Dance of the Red Death (Masque of the Red Death)

  “I doubt I’ll need to resort to it. The printing press is large, it can’t be that cleverly hidden. We’ll find it.”

  “Unless we’re going to search for it now, I suppose we’d better move on,” I tell him.

  “Come upstairs.” He offers me his arm, and after a moment, I take it. “You’ll need something to wear,” he says. “We need to eat, to regroup with the men and whoever’s left here. And your dress reeks of smoke.”

  His rooms are exactly as I remember them, except for the state of his bookcase. The leather volumes are shoved haphazardly on the shelves, some even upside down. Elliott leads me through the sitting room to his sleeping chamber. I pause at the threshold, but he continues to the dressing room.

  “Here,” Elliott brings out a dress and tosses it to me. “This should do. I’ll wait out here.”

  Once I’m alone I scrub my hands quickly in his washbasin, wincing at the state of my fingernails. I take off the flowery dress and kick it to the side. The new dress is a soft silvery-gray silk, shot through with threads that are almost white.

  It fits perfectly, and when I open the door of the dressing chamber, Elliott has changed too. Waiting for me. He’s wearing black, with a gray vest of the same fabric as my dress. He takes out a matching silver pocket watch and considers it.

  “This dress is lovely,” I say. “I’d have expected something brighter from April’s spares.”

  Silence stretches out between us. His posture is stiff and uninviting. I touch the fabric of my sleeve. He never said the dress belonged to April. I am a fool. The green one he gave me for the steamship’s christening was probably not April’s either. Elliott’s life didn’t begin when he met me. I never assumed it did. But the way the vest and the dress match—that had to be intentional.

  Before I can find the words to question him, he snaps the pocket watch closed. “Let’s go to the dining room,” he says. Elliott takes my arm, and as we pass by a mirror I can’t help admiring the picture we make.

  As we enter I search the room for Will, but the table holds six chairs and he isn’t in one. All of the men are older. The frightening one, with the face of a lizard, the one who tried to keep me from taking the book of maps, is flanked by two other villainous-looking fellows. Between them sits a slumped man with wild hair and sad eyes. He is the only person in the room who doesn’t have a mask, so perhaps that is why he looks so out of place. Or maybe it’s his obvious nervousness.

  Elliott’s step falters as he sees the man, but he recovers immediately.

  “Dr. Winston,” Elliott says smoothly. “When did you leave my uncle’s palace?”

  Dr. Winston nearly falls out of his chair when Elliott greets him. “Just days ago. I . . . used the tunnels.”

  “We’re lucky a man of your knowledge grew tired of my uncle’s hospitality, then.” Elliott draws out a chair for me, then takes one himself.

  A servant enters the room from the opposite side with a great tray, and I look up too quickly, some part of me expecting it to be Will. But it’s the boy from earlier, staggering under his heavy burden.

  Like the dining room at Prospero’s palace, the one here is decorated with polished mahogany and dragon statuettes. Our rather frugal meal is served on antique imported china.

  We eat our soup in near silence. Then Elliott says, “So tell us, gentlemen, what is the news in the Debauchery District?”

  “We understand that a certain young man has been inviting people to our territory, to our building, no less,” Prospero’s former henchman says. “Men in uniform have been arriving all day.”

  Elliott smiles. “You can keep your rooms for as long as you need them. I know you have nowhere else to go.” His words are low and loaded with threat. I watch the scientist. He’s eating steadily, but he eyes Elliott the way you watch a serpent.

  “How did you get away?” I ask the scientist, unwilling to play along with Elliott’s pretense that he was Prospero’s invited guest.

  “Someone left the doors of the dungeon open. All of us escaped.” He puts down his soup spoon and smiles at me. “Someone very courageous . . .”

  When he glances at me, my heart stops. My mother is with the prince, in his palace. “Someone who has a soft spot for scientists?” I ask.

  He nods.

  And now I’m both proud of Mother and worried about how the prince will punish her.

  “Why did you come here?” Elliott interjects. He isn’t even pretending to eat now, just interrogating the man.

  “The other men went to the swamp.” The scientist’s voice drops. “They were looking for something. A rumor.” He looks up quickly at the men who are listening, and then back to his soup. “But I have a grandson. I plan to search the city for him.”

  “I’ll assign a soldier to help you search,” Elliott offers. “If there’s anything else—”

  “Thank you.” His consideration of Elliott has softened a bit.

  “Dr. Winston has been telling us fascinating rumors,” the old man across the table says. “He says that both Prospero and Dr. Worth knew that there was a way to protect against the plague, and they chose to suppress the information.”

  “Those rumors aren’t new. They start up every few months,” I say. And who can blame people for being suspicious, when Prospero kept control of the masks and Father never fought him on it?

  “The prince never cared about anything except control,” Elliott says. “Now he’s focused on his masquerade balls. Those, he can control.”

  Elliott doesn’t seem surprised that rumors are circulating. He knows something that he isn’t saying.

  “I suppose you would know the prince better than any of us,” the old man says. Looking at Elliott, he says, “Your familial connections are quite . . . surprising.”

  Elliott ignores him, but I meet his hooded eyes. What does he know?

  I’m glad when Elliott pushes back his chair and places his napkin on the table. I can’t stand being in this room any longer.

  “We’ll talk soon,” he tells Dr. Winston. I follow him out of the dining room, where he pauses to speak to the guard on duty. After assigning a man to Winston, he walks me upstairs.

  “Will picked this room for you.” We’ve stopped at a door, and Elliott hands me a key. “I think you would be safer in my room. I’m not sleeping on the floor again, though.”

  “This will be fine,” I say. “I don’t wish to sleep on your floor either.”

  He pulls the book of maps from an interior pocket.

  “You’ve spent more time reading this than I have. I need to know which passages are near, which ones may connect with the cellars. Whether Malcontent can attack us from below.”

  I take the book from him, and in the same movement grab his wrist.

  It’s time to tell him who Malcontent is.

  I never meant to keep this secret from him. Never wished to know more than he did about the enemy who foiled all of his carefully laid plans.

  “Come inside with me,” I say.

  He arches his eyebrows and follows me.

  This room has two upholstered chairs, a tapestry depicting a tree with white leaves, and a doorway that must lead to a bedchamber. “Sit.” I gesture to the chairs. “I need to tell you something.”

  “You adore me and are having trouble keeping your hands to yourself?” he suggests.

  “No.” But my seriousness is lost on him.

  He sits and pulls me close. “I’m having trouble keeping my hands to myself.” The look on his face is completely earnest. I don’t pull away. It’s better that we are touching.

  The silk of my dress billows as he draws me into his lap. Removing his mask, he kisses the side of my face, and slides my mask off. I turn to meet his eyes, but I don’t kiss him.

  “Elliott.” We are so close I can see his pupils contrasting with the pale blue of his eyes. “Your father isn’t dead.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  HIS HANDS DROP, AND HE STARES AT ME.

  I plow on. “T
he corpse collectors took him, but he was alive. He survived. He stayed in the swamp. The diseased men took him in and worshiped him because he seems to be immune to the contagion. They consider him some sort of saint, a miracle.”

  “Malcontent,” he says slowly. “You’re saying that my father, who I watched my uncle murder when I was a boy . . . is alive . . . is Malcontent?”

  I grip his shoulders tightly, waiting for the knowledge to sink in. He shifts, and I slide from his lap, hitting the floor hard. He doesn’t seem to notice. He sits very straight, staring ahead.

  I expected him to curse. I expected indignation, but he surprises me.

  “Does he know who I am?” He’s gripping the arms of the chair, his knuckles white.

  “Yes. He knew what he was doing when he blew up the steamship.”

  The confident, arrogant Elliott that I’ve come to appreciate is gone. He slumps in his chair. I don’t blame him. His father—not an unknown madman—tried to kill him.

  I don’t reach out to him or speak.

  I kneel beside him. It isn’t the most dignified of poses, but I don’t care. My mother might have adopted the same position to comfort me as a child. I know how it feels to have your world crash down on you.

  “Are you sure?” Elliott’s eyes are haunted.

  “Yes.”

  He starts to say something else.

  “Elliott,” I say gently, “April was with me.”

  A clock in the corner ticks away the minutes.

  Elliott is so pale I’d be afraid he might pass out, if he was the sort of person prone to fainting. I reach to touch him, and then pull back.

  “If anyone finds out, you must hide how you feel. Let them think you don’t care.”

  “Like you, Araby? Nonchalant? Uncaring about your own father’s sins?” He’s getting angry now, defensive. That’s the Elliott I know.

  “I don’t suppose I was very good at hiding my feelings when I learned about Father. But you have to be.”

  “Your father didn’t try to kill you.”

  I used to like to see Elliott with his guard down, saw it as a chance to peer past the walls that he’s constructed. But now that I know him, it makes me uneasy to see him so unsure. Even when he doesn’t know the right course of action, the Elliott I know is always ready to fake certainty.

  “No,” I say. “My father tried to kill everyone in the world because I wasn’t happy.”

  Elliott puts his hands on either side of my face. He looks into my eyes. I don’t look away. For once, I don’t try to hide the guilt. The pain.

  “You told your father you couldn’t find happiness?”

  “The world is bleak,” I say.

  Then his arms are around me. It’s an embrace, but not a passionate one. He bows his head. I put my own forehead against his cheek. And we don’t move. Even when there are footsteps in the hall, and they stop in the doorway.

  “Sir?” It’s one of Elliott’s men, blushing furiously at whatever he thinks he interrupted.

  “Our meeting.” Elliott groans. “Of course. Araby, I’ll be back for you in an hour. We’ll make plans.” He looks pointedly at the book of maps.

  Elliott releases me and strides across the room. He hesitates in the doorway, but I don’t say anything, don’t ask to go with him. The regret is setting in. I shouldn’t have been so open, shouldn’t have revealed so much about my father and my feelings.

  So he goes.

  I walk over to lock the door behind him, and suddenly Elliott reappears in the doorway, alone.

  “I’d like to give you a reason to live.” He tosses something to me, and I catch it without thinking. And then he’s gone again, and I’m holding a diamond ring in my fist.

  Is this some sort of diversion? Is he trying to keep me from the overwhelming guilt? Was he afraid for my sanity? Or was it more?

  It seems so long ago that Elliott asked me to wear the ring, to pretend I was madly in love with him in front of his uncle. Since then I’ve come to understand him, and on some level I think he understands me. I slip the ring into my pocket.

  While I appreciate the sentiment, I don’t need him to be my reason to live. And I don’t plan to wait around for him to come back for me.

  As I reach the stairway, I see Will slipping down a side corridor. And I follow him.

  At first I mean to call out to him. But he’s moving furtively, and every time he passes a corridor, he looks down it quickly. He’s sneaking off, and I want to know where.

  He grabs a candle and starts down a flight of stairs. I wait until he’s passed through the door at the bottom before I follow him. In the darkness on the other side of the door, I can’t tell where he went. As I turn, while my eyes adjust, a hand reaches from the shadows and grabs my arm. I stifle a scream.

  “Did Elliott ask you to follow me?” Will asks.

  I shove him. “Did you really think I’d spy on you for Elliott?” I cross my arms over my chest, furious.

  He grins at me. “So you’re following me because you want to.”

  My anger is replaced by confusion. I’m following him because I wanted to see where he was going. That’s all.

  “He didn’t ask me to follow you.” I try to steer the conversation back to Elliott. “But he does want to know where your printing press is.”

  “He’ll figure it out soon enough. And then he’ll have someone take over the machine and print whatever lies he wants.”

  “And you only print truth?” Somehow the darkness makes it easier to ask the question.

  “I don’t always know the truth. But I don’t print things I know are lies.” His voice is quiet and thoughtful. “Give me your scarf.”

  “Why?” I ask as I unravel it.

  Will sets the candle on the floor, and then his hands are on me. He puts the soft fabric of the scarf over my eyes.

  “You’re blindfolding me?” My anger is returning. Does he trust me so little?

  “Araby—”

  “I trusted you. Despite—” I clear my throat. I won’t throw his betrayal in his face. “I don’t spy for Elliott.”

  “I know you can keep secrets. You’ve kept plenty of them. But he has ways—”

  I’m blushing. Will is careful not to pull my hair as he ties the blindfold. He can probably feel the heat coming off my cheeks.

  “I didn’t mean—” From his voice, I guess that he is blushing too. “I was thinking of torture,” he says finally. “Not anything improper.” But then his voice becomes bitter. “Not that I have any say over what you and Elliott . . . the way your relationship—”

  I turn toward him, though I can’t see him through the fabric. I trip over my own feet, and Will steadies me. “You already warned me about Elliott,” I say.

  “I did.”

  “That’s really all you can do.” Because even though I’m sure that my relationship with Elliott isn’t what he thinks it is, or will be, it’s my problem to fix.

  “I know,” he says. And then, changing the subject, “We’ll be going down another flight of stairs. I’ll tell you when we reach them.” We walk to the end of the corridor, through a creaky door, over a place where the floor is uneven.

  The stairs are torture. Even with Will’s guidance I have to feel to find my footing, and it’s distracting having him so near. Finally we reach the bottom. And then he leads me across a floor that gives under my feet . . . wood planks? And through another room.

  “Stop,” Will says, and I hear him fumbling with a key. Then “Come into my lair.” Something in his voice makes my heart speed dangerously. I try to hide my discomfort by taking my time removing the scarf from my eyes and then smoothing my hair.

  We are in an underground room, lit by gaslights. The printing press takes up most of the space. The mechanism looks complicated; it’s wooden with a series of knobs and handles, as well as a huge wheel, where it appears the paper is fed through.

  “How did you learn how to work it?”

  He picks up several pieces of lead
type, arranges them to spell my name. And then, as if embarrassed, knocks them away with the side of his hand. “I found some books in one of the libraries and studied. In the beginning I just printed messages to take home for the children. Eventually I learned to print more sophisticated jobs.”

  “Did you come down here often? Every night?” I ask.

  “Probably once a week.” He sets to work, consulting a sheet of paper covered with Elliott’s bold handwriting.

  Wooden crates line the walls. At first I think they are filled with extra printing paper, but they are actually yellowing newspapers.

  I step toward them. “Where did you get these?”

  “Kent and I rescued them from the same cellar where we found the printing press,” he says. He doesn’t even look up from arranging the type with deft fingers.

  I pick up a delicate paper, holding it ever so carefully. Even with the gaslights, it’s difficult to read the newspapers. I’d like to take them upstairs and comb through them for days. It’s like a glimpse of life when the world was normal. Before the plague.

  They feel precious.

  I flip to a society page with a picture of a girl in a fancy wedding dress with a veil. April would love something like that, and with the contagion spreading she could use a veil. I set the paper down.

  “What are you printing?” I ask.

  “Warnings, from Elliott. A list of symptoms of the Red Death.”

  “By the time you have the symptoms, it’s a bit too late, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t question my orders, but I don’t think he means the diagnosis to help the victim. I think he means for the other citizens to avoid those who are infected. It makes it easier to kill them. Or exile them.”

  He’s judging Elliott. And maybe Elliott deserves it. The print on one of the flyers he’s already made reminds me of the one about my father. I steel myself to ask him about it.

  “Did people find the one you wrote about my father helpful?”

  Will flinches. But he can’t ignore this question. He abandons the press and looks at me.

  “Araby—”

  “Did Malcontent pay you to say those things? To make my father a villain?” My fists are clenched, my nails digging into my palms.