The Secret Life of Algernon Pendleton

by Greenan, Russell H;

  Here the frog paused. The night exhaled a breeze and over our heads the trees mumbled in their sleep. Like incense from a ghostly censer, the white vapor waltzed on the pond. I began to feel uncomfortable. A rippling gurgle erupted off in the darkness.

  Nodding sagely, the little fellow went on with his story. “I knew I must escape. To stay was madness. Where nature is foolish, frogs must be wise. He who is stupid is he who dies. I would not stay. I dared not stay. Escape! Escape! Aboard a dhow I hid. In a puddle in the shade beneath a bale of cotton, there I hid, and I was borne downriver to Cairo. Though the heat—”

  Abruptly he halted. His green head cocked while his eyes seemed to swell to ebony boils upon his face. “Hazard! Hazard!” he called out, a spasm jerking his sleek body.

  Once more I heard the rippling gurgle, but now it was close at hand. A primitive, instinctual alarm chilled my heart; a sense of impending catastrophe clutched my brain. Awkwardly I leaped up from the fallen log, but before I could take a step in flight, the oily surface of the pond suddenly fell open, revealing a hideous snout. From the inky depths a long, tapering form ascended.

  “A crocodile!” I gasped, recoiling so impetuously that I almost tumbled from the bank.

  Twice the length of a man the brute was, more than that perhaps. His skull and muzzle were out of a bestiary of the Dark Ages; his spine was studded with bone; his tail, plated with armor, seemed to extend interminably. When his jaw dropped, as it did immediately, a ghastly cavern came into view—a whitish, sickly-looking grotto, lined with countless yellow, conical teeth.

  One instant the frog was there on the branch, the next he was gone, and the terrible jaws had closed. From within the dribbling snout a muffled, desperate croak came. “Hazard!” said the poor fellow.

  Then, unhurriedly and with grace, the crocodile swerved about and regarded me with a cold, demonic eye. Filled with fright and loathing, I scrambled from the water’s edge. Over my shoulder I glanced. The monster had turned a few more degrees, and I could now see the other half of his gray face. It was blank and blind; where the second eye should have been, there were only scales. Snorting like a horse and with his enormous body barely undulating, he lowered his nightmarish head and slowly, very slowly, swam back down to the profundities of the pond. There was a whirlpool—then nothing but some wrinkles in the water. A smell, pungent and musky, reached my nostrils.

  Supporting myself on a bough of the tree trunk, I gazed swiftly around, trying to verify reality. Without doubt, it was Hall’s Pond. There were the buildings; there were the black willows, with their limp branches like broken arms; there was the floodlight in the parking lot.

  “Good God in heaven! What does it mean?” I whispered hoarsely. “What does it signify?”

  Out on the black surface the wisps of mist danced a macabre, measured ballet.

  “Could the frog have been Norbie?” I asked myself. “Egypt, he said. What did it all mean?”

  Shivering convulsively and groaning with fright, I stumbled back across the park to the house.

  32

  CONVALESCENCE

  Out of delicacy, I will forgo a description of the hangover that resulted from this bout of immoderation. Suffice it to say that I was incapacitated for a full seventy-two hours, during which hellish period I twice saw the Egyptian frog in the wallpaper of my bedroom. He didn’t speak, however, and for this I was ineffably grateful. Though I was not the first man to observe bizarre animals while inebriated, it is not the sort of experience one cares to examine too closely.

  Three days I lay sweating, twisting, moaning, shivering in my bed. And to heighten my torment, the plumbing in the old house, which had of late been unusually noisy, favored me with a grand concert of knockings and rattlings. It was unbelievable. There had not been so much tumult at the Battle of Savo Island! How my poor head ached!

  Just as soon as I was strong enough to do so, I emptied the rest of the absinthe down the sink and threw the decanters in the trash can. I’d had enough of Norbie’s elixir. From my own personal explorations of the subject, I could vouch for the accuracy of the Encyclopaedia Britannica’s harsh opinion of the stuff. Absinthe was vile . . . and dangerous. Who had invented it? I wondered. Dr. Jekyll, perhaps.

  33

  I ATTEMPT A RESURRECTION

  To keep occupied—that was essential if I was not to sink into deep depression. I patched holes in the driveway, replaced sash cords, waxed the Mercedes, went for drives, repaired screens, did some caulking, chatted with Mrs. Binney. Apart from these small diversions, however, my life was quite uneventful. Each day was pretty much a template of the one before. There were no crises, no prodigies.

  The single occurrence that departed at all from the ordinary was an electric bill I received that was four times as high as it should have been. Though I insisted they come and read the meter again, I wasn’t able to persuade them to reduce this exorbitant figure to something reasonable. The serviceman swore that I had actually consumed that many kilowatts. But how could I have? I had bought a color television, yet it was ridiculous to suggest that it alone was responsible. A trivial matter, perhaps—all the same, it upset me because I’m leery of mysteries involving elemental forces.

  One day while I was working on my Conestoga wagon in the basement, an idea detonated in my brain. I had been gluing round slices of spinal column in place as the wheels, but when this flash of perception came I dropped everything and ran upstairs.

  From my room I got the cookie tin, carried it down to the dining room and strewed the pieces of Eulalia’s broken body on a napkin on the table. I arranged each of the thirty-four fragments into their original relative positions—but flat, of course. It didn’t look too bad, and I was encouraged. Fetching the tubes of epoxy, I carefully mixed the ingredients, spread it evenly on the matching edges of the two largest segments and pressed them together.

  To my chagrin, they fell apart at once. It was plain that china mending was a far more delicate craft than the bone gluing of osteo-art. What was required, I saw, was a method of propping the pieces up in such a way that gravity would keep them from separating. Memory came to my aid. At Mare Island I had once seen a Navy welder braze a propeller blade, and what he had done was place it in a drum full of sand. This enabled him to maneuver it any way he pleased. Then balancing the broken blade in its proper position, he proceeded with his welding. So I got a bucket of sand from the cellar, and used it in a like manner.

  The method worked. It required a steady hand, but it worked. However, no third piece could be added to the assembly until the first two had dried, and this took seven or eight hours. To speed things up I filled a number of flower pots with sand, which gave me additional beds for the constructions. It was a slow and tedious job nevertheless. The smallest fragments gave the most trouble, and often had to be held in place with Scotch tape. Another trick I learned was to stand the work in the sun, for warmth greatly hastened the hardening of the glue.

  As the bowl of the pitcher took shape, my excitement grew apace. Three full days were needed to bring the task to completion. Not until then did I permit my eyes to appraise the result in its entirety. What I saw made me weep. As diligently as I had labored, it had not been possible to hide the ugly lines of jointure, and so the once-overwhelming beauty of the little masterpiece was now ruined by a plexus of crooked seams and crevices. The shepherd and shepherdess were there; the velvet sky, the trees, the cattle, the elegant foliage could still be seen, but the surface was so crazed and pitted that all the charm, all the harmony, all the fragile enchantment had vanished—vanished forever.

  I regained control of myself quickly, however. The outward appearance of the restored jug was of less importance—much less importance—than its intrinsic or personal condition. Did it yet contain Eulalia? That was my paramount concern. Was her soul still within it, or had she—like the beauty—departed forever?

  Taking the pitcher to the library, I gingerly put it on the rope-legged table, and sat for a mome
nt silently contemplating it. Then, fortifying myself against disappointment, I called out softly, “Eulalia! Eulalia!”

  There was no response.

  “Eulalia! Eulalia! Eulalia!” I cried more loudly, but when the sound died, the room returned to total quiet.

  Ah! I’ve been defeated, I thought. All hope is gone. Her sweet spirit has flown away, and not until eternity becomes the present shall we meet again. Black melancholy swept over me. I experienced an excruciating sense of isolation, of abandonment. Perhaps a billion light-years of cold distance divided the two of us. What’s the use of anything? I asked myself hopelessly. What’s the good of going on? Better to die here and assume a new life elsewhere.

  My misery was so intense that I suddenly found myself wondering if there really was a life elsewhere, or if it was only something that I imagined to be so. Suppose I was mistaken—suppose there was no immortality? Was that why my old friend was gone forever? Suppose this . . . this weird and inexplicable, this dismal, direful existence was the only one we had? Suppose . . . suppose each of us was given just a single chance—only that, and no more?

  But it would be too cruel, I thought—too pitiless, too unjust. To suffer without purpose? To be racked without reason? Could the universe be so evil, and God so malign?

  I fell back on the velour sofa, the tears streaming down my face. Within my body, my soul felt as if it had been pulverized.

  Then, so faintly that it could have been the creaking of a joist in the floor, the word “Al” was whispered in the chamber.

  I stopped my weeping—indeed, I stopped my breathing—and listened desperately.

  “Al-l-l,” came the sound a second time, like the whine of an injured animal.

  “Eulalia? Eulalia?” I murmured, still afraid that my ears were playing me false.

  “Yes, Al—yes,” she replied to me, and there was no longer reason to mistake the reality or the source of the words.

  I leaped up from the sofa, exclaiming, “You’ve come back! You’ve returned, Eulalia!”

  “Yes,” she said, and then added something more, but her voice was too feeble, and I failed to catch it.

  “What? What did you say, my dear?”

  “Where is she?” Eulalia asked slowly, struggling with each syllable.

  I knew immediately whom she meant. “Madge is gone,” I said. “Yes, she’s gone for good—to Philadelphia. She left some time ago.”

  For almost a minute my little friend did not speak, though once she sighed, and the sound was strangely harsh. I waited, conscious that she was trying to gather her strength, as do the sick under similar circumstances. At last the words came.

  “See what she did to me, Al?” she declared. “I am nothing, now—only splinters, chips, shards, rubble. That’s what she did. But why? Why, Al? Didn’t she know how delicate I was? Didn’t she realize that porcelain is thin and frail? Did she think we were made of steel or stone? Oh, what a hateful individual she is! What a monster! Why did you ever bring her here, Al? Why? Oh, if I had it in my power—if only I had that proud and heartless woman at my mercy—I would crack and shatter her, even as she has cracked and shattered me! I would break the creature—split her flesh and crush her bones. I would make her dust on the ground. I would . . .”

  But Eulalia could go no further. Her speech degenerated into a kind of baying—a wolf’s howl of pain and vexation.

  “All of it . . . all of it was my fault,” I said, choking on my grief. “I was insane to let her stay. I . . . I simply didn’t realize how wicked she was, you see. Yes, I should have put her out at the very beginning, just as you advised. But please don’t weep so, Eulalia. It’s so awful for me. I can’t endure it, my darling. You’re back now, and that’s all that matters. The rest is nothing. We’ll be happy again, I swear it. Things will be the same as they were before.”

  “Happy, Al? How can I ever be happy?” she moaned, her tone as discordant as the rasp of a file. “Look at my glaze! Look at my body! I’m a patchwork, a jigsaw puzzle, See the scars in my neck, around my lip, in my handle? Ah-h-h! I can barely talk, and when I do, it sounds like the chattering of a monkey or a parrot. Happy? With such people as that nasty, cruel, ugly gypsy in the world, how can anyone be happy?”

  She recommenced her piteous wailing. I fell to my knees and begged her forgiveness.

  It was a long while before we were able to master our turbulent feelings, but master them we eventually did. I remained with her for the entire afternoon and late into the night. Still weak, she spoke little. As best I could, I tried to persuade her to forget the past and look to the future.

  Early the next morning I carried her about the house and showed her all the rooms. The color television cheered her up some, though she grew tired of watching it after less than an hour. I then took her for a stroll through the Burying Ground and out to the park. A few of the tennis players regarded us curiously, but that didn’t bother me at all.

  This excursion did her a great deal of good. Her voice regained much of its former strength, though unfortunately it continued to be disharmonic. I was very satisfied, nevertheless. To have Eulalia back with me was a gift beyond all others.

  34

  THE SUMMER DRAWS TO A CLOSE

  Our lives achieved a species of tranquillity in the weeks that followed—a peculiarly tough tranquillity, which made us immune to the kind of wild hysteria that had enveloped us that first bittersweet day in the library. Our ordeals had tempered our spirits. We were not so light-hearted as before, but we were stronger. That was all right. We had sacrificed something good, to obtain something better.

  September came, and the pin oaks formed their myriads of new acorns. I’d always been fond of acorns. They were like smug little green men, in brown berets. They reminded me of Great-grampy, too, for he would often gather a hatful of them and take it up to the attic, to play one of his favorite pranks. There, from the dormer window, he would fling the acorns down at the passers-by—fling them just as hard as he could. His victims would naturally think that the acorns were coming from the trees, though they were bound to wonder about the force with which they fell. How they would rub their heads! More than once I joined him in this game, but we had to play it on the sly, since my mother, fearful that we’d knock people’s eyes out, raised the devil if she caught us at it.

  The weather was ideal. I constructed a wooden cradle for Eulalia—one that I could hook on the back of the front seat—and took her for rides in the country. We even went on a picnic to Rockport once. Everything was quite pleasant, quite serene.

  During the week of Labor Day I became curious about Mahir Suleyman’s old store, and on Friday drove into town to have a look at it. The business wasn’t there any more, I found. Gone was his name from the window; gone were the inlaid tables, the leather poufs, the faded rugs; gone was his wickerwork chair and his jezbah of thick, fragrant coffee. A beauty parlor had usurped the place, and sinks and hair driers now crowded its modest interior.

  For a time I lingered there on the sidewalk, in hopes of seeing Mr. Vodena come by, but he didn’t make an appearance. It’s astounding how swiftly things can change, I thought to myself. In the space of a couple of months, a whole world—a small one, perhaps, but real and vital enough—had been obliterated. And how? By a single stroke of a walking stick! It was a sobering observation. Sursell’s words came to mind:

  Majestic change! Of all things the sum.

  Without it, today is yesterday,

  And bright tomorrow can never come.

  I departed finally, and while walking back to the Mercedes, had a flattering experience. A plump lady in a sports car honked her horn at me, and flashed the most brazen come-hither glance imaginable. It was a tempting overture—but when I thought of Eulalia home alone, I quickly looked away.

  35

  DUMBFOUNDING DISCOVERY

  Because the windows of the charnel house have no glass—only iron grilles—squirrels occasionally nest in the little building. As they clutter the p
lace with dead leaves and other woodland debris, this can be a bother. What’s more, when they spring up suddenly and dart past your nose toward the open door, they can give you a most unpleasant turn. That is exactly what happened to me about a week ago while I was rummaging for a hatchet. The animal’s flight was so abrupt and my alarm so great that I staggered backward against the wheelbarrow, which tipped over onto the stone floor, producing an ear-piercing clang. As I was righting it, something called out to me. The sound was faint, but unmistakable.

  “Al! Al!” is what I heard.

  I glanced around. Since the voice had a hollow ring to it—a halloo-in-a-tunnel quality—I thought initially that it had come from an empty nail keg that stood atop some cordwood on my right. Staring at it, I waited.

  “Is it you, Al?” came a second cry, no louder than the first and no less resonant.

  However, it was obvious to me now that it wasn’t emanating from the keg; it had come from a different direction.

  “Yes, yes,” I replied curtly, having small desire to engage in conversation with some silly rake or hoe. “What do you want? And who are you?”

  “It’s me, Al—Madge!” said the voice.

  “Madge?” I asked, nearly upsetting the wheelbarrow a second time. “Madge?” Had I received a bolt of lightning in my ear, I could not have been more shocked. “Did you say . . . did you actually say ‘Madge’?”