The Year's Best Australian Fantasy and Horror 2013

by Angela Slatter

  “Encoffined,” Anita Pike said.

  Anabella gave her throaty laugh. “I swear, Anita, only you would use a term like that. Encoffined. Again, very Poe.”

  Alana Goodrich was far more direct. “People know where we are, Ana.” The comment was so bold and accusing, so encompassing of their various misgivings.

  “Of course they do, Alana darling. You’re not going to be buried alive, I assure you. This is an indulgence on my part, keeping a promise in fact. One million for each of you when the caskets are opened at dawn. You each signed a disclaimer when you accepted my invitation promising that you would not bring your mobiles or divulge what took place here tonight. I will hold you to those agreements. I’d rather not have this on Facebook or in the tabloids.”

  “Will the caskets be locked?” Tory Mangan asked.

  “For the duration, yes. I mean, Tory love, I won’t be here myself. How will I know if you remain ‘encoffined’ as Anita so colourfully put it? You ladies are to spend the night with Papa, his sole companions, all tucked in together.”

  “What happens if we need to pee?” Anita Pike asked.

  “One million dollars, Anita,” Anabella said.

  Tory Mangan set down her glass, frowning. “The door will be locked?”

  “The caskets and the door will be locked until 6 am. But the tomb is well ventilated. The heating will be turned off, of course, all the catering equipment removed. No risk of carbon monoxide poisoning. But the caskets are well padded. Insulated.”

  Tory kept at it. “In darkness?”

  “The candles should last the night, I’d say. But if not, yes, you would be in darkness for a time.”

  Seyer laughed lightly. “With just poor dead Tomaso for company.”

  “One million dollars, Seyer. With the added thrill of knowing that when you write your memoirs you can truthfully say you’ve been a bought woman at least once.”

  “What about these frames?” Anita asked.

  “They’re to stop the caskets toppling, of course. Can’t have you being injured.”

  “So we’ll be standing for five hours?”

  “That’s up to you, Anita dear. There’s a small remote on a tether attached to the lid in front of you. You’ll be able to reach it and retrieve it if it’s dropped. Press the button and the hydraulic frame will lower your casket so you can recline for sleeping, raise it if you prefer to see the room for the duration. It’s up to you.”

  The room. Jane smiled at Ana’s choice of words. The vault, the crypt, the tomb more like it. Euphemisms were everything where death was concerned. The dead became the deceased, the departed. The language of sleep was used for death—“resting,” “sleeping with the angels”—the language of death for sleep—“dead to the world,” “no longer with us,” even “crashed.”

  Anabella seemed to anticipate such thoughts. She clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention, kept up the happy patter. “So, what’s it to be, ladies? Those of you preferring to leave will be collected in—“ Anabella checked her watch. “—fifteen minutes. No questions asked, no fee pocketed. But once you’ve decided, I want no changing your minds please. I’ll leave you to discuss it and make your decision while I go and use the torch.” She winked and stood. Marco opened the bronze door and handed her the flashlight.

  Jane watched the group around the big table. All present knew better than to disparage Anabella Savini openly. There were no comments about mad schemes, lapses of taste and the private lives of those with way too much money on their hands. The wily heiress could be listening at the door, even recording it all. This was entertainment for her, theatre, spectacle, perhaps even a genuine and heartfelt ritual of love and devotion, however Grand Guignol.

  Somehow the prospect of some of their company opting out and being returned home safely in the next ten minutes or so made Ana’s request seem much less sinister. There would be witnesses; there were witnesses, family and friends, those who knew they were at one of Anabella Savini’s do’s, possibly had even more details despite the non-disclosures. The prospect of being free to go made staying easier.

  “Hey,” Tory Mangan said. “Ten thousand would have got me. A million nails it. And excuse that last comment. No pun intended.”

  Maggie Ardron was for it as well. “It’s just five hours. If worse comes to worst I can buy a new dress. A new dress shop!”

  Ten thousand probably would have bought Jane as well. She knew better than to let herself be a hostage to fortune this way, but it was a magic bullet moment in her life. Five hours shut away alone (though hardly alone) would pay off her mortgage, change her world in very significant ways. She didn’t want to stay but, like the others, couldn’t afford not to.

  And so it went.

  They all agreed to remain.

  When Anabella returned and heard their decision, she actually clapped her hands in delight. “Excellent. Just the boys and me for the limo then. Can I ask you all to use the facilities outside, then Marco and Julian will tuck you in. You will be ‘encoffined’, you will hear the door close and lock, then you will tell each other bedtime stories to your hearts’ content. It’s up to you. You can lower your caskets and sleep or stay upright and awake, doing the Poe thing. We will return with a continental breakfast and your envelopes at first light.”

  One by one those who needed to do so went out into the tomb street and used the convenience while Marco and Julian opened the lids of the caskets to reveal plush, padded interiors of ivory, light-blue or rose satin.

  Then, amid nervous giggles and goodnight kisses, the donning of shawls, wraps and jackets against the chill, Jane and the others stepped into their appointed chambers and settled themselves.

  The bottom sections were closed and latched first, which was tactful, Jane thought, doing it in stages, letting them adjust to it, see the candles, see each other.

  “Hope the old boy doesn’t walk in his sleep,” Alana quipped, causing more giggles and no doubt further pangs of unease.

  Jane felt her heart pounding. We’re going to be so vulnerable, she kept thinking. And we haven’t verified any of the things we’ve been told, just accepted everything because of the money.

  She was indeed letting herself be a hostage to fortune, breaking so many of her own rules.

  But one million dollars!

  As Marco and Julian moved quietly about the vault, removing the hot-boxes and the propane cylinders, the sound system and accompanying laptop, leaving the candelabra but taking down the drapes, next dismantling the table and carrying it out with the chairs, Jane felt the beginnings of panic. Anabella was over by the northern wall exchanging last-minute pleasantries with Claire and Candace while the place was cleared of everything but the caskets. The nine caskets.

  But Ana would be leaving. That was the thing. Making jokes was easy. They would be staying.

  Jane forced herself to breathe calmly. She could change her mind. She actually could, Anabella’s insistence be damned. She could reach out right now and open the latches. Simply walk out. Who would stop her?

  But a million. A million.

  She stayed where she was, hating the greed that kept her there, hating her panic, her pounding heart.

  The others had to be feeling it too: the helplessness of wanting the money, the growing dread of where they were, what they were about to do to get it.

  And now Anabella was bidding them goodnight like any other dorm mum in that other world out there.

  “Very well, ladies. Sleep soundly. We’ll see you in a few hours.”

  Without another word, Marco and Julian began closing and latching the upper lids on the four caskets Jane could see. First Claire vanished from sight behind dully gleaming metal, then Candace, next Alana and finally Seyer McNeil. Then the men themselves disappeared from view as they turned their attentions to the caskets along the southern wall. Soon it would be Jane’s turn, her final chance.

  But a million. A million.

  Marco was suddenly standing before her, smi
ling, eyes glinting through his white domino. “See you soon, miss.”

  “Marco—“

  “Hey listen, just go with it. You’ll be fine.”

  And the lid closed heavily, snugly, with such finality. She heard it being latched to seal her in, a sound no living person should ever hear.

  She was in near-total darkness then, smelling the new, lightly perfumed satin, with just the rosette of, what?, at least sixty two-millimetre holes giving the most precious bloom of light before her, the barest broken glimpse of candle flames, the dull sheen of two other caskets. Whose, it didn’t matter. All precious, so precious.

  She heard a cheery “Goodnight, ladies!” from Marco or Julian, possibly Anabella herself for that matter—the padding muffled it—then there followed the dull boom of the bronze door being closed and locked, a Poe sound if ever there was one, another sound no living person should hear from inside a tomb.

  Don’t lose the key, Jane thought, then in the new silence found other things to trouble her, terrify her, truth be told.

  We never asked to see Tomaso’s body, she realised, leaning back in her casket, standing enclosed, encoffined, helplessly confined. What had she been thinking? Not thinking? None of them for that matter. Flattered by the invitation, the limos and the fine supper, the prospect of such wealth, all the attention, they’d never asked to see the ten-year-old corpse, never dared request it. Why would they, why would anyone?

  But how do we know that other casket actually contains Tomaso’s body at all?, she thought. That it’s even locked? It was against the back wall, the eastern wall, right in her blind spot. Try as she might, pressing up against the rosette—the mercy hole, for God’s sake, such a name!—she couldn’t see it, could barely see anything.

  What if it’s all a joke? More theatre? What if someone, an actor, is waiting inside to climb out at the appointed time to deliver the next phase of Anabella’s scheme? Though she’d seen no mercy hole on that casket . . .

  “Hey, can anyone hear me?” a voice cried, impossibly distant, heard through the padded lining that covered all but the rosette. It might have been Tory or Anita.

  “Jane here!” she called back.

  “It’s me, Jane. Tory,” the small voice cried.

  “Tory!” Jane called. “We can do it. It’s just a few hours.”

  “It’s me. Claire,” another tiny voice said from across the room—the crypt—a thousand miles away.

  “Candace, reporting in,” a voice said, thin, so small.

  “Alana, needing to pee already.” Echo of an echo. “Sorry. Shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Maggie here. Anyone got a spare teddy bear?”

  “Seyer. Hi, everyone. Jane’s right. We can do this.” Small voices, all small, but shouting, obviously shouting in their separate prisons.

  We’re not going to be able to keep this up, Jane realised. We’ll exhaust ourselves.

  “Are you there, Anita?” Tory called, though it was a whisper, almost a voice in Jane’s mind how it came to her. “Hey, Anita? You there, hon’’?”

  There was no answer.

  “Must be asleep already!” Jane called back, to give what comfort she could. “Probably a good idea.”

  “Jane’s right,” Claire’s tiny voice came. “We should sleep this through. Get it done as quickly as possible.”

  Jane heard a new sound then, hydraulics working.

  “Assuming the horizontal position. Goodnight, ladies!” It was Claire again, had to be Claire. Ever practical. Looking after the crew and leading by example.

  She heard other caskets activating then, moving down in their frames, taking a load off.

  Not for me yet, Jane decided. I need to think, stay with this.

  This isn’t the Hilton. Someone has to keep watch.

  The tomb became so quiet then, with some trying to sleep, the rest afraid to speak lest they ruin that blessed release for those already out of it. What did you do—speak or not speak? Those who wanted to stay awake were probably just standing there, forced into silence, without the one solace they needed most. Connection. Companionship.

  It left Jane straining to see what little she could through the rosette, left her mind racing, imagining all sorts of possibilities, worst-case scenarios, everything from Anabella’s limo being in a fatal accident to Julian thinking Marco had been sent to unlock the crypt while Marco expected Julian to do it, things like that.

  Minutes crept by, seconds that felt like minutes.

  Jane soon started imagining things—it had to happen—sounds other than the creaks and pops of metal cooling, stone and new concrete settling. Across two minutes or ten, twenty or sixty (how could she know?) there grew an almost hallucinatory intensity to everything: the feel of the satin, cool, soft and smooth against her fingertips and her cheeks, but too soft, moving a bit too much under her touch, the (surely) imagined smells of roses, then gas, faeces, human corruption. There were even moments of startling synaesthesia when she thought she could actually hear the flutter and dip of the candle flames in whatever eddies of air stirred out there, was sure she could hear seven other heartbeats drumming purposely in time with own, trying to synchronise. One moment she could taste vanilla, then cinnamon, the next iron and copper, as if her mouth were bleeding.

  She was so aware of everything, of too much in fact, found herself devising aphorisms, litanies, truths of the tomb. One almost became a mantra.

  Every time we wake the world is made again. Every time a reprieve, though we dare not admit it. We are all of us pre-death. It’s the only status worth having.

  However long these ramblings and wild imaginings took, in whatever time-frame they worked their subtle damage, the rosette became a mercy hole indeed, the source of all reality, all that was both good and terrible in this late-night world.

  But soon all that settled too as her own fatigue settled her. It was late, well after one by now surely. What with the champagne, the food, the aftermath of the adrenalin rush, she soon found herself drifting. Lower the casket, she told herself again and again, let go, but snapped back to find that she was still standing, still leaning, drifting.

  Then came an unmistakable sound in the self-haunting silence, unmistakable except that she was doubting everything now, needed it verified before she could be certain.

  The sound came again, far off but distinct, a sound that wasn’t the synaesthetic trickery of candle flames snapping and shuddering, granite blocks rasping and sliding, or worse, powdered relatives scratching, scratching, scratching in the walls, angry, restless and betrayed.

  A casket opening.

  It was. First the upper section, then the lower.

  Jane froze where she stood, pressed one ear fiercely to the rosette.

  Nothing. No-one called. No-one cried out. No-one else heard.

  Or were they all doing as she was doing, standing in silence, absolutely still, eyes wide in terror and ears pressed hard against their mercy holes, trying to hear something, anything, above their own thundering hearts?

  A casket had opened. Been opened. But from the outside or the inside?

  God, no! Opened from the inside because never locked!

  But who, who?

  Cool businesslike Claire or equally ruthless Candace, Anabella’s eyes and ears? Irreverent Alana Goodrich?

  Tomaso?

  Don’t think it, Jane told herself. Never think it!

  But who could it be? Who wasn’t tucked in?

  Tomaso!

  But how—how could it possibly be?

  We never checked, never looked. All of us hostages to fortune.

  No other sounds followed. Nothing.

  Just quiet candlelight. Just the room, the terrible room. Just the creeping terror and the doubt.

  “Hello?” she cried, shouted with all her might.

  There was no answer. No-one replied.

  All asleep. All blessedly asleep. Lucky, lucky, lucky.

  But not all asleep.

  Tomaso.


  Not possible. Simply not possible. An actor, surely. Or no-one. Nothing. Get a grip!

  She almost managed. For then something passed in front of her mercy hole—a quick rush of shadow.

  “Who’s there?” she cried, locked up with terror. “Who’s there?”

  But again there was nothing, nothing.

  The candle flames cut the dead air. The two caskets she could see caught the light, so much dull brushed silver.

  Fucking Ana!

  Then the candles flickered. They did. Quickly, suddenly. The tiny flames shivered, darted, trembled, became still again. A body wind. Someone had passed by.

  A ghost wind.

  Tomaso!

  They’d never checked.

  “For God’s sake!” Jane cried. “Is anyone there? Can anyone hear me? Anyone?”

  Silence. Silence.

  Seconds rushing, creeping into minutes.

  And again the candles flickered. Again someone had passed by, either that or they were becoming starved of oxygen, or simply guttering before going out. But no, no, Jane could see several of the thin white shafts, several steady flames. Plenty of time yet.

  Someone passing then. Had to be.

  Jane brought up her arms in the cramped space, first one then the other, and pounded on the padded lid. “Claire! Alana! Anyone! Who’s out there! Answer me! Who’s out there?”

  There was only silence. Cool dead silence.

  Then, suddenly, the room began darkening. The little blades of flame were being extinguished one by one. She hadn’t noticed at first; it was happening so gradually, one flame snuffed out, then another. Being stolen away, bringing the dark.

  “What’s going on?” Jane shrieked, pounding on the lid.

  No-one answered, and bit by bit, flame by tiny flame, the light fell away until there was total darkness at last, the darkness of the tomb talked about in stories, legends, urban myths.

  And like any animal struck by too much fear, the right amount of terror, Jane became immediately silent, completely still.