This Haunted World Book One: The Venetian: A Chilling New Supernatural Thriller (21 page)

There were some days when Enrico didn’t visit, and that was the only thing I was grateful for. I wouldn’t have to suffer his hands all over me, his breath in my face, his voice as he read words that I held sacrosanct, as he mocked me with them.

On those days the others – I didn’t know what else to call them at first – would grow stronger in appearance, more and more of them filling the room, all looking towards me. If I could muster up the energy I would smile. There were men and women, so many of them. They poured in through the window, from the fields, and from the graves.

Once or twice I fancied I saw Catarina, maybe Luigina, and the woman who walked back and forth, Gabriela, although when she visited she was still, her face surprisingly pretty, something I’d never noticed. I berated myself for that, for how blind I’d been.

The others were not just from the asylum. I came to understand that. They included all those who had suffered on the island: the rejected and the diseased. What was here before the walls of the asylum had been erected? How had they lived? Or rather not lived. No one lived on the island. Not truly. But I’d tried to make the lives of those I came into contact with easier, to show them a fraction of kindness, and some, like Catarina, had responded – and paid so dearly for it.

The nurse that tends to me daily makes no effort to be kind. Sent in to wash and feed me, she can barely bring herself to look at me, disgust wrinkling that pretty little nose of hers. Her voice belies her stature. It’s harsh as she barks orders I can’t understand – the language a barrier again. But the others, there’s no barrier between us, between the dead and the barely alive. What medication the nurse administers, I hide under my tongue. When she opens my mouth she doesn’t check there, she can’t bear to. The haze is lifting, continually lifting. I was afraid at first, I thought the others might fade when I came to but they’re still here, they surround me, and they are right, together we are strong.

“Charlotte, what is wrong,
amore?
You are sick, always sick. Is it what they are feeding you? I can change that; get you better things to eat. I have said it many times, if you continue to be good to me, I will be good to you.”

Charlotte marvelled at the concern in Enrico’s voice, which seemed so genuine. He really did play the part of the devoted husband to perfection, fooling her, reeling her in, leading her to this. She remained mute. He didn’t need an answer, didn’t want an answer, just a doll that he could play with, that he could bend and break. But she could speak. When she was sure there was no one outside her door she practiced, whispering at first, her throat unbearably dry, as if it had rusted with disuse. And then she’d practise at a normal pitch, the words flowing much easier after a while. They were nonsense words in the main, sometimes not even that – just sounds, primal sounds, dredged up from deep within, but still a mark of success. She could walk too. She’d get out of bed and cross over to the window. Only once had she dared to open the shutters, cobalt blue in colour, her eyes darting from left to right, checking that no one was outside and would spot her. She had an instinct she’d be all right. After all, who would be out there? A mass burial site, the living would shy away from it, but not her, not anymore. Slowly her eyes had travelled over stone steps, trees and bushes.

Can anyone see me? Is anyone there?
Breathing in deeply, she’d waited. There’d been movement beneath the trees: more of them showing themselves. She sent out further thoughts, repeating the words the others had first spoken to her.
Come. Join us. Together we are strong
.

She wanted them, all of them, even those that in life had been capable of wrongdoing, because whatever crimes they’d committed, they’d paid for them.

Content with their response, she’d closed the shutters and returned to her bed on legs that no longer felt so unsteady. Before climbing back in, she’d turn her head to look at the table where her books were. Should she go over to them, select one, open it – run her fingers down the spines of the others? No. She didn’t want to.
His
touch was on them.

Enrico brought her back from memories. He was standing over her, wiping her brow with a muslin cloth. “My poor Charlotte, my sweet Charlotte.”

He wouldn’t rape her whilst she was being sick, would he? Surely he’d give her some respite. When he bent his head towards her and she smelt tobacco and alcohol again – Enrico was living well at least – she couldn’t help but recoil. It was even stronger today.

Immediately his expression changed. Became one of suspicion rather than concern.

“Charlotte, what is it?”

Her disgusted reaction had registered. When she failed to answer his voice grew more insistent. Still she kept quiet. Isn’t that what he expected, what he wanted?

“Charlotte,” he said, grabbing her by the arm and shaking her. “What is wrong?”

Although she made herself go limp at his touch, she knew she was beyond fooling him. But perhaps the time had come, perhaps he’d be pleased she could talk again, could communicate. Perhaps his love for her would overwhelm his fear of her instead. And perhaps he ought to know what she wouldn’t be able to hide any longer. Even if the sickness wore off there’d be other indications of what was going to happen.

“I’m pregnant!”

As though her words were a physical blow, he staggered. “You can speak!”

A wave of nausea paralysed her almost as much as the drugs used to. When it was over, she sat up. “Yes, Enrico, I can speak. I can walk, I can think and I can conceive.”

“But… I do not understand. The drugs…”

“Are easy to manipulate. The nurse is easy to manipulate.”

Some of his astonishment faded and instead fury edged its way in. He muttered something to himself in Italian. Charlotte had a feeling it concerned the nurse she’d just mentioned. Just as rapidly, Enrico switched to English.

“If my uncle finds out, he will not like it. There will be… repercussions.”

Cold fear seized her. She looked around her at the others. They’d shrunk back when Enrico’s mood had changed but they were gaining in confidence. And so must she.

“Enrico, I am pregnant, with your baby.”

Still he stepped back, shaking his head all the while. “No, no, it is not possible.”

“Not possible? Enrico, you come to my room, you rape me – sometimes night after night. You are a doctor, you know how possible it is!”

“But… I…”

She had to know. “Enrico, are you mad?”

His eyes, already wide in horror, seemed to bulge from his head. For a moment he simply stared at her and then he leapt forward and grabbed her by both arms, holding her mere inches from his face. “Why do you say that, why?”

“Let go, Enrico. You are hurting me!”

He had also raised his voice and she was terrified someone might hear.

“How long have you been pregnant?”

“Weeks, a couple of months, maybe more. I don’t know.”

“Liar! Surely you must know!”

“I don’t!” She’d been horrified to realise what was happening but also… something else – something that was completely unexpected, something she hadn’t experienced in a long while… hopeful. “Enrico, get me off this island. I need to go home more than ever.”

“Home?” He looked at her as if he didn’t understand such a word. “My uncle,
Dio mio
. He will not tolerate this.”

She reached up to grab his arms too. “He need never know! Not if you get me off this island. Surely he can’t monitor every move that you make.” She watched as his eyes flickered from side to side. Was he considering her proposal? Hope flared again. “Enrico, my mother and father will look after me. I won’t breathe a word about you and what you’ve done, where we’ve been. I’ll… I’ll make something up. War is imminent. It may even have started. Has it started? I don’t even know that. But if it has, people will go missing. And that’s what I’ll say, that you’ve joined the army, that you’re missing.”

Still he was quiet and she found herself silently pleading instead.
Please, please, Enrico, send me home
. The very thought of seeing her mother and father again made her feel faint, and Albert too of course, dear Albert, the brother who had called her The Venetian. She knew he intended to join the army but could he have travelled to Venice first when communication between them had ceased? Had he done his best to find her? There was no way he’d realise she was here. Enrico’s mother wouldn’t tell him or Enrico’s father – another weak man. A weakness she had to play on, to try and manipulate.

“Enrico, what you are doing here, perhaps it is noble, perhaps I was wrong, too hasty in my judgement. I should have supported you and been a better wife.”

Enrico was looking at her again, his whole demeanour wary.

“This is your child inside me, Enrico, either a big fine boy or a pretty, obedient daughter. Your child, and mine, we are its parents and together we are a family. You know how important family is. I do too. We both come from good backgrounds. Enrico, the three of us can be happy. And in the future we could have more children if you wish, add to our family. But first you have to get me away from here. I need to be looked after properly, to eat good food, the medication you are giving me could harm the baby. I need to go home, Enrico,” despite her best intentions her voice began to break. “Let me go home.”

“To England?”

“Yes, to England, and then you can join me later. Follow on. But I have to get out of here, if our baby is to live. I have to.”

“You want to go to England, leave me behind?”

She faltered. “No… I’ve just said you can follow me, when you’ve finished here, when you’ve learnt all that you can. Part on good terms with your uncle.”

“I should leave? When we are so close to a cure.”

“YOU ARE NO CLOSER!”

She screwed her eyes shut, bit down on her lip. Why had she shouted? The last thing she should have done was shouted. Enrico’s face became a snarl.

“All you are saying is lies. You are going nowhere, Charlotte, do you understand? You are staying here, with me, and you will take the medication I give you – all of it.”

“But the baby—”

“There can be no baby on the island. Either you let me see to that with medication or my uncle will see to it, via his methods.”

“So he will experiment on me too, murder us both?”

“If you are not a good girl.”

Before she could protest he grabbed hold of her hair and dragged her out of bed, kicking over the bucket she had previously been sick in, its contents splattering everywhere. At the table he stopped, caught her mouth in his vicelike grip and, with the other hand, began forcing tablets down her throat, causing her to retch.

“Nurse,” he was calling. “Nurse.”

It took a few moments but the nurse came scurrying in, stunned to see Charlotte on her feet. He issued a command and she promptly left the room, returning all too soon with a liquid-filled syringe. Charlotte struggled but the needle went into her arm, tearing the skin slightly she was sure, and then it was as though liquid gold filled her torso, seeping into her limbs and finally shutting down her brain as she collapsed in her husband’s arms.

All that talk of home, it upset the others and I’m sorry for it. The last thing they want is for me to go. They need me to stay. To look after them, to take care of them, to love them as a mother would, as a mother should – as perhaps theirs didn’t. I’m not sure what I was thinking. Not really. It’s just… when I found out about the baby, I thought it might change things. Not between Enrico and me, of course not. But I had to say what I did in case there was a chance he’d believe me. It wasn’t my life I was thinking of, but the baby within me. You see… she – yes, I’m certain it’s a girl – might be half his, but she is half mine too and I had to say what I did in order to save her. A mother has to try. The last thing I wanted was to hurt the others, not when they’d been hurt so much already.

But I understand their upset, their concern, and it was all in vain anyway. This baby won’t live, how can she? Already she falters. I’m not sure if Dr Gritti knows I am pregnant, certainly he has never been to see me, but Enrico has increased his visits. Still he rapes me. He seems not to notice my belly. Maybe because it has hardly grown, neither the baby nor me are well nourished. Just lately he’s been crying a lot. Instead of reading to me afterwards he remains by my side. He strokes my hair, my face, and he cries. He is talking as he is crying but a lot of it is in Italian so I can’t understand. He barely ever speaks in English anymore. And sometimes he gibbers, like a baby in fact, the drool from his mouth staining my skin. I think he is apologising, or at least that’s what I tell myself. That deep down in that ruined mind of his, he regrets his behaviour. Even so, what use is sorrow? He’s on a pitiful crusade – one that’s destroying him too.

But I digress. It can’t be much longer before the baby is due, before my body finally expels her and they take her away, to lay in the plague fields, with no ceremony, no fuss, to be forgotten as all of us are forgotten. I don’t want that for her. I can’t bear to think of it. The others have to help me, they have to promise and, if they do, I will promise something too.

“OhmyGod!” Her cry tore the night in half, she was sure of it. She’d never experienced pain like this. So suddenly it had come upon her. Not creeping up, but leaping like a tiger, catapulting her upright, dissolving the stupor she’d been in for so long and forcing her unmercifully into the present. “OhmyGod! OhmyGod!”

Where was everyone? Why was nobody coming to her aid?

“Help me!” she yelled. “Somebody help me!”

Her hands gripping the sheet, she fought to breathe evenly but it was impossible. Instead it was coming in short desperate pants as she rode each wave of pain all the way to its peak before it subsided, the relief cruelly lasting mere seconds.

Please help me!

They wouldn’t leave her alone to endure this, would they? Not if she screamed loud enough, if she screamed the asylum down. Someone would come to her aid.

The door burst open. She thought it might be Dr Gritti, holding a syringe in his hand, determined to shut her up. But you couldn’t halt nature in its tracks. This baby was coming and there wasn’t a damned thing anyone could do to stop it. It wasn’t Dr Gritti it was Enrico and the nurse who usually attended to her – a relief of sorts, albeit a stark one.

Closing the door behind them, Enrico and the nurse started talking to each other in quick bursts of Italian. She gripped the sheets again, her knuckles turning white. Why weren’t they rushing straight over to her, seeing to her? What was wrong with them?

“Help me!” Charlotte continued to plead, trying to force her legs over the side of the bed, to stagger to them if she had to, but her body refused to comply.

Enrico again said something to the nurse and she left the room, coming back not long after with towels, one of which she laid roughly under Charlotte’s bottom half.

“You have to push,” Enrico was saying.

“Push, push.” The nurse echoed but Charlotte didn’t need telling.

Her body convulsing, she thought she might die. If she did, she could join the others more fully then. Oh, the others, the poor others. She glanced around, there were so many of them, occupying every corner, huddled in groups, their faces contorted with worry.

It’s all right. I’m all right
.

Even in such pain they were on her mind, and some looked relieved to see it.

Remember what you promised me. Remember
.

Of course they would, they wouldn’t forget.

She wailed again. Is this how every birthing mother suffered? “
In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee
.” The quote was clear in her mind, an echo of a text read to her as a child whilst at church on Sunday, and something she vehemently rejected. She did not desire her husband, not anymore, and he would
not
rule over her. The children would be her priority. Always.

“The head is coming, Charlotte, push.”

Enrico’s face was contorted too.

“Charlotte, listen to me!”

How afraid he was, of losing his perfect wife, his doll.

“Charlotte!”

If she thought she knew agony before with the contractions, then the burning as the baby’s head crowned nearly caused her to lose consciousness. It was as though she was being branded with an iron. She screamed again and again, and continued screaming until she realised that another cry had joined hers. The sound stopped her own. Only remotely did she realise there was no more pain, that her body wasn’t being wracked with it. The baby was here and she was screaming, which meant one thing and one thing only – she was alive! So often she thought its silence in the womb was an indicator that she’d died and then she’d kick again. She was hanging on, despite everything. Was there a reason for that? Could some good come out of this mess?

“Me… give her to me.” Struggling to sit up further she found she couldn’t, she could only lie against the pillow. Glancing downwards there was so much red – she’d clearly lost a lot of blood in the effort of delivering her baby into the world. It soaked not just her clothes and bed, but the room around her, strangely enlivening it. “Please,” she whimpered, feeling like a newborn too, “give the baby to me.”

Enrico didn’t seem to see or hear her. Instead, he took the baby from between her legs, wrapped her in one of the towels and crossed the room. He was holding her, and not only that he looked enraptured. Rage replaced hope.

GIVE HER TO ME!
She screamed the words but only in her mind.
SHE IS MINE!

Standing by the window with the cobalt blue shutters, Enrico opened them. Daylight streamed in, which confused her more. She could have sworn it was the dead of night. How many hours had she been in labour? It had seemed like minutes, just minutes. But she couldn’t deny it, the sun was bright outside, so tantalising she wanted to bathe in it, feel the warmth of its rays. Let it erase the fever that threatened to engulf her. She knew what Enrico was doing. He wanted to look at the baby properly; he wanted to study her, because even he, brute that he was, was moved by her perfection. And she
was
perfect, she didn’t have to set eyes on her to know it. Her head would be nice and round, her arms and legs well formed despite the drugs that had been pumped into her mother’s body.

“Give her to me.”

The nurse had wandered over to stand by Enrico and the baby, smiling up at him with such pride in her eyes. Misplaced pride, it was as if they were the ones who had created her. But they hadn’t. She was the mother – Charlotte Evans – the one who had carried her, who had borne her, who had loved her. And all she wanted in return was to hold her.

When would they turn to her? When would they acknowledge her?

And then the nurse’s expression changed. So did Enrico’s. Both of them stared at the bundle in his arms, their eyebrows furrowed, comical almost. She wanted to laugh, let laughter be the thing to consume her, to lose herself in unbridled hysteria, but quickly she realised there was nothing to laugh about. The nurse stepped closer, reached out a hand and started prodding the baby, not gently either. The rage building in her reached murderous proportions. If she could she would have leapt from the bed and wrenched her hand from the baby. How dare she touch her? But she could only lie there and stare.

They were talking in Italian again, another thing that fed her wrath.
Talk so I can understand you!
What was going on? Was something wrong with the baby? Surely not, when she’d journeyed this far, when she’d made it into the world.

At last Enrico was looking her way. There was no rapture on his face. He looked like a different man entirely – old and haggard, not handsome at all, with lines she’d never noticed before running deep. He held her gaze for what seemed like forever and then slowly came closer.

Was he actually going to give her the baby? For a short while, when he and the nurse had stood together, she thought she’d died and that was why they were ignoring her. But her heart pounding in her chest at the prospect of holding her daughter for the very first time made her realise how alive she was – and not only that, but, in a life as wretched as hers, she’d achieved something – something great.

Despite her elation, she couldn’t help but question. Why wasn’t the baby screaming anymore? Why wasn’t she wriggling either, her arms batting haphazardly at the air? Newborn babies squirmed, they mewled and they fussed. They didn’t lie so quietly. Was she asleep?

“
La bambina é morta
.”

“Wh… what?”

“
É morta, la bambina é morta
.”

Bambina
meant baby, she knew that, and ‘
morta
’, she’d heard a word similar, although initially its meaning refused to make itself clear.

With rough hands, the nurse forced her upwards, causing sharp pains to stab at her abdomen. The look of wonder on the nurse’s face had gone too, replaced by familiar disgust.

Emulating the others, she forced her arms to move and held them out – a beseeching gesture.
Give me my baby
. If she thought Enrico might hesitate she was wrong. He thrust the baby at her, seemed almost glad to be rid of her. So different to how he’d been a few minutes before. Paying him no more attention, she looked down at the child nestled in her arms. She was indeed perfect but so small – a sprinkling of hair covering her scalp, not dark but fair like her own. Her eyes would also be blue – if she had them open.

Sweetheart
, she cooed the words. Would the baby hear them even though she hadn’t spoken aloud?
Sweetheart, it’s Mother. Look at me
.

Still the baby lay quiet.

Oh, you’re a good baby, such a good baby, so bonny, so beautiful.

The pink in her cheeks slowly fading, she was becoming pale.

I’ll keep you safe, my English rose. I’ll keep you warm
.

Why was she growing so pale?

You are mine, just mine. I’ll keep you safe
.

Never had she been so happy, or so proud. Look at what she’d produced!

Sleep, darling, if you want to, Mother’s here. Don’t forget that, your mother’s here
.

Charlotte barely even registered the door bursting open again as Dr Gritti entered. She had to remind herself later what he did, how he had torn the child from her and asked the nurse to ‘dispose’ of it, how she had heard screaming –
her
screaming, not the baby’s, the baby would never scream again. How both doctors held her down, her body no longer limp but thrashing wildly, bucking and convulsing. How the others had crowded round her, not piteous, forlorn or even afraid, on the contrary, their faces were full of anguish, with nothing but a thirst for vengeance in their eyes. She wanted to tell them that vengeance would be theirs but to leave her right now because she was happy still, or at least a part of her was – the part that would forever be holding her baby, gazing down upon her beauty and revelling in such innocence. She’d had that moment and no one could take it from her.