The Manor

by Scott Nicholson

  She had touched that lace, of course. She knew the fabrics of the master bed better than anyone. She had seen the secrets written in the stains of sleep, and her job was to scrub them away. To erase all hint of corruption.

  Sometimes the mistress would already be in bed when Sylva came in. Margaret would watch her without speaking, a little smile of triumph on her face that she tried to hide behind the books she pretended to read. Sylva mumbled "yes'm" or "no'm" if Margaret said anything.

  Ephram himself was never in the bedroom during her nightly stoking. She called him "Ephram" in her secret heart of hearts, but she wouldn't dare call him that aloud. No, he was "master" or "sir" or, in a pinch, "Mr. Korban." She had wondered if he ever slept. Some of the help said he paced the widow's walk, especially when the moon was near full. They said his shadow stretched two miles across the mountains in every direction. Even then, the whispers had started.

  But young Sylva didn't believe the rumors, of how he laughed whenever one of the horses threw a rider, how he made the hog and cattle butchers save a pail of fresh blood in the springhouse, how he burned black candles in the dark of the basement when the only sound in the sleeping manor was the whisper of the grandfather clock's pendulum. They said that if you passed him in the dead of night, his eyes changed colors, gold, red, then yellow, the shades of fire. But that was what the men said. The house girls said other things, which Sylva equally refused to believe.

  Until the night his fire went out.

  Sylva had been late, her mother had a fever and Sylva had to feed her little brother and sister. Daddy was gone overnight, taking a wagon load of apples down the narrow trail that was really just a long scar in the side of the cliffs. So Sylva had whipped up some porridge, splashed it out into two bowls for the children, then changed the herb poultice on her mother's forehead. By that time, the fingers of dusk were scratching at the frosty November ground.

  Sylva ran the half mile to the manor, holding her skirts high, her breath silver in the twilight. The briars whipped at her knees and her long hair tangled in the laurel that lined the trail. She knew the way well enough, but she felt as if she were slogging through molasses. The manor seemed to be slipping farther away from her, as if the snake-belly trail had gained new curves.

  Sylva finally reached the house, her heart lodged in her throat and her pulse hammering. She quietly gathered some logs from the firebox and crept up the back stairs. She remembered that Margaret was away on a trip somewhere, to a place called Baton Rouge, fancy-sounding. If only Sylva could hurry, maybe no one would notice her tardiness.

  The bedroom was dark. She was afraid to light a lantern because, if any guests were visiting, one of them might look in. Sylva closed the door behind her, hoping the embers still cast enough glow for her to see. But the hearthstones were cold and the room was filled with the pungent stench of the spent fire.

  Kneeling, she put the wood on the floor and groped for the newspapers and the tin box of matches that she kept beside the poker. Even sheltered from the cold night air, she felt smothered as if by the waters of a deep dream, and the smallest movement took a great effort. The matches rattled when she knocked over the container. She balled up some pages of the newspaper and stuffed them under the fire irons. As she did, a harsh, low sound came from somewhere in the room.

  She struck a match and it flared briefly and died. In that split second of light, she had seen movement out of the corner of her eye. Trying to hurry, though gravity worked against her, she struck another match. A winter wind blew across the room and extinguished the flame before she could touch it to the paper.

  She wondered why the windows were open. Ephram never allowed the windows open in his room. Her fingers were like water skins as she fumbled for another match. The low sound came again, a rattling exhalation followed by the unmistakable creak of the poster bed. She squeezed her eyes closed, even though the room was pitch-black, and concentrated on the match that she wanted to scratch across a stone. The dark had never frightened her until that moment.

  A voice came, muffled and desperate and everything but dead.

  "Fuh… fire," it said.

  Sylva's heart gave a jump like a frightened rabbit. Ephram Korban was in the room, in the bed. She dared not look in his direction, but the same power that seemed to be weighing down her limbs made her neck turn slowly toward the bed. She opened her eyes and saw nothing but blackness.

  "Spell me," he said, a little more forcefully, almost angrily, but still muffled as if speaking through blankets. She nodded slowly, though he couldn't see her in the dark. Nor could she see him. And yet…

  As she looked at the bed, its form taking shape in her mind from the memory of it, she could picture Ephram lying there, his face stern and his hair and beard flowing onto the pillows. Handsome Ephram, who had never been sick. Ephram, who stayed young and strong while the workers and natives had faded away with their wrinkles and stories and tired, failing breath. Ephram, who was said to never sleep.

  Two small dots of light hovered in the darkness of the bed, weakly glowing, the only thing in the room she could see. She tried to turn her head away, tried to strike the match, even though she had now been pulled from mere waking sleep to a helpless awareness. She knew which side of the bed was his. The dots expanded, hovering in the area near the headboard where the pillows were. Where Ephram's eyes should be.

  The eyes smoldered the deep red color of a dying ember.

  "Call in the fire," he rasped, as a sharp flicker of yellow glinted among the red dots. The glowing eyes blurred in her tears, then she jerked the matchstick along the stone. It caught and she applied the flame to the paper. At last she could look away from that terrible bed, those impossible eyes. But she had to say those awful words, the ones Mama had taught her.

  The spell.

  She whispered them, hoping to weaken their power through lack of volume. "Go out frost, come in fire. Go out frost, come in fire. Go out frost, come in fire."

  The fire leapt to life and she put some kindling on the grate. As the wood crackled and heat cascaded onto her face, she found that her limbs were regaining their strength.

  Not daring to turn now that the room was bathed in firelight, she busied herself stacking a night's supply of logs onto the irons. Her tears had dried on her cheeks, but she felt their salty tracks. She was afraid she was in trouble, that she had committed the most unforgivable of offenses. She could only stare into the flames as they rose like yellow and red and blue water up the chimney.

  A hand fell softly on her shoulder. She looked up, and Ephram was standing above her. He was smiling. His eyes were deep and dark and beautiful, alive in the firelight. How silly she had been, thinking them to be red.

  "I'm sorry," she said, her words barely audible over the snapping of the hot logs and the hammering of her heart.

  Ephram said nothing, only moved his hand from her shoulder to her cheek, then up under her long hair until his thumb brushed her ear. She shivered even though the fire was roaring.

  "Thank you," he said. "We burn together."

  She didn't understand, all she knew was that she had wished for this moment so many times while lying on her straw mattress back home. Those dreams had come to her, taken over her body, brought her skin alive. Ephram's hands on her flesh. But in her fantasies, she hadn't been this scared.

  Then she realized what was wrong. He was behind her and above her, his face lit by the fire. She was kneeling on the hearth, looking up. But, somehow, his shadow was on her face. She couldn't fix on the thought, couldn't make sense of it, because other sensations were flooding her. His fervid hand traced the soft slope of her neck.

  And again Sylva was smothered in a dream, only under a different power this time, as she rose and let him put his arms around her, as the hellish heat of his lips pressed against hers. She was lost in his warmth, his strength, his great shadow. When he took her hand in his and brought it to the flames, she didn't whimper or beg. He was the master, after all.
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br />   Their hands went into the flames, merged, combusted, and skin and bone were replaced by smoke and ash. There was no pain. How could there not be pain?

  The next thing she knew, she was removing her coarse house-girl skirt and homespun blouse and they merged once more, this time on the floor in front of the fire, the spell lost from her lips, and only Ephram in her senses.

  Sylva looked down at her withered hands.

  If only she had felt pain. The wounds without pain were the slowest in healing.

  The tin plate sat empty in her lap. The fire had gone out. She shivered and spat into the ashes, She wasn't sure which pain was greater, Ephram's loving or his leaving her.

  She had known Ephram would come back. But then, he had never really left. He didn't die when she had pushed him off the widow's walk. He just went into the house. Because she'd killed him under the October blue moon.

  As he had promised, wood and stone became his flesh, the smoke his breath and the mirrors his eyes, the shadows his restless spirit's blood. And his heart burned in the fires of forever.

  She shivered in the heat of the day and reached for the matches.

  CHAPTER 8

  The house threw a sunrise shadow across the backyard. Mason was tired, his face scratched from his midnight wanderings. He'd slept poorly, his brain invaded by feverish images of Anna, his mother, Ephram Korban, Lilith, a dozen others whose faces were lost in smoke. He shivered as he walked behind the manor, following the worn path that wound between two outbuildings. He climbed a row of creosote railroad ties that were terraced into the earth as steps leading into the forest.

  The door on the smaller building was open. An old man in overalls emerged from the darkness within. Mason waved a greeting. The man rubbed his hands together, his breath coming out in a mist.

  "Brrr," he said, creasing his wrinkled jaws. "Cold as a woman's heart in there."

  "What is it?" Mason asked. He'd assumed it was a tool storage shed or something similar. The shed, like its larger counterpart, was constructed of rough-cut logs and chinked with yellowish red cement. A smell of damp age and cedar spilled from the doorway.

  " 'Frigeration," the man said. When his mouth opened on the "gee" sound, Mason saw that the old man had about enough teeth left to play a quick game of jacks. His overalls threatened to swallow him, his back hunched from years of work. The man cocked his head back toward the door and went into the shed. "Take a look-see."

  Mason followed. Cold air wafted over his face. A mound covered the center of the dirt floor. The old man stooped down and swept at the grainy mound with his hands, revealing streaks of shiny silver.

  "Ice," said the man. "We bury it under sawdust so it will keep through summer. You wouldn't think it would last that long, would you?"

  "I wondered how you kept the food cold without power," Mason said. "What about the food safety police, the health inspectors?"

  "They's rules of the world and then they's rules of Korban Manor. Two different things."

  The old man pointed through the door to a western rise covered by tulip poplars. Wagon tracks crossed the meadow, curving up the slope like twin red snakes. "They's a little pond up yonder," he said. "A spring pops out 'twixt two rocks. The pond's fenced off from the animals so it stays clean. Come the third or fourth long freeze in January, when the water's good and hard, we go up and cut out big blocks of it."

  "Sounds like a lot of work. I understand that heavy machinery isn't allowed on the grounds."

  "Oh, we got machines. A wagon is a machine. So's a horse, in its way. And, of course, they got us, too."

  Mason went out into the sun and the man closed the door behind him. His gnarled hand fumbled in the front pocket of his overalls as if he were looking for a cigarette. He pulled out something that looked like a knotted rag with a tip of feather protruding from one end. He waved the rag in the sign of the cross over the front of the icehouse door. The motion was practiced and fluid, appearing natural despite its oddness.

  Mason expected the man to comment on the ritual, but the knotted rag was quickly squirreled away. "What's in the other shed?" Mason asked after a moment.

  "That's the larder. Keep stuff in there that doesn't need to be so cold, such as squash and cucumbers and corn. A little spring runs through there, gets piped out into the gully yonder."

  Mason looked where the man had pointed and saw a trickle of water meandering through a bed of rich, black mud. Blackberry briars tangled along the creek banks, the scarlet vines bent in autumn's death. "Do you pick the berries, too?"

  "Yep, and the apples. They's hells of apples around here. You gonna have something apple every meal. Pie, turnovers, stewed, fried apples with cinnamon and just a dash of brandy. We keep up a vegetable garden, too, and-"

  "Ransom!"

  They both turned at the sound of the shrill voice. Miss Mamie stood on the back porch, leaning over the railing.

  "Yes, Miss Mamie," the man responded. The last bit of starch seemed to have gone out of him, and Mason was sure the old man was going to disappear inside his overalls.

  "Now, Ransom, you know you're not to trouble the guests," Miss Mamie said in a high, artificially cheerful tone.

  "I was just-" Ransom swelled momentarily, then seemed to think better of it. He studied the tips of his worn work boots. The sun lit the silver wires of hair that were combed back over his balding head. "Yes, Miss Mamie."

  The hostess stood triumphantly at the porch rail and turned her attention to Mason. "Did you sleep well, Mr. Jackson?"

  "Yes, ma'am," he lied. He sneaked a glance at Ransom. The man looked as if he'd been beaten with a hickory rod. "Um… thanks for setting me up in the master bedroom. It's very comfortable."

  "Lovely." She clasped her hands together. Her pearls shifted over her bosom. "Ephram Korban would be so pleased. You know our motto: 'The splendid isolation of Korban Manor will fire the imagination and kindle the creative spirit.'"

  "I read the brochure," Mason said. "And I've already got a few ideas. I might need a little help getting started, though. Is it okay if Ransom helps me collect some good sculpting wood?"

  Miss Mamie frowned and her thin eyebrows flattened. Her face wore the same expression that glared from the portraits of Korban. Mason realized he had challenged her authority, if only mildly. He was suddenly sorry he had dragged Ransom into the spotlight of her stare. She folded her arms like a schoolmarm debating the punishment of unruly students.

  After a moment, she said, "Of course it's okay. As long as his chores are finished. Are your chores finished, Ransom?"

  Ransom kept his eyes down. "Yes, ma'am. I'm done till dinner. Then I got to curry the horses and see to the produce."

  Miss Mamie smiled and adopted her cheerful voice again. "Lovely. And that sculpture better be perfect, Mr. Jackson. We're counting on you."

  "I'm kindled and fired up," Mason said. "By the way, is there a space where I can work without bothering anybody? Sometimes I work late, and there's no way to beat up wood without making enough noise to wake the dead."

  "There's a studio space in the basement. I'll have Lilith show you after lunch."

  "No need to bother her. I'm sure she'll be busy with the other guests. Why not let Ransom show me?"

  A shadow passed across Miss Mamie's face and her voice grew cold. "Ransom doesn't go down there."

  Mason peeked at Ransom and saw the corner of the man's mouth twitch. My God. He's scared to death of her.

  Miss Mamie turned back toward the manor, her heels clattering across the wooden porch. Door chimes jingled as she went inside. Ransom exhaled as if he had been holding his breath for the last few minutes.

  "What a wonderful boss," Mason said when Ransom finally looked him in the eye.

  "Careful," he said out of the side of his mouth. "She's probably watching from one of the windows."

  "You're kidding."

  "Just follow me," he whispered, then said, more loudly, "Toolshed's right through them trees."

  Afte
r they had gone down a side trail far enough that the house was out of sight, Mason asked, "Is she always like that?"

  Ransom's confidence grew as they moved farther from the house. "Oh, she don't mean nothing. That's just her way, is all. Everything's got to be just so. And she got worries of her own."

  "How long have you worked here, Ransom? You don't mind if I call you 'Ransom,' do you?"

  "Respect for elders. I like that, Mr. Jackson."

  "Call me Mason, because I hope we're going to be friends."

  Ransom looked back down the trail. "Only outside the house, son. Only outside."

  "Got you."

  "Anyways, you was asking how long I've been working here, and the answer to that is 'Always.' I was born here, in a little cabin just over the orchards. Place called Beechy Gap. Same cabin my grandpaw was born in, and my daddy, too. Cabin's still standing."

  "They all worked here?"

  "Yep. Grandpaw held deed to the north part, way back when Korban started buying up property around here. Grandpaw sold out and got a job thrown in as part of the deal. I guess us Streaters always been tied to the land, one way or another. Family history has it that my great-back-to-however-many-greats-grandpaw Jeremiah Streater was one of the first settlers in this part of the country. Came up with Daniel Boone, they say."

  "Did Boone live here, too?"

  "Well, he tried to. Kept a hunting cabin down around the foot of the mountain. But they took his land. They always take your land, see?"

  Ransom didn't sound bitter. He said it as if it were a universal truth, something you could count on no matter what. The sun comes up, the rooster crows, the dew dries, they take your land.

  "Toolshed's over yonder," Ransom said, heading for a clearing in a stand of poplars. He continued with his storytelling, the rhythm of his words matching the stride of his thin legs.

  "Grandpaw went to work right away for Korban, clearing orchard land and cutting the roads. Him and two of my uncles. They leveled with shovels and stumped with iron bars and a team of mules. Korban was crazy about firewood right from the start. Had them saw up the trees with big old cross-saws and pile the logs up beside the road.