Super Short Stories

by Stan Mason

  Mrs. Kinnear curiosity got the better of her and she visited the wax museum in the morning, explaining to the porter at the entrance that she had an appointment to see Dr. Attwood. He took her to the first floor where the scientist emerged from his laboratory with a broad smile on his face, closing the door quickly behind him before she could see anything inside. With a smile on his bearded face, he led her to the main hall and pointed to the wax effigies.

  ‘We have two hundred-and-twenty wax models of famous and infamous people here. They all look very real. We take great care to ensure they look like the people they represent. There are five rooms... each one depicting a different theme. For example, the main hall contains Kings and Queens and famous people in history such as Presidents, Prime Ministers, and the like. Room Two has many stars of stage and screen, as well as musicians and pop-singers. Room Three depicts wars. Waterloo, the First and Second World Wars, Bannockburn, the Vietnam war, and so on. Room Four is the miscellany room. All the odds and ends of people go in there. Your job will be to go into each room every half-hour of the night and check the thermometers to make sure there’s an even temperature of fifty-eight degrees. We don’t want the models to melt or sweat. Nor do we want them to be subject to an outbreak of fire. Otherwise we’d soon be out of business. Your tools will be a portable thermometer, although there’s one located on each wall in every room, and a mobile telephone in case of fire or any other problem. The hours of work span the period between ten o’clock at night until six o’clock in the morning. And, as I said, you’ll be paid handsomely. The only thing we demand is that you don’t fall asleep on the job.’

  ‘How strange!’ observed Mrs. Kinnear with astonishment. ‘These statues are all heads on pedestals. Just the heads from the neck upwards. None of them are full wax models.’

  ‘How observant you are,’ returned the scientist with a hint of sarcasm in his voice. ‘We consider it unimportant to show how tall or short a person is in life. It’s the likeness of the head that counts. Everything else is usually covered in a dress or a suit anyway. Does that answer your question?’

  Mrs. Kinnear nodded slowly although she failed to understand the logic. ‘Well, yes, I suppose so. Do you have a Chamber of Horrors?’

  ‘Of course,’ he replied casually. ‘What would a wax museum be without its Chamber of Horrors? But if it concerns you, let me say you’ll soon get used to it. They’re only wax models of heads, after all. The Chamber of Horrors is in Room Five. Oh, by the way, we do have another room but you needn’t concern yourself about it. You’re not required to check Room Six. I’d prefer you to ignore it. In fact I insist you ignore it.’

  ‘What’s in there then?’ she asked cautiously. ‘What’s in Room Six?’

  He shrugged his shoulders carelessly. ‘Nothing really. That’s why you don’t need to check it. Simply pretend it isn’t there. Will you promise me that?’ She looked at him strangely. Simply pretend it wasn’t there? What did he mean by that? ‘Will you give me your promise not to open Room Six?’ he persisted.

  ‘If that’s what you want,’ she replied innocuously. ‘It’s no skin off my nose.’

  She felt inclined to ask further questions but he led her away quickly. The main hall was the largest room. The rest were very much the same in size. Each one contained numerous, well-shaped, well-defined sculpted heads on pedestals. She wondered why people bothered to come to see body-less wax models but then she realised tourists paid their money, spending half-an-hour or so inside, probably to seek protection from the summer showers, and never came back again.

  After looking over the premises thoughtfully, Attwood told her how much she would be paid each week for her services. It was almost double she would receive anywhere else. Greed overtook her in that she failed to challenge him why the wages were so high. Ultimately, she left telling him she would think it over and let him know her answer on the following day. For the next twenty-four hours she tossed and turned the offer in her mind. There were advantages and disadvantages. Although the money was excellent, she would have to work at night. Ultimately, her whole life would be turned upside down... sleeping during the daytime, working all night. But she didn’t have a husband any more, so it wasn’t necessary for her to be around during the day. After a titanic mind- struggle, she allowed herself to be swayed by the wages offered and decided to accept the job.

  A few days later, she arrived at the waxworks at nine forty-five in the evening and started her rounds shortly afterwards. The museum was completely empty... with the exception of two hundred-and-twenty waxwork heads. At first, she considered she had made the wrong decision. What was she thinking of? A woman of her age acting as a night-watchperson in a wax museum! She had to be out of her mind to agree to employment of that kind... from a man she didn’t know! The place was absolutely silent and she experienced a high degree of fear in the strange atmosphere. However, she soon recognised that time and custom would resolve the problem. Within a week, common practice would make her quite used to both the silence and the atmosphere. It took her rather longer to convince herself that nothing would happen to her in the Chamber of Horrors. Room Five was dark, dismal and ostensibly dangerous, with dozens of evil faces staring at her on pedestals in front of scenes of horror and terror, instruments of torture, and designs representing the fires of Hell. However, after a few half-hourly visits to the room, she realised it was all very harmless... if not boring. Very quickly, she began to rationalise the situation sensibly. Elements of fear were personally created and self-perpetuated in the mind of an individual. If such fears could be challenged, conquered and driven out, only peace of mind was left. The new employment was really a standard night-watchperson’s job in a rather strange environment. Fifty visits in the span of a week to Room Five would reduce all her troublesome fears to nothing. But, having said that, there was Room Six. In reality, she should have discounted all thoughts about it entirely. The advice of her employer was sound. Simply pretend it isn’t there, he had told her. Yet, for that very reason, her curiosity kept gnawing away at the back of her mind. Why didn’t he want her to go into that room? What was in there? Surely if she was to prevent the occurrence of fire, she ought to be allowed into every room in the museum... including his laboratory which had been secured with a special lock!

  After completing her rounds, she returned to Room Six and stood outside for a few moments debating whether to disobey orders to find out what was inside. She placed one ear to the door and listened intently. Not a sound could be heard. She took hold of the door-handle firmly and turned it. It was locked. She held a large bunch of keys on a ring fixed to her belt. One of them would most probably open the door. She thought about searching for it... the temptation was very strong. However, after a few moments she decided against it. If her employer was adamant she shouldn’t enter the room, it was her duty to obey his orders. Subsequently, she walked slowly away, her curiosity unsatisfied.

  All went perfectly well during the first week. Mrs. Kinnear managed to adjust her life really well. She slept in the morning, did her shopping in the afternoon, and worked at night. At the end of the week, she returned home with delight, counting out the money she received in wages. Attwood had been honest with her... the job was easy and very rewarding. As soon as her body-clock adjusted to the new regime there would be no problem. It would seem that good fortune had been conferred upon her by favourable destiny. But life was not to remain smooth for long. It was early in the second week when changes occurred and a sinister element entered the scene. It was two o’clock in the morning. She had just checked the thermometers on each wall in the main room, having cross-checked them with her portable thermometer, and started to walk away when she thought she heard a loud sigh. Halting in her tracks, as a chill ran down her spine, she stared round the room believing that some mischievous person, or perhaps a tramp, had been shut in for the night and was sleeping there. A thorough search proved unsuccessful and she left
to continue her duties believing the sound was sheer imagination on her part. But when she returned to the main room two hours later there was definitely a loud sigh followed by a much shorter one. She approached one of the wax heads from which the noise seemed to emerge and examined it closely in the light of her powerful torch. Nothing seemed untoward. The head was very finely made, with bright eyes and natural hair. Attwood was an expert in his field. He was superb in bringing out the best in his models. They all looked so very real! She was about to move away when she heard a whisper from the other side of the room.

  ‘I’m not Henry the Eighth.’ The sound wafted distinctly across the area.

  She turned sharply. It had to be that her mind was playing tricks. These were wax dummies. They couldn’t talk! Then another voice whispered: ‘I do look like Marie Antoinette, you know.’

  Mrs. Kinnear approached the two respective statues and stared at them closely. They were simply wax heads. Nothing more. She was a down-to-earth woman, with a no-nonsense attitude, and was not known to harbour fantasies at any time in her life... even during a crisis. Therefore, the sounds she heard were not a figment of her imagination. But where were they coming from? It couldn’t be disputed that the room was eerie at night, enveloped in an atmosphere of silence. Any noises had to be imagination. Nonetheless, she felt extremely uneasy... almost as though she was losing grip on her sanity. She recalled a story about a haunted house where it was eventually proved that the noises occurred as a result of the tide moving up a cavern underneath the house which was open to the sea. Perhaps the wax museum was affected by some similar reasonable scientific explanation.

  The next night proved to be even more disturbing. As she travelled around the wax museum in the early hours of the morning, there were sighs and whispers which seemed to increase on each tour of the rooms. Worse still, every time she completed her rounds she ended up outside the door of Room Six. What was happening in there that she didn’t need to know about? Her curiosity became more and more stimulated each time she stood outside. There were no sounds to be heard from inside... no noises... yet the door was locked! She found a key on the ring hanging from her belt which fitted the lock and turned it... but then she thought better of the deed and turned it back so that it remained locked. Whatever was inside that room was none of her business! She had to concentrate on curbing her curiosity! That was the key issue. To cut out all ideas of sighs and whispers because they could not possibly have been made by the wax heads. For heaven’s sake! They were dummies fixed on pedestals... not real people!

  The situation worsened considerably the following night. By this time, she couldn’t fathom out whether the noises were real, subject to some identifiable phenomenon, or whether she was going mad. What was she supposed to believe? There was no doubt that whispers and sighs were evident every time she came to check the rooms. But she was unable to find a solution. At five o’clock that morning, she had checked all five rooms and found herself standing in front of Room Six again. This time she was unable to stop herself. Finding the key to the forbidden door, she inserted it into the lock and turned it. Then, opening the door in trepidation, she switched on the light, paused for a few seconds, and entered. She observed the room was quite small as the door started to close slowly behind her. To her surprise, there was nothing at all inside with the exception of four speakers located in the ceiling at each corner of the room. Every inch of the walls, the ceiling, and the floor had been covered with enormous mirrors, causing confusion to any person who entered the room. Doris Kinnear stared at herself in perplexity. Why lock a door to a room which had nothing inside except mirrors? It seemed very odd! Suddenly, the speakers came on as if triggered by a switch as the door closed. A number of diiferent male and female voices whispered continuously loud and clear.

  ‘They say I look like Marilyn Monroe.’

  ‘I refuse to believe I’m Mahatma Ghandi.’

  ‘Memories... .memories... lots of memories!’

  ‘How come anyone can say I’m Agatha Christie?’

  ‘Why, President Bush? Why? I’m no President!’

  ‘He got it all wrong. I’m not Elvis Presley!’

  ‘I can’t think straight! I can’t think straight!’

  ‘How do we find release from here? How?’

  ‘Where’s my body. I want it back... now!’

  ‘I can’t stand it any more! Help me, please!’

  Mrs. Kinnear began to take fright. There was now no doubt that someone was feeding information through the speakers. But who... and why? It couldn’t be the wax heads... or could it? If not, who was saying these things? She hurried to the door and turned the handle. ‘Oh, my God!’ she blasphemed in her urgency. ‘It’s one of those doors which opened only from the outside!’ She was trapped in the room. She turned and suddenly realised she could do nothing more than stare at herself in the mirrors. It was impossible to avoid looking at herself wherever she turned. The effect was astonishing. The situation was out of control as the voices continued their whispering and she could see only dozens of images of herself reflecting from one mirror to another.

  ‘Is there any likelihood of escape from this prison?’

  ‘Why am I like the Queen? That’s what I want to know.’

  ‘Put an end to all this right now! Right now, I say!’

  ‘We’re real heads, you know. Real heads! All of us!’

  ‘We want our bodies back! Do you hear me?’

  ‘If not, then put an end to it. Put an end to the misery!’

  ‘Yes... .put an end to it! I’ve had enough!’

  She placed her hands over her ears to cut out the noise successfully but she was unable to avoid witnessing her image in the mirrors. Consequently, after a few minutes, everything started to swim in front of her eyes and she sank to her knees, eyes wide open, to fall into a dead faint. Even after collapsing the voices continued but she could hear them no longer.

  When Attwood arrived early that morning, he went directly to the general office as usual but there was no sign of Mrs. Kinnear. Nor could she be found in any of the other five rooms. He went immediately to Room Six and found her laying stone dead on the floor with her eyes wide open. Raising himself to his full height of four feet eight inches, he bent down, dragged her into the hallway, and rolled her on to a low-level wheeled-stretcher, pushing it directly to his laboratory. Once there, he moved her on to a hydraulic bed and pressed the button to raise her to waist level. The next step was to remove a large bottle of a special serum from one of the glass-fronted cupboards and inject her twelve times all the way round the base of her cranium with a hypodermic needle. After this had been done, he took a roll of medical tape and wrapped it round her neck time and time again as if to prevent any fluid flowing from the head to the body. Satisfied with the situation, he took time to make himself a cup of coffee and take a long hard look at Doris Kinnear’s head as he waited for his new partner, Donald Craig, to arrive.

  Craig was another dedicated genetic scientist. He had been a researcher who spent three years with Attwood at a medical institution during which time they struck up a friendship. Both scientists were of like minds, eager to pursue the cause of science in the field of genetics, and they were determined to continue their research together when the opportunity arose. The death of Attwood’s uncle and the legacy of the wax museum was perfect. Craig was invited to buy an equal partnership in the wax museum to assist Attwood so that they could continue their research without having to rely on the generosity of foundations, grants from institutions, and funding by other sympathetic organisations to continue their work. Not only that, but they were now able to conduct their research in private with no one looking over their shoulders at their activities. The death of Attwood’s uncle left the way open for them to work without being fettered or criticised.

  When the new partner arrived, Attwood pointed to the body of Mrs. Kinnear. �
��Who do you think she looks like?’ he asked casually.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ replied Craig, staring at the dead woman’s face intently. ‘I recall a woman called Dolly Parton, an American country-and-western singer. I think she resembles her,’ he replied.

  ‘That’s exactly what I thought,’ returned the senior scientist. He moved across and touched Mrs. Kinnear’s cheek lightly. ‘As I told you last month, Donald,’ he continued. ‘The field of genetics I’m researching may end up having the most profound effect of any research in the whole world. The brain operates by the power of its own electricity. It’s how it directs the actions of the body. That much is standard knowledge. As you know, I discovered that after death the brain retains that energy for a period up to twenty-four hours. After that the energy weakens and drifts away. However, if the brain is hermetically sealed within that period with my special serum, it remains alive with memories of the past. The most important thing is to ensure that the process takes place within that span of time. After it’s sealed, the functions of the brain become extremely limited. Only memories remain. It’s unable to make decisions or plan for the future. The advantage we have is the wax museum. We can store the brains here without anyone realising what’s happening and actually make a small profit from the tourists who visit. Better still, there’s no restriction with regard to new material. I select the subjects very carefully. Always someone who’s a dead-ringer for a famous person... alive or dead. I offer them employment as a night-watchperson, with extremely high wages... double what they would get anywhere else... insisting they musn’t enter Room Six. They always do of course... by sheer dint of curiosity. The mirrors cover the floor, walls and ceiling so that when subjects die their eyes remain open. They become too terrified to close them. That’s essential to the end product.’