Peter Carey

by Bliss

  He came into the room and brought a chill with him. It was like a cloak of cold gas. He was not a devil. He was the victim of a devil. She had met a warlock once, in the city, with a coven of seven women who served him. The warlock was as calm and relaxed as possible. He had great power. Under his power another visitor, a young man, babbled sexual fantasies and was humiliated.

  'There is a devil in you,' she said.

  He asked too many questions and meant none of them seriously. He wanted to touch her. She didn't know the answers and it didn't matter anyway. Was it a Christian devil? Devils were devils. They did not belong to anyone, not Christ, not the Buddha – they were devils, malevolent spirits. They existed everywhere. Devils, goblins, evil forces. People say there is no evil, but they are wrong. Honey Barbara had seen the maggots in the heads of decapitated pigs, sheep, a horse once, animals killed for the sole purpose of an evil ritual. On the spot you could feel the evil. It was not the sound (the buzzing flies), not the smell, but a damp, dark feeling in the middle of a sunny clearing and the horse she was riding (Sally Coe's George) felt it as much as she did. It was not just death. Death is everywhere. There was a ghost down in the rain forest where an old man had lived alone and it was a good ghost, nothing cold there at all.

  He thought he was in Hell and he had gone looking for the devil. He had sired the devil and given birth to him and now the devil was in his guts like a parasite.

  First he had to be washed. He did not understand. He tried to kiss her. She kept him away by force of will. Tonight, she had the power of incantation and knew she could heal him. She scrubbed his back hard and talked to him. She soaped him. She removed the smells from him. She was not known to be a healer.

  But tonight she had a golden ball of light at the very centre of her being. She could heal.

  She wasn't stoned. She was Honey Barbara, pantheist, healer, whore.

  When a devil has your body he knots it, makes ropes, pulls it together, ties it up, braids it, circles you, makes you strangle yourself with your own neck muscles, cut yourself with your own tissues, burst your own organs apart.

  The muscles are the devil's ropes. The Christians don't know that, but it's true.

  She made him lie on the mattress on the floor in the middle of the circle of candles.

  Rain was falling on the roof, ever so gently. She warmed coconut oil. He lay on his stomach on his erection. When she returned with the oil he tried to kiss her but she pushed him away. Not yet. He was grasping and his eyes still showed a dulled, ash-covered sort of anger, like the snakes you find, still alive, in the forest after fire.

  Honey Barbara scented the coconut oil with a few drops of lemon.

  She wished she had real words for a ritual, but she had only her hands. She sat beside him, both of them naked, and rubbed some warm oil into his back. Then she set to rattle-out the devil. She put the palm of her hand on his spine and hammered up and down. She knuckle rapped, bang, bang, bang, along his spine, and then she used the edges of her hands to hack up and down. A drum-roll. She broke up the words that came from his mouth and let them float away.

  She pressed into the skin of his back with thumb and fore-finger and gently squeezed the flesh together. Then released it. A hundred small pinches in a light pattern over his back and the back of his legs.

  When she turned him over he looked a little better.

  She fast-stroked his knees, drained his thighs, her lips pressed determinedly together and Harry Joy exuded, like one giving up evil spirits, a gentle sigh.

  She stretched his neck, and lifted his head. A beatific smile came over his face.

  She lifted his arms and felt them – loose muscles.

  She circled his nipple with her tongue. She rolled him over and ran that pink wet tongue along his spine, down the skin and bit him, gently, on the back of the knee. She brushed his back with her small firm breasts.

  And then, kissed him.

  And then, in one smooth acrobatic motion that seemed to take ten slow, oiled, minutes to achieve, like two snakes entwining, she took his penis into her and smiled as he shut his eyes and gasped softly. She nestled her lips into his ear as he entered her (lips into a shell, lips into a rose), and as the slow long strokes began she talked her spell.

  The rain was on the roof.

  She told him it was another roof, not this roof, Harry, my roof at home, the rain is much louder, really loud, you're with me, and there is plenty of dry wood and you can hear the creek, Harry, and the goats are in their shed and they're very quiet and the big tallow woods up the hill are bending in the wind and if you have your arms around them you can feel their power, and even the old carpet snake has stopped hunting for hen eggs, Harry I love you, and you're really happy.

  'I love you,' she moaned, 'I don't know why I love you but when I take you home they'll think I'm crazy. Will you come home with me?'

  'Yes,' he said, 'Oh yes, yes, yes.'

  The words came in waves ( 'And be my lover, Harry' ) like rain ( 'Yes, yes, yes' ) and he was where she said he was, far away, in a tin-roofed hut with candles flickering in their safe magic circle and up the hill the tallow woods bent in the southerly wind and the water ran down to the creek which would show itself a clay yellow tomorrow and the hens and the goats and perhaps even the carpet snake lay still and in the morning the trees would glisten clean in the morning sun and the steam would rise off Bog Onion Road.

  For the rest of his life he would remember the night when Honey Barbara drove out his devil. Then he thought it was gone for good and she was the rain on the roof, the trees he had never seen, the river he had never tasted.

  Later, washed by candle light, she said, 'Now we can drink wine.'

  They sat on the mattress. She put on the white silk gown she had bought in the Op Shop. It was embroidered with two large golden flowers and one small bee. She had bought it because of the bee, which was executed in the most faithful detail.

  They sniffed their Cheval Blanc and entwined their legs together.

  'Will you really come home with me when we get out?'

  'Of course,' he said.

  'Why?'

  'I love you. I've missed you. I've got nowhere else to go.'

  'When do you get the money?'

  'Tomorrow.'

  'On your credit card?'

  'She won't take credit cards. She wants cash.'

  'Have you got that much cash?'

  'My wife's bringing it.'

  He felt her stiffen.

  'Does that upset you?'

  'No,' she said, 'that's fine.'

  But when he looked at her she was frowning.

  'It's alright,' he said, 'really.'

  'What does she want?'

  'Nothing.'

  'Did you tell her about me?'

  'Yes.'

  'What did she say?'

  'Nothing. She's bringing the money.'

  'And she knows about me?'

  'Yes,' he kissed her ear. 'Yes, yes, yes.'

  He was shocked to see Bettina: her face was puffy, her cheeks collapsed, her eyes rimmed, her skin a bad colour. When they kissed, her lips were tight and hard. A peck, quite literally. She smelt of stale tobacco.

  'Christ,' she said, 'you look terrible.'

  And it was true that he had a scab above his eyes and pimples on his nose and that there was, in his eyes, a quiet glow of anger that had not been properly extinguished by Honey Barbara's magic, and was lying there, waiting for the first little touch of wind to set it sparking again.

  Yet he felt wonderful. All night long he had stayed awake, tossing and turning with the sheer excitement of his life, re-living his fight with Nurse, the rain on Honey Barbara's roof, the future on Bog Onion Road. He was a child on the day before school holidays begin.

  They sat in the small sunless room in the building called 'The Foyer,' although it was a detached building and used for nothing but admissions.

  'Well,' she said.

  'Well,' he said.

  She w
ore black: a jacket, skirt. She had always distrusted pretty colours although they suited her very well. In black she could look at once severe and beautiful, but today she merely looked severe and unattractive and if you'd seen her in the street you might have thought her newly widowed.

  She sat on an ugly red chair and fidgeted with her hands. He sat opposite on a couch upholstered so tightly it had no inclination to receive his body.

  I don't apologize for what I did,' she said, 'so don't try and punish me.'

  He hadn't expected this tone. On the telephone she had been different.

  'I wasn't trying to punish you.'

  She pointed a finger. 'Not silently, not in words, not with distance, not any way. I won't be punished. Do you understand me?'

  'Yes,' he said nastily. 'I understand you, Bettina. I won't punish you.' He imagined, vividly, slapping her hard across the face.

  'And not that either.'

  'Not what?'

  'Not that nasty shit you got in your voice then. I don't know where you learnt it, but I won't pay money unless you stop it.'

  On the telephone she had been tearful and full of remorse. Now she sounded as if she'd consulted a lawyer. She was hostile, wary.

  'Bettina, Bettina,' the Good Bloke said and held out his hand. Her hand was damp. 'Bettina, it's O.K.'

  Her chin wobbled uncertainly and then firmed. She took her hand back.

  'I am going to do a deal.'

  'Sure,' he said, but now it was his turn to be wary. She had said nothing about any deal on the phone.

  'I want to do ads,' she said. He held her chin up.

  He rolled his eyes.

  'I'm not joking.'

  'O.K.,' he said, 'do ads.'

  Advertising seemed to him completely alien. He had seen advertisements while he was in hospital and he had found it astonishing that he had once thought they were important. Now all he could think of was the rain on the roof, Bog Onion Road, Honey Barbara, wholemeal bread. He wanted to be safe. He did not care about his house, his business, his car.

  'O.K.,' he said again, 'I agree. I accept. You do ads.' He was impatient. Honey Barbara was waiting behind the kitchen with her bundle.

  'And you sell them for me.'

  She was smiling. He stared at her with his mouth open.

  'If you don't come back to the business I won't give you the money.'

  'You didn't say anything about this on the phone.'

  'I'm sorry.'

  'I can't. I've made a promise. It's not on.'

  'I'm sorry Harry. But that's the deal.'

  'Fuck you,' he snarled. He clenched his fist and curled his lip. 'Fuck you.'

  'You want me to leave?' She stood up.

  'No, no, sit down. Bettina,' the Good Bloke said, 'what's got into you?'

  'It was always in me,' she said. 'Always, from the beginning. I was never a sweet little wifey. I was a hard ambitious bitch.'

  'It's because of the girl. You're pissed off at that.'

  'No.'

  'Well what the fuck is it?' he shouted and she looked with amazement at his twisted face.

  'You're good at selling ads,' she said, 'and I'm good at making them.'

  'You've never done an ad in your life.'

  'You don't know what I've done,' she said. 'Now that's the deal. It's the only deal. And if you start going crazy again I'll get you locked up for a long time.'

  'Christ Almighty,' he said to his wife.

  'Come on, Harry.' Now it was her turn to hold out a hand to him. There was a glitter of excitement in her poker player's eyes. 'We'll kill them, Harry. We'll clean up.'

  She felt she was back at the place when their hands had first touched, ready to be washed with vodka. She was going to be a hot-shot.

  She took the bundle from Honey Barbara. It was wrapped in yellow crushed velvet and tied up with a burgundy-coloured strap. She threw it on to the front passenger seat of the Jag and thus, in one casual move, eliminated any indecision about who was to sit where.

  She was not unkind to the girl. She had smiled at her and shaken her hand. She had found out everything she needed to know on the phone.

  'Do you love her?' she had asked.

  'Yes,' he had said. He did not even pause. Just: 'Yes.'

  Something happened then, something she had been almost planning, and by now everything was O.K. and she had it all worked out, she did not think it unreasonable that Harry should have fallen in love. But there was a deal about that one, too. The deal was that it was not unreasonable for Harry to do what he had done as long as it was not unreasonable for her to have Harry (Good Bloke) committed. She was not unreason-able. She was not bad. She had thought a lot about whether she was bad or not and most of the time, sober, early in the morning, she knew she wasn't bad.

  So the girl was all right. She had, at least, some style: a funny, not particularly acceptable, sort of style, but it was style (California, 1968) at least and even if she reeked of drugs, she had something.

  Bettina gave her eight out of ten.

  Honey Barbara had never been in a Jaguar before and she was not ready for it. She didn't understand what was going on. She tried to ask Harry questions with her eyes. They sat together in the back seat and held hands. There was something strange going on. There was something she could only describe as 'off'.

  'I've hijacked you,' Bettina said to Harry and laughed into the rear-view mirror. 'After all these years, I've shanghaied you.'

  A game was being played. Honey Barbara didn't understand it. She was simply shocked at how old and unhealthy Harry's wife was. She was laughing. Honey Barbara couldn't imagine why. She should go on a fast.

  'Barbara,' Bettina said, 'I have finally shanghaied my hus-band so that I can work with him. I had to buy him back to work with me.' She turned her head to smile and Barbara wondered if her thyroid might be slightly overdeveloped.

  'Oh,' she said. 'What work?'

  'To do ads.'

  Honey Barbara looked blankly at Harry who was chewing his moustache.

  'Advertisements,' he said. Everything felt horrible. There was shit in the air.

  'He never let me do ads,' Bettina explained. 'But while he's been in hospital I've been doing them, and now he's going to sell them for me.'

  'I'm sorry,' Honey Barbara said, and leaned forward in her seat, 'but you've lost me.'

  She smiled, to show she meant no harm.

  'I did a deal with his highness. I do the ads. He sells them.'

  'That was the deal,' Harry said and squeezed her hand. She could feel how guilty he was. 'I'm sorry but it was the only way we could get the money.'

  'What was what deal?' Honey Barbara's voice was rising. She looked from one to the other. 'I don't know what you're talking about. I can't even understand your language. I don't even know what your words mean.'

  'I'm going to work again, selling Bettina's ads to clients,' Harry said mournfully.

  'You said you were coming home with me.'

  'I can't. Not yet.'

  'I've kidnapped him,' Bettina said. 'But you can come home too. I don't want him for anything but work.'

  Honey Barbara could smell evil in the air. She had been around witches before, people who practised magic, black and white. She had felt wills like this before, wills you could not resist. She had lived amongst them. She had gone riding in the mornings and found the heads of pigs writhing with maggots. The poisons from the freeway flooded into the car. She felt the lead take up its place, the carbon monoxide do its work.

  'You mean,' she said to Harry, 'you're going to stay in the city.'

  He would not look at her.

  'That's right, isn't it? You're not coming with me. You're staying here.'

  'You can... '

  'Well fuck you.'

  She dragged the bundle from the front seat and jammed it tight on her knees. For a moment Harry thought she only wanted the bundle to cuddle. She held it tight and rested her weeping eyes in it. He knew she was crying. He could see the wet s
pots on the crushed velvet when she moved her head. She held out her hand to him without looking up. She squeezed his hand. She squeezed it hard.

  When the car stopped at the next light she opened the door and got out. She walked back the way they had come, against the traffic.

  When the lights changed, Bettina hesitated. The cars behind tooted, first one, then all of them. She was watching Harry, to see what he wanted. But he sat there stunned, not moving, and finally she applied her foot to the accelerator, very slowly, and when she moved off he did not protest. Thank Christ, she thought, one less complication.

  But after a while he said: 'She was right. I broke my promise.'

  There was nothing to say to that. All Bettina could ask was the question that had been in her mind since she met the girl. She knew it was the wrong question even when she was half-way through it.

  'Was that smell,' she asked, 'was it marihuana?'

  'It was Sandalwood Oil,' he said at last.

  'I always thought that smell was marihuana.'

  'Well it's fucking well not marihuana.'

  She was surprised by his tone. She looked into the rear-view mirror.

  'You think I'm a creep, don't you?'

  'No,' he said tiredly, 'I don't.'

  'You think I'm a conniving bitch?'

  'No.' He wasn't even interested in the conversation any more. He wasn't interested in Bettina's projections.

  Projections!

  Even the way he thought belonged to Honey Barbara. He had never known the word before he met her. He had broken his promise. She had walked out the door. He was full of shit. He should have just run away, run away with her.

  'Harry, I'm not a bad person.'

  'Bettina, I don't give a fuck if you are.'

  'But I'm not.'

  'Alright, you're not.'

  'We had to lock you up.'

  'Thank you.' He had decided how to find Honey Barbara. She would go to the house where Damian lived. He had memorized the address. Not the street number, but the name of the street.

  'Harry, will you look at my ads?'

  'Yes,' he said. 'Yes, I will look at your ads.'

  'Harry, we're going to kill them.'

  'Good.'

  He wondered how bad the ads would be.

  'Do you want me to go back and find... Barbara?'