Bull Running For Girlsl (7 page)

Eventually she lost sight of the pair in front of her and just aimed for the general direction she thought they had taken. After half an hour of negotiating tiny brooks and the stinging lashes of twigs against her arms and face, she came to the edge of the forest and crouched low in the thick hem of trees.

I thought about life after death a lot following the fire, and wondered, if you met a horrifying death, did the spirits on the other side have to treat you for shock when you crossed over? I went to the library to read about all beliefs and was drawn to the Gnostics, dualism and monism, radical dualism and mitigated dualism and qualified monism
—
and became confused
—
so I put them down and read William Blake’s “The Tyger.” I felt that I could cope with that. I decided not to bring any lambs into the slaughter; made sure I took the pill every day and took pleasure in nothing. I stayed at home and read stories about survival, and Sharper Knives by Christopher Fowler. I began to read and write more horror as the years passed.

From the forest edge, Susan could see a group of three caravans—a little small for a carnival, she thought. One was blue, one bleak-red, and another a faded green. She shuddered with cold and hunger. Then the sound of voices distracted her and there was the smell of something burning in the air. Susan pushed back into the trees a little so that she could get a better view of what was going on.

“I’ve heard a dog with a necklace of tin cans around his neck make less noise than you.”

Susan, startled, turned around and sat promptly down in the mud and pine needles. She put her hand over her mouth to stop from crying out. A few feet away from her, seated on a log, was the buckskin woman; the woman she had attributed to her absinthe dream.

“Don’t fret girl, just keep it down some.”

“I didn’t think you were real.”

“Well I’m not, in a manner of speaking.”

“And what do you want with me?”

“Well, now that you ain’t drinking the green stuff, I want you to help a child of mine.”

“Of yours?”

“Manner of speaking, yes. She is my great-great-granddaughter. The child’s name is Bethany Canary Burke. I did a bad thing. When folk raised some money for my girl to go into a convent, I spent the money on booze and friends—a terrible thing.”

“Your child?”

“No, dammit,
that
was years ago. Ain’t you listening? This child is my great-great-grandbaby. My gal grew up and married her cousin Robert Burke, who was this girl’s great-grandpa.”

“Was?”

“All gone now. The child has no one left, just her old, decrepit great-great-grandma. You understand me now?”

“Well, no. What has this to do with me?”

“I want you to get her away from them people who run this freak show—take her and get as far away as you can. Got that?”

“Me?”

“Jeezus. Cain’t ya get your head around this, girl?”

“No—I mean, why me?”

“Because she’s taken a shine to you. Who do you think brought that fox to you? She’s like a little kitty bringing you presents—ya know, like to her ma.”

“Why can’t you look after her, and where is her own mother?”

“Well, that would be a little difficult seeing as I’m dead ‘n all. Her relatives are all gone bad—her mom too.”

Susan looked her up and down; the buckskin shirt and trousers, her long brown hair streaked with grey and tied at the nape of her neck with a bit of string. On her head she wore a shabby, brown Stetson. Her eyes, cobalt blue—and a scar down her left cheek that looked to be almost healed.

“You seem pretty much alive to me.”

“What surprises me is that I
feel
like I’m alive too—but I’m not. Here, take my hand.”

To placate the woman Susan reached across to her and tried to touch her hand. She could see the colour of it. It belonged to a strong woman in the prime of her life, tanned by long afternoons in the sun. It looked solid enough but Susan couldn’t catch hold of it. Startled, she tried to grasp the woman’s hand again but batted thin air in her efforts to grab something substantial.

“See what I mean? I can talk to ya and you can see me, but that’s the measure of it I’m afraid.”

In an attempt to ground something of what had just happened Susan just kept staring about; at the pine trees, at the wet autumn landscape, the soaked flat grass, anything but at the buckskin woman. She could smell rotting ferns in the air and all her senses were in full working order. In fact, her extra sensory abilities seemed in full working order too—for now she could see dead people.

“And if I don’t help you?”

“Then a poor, sweet girl will suffer even more and you will be stuck with me for an awful long time.”

“Define long time.”

“Your whole life. I’ll be with ya when you eat ‘n sleep. Alongside ya when you go out with a man, when you stay in with a man. I’ll be everywhere. They’ll be no privacy, none at all.”

Susan sighed…looked to the darkening sky and thought about the fact that her breakdown, finally—after the fire—was now fucking total…and she nodded.

“Okay. Where do we start?”

“Why, with an introduction, Sue—where else?”

“Who exactly are you?”

“Well, most folks called me Jane. We can start there. Come on, let’s go see Bethany.”

Susan followed meekly behind, like one who had just found out that her reality was rapidly running out of choices. Jane, of course, moved soundlessly through the undergrowth. Every snap of a twig underfoot, every swish of a branch as Susan pushed through was met with a hard stare from her new companion.

“Why are you here now? Why not before?” Susan asked.

“I’m as sure—as a coyote’s heart when he yips at the moon—that I have no idea why. Now hush.”

As they skirted the caravans Susan kept low to the ground, occasionally dropping to one knee whilst Jane listened carefully and motioned with her hands to move on, closer to the campfire, from which arose the most horrendous smell of dead meat cooking. They could see the two men arguing and the small man becoming more agitated. Susan saw Jago punch the small man in the face, and he called for another man to see to the wound.

One woman in red was sitting on the caravan steps, oblivious to the cries of pain coming from the small man. There were no other women to be seen. She proffered Jago her cheek.

“Let me kiss your other cheeks,” he laughed as he drew her into the red caravan.

Susan and Jane crept around to the far side where a child was playing with an Alsatian dog. The girl, wearing a faded blue dress, was throwing a ball to the edge of the clearing from where the dog kept bringing it back. It wasn’t long before the girl noticed that someone was watching her from the undergrowth, and she ran up to them both with the dog in tow.

“Come on Roux, come on boy, and sit!” she said as she plonked herself down by Susan. The dog obeyed without hesitation.

“She speaks English,” said Susan.

“She is English,” Jane replied.

“But she’s in France.”

“So what, you are in France but do you speak the lingo?”

“Well I understand a little but speak it very badly.”

“Enough, Sue. Listen to what Bethany has to say.”

“Did you like the chicken, Miss Sue?” asked Bethany, eyes eager for attention. “I had to run fast to catch the fox that had it.”

“Thank you, Bethany, but did you have to kill the fox?”

“Well, I had to. I wanted to get the chicken to you, Miss Sue. Sorry about that.”

“That’s okay, Bethany.”

Jane was beginning to get fidgety. “Down to business. Bethany, I want you to go with Sue here.”

“But I don’t want to, Grandma.”

“But yesterday you said you did, child.”

“That was yesterday, Grandma, and now Billy has promised me
—
”

“Don’t matter what Billy promised you. Remember what Jago did to you!”

The child’s face darkened.

The tone of Jane’s voice changed from irritation to anger. “Show Sue your back, child.”

Bethany thought for a moment and asked Sue to undo the back buttons of her dress. As she did so Susan’s fingers started to tremble. She thought she could see something on the girl’s back. When the final button was undone Susan felt her stomach tighten and had to quell the need to be sick. In letters along the middle of Bethany’s back had been carved a word. Scabs were beginning to fall off, but the new pink skin, where the knife had written, revealed the word:

MINE

Susan began to cry quietly as she fastened up the girl’s dress. She could see now that old blood had stained the blue material, and it brought back the worst of memories.

The inquest went well until I gave evidence, and told them that I thought the family might have had a chance to escape. But the only means of escape had been narrow windows along the top, which in effect had signed their death warrants. Well, I didn’t put it quite like that. This upset the relatives who had told the grandmother that the children had died in their sleep
—
but I knew better. The grandmother would always remember it as a house full of smoke and no flames.

“Tell me, Bethany. You trust me don’t you?”

Bethany smiled thinly. “If my Grandma says to trust you, I will.”

“Did Jago do anything else to hurt you?”

“After he did
that
he said that he would never hurt me again. He said that in a few days he’ll give me a reward. There will be a party, and I will be the Queen of Hunter’s Moon. The other circus people will join up before…or after that…I don’t know. Billy says something is stopping them from coming but I don’t know what.”

Susan felt a cold hand on her shoulder and she turned around to see Jago’s wild eyes staring at her. The small man, Billy, was standing by his side, holding his bandaged arm and wincing with pain.

“Let me go!” Susan shouted as Jago grabbed her by both arms.

She struggled frantically to escape. She broke free but mind-bending pain exploded at the back of her head.

When she came around she was tied up with rope that tightened as she moved to free her hands. She thought that she must be in one of the small caravans. Bethany was crying, holding her hand, and Jane was sitting on the floor next to her.

“I should have heard him. I should have heard him coming,” whispered Jane.

With a groan Susan lifted her head and peered around in the near darkness. The place was filthy with screwed up paper and dirty clothes. She lay on a small bed in the corner, and a dismal lantern sat on a box across from her.

“Don’t be sad.” Bethany looked afraid but added in a calm voice. “It’s the Hunter’s Moon tomorrow. I’ll be crowned Queen and you shall be free. They will have to do as I say.”

“Child, we have to get you out of here before tomorrow. Sue here is hurt. We’ll have to get her some help too.”

Jago appeared then in the doorway.

Jane got up from the caravan floor and stood directly in front of Jago.

“Why, you half-breed animal, if you touch my granddaughter again I’ll slit you from throat to prick and feed your insides to that dog over there.”

“He can’t see you Grandma, you know that. Only Sue and me can see you.”

Jago gave the girl a funny look. “Get to bed, child.”

Bethany reluctantly left the caravan with him.

The desperation within Susan began to rise until her breathing became ragged and her heartbeat could almost be heard. She looked up at Jane towering above her. “If you can be seen by me can’t you go and get some help from someone else?”

“I tried. Somethin’ to do with Bethany—she has some sort of special connection to you and so you can see me. The only other person, well animal, that can see me is that dog Roux. We don’t have much time, Sue. It’s the Hunter’s Moon tomorrow night. I think that they have a sort of weird ceremony cooked up for it and Bethany—”

“Oh God,” Susan thought about the word that had been cut into Bethany’s back.

As day broke Susan could smell the foul cooking pot again and she wondered what had been added this time. It reminded her of the sickening, goose-grease that her own grandmother had made her swallow when she had a sore throat. Her other grandmother had placed camphor crystals in a little cloth bag on red ribbon and tied it around Susan’s neck. She had preferred the latter.

All that day she remained tied up, although she felt the binding loosen when she fought to get free. Jago had placed a filthy, black and white chequered rag across her mouth, and when he left her alone she’d lost control of her bladder more than once out of desperation and fear.

It was well into the evening when Jago reappeared in the caravan doorway. He had cleaned himself up a bit; his brown hair had been washed, and it hung loose in waves down to his shoulders. He reminded Susan of an artist’s self portrait she had seen once. He had the same long face and nose, with beard and moustache surrounding a full mouth. Jago was also wearing a fur trimmed, brown robe, as if about to go to a grand ceremony—the crowning ceremony for the Queen of the Hunter’s Moon. Over his shoulder the blood-moon had already risen, a warning to the innocent and vulnerable.

By his side was Bethany, dressed in white with all the red, gold, and orange of the harvest flowers bound into a circlet on her head. Tiny ears of barley and corn stuck out like a crown of thorns and her bouquet of faded, autumn flowers was threaded with purple berries. Her lips had been smudged with the ripe juice of purple berries too, and she smiled up at Jago, expectant, waiting for her reward. Jago smiled at her in return and put a protective arm around her shoulder—just above his scrawled handiwork.

The dog, Roux, squeezed past them, and sat down close to Susan. He began to whine a little, occasionally glancing up at her to see if she would give him some comfort, and then at Jane in the corner who was constantly trying to get the dog to do something. Bethany walked further into the caravan and Jago seated her on the small bed. He moved the lantern and placed it on a hook next to Susan. She could feel the heat of it on her face, whilst he untied the rope around her feet.