by E. B. Huffer
The relief that spilled out of everyone that morning must have broken something in the atmosphere - either that, or the Gods (like the eland) were exhausted by //Kabo’s defiance - for within hours of //Kabo’s return, the skies had darkened. With a flourish of electricity, the first rainy season for three years poured forth.
Sadly, the world’s greatest hunter would soon fall prey to the world‘s most avaricious hunters. When the white settlers came with their guns, //Kabo was hunted down and slaughtered. And once he was killed, his family were taken away to be slaves.
Three-hundred-years later, //Kabo found himself sitting in Margie’s mother’s bath.
He’d prided himself over the years on many fine accomplishments, from Florence Nightingale to Ghandi and was, in fact, an expert in his field. But he had not anticipated Mother Superior’s explosive reaction. He couldn’t believe he’d finally drawn the short straw.
Of course, Margie never knew anything of the Mud Man’s history, or that he was in fact her spirit guide. All she remembered was that after the Mud Man's brief appearance Mother Superior made her life a living Hell. At her hands, Margie endured a cruel regime that included long periods of prayer and solitary confinement. In her darkest hours she vowed to do everything in her power to ensure that it never happened again.
Her hatred of the dead had begun ... and so had a series of events that would lead to untold catastrophe for hundreds of thousands of innocent souls.
*****
Back in the Emporium Margie tried to make sense of what she was remembering. Had she really been abandoned in such an establishment? This wasn't exactly what she had hoped to remember. It didn't matter anyway. Right now she had more exciting things on her mind, like what The Giant would think of her amazing new talent.
The Listening Hands
The Giant had not noticed Margie creeping up on him. He was totally engrossed in butchering a creature that Margie had never seen before. The hairless creature, which hung upside down from an iron hook in the rafters, had the body of a large pig, the head of an ox and the teeth and jaw of a piranha fish. Margie had never seen her gentle Giant chop anything larger than a shank before and felt distinctly unsettled seeing him hack away at such a fearsome looking thing. A tub under the creature served to collect the innards as they fell.
Margie coughed politely feeling very pleased all of a sudden that she had never eaten any of The Giant's meals.
Startled, The Giant spun around, his knife stopping inches from Margie's face. He frowned when he saw her. "You made me jump!"
"What is that thing?" asked Margie, unable to take her eyes off the strange mutant beast.
"It ain't nothing for you to worry about!" replied The Giant, clearly tense. "I don't ask no questions when they bring 'em. Jus' do as I'm told."
Margie took the hint. "I need to show you something," she said dropping her sack on the ground.
"I ain't got no time," he muttered as he continued to hack away at the body. It was clear he had done this many times before. His great bulk moved effortlessly and within minutes there was barely anything left of the creature but a bucket full of viscera and a small wooden straw-lined crate filled with shiny red meat.
The Giant lifted up the bucket and in his haste nearly tripped over Margie's sack. As his foot caught the corner of the sack it opened, exposing its contents.
"You ain't allowed to touch those!" he yelled.
"Says who?" asked Margie.
"Auguste. He said it to my face. We ain't allowed to touch that stuff."
"Where is he then?" yelled Margie angrily. "I don't see him! Let him come and tell me to my face."
The Giant paced and muttered incoherently under his breath.
"Look," said Margie. "I have something I need to show you. It could be really important."
Margie lifted the rusting cog to her ear. It had given her the most clear and comprehensible message just moments earlier. "Look," she said. "I know this is going to sound really crazy, but it talks to me. Tells me things. Everything does; shoes, plates, toys."
The Giant kicked at some sawdust on the floor. "Looks like we got mice down here," he said absently. "Can't be doin' with no mice. Auguste wouldn't like that neither."
"Are you listening to me Giant? I just wish you could hear it too. Everything talks. It’s like they’re all tuned into radios and I have a receiver in my ear that lets me hear them. I don’t know what any of it means, but it’s true. You have to believe me."
The Giant stood still. Silent. Awkward.
"C’mon, c’mon," she urged the cog, "tell me something."
Margie held the cog out to The Giant. "This cog," she said, as though she was about to announce something amazing, "told me a code earlier; a load of numbers."
The Giant folded his arms.
"Really," protested Margie. " It meant something I just don’t know what."
Margie looked at the cog. "I don’t know why it’s not saying anything now. Let me try one of the others ..."
"Look Margie," said The Giant picking up the hoof of a cow, "this bit of beef is saying ... hang on ... it’s ... yup, it’s definitely saying Moo."
He threw the hoof over his shoulder.
Margie observed The Giant sadly. "You don’t believe me?"
"I ain't never said that. It's just ... you hold a bit of metal to your ear and tell me it’s talking. That's all I'm sayin'."
Without uttering another word Margie gathered together all the bits and bobs she'd collected and headed towards the door. She could understand The Giant’s reaction. She would be sceptical too. She had been initially. It didn't stop her from feeling angry and embarrassed though.
As Margie reached the door The Giant called out to her.
"Here," he said throwing his watch in her direction.
Margie barely caught it, dropping her bag in the process. It made a loud clatter as it hit the ground. The watch was heavy. Several pounds at least.
"What's it telling you?" asked The Giant.
Margie placed the watch to her ear and listened.
"I see a circus. I see lots of tents. I see lots of people. Strange people. People with deformed bodies. I see ugly people; people who can turn themselves inside out; a boy with the face of a dog; a lady with tattoos on her face; a troop of midgets ..."
Margie stopped and looked at The Giant with wide eyes. "I see you."
"How did you do that?" demanded The Giant. Margie had never seen him look so fierce.
"Your watch."
"You liar! You’ve been snooping!"
Margie threw the watch across the floor. "I’ve not been snooping. The watch told me all this stuff. It told me that you have a problem with your front tooth; that you suffer pain with your knees; that you once lost a ring that meant something to you and to this day you're terrified it landed up in a bag of meat scraps that got fed to the pigs ..."
"Enough!" shouted The Giant. "No more."
Margie stared at the floor.
"They was really talking to you then."
"I guess," said Margie sulkily.
"You know what this means?" said The Giant with burgeoning excitement.
Margie shook her head.
"Maybe you are the Collector. Maybe Auguste were right all along!"
The Giant clapped his hands together so gleefully that Margie couldn't help but laugh. She didn't know who this Collector person was. Truth be told she didn't much care. The Giant was full of funny ideas that didn't make sense. What was important right now was that The Giant had believed her. She liked The Giant a lot. He was a simple person who wore his heart on his sleeve. She liked this; it made things easy. And easy was good. Like all things in Limbuss, she was beginning to feel languidly comfortable with her existence. The search for her bag had long since been abandoned. Instead she passed the time quite happily poking through the Emporium, not really thinking much at all.
What she didn't know was that throughout Limbuss news of the Collector's potential return was creat
ing quite a stir. Everyone wanted a piece of the action and unfortunately this didn't bode well for Margie.
Something Changes
Margie spent the next few days wandering round the Emporium finding more and more items that spoke to her. She was mesmerised by the stories that they told, the characters and the voices. Only the more time she spent in the Emporium, the more she began to sense something unpleasant.
It started one afternoon whilst Margie was flicking through an old Girl's Own Annual from 1901. As she sat cross legged in the centre of the room, she became aware of a change in the atmosphere. It felt heavier, as though something large and unseen had entered the room. Her eyes couldn't see it, but her body sensed it. She rubbed the goosebumps on her arms. Then she thought she heard something, barely audible. A heavy breath perhaps or the sound of someone creeping through the shadows.
Margie closed the book and stood up. Unnerved she made her way cautiously through the tunnels and doorways of the Emporium. Was The Thing following her? She wasn't sure. Suddenly the Emporium didn't feel so friendly. The rooms felt colder, darker. In her panic to get away, she didn't take any real notice of where she was going and, just as she realised that she was completely lost, she felt a sensation across the back of her neck like a dog panting … followed by the sound of breath being exhaled.
"Who is that?" she cried, spinning around quickly.
Silence.
A moment later the sensation passed. Exhausted and afraid, Margie sat down and tried to gather herself.
It was several hours before she was woken from a deep sleep by someone or something calling her name. Margie could see no one but quickly sensed to her horror that whoever the voice belonged to was right there in the room with her as she sat lost and frightened in the heart of the Emporium.
Mechanical Spider
Margie remained very still and listened. Was it possible that she had imagined someone calling her name? She slowly raised herself off the floor, her face still creased from her deep sleep. Then she remembered that she was lost.
With no idea how to find her way out of the Emporium Margie felt the anger rise in her body. As the frustration mounted she kicked a small metal ball near her feet. It rolled across the floor at speed and crashed into a pile of old books.
Suddenly Margie was deafened by an ear piercing shriek – like a smoke alarm only much louder. Margie’s hands flew up to her ears but no matter how hard she pressed she just couldn’t drown out the torturous din. The noise, she decided, was coming from the metal sphere which she had just kicked. Assuming she had activated something when she'd kicked it, she stumbled forward, praying that it would be easy to deactivate.
Then just as quickly as the noise had started it stopped.
Margie breathed a sigh of relief. Already kneeling beside the strange little ball, she decided to look at it just in case. No harm in making sure it was switched off, whatever it was. As soon as Margie’s hands touched the ball however, it suddenly exploded to life, unfurling itself and scuttling across the floor at speed until it was backed into a corner and could go no further.
Margie screamed. The toy which had just sprung to life looked very much like a spider. A very large spider. Its body, the size of a clenched fist, was assembled from an array of cogs and fine mechanisms, whilst the legs (all eight of them) from instruments that resembled mathematical compasses. As she scrambled across a mountain of old broken things in a desperate bid to escape the creature, she frantically tried to figure out how she would get out of the room with that creature between her and the door. Oh the horror. And worse still, what if she couldn’t see it when she finally did turn around and look. What then? What if it was hiding in a dark corner ready to run across her feet as she made her way to safety?
Pretty quickly Margie found herself unable to climb any higher. Sitting atop a mountain of broken chairs, all piled high in a jumble of legs, she felt relatively safe. With a full 360 degree view there was no way Spider Beast would get close to her without her seeing it first. Not that she needed to worry right now. It was exactly where it had stopped moments earlier, sitting silently alongside some old books.
For a few short seconds she wondered if she’d been a bit hasty.
"You fool," she thought. "Spider Beast could just as easily have been a clockwork toy. A sudden bang could have released a jammed mechanism."
Still, she wasn’t prepared to take any chances. Not yet. Not until her breathing had returned to normal and her hands had stopped shaking.
Several minutes passed and Margie wondered if she ought to climb down from the chair mountain and investigate whether Spider Beast was in fact a toy. Her body was aching from sitting at odd angles amid the jumble of wooden posts, and every time she rested her head against one part of the chair or other, she was plagued by visions and voices belonging to all manner of previous owners.
However, it would seem Spider Beast lost patience before Margie lost all sensation.
"I’m guessing you’re afraid of spiders!"
Margie jumped so violently that a number of chairs dislodged and tumbled down the mountain.
"I’m sorry to have frightened you. I’m sure Auguste would have made me in the form of something more cuddly if he’d known."
Spider Beast spoke with a calm, solemn and authoritative voice which instantly and almost magically put Margie at ease.
"Who are you?" asked Margie wondering if it was in fact Spider Beast talking, or something else hiding in the room. "How do you know Auguste?"
"I have no name. I am Auguste's assistant. He built me years ago to help him run the Emporium. Since Auguste has disappeared it's now my job to assist you."
Margie’s mind was swimming with questions. How was it possible to be having a conversation with a mechanical spider? Was this some kind of trap? Something to do with the lobster man that had visited her rather ominously several weeks earlier?
"Why did Auguste never talk about you?" she asked warily.
"I was his assistant. His subordinate. It doesn't surprise me that he didn't talk about me."
"What happened to him? Why did he disappear."
"I can only assume he is in hiding. Or he has been captured. There are a lot of people looking for him. Either way, I think he knew as he prepared me in advance. I know everything I need to know in order to help you here in Limbuss."
Margie could feel herself welling up. She didn’t understand anything that this Spider Beast was telling her. Nothing made sense to her.
"Auguste was a genius. He knew things he shouldn’t. He had a gift and he believed that you have a gift too."
"What kind of gift?" asked Margie.
"You already know the answer to that," said Spider Beast. "Now, are you going to stay on top of that ridiculous pile of wood all night? It’s getting late."
Margie was still quite suspicious of Spider Beast. "Promise you won’t move from that spot. Not even a mechanical hair on one of those legs. Nothing until I say so."
Spider Beast remained motionless until Margie reached the base of Chair Mountain. "Move one leg slowly," ordered Margie, her voice cracking.
Spider Beast slowly moved its right back leg, stretching it back as far as it would go as though doing stretches before a race. "Is that good enough for you?" it asked dryly, clearly tired of Margie’s games.
"Okay," said Margie. "I’m fine." It occurred to Margie that she had learnt something about herself that day. She was afraid of spiders. She had no knowledge of this before Spider Beast startled her and for a second she wondered what else she didn’t know about herself.
"Auguste knew a lot about you, so I know a lot about you too," said Spider Beast interrupting Margie’s thoughts. "I also know the Emporium as well as Auguste."
Margie’s eyes widened. "Do you know where Auguste brought me when I first arrived?"
"You won’t find what you’re looking for there," said Spider Beast.
"And what am I looking for?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.
&n
bsp; "You’re looking for that bag. You’re hoping to find something in there that will remind you of who you are. I was watching you too. I was also watching The Giant watching you. There are a lot of people watching you. It’s a dangerous thing. Auguste knew this. He knew there was something about you as soon as he found you on the road out there."
Margie stared at Spider Beast for a moment. She wanted to argue with him but felt quite exhausted. "Do you know your way out of here?"
"Of course. That’s if I’m allowed to move?"
Just thinking about Spider Beast scurrying across the floor sent shivers down Margie’s spine. "Try not to look like a spider if you can," she said, "just until I get used to you."
Spider Beast sighed and turned sideways before scurrying towards the rear of the room like a crab.
It didn’t take Margie long to get used to the Spider. In some ways it reminded her of Auguste. There was something familiar about the voice. If she closed her eyes she could almost imagine that she was lying beneath a thousand blankets, her face being stroked by Auguste, the smell of soup wrapping its arms around her and holding her tightly.
"There’s no point being sentimental about Auguste," said the Spider. "You’ve got more important things to worry about."
"Like what?" She knew the answer but she asked the question anyway.
"There’s a lot I know, Auguste made sure of that. But there’s a lot I don’t know."
"What do you mean," asked Margie suddenly quite intrigued by what Spider Beast had to say.
"Auguste was convinced that you brought something with you …"
"A bag," cried Margie. "I saw it on the photo. I was looking for it when I found you."
"No, not a bag," said Spider Beast. "Something bigger. Something special."
"I’m not so sure," said Margie. "Look at me. What's so special about me?
"You have Listening Hands," said Spider Beast. "That's a pretty good start."
"Yes," said Margie, "that's only because I got a bump on my head."
