SUGARLAND MELTING
First Quarter
Founding Father
1.
At the mouth of a muddy mountain, on a mid-winter’s night, thirteen trailers sat arranged in the form of a cross. RJ Rockhouse stared down upon them from his house high on the hill. With old, cold breath he whispered,
“It is good.”
The plumbers did plumb. The electricians did wire. The carpenters did erect. The inspectors did inspect. No one in town brought quarrel against RJ’s deed. Even so, the common folk were inclined to question why.
“Why would a multimillionaire, who is ninety-nine years old, litter his acres with a baker’s-dozen mobile homes?”
Even more puzzling to those about the town was the fact that Rockhouse’s houses were absolutely rent-free.
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.”
Those in search of hope found it in the most unlikely of places. Rockhouse’s outstretched hands welcomed the poor to Sugarland. RJ plucked thirteen families from beneath the poverty line. He could have settled for merely providing warm shelter and still been awarded a Nobel Prize. However, his helping hand did not clinch. With his own purse, he paid to provide each family with satellite television. The electric, water, trash, and telephone bills were covered by the man on the mountain. Still, his heart was not humbled. RJ wanted what they wanted. He wanted them to want no more. When Rockhouse opened his purse, businesses in town were happy to accept a piece of the pie. Thanks to the influence of RJ’s money, every man, who wanted a job, was given one, and not just a job flipping burgers. Some men chose manual labor. Others chose the cozy comfort of an office. A few were granted the chance to receive higher education. RJ Rockhouse held no bias for gender. Men and women were treated equally. No longer would the children’s families be branded as beggars. There were new clothes for school, a computer in each home for educational and recreational purposes, and, of course, plenty of presents under the tree. Santa Clause has nothing on RJ Rockhouse. It was not long until he realized,
“Thirteen is not enough.”
So, he purchased thirty-seven more mobile homes. He plucked thirty-seven families from poverty’s cold claws. Sugarland trailer park stood fifty families strong. RJ Rockhouse smiled, and everyone in town wondered why.
2.
Whispers echo in small towns. RJ Rockhouse knew that all too well. For nearly seventy-five years, he remained cocooned in his hilltop mansion, refusing to visit a barber. Men tend to gather in small town barbershops. They huddle around buzzing clippers. Their floppy Dumbo ears open wide to intercept every echo of every whisper like sonar.
“I hold no sympathy for inquiring minds,” Rockhouse would say to Benjamin, his butler, “if you cannot trim my hair, Benjamin, I will let it grow from here to Heaven.”
Rockhouse knew not the taste of the town diner’s meatloaf. Small town waitresses are often eager to accept gossip as a tip.
“Should I desire meatloaf, I’ll have Amber prepare some. I refuse to eat at the diner until the town census learns not to talk with their mouths full.”
A small town will forgive a wealthy man for choosing not to eat at their greasy diner or congregate in their smoky barbershop. However, one thing a small, Kentucky town will never forgive is continuous failure to attend church on Sunday morning. Rockhouse was once a church regular. He even kept his tithe requirements, which is a lot of money coming from a man of his stature. All that came to an abrupt end. Some say he lost his faith. Others go as far as to say he devoted his life to witchcraft. For whatever reason, Rockhouse’s place on the front pew remained empty for nearly seventy-five years. The pastors, deacons, and all the little lambs faces and names changed throughout the decades. The Bible, Amazing Grace, and rumors of RJ Rockhouse were all that seemed un-weathered by the shift of generations.
The last time Rockhouse’s shadow stretched through the church door was the day of his wife’s funeral. Those there that morning witnessed what they referred to as ‘a melting.’ A man with the mental, physical, and spiritual strength of a glacier dripped with water. Tears cut his stern features and fell into stain on his expensive, dark suit. He trickled to his knees, softened, and crumbled, until he was nothing more than a puddle, weeping and trembling on the church floor. His beloved wife lay dead at age twenty-five. Even the hardest of men would lose his stone stature, if faced with the same circumstance. RJ was a boulder. But even boulders have a melting point. God, did he grieve. (In the same church, where he pledged everlasting devotion to Jesus, as his sin stained skin splashed baptizing holy water.)
Only five years earlier, he stood within those same sacred walls, dressed in a tux that would have wetted Cleopatra’s whistle. He kissed his virgin maiden’s smiling lips and swore before God and all creation that his love for her would follow him to the grave. There she was again, still smiling. And he still loved her. The same people were gathered there, but this time their palms were not slick with baby’s breath. There was no Wedding March on the piano. Everyone hid grief greased faces behind praying palms. Something was wrong.
Old Lady Crenshaw curled up in the corner, hiding behind black orchid buds. RJ tried to focus through the blur of tears. Was she crying or was she laughing? Gentlemen gathered around the coffin, dressed in the traditional black coat and tie. Their paper plates bowed in the middle, heavy with greasy ham and fluffy pieces of pumpkin pie that widows had baked for the occasion. The gentlemen had the audacity to shake hands and crack jokes over Lola’s dead body like she was some sort of decorative piece for them to drape their coats over or rest their coffee cups on. Black widows scurried to RJ’s side, making their play on the now single, rich widower and feeding him funeral rhetoric.
“I’m so sorry, RJ…”
“She’s with Jesus now, RJ…”
Their words rippled across his watery tear crest and were lost somewhere along his ridges. No words could comfort him. The glacier was gone. It had melted into mud, leaving behind a man weak as water.
RJ cowered at the widows’ black toes. They stared down upon him with swollen red eyes. Their pasty white faces glowed ghostly like the moon. Black dresses smothered sunlight like death’s dark veil. With fluttering fingers he clawed the widows’ legs hard enough to draw blood from their shins. Some shrieked. Some moaned sympathetically. All of them scattered. They knew what he was telling them to do and where he wanted to go. The widows had once been there themselves.
Mourners cleared a path through the aisle for RJ to crawl to his dead bride’s side. He poured down the aisle like lost liquid, leaving a trail of tears the entire way. She lay on red velvet, with arms crossing her firm breasts. A crimson tide of long, soft hair splashed her shoulders. Lola Rockhouse slept amidst the clutter. The sorrowful sobs of a thousand mourners did not disturb that beauty’s sleep. Her gentle face peacefully smiled, caught in the comfort of her crimson cradle. RJ squished tears from his eyelashes like a squeegee and looked around the buzzing room. All the people stared on in puzzled disbelief. Her subtle beauty had never been more evident.
Some of the gentlemen curved over Lola’s coffin a little too curiously. RJ was not quite sure, but he thought he could see their lips pucker into kissing position as their eyes crossed her breasts. A few went as far as to stroke her vibrant, velvet curls with their hungry fingers.
“How dare they!”
RJ feebly crawled to Lola’s side and clawed his way to her coffin’s lip.
“Lola,” he cried, “let’s go home.”
But the beauty did not awaken. Her electric, emerald eyes would not open. She was lost in Rumplestiltskin’s slumber. RJ brushed a tuft of ruby hair from her tender cheek.
“You’re so cold, darling,” he whispered, “wake up so we can go home.”
Black satin shreds and orchid petals flowed across the walls’ length like melting ice cream. Mourners spit hunks of slimy ham and creamy pie- some laughing, some crying. Was this a funeral or a festival?
The mourners surrounded RJ, spinning their web of sorrow like starving spiders. They were jealous. They wanted RJ’s money. They wanted his mansion. They wanted his woman.
“Get away from my wife!”
He looked down upon her. With the softness of silk, he rubbed the tip of his nose against hers. His tears splattered her eyelids. Black eyeliner cut creases down her temples and lodged like ink blots in her crimson curls.
“Are you crying, my darling?” he asked her, “don’t worry. I’m here.”
He wrapped his arms around his beloved Lola and lifted her from the cradle. He rocked her back and forth like he had done so many stormy nights before. His forehead kissed hers. Shimmering hair fell like flame around his face. Black tears blotched her dress.
“Come on, Lola. I’m taking you home.”
He kissed her with the softness of a man lost deep in love, before hoisting her over his shoulder. Lola’s dead body slumped. Stiff fingers dangled at his coat tails. Lifeless green eyes opened. Children scattered. Rows of red roses spilled to the floor. The suffocating smoke of stampeded posies arose like clouds from beneath the trampling feet of frightened children.
RJ lowered his head and plowed through the crowd. Some slipped and fell on the carpet, moist with RJ’s tears. Others grabbed at Lola, trying to steal her away
“Keep your hands off her,” he growled.
“RJ, get control of yourself…”
He held her tight. One arm wrapped her waist. The other defended his sweet lady from the circling crowd. The men tried to grasp RJ and save him from humiliation. The women hugged their children tightly, shielding their eyes from the morbid display.
RJ looked out across the crowd that called themselves his friends. Five years earlier, they showered them with rice. They wished them well. Now, however, they somehow seemed happier, knowing that RJ, who had it so easy with his millions, finally understood how it felt to be human. With their faces sculpted into stationary sadness, and the jerky movements of their black bodies, they resembled clay puppets. RJ never realized it before, but suddenly it became so apparent. The devil was pulling their strings, and if Satan had his way, lovely Lola would rot with the stinking corpses of Hell.
RJ’s fist cut the crowd like Lancelot’s sword. Silky strands of Lola’s red hair clung to her husband’s tear streaked cheeks. For the briefest of moments, RJ regained glacier strength. He knocked men he had once called brother chin first into tear puddles. His damsel clung tightly to her hero. Her white gown circled his shoulders like smoke. He stumbled backwards, with fist flailing blindly, until he found the church door.
“Don’t you dare lay one more finger on my wife,” he threatened, opening the door, “I can destroy every one of you, and you know it. With the simple flip of my wallet, I can crush this church like a locust. I can buy up your houses and rape your land. If you desire to see the hatred in RJ Rockhouse’s heart manifested, touch my wife just one more time.”
Everyone backed away and stood still like a picture. Clay faces kept their sad sculpting, but the jerky movements ceased. RJ ran down the porch steps and through the yard. Lola looked out to the crowd, from over her husband’s shoulder with green, marble eyes. He made his way to the Buick, opened the passenger door, seat belted Lola, and took his place beside her at the stirring wheel. As the Buick sped away into mountain shadow, the crowd funneled through the door and wandered the yard aimlessly, moaning and shrieking like zombies. That was the last time RJ Rockhouse darkened the church door.
No one truly knows what happened next. Some perverts claim he took her home and made love to her dead body one last time. Others say he buried her somewhere in the acres of his estate. The popular belief, even to this day, is that Lola Rockhouse’s body is tucked away somewhere inside his mansion. All anyone knows is that RJ Rockhouse became a recluse. Seventy-five years after Lola’s passing, he had yet to be seen in town. Within a few years’ time, the town folk began to notice a change. The mountain on which RJ built his gaudy mansion started… melting. Mud seeped from the peak. All the pretty red buds, dogwoods, and daisies choked and died in the sludge. Folks began to blame the sudden mud on RJ’s tears.
“The man cries so much over his dead wife, the ground can’t hold all the tear water.”
Not a very logical theory- but then again- what else could anyone believe? Even during times of drought, the mountain kept a dark, milky coating. The mud clogged the creeks and sheeted the streets. Folks would have addressed RJ with their concern, but he remained out of sight and out of mind for seventy-five years.
Within that time period, Rockhouse had gone through seventy butlers. Occasionally, a long, black limousine would cut curves, weaving its way through town and climb the steep slope ascending Muddy Mountain. Right away everyone knew,
“RJ’s hired another poor soul as his butler.”
Some lasted a few years. Most made it only a day. RJ’s butler of the month would venture into town once a week to check the mail and buy whatever was necessary for the house. Some butlers were young. Some were older. None of them would speak to the town folk about RJ Rockhouse or what exactly was going on inside the mansion. In fact, whenever someone asked about RJ’s wellbeing, the butler would fade snowy pale, begin quivering, and simply say,
“Mr. Rockhouse wishes to be left alone.”
Eventually, it got to the point where the town grocer did not even quote the price to RJ’s butlers. There was no need to speak to them. They would not speak in return. If the butler needed a stamp, he would ask for it. If the butler needed fresh onions, he would ask for them. You ask him nothing, especially questions pertaining to RJ.
So, the stormy night Anthony stomped into the town pub, with his boots beating thunder and his deep blue coat beaten into black by December rain, it was only natural that all of the pub’s action froze like a paused movie. The bachelors lost their breath. The bachelorettes stopped giggling. Billy’s rhythm on the piano slowed like a record player with weak batteries. Joe, the bartender, stood like a fossil somehow hardened in the midst of cleaning a whiskey stained glass. The pub’s doors had never opened to welcome one of RJ’s butlers. This was an occasion that would forever be logged in the annals of town folklore. Everyone there knew it.
Anthony shuffled to the bar, leaving a stream of cold December through the aisle. None of the brawlers clinched their fists. None of the whores adjusted their bosoms. If he had something to say, they did not want to interrupt.
He sat on a barstool and sloshed winter water onto the hardwood floor. The cuffs of his deep blue slacks dripped muddy sludge. His tattered brown boots bled creek soot from the seams- the rubber souls flapped like loose tongues. He had obviously walked quite a distance through the storm.
“Give me a whiskey,” he wheezed to Joe, still standing dumbfounded with his wrist buried in bourbon stained glass.
Joe sat a shot glass on the bar before Anthony and filled it with the most expensive brand in the house.
“Not a shot,” Anthony coughed, “give me the whole bottle.”
The pub people were propped stiffly in their chairs like cardboard cutouts. They gave Joe a look that said, ‘for the love of God, give the man what he wants.’
Joe popped the cork on a fifth of his finest whiskey and sat it by Anthony’s shot glass. Whether he knew it or not, a good enough story would pay for his tab.
The people were scared of him. In fact, the very presence of anything representing Muddy Mountain frightened the people the same way a graveyard seems to intimidate folks on full moon nights. Rockhouse had gone through forty-five butlers before hiring Anthony. Anthony was no different than the rest. He was just as cold and spooky. All of RJ’s butlers were as much icons of local horror as The Headless Horseman and The Grim Reaper, Anthony even more so. He managed to do what most butlers could not. He stayed with Mr. Rockhouse for over a year.
Anthony began services for RJ twenty-five years after Lola’s death. By then, rumors of dark deeds in the mansion on the hill were as common as Mother Goose tales. The town’s children sang jump-rope nursery rhymes about warlock RJ and his hunger for misbehaving children’s blood. The adults thumbed their noses to their kid’s foolish limericks but continued to lock the doors and pull the shades late at night. Of course, no one knew the truth, and they figured they would probably never know the truth, until the night Anthony dripped December poison at the beak of the local pub.
His hair shaped hard on his head, as if winter’s dark clouds had opened up to rain enamel. Misshapen features jutted further from his face in pub shadow, giving him the squared appearance of Frankenstein’s monster. He downed drinks of whiskey with no grimace against the gasoline taste.
“It all started with Hector,” he laughed, running gnarled fingers through strands of watery charcoal hair, “that damn dog. I hated that mongrel from day one, and I thought I was smarter than him. That was my first mistake. I’m telling every one of you right now, your life will be more golden when you figure out you don’t know a damn thing. None of us know a damn thing.”
By now, Billy had abandoned the piano. Everyone looked straight ahead to the bar with slacked jaws dangling open. Until that moment, most of them thought Anthony was a mute. He swallowed a gulp of fiery grain and continued without stutter.
“Hector was a mutt. He knew it, too. He knew he wasn’t born of a fighter’s breed. That’s why he prowled around late at night, when he thought I was asleep. Hector always rummaged through the garbage, sniffing out a morsel of steak. I heard his hungry panting from the window of my quarters.
He was a weak dog. His hide bore deep, purple mange scars. His nose was crooked. His teeth were corn colored. And he had only three legs. His rear right leg had been amputated, and from the looks of things, it had not been removed by any skilled veterinarian.
Sometimes I could spot him crouching near the timber at the north end of the grounds- his snout matted with chunks of rotting green meat he had stolen from the trash, and his ears endlessly fanning the flea storm nesting on his head. The tiny splinter of bone that had once connected to knee wagged below his belly. That ignorant mutt was too stupid to realize his leg was gone. He was always trying to scratch mange bumps cracking across his belly with claws connected to paws connected to a leg that was not there.”
Anthony’s eyes never peeped about the pub. He was not concerned with entertaining the audience. More than likely, he would have continued his story with the same enthusiasm had there been no one else there. Anthony stared straight ahead into the mirror behind the bar like he was somehow seeing his story unfold on the glass. The audience slowly moved closer so they could hear clearly. They synchronized their movements. Whenever Anthony paused to take a shot of whiskey, they would do the same. When he lowered his voice, they leaned toward him. When he raised his voice, they tilted backwards like people dodging a darting bee. By now, Joe had waxed the whiskey stained glass to a diamond shine and continued waxing unaware, with his fascination locked on Anthony.
“I must admit, I had it out for Hector. No matter how hard I tried, he always found a way to root into the trash and spread it across the yard. I guess the dog had more brains than I gave him credit for. First, I tried poisoning him, but I swear that dog’s guts were cast of iron. Finally, I’d had enough of picking through maggot infested scraps and shoveling up foul green droppings. So, I asked Mr. Rockhouse for the liberty to shoot the dog. He seemed rather keen on the idea. He loaded his .45 and handed it over to me. ‘You should name it, if you’re going to kill it. Does the dog have a name?’ he asked.
I told him I named the dog Hector in honor of a drunken bum uncle that lived with my family briefly when I was a child. ‘Hector,’ he chuckled, ‘that’s an odd name for a girl.’
I began to correct him, but decided against it. I knew Hector was a boy. I’d seen his sagging balls more times than I cared to. ‘If you shoot her between the eyes, one shot is all you will need. After you kill her, bury her in the backyard. Every lady deserves a proper burial.”
Had anyone else in the world wandered into the pub with this story, he probably would have lost a few teeth and more than a few dollars. Not Anthony. Thus far his story had been rather bland. However, he had not lost one whisper’s worth of interest from the audience. They sat around him like kids cozying to a campfire, engulfed in a ghost story. This was no average Joe sharing some tall-tale about a fish he never caught. This was RJ Rockhouse’s butler. They submitted unto him complete control of their inquiring minds because they knew his story was leading somewhere colder than a grave and darker than new moon midnight.
“I shot him,” Anthony rasped with bourbon breath. The crowd flinched backwards, once again dodging darting bees, “right between the eyes. Hector stumbled back onto his imaginary leg and fell over deader than Lincoln. God did that dog bleed. Gallons of blood gushed from his open wound and poured across the yard. The place looked like Bunker Hill with the grass painted the rusty color of fresh blood. I did as Mr. Rockhouse asked. I wrapped Hector in an old blanket and buried him in the valley.
Maybe if I hadn’t seen the dog’s head burst open like a rotting melon; maybe if the red blood and gray brains hadn’t been so apparent against the green grass; maybe if I hadn’t felt the dog’s dead body grow cold and stiff in my arms as I carried him to his grave, I would have been able to find some logical explanation as to why he returned.”
The audience hardened like wax figures. Their hands steadied against half empty shot glasses. Breaths were short. Muscles thickened like tar. Even the old grandfather clock propped in the corner seemed to slow the beat of its pendulum. Each time December’s clouds opened, letting loose a gust of rain against the gutters, the audience jerked in their chairs and turned toward the entrance like they were expecting zombie Hector to come waddling on three legs through the pub doors.
“I was in the laundry room,” Anthony continued, now gulping whiskey with the smoothness of milk, “The night was still and warm. A storm was brewing but not yet percolating. I heard shuffling noises outside the window. My first thought was, ‘a raccoon; maybe a fox.’ I stood before the window looking out into the night. I saw a silhouette in the moonlight and noticed the creature was limping, but not once did I dare think it was Hector returned from the grave, until he drew close enough to the glass for me to smell his breath. There was no mistaking those dumb red eyes, and that ugly, flea bitten face. I swear to you, the bullet hole was still bleeding. A scab formed around the wound. Maggots crawled all around it. Drool dripped from Hector’s green fangs as he growled. His growl wasn’t loud, but it was so fierce. It was deep and evil like something you would hear from a Hellhound, driven mad. That jaded hunk of leg bone vibrated like a jigsaw. With his snot hardened snout, he pecked the window softly, as if he were begging me to invite him in.”
Bachelorettes clung tightly to their suitors’ shoulders, much to the bachelors’ delight. Everyone double-timed their shots of whisky and shivered with each gust of wet wind. By now, Anthony had pushed aside the shot glass and drank his bourbon straight from the bottle.
“I dashed from the laundry room and locked the door behind me. I could still hear Hector pecking the glass softly and patiently. I took a moment to gather my senses. Then the pecking stopped and I knew Hector was sniffing around the house, searching for a way inside. I burst through the mansion, checking to make sure every window and door was bolted solid.
As I passed Mr. Rockhouse’s study, I noticed the door was open. Mr. Rockhouse was sitting at his desk in the dark. The red ash of his cigar glowed from deep within the room like a demon snake eye. ‘Anthony,’ he called, ‘you’re fumbling through this house like a hen on Christmas. For Christ’s sake, what’s the problem?’
I debated whether or not I should explain my dilemma to Mr. Rockhouse. But we had known each other personally for quite some time, and he is wise and very charismatic. I told him about Hector. The tip of his cigar blinked like a winking snake for a moment. Then he stood, turned on the light, and made his way past me. ‘This isn’t right,’ he said, exiting down the hall, ‘something is certainly bizarre here, Anthony. A dog should never survive a pointblank shot to the head from a .45. How do you explain this?’
I followed him down the hall deeply pondering. ‘He must be one tough dog,’ I replied, unable to think of any more reasonable explanation.
Mr. Rockhouse made his way to his sleeping quarters. He loaded the same gun he lent me to kill Hector, checked the safety, licked his thumb, and wetted the sights. ‘She’s not tough,’ Mr. Rockhouse said, in that typical, know it all, Rockhouse way, ‘she’s made of simple flesh and bone just like me and you.’
He strolled down the hall toward the door without a worry in the world. Just before he exited the front parlor, I dared to ask him how he could explain it. ‘Simple,’ he said, ‘it just wasn’t her time to go.’
He opened the door. Hector was waiting for him there. That same dog that had growled Hell’s fury to me at the laundry room window, backed away from Mr. Rockhouse, quaking with fear. Mr. Rockouse steadied his pistol and fired away. He filled Hector’s body with bullets, reloaded, and fired again. Once he was satisfied Hector’d had enough, he scooped the dead dog into his arms, disappeared over the mountain, and returned an hour or so later with a triumphant smile on his face. ‘Filet Mignon for dinner,’ he said with that arrogant prick smirk on his lips.
We never heard from Hector again. His bones are still decaying somewhere deep in the ravine, to the best of my knowledge.”
“That’s a hell of a story,” one drunken brawler called from the corner. Everyone looked at him the way an audience looks at a screaming baby in the theater. To speak to Anthony would remind him he was in the midst of a crowd, and may hinder him from continuing his story. However, it mattered not. By this time, Anthony’s head was warm with whiskey and his tongue was loose.
“That’s just the beginning,” Anthony boasted, “I was willing to dismiss the Hector incident all together. Everyone has one or two occurrences in their lifetime that makes us question whether or not the unreal can be real. What happened after that is what truly led me to this pub on this dark night, seeking the comfort of a bottle.”
Anthony took another gulp of whiskey. His fifth was nearly halfway gone.
“Shortly after that, everything started to get weird. Mr. Rockhouse would disappear into the basement and stay there sometimes for days. Coyotes began to circle the grounds late at night. This would not have been unusual had they always been there, but they hadn’t. They came from nowhere not long after Hector’s second death, keeping me awake all hours of the night with their demonic howls. They never scavenged the trash. They never came any closer than fifty yards or so to the mansion, but they lingered always. Their howling laughter filled the night. Mr. Rockhouse never acknowledged their existence, neither did I. I pretended everything was perfect and played the part of subservient butler, until the day Mr. Rockhouse’s brother, Randy, showed up with that Chinese couple.”
Anthony swallowed a mouthful of whiskey and shook his head like a wet dog. His eyes burned with bourbon, and his tone sharpened.
“Randy Rockhouse was very polite to me. And he seemed to bring out a side of Mr. Rockhouse I had never seen before. Mr. Rockhouse drank wine and cut jokes. Everything probably would have been perfect had it not been for the Chinese couple. Neither of them spoke a word of English, but they were young and in love. Their love transcended the boundaries of language.
Randy had gained some success in the real estate and cattle business up north in Chicago. He claimed he found the Chinese couple begging for pennies on the street corner, took pity on them, and hired them as his servants. They were illegal immigrants looking for a new start in the new world.
For a few days, everything was pleasant, despite the howling coyotes. Mr. Rockhouse was in a festive mood. Randy lightened the atmosphere with his humor and wit. Even the love struck foreigners seemed to add freshness to the stale mansion air.
About the third night of Randy’s visit, he and Mr. Rockhouse began disappearing to the basement for hours at a time. I could feel the winds of change blow harder and harder each time the brothers crept away downstairs. Something unexplainable was going on down there. Randy changed. His humor became dark. His eyebrows slanted to an evil point. He began to smile at misfortune. I no longer felt comfortable with him.
Two weeks or so after he showed up, Randy asked the Chinese couple to join him in the basement. They obliged. At first, there was silence, then screams. Those high-pitched Chinese shrieks cut the air like shattered glass. I couldn’t understand a word they were saying. Yet I understood everything perfectly. Randy stayed down there with them for three days solid. Finally, the screaming stopped. Randy came into the mansion, sluggish and tired like a snake fresh from a feeding. Mr. Rockhouse disappeared into the basement. He also stayed down there for three days. Randy slept the entire time. There were no screams. Everything in the house stayed dead silent. Not even the coyotes dared to break the hush.
Finally, Mr. Rockhouse came from the basement. Instantly, he demanded a feast of pork be prepared. I did as instructed. Not long after, the Chinese couple clumsily climbed the stairs and made their way drunkenly through the mansion. Everything about them was different. They no longer cared to be by each other’s side. They shuffled the halls like sleepwalkers with their slanted glossy eyes never focused on the floor unfurling before them. Eventually, the female made her way to the kitchen where I was preparing the requested feast. She took a seat at the table, stared straight through me with those yellow, cat eyes, and asked me in perfect English for a glass of water. There was not a hint of accent in her voice.”
Anthony took another swallow of whiskey and jiggled the bottle- proud of the fact he had inhaled two thirds of the fifth without so much as a belch. The crowd shuffled uneasily in their chairs, unable to find any proper response to Anthony’s mythical tale.
“I know what you might think,” Anthony smiled, “perhaps the Chinese couple knew English the entire time and just chose not to speak it. Maybe all of them had disappeared to the basement to partake in an orgy or some other display of ‘rich folk’ entertainment. I thought that myself. That’s how I remained sane through it all. But tonight something happened that I cannot deny. What I witnessed tonight, I hope none of you ever see, despite whatever criminal deeds you may have preformed.
It’s been days since I last saw the Chinese couple. Maybe they’re dead. Maybe they escaped. I don’t know. Mr. Rockhouse has been subdued in his study. Since the incident in the basement, I haven’t seen much of him. Randy, however, has been scurrying the house like a starving rat. He searches the closets. He roams the yard with a look in his eyes much like a broke dope fiend begging for loose change outside an opium den.
Finally, tonight the deaf silence broke me. It had been days since I had spoken and I needed to talk to someone. I didn’t care what the topic of conversation might be. I needed companionship, the same as anyone of you. So, I asked Randy, as he paced the halls, what he thought of the mountain’s coyote situation. ‘I thought you’d never ask,’ he said, ‘you want those coyotes gone don’t you?’
Naturally, I replied yes, expecting him to load a gun and go Wild West on the festering pack. Instead, he walked unarmed into the yard and began calling the coyotes the way you would call an old, familiar pet. Soon, one coyote heeded Randy’s beckoning. It came to him meek as a lamb. He scratched it behind the ears. The coyote wagged its tale and licked his palm. Once Randy had gained the coyote’s trust, he grabbed it firmly by the throat and flipped it over on its back. Before the animal had time to react, Randy was on his knees, holding the coyote’s jaws shut. He clamped his teeth over the coyote’s throat and began eating, as if the animal were delicate pudding. Blood coated his collar. The coyote twitched, but was too stunned to retaliate. After awhile, Randy arose from the coyote’s throat. Blood poured from his lips like wine. He had a look in his eyes like a man fresh from good sex. ‘Want a bite?’ He asked me, with fur dangling from his teeth.
I didn’t say a word. I didn’t take the time to pack my belongings. I simply gathered together the money I had saved and made my way through the wilderness, off the mountain, and into town. Now, here I am, sharing a drink with you fine folks. I just feel fortunate my underwear is not saturated with piss. You all want to know what goes on in that mansion. Now, you know.”
There was silence for a long while. Finally, a brawler spoke up.
“That’s a damn fine story,” he teased, “put his whiskey on my tab, Joe.”
Anthony stood, downed what was left of his whiskey, and slapped a few bills on the bar.
“I’ll pay for my own tab,” he slurred, “I don’t blame you guys for not believing my story. Hell, I saw it with my own two eyes, and I still don’t believe it.”
Anthony staggered out the door and washed away into cold December rain. No one ever heard from him again.
First Quarter
Founding Father
1.
At the mouth of a muddy mountain, on a mid-winter’s night, thirteen trailers sat arranged in the form of a cross. RJ Rockhouse stared down upon them from his house high on the hill. With old, cold breath he whispered,
“It is good.”
The plumbers did plumb. The electricians did wire. The carpenters did erect. The inspectors did inspect. No one in town brought quarrel against RJ’s deed. Even so, the common folk were inclined to question why.
“Why would a multimillionaire, who is ninety-nine years old, litter his acres with a baker’s-dozen mobile homes?”
Even more puzzling to those about the town was the fact that Rockhouse’s houses were absolutely rent-free.
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.”
Those in search of hope found it in the most unlikely of places. Rockhouse’s outstretched hands welcomed the poor to Sugarland. RJ plucked thirteen families from beneath the poverty line. He could have settled for merely providing warm shelter and still been awarded a Nobel Prize. However, his helping hand did not clinch. With his own purse, he paid to provide each family with satellite television. The electric, water, trash, and telephone bills were covered by the man on the mountain. Still, his heart was not humbled. RJ wanted what they wanted. He wanted them to want no more. When Rockhouse opened his purse, businesses in town were happy to accept a piece of the pie. Thanks to the influence of RJ’s money, every man, who wanted a job, was given one, and not just a job flipping burgers. Some men chose manual labor. Others chose the cozy comfort of an office. A few were granted the chance to receive higher education. RJ Rockhouse held no bias for gender. Men and women were treated equally. No longer would the children’s families be branded as beggars. There were new clothes for school, a computer in each home for educational and recreational purposes, and, of course, plenty of presents under the tree. Santa Clause has nothing on RJ Rockhouse. It was not long until he realized,
“Thirteen is not enough.”
So, he purchased thirty-seven more mobile homes. He plucked thirty-seven families from poverty’s cold claws. Sugarland trailer park stood fifty families strong. RJ Rockhouse smiled, and everyone in town wondered why.
2.
Whispers echo in small towns. RJ Rockhouse knew that all too well. For nearly seventy-five years, he remained cocooned in his hilltop mansion, refusing to visit a barber. Men tend to gather in small town barbershops. They huddle around buzzing clippers. Their floppy Dumbo ears open wide to intercept every echo of every whisper like sonar.
“I hold no sympathy for inquiring minds,” Rockhouse would say to Benjamin, his butler, “if you cannot trim my hair, Benjamin, I will let it grow from here to Heaven.”
Rockhouse knew not the taste of the town diner’s meatloaf. Small town waitresses are often eager to accept gossip as a tip.
“Should I desire meatloaf, I’ll have Amber prepare some. I refuse to eat at the diner until the town census learns not to talk with their mouths full.”
A small town will forgive a wealthy man for choosing not to eat at their greasy diner or congregate in their smoky barbershop. However, one thing a small, Kentucky town will never forgive is continuous failure to attend church on Sunday morning. Rockhouse was once a church regular. He even kept his tithe requirements, which is a lot of money coming from a man of his stature. All that came to an abrupt end. Some say he lost his faith. Others go as far as to say he devoted his life to witchcraft. For whatever reason, Rockhouse’s place on the front pew remained empty for nearly seventy-five years. The pastors, deacons, and all the little lambs faces and names changed throughout the decades. The Bible, Amazing Grace, and rumors of RJ Rockhouse were all that seemed un-weathered by the shift of generations.
The last time Rockhouse’s shadow stretched through the church door was the day of his wife’s funeral. Those there that morning witnessed what they referred to as ‘a melting.’ A man with the mental, physical, and spiritual strength of a glacier dripped with water. Tears cut his stern features and fell into stain on his expensive, dark suit. He trickled to his knees, softened, and crumbled, until he was nothing more than a puddle, weeping and trembling on the church floor. His beloved wife lay dead at age twenty-five. Even the hardest of men would lose his stone stature, if faced with the same circumstance. RJ was a boulder. But even boulders have a melting point. God, did he grieve. (In the same church, where he pledged everlasting devotion to Jesus, as his sin stained skin splashed baptizing holy water.)
Only five years earlier, he stood within those same sacred walls, dressed in a tux that would have wetted Cleopatra’s whistle. He kissed his virgin maiden’s smiling lips and swore before God and all creation that his love for her would follow him to the grave. There she was again, still smiling. And he still loved her. The same people were gathered there, but this time their palms were not slick with baby’s breath. There was no Wedding March on the piano. Everyone hid grief greased faces behind praying palms. Something was wrong.
Old Lady Crenshaw curled up in the corner, hiding behind black orchid buds. RJ tried to focus through the blur of tears. Was she crying or was she laughing? Gentlemen gathered around the coffin, dressed in the traditional black coat and tie. Their paper plates bowed in the middle, heavy with greasy ham and fluffy pieces of pumpkin pie that widows had baked for the occasion. The gentlemen had the audacity to shake hands and crack jokes over Lola’s dead body like she was some sort of decorative piece for them to drape their coats over or rest their coffee cups on. Black widows scurried to RJ’s side, making their play on the now single, rich widower and feeding him funeral rhetoric.
“I’m so sorry, RJ…”
“She’s with Jesus now, RJ…”
Their words rippled across his watery tear crest and were lost somewhere along his ridges. No words could comfort him. The glacier was gone. It had melted into mud, leaving behind a man weak as water.
RJ cowered at the widows’ black toes. They stared down upon him with swollen red eyes. Their pasty white faces glowed ghostly like the moon. Black dresses smothered sunlight like death’s dark veil. With fluttering fingers he clawed the widows’ legs hard enough to draw blood from their shins. Some shrieked. Some moaned sympathetically. All of them scattered. They knew what he was telling them to do and where he wanted to go. The widows had once been there themselves.
Mourners cleared a path through the aisle for RJ to crawl to his dead bride’s side. He poured down the aisle like lost liquid, leaving a trail of tears the entire way. She lay on red velvet, with arms crossing her firm breasts. A crimson tide of long, soft hair splashed her shoulders. Lola Rockhouse slept amidst the clutter. The sorrowful sobs of a thousand mourners did not disturb that beauty’s sleep. Her gentle face peacefully smiled, caught in the comfort of her crimson cradle. RJ squished tears from his eyelashes like a squeegee and looked around the buzzing room. All the people stared on in puzzled disbelief. Her subtle beauty had never been more evident.
Some of the gentlemen curved over Lola’s coffin a little too curiously. RJ was not quite sure, but he thought he could see their lips pucker into kissing position as their eyes crossed her breasts. A few went as far as to stroke her vibrant, velvet curls with their hungry fingers.
“How dare they!”
RJ feebly crawled to Lola’s side and clawed his way to her coffin’s lip.
“Lola,” he cried, “let’s go home.”
But the beauty did not awaken. Her electric, emerald eyes would not open. She was lost in Rumplestiltskin’s slumber. RJ brushed a tuft of ruby hair from her tender cheek.
“You’re so cold, darling,” he whispered, “wake up so we can go home.”
Black satin shreds and orchid petals flowed across the walls’ length like melting ice cream. Mourners spit hunks of slimy ham and creamy pie- some laughing, some crying. Was this a funeral or a festival?
The mourners surrounded RJ, spinning their web of sorrow like starving spiders. They were jealous. They wanted RJ’s money. They wanted his mansion. They wanted his woman.
“Get away from my wife!”
He looked down upon her. With the softness of silk, he rubbed the tip of his nose against hers. His tears splattered her eyelids. Black eyeliner cut creases down her temples and lodged like ink blots in her crimson curls.
“Are you crying, my darling?” he asked her, “don’t worry. I’m here.”
He wrapped his arms around his beloved Lola and lifted her from the cradle. He rocked her back and forth like he had done so many stormy nights before. His forehead kissed hers. Shimmering hair fell like flame around his face. Black tears blotched her dress.
“Come on, Lola. I’m taking you home.”
He kissed her with the softness of a man lost deep in love, before hoisting her over his shoulder. Lola’s dead body slumped. Stiff fingers dangled at his coat tails. Lifeless green eyes opened. Children scattered. Rows of red roses spilled to the floor. The suffocating smoke of stampeded posies arose like clouds from beneath the trampling feet of frightened children.
RJ lowered his head and plowed through the crowd. Some slipped and fell on the carpet, moist with RJ’s tears. Others grabbed at Lola, trying to steal her away
“Keep your hands off her,” he growled.
“RJ, get control of yourself…”
He held her tight. One arm wrapped her waist. The other defended his sweet lady from the circling crowd. The men tried to grasp RJ and save him from humiliation. The women hugged their children tightly, shielding their eyes from the morbid display.
RJ looked out across the crowd that called themselves his friends. Five years earlier, they showered them with rice. They wished them well. Now, however, they somehow seemed happier, knowing that RJ, who had it so easy with his millions, finally understood how it felt to be human. With their faces sculpted into stationary sadness, and the jerky movements of their black bodies, they resembled clay puppets. RJ never realized it before, but suddenly it became so apparent. The devil was pulling their strings, and if Satan had his way, lovely Lola would rot with the stinking corpses of Hell.
RJ’s fist cut the crowd like Lancelot’s sword. Silky strands of Lola’s red hair clung to her husband’s tear streaked cheeks. For the briefest of moments, RJ regained glacier strength. He knocked men he had once called brother chin first into tear puddles. His damsel clung tightly to her hero. Her white gown circled his shoulders like smoke. He stumbled backwards, with fist flailing blindly, until he found the church door.
“Don’t you dare lay one more finger on my wife,” he threatened, opening the door, “I can destroy every one of you, and you know it. With the simple flip of my wallet, I can crush this church like a locust. I can buy up your houses and rape your land. If you desire to see the hatred in RJ Rockhouse’s heart manifested, touch my wife just one more time.”
Everyone backed away and stood still like a picture. Clay faces kept their sad sculpting, but the jerky movements ceased. RJ ran down the porch steps and through the yard. Lola looked out to the crowd, from over her husband’s shoulder with green, marble eyes. He made his way to the Buick, opened the passenger door, seat belted Lola, and took his place beside her at the stirring wheel. As the Buick sped away into mountain shadow, the crowd funneled through the door and wandered the yard aimlessly, moaning and shrieking like zombies. That was the last time RJ Rockhouse darkened the church door.
No one truly knows what happened next. Some perverts claim he took her home and made love to her dead body one last time. Others say he buried her somewhere in the acres of his estate. The popular belief, even to this day, is that Lola Rockhouse’s body is tucked away somewhere inside his mansion. All anyone knows is that RJ Rockhouse became a recluse. Seventy-five years after Lola’s passing, he had yet to be seen in town. Within a few years’ time, the town folk began to notice a change. The mountain on which RJ built his gaudy mansion started… melting. Mud seeped from the peak. All the pretty red buds, dogwoods, and daisies choked and died in the sludge. Folks began to blame the sudden mud on RJ’s tears.
“The man cries so much over his dead wife, the ground can’t hold all the tear water.”
Not a very logical theory- but then again- what else could anyone believe? Even during times of drought, the mountain kept a dark, milky coating. The mud clogged the creeks and sheeted the streets. Folks would have addressed RJ with their concern, but he remained out of sight and out of mind for seventy-five years.
Within that time period, Rockhouse had gone through seventy butlers. Occasionally, a long, black limousine would cut curves, weaving its way through town and climb the steep slope ascending Muddy Mountain. Right away everyone knew,
“RJ’s hired another poor soul as his butler.”
Some lasted a few years. Most made it only a day. RJ’s butler of the month would venture into town once a week to check the mail and buy whatever was necessary for the house. Some butlers were young. Some were older. None of them would speak to the town folk about RJ Rockhouse or what exactly was going on inside the mansion. In fact, whenever someone asked about RJ’s wellbeing, the butler would fade snowy pale, begin quivering, and simply say,
“Mr. Rockhouse wishes to be left alone.”
Eventually, it got to the point where the town grocer did not even quote the price to RJ’s butlers. There was no need to speak to them. They would not speak in return. If the butler needed a stamp, he would ask for it. If the butler needed fresh onions, he would ask for them. You ask him nothing, especially questions pertaining to RJ.
So, the stormy night Anthony stomped into the town pub, with his boots beating thunder and his deep blue coat beaten into black by December rain, it was only natural that all of the pub’s action froze like a paused movie. The bachelors lost their breath. The bachelorettes stopped giggling. Billy’s rhythm on the piano slowed like a record player with weak batteries. Joe, the bartender, stood like a fossil somehow hardened in the midst of cleaning a whiskey stained glass. The pub’s doors had never opened to welcome one of RJ’s butlers. This was an occasion that would forever be logged in the annals of town folklore. Everyone there knew it.
Anthony shuffled to the bar, leaving a stream of cold December through the aisle. None of the brawlers clinched their fists. None of the whores adjusted their bosoms. If he had something to say, they did not want to interrupt.
He sat on a barstool and sloshed winter water onto the hardwood floor. The cuffs of his deep blue slacks dripped muddy sludge. His tattered brown boots bled creek soot from the seams- the rubber souls flapped like loose tongues. He had obviously walked quite a distance through the storm.
“Give me a whiskey,” he wheezed to Joe, still standing dumbfounded with his wrist buried in bourbon stained glass.
Joe sat a shot glass on the bar before Anthony and filled it with the most expensive brand in the house.
“Not a shot,” Anthony coughed, “give me the whole bottle.”
The pub people were propped stiffly in their chairs like cardboard cutouts. They gave Joe a look that said, ‘for the love of God, give the man what he wants.’
Joe popped the cork on a fifth of his finest whiskey and sat it by Anthony’s shot glass. Whether he knew it or not, a good enough story would pay for his tab.
The people were scared of him. In fact, the very presence of anything representing Muddy Mountain frightened the people the same way a graveyard seems to intimidate folks on full moon nights. Rockhouse had gone through forty-five butlers before hiring Anthony. Anthony was no different than the rest. He was just as cold and spooky. All of RJ’s butlers were as much icons of local horror as The Headless Horseman and The Grim Reaper, Anthony even more so. He managed to do what most butlers could not. He stayed with Mr. Rockhouse for over a year.
Anthony began services for RJ twenty-five years after Lola’s death. By then, rumors of dark deeds in the mansion on the hill were as common as Mother Goose tales. The town’s children sang jump-rope nursery rhymes about warlock RJ and his hunger for misbehaving children’s blood. The adults thumbed their noses to their kid’s foolish limericks but continued to lock the doors and pull the shades late at night. Of course, no one knew the truth, and they figured they would probably never know the truth, until the night Anthony dripped December poison at the beak of the local pub.
His hair shaped hard on his head, as if winter’s dark clouds had opened up to rain enamel. Misshapen features jutted further from his face in pub shadow, giving him the squared appearance of Frankenstein’s monster. He downed drinks of whiskey with no grimace against the gasoline taste.
“It all started with Hector,” he laughed, running gnarled fingers through strands of watery charcoal hair, “that damn dog. I hated that mongrel from day one, and I thought I was smarter than him. That was my first mistake. I’m telling every one of you right now, your life will be more golden when you figure out you don’t know a damn thing. None of us know a damn thing.”
By now, Billy had abandoned the piano. Everyone looked straight ahead to the bar with slacked jaws dangling open. Until that moment, most of them thought Anthony was a mute. He swallowed a gulp of fiery grain and continued without stutter.
“Hector was a mutt. He knew it, too. He knew he wasn’t born of a fighter’s breed. That’s why he prowled around late at night, when he thought I was asleep. Hector always rummaged through the garbage, sniffing out a morsel of steak. I heard his hungry panting from the window of my quarters.
He was a weak dog. His hide bore deep, purple mange scars. His nose was crooked. His teeth were corn colored. And he had only three legs. His rear right leg had been amputated, and from the looks of things, it had not been removed by any skilled veterinarian.
Sometimes I could spot him crouching near the timber at the north end of the grounds- his snout matted with chunks of rotting green meat he had stolen from the trash, and his ears endlessly fanning the flea storm nesting on his head. The tiny splinter of bone that had once connected to knee wagged below his belly. That ignorant mutt was too stupid to realize his leg was gone. He was always trying to scratch mange bumps cracking across his belly with claws connected to paws connected to a leg that was not there.”
Anthony’s eyes never peeped about the pub. He was not concerned with entertaining the audience. More than likely, he would have continued his story with the same enthusiasm had there been no one else there. Anthony stared straight ahead into the mirror behind the bar like he was somehow seeing his story unfold on the glass. The audience slowly moved closer so they could hear clearly. They synchronized their movements. Whenever Anthony paused to take a shot of whiskey, they would do the same. When he lowered his voice, they leaned toward him. When he raised his voice, they tilted backwards like people dodging a darting bee. By now, Joe had waxed the whiskey stained glass to a diamond shine and continued waxing unaware, with his fascination locked on Anthony.
“I must admit, I had it out for Hector. No matter how hard I tried, he always found a way to root into the trash and spread it across the yard. I guess the dog had more brains than I gave him credit for. First, I tried poisoning him, but I swear that dog’s guts were cast of iron. Finally, I’d had enough of picking through maggot infested scraps and shoveling up foul green droppings. So, I asked Mr. Rockhouse for the liberty to shoot the dog. He seemed rather keen on the idea. He loaded his .45 and handed it over to me. ‘You should name it, if you’re going to kill it. Does the dog have a name?’ he asked.
I told him I named the dog Hector in honor of a drunken bum uncle that lived with my family briefly when I was a child. ‘Hector,’ he chuckled, ‘that’s an odd name for a girl.’
I began to correct him, but decided against it. I knew Hector was a boy. I’d seen his sagging balls more times than I cared to. ‘If you shoot her between the eyes, one shot is all you will need. After you kill her, bury her in the backyard. Every lady deserves a proper burial.”
Had anyone else in the world wandered into the pub with this story, he probably would have lost a few teeth and more than a few dollars. Not Anthony. Thus far his story had been rather bland. However, he had not lost one whisper’s worth of interest from the audience. They sat around him like kids cozying to a campfire, engulfed in a ghost story. This was no average Joe sharing some tall-tale about a fish he never caught. This was RJ Rockhouse’s butler. They submitted unto him complete control of their inquiring minds because they knew his story was leading somewhere colder than a grave and darker than new moon midnight.
“I shot him,” Anthony rasped with bourbon breath. The crowd flinched backwards, once again dodging darting bees, “right between the eyes. Hector stumbled back onto his imaginary leg and fell over deader than Lincoln. God did that dog bleed. Gallons of blood gushed from his open wound and poured across the yard. The place looked like Bunker Hill with the grass painted the rusty color of fresh blood. I did as Mr. Rockhouse asked. I wrapped Hector in an old blanket and buried him in the valley.
Maybe if I hadn’t seen the dog’s head burst open like a rotting melon; maybe if the red blood and gray brains hadn’t been so apparent against the green grass; maybe if I hadn’t felt the dog’s dead body grow cold and stiff in my arms as I carried him to his grave, I would have been able to find some logical explanation as to why he returned.”
The audience hardened like wax figures. Their hands steadied against half empty shot glasses. Breaths were short. Muscles thickened like tar. Even the old grandfather clock propped in the corner seemed to slow the beat of its pendulum. Each time December’s clouds opened, letting loose a gust of rain against the gutters, the audience jerked in their chairs and turned toward the entrance like they were expecting zombie Hector to come waddling on three legs through the pub doors.
“I was in the laundry room,” Anthony continued, now gulping whiskey with the smoothness of milk, “The night was still and warm. A storm was brewing but not yet percolating. I heard shuffling noises outside the window. My first thought was, ‘a raccoon; maybe a fox.’ I stood before the window looking out into the night. I saw a silhouette in the moonlight and noticed the creature was limping, but not once did I dare think it was Hector returned from the grave, until he drew close enough to the glass for me to smell his breath. There was no mistaking those dumb red eyes, and that ugly, flea bitten face. I swear to you, the bullet hole was still bleeding. A scab formed around the wound. Maggots crawled all around it. Drool dripped from Hector’s green fangs as he growled. His growl wasn’t loud, but it was so fierce. It was deep and evil like something you would hear from a Hellhound, driven mad. That jaded hunk of leg bone vibrated like a jigsaw. With his snot hardened snout, he pecked the window softly, as if he were begging me to invite him in.”
Bachelorettes clung tightly to their suitors’ shoulders, much to the bachelors’ delight. Everyone double-timed their shots of whisky and shivered with each gust of wet wind. By now, Anthony had pushed aside the shot glass and drank his bourbon straight from the bottle.
“I dashed from the laundry room and locked the door behind me. I could still hear Hector pecking the glass softly and patiently. I took a moment to gather my senses. Then the pecking stopped and I knew Hector was sniffing around the house, searching for a way inside. I burst through the mansion, checking to make sure every window and door was bolted solid.
As I passed Mr. Rockhouse’s study, I noticed the door was open. Mr. Rockhouse was sitting at his desk in the dark. The red ash of his cigar glowed from deep within the room like a demon snake eye. ‘Anthony,’ he called, ‘you’re fumbling through this house like a hen on Christmas. For Christ’s sake, what’s the problem?’
I debated whether or not I should explain my dilemma to Mr. Rockhouse. But we had known each other personally for quite some time, and he is wise and very charismatic. I told him about Hector. The tip of his cigar blinked like a winking snake for a moment. Then he stood, turned on the light, and made his way past me. ‘This isn’t right,’ he said, exiting down the hall, ‘something is certainly bizarre here, Anthony. A dog should never survive a pointblank shot to the head from a .45. How do you explain this?’
I followed him down the hall deeply pondering. ‘He must be one tough dog,’ I replied, unable to think of any more reasonable explanation.
Mr. Rockhouse made his way to his sleeping quarters. He loaded the same gun he lent me to kill Hector, checked the safety, licked his thumb, and wetted the sights. ‘She’s not tough,’ Mr. Rockhouse said, in that typical, know it all, Rockhouse way, ‘she’s made of simple flesh and bone just like me and you.’
He strolled down the hall toward the door without a worry in the world. Just before he exited the front parlor, I dared to ask him how he could explain it. ‘Simple,’ he said, ‘it just wasn’t her time to go.’
He opened the door. Hector was waiting for him there. That same dog that had growled Hell’s fury to me at the laundry room window, backed away from Mr. Rockhouse, quaking with fear. Mr. Rockouse steadied his pistol and fired away. He filled Hector’s body with bullets, reloaded, and fired again. Once he was satisfied Hector’d had enough, he scooped the dead dog into his arms, disappeared over the mountain, and returned an hour or so later with a triumphant smile on his face. ‘Filet Mignon for dinner,’ he said with that arrogant prick smirk on his lips.
We never heard from Hector again. His bones are still decaying somewhere deep in the ravine, to the best of my knowledge.”
“That’s a hell of a story,” one drunken brawler called from the corner. Everyone looked at him the way an audience looks at a screaming baby in the theater. To speak to Anthony would remind him he was in the midst of a crowd, and may hinder him from continuing his story. However, it mattered not. By this time, Anthony’s head was warm with whiskey and his tongue was loose.
“That’s just the beginning,” Anthony boasted, “I was willing to dismiss the Hector incident all together. Everyone has one or two occurrences in their lifetime that makes us question whether or not the unreal can be real. What happened after that is what truly led me to this pub on this dark night, seeking the comfort of a bottle.”
Anthony took another gulp of whiskey. His fifth was nearly halfway gone.
“Shortly after that, everything started to get weird. Mr. Rockhouse would disappear into the basement and stay there sometimes for days. Coyotes began to circle the grounds late at night. This would not have been unusual had they always been there, but they hadn’t. They came from nowhere not long after Hector’s second death, keeping me awake all hours of the night with their demonic howls. They never scavenged the trash. They never came any closer than fifty yards or so to the mansion, but they lingered always. Their howling laughter filled the night. Mr. Rockhouse never acknowledged their existence, neither did I. I pretended everything was perfect and played the part of subservient butler, until the day Mr. Rockhouse’s brother, Randy, showed up with that Chinese couple.”
Anthony swallowed a mouthful of whiskey and shook his head like a wet dog. His eyes burned with bourbon, and his tone sharpened.
“Randy Rockhouse was very polite to me. And he seemed to bring out a side of Mr. Rockhouse I had never seen before. Mr. Rockhouse drank wine and cut jokes. Everything probably would have been perfect had it not been for the Chinese couple. Neither of them spoke a word of English, but they were young and in love. Their love transcended the boundaries of language.
Randy had gained some success in the real estate and cattle business up north in Chicago. He claimed he found the Chinese couple begging for pennies on the street corner, took pity on them, and hired them as his servants. They were illegal immigrants looking for a new start in the new world.
For a few days, everything was pleasant, despite the howling coyotes. Mr. Rockhouse was in a festive mood. Randy lightened the atmosphere with his humor and wit. Even the love struck foreigners seemed to add freshness to the stale mansion air.
About the third night of Randy’s visit, he and Mr. Rockhouse began disappearing to the basement for hours at a time. I could feel the winds of change blow harder and harder each time the brothers crept away downstairs. Something unexplainable was going on down there. Randy changed. His humor became dark. His eyebrows slanted to an evil point. He began to smile at misfortune. I no longer felt comfortable with him.
Two weeks or so after he showed up, Randy asked the Chinese couple to join him in the basement. They obliged. At first, there was silence, then screams. Those high-pitched Chinese shrieks cut the air like shattered glass. I couldn’t understand a word they were saying. Yet I understood everything perfectly. Randy stayed down there with them for three days solid. Finally, the screaming stopped. Randy came into the mansion, sluggish and tired like a snake fresh from a feeding. Mr. Rockhouse disappeared into the basement. He also stayed down there for three days. Randy slept the entire time. There were no screams. Everything in the house stayed dead silent. Not even the coyotes dared to break the hush.
Finally, Mr. Rockhouse came from the basement. Instantly, he demanded a feast of pork be prepared. I did as instructed. Not long after, the Chinese couple clumsily climbed the stairs and made their way drunkenly through the mansion. Everything about them was different. They no longer cared to be by each other’s side. They shuffled the halls like sleepwalkers with their slanted glossy eyes never focused on the floor unfurling before them. Eventually, the female made her way to the kitchen where I was preparing the requested feast. She took a seat at the table, stared straight through me with those yellow, cat eyes, and asked me in perfect English for a glass of water. There was not a hint of accent in her voice.”
Anthony took another swallow of whiskey and jiggled the bottle- proud of the fact he had inhaled two thirds of the fifth without so much as a belch. The crowd shuffled uneasily in their chairs, unable to find any proper response to Anthony’s mythical tale.
“I know what you might think,” Anthony smiled, “perhaps the Chinese couple knew English the entire time and just chose not to speak it. Maybe all of them had disappeared to the basement to partake in an orgy or some other display of ‘rich folk’ entertainment. I thought that myself. That’s how I remained sane through it all. But tonight something happened that I cannot deny. What I witnessed tonight, I hope none of you ever see, despite whatever criminal deeds you may have preformed.
It’s been days since I last saw the Chinese couple. Maybe they’re dead. Maybe they escaped. I don’t know. Mr. Rockhouse has been subdued in his study. Since the incident in the basement, I haven’t seen much of him. Randy, however, has been scurrying the house like a starving rat. He searches the closets. He roams the yard with a look in his eyes much like a broke dope fiend begging for loose change outside an opium den.
Finally, tonight the deaf silence broke me. It had been days since I had spoken and I needed to talk to someone. I didn’t care what the topic of conversation might be. I needed companionship, the same as anyone of you. So, I asked Randy, as he paced the halls, what he thought of the mountain’s coyote situation. ‘I thought you’d never ask,’ he said, ‘you want those coyotes gone don’t you?’
Naturally, I replied yes, expecting him to load a gun and go Wild West on the festering pack. Instead, he walked unarmed into the yard and began calling the coyotes the way you would call an old, familiar pet. Soon, one coyote heeded Randy’s beckoning. It came to him meek as a lamb. He scratched it behind the ears. The coyote wagged its tale and licked his palm. Once Randy had gained the coyote’s trust, he grabbed it firmly by the throat and flipped it over on its back. Before the animal had time to react, Randy was on his knees, holding the coyote’s jaws shut. He clamped his teeth over the coyote’s throat and began eating, as if the animal were delicate pudding. Blood coated his collar. The coyote twitched, but was too stunned to retaliate. After awhile, Randy arose from the coyote’s throat. Blood poured from his lips like wine. He had a look in his eyes like a man fresh from good sex. ‘Want a bite?’ He asked me, with fur dangling from his teeth.
I didn’t say a word. I didn’t take the time to pack my belongings. I simply gathered together the money I had saved and made my way through the wilderness, off the mountain, and into town. Now, here I am, sharing a drink with you fine folks. I just feel fortunate my underwear is not saturated with piss. You all want to know what goes on in that mansion. Now, you know.”
There was silence for a long while. Finally, a brawler spoke up.
“That’s a damn fine story,” he teased, “put his whiskey on my tab, Joe.”
Anthony stood, downed what was left of his whiskey, and slapped a few bills on the bar.
“I’ll pay for my own tab,” he slurred, “I don’t blame you guys for not believing my story. Hell, I saw it with my own two eyes, and I still don’t believe it.”
Anthony staggered out the door and washed away into cold December rain. No one ever heard from him again.
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