Chapter 6
This time when Felicity woke it was dark. This room was windowless, but she could see moonlight through a crack in the ceiling. He had moved her. Her body ached all over and her head was spinning. The door banged open and there stood Albert, towering and menacing. Lumbering drunkenly toward her, shouting abuse and ranting at her. He became furiously angry, especially when his threats didn't work. She was a realistic woman. She knew she was plain, and that she would probably never marry, at least not for love, so she wasn't afraid when he threatened to disfigure her. Her defiance only served to make him angrier and he threw the vial at her in his rage. She turned her face in time to keep the acid out of her eyes, but the liquid splashed over her right shoulder and the side of her neck. As the fabric of her dress was eaten away by the sulphuric, he hauled her to her feet. When he started pulling at her clothing, realisation and fear overrode the pain. She struggled desperately, but his powerful body was more than a match for her bruised limbs. Through the tears, she begged him to stop, but he was relentless. His large hand round her throat, he pawed at her, muttering obscenities at her.
"You should be grateful, you know, to feel the touch of a man. You never will again now, not when they see what I've left of you. That is, if you live to find out." Said from nowhere, he produced a knife. Felicity couldn't tear her eyes away from it. Long and thin, impossibly sharp, she watched the light glinting off it as he trailed the point of the blade down her stomach. It sliced through all the layers of her clothing, so close she could feel the cold edge of steel. Closing her eyes, she readied herself for a second invasive assault, but none came. Glancing quickly down, she saw that he was unable to perform. He caught her looking, and lost the very last grasp he had on his temper. "Don't laugh at me, bitch" He raged at her. "How dare you! Don't look at me!" With the howl of a wounded animal, he plunged his knife into her side, a few inches below her left breast. Felicity screamed. Wrenching it out of her, he crawled up her body, smearing her own blood across her bare stomach. "I told you I'd make you scream." His voice developed a smug, gleeful quietness that sent a chill down her spine. She screwed her eyes shut in apprehension of the final, killing blow. There came another searing stab of pain as he sliced into her breast, her underwear shredding and her blood soaking the silk, and leaving the knife lodged in her body. Fighting the rising unconsciousness, she was horrified to see him lower his mouth to her, ducking her blood from her, much as a child would suckle milk. His body became stimulated enough to ravage her body a second time, and she sobbed in pain and humiliation. Suddenly she realised she was praying for death. The thought of Mr. Poirot or the Inspector or the Captain seeing her like this was more than she could bear. What would they think of her? What would become of her? Why would they want her now?
Inglethorpe stopped and stared down at her. "Is that what you think. You'd rather die than live knowing they have to live with what they've done. That their actions led to this? They might mourn your death, but they'd move on, but spending the rest of their lives looking at this? Oh, what an idea. Much better."
Suddenly he was gone, but only as far as the next room. She heard him speaking to the telephone exchange. What little breath she had left caught in her throat.
"Mr. Poirot? My name is Inglethorpe. I've got something for you."