by Ishbelle Bee
“Goliath Honey-Flower and Miss Mirror.”
The house is full of the exotic and strange: Persian carpets, dark eerie paintings of weird and wonderful ancestors, a great stone Indian elephant, a hand of Fatima encrusted in gold and hanging on the wall, a wooden shaman mask with white painted teeth and red lips and black snake hair. Wonderful, curious things.
We follow the butler into the dining room, where a fireplace roars and the guests are already seated, engaged in conversation. At the head of the table sits Mrs Pigwittle, the famous Spiritualist Medium. She reminds me of the tubby children in fairy tales who get fed sweets by the witch and then put in the oven. Rising from her chair, she approaches us; I notice her feet are slippered, with a pearl dangling off each silk-shod toe.
“Welcome Mr Honey-Flower and Miss Mirror.” Her eyes ghost blue, her little plump hands shake mine. “Lovely to meet you. Do make yourselves acquainted with the other guests. The séance will begin after dinner.”
There are two empty seats. We sit down to complete the party. Four other guests are seated round the dining room table, whom we are introduced to. First, a bushy red haired gentleman and explorer who has recently returned from South America is seated next to Mrs Pigwittle. His name is Rufus Hazard. He has a medical background and a fascination for unusual botanical specimens and their uses in poisons and remedies. He reveals his yellowish teeth through a fuzz of red moustache.
“Same colour hair as me,” he says to me. “In Peru they kept touching my hair. Thought I was a devil, I’m sure they would have kept you as some sort of pet.”
Sat alongside Mr Hazard are Sophia and Clarissa, who are identical twins. Bird-like faces with pale coloured hair. Mrs Pigwittle explains that they are able to read each other’s minds and read the thoughts of others.
And finally, a curious looking gentleman with bright lemon coloured hair, which is sticking up on end as though as he has been electrocuted. And he’s wearing a white waistcoat embroidered in red hearts.
“Do you believe in the afterlife, Mr Hazard?” asks Goliath.
Mr Hazard responds nervously. “Well, it’s a bit of fun, isn’t it? A lot of nonsense, really. Quite frankly when I’m dead I hope that’s the end of it. I really don’t want to be loitering about haunting someone, banging on doors and making daft noises in the night, playing silly beggars!”
“Have you ever seen a ghost?” I ask him.
“No, little girl, I haven’t.” He peers down at me. “But I’ve witnessed some horrible things in my life. Musical Theatre! Frightened the buggery out of me.”
The twins stare at me with their inquisitive eyes, a thin smirk spreading across their lips, like a line in the sand drawn with a stick.
“Hello,” I say.
“Hello,” they reply together.
Mr Hazard waggles a finger at Goliath, “I tell you, anyone breaking into song for no god damn good reason should be shot!”
“That’s a little harsh, Rufus,” Mrs Pigwittle chirps.
“It’s not harsh enough, I tell you. I’d flog them before I shot them!”
I stare at the gentleman with the bright yellow hair. He has ink-black eyes.
“My name is John Loveheart,” he says.
“Nice to meet you, Mr Loveheart. My name is Mirror and this is Goliath, my guardian.”
“Indeed,” he replies.
Mr Hazard interjects. “Loveheart. What’s your opinion on Musical Theatre?”
“I believe your idea about flogging is an excellent one.”
“Good man. Glad to see there is someone of a sound mind in the room.”
“Are you a spiritualist?” Goliath asks.
Mr Loveheart replies, “No, not at all, but my employer is interested in such matters. Or should I say, he is interested in people with peculiar talents.”
“And who is your employer, if I may ask?”
“A man I’m sure you’ll meet very soon.”
The twins say in unison, “He’s a very bad man, a very bad man.”
Mr Loveheart’s eyes suddenly fix upon me. “And what sort of creature are you, little lady?”
The twins reply, “He thinks you are very interesting.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” I say. He looks like something from a fairy tale. A prince of some sort. But something has happened to him, something wrong.
A spicy tomato soup is served with bread and butter. I sit opposite the stony faced twins, who slurp their soup in delicate, cat-like licks. Mr Hazard points out a shamanic cloak hanging from the wall, with feathers and bells, which is next to a skin drum painted with a red snake upon it. They are beautiful things. I think it is sad that they are hanging on a wall. Mr Hazard, who is keen to impress the young ladies, blathers on at some length about his recent tour of the Americas, and the variety of poisons used on arrow tips to paralyze enemies.
Mr Hazard’s eyes are clearly wandering towards the two young ladies, who are both barely of marriage age.
“Fine pair those two,” he mutters under his breath. Florence Pigwittle turns her attention towards Goliath. “I read your letter, Mr Honey-Flower, with great interest. And I will endeavour to see if I can help your ward in any way that I can. The spirit world may have a message for her.”
Goliath nods with appreciation.
The twins chirp together, “Oh, Mr Hazard, you can’t make up your mind which one of us you prefer.”
Mr Hazard smiles, a little embarrassed, and goes on to explain about his meeting with a medicine woman who regularly drank blood and who had tried to eat him.
“Rufus, I beg you, you are putting me right off the tomato soup!” Mrs Pigwittle tuts.
“My apologies, but I feel I must finish this story. I escaped from that woman’s clutches by wielding the stuffed human foot she kept as a weapon.”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Rufus!” the hostess gasps.
Dinner is roasted duck, potatoes, cabbage and beetroots. I lick my fingers of delicious duck fat. Our host tells us ghost stories during the main course while we gobble down the duck. There have been sightings of no less than three ghosts in the house. Mrs Pigwittle’s dear mother, Prunella Pigwittle, her cat, Mr Fudge, and a disgruntled servant who had accidentally fallen off the roof.
Mr Loveheart’s eyes wander while the stories are told, over the shamanic cloak and then onto me. Eyes like black holes. Eyes of a blackbird. On the other side of the table Mr Hazard is still trying his best to impress the young mind-reading twins with a tale of how he narrowly escaped an enormous crocodile by hiding in a swamp for two days.
Mr Loveheart suddenly speaks. “Let’s play a little game.” His voice is like tiny bells. A delicate warning.
Florence twitters, “Oh, I love games.”
“Let’s test the twins,” Mr Loveheart continues, “let them tell us all our favourite food.”
Heads nod and Mrs Pigwittle claps her hands excitedly. “Come on girls, we will all think of our favourite foods and see if you can guess.”
Clarissa and Sophia stare at the hostess. “Marzipan squares.”
“Yes, yes,” she cries.
Their eyes dance to Mr Hazard. “Roast beef, bloody.”
Mr Hazard bows his head in appreciation. They look upon Goliath. “Apple pie and custard.”
Goliath looks nervous. They turn towards me, faces like a pair of birds, eyes small and sharp. “Chocolate bonbons.” I clap my hands. And then they turn all the way round to look at Mr Loveheart. “Jam tarts.”
Mr Loveheart grins. “Excellent, girls. Really well done.”
The pudding is brought in: a huge steaming treacle tart with cream. Goliath has three helpings and I wipe my sticky lips on my napkin.
Mr Hazard wipes cream from his lips. “I think we should play the game again. This time let the girls guess our worst fear.”
The girls gaze simultaneously at Mrs Pigwittle. “Being denounced a fraud.”
They examine Rufus. “Crocodiles.”
They look at Goliath, who
is peering fruitlessly at his plate for the last morsels of treacle tart. “Not being able to protect her.”
They look at me. “The grandfather clock, tick tock tick tock,” they mimic.
They turn finally to Mr Loveheart, who looks directly at me. “It’s her you fear the most.”
We all remain silent for some time, until Mr Hazard slaps his hand down on the table. “Well that was delicious. When does the séance begin, Mrs Pigwittle?”
Mrs Pigwittle stands, “Of course, follow me into the library. We’ve got it all set up. I’ve a rare brandy, gentlemen, if you fancy a glass.”
We are directed into an impressive room where a skull sits as an ornament on a circular table. The expression on its face is one of amusement. Candles flicker softly, shadows creeping up the walls.
“Ooooh, spooky,” the twins sigh, excitedly.
We are seated around the table, Florence Pigwittle placed gently next to Mr Loveheart. The skull’s eye sockets flicker gold. Goliath is sat on the opposite side of the table from me, next to the twins. He winks at me.
The lights are dimmed, our shadows stretching like witches’ fingers over the walls. We are told to hold hands, to be quiet and let Florence concentrate. I grip Mr Rufus’s big fuzzy hand, and he whispers “Time for the ghouls to come out and play, little one.”
Mrs Pigwittle sighs deep uncomfortable breaths and then slumps back into her chair. She opens her eyes, which are white orbs of the blind; her voice not her own, but something distant: “There’s somebody dangerous in the room.”
Mr Loveheart removes a pair of scissors from his waistcoat pocket and stabs them into her neck. Blood sprays across the wall and the faces of the twins. Goliath stands up, pulling the table over, trying to grab him, but Mr Loveheart is too fast and leaps over the table and grabs me by my hair and and drags me to the door.
The table is thrown across the room. There is screaming and chairs are being knocked over. I cry out for Goliath.
I bite Mr Loveheart Sink my teeth deep.
A terrible roar sounds; Goliath has turned into an enormous tiger, his tail a flickering whip, his teeth massive. He lunges at Mr Loveheart, who releases my hair and I am flung to the floor while the pair of them crash through the window and out into the garden.
“Good god!” I hear Mr Hazard shout as he lunges for the fireside poker to defend himself, while blood drips from the walls. I run to the shattered window and peer into the darkness. I can see nothing.
III: The Dream
The Twelve Dancing Princesses
Once upon a time there were twelve princesses and they were locked in a tower. None of them were beautiful and all of them would befall terrible fates. Their names were:
Myrtle who was small and scared of clocks
Rose who kept falling asleep
Violet who dreamed she’d never wake up
Nettie who was overweight
Clarissa who was only a reflection of her sister Sophia
Sophia who was only a reflection of her sister Clarissa
Florence who was agoraphobic
Maggie who was really a cat
Foxglove who wore a mask, for she had no face
Lily who was scared of food
Belle who was invisible
Rosebud who poisoned people
Mirror who ate demons.
One beautiful autumn evening when all the stars were in the heavens winking like pearls, a crow with a little tinkling bell around his neck arrived with an invitation for them all to attend a magnificent ball.
All twelve princesses were released from the enchanted tower and transported to the ball in black carriages with enormous horses that carried them all into the Underworld, where the King of the Dead was waiting.
The King’s name was Mr Fingers and he sat on a throne made of antique clocks, which chimed every quarter of an hour. His palace was decorated with the wallpaper of moth wings and firefly lanterns. When the princesses arrived they were greeted by many princes of the Underworld, who took them by the hand and led them away. The King of the Underworld chose Princess Myrtle to be his wife and he placed her on his knee on his throne of clocks. She was so frightened she lost her voice and when she opened her mouth only moths flew out.
Of all the princes, the most beautiful of all was Prince Loveheart. He chose Princess Mirror for his own.
My name is Mirror and I am dancing with Mr Loveheart in the Underworld. I don’t know what has happened to the other princesses. I can see Myrtle sitting on the knee of the King of the Dead. But where are the others? Mr Loveheart is spinning me around the floor. I ask him, “Where are the other princesses?”
He replies, “My brothers have taken them away, deep into the Underworld.”
“What will happen to them?” I ask.
“I am afraid they will be all gobbled up. For there’s nothing much else we can do with them but eat them.”
“What about Myrtle?” I look over to her; she is frozen like a doll.
“The King of the Dead will turn her into a clock. She will become lost in his time.”
“What about me?”
“I haven’t made my mind up yet”
We dance around the great hall; we dance in spirals while the moths beat their wings around our faces. A soft furry kiss of wings. Mr Loveheart is dressed in red with hearts embroidered on his waistcoat. His hair is the colour of lemons. So bright. His eyes black as octopus ink. I think to myself, he’s a wicked prince and I am not going to get out of here.
We dance and dance. My feet are starting to hurt.
There’s a beating at the great door of the hall. And in arrives another king. Goliath Honey-Flower. “I am the King of the Stars and I have come for Myrtle and Mirror.” He opens his great hands out to us both.
The King of the Dead will not let Myrtle go. My wicked prince holds me tight and laughs.
The King of the Stars says, “Let them go or I will tear down your kingdom with my bare hands.”
“No,” says the King of the Dead, and the clocks chime a quarter past, politely. I don’t think any of us are getting out of this.
IV: August 1887
Mr Loveheart & Mr Fingers
My name is John Loveheart and I was not born wicked.
When I was a child, I was taken away from my home by a demon. I was taken away to the kingdom of the dead. When I came back to Earth I could not look into mirrors, for my eyes were black. The colour of dead things.
I remember our house. It was like something from a fairy tale. A magical kingdom of a king and queen, and I was the little prince. I remember in winter the snow would cover the house like diamonds: glistening, supernatural light. I remember thinking how lucky I was.
On my seventh birthday my father returned from Paris with a telescope and a map pinpointing the stars in the galaxy. I remember that time so clearly, as he was hardly ever home. He stood with me on the balcony, his finger an arrow aimed at the heavens, naming every star.
“John, remember the stars. They are constant when all else falls apart. They contain the souls of man. When I die, I will be up there forever watching you, forever with you.”
My father had an enormous collection of machines and contraptions, which he had acquired over the years and throughout the world. Each machine was an invention. Each machine held the possibility of time travel.
I was under the strictest instruction never to play with these contraptions, as they were dangerous and also expensive. To me they looked like strange and beautiful sculptures throughout our house. A spiked wheel engraved in symbols in the hallway; a mirrored black coffin-shaped box in the dining room, an Egyptian throne of gold that used sunlight as a source of energy in the conservatory, even a set of shrunken Pygmy heads and a lightning conductor on the roof. In my father’s study was a grandfather clock, his prize possession. He had acquired it from a clockmaker in London: a very unusual clockmaker.
“This clock,” he said, “is very, very special. It has something inside it. Something
trapped in time.”
“What is inside it, Father? How does it work?” I asked.
“The clockmaker tells me it will start speaking to me. It will tell me how it works.”
I gazed at that clock; it was a beautiful and frightening thing. It stood over six feet tall with a great painted face, its smile demented. Ladybird engravings crawled up the sides. What worried me was that it was shaped like a coffin.
When my father was out of his study, I secretly touched it with my hand. It was warm and I am sure I could feel it breathing.
It became my father’s favourite thing in the world. He loved it more than anything.
My mother had become mysteriously ill over the last few months and was confined to her bedroom, as she was too weak to move about. The curtains were always drawn in her room as the sunlight was hurting her eyes and gave her headaches. Many doctors came to visit, each prescribing different potions and remedies, none of which ever made her any better. Eventually the doctors stopped coming. It was believed she simply had a weak heart and must rest and let nature take its course. As Father spent most of his time abroad with business or in his study worshipping his new clock, she was very lonely, and only had me and her sister for company.
Aunt Rosebud lived nearby. She was a widower; a tall, stern woman with amber, reptilian eyes and a bun of black hair coiled on the top of her head. Every morning she would visit my mother, sit by her bed. Every morning she would bring her needlework, for she enjoyed embroidering biblical phrases onto lace, and every morning she would bring with her a homemade cake to cheer my mother up. Little comfort gifts.
One morning, before Aunt Rosebud’s visit, I took my mother some snow-bells, which I had picked from the garden. The flowers were so delicate, like fairy bells, as white as whirlpools.
“Good morning, Mamma,” I said, The room smelt of lavender and something salty.
She smiled and I kissed her on the cheek and put the snowbells into the empty vase by her bed.