The Book of Cthulhu

Some Buried Memory

W. H. Pugmire

Charlotte Hund stood before the full-length mirror in its great gilded frame and examined herself. In the palsied yellow light of the enormous room she could not see her reflection clearly; she could just make out the rough texture of her large face, the verdant eyes, the uneven tusks of xanthic ivory behind the bloated lips. Raising a hand, she smoothed the nest of hairs that sprouted from one corner of her mouth, then scratched her face with thick nails. “Is it not true, sir, that I am the ugliest woman in this city?”

“Au monde, madame, au monde,” Sebastian Melmoth assured her, to which she smiled.

“I often think that it was for this ugliness that I was shunned in Boston and not my criminal reputation.”

Her host sucked on his opium-tainted cigarette. When he exhaled, he fancied that the smoke formed itself suggestively before his face. “You must tell me of your crime, Miss Hund,” he told her as he admired the scarab ring on one fat finger. “You are certainly criminally grotesque; but ugliness is a crime of nature, not a felon of choice. Tell me the tale of your trespass, and drench your telling it with such rich description that I may fully imagine it.” He sucked once more at his bit of nacotia and closed his eyes.

Charlotte stepped away from the mirror and moved to one of the room’s small stained-glass windows. “To speak of my sin would mean to reveal my life, and there isn’t much to tell. I do not know my parentage, for I was found.”

“Found?”

She shrugged. “So I was eventually told, by my grandmother, who raised me. She would call me her ‘fond foundling,’ which I liked. Grandmother was an eccentric Boston witch. She taught me divination, and together we discovered my talent for finding long-buried treasure.” Turning away from the window, Charlotte walked to a table and examined the beautifully crafted miniature sphinx that sat upon it. “It’s amazing, the things one finds buried beneath the ground. I could sniff these things, and these nails were fashioned for digging. I especially loved the old burying grounds of New England. I remember one curious early morning, when grandmother hinted that she knew more about my background than she was wont to let on; for as we burrowed beside one venerable tree, she whispered that my kinfolk dwelt beneath that chilly sod.”

“How esoteric.”

“We found quite a treasure that morning. Together, over time, we collected quite a pile of buried treasure. She taught me how to weave spells, and together we would dance naked beneath the autumn moon. As I grew older, my ugliness increased, and society taught me that its heart is cruel. I began to shun humanity, to exist in the hours when most were asleep. My own slumber was haunted by curious dreams of dark figures in black spaces. I would awaken, at times, in curious places, with booty in my embrace but no memory of where I had been or with what I had occupied my time. I cannot clearly recall the morning I was found, with mud on my hands and an amazing taste in my mouth. Whatever I had done, it earned me a new home in a state hospital. I was lunatic at first, screaming to be with my grandmother. Over the years I grew more settled. I studied the sane and began to ape their ways. I discovered a great fondness for literature, and my grandmother would bring me wonderful books. The news of her death was a cruel blow, but I endured, and eventually won my release. Among my belongings was a key to grandmother’s house, now mine; it was at the house that I found her letter, from which I learned of the wealth that she had left me, and that told me of this city of Gershom, where I would find exile.”

“For which we are the richer,” Sebastian told her. “I’m exceptionally fond of the gift of this ring. Its ancient metal, slipped so snugly around my flesh, feels very old indeed. Please tell me that you found it during one of your excavations, adorning the finger bone of some long-interred fellow. That would give me such delicious dreams.”

“I’m happy that you like it. And in exchange, you will keep your promise.”

“Ah, a journey to our cemetery isle. I have visited it but once; so much nature hurts my eyes, and the leaves are particularly bright at this autumnal time.”

“I’m anxious to see it in reality. Your beautiful verbal portrait of it has danced in my imagination. I can well believe that you were once a poet. Come, take my arm and let us leave this smoky chamber. I’m in need of moonlight. We’ll stroll beneath its glow and you can tell me what brought you to this remarkable city.”

Linking arms, they vacated the building. The night was very still and very silent. As they walked past factories and old brownstones, Sebastian Melmoth began to tell his tale. “I came to Gershom because of what the world calls sin. I came because I heard that this is a godless town, and without god there can be no fall from grace. I confess that I miss sin horribly. It gives such texture to existence. This spectral place has a way of luring lost souls to its confines. I find it a comfortable nether world. One meets such interesting sorts. As for transgression, well, I am hopeful that in time I shall find a new form of sin. And yet, the longer I remain in this city, the more intense my sensations become, innocent as they are. Gershom teases the brain with singular dreaming, and in such visions we find new forms of thought and novel ways in which to express innovative ideas. Ah, but here we are at our destination.”

He led her onto a pier, and she saw the means of their transportation. “Oh my,” she moaned.

“No, no. This teakwood raft is far sturdier than it looks, and the couch, though tiny, is quite comfortable. This small gap between pier and raft is easily stepped over. You see how even a heavy fellow like me can manage it. Take my hand and—voila! No, you sit on the couch. I shall stand and hold onto this pole. This pale young creature will be our Charon.”

The ugly woman sat on the cushioned seat and watched as the child who was their navigator unwound the craft’s brittle sail; and she wondered what was the good of such a canvas, on this windless night. Her interlocutor bent so as to whisper at her ear. “The poor child suffers from poliomyelitis or some such ailment. His limbs are quite curved. I like the way he walks, like some pathetic puppet. He will love you for any pennies you may throw his way. I seem to have forgotten my purse.”

Charlotte reached into her pocket and produced a silver coin. Bowing to her, the child took the coin and pressed it against his forehead. His wide eyes looked past his wayfarers, into eventide, and when he began to sing the sound of his voice caused a chill to tingle Sebastian’s spine. Charlotte listened to the wind that rose above the water. The raft began to move away from land, toward mist. That cloud of liquid air kissed the woman with beads of moisture, which she brushed away from her face with a rough hand. At last the mist began to thin, and Charlotte could see the mass of land that was their terminus. Eerily, Sebastian Melmoth began to whistle.

“Why do you make that sound, monsieur?”

“Because I am afraid.” The winds extinguished, and yet the raft continued to move toward the island, as if pulled to it by some force. “The Isle of Moira,” Sebastian continued, “draped in darkness. Her sand aches for the touch of our hot naked feet. She would drink our vitality with those mouths that are her barrows and her pits. Ah, and there—do you see her? Our desolate receptionist.”

Charlotte peered at the place of stone steps toward which their craft sailed, and saw the grim figure that stood like some obsidian statue. The raft lodged itself perfectly against the pitted platform of the lowest step. Kicking off his shoes, the child limped toward the waiting figure and offered it his hand. Swiftly, the creature lowered itself until its cowled head was in alignment with the child’s. The infant moved his mouth, as if whispering secrets. A dark face parted its lips and fed upon the lame boy’s living breath. As the child began to shudder, the woman took him in her arms.

Sebastian removed his slippers and indicated to Charlotte that she should discard her shoes. He tried not to gape at the sight of her bestial feet, which were far more feral than her ungainly hands. Offering assistance, he helped her from the raft, onto the weathered stone steps. They approached the woman and her captive. Charlotte watched the dusky hand that loosened the lad’s shirt and manipulated the flesh nearest the child’s heart.

Sebastian’s musical voice began to pipe. “Mistress Atropos, may I present Miss Charlotte Hund, of Boston? She has come to dance naked beneath your moon.”

The black woman chuckled as she rose, not relinquishing her hold on the child. “You will want to climb the highest hill, where the wind is exquisitely musical among the numbered sarcophagi. You know the place, Melmoth; you capered there once yourself.”

“In one of my Greek moments, yes. I was much younger then. And far less innocent. But we shall have to ascend slowly. These thick old limbs are no longer in fine fettle. Do release the child, Mistress, that he may playfully lead the way.”

The woman spread her arms and the child hobbled forward, to Charlotte, whose hand he held. Sebastian watched as they began to climb the upward path, and then he touched his brow to the Mistress and followed his friend. The moon was as orange as many of the decorative leaves, and mauve shadows hovered behind the many trees and shrubs. Sebastian did not like the silence of the place; he could hear too loudly his labored breathing. Now and then, in places of deep shadow, he sensed that he was watched by shapes in the night. He followed the path, past tombs and angels and obelisks, watching the two before him. He saw the child suddenly stop and place a tiny hand to its heart. Stopping, Sebastian produced a gilded case, from which he snatched a cigarette.

“The child has been too active, too excited,” Charlotte concluded as she folded her arms around the boy. “His heart is racing and he burns with fever.”

“Yes, he suffers from that dread contagion called Life. But we are almost there, and he may rest upon one of the paws of the great beast. Shall I carry you, boy? Would you like a cigarette?”

Ignoring the man, the silent child took one of Charlotte’s hands and continued to lead the way. They reached the crest, and Charlotte gazed in admiration at the moon-drenched colossus. She and the child watched as Sebastian approached the gigantic stone Sphynx, before which he raised his hands and snapped his fingers. His high voice hummed an ancient tune, and he smiled as Charlotte joined him in the danse. Happily, the lame child began to move with them, his crooked feet moving in imitation of the woman’s hoofs. They moved beneath the moon for quite a while, until finally the child tripped and fell, clutching again at his chest. Charlotte dropped beside him and smoothed his brow with her rude hand. Sebastian watched as her expression altered, as she lowered her face to the earth and began to snuffle.

“Whatever are you doing?”

She looked at him with shining eyes. “There is something here, beneath this ground; something rare yet familiar, something seductive. It is a memory that I once knew, long ago; it has taste and texture, and it calls to me.”

“Really, you are too fantastic. I think you’ve been touched by the corroded light of that torrid moon. I hate the moon when it resembles a scab on diseased flesh. Ugh! Those awful crimson shadows around the tombstones, it’s too macabre.”

Charlotte ignored his histrionic chatter and continued to smooth the ground with anxious fingers, the limping child beside her. She crawled until coming to a toppled obelisk, beside the base of which she found an opening in the earth. Peering into that cavity, she saw the steps that led beneath the surface. “Do you sense it,” she asked the child, “how this hollow summons? Are you game, boy? Shall we investigate?” Standing, she took the lad’s hand and led him down into the pit.

Sebastian Melmoth raised a white hand and sang some lines from Jonson:

“Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;

My sin was too much hope of thee, dear boy…”

He watched them vanish into dank shadow. Then he turned to the gigantic Sphynx. Would she answer the riddle of what his friend would find? Was there anything that would appease doom? He looked to the moon, which had paled to a shade of ocher. Sebastian raised his hands to the sphere of dead refracted light, and then he began to remove his clothing.

The steps of loam felt strangely familiar to Charlotte’s naked feet, like something she had known while dreaming. She paused one moment to press her brow against the earthen wall, breathing its aroma, which stirred a cloudy image in her brain of something she had known, now forgotten. Touching lips to the dark wall, she trembled at the taste. Something in the sensation filled her with happiness, and turning to the child she began to dance upon the steps. Weirdly, she could easily see the child’s bright flesh in the dark place, the small hands held out to her. Eschewing caution, she took those hands and led the boy into a clownish dance upon the sleek and narrow steps. She seemed not to notice the heaviness of his breathing, and thought that he was clowning when he began to jerk with spasm. When she let go of his hands, she was too slow to catch his falling form. He tumbled down the stairs, to a level of rocky surface. Crying, she rushed to him and took up his still limp form in her embrace. She held him as is flesh grew cool and dry. She pressed him tighter to her breasts and whispered to his uncomprehending ear. How keenly she could smell his death, the fragrance of the stuff that clothed his bones. At last, she set his still form onto the surface to which he had fallen. Pressing fingers to his mouth, she pushed it shut. “Rest in peace, sweet innocent,” she murmured.

Before her was a passageway, through which a charnel breeze wafted to her. She could smell the bits of old bone that, over time, had sifted through the ground, some poking through the earth, others littering the place. Their stench was like something she had known, intimately, in Boston; but the memory was vague, like a favorite delicacy from childhood that had been forgotten in dull adulthood, until happened on by chance. Charlotte followed the chthonic blast, through the passageway, until she came to a spacious grotto, which seemed to her like the forgotten catacomb of some deserted cathedral. Broken statuary stood among the boxes of discarded death. She peered at a raised platform, a kind of bema, and saw two figures huddled over an altar, whispering as they watched her approach. She did not look away from the green eyes set deep within the rubbery faces, eyes that resembled her own. The eldest creature moved to meet her at the steps leading to the platform, and offered her his bestial hand. He smoothed her face with that hand, and combed her hair with thick strong nails. His mouth found her own. His kiss was revelation. She knew from that kiss exactly who she was.

She turned at the sound of another who approached them, and sighed at the sight of the burden in his arms. She helped to place the broken body on the altar and touched a hand to the bright small face. His carrion bouquet made her mouth to water.

“Found him just above,” the new arrival muttered. “Freshly dead.”

The elder beast pressed his hands together and moaned in pleasure. “Excellent. A welcoming feast for our sister.” He hissed as one of the others tilted toward one thin bent limb. “Where are your manners, Erebus? Our sister shall have first pick.” Turning to Charlotte, he motioned to the child.

“Give me his tender heart,” was her request.

∇