Running smack into Leopold’s scowling face.
“Nesting, Dear Harriett?”
“Yes,” I reply, attempting a steady voice so he doesn’t notice I’m gulping for air from sprinting around the house. Intuitively, I lower my bounty to sit between Leopold’s body and my eggs. I hold his skeptical gaze as I conceal the blood splatters on my clothes. While Leopold ignores women’s fashion, he would take great interest in why I’ve paired a nightshirt with gardening pants and riding boots. He’s clever enough to figure out I’m escaping.
Oh heavens, the blood on my hands from Phin’s surgery is damning too.
“Glad you selected a few trifles. Your baser instincts will emerge as your incubation progresses, but you mustn’t be embarrassed by them. You must tell me everything, for the good of the experiment and mankind as a whole. The documentation is your duty as much as it is mine,” he says, grabbing my arm.
He sees me. He talks to me, but he doesn’t recognize me as Harriett. His glazed eyes miss the stains on my nightshirt. His ears are too full of future fanfare and plaudits from his guests tohear the uneven clomp of my boots as he drags me back to my rooms. No matter how I try to balance us, my limp tugs on his arm with each step. When he jerks on my bedroom door handle, why doesn’t he question why it’s still locked? He doesn’t ask me how I got out. The distraction of his impending fame puts him behind the eight-ball. Best of all, he rationalized my stealing Phin’s storybook, or he missed it under the baby blanket.
Nesting. What a Patsy.
“Now be a good dear and change into something matronly,” he says, patting my head like a child. If I weren’t shaking with fear for my eggs, I’d smack his hand away. “I have three guests in the parlor who require coffee and light refreshment—nothing too heavy, as we will tour the labs while you clean up. Then it will be your turn in the spotlight. Isn’t it wonderful that you will get the attention you always pestered me to give you?”
“Yes, wonderful,” I say, failing to keep the sarcasm from my tone.
“See, I knew you would grow into the wife I needed,” he says, planting a slimy kiss on my cheek.
“Yep,” I reply with a fake smile that squints my eyes. “You’re the bee’s knees.”
I might have laid it on a little thick, because his brow drops like an iron trellis blocking the drawbridge to freedom. A breeze blows through the gaping open window like a tattletale. He pushes mefurther into the room, both hands squeezing my shoulders. He must suspect something. I cry out at the bruising pressure on the delicate place where my collarbones meet the joints. His thumb digs into the pressure point. Tears bloom in my eyes. My mouth drops open wide, but his expression silences my scream.
This is a test. If it were a punishment, he’d be yelling questions. For Leopold hates nothing more than knowing less than someone else—especially a woman.
I can’t alert the scientists that I’m less than cooperative if I’m on Leopold’s side. He’s evil enough to hurt me to press the issue. I’m not surprised in the slightest. However, the fact that Phin hasn’t come up in this conversation says he—and the dungeon that held him—isn’t part of today’s tour. If the hybrids reached the swamp without detection, Phin is safe. I hold an image of them building a raft while Phin supervises in my mind’s eye to distract me from the pain.
Three…two…ah, it worked.
Leopold releases me with a shove. I’m careful to sit on the bed without throwing my feet in the air and flashing my muddy boots. His smirk of triumph churns my insides. I’ll give him this victory, but he willcelebrate it alone.
“Not more than five minutes,” he warns as he backs out the door.
I nod like a docile wife until the door’s latch quietly clicks shut. No lock engagement. Do I dare run through the house? Do I try the window again? Damn, my rope of sheets isn’t attached to my bedpost. It lays uselessly in a heap in the grass below. I don’t dare to hope it will cushion my fall. My knee twinges in agreement. Going through the house is my only option, which means fooling anyone who may cross my path.
My gardening dress isn’t the finery I usually wear to entertain, but I can’t pass up the tool’s pockets. He did say to dress matronly. I sigh at my glittery flapper dresses as I bid them farewell once more. Knowing the frigid water of the swamp intimately makes me long for thermal underwear, not beaded fringe.
I add a thermal layer under my riding pants and jam the storybook into my biggest pocket at the hem of my apron. It weighs down the heavy dress, but I can still run. Trinkets with dual purposes, such as hat pins, fasteners, and half-empty gin flasks, fill the smaller pockets. I exchange the laces of my boots with longer ropes. I may need rope, thicker than the suture string I gave Ruth, in my raft life.
I’ve never lived on a raft, but the opportunity brightens my face to a smile, rivaling the late afternoon sun. An aura of fancy washes over me, andI pin the receiving blanket I stole from the nursery to my shoulders. Not only will it keep my hands free, but it will enhance my demure appearance should I get caught. I tuck my hairbrush in my apron strings after running it through the snarls on top of my head on the way out the door.
With my chin held high and my upper lip stiff as a board, I march down the hallway. Eyes trained on the top of the stairs, I don’t turn to my left or right in case I trigger myself with a glance into the wrong room. If I calmly exit the house, I’ll make it to Phin. One foot forward turns into one step, which increases to one hallway. I made it to the stairs!
Rhythmic. Serene. Unhurried.
There’s the front door. Too close to the front parlor where men’s laughter and cigar smoke leak from underneath the door. My heart breaks as I glide past an exit and the den of my enemies. The back door will give me a straight path to the swamp without windows to give my exit away. Plus, there’s the added bonus of my footsteps disappearing into the kitchen in case Leopold listens to my movements.
Ten feet. Three steps. No, no, don’t speed up. I can’t allow Leopold to suspect anything. Even steps, calm breathing, rubbing my belly, I must be the picture of domestic bliss. The kitchen door creaks as I open it—a signal thatI’m obedient.
My veneer shatters as soon as I enter the kitchen.
Phin’s puddle on the table. Snipped ends of suture thread. Bloody hand prints on the kettle.
“Want to explain, Harriett?” Leopold leans against the countertop, wiping his hands on a fresh dish rag. “I came in here to put the kettle on, to help you serve our guests, and look what I found. Either you hunted a very large animal and butchered it, or you’ve been playing doctor.”
“Did Mr. Breyers hunt this morning? Perhaps he—”
“Do you doubt I know the whereabouts of my staff? I know Mr. Breyer’s activities this morning didn’t include hunting. He was disciplining a naughty specimen and got quite messy—almost as messy as this room. Do you know which specimen required discipline? Do you know the fate of your precious Phin?” His evil smile brightens to the sinister glow of a full moon.
