The Medea Complex by Rachel Florence Roberts Read Free Book Online Page B

a
moment?" I ask him. "I'm sure one of the nurses would be all too
happy to make you a cup of tea."
    He stares at me, twitches his jaw, and knocks twice on the
cell door, hard and loud. Nurse Ruth opens it for him, and he walks past her
muttering obscenities under his breath and sniffing.
    "Really, you employ people whom use such foul language
in front of a lady? Disgraceful," Lady Stanbury says, picking the paint
again. A large area of the wall is now grey; she has exposed the stone.
    Evidently she has no insight into her own vulgarity, and the
hypocrisy of her words are not lost on Lord Damsbridge as he shakes his head in
shame.
    "Anne, tell me where you are." I say.
    "I'm in a cell, are you blind? There is no door handle,
I am trapped, and nobody speaks French. Where is Beatrix?"
    "Do you remember how you got here?"
    "No, because you evidently gave me chloroform or some
such." She starts swaying back and forth.
    "What is the last thing you can remember before waking
here?"
    She becomes wild, leaping off the bed and circling the room
like a caged animal. "I was at home! I went to sleep! And I woke up here!
Believe me, when I DO remember getting here, I will identify every person
responsible for this and make sure they are all swiftly arrested." She
stops, stands in front of me, and squints. "Including you. I can be sure
to remember your long, unruly beard, and evil eyes."
    "Do you remember my name?"
    "You call yourself Doctor. Now, I shan't answer any
more of your questions as firstly, they bore me rigid, and secondly, I shan't
give you any reason to harm me."
    "But Anne, why would we want to harm, you?"
    "For the ransom, idiot,” She turns to her father.
“Father, do these people never read? By next week expect a finger or toe in the
post. I'm sure their lack of education will ensure they resort to violent negotiations
soon enough,” She shifts her gaze back to me.
    “But I have ten of each, you fiend, in case you can’t count;
and I shall cut off your fingers and toes lest I get the chance." She
shakes her fist at me, and counts her fingers out loud. “One, two, three,
four...”
    "I think it's time to leave," I say to Lord
Damsbridge. He looks once more at his daughter.
    "I love you Anne."
    Something passes between them, a flicker below the surface
of her features, a ripple across his. A mutual recognition. It disappears as
quickly as it appeared, and she frowns, rubbing her hands together, turning her
face away from him.
    "Oh, go away Father. One of my feet is already in the
grave.”
    As we close the door, she shouts:
    "Send Fat Ruth back here, will you? I like her more than
you."
     
     

A Poison To The Body
     
    Edgar
    October 16th, 1885
    Royal Bethlem Hospital
     
     
    “Mr Stanbury, please, calm yourself. Anger is a quite
unnecessary emotion. A poison to the body.”
    “My wife is a lunatic.” I say calmly, yet inside I am
seething. My fingers curl protectively around the metal ring in my pocket.
    Insane. Positively mad. Perhaps I made a mistake in marrying
her after all. 
    Lord Damsbridge, unable to stay in the hospital for even
another minute, took his leave after my wife’s parting words. “Cruel, cruel
words for a daughter to say to a father,” he muttered, distraught, as left me
outside of the doctor’s office.
    She had cruel words for her husband, too.
    “How can I not be angry, doctor? I hate her for what she has
done. I was upset when I saw her, and now I'm just....just...” I search for the
right word. I find it. “Enraged! Oh, I don't know what to think of her! 
And...the manner in which she spoke to us both! Quite unlike anything I have
ever heard!” A noise buzzes in my ears, and I am having difficulty taking a
full breath. I lay my hands on the Doctor's desk and try to calm myself. “A
woman, speaking like that to her husband!”
    She is a criminal lunatic, not an ordinary one. She murdered
my son.
    Does it really matter how she spoke to me? Why am I focusing
on that, now?
    "I can