Past: Log-Arms, Indi Abrams

Past

Log-Arms

by Indi Abrams

I squeezed my eyes shut and braced myself, yet no gunshot rang out. The rhythmic clacking of hooves on hard-packed dirt was accompanied by jovial birdsong, not the echoing boom of gunpowder I had expected. Victoria’s scream, however, came on cue. I felt the cart lurch forwards slightly as the horses gave a start at the holler and I opened my eyes in time to spot the man escaping into the greenery of the park. No point in giving chase; he had too much of a headstart to catch up on foot, and the carriage wouldn’t make it far, what with all the trees. Victoria was hunched over. I felt my heart trying to burst free from my ribs as I reached out my hand to her. She turned to face me.

“I am fine, Albert, no need to worry,” she said, with a strong voice, characteristic of the woman. This wasn’t the first attempt on her life, and as I would soon learn, it would not be the last.

“Well, thank goodness for that. We can’t have our Queen dying on us, now can we? And I, for one, would not like to become a widower just yet.”

Victoria laughed, a hearty laugh that those less favourable of her might have called a ‘chortle’. The carriage had slowed to a reasonable pace, now, and the driver, voice quiet and shaky with meekness, asked, “would you like to return to the palace, your highness?”

“Well of course not!” Victoria declared, much to my horror. “We shall not have our outing ruined by so pathetic an interruption!”

“Dear, I do think that it would be best if we went back. It is entirely possible that that swarthy rascal is still around,” I intervened.

“And if he is? His gun clearly does not work, or else we would not be having this conversation. I appreciate your input, as always, Albert, but I wanted a carriage-ride, and I shall have a carriage-ride.” And that was that. We continued on, and all seemed peaceful. I tried shutting my eyes, and breathing slowly, in order to calm down, yet the helplessness brought about by this blindness was unbearable. And I could not focus on my breathing when all I could hear was my heartbeat. I tried admiring the greenery; after all, what’s more peaceful than nature? Behind every tree I saw something, be it a shadow, or a hint of movement. The carriage-ride was torture.

Upon returning to the palace, my first order of business was contacting the authorities. The prospect of a regicidal maniac on the loose chilled me to my core. Officers arrived sharply (though, I reckon that they ought to have been faster, and I said as much), and I talked them through the event. They left soon after, intending to search the park for traces of the criminal. I decided, during this interim, to speak with Victoria. If I’m honest, I went to check that she was safe, as much as I did to talk to her. She was a headstrong woman, but even she saw the sense in alerting the police. Argument averted.

“Good thing we got back when we did,” I said, as the slate-coloured clouds overhead began spewing forth torrents of rain. I pitied the policemen who would now be trudging through the muddy park, searching for rapidly disappearing footprints.

“Good thing we got back at all!” Victoria’s eyes took on a cheeky sparkle.

“Indeed! Ah, but what will we do when the police get back? They’ll not find anything in this weather.”

“Do you doubt our police force? I would never allow such incompetence,” Victoria announced smugly.

“I doubt that they can follow tracks which don’t exist,” I retorted, gaining the upper hand in our bout of words.

“Ever the optimist, Albert.”

“Ever the realist.”

This continued for some time, before our little dispute was interrupted by Robert, our head servant, announcing the return of the police. In a shocking display of nightmarish manners, they stood, sopping wet, on top of our brand-new Indian rug. With a dejected shake of his head, an officer announced their inevitable failure, prompting me to shoot Victoria a triumphant glance.

We had a problem, now, which was one more problem than we had leads on this attempted murderer: without a way to arrest

him, Victoria was in perpetual danger. And the chances that she would agree to remain indoors was slim, at best.

“In that case,” Victoria’s voice rang out, “we must make him reveal himself!”

“Oh, and how might we do that?” I asked, sceptical.

An officer spoke up, next. “Her highness is right, I’m afraid. Though I’m not sure how we can do that.”

“Albert,” Victoria said, with a glint in her eye that told me I would not like what she was about to say, “we must take a carriage ride again tomorrow!”

“Are you insane?” I cried, “have you taken after your grandfather?”

“Far from it, Albert! We shall dress these policemen up as common folk and take them with us, so that when the gunman shows himself, they may arrest him!”

“Or, your highness,” an officer interjected, “we could send a decoy out in the royal carriage?”

“Now that would indeed be a clever idea,” I agreed profusely, only to be shot down by an admittedly good point from my wife.

“And do you think that the killer would fail to notice? Do you think he would fire without first looking to see his target? Nobody more competent than a madman would draw a gun without first checking to make sure his target is there!”

And so, it was decided that we would go out tomorrow. This meant, among other things, that I had great difficulty getting to sleep that night. I played the scenario in my head for hours upon fidgety hours. Victoria, of course, slept like a log. Eventually, however, I dozed off.

My dreams were no solace, however, as the figure – who took many forms, as I did not get a good look at the man – haunted every corner of the palace, stood in ambush at every event. He poisoned, he shot, he strangled Victoria, in every single horrific nightmare. When I was awake, I longed for the refuge of sleep. When asleep, waking up was my only escape. And what if the man did not show up? What if he was plotting something far greater, instead? After all, only a fool would fail an assassination, before trying again, in the exact same way, on the very next day?

Many times, I awoke, often at the perceived sound of soft footsteps, or the cocking of a gun. I saw figures in the darkness, but when I glanced to Victoria and back, they were gone. The hair on my arms was perpetually on-end, and when I closed my eyes, I felt someone watching me; I heard the subtle shifting of a patient killer.

Yet none of my fearful fidgeting woke Victoria. For that, I was thankful: should I have woken her, I would have had better things to worry about than a killer! Her snores broke the silence, punctuating my paranoid thoughts. At times, she would throw a great log of an arm over me in her sleep, a log to which I would cling, and drift down the raging torrents of fear, into a vast ocean of sleep.

Morning came, to my relief, and terror. Robert served us breakfast, as he often would when he could tell that the mood in the palace was undesirable; in such sit-

uations, he feared that a less experienced servant may accidentally fan the flames of whichever negative emotions were roaring at the time. Yet I did not eat, and I urged Victoria to refrain, as well. I had not lost my appetite, as one might assume, on the contrary: I was hungrier than ever! I would not, however risk the food’s being poisoned. Just because the would-be assassin attempted a shooting yesterday, that does not mean that he will resort only to violence. Assassins, I imagined, could be tricky.

Victoria ignored my desperate pleading and inhaled her meal of cured ham and heavy bread with gusto. I, on the other hand, took to eating my nails, rather than the food on the plate before me. She showed no signs of poisoning, which set my worries aside, until I remembered that some poisons are slow acting. I would have to be nervous for days!

Eventually, the time for our criminal-chasing carriage ride came along. Worchester, our driver had readied the horses, and moved the carriage around to the palace gates. Oh, how I loathed that dreadful thing. In that moment, I vowed never to set my pathetic bottom on a carriage seat again, after this. I stepped up into the open-topped coach, and offered my hand to Victoria, who often had trouble entering the vehicle.

And we were off.

If I was nervous in the night, now, I was hysterical. My foot, having obtained a mind of its own, tapped incessantly on the carriage’s polished wooden floor. My eyes, which refused to blink, lest they miss the man, darted wildly about. I inspected the face of everybody near, even the police officers, who were now dressed in civilian clothes, in case the killer had snuck into their ranks. The gnarled knots of the oaks, which I once so loved, seemed to be sneering at us, chastising us for our foolishness. Something moved.

It disappeared behind the tree. Discreetly, I gestured for an officer to have a look. I braced myself for the inevitable gunfight. As the officer peered behind, however, no more than a grey squirrel leapt from the undergrowth. How foolish I felt!

Victoria gasped as a man leapt out from the crowd, which had formed to watch our precession. He pulled a pistol from his coat. Cruel light glinted off of the weapon’s muzzle as he cocked it.

His arm was outstretched.

He raised the gun.

My eyes met his, and the frantic, animalistic rage that I saw chilled me to the core. Police were rushing forwards; the crowd recoiled in shock; I screamed a soundless scream.

He fired.

The man fell to the ground as the police officers piled on him. They rolled about wildly on the hard-packed dirt. The gun had flown from his hand, and smoke billowed from its barrel. The man was on his back now, as the police officers held his arms in place behind him.

Victoria’s grabbed my hand and squeezed. Never had I been more filled with dread than the brief moment as I turned my head to look at her. The corners of her mouth curled into a triumphant grin. Those log-like arms embraced me once again.