Black Body

by H C Turk

  Elsie looked down to the paper, then up to the window, to me. Having the same ability to read thoughts as any witch or servant, I was left with reading her countenance. Elsie returned inside with a folded note.

  “And the urchin is only saying that this paper be for Alba,” Elsie told me. “I’m confessing I might be reading the thing meself if I’d not known you to be looking. But I’m hoping you’re taking in no news you can’t be telling me, for even witches should be ladies.”

  “But never the reverse, I assume,” I mumbled while unfolding the note. There I read: “I survived. I thought I had the other end.”

  “No shame have I in describing this communiqué, Miss Elsie. Although no name is signed, the paper is from Master Eric. He tells me—to some relief, I confess—that he survived. That is a quote from him, its meaning that yesterday he received no severe punition from being out on the street with me and the dog, but no chaperone.”

  Elsie looked down to the note, then up to my face. The paper was folded again, not offered for the servant’s perusal.

  “Yes, miss,” I said with a mischievous tone, “the remainder of the writing is secretive in nature as fit an English boy and girl. Its content I shall retain, but I vow that nothing therein would cause you shame in your Alba.”

  “Ah, and you should be selling riddles on a corner, girl, with all of your humor,” she retorted, and walked away with less of her previous dismay. The messenger, it seemed, had improved both our spirits.

  • • •

  The entire morning, I remained satisfied with my relief. And though the problem alleviated was my concern for a sinner, I felt no regret for misplacing my emotions. I appreciated Eric from God’s inspiration, not society’s corruption, for Eric was the source of that profound and permanent idea affording me a type of immortality. Even sinners, I knew, were human enough to love God.

  Another male of profundity soon returned, for that afternoon I found Georges Gosdale. With no tutor due, I was being so generous as to apply tea outside my chamber, sprinkling the fragrant grounds in the drawing room when I discovered selfishness. I understood that again I was providing for myself, since no person occupied this room more than I and my guest. With a guilty glimpse to see if anyone had noticed my failing, I saw instead a change on the wall: the Rathel’s military heirlooms. That second lance had been cleaned and returned. The stick that had stabbed Mr. Gosdale. The stick tipped with sharp metal. Sharp metal that had stabbed the elephant trainer, another sinner lying wounded due to his lust. Due to me. As I stared at the dark grit on the carpet, there as though before me on the grass lay Georges Gosdale. There on the soil lay Imbriati, each man shaking with pain, their expressions of surprise never to be forgotten. And there before me dying was Eric. As surely as the previous men had lain wounded, so would Eric. The nearer he came to being part of my life, the nearer he would approach his death, exactly as intended by the foolish Rathel lady. And finally I understood that the fool was I. The potential for death from my sex promised by Rathel even then had twice been proven true. She had spoken of a “sexual capacity” for killing, and I was so foolish as to believe she expected me to smother men with my breasts, strangle them with my vagina, when in fact death from this white witch was well specified in demonstration. Gosdale and the trainer through their lust for me had accepted steel into their persons, and Eric—I knew—would somehow gain the same gift.

  I saw those wounded people on the ground, then I saw the dead one. I saw the person who had died for me, and she was Mother. I saw the end of my sisters from Man’s Isle, and they had died for no one, nothing. But none of this from witches, no, for by Lord God’s morality the cause was sinners. The killing had all come from lustful misunderstanding, for greed was the sinners’ religion. This evil race required no witch for their violence to be released, for the sinners’ society was implemented passion, an act of damage against the God they so poorly worshiped.

  When would my sense come to equal the sinners’ lust? When would I no longer endorse the sinners’ evil with passivity? for their torment had found me even when I was least cooperative with their ways. When would I learn the lesson of leaving? But I knew. I knew to become active in seeking survival by removing myself from the sinners’ path. And now I had a new excuse to spur me. Without my presence, the Rathel’s threat against Eric would be removed. I became determined to preserve not only myself, but also my religious mentor.

  • • •

  I expected Eric to have taken from the animal faire caution enough to keep him apart from me for days. But the days were few. Passing through the great room one morn, I heard a familiar sound. The same as a person’s gait, one’s knock is distinctive and identifying. That sound at the door was surely Eric’s, and I found myself moved by anticipation. Delilah answered the door to find Eric, as expected, but not only Eric, for behind the young man came his father.

  How strange to see these family members’ divergent states. Smiling at Delilah and even moreso upon sighting me, the son stood unaware that stalking behind him was his angry father set to snatch the boy away, to scold his kin while ignoring all of the Rathel household.

  And so the theater transpired. Eric learned of the upcoming opera by the strange looks thrown past him by Delilah and me. The boy turned only to receive his father’s forceful grasp on his shoulders, the more massive adult heaving the youth around.

  “You thus disobey me and English decency?” Edward harshly confronted his son. “Are you so lecherous as to dishonor both your parents?” And with his hand grasping Eric’s shoulder, he pulled his boy toward home.

  I watched them depart, Eric embarrassed and unresisting, shamed worse than ever by this witch, no crowd collecting for this compact encounter, one that moved me as deeply as the victim. Of course, Eric was ever meant to be the victim. And despite the scene’s lack of bloodshed, the violence here was imposing; for these people were of import to each other, not enemies, the Rathel through her selfish auspices harming the truth of their family love via the encompassing evil of revenge.

  • • •

  “Miss Elsie, you might please aid me in understanding London, for Lady Amanda and her tutor have failed to grant me adequate knowledge of English finance.”

  “And I’m to be telling you business things that the mistress and Mrs. Natwich haven’t? You’re burdening me, child, with knowing about the wealthy as though I be one. But I’m helping you if I can, lass, though don’t be expecting from me learning that a simple person is not having.”

  “I would ask you, miss, from whence people obtain money.”

  “Why, of course, child, but your question is easy. One asks their mistress for coin to be buying a new batch of fish or a peck of kumquats.”

  Elsie smiled so pridefully as to be purely the sinner.

  “Thank you, miss, for your fulfilling humor. As well, accept my forgiveness for your taunting me when I seek only to better myself. Or is the truth I now discover that you have no desire for me to become a lady?”

  “Aye, a few things you’re learning about being the lady, girl, for even now you’re excellent at unkindness to servants.”

  “I beg your pardon, miss, for such an incompatible accusation. The fact shall ever be that you are the Rathel’s servant, not mine. I am cruel only to my friends, and on occasion the tutor. Since in this scenario you are the latter, my unkindness is fitting. To proceed, educator of lady witches, from whence does this household gain its coinage for the procurement of onions?”

  With the term “witches,” Elsie reacted by hurling me a look of displeasure. But neither of us doted on the topic, Elsie proceeding with my query instead of my evil.

  “Why, Mistress Amanda is gaining a fine estate from poor Master Franklin, from both his ownings and his business with Mr. Denton. This building we’re living in is only a part, but it’s the other properties that are bringing her moneys. And I’m hearing the mistress is most wise in handling her husband’s wealth.”

  “Therefore, the R
athel on her business dealings obtains money from other buildings and brings the coinage home.”

  Laughing, Elsie added, “Girl, I’ll feign no awareness, then, of your taunting me out of vengeance. And I’m pretending I believe you don’t truly know that in cities like London, most funds are in the form of paper, promissories and drafts being held by banks.”

  “My heavens, Elsie, whatever are these banks promising for the Rathel’s money? That is to say, what is a bank?”

  Studying me carefully this instance, her smile withheld, Elsie observed true innocence.

  “So I’m telling you, lass, that a bank is a business which holds your money so it won’t be lost. When you’re needing some currency, you go there and they’re returning some of which you gave them afore.”

  “Then why, Miss Elsie, do you not go directly to the bank to acquire your fish or other slimies?”

  “Selling fish at a bank, you’re saying?” Elsie returned, and guffawed so foolishly that she had to hold her mouth to keep her sinning heart from leaping out.

  “Thank you, miss, for teaching me how to revile your black heart, which is filled with evil mocking.”

  Soon controlling her shameful sinners’ cackling, the servant continued.

  “Ah, I’m not going to the bank to buy your guavas, girl, because they’re only giving moneys to those that were placing it there to begin with. They’re giving Mistress Amanda’s money only to Mistress Amanda.”

  Learning little in this conversation, I decided to invoke boldness with my further deceptions.

  “How exactly would you manage to gain funds for purchasing a slimy thing as a gift for the mistress, therefore being unable to ask the recipient for money?”

  “Girl, you’re a terror to society with your tremendous lack of learning. So I’m telling you now that servants buy no gifts for their masters, and the blooming opposite as well is surely true. But if a person would be purchasing a gift for any cause, there are other sources. Some are gaining a bit of honest money from craftwork or home gardens. Things such as knittings and vegetables can be sold, you know. Another way is in turning criminal. Then you can be visiting honest folks’ banks and take all the money you can—until you’re caught and hanged, that is.”

  “What other things of a household can be built and sold?” I asked. “Are all these tapestries and porcelain as valuable as are goods from a garden? In that you would teach me needlework, can you teach me to produce these items as well?”

  “My stitching a welcome mat is not the same as a tapestry it’s taking a crew of Frenchmen a year to make. And you’d best be understanding, lass, that selling such artworks if not your own is called ‘thievery,’ and for such acts the magistrate will be making your new home his old prison.”

  “I now comprehend why I have not been made aware of finance’s complexities, for this is an area no person of God should enter, since the process ever ends with a hanging.”

  “Aye, and it’s the attitude of a lady you’re now taking, girl, for finance is best left to the menfolk. If you’re needing money, be marrying a rich man, is what me mum ever said. Since I’m a commoner and having no need of funds, I’m sending away the countless barons always after me apron strings.”

  Again Elsie had produced a humor to sicken me by being so similar to my own. As the servant moved away to proceed with her baseborn affairs, I concluded my interpretation of English finance, conjoining her ideas of money with Eric’s of hocking. Because no more than Elsie would I be marrying a wealthy sinning man, and unlike her I was subject to the magistrate’s ultimate punition via the Rathel’s whim, to attain the funds required for my purposes, why not become a thief?

  Since I sought release from London, not a hanging therein, I would heed Elsie’s speaking and not attempt to gather bits of Rathel’s fortune directly from her bank. And though not so abjectly foolish as to remove portraits of British kings from the walls, since I possessed no fobs or similar gifts, I would necessarily pawn the Rathel’s belongings. As explained by expert Eric, items for the merchants of hocking must be carefully selected. At once I was terrified by the thought of stealing a ring purchased by Franklin for Amanda, who had vowed to retain it for her lifetime. And though never worn, the ring received the lady’s renewed vow each evening with a touch and a prayer to God, immediately after her renewed vow to Satan that soon she would deliver Eric’s soul. With less fear and more sensible thinking, I selected an item to be my economic victim.

  • • •

  “Good morning, Miss Rathel, and is it that you care to take the clock for a ride?”

  Had I a source of coinage, I would have hired a different coachman, for one unfamiliar with me would not have asked semi-humorous questions as to my temporal companion. Since no ready supply of cash funds lay about the Rathel’s household, I had begun with a major theft.

  “Sir, you would be so good as to convey me and the timepiece to a shop of pawning where I might sell the former.”

  “Oh, and miss, this object must be yours before you are selling it, I so assume.”

  “As I am in need of a birthday gift fit my new and wonderful mother, I am selling this common clock that was given me by a true aunt from my original home.”

  “I would aid you, miss, if I could, and will apologize for asking so much where little concern is due from me, for aid I cannot. Instructed I was directly by Lady Amanda not to transport you to any place alone, in that she feared for you without chaperone. This I can agree with, in that you are from a mild place which lacks the criminals of London.”

  Again, I felt enslaved by Rathel, that mistress of human manipulation. But I also felt social enough to be embarrassed before this coachman. And blushing or not, I was more apprehensive to reenter the house with my booty than to proceed. Therefore, I continued with the same sinner rather than beginning anew with a more dangerous male.

  “In that my task is decided, sir, I must proceed without your service. Nonetheless, I ask you with kindness to inform me of the whereabouts of the sort of enterprise I seek.”

  “Miss, I fear that telling you this would lead you to go there and gain for yourself difficulty. I would not bring a problem upon you. And certainly you would not be walking, I’d wish.”

  “Sir, I begin walking immediately. If you are such a minister of my household as to inform Lady Amanda of my plans, may you rest peacefully with your thoughts. But you would aid me without jeopardizing your employ by providing the directive I seek. Furthermore, I would have you understand that I came to London from the wilderness, which was my home. In the wilds are no thieves, but giraffes and other creatures certainly no more difficult to avoid than London’s average criminals.”

  “If you are one to deal with a thing as great as a giraffe, then human murderers should cause you scant pause,” the coachman responded. “Thus, I shall direct you to the place you seek.”

  And so he did, the witch listening carefully to instructions for gaining a shop supposedly not far removed. Thanking the coachman, I retained the haughty mode fit an English lady and a witch so ignorant as to accept insufficient directions. Foolish these sinners were to be deceived by a witch, one to convince them she was a young lady instead of a child. Even sinners know how easily children can misplace themselves, this one so wild as to be lost paces beyond her doorstep. Though reasonably the complex streets of London should have been marked, only a few signs were posted, those names the coachman had given me so unfamiliar that I forgot them regardless. But the man had also mentioned the tall office of a basket manufacturer whose braided sign would be missed with difficulty.

  Not at all. The walking was difficult, however, because I stubbornly continued to search long after losing my landmarks, fooled by the false belief that I would eventually find the proper shop, if only because every shop in London I would eventually pass. My grand mistake was continuing toward a semi-hated smell, for ahead were the remnants of a great burning. Proceeding, I came to poverty, and what direction then? No fine carriages await
ed on these narrow streets, for no elaborately dressed gentry lived here to hire them. No intricate houses with elegant vines gracefully coating the buildings’ fronts beneath high, peaked roofs and multiple panes of glass. Only unpainted clapboard and broken windows, dirt streets, the only brick covered with soot marks from a hot history.

  From behind a partially boarded window came the sound of a sinner woman cackling like no witch; whereas in the Rathel’s locale, no person of any gender or station would display such a loud lack of etiquette. Neither did any men in my ward slouch as did these, as though to be nearer the dirt that covered them. Though many males in wealthy locales found interest in me, none had ever stared at my torso only to imitate a wild pig hungered to the point of madness, salivating and swallowing their spittle from lust, a putrid desire extended to verbal obscenity.

  “Ooh, cor, bloke, and there’s a thing to be mouthing on.”

  Here were children never influenced by a tutor, numerous examples of the wretch I had deservedly beaten in the park, quasi-human creatures who sneered at me worse than any in Jonsway, calling out as though viewing a giraffe grazing their streets that I was, “Carrying a bleeding clock!”

  The final determinant of my course’s being modified was a man more erect than the previous wretches who tipped his crumpled hat and inquired of my health with a dearth of teeth.

  “And you’d be feeling so generous in your heart if you’d give me a coin for my needed medicine, missus.”

  “Miss,” I spat in return. “And if I had coin, I’d not be walking amongst you scurrilous sinners.”

  At the next intersection, I turned onto a street even less desirable due to its more numerous destroyed buildings. The advantage here was that I saw no populace beyond, and I wished no more exposure to sinners far worse than Rathel’s kind, their response to a harmless stranger describing their society as one ruined—as though paradoxically—by a lack of wealth. If wealth were a prime evil to have spoiled the whole of London, how could its removal be responsible for this inferior part? Why did these people, in their lack of materials, not become like witches? Though I could not determine whether poverty or wealth were more akin to wild living, I was convinced that despite its pretension and waste, luxury was preferable to human filth; for squalor is not only unnatural, but unpleasant. Unladylike.