Death by Chocolate

Artemisia Absinthe was a precocious girl. And while her parents’ boast that she could read by the time she was two was probably an exaggeration springing from parental pride, it was clear to all she was several laps smarter than her older brother, Cyril. Who, even at seven, still lacked the skill to pick his nose - and had never been known to open a book, except to look at the pictures.

Regardless of when she learned, by six she had read the complete works of Shakespeare and was fond of saying things like “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!—One, two. Why, then, ’tis time to do ’t. Hell is murky!—” whenever her mother told her to wash her hands.

By nine, Artemisia had the intellect of a philosopher. But she had reached a difficult age. Not yet double-numbered, but already fragile, she embraced the dismal self-regard and aggressive ennui which hallmarks teenagers. And none could loll on the fainting couch with the insouciance she brought to the challenge. And yet, despite these affectations, she had good friends. And it was with these friends, Rosalind and Julia, that she went to Elsinore Abbey, the local school.

School bored her. As anyone who has been smarter than their teachers knows, there is no bigger waste of time than listening to the drone of an educator on automatic pilot, flying low and slow. She was a thoroughbred lashed to the traces of a dray.

Adding to her woe was the school’s headmaster, a martinet called Mr. Christie Bercow. He was a sadist who tended to his life-long loathing of children with a diamond cutter’s precision. At Elsinore, his cruelty blossomed like a hot-house orchid in the hands of a master botanist. The school clung to tradition. Its Victorian halls were redolent with the spirit of Tom Brown’s tormentors. And it still promoted the prophylactic use of corporal punishment.

Bercow was a coiled wire of self-righteous disapproval. His hostility to kindness cracked like static electricity through his angular, choleric, flick-knife of a body. The parents loved him. He was a two-faced Janus in the flesh. While he offered wintery discontent to the uniformed children in his charge, he bathed their parents in the sun of his sociopathic charm. He spoke with glowing approval of all his charges. And parents would leave conferences in his wood-paneled office satisfied their fees were converting their snot-nosed spawn into mature independent thinkers. So they dismissed the complaints of their children as the usual whining.

Bercow’s reign of terror continued. Pupils were dispatched to his sanctum sanctorum for such grievous offenses as laughing in the halls, skipping too close to the front door, and untucked clothing. There, this malevolence would conduct his autos-da-fe with the exuberant disregard for evidence that would have made the grandest of inquisitors hang up his whip in disgust at his own amateurish attempts to pervert the course of justice.

Most punishments left only psychic scars as the victims of the capricious process were held captive in a windowless room, scrawling hundreds of lines on countless sheaves of paper. The younger children were sentenced to write a promise of future improved behavior - for example, “I will not run in the hallways ever again” - as many as 500 times. The older children labored to copy, without error, a book from Vergil’s Georgics in the original Latin.

Anyone who has both done lines, and been caned, knows the sharp but fleeting pain of the switch is by far the lighter punishment. You bend over. Receive your six of the best. And immediately after the last blow falls, and the formality of the handshake is executed, the miscreant is free from both the anticipation and reality of the agony. And is on to the next thing. While the poor scribes in the windowless room remain chained to their metaphorical oars for hours.

Artemisia was blessed. She had committed the Georgics to memory and could dash off the 600 or so lines of the task with immaculate penmanship while her peers struggled to sharpen their pencils. Then she would read the books her eidetic memory visualized and, in doing so, travel wherever her fancy bade her go.

While pain was his main enthusiasm, Bercow also loved to eat - especially dessert. His coat-rack stature disguised his passion for sweetmeats. He ate these with abandon. At lunch, sitting at the top table, he caused wonder among the senior students by polishing off two, perhaps three, helpings of pudding. Warm treacle tart, matron’s leg, or spotted dick. well-flooded with rich, sugar-saturated, eggy custard. But prime in Bercow’s ranking was chocolate cake.

To satisfy his delectations Bercow had a hidden treasure in the kitchen, an ex-con with culinary skills. She was the product of a broken home who had spent time in a London facility for wayward youth. She had been an enthusiastic pickpocket. But enthusiasm does not get you far in your chosen career if you lack the skills to make a go of it. And Ophelia lacked the leger-de-main that is second nature to the greats in the wallet-lifting game. Even an open handbag, slung casually over a shoulder, was too steep a climb for this young woman taking her first steps on the path of larceny. And in the parlance of the local constabulary, Ophelia was nicked.

Fortune, however, smiled at her. While nature had denied Ophelia dexterity, it had granted her the wisdom to listen to the career counselor who suggested she get a trade. And thus she applied to culinary school. She discovered she had an aptitude for cooking, especially desserts. And when she saw the posting for a position as sous-chef at Elsinore she applied for - and got the job. Brushing off the city’s grime, she dressed in the Salvation Army’s best offerings and took the train to embark on this new rural chapter of her life.

The children she cooked for were the offspring of privilege. But she recognized in them the same fears and apprehensions she experienced in her early deprivation. It did not take long for her to realize that Bercow was as heartless as a modern-day Bill Sikes. His psychological sadism terrorized the children. His acid tongue made a mockery of the old lie that “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me”.

His malign remarks were a rapier thrust into the souls of sensitive children whose parents had been seduced by Bercow’s facile charm. There is no torture greater than not being believed by the people who were honor-bound to believe you. If that safe harbor is denied, then your last hope remains in the bonds of friendship. It was to this haven that Artemisia, Rosalind, and Julia retreated.

Artemisia imagined herself as Joan of Arc, and her companions the French army. But her forces were no match for Bercow, well-practiced as he was in the art of crushing the will of children. It was then that help arrived in the form of the reformed petty criminal. One day, Ophelia came across the three of them huddled in conversation near the tradesman’s entrance. She sensed something amiss and asked what troubled them.

Ophelia may not have long been an adult - but an adult she was - and was thus regarded as most likely, if not fully allied with the enemy, at least sympathetic to his cause. The girls were, therefore, suspicious of this stranger with her exotic accent and eclectic wardrobe. All they offered were muttered assurances that their skies were cloudless and things couldn’t be better. But Ophelia was unfamiliar with the custom of obfuscation and stiff upper lip and pressed her inquiries. Finally, the girls relented, took Ophelia into their confidence, and confessed to their misery at the current state of affairs.

Had they expected to be told to “buck up” or assured that “things would get better” they were disappointed. Ophelia instead, not far removed from the horrors of her own youth, offered to help. And it was from this fortuitous confluence of need and opportunity that the cabal birthed their revenge.

At the foot of the playing-fields meandered a sleepy stream ennobled by the name the River Cherwell. Along its banks lived the common toad. The skin of this warty beast secretes bufotoxin, which is known to scientists and intelligent young ladies as a cardiac glycoside. In small amounts, it aids those with congestive heart failure. In larger amounts, it is fatal.

In their free time, gowned and goggled in protective gear stolen from the science labs, Artemisia scraped the skins of toads held firmly in turn by Rosalind and Julia. When she had filled a jam jar with what was, in Artemisia's estimation, an appropriate dose, with an allowance for waste, the girls ceased the operation. With the lid tightened on the glass container, they stuffed the lab-wear into a backpack along with their harvest and threw a few books on top for camouflage.

They retreated to the tradesman’s door. When an inspection revealed no visible enemy, they passed the jar to Ophelia and hastened to their schoolroom, just in time to hear the start of the glowing remarks offered by the English teacher, Miss Fortinbrite, on the genius of Roald Dahl as revealed in the book ‘Matilda’.

The next day at school, the morning went as most mornings did, with the hum of teachers attempting to stuff the heads of students with important information. And all was as it should be when the children filed in for lunch. The event passed smoothly as the buzz of chatter was punctuated with cutlery’s clatter and the main course was consumed.

And then the play’s ultimate act commenced. Mr. Bercow’s inflexible face softened as he regarded the finest chocolate cake he had ever witnessed. It appealed to him as a mistress does to the man who needs to shed the trials of the world and lose himself in the warmth of ethereal passion. The hand that held the fork, that had tined the first slice, shook gently in anticipation of the first bite. And bite he did.

The taste of rich, warm chocolate lightened his soul and quickened his heart. At that moment, he could have forgiven any sin, no matter how grievous, in even the most recalcitrant child. And it was in rapture he slid from his chair and died.

The children were shocked by the collapse of their tormentor. The tyrant was slain by that which he held most dear - while those who feared him, found nothing in their experience to guide their reaction. They looked, one to the other, for support and direction. And were relieved when the school’s matron shouldered her way through the mob. To no avail, as Bercow was beyond the reach of her care.

Artemisia’s triumph filled her with pure elation. She had faced her demons, taken action, and prevailed. She had dared greatly and slain the dragon. She knew then that no future terror would ever cower her. But, even in victory, her joy was tempered. Her enemy lay dead. But he rested serene, his lifeless face illuminated with a contented smile. She may have won, but in her heart she wondered, had Bercow had the last laugh?

And worse, when she looked around and saw the weakness of the other children, she felt the first glimmerings of hate at their helplessness. She had taken action while they had taken abuse. What horribly spoiled brats they all were, she thought. And it dawned on her that, while she had been unconscious to the lesson, Bercow had taught her well. It was then that she knew her life would be his legacy. And she turned to a crying girl who was sucking her thumb beside her, and said,

“Stop sniveling, you vile child. Elsinore is no place for second-rate specimens like you.”