“The Mad Devon Daily. Murders. Two in two days. The local authorities are baffled, but of course that is hardly news.” He handed down a heavily-creased clipping. They were brutal, bloody killings. Although the paper didn’t really spell it out, he could surmise that some dismemberment had been involved. “Youngsters, really,” Jacob said, “Teenagers. Not wanting to jump to any conclusions, of course, but I would be remiss if I did not consider the possibility that Arthur, due to the mental deterioration common to his kind in their later years, has broken the rules.”
Richard stared at him. “He wouldn’t.”
“Some have. You know that. I have cautioned you.”
“We can’t let this –”
“Of course not. But I emphasize that we do not know this breach has occurred, simply that it is a possibility. We have to be informed, we have to be cautious, but we must be fair about this. It is our obligation. I just wanted you to be aware, so that you will remain on the alert. If Arthur has suffered some kind of breakdown, then I assure you we will act; there are policies in place for just such an occurrence, which all parties have agreed to. But just be cautious. Keep on the alert. Keep Serena close to you. Arthur may be old, but an undiminished wildness resides there, as has always been the case. He’s not to be played with.”
Jacob retrieved his clipping, stuck it into his back pocket, and with his usual abruptness returned to work.
Something rustled the dried vegetation beneath the gazebo. Richard leaned and peered past the latticework surrounding the gazebo’s base. Cold stared out at him. Cold blinked its eyes, then went away before Richard could decide exactly what had been there.
He straightened and looked around. He could see Serena out in the field, sitting up on an outcropping of black rock. Richard looked around for the running figure with the long red hair, the loping old man, but didn’t see him. He began striding briskly in Serena’s direction.
He was almost at her side when he saw the blood spot on her bright yellow shorts. Her face was washed out, pained looking. He felt a sudden panic, reached for her shoulder, started to say something, then realized where the blood came from. He was embarrassed. He drew his hand back, and then was ashamed of himself.
“It hurts, Daddy.”
Richard eased up on the rock beside her. “I know, sweetie. It’s” – he gestured awkwardly – “it’s what happens to you when you become a woman.” The words sounded awkward to his own ears, stupid, but he had no others to offer her.
“And that old man scared me.”
He stared at her. “What old man?” he asked as softly as he could.
“That old man. He ran right by me, and I didn’t even hear him coming. Like he was nothing but wind.”
Richard followed her gesture. Lovelace was running by the trees. At that distance his stride looked impossibly broad, his legs inhumanly long. “Did he touch you?”
“What?”
“Did he touch you?!”
Serena looked up at him, startled. “No, daddy.” Her voice quavered.
Richard hugged her to him, feeling clumsy and ridiculous. He tried to ignore the faint scent of her blood.
In the distance he could see Arthur Lovelace standing against the backdrop of dark trees, watching them, his blood-colored hair billowing in the wind.
“THIS IS MY eighteenth – no, twentieth year here. I imagine it must feel odd at times, Mister – oh, may I call you Richard?” Richard nodded his assent. “Very good. I was simply saying, Richard – I do prefer referring to the Deadfall’s various proprietors by their first names – it must feel odd to have guests who know far more about the Deadfall than you may ever be privy to.”
Lovelace had taken the chair next to him so quietly that Richard was startled to see his sudden appearance. Certainly in his formal smoke-gray suit, his long hair blown out like a copper-colored cloud, he appeared nothing less than a hallucination.
Enid had just handed Richard a cup of tea. Escape would have been awkward. He looked up – she was still there, waiting for… what? His dismissal? It wasn’t like her – usually she was gone by the time he’d realized she was there. But she wasn’t looking at him – she was gazing at Lovelace, her eyebrows raised, mouth slightly pouted. He could detect no fearfulness in her. On the contrary, she appeared curious, slightly disapproving of what she saw, and maybe – if he wasn’t reading into it – somewhat disgusted.
“Thank you, Enid.”
She nodded, then much to his surprise, smiled, replying, “Of course, sir,” curtsied and left. Richard almost spilled his tea at her obeisance. Clearly an act for Lovelace’s benefit.
“For me as well, if you don’t mind.” Lovelace growled the words.
Enid paused in the distance, and without turning replied, “Of course.”
Richard glanced over at Lovelace, who looked displeased. “It does feel strange at times. But Jacob has shown me a great deal, Mr. Lovelace. More than you would know.”
Lovelace looked at him quizzically, then let a mild chuckle slip. Richard felt foolish, a bragging boy caught in his bravado.
Enid brought Lovelace a cup of tea. She stretched out her arms to deliver it into his palms. Steam billowed from the liquid but he did not wince. The skin of his palms looked worn, rock-like. “I trust this is strong, undiluted by condiments?” Lovelace asked. Enid nodded curtly and escaped.
As Lovelace drank the tea, in surprisingly delicate sips, Richard noted subtle changes in the man. The cheeks flushed even more, as if the mere sensation of liquid in his mouth was exciting him. The nostrils flared to an almost grotesque width. Lovelace’s head eased back and his mouth fell open, as if he had fallen asleep, although Richard knew he was wide awake – the body appeared tense, expectant.
Across the lobby, Serena was poised by the front desk, her elbow draped casually on the counter, watching. Lovelace’s eyes were pointed decidedly in her direction, his nostrils expanded ever wider, smelling her.
Richard leaned forward slightly and tried to see Lovelace’s teeth. They weren’t unduly long, but the surfaces seemed to have more sharp edges than normal teeth – he could imagine them scratching the inside of their own mouth. They appeared meticulously cared for.
And then Lovelace was speaking to him again. “The first time I stayed here, it was a Mr. Grant who was the manager. William. A quiet, dark man, that one, said almost nothing. As ‘other’ as his guests. That one didn’t die, I believe. He was simply lost on a midnight’s journey to the lavatory. Perhaps he booked himself into a room.” Lovelace’s chuckle made no sound this time.
Richard remained silent for a long time. His tea was cold when he began drinking it again. Then, “Why do you come here, Mr. Lovelace?”
Lovelace turned his head and stared at Richard – a rotation seemingly independent of the rest of his body. “A manager has never asked me that before. I’m not even sure if it would be considered bad manners.” He tilted his head slightly. The mouth grew redder. “I can be myself here, young man. I do not normally have such luxury. Surely you can understand that much?”
“I can. But are you trying to tell me you never show yourself away from this hotel? I’d find that hard to believe.”
“I’m an old man. There is little I can do.”
“Come now. I’ve seen you run.”
He grinned. His lips seemed too loose, too mobile. “I do enjoy my running. But I’m an old man. Where else could I run so freely and fail to attract attention? Away from here I am the old man again – I keep my hair tight under a wig. My cheeks fall inward. I am wound tight. I can hardly move, I am so… inside myself. Away from here I am a safe old man.”
RICHARD’S ATTEMPTS TO go to sleep that night were thwarted again and again by glimpses of Abby’s face, Abby’s body, her hair flowing long as curtains, ending bloodily, ending in ash and a charred skull. He sat up in bed, staring across the room, mesmerized by the strands of hair twisted through the dark, unraveling, vanishing beneath the door. He made himself climb out of bed. W
hen he opened the door, he saw traces of the hair slipping around the corner that led to the back staircase and the upper floors. He struggled to keep up. The hair had vanished by the time he reached the second floor. But he knew where to go.
He stood outside that room on the far corner of a dog-leg wing, that door which he had seen Jacob closing, whispering so softly to (“Abby, you rest now”). When he rested his hand on the knob, its coldness sent a thrill through his arm, but still he curved his fingers gently around it, and pushed.
Things stirred as he walked inside. The ancient bedclothes, unused, rose and fell. The window glass fogged with the sudden temperature change, with breath. There was a gentle sigh, as of something holding onto its emotion, trying not to betray too much.
He sat down on the bed. He could smell Abby all around him, the saltiness of her sweat mixed with her perfume, and the same shampoo she’d used all the years of their marriage. He leaned forward, put his face in his hands. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.” He said it in a whisper, not feeling the need, or afraid, to speak any louder than this. “I think maybe we should leave. He says it is safe, as safe as –” He chuckled grimly to himself. “As safe as houses.”
A sound like the release of tears, a sadness not quite unbearable. In this room he could not tell if the emotion came from inside.
“I’ve moved her around, I know that isn’t good. I just don’t know, could this be any more dangerous than anyplace we’ve been, or less?”
A rustle in the walls. Paper separating from plaster. Rats or insects?
“And I think you’re here, I’m almost sure, but I can’t imagine how.”
A change in the light, shadows drifting.
“Would you be going with us? How can I even think of leaving you behind, again?”
Soft sighs under the dry whisper of sheets.
THE DEADFALL WAS periodically infested by what Jacob referred to as “inch worms.” These were not the small caterpillars or moth larva that Richard had always associated with the term, but long, ropy creatures an inch thick which liked to wrap around things, especially heat and light sources. One of his regular chores became removing these creatures from the hallway light fixtures. As far as he knew, they were harmless, but they greatly lowered the life expectancy of the bulbs.
Jacob had provided him with a special tool for the task: a long pole with three hooks on the end, the points blunted so as not to hurt the worm. But the tool had gone missing again, a regular occurrence. He might have mislaid it once or twice – left it behind a door or in a corner – but clearly someone had another use for the device.
He was searching for the tool outside Serena’s classroom when he heard Jacob’s voice. “Stalin could be particularly cruel to some of the old Bolsheviks, anyone who had known him in the old days. He would have them arrested, with their wives, send them off to Siberia. When relatives protested, he would claim it was someone else’s doing, that his hands were tied, that even he was not above the law. The victims would not be told the specifics of their crimes, they would have no idea how they had offended him. Some were convinced he couldn’t possibly know, and if they were only able to inform him of their plight, he would save them. Sometimes he would bring them back to Moscow suddenly, promote them, sit them down for a special meal, and then that same day take offense at the smallest thing, something he’d just manufactured, and send them right back to Siberia. That was his idea of a joke.”
“Ooh, that’s horrible,” Serena said.
“Quite,” Jacob replied. “We’ll be discussing the purges and Stalin’s particular brand of cruelty in more detail next week. For tomorrow I’d like you to read in the Hitler book, the chapter entitled ‘Rearmament.’”
After Jacob left Serena to her studies, Richard caught up with him out in the hall. “Stalin? Isn’t that a bit much for a kid her age?”
Jacob nodded. “She is a precocious child. I believe her time here has made her more curious about the outside world.”
“So Hitler tomorrow? Do you have a name for this course?”
“As a matter of fact I do. A History of Cruelty in the Twentieth Century.”
“I want to trust your judgment, but I’m not so sure about this. I have to insist – you’re not to show her any concentration camp pictures, okay? I won’t have that.”
“Why, Richard, of course not. A child her age.”
“Hey, I don’t know. She might be ready, but I’m certainly not.”
“She is ready, I think, to know that such horrors exist. Children, I believe, need a basic arsenal of emotional tools, in the event that they do encounter death, tragedy, in the event that true horror does walk into their lives. They do not develop these tools, however, as a result of being overwhelmed.”
“So no sugar-coating history, is that your meaning? No fairytales?”
“Only original, unsanitized fairytales. We discussed those a couple of days ago as part of a Folklore unit. The original Red Riding Hood, that sort of thing. Perhaps I should have kept you better informed.”
“No, no, I’m sure you’re doing fine. I’m a nervous dad, that’s all. I take it you don’t care for the rewrites? The Disney versions?”
He shook his head. “Actually, I enjoy many of those films. Animation has always… pleased me. I simply believe that the original storytellers who shared those rather gruesome tales around a campfire understood some things about psychology and emotional survival which we have unfortunately forgotten.”
Richard nodded. “By the way, have you seen the worm stick?”
“First floor closet, left side, beneath the stair case.”
“Thanks.” He started to leave. “What did she think of the original Red Riding Hood?”
Jacob considered, then, “She said she keeps thinking about the wolf in the story. She says she thinks about him every day.”
“LET’S HAVE YOUR party in town.”
“But I want the party here, Daddy. In the gazebo. I’ve always wanted it here. And you promised I could.”
“I could hire out an entire restaurant. An entire restaurant just for you.” He sounded foolish even to himself. He had no idea how he could even get that much money; Serena must know he didn’t have it.
“I don’t understand why we just can’t have it here.”
“Maybe Jacob won’t have the gazebo finished in time. You did want the gazebo.”
“He’s almost finished. You know he’s almost finished.”
“He’s pretty busy. I haven’t seen him at all the last two days.”
He felt something cool against his hand. He stiffened, and looked down at the small hand that had reached inside his own. “It’s okay, Daddy,” she said. “I’m older now. I like it here.”
ON MOST DAYS, visitors to the Deadfall might think they had come into a virtually empty hotel. Richard might have thought so as well, if he hadn’t had access to the hotel register, which indicated a thirty-five to fifty per cent occupancy rate, on average. Many of those, as he now understood, were long-term residents. There were others whose names simply appeared in the registry one morning, without Richard having made any sort of contact. Some of the guests were slightly more visible, and he might pass those in a hall, or encounter them on the tennis court or in one of the kitchens, or more often see them walking the grounds some distance away, singly or in pairs.
A couple of weeks before Serena’s birthday, Richard was coming around the side of the staircase when he saw the remarkably tall man with the pale complexion sitting in one of the chairs in the lobby. From his stiff posture and quiet manner, Richard assumed the man was patiently waiting for someone. He had never seen the man around the hotel before, but that certainly didn’t mean anything.
“May I help you with something?” Richard approached with his best managerial smile.
He felt his smile warping when he saw that the figure was in fact a mannequin, whose painted face did not even attempt to be life-like, resembling more a figurative abstract out of Picasso o
r Miro. He looked around for whoever had placed the figure, then heard the whisper of movement, and looked down at the figure’s chest.
Two yellow arms and hands had been thrust from between the buttons down the red-checkered shirt. They held a local newspaper, spread for reading. Richard stepped closer, leaned over for a better look. He could see a pale gray eye through another gap between buttons. It rotated up, blinked.
“Oh,” Richard said, feeling his face flush. “I’m sorry to intrude.”
The gray eye appeared to roll in its socket. The hands threw the paper aside, then disappeared. The figure stood up, the painted head rocking side to side as it walked out of the lobby.
“You rarely see him,” Jacob said, from behind the desk. “I wouldn’t worry about offending him – he’s always offended. It’s part of his nature.”
Five women walked down the stairs, speaking in a language Richard had never heard before. They all had high foreheads, and rough patches of skin above their halter tops.
“Ladies,” Jacob called.
The women turned their heads and chattered something back in unison. At the front door they struggled with each other briefly before the tallest woman won and went through the door first. The rest then followed silently, their heads bowed.
“It’s Serena’s birthday,” Jacob said. “A number of the residents seem able to perceive when a birth date is near, and you see them much more frequently in the weeks beforehand. After the birthday has passed you don’t see them again until the next one. I have no idea of the mechanism involved, but I have to say the talent would come in handy sometimes.”
SOMETHING HAD BEEN bothering Richard all night, worrying its way through the shadowed regions of his dreams, gnawing at the edges of the visual frame, eating through bittersweet memories of Abby. He woke, sat straight up in bed, and found he could hear the gnawing. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered, and wished he hadn’t spoken. The gnawing suddenly stopped, as if the hungry thing were waiting, listening.
Something hard and dark dropped onto his bed. He went rigid, holding in a frightened breath so that it throbbed painfully against his ribcage. The animal started moving up the covers. He could feel its claws through the sheets.
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