Small World (31 page)

She jumped off on the other side from her approach to watch the water level in the tank drop noticeably as the pipes below filled up again. This side was not purely white as was the other but had a faded legend on it. It was unreadable close up, so she stepped back a ways and pieced it together, a letter at a time,
o-a-k-h-u-r-s-t
and then there was another line, reading top to bottom,
d-a-i-r-y.
Smaller letters on the next line stated
f-a-t
space
f-r-e-e
space
m-i-l-k.
She stood reading it over and over for a long time. It was always possible, she supposed, that someone had used an old milk tank to hold the household water supply. But she had never seen one that was semitransparent, clearly made of plastic. There’s lots of things she’d never seen, she might scold herself, what does that prove? Not much, but the thing still looked like a goddamn plastic milk carton to her. Another detail for the lady journalist.

‘Shit,’ she sighed out loud. Shit never ended, did it?

Dolly decided to do something nice for poor little Leyna. She had given her something to do, and it had been rather amusing, watching the little beast solve her plumbing problems. Well, Dorothy Hardesty Douglas was not some kind of unfeeling monster. She would give her little dollie a reward.

She started by calling Lucy Douglas, who was, from word one, quite obviously hostile.

‘Let me talk to my little darlings,’ Dolly began.

‘Pop’s taken them to the swimming pool.’

‘Oh. What swimming pool is that?’

‘The Y pool. In the town park.’

‘Ummm. I hope they don’t catch something there.’

Lucy fumed silently.

‘Well, actually I’ll like to talk to you, dear.’

Lucy came back bluntly. ‘I really don’t want to talk to you, Dolly.’

‘Oh, come now. Mustn’t be a baby, now. Let’s be grown-up. You’ve been wanting something to be mad about ever since I wised you up about Nick.’

‘Dolly, 1 don’t have a grievance list. It’s not worth my time or effort. I just don’t feel friendly; I don’t want to talk. And your interfering between Nick and me hasn’t come to anything.’

Lucy bit her lip; she hadn’t intended to let that out.

It gave Dolly pause. That was satisfying.

‘So you’re back together.’ Her voice was cool and amused. ‘Yes, we are.’

‘Well, it’s your life.’

‘Yes, it is.’

‘Isn’t that nice. Really. You know I’d be very happy if you remarried. I’d dance at your wedding. I don’t bear you any ill will and I wish I could convince you of that.’

‘What do you want, Dolly?’

Another pause. Dolly, from the sounds of scratching, and thunking, was looking for a cigarette, never mind the phone bill. The click and whoosh of her lighter, a sudden sucking breath and immediate exhale confirmed Lucy’s supposition.

Finally, ‘Well, this isn’t actually for me. It’s for a friend. She saw the little reproductions you did of Grace Coolidge’s and Angelica Van Buren’s gowns. She wanted me to ask if you might do some dollclothes.’

Lucy knew immediately she didn’t want to do any more dollclothes and suspected Dolly’s friend was in fact Dolly, but she couldn’t help asking. ‘Period reproductions, you mean?’

‘No. Simple contemporary children’s clothes.’

‘Oh.’

‘On a slightly larger scale than the two pieces you did for me.’ ‘Ummm. Sounds interesting. Who is this?’

She waited patiently to see if Dolly would continue her ,:e

‘No one you know,’ Dolly said airily.

Lucy’s grim smile was intimated in the tone of her voice. 'Oh. come on. Dolly. I’m not a complete idiot. You can lie better than that. Why do you want dollclothes? Have you found someone to make dolls for you and they can’t do the clothes?’

Dolly’s silvery laugh frosted Lucy’s ear.

‘Aren’t you clever? Well, I didn’t think you’d work for me again, that’s all. You do hold a grudge, don’t you? Yes, I’ve got some dolls. No, the maker can’t do the clothing.’

‘Well, I can’t either. I’m too busy right now. And you’re right. I hold a grudge. I won’t work for you again.’

Lucy rolled her eyes at Dolly’s long suffering sigh.

‘Of course, if you feel that way . . . Nick must be keeping you very busy.’ There was a poisonous pause. ‘Tell me, is he any better in the kip than he used to be?’

Lucy dropped the receiver into its holder with a clunk.

‘Fuck you,’ she said calmly at the phone.

Dolly, listening to the dial tone, laughed again, but without much amusement.

‘Fuck you,’ she said into the open line. Then she hung up.

Sucking fiercely on her cigarette, Dolly stalked into the dollhouse room to peer at Leyna, undressing in the bedroom. The water was running in the bathtub.

But while she watched, her thoughts were on Lucy. For Lucy, she fantasized, she would like a nice hot cauldron. And for every time the bitch had bitched her up, she would add a new and more painful poison. Starting with Harrison, their marriage, and his death. The grandchildren, being raised in the self-righteous bosom of the middle class, by Lucy and her dotty father. Everything they ever argued over while renovating the Doll’s White House, because Lucy, the craftswoman, had
her
standards. Never mind who was paying the freight. Signing everything, while Dolly signed the checks. And the little matter of friend Nicholas. She was welcome to him and he to her, and Dolly hoped that Lucy’s younger body wore the bastard out.

Now she would not have new clothes for herdollie unless Roger could be persuaded to buy them and shrink them. He would say it wasn’t safe yet. Piss on him, too; holding his mother’s hand and probably sucking her watermelon old tits, too.

It was all enough to make her feel quite irritated.

Leyna was soaking in the tub when the wall was taken away. She winced but fought to control her panic. The Giant Dorothy stared in at her.

‘This place stinks.’

‘The water was off,’ she cried out.

Sitting straight up in the bath, she lifted a soapy fist in unthinkable anger. The charge was true. She had flushed the toilet but the stench remained, a lingering, still rotting ghost in the air. The bathtub was foamy with soap, partly to clear away her own grime, but mostly to perfume the air.

Dolly was deaf to her defense. ‘Smells like a cage full of mice.’

A Hand hovered and swooped. Leyna heard the bedclothes ! being torn apart.

‘Where’s my fruitbowl?’ Dolly demanded.

Without waiting for a response, she poked noisily under the bed, into the commode, and then into the wardrobe.

‘What!’ she hissed. ‘It’s dented.’

Leyna trembled in the breathless stoppage of Dolly’s scolding.

‘You’ll be punished for this,’ Dolly muttered.

It was like a low roll of thunder to Leyna. The bathwater was suddenly cold and clammy.

A Hand passed the open bathroom door towing bedclothes like flapping ghosts behind it. It returned immediately; there was a cool thump on the floor as it dumped the clean linen.

‘Clean this place up, you lazy bitch, and I’ll bring your breakfast.’

Leyna climbed out of the bath and dried herself quickly with shaking hands. Her shorts and shirt were filthy. She had planned to rinse them out in the bathwater. There was no time to drape a towel into a toga, so she did the bed quickly, still naked.

The Giant Dorothy returned, a mountainous, moving monster with breath that wheezed and rattled. There was a curious smell, like grass, around the tray she carried.

‘That’s better,’ she said.

The Hand intruded into the room, depositing the tray on the commode. Leyna sidled forward, watching Dolly. She didn’t want to eat in front of her. But hunger overcame her inhibitions; she lifted the cover of the tray. There was an enormous tureen of something that looked like a dry salad of coarsely chopped green and white cabbage. It smelled strongly of chlorophyll. There were no utensils, dishes, or beverages on the tray. No condiments. Leyna dipped her hand into the stuff. It was dry, papery in

texture. Pinching a couple of pieces, she lifted it to her mouth. As she tasted the stinging, papery strips, she heard the first violent explosion of the Giant’s raucous laughter.

She spit out. Dolly was peeking in.

‘Didn’t you like the gerbil litter? Best gourmet litter in town? It was a special treat, too, just for you.’

And she laughed again. And again.

Leyna was convulsed with anger. Seizing the tureen with both hands, she heaved it upward at the Giant. She watched it flash briefly in its arc and then descend, far short of its mark, into the garden below. The anger disappeared with it as she realized she might now have nothing at all to eat, if Dorothy chose to be offended by her attack.

Dolly’s laughter trailed away.

‘Temper, temper,’ she chided.

There was amusement in her tones, to Leyna’s relief. Then she went away.

Leyna waited a long time before retrieving a mushy apple and a blackened banana from her hiding spot behind the pot in the commode. With the art blade, she sliced the apple in two and returned one half and the banana to the commode. Bananas, she told herself, may look like shit and be fine inside their decayed peel. But apples, apples that look yukky usually taste yukky. Her half in hand, brown spots and all, wasn’t as tasteless as she had anticipated. The sauce of hunger, she thought sourly, nibbling at the half core.

The Giant’s shadow fell over her again, long after she had deposited the scant, inedible remains of the half-apple in the toilet bowl. Dorothy came with a wonderful smell of tomato, garlic, and olive oil. Her Hand entered to place a new tray on the floor by the bed. The rich odors of the pasta and sauce made Leyna a little dizzy. She scooted to the tray, her mouth watering, made bold by hunger.

Under the silver dome the delicious smells kept their promise: even the oil-shiny leaves of the salad had their own delicate perfume. There was a small bonus, a bottle of Chianti with a note :aped to its side. Hungry as she was, Leyna had to investigate. Mail, she thought, and grinned. Unfolded, the note revealed an jnpracticed typescript of just five words:
Bon appetit, your friend, Roger.

You’ll burn yourself if you eat that in your birthday suit,’ the Giant scolded cheerfully.

Loathing for the huge being rose in Leyna’s throat as sour bile.

‘You just thank Roger for this feast. He thinks you’re cute.’

Leyna tried to ignore her, concentrating on forking up pasta. A Finger reached out and touched her left breast before she could move away. She jumped from it but the Finger followed relentlessly.

‘Cute little titties. Roger thinks they’re cute,’ the Giant’s voice murmured in a curious flat tone.

The Finger traced an invisible line down Leyna’s belly and tickled the patch of hair furring her pubis. Abruptly, with all the force she had in her, Leyna drove the fork she still clutched in her hand into the Finger.

The Giant yelped and withdrew the Finger hastily. She comforted herself with a string of curses.

Stunned by her own rashness, Leyna stared at the fork in her hand. The moment in which to seek shelter passed almost before she considered it.

The next time the Hand came swiftly, and pushed her backward roughly. Leyna saw bright red drops welling on the index Finger, red as the polish on the shieldlike nails, as she staggered against the bed. It pinned her there, hard against her chest. When she struggled to raise the fork in her own defense, the other Hand entered like a great dark bird from above and snatched it from her. The struggle came to a standstill.

‘Bad girl.’ Leyna was reproved.

She closed her eyes in resignation. If she counted to ten, the Giantess might go away. It was harder than it should have been. The smell of food rose around her until she was weak and had trouble recalling the numbers. Suddenly, at the count of seven, the pressure lifted and was gone.

Exhaling raggedly, she opened her eyes.

And the Hand returned, in a blur. Her legs were thrust apart, the Finger separating them effortlessly. Leyna screamed and screamed but the Finger probed at will. The Giant Dorothy hummed some Giant’s song.

After a time, Leyna was left to herself. She curled on the bed, her thumb in her mouth. The perfume of congealing spaghetti was heavy in the air.

‘Why, dollie,’ the rasping Voice of Dorothy said in mock surprise, ‘you're upset. Don’t you like being five inches tall? I thought it would seem perfectly natural to you. Just like being on television, isn’t it?’

Tears leaked from Leyna’s closed eyes. She tried to count igain. This time the magic worked completely, and the Giant »ent away.

She woke in utter darkness but to total awareness. She was not afraid. She could hear the emptiness of the Doll’s White House in ihich she now knew she was imprisoned.

11

Sleep had
thrown up the ancient, minor incident to which all this terror referred. Dorothy Hardesty Douglas, the Queen of the Monkeys, and her miniature White House, at the Founders’ Day Gala of the Dalton Institute. Tiny Dorothy had blown all her circuits because Leyna had dared to use the little princess’s darling iaddy’s name for his baby. It all had been so unimportant at the time, a bit of cattiness, a mere showing of claws.