Magruder's Curiosity Cabinet (23 page)

The Monster

Kitty paces in a circle in front of the door to the observation suite while seagulls squawk and fight just offshore. Her hospital-issued skirt makes a quiet swishing sound as she stomps back and forth in the sand, flattening the beach grass over and over again.

P-Ray's cough spiraled quickly into full-blown illness—his little body wracked with fever, his neck sprouting black lumps. She'd gone to the fence and shouted to anyone and no one that they needed a doctor, please, right now, please. But the hours crept by with no response.

The head nurse's words thundered in her ears.
It'll be Swinburne for both of you. If it were up to me, you'd be there already.

Kitty raced down to the water to wet a washcloth and soothe P-Ray's feverish head, but it didn't seem to matter. The boy lay curled on the cot, sweating and shivering and weeping. She tried to read to him, but she couldn't focus on the words. She tried to sing to him, but her voice cracked. She couldn't even hold him—the slightest touch seemed to send waves of pain across his body. There was nothing Kitty could do but watch. When she couldn't bear that any longer, she'd gone outside to pace in circles.

If it were up to me, you'd be there already.
Both
of you.

Enzo calls out from the other side of the fence. “Signorina! I am here! Signorina, come closer.”

Kitty does not stop pacing. She does not even look up. “Climb the fence if you want to be closer.”

“I cannot. They are watching.” He gestures at a guard standing not fifty yards away, his eyes locked on Enzo. There will be no more casual, fence-jumping visits, not now that plague has come to the observation suite.

Kitty keeps pacing. “So? What did they say?”

“Please come closer, so I no holler.”

“I'm not leaving him. What did they say?”

Enzo frowns at having to not merely deliver bad news but shout it. “The doctor, he is not coming.”

“Why?”

“Why ask what you already know? They say they cannot help him.”

“
Won't
. Won't help him.”

“There are many other children sick, signorina.”

She stamps her foot. “I bloody well know that, don't I? One of them gave it to him!”

Enzo sighs and says, “
Sì.
” But he does not sound so sure.

“He
did not
give it to them, Enzo. They gave it to him! He was
fine
until we got here. And now
those
children—those light-skinned children, English-speaking children—
they
get to see the doctors, don't they? Don't they?” Enzo looks away, but his silence only feeds her fury. “Of course they do. Of course! They get doctors and medicine, but what does P-Ray get? A mildew-covered blanket. A rag and some seawater to cool his fever. And a waiting oven when he's yielded up the ghost. And you! You stand there staring at me like a beaten dog. Are you up there fighting for him? Are you arguing against this slow execution? No! No, with you it's ‘
sì
, signorina,' ‘no, signorina.' Won't even climb the fence now, because you're afraid of some guard!”

“I climb this fence, I no allowed back in the main building.”

“And what a shame
that
would be—losing your comfortable bed in the dormitory.”

He slams on the fence with both hands. “No dormitory, no boat!” He glances back to see if the guard might have overheard, but the guard looks distracted by the seagulls. “I try to finish boat, get us away from here! And
sì
, I argue for him! I love
il ragazzo
like a son. How dare you say this? I try everything I can think. But they no listen! Can you no see? To
their
eyes, I am monster too!”

Kitty stares at Enzo, the left half of his face purple and leathery, drooping just slightly lower than the right. Of course. She takes a few contrite steps toward the fence. “I'm sorry, Mr. Enzo. I don't even see your scars anymore, now that we're friends. I guess I wasn't thinking.”

He sighs. “You are upset, I know. But remember not everyone glide across the world so easy like you.”

Kitty goes the rest of the way to the fence. Her eyes are wet. “Does this look easy?” She gestures at her hospital uniform, the observation suite, everything.

He smiles a little. “No. But I do think…I think some of the people, like you, they…walk a path with fewer rocks. They expect differently.”

“Should I just accept this from the doctors? Should I just…what, shrug?”

“No,” he replies. “You rage. You rage, signorina. Just maybe you no rage at me, okay?”

She nods. “I promise.” She hugs herself and looks down at her boots. “I'm just so frightened. The past few days have been difficult but…it's been me and him. Together. Do you know what I mean? But now…anytime I step back in that cabin, I might discover I'm alone.”

“Aww,
il scugnizzo
, he's tough one. You also are tough one, I think. And like they say, I am monster. So.”

Kitty reaches out, linking fingers with him through the fence. “Noble monster. Please finish our boat.”

Bells

First, Spencer takes care of Timur's urgent, nonsensical telegram. His steps are lighter due to his brief conversation with Nazan. Things were looking precarious for a bit, but now… Spencer smiles. Everything is going to work out after all.

That the telegraph office is open at all is a surprise. Nothing else seems to be. Storefronts have been repurposed for other, more pressing needs. The sign for Ira's Incredible Ice Cream is covered with a piece of cardboard announcing
XTIAN Baptism, 7:00 p.m. Saved & Sinners All Welcome
. What had been the Coney Island Souvenir Emporium advertises
Spiritual Cures and Prayers, His Holy Shree Harjeet Sundaravadhanam. The Mystic Is In.

He stops short in front of another sign—an ornately painted human palm floating in a starry night sky, the constellations drawn to resemble the zodiac.
Tibetan Priestess Yeshi Rinpoche
, says the flowery script.
Palm Readings and Spiritual Consultation.
And then underneath, in fresh, wet paint:
Traditional Tibetan Burial Services.

“Tibetan burial services!” Spencer scoffs. “Nothing but rocky slopes in Tibet—they can't even dig holes there.” He shakes his head. “The con men in this town need to read a book once in a while.”

As he walks on, Spencer can hear the ocean. He shudders.

The sea is normally drowned out by the carousels and roller coasters and general pandemonium. The crashing waves, so comforting when lying on the beach with a good book or a pretty girl, seem ominous now. A hungry tide creeping up to swallow the world.

A woman's sobs drift down from an open apartment window. Her voice is hoarse. She's wept as much as she can but not enough. He thinks of his brother, of his friends from school. Did they get out in time? Or are they gone forever?

Along the street comes the clip-clop of distraction. Spencer recognizes the tinkling bells of Children's Delight—a portable four-seater carousel pulled along by a fine white horse. The Children's Delight was such a part of his childhood; he and Charlie used to search for it on every family visit to Coney. What a relief that some things never change.

And yet.

A young girl with pigtails, no more than ten years old, sits atop the cart. It is packed with corpses. Bodies stacked four and five deep, from the base of the cart to the saddles of the ponies, mouths gaping, arms and legs flopping off the edges of the wagon. Flies hover over dead eyes searching the sky.

Spencer approaches. “Excuse me, are you… What is… Good God, child, what are you doing?”

She holds up her hand. “Don't get close. I got it.”

“You have what?”

“The Cough, stupid. You got a body?”

“What?”

“Tell me the address, I'll go 'round the back, and you can put it on.”

“No, I… You're a little girl! Why are you doing this?”

“This here is Daddy's cart, but he died yesterday. This morning, Mama died too. I got a baby brother at home. I didn't want him playin' around no bodies, so I put Mama and Daddy on the cart. They're down at the bottom of the pile—you can't see, but they's there. I was drivin' Bess—she's my horse here, this is Bess. You say hi to Bess now.” Spencer just stares, which annoys the girl. “I says, say hi, dammit!”

“Uh…hi, Bessie.”

“It's Bess. Bessie's a cow's name, stupid.”

“Sorry.”

“Anyway, so I was taking Mama and Daddy down to the beach. Figured I'd bury 'em in the sand? Me and my brother, we bury all kinda stuff in the sand. So I thought I'd take Mama and Daddy there. But this old lady stops me, see? She says, you got bodies—you collecting bodies? Whole family next door to her—mother, father, granny, two kids. All of 'em gone. Boy, they smell something fierce. But she gives me some rock candy, so I take 'em. Farther I go, more bodies I get. Don't care what people give me, you know—I got candy, few nickels, cinnamon bun. But…” She gazes at her cargo regretfully. “Sure a lotta diggin' to do.”

Suddenly she's overcome by a violent cough that nearly knocks her off her perch. But she steadies herself, spits blood at the sidewalk, and squints at Spencer. “Mister, you wanna help me dig?”

“I'm sorry…I can't. I'm going to the doctor's. Hey, why don't you come with me? We can get you some medicine. My treat. What do you say?”

“Aww, I don't know. Mama always tellin' me don't go nowhere with strangers.”

“Of course, yes, that's wise. But… Look, my name is Spencer.” He gives an awkward little bow. “Now we aren't strangers. Right? Come with me to the doctor.”

“Nah, I gotta go. Got a lotta diggin'.” She thwacks Bess with the reins. “See ya, mister.”

The Children's Delight clip-clops away toward the sea. Spencer can only watch her go.

• • •

Outside Luna Park, there's a line of Unusuals, patiently waiting for…something. In the middle of the line, Spencer sees Whitey Lovett with other residents of Lilliputia. “Afternoon, Chief,” Spencer says. “Ladies, gents…” The little people ignore him, but Spencer pauses beside them anyway. “Whitey, what's the line for?”

“Na-Na Xiou. She's a healer.”

“Whitey, not you too.”

Whitey suppresses a cough. “Let's just say I've felt better.”

The tiny woman beside him pats Whitey's arm. “You'll be all right. Na-Na will fix you up.”

“Look,” Spencer says, “why don't you come with me to an actual doctor? Don't worry about the cost. I'll take care of it.”

Whitey frowns. “Na-Na Xiou
is
an actual doctor. Just because Chinese medicine didn't come from Harvard doesn't mean—”

“All right, I'm sure it's wonderful. But, Whitey, this is Surf Avenue! Last week, we were selling penny postcards. Now it's plague cures?”

“What do you know?” sneers Whitey's companion. “What have you Dozens ever done for us? Fleeing off to your summer houses and leaving us to die.”

“Miss, as you can see, I haven't—”

She stomps her tiny boot in rage. “I don't care, I don't care! Go away. You aren't wanted.”

“Whitey, come on…” But Whitey looks away.

Spencer sighs. “I can't force you. But if you change your mind, you can find me at Magruder's. In fact…” Spencer takes a step backward and raises his voice to address the entire line. “I'm on my way to a doctor right now. Come with me. Money is not an issue. Please, let me help.”

The Unusuals stare balefully at the Brooklyn prince, reduced to pleading in the street. They can't help but enjoy saying no to someone who's enjoyed such a glittering lifetime of yes.

Spencer notices the sparkle of triumph in their eyes. He's wasting his time. “All right. Offer stands. You know who I am, all of you. I'm stopping at Magruder's, and I will help if you ask.”

As he walks away, he hears Whitey's girlfriend mutter “jackass.” No one argues.

• • •

The gathering outside the doctor's apartment is even more chaotic than Spencer expected. People in the line, such as it is—it's more like a festering clot of affliction—have boils and hacking coughs. They wring their hands and moan and weep. They poke one another with gangrenous fingers. They mutter angrily to themselves and scream obscenities at the air. A man collapses, and the people behind step over him, happy to be that much closer to the front.

My God. It's like the dinner bell rang at the madhouse.

Spencer takes a position behind an elderly woman wrapped in a moth-eaten blanket. She's sweating and shaking and ranting at no one in particular. “Go up, thou bald head,” she cries. “Go up, bald head! Go up, goddamn it!”

Spencer lowers his chin and tries to cover his mouth with the collar of his shirt but discreetly, so as not to cause offense. Then he thinks,
Offense? To whom, exactly?
So he takes his handkerchief from his pocket and ties it around his face.

A basket is lowered by rope from the window. The gaggle of deranged diseased all reach up to the sky, even though there's only one miracle per customer, and this one isn't theirs.

Before the lucky patient can retrieve his medicine, a lunatic war cry echoes among the buildings. A pack of young men comes screaming along the street, whooping and roaring, gripping glass bottles full of fire. They rush the building, throwing their bottles in high arcs toward the windows of the doctor's apartment. Some of the bottles smash onto the crowd, who shriek in terror at the shower of flames. But some hit their target, bursting through the windows and setting the doctor's curtains on fire. Seconds later, one of the bottles connects with the apartment's gas line. Windows blow out like a horizontal fireworks show, and the building is ablaze.

“Come out, come out, Medicine Man,” taunts the pack. On the street, the sick, the mad, and the confused run every which way in panic. A thin man bumps into a fat one, the fat one screams, and the thin one vomits at the fat man's feet. The little old lady in her blanket cackles delightedly and points at the building. “Behold,” she shouts, “the smoke goes up forever and ever!” She grabs Spencer with rotting hands. “Blessed is the one who stays awake! Hallelujah!”

Startled, Spencer pushes her away, and the weakened old woman goes sprawling. Muttering an apology, he reaches down to help her up, but she has already rolled away. Spencer takes a step to follow, but a child sobs, and instinctively, he moves toward the sound when a shriek makes him turn back toward the burning building, just in time to see some poor soul leap out a window and land with a smack on the sidewalk. He rushes over and asks, “Are you all right?” but the pile of bones makes no reply, and Spencer notes something unnatural about the way its neck is tilted. He looks around and spots the young men who threw the bottles—a murder of raggedy crows, robbing their way through the hysterical crowd. A necklace from her, a wallet from him, a handbag over here, perhaps a brooch. No pickpocket's subtlety required—stride up to a demented sack of pestilence and snatch whatever trinket is available, and if someone has the presence of mind to object, just punch them in the face, easy peasy. But most don't object; they don't see, and how could they? Spencer glances at the doctor's building, belching smoke from numerous windows on different floors, and his only thought is,
No. No, it does not end like this.

He runs toward the front door, one fish swimming against the current, and a mad thought strikes him.
Actually, this is perfect; this is just the break I needed. I'll drag that goddamned doctor from his burning apartment, bring him back to Magruder's, and he'll toil day and night to bring Mrs. Hayward back to life. Nazan will be thrilled, I'll be a hero, and she'll forget all about Zeph.

Spencer shoves his way toward the door, dodging thieves and vomit. He worries he'll have trouble finding the doctor—he has no idea what he looks like.

But somebody does.

Spencer reaches the stoop and looks up to see two figures emerge. First out is a small, gray-haired man wearing spectacles and a white coat. He looks terrified, and who wouldn't—there is a muscled arm wrapped around his neck. The arm connects to a brick wall of a man who follows right behind, a powerful, beefy slab of a human, but something is wrong, Spencer realizes; something is wrong with this man, and then he sees. The slab is rotting. Fingers black and skin mottled and nose missing and…
Nose missing?
Spencer blinks hard and looks again—perhaps the smoke is playing tricks—but sure enough, there's just a dark stain where his nose should be. Does he have the Cough? Can the Cough even do that? As the two men stumble a bit down the steps, Spencer gets a good look at the telltale obsidian eggs sprouting from either side of his neck. He has it. The noseless man has it, and now he has the doctor too.

“No! Leave him alone! You can't do that! You can't take him! It isn't fair!” Spencer knows he sounds ridiculous, like a child. But he can't watch his only chance get dragged away by some hunk of festering, noseless flesh. The man and his captive brush past Spencer on their way out of the building, and Spencer grabs the old man's white coat. “No, you can't do this. You mustn't—”

Something cold and heavy connects with the back of Spencer's head, and he goes down, his smooth-shaven face scraping across the sandy pavement as his own nose goes crunch. The whole world is suddenly a carousel, and Spencer grabs the sidewalk as it spins. He rolls onto his back and sees he's lying at the foot of an enormous castle.

No, not a castle. A man. A man who looks like a castle.

The Castle Man's green eyes gleam, and his yellow teeth glisten, and he holds a length of heavy pipe in his hand like a prize. A rat sits on the Castle Man's shoulder, and the rat is laughing.

No, the man is laughing. Maybe they both are laughing. It hardly matters, Spencer; you need to focus.
There's laughing and spinning and blood everywhere—blood from his nose and his eyes and the back of his head. Bloody fire pours from the building, and Spencer's head is full of smoke, and it's too much, too damn much, and Spencer vomits, which makes the rat laugh even harder.
Bessie's a cow's name, stupid.

Spencer rests his broken head on the sidewalk, and it hurts in a way that feels like it's happening to someone else. The pipe clanks down against the sidewalk beside his head, echoing in his ear like a bell.

“Hey, Goo-Goo,” the Castle Man says. “C'mere and look at this.” He leans down and yanks the vomit-soaked kerchief down from Spencer's face. “You're that Reynolds kid. I recognize you from the papers.”

No Nose stalks over, dragging the doctor along with him.

“Look,” the Castle Man says to him. “A Reynolds! I caught us a goddamn prince of the city right here.”