A moan from the front of the church broke up the tussle. It started low, almost literally so, as if bubbling up from the depths of the earth, a distant wail from Hell itself. Then it built to a high, piercing howl that rattled glass and emptied bladders all through the chapel. It was a cry that hadn’t been heard in Hertfordshire for years, yet nearly everyone there knew what it was.
The zombie wail.
The mourners shot for the doors like a great black arrow, and with miraculous speed Mrs. Bennet regained her footing and found the strength to join them in flight. Jane went with her, but not before pausing for a doleful glance back at Elizabeth and Mary, who were holding their ground in the aisle even as Kitty and Lydia and a host of other parishioners poured around them.
Elizabeth could go after her father now. But would she? Should she, when reason surely said to flee, and fast?
The debate raged for all of a second.
Run! said Fear.
Obey, said Duty.
And then a third voice chimed in, one Elizabeth didn’t even recognize at first, so well trained were proper young ladies in ignoring it. The voice of Self.
Oh, go on, it said. You know you’ve always wondered . . . .
Elizabeth turned toward the front of the church, facing the throng rushing at and past her, and began walking against the flow. Each face flying by looked more terror stricken than the last. Yet when Elizabeth felt their panic worming its way inside her, threatening to infect her, she simply willed herself to stop seeing them. Everyone and everything merged into a great, dark blur, so much so that she didn’t even notice when her Aunt Philips flashed past, crying, “Lizzy, what are you doing? This way! This way!”
Elizabeth didn’t let herself truly see again until she was almost at the end of the aisle. She looked back, wondering if Mary had come, too, and found her younger sister right behind her, so close that her steps brushed the hem of Elizabeth’s skirts.
Elizabeth felt such relief she actually smiled. It was a compliment Mary wasn’t willing to accept.
“I was simply following you,” she said.
When Elizabeth looked ahead again, she saw her father watching them from beside the bier. He wasn’t smiling, though there was a curl to his lip and a gleam in his eye that suggested droll satisfaction, as when he and she shared a private joke at her mother’s expense. Only three other people had dared gather with him near (but not too near) the casket: Mrs. Ford; her brother, Mr. Elliot; and the Reverend Mr. Cummings.
Of course, Mr. Ford was there, as well, but he didn’t count as “other people” anymore.
“Come closer, girls. He won’t bite,” Mr. Bennet said. “Not so long as you stay out of range.”
With slow, uncertain steps, Elizabeth and Mary joined their father. Mr. Ford turned toward them as they approached, watching with empty eyes. It comforted Elizabeth somewhat that the expression seemed so familiar: Mr. Ford never had been the friendliest of her neighbors, hoarding his small store of cheer for those more likely to bring him business.
He’d been the village apothecary all Elizabeth’s life, building up a reputation thereabouts for both humorless competence and a heavy thumb upon the scales. Two days before, he’d bent down to retrieve a stray ha’penny from the road and was promptly run over by a joy-riding Lord Lumpley, who’d been momentarily blinded by a smiling milkmaid. All might have been well if His Lordship hadn’t circled his cabriolet to see what he’d hit (and get another look at the girl), compounding Mr. Ford’s minor scrapes and bruises with a most un minor severing of the legs.
“Oh, Martin, my precious Martin!” Mrs. Ford sobbed, and Mr. Elliot had to hold tight to keep her from squeezing her husband to her heaving bosom. “To think we almost buried you alive!”
Her precious Martin merely turned his vacant gaze her way for a moment before returning to the task at hand: trying to heft his trunk up out of the casket. He would have met with immediate success had he simply loosened his pants, thus freeing himself of the literal deadweight of his amputated legs, but this was beyond his now nonexistent powers of reasoning.
“My dear Mrs. Ford,” Mr. Bennet said, “I’m afraid the only thing premature about this particular burial is that it was almost conducted with your husband’s head still attached.”
IT WAS A CRY THAT HADN’T BEEN HEARD IN HERTFORDSHIRE FOR YEARS.
“No!” Mrs. Ford cried. “He was just sleeping! Unconscious! Cataleptic! He’s better now!”
Drawn by the sound of the woman’s distress, the creature in the coffin began making lazy swipes at her with its long, stiff arms.
“Urrrrrrrrrrrr,” it said.
“See! He recognizes me!” Mrs. Ford exclaimed. “Yes, darling, it’s me! Your Sarah!”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Mr. Bennet sighed. “All he recognizes is an easy meal.” He turned to Mr. Elliot. “Might it not be best if you were to remove the lady?”
“Yes . . . yes, certainly,” Mr. Elliot muttered with a quick nod. He was obviously anxious to remove himself, first and foremost, yet he managed to tug his sister along as he made his eager escape up the aisle.
“Maaaaarrrrrrrrtiiiiiiiinnnnnnnn!” howled Mrs. Ford as she was dragged away.
“Urrrrrrrahrrrurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!” replied what was left of her husband.
“How can she not see the obvious?” Mary asked. The bifurcated neighbor sitting up in his coffin had made a strong impression, yes, yet she seemed almost more disgusted by Mrs. Ford.
“Don’t judge too harshly, for once, my dear,” Mr. Bennet told her. “Wishful thinking is a sin all England stands guilty of today, your fool of a father included. We told ourselves our long nightmare was over, that a new day had dawned. Alas, that was the real dream. But, goodness—just listen to me chattering away when there’s work to be done!” He turned back to the casket and began tapping a finger against his upper lip. “How . . . to . . . kill it?”
Elizabeth gave a little start. She wasn’t sure, though, what it was that really shocked her. Was it hearing her dear Papa talk about killing an “it,” when “it” was a man she’d known all her young life? Or was it his cool, nonchalant tone as he did so?
“B-but, s-sir,” Mr. Cummings said, “are you absolutely sh-sh-sure he’s a . . . a . . . a . . .?”
Mr. Bennet finished the vicar’s thought for him.
“A dreadful? There can be no doubt. Our Dr. Long is no Hippocrates, to be certain, but even he’s not so incompetent as to misdiagnose death when a man’s been cut in half.”
The vicar acknowledged the logic of it with a jittery nod. “I s-suppose you’re right. All the same, must you . . . dispose of him here? P-p-practically on the altar? As you say, poor Mr. Ford has no legs . . . a-t-t-t-tached, I mean. Surely, he p-poses no danger in such a state.”
“Mr. Cummings, I have seen nothing more than a head, a neck, and a pair of shoulders devour a highland warrior, kilt and all.”
Elizabeth noticed her father’s gaze flick, for just an instant, to her. If he was looking for any sign of surprise, he surely saw it, for Elizabeth was unaware that he’d ever laid eyes on an unmentionable at all.
“Yes,” Mr. Bennet went on, eyes on the vicar again. “It’s dangerous. Once it gets out of that box, it’ll be slithering across your stone floors quick as a snake. It must be dealt with posthaste.”
Mr. Ford chose that moment (and a fine one it was) to jerk toward Mr. Cummings simultaneously roaring and snapping his teeth. In doing so, he managed to bite off most of his own tongue. It fell, gray and flaccid as an old kipper, into his lap, where it remained until he noticed it, snatched it up, and greedily gobbled it down, moaning happily as he feasted upon his own rancid flesh.