The Asylum (13 page)

“Morning?” said a puzzled, questioning voice as we passed each other.

“Good morning,” I murmured without raising my head.

Her footsteps slowed and stopped. I fought the impulse to run as the end of the passage approached. Five paces to go—was it left, or right? Left, left—no, right. Still no sound from behind me. I turned right, into a wider corridor, and saw another woman, in a white uniform, approaching, and beyond her, a staircase. Again I strove to keep my pace steady and my gaze low, like someone lost in thought.

There was no greeting this time, but again the footsteps faltered and stopped behind me. My heart was pounding so violently that I could not tell whether they resumed or not. I reached the head of the stairs—the treads, to my relief, were carpeted—and began to descend, sliding one hand down the banister for support with the keys still clasped in the other.

I glanced over my shoulder when I reached the half-landing. No one was following, but as I came to the floor below, I heard several sets of footsteps approaching from my right. I quickened my pace and went on down.

One more half-landing, and I could see a passage, flagged in stone this time, leading straight ahead. I stumbled down the last flight, hearing voices descending from above. There was the longer passage Hodges had mentioned, leading away to my left. And a man, a tall man in dark clothes, a dozen paces ahead of me, pausing with his hand on a doorknob, and staring in my direction.

If I took the passage on my left and waited a moment, he might go on into the room; then I could double back. But then the people on the stairs would cut me off. There was no help for it: I kept walking toward the man, feigning oblivion.

It’s the voluntary patients, so walk like you belong.

Ten paces, five, and still he did not move; I had come within three feet of him when he faced me directly and spoke.

“May I be of assistance?” A sombre, questioning voice, challenging my presence and compelling me to glance up at him. He was older than I had thought at first glimpse, tall and stooped and gaunt, with a long, haggard face, sunken eyes, and scanty grey hair swept back from his forehead. There was something vaguely familiar about him.

“Thank you, no,” I murmured, and slipped past him without breaking my stride. I heard something, a cough or an exclamation, I could not tell, and felt his gaze fixed on the back of my neck. But now the end of the passage was in sight. I could see the door, and the glow of stained glass in the fanlight above it. My legs were shaking; the flagstones swayed beneath my feet; distant voices echoed behind me, but still no one cried, “Stop her!” The handle turned in my grasp, the heavy door swung inward, and a moment later I was through, breathing damp, icy air and squinting against the light of day.

A gravel path ran along the side of the house in both directions, bordering a lawn about twenty yards wide, and beyond that, coppices of trees, their autumn colours fading above mounds of dead leaves. Through the branches to my left I caught a glimpse of ivy-covered brickwork. I set off along the path to my right, almost running now, listening for the view halloo and the crunch of pursuing footsteps, but still it did not come. Grey stone gave way to new brick; still the door behind me was in clear view, and still no one emerged. I passed beneath the branches of a copper beech, around the corner and onto a broad gravel forecourt, and there, fifty yards ahead of me, was the gatehouse, with two massive oaken gates standing open, and a wagon drawn by a pair of horses rumbling toward me.

I slowed my pace a little, feeling the great bulk of the asylum at my back and the pressure of a hundred eyes peering down at me. Now, I thought, now someone is bound to catch me. I still had the keys clutched in my left hand, but there was nowhere to drop them. The driver of the wagon, a stout, rubicund man, tipped his hat to me as he passed; I waved timidly in reply.

Twenty yards; ten; still no one in sight. From the gatehouse on my right, I caught the smell of bacon frying, and I felt a mingled pang of hunger and nausea. The wall loomed above me; I passed beneath the arch and onto a rough, stoney road. There was no other dwelling in sight, only bleak, rolling moorland, rising until it vanished into the mist. A fine rain was falling, gathering in tiny beads on the fabric of my cloak.

Liskeard’s four mile to your right.
I did not see how I could possibly walk four miles. I was shaking with fear and fatigue, but I set off anyway, throwing the keys into a muddy pool. For hundreds of yards, it seemed, the road ran straight alongside the wall; every time I looked back, I could still see the gate. On the Isle of Wight, I could have covered four miles in an hour; at this plodding pace, assuming I did not collapse, it would take me nearer two. Hodges would be found long before I could reach Liskeard, and then Dr. Straker would wire—but of course he could not wire from the asylum; he would send people on horseback, perhaps even dogs, to recapture me.

At last the road began to veer away from the wall, and then to slope downward, until the top of the wall had sunk below the skyline. How far had I come? Half a mile, surely. I was beginning to believe that I might actually escape, when I heard the sound of hooves and wheels coming up over the hill behind me. There was nowhere to hide; nothing but low, tussocky grass and boggy ground; a rabbit could scarcely have concealed itself.

I glanced back fearfully, just as a pair of horses, hitched to a wagon, appeared on the skyline and began to descend toward me. It was the wagon I had seen on the forecourt; I recognised the red-faced driver. Yet he seemed in no particular hurry, and as he drew closer, I could hear him whistling.

“Mornin’ miss,” he said cheerfully as he came up beside me. “Come from the asylum, haven’t you? Not much of a day for walkin’.” He had a pleasant country accent, not unlike Bella’s. Curls of grey hair protruded from beneath a greasy billycock hat
;
his nose was even redder than the rest of his face.

“No,” I replied, thinking frantically, “I was expecting to be met, but the gentleman has been delayed, and I must get to Liskeard station.”

“Well, you’re in luck, miss; I’m goin’ that way myself. Jump up now; there’s a step by your foot there.”

He leant down, grasped my wrist, and lifted me onto the bench beside him. A flick of the reins and we were off, only at a walk, but at least double my previous pace. I was wondering how to account for myself when it struck me that there must be a constant flow of voluntary patients to and from the asylum; it might be best to stay close to the truth.

“Do you live in Liskeard?” I asked my rescuer.

“Bless you no, miss. George Baker is my name, and I live in Dobwalls, over that way,” he said, gesturing to his right.

“And . . . do you have children?”

“Yes, miss, three boys—fine, strapping lads they are—and two girls, both in service now, and a credit to their mother.” And with that he was safely launched, needing only occasional prompting. The air seemed even icier now that I was no longer walking. I huddled into my cloak and tried to subdue my shivering.

We had driven for perhaps twenty minutes when I heard the sound of galloping hooves coming up very fast behind us. George looked over his shoulder; I dared not lift my head but shrank lower on the seat. Seconds later, a big bay horse shot past us, with the rider, heavily cloaked and muffled, bent low over the horse’s neck; he did not even glance in our direction.

“
He’s
in a hurry,” was all my companion said before returning to the story of young Bart and the escaped piglets while I weighed my own chances of escape. Was the horseman on his way to the telegraph office? Or to the police, to have me arrested at the station? Would I be better to try and secure a lift to some other town, and catch a train from there? Perhaps I could change my cloak if there was a ladies’ outfitter in the town. But that would mean delay . . . and most likely the horseman had nothing to do with the asylum, or he would have stopped to make sure of me.

I was still wondering what to do when we crested a rise and a sizeable town came into view, less than a mile away.

“Not far now,” said George. “Come up, there!” He flicked the reins, and the horses broke into a trot.

A few minutes later we were rattling through the streets of Liskeard, with George pointing out various landmarks while I watched covertly for policemen. There were none to be seen, but several people greeted George as we passed, and looked curiously at me. I felt sick with apprehension, but it was a strangely fatalistic kind of fear: I would escape, or I would not, and there was nothing more I could do about it.

When at last we drew up beside a small, whitewashed booking office, still with no policeman in sight, I remembered I had only the three golden guineas.

“Thank you so much for your kindness,” I said. “I should like to give you something for your trouble, and if you will just wait until I have bought my ticket—”

“Bless you, miss; there’s no need for that. It’s a pleasure to have someone to talk to. You have a pleasant journey, now, and I’ll be on my way.”

I thanked him again and clambered stiffly down. My knees wobbled as I set foot on the pavement, which seemed to sway with the same motion as the wagon.

“Sure you’re all right, miss?”

“Yes, thank you, just a little tired.”

It struck me, as I waved goodbye to George and made my way unsteadily into the booking office, that he had not asked me a single question about myself.

The clock above the counter said twelve minutes to nine. There were two people ahead of me, and a moment later I felt someone at my back. It took all of my resolution not to glance over my shoulder. My hands were shaking so badly that I feared they would give me away. If the horseman
was
a coincidence, I told myself, and if the people I passed on my way had not raised the alarm—and surely I would never have passed the gate if they had—then it was quite possible that Hodges was still locked in the infirmary; she might not be found for another hour. I clasped my hands and breathed as deeply as I could.

The clock had moved on to eight minutes to nine before I came up to the counter.

“When is the next train to London?”

“Well, miss,” said the elderly official, “there’s the stopping train at six minutes past nine, or the express at eleven, but the express’ll get you there sooner. Or you can change at Plymouth, and take the London express from there.”

“When does the stopping train reach London?”

“At ten past five, miss.”

I was about to buy a first-class ticket when I remembered asking Frederic about the first-class fare; if they searched the train, that was where they would look for me. Just as they would expect me to catch the express.

“I should like a second-class ticket for the stopping train to London.”

“Thank you, miss. One pound three and six, if you please.”

He directed me to the second-class ladies’ waiting room, where I meant to stay until the last possible moment. The platform was in a deep cutting, reached by a ramp that passed directly beneath the cloakroom window. There were no policemen visible, and no one I recognised from the asylum, but if they
were
waiting for me, they would be standing out of sight, in the shadow of the embankment. A wave of dizziness rolled over me. I felt my knees giving way, and grasped the sill for support, just as a whistle shrilled in the distance.

“Are you all right, my dear?” said a kindly voice.

A stout, grey-haired woman was peering anxiously at me.

“I am feeling faint, but I must catch my train; I think I hear it now.”

“Come along with me, then.”

Drawing my arm through hers, she picked up a large basket and led me down the ramp and onto the platform just as the train pulled in. Through the sheltering clouds of steam, we must have looked like mother and daughter; I could not, I thought hazily, have hoped for a better disguise.

Three minutes later I was seated beside her on a hard wooden bench, watching the platform slide away behind us.

Seen through the grimy windows of a cab, London by night looked truly infernal. Gaslight flared over wet cobbles; blackened figures moved amidst the glow and smoke of braziers, sending grotesque shadows capering across the walls behind them. I had passed beyond exhaustion into a strange, febrile, hallucinatory state in which the prospect of food, bath, and bed receded endlessly before me. I had never been so cold for so long, not even on the night of the landslide, and yet every few minutes I would sink into a waking dream in which I was simultaneously basking in the warmth of a blazing fire, and jolting through the streets of Marylebone, until the lolling of my head jerked me awake again. I did not know where exactly in Marylebone I was, but in a few more minutes I would be home and safe.

Mrs. Tetworth, the second of my rescuers, had kept me company as far as Plymouth, and even fed me with pastries from her basket. After that, it had been an endless procession of stations and fitful dreams, and the grinding discomfort of the uncushioned seat. My fear of capture had diminished as the hours crawled by; I had thought of getting out at Acton and taking a cab from there, but instead I had managed to attach myself to a middle-aged couple, who saw me through the barrier at Paddington—again without a policeman in sight—and into a hansom.

And now we were turning in to Tottenham Court Road, where the press of vehicles grew even heavier, and the gaslight fell upon crowds of pedestrians hurrying through the thin rain—to me an utterly incongruous spectacle, for it felt like three o’clock in the morning—and then in to Great Russell Street, past the looming bulk of the British Museum, and at last in to Duke Street, halting by the black mouth of Gresham’s Yard.

I clambered down stiffly, paid the cabman, and waited for a moment in the shadows opposite. Lights were burning behind the curtains on the first and second floors of my uncle’s house; the time, I thought, must be approaching seven o’clock, his dinner hour. Today was Monday—no, Tuesday—so it would be curried mutton, the dish I liked least of Mrs. Eddowes’ seven, but my mouth watered at the thought of it. Two men in greatcoats went by, glancing curiously at me; I could not remain here long. A woman, muffled against the cold, came briskly up the other side of the street and turned into Gresham’s Yard, and I followed her upon instinct.