The Mallow Marsh Monster

by Gary Ghislain

  “She’s such a wonderful woman, your mother,” Frank Goolz said, walking at his usual quick pace beside me. “So strong-minded.”

  I turned into the alley, checking over my shoulder to make sure we were all blocked from view by the Goolz’s house. I couldn’t see Mum, which meant she couldn’t see us. We could make it all the way to Newton without her suspecting a thing.

  2

  DOCTOR

  SUPER

  STRANGE

  “No one ever visits us.”

  “Dad has no friends.”

  “No parents.”

  “No-bo-dy!”

  “Mom used to have friends.”

  “They’re not welcome in our house anymore.”

  “Mom says they’re blab-ber-ers.”

  “That means they can’t keep a secret.”

  The twins stopped in the middle of the road and pointed toward the marsh. “That’s our house!”

  I could already see the roof of their house rising above the thick screen of high grass. It was a rotting old building right at the edge of the marsh, the very last house you saw before leaving Bay Harbor on the road to Newton. Each time Mum and I drove past it, I couldn’t help wondering how anyone could live in such a gloomy, rundown place.

  “I thought that place was abandoned,” Suzie said.

  The Farrells’ house might have been dark red in the past, like most wooden houses in our town, but the red paint had dulled into a sickly brown, and the base of the building was covered in pale-green moss. The land was slowly being swallowed by weeds and water creeping over from the marsh.

  “Dad’s going to be surprised to see you.”

  “We didn’t tell him where we were going.”

  “He thinks we’re in the marsh.”

  “Looking for more snakes.”

  They resumed walking toward their house and we followed them.

  “Did you see their eyes?” Ilona asked me.

  The twins looked back at us. “We were born like this.”

  “Ruth has one brown eye and one green.”

  “Beth’s eyes are both brown.”

  “That’s cool. It’s a good way to tell you apart,” I said.

  Their three brown eyes and one green lingered on me.

  “Were you born like that?”

  “We were born different, too.”

  “Mom says we’re special.”

  “She means it in a really nice way.”

  “Mom is really nice.”

  “Is yours nice, too?”

  They were like the Goolz girls. They didn’t pretend not to notice that I used a wheelchair. And they were definitely not shy about bringing it up.

  “My mum’s nice. And I wasn’t born like this. I climbed on a chair to reach for a plum on a high branch. The chair broke. I fell on my back. It was eons ago.”

  “He doesn’t even like plums,” Ilona said, stealing my punchline.

  The twins stopped again as we reached a path leading from the road to their house.

  “We don’t like plums either.”

  “They’re tart.”

  “We like apples.”

  “Do you like apple pie?”

  “Mom makes delicious apple pies.”

  “When she’s not working on snakes.”

  “Apple pies are nice,” Suzie said, stepping close to a sign she’d noticed by the mouth of the path. She pushed some high grass aside to read it. “Danger. Quicksand. Stay Away.” She grinned. “Great!”

  The marsh had nearly digested both the sign and the path in a mixture of green moss and black fungus.

  Frank Goolz squeezed my shoulder and followed the twins and Suzie. “Perfect setting for a horror story. Wouldn’t you say, Harold?”

  The unbearable odor of the shoebox that he carried under his arm confirmed we weren’t on our way to a picnic.

  Ilona and I stayed on the road as they walked up the path and disappeared from view. We hadn’t been alone for the longest time. Between the ghost hunt and Mum’s embargo, we hadn’t had a chance to do anything normal together—like talking, joking, going to the boardwalk, studying, or anything else that didn’t involve supernatural creatures or severed limbs.

  “You all right?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Sure.”

  “Should we follow them before they solve the foot mystery without us?”

  “You got it.”

  We reached the path. The muddy, trampled ground was boss-level difficult to maneuver with my chair. Ilona walked a few feet ahead of me, kicking stones and sticks out of my way.

  She stopped to pick up a big piece of rotten wood that blocked the path. She smiled and I smiled back. I loved when she did things like this. Helping me without making anything of it. Like we were meant to explore the world together in perfect harmony.

  “Oh, bananas. They’re at it again,” I heard Suzie say from the high grass ahead. “They’re stupid in love, just so you know,” she clarified for the twins.

  Ilona rolled her eyes. I slapped my forehead. “Your sister’s nuts.” I tried to laugh it off, but it came out as a tense chuckle.

  Ilona threw the piece of wood aside, and it splashed into some water, out of sight. She brushed the mud off her hands, and we kept going up the path, both of us redder than begonias in spring.

  We came to what looked like a dead end of weeds. But the twins and Suzie had already disappeared beyond it. Frank Goolz must have been waiting for us because his arm came back through the grass and he and Ilona made an entryway for me. They stood on either side like ushers holding a curtain.

  “See you on the other side.” I gave them a silly military salute and crossed through to the strange world of the Mallow Marsh.

  A dark brown shape appeared ahead. Once I got a little closer, I realized it was a rusted old pickup truck that must have been rotting there for a long time. The tires were flat and half sunk in mud. Like the sign and the path, the marsh had almost completely absorbed it.

  “This one’s never getting out,” Ilona said, coming out of the grass behind me and knocking on the rusty door.

  Looking past her, I noticed a network of ancient boards that started at the edge of the Farrells’ yard and led up to, around, and even through the marsh. “Look,” I said. “It’s a dock—or it used to be. I never saw it before.”

  “A world hidden from ours. I like it,” Frank Goolz said. He squashed a mosquito on his neck and we continued toward the house.

  The twins ran in, shouting for their dad and leaving the door wide open behind them.

  Suzie followed them in. “It smells really weird in here!” she called back to the rest of us.

  When I entered, the chemical stench made me gasp. “Suzie’s right. It stinks!”

  Frank Goolz inhaled noisily through his nose. “Formalin,” he said.

  As my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I saw that the hallway was lined with shelves, from floor to ceiling. But instead of books and family photos, they were full of mason jars. “Holy cheese! That’s a lot of dead creatures,” I said as I peered through the cloudy glass of the closest one.

  “Now we know what they’re doing with all those snakes they catch in the marsh,” Ilona said, coming up beside me.

  “It’s not only snakes.” Suzie moved from one jar to the next. “Here’s a mouse. That’s a lizard. And…is that a brain?”

  Frank Goolz tapped the jar she was pointing at. “Correct, darling. That’s a brain. It could have belonged to a cat. Or a small dog, maybe.”

  I moved closer to the brain. It was both disturbing and irresistible. “What kind of crazy person collects cat brains?”

  “It’s a beaver’s brain,” someone mumbled behind us. We turned around as Ed Farrell came out of the basement. “It died of rabies. It’s quite rare that they get infected with it.”

  He stood in the doorway and used his rubber-gloved hands to brace himself on the frame. Even his thick-rimmed glasses couldn’t hide the plump, dark pockets under his eyes.

&
nbsp; Mr. Farrell took a couple steps toward us, his gloves leaving thick red smudges on the doorframe. His lab coat was spattered in red too.

  I looked at Ilona. Blood! I mouthed. She nodded back at me.

  The twins came out of the basement behind him.

  “Dad’s sleepy—”

  “And dirty.”

  “And a little smelly.”

  “He hasn’t slept—”

  “For days!”

  He was about the same age as Frank Goolz, somewhere in his forties. His thick black hair was slicked back, though a few greasy locks had escaped and stood straight up. He was well overdue for a shave, a change of clothes, and—by the smell of it—a shower.

  “Hello there, sir.” Frank Goolz held out his hand, ignoring the bloodied medical gloves.

  “Oh. The famous writer,” Farrell responded softly. He removed a glove and shook Frank Goolz’s hand oddly, holding it way too long, like this basic human interaction was unfamiliar to him.

  “I love your novels. Especially the one with the mad alchemist.” Farrell finally let go of Frank Goolz’s hand. Then he scratched his head, freeing more locks of hair, which sprang up to join the others. He gazed at the ceiling, falling silent for several long moments. Then he seemed to reboot his mind and said, “You could sign it if I can find it, but it might have gotten lost.”

  “We move a lot.”

  “We go from one place—”

  “To the next.”

  “All. The. Time!”

  “I didn’t come to sign books.” Frank Goolz looked at both sides of his hand, probably checking if Ed Farrell had gotten blood on him.

  Mr. Farrell removed his other glove, and the smile dropped from his face. “Why are you here exactly?” he asked as if the thought had just occurred to him.

  “Your daughters asked for our help,” Ilona said.

  “Help with what?”

  I made a mental note to tell the Goolz that Ed Farrell had fresh bruises and scratches on his neck, like something had tried to strangle him.

  “They want us to find their mother.”

  I knew I was biased when it came to Ilona, but I couldn’t help admiring how composed and fierce she looked while talking to this strange man.

  “Their mother is fine,” he said, and then seemed to realize we were all looking at the blood on his lab coat. He shook his head and walked away, abandoning us and his daughters in the hall.

  “I guess we should follow him,” Frank Goolz suggested, and we did.

  Farrell went straight for the kitchen sink, where he dropped his gloves on top of a pile of dirty dishes.

  “Mr. Farrell, can you tell us where your wife is?” Frank Goolz asked.

  Farrell took off his lab coat and threw it on the counter. “She’s…” he turned on the faucet and started washing his hands with steaming water. “Gone.”

  Their kitchen was like the rest of their house—messy and old and odd. The floor was covered with ancient greenish linoleum that had come unglued at the corners and been repaired with duct tape here and there. The appliances looked like they belonged in a museum and the yellowy-white fridge was purring noisily.

  “Gone where?” Ilona asked.

  “South?” Farrell said.

  He dried his hands on an unbloodied corner of the lab coat and turned to us. His graying white shirt was drenched at the armpits and, though he’d been home alone, he wore a black tie, which hung loose around his neck. His breast pocket held a jumble of pens that had leaked spots of blue, red, and black ink into the dingy fabric. His glasses were fogged with steam. Altogether, he was a picture-perfect representation of a mad scientist who had spent many sleepless nights waiting for a thunderstorm to reanimate the dead.

  “Well!” Frank Goolz said cheerfully. He took the shoebox from under his arm and lifted the lid. “Do you recognize this?” He extended his arms to show Mr. Farrell the contents of the box.

  Mr. Farrell took off his glasses and blinked at the foot. He didn’t register any shock or horror, nor did he appear disturbed by the unbearable smell. “Oh,” he whispered. He cleaned his glasses with the unbuttoned bottom of his shirt, then pushed them back onto his nose. “Where did you find it?”

  “Your daughters found it in the marsh,” I said.

  He turned to me and squinted like he had just noticed my presence.

  “We told them.”

  “About Mom.”

  “That’s she’s gone.”

  “And that you’re worrying—”

  “Or crying.”

  They looked at each other.

  “Sometimes,” they finished carefully.

  “Nonsense! I’m not worrying. Mom’s fine, absolutely fine. She will be back very soon,” he told them, then nodded toward the foot. “And this foot is mine.”

  I instinctively looked down at his feet. They were both definitely there, secured in soft black shoes over dingy white tennis socks.

  Frank Goolz put the lid back on. “Do you collect severed limbs?” he asked politely.

  “It came from the morgue,” he said. “My wife and I need it for our research. It should be in our freezer down in the lab.” He looked down at his daughters. “Did you take it from there and make up a story for Mr. Goolz?”

  “No!”

  They pointed at the marsh.

  “It was out there.”

  “In the water.”

  “All slimy.”

  “And yucky.”

  “We’re not lying!”

  “It’s okay, girls. I’m not angry.”

  I was watching Ilona, who was watching Mr. Farrell even more intensely than her dad was. “Can we speak with your wife, Mr. Farrell?” she asked pointedly. “On the phone, I mean? We’d like to make sure she’s fine.”

  “I told you she’s fine!” he snapped. “That should be enough!”

  We looked at him silently for an awkwardly long time. Frank Goolz slapped another mosquito on his neck.

  “I’m sorry,” Ed Farrell said, composing himself. He cleared his throat and forced a smile. “I’m going to need my foot back.”

  Ilona turned to her dad and gave her head a minute shake.

  “I’m sure you do,” Frank Goolz said, but he didn’t hand over the box. He snapped his fingers like he had just remembered something. “About this foot.”

  “What?”

  “All the bones have been removed, but the foot is completely intact. It’s quite extraordinary. Do you know how it could be done?”

  “That is…part of our research,” Farrell said hesitantly. But the surprise in his eyes told a different story. “I need to return to my work, if you don’t mind.”

  He reached for the box. Frank Goolz took a step back. “What exactly is your research about?”

  “Rare infections.”

  “Like a bone-dissolving infection?”

  Mr. Farrell’s face lit up. “Yes! That’s about right.” He reached for the box again and this time Frank Goolz let him have it.

  Mr. Farrell set it on the counter on top of his bloody lab coat. “I hate to come across as unfriendly. But I have so much work and so little time.”

  “But Dad—” the twins started, but their father cut them off.

  “We’ll entertain our new friends another time when I am less busy.” He shooed us out of the kitchen and walked us to the front door. “You people have a nice day.” And he shut the door without another word.

  We stopped when we reached the wrecked pickup truck.

  I looked back at the strange house. “Did you see the bruises on his neck? And all that blood!”

  “You shouldn’t have given him the foot,” Ilona told her dad. “That might be all that’s left of Mrs. Farrell.”

  Frank Goolz smiled and put his hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t give him all of it. I cut a nice slice of it before we left the house. It’s in our freezer at home if we ever need to have it analyzed.”

  “You cut off a slice of the foot?” Suzie yelled. “Like it was ham?”


  “That’s disgusting!” I said, smiling because I thought it was genius, too.

  Suzie inspected the inside of the truck through the grimy passenger-side window, then opened the door. A cloud of fetid odor wafted out. “Everything stinks today!”

  She took a step back, waving her hands and arms, trying to dissipate the stench.

  I was the closest to the open door and the first to take a look inside the cab. “Guys!”

  They gathered around me. We leaned together inside.

  “Oh, cheese!” Ilona said.

  The entire interior, from the dashboard to the fake leather seats, was covered in deep gouges with patterns of three or four lines, like someone—or something—had tried to claw its way out.

  “What’s that?” Suzie hunkered down, picking up what looked like a bunch of white pebbles scattered on the passenger seat. She held them out on the palm of her hand.

  Frank Goolz pinched one between his fingers. “Teeth. Human.”

  “What kind of crazy dentist did that?” I picked one up and examined it just like he had, even though my stomach roiled with disgust.

  “Not the type that gives you a toy once he’s done,” Suzie said, giving all the teeth to her dad. I gave him the one I held quickly, then brushed my hand off on the front of my hoodie.

  Frank Goolz held the teeth loosely in his fist, rattling them like dice before dropping them into his coat pocket. “This is getting more interesting by the minute.”

  I looked back into the cab. My eyes traveled from one set of scratches to the next. Some of the scratches were lighter than the others and didn’t follow the same pattern. “Wait. These right here aren’t random.”

  I took out my phone and switched on the flashlight.

  “You’re right, Harold. It’s a message,” Ilona said.

  I brought the light very close to the dashboard. Someone had clumsily carved a few nearly invisible words.

  “I’ll be back for you,” Ilona read. I quickly looked up at the Farrell’s house.

  The twins were observing us through one of the windows. They waved in perfect synchronicity—and I shivered.

  3

  LIFE

  IS

  CAKE