Grace House: The Trial of Obscurity

Chapter 8 Red Handed

  Dignity was not sure which room in Grace House he was looking for, and that in itself stung him. He had in his hand a large, yellow envelope that he had rescued from Obscurity’s van. He had happened to notice it while passing near the van’s open side door while on his way to his car. It contained a publisher’s query for his own book, one that Reason had meant to mail on the very day that Obscurity had first intruded at Grace House. It had never been mailed, and he intended to know why.

  However, he must first find Obscurity, who was said to be in her room; that is, in one of his rooms! Until this hour, Dignity had not been completely aware that Obscurity had moved in. But in general Dignity’s attention span was that of a five-year-old on a beach holiday.

  Peering down a hallway, he spotted Bits Bitterly with one of the children and strode up to them. Bits had his hand on Peace’s shoulder—a characteristic gesture—and his face was near hers. She wriggled away from him. When Bits saw Dignity, he suddenly straightened up laughing.

  “Dignity! Our little friend won’t show me around the house, not even if I ask nicely.”

  As he was saying this, Dignity had a momentary glimpse of the girl’s face close up—a look of alarm—as she ran by him and disappeared into the nearest room. He gave Bits a questioning look, and Bits’ face became somber.

  “I tend to go too far with kids. They don’t understand my kidding, so I end up just driving them away from me.”

  “Well, yes, but Peace is oversensitive,” Dignity said charitably. “Say, you don’t know which room is Obscurity’s, do you?”

  Bits did not. In the end Dignity found it in the servants’ quarters in the attic, a small room with half its ceiling angled down by the slant of the roof, and a tiny bathroom adjacent. At least he assumed this was her room—it was a woman’s room, judging from the bedspread and curtains. But she was not there.

  The thin winter sunlight fell on a bed, a chair, and a battered dresser. On a stand by the window was an electric guitar, and by it an amplifier. Taped to the dresser’s mirror were two notes and a picture. One note, in a woman’s neat hand, read, “Call Pinch about parts.” Another read, “Buy something for Self-Control.” The picture was apparently a family grouping of a couple and their two daughters. Dignity looked closer, and Obscurity’s face, much younger, popped out at him. She was the older daughter, and her hair had been red.

  Under the circumstances Dignity felt that a little snooping would be forgivable. He gripped the knob of the top drawer, but something about the atmosphere of the room made him pause. He looked around again. He thought that he had never seen a woman’s bedroom like this, so spare and simple, certainly not fitting for a woman as young and pretty as Obscurity. The top of the dresser was almost bare—just a comb and a hairbrush. No lipstick or perfume or anything of that sort. No magazines. No decorations. The walls were bare of pictures or posters. Nearly all her possessions must be crammed into the three dresser drawers, for the room had no closet.

  A crumpled candy wrapper lay at his feet. A bug walked the windowsill. With all this, a tranquility bathed the place, a feeling that seemed to slow Dignity’s breathing and heart rate. It put him in mind of timeless afternoon’s of his childhood, days when he had been too young to have ambitions and too satisfied to discover any. A thought flashed through his mind: “She’s happy here.”

  He opened the drawer slowly and found clothing and three books. One of the three was a copy of The Pride Story, his own face grinning at him from the cover. His brow wrinkled as he lifted it. What did she want with this? And if she wanted a copy, why had she not asked? He set it aside. The second book, a well-thumbed Bible, was of no interest. The third was a little-used scrapbook. He flipped past a few pages of her childhood pictures and came to a large glossy photo of a rock band, identified by their drumhead logo as the Gray Ciphers. Obscurity, still red-headed, stood among four others, holding the same guitar that now stood near him. The Gray Ciphers’ newspaper clippings followed, few and uncomplimentary. The words ‘fade into the pack’ caught his attention, as did ‘unmemorable.’

  The last page with anything on it was another newspaper clipping with the headline: “Immigrant Family Welcomed to Citizenship.” It was about three years old.

  Monday at Town Hall, Mayor Patsy welcomed the Righteousness family, lately foreigners, into full City citizenship. After the legal ceremonies, Mr. Righteousness, his wife Godly Fear, and their daughter Innocence were feted at a party held at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Power. In keeping with tradition, the new citizens will adopt altered names. Righteousness will take the name Self-righteousness, his wife will be Fear, and his daughter Lost Innocence. In a short speech, Mrs. Power invited all City residents to welcome and encourage the new citizens. Another daughter, Obscurity, was not part of the naturalization ceremony, but is expected to soon follow the example of her parents and sister.

  The clipping showed signs of having been crumpled at some point and then carefully smoothed out again. Dignity replaced the scrapbook and closed the drawer.

  “So,” he said to himself, “she ended her scrapbook when her family got in close with the Powers. Or—she’s deliberately removed everything after that. She must have a lot to hide.” He picked up The Pride Story. “And she swiped this to pass on to someone, maybe Power himself. That way he gets a preview of the exposé.”

  Dignity left the room, descended a floor, and passing one of the children’s rooms, full of chatter and hilarity, discovered Obscurity within. Here the boy Self-Control lay in bed sick with an open book on his lap, Stevenson’s Kidnapped. His younger brother and sister Gentleness and Goodness (the twins) were being allowed to visit him, since they were recovering from the same flu-like sickness and so could not catch it from him. This was hastily explained to Dignity by the little girl Goodness who hung on his arm. Meanwhile, Obscurity stood by and Dignity glared at her.

  Gentleness hopped up from his seat on the plaid bedspread. “Uncle Dig! You want to hear something?”

  Self-control and Goodness giggled in anticipation. Without waiting for an answer, Gentleness led them in singing the following to the tune of ‘I Have Decided to Follow Jesus’ and punctuated by much eye-rolling and laughter.

  I have decided to swallow doorknobs,

  I have decided to swallow doorknobs,

  I have decided to swallow doorknobs,

  No turning back,

  No turning back.

  Even Obscurity joined in with a rich, low voice. When it was over, the children all watched Dignity expectantly, but he did not smile. Instead he turned darkly on Obscurity.

  “Have you been teaching them this?”

  “No, I think they made it up themselves.”

  “But you encouraged them?”

  She looked at him blankly.

  “I mean you sang it with them. You’re making fun of a serious religious song.”

  The children were very quiet, suddenly finding things to stare at on the floor. Gentleness did giggle just a little more, but Dignity ignored him. “Come with me,” he said to Obscurity. “I have things to discuss with you privately.”

  She nodded stiffly, her thick hair shifting on her shoulders, and followed him out. Dignity led her to a small parlor on the same floor but did not invite her to sit down. Instead he waved the envelope in her face and told her where and how he had found it.

  “Reason says she gave it to you to mail. Don’t insult my intelligence by saying you forgot.”

  “No,” she said quietly.

  “No, what?”

  “No, I didn’t forget.”

  He paced around. “Well, there then! And I guess I don’t have to wonder why you kept it, either. It’s plain enough you’re in thick with the Powers. You’re spying for them, aren’t you? No, don’t deny it, it’s plain. First you kept this query and read it; and when you saw it was explosive stuff, you stole an actual copy of the book. Then you must hav
e gotten on the phone to them and warned them. Power would have pressured the other publishers to turn it down.”

  Obscurity just stared at him.

  Not being really sure of all this, Dignity hesitated. “Well? I notice you don’t deny it.”

  “I deny it all,” she said.

  “Oh, you do! Well, you weren’t careful enough with your scrapbook. You left a clipping that says your family went over to the City.”

  “You’ve seen my scrapbook,” she said flatly. She did not appear alarmed or offended.

  “That’s right. I think under the circumstances I had every right to investigate.”

  “So you saw about the Gray Ciphers.”

  “Yes. What was that? Some band you were in.”

  “We never made much of a splash,” she said, “so we broke up. And no one seemed to notice me at all. If you read those clippings, you probably saw that the reporters and critics never mentioned me.”

  “Well, you probably were playing in back,” Dignity said, trying to dismiss the subject.

  “No, I was the lead singer.”

  This note was just jarring enough that Dignity focused on her. What was she trying to tell him? She did not appear to regret the band’s failure, and yet her pretty face had an intent look, as if for once she was trying to communicate something worthwhile.

  She took a step nearer. “You see what that means?” she said. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but I have a real knack, a talent, for staying in the shadows and for drawing others there with me. So eventually I decided to make it my life’s work.”

  Dignity put his hands on his hips. “I do not understand you, lady. So you’re the kiss of death to other performers. What has that got to do with....”

  Then suddenly he saw it, or guessed he did. She had killed the Gray Ciphers. And she had been sent here to kill The Pride Story. That was her talent.

  “I want you to understand me,” she was saying. “Usually that doesn’t matter to me when I’m on an assignment, but—”

  “What are you doing, confessing all?” he interrupted. “You’re a tool of the City. You’re here to drag Grace House into the shadows. Good Lord, you’re sick.” He turned from her.

  “Shadows are not so bad,” she said. “What’s to become of you if I don’t?”

  “Well, what became of the other band members? The Gray Ciphers?”

  Her face, which had briefly become animated, was again somber and dispassionate. She walked to the door. “I heard they got back together, changed the name, and made it big.”

  “Without you.”

  “Yes, without me.”

  She was half out the door.

  “Wait a minute! What were you doing with the kids just now?”

  She turned. “I was trying to cheer up Self-control.”

  “With blasphemy?”

  “I bought him a present, a book.” She went away down the hallway.

  Dignity paced the carpet for many minutes, mulling it over. He could not understand her. Here was a cold hearted menace who took time to cheer a sick child; a spy who said she wanted to be understood. While still uselessly revolving such thoughts, he found that he had been joined by Reason and little Peace. Reason had her arm around the girl’s shoulders. Peace was sobbing.

  “What is it?”

  Reason settled Peace in a chair, and took Dignity aside.

  “She’s had an awful shock,” Reason said. “Dice the cat didn’t show up for feeding time, and she went looking for him. She found him dead—” Reason made a face “—in the lower basement. I asked if she was sure he was dead, and—” she glanced at the girl, who was staring at them with haunted eyes “—and she said his body had been torn open and partly eaten up! Can you imagine how awful!”

  “It must have been rats,” Dignity said.

  “But the house doesn’t have rats, and even if it did, what killed Dice? I want to go down there and see this.”

  After taking Peace to the comfort of her mother, Dignity and Reason went down to the first basement level, where they found the trap door that led to the second level standing open. They fetched flashlights and climbed down the ladder.

  Grace House had this second basement below the first, and there it had a second and older gas furnace, duplicating the one used to heat the house. This second furnace, which long ago had been manufactured by the Sin Nature Company, heated only the basement rooms on its level. The previous year Humility had discovered that Dignity, in sleepwalking fits, maintained the old furnace. Dignity did not like to be reminded of it and as a rule never descended here in company.

  “It’s hot,” he said, shining his flashlight around at dark doorways leading to unguessed places. “Let’s just find this thing and get out of here.”

  Reason was shining her light at the foot of the ladder. “I see some stain marks and maybe some fur. Yes, it was here. But where is it now?” She shined her light into an adjacent room.

  Dignity had never been into any of the other rooms and did not want to go. “It’s not down here,” he said decisively. “Someone took it back upstairs.”

  Reason went to the doorway and looked in. She whipped around and returned to him with a strained face.

  “Absolutely right,” she said. “Must be upstairs.”

  “It’s no use looking down here,” he said, preceding her gallantly up the ladder.

  “Waste of time,” she agreed, as—even pregnant—she practically climbed his back.

  In the kitchen, Dignity told Reason what he had just learned about Obscurity and about his further suspicions.

  “What do you mean? Do you think she killed Dice?” she said.

  “No, I hadn’t even thought of that. Why would she do that?”

  “Maybe to terrorize us—terrify the kids anyway. Sort of like a mafia warning.”

  Dignity snapped his fingers. “That’s it. Her bosses don’t want our book published, and this is their way of warning us off. The monster! Let’s go up to her room.”

  After a long stair climb, they entered Obscurity’s room and found it empty, as before. They looked at each other and shrugged.

  “Does she ever—” Reason began, but she was interrupted.

  From behind the half-open door to the little bathroom came the sound of a woman singing in rich, clear tones.

  I have decided to swallow doorknobs,

  I have decided...

  Dignity flung the door open. Obscurity was washing her hands at the sink. On the floor at her feet was a large, clear plastic bag, and plainly visible in the bag was Dice’s mangled corpse.

  “Gotcha!” Said Dignity, pointing a finger in her face. “You’re out of here, Obscurity.”

  Part 2 The Siege of Grace House