Ingrid smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. Her long hair spilled over her shoulders as she sat down on the chair beside my desk. “Still sulking, I see.”

“Dear sister, why have you come here? Oughtn’t you be at home with your husband?”

Ingrid frowned. Her fingers combed through my blond hair distractedly. “Jack is a temperamental bastard. Did I tell you he threatened to skewer me with a butter knife?”

I closed my eyes, picturing the scene. Ingrid at the kitchen table with that sour expression on her face. Jack looming over her with a butterknife in his meaty grip. Jack’s face contorting in the grotesque way it always did no matter his temperament.

“All the same,” I said plainly, opening my eyes. “He’s your husband. You should be by his side, not off wandering the countryside.”

“I’m not wandering town.” Ingrid smiled coyly. “I’m visiting my dear brother.”

“It’s unbecoming of a young woman of your station. I’ll send for a carriage right away.”

Ingrid pouted. “Oh, no! Please! Take pity on your unhappy sister!”

“What will people think of you, Ingrid? Of me?”

Ingrid stood up abruptly. Her eyes darkened with anger. “They will think the truth! That I was forced into marriage with an impotent imbecile by my money-grubber uncle!” she yelled. “In exchange for what? A patch of land in the middle of nowhere and a shabby old house the dead son of a bitch can’t even live in-”

Ingrid squeaked. Her face whipped around as my hand came down on the side of her face. An angry welt began to form on her cheek. She clutched her face as tears began to well in her eyes.

“Damn you, Ingrid!” I hissed. “I’ll skewer you myself if you keep talking such nonsense!”

Ingrid began sobbing, but I paid her no heed as I sought to recollect myself. I adjusted my vest and then my cuffs. I drew in a deep breath and then a second before turning to her once more.

“Now, Ingrid,” I splayed my hands. “I know this is difficult, but what’s done is done. What would you have me do?”

Ingrid whimpered and averted her gaze.

“Why! Surely you don’t expect a divorce!” I laughed incredulously. “That would ruin us both!”

Ingrid sniffled. “We don’t need a divorce…W-we could simply live separately or I could run away! Y-yes! I’d run away far, far from Plymouth and- and then it wouldn’t matter w-what people thought of us, would it?”

I swallowed the scream clawing up my throat. “Ingrid, I ought to slap you again,” I said through clenched teeth. “How selfish you are. If I ever catch you running away, mark my words you won’t live to know peace.”

A knock at the door broke through the room and I swiveled around. “Who is it?” I barked.

A voice spoke from outside the room. “Archie, sir.”

The scrape of metal against wood floor sounded through the room as Archie entered. Light poured in from the hallway as the door swung open. Archie stood at the entrance of the room, backlit from behind. The light seemed to cling to him. It formed a halo around his tall frame as he walked in with that even gait of his. In that instance, I thought he looked like a dark angel.

“Good evening, sir,” Archie said dryly.

“Good evening, Archie.”

Archie withdrew a small vial from the pocket of his waistcoat. “I have brought you your medication, sir.”

“How rude you are Archie! Is Ingrid not worthy of your greeting?” I motioned to Ingrid angrily.

Archie blinked. Then blinked again. He looked Ingrid up and down with critical eyes. His brows furrowed. “Right….Of course…” he said evenly. “My apologies, miss. I had not noticed you earlier.”

Ingrid shifted uncomfortably, wiping her nose on her sleeve. “Where’s Agnes?” I asked. “Agnes always administers my medicine.”

Archie’s lips thinned. “Agnes is otherwise engaged, sir.”

“I want Agnes.”

“You’ll have to settle for me, I’m afraid. Sir.”

“I’ll only settle for Agnes,” I glared and tried to cross my arms, but the canvas vest was unforgiving. “You know this.”

Archie glided to the armoire in long, elegant strides. His feet hardly seemed to touch the ground. He opened a cabinet and took out a piece of cloth. He began wetting the cloth with the medicine. “You seem awfully anxious today, sir. Some medicine will do you good.”

“No! No. I require no medicine. Only peace and quiet.”

“Sir, I really do insist-”

“No! I said no!” I became agitated, sweating and trembling. My heart began beating at the pace of a racehorse. Faintly, I heard Ingrid warning Archie off, but my hearing was starting to escape me. What was Archie playing at? Why his insistence on delivering this medicine? The shadows in the room seemed to be solidifying. From their depths, those evil eyes seemed to be watching. Archie moved closer.

“No! No, you damned devil! Not a step closer!” I screamed.

My vision swam. Archie’s smile wobbled and twisted like a snake. The shadows crept closer still.

Archie looked unmoved. “Please calm down, sir. You are having a nervous fit – that is all. This medicine will calm your nerves.”

“No!” I gasped for air.

Archie surged forward and I was too weak to stop him. He pressed the cloth to my nostrils. Unwillingly, I inhaled the medicine. The effect was immediate. My raging thoughts quieted and my mind suddenly became clear. My limbs sagged heavily. My heart calmed and steadied. I laughed aloud. How strange I was! Archie was right! How wonderful this medicine was! Why, what a fool I have made of myself. I’ll surely never hear the end of it from Ingrid.

“A final matter of business, if I may, sir?” Archie’s voice floated to my ears from somewhere up above.

I could hardly think through the haze the medicine had imposed over my mind. “Certainly,” I mumbled. My mouth seemed to be coated in thick syrup as my teeth stuck to my tongue.

“A matter of correspondence – from Lord Salisbury. It requires your signature. If it pleases sir, I shall sign it for you. Seeing as you are…ah…incapacitated.”

“Yes…of-f course…”

Archie motioned to the desk and the fountain pen that lay on it. “May I borrow your pen?”

Slowly, miserably, I reached over. I numbly grabbed the pen and thrust it at Archie.

“Excellent, sir.”

My eyelids sagged and I began drifting off. Through the murkiness of my addled brain, I thought again how right Archie had been. The darkness that had weighed so heavily on my soul had drifted away. I felt light and entirely at peace. For the first time in a long time, I felt hopeful and I felt alive.

A shrill scream pierced through the fog of my thoughts. I twisted around. Agnes was now standing where Archie had earlier. When he had sprouted wings and been set ablaze. Agnes’ eyes were ablaze now.

“What have you done? What have you done?” she screamed.

I followed her gaze, followed it down to where my hand gripped the pen buried in Archie’s gut. My vision began to clear. I blinked and rubbed my eyes as though I had just awoken from a deep sleep. The pen’s barrel became leather; its fine metal nib morphed into glistening teeth that winked wickedly in the dark room. Blood, black and viscous as ink, spattered my straight, canvas jacket and ran down my hands, sleeves, and pants. The knife clattered to the ground. My hands hung limp and useless at my sides.

“Naughty, naughty pen,” I muttered.

I looked over at Ingrid for confirmation. But where Ingrid had been, there lay only a chair and my red scarf draped over it. As if I had imagined her presence. As if she had never been there at all.

I looked around the room furiously. She couldn’t possibly have left on her own! I was sure of it! “Ingrid? Ingrid, where are you dearest?”

Archie’s moans drew my attention to his convulsing body on the floor. I jolted back as his face began to contort and change. The hard lines of his face became soft. Cheeks flushed with color and brown hair became gold soiled with blood. Ingrid’s agonized face suddenly looked up at me. Her bloodshot eyes bulged out of her skull. Her bloody lips formed a silent plea for help. For a moment, I imagined I had just killed her. But no, it couldn’t have been. I blinked and she was gone. Only Archie lay in her place.

Archie looked different now. He no longer wore a waistcoat, but solemn black clothes. He was dressed as a doctor; medical tools and the like were stuffed inside his pockets. I looked down at myself. I, too, had changed. I was dressed in all white, discounting the blood stains. I giggled at this. In the place of my fine vest was a strangely constrictive jacket with leather straps pulled tightly up and around my waist, my arms, my shoulders. Although, my hands seemed to have escaped their confinement. They wiggled freely at my sides. Now, come to think of it, how had I never noticed how bare this room was? It was hardly fit for a lord of my esteem. I giggled again.

Agnes was still screaming and sobbing like a madwoman. She crumpled to the ground and began rocking to and fro. They really should create an institution for people like this, I thought to myself. Perhaps I ought to create one. I chuckled at the thought, at my own cleverness. I continued to chuckle and chuckle until the chuckle became a howl of laughter and I lurched forward on all fours, baying like a wolf. A crowd was beginning to gather at the door. Their faces were grave and stricken.

A phalanx slowly emerged from the audience. They moved toward me like a pack of savage animals, pawing at the ground, maws gaping open. Their eyes salivated.

And then they were upon me. John and Theodore and Ralph and Oliver and Claude. All were upon me as I thrashed and kicked and clawed. Two held me down as the other three strapped a muzzle to my face. The gleam of a syringe flashed and disappeared in the darkness and then pain was erupting down my spine, searing my skin, scalding my skull.

I howled into oblivion.