The Axman Cometh (18 page)
I have somewhere surely lived, a
life
of
joy with you
Two deaths have been improvised, and done as well as he could do them.
But this is the part the Axman likes best:
With the stately symphonic poem taking shape in his head (reminiscent of, but certainly not borrowed from, Siegfried's Funeral Music in the third act of
Die Gotterdammerung),
he takes the time to again look around the master bedroom with his pencil flashlight. This time there are sleepers, whom he does not disturb but studies with what amounts to familial compassion as he waits for those moments in the course of the threnody that are certain to move him to tears: waits to lead them in their
unmarriage
vows, to unjoin them in holy bloodletting.
(If one should wake, and if one could see in the dark, and had chilling moments of apprehension, of realization, then one would see a yellow hard hat, and beneath its narrow brim clear polycarbonate goggles already besmirched, little pinpoints of quick-dry
bloodspatter
. One would see the unblinking unwavering eyes of a curious man. Yes, curious, not inimical, nor gloating, nor wishing the sleepers pain, which is the beauty of the heavy ax he, holds, no bone a barrier to the sharpness of the blades he carefully hones after every third or fourth stroke, circumstances permitting. He is respectful of his victims, aware of the very great privilege they afford him in the drawing of their blood. He wishes they all could hear the music, but that's the rub: the music is of their dying, during their dying; no one will hear the full symphony except she who he has chosen to be the last,
his
gift to her fine, unblemished soul.)
The beam of the penlight moves with the silence of a butterfly over surfaces, is reflected in its poignant searching from mirrors, glassware, the screen of a bulky TV set, rabbit ears wrapped in crinkly aluminum foil. As he looks, he moves, never more than a step at a time, gradually coming ever-closer to the bed with the high
birdseye
-maple headboard, forming a scrolled crest a third of the way up the wall above which are positioned family photographs. Her family? His? Axman doesn't know. There is a thinness, a sallowness to the
countryfolk
in the group photos, not a smile to be spared, a certain dogged reluctance to look the camera in the eye. Churchyard. After a wedding, no doubt; who poses for photographs following a funeral? To a man they wear dark suits and fedoras; the women's flowered dresses reach to the top ankle strap of their best shoes. 1930's, even earlier, to judge from vintage high-roofed automobiles parked in the background.
The
beam
traces
down the papered wall, the headboard, steadies there as a sleeper shifts beneath the quilt, breaks wind obliviously. He waits, agreeably chilled by the recurrence of the
leitmotiv
conceived so effortlessly at the first fall of his ax downstairs. He listens intently, but there is nothing in the music he would change. Impatient to get on with what he is creating—but this is the inevitable lull before the next gorgeous, incredible gush of inspiration. As the music begins to fade from his mind (not losing it, no, it is always there even though he must sometimes shift his concentration outside himself, as if taking a short stroll away from the concert hall), he lets the light play on the wiry unkempt head and freckled brow of Ernestine Hill. Her eyelids shiny, purplish ovals. She is lying on her stomach, breathing through slack lips. One bare arm is thrown over the side of the bed, fingers trailing on the floor near where an ashtray, matches, a packet of cigarette papers and sack of tobacco are piled on top of a seed catalogue. Very small diamond in the wedding band which in turn is deep in the flesh below an enlarged, obstructive knuckle. She is wearing some kind of corset-thing beneath her flimsy sleeveless nightgown. Maybe it's for her back. One other problem, the sheet and quilt, though folded back and covering the sleepers only to about their waists, are still in the way. He has to remove them. But first a look at Dab, face-up and snoring less than two feet apart from his wife. Undershirt and skivvies. One knee raised. He moves the light across Dab, back to Ernestine, again to Dab from tattooed arm to hairy shoulders, all the while approaching the bed. The light in his left hand. The ax in his right, at his side, the bit swinging in a short arc just off the floor. Which squeaks under his weight. Not much of a noise, but in the bed
Dabney
Hill breaks off in mid- snore, jerks, mumbles. Instantly the light is off.
He waits, two or three minutes, for Dab to adjust himself on the mattress, breathe deeply, commence snoring again. The light.
fl
ick
///////////////////////
Dab is still on his back,
nostrils high, mouth
open,
adam's
apple like
a hut of cartilage on the
exposed
throat.
flick
a
vacan
-
cy
///////////////////////
in Dab's mouth, he re-
moved
a partial upper bridge
before retiring.
flick
again, back to the
throat. Lingering //////////
there, pale as a moonbeam. So.
Dab
will be the first, and headless, even as Ernestine dreams on with furrowed brow and twisted lip.
Dearly beloved how I adore you for the blood you dedicate to me
His devotional all but inaudible as the music thunders through his head. The light is out.
In the dark he pulls down the quilt on
the bed, slowly, until they both lie uncovered, unknowing.
Exultant, the Axman weeps.
Awake, Shannon?
Someone is calling her by that name again.
Not one of the psych-techs. It has to be a newcomer on the floor, but whoever it is, he should know better. She will not respond to that name. If he doesn't know what to correctly call her, she will go on lying there with her eyes closed, on the narrow bed. Face to the unadorned, pastel-yellow concrete block wall. Her knees drawn up, hands clasped between her thighs. The position she finds most comfortable . .. endurable is more like it. She can go on for long stretches at a time like this, ignoring the body's most basic demands. Thirst Hunger. Meaningless. Lying in shit. Meaningless. Blood—but she has no blood. Her veins, arteries, empty, waxen. Her heart contracting, expanding rhythmically, but the chambers are scoured clean. Total emptiness. No blood.
Now leave me alone.
You can't get away from me that easily. Shannon.
Oh, she'd like to teach him a lesson! But, ironclad rule, she
never
talks to strangers, those who have mistaken her for someone else. Is this Georgia's day off? She will not move or blink until Georgia comes around and greets her properly, warm and chuckling: "Well, how are we
feelin
' today,
Suzylamb
? Oh, oh, did we have a little accident while we was snug asleep? Don't you worry about that, sugar, have it cleaned right up." She loves Georgia. And Dr.
McLarty
, the whimsical Irishman with the awful pipe tobacco and plaid vests, hair too thin and lazy to comb, eyes big as a squid's behind thick glasses: she loves him, too. "I like the new strip. What a problem! That stray puppy Suzy brought home chewed a hole in mom's favorite sofa cushion." "
Suzy'll
patch it, and mom will never notice." "Then she'll get to keep the puppy?" "Oh, sure. A family needs a puppy." "He might get into more mischief, though. He might do something really bad." "No, he
won't.
See, he's sorry about the sofa cushion, and he'll never do a thing like that again. He loves Suzy, because she gave him a home." "Tell me something—" Dr.
Firmikin
speaking; he wears glasses too—but with severe, dark frames. She doesn't love Dr.
Firmikin
. He seldom says anything, but when he asks her a question, the question frequently makes her nervous, uneasy. Then when she replies he'll rub his temple with the eraser of a pencil as if perplexed, not pleased with her answer. "Why does Suzy like dogs better than cats?" Always that kind of question: difficult. But for this one she has
em
answer she doesn't have to prepare. "Cats are too quiet. They prowl around at night. They have—" "Claws?"
No, no, guess again. But I'm not talking. I'll never tell
Shannon, get up. You've made a mess. You have to clean yourself.
Georgia, you do it for me? Please? I'm
sorrryyy
. I've been
SO
good; haven't done it in my sleep for months and months.
I'm not Georgia. And you're a long way from the hatch in Topeka. But we've all been wondering, when are you going to finish the strip? Make a few important changes. Draw the truth, this time.
You're in the elevator.
(In the elevator. And oh God, it is so dark! At the clinic the light, at her request, was always on, that first eighteen months. Between bouts of torpor, indifference, she would swing to new highs of creative activity, drawing, drawing, until her fingers ached or trembled and she could no longer hold the crayons they allowed her to have. At first, until she was accustomed to crayons, she had to draw clumsily, on a big scale. Suzy. Mom. Pop. Richie. David. The
Tafts
of Roseboro, Kansas. Removed in recent years to a distant asterism of the mind.
She had almost forgotten what they looked like although—she knows—wherever they are, they still smile a lot. Mom wore pearls and good-looking blouses around the Colonial-style house, and Pop always bad a tie on with his cardigan sweater. She never knew what he did for a living. There were always flowers in the
Tafts
' foyer. Richie delivered papers on his
motorscooter
and Dave went to law school at the college in town, but he often found time to play basketball with his little brother in the driveway. Suzy's bedroom had a four-poster canopy bed. A double-sized walk-in closet filled with the nice things she bought from the money she made babysitting and doing chalk portraits at the county fair. She didn't slip and mess her pants when she was terrified and lonely. Suzy Taft was never terrified and lonely. But Shannon Hill—
(She groans as she moves on the gritty elevator floor. The floor seems unsteady to her and she is reminded, horridly, of being in suspension—just how, she doesn't know, something to do with wheels and cables—in a high rectangular shaft. How high? The elevator scarcely seemed to have started down before the lights, two ordinary dusty bulbs in wire cages on the ceiling and well out of her reach even if she stood on tiptoe, failed to a deathlike brownish-yellow and the apparatus jolted to a stop. She freezes, listening. Thinks she hears a soft tapping or dripping overhead. Water. Rain on the roof of the building that has found a way into the elevator shaft. Again she moves, a hand against the wall behind her. Almost trips over her shoulder bag and portfolio, the thick drawing pad that goes everywhere with her. A pencil rolls. She had been drawing, in the dark. But now her lower back aches, her head aches, her throat is dry. And she can smell herself.
(Shannon unbuckles and lowers her pleated, men's-style trousers. Takes them off. Then the panties. It isn't too bad. She
wads
the panties and throws them away from her, takes tissue from her purse. When she feels clean and decent again she dresses. She can hear herself breathing. That, and a slow drip of leaking rain. The cold sound sets her to shivering, ferociously. How long has she been trapped? Her head pounds, hard to think. Should she yell again, scream, try to get someone's attention? Anyone else but
him—
(Who is, uncharacteristically, quiet now. (Somehow she doesn't feel abandoned.
No.
(Which means something important has happened, to alter the delicate balance of their relationship.
(She places her hands over her face, feels the lids of her eyes, tight as rosebuds in the darkness; they will open only to the sun. It occurs to her that she may have had her eyes closed from the moment the lights went out. Seeing all that she cared to see within protectively sealed lids. Sketching in darkness by the mind's brilliant eye.
(If she should open them now, and look around her—
(Nothing to be afraid
of.
But the reassurance is almost too quick—glib, seductive. Not her thought, but his.
