Raindrops tap along the tin roof of the building and even though he
struggles, he can hear a faint meowing as a door opens. The light voice, a
dazzling piano prance by the squeaky hinge, appears and talks to the
animal. A can of deep sea turkey opens, the fishy scent mingling with
gasoline and garbage. Raincoat rubbing swishes in the corner and falls,
clinging to the floor.
“I found him outside, poor thing,” the voice floats through the dingy air.
A second voice echoes in the ceiling, more confident and stronger than the
first gliding intonation, “We are not taking him back with us. You always
collect strays.”
8
“It’s freezing outside, Honey. We could keep him for a few days and see
if anyone wants a pet.”
“If you wish, I suppose. You look cute with that feline curling up to your
neck. I should take a photo. I got a camera from the scaly one, the latest
thing. Takes photos in the dark crystal clear.”
A fired camera flash lends its sulfur stench to the room. Double titterings
of pleasure pepper the area as the camera’s gears crank into motion.
“See, the picture paper comes out here. It develops before your eyes. The
toast of 1919’s Oddman’s Invention Market,” the stern voice explains.
“Remarkable, we must show my employees how to use it.”
Melodic notes whisper by his naked ears, yet there is no acknowledgement
of his presence in the room. He ghosts along as if in a delusion. The chair
clasps his arms. He tries to count sheep to pass the time, but he is not sure
if it’s been minutes or hours. A blindfold forces his eyes into damp
darkness. A tiny bit of water quavers from a metal funnel over his tongue
into the back of his mouth. He moves his head and finds the device isn’t
attached to anything he can feel. No hoses, no wires.
“Do you really want to do this?” cascades the first voice down his
eardrum. The man tries to note any characteristics so he can tell his men
once he frees himself. A dullness causes his ears to fail one moment and
focus the next. An underwater plugged sensation leading to clarity. It
could be a dream.
The second voice sinks low with conviction, “Of course, I don’t have a
9
doubt in my mind. Do you?”
“Won’t we become like them? Remember the Battle of Portland?” the
voice has released the cat, who is purring and meowing, walking closer to
where his chair is. His legs can’t move. Belt-like attachments, could be
leather. Strong.
“You can’t compare that to this. Do you have the tools ready? Are they
clean?”
“Amazingly so, given the squalor of this room.”
“Give me the butcher knife and the metal board. It will fit into the chair’s
arm. And see that drainage area there…that’s genius, that will catch the
blood.”
The man sits and listens to the voices. He tries to communicate, but his
words mumble out and he sucks in a toxic, metal taste.
“There really isn’t anything you can say. You shouldn’t talk. Didn’t you
take away communication from her? She can’t even talk now,” one of the
voices addresses the captive man and his mind digs into his past.
The room rockets with a biting coolness as his ears dial in on the dual
voices. One seems to be taller than the other. One is in command. He’s
breaking down, his mind wandering instead of trying to hone in.
The taller voice remarks, “I have the tranquilizer ready.”
“Don’t give him too much of it. Enough to stop him from moving, but not
enough for him to not feel pain,” the shorter voice answers. Is this the
10
ringleader?
A large needle injects into his popping vein, trailing out of his left arm. It
makes him feel at peace. A sudden calm comes over him at the moment
the butcher knife hits his wrist. It cuts most of the hand off, but the arm is
still tied fast. Tears flow down the blindfold and around the edge of the
funnel’s bandage on his mouth. The desire to scream and curse his captors
burns from his brain. It releases as a grumble, muted.
“I thought you said you wanted to hear his words,” the lower voice
reasons.
“What would they be? Telling us we don’t have the right. Put-downs?
This is much more zen. It is what Dragon would say. Zen. Get the
cauterizing wand. He’s losing a lot of blood fast.”
An engine fires in the room and chugs to a stop.
Smoke and gasoline pour into his mouth in particles from the night mist
bonding with the miasma. The voices sound less strong now. He fades a
bit and can’t differentiate between the people talking. It’s like a flood of
sound. Neutral neuter voices. Who’s Dragon? Someone in the service?
“Blazes!”
“What?”
“The engine isn’t working.”
“Well, pop it again.”
11
“See, this is why I need a proper lab. Here, I’ll try it again. Hold the wrist
with this towel to stop the blood flow.”
“There it goes…wait.”
The engine runs and then peters out.
“Why today of all days? This is Redcrown garbage. We always make bad
trades with them.”
“Anyone who makes a trade with a gangster called ‘Itchy Index’ ought to
know better.”
“Hey, there it goes! Aren’t we lucky?”
The stagnant engine launches into a roar and revs into full power. Its
bombardment of sound makes the cat screech and it runs across the
captive’s ripped pant legs with fear, leaping onto the floor and heading
into the unknown, the claws making the man’s legs twitch.
Distracted, the man feels a hot blast to his dead wrist from the makeshift
weapon. The phantom hand still moves in the mind of the captive, though
he smells smoke and knows the deed is done. He mumbles out as fingers
push the funnel-gag in further, so he stops making noise. The claws
linger. Time moves so fast.
“Poor baby,” the higher pitched voice wails. “If you wouldn’t do what you
do, your hands could still be yours.” He hears a plop in a basin where his
hand hits.
His mind runs foxlike. Battles have done that. He remembers following
12
her, gaining her trust. It wasn’t hard, even with the war. She remained
lovely even after her accident. He should have kicked her more.
“I need to empty out this basin. Where do you want me to put the hand?”
the voice enquires intentlyThe Maltese Spectrum.
“In that canning jar of formaldehyde there on the table.”
Another swish as he waits. A spark of feeling, other than pain, comes back
and he tries to knock over the chair, finding it firmly screwed into the
floor.
“We thought of everything, my sweet. Sit back and enjoy the show. Isn’t
that what you told her?”
“You can nod your head. You did tell her that, right?”
The man nods a “yes” without thinking. It was training. Why put him in
this place? He should have gotten a purple heart for this, from the burns he
received from battle from her. He shifts from side to side, trying to release
the bonds.
“It is so nice you can be disgustingly forthcoming,” the higher pitched
voice states. The blade sits lightly on the second wrist cautiously,
patiently, so he can feel the next swipe coming even before it falls. “You
did art before the army, right? Oh wait, you still took photos and newsreel
footage too…we found those films you did.”
“There was no doubt it was you. You left nothing private and it was like
an instructional movie.”
13
“We burned the copies. It was hard finding them all, but I am not sure why
you would let that be in this world,” the voice informs, as the blade moves
up and down the wrist. The skin parts to bone and warm liquid starts to
lightly drizzle down the chair’s weather-beaten, oak arm. “I wish I could
do this slowly, but you would die. The key here is to keep you alive to go
back to your boys and tell the tale.”
“You don’t think of the retribution of this?” the other voice debates.
The man sits still, listening to them, without a comment, thinking this has
to a whimsy of his mind, if not for the burning, if not for the puddle of
warmth down his arm, if not for the foul-smelling lake forming down his
legs in fear. Be brave, he says in his head. Don’t let them know you are
cracking.
“You think they think of retribution for what they do? They think it is
glory. Bring the basin over. I am breaking the skin right now and he’s
bleeding out. I need to chop the thing off now. If thy hand offends thee…”
the voice lilts as the man's ears start to feel plugged and ring from the
clamorous machine puttering in the background.
A basin clunks and the blade sweeps. The pain thunders in. The fuzziness
parades into his visible darkness, but the voices pour water on him and
then the burning of the stub makes the tears flow again. A whimpering
ripple, collected by touch and echoes. Life runs past and upon itself,
foaming waves, memories swim by, churning buoys, red impulses, firing.
Shaking and trying to pull his dead hand up, he goes passive in panic and
his arm goes numb. Dead flesh is in the air. Soot. It reminds him of
barbecue. He begins to black out.
He’s there at the camp and scans the vividness of its ruins, its dirty cells
against the clean, white offices of sergeants, with their expensive wooden
14
furniture and maps. The charred scent reminds him of what they did to
her. Ironing, they called it. They had ironed her. Her muscular legs kicked
to release the grasps of guards and then the iron came, a brass iron, and
her blood became a ribbon around the circumference as it did its job. No
screams came. The guard’s hand was over her mouth and she knew that
screaming meant nothing. That no one would come to her aid. She became
like the dirt, particles of a human, twirled into coiled frame, clutching
herself with a soiled bed sheet, agonized by cauterized pains and fists
beaten into her. Sobbing pathetically, a mouse thrown about like a
tomcat’s catnip toy. Never a sound, her mouth agape, motionless, finished.
It was the first step of many to control. First, working up trust. Second,
giving them good food, work, and money. Third, rounding them up in the
night to be rushed to the camps. It was protocol. They were young. If they
ironed them, they would suit the purpose more. Though a few were spared
for obvious reasons. They had to suckle and make milk until they found a
way to create a substitute. It was their fault for saying “no”, having an
opinion. It wasn’t for them to say, only to do…not even do, be. Seeing
them as people only created more paperwork. He hates paperwork. One
time, he had to fill out a whole stack of forms because that sad sack of a
doctor intervened. Humanitarian. We’ll get him back for stealing the next
time he comes into our borders, the captive man imagines. It’s a kingdom
with barely a population to stand on, but it is still ours.
That city. It was hardly a city anymore. It was empty. Did these voices
know how crackled their NYC was, how destroyed? Of course, they
didn’t. A wall had been built. That girl bemoaning her beau, Yves. She
cried more that day than when the iron came down. They could have been
happy if they hadn’t joined the service. She was a vision with her dyed
blonde hair and blue weekend case, the brass handle pulled with both her
hands tight up to her chest as he picked her up to get on a train for the big
15
city. It wasn’t always bad. His jokes made her eyes sparkle. Then her eyes
fade to visions of the thunderous beating to her bust that once curved
lusciously over the top of her ribcage. Puce bruises, pink trails of faded
claret. Her body served as canvas for their bouts of raising broodmares.
She was being punished for not being pure enough. Pure enough in blood.
Now they only went after the natural blondes with blue eyes. The men
had learned their lesson. All the years of non-stop war had made his band
the enemy. Those Germans who had the strength to come here and make
parts of the East Coast their own. He sides with the strong.
“Yeah, I want the tongue too,” a laugh rings out.
He can’t tell the voices apart again. He runs to the safety of his inner
sanctum, but the intense agony flows into his brain, throbbing.
“You will have to take the funnel-gag out. I don’t want you to have a bad
experience,” the first voice says to the other.
“It’s ok,” the other responds, hesitant.
The funnel-gag is pulled free. Its metal cone pops free of the man’s lips.
“Why are you doing this to me?” the man says. “Everything we did was
for the government, the greater good.” The words mix with wails and
sniffling. Water comes out of his nose and down his chin. Snot dangles
from his reddened nostril down to his burned chin.
“You don’t even know why you are here?” one of the voices demands like
a sadistic radio game show host.
“I assume you are with the Resistance,” he pants. He can barely ease the
16
words out of his tight throat. He is trying to think of a funny radio show,
anything to get out of this world and into his head, trying to make the host
voice pleasant, human.
“You know Beryl Duiker?”
“Beryl, who?” fakes the man as the sweat on his forehead beads. The
voices won’t let him go. They are as tight as the straps that lock his life
away.
“I’ll be danged. They gave them numbers, not even names, right? Or
letters?”
“Camp 923. You called them Field Cows eventually; she would have been
FC 9237821. Kept in barracks #4931251.”
Finding the courage to speak like a soldier, the captive man says, “Yes,
Madam or is it Sir? We had her help us with photography at first.
Newsreels. We thought the girls could be put to use weaving film together.
She was a good one. Hated to put her into the program. It was an order
though. I did enjoy her. She was carrying one of mine.”
“She still is,” the higher voice says to the captive man.
The captive man whispers, “She’s alive?”
“Yeah, even after the violence you inflicted on her. Do you have any final
words?” the voices merge again in the man’s ears.
“You are going to kill me?” breathes the tied man in a whisper as a tear
lingers in the corner of his eyes under the dusty blind.
