The Journey: Illustrated Edition (An Anna Kronberg Thriller) (7 page)

— six —

J
ames smiled at me. He slid his hand down my neck, curling his fingers around my throat. His smile changed to a fanged grin. He bent down to kiss me. My tongue slid over his incisors as I felt his hackles rise. He sank his teeth…

‘Anna!’ A voice cut through the dream. Fingers dug in my shoulder, sending a hiss up my throat.

I discovered Sherlock by my bed, bending over me. The light from his room illuminated one side of his face. His brow was crinkled.

‘Thank you.’ I coughed. ‘I’m good now. Go back to sleep.’

Slowly, he rose and walked away. ‘Good night,’ he said before closing his door.

‘Good night,’ I answered after he was already gone.

Why was it that I felt so… so hollow and transparent? As though I weren’t there. Every night, James invaded my dreams and forced himself on me before he killed me or I killed him. And every morning, I woke up and still felt him between my legs and smelled his death on my skin. It bore no logic. He was dead and I am alive. But I never felt so. I felt as though he were more alive than I.
 

And yet, I preferred these dreams to the ones about my dead father.

The morning sun shone through my window and through my eyelids, prodding me awake. I blinked and heard a knock. ‘Yes?’

‘We must leave soon,’ Sherlock called through the closed door.
 

After we had eaten, we bought provisions and supplies and boarded the train to Brighton. I had a new dress that could be adjusted at the waist to accommodate my growing stomach. Buying it was almost as painful as putting it on. It felt as though my fate was to be sealed again and again.

When the train followed a sharp eastward bend, my nose was dipped against the window. I wiped the print off the glass and watched the dark blue sea coming into view, the green countryside littered with small farms, villages, cattle, and sheep.
 

‘I wonder how you observe, or rather, what your eyes see and your mind analyses,’ Sherlock mused. ‘Is there anything in particular that you tend to focus on? How loud does a sound have to be? How fast does an object, an animal, or person have to move to attract your attention?’

He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, eyes lit up with curiosity. It wouldn’t surprise me the least if he’d pulled out his magnifying glass to attempt a brain examination through my ears or nostrils.

‘While we walked to the station,’ I began, suppressing a smile, ‘we passed an elderly couple. The man was talking about their too-old horse while she told him that the pain in both her hips had got worse. Three children, a few yards to the left, had an argument about a single piece of candied pineapple, the artificial kind that is so very yellow and sticky sweet. The cobbler on the other side of the street moved a crate out of his shop; it caught on a stone that stuck out of the pavement a little. It must have become loose only recently. The man swore into his beard while a woman in the room above him was about to tip cabbage leftovers out the window. The sash needed oiling; it squealed as she opened it. She must be doing this every day, always at the same time, for a flock of sparrows was already waiting for the food to hit the street. They fought over it while a buzzard called high above the town and a goldfinch snuck past us quietly, flying low. A pair of swallows switched places on their nest that stuck to the house behind us and you chatted nonsense about our new home in London. All that happened in merely a minute. Do you want me to go into detail?’

‘An example, if you please.’

I closed my eyes, recalling the scene. ‘Naturally, my view is somewhat sharpened for injuries and disease. The man had a slight limp, but I cannot tell what the cause might be. It was an old injury or illness. The shape of his shoe had adapted to his way of walking; the slight inward tilt of his foot wore the heel flat on that side.’ I opened my eyes again. Sherlock was listening attentively. ‘The aching of the wife’s hips was not chronic, I believe. She walked carefully, but otherwise placed her feet almost normally; her legs weren’t bent outward. I assume her hipbones were not arthritic. Whatever she did to reach this state, I would recommend her stopping it at once to save her from more pain.’

‘Intriguing. Hum…’ He leaned back, stretched his long legs, and pushed his hands in his trouser pockets and said, ‘You never take morphia to shut them out?’

‘Shut out what? People?’

‘Yes.’

‘No,’ I answered. ‘But it is indeed tiresome. Sometimes I feel like screaming to muffle the noises that constantly scream at me. I feel the urge to scream at all these people who are constantly buzzing, chatting, and behaving utterly illogically and insensitively. Keeping my hands busy keeps me sane. Healing people keeps me sane.’

Silently, he watched the countryside fly by. As the train slowed to a stop in Brighton, he said, ‘There are moments when I despise everyone. That is why I’m not in the habit of carrying a revolver.’

He rose and slung the bag over his shoulder. I watched his back, wondering whether this was the reason for him to avoid humans: we were emotional, uncontrolled, loud, and dumb. We had a tendency to drive a man like him into madness.
 

We took the train to London. As soon as we reached our compartment, he extracted from his bag the telescope he had purchased in Littlehampton.
 

‘That’s why you led us along these hills,’ I said. ‘To watch Moran, should he be tracking us.’

‘Precisely,’ he said and leaned against the window.
 

‘We should take turns,’ I said, eager to see if Moran was indeed coming.

‘Hum,’ he grunted and then said nothing while he searched the countryside.

We passed Hodshrove and his body tensed like a spring, his telescope pointing west to a hill about half a mile or a mile away. ‘I cannot be absolutely certain. But two men and three dogs are walking precisely where we walked, and they look suspiciously familiar.’

‘Let me see,’ I said, and he gave me the instrument. The view was a little blurry, and the movements of the train didn’t make it easy to focus, either. The locomotive hooted and I saw both men turning towards us. His movements, the way he shaded his eyes, how he slapped at his companion, looked all too familiar.

‘It’s him,’ I said. ‘I even know the dogs. They are James’s Mastiffs. They know my scent.’

‘Excellent!’

‘What’s the plan?’ I asked.
 

His eyes were shiny with excitement, his voice crisp. ‘He is faster than I expected him to be. We will reach Lewes shortly. I’ll dispatch a telegram to my brother. Tomorrow, we’ll return to Littlehampton. These two,’ he pointed at the window, ‘should need another three days.’

‘The miscarriage plan,’ I noted.

‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘It should provoke Moran to contact his men. Their identities will be revealed!’ He rubbed his hands and clicked his tongue. ‘I do hope he reveals the identity of the doctor in Dundee. But first we need to make sure you are sufficiently suffering.’

‘I need blood, a pale face, and a coat to warm my weakened body and, of course, to hide my stomach once the child is officially buried and we are leaving Littlehampton. A new dress would be practical, too, since I’ll be spoiling this one.’

‘Good. While I go to the post office, you get a dress and a coat. We’ll find an inn later.’

‘And bandages, a sharp knife—’

‘I have one,’ he interrupted.

‘I know. But I’m not using that dirty thing.’

‘You want to cut yourself? We can get blood from a butcher. Ah… no. It will congeal, of course. Good. We’ll use my blood.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘We use mine. I’ll open a vein at my ankle. It’ll be easy to stop the bleeding. A little blood loss will make me convincingly pale and queasy. Besides, you need to be the one running about nervously, fetching ointments and medicine for your ailing wife. If you pass out every few yards—’

‘Don’t be ridiculous! But yes, we’ll do as you say.’ He grinned and appeared ten years younger. I wondered how he had looked when he was a boy. The images of a five-year-old in an asylum made me nauseous.
 

‘Are you afraid?’ he asked.

‘No. I was just wondering how you looked when you were a boy.’

‘Like a stick.’ He laughed, then leaned back and inspected the window.

The train rolled into Lewes and we parted at once. I dashed to the chemist, to a second-hand clothes store, and then met with Sherlock at Lewes’s only inn half an hour later.
 

‘I’m starving,’ I announced as we stepped inside.
 

With trotters, potatoes, cabbage, and ale on the table, we discussed our plans.

‘I instructed Mycroft to meet with us the day after tomorrow. He will bring a stillborn of appropriate size and freshness.’
 

I nodded and poked at my trotter. The naked and gooey sheep foot suddenly looked rather uninviting. On the other hand, if it were hairy, it would be much less edible, I told myself, and began to suck the soft meat off the bone.

‘I’ll bleed myself ten minutes before we arrive in Littlehampton, then decorate my dress with a sufficient amount of blood, as well as your hands — you are my husband, and a doctor, after all. I’ll walk into town, moaning and heavily supported by you.’

‘Precisely,’ he said and plopped his jug with ale on the table. ‘How did you manage to poison Moriarty?’

His gaze slid to my hands that now froze around fork and knife. I felt like retching. ‘I spread a mixture of essence of belladonna and arsenic solution on my lower lip, my breasts, and my vulva, knowing that James would lick it off eagerly.’

‘Exceptional!’
 

The admiring tone was the last thing I had expected. Only a second later, he seemed to have arrived at the conclusion that his reaction was, perhaps, rather inappropriate. The light in his eyes flickered.

‘Can you really admire that?’ I said quietly, as not to snarl at him. ‘A murder? How can you not be disgusted by how I betrayed a man and destroyed his life?’

‘The method is admirable, but more so the strength, calculation, and nerve to accomplish it. Morals are not helpful here; they will twist you either way. Was Moriarty an evil man who deserved death? Or was he merely a man who made mistakes that could be forgiven? Simplification of the utterly complex for the sake of self-accusation to hold up moral is not only stupid and invites self-pity, it is outright dangerous.’

He was correct, of course. I began to wonder whether the logical mind would help the heart to heal.

‘There is no use in regretting the past,’ he said.

‘But
that!
How can I not regret
that?
’ I cried. ‘This is his child. It will be born in a few months.’
 

I thought about the risk of dying during childbirth. The thought tasted like an option, not a threat.

‘You think of the child as his. But aren’t there parts of you, too? Isn’t it half you?’

‘Which part of me? The part that manipulates or the part that believes humanity is a mob of brainless creatures?’

‘My father used to tell me that I’m just like his father, a man whom he despised,’ he said. A deep laugh rocked his ribcage. ‘He told me I was a perfect copy of his father’s character and stature. He knew I adored my grandfather, a grumpy and irritating man whose snide remarks always hit the truth in the heart.’

‘And you mean to tell me what precisely?’

‘That your child could be like you, or like Moriarty, or like your father, or even your mother. But most likely, your child will be a person of his or her own.’

I huffed at him. The chances that a second Anton would suddenly appear were minimal. A series of images flitted through my mind — a row of ancestors, a chaotic mix of Moriartys and Kronbergs.

‘I cannot tell you what the right thing to do would be. But should you choose to raise him, you can give him what he needs to be an intelligent and loving man,’ he said. ‘Or woman.’

He bent forward, pressed my hand for a long moment before releasing it again. How empty it felt now. I curled it around the other to fill the void.

‘So, in essence, you try to tell me that the child might or might not show James’s characteristics and that I should raise him or her to ascertain the world will not be bothered by another criminal mastermind,’ I said, slamming the cutlery on the table. My appetite had disappeared.
 

‘You are terrified,’ he observed.

‘You believe that locking you up in an asylum one day would be justified,’ I retorted.

He signalled yes, and so did I.

Then he changed the topic. ‘The man who talked about the too-old horse has served in the Boer War. He took a shot in his right lower leg. The injury tilted his foot inward a fraction. The horse was too old to pull the plough, but the couple couldn’t afford a new one, so the wife had begun to work as a help in the post office. The constant sitting made her hips ache; her wrists had marks from the edge of the counter and her fingers were smudged with ink. She even had ink on her right temple. She must have rubbed it repeatedly. Perhaps a headache?’