"What's so funny?" I asked.
"Come here and look for yourselves," she said. We all did.
There on the floor was a wax figure of a woman in a black dress, a slash across her right wrist. It was very lifelike-- or I should say, deathlike, because the eyes were glassy, like the eves of a corpse, but the skin looked so real. There was even a wedding ring on her finger and a working, expensive looking watch on her wrist.
"What's going on here?" Rose asked.
Cinnamon started to shake her head and then stopped, her eyes widening.
"Of course," she said. laughing. "This is like a museum."
"What? How?" Ice demanded. "It looks like a madhouse to me."
"That's because you guys haven't been forced to watch Madame Senetsky's greatest performances as part of your curriculum here. Howard and I have, and this corridor, all the trappings, even the statue... it's all from a German film she did called Mehl Medea-- My Medea. Its something of a twist on the famous Greek story, a modern-day version. Madame Senetsky played this wife, betrayed by her husband. Just like Medea, she gets back at him by killing their child and then she takes her own life in a very dramatic finale. It's a dark and depressing movie, but according to Mr. Marlowe, it's considered a classic, and Madame Senetsky's performance described as pure brilliance."'
"What's that have to do with all this?" Rose asked.
"She's built the set that was used in the movie for the final scene, and that's why I say it's like a museum or a homage to the performance. If you look closely at this waxwork," Cinnamon added, moving around to gaze down at the face more closely. "you'd see it's a very accurate depiction of a young Madame Senetsky."
We all studied the face and nodded in agreement.
"Didn't she make any good, happier films?" Ice asked.
"Yes, of course, but this is considered one of her masterpieces." She continued to gaze down at the waxwork.
" 'What greater punishment can you inflict on a man who betrays you than to take his child?' That's a line from the film." she said. "Of course, she couldn't live with herself afterward and so... this tragic and gruesome ending."
We continued to stare at the wax version of our mentor. There was great detail, right down to the small birthmark on the edge of her chin.
"I just thought of something strange," Rose said. "Stranger than this?" I asked.
"Well. Evan told us that there was the possibility of Gerta committing suicide. right? There was some talk of that in the stories he found in the old papers. remember?"
"But Gerta didn't die. She's upstairs!" I cried.
"Yes, but that was what Evan said he read. And then Madame Senetsky's husband committed suicide soon afterward. That was definite, wasn't it. Cinnamon?"
She thought, her eyes narrowing.
"Yes, I see what you're saving." She looked at the wax figure.
"But the wife committed suicide in this movie, not the husband," Ice pointed out.
"Minor point," Cinnamon said with a smile. "'Madame Senetsky dies on the stage and in movies in many productions, but not in real life.
"In real life, she lives on to perform again and again."
Suddenly, a shadow seemed to slide across the wall. We were all still, listening.
"I don't like this." Rose said, embracing herself. "There are too many dark places here. Let's go back. Let's stop frying to learn about her past and Gerta's before..."
"Before what?" I asked.
"Before we find out too much," Cinnamon answered for her. "Right, Rose?"
"Yes," Rose said. nodding. She was reliving her own family tragedy. her father's suicide. I could see it playing behind her eyes. Reviving something like that surely turned her spine to cold stone.
The sounds from above changed. Now, we heard music.
"Isn't that "Shortrnin Bread'?" I asked Ice. She smiled and nodded.
"We've got to keep going. We're in this far. How can we turngback now?" Cinnamon pondered.
Rose wasn't happy about it, but we continued into the private residence.
Once past the corridor of candles, as it became known in my mind, we found more normal
accommodations: a small kitchen with a round wooden table and four chairs, another living room with plush furnishings, but also pieces that looked like they would be more at home on a stage, like a royalpurple velvet lounging chaise embellished with gold cording, albeit looking never used. There were two large oil paintings, one of which Cinnamon identified as a portrait of the famous actress Sarah Bernhardt and the other as a portrait of the French playwright Moliere. There were Tiffany lamps, crystals glittering like pieces of ice in the lamp light, a small secretary in the far right corner, and a hutch filled with expensivelooking memorabilia.
One door down we discovered what had to be Madame Senetsky's bedroom. It was a very large room with a bed Cinnamon described first as a small stage. It was round, with a crest of big fluffy pillows against the grand, curved headboard built out of what looked like rich mahogany, and in which was carved the words, To hold as t'were the mirror up to nature."
"What does that mean?" Ice asked.
"It's from Hamlet, part of what Hamlet says is the purpose of theater," Cinnamon explained while she gaped at the oversized furniture, with mirrors everywhere, even in the ceiling. There was a large magnifying, mirror at the vanity table, which ran the length of the room and was covered with a variety of makeup, brushes, and pencils. There were jars after jars of skin creams, many of whose labels boastfully announced the end of wrinkles. In an open closet to our left we saw shelves of wigs, same of which we recognized as ones Madame Senetsky had worn at dinners and on other occasions. The clothing closet on the right looked as long and wide as each of our bedrooms.
The walls of the room were papered in pink with figures of mythological creatures like satyrs, sileni, gorgons, and centaurs. Statues of what looked like Greek gods and goddesses stood on pedestals in every available corner.
Most interesting, perhaps, was the tile floor. Each tile was about a foot in diameter and depicted a scene from a famous play. It looked like the entire history of the theater was painted on the floor.
"Someone could go mad in here, never being able to not look at herself and see every blemish or hair out of place." Rose commented, turning from one mirror to the next.
"Doesn't that look like a spotlight?" Ice asked, pointing to a can light in the ceiling directed at the bed.
"Bizarre," Cinnamon said. "I bet she performs her death bed scene from Othello often."
We walked on until we came upon a stairway that spiraled up. It wasn't as grand as the one that greeted us on entry to the house, but, like that one, it had a rich-looking mahogany balustrade and carpeted steps.
We contemplated it, and then Cinnamon nodded,
"This has to be the way to Gerta's apartment. Let's go up." she said. and we started up the steps. At the top we found a door with a key in the lock.
"This is it." Cinnamon declared. She turned the key and we entered what we knew to be her living room. The needle was stuck on the record again. For a moment we all stood in the opened doorway, gaping. Then Ice moved to the phonograph and stopped it from grinding.
"Gerta?" Cinnamon called.
There was no response. Cinnamon nodded at the bedroom and we walked slowly across the room to the doorway. She was there, sitting in a chair, her arms and hands resting on the chair's arms. Now she was fully dressed in her manly clothes, a dark brown suit and brown tie, wearing a wig that resembled Edmond's hair with a deep part down the right side, and looking more like Edmond than herself. She sat calmly, staring at us, her legs crossed.
"Whom do you wish to see?" she asked in a deeper and more adult-sounding voice.
It took us all by surprise, and for a long moment, no one, not even Cinnamon, could respond. The only lamp that was lit in the room threw a pale glow over Gerta, deepening the shadows around her eyes, making them look more like small pools of ink in her pale face,
&
nbsp; "We've come to see Gerta," Cinnamon said.
"Gerta? I'm afraid you're too late," she replied. "Gerta is gone."
"Gone?" Rose asked. "Where did she go?"
"She's out, shopping for new clothes," she replied.
"Shopping for new clothes? What is she saying? I don't understand her." Rose complained, with her lips pulled back and her eyes set to shed tears of frustration and fear.
"Let's get out of here," Ice said in a throaty whisper, her gaze cold and full of warnings.
"Take it easy," Cinnamon said. "Relax, everyone."
"I'm with Ice." I said. "Let's go. Cinnamon."
"Wait." She turned back to her. "How can Gerta be out? Doesn't she have to stay in here?" Cinnamon asked. Moving closer to her.
"Not if she doesn't want to, not anymore. She found a way to go wherever and whenever she pleases," she replied with a bright smile.
"What way? How can she do that?" Cinnamon asked more firmly.
"Cinnamon," Rose urged, grasping her arm. "Don't."
"How can Gerta leave?" Cinnamon continued, ignoring Rose's plea.
Gerta turned away. I thought she wasn't going to respond and that would be that, but she snapped her head back so fast and hard. I thought she could have cracked her neck. Her face was now dressed in a rage, her lips pulled up and back so her clenched teeth were showing.
"Don't you blame her. Don't you dare blame her, too," she warned, spitting her words through those teeth.
"We don't blame her. Right. girls? No one here blames her a bit. We just want to know about her. We're her friends. That's why we came back to see her."
Gerta considered us, studying everyone's face very carefully. I thought. Then she leaned forward slowly.
"She was very unhappy where she was. She wanted to go home, even if it meant being Gerta Berta," she said with obvious bitterness in her voice. "But they wouldn't let her go, no matter how she cried and begged. There were bars on her windows and her door was always kept locked until they came to take her out for walks or to go eat or to go to the rec room or to see the doctor."
She sat back.
"No one can blame her," she emphasized again. "How else could she have gotten out?"
"Right," Cinnamon said. "We understand and we don't blame her a bit. How did she do it?"
Gerta smiled.
"She figured it out. She wasn't stupid."
"No, she wasn't. How did she do it?" Cinnamon insisted on hearing.
"First, she had to get out of her body. They were keeping her body locked up. Sometimes, she could do it easily. When her body was asleep, she could very quietly slip away, but she couldn't be away long enough. Her body always realized she was gone and woke and pulled her back inside.
"Once, she was just outside the window. She was on her way home and then, her body trembled and shuddered until it woke and pool:" she said, clapping her hands so quickly, sharply, and
unexpectedly, we all jumped. "She was brought back again, back into her body."
"So what did she do?" Cinnamon pursued.
I wished she hadn't. I had enough already to provide me a few weeks of nightmares, and from the looks on Ice's and Rose's faces, I saw they had enough, too.
"There was only one way. She had to put her body to sleep for good so it couldn't pull her back. Under her bed hung a broken bedspring. She crawled there and bent it back and forth, back and forth until it snapped off. It was sharp enough to rim it over her wrist until it unzipped her skin and let the blood drip out. Her body was screaming and begging and promising never to call her back again, but she didn't believe it. Bodies lie, you know. They tell us things that aren't true all the time.
"They tell us we're hungry and we're not really hung7. As soon as we begin to eat, we throw up.
"They tell us we're not tired, but when we try to do something, we can barely move.
"They tell us it's morning when it's still night. They tell us we're warm when we're really cold. They lie, lie, lie to keep us quiet.
"So, she said no, she wouldn't zip up her skin. She sat there watching it stop and go until it finally just flowed and then she closed her eyes and waited. She knew that as soon as her body was permanently asleep, she could be off. She could be gone.
"And so she was, because when they found her body in the morning, she was already gone and they couldn't get her back."
"Look at her wrist," Rose said with a small gasp. "Is that scar what I think?"
"Yes, wait." Cinnamon said. She turned back to Gerta. "And when she was free, she came here?" Cinnamon continued,
"Yes, of course. She came home. But he was gone. too. His body was in the ground and he wasn't here to call her his Gerta Berta. She was happy and sad, happy and sad. I told her I would help her. I would always help her. Sometimes, she needed to be back in a body, you know."
"I think I'm getting sick," Rose said. "I don't know about y'all, but I think I want to just leave."
"Hold on. You don't know what this means yet," Cinnamon insisted. She turned back to Gerta. "So, you let her go into you?"
"Of course. She's my little sister. It wasn't her fault. What he did to her wasn't her fault."
"What did he do to her?"
Gerta's eyes grew small, suspicious. I felt my chest tighten. My heart was beating fast, but low, thumping like someone's fingers on a tabletop.
"She didn't tell you?" she asked Cinnamon,
"No. She couldn't do it. She said we should come to ask you."
"Poor Gerta."
"Right," Cinnamon said, "What happened to her? What did he do?"
"He made her his Gerta Berta. When she had nightmares and she went to him, he showed her how to forget them, but that wasn't nice. Her body lied again. Her body thought it was nice."
"Didn't she tell her mother?" Cinnamon asked.
"Oh, yes. Of course, my mother told her everything must be kept secret. Only whisper to yourself and never tell. Never
She looked about the room.
"These walls are full of whispers, you know. They are like sponges, and if you press your ear against one hard enough, you can squeeze out some whispers."
"This is disgusting," Ice practically spit.
Rose turned away and hurried to the doorway of the living room, clutching her stomach.
Cinnamon stared after her a moment and then looked at us.
"You've got to transfer your fears, put your emotions into something constructive." she recited as if we were all training for a dramatic presentation. "None of us want to hear such things, but they happen."
"Let's get out of here," Rose urged from the doorway. "She's right. Cinnamon," I said. "What can we do for her?"
"We've got to do something," Cinnamon said with fury in her eyes.
She was remembering what had happened to her mother. I thought.
"Not tonight," Ice said. "Let's go. I've heard enough anyway." Cinnamon looked at me and I nodded.
"They're right. We should go."
"Okay. We'll come back to see Gerta," she told her. "Will you tell her that? Tell her we like her and we want to help her go shopping,"
"That's very nice." she said. "She'll be happy to hear that." She turned toward the wall on the right and just stared,
"Cinnamon," Ice urged, tugging at her arm.
Cinnamon backed up and we all started for the door. Just as we walked out. however. Nxre heard a door slam below,
"Oh, no. Madame Senetsky's back, or it's Laura Fairchild,' I said.
We froze and listened to the footsteps below. They were getting louder and approaching.
"Back out the window," Cinnamon said. retreating.
"But the door will be unlocked. She'll know someone came in here," I said.
"Or she'll think she just forgot to lock it," Cinnamon said. "C'mon. We don't have time to argue about it."
We closed the door softly and hurried back into the bedroom. Gerta was still sitting the same way, staring at the wall. She didn't seem to hear us. We went to the windo
w. It, too, had been locked, so we had to open that and go out, closing the window behind us and hurrying off the landing and down the stairs to my room.
"Ms. Fairchild is going to figure it out," Ice warned as we all descended. "The door was unlocked and the window was unlocked,"
"Gerta could have done the window. Just keep cool and reveal nothing," Cinnamon fired back.
We stepped on the landing and I opened my window so we could all crawl in. Just as we did, the lights went on.
Rose cried out. I gasped. and Cinnamon and Ice turned with surprise.
Standing there with a big, fat smile on his face was Howard Rockwell.
"What are you doing in my room?" I cried,
He wasn't fazed at all. He stood there, cocky as ever with that arrogant smile, his arms folded over his chest, and leaned against the closed door.
"When I came home and found none of you about, I began to check your rooms. This was the last and just as I stepped in to look. I heard the racket on the fire escape and waited. So, what are you, a bunch of burglars?" No one spoke.
"You had no right coming into my room without my permission," I fired back at him.
"Really? And I suppose you girls have a right to climb the fire escape to the rooms above?" he asked, his eyes lifting toward the ceiling.
"This is trespassing," I charged. He shrugged.
"And what you're doing isn't? We were all told what was and wasn't off-limits here."
He shrugged.
"I suppose you could always tell on me. Ms. Fairchild and Madame Senetsky would call me on the carpet and I would have to describe this scene, I guess. Whatever you want. Maybe we should march down to Ms. Fairchild's quarters right now. What do you think?"
He started for the door, put his hand on the knob, and turned.
"Well?"
"You're a real bastard. Howard," Cinnamon said.
"Is there any other kind?' he countered. "So, what will it be, girls?" he asked after we all looked at each other. "Am I going to be brought in on this or do I have to conduct a more elaborate investigation? Is Steven in on it?" he added quickly.
"No. Steven is not poking his nose into our business. thank you," Rose said.
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