Later, Ruth Turner would tell herself that it all started on the night the cops raided the Southside Speakeasy. When things twisted out of shape and the nightmares began, she needed to find a starting point to give her story a direction and make sense of it. And the hectic run in the alleys, feet slipping on the wet paving, her breath short, was as good a beginning as any other.
Hidden in the arch of a doorway, panting, she had tried to catch a glimpse of whoever was coming after her, unseen steps echoing in the dark. Her heart pounded in her chest not just from the strain of the long run. Running in men’s shoes was a lot easier than running in half heels. But being caught in a bootlegger’s place? And wearing male clothing?
She shuddered. Everybody knew what cops did to people like her. So when the shout had sounded, “Raid!” she had followed a few of the other patrons through the back door behind the bandstand, in the small courtyard where the privy was, and then through the iron door into the alley, and into the night, each man and woman for themselves, running.
Trying to slow down her breathing, she leaned out of her hideaway, and a body smelling of rose and tobacco slammed into her, knocking her back against the closed door with a bump. A brief cry, and Ruth pulled the newcomer into an awkward embrace, and placed a hand on her mouth. She could feel the heartbeat of the woman, a frantic pulse against her chest.
“Hush,” she whispered in the other woman’s ear.
More steps approached. Slowed down. Ruth and her companion retreated further into the shadows, and held their breath.
“I’m sure she came this way–” a man’s voice said.
Another man coughed, like a dog barking. “I’m too old for this rubbish,” he gasped, and coughed again.
The first man came closer. A streetlight at the head of the alley cast his long shadow on the pavement. A cop. He wore a beret, he carried a bludgeon.
With a screeching mewl, a cat shot out from behind a dustbin and ran to the end of the shadows.
Ruth’s companion pressed hard into her, just as the out of breath cop let out a rattling laugh. “There goes your mystery dame,” he said. “Let’s get back.”
“I tell you I saw her run this way.”
“If she did, she was faster than us. Let’s go back.”
The silence seemed to last forever. Then the first cop grunted. “Yeah, fine.”
Ruth and her companion remained still for a while, after the steps had died away. Then they finally let go of each other. “Are you alright?” Ruth asked, in a hushed voice.
The other woman nodded. She was about two inches shorter than Ruth, and wore a soft dress, the color impossible to tell in the yellow glow of the distant streetlight. Short, bobbed hair, and a sharp face, pointed chin and high cheekbones, her eyes and lips underscored by dark makeup.
“We’re safe now,” Ruth said, slowly.
The girl was staring at her. Taking in the double-breasted jacket, the fedora.
“I saw you in there,” she said. Her voice was pleasantly husky. “I like your style.”
Ruth was speechless for a moment. “Thanks.”
The woman just ran a hand through her short hair, and sighed. “I lost my hat.” Then she grinned mischievously. “I’m Charlie,” she said, offering her hand.
“I am Ruth.”
They were still standing real close, half in shadow. Ruth could smell Charlie’s perfume.
“Have you got a cigarette, Ruth?” Charlie asked suddenly.
Ruth’s hand went to her pocket, and then she froze.
Charlie smirked. “Worried we might get arrested? For smoking in public?”
Ruth chuckled and pulled out her pack of Lucky Strikes. She shook two cigarettes out of it. The click of her lighter illuminated Charlie’s fine features, highlighting her bright eyes and the copper in her hair. Finally, Charlie stepped back and leaned against the frame of the door. She took a long drag and exhaled slowly. “I needed this,” she said.
Ruth nodded and tipped the ash off her cigarette. She was not a heavy smoker, not really, but the Luckies were part of her persona when she went out at night, just like the jacket, the tie, the hat.
They smoked in silence, enjoying the sudden peace, the noises of the night city faint in the distance. Finally Charlie dropped the butt of her smoke on the ground and squashed it with the tip of her foot. “So, Ruth,” she said, turning to stare at her, “are you into girls?”
Ruth’s eyes widened, and she felt her cheeks burn.
Charlie came closer. “Because I am.”
Her boldness was like a slap. Ruth retreated, and Charlie smiled at her. “Let me see your hair.” She took Ruth’s hat away. Ruth’s long black hair fell on her shoulders, brushing the curve of her jaw. “Beautiful,” Charlie whispered.
Later Ruth would tell herself it was there it all started.
•••
In the following days, Ruth felt like she was walking two feet over the ground, and was so happy she was sure she was giving off light. She worried for a while her colleagues in Pickman Street would notice and ask her questions. It didn’t happen.
To all around her, she remained the black-haired, silent woman working in the morgue, barely visible to the other employees, and a silent shadow to the people that would come and cry for their dead friends, or stare silently, unbelieving, at the still bodies of their relatives.
And yet, for Ruth the smell of disinfectant could not wash away the smell of roses, and her eyes sparkled with joy. She strove to set her features to a somber demeanor when she walked visitors to the icebox drawers where the bodies were preserved. She felt their pain, but her heart was singing.
Grief, like her, haunted these rooms, and she had managed to find a way to live with it so far, slowly retreating into a solitary existence, pushed into a corner by the leaden weight of the world’s pain. Eat alone, sleep alone, her nights at home spent with a book, or a radio serial.
Of her youthful dreams, she had a distant, almost impersonal memory, like the ghost limb of a trench war survivor. Like the distant echo of a toothache: there, but not really anymore.
That had been Ruth’s existence for years. Until the day the pale blonde girl arrived at the morgue.
They had fished her out of the Miskatonic, her hair intertwined with river grasses, her fingernails broken as she had tried to claw her way back onto the banks, and failed. “Accidents happen,” the man from the ambulance said, handing Ruth his report.
No name, no history. She had been so young. So beautiful.
Moving like a machine, Ruth arranged the body on the slab and then sat down to fill out the forms describing the conditions of the remains. It was only when a single tear drew a black smear on the paper, washing away the ink, that Ruth realized her heart was broken.
She cried then, giving in to the emotion. She only managed to compose herself when one of the detectives from the precinct came and collected the report. The man had looked at Ruth in a strange way, maybe sensing something Ruth herself could not name.
No one claimed the body. A column appeared in the Gazette, but no one came forward. After the prescribed time, the men from Christchurch Cemetery came and took the blonde girl away, leaving behind a signed, stamped paper. A solitary ceremony, a cheap coffin and a shallow grave, paid for by the city. Ruth had accompanied the body and stood as the gravediggers shoveled dirt on the pine box, and the priest turned and walked away, his head down. As the men put a white wood cross in place, hammering it down with a shovel, the last of Ruth’s heart crumbled.
She was standing on the brink of a precipice, and she decided to take a plunge.
Two days later, on her morning off, Ruth visited a shop selling secondhand clothes, in the old neighborhood where the Italians and Spaniards lived. She bought a man’s suit, blue, three shirts, three ties. A pair of comfortable two-tone loafers, their soles worn, the leather scuffed. A wide-brimmed hat.
The following night, at home, she watched herself as though in a dream as she dressed in front of her mirror. The clothes felt so right. The jacket made her shoulders wider, her waist thinner. The hat hid her hair, cast her eyes in shadow.
Then, her head spinning and her heart racing, she went out in the night. As another person. Like Fantòmas, like the Scarlet Pimpernel. Looking for life.
It did not take long for her to find the steps down to the Southside, where there was music, and booze, and freedom. She had been patronizing the speakeasy for about a month when the cops raided the premises, and she met Charlie, and fell in love.
•••
“They raid us once a month,” Levon said. He placed the teacups down in front of them, filled with the dark amber of bootleg whiskey. He winked. “The cops want to make sure the boss keeps paying his dues.”
Ruth took a sip of her liquor, the alcohol burning on her tongue.
“Damn nuisance,” Charlie said. She was a little tipsy already, this being her third “tea” of the evening.
“They usually come on the Saturday, when the place’s packed,” the waiter said. “So tonight we’re easy.”
Ruth looked at the people crammed in the smoky room. To her, the place seemed packed enough. On the bandstand, the guys were warming up. The noise of a thousand voices went down a notch as the bass and drum picked up the rhythm. Jungle Blues. Levon nodded and moved on to the next table. Ruth sighed and relaxed against the back of her chair.
“Feeling good, love?” Charlie asked.
She did that thing she did, caressing Ruth’s hand, running her long nail around Ruth’s ring. Ruth had started wearing it two weeks before, on their first anniversary celebration. Three months, and a silver ring. Charlie had one just like hers.
Ruth drank some more and nodded. “Always, when we’re together.”
The music was jumping in time with the butterflies in her chest. She’d never get used to it, she knew. And she liked the feeling. A woman at a nearby table, her man’s hand on her knee, looked at them and grinned. She gave Ruth a thumbs-up, like they were aviators in a film.
“We could go to the movies one of these nights,” she said, suddenly.
Charlie shrugged. “If you like.”
Ruth arched an eyebrow, and Charlie seemed to sober up suddenly. “I like it here,” she said. “I like being with you in the bright lights. Where everybody can see us, and nobody cares.”
Ruth chuckled and lit a cigarette. “You’re drunk.”
But she felt like it too. She ran a hand down the lapel of her double-breasted jacket, touched the lilac silk pochette Charlie had given her on their first date.
“Let’s order one more tea,” Charlie said, raising a hand to call Levon. “Then we go home.”
Ruth gave her a look. “What do you have in mind, you minx?”
Charlie smiled like a happy, tipsy cat. “Wait and see.”
•••
“Some people were here to see you,” Lumley said.
Morgue assistant, he was the sort of guy that carried a black leather bag like a doctor’s, containing just his sandwiches. His shift over, he stood and picked his coat from the hanger behind the door.
“What people?” Ruth asked. It was not like she ever had any visitors.
Lumley shrugged. “People. A man and a woman. Nice clothes, the dame. He looked like a bum. I told them you’d be in tonight.”
He picked up his hat and his bag and wished her goodnight.
Despite her seniority, Ruth still got nights, two weeks a month.
“It’s because you’re a dame,” Charlie usually said. “We girls always get the short end.”
Charlie worked at a milliner’s shop on Church Street, and when Ruth was doing nights, they barely saw each other.
With a sigh, Ruth worked her silver ring around her finger.
“Nice bauble you have there, Miss Turner.”
A man’s voice. Rough. She started and turned. At the office door, a man and a woman stood, looking at her.
“Can we have a word?” the man said.
Ruth took a step back. They came in and closed the door behind them.
They were a strange couple. The woman was tall, aristocratic, her black hair pleated in an expensive do. Everything about her spoke of money. She pulled her fur cape closer as she looked with bored curiosity at the desks, the filing cabinets. Like a tourist. The man, on the other hand, looked a lot cheaper in a well-worn gray suit. He badly needed a shave, and kept staring at Ruth with a hungry, predatory look on his face. He had short stubby hands, his fingernails stained brown.
They were not the sort of people that usually visited these rooms. “How can I help you?” Ruth asked, warily.
The woman turned to her, like she had just noticed Ruth was there, and arched an aristocratic eyebrow. “Yes,” she said.
Ruth frowned. The man nodded. “You certainly can, miss. Help us, that is.”
His grin revealed big yellow teeth. Ruth looked at him, and then at the woman.
“We are seeking an arrangement of reciprocal benefit,” the woman said.
“You know how they say,” the man said. “One hand washes the other, and together they wash the face.”
“I don’t–”
“Do you have many unclaimed bodies?” the woman asked suddenly, with the same tone one might use to inquire about groceries.
“Sure they do,” the man nodded. He was rifling through the papers Lumley had left on his desk. “John Doe, they call ‘em.”
“Don’t touch–!”
He turned sharply, his mellifluous smile gone. “Don’t you snap at me, woman.”
His companion took a step forward. “Excuse my… partner,” she said. The man scoffed. “He has some authority issues.”
“Who are you?” Ruth asked. “What do you want?”
The woman sighed. The fur slid down from her shoulders. She had a long neck. A gold medallion rested on her chest. “Let us talk about what you want, first,” she said, her voice dripping poisoned honey. “And what you don’t want.”
“We hear you like a bit of the night life,” the man said, and winked. “One wouldn’t say it, from the looks of you.”
Ruth felt a chill. “What do you mean?”
“It is alright,” the woman said. She came closer. She was wearing an intensely sweet perfume. “We can appreciate your… little indiscretions. We all have our weaknesses. But not many share our enlightened point of view, do they?”
Fear and anger bubbled in Ruth’s chest. “Get out of my office,” she hissed.
“And go where? To your boss? Or should we go to the police? Do you think they’d go easy on you and your ginger girlfriend? No, wait – maybe we should pay a little visit to your family.” His evil smirk widened into a sickening grin. “Imagine finding one of them here on the slab, one of these days.”
Ruth opened her mouth, but no sound came out of it. This couldn’t be true.
The woman smiled. “Breathe, darling.”
She pulled out one of the chairs, inspected the seat critically, and sat down. Crossed her legs. She smiled again. The man moved behind her and crossed his arms.
“What do you want from me?” Ruth asked.
The woman’s smile did not reach up to her eyes. “We want your unclaimed bodies.”
•••
They had everything figured out already. The man’s name was Collins. He worked as a gravedigger and general handyman in the graveyard on Hangman’s Hill. He would provide the burial papers. Ruth was to take care of the paperwork on the morgue side and, when needed, just leave the service door open. Ruth would only need to call them when there was an unclaimed body in the morgue. Doctor the papers and turn the other way. The friends of Collins and the woman would do the rest. Everything would look fine.
“Nobody cares about that dead meat anyway,” Collins said.
“It’s better than being forgotten in some common grave,” the woman said.
“It’s against the law,” Ruth said. But her voice was uncertain.
“So is imbibing the bootleggers’ booze,” Collins said with a chuckle.
“And dressing up as a man,” the woman said. “And a few other of your… shall we say, pastimes?”
Ruth was squeezing her hands together to stop them from shaking. “What are you going to do with… with these people?”
“That’s none of your concern,” Collins said.
“At least for the moment,” the woman added. Collins gave her a weird look. “And you should stop considering them people. They are bodies. There’s nothing to them but that. Dead meat.”
“And if I do as you ask–?”
“You’ll go on havin’ a wild time, and no one will be any the wiser,” Collins winked. “And all your loved ones will be safe.”
“Indeed, you’ll be much safer with us,” the woman said, “than on your own. We are very good at keeping our secrets. And our friends’.”
Ruth’s hands ached from the way in which she was pressing them together. She looked from the woman to Collins and back. “If I were caught–”
“You won’t be,” Collins said. “People like you are good at keeping secrets, aren’t you? But sure, we could rat on you alright.”
He leaned closer, a cruel smirk on his face. “After all, we are law-abiding citizens. We have a moral duty to report your… indiscretions? I am sure they would like to have a talk with you, and your ginger-headed friend.”
The woman gave him a hard look. “Enough.”
She stood and took a step towards Ruth. She placed a nicely manicured hand on her shoulder. “You should think of this as an opportunity,” she said.
Ruth remained silent, but she already knew what her answer would be.
“Nice girl,” the woman said, like she was reading Ruth’s mind. She squeezed her shoulder gently. “You won’t regret it.”
•••
The first one was a man in his late seventies, dead of a stroke, alone in his two-room apartment on East Street. A widower, all of his family dead of the Spanish Flu ten years before. Ruth called the number they had given her, and started filling out the forms.
Ruth was working afternoons.
Early in the morning, someone dropped an envelope in her mailbox. She found it on her way out to work. Hangman Hill Cemetery papers, burial permits, general authorizations. She faked the missing signatures and got them stamped during the lunch break. Nobody locked their offices. Why should they?
Then, the following night, she left the door of the service corridor unlocked, and went home.
She tossed and turned in her bed through the night. Late in the morning, her head splitting with a headache, she made herself up and dressed and went to see Charlie for lunch.
They sat in one of the students cafés on College Street, just two friends having lunch together. But Ruth was distant, distracted. Charlie leaned across the table and placed a hand on her forehead. “Are you coming down with something?” she asked.
Ruth jumped, startled. She pulled back and looked around. “What are you doing?” she hissed.
Charlie grinned and picked up her sandwich again. “You’re no fun today.”
Ruth took a deep breath and shook her head. “I am sorry.”
“What for? It’s not your fault if you caught a bug.”
They walked together after lunch, just two friends having a stroll. A few college students stared at Charlie, and Ruth felt a pang of jealousy that distracted her briefly from her mounting panic.
Then they parted ways, and Ruth went to her office, ready to face disaster.
The body was gone, the icebox drawer empty.
And nothing happened. Nobody came to inquire about the old man, no one checked or made any fuss about the records. As long as the papers were in order, nobody seemed to care.
Not a person, Ruth thought. Just a dead body.
That night, when she got home, she found a plain envelope in her mailbox. Inside were five five-dollar bills, and a card of fine ivory-colored paper. Ruth recognized the woman’s perfume.
Buy something pretty for your girlfriend.
Olivia.
Ruth dropped the money and the card in a drawer. She needed a hot bath. She felt dirty.
•••
The days turned into weeks and the weeks into months.
Things settled into a reassuring routine. Work at the office, sometimes lunch with Charlie. Maybe a movie on a weekday night. Clara Bow. Ramon Navarro. And then, on the weekend, Ruth would shed her everyday skin and don her jacket and tie. Charlie had given her a fine trench coat as a gift, and she had bought more shirts, and another hat, using the money from Olivia. She also bought Charlie perfume and a pair of pearl earrings.
And sometimes a dead body would land on the slab, some sad forgotten man or woman. Ruth would pick up the phone and slip a new form into the typewriter. She had her own stamp now. She had asked one of the guys in the Southside, and he’d suggested an old Polish man, who made her a copy of the records stamp. She carried it in her bag. No more sneaking into other people’s offices at lunchtime.
Everything was fine.
Ruth was maybe drinking a little more than before, smoking more cigarettes. When she was out with Charlie, dressed like a man and with her lover on her arm, she was aggressively cheerful. She danced and made a racket and ordered more “tea”. But it was alright. They’d sometimes stumble to Charlie’s place, a little smashed, and fall in bed, giggling.
Later, Charlie snoring gently at her side, Ruth would stare at the ceiling, questions running through her now sober mind.
What were they doing with the bodies?
Olivia and Collins did not look like Arkham’s own Burke and Hare. But one heard things, about fraudsters and criminals. Ruth believed they were involved in some form of insurance scam, the ramifications unseen to her and impossible to fathom.
•••
“Leaving so early?”
Olivia was standing in the doorway, her hand on the knob. She was wearing a deep maroon coat with a soft fox collar and a matching cloche hat.
Surprised, Ruth put her bag down. “What do you want?” she hissed.
Olivia pouted. “Let’s call this a social visit.”
Ruth glanced at her wristwatch.
“Yes, I know, it’s late,” Olivia said. She unbuttoned her coat, revealing a black dress, a long string of pearls. Like she was coming from a gala night. “They will be here soon.”
“Who?”
“Our… associates. I guess it’s high time you met them. Get acquainted. Learn more about our circle.”
“I am not interested.”
“Liar.” Olivia came closer. “You are too intelligent not to be curious. And tonight–”
There was a sound from the service corridor. The metal door at its end opened, hinges creaking.
“Ah, here they come.”
Fear like a spike of ice pierced Ruth’s chest, cutting her breath short. Sharp, unexplained, a feeling of helplessness, an urge to flee. Run away. Hide. Irrational. Paces clicked in the corridor. Feeling the other woman’s eyes on her, Ruth stepped back from her desk, and Olivia moved to her side and, unexpectedly, took her by the hand.
The corridor door creaked, and the handle moved.
“Do not be afraid,” Olivia ordered, a quavering note in her cultured voice.
Ruth wished she could turn and look at the woman’s face, but her eyes were glued to the door as it slowly opened.
And then in they came. A slow procession of hunchbacked shapes, walking on hoofed feet, ember-like eyes burning in dog-snouted faces. Black fur, flashing teeth. They moved like apes, their paws’ knuckles sometimes touching the floor. Sometimes their talons clicking on the marble tiles. There were six of them, two undoubtedly male.
Ruth wobbled, and Olivia’s hand squeezed her own. “They mean us no harm. Look at them.”
Ruth’s voice was broken. “I–”
“Look! Don’t you dare turn your eyes away… Look at them if you want to live!”
The creatures crossed the room in single file. One of them, Ruth noticed, wore wire-framed glasses. Another sported a wristwatch. Ruth choked on a laugh at the incongruity.
“Good,” Olivia whispered. “Keep looking.”
The creatures opened the two icebox drawers where the recent unclaimed bodies had been waiting. A man and a woman, drifters by their clothes. Found by the railroad after a chilly night. The black creatures pulled away the sheets and remained for a moment in contemplation of the remains. One of them stretched out a hand and caressed the face of the dead woman, almost affectionate. They stood like that for a minute, as though in prayer. Then, effortlessly carrying the bodies, the things walked back to the corridor.
Thank you, they said. Or so Ruth believed. By now, her mind had completely dissolved.
“See?” Olivia whispered in her ear. “There is nothing to fear.”
•••
Ruth missed five days of work, claiming a bad cold. In fact she spent the time curled up in her bed, her arms wrapped around her folded legs. Laying perfectly still, breathing slowly, and moaning rhythmically. When fatigue overwhelmed her and sleep came, she was shaken awake by the dreams screaming in her mind.
Charlie found her like that, when she came to visit after work on the evening of the fourth day. Ruth was still wearing her office clothes and her shoes, and was soaked in sweat, and trembling. Her moans were like a frightened animal’s.
“I’m calling Doctor Howard,” Charlie said. There was a telephone at the bottom of the stairs. But Ruth caught her by the wrist. “No,” she croaked. “Just stay with me.”
Charlie frowned, worried. Then she slipped out of her shoes and lay down with Ruth in the bed, holding her tight. They spent the night like that, both awake. One of them worried sick, the other slowly going crazy.
•••
After that night, and the fever days, Ruth did not care anymore. She went through her days like they were somebody else’s.
She called the number and handled the paperwork and collected the money from her mailbox. She no longer had any qualms spending it. She stalled Charlie’s questions at her gifts, and all the rest. She danced and drank and smoked and partied harder than ever. She became notorious at the Southside Speakeasy.
She started wearing slacks at work, and ignored the raised eyebrows. She started smoking in her office. “It covers the smell of the disinfectant,” she explained when a surprised Lumley caught her lighting up. He could not deny that it did.
She carried a hip flask in her handbag. Sometimes she came to work dead hungover. Sometimes she was tipsy by lunchtime. But nobody noticed, nobody cared. She least of all.
She tried not to think of the nightmares. The dark shapes dancing in the dusk, the strange chanting. And on the nights when the bodies were taken, she no longer vacated the offices. She would just sit at her desk and watch as the creatures came. It was better than be at home alone, and dream.
It was on the third night they came that she started talking to them, and they answered back.
The Devourer Below needs feeding, the dog-faced creature explained, during one of their conversations. He moved his lips, but his voice sounded in Ruth’s mind like her own thoughts. And we are Those That Feed the Devourer.
There was pride there, and duty. A sense of belonging. And Ruth knew she was one of those “we”, just like Olivia or Collins or the others. Because there were others.
Surface Dwellers, the creatures called them.
But that did not matter to her. Only Charlie mattered now.
The creature she called Bob caressed Ruth’s face, and she did not shrink or start. His touch was delicate, like a friend’s. Protecting your mate, Bob said. Feeding the Devourer. This is good.
She offered him a cigarette, but he declined.
After they left with the body, she locked up the office and staggered back home.
She hoped she would get at least two hours of dreamless sleep.
•••
Their first row was terrible, and started from nothing. They had come home from the Southside, where they had danced until they were dizzy, and everybody clapped and sang along. They sat together on the bed, and Charlie slowly undid Ruth’s clothes. Took off her jacket, loosened up her tie. Helped her out of her shirt.
“I think the landlady is getting suspicious,” Charlie whispered, and kissed Ruth’s shoulder.
Ruth shrugged her off, instinctively.
“Hey! What’s wrong with you these days?”
Ruth turned to her, her eyes two steel spikes. “What do you mean?”
Charlie shrugged and huddled closer. “You are strange,” she said softly. “It’s like there’s always something going on, in here.”
She caressed Ruth’s temple, her fingers light and cool. Ruth pushed her back.
“Hey!” Charlie screeched. She chuckled, but Ruth’s expression smothered her mirth.
“If you weren’t this insistent,” Ruth said, “people wouldn’t be suspicious.”
“You got it bad tonight, huh?” Charlie snorted. “Well, sorry for loving you.”
“This is it, right? You’re sorry about this.”
Charlie’s eyes widened. “Are you insane?”
And Ruth started screaming at her, words that cut like blades, until Charlie broke down crying, and Ruth finally realized where she was, and what she was doing. She stopped mid-phrase, her mouth suddenly dry. “I am sorry,” she said next. “I’m sorry, my love, I am so sorry–”
She sought Charlie’s hand, and the redhead pulled back, her face streaked with black eyeliner, her eyes reddened and puffy. They looked at each other, both of them more sober than they had been for weeks. More sober than they wished to be.
“I am sorry,” Ruth said again, and finally they held on to each other.
•••
There was a fire in the Rookeries on French Hill one night, the flames painting the clouds red. The fire truck tore through the streets screaming and later, as the greasy black smoke rose from the wreckage, the bodies were brought to the morgue.
“You want to stay where you are, miss,” the fireman said. Fatigue colored his voice. Ruth was standing behind her desk, her hands on the desktop, her face pale. “It’s not a pretty sight.”
Men with soot-smeared faces brought in the stretchers. Three bodies, under dirty sheets. The smell was awful.
The creature under the desk moved and brushed Ruth’s leg.
There had been four of them in the morgue, when the firemen had come. Now two were hiding in the supply closet, and one had made a dash for the staircase. Bob was huddling under the desk.
The firemen put down their stretchers, opened the ice drawers.
“We will get you the reports and paperwork tomorrow.” The chief walked closer, and Ruth retreated. She could smell the musky tang of the creature under the desk. Felt his breath, hot against her leg. But the fireman just looked her in the eye and frowned. “For the moment, put down in your registers we’ve got three of them, male, in their thirties by the look of them.”
“Shouldn’t there be an autopsy?” Ruth asked, her voice shaking.
The fireman shrugged. “It’s pretty clear what killed them,” he said. “I doubt the city will waste too much time or money on them.”
“Poor bastards,” another man said, pushing the drawer closed.
They were folding up the stretchers. They nodded to her as they filed out, and in a moment she heard the trucks starting. She sat down with a sigh.
Three more, the thing under the desk said.
The closet door opened, and the other two peered out.
“You can’t take these,” she replied. “Not yet.”
They are cooked, Bob conceded. The Devourer would reject them. But we can consume them anyway. Honor them. Share them.
Ruth’s heart skipped a beat. She had always known, of course. The knowledge had been festering at the back of her conscious mind for weeks, months now. But now she could no longer hide from it.
They ate them.
The Devourer Below was a greedy master, but he did share his food with his servants.
Ruth pushed back a bout of nausea. “Does Olivia… and Collins…?”
Sometimes, her confidant said.
She closed her eyes. “And am I expected to?”
Where had that thought come from?
When the time comes. Soon. In the woods.
“I don’t think I could.”
The creature gave a brief shrug. Your time will come. You are a lot like us. You hide away. Secretive. You are not used to being seen. You would feel at home with us, down below. You could share the food with us.
Ruth laughed. “Are you flirting with me?”
Bob’s eyes were like dying embers in the dark. You have a mate already.
Ruth shuddered. “What do you know of her?”
She has a nice smell. We feel it on you. His gaze lingered on her face. She would be welcome too. In the woods. And Below, too, where the Devourer awaits.
That was when Ruth decided she needed a way out of all this. She wished she still believed in God, in any god that need not be fed dead bodies. Then she could pray for some form of deliverance. For herself, and for Charlie.
•••
“Some guys were here looking for you.”
Ruth stared at Chuck Lumley, the feeling of déjà vu washing over her. “What people?”
He shrugged and picked up his hat and his bag. “Two guys, one Black, the other looking like a cop, and a woman. They were here this morning. Asked a lot of questions.”
Ruth felt a pressure in her chest. “What sort of questions?”
He shrugged and glanced at the door. His shift was over, and he wanted to go home. “Questions. About how we run things hereabouts. You know, the paperwork, the routines. They might be back. I told them you’re the one to see about the unclaimed bodies and the rest.”
Then he wished her a good evening, and left her alone with her fear.
The three strangers called about one hour later.
“Miss Turner?”
She looked up. A man in a trench coat, a young woman in a cheap coat and comfortable shoes, and a tall Black man in suspenders stood at the door of the office.
“Yes, I am Ruth Turner.”
The two men looked at each other. “Can we have a bit of your time?” Trench Coat asked. “Your colleague said you are the one we should talk to.”
“Mister Lumley,” Comfy Shoes added. She had short red hair, and large brown eyes.
“I think he mentioned you,” Ruth said. “I don’t know–”
“It won’t take long,” Suspenders said, with an affable smile. “You can call me Calvin, and my friends here are Roland and Lita.”
Ruth gave them a wary nod.
“So this is where the bodies are kept, huh?” the man named Roland asked. He gave her a look. “Before they get buried, I mean.”
Ruth arched her eyebrows. “This is the morgue,” she said.
“She’s not wrong, you know,” Calvin chuckled.
“Do you get many unclaimed bodies?” the other man asked. The same question Olivia had asked, a lifetime before.
Ruth crossed her arms. “You should define ‘many’,” she said, keeping her tone professional and detached. “I am not aware of the average figures across the country. We do get an unidentified body once in a while, but it is not a common occurrence. I am sure the police have better figures than I do right now.”
Calvin frowned. “And what about the bodies that are identified, but not claimed by any family member?”
“The lonely and the forgotten,” the woman, Lita, said. It sounded like a quote from somewhere.
“Once again, we can have one of those, once in a while. I do not have any figures at hand. If you could call again–”
“What happens to them?” Roland asked. He was slowly walking around the room, and asked his questions without watching her.
“The Town Council arranges for their burial. On the Hill, or in Christchurch.”
“What’s the difference? Why choose one or the other?”
Ruth shrugged. “A matter of convenience, I presume. We have no say in these arrangements.”
The man in the trench coat was standing by the filing cabinets. “And I guess this is where all the records are kept, right?”
Ruth stood. “Why are you asking me these questions? Who are you?”
He looked at her from underneath the rim of his fedora. “Just… you know, concerned citizens.”
“Concerned about what?”
Roland put his hand on a filing drawer handle. “I guess we couldn’t take a look at the records, right?”
“Your guess is correct, mister–?”
The Black man placed his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “I think we have inconvenienced Miss Turner enough,” he said. “Let’s go.”
They wished her a good night, and before she could ask her own questions of them, they were gone. Ruth sat down heavily, her heart racing.
•••
“And what have you told them?”
Ruth took a drag from her cigarette. She was leaning on the wall by the telephone. Her landlady gave her a hard look, and she answered with what she hoped was a reassuring smile. “What should I tell them?” she hissed into the receiver. “They wanted to know about the unclaimed bodies. And how they are assigned to the different graveyards.”
Olivia was silent for a long moment.
“You have done right,” she said finally. “Just keep acting normal. Everything’s fine.”
Ruth doubted it. The strangers were certainly not done with her.
“We must be careful,” Charlie said in a low voice when they met for lunch the following day.
Her luminous smile was gone, and she kept looking around.
“What happened?”
“A guy came to the shop,” she said. “Asking questions.”
“A guy? Questions about us?”
Charlie nodded. “Tall, wearing a trench coat and a slouch hat. He did not look like vice squad, but he certainly had a cop feel to him.”
Two nights before there had been another raid at the Southside. Another hectic scramble, another wild run through a maze of darkened alleys, police whistles and frantic footsteps. Another sharp stab of panic that had dissolved in a burst of frenzied release.
But in the cold daylight, this was different.
They walked towards the campus grounds, neither of them feeling like lunch.
“What did he want with you?” Ruth asked.
Charlie looked at her and frowned. “What do you think?”
“Maybe he’s not vice,” she said.
“Maybe we should stop going out for a while.”
Ruth stopped, like she was rooted to the ground. A young man carrying a stack of books dodged her and kept running past. “Watch out!” he shouted, and was gone.
Ruth listened to her own voice, dead and toneless. “You want to call it quits?”
Charlie’s cheeks were aflame. “Don’t be stupid,” she hissed, and squeezed Ruth’s hand.
She sat down on a bench, and Ruth sat by her side. “I just say, we should start being more careful. More private about… about everything. About us.”
Ruth stared at the tip of her shoes. “I don’t want to hide anymore.”
She was feeling again at the brink of a precipice. The endless fall was calling to her.
Charlie placed her hand on Ruth’s forearm. “I know, love. But we must be careful.” Her usual mischievous spark lit her blue eyes. “We can be together at my place. Dance to the radio.”
She was suddenly serious. “But we must be careful.”
“Yes,” Ruth agreed. “Very careful.”
•••
According to the police, whoever broke into her office was scared away by the night watchman. Ruth wondered if any of her friends from Below were also involved. A chair had been smashed, and the place was in a mess. Lumley was standing in a corner, holding his black bag like a shield over his chest.
“They cracked the locks,” the uniform cop said. He walked to the filing cabinets, trampling the spilled sheets on the floor. “And then they had a go with a crowbar on these here drawers.”
The files from the community burials.
Ruth interlaced her fingers, hoping the policeman would not notice her trembling hands. He did not.
“Not much to steal here anyway, what?” he said, genially. “Young punks, probably. Or some student prank.”
“Do we need to come down to the station?” Lumley asked. He glanced at Ruth.
The officer shook his head. “We might need a statement. You check out if anything’s missing. But as I said, this is not the crime of the century, what?”
“At least nobody got hurt,” Ruth said, trying to sound calmer than she felt.
The cop scoffed. “Kids. It’s those pulp magazines they read, if you ask me. And movies too. All those gangster stories.”
•••
The knock on the door cut short Bob Haring’s crooning about Tahitian skies, and put a stop to their dance. “Don’t–” Ruth whispered.
The knocking came again. Charlie hugged Ruth harder for a moment, then they let go of each other, and the redhead went to answer the door.
The man in the trench coat pushed her back and walked in, ignoring her protests, the Black man in suspenders and the young woman in the sensible shoes right behind him.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Roland said. He gave a long look at Ruth, taking in her neatly pressed trousers, her jacket, her tie. “Well, well,” he said, and pushed his hat back on his forehead.
Charlie stepped in front of him, her hands closed into fists. “What does this mean?”
“We need to put a few questions to your girlfriend,” he said.
“You can’t come into my house like this!”
“Really? And what are you going to do? Call the police?”
He flashed a badge at her, and put it back in his pocket. She barely got a glimpse.
Calvin grimaced. “Awkward.”
Ruth stood by Charlie’s side. “What do you want?”
Roland snorted. “Like you don’t know.”
“She’s not one of them,” the woman said. She had a steady, authoritative voice. Lita, Ruth remembered.
“Yeah, sure,” Calvin smirked.
“She’s not. I can feel that. You know I can. She’s tainted, but not yet–” she waved her hands, “corrupted.”
“Tainted?” Charlie turned to Ruth, sharply. “What does this mean? You know these people?”
“It’s OK,” Ruth said in a low voice, her eyes on Roland’s. She squeezed Charlie’s hand. “This has nothing to do with you.”
He grinned. “Yeah, sure.”
“She’s right,” Lita said. “The girl is clean.”
Charlie was no longer listening to them. “What is happening?”
Calvin sighed. “Your friend here, miss. She got involved with some bad people. Bad people indeed.”
Charlie turned to stare at her. Ruth felt a tightness in her chest, but it slowly dissolved in a cold spike of resolve. She leaned closer, and gently kissed her on the lips.
“Well, I’ll be damned!” Roland blurted.
“I need to talk to these gentlemen,” Ruth said, like she was talking to a child. “It will be alright.” She looked at the Black man. “Not here. Let’s go out.”
Roland was about to say something, but the other man stopped him. “We’ll go for a walk,” he agreed.
“I will stay here with her,” Lita said. She was staring Ruth in the eye. “I’ll make sure she’s safe.”
Ruth whispered a thank you, and followed the two men outside.
They walked slowly along the street. With Ruth in her coat and her fedora, they were just three men taking a stroll after dinner, having a smoke.
“How long have you been with the cult?” Calvin asked.
Ruth was feeling strangely lightheaded. This was not the way she had imagined it would be. “I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“We’ve seen the registers,” he said. “You’re good, but we knew what to look for.”
“Why use a crowbar?” Ruth asked. “Why not get a warrant?” She looked closely at Roland. “This is not official, is it? Who are you? What do you want?”
They were silent for a moment. “We want to do the right thing,” the grizzled man said. “Cut the snake’s head.”
“We want the top people,” Roland said. “Madame Dyer, Collins. All the others. Professor Warren too. Put a stop to the madness. For good.”
“We need to know where they meet, when,” the other explained. “Sweep the whole thing clean.”
“I know nothing of this,” she said. She felt like she was slowly sinking in deep, cold water. Her breath came out in ragged bursts. “I met Collins and, I think, Madame Dyer. Olivia. But apart from that– They only use me to get the bodies.”
“This is really a pity,” Roland said.
He stopped, his hands in his pockets. “She looks like a nice girl, your girlfriend. You think you’ll be able to keep her out of all this? You think they will let you go? Her too?”
“They threatened my family,” Ruth whispered.
Calvin placed a hand on her shoulder. “We want to help you.”
Ruth straightened her back. This was what she had been praying for. She took a bold step over the brink. “There is going to be… something. In the woods,” she said. “I do not know the details. Some kind of celebration.”
She had gone with the flow for too long. Not anymore.
“When?”
“I don’t know. Soon. I can learn more. I have been invited. So to speak.”
The two men traded a glance. Then the man in the trench coat handed her a calling card. Special Agent Roland Banks. And a phone number. “OK, Miss Cinderella,” he said. “You’re gonna give us a call as soon as you get your invitation to the ball.”
•••
They talked long into the night, holding on to each other, after the three strangers had gone.
Ruth told Charlie of Collins, and Olivia, and their racket. An insurance fraud, she explained. They bought insurance for people that did not exist, and then provided a body, and burial details, and collected the money.
“It’s horrible,” Charlie breathed.
Yes, horrible. But not as much as the truth.
“And now the feds…”
“Yes, they have been on the case for a while.”
“What will happen to us?”
Ruth smiled, and kissed her on the top of her head. “Nothing. I will help them. I am just an accessory. I will testify. They will let me off the hook.”
Charlie was slowly rocking back and forth.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Ruth took a deep breath. “Because I love you.”
•••
Ruth lit a cigarette, filling her lungs with warm courage.
“Is your invitation still on?” she asked. Bob’s burning eyes drilled into her. She hid behind a cloud of smoke. “To the feast.”
Yes.
“Good!” she smiled. “I’m curious. When will this be? Where?”
When the stars are right. Where the shadows are deeper. In the woods.
“It’s a bit vague.”
You will be told. The woman that smells of dead flowers will tell you.
“Olivia? Is she going to be fine with me coming?”
The lips of the creature curled up to reveal a thick, sharp, eye-tooth. You will come. We will welcome you. She won’t question this.
Bob lifted his hand, and his sharp talons ran along the curve of Ruth’s jaw.
You could be one of us. Your mate too.
“She won’t come,” she said, a little too sharply.
Why?
“She’s not ready yet.”
The creature nodded. But you are.
The others had carried an old woman’s body out already. Her friend was getting ready to go.
It will be glorious, he said.
Olivia’s expected visit was three days later. “Have they found out who broke in here, then?”
“Students from one of the Miskatonic Greek societies,” Ruth replied. The lie came naturally, her tone light, her voice steady. “Some kind of dare or initiation. You know how students are.”
Olivia arched an eyebrow. “No, not really. But talking about initiations… In five days, on the next new moon. Your presence has been requested. It seems our friends down below have taken a shine to you.” Olivia Dyer sounded peeved. She touched a strand of hair that escaped her powder-blue cloche, and gave Ruth a poisonous smile. “They want you along for the next ceremony. Remember, in five days.”
Ruth crossed her arms, expectant. “Where?”
A smirk. “Out in the sticks. We will send a car for you. It will be an informal thing. No black tie or anything – come as you are. But come on an empty stomach.” She licked her lips, a quick flick of her tongue. “There will be a buffet.”
•••
Collins drove a wobbly old Model T with one headlight on the blink. Ruth climbed aboard and he gave her one of his yellow-toothed grins. The engine coughed and belched black smoke.
“No tie?” he asked. “Someone might mistake you for a woman.”
His laugh turned into a cough, and he spat out of the side window.
Ruth did not deign to reply. She had opted for slacks and sensible shoes. She adjusted her hat, and glanced in the rear-view mirror, trying to spot in the dirty, cracked glass a hint of Banks and the others following them. She had found an excuse with Charlie. A providential headache. No movie tonight. She repeated to herself that all would be well.
Collins drove the car out of town, along the road to Dunwich. The trees closed around them, and the road wound through the hills, all twists and turns.
“Is it far?” she asked.
“Nervous?” He looked at her, and she wished he’d keep his eyes on the road.
“Curious, actually.”
“We’ll be there in a quarter of an hour. Then there’s a short walk up the hill.”
The rearview mirror reflected only darkness. Collins started humming a repetitive, dirge-like song. Ruth lit a cigarette and ignored his coughing.
They drove in silence, the road trying to surprise them with humps and tight bends, and finally they passed a standing stone, placed in the ditch like a sentinel. Collins gave a satisfied sigh and turned right, into the woods, past a narrow wooden bridge. He parked in a small clearing, next to three other cars.
“Come,” he said. He took a lantern from the back, and she offered him a light. Then they started through the trees. “Mind your step,” he said, holding the light high.
They followed a dirt path uphill through the undergrowth, and passed two more standing stones. Ruth tarried for a few breaths, leaning on the rough surface of one of these. She strained to catch a sound of someone following them, but all she heard was a faint breeze through the bushes, and an owl hooting in the distance.
“Are you coming?” Collins snapped.
Up ahead, she caught the faint glow of more lanterns.
“Here we are!” the man announced, waving his light and coughing again.
A broken chorus of greetings welcomed them.
Olivia was standing in front of a grassy knoll, a perfect inverted bowl, crowned with stones like fingers pointing at the sky. There was a passage, like a corridor leading down into the earth. A distant sound, coming through the ground, like a rhythmic humming.
“Oh, here comes the special guest of the soiree,” Olivia said, when Ruth entered the circle of lights. She turned to the side and gave a sign. With a faint cry, Charlie was pushed forward, and staggered on the uneven ground, trying to keep her balance. Ruth was fast to catch her in her arms.
“What does this mean?” she blurted. Her heart raced and her mind reeled. This was not supposed to happen. She felt momentarily lost.
“You make such a great couple,” Olivia leered. “Our hosts insisted you share tonight’s feast. They seem to have a strange romantic streak.”
“The more the merrier,” Collins chuckled.
A balding man in a tweed jacket harrumphed at their mirth, and scoffed. There were others waiting around, black shadows among the black trees.
“Are you alright?” Ruth asked, in a whisper.
Charlie nodded. She was pale, and her heart beat like a mad drum against her ribs. Like that first time, the night everything began, Ruth thought. “Hush,” she breathed, like she had done back then. She ran her fingers through Charlie’s disheveled hair.
“Here they come,” she said. The man’s laugh died.
Hunched shapes were emerging from the earth. Ape-like and silent, they fanned out in front of them, standing just outside the glow of the lanterns. They smelled of earth and musk and something sweet and sickening.
“All is ready,” the man in the tweed jacket intoned.
One of the black shapes detached itself from the shadows and came close to Ruth. Charlie went rigid, her eyes wide, as the thing stretched out a clawed hand and caressed Ruth’s face.
You have brought your mate. This is good.
“Oh, God–” Charlie moaned, “It’s in my head!”
Suddenly she was pushing against Ruth, trying to disentangle from her embrace. The black dog-faced ghoul took a step back, looking at her with his burning red eyes. He tilted his head to the side, frowning.
There was a bang, loud, like a thunderclap. A bullet caught the ghoul in the shoulder, and it spun around and crashed into a bush.
Ruth tackled Charlie, and together they rolled on the ground as bullets started flying, the rattle of the automatic weapons tearing through the night. The cultists and the ghouls scattered screaming as a flame arced through the air and smashed into the entrance to the barrow, erupting into a ball of fire. Pressing Charlie down, Ruth caught a glimpse of Collins staggering back, the front of his shirt soaked in darkness.
“Let’s get away from here,” she hissed, and she ran in a squat, dragging Charlie along. Hunched over, using her free hand and feet, she scampered through the undergrowth. She slipped and fell, and Charlie helped her up. They ducked behind a tall tree as the tight beam of a reflector swept the vegetation. Fear and anger were a taut ball of cold in her belly.
They stood motionless, holding on to each other, pressing against the bark. Charlie was crying. Ruth tasted her tears with a kiss, and hushed her.
Then the guns were silent. Light beams cut through the dusk. Voices were calling. The fire was roaring, eating at the trees. The whole top of the barrow was aflame, the stones standing out black against the liquid brightness of the fire. Men were coming in from their hideouts. Ruth thought she caught a glimpse of Special Agent Banks, holding a Tommy gun, and the woman, Lita.
“Let’s go,” she hissed.
They ran through the ferns, not caring about the noise, the low branches slapping at their faces. Charlie squealed as she stumbled and fell, her hand slipping from Ruth’s.
“Come!” Ruth gasped. She tried to pull Charlie back to her feet, but the redhead pushed her away with both hands. A question lingered on Ruth’s lips as a line of fire seared through her side. She cried out in pain, and turned.
“I guess we owe all this to you.”
The dancing light of the hilltop flames turned Olivia Dyer’s face into a grotesque mask, her eyes wide and crazed, her makeup smeared in dark streaks, her lips a ragged gash. She had lost her hat, and her hair was a wilderness of dirt and twigs. She had lost her shoes, and her dress was torn. She held a large knife in her hand, the ornate triangular blade glinting, red with Ruth’s blood.
Ruth pressed a hand to her side, wet, her heart pounding in her fingers.
“Two more bodies,” Olivia leered.
She lunged, pushing the blade forward. Ruth dodged, her side burning, and slammed into a tree. The blade swished close to her face, and she kicked out at Olivia. The other woman backed away and moved in a circle. With a snakelike twist, she grabbed Charlie by the hair, pulled her head up.
“The girlfriend first, then,” she hissed. She poised her blade to cut through Charlie’s throat. “I want you to see this.”
Charlie’s eyes were liquid pools of fear. “Run!” she cried.
Instead, Ruth jumped at Olivia, crashing into her. Charlie cried again as the two women rolled through the undergrowth, grappling with each other. They stopped against a tree stump, Olivia sitting astride Ruth. “I always knew it would end like this…” Olivia chuckled and lifted her knife. Charlie rushed her, screaming, grabbing her arm and wrenching the knife free. Olivia hit her in the face with her other elbow. Charlie fell back to the ground.
Olivia took a deep breath and looked around for her knife. From beneath her, Ruth grabbed her by the wrists. Olivia cursed and tried to wrestle free.
Then two large furry hands cradled Olivia’s face and twisted her head around. Her neck broke with a sound like a dry branch. Her face frozen in a surprised expression, Olivia fell to the side and was still.
Charlie scrambled to Ruth’s side, and the two women crouched in the bushes, holding each other. A familiar ghoulish face looked at them. There was dark blood pouring from a wound in his shoulder, and his eyes burned brighter than ever.
There was the noise of people moving in the underbrush. They are coming, he said. Come with me. Below. We will be safe. Your mate too.
Charlie was shaking as though in a fever. Ruth held Bob’s gaze and shook her head.
“I can’t,” she said.
Bob was still for a moment. The hunters were coming closer.
One day, maybe.
Ruth’s breath was ragged. “Maybe.”
And why not? she thought. The dog-faced creatures were honest, clean. Pure, in their strange way. They saw the world for what it was, and did not try to change it. They did not blackmail or betray each other. They had no guns, no knives. Maybe they’d let her make amends for what she’d done to them. It would be good, to finally live without hypocrisy. Free.
Ruth squeezed Charlie’s hand. “We’re safe now,” she said, slowly. Just like that night, a million years before. But different.
Ruth cast a glance at the dead, pathetic remains of Olivia. She was already free, she realized. She cleared her voice. “I will not hide anymore,” she said.
It would be good, she thought, when the moment came. Good for the both of them.
Her heart was slowing down. “One day,” she nodded to the ghoul.
The creature held her gaze for a long moment. Then he walked away into the dark, dragging Olivia’s body with him.