Totentanz (19 page)

"Fuck her! Fuck her!"

The orderly began to administer shots,
starting with the bed by the door. When he came to Frances, he
looked at the doctor, who seemed to consider for a moment and then
nodded. Frances felt a jab in her cold, wet arm. The screams and
other noises, the pounding of the girl's clenched fist on her leg,
began to fade. She heard one last tearing cry from the girl in the
bed next to hers before she heard nothing. . . .

She was in another white
room, this one whiter than the other. Was
this
heaven? She remembered speaking
of the Book to the doctor. Perhaps that speaking, her last act, had
been enough to redeem her abomination in His eyes. Perhaps this was
finally redemption. This whiteness was pure, unblemished—but then
she saw that there were corners where the white met, forming walls
and a ceiling.

She pushed herself up in the bed. There was a
window in this room, with bars set into it, and a real screen
securely fastened on it. There was a moth on the screen. Slowly it
lifted its wings and then quickly let them fall. She was alone. The
bed was white; the door was white with silver hinges, a regular
door, without a porthole in it. But there was no knob on it. She
was warm, dressed in a new linen, a starched white robe fastened at
the top and back with white cloth strips. The bed was warm and dry,
too. Through the window she could just make out the top of an oak;
its leaves had started to turn. She heard bird sounds outside,
sounds as though the birds were making ready for winter.

There was a small table with a smooth wooden
top next to the bed. There was a white lamp on it. Next to the lamp
was a book.

It was the Book. Carefully she lifted it and
brought it to her lap. It was heavy, and she almost dropped it. The
black, rough-grained cover felt thick in her fingers. She pulled
at it, and saw a marker opening to:

I am the resurrection, and the life; he that
believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and
whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.

A fierce trembling began in
her body. It was a trembling of mingled fear and joy, for these
were the words that had suckled her, had held up for her the only
hope for her salvation. These were the words by which she knew that
He watched over her. Without these words, she was lost. A sob
escaped her throat. She dropped the Book into her lap, holding her
hands up to the ceiling and closing her eyes, letting rapture
enshroud her. There
was
redemption possible; He would bring it to her. He
would shield her—

"Frances?"

The door to the room opened and then closed
again. Someone stood there motionless. Frances felt a surge of fear
and then one of joy—maybe this was heaven after all, and He had
heard her heart, had come to her Himself.

"Frances, my name is Doctor Payton."

It was not Him. And this
was not heaven. But at least it was not the
other
come to her, he whom she
sought to push away. At least it was not he who had the power over
her.

"Frances, are you all right?"

The doctor approached her bed. His shoes had
rubber soles that made a slight squeaking noise as he walked. His
face, now furrowed as he bent over her, was as kind as it had been
when he talked to her in the other white room; his body gave off
warmth.

"What's wrong, Frances?" He felt her
forehead, took her limp hand, held it.

She said, "I . . . nothing."

There was something about him that calmed
her, something about the assurance he had given her that made her
feel he might have been sent—maybe by Him!—to save her. He had
taken her from that ward of madwomen, put her in this room by
herself. He would heal her, make her whole again, and cleanse the
memory of the other from her.

"Are you sure nothing's wrong?" he asked.
"Should I send for something to help you sleep?"

"I'm all right."

He looked at her sternly, and then smiled.
Despite herself, Frances smiled too.

"That's better," the doctor said. His white
hair smelled of oil, anointment. His eyes had moved to the Book on
her lap, and she rested her hand on it.

"Thank you," she said.

He smiled and settled himself next to her on
the bed.

"I'm a Bible reader myself." He looked away,
and his face assumed a serious expression. "Do you know why you're
here, Frances? Do you remember anything of what happened before you
. . . slept?"

She waited a long moment before answering,
"Some."

"Do you feel we should talk about it
now?"

She hesitated again, probing her feelings.
"Not yet."

"All right, then. Whenever you feel ready."
Suddenly he put his large, warm hand on hers, both their hands
settling on the Book. "I want to help you, you know. You must love
life very much to have come back this far.”

"I know," Frances said, and again she found
herself warming into a smile.

Somewhere far in the recesses of the
hospital, someone gave a piercing cry and then was silent. The
doctor was looking at the window, at the falling darkness outside.
There was a strange expression on his face. He looked as though he
were battling with himself over some dilemma. Once again there
came a short cry from far off, and then silence.

"Frances," the doctor said in a low
voice.

"Yes?"

"You're very sick, you know that?"

"I know that, Doctor."

"I want to help you."

His voice had changed, was less soothing.

"You're a very attractive young woman,
Frances."

He was a different person now. The broad,
soft features had steeled; the gray, moist eyes hardened into
walls. The kindly exterior had been pulled inside to reveal
something animal-like, mindless, filled with blind force.

"Let him kiss me with the kisses of his
mouth," he gasped, "for thy love is better than wine."

He put his hands on her arms, pinning her
against the pillows. "It won't do you any good to scream," he said,
"because no one will care. They all know you're a sick woman." He
stood up and fingered the belt on his white smock trousers. Frances
stared at his large hands, at the trousers, at the belt. "No one
would believe you," he said again. "When I first saw you, when you
were confined to a ward at the county hospital, I knew I had to
have you here." He was speaking as if she was not in the room, as
if he was alone, repeating a litany to himself. "Strange things
happen all the time in places like this, and no one cares." He
loosened his belt, and his trousers slid down. Frances saw that his
legs were thick and hairy. "You understand all of this, don't
you?"

Frances said nothing but only stared,
terrified, at his thick legs.

The doctor was lost in himself now; he pulled
his underpants down quickly.

"I don't want you to say anything. I don't
want you to scream or call out." He talked in little breaths as he
moved toward her.

Frances' eyes were locked to the thing
between his legs. It was the thing the boys around the schoolyard,
and sometimes Billy Bayer after Sunday school, called "cock." Once
she heard Billy Bayer call after her, in a voice that was taunting
but at the same time hushed and uneasy, "You want to touch my cock,
Frances?" The thing between the doctor's legs was bloated. She
knew what that meant: sex. Down deep inside she tightened like a
spring, and her insides went cold as though water was soaking her
all over again.

"I won't hurt you," the doctor said. He was
next to the bed, bending closer to her. Frances stared at the thing
between his legs—it reminded her of something. . . . The bed
creaked, sagging as the doctor kneeled on it, and suddenly
everything dawned on her. As the doctor's cock moved closer to her,
as he arched it up over her, she looked at it and it came to her
what it was. It was something else, long and serpentine, uncoiling,
growing longer and longer

A hose; it was a long and evil hose, and the
full memory of Jeb unlocked in her brain and she was standing next
to the truck waiting for Jeb, holding the Book that he had
mysteriously told her to take. The truck was gaily painted with
circus clowns in red, white and yellow and had big flowers on the
doors; and on the back of the tank, where the hose was wrapped, was
the word 'FUN!' spelled in large, crooked, balloon-like
letters.

She was alone next to the truck, and then she
heard Jeb's boots crunch on the gravel as he approached. "Into the
truck," he said, and as she climbed up, there was a roar, and the
barn and the house exploded into high flames. Frances saw a row of
Jeb's paintings, neatly stacked on the front porch, melt in a riot
of colors and disappear into orange fire.

"Jeb—" Frances began as he climbed into the
cab, settling himself down, but her words died in her throat. The
face he turned on her was not his, was worse than any face she had
ever seen on him before, a mix of his own face and white bones,
something possessed. He gunned the truck into loud life and they
pulled out, leaving a mountain of flame and a growing burned stench
behind.

Jeb was silent, but as the art fair rose into
view, his lips stretched into a cracked smile. He turned his hard
eyes for a moment on the little cluster of roped-off tables where
paintings hung on clothesline or were strung from boards; then he
turned them back on the road again.

They circled the art show, slowly. At first
no one noticed, but then a few children caught sight of the painted
truck. Soon others, adults bored with ill-defined landscapes and
paintings of children holding flowers, gathered at the perimeter.
At each appearance of the truck, they cheered.

"Drive," Jeb said, pulling Frances by the arm
over to the driver's side.

"Jeb—"

"Do it," he said, squeezing her arm
tight.

She slid across the seat, noting that the
spot where Jeb had been sitting was still cool. She kept the truck
moving in a slow circle, arching her back to see over the steering
wheel and out past the hood. Jeb climbed over her and out the
passenger side onto the running board. He slammed the door behind
him and made his way to the back of the truck, where he threw a
switch, and then twin horns on the roof of the cab began playing
loud circus music. Another cheer went up, and someone said, "That's
Jeb." A hush fell over the crowd until Jeb waved and grinned.

Slowly he began to unravel the hose at the
back of the truck. It had a huge bronze nozzle, and he suddenly
twisted it, sending a fine spray of rainbow colors out over the
spectators. Bright dots mixed in midair, forming beautiful shades,
then separated to combine with other colors in a continuous shower
of bright glitter.

"Jeb's painting us a picture in the air!"
someone said.

The truck circled. Everyone from the art show
was watching now. Jeb spun the nozzle to a tighter spray so it
would reach out over them all. On the second pass, the colors hung
a little longer in the air and didn't dissolve as quickly, some in
the crowd began to complain that little oily bits of color were
sticking to them. Jeb wound the hose in. There was another small
hose, set in the side of the truck. Jeb pulled it out and snapped
the nozzle open. Flame leaped out, catching those in front and
setting them instantly ablaze.

There was panic, but it was already too late.
The flames spread through the air, each dot of color exploding into
a miniature fireball, the heat leaping from one to the next in a
tornado around the art show.

As Frances saw the flames wrap around the
crowd in front of her, she pulled her foot from the accelerator.
"Keep going!" Jeb shouted menacingly from the back, but she sat
stunned. The door opened with a loud creak, and he pushed her aside
roughly, jamming his foot to the gas pedal. The fire quickly
spread from the outer fringes of the crowd inward: there was no
escape. A heaving, flaming ring of people were trying in a mindless
rush to find some way out of the fire. Frances saw some of them go
down in the wake of a forming stampede. Some tried to move inward,
but this was no escape because the fire was spreading in all
directions. The art pieces now caught fire, and tongues of
multicolored flame were licking across clotheslines and outlining
wooden walls and tables.

Frances began to weep, her eyes fastened to
what was happening. Jeb made one more slow arc around as, with a
great whoosh, the judging stand in the center caught fire, balling
into heat all at once, its red-and-white painted sides mingling and
then disappearing into a globe of yellow and blue. The flames were
still spreading outward. As Jeb pulled the truck into a leaning
turn away, Frances saw, just at the edge of the fire, a little girl
wandering in a circle bordered by the inferno, shouting, "Mommy,
Mommy." The circle swept in at her like a closing iris.

Frances screamed and grabbed at the steering
wheel. Jeb pushed her back against the seat, but she had taken him
unaware. As he fought to regain control of the truck, it swerved
wildly, back and forth, and then tipped over. As Frances climbed
out, she saw Jeb escape behind her. Somewhere she heard "Mommy. .
.” and then silence.

Jeb looked stunned, confused; he stared
dumbly at the wall of fire for a moment, and then a wail of despair
leaped from his throat. He sounded like a wounded animal. Frances
put her hand on him, and he looked down at her as if seeing her for
the first time.

"Go away," he said.

"Jeb, we have to get out of here." She saw
now that she was still holding the Book in one hand, had been
clutching it all along.

"Go!" Jeb said, and his
face had that look on it, that look of caring, that she had seen so
rarely but knew was always there. "Run," he said desperately. "1
can't be with you anymore.
For God's sake,
love only life
."