A Beast in Venice: (Literary Horror set in Venice) (31 page)

“Why are you doing this to me?” Brigham gasped. “Tell me what you want. I’m sorry about what happened to Samantha but she attacked me. Be reasonable.”

Charles laughed. “Do I look like a reasonable man to you? You’ve seen my dungeon.”

Brigham rested his head on the back of the chair, eyes closed. The pain from the nail in his hand pounded up his arm. Through gritted teeth, he said, “I see your point.”

“And as to the woman, I’ve been trying to get rid of her for decades.”

Brigham raised his brow. “Then this isn’t about Samantha?”

“No. I’m angry because you were snooping.”

Brigham growled in pain. “I explained all that to you. It had nothing to do with you. We were looking for my wife.

Charles motioned to the goons.  They freed Brigham’s hand, causing him to cry out.

“Be that as it may,” Charles said, “I can’t have you running around searching tombs.”

Brigham held his nail-pierced hand, using an old painting rag to absorb the blood. “All right, then, a word to the wise and all that.”

Charles shook his head. “I’m afraid I have to take a more…
active
role in this. You need to be restrained for a while.”

Charles motioned to his henchmen, who took hold of Brigham and led him to the door and out into the darkness of the pre-dawn.

BRIGHAM SHIVERED VIOLENTLY in the snow and brisk wind. His hand and side burned and throbbed with pain. They dragged him down the street and through a bricked-up doorway, which led not to another time, but to a dark, cold, wet, and windowless room, piled with straw for a bed. They threw him in, shackled his legs to the floor, and shut the door. Utter darkness fell on him like deep wet sand—a darkness so intense it hurt his eyes and stifled his mind. It felt as though he were encased in lead.

The chain on his legs, attached to the floor at a large metal ring, allowed him only slight movent. He lay on the musty, moldy, rotting straw, which mitigated the chill damp of the floor only minimally, and stared into the darkness, though he couldn’t tell whether his eyes were open or closed. The ammonia of bodily waste hung heavy in the room. From a distance came the sounds of people howling in agony, screams of torture, and the ring of a steel hammer on iron nails being driven into wood. His hand and side were wet and sticky with blood.

He began to imagine the sorts of vermin inhabiting the place and felt them crawling on him. Struggling against the chain, he tried to shoo them away, shouting in fear. But they were not there. He thought he saw them, but in this darkness, in the complete absence of light, there were only images his mind conjured. Nothing was real. In the world of light, images had three elements: that which really existed; that which existed only as an interpretation of the light that came into one’s brain; and that which existed purely as a fabrication of the mind. Not always easy to tell one from the other, or to what extent each such element was present in what one saw. Here, however, there were only the inventions of his mind.

Deeds done and not done; real and imaginary; images of things accomplished and things not yet accomplished; crimes committed and crimes yet to be committed… all played out in front of his unseeing eyes; not asleep, but awake and alert. Images of blood, feeling the hot breath and steamy warmth from those about to die. It occurred to him during this show, imagining the blood, that he wouldn’t be able to satisfy his need for blood here unless given it by his jailers. Maybe that was the plan: let him starve here, driven insane by the need. Maybe they would toss him something now and again. Or would he go without? What would happen in a hundred years? Now totally powerless, he could do nothing for himself or for Rose. But he had been here only a few minutes. Maybe they would come for him and let him out. No, he would die and rot here. No, wait, he can’t die. He would only rot.

The images from his mind didn’t stop until at last he fell asleep. That is, he must have fallen asleep, for he woke disoriented, not remembering where he was, thinking he should be somewhere but seeing nothing in the solid black darkness of his tomb. Is that where he was? In a tomb? Not dead, not capable of being dead, but treated as though dead? Buried alive. Forever.

Feeling around, he found a bowl of water. He drank. He reckoned that he had been chained here only a few hours. No way to tell time. What could be done? Shout for help. Maybe someone would hear him. In calling out, it felt as though the sound didn’t leave the room. Like screaming under water. He lay back on the straw, trying to fathom what had happened to him and trying to imagine what might happen to him in the immediate future. Had he just been tossed in here to starve? No, Charles wouldn’t do that. He had a plan for him. Maybe he just wanted to get his attention. Maybe he would flay him and treat him like the others. Charles showed no reluctance to cause mortal pain. Oh, he had thrown in with an evil man. But then, he hadn’t been thrown in, but been hijacked. He lay back and slept again.

He woke with his hand and side in burning, stabbing pain and an unbearable, aching urge for blood. Nobody had come, or at least he wasn’t able to find any evidence in the pitch-colored air of his prison that they had come, and he couldn’t smell anything. He would be able to smell it. He had nothing to eat and no apparent prospect of getting anything.

He lay on his back in the straw, the darkness pressing his eyes like thumbs. Up to his nostrils in self-pity and drowning in hate for himself and the whole world—hate for man, woman, life, death—wondering how he had come to this calamitous state of affairs.

With a thud and a ray of dim light from the door, two brutish men barged into the cell with a roll of barbed wire and the implements for stretching it, cutting it, and attaching it to the metal rings embedded in the floor.

“What are you doing?” Brigham asked, but they didn’t answer.

One of the men held Brigham down while the other began stringing barbed wire over him, through the rings, pulling it tight, particularly over his forehead. Brigham screamed as the barbs cut into his flesh. The beastly men ignored his pathetic entreaties to stop and didn’t answer any of his questions as to why and how long? When they had finished their horrible task he lay secured to the floor under a dense net of barbed wire and pain, unable to move and barely able to breathe. Slipping in and out of consciousness, he lost track of time. He struggled not to move, as even the slightest motion caused the wire to bite deeper into his skin. He remained thus bound for unknown hours, or days, without food or water or blood. His thirst hurt almost as much as the barbs.

Visions of things past, both real and not real, filled his mind. Walking on the beach in Florida just before sunrise, when the world is no longer dark, but gray. Little crabs running sideways over the sand from one hole to another, the sky a pale gray-blue, and the water an intense and beautiful silvery light blue, crashing gently over the sand. The black sky in Jamaica, foggy with stars, meteors streaking and exploding. Dreaming of things past, things as they were, or things as he wished they would have been. 

XXV

The snappy twang of wire being cut brought Brigham back to consciousness. A figure squatted next to him, busy at work freeing him from the barbed wire. He couldn’t make out who it was at first, as it looked like half a person, yet whoever it was seemed vaguely familiar. Then he saw the hat and angular face of Tiberio. Brigham started to speak, but Tiberio shushed him, finished cutting the wire, unlocked the shackles, and led him out into the night, back to his studio.

“Quite a little mess you’ve gotten yourself into,” Tiberio said.

“I don’t know what happened. One minute everything was going swimmingly, and the next minute I was in a dungeon.”

“We’ve got to move fast. You’ve pissed off one of the most evil spawns of Hell ever to soil the earth.”

Brigham’s entire body throbbed in pain and was racked by a hunger and thirst for blood. They summoned Gloria to come over and donate blood. She came to the studio and made her contribution, but it wasn’t enough. In fact, the need grew stronger, and it was all he could do not to dispatch Gloria in the manner of the others. He had to go out. They implored him not to do it, but he couldn’t stop. On the street he would have taken her without hesitation, but not now. They left the studio, and he went out. Although ordinarily reluctant to do so, he decided this night to do his work in another time.

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY was the best era to visit by going through a portal. Clothing of that period was generally available in present-day Venice, and people wore masks. The streets were dark, and although not particularly sanitary, it was not the cesspool of earlier centuries. He passed through the portal that took him to the small campo behind the church of San Nicolò dei Mendicoli, where he was not likely to be noticed and which was an easy walk to Campo Santa Margherita.

While Charles and Lorenzo tended to bring their victims back to modern-day Venice, he intended to do his work in that time. It was unusual to find a woman walking by herself at night in 1756, but there were ladies of the evening in certain parts of town, and he would perhaps take advantage of their… charms. He would hire one of these women and visit his own charms upon her in the privacy of her room.

Although Brigham was in need of blood and flesh, Gloria’s contribution had taken the edge off the blood urge, and he had the desire for a glass of wine. In his mask and tri-corner hat, he entered a wine bar in Campo Santa Margherita and took a seat at a small wooden table in the back of the room. This was actually a fabulous period in which to visit bars and cafés. Candles provided the only light, there was no horrible music blasting from a stereo, and the only smoking was an occasional pipe, the filthy cigarette not yet invented.

The waitress placed a half liter of wine and a glass before him, and he began to drink. The other patrons sat at tables or stood near the bar drinking, in their long coats and breeches, some with masks, all wearing tri-corner hats. A man was playing a wooden flute at a table next to the counter. As Brigham took in this scene, three people entered the bar, led by Charles, his face uncovered while his companions, a man and a woman, wore masks.

Brigham at first felt panic, but then he remembered that his face, too, was obscured by a mask. As the three approached the center of the room near the bar, it became plain that the man was Augusto, whose white hair protruded from under his hat. The woman must be Deborah, though none of her features were visible under her lacy shawl and skirt.

He had not yet run across Deborah or Augusto in Venice at night going about the business of being shroud eaters. Perhaps this was why.

The three sat at a table opposite the bar with a liter of wine and a loaf of bread. This bar had gotten a tad crowded for Brigham, so he rose to leave. He paid the barista and started for the door. As he passed Charles’s table, Charles said, “Brigham.”

How did he know? Should he stop? No, keep going. He ignored Charles and continued into the Venetian night. What now? Charles knew he was here. Or perhaps Charles thought he was mistaken. What if he followed him? Brigham turned. No one there. He would go to the Rialto and the tangle of narrow streets near the market.

The cool air smelled of burning wood. He had been in other times briefly with others, but this was his first time alone. The similarities between present-day Venice and Venice of the eighteenth century were striking. The city was essentially the same, physically. Certainly there had been changes in some of the buildings and a number of canals had been filled in after this period, but the layout of the city was largely unchanged. The differences were also striking. Most notably, it was very dark. There were no street lamps and few sources of light. Many of the streets and squares were still paved in brick, and the city was a place for people to live, rather than a sight for tourists.

Not far from the Frari Church, a young and attractive woman propositioned him. His desire for blood and flesh gave him pause to consider the offer, but he was too close to Campo Santa Margherita and Charles. He waved her off and continued toward the Rialto. Among the columns of the covered walkway just on the other side of Campo San Polo he was again approached. He didn’t understand what the woman said, but she was suitable, and her body language said it all. It didn’t matter the cost; he didn’t intend to pay.

She led him to a door, unlocked it, and led him up narrow and dark stairs to a small room on the third floor. Now quite ill due to his need, he grew impatient and began to tremble. The woman sensed this and spoke to him in a calming tone, apparently believing that the shaking was due to fear.

The woman lit a candle on a small dresser along a wall, thus revealing a large chair in one corner and a bed along the wall opposite the door. She indicated for him to put his hat and mask on the chair. Taking him by the hand, she led him to the bed.

The matter would wait no longer. The woman fussed with the bed, facing away from him. The moment was there, like when hunting deer when the animal halts twenty yards away, standing broadside. The moment when it all comes together and all you need to do is release the arrow. Any twinge of doubt or remorse would be ruinous. He began to free the knife from his cane. The woman pulled back the covers and adjusted the pillows. The dagger was free of its sheath, and he stood with it behind his back. Why didn’t he act? Was he afraid? Did he pity her? Yes, he pitied her, but she brought strange men to her room for sex. What did she expect?

She had not finished preparing the bed when the door opened. There in the doorway stood a man with a short club. Brigham had walked into a trap. Her fooling with the bed was a delay tactic. Or was the man just there to collect? No, this was not how it was done. The man said something and pointed to Brigham’s pocket. Brigham asked him how much; the man said “
Tutto
.” All of it. There was no decency in the world, not even in 1756. The man came nearer. Brigham’s remorse gone, he brought the knife up under the man’s chin, the blade penetrating into his brain through the roof of his mouth. The woman screamed and jumped on Brigham’s back. As the man fell, Brigham held on to the knife, sliding it from the man’s head. The woman clung to his back, striking and biting him. He stepped backward, slamming her into the wall. She held fast, pummeling him with her fists. He turned and with all his strength bashed her into the dresser. She fell, apparently unconscious. He took the knife to her.