Alan Petrillo - Asylum Lane

“Quickly, man; pull over behind that hedge.”

Andrews yanked the wheel around, slewing the little vehicle in a tight turn that brought it perilously close to the head-high hedges.

Peering around the thick branches and newly-greening leaves, Round Freddy watched as Lund and Reverend Elsworth exchanged words on the vicarage portico. Round Freddy couldn’t decipher what was being said, but the raised voices and staccato punch of the conversation clearly indicated a strong disagreement.

As Lund got into his car, the reverend approached its off side, leaning into the open window. The engine fired to life and the reverend lunged back as the sleek black auto flung itself into reverse, then roared down the dirt drive toward the street. Preoccupied, Lund did not notice the small police vehicle hidden behind the hedge.

“Clearly,” Round Freddy murmured, “this is not the time to disturb the reverend. It’s best if we see what develops next.”

Jane did not know where she was or where she was headed. She only knew she had to get away from the farm house and the madmen who were after her. She had begun hyperventilating when the snowy-haired man had put the knife to her neck, but when she realized he really didn’t intend to hurt her, she decided to find a way to escape. Stomping his foot wasn’t an action she consciously considered; it simply happened and Jane was as surprised as he must have been when she did it.

She passed several small farms set back in the fields from the dusty track, but was too terrified to stop and ask for help. Her fear made everyone suspect. Jane slowed her pace as she passed the last farm, watching the smoke curl lazily from a stone chimney. But as she debated about approaching the house, the fear of being caught by her former captors seized her again and she took off at a quickened pace, driving the bicycle’s pedals faster and faster.

A mile down the road, the bicycle’s front tire bounced as it ran over a partially-buried stone in the dirt track, pushing her toward a hedge, but Jane recovered in time to avoid crashing into the thick foliage. She was breathing hard and looked back down the track to see if anyone was following her. She could see no one and decided it was safe to stop and rest.

Jane sat on a grassy patch of ground and smoothed her skirt over her outstretched legs, listening to her heartbeat slowing to a more normal cadence. She looked at the countryside around her, trying to decide which direction would take her to safety. The day was dry, but a thick bank of clouds filled the sky and blocked out all signs of the sun. If she only had the sun, Jane thought, she could determine the direction in which she should ride. But without it, she decided it was best to continue in the direction she had been heading.

Another half-hour of pedaling brought her to a junction with a well-traveled dirt road. To the left she saw only a few scattered farms and outbuildings, a scene that looked much like where she had been. But to the right, Jane could plainly see a cluster of buildings in the distance, probably a mile and a half away. She remounted the bicycle and began pedaling with renewed vigor.

The town limit sign read Nunthorpe, which Jane knew to be a village about five miles southwest of York. She pedaled along the tiny village’s main street and stopped in front of the Sleeping Dog Public House. As Jane stepped inside, the low hum of conversation stopped and all of the room’s occupants turned to stare at her.

Jane sat down in a straight-backed chair at a small round table and breathed a large sigh. I must look a fright, she thought, brushing her hand back through her tangled hair. Everyone is staring at me.

The publican, a large, raw-boned man, shuffled over to her. “Here now, we’ll not be having your type in here. This is a clean establishment.”

Jane’s eyes widened at the implied accusation. “And what type would that be, sir?”

The man blew a beery breath in her direction. “You knows well enough the type I mean. Go ply your trade somewhere else.”

“I can assure you sir, that you are quite mistaken.”

“Harold, you leave off insulting that young woman.” It was the publican’s wife, one hand on her hip and a broom in the other. “Can’t you see she’s had a hard time of it. Why in bleedin’ hell must you always pick on the pretty young ones?”

A roar of laughter erupted from the small crowd of drinkers in the pub.

The publican, red-faced, retreated behind the bar. “You deal with her, then.”

“That I will Harold.”

The woman ducked behind the bar and pulled on a long handle, drawing a half pint of lager into a mug, then strolled over to Jane’s table.

“Drink this, dearie,” she said, setting the half pint in front of Jane. “And don’t you pay any mind to Harold over there growling at us.”

Jane gulped a mouthful of lager and spilled some of it down her chin.

“Easy, girl. There’s plenty there. My name’s Lizzie. Now tell me what’s happened to you?”

Jane swallowed two more mouthfuls before beginning her story, starting from the day when her uncle committed her to the asylum. By the time she chronicled her ordeal, she had finished the half pint, as well as a second one that the publican had brought at his wife’s direction.

“You’re in a fix, you are,” Lizzie said. “You need a safe place to hide until those men stop looking for you.”

“How do we know that they will stop?”

“We don’t, but men being men, they’ll get distracted by something else — either ale or a woman — and forget about you. Until then, you stay here. I have a room at the back upstairs. You’ll be safe. And you can work in the pub and the scullery to earn your keep.”

“Why are you doing this for me?”

Lizzie bit her lip. “My younger sister was in a situation a bit like yours. A bad man wouldn’t leave her alone, so she packed up and ran. I haven’t seen her in four years.”

Jane’s eyes teared as she grasped Lizzie’s hands. “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

“Let’s get you cleaned up and then onto a soft bed.”

“At this point, the soft bed alone sounds fine.”

Snow leaned against the cold stone wall of the farmhouse and tried to control his breathing by opening his mouth wide and sucking in great gulps of air. He had seen Fletcher do many distasteful things, but nothing like this. Dead, he thought. Fletcher had really killed her. When they were talking about it in the kitchen, Fletcher made it seem so sensible, like it was the only thing they could do. But now, Snow wasn’t so sure. He looked at the dogcart he had dragged to the front door and shuddered at the thought of touching the woman’s dead body.

“Snow, where the bloody hell are you? Get in here.”

Snow bumped his head lightly against the cottage wall, closing his eyes tightly. “Coming, Fletcher.”

Inside, the woman lay on her back on the smooth floor, her eyes staring unseeing at the beamed ceiling and her tongue lolling out of her mouth as if she were licking crumbs. Those eyes held the same fear now as when she was tied to the chair, Snow thought.

“Stop staring like a schoolgirl and give me a hand here,” Fletcher said. “Grab the legs.”

Fletcher had lifted the woman’s torso so she resembled a rag doll folded in the center, with a head too heavy for its body. Snow grabbed the woman’s ankles and lifted, surprised at how light she was. He backed out of the room slowly, putting most of his weight, and the woman’s, on his good ankle.

At the rear of the dogcart, they lifted the corpse into the box, but even though the woman was short, her body was too long for the cart and hung over the end.

“We could cut her legs off and solve the problem, but that would ruin the purpose of dumping the body,” Fletcher said. He looked at Snow with a burning-bright eye, then laughed. “Let’s get her arse up at the back of the cart and fold her in half.”