The Woman in the Wall

by Patrice Kindl

  Well, it is odd; I don't claim to understand it. The very thought of a stranger's eyes upon me makes me faint with fear. My heart pounds in my ears, my hands shake, and I see spots in front of my eyes. Yet whenever someone looks right past me without seeing me, I feel myself infinitely superior to him. I laugh in my secret heart at his stupidity and hug my own quick-wittedness to myself.

  Now, I know as well as you do that this is wrong. A really nice person would not think or feel this way. So I do my best to subdue my vanity. For instance, whenever I do something that might be considered clever, I try to take no notice whatsoever. Or if I must think about it, I look for flaws. "Not top quality work," I say to myself. And whenever I do something wrong I point it out to myself very firmly. "Anna," I say, "you are a perfect fool." I am not really sure that this is working.

  How difficult it is being human! Inanimate objects never have all these complicated emotions. Just think how simple and pleasant it would be to go through life as an object. An attractive little blue sugar bowl with a painted bird on the lid, for instance, sitting in a patch of sunlight on the breakfast table. How peaceful, how tranquil, that must be. And if a careless elbow knocked you over and you smashed to bits, you wouldn't care, why should you? Being brainless has its advantages.

  I love things; they are so patient and good. They'll do anything you ask, anything at all, if only you understand their nature and treat them well. Things never make me nervous the way people do. Even I make myself nervous.

  But back to the secret room. The library in our house shared a wall with the main staircase. It was a broad, impressive staircase with a curving mahogany banister, and underneath was a narrow, wedge-shaped cloakroom. Since this cloakroom tapered down to a point at the foot of the stairs, most of it went unused. There was a coat rack right by the door, with a jumble of hats and gloves and boots, but the dark recesses of the room were filled with nothing but dust and darkness.

  I erected a thin plasterboard wall behind the coat rack. This gave me an enclosed area five feet by five feet with a steeply sloping roof. I carefully painted the new wall to look as though no wall was there; anyone pulling on a jacket or a pair of boots would see only the accustomed back of the closet, empty and dusty as usual.

  The next step was a rather large-scale, noisy project. To distract my family's attention, I began work on a great number of repairs and improvements around the house all at once, at all hours of the day and night. I hammered and drilled and power-sanded here, there, and everywhere. I shut off the lights and water for hours and then turned them on again. I dismantled the bathroom sink and left it in pieces all over the upstairs hall.

  The first few days, my family complained bitterly, shouting my name, banging on the pipes, and thumping on the ceiling with brooms. This was painful for me; angry people make my stomach hurt. However, gathering up my courage, I carried on. I took apart the table saw and brought it up from the basement. Then I reassembled it in the dining room and began cutting up a great stack of plywood.

  This seemed to do the trick. They became resigned and lay on sofas in the front parlor with their heads wrapped in pillows, moaning softly. That was when I knew it was time to begin work in the library.

  That night as they slept (or tried to), I erected a whole new wall in the library, parallel to the wall that backed on the cloakroom. The new wall was two feet closer to the center of the room than the old wall, leaving a narrow passage down the whole length of the room. I installed a trap door to the basement at one end of the passage, which gave me an entrance to my hidey-hole. No one but me ever goes down to the basement, so it would be much more secure than an entry on the first floor. Then I cut a door in the inner wall to connect the passage with the little chamber I had carved out of the cloakroom.

  For those of you who are confused, or who skipped the last paragraph, feeling that it was too dull to follow, let me summarize: I now had a very small room under the stairs connected to a passageway through the library. This passageway could only be entered through the basement.

  All that remained was to make the library look untouched. Working rapidly, I installed the built-in bookcases from the old wall onto the new wall and replaced the books in their proper order. Finally, as the sun rose in the eastern windows, I swept up the floor, re-laid the carpet, and put the furniture back in place. As I staggered off to sleep in the back of a clothes closet, I felt that I had put in a good night's work.

  My family never noticed. There were so many rooms in that house, there simply wasn't time to sit in them all, let alone memorize their exact dimensions.

  The next day I quickly finished up the various jobs I had begun all over the house and tidied things up again. My mother and sisters were cranky from lack of sleep and hot water, so I kept well out of their way. When everything was back to normal, I crept into my secret room. As it happened, my family chose to sit in the library (a favorite place for homework) that evening, and I found that I could hear them chatting and moving around the room with perfect clarity. Inside the wall I smiled. It was a small, secret smile; the smile of a snail curled up snug and safe in its shell.

  It was pitch-black dark in there. I have good night vision, but it was too dark even for me, so I drilled tiny holes in the walls to let in some light. Later on, of course, I electrified my room, but back then I didn't mind the gloom. I didn't mean to live there, you see. All I wanted was a really secure hiding place.

  And I had one. Was there ever such a wonderful little room! So long as I was enclosed in those four walls, I was strong and secure; I could do anything. No one could harm me, no one even knew where I was.

  While I spent my time fitting out the room and making it comfortable, I could forget about the psychologist, about school, about the future. With much pushing and shoving, I managed to wrestle a big squashy armchair down to the basement and up through the trap door, down the passageway and into the room. Once I had added a footstool, a big cozy quilt, and a small but sturdy table, my little room was as neatly filled as an egg.

  I spent as much time there as I could, contentedly sewing by candlelight. Often I would pause and look about me, smiling a little at my own world within the walls of my own beloved house. Some nights I even slept there, curled up in the quilt in the big old armchair.

  In my room I almost felt that I had become a part of the house. I could hear its heartbeat, the rumble of its pipes, the creak of its timbers. Sometimes an overwhelming love for the house would well up inside of me so that I wanted to cry. It loved me too, I could tell. We were necessary to each other; I protected it against the ravages of time and creeping dry-rot, and it sheltered me and gave me strength.

  I loved it because it was strong, but I also loved it because it was blind and mute and deaf. It had no eyes to see me or ears to hear me or tongue to scold me. It did not judge me, it only held me close in its arms and rocked me gently to sleep through the long silent nights.

  Three

  The day the psychologist was to come arrived.

  "Anna, where are you?" my mother called, her voice sharp with anxiety. When I appeared she caught me by the arm and gripped me firmly, as though she thought I might run away.

  "Now, Anna, I want you to stay right here where I can keep an eye on you. Sit in this chair by me ... no, maybe you would be better off in the red chair. We want to get some contrast between you and your surroundings."

  Unhappily I hoisted myself up onto the red armchair.

  "Looks like somebody left an old dustrag lying around," Andrea observed critically. "Mrs. Waltzhammer'll think we think she's the new cleaning lady."

  Both Mother and Kirsty turned on her.

  "Don't you call Anna an old dustrag!" Kirsty shouted.

  "Andrea! That will be quite enough out of you," said Mother sternly.

  "You wait," Andrea said ominously. "You'll see. Mrs. Waltzhammer is going to wipe up the floor with her."

  "Don't worry, Anna. I'll protect you," Kirsty said. "Nobody's going to use my sis
ter for a dustrag," and she waved her fist belligerently at an imaginary Mrs. Waltzhammer. This encouraged me a little, but only a very little. I was stiff with terror.

  "Maybe I should tie a ribbon in your hair," my mother worried. At that moment the doorbell rang. We all froze and stared at each other.

  Mother recovered first. "Well," she said in an artificial voice, "that must be Mrs. Waltzhammer," and she hurried off to answer the door.

  "Here," Kirsty whispered, thrusting her doll at me. "You can hold Bethany. Whenever I'm scared, Bethany makes me feel better."

  I took Bethany onto my lap rather reluctantly. She was a large doll, really quite as large as I was. I couldn't help but feel that I must look a little foolish. Still, it was kindly meant, and I couldn't afford to reject any possible source of comfort.

  We heard voices from the front hall. First Mother's voice and then another woman's voice, a powerful contralto that cut through walls like a chain saw. Kirsty glanced at me nervously. She looked as if she were about to ask for Bethany back.

  Footsteps approached. The woman was talking, her words rolling and rumbling around the halls like boulders in a landslide.

  "Great house!" she shouted. "I love these old houses! I'll bet the upkeep just about kills you, though, on a place this big."

  "The girls help out, especially Anna. She's very talented that way," Mother said.

  "Oh?"

  "I know I shouldn't say so, Mrs. Waltzhammer, but Anna really is quite an exceptional child. In many ways."

  Mother opened the door to the front parlor. "Mrs. Waltzhammer, I'd like you to meet my family," she said. "This is my eldest, Andrea, and my youngest, Kirsty. Kirsty will be starting at Bitter Creek Elementary this fall."

  "Pleased to meet you," bellowed the woman. I cringed. Mrs. Waltzhammer was at least ten feet tall and six feet wide. She had an enormous bush of flaming red hair, and she carried the largest purse I had ever seen.

  "And this, of course, is Anna. Right there on the red chair." Mother pointed helpfully.

  Mrs. Waltzhammer rotated her huge body in my direction. "How do you do, Anna?" she boomed.

  There was a moment's stunned silence.

  "You mean ... you can see her?" Andrea asked.

  "Why, certainly," Mrs. Waltzhammer said.

  "You don't think she looks like an old dustrag, do you?" Kirsty asked anxiously.

  "Of course not. I think she looks like a very pretty little girl."

  "Well, naturally!" Mother said, sounding relieved. She laughed a bit hysterically. "All my daughters are pretty. Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I hear the tea water boiling. Mrs. Waltzhammer, will you take coffee or tea?"

  "Oh, coffee, coffee! Got to have my daily ration of caffeine," she roared with senseless laughter. "While you're gone I'll get a little better acquainted with your children." She winked at Mother, meaning, I suppose, that Mother should take her time bringing in the refreshments.

  Mrs. Waltzhammer lowered herself into an armchair with considerable difficulty and then turned to Kirsty.

  "So! I understand from your mother that you are a very shy young lady, Kirsty," she said, smiling genially.

  Andrea snorted with laughter.

  "No, no!" Kirsty said. "It's Anna who's shy!"

  "Ah! It's Anna who's shy. I beg your pardon."

  Mrs. Waltzhammer sat staring at me thoughtfully for a few moments. "Perhaps Anna would prefer it if I ask the two of you my questions and you can answer for her. Do you think that would make her more comfortable?"

  "Yes, I think that's a great idea." Kirsty nodded her approval. I sighed with relief.

  "Then tell me, if you would be so good, a little about your sister Anna."

  Kirsty spoke up. She told Mrs. Waltzhammer the family legend of our father's shyness, and how much I resembled our father in that respect. Mrs. Waltzhammer seemed to be very interested in our father.

  "Tragic," she said, shaking her head weightily over our father's fate. "A disappearance is so much harder on the family than a straightforward death or divorce." She sighed, a great gust of breath that stirred the uneven hem of my tunic. Still, large and noisy as she was, she seemed genuinely sympathetic. Cautiously I began to think that Mrs. Waltzhammer might not be the ogress of my nightmares.

  Kirsty went on to tell Mrs. Waltzhammer how clever and hardworking I was. I stuck my fingers in my ears during this speech and murmured, "Exactly the reverse! Stupid and lazy, that's what you are!" to myself.

  I unstuck my ears in time to hear Mrs. Waltzhammer say, "I'm sure she is, Kirsty. And she is your special friend, isn't she? More than say, Andrea's?" she smiled kindly at Andrea.

  Kirsty nodded vigorously. "Yes, she is! Anna likes me much better than she does Andrea!"

  "I beg your pardon," Andrea sputtered.

  "You're mean to her," Kirsty shrilled. "You say awful things about her."

  "I do not!"

  "Well, no need to argue about it," Mrs. Waltzhammer said hastily. "Perhaps it's time for me to get to know Anna a little better." She rose from her seat and advanced on me.

  Alarmed, I shrank back in my chair. Mrs. Waltzhammer opened her enormous purse and rummaged around in it. She drew out a pair of reading glasses and put them on, dropping the purse on the floor by my chair.

  She smiled hugely at me, a jovial giantess.

  "HELLO, ANNA!" she bawled. She reached out one vast white hand toward me. I stared in horrible fascination at the hand as it approached.

  "What are you doing?" Andrea demanded in a strangled croak.

  "Just saying hello to Anna," Mrs. Waltzhammer said in a jolly voice.

  The hand gripped me insecurely about the waist, crushing me up against the doll. I was lifted up and—

  My mind fell into darkness and I knew no more.

  "That's not my sister, that's a doll," Kirsty was saying patiently when I came back to my senses again. She sounded as though she'd said it before.

  I knew a moment of pure panic. I could hear Kirsty's voice, but I had no idea where I was. I seemed to be lying in a very small padded cell of some kind. I could see the ceiling of the front parlor above me, but all around were flabby, leathery walls. Underneath me were a lot of loose sharp objects that dug into my back.

  "Well! Here I am at last!" It was my mother's voice. "This house is so big," she said gaily, "I guess I just got lost coming back from the kitchen!"

  "Oh, coffee! Goody!" Mrs. Waltzhammer's voice was mercifully deadened by the walls of the padded cell, but she was standing dangerously near.

  I heard sounds of slurping as Mrs. Waltzhammer imbibed her favorite beverage. "Good and strong," she exulted.

  "And how have you all been getting along while I was doing the tea tray?" Mother asked.

  Silence from Andrea and Kirsty.

  "Excellently!" Mrs. Waltzhammer said. "I think we have made great progress. And now I'm afraid I must eat and run. I have another appointment. Delicious cookies, my dear."

  "Thank you, but Anna made them."

  Mrs. Waltzhammer's laugh rang out.

  "Oh, Anna made them, did she? Clever, good Anna!" She laughed again. "Why don't you walk me to the door, Mrs. Newland?"

  "Mom!" I heard Andrea's urgent whisper, "She thinks Anna is Kirsty's doll! And we can't find Anna."

  "What, dear?" Mother murmured, but then a huge flap fell down over the top of my cell and the ceiling disappeared. The world lurched underneath me. A hail of large, angular objects fell about me. I reached out for something to hold onto, but there was nothing.

  "Help," I cried. "Help!"

  I thrashed about for a while, unable to get onto my knees. Outside there was a hearty booming that sounded like Mrs. Waltzhammer, and a worried tweeting that sounded like Mother. Thankfully, the movements stopped for a moment, and I struggled into a better position. Then, abruptly, off we went again.

  This time, however, I had gotten my head out under the roof-flap and my knees were braced against some hard surface.

  A mass of g
reen shrubbery bobbed into my field of vision. I saw a concrete path below me and a green lawn. We were approaching a car parked by the side of the road. I looked up as best I could from under the flap. Far above floated Mrs. Waltzhammer's huge face.

  I was in Mrs. Waltzhammer's purse. In a moment she would get into her car and we would drive away. In one convulsive movement I leaped clear of the enveloping purse and landed hard on the pavement.

  There was no time to be lost. I scrambled painfully into the shrubbery. Mrs. Waltzhammer made a sound like, "Ugg-gugh!" It sounded like she'd swallowed her tongue. She looked furtively around and then hurried into her car and drove away.

  I was out of the house.

  For the first time in years and years, I was out of the house. I stood alone under the naked sky with nothing but air and space between me and the huge, barbarously bright sun. I looked up into the sky and grew dizzy. At any moment, I felt, I might fall off the earth, I might be pulled into the greedy heat of the sun. Or I might go flying off into dark, eternal nothingness.

  Quickly I looked away, looked at the houses and trees and cars, trying to root myself to the ground. But everything was so far away! I had spent many hours lately inside the wall, and I had grown used to its proportions. Inside the wall all distances are small; all horizons are close at hand. It is easy to forget how large the world is, and how empty.

  I bolted into the house, down the cellar steps, up through the trap door, and flung myself sobbing into my secret room. I wouldn't be leaving again in a hurry.

  Four

  Five years went by.

  I did leave my secret room, of course, but only when everyone was out, or by night after they were in bed. Otherwise I lived almost entirely inside the wall.

  The night after Mrs. Waltzhammer came to visit I crept out and left a note:

  I'm sorry but I can't go to school.