The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer

by Joyce Reardon

  I spent the dinner as something less than a gracious hostess, as preoccupied by these new concerns. I drank a little too much wine.

  John and Douglas Posey had emerged from the Smoking Room with their contempt barely disguised. I don’t believe they shared another word all evening—not even so much as a handshake good-bye. I retired to my room where Sukeena helped me get ready for bed, and I nursed dear Adam. (I think he may walk any day! He crawls—he’s fast as lightning—and pulls himself up and looks at me with the sweetest face as if to say, “Do I dare, Mama?” Sukeena and I encourage him: if there’s one thing a Rimbauer needs, it’s independence and strength!)

  The air was still, the night terribly hot. I lay naked on my bed, debating whether to wear a nightgown on such a stifling night. (The night nurse had returned Adam to his room.) Sukeena had gone to my dressing room to put away my silk hosiery and the black heels I’d worn to dinner. I felt the wine as a penetrating heat.

  John knocked and opened the door before I answered, and he saw me exposed there on the bed. It is odd, but rarely does John see me without my clothes. On those nights he comes to my bed, it is already dark as he slips in beside me. During our honeymoon he afforded me privacy, believing me modest, I suppose (and indeed I did blush quite a bit in those first few days with my husband). But last night he threw open the door and saw me there, fully exposed as I was, and something came over him. He has rarely shown me the level of interest as he did in the moments after his discovery. He locked the door behind himself and was half undressed by the time he reached my bedside. I opened my mouth to warn him of Sukeena’s presence, but his mouth was on mine before those words found their way out. My God was he excited!

  I must confess my attention was not fully on my husband, knowing that my handmaid was basically in the room with us, and the electric lights still on! Sukeena had no escape, for there is no exit from the dressing rooms other than through my chambers. She could not have escaped our union if she had wanted to (and I’m sure she did!). As John unleashed more ardor toward me than perhaps ever before, we had a witness. Was he trying to erase the thoughts of Douglas Posey’s fascination with boys? Was he drunk to the point that a naked woman prone on fresh linen was too much to bear? (Even if it was his wife!) Whatever the case, his advances … the lengths to which he went (which will certainly not be discussed here!) reminded me that a man and a woman can still make discoveries about each other well into a marriage. I bit down on my wrist and finally took to stuffing a corner of a pillow into my mouth before I woke half the city. In the midst of our most excited moment, I glanced over John’s shoulder only to see Sukeena’s dark face staring out from the doorway to the dressing rooms. Sukeena, smiling back at me. And though I cannot explain it, the knowledge of her there looking on drove me to a heightened passion. Finally, I slumped back to the headboard, sweating and panting, and flushed from my chest to my knees.

  Without a word, John redressed, kissed my forehead, and left my chambers.

  A moment later, Sukeena slunk from the shadows of the dressing room and made for the door.

  “Don’t go,” I said.

  “Sukeena sorry, Miss Ellen.”

  “I’m not, dear friend.”

  “I should not have looked.”

  “I don’t mind that you did.”

  She looked at me timidly. “Sukeena sorry,” she repeated.

  “It isn’t always like that.”

  “The heat, Miss Ellen. The heat do strange thing to a man.” She moved toward the bed cautiously, for though she had seen me fully undressed a hundred times, never quite in the state I was. “A pillow, Miss.” She indicated my bottom. “Use the pillow, you want the child.”

  Another child … My heart skipped little beats. Use the pillow you want a child. I used two pillows, though I suspected none was needed. Never had my husband been quite like that. I imagined that if ever there was cause for a woman to be with child, I had just experienced such a moment.

  And I know that I am right. I am with child. If true, it will be a spring baby.

  9 APRIL 1911—ROSE RED

  We will call her April, for that is the month of her birth, but the Devil delivered this child and the Devil’s she is. The childbirth was unbearable, the doctor working at my bedside for nearly seven hours to save my life and that of my child. She has been born with a withered arm, and I’m told that arm would not allow a proper birth, and so they cut me, and then cut me some more and finally took the baby by a means only ranchers use—but thankfully my doctor was raised on a sheep ranch. She lives—little April with bright blue eyes and John’s sturdy looks. She will be my last child, I’m told, and I’ve been sick with grief over it. They saved my life, but not my womanhood. Whatever accounts for a woman having babies, I am now without. Barren. Just the thought of it prevents me from getting out of bed. I have not left my bed in a week (April was born on the first day of the month—the second anniversary of Laura’s disappearance!), not that the doctor would let me get up, but I wouldn’t have even if he had allowed it. No more children. No more reason to be in this family with this man whose seed is so foul as to wither the arms of his young—for Sukeena explained that my illness in Africa is to blame for April’s deformity. I hate my husband. I hate my life. I hate this house that holds us all like prisoners. I shall stop writing now, for I hate even you, Dear Diary. I hate reading back and seeing a time where a choice still existed in my life. What have I done? Who is this creature I have married who would—intentionally or not—poison our children in conception!? Who are these whores he takes up with that their venom ends up in the roots of our family tree? I hate them all. You, them, everything.

  21 MAY 1911—ROSE RED

  My mood has improved in the weeks since my last entry. I could not even look at these pages for so long. Could not review the decline of my life and the tragedy of my marriage. Today, in the blossoms of spring and the music of the songbirds, I sit in the garden with Adam playing ringtoss with his nanny, with April at my side, your pages open on my lap, a pen in hand.

  I am delighted to say another maid has gone missing. Giddy even. It is a girl identified by Sukeena as having had intimate relations with John prior to that hot July night when April was conceived. It is a girl I wanted fired, but one whom Sukeena suggested remain in our employ. And then I understood. It was then I fixed my prayers to this girl. Prayers made to the other side. I begged for her demise. I offered my April’s withered arm as example of evil. And I waited patiently for a response. Sukeena made a doll. She covered it in black paper and hid it in a drawer.

  To-day, we have our answer. While John and the rest of the house mill about anxiously searching for the young waif, I sit proudly quiet in the sunlight of the garden, a wry grin allowed upon my lips. Let them bring on the police. Let them bring on the dogs. They will not find her. Let them ask all the questions they like—they cannot conceive of the truth (ah! there’s that word “conceive” again, appropriate as ever!). The police have no idea of the spirit that inhabits this place—if they did, they would burn her to the ground. Burn her like a witch. Rose Red has claimed another disloyal subject. And I swear she feeds off it! She looks bigger to-day. She does! More impressive than ever. Or perhaps it’s just me.

  Such a fine, fine day is this. I mark it here in your pages for little April to someday know that her arm has been avenged. At least partly.

  I’m not sure I’m done with my prayers just yet.

  I laugh into the sunshine. Little Adam looks up and laughs along with me. The nanny looks slightly disturbed at this levity, given the disappearance. But I laugh just the same. Let them call me crazy if they want. I’ve connected to Rose Red.

  I do believe that I’m beginning to understand her.

  23 JUNE 1912—ROSE RED

  With dear little April over a year old, and young Adam growing like a weed, I reflect on the year just past and how our lives here at Rose Red have finally settled down. Perhaps this can be attributed to the fact that John took
nearly four months in Europe and the Far East, opening up new business for the oil company. (His geologists believe there is oil to be found under the deserts of Saudi Arabia—of all places!—and John has put this and neighboring countries under contract to allow Omicron to explore.) With John gone, the house seemed to take a rest, and once again I found myself discounting my suspicions that Rose Red could be thought of as a person.

  To-day I have dreamed a horrible thing. Just how it will affect those of us at Rose Red, I have not the slightest. In my dream, a bridge collapsed. It was very high, spanning a torrent of water not unlike Niagara Falls, where John and I visited following our return to New York from our year abroad. This bridge fell into that torrent and killed dozens of people, their screams swallowed by the roar that engulfed them. It is not my first vision. It shall not be my last.

  I admit to you, Dear Diary, that I have not felt terribly stable since praying that young tart into the clutches of this grand house. Sukeena, God bless her, has gotten to the truth of the young vixen, Delora (the Christian name of the girl), and it was nothing like I thought it was. (I bear the burden of a tremendous guilt over my prayers now!)

  According to one of our Oriental maids, a girl named Kathy, Delora White had complained to her about her situation with the carriage master, not knowing what to do. It seems that like young Laura, one of her assignments took her to the Carriage House at least once a week, sometimes twice. It was here that Daniel began to ask questions—often just following a visit (an arrival or departure) by my husband, in motorcar or on horseback. The questions seemed peculiar to Delora—how often she got out, whether or not she had boyfriends on the staff, where she came from, how often she spoke to her family. But the real questions that stung her were about loyalty to “the family,” the Rimbauers. To John and me. To John. She reportedly replied that she owed the family everything and would do anything for us.

  This is as much as Sukeena knows, but I fear I have done this child wrong by my prayers to remove her. It sounds to me as if Daniel, at the very least, and quite possibly John himself, has been working with the minds of the young housemaids, testing how far their loyalty will carry them. To what end, I need not guess. What else could Daniel be asking of girls like Delora, but to submit to a man’s needs? Theft? This house does not need money. Deceit? To what end? No, I think it is quite clear what Daniel asked of her.

  What intrigues me now, however, is my mistaken assumption that my prayers were responsible for Delora’s disappearance. Perhaps not. Perhaps I do not know this house as well as I thought. Perhaps Rose Red herself feels sorry for these young girls, holding them in her arms, as she does, while they are in the midst of unspeakable acts demanded of them by their employers. Perhaps these disappearances are missions of mercy, not of condemnation! What if she is protecting them from within? What if their blind loyalty to this house later causes guilt on the part of the very house to which they’ve sworn their loyalty? What choice would Rose Red have but to save them from themselves, to transport them through her walls to rooms where they will live safely forever? This might further explain why men die and women disappear in these halls.

  Now, more than ever, I wish to commune with Rose Red, to enter within her and divine answers to these outstanding questions. Madame Lu once offered to put me in touch with Madame Stravinski, and I am remiss for not following up on this offer. Whether a month or a year away, I feel the absolute necessity for a séance. Here. On this property. With my husband in attendance. (I am amazed that John has expressed an interest in both he and Douglas Posey attending. He’s openly curious about the event.) Perhaps Laura is there and can speak. Delora? Maybe the grand house, the lady herself, would condescend to communicate with those of us responsible for her birth and growth.

  I feel light-headed with just the thought! A séance. The chance to hear the voice that lurks behind the walls of this enormous edifice. Rose Red. Here. In person.

  I shall not make another note in these pages until that day does come!

  24 JUNE 1912—ROSE RED

  Reading back, I see I lied! (Here I am writing again already! I can’t leave your pages!)

  Oh, Dear Diary, tell me this isn’t happening to me! First, my daydream about the bridge, during yesterday’s nap. Then, to-day in the paper, front-page news that the bridge at Niagara Falls collapsed yesterday. Forty-seven people fell to their deaths. How did I know? How did I see this as it was happening? What power lurks inside me? What is happening to me?

  I know the answer: Rose Red has found her ways into my dreams … into my soul … and I am powerless to stop her.

  23 JULY 1912—ROSE RED

  John is quite excited by the possibility of war. I will never understand men, except to say that John believes it will expand his oil business considerably, and if there’s a way to gain riches, John Rimbauer is ever aware. There are reports to-day that the Brits have ordered their powerful Navy into the North Sea, in a buildup against the Germans. These same reports say that the Germans attempted to corner the Brits into signing a mutual declaration of neutrality, but the Brits would have none of it. John believes a business trip to Europe is imminent, perhaps for as long as six months or so, and has asked that the children and I join him! To be free of Rose Red!! I accepted his offer immediately, until he informed me that Sukeena would have to stay, to make room for the children’s nannies.

  I am unsure how to interpret his request. Is it that he has come to fear Sukeena and her insights? Does he know about her questioning some of the staff about Delora’s disappearance? Does he wish to leave her behind, with me away, so that harm can come to her? Or is it that he’s lifting the skirt of one of the nannies, with me unaware? I withdrew my acceptance immediately, and John stood his ground: the offer for a European trip stands, but Sukeena is to remain behind.

  I postponed my answer for a day or two. Meanwhile, I must make Sukeena busy. There is more here than meets the eye.

  10 NOVEMBER 1912—ROSE RED

  I write with little Adam about to fall asleep on my lap, pressed against my bosom, his small face warm, his little hands twitching as he can’t decide whether to sleep or get up and roam the room. I have dismissed his nanny, Miss Susan McConnell, for the present, content to be alone with my child, the heir to Rose Red. Oh, heart, how can I love so? My children fill and occupy a place in me that sings of contentment and satisfaction. If only I had known life could be so fulfilling and whole! I fear I married for all the wrong reasons—society and wealth—when in fact one should marry for family and love I know now.

  I am driven to these thoughts, no doubt, because John is still away in Europe. I considered taking the children, traveling with him, but used the excuse of an epidemic influenza in that part of the world to remain at home (in protest of his refusal to allow Sukeena to attend me on the voyage). I pray for my husband’s health. I have had a letter or two. He writes of business and the likely expansion of war, one of a very few who might benefit by that prospect. I hear little of his social activities beyond the mention of the occasional dinner with a few of our acquaintances, and my wife’s heart fears the worst. I know the man he is. Live and learn. It troubles my imagination to think of him alone in his five-room hotel suite, his chauffeur-driven motorcars, his late dinners and his brandies.

  As to events here at Rose Red, I am saddened to report the death of our stable master, Daniel—one of my husband’s most devoted employees. I have written John of our loss (I know this news will devastate him!), but he will not receive the post for another several weeks at the earliest, and by then Daniel will be buried and all but forgotten.

  One can imagine such accidents are commonplace enough for stable hands, and thanks to some quick thinking on the part of Daniel’s staff, this house was spared another round of scandal. But mark my word, this man’s horrific death was no accident! In point of fact Rose Red reached down and took another man’s life—the fourth such “accidental” death in a little over two years’ time.

  Official
ly, the police determined he was trampled to death, found as he was in the stall of a young stallion who is known to get quite high of spirits when fed straight oats—a misfortune of inexperience on the part of one of the stable boys, who fed him a bucketful. In point of fact, Daniel was found in the very same wagon stall where Sukeena and I witnessed the ghostly specter of Laura’s misfortune. Mind you, Dear Diary, there is no horse in this stall to have trampled poor Daniel to death, and as stated earlier, only the sharp wit of a stable hand (who moved Daniel’s broken corpse to the stall occupied by Black Thunder and then relaid straw in the wagon stall to cover the spillage of blood) saved us from the undue attention of the police and society. This house and its employees have seen so many bizarre events that we have begun to protect one another. The fast-thinking stable hand, a boy named Dirk, shaken as he was by the events of the evening, was provided several bottles of claret, subsequently drinking himself to unconsciousness. (Sukeena’s remedy, as she wisely suggested I quickly buy this boy’s silence while formulating a plan. In John’s absence the running of this house falls firmly on my shoulders. In the morning I plan to offer him a month’s wages and promotion to stable master for his silence.)

  I once believed trouble comes in threes. Now, I simply believe that trouble comes. One learns to get out of its way. Daniel invited trouble and was, at least in the opinion of this great house, expendable. My husband, who may or may not be guilty (all evidence suggests he is!), is too valuable to Rose Red to be sacrificed. No matter what others may believe, it is my conviction that Rose Red is behind all of this: she brings out the worst in men, she gobbles up women—she judges, sentences and condemns. (I am told that Daniel was so badly trampled that only his belt and boots lent to his identification. He was not killed, but executed.)