The Butcher's Daughter

by Jane E James

  ‘See if you can find a first aid box. Some bandages or something.’ His voice fades away as he passes out again, leaving me alone with my demons in the whitewashed building.

  Keeping one fearful eye on the open trap door, terrified in case my mother should make an appearance, I search my father’s workshop for a first aid box, never really expecting to find one. At the same time, I experience a hazy memory of being out here on my own quite recently and a shiver runs down my spine. I cannot think of any reason why I would come out here in the dark unless I was searching for something, as I am doing now.

  Not something, Natalie. Someone.

  Where would my father store a first aid box? Where? Where? For some reason, my eyes keep returning to the butcher’s block with the rusty cutting tools that have always unnerved me. Luckily, there are no animal carcases hanging in here for me to bump into. I will not think about what I discovered back at Thornhaugh. Every time I close my eyes, I see the swinging joints of milky white flesh and the “Slaughtered in Little Downey” stamp.

  Natalie. Natalie.

  I imagine I hear my mother’s haunting whisper, calling out to me from the cellar below, but I fight against it. I must keep my wits about me if I am to be of any help to Jed.

  Ignoring the scratches on the floor where the butcher’s block stands, I do not stop to stare at the knives as I pass by, but I do catch a glimpse of my own blurred reflection in their blades. I immediately think of my mother again. We are so alike.

  Natalie. Natalie.

  I find bandages in a cupboard on the wall that also houses poisons and jars of suspicious-looking liquid that look as if they should have been thrown away years ago.

  Something in my drink.

  Your father did not drug you, Natalie.

  From behind me, I hear a creaking sound followed by a secretive shuffling. I know it is not Jed. He is well out of it.

  After a few seconds of silence, I dare to glance over my shoulder. That’s when I see it—not my mother God forbid—but a mound over by the window with a tea towel thrown over it. I am not naive enough to believe that someone has left a tray of cakes out here to cool by the window, although that is exactly what it looks like.

  Besides, it is swarming with flies. I watch them buzz around then land on the gingham fabric before disappearing underneath. Breaking the seals on the cellophane packaging, I unwind the rolls of bandages but do not take my eye off the tea towel. It doesn’t matter that somebody else’s life is in my hands, I will not return to Jed until I have found out what it is hidden underneath it.

  The House By The Sea

  My body shakes with rage as I tiptoe into the room. My father has collapsed into a chair at the kitchen table and has his back to me, holding his head in his hands. He doesn’t see me. Doesn’t hear me. Nothing changes. I have always been able to creep up on him in this way; fool that he is. Sweat is coming off him in buckets, forming dark patches on his clothing. His smell fills the room. I pause when I notice the gun resting on the table, inches from his hand. I want to pick it up and bash him over the head with it, for what he has done to Jed, but I do not. Haven’t I been brought up to be a dutiful and obedient daughter?

  As if sensing he is not alone, my father twists around in his chair to look at me. His eyes, smaller and shrunken than ever, are swine like. I see something in them that is not new, now I come to think of it. He is terrified of me. But I remind myself he is the monster. Not I.

  ‘I take it you’re not going to ask how Jed is?’ I spit.

  Father is immediately on his feet, jumpy and anxious, but does not speak, just stares blankly at me. I know him well enough to guess what he is thinking. He will be telling himself that if he says nothing, he will get away with it. I doubt he thinks anything of shooting a gypsy. Probably thinks Jed deserves a bullet in the chest for simply being on his property.

  Eventually, my father breaks his silence. ‘What are you doing here, Natalie?’

  He sounds as if he cares. I am tempted to laugh out loud at that, but I do not. I watch him glance behind me, as if checking I am alone. He is probably wondering where Jed is.

  ‘Where have you come from?’ my father wants to know.

  I want to tell him “Hell and back” but of course I do not do that either. Such dramatic words would result in a raised eyebrow from Dr Moses, I cannot resist thinking.

  When my father notices the blood on my hands and the cold guarded expression on my face, he makes a great show of being puzzled. ‘Natalie?’ He cannot fail to notice my fury, yet he is stupid enough to take a step towards me.

  ‘Don’t come near me!’ I yell, recoiling in horror. I would rather drown, face down in the sea, than have any contact with him.

  ‘Natalie,’ he says again, confused by my behaviour.

  He is wondering why I won’t look directly at him; why my knuckles are locked white with anger, with strips of bandaging stretched tightly around my wrists, like restraints, which we both know I am no stranger to. As if my hands were wrapped around his neck, I squeeze the taut piece of fabric until it cannot stretch any further. I am sure this is the only thing stopping me from lunging at him. I will no longer refer to this man as Father. When the material eventually rips, he nervously licks his bottom lip.

  I watch his mind at work. His eyes flit from the shredded bandages, to my face, then to the darkened window. I can almost see his train of thought. He is in the whitewashed building, glancing around, trying to figure out what I might have seen there to make me react like this. When it eventually dawns on him, his eyes pop wide with disbelief.

  ‘That’s…’ I stumble on my words, my voice choking with emotion. ‘Merry out there.’

  A shutter of deceit comes down on his face, making me hate him even more.

  ‘Merry’s birthmark!’ I scream. ‘I’d know it anywhere. You killed her. Cut her into pieces.’ The bandages fall from my hands, scattering on the floor like petals on a coffin.

  I think Frank is about to pass out. He struggles for breath and gulps at the air like a fish. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he admits finally.

  I can tell by the guilty look on his face that he’s determined to make me think I have imagined all of this. As if that will get him off the hook! I wonder why he bothers. It’s clear that he feels nothing for no one, me included. Isn’t that what I always suspected?

  Refusing to look me in the eye, he stares at his boots instead. I think the pulsating blue veins on his face are about to explode. But he, at least, is alive, I remind myself bitterly. Unlike poor Merry. As soon as I saw the slab of white meat hidden under the bloodstained cloth, I recognised the distinctive strawberry mark on it. At first, I couldn’t make the connection. It was only when I traced the mark with my finger that the memory of that day on the beach came back to me—when a naked laughing Merry showed me her birthmark for the first time. The baby has one too, see.

  Darling Merry, who was young and beautiful and so full of life. She was everything I wanted to be and more. My eyes well with tears thinking about her.

  ‘You cut her up. Murdered her. You’re going to do the same to me,’ I sob.

  ‘No, Natalie. It’s not how it looks. I swear I never touched anybody. After… I’ll tell you everything but right now we need to get the hell out of here.’

  I dodge his outstretched arms. Since when did my father want to hold me?

  ‘I’m not going anywhere with you!’ I shout, backing towards the door, pausing only when my elbow scrapes against the handle. ‘Don’t come near me,’ I warn, looking around for something to arm myself with. Then, I remember my father’s gun. But he is closer to it than I am. I would not be able to reach it first.

  My father’s guilt-ridden eyes are everywhere, trying to second-guess me. I back out of the door but dare not turn my back on him until I am in the hallway, where I stand a fighting chance of getting away from him. Fearing he will soon be upon me, I make a bolt for the front door. This door is rarely opened and I fumbl
e with the lock for a few wasted seconds. The silence is unbearable. Inside my head I am screaming but all I can hear is my own breathing. Convinced that my father is going to chop me into tiny pieces, I feel overwhelming relief when the door finally creaks open.

  ‘Stop!’ I hear Frank holler from somewhere behind me.

  And I do. Not because of him, but because of what I see coming towards me—

  Chapter 51

  ‘We’re too late.’ Father slams and bolts the door in our faces. I do not argue. Do not fight him as he shoves me back inside, but I claw at my hair as if it were on fire. I think I must be going mad because I cannot believe what I saw. It makes no sense. What the hell is going on?

  I stare wide-eyed at the door handle, terrified in case it should get turned from the outside. When it doesn’t, I sneak a look at my father, wanting reassurance, but he is glaring intently at me, his eyes anything but calming. I know the look well. Be brave. Don’t cry. Sit up straight. Be tough. Like a boy. Frank’s Law, remember.

  But I am scared and want my mother.

  Barring my way, as if he thinks I am crazy enough to step foot outside, he leans heavily against the door and buries his head in his hands. He is so close, I can smell his breath on my face, and for a moment I think he is about to cry, but instead he barks out a sarcastic laugh that startles me. Not for the first time, I question which one of us is insane.

  ‘What do they want?’ I plead, digging my fingernails as hard as I can into my wrist.

  Grabbing hold of the offending hand, Father tugs me, first into the kitchen, to pick up the gun and to lock the back door, then marches me into the living room. I do not know if I am his prisoner or not, but I am too stunned to do anything other than obey. What I saw out there has me beat. My father too, only he doesn’t realise it yet. He is still going through the motions, reloading his rifle, turning off the lights, hiding in the shadows—as if we stand a chance. As if we stand a chance.

  ‘What do they want?’ I ask again, peering through a gap in the curtains, making sure what I saw was real, that I didn’t imagine it.

  They are still out there. The villagers. People we have known all our lives. Men and women. Old and young. Most of them are on foot but others have arrived in vans or pickup trucks. Those on foot carry torches but it is the car headlights trained on the house that dazzle and hurt my eyes. A few of the men are armed with shotguns, some with spades. The spades worry me more than the guns. When you are shot you either die straight away or bleed to death like Jed could do if I don’t soon get him to a hospital, but being hit repeatedly with the dull edge of a spade would be unimaginable.

  I recognise many of them, but their expressions are new to me, riddled as they are with anger, fear, and something else I can’t immediately put a name to—excitement. The missing word pops out of nowhere, like a bad omen. These people are my own, yet they terrify me. A small part of me admits that this has always been the case.

  It comes as no shock to see that Bob Black and Daniel are the ringleaders of this unruly mob. Bob sits behind the wheel of Daniel’s pickup truck, while Daniel and the lanky ginger-haired youth stand in the open cargo area at the back, drumming up a rising hatred. I do not know how Daniel managed to get out of the truck alive or what happened to the dog, but when I recall the pitiful whining I heard earlier, I feel myself shudder.

  When my father unexpectedly wraps me in his arms, I stiffen automatically. Is this a trick? Is he part of this? I have never known my father voluntarily pull me into an embrace before. He hugs me so tightly, I think I am about to be crushed.

  ‘Why did you have to come back?’ he mumbles into my hair. ‘Why did you have to remember anything?’ He goes on in a different voice to the one I am accustomed to hearing. ‘Sixteen years I’ve been trying to protect you.’

  ‘From them?’ I pull my head away from the sweaty crease in his neck. I must look into his eyes when I say this— ‘Because of Mother?’

  He takes my face in his hands and I watch his already-swollen eyes well up.

  ‘I wanted no part in it,’ he whispers, wagging a silencing finger at me, as if afraid I might scream and bring even more trouble down on us, as if that were possible.

  ‘Told ’em so right from the start. That’s when they took her.’

  Unable to continue, he breaks down and sobs into my hair. Impatiently, I push him away. As much as I’ve always wanted my father to love me, I need answers, not hugs.

  ‘No part in what, Father? Tell me—’

  Outside, the roar of the mob can be heard above our own voices. They are coming for us. In my mind, I see them shouting, gesturing, and shaking their fists in the air. I don’t have to explain my fear to my father. I can see the same terror reflected in his eyes.

  ‘Turned up with torches. A night like this one. Threatened to burn us down, don’t you remember?’

  Screwing up my eyes in concentration, I blink several times as I try to think back to when I was a child. Conjuring up lost memories is never easy, especially when you have been warned against it all your life. Dr Moses was fond of saying that the past was just that, the past, and going back to it was dangerous for someone like me.

  Just as I am about to give up, I do remember—

  Her smile was all for me that night. Although she must have been as terrified as I am now, she stayed brave for my sake. When I saw her walking with her head held high towards the crowd, I tried to run after her, but my father would not let go of my hand.

  ‘Mummy! Mummy!’ I remember screaming. Unlike now, I had no idea what that night was all about or why the villagers had turned up at our door demanding that my mother be sent out to them. The mob might have changed, although I seem to think Bob Black was there that night too, but the outcome was the same. My mother disappeared into the night as surely as if she had flung herself off that cliff edge.

  ‘It was because of me, wasn’t it?’ I whimper. ‘Something I saw?’

  Before he has chance to reply, we hear thumping on the walls. Father grabs hold of me again and pulls me close. When he gestures for me to move away from the wall, I obey without question.

  ‘You made them nervous,’ he acknowledges with a proud smirk. ‘Always poking your nose in where it wasn’t wanted. Your mother and I wanted to send you away from Little Downey, but they wouldn’t allow it. Too frightened you would talk. I had no choice but to send you to Dr Moses. It was the only way of keeping you safe. It was either that, or—’

  I try to ignore the tremor in his voice that reveals he is as afraid I am. I need him to be brave, like my mother.

  ‘It was human meat I saw, wasn’t it? You used to make me deliver it on my bicycle,’ I whisper. ‘I think I have always known.’

  My father’s eyes soften momentarily, and I see myself in them, as a child, cycling past him while he stood in front of the butcher’s shop, a butcher’s saw dangling in his hand. I remember that he used to watch me go and I could never understand why he seemed so angry. At last, I understand, it was them he was angry with, not me.

  ‘They’ve been eating it since before the war. Generation to generation has kept the craving going. To keep you and Viv safe, I had to become involved, as my father did before me. They threatened to kill her, and you too, if I didn’t do what they said.’

  ‘You kill people?’

  Fear of my father returns. I cannot bear to be the daughter of a murderer.

  ‘No. Not me.’ He is quick to reassure me, but his next words chill me. ‘I just… look after the meat.’

  His confession sickens me, but I feel my heart hammer again. I hadn’t even realised it had paused. Be grateful for small mercies, I tell myself. Anything is better than him being a cold-blooded killer. It’s too soon to think about whether Dr Moses is somehow embroiled in all this. Another disappointment would surely finish me off.

  ‘And Merry?’ I must know.

  Father fixes me with such a cold disinterested stare, that I realise he is just as capable of hiding the truth from
himself as I am. ‘Being locked up so long has driven your mother insane,’ he finally admits. ‘She was mentally unstable before you went away but after you left, they let her come back, but it was too late by then. She’s like them now, addicted and capable of just about anything. They made her that way. Force-fed her like a dog. The bastards. We were lucky they didn’t make her walk off the cliff edge like they did so many others, but her madness made them nervous. It was the only thing that kept her safe. The villagers agreed she could stay in the cellar, provided she was not allowed to roam.’

  ‘Oh, my God.’ I take a step back in horror and almost collapse to my knees. Can this be true? My poor gentle mother, who wouldn’t have hurt a fly – a cold-blooded killer.

  When my father picks up his gun and goes to the window, I pull at his arm to stop him.

  ‘You can’t fight them,’ I declare, terrified in case he should open fire on the crowd outside. Not that they don’t deserve it, but surely then we would have no chance. ‘There are too many.’

  In response, an authoritative voice in the crowd rings out. It’s a voice I recognise—

  ‘We know you’re in there, Frank!’ Daniel yells in a deceptively friendly tone. ‘Come on out. Nobody else need get hurt.’

  Again, I tug at my father’s arm. I want him as far away from the window as possible. It’s too dangerous. But when my father turns weary eyes on me and shakes his head, I know he has made up his mind to do something foolish.

  ‘Promise me,’ he pleads, with his voice cracking, ‘whatever happens, whatever they do to me, you’ll leave here. Take the baby with you, she’s—’

  ‘My sister, yes I know,’ I say quickly, hoping for some acknowledgement of his relationship to Merry but once again he dodges the subject, unwilling or unable to accept his part in her demise. My mother might have killed Merry in one of her jealous rages, but my father took her body apart, bit by bit, turning her into a slab of meat, in order to cover up this terrible crime. I must not think about this now, I realise. It won’t do any of us any good, least of all Merry.