“And he shed a tear, but by now I was sick of my brother’s sentiment. I said, ‘This is not what I wanted my life to be. To eat and pretend what we eat is something else. To shit and pretend what comes out is not what we have eaten. To fuck and pretend you’re not my brother. There has to be more to life than that.’
“And Hans said, ‘That is all life has ever been.’
“And the child. The child never stopped smiling. I swear to you, if the child had caved in, if it had begun to cry like all the others, if it had struggled or begged for its life, I’d have given in to my hunger and eaten it raw right there on the spot. But it smiled. So what else could I do?
“I said to Hans, ‘I’m leaving.’
“And he said, ‘If you leave, we will never meet again.’
“And I said, ‘So be it. Will you let us go?’
“Because he held his knife. And we were starving—it had been a cold winter, and the children had been playing safe. And I thought he might eat the girl regardless. And I thought he might eat me too.
“And we stood there for a while, all three of us, my brother, me, and the smiling girl. And then my brother turned around and went back to the house and went indoors.
“‘Come on,’ said the girl, and she took my hand. And I held on tight, and I tell you, I was blinking back tears, and I don’t know whether it was because someone had rescued me at last or because I had lost my brother. ‘Come on,’ she said, ‘I’ll get you home.’
“And we walked right out of the forest. I got a job in a department store, selling hosiery. That is where I met your grandfather. He was working there as an accountant. He took pity on me. He didn’t mind my coarse ways. He married me, he smoothed off my rough edges. Ach, he took me to his bed, and I gave him children. One of them was your father.”
Sieglinde asked, “What happened to the little girl?”
“And the family accepted me for his sake. Or if they did not accept me, they tolerated me. They tolerated me to my face. And we lived happily ever after. I never ate another child—I need you to know that. I need you to understand. I never hurt anyone ever again, not after I had left the forest. I paid that price.”
“What happened to the little girl?”
“This suitcase does not suit! Look at this suitcase. It is too big. What is the use of such big suitcases? Who needs to carry so much?”
(And for a moment Sieglinde thought her grandmother was going to ignore her question, and then Grossmutti Greta sighed, and looked straight at Sieglinde, and said …)
“It was a very large forest.”
Greta offered Sieglinde another gingerbread man, and Sieglinde didn’t want one, and her grandmother told her not to be silly. Sieglinde said, “What is the special ingredient?” And Grossmutti Greta looked shocked for a moment, and saw that Sieglinde was in earnest, and that she was even shaking a little, and shaking with fear of all things; and she laughed, and said it was cinnamon, just cinnamon.
And Sieglinde bit into the head, and now she knew, of course, it was obvious it was cinnamon, but she couldn’t help but taste something fleshy there too. Her grandmother was watching her. Her grandmother would be disappointed if she didn’t finish. She didn’t want that. She wolfed the whole man down, every last scrap of him.
“It was a very large forest. The girl had told me she could find her way out of it, and I don’t think that she was lying to me, or if she was, she was lying to herself. We got lost. It was dark. It began to rain. We were hungry. We slept for hours, sometimes complete days, because we were too tired to move. And I said to her, ‘You or I have to eat the other. It’s the only way one of us even stands a chance of survival.’ And I said to the girl, ‘I think you’ve got a whole life ahead of you, and it’s still sweet and untainted, and you haven’t made any mistakes yet, or if you have, they weren’t of your making. You should be the one who lives. It should be you.’ I said to her, ‘Eat me.’
“And the little girl said, ‘No.’ And I told her there was no choice, and I told her it wasn’t hard. And I ran my finger down my breasts and down my thighs, and showed her the best meat she could get from them, and how thinly she should slice, and exactly how long over an open flame she should cook for the most appetizing results. I told her there was nothing to it. I told her that I had done it, and so had my brother, and we were nothing special. Not like her. Not like she could be.
“And she begged me. She begged me not to make her go through with it.
“‘Eat me,’ she said. ‘Eat me. Because you know just what to do. You’ll enjoy the meat so much more than I will. Don’t waste your chitterlings on a palate as weakly sensitized as mine.’ And she said, ‘Eat me knowing that I give myself to you in full cooperation, I give myself to you as a present; feast on me, and enjoy, and know that I’ll be in Heaven looking on. Eat me, and let your last meal of child be the best meal of child you’ve ever had, let me be the apotheosis of all who have gone before, let me be the reason you can stop afterward, because there’ll never be a child as succulent as me.”
“And I said, ‘All right.’
“And then she told me her name. Her proper name. And I let her.”
Sieglinde asked, “What was it?”
“Ach, what does it matter now?”
“Did she ask you your name?”
“Yes.”
“Did you give it?”
“No. What good would it have done her? I was about to hang her on a tree upside down and slit her throat. I gave her a name—a made-up name. It was a perfectly good name.”
“Is that what really happened?”
“It’s the way that I remember it.”
Sieglinde said quietly, “And was she succulent?”
“Oh, yes.”
The grandmother leaned forward, and Sieglinde thought she was going to impart some terrible secret, something that would be so dreadful that it would taint her even to hear it. And she leaned forward too—she wanted to hear it, she knew she wanted her innocence destroyed. Let it be now, she thought, let it be now. Grossmutti Greta smiled. And said, softly, “Shall we go up and find that suitcase, once and for all?”
The dark of the attic was now solid, like a wall; the light from the staircase touched it and died. “You can’t go in there,” Sieglinde said to Greta, and Greta agreed.
“No, my dear, now it’s your turn. You go into the attic and fetch for me the best suitcase you can.”
And Sieglinde thought it would be impossible—that that solid darkness would knock her back—and she looked at her grandmother’s face, and it was so old, and she saw now how close it was to death. Sieglinde stepped forward, and the darkness pooled around her, and all the light was gone, all the light was gone completely.
There were things there, in the dark—things that feed off the dark, that aren’t afraid of it, that need the pitch-black to survive. She felt something leathery, like a bat, but it was too scaly for a bat; something tickled against her hand—a spider? But it was too large for a spider. And the blackness was thick like syrup, and it was pouring out all over her, into every last corner of her body—a syrup—and she could bite into it if she chose; she could eat it; if she didn’t eat it, it would eat her, she knew. But she didn’t want to eat it.
She heard her grandmother’s voice. There was an echo to it. As if it came from a long way away.
“Don’t panic,” she said. “Just listen to my voice. Listen to me, and all will be well.”
And Sieglinde knew nothing would be well again—that she would never more be able to see, or speak, or feel—because if she opened her mouth to speak, the darkness would swim down her throat; if she dared to feel, then the darkness would feel at her right back. But she listened to her grandmother’s voice, and to her surprise it worked—her heart steadied, she stopped shaking, she began to calm.
“You think you now know why I’m leaving your grandfather? Yes? You think it is guilt? It is not guilt.
“Oh, I feel guilt enough. But not for the children I�
�ve killed. I feel guilt because I married a man I did not love and have never loved, not one day in all these sixty years. I feel guilt because I never loved my children. I kept popping them out, just to see whether I’d produce a single one I might feel some affection toward. I didn’t. I hate them all. Your father, he’s an especially cold fish. He deserves that bitch of a mother of yours. You do know your mother is a bitch, my dear? And that she has never cared for you?”
Sieglinde didn’t open her mouth to answer. But, yes, she thought. She hadn’t realized it before, and now that she did, it didn’t much seem to matter.
“I have spent so many years trying to be what I am not. The scent of childmeat clings to me. I taste it in everything I cook. Just a hint, mocking me, telling me that out there is something tastier, richer, better. And I will be dead soon. And I must not waste another day on this little excuse for a life.
“I need to eat the flesh of innocents again. I was wrong. All these years, I was wrong. I should never have left my brother. I will go to him. I will go, and see whether he will take me back. I shall fall into his arms and apologize and beg his forgiveness. He may not recognize me. If he doesn’t recognize me, he will eat me. But if so, ach, well, then, there’s an end to this suffering.
“I am so hungry. I am so hungry. I am so hungry.
“Now, get me a suitcase. Come out of the darkness, and bring the best you can find.”
Sieglinde thought she would stay in the dark. It might be safer in the dark, after all. But the dark began to drain away from her and she tried to cling on to it, she reached her arms out and grabbed—onto the bat, onto the spider—and then she saw she was clutching on to a suitcase, a nice, neat little suitcase, and the bat-leather was its shell and the spider-legs were its straps.
Grossmutti Greta took it out of the hands. She looked it over. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, good choice.” She held it against Sieglinde’s body as if measuring it against her.
And Sieglinde knew that she was going to be put into the suitcase. And then her grandmother would take her into the forest, and she would find her brother, and together they would hang Sieglinde upside down and gut her and eat her.
“Please don’t kill me,” said Sieglinde.
And it was as if Sieglinde had slapped her grandmother. It made her step backward.
“You think I would eat you?” said Greta. “Oh, my darling. Oh, blood of my blood. I could never hurt you. Because you’re like me. You’re just like me. All these years, I’ve been waiting to find someone in this family I could love. And it is you. Don’t be afraid. Be afraid of everyone, but never of me.”
And Sieglinde saw her grandmother was crying, and realized she was crying too.
“The suitcase,” said Greta, “is for you.”
“I don’t understand,” said Sieglinde.
“Ach, you think I need a suitcase? At my time of life? What would I want with a suitcase where I am going? But you. My darling, my blood. You will leave. You will leave this place, thank God, because you cannot stay here with these people, with these passionless people. And when you do, this suitcase is for you.”
She gave it back to her granddaughter.
Sieglinde weighed it in her hand, and it felt right. Not too heavy, the right size, none of those annoying buckles. The strap fitted snugly in her fist.
“There is no forest anymore, Granny,” said Sieglinde. “They chopped it down. Father said they chopped it down years ago. There are factories there now.”
“I know where my forest is,” said Greta. She bent down, kissed Sieglinde on the cheek. It still felt awkward, uncomfortable, like being brushed by a wrinkled bag of onions.
Greta walked into the attic. The darkness swallowed her.
Sieglinde waited to see whether she would come out. She didn’t. Sieglinde went home.
Sieglinde tried to think of an excuse to explain where she’d been. But when she got home, Father was still in the study, Mother was still in the kitchen and they hadn’t even noticed she’d gone. They hadn’t cared.
She phoned Klaus. He wasn’t in, she got the answering machine. She told him she had never loved him. She told him she would never see him again.
She took the suitcase up to her bedroom, opened it. It seemed so big inside, you could fit a whole world in there, a whole future. She opened up her wardrobes and closets, worked out what she wanted to take with her. There was nothing. She needed none of it. So she closed up the suitcase again and carried it down the stairs and out of the house and into her new life.
She would fill it up along the way.
ROBERT SHEARMAN is an award-winning writer for stage, television and radio. He was resident playwright at the Northcott Theater in Exeter, and regular writer for Alan Ayckbourn at the Stephen Joseph Theater in Scarborough. He is a recurrent contributor to BBC Radio 4’s afternoon play slot, but he is probably best known for his work on TV’s Doctor Who, bringing the Daleks back to the screen in the BAFTA-winning first series of the revival in an episode nominated for a Hugo Award. His first collection of short stories, Tiny Deaths, was published by Comma Press in 2007 and won the World Fantasy Award. His second collection, Love Songs for the Shy and Cynical, published by Big Finish Productions, won the British Fantasy Award and the Edge Hill Readers’ Prize, and was joint winner of the Shirley Jackson Award. A third, Everyone’s Just So So Special, won the British Fantasy Award. In 2012, the best of his horror fiction—half taken from these previous collections and half new work—was published by ChiZine as Remember Why You Fear Me.
The Three Little Men in the Wood
There was once a man whose wife died, and a woman whose husband died, and the man had a daughter, and the woman also had a daughter.
The girls were acquainted with each other, and went out walking together, and afterward came to the woman in her house. Then said she to the man’s daughter, “Listen, tell your father that I would like to marry him. And then you shall wash yourself in milk every morning, and drink wine. But my own daughter shall wash herself in water and drink water.”
The girl went home, and told her father what the woman had said. The man said, “What shall I do? Marriage is a joy and also a torment.”
At length, as he could come to no decision, he pulled off his boot, and said, “Take this boot, it has a hole in the sole of it. Go with it up to the loft, hang it on the big nail, and then pour water into it. If it hold the water, then I will again take a wife, but if it run through, I will not.”
The girl did as she was bid, but the water drew the hole together and the boot became full to the top.
She informed her father how it had turned out. Then he himself went up, and when he saw that she was right, he went to the widow and wooed her, and the wedding was celebrated.
The next morning, when the two girls got up, there stood before the man’s daughter milk for her to wash in and wine for her to drink, but before the woman’s daughter stood water to wash herself with and water for drinking.
On the second morning, stood water for washing and water for drinking before the man’s daughter as well as before the woman’s daughter.
And on the third morning stood water for washing and water for drinking before the man’s daughter, and milk for washing and wine for drinking before the woman’s daughter. And so it continued.
The woman became her step-daughter’s bitterest enemy, and day by day did her best to treat her still worse. She was also envious because her step-daughter was beautiful and loveable, and her own daughter ugly and repulsive.
Once, in winter, when everything was frozen as hard as a stone, and hill and vale lay covered with snow, the woman made a frock of paper, called her step-daughter, and said, “Here, put on this dress and go out into the wood, and fetch me a little basketful of strawberries—I have a fancy for some.”
“Good heavens,” said the girl, “no strawberries grow in winter. The ground is frozen, and besides, the snow has covered everything. And why am I to go in this paper frock? It is so cold
outside that one’s very breath freezes. The wind will blow through the frock, and the thorns tear it off my body.”
“Will you contradict me?” said the stepmother. “See that you go, and do not show your face again until you have the basketful of strawberries.” Then she gave her a little piece of hard bread, and said, “This will last you the day,” and thought, You will die of cold and hunger outside, and will never be seen again by me.
Then the maiden was obedient, and put on the paper frock, and went out with the basket. Far and wide there was nothing but snow, and not a green blade to be seen.
When she got into the wood she saw a small house out of which peeped three little men. She wished them good day, and knocked modestly at the door. They cried, “Come in!” and she entered the room and seated herself on the bench by the stove, where she began to warm herself and eat her breakfast.
The little men said, “Give us some of it, too.”
“Willingly,” she said, and divided her piece of bread in two and gave them the half.
They asked, “What do you here in the forest in the winter time, in your thin dress?”
“Ah,” she answered, “I am to look for a basketful of strawberries, and am not to go home until I can take them with me.”
When she had eaten her bread, they gave her a broom and said, “Sweep away the snow at the back door.” But when she was outside, the three little men said to each other, “What shall we give her as she is so good, and has shared her bread with us?”
Then said the first, “My gift is, that she shall every day grow more beautiful.”
The second said, “My gift is, that gold pieces shall fall out of her mouth every time she speaks.”
The third said, “My gift is, that a king shall come and take her to wife.”
The girl, however, did as the little men had bidden her, swept away the snow behind the little house with the broom. And what did she find but real ripe strawberries, which came up quite dark-red out of the snow. In her joy she hastily gathered her basket full, thanked the little men, shook hands with each of them, and ran home to take her stepmother what she had longed for so much.
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