Maplecroft

by Cherie Priest

  • • •

  (There was no time to examine it more fully, but I’ll come around to that. I feel like I’m saying this too much, about too many things at once, but what can I do? There are too many things to say, so I must say them here and now, or remind myself to say them later. This is all I can do, and in this way I hope I’ll come around to everything, in time.)

  • • •

  The creature stumbled forward and released me even as it crashed into me, knocking me backward and to the ground, where it jerked atop me, clawing at me—or clawing for purchase on the ground, I can’t say which. It flailed and seized, and I lifted one leg and used all my weight, and the weight of my boot, to leverage it away in a mighty kick.

  The creature fell backward, and Lizbeth’s axe caught it on the downswing, striking the base of its neck and almost completely decapitating it.

  Its head lolled to the side, and back, and down to dangle against its chest. The creature fell to its knees, and Lizbeth struck it some more, again and again, well past the point at which it must have been dead.

  • • •

  (But . . . once I thought I knew of death. Now I’m not so sure. The line is finer than I would have ever guessed, and with these inhuman things? Are they mortal enough to die? And if so, do they die on the same terms as the rest of us?)

  • • •

  Finally the monster lay on the ground, looking like some bony pulp with a loosely humanesque structure. I climbed to my feet and stood over the mess, wishing for all the world that we had a light and I could see it better—for this whole battle had been fought in pitch-dark, save what slivers of ambient glow the small town afforded us. The whole thing took place in silhouette, in outline, in vague impressions like strokes of paint intended only to suggest an event, not portray it with any real accuracy.

  Half of what I’ve composed here has likewise been conjecture, informed by those brushstrokes. Conjecture, combined with Lizbeth’s account. Between us, I think we’ve recorded it with as much truth as we could muster.

  We’ve done our best, and then some.

  But the creature . . . it lay flat upon the earth, oozing onto the grass. I thought perhaps it twitched, but again, the light was so poor that I would not swear this was the case. Lizbeth was panting, leaning on the axe for support, and clutching at her stomach as if she could scarcely catch her breath.

  “Lizbeth,” I called her by the name she suggested, the one I always tried to remember, but didn’t, And my own breath had hardly been corralled enough for even that lone word.

  “Doctor?”

  “Are . . . are you all right?”

  Grimly she informed me, “Not yet.” She straightened up, sniffled hard, took a deep breath, and brushed her hair out of her face—for all the good that did. “We have to get this thing inside.”

  I thought I had misheard her. “Inside?”

  “Yes, inside. You wanted to see the laboratory, didn’t you? No—” She gestured with the axe and shook her head. I’d been leaning down to touch the thing. “Don’t touch it,” she told me. “Not with your bare hands. It’ll only hurt later. We’ll . . . you and I, Doctor. We’ll put this thing to rest for good.”

  “Is it dead?”

  She sounded exhausted when she replied, “I have no idea.”

  Together we hauled the thing to the cellar doors, a little farther around the back side of Maplecroft. She mostly used the axe to drag it along, and I kicked at it with my boots when pieces appeared on the verge of falling off.

  When the doors were unlocked, Lizzie asked me to wait with the thing, and said that she had an idea. So I stayed there alone in silence with the festering mess, and none of this might have ever happened, or so I could almost convince myself. That’s how quiet the whole damn world had become.

  Had no one heard us?

  Had no one noticed that a life-or-death battle with an unnatural monster took place, right behind a grand old house where the Borden sisters lived? No? I find that incredible, and I’m not sure that I believe it at all. Though if anyone overheard, no one came to help. And no one brought a light, so I’m reasonably confident that no one saw anything. I was standing right there, part of the action myself, and I could barely see it.

  Lizzie returned shortly, bearing an old sheet. We scooped the creature’s remains into the sheet and rolled it up, which did make it easier to maneuver the sodden mass down the cellar steps.

  I insisted on carrying it. It wasn’t very heavy, a fact which surprised me; and my companion was so tired and injured that it spoke to her credit that she hadn’t yet passed out from the pain and exhaustion.

  “Here,” she said, gesturing at a spot on the floor. “I’ll show you what to do now.”

  She did not so much kneel as fall to all fours beside an open trapdoor embedded in the floor. Inside I saw a metal trunk about the size of a shoebox, and when I looked at the box, I thought I heard a strange humming noise. It was not entirely unpleasant, but it was entirely distracting.

  She closed the trapdoor and sat on it, then turned to another place on the floor and manipulated a cunningly concealed latch. Another portion of the floor lifted away, and I wondered at the honeycombing she must’ve accomplished beneath this house, and what else might lie under our feet.

  “I call this ‘the cooker,’” she said simply.

  The cooker was an industrial appliance, built into the floor. Its contents burbled and bubbled, and steam valves and gauges covered a panel on the top. “What’s . . . where did you get such a thing?”

  “They’re more common than you think. Mostly you find them on farms, or in slaughterhouses.”

  “For disposing of large carcasses?”

  “Very good. Yes, that’s what it’s for. Now here—” She pointed at the rolled-up thing in the sheet and waved me closer. “Put it inside. Within a few hours, there’ll be nothing left but liquid, which drains out underneath the backyard. Please, help me lower it. It mustn’t splash; the contents of the cooker are highly corrosive.”

  “They must be, indeed,” I agreed as I did what she asked. Sheet and all, I placed it within and resisted the urge to stir it up like a repulsive stew.

  She shut the lid, set some dials, and a low, murmuring clank announced the steam was flowing and the cooker was doing its job.

  Just as she went to close the cabinet door, I thought to exclaim, “Oh! But I would’ve liked to examine it, before we destroyed it. I’m in shock, I suppose. I should’ve said something sooner.”

  “There wasn’t much left of it to examine, even by the time we got it to the stairs. Their soft tissue disintegrates very quickly, beginning almost as soon as they’ve stopped moving. The flesh melts down to gelatin, and the bones crumble, until they feel like pebbles in your hands. Still, I am happier to see them boiled down to nothing. At any rate,” she added wryly, “I doubt you’ll be forced to take my word for it. The odds are perilously high that you’ll meet another, if you continue to keep company here.”

  “This isn’t the first?”

  “No. This is the seventh, or eighth. I can’t recall right now. It’s been . . . such a day. Such a night, as the case may be.”

  “Your stepmother, and your father. Is this what they were becoming?”

  Softly she said, “I wish I knew for certain, but I have never—not once, in these last few years—ever doubted the course of action I took that night. They were becoming something else . . . and it wasn’t human.”

  “Is that your confession?”

  “Of something, yes. This has become my life’s work, Doctor Seabury—accidentally, unfortunately, but what else can I do? Surrender to what comes, and let the whole world burn?”

  “Or drown,” I said, and I’m not sure why. It was a silly sentiment that sprang to mind, and I aired it.

  She took it amicably enough. “Or drown, yes. These things, they have some connection with the ocean—that much is clear. The sea glass, the finned fingers and webbed toes . . .”

 
“Do they have such things? I didn’t see. There wasn’t time or light enough; thus I wished we’d taken a moment, before tossing it into the bath.”

  “I’ll give you my notes, and you are welcome to every scrap of knowledge I’ve collected thus far. I’m afraid it isn’t much.”

  “It must be more than I’ve accumulated,” I admitted. “I’ve only been aware of the affliction for these last few weeks, and I haven’t done a very good job of understanding it. I suspect I’ve failed in ways I’ve not yet imagined.”

  We sat together in silence, me on the edge of a table and her still on the floor, where the cooker vibrated and hummed beneath her. Finally she said, “It’s awful, knowing just enough to know how bad this is.”

  “And yet not knowing how bad it might get. Or how to fix it.”

  “That’s the worst part, yes. But I pray—in case that means anything—I pray that you and I can work together, and you’ll help me with this. I’ve shouldered it alone, and I cannot bear it much further. I’m at the end of my reach, and I don’t know what else to try. Who else to ask. How else I might proceed. You’ve always been so kind to us, and I’ve appreciated it more than you know. Even the little things, the acts of politeness, they’ve meant the world . . . and now, I hope you don’t mind my saying so, but you give me . . . well . . . you give me hope.”

  I was touched. “I’m honored that you would take me into your confidence. And left to my own devices, I do not pray; but I verily hope that I prove myself worthy of your trust.”

  She smiled. It was a feeble smile, but a genuine one, I think. “Thank you, sir. And now, if you’ll excuse me briefly, I’ll check on my sister and Nance. Feel free to look around the laboratory, though I’d caution you to avoid the box in the floor beside the cooker.”

  “The sea glass baubles?”

  “Yes. You hear them?”

  “I do. But now I know the call for what it is, and I can resist it, I think.”

  I should’ve said it with more confidence. She watched me for a few long seconds, and then said, “Then perhaps you’d better stay with me. Please join me upstairs, and then when all’s secure, and everyone’s as well as we can manage . . . I’ll show you around the laboratory. I’ll open my notes and my research books to you, and maybe you’ll see something I’ve missed.”

  “I will be fine unsupervised,” I promised her, but I knew I’d said it too quickly. I felt it even as I heard the humming, purring, warm, wet sound . . . I didn’t hear it with my ears, but with my soul. And it frightened me.

  “All the same . . . ,” she said. She collected herself, and rose from the floor. “Until you have a better grasp on what we’re dealing with here, I’d appreciate your immediate proximity.”

  I did as she asked. She was the expert, after all.

  But what a terrifying thought, that the world’s foremost expert knew only enough to live in horror.

  Aaron B. Stewart, Fire Chief, Farthington, Mass.

  APRIL 26, 1894

  INFORMAL REPORT SUBMITTED TO COUNTY SUPERVISOR MARTIN HELLERMAN

  Since you’ve pressed us for particulars outside the bounds of the standard report, I will cheerfully oblige you—for there’s nothing I can give you but the truth, and I must trust that it proves sufficient to appease the adjusters, or whoever leans upon you to lean upon us.

  The call came at approximately four forty-five a.m. via James Horner, who arrived at the main station on horseback. He was frantic, and all the way from the other side of town he’d been rousing the populace, a veritable Paul Revere shouting out that the fire was coming, the fire was coming. Or rather, the fire had arrived—in all its sky-high glory, and the entire block would shortly be consumed if nothing was done, and done promptly.

  The block in question once housed the Franklin Cassock Cannery and Shipping Facility, which closed eight years ago, in the wake of some industrial accident which was never satisfactorily explained. Something about a belt snapping, a compression device failing, and to sum up a tragic and tedious tale: a dozen people were killed. Whichever Cassock son ran the operation at the time (and I can’t remember the name off the top of my head, but it’s a matter of public record, I should think) . . . he never recovered from the shock. He witnessed the catastrophe firsthand, and subsequently took leave of his senses. Truly, the matter was heartrending for all involved.

  But I tell you all that to say this: The place had been abandoned since the late 1880s, and boarded up tight to keep out the daring youths and derelicts who might be drawn to it. Though, all things considered, it wasn’t quite the problem you’d expect. The old cannery was rumored to be haunted—and not in the charming, romantic way that attracts curiosity seekers, but in the fashion that frightens off all but the most desperate or inebriated. The buildings have been listed for sale for quite some time, but to the best of my knowledge there have been no offers, and no interested parties in pursuit of redevelopment.

  The site has not seen a great deal of trespassing. That’s what I wish to convey.

  But at four forty-five in the morning, Horner came around crying about a fire—warning that it would surely consume the entire block, and it might well spread farther than that if the whole community were not rallied on the spot.

  I wanted to say he must’ve been mistaken or deliberately inflating the stakes, but when I stepped outside to greet him, I could see the glow of the blaze over the tops of the trees, lighting him from behind. My heart sank down into my belly, and rested there like a lump of lead.

  I asked Horner if he’d summoned the police force yet, and he nodded, turning his horse and telling me that I was nearly the last man to be roused, because I was sleeping at the station’s quarters—and inconveniently enough, the station lies at the most distant end of town from where the blaze began. He said I should bring the cart and all my men, and he’d instigate a bucket brigade in advance of us.

  To be honest, I’ve always found Horner a bit too eager to please, or eager to make himself valuable; and in my experience a man is either useful or he is not useful, and those who must convince you of their enduring worth . . . probably fall into the latter category. But on that night, I could not fault him, and I was glad to have such an informed busybody within the town’s limits.

  After he’d gone, I raised my own alarm—ringing the bell and cranking the siren, bringing out my two nearest lieutenants, whose aid I needed when it came to fastening the horses and preparing the hoses. (The tanks were already filled in accordance with regulation.)

  We maintain three such tanks, each one holding four hundred gallons, mounted on a reinforced wagon of the traditional metropolitan type; though here I must point out that if we’d received the funds for a new steam-powered engine, there’s a fair chance that we might’ve saved more of the cannery than we managed.

  When we work with horses and leather, as opposed to steam and rubber, you can only hold us accountable to a given extent. We do our best with the equipment at hand, but it’s hardly the newest technology—and I’m aware that Commissioner Freeman is loath to part with funds for a town the size of ours, but progress shall catch us eventually, if we do not catch it first.

  You may expect me to follow up further, on this point. Perhaps at a later date, when the insurance men are satisfied. If ever they are satisfied.

  But with regard to the Franklin fire, we were fortunate, after a fashion. When we arrived with cart and ladders, we found the north end of the compound wholly engulfed, and I knew immediately that there was nothing to be done for the place. It would burn to the ground, and the only question was how much property and how many lives it would bring down with it.

  The flames had burst through the roof at the cannery’s tallest point: a four-story tower that once housed the family offices. The blaze appeared to have begun there, but given the scope of the situation, I could not swear to it in court. Not yet. Not before all the investigations are concluded, and all the evidence sorted from the ashes.

  Just call it the gut feelin
g of a longtime fireman, and lend as much weight to that as you like.

  But the fire had not stopped with the tower offices, alas. It’d spread in both directions, up and down the block, devouring a smaller segment of the plant (which had collapsed before we got there), and devastating a wing where the sorting of meats once occurred. This left approximately half of the remaining structures unscorched, but in the inevitable path of a blaze that was wholly outside our capacity to contain it.

  With a steam engine, we might have cut the unburned structure off with a water wall, and saved it. But with rows of buckets and heavy hoses, I regret to say that we emptied all three tanks into the inferno to absolutely no effect. In the end, we were forced to retreat—and to ask the stalwart brigade members to abandon their posts.

  We reassigned them to the side streets, where they doused cinders and stomped upon embers that still glowed. We sent some to the nearby rooftops with all the water they could carry between them, pumped from wells or dragged from creeks, so that the structures might be preserved.

  Containment, sir. That’s the best we could hope for, and I am proud that we accomplished even that much.

  If the insurance company is unsatisfied with this account, then I scarcely know what else to provide. This was the situation, and these were the conditions. We were powerless against a problem of that size, and nothing short of the most advanced equipment—and another dozen trained men—would’ve made the slightest difference in the outcome.

  I am personally insulted that the adjuster has called our efforts into question, and if he has any further inquiries—or any accusations, for that matter—you may send him to me directly. I’ll no doubt be at my post, at the station. He’s welcome to wave his paperwork and spew his nonsense as he likes, and I’ll let Thompson or Coy have a go at him. Or at any rate, I won’t stop them if they do.