Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction from the Margins of History (19 page)

My choice
.

As I enter the room she shuts and locks the door behind us. Isabella is sitting on Mémé’s bed and she will not meet my eyes.

“Sit at the desk, Claire,” Mémé says.

There is a piece of paper, a pen, an inkwell. The chair creaks beneath me as I sit down. My hands on the polished wood surface. All the drawers are unlocked now, but what does it matter anymore?

“I want you to draw, as best you remember, what you painted on Isabella’s ceiling.”

In my mind’s eye I can see the sigil flaring into life. The pen and ink sit there, waiting to be used.

“And thus hath the candle sing’d the moth.” Mémé sighs the words out as the bed creaks beneath her weight. “Claire, Claire. I have never before taken a girl I did not choose myself, but Isabella is special to me. Now I can see I made a mistake.”

She strokes Isabella’s head. Isabella still won’t look at me.

“We are so close, Claire.” She takes Isabella’s hand and presses it into her own lap. “So close to an uprising that will change all our lives. But I cannot have less than eight each month. Did I not take Aimee’s place myself last night, so we could be eight? So we might finish what we began?” She takes a breath. “Yet now, because of you, we were not eight. Because of you, we may lose all that we have worked for. What did you paint on her ceiling?”

“I cannot remember,” I say, hoping against hope it sounds like the truth.

Mémé’s foot taps on the floor, the tempo increasing with each passing moment–

And then she seizes Isabella by the throat with one hand, a knife in her other, pulling her close and driving the point into Isabella’s cheek, just below her eye. Blood wells around the blade and Isabella shrieks in fright, making me cry “No!”

“Draw it,” Mémé says calmly. “Draw it or I will cut her face and she will spend the rest of her days servicing men at the quays. Draw it.”

“You wouldn’t hurt her.” I nearly stutter in my panic. “You need her, you need her for Turgot.”

“What do I care about Turgot if we fail? And if I am to replace one, I can as easily replace two.” She digs the blade deeper and Isabella starts sobbing. “Draw it!”

Choking on my tears, I shove the pen in the ink and draw as fast as I can. The point digging and scratching, the ink splattering. Isabella crying behind me,
oh my love–

“There,” I yell, holding up the paper, smeared and blotched. “That’s what I drew! And it didn’t work because it’s all a ploy, to make us do what other whores won’t. We haven’t made anything happen, we’ve changed nothing!”

Mémé shoves Isabella aside and lunges forward, seizing my arm and spinning me face-first onto the floor. Her knee pinning my back, her hand on my neck; she presses down, crushing my face against the wood.

“We’ll see what I can change,” she cries furiously. “Let’s see if I can change
your
world, eh? Yours and hers and anyone else you have turned with your deceit.”

I buck and kick but I cannot dislodge her, something in my nose is cracking and I cannot breathe and I can feel her tensing against my back–

There is a rush of air, a sickening thud, and her weight disappears. I look over my shoulder to see Mémé fallen on her side; I turn over completely and Isabella is holding the poker in her hand, its tip darkly wet. It takes me a moment to realize she is trembling everywhere, her face pale save for the scabbing blood on her cheek.

Mémé’s body is still.

I start to crawl towards Mémé. If she is dead it will be the gallows for us both…

“No,” Isabella says hoarsely. “Don’t touch her.”

I get to my feet, my head throbbing, my nose hot and tender. “We need to get away.” I sound as if I am speaking through a tube. “There may be money in her desk.”

Isabella only stands there, shaking, her eyes darting from Mémé to me and back again. Carefully I take the poker from her hands, not daring to touch the gouge on her cheek.

Behind us Mémé makes a gurgling sound; we both jump. Still she lies unmoving.

“I’m so sorry,” Isabella whispers then.

“For what? She would have killed us both.”

“For bringing you here.” She is crying again. “I – I changed your sigil. Claire! I changed your sigil. Only I could not find the words to confess it, she was enraged, it frightened me. But it was me, it was me, I figured out how she made them and I changed yours.”

I can only gape at her.

“I changed your sigil,” she repeats more slowly. “I couldn’t bear it any more, watching them go to you, knowing I did this to you. You were just so beautiful that day, so beautiful and sad, and I thought I could help you, give you some, some food, money, I don’t know. And then Mémé thought… well.” She wipes at her eyes, takes a shuddering breath. “I made it say you would leave Paris, leave and be happy and never again have to do
this
.”

“But I changed yours,” I say, stupidly.

Isabella falls silent.

“I changed yours. It wasn’t that I couldn’t remember hers. What I showed her was what I painted. That’s why I took the slip from Marie, to be the one to paint your ceiling.”

“What did you change it to?” she whispers, her voice nearly inaudible.

“That something would stop her, and you would be safe.” I am weeping now, my breath catching in my swollen nostrils. “I know – I know you don’t love me, not as I love you, but that day, all the violence and Aimée… it wasn’t right that we were making things so terrible. And I thought I could at least free you from her, I could make you safe…”

At once she is in my arms.

There is little here save for rocky beach and scrub to the front, grass and stunted pines behind. The cottage was once the residence of an elderly fisherman –
a hermit
,
the villagers tell us, shaking their heads that anyone would want such a decrepit property, only that tiny garden and a barn they wouldn’t keep the devil in.

It suits us perfectly.

Every day we listen to the surf; every night we study the fields of stars. We have turned our bed to the east, to face the dawn.

We ordered marigold seeds, giggling together like naughty little girls.

Did the sigils really work? I still cannot say for certain. I had wanted Isabella safe, Mémé stopped, but I had imagined it would come in the form of police, not our own hands. I do know that there were no more mobs after that day, or so we read in the gazettes after; we were away on the first coach. The fishermen here tell us that a tiller takes a light hand; perhaps Mémé tried too hard, demanding instead of asking, pushing instead of letting events unfold in their time.

Isabella’s body next to mine, embracing me. Her hand sliding over me, inside me. And then rising up again to draw the sigil on my face, lazy strokes of her thumb, the easy slide of her fingertips.

Kissing me, everywhere but where she traced the sigil. Drawing my legs between hers, pressing us together. Her thigh between, her heat against my skin. My mouth dropping to her neck, her breasts, and we are rocking and sliding and then she suddenly cries out, staring into my face, her own suffused with love and I love and oh the light–

We do not demand; we ask. We do not plot; we suggest. No hunger, no suffering, no murderous rage. Just the slightest touch on the tiller, turning the world towards something a little kinder, a little sweeter, a little more like love.

Art by GMB Chomichuk

1883
Hell’s Gate, Fraser Canyon
British Columbia, Canada

My ears rang as dynamite shattered stone. Rocks flew from the blast zone. My eyes followed the wire that vanished into the dust-cloud billowing out of the hole. Releasing the detonator’s plunger, I stood. I lifted my goggles, praising Buddha under bated breath.

Six fellows neared the opening with picks and shovels. I heard the banter of Mandarin as they entered. “Keep your eyes up,” one warned his brothers. “Who knows how stable it is here.” I seized the wire and dragged it over. Wrapping the cord around my arm and lifting the detonator, I watched them dig through the rubble.

Then I remembered I had to go.

Sprinting ahead, I chased down a supply wagon, jumped into the back and held on tight. Cold winds bit the Fraser Canyon. Morning sunlight crept over the horizon. Orange blades stabbed through the sky, illuminating the trees and cliffs. Light danced along the river beyond. We neared the edge. I watched the torrent rage, shivered, and missed home.

Before too long, we reached the bottom. Pines guarded the old railway town, dotting the rolling hills around it. Workers toiled by the roads. Wagons and horsemen passed. Two railcars sat on tracks we had already laid out. Men cleaned the railcars’ sides; others lazily smoked near them. I leapt out and headed to my supervisor’s cabin. Lamplight flickered behind the windows. I stepped through the front door.

Five whites sat around a hardwood desk, consulting piles of documents and a large map. One ran fingers through his thinning hair and sneered my way. A portly man sat on the right, cane on his lap as he glossed over a page. The project overseer, Mister Bunting, raised a hand and silenced a bearded man on his left. His niece Olivia, slender with tied-back brown hair, hungrily read a leather-bound book beside him. Boredom crossed her face. No doubt her visit to the countryside was not as she had expected.

“There he is,” Mister Bunting declared, standing and straightening his lapels in a bid to look official. Fading blonde hair gripped his scalp. His belly pressed against his shirt. A smile nothing short of venomous covered his face. “How’s it coming?”

“Fine, yes.” Colleagues who had been in Canada longer than I, and some genial whites, had taught me key phrases and words. Sadly, my comprehension was better than my speaking ability, which was better than my laughable reading level. “We make another two metre. Cleaning up is now.”

“What’s his name, again?” The sneering man aimed his chin at me. “Wushu or something, right?”

Mister Bunting turned his hand over. “Introduce yourself, lad.”

Showing respect, I lowered my head. “Wu Xiao-Li.”

“Gesundheit,” someone joked. Leering grins wide, the men laughed, nudging each other. Olivia hardly moved, but sighed heavily, annoyed. I kept my peace and let them finish.

A wave of Mister Bunting’s arm and his cohorts fell quiet. He bent down and produced a set of rolled-up papers. “Now, listen.” Mister Bunting put the papers in front of me, speaking as though addressing a child. “I want
you
. To take-ee
this.
To
Benny
.
Benny,
all right?”

“Yes, Mister Bunting.” He meant my foreman.

His smile again. “Good boy, Charlie.”

I took the papers. “Xiao-Li.”

“Yes.” Bunting nodded condescendingly. “Yes.
Charlie.
That’s your
name
.”

I hid my frustration. “I take to Benny.”

“Make him roll over next,” the portly man guffawed. Another round of raucous laughter. I left, anger nipping at my heels.

I found Benny in the centre of town, dragging a man out of a latrine. Three of his thugs had pulled the poor soul from his business and brought him into the street, trousers still around his knees. I tried not to stare at his shame as the men held him down. One hooligan gripped a long broomstick eagerly. A crowd gathered; Chinese and whites alike stopped to watch the half-nude man forced onto his knees. I put myself behind Fat Leung, a fellow whose girth kept me well-hidden.

Benny glared down at his captive joylessly. A wide-brimmed sunhat sat on his head, his pristine suit pants and vest woven from high-quality cotton. In his hand was a gold-plated pocket watch. His thumb tapped its side impatiently. I was told that Benny once went by Bai Wei, but changed his name when he started moving up in the ranks. Reminding him of his old name often resulted in beatings. Then again, Benny’s name was synonymous with pain.

“Wing,” he addressed the half-nude man in Mandarin, “would you like to explain where you were this morning?”

Now I recognized my colleague. Wing’s stringy hair covered his gaunt, unshaven face. Too scared to speak, he stumbled around his words incoherently. Benny lost his patience. “Well! It seems you were out looking for your tongue. Open his mouth! Let’s see if it’s still there!”

“Please, sir!” Wing cried. Struggling, he freed himself from the men’s grips and shuffled forward on his knees, hands clasped. “I had an upset stomach when I woke up! It’s the food, sir! Last night’s meat was rancid!”

Benny faced the crowd. Shocked looks circulated. “Your colleagues seem healthy.”

“Then it was something else!” Rubbing his hands, Wing kowtowed before the foreman, head to the ground. “I just couldn’t work with my bowels rebelling against me! Please, sir, I’m sorry!
I’m sorry!
”

“You think you can squat on the job when we have a whole mountain to tear down?” Benny snapped his fingers at his flunkies. “Beat some sense into him.”

As Wing wailed in protest, Benny’s heavies fell on him. The man with the broomstick dealt terrible blows against his bare legs and backside. Cackling, his companions’ fists pounded against my friend’s torso and face. Turning, Benny barked at the onlookers in English: “Back to work!”