pride And prejudice And zombies: dawn of the dreadfuls

Chapter 37

FIRST, THE THREE YOUNGEST Bennet girls had to clear the wine cellar of its dreadfuls. (There were two still squirming like worms from the packed-dirt floor, their progress slowed by the quicklime that had apparently eaten away most of their connective tissue.) Then it was time to clear the wine cellar of both its wines and its many rows of wine racks—all of which proved excellent fodder for zombie bombardment once it was hauled up to the second floor. After that, the packing began.

They started with the walls. The house, it was quickly discovered, was a Swiss cheese of secret passages and hidden vaults. With Belgrave's reluctant help—which turned quite a bit less reluctant whenever Jane was in the vicinity—dozens of people were soon tucked away out of sight.

Which meant there were that many fewer to fight back the unmentionables breaking through. And there were steadily fewer still as more and more people were sent into the cellar to join the children and the elderly and the wounded already there. Eventually, there was no one left guarding the windows and doors at all, and the cellar was stuffed wall to wall.

"Time for you to go in, too," Mr. Bennet said to his daughters. "Seal the door from the inside, as we discussed, and I'll put the false wall in place out here. It won't be pleasant down there in the dark, I'm sure, but the air holes should—where do you think you're going?"

Lydia and Kitty were hurrying off down the hall, toward the sound of splintering wood and phlegmy moans.

"Our friends from outside are letting themselves in a trifle early!" Lydia called over her shoulder.

"We'll just go and ask them to wait!" Kitty added.

They were drawing their swords as they darted around a corner.

"There's no time for that now!" Mr. Bennet called after them.

"Well, there's a little more time than you might have thought," Elizabeth said.

"We're not going down there, you know," said Jane.

Mary hefted one side of the wood panel that had been hastily fitted to hide the landing before the cellar door. "This is really quite heavy, Papa. Together on the count of three . . .?"

Mr. Bennet looked at her, then Jane, then Elizabeth, and despite the bags under his eyes and the deep sadness within them, he seemed to be on the verge of cracking a smile. And perhaps he would have, if a familiar voice hadn't called out from the darkness below.

"Mr. Bennet! You march those girls in here this instant!" Mrs. Bennet demanded. "You're not going to leave me down in this filthy hole all alone!"

"Did you hear that?" one of the maids grumbled from under the stairs, where she stood stuffed in with the rest of the household staff. "The silly cow thinks she's all alone."

"Farewell, Mrs. Bennet. I . . ."

Whatever Mr. Bennet had been about to say went unsaid, and he instead stomped down the steps, met his wife at the bottom, and kissed her. Then he turned and marched back out of the attic, leaving Mrs. Bennet sobbing in the arms of her sister Philips.

When he reached the landing again, he couldn't meet his daughters' gazes: For once, he was the one blushing and looking away.

"Come now, all together," he said, grabbing one side of the false wall. "One . . . two . . . lift!"

There was a distant clatter of boards falling to the floor just as he and the girls got the panel in place, and an otherworldly yowl echoed through the halls.

"That would be in the north wing, by the sound of it," said Mr. Bennet. "Jane, run along and greet the new arrivals, hmm? I'll join you shortly. Mary, go see what's keeping Lydia and Kitty. And you—"