Do you know Aaron Huckabee? she asked.
Jake Huckabee's brother? He has a farm over near Andalusia.
Yes.
He's two months behind on his account at the store.
She looked at him the way his mother used to if he ate his salad with the wrong fork. His daughter Ruthann is one of my tenth-graders.
Yes.
She was not at school today. Or rather she was there long enough to leave a sealed note on my desk. Constance rose, went to the table with the flowers, took a piece of paper out of a drawer, and sat back down on the divan.
Dear Miss Baldwin, she read. I am so sorry but I will not be in class ever again. My daddy has gone too far this time and I cannot stay any longer. I am sorry not to tell you face to face but I tried once or twice and I just couldn't. He has beat me more and more and done other things too. It hurts all the time and I can't look in a mirror I hate so what I see. Please don't be mad. I have learned a lot from you. My mother has people down in Mobile and I will go to them. Please don't tell my father. I love you Miss Baldwin you have been very good to me. Please don't tell. Love Ruthann.
She set the letter on the end table and held her head in her hands.
He sat by her and put his arm around her, removed it, put it back. Constance. I am so very sorry this happened.
She tried to tell me and couldn't? Or was I just not listening?
The Huckabees are a bad lot, Franklin said. Aaron's mother's family was the worst sort of trash, always fighting and cutting. My mother said when she was a child they could hear them clear across the creek. I'm not surprised this happened.
She had bruises sometimes, Constance said. I didn't think anything of it. She lived out on a farm. They all had hard labor to do.
This is not your fault.
Ruthann had a strange tone in her voice when she was asking about Romeo and Juliet. I realize that now. I should have realized that then.
This is not your fault. He tightened his arm around her and she leaned into him.
Other things, Franklin? What sort of man could do that?
His head suddenly filled with the room in Storyville and the photograph of the little girl on the vanity. He shuddered and held Constance even tighter. Don't think of it, he whispered. Don't think of such things. Her people in Mobile will see after her.
And who will I see after? She pulled away and walked quickly over to the piano. She stared at the photograph on top. And who will see after me?
I will.
I have been so careful. So very careful. I have preserved myself, preserved us. I wanted to make a difference with the children. She lowered her head. I wanted you to be proud of me.
Oh, Constance, I am. He rose and went to her. He wanted to embrace her fully but simply touched her cheek. I am so very proud. No man could ask for a better woman. You are everything I've ever wanted.
It doesn't matter, does it?
It doesn't matter that I love you?
It doesn't matter how careful we are. Terrible things happen for no reason. We can take all the precautions in the world. We can never leave our own back yard, and a tree will fall. We can confine ourselves to one room, and the lamps will turn over and burn us.
He had never heard her talk like this. It frightened him and made him hold her closer.
Constance—
We can't do anything to stop it, she said.
He turned her face to his and kissed her mouth. In the light from the window her blue eyes seemed nearly black. She kissed him back, wrapped her arms around him. He buried his face in her neck and almost fainted from the pressure and the scent and the warmth.
They returned to the divan and remained for a very long time. Then, without speaking, he rose and took her hand, and they walked side by side into her bedroom.
He had not known she kept a picture of him on her vanity. She took down her hair; it fell almost to her waist. At her request he helped her with the back of her dress, but when he tried to push it off her shoulders she gently stopped him and disrobed herself. The dress rustled noisily to the floor. He helped her again with her corset. To his astonishment, his hands were steady. She stepped away from him and removed her undergarments. She stood with her arms over her breasts; her face looked like her grandmother in the picture on the piano. He took her arms and pulled them gently toward him, kissed her hands, placed them on her breasts, and moved them in slow circles. She lay back on the bed and waited for him to undress. Her hands moved over her breasts, around and around. He came to her as gently as he had kissed her hands. She cried out in pain, once, and he thought his heart would stop, but she wrapped herself more tightly around him and it lasted a long time after that. He had never felt such things. He had never been to New Orleans.
And then when they were finished and lay side by side, Constance cried out in pain again, sat up and grabbed her shoulder. Franklin! It hurts!
My God, Constance, what is it—
It's sticking in me! It's on fire! She rose naked from her bed and clawed frantically at her side, then both her arms. A swath of her hair rose from the left side of her head, stood straight perpendicular to her body, and pulled itself loose. She screamed and fell to the floor, but before he could get to her a voice said: Couldn't wait any longer, eh?
No! Constance shouted. No!
I knew it was only a matter of time. I knew in the end you wouldn't disappoint me. The voice was harsh, distant, metallic, as if it were coming through a telephone from a distant place.
Leave her alone! Franklin shouted. This is not her fault!
Oh, come now. Do you really think I care if you fuck her? Your grandparents fucked like dogs. The words were horrible but flat, without inflection. But they never married each other, and neither will you.
We haven't done anything to you! Franklin was on the floor and held Constance as she sobbed. We haven't done anything—
Of course you have. You in particular, Franklin. You did that whore on Basin Street, didn't you? If you call that doing anything. You did better this time, boy. In Storyville you almost came in your pants before that whore got them off you.
Constance's sobs were uninterrupted; mercifully, she did not seem to take in what the voice was saying. Shut up! he shouted. Stop this!
I will stop when I'm ready to stop, prick. His picture rose from the vanity and smashed against the opposite wall. The corner of the frame scraped the top of his head as it flew by. Constance screamed again. No! Go away, please go away!
Oh, no. I'm just getting started. You're just getting started, too. But you have a lot to get used to, Franklin. The blood for starters. Didn't you smell it, that awful coppery stench when you came in here! Every month, boy, no amount of flowers or perfume can get rid of it—
Shut up!
Welcome to her body, Franklin. There was a rattling sound under the bed. The chamber pot slid out from beneath the dust ruffle, slid across the floor, leaped in the air, and shattered against the wall over the bed. The voiced laughed, an explosive, emotionless sound that frightened Franklin almost more than the rest of it. My bowels moved for thee.
God damn you, stop this!
Constance shits as much as you do.
Stop!
She does other things, too. She takes that picture of you and holds it in one hand and puts the other between her legs. You should hear what she whispers to herself—
Go away! Constance pulled away from him and rose unsteadily to her feet. She whirled in circles, seeking the voice. I don't care! Do what you want! I don't care anymore!
Of course you do.
I don't! I love him!
Of course you do.
I shall marry him!
No, you won't. The room shook as if in an earthquake. Franklin jumped up and grabbed Constance, tried to soothe her as the room rattled around them. He felt something on her back, cried out as he saw huge welts rise and run down to her buttocks. Entertain yourselves, children, but expect my visits often.
Merciful God,
Franklin said. Our father which art in heaven—
Oh, please, the voice said. There was almost a hint of feeling. What did He ever do for you? Your families? Ruthann Huckabee?
—hallowed be Thy name, Thy Kingdom come—
You are bags of shit and piss and blood and you will die. With or without me.
And then the room was still.
When he finally stopped shaking, when Constance was finally still, he pulled on his pants, ran to the parlor, and drew all the drapes. He came back and picked up her clothes and took her with them to the parlor and left her to dress. He returned to her bedroom and put his clothes back on. He tried to pick up some of the shattered things but his hands started shaking again and he went back into the parlor.
Constance sat on the piano bench and did not acknowledge his presence. He sat on the divan and waited.
Finally she said, Take me out of here.
Of course. Come home with me. Or to my father's. There's room.
No, please walk me over to the hotel.
But Constance—
I do not want your father or anyone else to know of this.
What will you tell the clerk?
Something. Please take me there now.
He forced himself to stand. Then he walked her the half-mile to the town's only hotel. At her insistence he left her at the front entrance. As she walked through the doorway he felt his life fading away like the pattern on a much-trampled rug. Then he went home.
He returned to the hotel the next morning, but the clerk said she had left at first light. He endured two agonizing days and sleepless nights, and then he received a telegram from her saying she had gone to stay with her aunt in Tuscaloosa until the repairs on her house were complete. She was gone for over a month.
When she returned she looked well, if a bit thin. She asked him over the second night, and for many nights thereafter. They talked as they had always talked. Her cooking skills were undiminished. She played the piano for him, and he always brought her flowers.
A week after her return, he tried, tentatively, carefully, to talk with her about what had happened. He was afraid she would break down, be overwhelmed by the cold dead terror that had come and the desire that would not leave. But she simply put a finger to his lips and said, Hush, Franklin. It's all right. We are safe.
But Constance, I—
It will not come back, she said. Don't worry, Franklin. It will never come back.
Oh, my darling, my love, please—
Don't worry, Franklin. Dear Franklin. It will never ever come back.
As the weeks turned into months, he came by less frequently. The following year, Constance went back to Tuscaloosa and spent the entire summer with her aunt. When she returned in the fall she was engaged to a medical student. They married the following spring and he returned with her to set up his practice in her town. Franklin left her flowers the night before her wedding but did not attend. She and her husband lived in her house and were never disturbed.
Two years after Constance's wedding, Franklin married a second cousin who had admired him since they were children. By then he had opened more stores in nearby towns. Before his father died, he declared how proud he was of his only son.
Constance quit teaching soon after her marriage but occasionally gave music lessons. She had her husband and her home. Franklin had his family and his business. He found a whore in Mobile once, but he never went back.
* * * *
[Back to Table of Contents]
Serpents
Veronica Schanoes
Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard, but I think—
Oh bondage! Up yours! 1-2-3-4!
—The X-Ray Spex
* * * *
And what does it matter to me whether you're a little girl or a serpent?
—Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Lewis Carroll
* * * *
"Will you take the path of pins or the path of needles?"
It doesn't sound like much of a choice to Charlotte. Dark woods, sharp metal. It sounds like some kind of test. Perhaps if she gives the wrong answer, toads and snakes will fall from her tongue whenever she tries to speak. Charlotte wouldn't mind that. She likes snakes: she likes the way they move, twining themselves along the ground. She thinks she might be a kind of serpent herself, sliding along in a smooth sine wave, wise and cunning. Serpents don't sew.
"The path of pins."
The scenery changes, wavers like a snake curving from side to side, and then slides away. While it is swerving and sliding, Charlotte wonders if the world is a snake as well. That would make her happy, to be a smaller snake inside the belly of a larger snake undulating through tine and space. The past would be the tail and the future the head, and the massive sinuous body would coil and curve over and under and through itself in a Moebius pattern, and the past would be the head and the future would be the tail and the world-serpent would hold its tail in its mouth, a tale in its mouth, its tale in its mouth.
Snakes never blink.
* * * *
Charlotte finds herself on the path of pins. As far as she can see, the dirt path is strewn with pins, safety pins, straight pins, hair pins, hat pins, diaper pins, glittering like scales along the back of a winding serpent. A careless little girl could cut her feet to shreds, but Charlotte is wearing her purple fourteen-hole Doc Martens. She can't even feel the pins grinding into the dirt floor of the forest under her heels. She walks along, imagining the silver serpent that has shed this skin. It would be huge, she thinks, to shed this many scales and the pins would almost be more like stiff little feathers than smoothly overlapping scales. As she begins to imagine the cold sapphire eyes of the pin snake and the sharp metal teeth lining its mouth, she realizes where the pins are coming from. The trees lining this path have pins where the leaves should be. These trees would be impossible to climb—one wrong move and you'd have a face full of blood and scratches. You'd probably need a tetanus shot.
While Charlotte contemplates the trees, something is moving very quickly towards the path, making as little noise as possible. It skids right in front of her like a schoolgirl crossing Park Avenue against the light to get to homeroom before the bell rings. Charlotte is thrown off balance; she tries to stop in mid-stride, and almost instinctively, like a snake sensing motion, she whips around to follow the movement. She tries to balance on one leg, her arms pinwheeling as her left foot waves in the air behind her. She's almost regained her balance when she skids on some pins and falls heavily to the side, bloodying her hands, her knees, and her face.
The sun is setting. Oh my fur and whiskers, I shall be too late.
But Charlotte is not too late; she turns her head aside just in time to avoid an eye full of pins. As she lies where she's fallen, breathing heavily, nonsense phrases slide through her head: it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye, cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye. Not needles. Pins. Charlotte takes a deep breath and stands up. She dusts pins off her blue skirt and white apron, leaving red streaks from her bleeding hands, streaks the same color as her wine-dark motorcycle jacket, with all the zippers and pockets holding her subway pass, silver eyeshadow, red lipstick, liquid black eyeliner, a fake ID that gives her age as twenty-two, a neon-pink cigarette lighter, a pack of cigarettes (she doesn't smoke), some speed, some bobby pins, a thimble, and a box of comfits. She opens her basket and pulls out gauze and tape. After bandaging her knees she puts on a pair of swimming goggles. No pins in her eyes, thank you very much. No needles either. She sets off to find whatever it was that made her lose her balance. She steps off of the path.
Aha, you may be thinking. We all know what happens to little girls who stray from the path. Do we?
As Charlotte walks carefully and firmly through the pin-grass growing in this part of the woods, she thinks about goggles. Do snakes wear goggles? It depends, she thinks, on whether or not they go in the water. Water moccasins go in the water. So do o
ther snakes. She likes to watch them skimming, sliding along the surface of the water, arching their bodies back and forth. She wonders if sea serpents swim the same way, gliding in “S” shapes along the surface of the ocean. Probably not, she decides. Sea serpents swim through the water, not on it. She imagines a sea serpent weightless in a wine-dark sea. She imagines the same serpent pulling a fishing boat down to the ocean floor, twining the rope of its body around the boat as strapping young sailors shriek and hurl themselves overboard. The thoughts make her smile. Sea serpents, she thinks, might wear goggles.
She continues to track the quickly-moving creature. Her Docs make surprisingly little noise as she goes; perhaps she's done this before. She draws closer and sees it is a white rabbit, breathing heavily and shaking. Blood and mud are smeared across its paws and its fur. Its small pink eyes roll around in an even madder manner than usual.
Charlotte wonders whether or not snakes eat rabbits. Surely swallowing a rabbit wouldn't be much of a difficulty for a boa constrictor, she thinks, remembering pictures she's seen of other smaller snakes with rat-shaped lumps in their bodies. As if sensing the predatory turn her thoughts have taken, the rabbit freezes, its ears triangulate frantically trying to catch the sound of her breathing, and all at once it leaps down a rabbit hole that has been concealed under a mound of stacked pins piled precariously like pick-up sticks. Charlotte throws herself after it and is falling, falling down a hole whose walls are made of pins with duck heads holding diapers onto babies’ bottoms, safety pins punched through clothing, straight pins piercing butterflies as they flap their wings vainly, push pins holding Charlotte's second-grade essay on poisonous snakes to a cork board, bobby pins twisting her hair too tightly, safety pins through her earlobes (they had already been pierced so it took only a steady hand and some patience). The hole is quite long and it twists and Charlotte feels as though she is being swallowed by a snake. It is not a bad feeling. She lands with a rush on a leaf pile of pins.
Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet No. 13 Page 9
