It was so quiet and peaceful, the slight sound of Sardis suckling away on the bottle made his heart flutter. She was so beautiful, staring at him with bright blue eyes and her thin, silky fair hair collapsed forward, and the nostrils of her button nose expanded and collapsed ever so slightly. He had no doubt she was going to be a stunner when she got older. So, so beautiful and he smiled when he thought about his speech to the first guy she inevitably brought home. It began with “If you ever lay an unloving hand on my daughter,” and then he changed it to, “Hi, I’m Sardis’ dad, very pleased to meet you, young man. If you ever lay an unloving hand on my daughter . . . .” There was no need to be impolite about it.
With three-quarters of the bottle consumed, Sardis’ mouth came away from the nipple of the bottle. Alex put her on his shoulder and rubbed her back until he heard the wind escape out her mouth. He made a point of not breathing in the fumes. She began to fidget underneath the blanket. It did feel a little tight with her arms wrapped up inside. He propped the bottle between him and the arm of the sofa and loosened the blanket. He gently pulled her right arm free and as the left arm came up the mitten slipped off, but not altogether. It dangled from her index finger as if snagged. Alex pulled on it and her hand followed in the direction of the tug. He gently took Sardis’ wrist between his fingers and raised it for inspection. One of the threads was caught under Sardis’ fingernail, a curved fingernail, a talon, like a kitten’s claw.
He could hardly believe it until he remembered he could just about believe anything these days. It all made sense now, Suzanne’s behaviour. A shiver chilled him to the core as he took the second mitten off and saw that the hand was the same, every fingernail shaped like a claw. He gently brushed his finger underneath the tips and he felt the curvature of the nails catch the ridges of his skin. They were tiny as expected, and in proportion to her size, but they were solid and off-white, strong and horned to sharp points. Now he knew the reason for the mittens and Suzanne’s reluctance for him to spend time alone with her and see her hands. With tentative anticipation he gently uncovered her feet to see that her toenails were the same.
Without further thought, he ran his hand underneath her and gave a huge sigh of relief not to find a bump or a stump or a triangular tip, anything at all that might resemble a tail. Next, he picked the bottle back up and turned it over above his open palm to catch the spill. Again the russet drips appeared from more than one hole in the nipple.
Sardis kept her tears and cries at bay, content with her fill. Her bright blue eyes happily wandered mindlessly about the room but Alex was now concerned about the mutilation of the nipple. He gently prised her mouth open with his thumb and forefinger and with less surprise he spotted the small set of well-formed teeth, and like the fingernails, they appeared off-white, not like enamel teeth. He put the tip of his little finger into Sardis’ mouth and immediately she closed in around it. He felt the hard heads scraping against his skin and then a sharp nip as if bitten by a small fish. Mindful that his finger was in the mouth of a baby and not a piranha, he wiggled his finger free and inspected it. It actually hurt and there was a speck of blood when he squeezed the tip of his little finger. Sardis, his week-old daughter, had a full set of teeth, sharp and pointy.
The Devil’s Daughter, Alex thought.
But nothing else felt like she was, actually, the Devil’s Daughter. Her head didn’t all of a sudden snap around, scrunch a stare in his face and cream his cheek with a lizard’s tongue. Her mouth did not open and mock him in a foreign tongue with a hoarse and petulant voice. Neither did she pounce up into his neck and gnaw with those tiny sharp teeth in a bid to burst his jugular, then laugh and cackle with a mouth full of blood. At the first sign of any of those things happening, he would have tossed her to the ground and stomped all over her, put her out like a smouldering cigarette butt.
On the contrary, Sardis remained quiet in his arms and the only thing her tongue was capable of doing was to creep out to the corner of her mouth, taste the air then slip back inside. The fingernails and the teeth looked strange, unnatural, and even a little frightening to begin with, given she was only a baby, but he was already getting used to those imperfections. And who was to say they were actual imperfections, considering her previous environment; it was plausible that nature merely gave her the appropriate tools that allowed her to evolve in order to survive and that made her perfect. She was still beautiful, still helpless, and still his little baby daughter.
He put the mittens back on but only so she wouldn’t accidentally scrape herself. He picked her up above his head, lowered her, and they rubbed noses. Sardis fashioned a squeak that he considered cheerful while her mouth dropped open to expose the tiny row of teeth on her lower gum. He pulled her in tight to his chest and like a hot coal she warmed his entire body to enlightenment.
“So this is what parental bliss feels like.”
Something caught Alex’s attention, a slight movement and a creak in the floorboard to the side of him, and he turned to see Suzanne leaning up against the doorframe in only her sweatshirt with her arms folded below her pert breasts, her head tilted to one side, eyeing them both from the doorway. The redness in her cheeks promoted relief in her tired eyes. Her hair was scraggy but in a sexy way and she looked vulnerable and a little dazed as if her mind had wandered off without her. The docile grin on her face told him she had no more secrets. She looked lightened like a whole heap of pressure had been lifted from her.
“Hey,” she said with a lazy smile.
“Hey, yourself,” Alex said, watching her eyes find their focus. “I’ll tell you one thing. She’s going to be one hell of a tree climber when she gets older.”
“She’d be even better if she had a tail,” Suzanne replied and broadened her smile to the point of laughter. “I caught you checking.”
“Well,” Alex said with a subtle smirk, embarrassed by what now seemed foolish.
“Is there any room on that sofa for me?” she asked, easing his discomfort.
“Plenty, come on over,” he said and the momentary build of embarrassment that turned his face red alleviated back to normal.
Suzanne pushed herself off the doorframe with her shoulder and came across to cuddle into the crook of his free arm. She gave Sardis a little rub on her chest. “She is beautiful, isn’t she?”
“That she is,” Alex agreed.
Suzanne lifted up Sardis’ hand and slipped the mitten off. “I checked for a tail, too, when I noticed her fingernails,” she said and gave Alex a playful nudge.
“Why did you try to hide her hands? I don’t get that. You don’t have to hide anything from me,” Alex said with a little less cosiness.
Sardis gripped Suzanne’s finger and she kept her gaze on her daughter when she replied. “I don’t know; part of me thought you wouldn’t accept her. I wanted to give you time to get used to her. Anyway, let’s not go there with all the secrets, Mister Keeper-of-the-century. You’re a fine one to talk.”
“Okay, you got me, but—”
“I just felt very protective of her, overly protective maybe. I felt this really strong bond between us as soon as I saw her.”
“I did notice that.”
The insinuation of an orgasm went over Suzanne’s head. “And when I saw her nails and teeth . . . . Oh, I don’t know, I sort of panicked. I just didn’t want anything to happen to her or for her to get taken away from us.”
“Taken away by whom, by me?”
“No, no, no, not you. Well, at the time, maybe. Ooh, what’s that?” she said with discomfort and raised her backside off the sofa. She pulled the remote control out from under her, absent-mindedly turned the TV on, and tossed it aside. “I suppose a small part of me thought you might want to get rid of her or something, once you saw she was different. That somehow you might think she was the—well, you know, given where she came from and all. You di
d check for a tail after you looked at her feet.”
“I was checking if she needed a nappy change, smart ass. A tail, get out of here, and no, I didn’t,” Alex lied whitely.
Suzanne knew better, but wasn’t about to dwell on it. It was a relief just to get things out in the open. “Look, I was just afraid what you might think, that you might view her differently.”
She glanced up at the television, distracted by the picture that appeared on the screen. Alex looked up, too. A young, attractive anchor woman talked into the camera, her expression still, professional. A photograph of a family filled the backdrop. Alex looked back at Suzanne, unaware of any relevance and gave her a reassuring squeeze with his arm.
Suzanne managed half a smile. “Sorry, hon, just a sec,” she said and fumbled blindly for the remote.
She squinted at the photograph that now came to the fore and turned the volume up. A young girl stood slightly forward, a hand from each parent resting on her adolescent shoulders. They were smartly dressed, each item of clothing bought specially for the occasion. Their hair and skin shined an unnatural glow thanks to well-placed lighting. They looked proud; a happy family. Suzanne first recognised the woman from the hospital with her terrified daughter, the one she prepped for the operation, the abortion. The ribbon of information scrawling the bottom of the screen read,
“TOP STORIES: Family of three found dead in their home in Butterfield.”
Suzanne glanced down at Sardis and then back to the face of the sweet little girl in the picture. Just like the first time she had seen her picture on the student card that spilled from her bag, and a short video of her on the news, it was hard to imagine it could be the same pretty little girl, a member of the science club, butchered by a madman still on the loose, and now what’s this all about? She looked again at Sardis and back at the television. The picture changed to show a man standing on a street in a dark blue suit with a microphone in his hand. Behind him the perimeter of a house was cordoned off with crime-scene tape.
“Suburban Butterfield shook further today as news of the Dooley family broke. The family of three were discovered dead in the upstairs of their home yesterday afternoon by a friend of the family. The gruesome discovery was made when Mr. Dooley did not show for a game of golf he was due to play on Saturday morning. This brings a tragic end to a family already plagued by intense turmoil.”
While the broadcaster continued to give details of the discovery, images depicted the ambiance. Footage taken from a helicopter showed the removal of bodies on stretchers from the house. People mourned, some hugged and held each other’s hands. Two young girls approached a policewoman who stood behind the tape. They each handed her a bouquet of flowers and she diligently placed them among a growing collage of colour along the outer wall of the home. The picture returned to the broadcaster.
“The manner in which each of them died is still not clear, but it is believed that both Kate and her daughter, Helen, were discovered together in the master bedroom.” The newscaster paused for effect. “And what makes this tragedy all the more horrifying is the preliminary post-mortem results suggest that Mr. Dooley lived in the house for up to a week with the bodies of his wife and daughter’s remains upstairs. The results show that he took his own life in the early hours of Saturday morning. Neighbours describe the family as pillars of the community. It raises unlikely questions as to Mr. Dooley’s involvement in his family’s death but it’s too early to speculate about what exactly happened. Police are not looking for anyone else in connection with the investigation. This is—”
Suzanne switched the television off and let the remnants of the newscast sink in.
“Oh my God, that’s them, that’s the family,” she said, as much to herself.
Alex knew the family, too; anyone with a television or radio or who read the paper knew who they were. The attack in Brushy Park was headline news for a number of days, if not weeks, with numerous appeals from the police for information. A reward was also on offer but as far as he was aware the madman was still out there somewhere, a concern for everyone.
Things were beginning to make sense and from the way Suzanne was looking at Sardis, she was probably thinking on the same lines as him. Nothing about Helen conceiving or the termination was ever mentioned in the news or in the papers. It was a well-kept secret known only by those involved with her care. The timing was right, too. It must have been at least four and a half months ago when Pat banged on the door of the van, saying, “Don’t go without this one.” Tic. “Motherfuckendeadbits WhoopWhoopBop.”
(not quite, evidently one bit was very much alive)
He shuddered, recalling what must have tipped into the tank, an embryo slithering from within the red bag and plopping head first, or feet first, or belly flopping, or back-flopping into the stomach of the septic tank. That’s what happened, he knew that now.
Sardis’ tiny hand pulled free of Suzanne’s finger, her legs kicked and her bottom lip puckered, a sign she was about to cry.
They both looked at Sardis, at each other, and then back to Sardis.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Alex asked.
Suzanne held the tip of her finger between her teeth, her thoughts deep, disturbing. She nodded, but did not speak.
“It’s that girl, Helen, and by the grace of God she gave us Sardis.”
Alex meant well but for Suzanne the words sounded anything but comforting.
She barely kept her composure. Her heart struggled to do the same, while unwanted thoughts formed a conclusion that made her physically stir beside Alex. Sardis was a miracle baby, her baby, and no one was going to change that, but she had a mother and a father just like everyone else and it just became clear who they were. Her “biological” mother, Suzanne reminded herself, was a seventeen-year-old girl, attractive, bright and ambitious by all accounts, but now sadly dead. And that left only one possibility as to the father (maybe Alex was still only catching up and hadn’t thought that far ahead) a sick, twisted, murdering rapist; a stranger in the mist still very much alive.
Suzanne shook the thoughts away, afraid of where they might bring her.
“Alex, promise me something,” she said.
Alex bobbed Sardis on his knee in an attempt to hush her cry. “What is it?”
“Promise me from this moment on we don’t think of Sardis as anything else but our child. We’re her parents, Alex, you and me, and that’s the way she will always be treated and loved by us. She is never to know the truth about where she came from and we never bring it up again. So if there is anything you need to say, I’d appreciate if we discussed it now and then put it to bed for good.”
“Yes, honey, you’re right, I’m all for that. I already think of her as my own, as ours. No more secrets, Suzanne; Sardis is our beautiful daughter, for better or for worse, until death do us part.”
Sardis’ crying intensified.
Suzanne leant up into Alex and gave him a kiss on the lips, then pulled back. “Give her here, she needs a nappy change. You go back to bed and I’ll be right behind you.”
37:
“Having a field day.”
The private residential park was small by national standards but well maintained and the perfect setting for its members’ sports day. The park teemed with adults and children of all ages. Many in attendance occupied the houses that backed onto the park, conveniently coming and going as they pleased via their back gardens. For everyone else entry was via two gated laneways at either end. The park was clever in its design, accommodating two tennis courts enclosed in green wire fencing. A climbing frame stood outside the courts where kids swung like monkeys and practiced chin-ups. A well-used unmarked pitch with four portable uprights sat below the courts of sufficient size to accommodate games of football, rounders, and Bulldog. A playground furnished with climbing frame, roundabout, and a sandpit sat neatly
in the bottom right-hand corner for the younger kids.
The grass had been freshly cut with the riding mower housed in its shed located up by the tennis courts. Wooden picnic benches, usually positioned around the park, had been brought together to hold plastic cutlery, bowls of salad, and other food stuffs set out for the barbeque. Eight numbered running lanes had been professionally painted on the short grass by one of the residents and ended a few meters in front of the kids’ play area.
There was great excitement among the participants, with some taking it more seriously than others. Potatoes fell off spoons in practice for the egg-and-spoon race. Pairs of girls and boys teamed up and ran on their hands while the other held their legs, then they swapped over to see who held the advantage. Some pairings tied their legs together with neck ties and ran with varying degrees of success. A small group of five played with a football, using two of the posts as a goal.
All races were treated with the same proficiency. A man with megaphone called each race to the starting line and there was a ribbon to break through at the end of the track, loosely tied between two sticks. The only race without motivation was the toddler event; in that race the parent who screamed and coaxed the loudest generally came off best. Younger kids had their faces painted in styles of Spiderman, tigers, cats, butterflies, pirates, and princesses.
The Ice Scream Man Page 27