The Diary of Ellen Rimbauer

by Joyce Reardon

  We passed stall after stall of some of the finest horses in this part of the country: Summertime and Rex are my favorites for I helped buy them, but all the horses here are extremely ridable and elegant examples of their breeds. John knows his horseflesh.

  In the middle of the building, we found the tack room and the saddle room locked up tightly. Disappointed, we continued on. Daniel’s office was locked as well. We moved silently down the center hall, Sukeena careful to check behind us every few seconds, looking back toward those wide open doors at the west end, fearing someone might find us out and beg an explanation. The stalls were bigger in this east end of the Carriage House, large sliding doors accessing one carriage after another—six in all, three to a side. The first two were ornamental carriages—one a single-pull; the other intended for a pair. We peered inside through the wrought iron. The pony carriage and the sleigh were next, followed by two large hay wagons, the last of which was rigged to hold a fire-fighting pump, if ever needed.

  I can offer no explanation for why Sukeena stopped in front of the door to the second to last storage area, no reason for her choosing the hay wagon, except to say that she is a woman of uncanny perceptions, an almost magical ability to “see” beyond where we mere mortals see. She stopped there as if striking an invisible wall, her head angled on her shoulders in a most unusual way, her eyes locked intently on the darkness beyond that door. “Is here, miss,” she whispered, in a nerve-grinding monotone she elects for only the most dire of discussions. That tone alone won my full attention.

  “Sukeena?”

  “I think we look here. This place here.”

  “All right.”

  I helped her to roll the large door open on its tracks. Intended to double as breeding stalls, these east stalls are substantially larger than those on the west end of the Carriage House. One learns not to question a sister’s instincts, and I had absolutely no intention of engaging my dear Sukeena in any such debate. The door opened nearly silently, and we stood facing a hay wagon that I knew well, for it was of sentimental value to John, having been in his family many years. I found myself transfixed by the realization that this was also the wagon that had been driven by Mr. Corbin the day he shot and killed the foreman. It still carried bloodstains from that gruesome event. I shuddered as the door ran on its track again, and Sukeena pulled it shut behind us. Only the small viewing window, barred by wrought iron, communicated to the stable’s central aisle. I wanted out. I wanted to run from there. John spoke of this wagon often—it seemed many a childhood event surrounded the cart, including the first few dollars he ever earned, won from a neighbor for hauling away refuse. (John entertained dinner guests with the story of how he’d started out as a garbage collector and ended up an oil tycoon!)

  Sukeena moved closely around the wagon as if it possessed some power over her. She touched it, closed her eyes, and I saw the hair on her arms stand on end, as if she’d thrown a window open to the cold. When her eyes reopened, fixed now on me instead, I felt a wave of fear flush through me to my toes.

  “What?” I gasped.

  “We in the right place, Miss Ellen,” was all she said. Moving around the wagon, she came to the back where one could load or unload its flatbed. She laid her wide, black hand down onto the neatly fitted planks there and I believe for a moment the entire wagon trembled beneath her touch. Her face broke out in a shine as fast as anything I’ve ever seen, as if a fever now possessed her. Her jaw hung down. From her mouth came the unmistakable groans of a woman in pain. And I swear this is true: it was not Sukeena’s voice at all, but that of another woman entirely. I covered my ears against that cunning agony, for it is nothing a woman should ever be made to hear. Sukeena—or whoever she had become—snapped her head so quickly then I feared her unreal, for it was with the degree of movement an owl might demonstrate, and it turned straight back behind her.

  There, hanging from a stout hook, was a thick horse blanket, or perhaps a quilted throw used to separate delicate cargo while in the back of the wagon. A deep forest green, that blanket was stained darkly. Sukeena moved toward it as if in a trance, grabbing its bulk in both hands and jerking it away from the wall. As she did so, the bed of the wagon began to move again behind us all of its own—up and down, up and down.

  There, beneath the blanket, hung a woman’s black skirt.

  With the squeaking of the wagon, we both turned around at once—and I for one was paralyzed by fear. There, on the wagon’s wooden flatbed, vulgarly exposed to us, a spectral image of young Laura lay, her blouse torn open, her breasts exposed, her arms held back as if pinned, her legs spread wide, rocking her hips in a most ungainly and ugly manner that was not to be mistaken. She was being attacked—forced into this act—though her assailant remained invisible to us.

  Sukeena, God bless her, kept her wits about her. She snatched the black skirt from the hook on the wall and threw it toward the wraithlike creature undulating there on the bed of the wagon, a grotesque expression of pain plastered on the girl’s face. She threw the skirt as if covering an open fire. As the skirt landed, both it and this poor girl vanished and the wagon came to rest. I swear I saw this with my own eyes! A moment later we heard voices approaching, male voices, deep and foreboding, and I do believe that this was when I fainted, the rumbling of a motorcar also approaching from far off in the distance.

  * * *

  Sukeena shook me awake, having caught me as I fell, one hand clasped gently over my mouth to keep me from speaking and revealing us. It immediately became apparent that Daniel and one of his Carriage House staff had witnessed the approach of John’s motorcar and had returned to the Carriage House to help secure the vehicle for the evening and to greet the master of the house, my husband. All this occurred nearly simultaneously—the boisterous, lively discussion between the two men who argued over a dice game, the soft putt-putt and clatter of John’s motorcar pulling down the long drive and past Rose Red and into the center hall of the Carriage House, the oily stench of the car’s exhaust. The sudden silence.

  “Hello there, Daniel.”

  “Sir. Earlier than expected.”

  “A visit to the docks and a brandy is all. I tell you, Daniel, there’s nothing as satisfying as seeing those barrels of oil safely put to bed and on their way to the Pacific Isles. Money in the bank for little Adam is what they are. Money in the bank. Providing she has safe passage.”

  “I’m sure she will, sir.”

  “Expecting any ‘visitors,’ Daniel? Should I stay?”

  “You might find the view from the tack room entertaining, sir. If I do say so.”

  “Who is she?”

  “A blonde, sir. A new one. Kitchen hand. As young as a green apple, sir. But lured to my company by the offer of pure Irish whiskey. Be along any moment, sir.”

  “Very well.”

  I overheard the exchange between the two men, and I knew Daniel had been the one atop Laura in the back of the wagon. Perhaps my husband had watched—for I know so well how he enjoys voyeurism. (Sukeena has found two mirrors in the house that, from hidden spaces, one can use to look in on both the women’s dormitory and the baths attached to it. Needless to say, these hidden chambers were not in the house plans that my husband shared with me over the course of our honeymoon!) How desperately I clung to the notion that it had been Daniel with young Laura, not my John. These were Daniel’s stables after all. Perhaps my husband knew—perhaps he was attempting to protect one of his most loyal employees.

  Sukeena moved us to the rear of the wagon as the voices drew closer. John and Daniel stopped immediately in front of the door to our room. In the dim light before us, the ghost of Laura reappeared. She had redressed herself, though her clothes remained torn and tattered. She stood at the driver’s bench, pointing in the direction of the two men as if accusing them. She could see us! She wanted our help!

  John looked up, sensing something. And I swear he looked right at me, right into my eyes. Right through that ephemeral girl. He looked right
at me, but not expecting me, did not see me. Or if he did, convinced himself it was illusion.

  I felt hot with anger—this waif of a girl used up, her disappearance lied about. That awful spectral image from the bed of the wagon haunted me. Perhaps he had intended to throw her a few coins for her service. Perhaps he had promised promotion. No matter. She was gone now. Swallowed by Rose Red, the same as Mrs. Fauxmanteur. It was then that I understood for the first time not only what I would come to know for certain but what I intended to take advantage of for many, many years to come. Rose Red was on my side.

  Rose Red was my friend.

  24 SEPTEMBER 1909—ROSE RED

  I take comfort in my dear child, Adam, his sweet innocence. So new is his existence in the world. What a blessing to start with a clean slate. I find myself thinking about Mrs. Fauxmanteur and the beguiling Laura almost to the point of torment. Mr. Corbin’s flirtation with murder and insanity. What kind of place is this? Rose Red, it would seem, discards men while stealing women. Sukeena and I talk often of it now, as she worries for me. (I am troubled to the point of nervosa—my hand shook so badly at supper to-night that I returned the soup saying I didn’t care for it, when in truth I couldn’t hold my spoon steady. John catches none of this; Sukeena sees all.)

  We wonder aloud, Sukeena and I, why and how the grand house makes its choices. Why have Sukeena and I been passed over in favor of our two sisters? Why not take all the maids of the house—there are some twenty of them? Why not “accidentally” kill a gardener or a groomer? Why the construction foreman and some of the workers? I look for a message in all this while Sukeena states very definitely her own beliefs.

  Rose Red, according to Sukeena earlier to-day:

  The house is inhabited by the souls of the Indians whose graves were disturbed during its construction. The foreman and others were held responsible for this atrocity, but now that the house is built and here to stay in all its enormity, its inhabitants shall pay, and pay dearly. It looks kindly upon me and Sukeena because we are victims of the men who built it as much as Rose Red herself. The truth of Mrs. Fauxmanteur may not yet be known, but Sukeena believes Laura was chosen because of her indiscretion with either Daniel or my husband. Rose Red has chosen sides in the age-old war of husband and wife. It does not dare kill John because he is the engine behind its continuing growth—he is making it bigger and stronger; it will not claim me because I am the one demanding this construction of my husband. Together, John and I represent its only chance at life—that is, according to Sukeena, its continued expansion. The souls of the departed Indians have no room for warriors—and men, according to Sukeena, are all seen as warriors in the eyes of tribal leaders. Women, on the other hand, represent little threat, and few would dispute that a tribe’s true history is known only by the women, for they survive much longer than the warriors. Sukeena says Rose Red is not only punishing John and his mistresses but capturing the women to learn from them, to have them as company. She believes that as long as the construction continues, as long as John and I live here together, Rose Red will gain strength and that more men shall die, more women disappear. She advises me to order my husband to stop the construction and to sell the home. “No good can come of dis place, Miss Ellen. A woman should not raise her children here.”

  Over the course of the past two years, Sukeena and I have rarely argued. Our occasional disagreements have instead taken the form of informal debate, one point following another, with no raised voices or harsh expressions. But when she put forward her theory of Rose Red earlier this morning I expressed my anger in the form of a tantrum (which I now regret!). I told her she was meddling in African witchcraft, and I left her and the Drawing Room abruptly, without explanation. Since then, I have not seen her.

  Dear Diary, what a fool I have been! To risk my friendship with the one person on this earth who understands me, when deep in my heart I know my resistance comes more from a fear that she speaks the truth. Each part of her explanation haunts me, for it makes so much sense. And yet for it to make sense, I must concede that a house—a structure of brick, stone, wood and glass—can somehow be possessed of spirit, and this is a leap of faith that perplexes me, for though the eye does see, the heart will not accept. A living house? Even one of this size, even built upon a hallowed graveyard, can surely not exist in the spiritual realm! Or does it? I ask, feeling myself haunted and without stability. My mind wanders. I am unable to hold a single thought for very long. Is this motherhood, or does Rose Red own me even now, while I remain unaware?

  My temptation is to call upon my dear friend Tina Coleman and to arrange another consultation with Madame Lu, and to present this possibility to the Great Lady (in ambiguous terms, of course) in hopes of establishing her opinions and guidance. Madame Lu’s connection to “the other side” could, quite possibly, provide me insight as to the validity of Sukeena’s suggestions. (Without mentioning Sukeena! The Chinese do not look kindly upon the Africans, of this there can be little doubt.)

  Underlying all this suspicion of reason on my part is the consummate belief that Sukeena possesses a wealth of knowledge that even Madame Lu may not match. Sukeena is my dark angel. She not only nursed me back to life in the African bush but in the process became part of me, a friend, a sister. There are times—I must confess here in the privacy of my writing—that I glimpse the small of her back or the curve of her hips, and I am taken back to my shameful lust for my Indonesian chambermaid. She rubs my tummy with oils in an effort to return it to its former shape before the birth, and I long for her strong hands to wander my body. (My husband and I have not been with each other in months, and since the birth I am loath to even think of our joining.) So sinful are these thoughts that I hardly dare write them here. But if not put down here, they are left to linger inside my thoughts, and that is far more destructive. (You will never know, Dear Diary, what a help you are to me. Once my thoughts find their way into your pages I am free to start over. I am purged. I am certain, for instance, that once I lay my pen down by your side here to-night, I shall call for Sukeena and she shall come, and all shall be forgiven. There is much talk in society of this foreigner Freud, and his formidable insight to the human condition—but I see no need to share with others that which I can place in your pages. You save me with your listening!) So it is with Sukeena and I—a mystery that has yet to fully unfold, not so unlike this house and the people who inhabit it.

  I return to your pages now after a brief and wonderful reunion with Sukeena. She made no objections to my suggestion of visiting Madame Lu, and to my relief will make the arrangements herself, having struck up something of a friendship with Tina’s handmaid, the woman named Gwen who joined us before.

  27 SEPTEMBER 1909—MADAME LU’S

  I can see now that John’s fascination with his heir is fading. He finds the smells, the crying, the spit-up, even the breast-feeding a bit too much to take. (This, despite the two nannies—one, a wet nurse who feeds Adam at night.) I suspect that when Adam is eight or nine—an age for hunting and fishing and the like—my husband’s affections may rekindle, but for the time being he is absent, showing no interest in the boy whatsoever. His dawdling attentions lavished on me during my pregnancy are a thing of the past as well. I have carried his child. His firstborn was a boy. My purpose is served, I fear. Were I to have known that this was the life destined for me, I might have expressed reservations in consummating this marriage. Now, however, it is far too late for such decisions. I can only make the best—or the worst—of the situation. I labor for the higher ground, fearing the results if John and I entrench ourselves for a protracted battle.

  I will ask my husband back to my bed as soon as I feel my body recovers fully from childbirth. I see now that my joy and happiness in life is to come from the children. (Adam gives me more joy in my heart than I have ever felt. He is nothing short of a miracle. I have reason to live. Reason to love!) If I am here to make babies, make babies I shall, even though I alternate between loving my husband and de
spising him. Adam Rimbauer holds a place special and dear in my heart that no other person shall ever come close to occupying. I can’t imagine this feeling multiplied by four or five! I can’t wait! I long for the sound of many small feet scurrying about this house! Damn John Rimbauer. I shall make a life for myself in spite of his womanizing ways.

  My arrival at Madame Lu’s felt considerably different today than it did when I viewed this part of town for the first time. I will not go as far as to say I’m comfortable with Chinatown, but I am at least familiar with this area of it, thus reducing my anxiety. Madame Lu, for her part, was most welcoming and accommodating. Again, I was in the company of Tina Coleman, and again Tina was responsible for much of the social talk to introduce us (the Chinese insist on this social exchange before any business is discussed). Finally Madame Lu glanced in my direction and spoke to me.

  “You wish ’nother visit, child?”

  “Yes, Great Lady.” (I follow Tina’s lead wherever possible.)

  She looked me over. “Something much troubling you.”

  “Our home,” I answered. “Our house.”

  She nodded. That enormous head falling forward like a stone. She wore a good deal of her hair in a bun at the back of her head, and yet the tail that spilled out of this nest was easily two feet long. All told, her hair must run five feet or longer—as tall, or taller, than she is herself. “I in contact with people, child, not houses.”

  “Two women have disappeared in our house. One, a chambermaid. A young girl. She’s there still, but no longer flesh and blood. I saw her with my own eyes. My handmaid saw her as well,” I said, indicating Sukeena. But the Great Lady would hardly acknowledge Sukeena’s presence.