When she heard the sound of scrabbling under her bed she
gaped in horror. The roof was no longer there and the sky was crammed with
stars. The yellow lamplight had its neck twisted and the light was dimming, a
dark hairy whisker of shadow creeping up to swallow everything. The sliver of
light coming in through the parting curtain was the only thing remotely
consolatory in the creepy hotel reminiscent of horror movies, old and new. The
wooden cabinet shook and the drawers slid out, one after the other, like the
many tongues of a hysterical creature of the nights. The clothes hanger slid to
a side and revealed the crack in the wall beyond.
She tried the light switch but obviously it was not working.
The bedspread was damp from something that was not hers – an ache spread
through her limbs, paralyzing her, bolting her spine to the cot. A whiff of
chill air snaked through the open fisheye hooks of her blouse, circling her
rigid frame, raising the hair on the back of her neck. Fear cascaded like
thousand volts of electric current through her veins, gripping her heart,
asphyxiating her throat and blinding her eyes. She wanted to shout but was
afraid that she would enrage the devil that was only showing her the wall, a
pathway to somewhere discreet and intimate, perhaps its hiding place.
A tinny sound filled her ears like cotton, her fingers
biting the soft side of her palms. The cupboard door opened and closed on its
own accord, the hinges squeaking and the cat, which was never there, now
peering at her through its slit eyes. She freed her hands from the laced
grip, let go off the blanket, opened her mouth and threw her head to a side,
not seeing what was before her. Blindly impelled, beating like a fish in a
trawl, she slid into the cupboard and pressed her body, sideways, into the
crack of the wall. But her movement rattled the clothes hangar and a coin fell
on the floor, at once dispensing with the whole scheme. The lights came on, the
window admitted light from the street, the curtain ruffled and she was able to
register the sound of an ice truck backing into the hotel parlour.
She took the coin and stepped away from the cupboard and the
wall which appeared perfectly sealed. Her bedspread was dry and the bedside
lamp brandished a staggering straight back. She went over to the window,
rubbing her hands and hugging herself. Outside, she spotted a man who was
staring right at her from under his felt hat. His flannel pajamas and folded shirt
sleeves suggested he was staying in the same hotel. Was he sleepwalking? She
nodded as if to nobody. He hunkered down to pick up a stone which he hurled at
her as if it was a casual thing people did in hotels. She dipped her head just
in time and managed to avoid what could have been a vicious stoning. He
straightened and stood there like a statue, frozen and noncommittal. She called
out to him but there was no reaction from him. He kept staring right through
her, into the room beyond where the stone now lay on her bed like a reminder of
mischief.
She tried the operator and the man who greeted her said the
hotel was closed until further notice. She was taken aback, almost scowled at
this unpitying insurgence into her otherwise plainly tired night. all she
wanted was to get some rest. The man on the phone asked if she was a reporter.
She thought about it – she was a travel writer and her editor commissioned her
to write a review for this hotel. Did that make her a journalist? She replied
that she was in a way. The man on the phone suggested that she must try talking
to the survivor of the gruesome murder that was committed in the hotel which by
the way led to its closing down.
She tried telling him that she checked in like everyone else
and would he please shut up about closing down. But the man shunned her remarks
and hung up on her. She searched in the telephone book for the local police but
all she heard was the papery rustle on the line. She tried the operator again
and asked him to put her through to her employer in the city. The operator
whined and cussed and rammed the receiver down. Who are you? he yelled. What
are you doing in my hotel?
The operator shook the old willow basket, upended it and
found the talisman. It was a green one with copper blue whiskers running round
the rim. He wore it and held it close to his chest with one hand. With the
other hand he leveled the broomstick like a gun, its frilled end caught in a
garland of miniature skulls, laced together with cat hair and bear claws. He
proceeded with caution, his heart racing like a thousand horses were pounding
inside. When he reached the room number 713, he curtseyed once to all the gods
of hic choice, and flung the door open with the broom. He tried the light
switch and the overhead tube flickered into existence. The bed wore long
stripes of blood, old and dry. A ball of hair sat like a severed head in the
open cupboard where a crack lay, spiders guarding the ethereal realm of
darkness inside. The man touched the end of his broomstick to the hairy
specimen at his feet. The bedside lamp hoisted by itself, climbing up the wiry
terrain of stains on the wall. He squeezed his talisman and raised his broom
one last time and flung it into the cupboard, slicing through the arterial
angst of the crack.
The room resisted, lights were killed and things broke one
after another, the curtain flew up in a rage and wound round his head, choking
him for air. But he persisted and pierced the devil’s heart.
She saw the broom handle animate by itself and ran to
safety, into the corner, and raised the bedside lamp, aiming at him. But the
broom approached the cupboard instead. It should have been a harmless maneuver,
but it was not. She suffocated, her stomach churned and her eyes peeled back,
revealing the whites. As the broom jingled with its skulls and bear claws
her eyes leaked blood, her mouth slathered and her whole body shook like a thin
leaf, riveting her shadow to the wall as a full composite while she atrophied
in body. Her shadow climbed the wall opposite and joined the inverse halo of
darkness while she faltered and desiccated. The final collapse came when the
broom twisted in the crack of the wall. It spun her on her heels and shattered
her, splashing her shadow back into the writhing pool of liberating dusk.
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