Protection (18 page)

“If we transition together – I don’t know what will happen,” Gabriel said. “We may become one.”

“If we transition together – I don’t know what will happen,” Joey said. “We may become one.”

They spoke in unison, holding the last word like a single perfect note.
 
And when the sound faded, they did, together.

THE END

AUTHOR’S NOTE

Wentworth Men’s Prison, a fictional combination of Wandsworth (where Oscar Wilde was incarcerated) and Pentonville, exists only in my imagination. In most cases, I strove to be accurate, but I took a bit of artistic license with the legal concept known as “irresistible impulse.” Diminished responsibility, as we now call it, was still being explored in the 1930s, and I believe it was successfully employed in the United States long before the United Kingdom.

I would like to thank Rosemary O’Malley, J.David Peterson, and the LiveJournal group
little-details
for their assistance with the research.
 
Also, for this second edition, the wonderful Kate Aaron provided some much-needed feedback. Check out her blog at
http://onlytruemagic.blogspot.com
.

An Excerpt from
Soulless
, a full length vampire drama by S.A. Reid

Maidenstone Village

Surrey, England

1798

’T
is a queer thing, surviving one’s own death
, Nicholas Robinson thought for what must have been the thousandth time. Within Maidenstone Village, townsfolk and crofters alike had been steeled for Nicholas’s burial. After his accident they’d queued up outside Grantley, his rambling old manor house, braving rain and an ominous yellow-gray sky to offer condolences to his grandmother. Then as a procession, they’d marched to the public house, crowding the bar and filling the tables to quaff a pint in his name.

But Nicholas, given up for dead by the apothecary, the surgeon and the doctor, had lived. And since that day, no one knew quite what to say to him. Or what use a broken man might be, even to a woman as aged and frail as Grand-Mamma.

“Well?” Martha’s voice was sharp.

Nicholas had told the girl she might address him informally while they were at lessons in his laboratory. Most of the villagers—servants, illiterates and other natural inferiors—would have taken Nicholas’s offer as lordly courtesy and continued addressing him as “Mr. Robinson” or “sir.” Martha, coldly literal even at fourteen, did not recognize unspoken nuances. When they were alone together, she addressed Nicholas as if he were the boot boy or the scullery maid. “Have I got it wrong, then?”

“Let me see.” Nicholas noted Martha’s answer—12, correct—and checked her calculations. Flawless. If Martha continued to master geometry so rapidly, he’d be forced to move on to Euler’s trigonometric functions merely to keep the girl’s attention.

“Mr. Robinson. Martha,” said a voice from the doorway. Mrs. Parker’s voice carried a note of disapproval, as it always did when she found him alone with the girl.

Nicholas found the censure darkly amusing. The housekeeper had known him from the cradle. Lacking children of her own, she’d comforted Nicholas when rheumatic fever killed his parents. At his wedding, she’d shed tears of joy, awaiting an heir that never came. And when Nicholas’s wife walked out on him, disappearing in the barouche of her lover, Dr. Graham, the housekeeper had sunk into a bitter silence. It was under Mrs. Parker’s orders that the staff refrained from mentioning Lydia Robinson by name.

Not that his ex-wife was harmed by such censure, Nicholas thought. These days she resided in the States, styling herself Mrs. Lydia Graham. But Mrs. Parker liked to behave as if Lydia were dead, preferably of something nasty and unspeakable. Mrs. Parker also liked to pretend that each time she found Nicholas alone with Martha, the potential for scandal loomed.

As if even the most blue-lipped harridan would deem me anything but harmless
, Nicholas thought. Only Mrs. Parker kept track of his hours alone with Martha. Nicholas could have loaded his laboratory with nubile young women and garnered nothing but polite curiosity from anyone else. It was infuriating. Nicholas wished he could do something to offend, shock and scandalize Maidenstone Village as a whole. Alienating the residents piecemeal, on an individual basis, had lost its appeal.

“Dinner? Now?” Martha frowned at Mrs. Parker. The girl was always aware of the time, whether a timepiece was to hand or not. It was only a quarter past noon. At Grantley, dinner was typically served at one o’clock.

“Yes. Dinner now and be grateful for it.” Sweeping inside, Mrs. Parker placed the laden silver tray in its designated space. Long ago, Nicholas had brought up a tea table from one of the many disused guestrooms, giving the table a prominent spot. Providing the laboratory with a designated place to sup kept the housekeeper from brushing aside his priceless experiments like so much rubbish and replacing them with her usual fare. Today it was boiled mutton and stewed cabbage.

“I
am
grateful,” Martha said, forcing a smile.

Shooting Mrs. Parker a glance, Nicholas saw that the housekeeper was at least nominally appeased. It had taken several weeks, but he’d finally impressed upon Martha a cardinal truth; insincere sentiments were the very pillars of civilization. Now, if only he could teach her to deliver said sentiments with passable warmth. Martha, square-faced with coal black hair, dark eyes and a small, mutinous mouth, was as transparent as a forest stream. She despised putting aside her maths. Being forced to do so ahead of schedule left her transparently vexed.

“I am grateful,
ma’am
,” Mrs. Parker corrected, smacking the top of Martha’s head for emphasis.

“I am grateful, ma’am.” Even after the smack, Martha sounded as wooden as ever. Nicholas knew the girl wasn’t consciously defiant. Her parents were sensible, ordinary crofters. From girlhood, they’d taught Martha she could aspire to nothing better in this world than a serving position in a manor house. Offending the housekeeper—the iron ruler of her particular sphere—was courting her own destruction, for a servant with no references and no position elsewhere would quickly starve. Martha knew this, knew it down to her marrow, yet Mrs. Parker’s illogical ways made true obedience impossible. How could Martha obey someone she couldn’t respect?

It is nothing short of perverse
, Nicholas thought. For reasons of Her own, Nature had trapped the mind of a scientist in the body of a lowborn girl. Martha wasn’t suited for the life her birth demanded. And Nicholas, clever as he liked to think himself, had yet to devise a ready solution.

“Mr. Robinson? Shall I fetch you a plate, sir?” Mrs. Parker asked.

“No.” Nicholas smiled to modify his usual brusque tone. Mrs. Parker deserved gentleness. Of all the servants still at Grantley, she alone comprehended his physical difficulties. She understood that sometimes his legs and pelvis stiffened so terribly, walking was his only relief. Other times, his joints ached and swelled until he could do nothing but lie miserably abed. So the housekeeper never presumed to know Nicholas’s intent. She merely awaited his instructions.

Today, his stiffness was abominable. He would have limped up and down the length of his estate, taking the air and studying the turning leaves, were it possible to do such a thing in peace. But he was lord of the manor, a baronet and Maidenstone’s richest resident. Which meant if he ventured off on his own for more than two hours together, someone would panic and a well-meaning but humiliating search party would be dispatched.

“Let me rise,” Nicholas croaked. Seizing his cane he pulled himself upright, dragging his shorter leg toward the dinner spread.

Martha, already seated at the table, shook out her napkin across her lap. As she reached for her fork, Mrs. Parker clucked in disapproval.

“Child, Mr. Robinson has yet to settle himself. Suppose you offer to pour his cider? Ask to make up his plate?”

Martha frowned. “In the laboratory, I am not to behave as a maid. In the laboratory, I—”

“Mrs. Parker knows the rules in here,” Nicholas cut across the girl. It was imperative to spare the housekeeper’s feelings; otherwise, there would be repercussions when Martha resumed her regular duties. “Besides, you could not pour my cider without spilling it, nor make up my plate without botching it. Best tuck in and let me shift for myself.”

Smiling, Martha began serving herself ragout from the tureen. True to her reputation as an odd girl, Martha always looked pleased when Nicholas remarked on her domestic failures. He suspected if he hadn’t singled her out for tutoring—tormented by his own boredom but unwilling to accept any of the village’s lackwit boys—the girl might have cropped her hair, dressed in boy’s clothes and run away to London. Marriage was an unlikely end for Martha. Even at fourteen, anyone could see it in her: the shadow of the old maid. But that, too, she wore like a laurel wreath, as if Fate had designed her for something better than mere domestic ambitions.

Suppose she is proof that females are weaker only in body? That they can equal men in the mental disciplines if properly prepared?

Nicholas chewed his lower lip, captivated by the heretical notion as he loaded his plate. As a whole man, he had steered away from such controversial notions, pushing them aside the moment they popped into his head. Now he welcomed them, studied them, and occasionally gave them precedence. What else did he have to lose?

He and Martha dined together with a minimum of talk. It was yet another trait Nicholas enjoyed about the girl. Hers was a truly methodical mind. Of course, Martha understood Nicholas was her master as well as her tutor, yet because he had instructed her not to fear him, she did not. She knew he was crippled, yet to her that only meant he walked with a cane, navigated stairs slowly and no longer sat a horse. It didn’t occur to Martha to pity Nicholas or speculate on what had driven Lydia away. Martha didn’t deride him. Contempt hadn’t spurred her to spread out her napkin and start eating before Nicholas was served. On the contrary, Martha presumed he was still enough of a man to look after himself.

And in that sentiment, she stands alone. If I truly do sell Grantley lock, stock and barrel, I’ll take her with me, Nicholas thought suddenly, realizing he meant it. Marry her, even, to prevent a scandal among those who don’t know us. Martha is an unnatural woman and I am an unnatural man. In that, at least, we are well matched. And she can continue my work when I’m dead.

After dinner, they resumed their geometry lesson, pausing only for Nicholas to monitor an experiment and note its results in his log. Thus far, his attempts to synthesize an organic compound, carbamide, from inorganic substances had come to naught. Still, he knew a breakthrough was just around the corner. His colleagues at university, whom he still corresponded with quite vigorously—most had no knowledge of his injury and subsequent divorce—were all proponents of vitalism.

The doctrine of vitalism was well known to him, and to better-educated members of the public, too. It posited that all life arose from a Godlike spark. A divine line had been drawn in fire, lingering from Creation even unto these modern days. Traces of that ineffable force separated every living thing—humans, lower animals, insects, even microbes—from the unliving. From dirt and wind and sea and flame …

Even as a boy, Nicholas had known the doctrine of vitalism was nonsense. Patent superstitious nonsense, and unscientific to boot. Nothing in the world was beyond measure. If a Creator existed, which Nicholas did not believe, that Creator had designed a Universe wholly comprehensible to the questing mind. There was no enshrined Secret, no Revelation gained only after death. No—the line between organic and inorganic was an imaginary one, delineated by people drunk on poetic notions of a human soul. But when Nicholas succeeded in synthesizing carbamide, also called urea, from inorganic substances, the eyes of even the most backward scientists would be opened. And the doctrine of vitalism would disappear from the annals of serious scientific inquiry.

He and Martha finished her lessons around three o’clock. Nicholas didn’t send the girl away with problems to work out or passages to read. There was enough simmering resentment among the house staff about her special treatment; if Martha announced she had additional studies during the time she was expected to fetch, carry and scrub floors, she’d be despised beyond what even Nicholas had the power to mend.