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Breath coming in puffs. Heart racing. Numbness in his fingers.
They followed Coleman into a large dining hall.
“Hello there.” A plump, matronly woman with white hair that matched her starched white apron greeted them.
“This is my wife, Mrs. Coleman,” Mr. Coleman said.
“More visitors, dear?” Mrs. Coleman asked. “Shall I fetch some tea?”
“We don’t want any tea,” Lear growled.
“I’m afraid many of the rooms are locked,” Coleman said smoothly. “I need to go and fetch the keys for your tour.”
Nick saw the deceit dripping from his smile, like blood welling from a fresh wound.
“Have some tea,” Alice whispered to Nick. “It will do you good; you look very pale.”
Mr. and Mrs. Coleman left and Nick, Alice, and Lear inspected the empty dining area. It seemed ordinary enough. Long wooden tables and benches. A sideboard with water pitchers and baskets of bread.
Nick didn’t like the idea of drinking tea at the Yellow House as if they were on a social outing in a parlor in Mayfair, but he’d promised Alice to try things her way first, before he started flinging his fists around.
Nick hadn’t come here to be led like a lamb through the carefully choreographed presentation that Coleman had no doubt assembled to fool visitors into thinking his operation was aboveboard.
The truth had already been told to Nick over and over by the inmates he spoke with after they made their escape. This was a house of death and suffering. .
He sat on a bench beside Alice, trying to remain calm and not succeeding very well.
Mrs. Coleman returned with a tray of teacups and biscuits.
Nick finished his tea in one swallow and set the teacup down so hard the handle cracked.
Everyone stared at him.
“Now,” he said through tightly clenched teeth, rising from the table. “We wait no longer. Fetch your husband,” he said to Mrs. Coleman. “The tour begins now.”
Something was very wrong.
Nick’s mouth was strained around the edges, his shoulders hunched in on themselves like broken wings.
Even the way he walked was all wrong—no confident striding, no nonchalant, careless stroll.
His steps were tentative and faltered ever so slightly, probably unnoticeable to the rest of the company, but to Alice it was beyond troubling.
Coleman led them into a long, narrow room with rows of high-walled cribs, large enough to fit grown men. “This is one of the sleeping chambers,” he said.
Chains fitted to the railings of the beds. A few inmates wearing the chains, trapped in their beds. The stench in here was worse. Alice put a sleeve over her nose.
Coleman didn’t seem too interested in hiding anything from them. He didn’t even comment on the loathsome stench or try to divert them away.
A sullen, greasy-haired attendant was scrubbing the wooden floor. A rust-red stain.
Alice laid a hand on Nick’s arm. When he turned his head, his eyes were as vacant and cold as those of the man scrubbing the floor. Flat gray of cold metal frosted over so that all the shine was gone. Crystals of fear and hatred in his eyes.
She must take him away from here.
This was why he hadn’t wanted to come. He was afraid.
More than afraid, terrified and faltering in the darkness of his mind.
