CH. 3 Straddle the Line in Discord and Rhyme
The back of the Asylum wagon was dark, and quite crowded. Six burly orderlies were almost enough to fill the space — and now there were not one but two patients being transported amidst them.
Maurice babbled and cursed, making vague but ultimately impotent threats. The Prince, meanwhile, could barely keep his eyes open in the dark and understimulating space.
"Dagnabbit, you're not falling asleep are you?!" cried Maurice as he observed his companion nodding off. "At a time like this?"
The Prince groaned and forced himself awake. "Sorry. Belle and I were up late last night."
Maurice winced. "And now you're bragging about your — your —"
"Hm?" said the Prince groggily. "Oh! No, no, I didn't get any farther than — " he suddenly realized he might be saying too much to the father, and astutely shut his mouth without completing the thought.
Still, the two-finger gesture he'd unwittingly made to illustrate his point told Maurice more than enough. "Gah!" cried the old man. "You perverted — animal —"
"She is my fiancée," said the Prince, defensively. "Legally, if I abandoned her now, she could sue me for breach of promise."
"A promise made under duress means nothing!" barked Maurice. "You, monster, kept her a prisoner in your castle — what could she do but agree?"
"I was under that old fairy's curse! I had to make someone fall in love with me — and the curse would not have been broken if I didn't succeed. I transformed back into a human again. So — Belle loves me, and I love her, you can be very sure of it."
Orderlies exchanged glances over the increasingly weird conversation.
"There's more to a marriage than love, young man," protested Maurice. "Belle's only eighteen! She doesn't understand increments of ten years, twenty years yet. She doesn't comprehend a lifetime. You know where her mother was at that age?"
"Umm… no," said the Prince, for why would he.
"She was married off to some rich young fop like you!"
The Prince raised an eyebrow. "You're a rich fop like me?"
"No!" cried Maurice. "Mirabelle's first husband! She said it was nothing but misery being married to such a man — it's why she learned her lesson and chose someone like me for her second chance. Oh, I might not have had money, but I had everything else I could give to her."
"Were you better looking then?" the Prince asked innocently enough, for really he was puzzled for how Maurice had managed to win such a beauty as Belle's mother must have been.
Maurice comprehended the criticism. "Oh-ho, because I'm not dressed in some lacy frock-coat I'm not good looking, eh?" he growled. Maurice had always had a curious supposition that he was considerably better looking than most people perceived him to be.
"But she loved you, you say. So you know what it is to be in love as well!" gushed the Prince, happy that he was at least understood.
But Maurice was on another page altogether. "What I know, is what she has to watch out for — and some duplicitous, two-faced, two-bodied, talking-furniture-having monster like you is exactly the last thing Belle needs! She thinks you've changed, but I know human nature — no one ever changes, at least not in the important ways."
The Prince frowned deeply. "I've changed a great deal in these last three days."
"What kind of permanent change can transpire in three days time?" cried Maurice.
"Species, I hope," said the Prince.
Suddenly the wagon came to a stop.
"Have we arrived?" asked Maurice, terror creeping back into his voice where previously had been anger.
The Prince was nervous too. He trusted that, some way or another, this affair would be sorted out shortly and that he, and probably Maurice too, would be released. Still, he worried for what might happen in the meantime. There were afterall such dreadful stories about these lunatic asylums. Tales of torturous experimental treatments, malnourishment, inadequate supervision, violent inmates attacking the innocent…
The wagon lingered in a state of immobility. Eventually, after an interval that could only be measured in exasperating epochs, the door of the mobile confinement creaked open. Bright afternoon light spilled in.
Before them stood M. d'Arque, his countenance locked in that perpetual state of professional disapproval, a grotesque symphony of features orchestrated into a frown so expertly executed that it could make a funeral director take some notes for improvement.
"Time to disembark," said the half dead elder.
The orderlies filed out of the wagon first, leaving only the Prince and Maurice behind. The paralyzed pair were understandably less than anxious to leave the relative safety of the wagon and enter the unknown dangers of the asylum.
"You two," said d'Arque with a wave of his ghastly hand, "are free to go."
The two prisoners were stunned.
"Free to go?" asked Maurice. "You mean — we aren't being detained?"
"That is correct," said d'Arque. "Your presence here is a consequence of an arrangement with M. Gaston, and explicitly, you were not to be confined within these walls."
"I don't understand…" said Maurice, coming forward.
"M. Gaston was, in effect…" he hesitated, seeking out the best word. "…playing a prank on young Mlle. Belle. It's been taken to its conclusion, and you are free to go," said d'Arque. "I have no more responsibility towards you."
Maurice smiled. "Well! How about that! You hear that? A prank!" With a laugh, Maurice leapt eagerly out of the wagon. "I knew Gaston wouldn't let me down!"
Baffled, the Prince followed after. He emerged to find that they were planted outside of the veritable spook-show that was the Asylum de Loons. Above the tarnished edifice, dark clouds crashed with lightning, despite that it was otherwise a bright and sunny afternoon.
"Will you take us back to the village?" Prince Matthieu asked of M. d'Arque.
"Regrettably, you must find your own way," d'Arque replied. "The carriage is spoken for here, but the village is within easy reach. You should encounter no difficulties."
Maurice started hoofing it immediately down the road, still dressed only in his nightshirt and underwear as was the state in which he had been abducted. The Prince began to follow after him like a dog.
"Now, don't think you're coming home with me!" cried Maurice in anger, spinning in his thick woolen bootie-socks to face him. "I don't want you on my property ever again!"
"But," said the Prince, "my horse is stabled at your house."
Maurice let out a cry of frustration, realizing that now he indeed had to let the Prince come with him. "Tarnation! Alright then — you can follow me as far as the house. But soon as we're there, I want you gone and out of my life and my daughter's…"
The two figures journeyed out of view of the asylum men.
"Why did you let them both go?" asked one of the orderlies to d'Arque. "The old man was the only one Gaston arranged."
"I believe the young man really is a Prince," said d'Arque.
"How come?" asked the orderly.
"Because he is dressed in an outfit worth more money than you make in a season," said d'Arque calmly. "And while the young Duke disappeared ten years ago as a child, this gentleman looks to be the same age that he should be today. It is he, I'm sure; and sure, too, that friends of his would be here soon enough to confirm the fact." He turned towards the building, making to enter. Without looking back he announced in a tone deliberately loud enough to be heard by his bullies: "I only hope he makes it back to the village safely. It would be a shame if he were robbed of all that finery while he's walking alone on the roadway undefended."
…
Belle rode into the woods by light of the afternoon. Philippe was not at his best after such a hard morning ride, and frankly neither was Belle after the sleepless night at the castle. The going was slow, despite her best efforts.
She even lost her way, having almost dozed off at the point of a vital turn in the road. It killed an hour as she tried to reorient herself.
Whenever she reached the castle, she planned that she would find Lumiere or Cogsworth or any of the servants, tell them what had happened, and hasten them out to the Asylum de Loons to explain everything. Surely Gaston couldn't pretend an entire noble household were all crazy. But perhaps, once she had her allies in tow, she could take one of the Prince's horses back to town and let poor Philippe rest a while — three long trips in one day was a lot for a single animal.
Philippe became hungry and thirsty and demanded to stop when they soon afterward passed a stream. Belle had taken no food or drink all day herself, and despite the plentiful feasting she'd enjoyed the prior night, she was now hearing her stomach growl. She cupped a bit of water in her hands and drank alongside her horse.
The weary pair went on through the dreary woods. To Belle's consternation, she could see that the only thing moving swiftly was the nightfall, and she still wasn't very close to the palace.
And… she could hear the howling of wolves in the distance.
"Come on, Philippe, we have to hurry!" she pleaded to her tired animal.
Philippe was a rather intelligent horse and understood the risks of night-riding all too well. He gritted his teeth and tried to push ahead with more speed.
Then it happened. The noisy-clip clop of the hurried ride was enough to attract those damn wolves again.
Belle first heard their growls and barks drawing near. Craning her neck, she saw the approach of them. Only three, but that was plenty more than she wanted to see.
"Philippe! Speed up!" she screamed. Her hope was to outrun the pack. Like the wind, Philippe began to race. The trio of vicious wolves barked after them.
Suddenly, three more wolves appeared in the path ahead of them, growling and snarling.
Philippe whinnied, and without any instruction went off the dirt road into the wilds of the woods. Wolves pursued.
Then all of a sudden, the sound of three gunshots in succession.
Belle pulled the reigns and turned around to see what had happened. Three wolves lay dead — shot. The remainder, confused and frightened, whimpered and dispersed, knowing that they had suddenly become the prey in this scenario.
"What on earth…?" said Belle aloud, baffled as to what could have been the cause of this.
She urged Philippe back onto the road.
And there she saw him. Swaggering in through the dusky light like he owned the place, towing the reigns of his big, black, red-eyed horse in one hand, and spinning his smoking rifle in the other.
"Gaston!" cried Belle. "What are you doing out here?"
"Saving your life, it looks like," said Gaston. He was holding bullets in his teeth and trying to reload the weapon with one hand.
"Did you follow me from the village?" she cried, horrified by the thought.
"Tracked, actually. You had about an hour's head start," said Gaston.
"Gaston!" Belle scolded. "I'm not going to go along with your ridiculous scheme! Stop wasting time trying to change my mind!"
"I'm not here to change your mind," said Gaston. He took an iron ramrod from the back of the weapon and began using it to jam paper wadding down the muzzle to get the bullets in place.
Belle furrowed her brow. She wondered if Gaston might have had a change of heart and seen the error of his ways. He was a respected man in the town, afterall. "So… what are you doing?" she asked, her tone softened. "Are you going to help me get Papa and the Prince out of the asylum?"
"Nah," he said, and at that pointed the muzzle of his freshly loaded gun in Belle's direction. "I'm actually here to kidnap you," he said casually.
Belle's jaw dropped. "You wouldn't dare fire that gun!" she challenged. "If you kill me, I can't marry you."
"Not you I'm aiming at," he replied.
Belle gasped.
"Not Philippe! No!" she cried, trying to shield her animal.
"Then come with me," demanded Gaston, "and he'll be able to run free. Or, don't and he gets it between the eyes. Your move."
Belle gave a sorrowful look to her beloved horse. She couldn't risk anything happening to him, her faithful friend of so many years.
"Alright," she cried, getting down from her saddle. "I'm coming. Don't hurt him, please!"
She couldn't imagine what Gaston believed he was going to accomplish by this, but she decided it was safer to risk whatever he had in mind for her than to expect he'd extend sympathy to anything else. She slowly approached the massive huntsman.
"Good," he said, not lowering his gun. "Hanging 'round with your crazy father all the time hasn't rotted your brain altogether."
"Gaston, don't do this!" Belle pleaded. "I don't want to marry you. I'm already engaged to someone else!"
"Exactly," said Gaston. "That's where I realized my mistake. But we're going to fix that. Come on — up on the saddle." He patted the saddle of his black horse.
For the sake of her own animal she obeyed and climbed up. Gaston leapt up behind her, keeping her secured between his arms as he held the reigns.
"Where are we going?" Belle asked, hesitantly.
"To a nice rustic little hunting lodge I had rented out for our honeymoon," said Gaston.
Belle went pale, imagining what was in store for her.