Dark Rooms: Three Novels

by Douglas Clegg

  Dark purples swirled in Rachel’s mind, dancing with dots like mosquitoes, and she wondered where the dream had begun— down the hallway to the vanity, she was walking, it was a dream after all. A dream because babies surrounded her, dozens of babies, spheres with arms and legs. Their mouths opening upwards to her. At the end of the hall, at the vanity, hanging up to dry: the children from the park. Skin ripped open from their stomachs to their chins, torn and hollow. Jamie kept talking even with his sister’s fist in his mouth. “It’s where babies come from. But if it’s not all done it has to crawl back in. What do you suppose would happen if the half-done baby couldn’t find its mother’s cunny again?”

  Purple haze of sleep again, as if she were rising out of the dream, about to open her eyes.

  Mrs. Deerfield said, “And you, you stupid fool, you’re here for one purpose and one purpose only, to guard the wall, your sleazy hands all over her, she can’t be damaged, twit, if she’s to carry the child.”

  That’s right, Rachel nodded in her dream, keeping her eyes closed, tasting the licorice and almonds in her mouth, can’t be damaged if I’m going to carry the little sphere.

  Falling downward into sleep.

  3.

  Rachel’s lips were parched, her throat dry. Pins and needles poked at her toes, along the soles of her feet, around her calves. A hand tenderly pressed against the back of her head, raising it slightly. She opened her eyes.

  To see.

  Mrs. Deerfield’s face. Dim and flickering like candlelight. The old woman’s face was flat and empty, a pie crust of a face, but kind and colorless, with her translucent eyes looking right into Rachel, right through Rachel. “Don’t talk now, dear, just take another sip and you’ll be fine.” Mrs. Deerfield held a cup to Rachel’s lips.

  “Bone china,” someone giggled from a corner.

  Rachel murmured, “More dreamland tea?”

  “It’s full of vitamins,” Mrs. Deerfield said, “some herbs and even a lizard’s gland or two. An old recipe passed down through generations.”

  “You’re… so… funny… and… I’m sleepy.”

  “Well, you’ve been having some bad dreams, dear. You’re here in my flat.”

  “Oh? Oh. Is Hugh here?”

  “Honey,” a woman said from somewhere nearby, “we are so proud of you.” It sounded to Rachel like one of the weird sisters—was it Annie Ralph? But then, it must be daddy, that’s what daddy would say, “We are so proud of you.”

  “Daddy?”

  Laughter, women’s laughter like pattering rain on a rooftop.

  Rachel tried lifting her head on her own to look around, but her skull seemed heavy beneath her skin, her neck was pure liquid. She was lying flat somewhere. On the cold tile floor. The opening to the crib nearby, and flickering candlelight from down there, down below. Rachel’s whole body was jelly and jam. “Jellies in those jars,” Mrs. Deerfield had once said. “Jams and preserves. Whatever’ll keep. Most things do keep.”

  “Daddy?”

  Someone said, “You’d think she’d say ‘mommy’—it’s not fair, I don’t see anything so special about her.”

  Mrs. Deerfield turned her face away from Rachel. The woman’s yellow hair fell across her cheek as she turned. Mrs. Deerfield said, “She’s open to the influence, which is more than I can say for some people, Elizabeth Kellogg. Now, one of you get over here and loosen these scarves—you’d think you were tying the Gordian knot here and not just a simple Boy Scout slipknot—yes, right now, do you think she’s going to jump up and bite you?”

  Scout? Hugh? Rachel’s thoughts blended in half sleep. “Did something bite me?” She had no energy, and when she looked at the bone china cup that Mrs. Deerfield held near her chin it didn’t look like a cup at all. It was a shallow saucer, a yellowed bone saucer with jagged edges around the rim as if it had been sawed from something. Bone. “Am I sick, Nanny Deerfield?” Rising into consciousness and nausea.

  Mrs. Deerfield returned her gaze down to Rachel. “Bit of fever, dearest, but Nanny Deerfield will make it all better.”

  “Dream,” Rachel murmured, her lips moistened by dreamland tea. Something twisting at her wrists—like copper wire wound around them—and then just a distant throbbing pain. She turned her head to her left and saw Annie Ralph standing there.

  “Hi, honey.” Annie nodded; she was doing something with Rachel’s hand. “Sorry if they were too tight.” Annie’s face blinked on and off with flickering yellow light. Every inch of the floor was covered with votive candles.

  “Dreamland,” Rachel sighed.

  “Yes, dear.”

  “Ted—and the children, Jamie, I saw them, I saw them, hanging in -” But even these words made no sense to Rachel, even she didn’t know what she was trying to say. More flickering candlelight poured up from the open crib. The clamoring place. The dark hole full of jams and jellies and pickles and preserves and whatever will keep.

  Mrs. Deerfield was stroking her forehead with a damp cloth. It felt like ice across her face. “I knew you were sensitive. Would Baron Samedi bring us the right flesh without the right spirit?”

  Rachel’s throat felt like it was burning, but pleasantly, warm. She wanted to wake up now, but she felt so damn good and pleasant and the weird sisters were being so lovely and sweet she just let this dream continue. A while longer and then I’ll wake up. Hugh? Are-you-there?

  “She’s closed her eyes again,” Betty Kellogg said.

  Annie whispered, “She seems heavier now.”

  Rising up and then falling back, falling into sleep, falling through the floor, falling down into the earth to sleep.

  “Be careful putting her in,” Mrs. Deerfield said. “Watch your toes there, and be mindful of the candles.”

  Put me in? Where? “Nanny?” Rachel asked dreamily.

  “Yes, dear.”

  They were carrying her but she didn’t have the energy to open her eyes. They’re putting me to bed, that’s what she meant. “Where are we going?”

  “I don’t like lying, dear, so you should know. I’ve given you a drug, dear, powerful medicine from an extremely deadly plant, but in a small dose. We’re going to put you down in the crib.”

  “Nice,” Rachel replied, “you’ll take care of me.”

  Falling down into sleep, down where the babies play in their nurseries, crying for their mommies.

  “Yes, dear, I care about you more than life itself. You and him. He’s our god, dear, not yet born, once a man, a man of spirit, named Gil DuRaz. He inhabits my sweet fleshling and when he’s allowed to grow in your womb, he will be fully born with greater power than, well, either you or I can imagine. He shall be a devourer of human flesh and the spirits of this house shall be released from their cage.”

  Nice, nice and sleepy, nice and cool and soft down here, darkness like an arm around my waist, like Hugh against my back at night, and candlelight between the eyes of darkness.

  Words sinking from Mrs. Deerfield, bobbing and floating like a balloon half filled with helium. “Do not be afraid, my dear, your friend Miss Parker is here to keep you company. Motherhood is a natural part of life, and a part that has been denied you much too long.”

  A sound like the clack! of a mousetrap snapping shut.

  4.

  In the darkness of sleep she heard voices around her:

  Mrs. Deerfield said, “Volunteers?”

  “Me first, honey.” It was Annie Ralph.

  Then Betty. “Well, I’ve never really disemboweled anyone before.”

  “Honey, it’s like carving a turkey. And if you don’t do it now. I’ll do it myself.”

  In her dream of absolute darkness, Rachel heard a sound like wet rubber splitting, tearing, and heard a series of thumps, a groan.

  “Dear old Annie, such a trouper. Now dear, by your own hand. Rules are rules, Betty, after all, can’t have any living witnesses. Time to join the house with the others.”

  Betty Kellogg said, “I can’t.”

  “The
flesh is weak, yes?”

  “No, don’t—I can do it.”

  “He wants you to go over, dear. Now.”

  “I can do it. It’s just that it looks awful. All over my hands—Annie’s—all over me. The knife.”

  “It’s an apple-coring knife, but it’s served other purposes in the past. A little pressure might help, dear.”

  “Please, don’t—it—it hurts, it hurts so much—not like—when you push, don’t push it against my skin—it hurts—I can—please, it hurts so damn much, my stomach please, no, it’s not -”

  “Pain is brief, dear, but if you think of what the pain is for, well, then. We’re born, we live, we die. That’s it. Mustn’t get sentimental.”

  “Please, let me do it myself—it’s the blade, feels so cold, so damned cold on my stomach, no, don’t, I’m not ready, not yet—not yet—God—not -”

  In the dream of candle-lit darkness that Rachel was having, the sound of wet rubber tearing, the sound of boots treading in the mud, the suction of pulling a boot out of the mud, and a whine, almost a scream, coming from beside her and then she thought she heard her little sphere, the one she’d lost last year, weeping in the corner because it was still trying to be born.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  BELIEF

  Hugh waited in the bookstore for Rachel for over an hour. Rain splattered across the sidewalks outside, sheets of rain hammering down the darkness beyond the wide windows of the bookstore. He stared out into the rain. The store was packed with people milling around the stacks of trade paperbacks, customers flirting with each other, couples sitting over in the cafe section. Hugh stood alone, staring out through the blurred glass.

  Watching.

  Hugh knew that Rachel would not be coming. It had been in her voice on the phone. She sounded as if his calling her had repulsed her.

  The world is a crazy place.

  The bag lady standing in the rain, watching him, only seemed to confirm this opinion.

  My God, that crazy woman is patient.

  But what if Rachel is in some kind of trouble?

  The thought seemed to buzz around his ear, and for a second he thought it was another damn wasp.

  Let’s Pretend, Hugh, that there’s something going on here. You saw the words in blood: HELPRACHEL. Is it some subconscious thing? Do you really think she needs your help? Shit, she’s the most self-sufficient person in the world, right? She needs you about as much as she needs a hole in the head.

  The bag lady stared through the window at him, unblinking. Hugh felt he’d spent the past hour trying to erase her from the street landscape, trying to see through her, trying to turn her invisible. His head throbbed from a hangover.

  But she communicated with me, somehow, don’t know how, but it was as if she refocused my eyes. HELPRACHEL. Scout? You in trouble?

  The bag lady began to look urgent; she stomped her feet in the puddles, sending water splashing up against the storefront.

  I’ll wait her out. If I have to wait here another hour, I’ll do it.

  But the woman turned away and began hurrying up Connecticut Avenue in the rain.

  Go ahead, wherever the hell you’re headed.

  But she’s headed to my home.

  What if there’s—Let’s Pretend. Rachel is in some kind of danger. You asshole, Hugh, just standing here, you should be home, you should be there with her. She did sound funny on the phone. Funny and scared the way she was when she lost her baby, why haven’t you gone home yet?

  Hugh made his way through the crowd of people at the entrance of KramerBooks; he felt like he was drowning. When he was on the street in the blinding rain, he ran after the bag woman, towards home.

  Halfway up the hill he caught up with her. “Wait!”

  She turned and glared at him. “You seen the signs! You know you seen the signs! They gonna do it tonight. Ain’t no more girls gonna die, and if I gotta do it myself I will, Mr. Big Man, but I can’t help your woman if I’m fighting the other one. I ain’t God, just old Mattie Peru, flesh and blood and I can only fight one battle at a time!” Her anger seemed to dissolve with the rain, and Hugh realized the woman was crying. “I know what waits for me up to the Screamin’ House, and I ain’t afraid for me. I know the hell I’m headin’ for. I know my crime.” She drew the skull from between the folds of her bags. “This here’s my babygirl that those in the house killed, mister, and it was a Mr. Big Man just like you that gave me the seed for my girl and gave my girl the seed for her baby, and now they gonna bring something into the world that don’t belong here.”

  She tossed the skull to him and he instinctively caught it the way he would catch basketballs in college. When he looked back at Mattie, as he held the skull, he saw:

  The Old Man, battered, rain washing blood from the jungle of cuts and open wounds. His upper jaw opened and closed mechanically, the lower jaw just hung slack in a pocket of skin. “Hugh! Get up to that house now! It’s too late for me, and they got Ted, they killed him and they filled his body with one of their own, but Rachel! For all the love you have for her, get the up there!”

  Hugh glanced down at the skull: it glowed in the slashing rain like a lantern.

  And he believed.

  He believed the way a man believes when it is four in the morning and the rational world doesn’t tell him otherwise. He believed the way a man wakes up when he remembers a smell, wakes up and realizes he has been sleeping, and the smell is fire, and his house is burning. He believed the way a man believes in something when there is nothing else to believe in.

  “Rachel,” he said.

  And he knew it was true. It cut through every ounce of intellect in him, but he knew these visions were real, oh, but God, what if he’d waited too long?

  But when have I ever been right before? It’s all been delusions, this could be just another one.

  And then he thought: Screw that.

  Knifing through all his thoughts: Scout, you be safe, I’ll come get you.

  “We gotta go now.” Mattie grabbed his arm. The touch of her hand was like an electric shock, a current ran between them. He heard her voice in his head: “I am Mattie Peru, and the spirits of this house are evil, and of them, the most powerful and malevolent is called Gil DuRaz, Baron Samedi, the guardian of the dead. He has been both man and demon, and he murdered my daughter. ”

  Interwoven with the sound of her voice, Hugh saw a fetus with the translucent blue eyes of his own father, the creature he’d seen in the shadows of the vanity.

  “God,” Hugh gasped.

  Mattie let go of him, and the vision evaporated. “They been waitin’ for a long time, and now they got their chance, mister, but we gotta get up there, we just gotta.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  HOUSECLEANING

  1.

  Rachel awoke because she was having difficulty breathing. The air was thick with incense: the candles, all around her like tiny eyes. Mrs. Deerfield was at her legs, massaging them, but Rachel couldn’t feel anyone touching her. Some kind of shiny grease in Mrs. Deerfield’s hands, pressing down on her legs. Rachel’s robe was open. Rachel came in and out of consciousness, feeling like a tired swimmer, drowning, going down for the first time, second, third. Her shoulders were sore, her neck ached. She was in a dark cave surrounded by candles, a dark cave with Mrs. Deerfield massaging her legs. Rachel felt her own bones chafing beneath her breasts, down to her womb. Above her, mushrooms grew from the stone ceiling. The crib. The candlelight cast animated yellow shadows across the etched stone. Things seemed to move inside there with them. There were others, faces Rachel could barely make out. Two women watched Mrs. Deerfield grease Rachel’s legs. Annie Ralph and Betty Kellogg, their faces unmoving, their eyes open wide. They sat up in the dirt behind Mrs. Deerfield. Rachel clutched the earth under her fingers; it was moist. Her fingers clawed at the earth. Hurt, every muscle hurt. Annie and Betty watched her, unblinking. Shadows danced across their faces, giving them a semblance of movement, but they were
still.

  “Am I dreaming?” Rachel asked Mrs. Deerfield. She didn’t want to look over Mrs. Deerfield’s shoulder at Annie, because just beneath Annie’s chin there was an opening into her throat, a jagged but precise cut as if someone had taken a knife… “It’s an apple-coring knife…” and the slit began beneath Annie’s chin and ran down farther, but Rachel couldn’t look, she just couldn’t and anyway it would be a dream.

  Mrs. Deerfield glanced up from her work. She was wearing her work apron over her jeans and a blue work shirt. She had various gardening tools stuck in the pockets of her apron. “Well, you’re up and about, how unexpected of you, dear, and yet not something to fight.”

  “Is this a dream?”

  “Life is but a dream, dear, you just go back to sleep and think of England if you must.”

  “I’ve had the worst nightmares.” Rachel’s fingers in the damp earth floor of the crib, fingers curling into tight claws. She tried to move her legs, to pull back from Mrs. Deerfield, but her legs did not budge. Sleep tugged at her; her mind hurt from being so weary and wanting to fight the tiredness, too.

  “About children, dear?”

  “Oh, God, about everything, what are you doing?”

  “Preparing you, it’s a simple procedure, age-old.”

  Her mind fighting the sleep, re-tasting dreamland tea in the back of her throat, her throat which felt scarred and numb as if healing from an operation. She wanted to scream, but she had lost her voice, all she could do was whisper. “You poisoned me.”

  Mrs. Deerfield shook her head. “No, no dear, it’s just what I called it, dreamland tea, and it’ll make it so you won’t hurt. Pain is nothing to be afraid of, really, but you’re a weak vessel and the trauma it might cause…”