The Underlings

by Darrel Bird

tree-lined street and pulled into the driveway of a brick house with lights shining in the windows. The woman kept up a running twitter about how good the service was, and about how Dr. Slavor would be “absolutely spitting” when he found out they had baptized another one into the kingdom of the dear saints.

  They led him into the immaculate home, and Chet’s mouth began to water at the thought of all the silver and jewelry he could carry off.

  They drew him a bath and brought him a suit of clothes, and then Fred scrubbed him until the water ran brown. He arose out of the tub cleaner than he had been in all his 42 years, and he felt pretty good except for the hunger gnawing at his gut. The pants were a little long, but the new shoes fit well as he walked into the kitchen, putting on a fake limp.

  They set him down at the table and brought him juice and a gray-looking mass of vegetables. He dug through the mass looking for the meat, but there wasn’t any. He ate two platefuls of the stuff anyhow, and washed it down with the juice, as his stomach didn’t seem to mind.

  They put him in a bedroom complete with clean sheets and Chet slept the sleep of the mouse that has just eaten the cat. The next morning they fed him more vegetables and stuff made to look like bacon, but it sure wasn’t bacon.

  “We are going to a church potluck today, Mr. Reed, and you can come with us.”

  “I guess I could take time to do that.” Chet mumbled.

  The Devil in a Top Hat

  They arrived at a Chicago park where two long tables were laden with food. Inez and Fred began introducing him to the elect select. “Mr. Reed is the third one we baptized this week!” said Fred proudly, giving Dr. Slavor and his proud missus a sidelong glance, Knew I’d beat you, you twerp of a sawbones, he thought.

  Slavor glared over his horn rims at Fred and Inez, as if he had just swallowed a handful of ball bearings.

  Chet eyed the food table. He was getting itchy to get on with eating as the meatless gray breakfast that was made to look something like food had long since worn off. He had choked down the food that morning, and his metabolism had swallowed it up and come back to see if his throat was cut.

  At length, they decided to quit crowing over him, as someone clapped their hands for everybody’s attention. Old Chet bowed his head obediently as the fool who had clapped his hand went on interminably about how thankful they all were to be Seventh-day Adventists, and not like the Sunday worshippers on the boats out on the lake and the wicked ones on their street who broke the Sabbath, and who were slated to get the mark of the beast.

  At long last the fool ended the derailing of the world, and everybody said “amen,” while Chet’s stomach took another hitch, his belt loosening another notch, or so it seemed to Chet. He held his head, as he was smart enough not to appear too eager.

  He squeezed in front of a man with his hat pulled low over his eyes. Pardon me sucker. He grabbed a Melmac plate off the pile and began to appraise the food behind a couple young and good looking women. Wouldn’t mind adding some of that as a snack!

  He began loading on the food, again looking for a piece of meat. Thought he spotted one in a brown pan and forked it, but when the fork sunk in, it bled some kind of greenish white goo and dropped off his fork. “Hell’s bell’s!” he mumbled under his breath.

 

  “What is that you said, Sir?” Chet looked around at the gleeful face of the man with the hat. The man leered at him, and he saw a big fat black worm begin to crawl out of the man’s nose. He stared in horror at the man’s face, as a piece of his cheek fell off, and uncovered the maggots underneath, working at the puss.

  Chet dropped his plate and up came the gray mass he had for breakfast, along with about a quart of bile.

  “Oh my God, the man is sick!” yelled the young woman in front of him, and dropped her own plate.

  “I’ll see to him; make room!” said Dr. Slavor. Slavor grabbed a wet towel and put it over Chet's face. This’ll teach that Fred McNish not to try and get ahead of me in the baptisms, he thought, grabbing old Chet's forehead as he upchucked his guts on the ground.

  My great medical training hath prepared me to serve thee, oh Lord, Slavor crooned in his own head. Chet did come round after a few minutes while everybody stood around and watched. He looked around, but the man with the hat was gone.

 

  “Did you see that man with the hat?” Chet looked at the doctor as he rubbed the tears from his eyes, acquired by the retching.

  “Sir, there is no man here with a hat on today, as you can see.”

  “There was. I saw him, and he had worms crawling out of his face!”

  “Poor dear; he is hallucinating!” Inez said loudly, as she grabbed Chet out of Dr. Slavor’s hands, and began to escort him to their car. Chet went along weakly; glad someone had hold of him besides that man with the hat. Fred followed obediently, glancing behind him at Slavor. Slavor returned the glance with a big grin.

  They got Chet home and tucked him into bed where he stayed, frozen and sick, as he listened to the ticking of the grandfather clock through the door.

  The next morning they fed him some more gray goo as he fondly brought to remembrance the dead rabbit he had passed up on the side of the road the day before. By cracky, I wish I had some of that rabbit. Inez plied him with orange juice, declared it to be the Sabbath, and told him they were taking him to church. Chet groaned, but said nothing.

  Chet boy, you got to hold your head together here, if you’re going to come away from here with anything but some new clothes on your back. He was beginning to miss his old clothes anyhow, all except for the shoes. He could almost smell the grease in a roadside diner somewhere along the anywhere, as he ordered a steak and real coffee, not the crap they served here. Chet Wolford got hold of himself. He felt almost normal as they slicked him down to the church house in the shiny Pontiac two-door sedan. Inez smelled like a whorehouse in strong perfume that permeated the car.

  They drove up to the church house, and nearly had to drag him in, but he followed. He didn’t see any sign of a cross on the building, by cracky that is shear bad luck! They took a seat directly behind Dr. Slavor and his missus, who had a bun on her head the size of a basketball.

  The service droned on amid the shlocking of water bottles, whispering, gouging, and elbowing. Some old hag yelled out a loud burping AMEN! “I wish they would get Mrs. Grum a hearing aid,” Inez whispered to Fred, loud enough for people to hear her two rows back.

  The pastor glared at the crowd and railed on at them about their inability to keep the Sabbath day holy. Chet was just getting comfortable when Inez began working her back side closer to his thigh than to Fred’s, who seemed oblivious of the whole scene.

  As the preacher began to get with it, the man from the picnic walked up out of that crowd and stood beside him. He pulled his hat up and leered right at Chet with his cracked teeth. Chet went into a nose dive. He watched in horror as the man waved his hand before the pastors face and out came the worms from the pastor's nose hole!

  Chet looked around as the people went on shlocking their water bottles and whispering, as if nothing was amiss.

  “May God forgive me for the man I killed,” he muttered.

  “Your God ain’t got nothing to do with where yer at sonny boy!’ The man cackled and leered at him.

  About that time Inez was getting much too close for a married woman as she slowly worked her thigh against his.

  Chet froze and could not move. You're not real, you're not real, you're not real, he chanted in his mind.

  “Oh I’m real enough sonny boy!” the clear voice came from behind him, he looked and the man was gone from the front. “What the hell?” he muttered under his breath.

  “Now you got it sonny boy. That’s the idea!” the voice said, matter of fact.

  Chet had never been so scared in his life. He wanted to get away, he wanted to crawl back under the old familiar bridges, yet he was afraid to leave the human company. He didn’t know what would happen if he left.
The man would surely follow him.

  On the way home he asked Fred, “Fred, didn’t you see the man standing beside that preacher?”

  “You're just seeing things, Mr. Reed. It must have been the results of going hungry.” For the first time he read a kindness in Fred’s eyes as he caught them through the rear view mirror of the Pontiac. He heard the kindness in Fred’s voice, and he figured Fred was not such a bad sort after all.

  That night Chet went to bed without eating, and he tossed and turned until about eleven, finally dropping off into sleep, exhausted.

  About one o’clock he was awakened to Inez slipping into his bed, and she was naked as the day she was born. After doing things to Chet that he would have thought impossible, she slipped out the door and pulled it closed. The clock chimed a quarter after three and Chet would get no more sleep this night.

  Next morning he remembered Fred’s kind eyes as Inez plied Chet with orange juice, as if it was the most normal thing in the world. Chet didn’t normally go on guilt trips, but this trip was a doozer! He glanced at Fred across the room, and he began to lose the inclination to rob the man. And besides, the house seemed really short on