The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror Read online

  (My brood. Violet wondered what that meant! It made you think of a mother hen fussing protectively over her chicks.)

  Rita Mae told Violet that she thought her father had “inherited” the property somehow and that it had once been much larger—“Acres and acres. Now there’s just two acres.”

  Rita Mae did not seem to recall if her mother had ever lived in this house or if she’d “disappeared” before Mr. Clovis moved the family here when Rita Mae had been just about old enough to walk.

  Violet thought it was cool, to live in such a big sprawling old house that you could find an actual room to be in alone, if you needed to be alone. Though most of the upstairs rooms were empty of furnishings, and were very dirty with dust balls on the floors, cobwebs everywhere, and the husks of dead insects underfoot, and a pervasive smell of grime, she much preferred the Clovis house to the cramped two-bedroom apartment at Valley Garden Apartments. There, Violet was often alone—lonely. And even when her mother was home, Violet felt lonely.

  You could see that the original farmhouse had been plain and utilitarian like a square box of two storeys; added to this were additions on both sides, like wings, that tilted just a little, as if the foundation beneath them had not been secure.

  Close behind the house were rows of small nasty-smelling cages with wire mesh, which Rita Mae said were “rabbit-hutches.” In all, there must have been more than a dozen of these. Violet wasn’t sure if there were rabbits in these enclosures or if the enclosures were empty; or if, horribly, there were remains of rabbits inside, that had never been cleared away.

  “It’s OK, Vi’let,” Rita Mae said, seeing Violet’s nose crinkled at the smell, “—you don’t have to clean them. You’re not family—yet.”

  The downstairs of the Clovis house smelled of scorched and spilled food and a not-unpleasant aroma as of overripe fruit. The kitchen was pleasantly hot, even steamy. One afternoon Rita Mae’s older sister Eve was preparing supper, cooking spaghetti sauce in a large pot on the stove. Mr. Clovis kept popping into the kitchen to taste the sauce, and to add “pinches” of spice—“I like my Italian sauce hot and spicy. Don’t you, Vi’let?” Eve had emptied cans of tomato sauce into the pot, then added tomatoes, onions, red peppers, and some kind of coarse-ground meat like hamburger. (What was this meat? Violet wanted not to eat meat, she’d have liked to be a vegetarian—but it was so hard to resist! Her mouth watered at the smell.)

  Of course, Violet was invited to stay for supper. Mr. Clovis insisted she should call her mother on her cell phone to ask permission—“That is the polite way, Vi’let.” But Violet knew better than to call her suspicious mother who’d just say no out of meanness.

  Discreetly Violet went into another room to call so that the Clovises could hear her bright voice—“Oh hi, Mom! Hey ­listen—Rita Mae’s dad says I can stay for supper with them, then he’ll drive me home. OK? It’s real nice here, Mom—a ‘rural retreat.’” Violet paused, breathing quickly. Then, “Thanks, Mom!”

  When she returned Mr. Clovis said approvingly, “It is always the proper thing, dear Vi’let, to be polite to your elders.”

  Again, Mr. Clovis winked at Violet. That wink!—Violet squirmed, and giggled, and shivered, and looked quickly away. She felt just slightly guilty about misleading Mr. Clovis, well—lying to him. But he would never know, she was sure.

  Violet wished that Mr. Clovis would lay his hand on the nape of her neck as he sometimes did, to stroke her like you’d stroke a cat. But Mr. Clovis never did this except if they happened to be alone, which was not often. Too many Clovis children!

  Was there something happening in the Clovis household? Violet noticed the younger children excited and giggling. And there came Emile home, sort of excited, too. Violet had been looking out a window and had seen Emile climb out of the SUV with a canvas bundle in his arms, that was bulky and awkward-sized, and looked almost as if it was moving, but later when Emile came into the kitchen he didn’t have the bundle.

  Emile was the oldest of the Clovis children whom Violet had met, somewhere beyond eighteen, Rita Mae believed—maybe as old as twenty-two. (To Violet and Rita Mae, both thirteen, this was old.) Emile had quit high school to take a job with “the county” which was where Mr. Clovis worked, too: road repair, construction, snow removal, storm and flood cleanup. He wore colorful T-shirts, jeans with deep rips, and safety boots big and clunky as a horse’s hooves. He had a sexy close-shaved head that looked small on his shoulders, gold studs in both ears, tattoos scattered on both muscled arms. From the waist up Emile was normal-seeming but when he was on his feet you could see that his legs were strangely short. He was not so very much taller than Violet and Rita Mae. When Emile walked quickly he seemed to scuttle like a crab as if one leg was slightly shorter than the other. It was Emile who held the “family record” for pizza: he’d once eaten three entire medium-large pizzas without pause, as well as several sixteen-ounce Cokes. Violet blushed when Emile winked at her for it was clear that, for all his teasing of Rita Mae and Violet, he had special feelings for her.

  That day, Violet saw Rita Mae whispering with Eve and Emile. And there was Mr. Clovis smiling in her direction. Rita Mae said to them, in a voice loud enough for Violet to overhear, “Hey, it’s cool. Vi’let’s cool.”

  What was it? Violet felt anxious, wondering what they were saying. Were they talking about her?

  “Would you like to meet Big Momma, Vi’let? Before we sit down for supper?”

  Violet smiled uncertainly. She glanced at Rita Mae who said, “Sure she would, Dad!”

  Mr. Clovis took Violet’s hand in his warm calloused hand, and led her along a corridor into the rear of the house. She’d never been in this part of the Clovis house before. Her nostrils begin to pinch at a new, strange smell.

  Mr. Clovis said, “It’s a little surprise. We have a special pet—we don’t show just anyone. Big Momma is her name.”

  “What kind of pet?”—Violet’s heart beat quickly.

  “Not your ordinary pet.”

  Out of his pocket Mr. Clovis took a key to unlock an unusually heavy door, that looked as if it were reinforced with steel. When he led Violet into the room beyond, Rita Mae and the others followed close behind, and the door was shut behind them.

  “Big Momma, look who’s here! Vi’let, our new friend.”

  At first Violet couldn’t make out what the thing—the ­creature —was on the other side of a glass barrier. Was it a snake? A huge snake? The largest snake she had ever seen, even in photographs, lay languid and unmoving on the floor inside an enclosure like a large aquarium, only about ten feet away on the other side of the scummy glass. Strange words came to her, like stuttering—boa ricter? boa stricter? The immense snake was thick as a big man’s body, with a scaly glittering skin splotched in diamond shapes, tawny and brown like a rotted banana. The air in the windowless room was oppressively humid, like a jungle. There was a smell as of rotted fruit and a sharper, saltier smell.

  Violet’s heart was pounding so violently she nearly fainted.

  “Oh—what is it? A s-snake?”

  “Python.”

  “Reticulated python.”

  Proudly the Clovises told Violet of Big Momma who was some age beyond ten years, and weighed more than three hundred pounds—“That’s just our estimate. Nobody’s ever weighed her.” Big Momma was as long as twenty feet when she stretched out straight which she rarely did. Mostly, Big Momma lay in coils.

  Rita Mae said excitedly, “I knew you’d like her, Vi’let! We all think she is way cool. Daddy bought her from a carnival when we lived in Florida. The carnival was disbanding, so Daddy got her cheap. She wasn’t so big then, I guess. A python is way, way bigger than a boa constrictor. She got her name ‘Big Momma’ by just growing.”

  One of the Clovises nudged Violet in the small of the back, to push her forward for a better look at the python.

  Languidl
y the snake’s eyes moved as if Violet, stepping forward, had stepped into the snake’s vision. The head was so large! Violet stared at the hideous huge snake that was staring back calmly at her.

  It was unnerving, the snake had such large eyes. Intelligent and alert eyes they seemed, the size of oranges, tawny in color, with dark slits for pupils.

  And did the snake have eyelashes? Violet trembled to see that she did.

  Then Violet saw, the snake’s cylindrical body was distended, about five feet from the head. Something fairly large had been swallowed whole.

  The Clovises were eager to speak of Big Momma in whom they clearly took much pride.

  “Big Momma was fed a few days ago. She doesn’t eat often—just eats a whole lot. Then she rests.”

  “Big Momma sleeps a lot, you’d think. But see, she isn’t actually sleeping. She’s watching.”

  “Big Momma doesn’t have teeth like we do, to grind up food. She swallows her food whole.”

  “She catches her food in her coils and squeezes it so it’s paralyzed but she doesn’t care for dead food. She likes live.”

  “Her mouth stretches open, sort of unhinges, you wouldn’t believe how wide, so she can swallow her food . . . It’s awesome.”

  “It only looks like she’s sleeping. But if you were to go inside, she’d wake up fast.”

  The Clovises laughed. The prospect of venturing inside the glass enclosure made Violet feel panicked.

  There was a buzzing in Violet’s head so that she had difficulty hearing the Clovises. She saw Mr. Clovis glancing at her with his warm brown eyes and friendly smile, and Rita Mae, and Emile—to see how she was taking Big Momma. Was it a test?—to see if Violet was one of them, or a coward?

  Violet asked, “What—do you feed her?”

  “Rabbits. Lots of rabbits.”

  “Sometimes mice.”

  “Lots and lots of mousies!”

  “Lots of rabbits.”

  Doubtfully Violet said, “That doesn’t look like the size of a rabbit . . .”

  “Well, it could be a jack rabbit. They’re real big.”

  The Clovises laughed, excited. Violet saw Emile clenching and unclenching his fists. His face shone with pride.

  Now Violet noticed that there were cages along the walls of the room, the size of the outdoor rabbit hutches Fortunately these cages were all empty. In a corner was an ax, and on the floor scattered pages of newspaper soaked with dark stains.

  “Where do you get the r-r-rabbits?”—Violet was trying not to stammer.

  “Where do we get the rabbits, Dad?”—Emile asked, as if he couldn’t recall.

  “Pet supply store, son. Out Ajax Boulevard.”

  “D’you think Big Momma is beautiful, Vi’let?”—Rita Mae’s breath was warm against Violet’s cheek.

  “Y-Yes. Big Momma is beautiful . . .”

  Violet spoke in such a halting voice, all of the Clovises laughed. It was like teasing her, she knew.

  Did that mean that they liked her, if they teased her? She thought so!

  Mr. Clovis trailed his hand lightly against the nape of Violet’s neck. Violet shivered, and did not shrink away.

  “Next time we feed Big Momma, you can help, Vi’let—would you like that?”

  Hesitantly Violet nodded yes.

  The rest of the visit at the Clovis’s house, that day, passed in a haze.

  The spicy Italian tomato sauce, lavishly poured onto fresh-cooked spaghetti, was the most delicious meal Violet had ever had. After seeing Big Momma in her glass enclosure, Violet was hungry.

  Violet was excited, and nervous, and anxious, and hungry. Though she hated garlic and would never have eaten garlic bread prepared by her mother, she had several pieces of garlic bread at supper.

  During the meal Mr. Clovis regarded all of the faces around the table with a playful sort of scrutiny as if he had the power to read minds. This was how Mr. Clovis—the “resident patriarch” as he called himself—behaved at most meals Violet had attended.

  She both dreaded and wished for the man’s gaze moving onto her because that made her feel so self-conscious—but of course there was no escape: “Vi’let! You know, Big Momma is our family secret. You must never tell. Promise?”

  “Oh yes, Mr. Clovis. I promise.”

  “But I didn’t need to tell you that, did I? You already knew.”

  “Oh yes, Mr. Clovis. I knew.”

  “And you know, Vi’let, you’d be a whole lot prettier if you smiled more, and didn’t frown.”

  Mr. Clovis leaned over, past Rita Mae who was sitting between them, to smooth Violet’s forehead with his thumb. It was such a sudden gesture, Violet couldn’t shrink away. She blushed to realize she’d been frowning the way her mother often frowned.

  “Just remember, Vi’let: your step-daddy Clovis prefers you to smile. Every time you’re about to frown, think: Step-Daddy Clovis prefers me to smile.”

  Violet collapsed into a fit of giggling that got everyone giggling with her. It went on and on.

  When Mr. Clovis and Rita Mae drove Violet home it was shockingly late—past 8:00 p.m. Luckily, Violet’s mother wasn’t yet home.

  There was a macaroni-and-cheese casserole in the refrigerator for Violet to heat up in the microwave. Her favorite food!

  Anyway, used to be her favorite food.

  Violet felt sickish at the prospect of more food but heated the casserole up dutifully so that the food-smell would be in the air when her mother came home. She scraped most of the casserole into the garbage disposal. The yellowish melted cheese with splotches of brown reminded her of—something . . . She laughed nervously and pressed the chilly back of her hand against her forehead. She was feeling just slightly nauseated.

  Here was a strange thing: Violet had to force herself to recall the very special thing she had seen at Rita Mae’s house that day. The reticulated python.

  The reticulated python kept slithering out of her consciousness like a TV screen turning dim. Violet kept swallowing, her mouth was very dry. She was feeling very sleepy.

  On the sofa, with the TV on but muted, and printouts of math homework problems in her lap, Violet fell asleep and was wakened by a stranger’s hand nudging her shoulder at 10:55 p.m.

  “Violet? Sweetie? Are you asleep?”

  It wasn’t clear if Violet’s mother was angry, or annoyed, or abashed. She’d stumbled coming into the semi-darkened room in her high-heeled shoes holding her hand over her mouth as if she didn’t want Violet to smell her breath.

  Violet’s mother’s hair was streaked blond now and her eyebrows were sharply defined in dark pencil. She was apologetic telling Violet that she hadn’t meant to come home so late except something had “come up” in the office and she’d had to remain at work later than she’d planned.

  “I didn’t know banks were open at night, Mom.” But Violet was yawning, to show that she didn’t care.

  “Don’t be silly, banks are not open at night. Not to the public. But the world of finance never sleeps. If you work in the world of finance, you can never sleep. I see you ate the casserole, sweetie. All of it?”

  Assiduously Violet had scraped every last scorched bit of the macaroni-and-cheese into the garbage disposal. She’d done a heroic job scouring out the casserole bowl with steel wool and had placed it in the dishwasher.

  “Did you stay after school today, Violet?”

  “No.”

  “When I called you, you didn’t answer. Why was that?”

  “Charge ran down, I guess.” Violet yawned.

  “You don’t lie to your mother, sweetie, do you?”

  “Do you?”

  “Violet! I’m asking you a question.”

  But Violet was yawning so, her jaws stretched wide and aching, she couldn’t pay attention to whatever her mother was saying.

&nb
sp; “Sweetie, I love you. You know that, don’t you?”—Violet’s mother stooped over Violet to help her onto her feet, to walk her to her bedroom and to bed. It was just 11:00 p.m., hardly any time had passed.

  When Violet crawled into bed, Violet’s mother kissed her forehead with lipstick lips that smeared though neither Violet not her mother noticed at that moment.

  “Is macaroni-and-cheese still your favorite food, Violet?”

  Violet nodded yes.

  “You know your mother loves you very very much, don’t you, Violet?”

  Violet nodded yes.

  “Let’s hear from Violet—‘smartest girl at South Valley Middle School.’”

  Violet blushed crimson. She knew that Mr. Clovis was just teasing but it was a sweet tender flirtatious kind of teasing that lit up her heart like Christmas tree bubble lights.

  She’d been thinking she would not accept a ride from Mr. Clovis and Rita Mae any longer but, well—a few days after her last visit there she was on Meridian Avenue walking kind of slow and distracted in a light-falling rain, and there came the welcome cry—“Vi’let! Hey! Why didn’t you wait for me after homeroom? Want a ride home?”

  So, Violet hadn’t any choice but to run to the curb, to swing up into the shiny black SUV. Thinking of her mother with a stab of satisfaction—Don’t need you. Hate you.

  At the Clovis house, she’d near-about forgotten what was kept in the locked room at the end of the corridor. Not one person spoke of B___ M___ and when Violet tried to think what or who B___ M___ was, her brain came up blank like a computer screen when there’s no Internet connection.

  What Violet loved about the Clovis household, next to the way they all seemed so fond of her, was how everybody talked, and everybody listened.

  All sorts of serious things, they discussed. Like whether there was God, and whether animals have souls; whether there was “some special meaning” to life, and a “heaven where people would meet their loved ones.” The loudest voices would prevail initially but then Mr. Clovis would tap his water glass and call Quiet! so that Violet could speak.

  Crinkling her nose Violet said, “But what if you didn’t have any ‘loved ones’? Or what if you and your ‘loved ones’ didn’t much like each other?”—and everyone around the table laughed, especially Mr. Clovis who appreciated wit. Violet blushed with pleasure.