Ramsey Campbell - 1976 - The Doll Who Ate His Mother (20 page)

 
          
“She
wouldn’t tell me much about the meetings—or at least, I knew there was a lot
she wasn’t telling. They met in the basement under the witch-doctor’s house,
about a dozen of his victims. And he made them do things.

 
          
“Even
the things she told me, she didn’t understand. He made them stand in a ring and
he’d stand in the center with all the models. He moved the models as if they
were dancing, and everyone danced round him.

 
          
“She
said one odd thing, and she wouldn’t look at me—she said she didn’t like to
dance so slowly, but that was the way he was moving the models.

 
          
“She
showed me how they danced. She said she didn’t mind it, but I’m not so sure.
They lifted their feet as high as they could and strutted about with their legs
wide open.
But slowly, very slowly.
I didn’t like it;
there was something very nasty about watching this pregnant woman dancing like
that, here in front of me—something degrading. He said it was to help his
power, some such rubbish. But I think he was showing the contempt he felt for
them.

 
          
“I
could tell she didn’t like the meetings. She went to as few as she dared, I
think. She didn’t like some of the things he did with the models. He gave one
woman an abortion without even touching her—well, that was probably a
pseudocyesis
, a hysterical pregnancy.

 
          
“I
think she’d have refused to go to the meetings if he hadn’t had that model of
her. She didn’t like some of the things he made them all do. He made her think
things about herself, or about the others. He made her do things so that he
could watch. But she couldn’t stop herself; she said she didn’t want to. It was
only afterward she was disturbed.

 
          
“The
last meeting she went to, he made one of the others do something. Whatever it
was, it decided her never to go again. But she’d just decided that when he told
her she was pregnant.”

 
          
The
doctor leaned forward; his chair creaked sharply. The sounds of the room
flooded back around George. The curtains shifted, half awake. “What scared her
was she hadn’t known she was pregnant herself. Yet he did, as if he could look
inside her. He told her that if she found she wasn’t, she need never come to
another meeting. So when she found she was
,
that
scared her into going back.

 
          
“Then
he said she must promise the child to him.”

 
          
“But what about her husband?”
George demanded. “What the
devil was he doing?”

 
          
“Keeping quiet.
You see, he hadn’t believed the witch-doctor
at first; he’d had to have the power proved to him. So she said. And after that
he didn’t dare open his mouth, whatever the proof had been.

 
          
“Well,
she still wouldn’t promise the child. The witch-doctor didn’t argue. All he
said was that if she didn’t give it to him she would bear a monster.

 
          
“Well,
she didn’t know what to do. If she went back she would have to promise; if she
didn’t she was making her baby be born a monster. I’ll be
honest,
I didn’t know what to believe. And she didn’t help by going on about the things
he could do, how old he’d told her he was, the things he knew that no one else
did. And, oh yes, how he could sing without words in a terrible deep voice and
make her feel something behind her, coming out of the earth or the basement
wall or some such nonsense. I mean to say. Would you have believed her?”

 
          
“I
don’t know,” George said, for the story had disturbed him, here amid the smell
of antiseptic. At once he saw that the doctor had hoped he would say
No
.

 
          
“I’ve
seen pregnant women as good as mad,” Dr. Miller said, a little defensively. “I
thought there was a bit too much of her story, what with black magic and her
husband plotting against her. But I felt there was more wrong than just her
mind. So I told her to go home, and I’d talk to her husband.

 
          
“She
didn’t like that idea, but she hadn’t any others. I went to her house next
evening. She must have told him I was coming. I don’t know what else she’d
said, but she had a bruise on her face as big as your fist.

 
          
“Well,
I asked him what this voodoo nonsense was about. And he said she’d made most of
it up. He hadn’t told her the baby would be a
monster,
he’d just said he couldn’t be sure. Oh, there’d been a faith-healer all right;
she’d even asked him once for an abortion. But all the rest was her
imagination. Even so, he didn’t like the effect the man had been having on her
mind, so he said. She wasn’t to go near him again. In fact, they were planning
to move out of town.

 
          
“I
believed him, because he was saying what I’d thought. The only odd thing was,
he kept shouting. I remember thinking he didn’t need to shout to convince me. I
think he was shouting himself down. He didn’t want to believe they were still
in the witch-doctor’s power. I think that was why he hit her, for saying what
he wanted to forget.

 
          
“She
didn’t say a word, and I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. So I told him to
look after her, treat her kindly—I didn’t want her having any more bruises, and
he knew that was what I meant. I tried to get him to tell me the witch-doctor’s
name, but he wouldn’t. Said the man was giving up his
mumbojumbo
.
He was lying, of course.

 
          
“I
must say I felt quite pleased with myself. When I didn’t see her again I
thought he’d begun looking after her properly. I should have looked in on them,
I know, but I hadn’t the time,” he said harshly. “She had a midwife, if they
hadn’t left town before the baby was due—I’d told him to try to get her moved
before then. Of course she didn’t trust hospitals.

 
          
“Then
her next-door
neighbour
ran in here one evening to
tell me the baby was coming.”

 
          
Though
the room was thick with dusk, the doctor made no move to switch on the light.
He seemed glad of the dimness, glad to be able to gaze without seeing. Outside
the window, flowers nodded, bulbous on thin necks; the curtains scraped the
floorboards softly, restlessly. George watched darkness fill the doctor’s face.

 
          
“The
midwife was out on a call. The woman wanted me to go; no one else would do. Her
neighbour
pleaded with me to go. She said her friend
was terrified, no telling what she might do.

 
          
“I
only had a couple of patients waiting. I dealt with them as quickly as I could
and hurried round there. She was lying on the bed. I could see the baby was due
at any moment. She was gasping, but she managed to say she could feel the baby.
She could feel how it was moving, she screamed that. She could feel it was a
monster.

 
          
“That
was all she had time to say. And all I could do was
give
her husband his instructions and begin the delivery.”

 
          
He
had no face now, only talking darkness. “It wasn’t a difficult delivery,” he
said. “I remember I was hearing children in the street, I could hear a football
hitting the wall of the house. There was a bit of a breeze; it was an evening
like the one we had today. I brought that out of her on an evening like this.
Actually, the head looked almost normal.”

 
          
George
stared at the darkness, which had fallen silent. The only sound in the room was
the faint oily creaking of the plastic curtains. The darkness was rushing at
him, exploding behind his eyes. “Was it dead,” he blurted, “the baby?” It was
the nearest he could come to voicing his unease.

 
          
“It
couldn’t have lived,” the doctor said. George heard shame, self-righteousness,
the
memory of disbelief.

 
          
The
desk light glared down its cone. Dr. Miller’s face was expressionless; perhaps
he had prepared that in the dark. “Was it—” George said, startled by the light,
and wished he hadn’t begun the question. Incomplete, it sounded as if he’d
repeated his previous question, like a relentless interviewer. He had to say,
“Was it as bad as she’d feared?”

 
          
“Yes,”
the doctor said. “Yes, it was.”

 
          
His
eyes were blank, as if he refused to allow them to fill. George tried to look
away. But the doctor took his gaze to be a question. “This is all I’ll tell
you,” he said, and George felt he hoped it would leave him in the telling. “It
was nearly three feet long.”

 
          
George
glanced away, at the glossy
lamplit
patch of yellow
wall, smooth as jelly, at the greasy-looking flowers that swayed on the plastic
curtains, at anything.

 
          
“She
never saw it. I took it away,” Dr. Miller said rapidly, anxious to finish. “But
a couple of weeks later her husband came for tranquillizers, for her. She’d
already known the baby was a monster, you see. He couldn’t persuade her
different. And she was convinced the baby was still moving.

 
          
“Not
alive.
Moving.
She said the witch-doctor could make
that happen, with his model. She said it would crawl out of wherever it was and
come back to her. She’d been dreaming she’d found it writhing along the hall,
covered with earth. Her husband didn’t dare ask her what it looked like.” He
said violently into his own silence: “I gave him the tranquillizers. They moved
to another house shortly after. I never saw them again.”

 
          
The
dim flowers peered in the window, tapping. “What’s all that got to do with
Kelly?” George demanded, furious with the enclosing darkness beyond the lamp.

 
          
The
doctor mused, frowning. At last he said, “The woman I’ve told you about didn’t promise
her child. Christopher’s mother did.”

 
          
“Do
you mean that worried her so much it made him what he is?”

 
          
“Perhaps,”
the doctor said, gazing at him as if he hadn’t paid attention.

 
          
“Did
you deliver him?”

 
          
For
a moment the doctor’s hidden emotion flickered clearly: horror, dismay. “No,”
he said, and it was gone. “It was nothing to do with me. There was a doctor in
Wales, but he’s dead. I should have liked to talk to him. Christopher’s
grandmother did.” The dismay peered out again. “But I’m sure she exaggerates.”

 
          
“Why,
what happened?”

 
          
“No.
I’m sorry.” The doctor sat up sharply, determined. “I gave her my word. We
agreed to forget the past. I thought she was making too much of it, anyway. I
thought that to harp on it would only make the boy worse. He might have been
all right if he’d been left alone. The witch-doctor was dead,” he said
defiantly. “That was partly why I promised.”

 
          
“I
don’t understand,” George said, hoping that might make a difference. “What
happened to the boy’s mother?”

 
          
“She
died. She’s dead. No more. I’ve said too much already.” He tapped piles of
forms together impatiently, rolled the desktop down.

 
          
George
stood up. “Well, thank you for your help,” he said. He found his legs were
trembling.

 
          
“Of
course,” the doctor said, half to himself, “the boy’s grandmother could tell
you the rest.”

 
          
George
gazed down at the bald head. “Would you tell me her address?” he said, more in
incredulity than in hope.

 
          
“Would
you expect me to?”

 
          
“No,
I wouldn’t.”

 
          
“Neither
would she,” the doctor mused. “Neither would anyone else. Still, I don’t think
I’ve long to run now. And if you told anyone who gave you the address I’ve only
to say that I didn’t. But I think it’s time she was reminded what she’s
responsible for. She lives at 2a Mozart Street. Her name is Mary Kelly.”