15
Grown increasingly and mysteriously insensitive to his wife’s feelings, Mr. X, within their first year of marriage, began to bring home “business associates” (as he called them) to ogle Babygirl, to peek at her in her bath, to whisper licentious remarks in her ears, to touch, fondle, molest—as Mr. X, often smoking a cigar, calmly watched! At first Babygirl was too astonished to comprehend, then she burst into tears of indignation and hurt, then she pleaded with the brute to be spared, then she flew into a tantrum tossing silky garments and such into a suitcase, then she was lying in a puddle on the bathroom floor, nights and days passed in a delirium, her keeper fed her grudgingly and at irregular intervals, there were promises of sunshine, greenery, Christmas gifts, promises made and withheld, then one day a masked figure appeared in the doorway, in leather military regalia, gloved hands on his hips, brass-studded belt, holster and pistol riding his hip, gleaming black leather boots the toes of which Babygirl eagerly kissed, groveling before him, twining her long curly-cinnamon hair around his ankles. Begging, Have mercy! don’t hurt me! I am yours! in sickness and in health as I gave my vow to God! And assuming the masked man was in fact Mr. X (for wasn’t this a reasonable assumption, in these circumstances?) Babygirl willingly accompanied him to the master bedroom, to the antique brass four-postered bed, and did not resist his wheezing, straining, protracted and painful lovemaking, if such an act can be called lovemaking, the insult of it! the pain of it! and not till the end, when the masked figure triumphantly removed his mask, did Babygirl discover that he was a stranger—and that Mr. X himself was standing at the foot of the bed, smoking a cigar, calmly observing. In the confusion of all that followed, weeks, months, there came a succession of “business associates,” never the same man twice, as Mr. X grew systematically crueler, hardly a gentleman any longer, forcing upon his wife as she lay trussed and helpless in their marriage bed a man with fingernails filed razor-sharp who lacerated her tender flesh, a man with a glittering scaly skin, a man with a turkey’s wattles, a man with an ear partly missing, a man with a stark-bald head and cadaverous smile, a man with infected draining sores like exotic tattoos stippling his body, and poor Babygirl was whipped for disobedience, Babygirl was burnt with cigars, Babygirl was slapped, kicked, pummeled, near-suffocated and near-strangled and near-drowned, she screamed into her saliva-soaked gag, she thrashed, convulsed, bled in sticky skeins most distasteful to Mr. X who then punished her additionally, as a husband will do, by withholding his affection.
16
So light-headed with hunger was he, hiding in terror from his enemies beneath a pile of bricks, he began to gnaw at his own tail—timidly at first, then more avidly, with appetite, unable to stop, his poor skinny tail, his twenty pink toes and pads, his hind legs, choice loins and chops and giblets and breast and pancreas and brains and all, at last his bones are picked clean, the startling symmetry and beauty of the skeleton revealed, now he’s sleepy, contented and sleepy, washes himself with fastidious little scrubbing motions of his paws then curls up in the warm September sun to nap. A sigh ripples through him: exquisite peace.
17
Except: two gangling neighborhood boys creep up on him dozing atop his favorite brick, capture him in a net and toss him squeaking in terror into a cardboard box, slam down the lid that’s pocked with air holes, he’s delivered by bicycle to a gentleman with neatly combed white hair and a cultivated voice who pays the boys five dollars each for him, observes him crouched in a corner of the box rubbing his hands delightedly together chuckling softly, Well! you’re a rough-looking fella aren’t you! To his considerable surprise, the white-haired gentleman feeds him; holds him up, though not unkindly, by the scruff of his neck, to examine him, the sleek perfectly-formed parts of him, the rakish incisors most particularly. Breathing audibly, murmuring, with excited satisfaction. Yes. I believe you will do, old boy.
18
No longer allowed out of the house, often confined to the bedroom suite on the second floor, poor Babygirl nonetheless managed to adjust to the altered circumstances of her life with commendable fortitude and good humor. Spending most of her days lying languorously in bed, doing her nails, devouring gourmet chocolates brought her by one or another of Mr. X’s business associates, sometimes, in a romantic mood, by the unpredictable Mr. X himself, she watched television (the evangelical preachers were her favorites), complained to herself in the way of housewives in America, tended to her wounds, clipped recipes from magazines, gossiped over the telephone with her female friends, shopped by catalogue, read her Bible, grew heavier, sullen, apprehensive of the future, plucked her eyebrows, rubbed fragrant creams into her skin, kept an optimistic attitude, made an effort. Of the disturbing direction in which her marriage was moving she tried not to think for Babygirl was not the kind of wife to whine, whimper, nag, not Babygirl so imagine her surprise and horror when, one night, Mr. X arrived home and ran upstairs to the bedroom in which, that day, she’d been confined, tied to the four brass posts of the marital bed by white silken cords, and in triumph threw open his camel’s hair coat, See what I’ve brought for you, my dear! unzipping his trousers with trembling fingers and as Babygirl stared incredulous out he leapt—squeaking, red-eyed, teeth bared and glistening with froth, stiff curved tail erect. Babygirl’s screams were heartrending.
19
Mr. X and his (male) companions observed with scientific detachment the relationship between Babygirl and He (as, in codified shorthand, they referred to him): how, initially, the pair resisted each other most strenuously, even hysterically, Babygirl shrieking even through the gag stuffed in her mouth as He was netted in the bed with her, such a struggle, such acrobatics, He squeaking in animal panic edged with indignant rage, biting, clawing, fighting as if for His very life, and Babygirl, despite her flaccid muscles and her seemingly indolent ways, putting up a fight as if for her very life! And this went on for hours, for an entire night, and the night following, and the night following that. And there was never anything so remarkable on Burlingame Way, the attractive residential street where Mr. X made his home.
20
He did not want this, no certainly he did not want this, resisting with all the strength of his furry little being, as, with gloved hands, Mr. X forced him there—poor Babygirl spread-eagled and helpless bleeding from a thousand welts and lacerations made by his claws and teeth and why was he being forced snout-first, and then head-first, then his shoulders, his sleek muscular length, why there—in there—so he choked, near-suffocated, used his teeth to tear a way free for himself yet even as he did so Mr. X with hands trembling in excitement, as his companions, gathered round the bed, watched in awe pushed him in farther, and then farther—into the blood-hot pulsing toughly elastic tunnel between poor Babygirl’s fatty thighs—and still farther until only the sleek-furry end of his rump and his trailing hind legs and, of course, the eight-inch pink tail were visible. His panicked gnawing of the fleshy walls that so tightly confined him released small geysers of blood that nearly drowned him, and the involuntary spasms of clenching of poor Babygirl’s pelvic muscles nearly crushed him, thus how the struggle would have ended, if both he and Babygirl had not lost consciousness at the same instant, is problematic. Even Mr. X and his companions, virtually beside themselves in unholy arousal, were relieved that, for that night, the agon had ceased.
21
As, at her martyrdom, at the stake in Rouen, as the flames licked mindlessly ever higher and higher to consume her, to turn her to ashes, Jeanne d’Arc is reported to have cried out “Jesu! Jesu! Jesu!” in a voice of rapture.
22
And who would clean up the mess. And who, with a migraine, sanitary pad soaked between her chafed thighs, she’s fearful of seeing her swollen jaw, blackened eye in any mirrored surface weeping quietly to herself, padding gingerly about in her bedroom slippers, mock-Japanese quilted housecoat. The only consolation is at least there’s a TV in most of the rooms so, even when the vacuum is roaring, she isn’t alone: there’
s Reverend Tim, there’s Brother Jessie, there’s Sweet Alabam’ MacGowan. A consolation at least. For, not only did Babygirl suffer such insult and ignominy at the hands of the very man who, of all the world, was most responsible for her emotional well-being, not only was she groggy in the aftermath of only dimly remembered physical trauma, running the risk, as she sensed, of infection, sterility, and a recrudescence of her old female maladies,—not only this but she was obliged to clean up the mess next morning, who else. Laundering the sheets, blood-stained sheets are no joke. On her hands and knees trying (with minimal success) to remove the stains from the carpet. Vacuum the carpet. And the dirt-bag is full and there’s a problem putting in a new dirt-bag, there always is. Faint-headed, wracked several times with white-hot bolts of pain so she had to sit, catch her breath. And the pad between her legs soaked hard in blackish blood like blood-sausage. And the steel wool disintegrating in her fingers as gamely she tries to scour the casserole dish clean, dissolves in tears, Oh! where has love gone! so one evening he surprises her, in that melancholy repose, the children are in on it too, what’s today but Babygirl’s birthday and she’d tormented herself thinking no one would remember but as they sweep into the restaurant, the Gondola that’s one of the few good Italian restaurants in the city where you can order pizza too, the staff is waiting, Happy Birthday! balloons, half-chiding there’s a chorus, Did you think we’d forgotten? and Babygirl orders a sloe gin fizz which goes straight to her head and she giggles and suppresses a tiny belch patting her fingers to her mouth, later her husband is scolding one of the boys but she’s going to steer clear of the conflict, goes to the powder room, checks her makeup in the rose-lit flattering mirrors seeing yes, thank God the bruise under her left eye is fading, then she takes care to affix squares of toilet paper to the toilet seat to prevent picking up an infectious disease, since AIDS Babygirl is even more methodical, then she’s sitting on the toilet her mind for a moment blissful and empty until, turning her head, just happening to turn her head, though probably she sensed its presence, she sees, not six inches away, on the slightly grimy sill of a frosted-glass window, the red-blinking eyes of a large rodent, oh dear God is it a rat, these eyes fixed upon hers, her heart gives a violent kick and nearly stops. Poor Babygirl’s screams penetrate every wall of the building.
© 1992 by The Ontario Review Inc.
Originally published in MetaHorror,
edited by Dennis Etchison.
Reprinted by permission of John Hawkins and Associates, Inc.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Joyce Carol Oates is not only one of the most acclaimed authors of our time—her more-than-forty novels, novellas, plays, short stories, poetry, and nonfiction works have earned her a National Book Award, two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and a Pulitzer Prize nomination—but she’s also an acclaimed horror and suspense author who is a multiple winner of the Bram Stoker Award, a recipient of the World Fantasy Award, and the first female author to receive the Horror Writers Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Her genre works include the novel Zombie (1995), the short story collections The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares (2011) and Black Dahlia & White Rose (2012), and, under the pseudonym Rosamond Smith, Starr Bright Will Be With You Soon (1999). She also edited American Gothic Tales (1996) and Tales of H. P. Lovecraft (2007). This year she retires from Princeton University, where she’s been teaching since 1978.
To learn more about the author and this story, read the Author Spotlight. Also be sure to check out our feature interview with the author in this issue.
Black and White Sky
Tanith Lee
I
Almost Morning; it is early summer, not quite five o’clock. The sky has a colourless lightness, faintly golden in the east across the fields. In the woods birds sing in pale, clear sprinklings of sound.
From a copse one magpie rises. It flies straight upward.
There is a slight visual softness to all distances, perhaps mist, or haze. The air is fresh, but not unwarm.
A second magpie rises, this time not from the copse.
The golden edge of the sky intensifies, begins to dazzle. The sun is nearly free of the horizon.
A third magpie rises.
A fourth magpie rises.
The bird-chorus redoubles, eagerly encouraging the dawn. From the farm over towards the main road, some heavy vehicle or machinery rumbles.
A fifth magpie rises.
The sun rises.
A sixth magpie rises.
The sky floods with shell pink and golden lacquer.
A seventh magpie rises . . .
• • • •
It was the day when Alice came to clean Cigarette Cottage. Of course, that was not the cottage’s proper name. After it was built in the 1930s someone pastorally-minded had christened the place “Woodbine Cottage.” And following various renovations, and the removal of the name-plate above the door, “Woodbine” still stuck.
But George Anderton, moving in during 2003, coined his own private version of the name, in memory of those cigarettes he could recall his grandmother puffing at, in the days when smoking was a pleasant habit rather than a capital offence.
George himself had smoked, but no longer did so. He had never really been that serious a smoker. But, although having successfully given it up some twenty years before, he still occasionally missed them. The act perhaps, more than any hit.
“I’ve counted twenty-four magpies just as I was walking along the lane from the Duck,” said Alice, as she put down her bag and accepted a mug of coffee. “What do you think of that?”
“Triple hell,” said George, idly.
Alice laughed. She was only about forty, and very attractive. She made no secret of the fact she found George, a man more than ten years older, attractive too. But she was happily married and so would, hopefully, never impinge on George’s solitary country life. He had given up London rather as he gave up smoking, missed the act, or idea of it, but not constantly. Women he had not given up. But there had been plenty—too many, he supposed—in his previous life. To be truly alone at last was restful.
Once a fortnight Alice came in, to dust, hoover, and bleach the bathroom and the cooker. Now and then she cleaned the windows unasked. She charged the going rate, damaged nothing, did not get on his nerves, and was out of the house in never more than three hours.
“Triple hell—why’s that?”
“The old rhyme,” said George. “One for sorrow, two for joy, that stuff. There are several versions. The ones I know all end at nine magpies. And one of them finishes ‘Seven’s for Heaven, and Eight’s for Hell.’ So: three times eight equals twenty-four—triple hell.”
“And what’s nine?”
“The Devil.”
“Oh, you,” she said, beaming at him and liberating the dusters.
He was a writer; novels, and even some stage plays put on at the Lyric and the Royal Court. Now all he seemed to turn out were short stories, but his reputation, if not major, was not quite non-existent. To Alice, he thought, he was a curiosity, maybe a sort of catch in the cleaning market. The rest of her clients were more usual, weekenders or locals with enough money, plus of course the Duck pub up the lane.
When he went upstairs to his workroom (his study, Alice called it), he glanced from the window. Downstairs by now the trees in the small front garden, and the woods to the back, were thickly leafed, obscuring much of the sky. From the cottage’s upper story, however, he could see out across the shorter trees to the fields, as far as the farm. So he noticed a magpie fly up at once. And then, about half-a-minute later, another. And then, approximately equally spaced, several more. They rose singly, each from a different area, from behind the ring of trees on the fields’ edge, from the fields themselves, from over the farm, out where the main road to Stantham cut ugly through the curve of the landscape.
Downstairs Alice was gently clinking something. George stood at the window and watched the magpies rising, he thought at first e
very one from a different spot, yet now and then another one would go up later from the same spot. There seemed always a similar interval, though he did not bother to check it exactly. It was curious. He wondered briefly what had caused it, so many of them, and so regular in rising. But then he told himself to stop prevaricating and go back to the computer. Most writers used almost anything, he knew but too well, to absent themselves from work.
• • • •
It is midday. The church clock in the village a mile off chimes out twelve. The light is very bright now, metallic and clear. It shines on the hills that rim the distance, and sparks up the windows of the cottage. A woman has cycled away about an hour before. The man is working diligently in the room on the upper story, drinking his fourth mug of coffee now. He is on a roll with the story he writes, does not wish yet to stop for lunch.
A sluggish car lurches along the lane, heading for the pub. Bees buzz, and a few grasshoppers creak in the hedge. A gray squirrel performs acrobatics in the garden trees, then bounds overland for the wood.
A magpie rises.
It is now the most recent example of hundreds. The man in the cottage might have seen, if he had been looking.
It flies straight upwards, straight up into the glare of the zenith sun. Light digests it. It has vanished.
Nightmare Magazine Issue 25, Women Destroy Horror! Special Issue Page 10
