I turn back to the painting then, for the first time since the old man began to relate his tale. The insane genius of the irredeemably youthful Michelangelo juxtaposed with the ingenious insanity of the centuries-old monk.
“Where is it now?” I ask.
“It is still in here,” he says, tapping his head with a bony finger. “But it is sleeping now. It grew bored of this game long ago, but it will never let me go…that is my eternal torment.”
“But how...“ I begin.
“No, now it is my turn.” The old man breaks off as a hacking cough assaults him. When it subsides at last he says, between wheezing gasps, “Do you believe in God?”
I hesitate, my tongue already against my teeth. “Yes.”
“Then if you believe in a loving God, the God of Abraham and Moses, God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, then you must also believe in the Other, the Enemy who would oppose him at every turn.”
I pause again before answering, dimly aware of the tapping footsteps of others moving about us in the gallery, beyond our frozen bubble of time.
“Yes. I suppose I do.”
“Then you must know that what I have told you is true,” the old man says, his voice become a bestial growl, his throat still thick with phlegm. Or is there some other reason for the animalistic quality it has acquired.
I look into his eyes, and something stares back. I take a shocked step backwards, unable to help myself, instinct overcoming reason again in that moment.
“Then you understand the nature of my torment,” the old man coughs, his heavily-accented voice as cracked with age and wheezing as before.
I turn back to the painting one last time – to the unreal scene exquisitely realised in oils and tempera – and I find myself gazing into those same inhuman yet human eyes again, eyes set within a green-furred simian face – or is it more like that of a bat?
I hear gibbering voices within my mind, like audible memories I can have no recollection of, and I clutch at my arms, feeling claws snag within the flesh there.
I feel light-headed. The oils shift and swim before my unfocused eyes. Something within the painting moves.
Those eyes, as black as oblivion, blink.
And in that moment, I know torment too.
K Is For Kilcrops
The Twistweaver’s Son
Lily Childs
“...certain strange children called Kilcrops, the child of the Devil, either laid as a changeling in the cradle, or begotten by the Nix...he sucks his mother dry & all the nurses that comes to him & moreover eats as much as two threshers.”
Robert Southey to Charles Watkin Williams Wynn, 17 December 1798
Seven layers of leaves rose up into the forest in a tumult of golden green, scattering away from the creature as it tore through bleeding trees. Carolyn had called him a beast of a man, which only made him lick her throat and pull her once again onto his groin. He thought of her now as his bare feet slowed on the journey; when Duval first brought the young English woman home as his wife there really had been no choice – for Duval. Had the demon possessed a heart, it would have quivered with pity – but to trust to fortune in this godforsaken place – the man was a fool. He deserved to lose.
The trot became a long, loping pace. With a roar of ecstasy the creature extended its limbs toward soil and sky, stretching gristle and flesh. A new, fragile skin quickly formed, painted with Autumn bruises; all semblance of Maurice Duval erased.
Released, the being entered the nearest tree, pissed away the Duvals’ desperation and laid itself down to rest.
They called him Le Chênard – Oak Man, or Twistweaver – an entity that roamed heathen woods seeking human souls, ever creeping, ever entwining itself into the fronds of mortal minds. The beast paid no heed to the names as long as he could run free and slake his wild hunger as he had for an eternity. But this woman had exhausted even he with her desires and demands. And so he had taken his leave, returned a damaged and spent soul to her husband, and vowed to slumber for five years and a day. The woman Carolyn would wait for him – he knew it.
Le Chênard cocooned itself, but even hibernation failed to ebb the memories away. Thoughts of their first encounter sparked and throbbed; her rose-blossom scent, her gilded, twistable mane that slipped across her shoulders in a golden sheen. She’d smiled as her husband approached from behind to run his fingers down her spine. Unlike the neighbouring farmers that leered and muttered obscenities whenever a female happened to pass by Maurice was a gentleman, had bought himself an education and kept himself clean. His eyes shone as black as the truffles hunted by his beloved pigs and she adored the sad kindness in them.
“Un jour...” he repeatedly said. “One day, we’ll have enough money to leave Noirchapel and move to the city - Angoulême, Paris even.”
Maurice’s fingers crept to her neck and Carolyn shuddered with his touch. She reached up to stroke his hand, and stopped. His skin felt rough and callused, not like her husband’s at all. She turned, fearing an intruder but only Maurice stood there, as he should.
“What have you been doing?” Carolyn stood up, astonished at his appearance. Maurice’s hair waved in wild ribbons as he ran filthy fingers through it. Mud had greyed in splotches across his unshaven face. He breathed hard, heavy intakes of air that swelled the chest beneath his shirt. He grabbed Carolyn’s wrist.
“Undo it,” he said.
Carolyn Duval looked straight into eyes that were darker even than Maurice’s, and tore the clothes from the imposter’s body; Paris forgotten.
***
James Bailey chewed at his oiled moustache whilst his wife fussed back and forth, picking up ornaments to wipe away invisible dust.
“Just leave it, Beth. We pay Higgins to clean the house; she’ll keep it straight while you’re away.”
As long as she doesn’t keep you straight, Elizabeth thought. She didn’t trust James with women but it was nothing compared to what he might do with their money. Her money. When she spoke to the bank about releasing funds for her trip she discovered James had been hacking at it with a knife made of greed; his salary from Fordham’s being withdrawn as fast as it was paid in. As she managed the household bills and wages she could only wonder what James was spending it on.
She resolved to talk with her husband as soon as she returned from France. In the meantime she opened a further account in her sole name into which she transferred the majority of the remaining funds, with specific instructions that Mr Bailey was to have no access under any circumstances. The bank teller raised a knowing eyebrow at Elizabeth’s request but nodded sagely as she signed the documents.
Even as she left the bank she wondered what her late father had seen in James Bailey that she had missed; his will made no bones about his opinion of the man she had married, making it clear that under the Law of Coveture Elizabeth, and Elizabeth only would inherit his money and property in its entirety, and in the case of her death the family home, Bridge House would pass to her sister Madame Carolyn Duval of Noirchapel, France. The will then gave a long list of alternative relatives who would be next in line, before declaring that no child of the Bailey or Duval marriages would be entitled to inherit, a statement that had grieved Elizabeth at the time. It no longer mattered; Elizabeth had lost one baby at six weeks and not been able to carry several others to full-term. James soon gave up on her, seeking affection and spreading his arrogant charm – and no doubt Elizabeth’s money - elsewhere.
“I said – if only you’d listen – that I forbid you to go on this fruitless trip.” James pushed back the chair and approached his wife. “You haven’t spoken to the damned woman in six years and now you’re dropping everything to run to her aid.”
Elizabeth tried to pull away as he grasped her wrists; his clawed accountants’ fingers pressed into her flesh.
“Forbid all you like James, I’m going. She needs me. Whatever differences we had, they’re in the past.”
“She’s after our money, more like.”
&nbs
p; The pair stared at each other, two strangers. Elizabeth sighed.
“Not everything’s about money, James.” The frown that creased James Bailey’s brow revealed he thought otherwise. It was enough; Elizabeth gave in to her reluctant fears and silently vowed to start divorce proceedings on her return. She would not mention it now, or risk coming home to a house stripped of its belongings, already empty of love.
The journey to Bordeaux by sea took its toll. Violently sick the entire passage, Elizabeth gladly accepted assistance in leaving the boat from a blithe married couple visiting the city on business. The wife offered to enquire whether a suite might be available at their hotel and Elizabeth had just about enough strength to confirm she would only require a single room, and would be moving on as soon as she felt sufficiently recovered.
“As you wish,” the woman smiled with tight lips, and helped her into their cab.
The port struck Elizabeth as a strange mix of extremes – filthy street children begged outside fine, majestic buildings; girls she assumed to be prostitutes sidled up to well-dressed gents, sometimes taking off with them arm in arm, otherwise raising a fist and spitting out expletives.
Elizabeth closed her eyes and dozed the short thirty-minute journey to Hotel des Cornasses where indeed, a single room was available.
Perfect.
“C’est parfait,” she said, her lips barely open.
Elizabeth slept around the clock, awakening only to an increasingly persistent knock at the bedroom door.
“Are you alright in there?”A familiar high-pitched voice. “Bertie and I would like to invite you to dine with us this evening. Shall we say seven o’clock in the Orangerie? Mrs Bailey?”
The room swayed as Elizabeth dragged herself to her feet. She stumbled to the door and pulled it open a crack.
“Seven” she replied, her voice a slur of exhaustion. “I’d love to.”
They parted two days later with a warm embrace. Elizabeth exchanged calling cards with the couple and promised to visit them in London the next time she had to go up to town. In the carriage she read Carolyn’s letter yet again.
My dear sister. I no longer wish the troubles of our past to mar our blessed friendship. It is with regret that I write to you under such difficult circumstances but I must beg your help. Maurice is all but a dead man; he has lost the light from his eyes, with which I fell in love, and sleeps outside with the pigs. Dear Beth, he even grunts like them.
We have a son, Jacques. He is five years of age. Forgive me for not informing you of his arrival, but all has not been well since the moment I bore him, in fact carrying him was a trial I never wish to repeat. I hate to write ill of any child but Beth, he is not normal and has me on my knees with worry.
I am not sure I can survive for much longer here, in this rotten place where the men have mad expressions and their wives curse that I am corrupt – corrupt! They talk about le Chênard, some evil forest spirit they accuse me of coupling with, but Beth – my dear Beth – there has only ever been Maurice, and now he is lost to me too.
Please, I am asking you to find it in your heart to help me escape this wretched village, this wretched existence – and take me home, me and Jacques.
In the hope of seeing your loving face once more I send my sincere best wishes.
Your sister, Carolyn Grace Duval.
According to the date, the letter was already a month old before Carolyn even sent it – and a further six weeks passed before it dropped, crumpled and torn onto the Bailey’s doormat. Elizabeth held the paper with shaking fingers, disturbed by her sister’s base language. To discuss the nature of relationships and childbirth – even when corresponding with one’s own sister – was highly inappropriate. The poor girl really had to be at her wits’ end. And this child – Jacques...Elizabeth fought to dampen the twinge of frustration that Carolyn could dismiss the boy so, when she would give anything to have a little one to care for and educate in the ways of the world. Her sister was still selfish then, but for the moment Elizabeth decided to overlook that fault in the younger woman’s make-up.
At the end of the first, long day on the road the carriage driver pulled up to a small auberge in the town of Ménesplet and asked Madame to wait in the cab. A few minutes later he emerged from the hostellerie, his long moustaches moist from some liquor, quickly imbibed, and confirmed they could eat and sleep there that night with an early start the following morning.
Elizabeth requested to remain in her room, where dinner – a warming beef and vegetable stew served with a small jug of red wine and a characterless slab of cake – was brought to her door. The wine was as welcome as the stew and as she drifted off on the hard mattress Elizabeth heard the cab driver’s drunken laughter rise up the stairs in louder and louder blasts until the happy sounds flew away into the skies of France.
Breakfast, by contrast was a grumpy affair. Elizabeth insisted on eating in the small dining-room where a girl with a lazy eye cut a chunk of bread and served it with a sticky brown confiture and a small cup of thick coffee. The driver, less jolly than the previous night spoke in quiet tones to the landlady in the kitchen. From the snatches of conversation Elizabeth deduced the man had spent the night in the woman’s bed. If that was what her money was paying for she would be less than generous with her tip.
The sun rose, vaguely visible behind oppressive clouds that threw down stinging squalls of rain and hail. Elizabeth pulled her cloak tight around her shoulders and wished she had packed something more substantial to wear. Her single bag contained two dresses, some undergarments and her toiletries plus a new dress for Carolyn and a tin soldier for Jacques.
The journey seemed to last forever, longer than the sea passage and the previous day’s drive put together. Rough roads had Elizabeth sickening once again; she forced herself to eat the mutton and now-dried bread prepared by the auberge landlady but it did nothing to settle her stomach.
Outside, the forest grew thicker and more menacing. Elizabeth imagined she saw creatures running alongside the carriage, wild beasts with tusks and tiny feet; tall, spectral men looming above the cab to flit in and out of the trees. Elizabeth cursed her imagination and put the hallucinations down to her nausea and the greasy sheep fat slithering through her gut.
Finally the carriage slowed and turned into a series of curling lanes. Small cottages dotted the landscape, all surrounded by muddy mires. Just when they appeared to be leaving the disparate community the driver slowed and called out to a group of raggedy children playing in the road.
“Maison Duval?”
Two girls pointed down the street. “Gauche.”
They set off again at a trot then took a left turn onto a short lane, where the driver pulled the horses to a halt. Elizabeth peered from the window; the house looked to be in a better state than the others in the area but the land was overgrown. Fowl of various breeds walked freely around a grubby yard; pigs rolled and snorted in a flurry of congealed filth. Elizabeth opened the carriage door – the driver offering no assistance. He fetched her luggage, threw it down and shoved a hand under her nose, demanding the fee for this leg of the journey. They had already negotiated a price before leaving Bordeaux as well as the subsequent return to the city in two days’ time. The driver grunted when Elizabeth questioned him about this again, confirming he would return – as requested – to collect her and any additional passengers on the Friday morning.
Uttering weak thanks Elizabeth picked up her luggage. A small gate opened onto the Duvals’ path; its hinges creaked as she pushed through and she scooped up her skirts to avoid dragging them in the mud.
“Good evening,” she called as she approached the half-open front door. “Carolyn, are you home?”
A sound of scraping furniture and metal clattered within the house, but no-one came out. Even in the fast-approaching dusk Elizabeth became aware of a shadow growing at her back. She turned on her heel and there, an echo of the man Carolyn had married, stood Maurice. Skeletal and bedraggled the farmer’s shou
lders slumped, forlorn; his black eyes dull within yellow pits.
“She is not here.”
The stench of his breath and the man’s statement knocked Elizabeth back a step. Had she come all this way for nothing?
“Where is she, Maurice? What has happened to you all?”
Duval’s gaze drifted towards the woods.
“Là-bas. She’s out there. She runs with the Devil, le Chênard.”
Elizabeth blinked, what was this madness?
“Come Maurice.” She pulled her brother-in-law’s tattered sleeve, gently but with firm resolve. “Let’s go inside and you can tell me what is going on here.”
“Non!” Duval snatched his arm away. “Not...there.” He nodded at the front door. “We must go to the back, to my rooms.” He gathered himself, standing taller than before and reached out to take Elizabeth’s bag.
“No,” she said. “It’s fine.”
“I insist. You are a guest in my home.” Duval pulled the small bag from her hand and limped across the yard. Elizabeth once again hitched up her dress and tiptoed after him to the back of the house.
He told her everything, as he understood it.
When he first brought Carolyn back to the village in which generations of Duvals had farmed their life was filled with aspirations and dreams. Elizabeth recalled the man she had met only once before – an articulate and charming Frenchman with a positive future ahead of him as a trader of expensive truffles and fine cognacs. But her father had not approved of his youngest daughter’s choice of suitor and it transpired, contrary to what Elizabeth had always believed, that it was Carolyn who convinced Maurice to elope, marrying him in a small chapel on the Kent coast where she claimed to be ‘of age’, and that her parents were deceased.
Maurice talked of Carolyn’s exuberance and joy of life, and how she had assured him all would be well. But within weeks of ‘coming home’ Maurice had fallen ill, whole days passing without him being able to recall what he had done, where he had been. Yet conversely, Carolyn seemed to thrive.
The Demonologia Biblica Page 14
