister in her arms as she sat down in her mother’s big chair, with a remorseful face.

  Beth tore free of her sister’s embrace, ran to the other side of the room, and pressed her back against the wall. “Don’t touch me. You mustn’t. You mustn’t. I feel so queer. My throat is sore and my head aches. It actually feels as if someone is driving a stake through it. What’s wrong with me, Jo?”

  “If Mother was only at home!” exclaimed Jo, suddenly frightened, for her sister’s cheeks were bright red and her eyes blazed hotly. Slowly, she crossed the room and gently pressed her hand against Beth’s forehead as the girl trembled. “You have the fever.”

  Beth turned her head away. “Don’t touch me. Stay away. You must all stay away. Don’t let Amy come. Or Meg.”

  Although very scared indeed, Jo calmly led her sister to her coffin and closed the lid. “Selfish pib, to let you go and stay reading rubbish myself!” Jo muttered as she went to consult Hannah.

  The good soul was wide awake in a minute, and took the lead at once, assuring that there was no need to worry; they had already found the cure and Mr. March was all better now, so recovery was swift, all of which Jo believed and felt much relieved as they went up to call Meg.

  “It’s not a coincidence,” Meg said after she had heard the story of the Hummel baby and Beth’s illness, so much like their father’s.

  “No,” Jo said simply, “it’s the work of slayers.” She knew what had to be done next but first she had to see to the comfort of Beth and the safety of her family.

  “I shall stay, of course, I’m oldest,” began Meg, looking anxious and self-reproachful, for she knew that Beth would never have fallen ill if she and Jo had done their duty to the Hummels. But if they had, they would’ve been struck by the fever, too, and what good would it have done for all three of them to be sick? No, it was far better that only one of them suffered the illness. But it was a shame it had to be Beth, for she was so good and kind and gentle. Jo would have been a much better victim, as she was as sturdy as a bull and just as mean.

  “We’ll send Amy to Aunt March’s,” Jo said. “There’s no telling who they’ll go after next and the old lady needs protection. I’ll bring her, then get the formula from Gentleman Jackson and procure the ingredients.”

  Beth would have much preferred to have Jo as her caretaker but she knew her sister had important matters to see to, so she submitted to Meg’s administrations.

  Amy rebelled outright, and passionately declared that she had rather have the fever than go to Aunt March. Meg reasoned, pleaded, and commanded, all in vain. Amy protested that she would not go, and Meg left her in despair to ask Hannah what should be done. Before she came back, Laurie walked into the parlor to find Amy wrenching with sobs, with her head in the sofa cushions. She told her story, expecting to be consoled, but Laurie only put his hands in his pockets and walked about the room, whistling softly, as he knit his brows in deep thought. Presently he sat down beside her, and said, in his most wheedlesome tone, “Now be a sensible little vampire woman, and do as they say. Someone has to protect your aunt March from assassins. Think on it. She’s a cross old curmudgeon and a regular samphire. Who wouldn’t want to stake the old bat? There must be legions after her by now.”

  Amy smiled weakly. “You mean vampire. Samphire is seaweed.”

  “Oh, do I?” His tone was teasing.

  “You’re making fun of the way I mix up my words every now and then.”

  “Maybe. But only in a lighthearted way. I mean nothing by it. Now, shall you be very brave and go protect your aunt March?”

  “Well—I guess I will,” said Amy slowly.

  “Good girl! Call Meg, and tell her you’ll give in,” said Laurie, with an approving pat, which annoyed Amy more than the “giving in.”

  Meg an
d Jo came running down to behold the miracle which had been wrought, and Amy, feeling very precious and self-sacrificing, promised to go.

  “How is the little dear?” asked Laurie, for Beth was his especial pet, and he felt more anxious about her than he liked to show.

  “She is lying down in Mother’s coffin and feels better. The delirium hasn’t set in yet,” answered Meg.

  “What a trying world it is!” said Jo, rumpling up her hair in a fretful way. “No sooner do we get out of one trouble than down comes another. There doesn’t seem to be anything to hold on to when Mother’s gone, so I’m all at sea.”

  “Well, don’t make a porcupine of yourself, it isn’t becoming. Tell me if I shall telegraph to your mother, or do anything?” asked Laurie.

  “That is what troubles me,” said Meg. “I think we ought to tell her, but Hannah says we mustn’t, for Mother can’t leave Father, and it will only make them anxious. Beth won’t be sick long, and Hannah knows just what to do with the formula, and Mother said we were to mind her, so I suppose we must, but it doesn’t seem quite right to me.”

  “Hum, well, I can’t say. Suppose you ask Grandfather after the first dose.”

  “We will. Jo, go and get the medicine at once,” commanded Meg. “We can’t decide anything till it’s been given.”

  “Stay where you are, Jo. I’m errand boy to this establishment,” said Laurie, taking up his cap.

  “I’m afraid you are busy,” began Meg.

  Laurie insisted he had finished his lessons and was free to serve them in whatever capacity they needed. Grateful, Jo sent him with a note for Gentleman Jackson that explained the entire situation, knowing full well that the noble vampire defender would personally oversee the administration of the medicine. Then she set off for the Hummels’.

  The shack, for it couldn’t be called anything but that, its walls barely standing and its roof so full of holes that moonlight dappled the dirt floor, was empty. The still-smoldering fire and the tumbled shelves spoke of a hurried departure. The enemy in Jo’s bosom snapped and snarled as she searched the room for hints about the Hummels—who they were, where they went, what they did—but they’d left nothing meaningful behind.

  Jo paused, closed her eyes, and inhaled deeply, but the only smell that pervaded her nostrils was that of garlic, which hung from the riddled ceiling in large burlap sacks. She tried again, working to sift out the pungency of the herb and get beyond the scent barrier, but it was impossible without an allium mask. How thoughtless of her not to bring one, for she should have anticipated this difficulty. The Hummel gang was clearly an experienced band of ruffians. Of course they would use garlic to throw her off the scent. Now all she could pick up was garlic. That, and the stench of death.

  It was very faint, but there and recent. So the baby had really died.

  Jo felt the weight of the loss as keenly as Beth, and her bosom enemy rattled and raged at the thought of that poor little innocent being slaughtered to satisfy some unholy crusade against vampires. What a world they lived in! Humans killed helpless babies, then turned around and called vampires monsters.

  She was so enraged by what had been done to her father and to Beth and to the unknown infant that she wanted to rip the throat out of the first person she came across and drink, drink, drink. All those years of abstaining, of preserving life, of treating humans better than they treated each other, had left her thirsty, so very thirsty, for the taste of pure human blood, fresh and still pulsing. Pig and cow and beaver and sheep didn’t taste the same, no matter what Marmee claimed. Why should she deprive herself any longer? What had humanity ever done to deserve her nobility?

  With a ferocious slam of the door, she was off, a predator in the night hunting for justice, for even if the victims she found were innocent of the crimes committed against her, they were still guilty of something. Every human was.

  There, she thought, a sound in the distance, a rattle of a carriage, the pounding of hooves. In a flash, she was at the carriage’s door, pulling it open and confronting the frightened passengers inside, a man and a woman in simple woolen coats and thick fur-lined gloves. They weren’t rich but nor were they poor, falling somewhere in the merchant class, Jo supposed, and although not exactly fair game for a vampire, fair enough, given her mood.

  She leaned forward, toward the gentleman, who had nothing to recommend him but his proximity, and flared her fangs, frantic for the taste of blood. She pressed her lips to his throat and tasted his fear, a salty thing with a desperate edge, and heard a sob. Someone was crying, either the man or the woman, and pleading for mercy. Both, Jo realized, as her fangs brushed the soft flesh of his neck. Now that the moment had arrived, she wanted to savor it. Oh, how sweet the taste. She closed her eyes, opened her jaws wide, and—

  A baby cried.

  No, Jo thought, shaking her head. Don’t listen. Don’t hear.

  But the high-pitched wail continued and grew stronger until the sound filled the carriage and Jo’s head.

  She straightened and looked across at the young woman cradling the infant in her arms. The baby was distraught, the mother was distraught, and now, too, was Jo, who could see her own beloved Marmee holding her just as gently all those decades ago, calming her with a soft word and a cheerful promise that everything would be all right. More recently still, Jo had promised her that she would learn to keep her temper in check. How had her mother done it? When I feel that the hunger means to break out against my will, I just go away for a minute, and give myself a little shake for being so weak and wicked.

  Jo stood up, climbed out of the carriage, and shut the door. One baby had already died that night because of the Marches, and that was more than enough.

  Chapter Fourteen

  DARK DAYS

  Beth did have the fever, and was much sicker than anyone expected. The antidote did not work. Baffled, Gentleman Jackson made another batch, then another and another, taking extra care each time to measure out the ingredients in case a minuscule amount made the difference. He took blood first from Beth’s arm, then from her leg, then chest, toe, and ear. It didn’t matter what he did. Beth grew worse and worse.

  Meg stayed at home, lest she should infect the Kings or their children, and kept house, feeling very anxious and a little guilty when she wrote letters in which no mention was made of Beth’s illness. She could not think it right to deceive her mother, but she had been bidden to mind Hannah, and Hannah wouldn’t hear of “Mrs. March bein’ told, and worried just for such a trifle.”

  Jo devoted herself to Beth day and night, not a hard task, for Beth was very patient, and bore her pain uncomplainingly as long as she could control herself. But there came a time when during the fever fits she began to talk in a hoarse, broken voice, to play on the coverlet as if on her beloved little piano, and try to sing with a throat so swollen that there was no music left, a time when she did not know the familiar faces around her, but addressed them by wrong names, and called imploringly for her mother. One afternoon, late in the day, when Jo was napping coffin-side, she woke to find Beth’s nose a few inches from her own, her eyes wide and kindling with hatred, a pencil gripped tightly in her grasp as she pressed it against her beloved sister’s heart.

  “Beast,” she growled. “Abomination.”

  Then Jo grew frightened, even though she easily wrested the paltry weapon from the poor invalid’s hand. Meg begged to be allowed to write the truth, and even Hannah said she “would think of it, though there was no danger yet.” A letter from Washington added to their trouble, for Mr. March had had a relapse, and could not think of coming home for a long while.

  How dark the days seemed now, how sad and lonely the house, and how heavy were the hearts of the sisters as they worked and waited, while the shadow of death hovered over the once happy home. Then it was that Margaret, lying unsleeping in her casket, felt how rich she had been in things more precious than any luxuries money could buy—in love, protection, peace, and health, the real blessings of life. Then
it was that Jo, living in the darkened room, with that suffering little sister always before her eyes and that pathetic voice sounding in her ears, learned to see the beauty and the sweetness of Beth’s nature, to feel how deep and tender a place she filled in all hearts, and to acknowledge the worth of Beth’s unselfish ambition to live for others, and make home happy by that exercise of those simple virtues which all may possess, and which all should love and value more than talent, wealth, or beauty. Often, she thanked God that she hadn’t slaughtered that family in the carriage, for how could she sit by Beth’s side with that hideous sin on her soul? And Amy, in her exile, longed eagerly to be at home, that she might work for Beth, feeling now that no service would be hard or irksome compared with the onerous-ness of protecting annoying Aunt March, who ordered her about like a servant and jumped at every creak of a floorboard, and remembering, with regretful grief, how many neglected tasks those willing hands had done for her. Laurie haunted the house like a restless ghost, and Mr. Laurence locked the grand piano, because he could not bear to be reminded of the young neighbor who had turned him into an invincible being.

  Meanwhile Beth lay in her coffin with old Joanna at her side, for even in her wanderings she did not forget her forlorn protégé. She longed for her cats, but would not have them brought, lest she eat them by mistake, for although she thought herself human, the desire to consume the innocent felines was unbearable. She raged at Jo for holding her prisoner in a house of horrors, and tried to cut Hannah’s head off with a letter opener. Soon even these intervals of crazed consciousness ended, and she lay hour after hour, tossing to and fro, with incoherent words on her lips, or sank into a heavy sleep which brought her no refreshment. Gentleman Jackson came twice a night, Hannah sat up during the day, Meg kept a telegram in her desk all ready to send off at any minute, and Jo never stirred from Beth’s side.