Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls Read Online Free PDF Page B

blared. “Where is that wretched woman when you really need—ah, there you are! We have so much to do to get ready! You must cut fresh flowers, polish the silver, launder the table linens, set out the girls’ best morning dresses . . . ooh, and run to the village for cakes! What? Which one first? Why, all of them, of course! The Baron of Lumpley is coming!”
    Through it all, Lydia and Kitty whispered and tittered and snorted, ignoring Mary’s disapproving glowers (it falling to their sister to sit around looking dour and long-suffering now that Miss Chiselwood was gone).
    Elizabeth and Jane, meanwhile, were exchanging significant looks of their own. Elizabeth’s was simultaneously concerned and fierce; Jane’s, discomfited and mildly reproachful. The two girls disagreed on few things, and one of them was about to pay them a call.
    “You don’t seem as excited as your mother,” Mr. Bennet said dryly, eyeing first Elizabeth, then Jane.
    “My excitement is merely of a different sort,” Elizabeth said.
    “And I think it is premature for overexcitement of any sort,” said Jane.
    “I see.” Mr. Bennet nodded sagely, then looked at Elizabeth again, eyebrow cocked. “You know, I’m suddenly put in mind of the next move I should like to teach you all. It is called the Fulcrum of Doom. We shall take it up directly when we return to the dojo.”

    THEIR FATHER WAS OBVIOUSLY UNHAPPY WITH THEIR LIMP GRIPS AND HESITANT MOVEMENTS.
    The Fulcrum of Doom turned out to be a remarkably simple move involving no more than a quickly lifted leg and a strategically placed knee. (It was presumed the Doomee would be male.
Why
had to be explained with some delicacy.) After running his daughters through it to his satisfaction—and nearly being Fulcrumed himself more than once—Mr. Bennet chose to focus on sword work.
    It was a bit frightening, picking up one of the long-bladed, foreign-looking
katanas
for the first time, and when Elizabeth and her sisters began taking slow practice swings, her hands were soon slick with sweat. No matter how tightly she tried to clamp down, the hilt felt lubricious, loose. As with everything her father had been trying to teach them the past day, Elizabeth found it difficult to get a grip.
    Yet Mr. Bennet seemed pleased with the way she and Jane handled their swords, and he steadily increased the speed of the girls’ swings and thrusts—right up to the moment Kitty’s katana spun from her hands and speared a post mere inches from Mary’s head.
    “Smooth, controlled movements,” Mr. Bennet growled. “Where’s the poise? Where’s the presence of mind?”
    “Over there,” Lydia said, pointing at Elizabeth and Jane.
    Mr. Bennet glowered at her. “Prepare yourself for the punishment you have long deserved. The first and last time I made a joke while training under Master Liu, he took blow dart practice on my . . .”
    He blanched and, for a moment, could go no further.
    “Ten laps around the grounds, child,” he finally said.
    “Ohhh!”
    “Ten laps! Go!”
    Lydia shuffled off in a half-hearted jog, her arms hanging slack at her sides.
    They practiced some more after that, but before long Mr. Bennetgave the girls the rest of the day off to prepare for Lord Lumpley’s visit.
    “I will remain in the dojo and am not to be disturbed,” he told them glumly. “I find I have much to meditate on.”
    The girls marched off toward the house sluggishly, soaked with a perspiration that would be, for a proper young lady, an entirely alien and repulsive thing to experience. Yet, to her surprise, Elizabeth found that she didn’t much mind. It was what was to come that bothered her.
    “Up we go,” she said to Jane as they trudged upstairs to change out of their soiled sparring gowns. “Onto the auction block.”
    “You’re being ridiculous, Lizzy,” Jane admonished her gently. “A man like Lord Lumpley could never take a serious interest in any of us.”
    It was true, Elizabeth knew. Yet it