“These are the skins of slaves? But … why do this?”
“In the past, books were sometimes bound in human skin. So why not a house bound in human skin?”
“No, you’re lying!”
Newton spoke with cold certainty. “Picture this: Two hundred years ago, your ancestors kidnapped thousands of men, women, and children from their homes in Africa. They were chained together, and they were transported in ships without adequate ventilation, food, or clean water. Hundreds would have died on the way. Those that survived faced a harrowing life of forced labour until they died.”
Kirkwood stared at the dried-out face of a young child. A split in the skin ran from the corner of its mouth to the distorted opening of an eye. “But why on earth would anyone cover a house in human skin?”
“Undoubtedly, your ancestors were superstitious. They were terrified that the ghosts of slaves would come looking for revenge. Superstitious people have been doing something like this to protect themselves from vengeful spirits for thousands of years. In some cultures, they make shrunken heads from their victims, or even eat part of their bodies. In the case of your ancestors, they decided to adopt elements from voodoo cults and incorporate the skin from a number of slaves into the fabric of the house.”
Despite his fear, Jeremy Kirkwood moved closer. “If they’re stretched over the entire frame of the building, there must be dozens and dozens.”
“And dozens of your ancestors must have been involved with this barbaric ritual.”
“What do you mean?”
“Even after the abolition of slavery, your ancestors continued to be wealthy because of the money they made from selling human beings. They also continued to believe that the slaves could somehow come back from the dead and hurt them, so they made sure they still kept these talismans for protection.”
“This house … I knew this house wasn’t right … even as a child, I knew something was wrong …”
“Your uncle knew, too. That’s why he rarely left what he believed to be the magic protection of this building. But he left in the end …”
At that moment, the wind started to blow from the sea. Newton thought he could hear those grim diaphragms made from tightly-stretched human skin softly hum as they began to vibrate. When the breeze quickened, the strips of finger skin fluttered. The white fingernails attached to the ends struck the tin sheets, making a popping and clicking sound. This is must have been what he’d heard earlier. Like tiny bone-hard fists hammering at the metal.
Jeremy Kirkwood gave a shriek. “Cover them up! Cover them!”
He seized the corrugated section of metal that Newton had pried off, and tried to push it back over those tremulous skins.
The fingernails tapped against that piece of tin as Kirkwood tried to shove it back into place. Instantly, the tapping became a furious clatter. In the glare of the headlights, Newton noticed filaments attached to one of those dead fingernails.
“Wait.” He pushed Kirkwood away.
“I’ll sue you! I’ll sue the entire police force! You’ll pay for this!”
After silencing the man with an angry glare, Newton turned his attention to the pearlescent fingernail. Between finger and thumb, he carefully removed the filament from the nail then held it in front of the headlamp. A single long, white hair. Straightaway, he remembered photographs in the master bedroom of Lord Alfred Kirkwood, the white-haired man who’d lived on the wealth generated by the slave trade. And he pictured the fine white hair still adhering to the hairbrush.
He fixed his eyes on the lord’s nephew, who stood there panting, with the tin sheet in his hands. He held up the hair for him to see. “I’m certain a DNA test will prove this belonged to your uncle.”
“How did it get stuck to one of those disgusting things?” He threw a frightened glance at the red material stretched tight over the woodwork. The distorted faces pulsated as the breeze played upon them. The lips tightened and slackened as if mouthing words. “And why did my uncle disappear?”
“Perhaps the magic doesn’t work anymore. Occult protection doesn’t last forever.”
The skins billowed as the winds blew harder. Fingernails rapped louder on the walls of the Tin House.
Jeremy Kirkwood appeared to freeze, his muscles locked tight. “My God … I’m the next of kin. I inherit everything. All the slave money. They’ll try and kill me, too!” His eyes blazed with terror. “You’re a policeman … you’ve got to protect me. It’s your job, you bastard!”
The man that Newton had judged to have been born with angry bones swung the six-foot by four-foot tin panel. It struck the side of the detective’s face. That heavy piece of metal cut him down as if it were an axe. Its sharp edge sliced open his jaw, blood sprayed — an aerosol of crimson in the car’s light.
He must have passed out for a moment, because when he opened his eyes, he realised he lay on the lawn, looking up at both Jeremy Kirkwood and the front of the house.
The human skins were melting. That’s what it looked like. Those skins that were almost the size of bed sheets slipped downward from the building’s timber skeleton. Jeremy stared at what was happening. He appeared fixed there. Hypnotised.
The skins continued to slide downward. Newton saw something dripping down through the narrow gap between the tin cladding and the frame at the bottom of the wall. The dripping effect resembled dark treacle being poured from a jar. Thick and continuous. These were yet more leathery remains sliding down from behind the intact panels. He realised he should try and stop his wound from bleeding, only he found he couldn’t move, either. He lay there on the grass propped up on one elbow. He watched the skins, and he realised they weren’t melting after all — they were sloughing from the woodwork. Detaching themselves from the house. Breaking free.
The car’s headlamps not only illuminated the dark red hides, but shone through them.
He could only compare those relics as something that resembled outstretched sheets on a washing line, except they moved into the wind. The mask-like faces at the top of the hides contained distorted holes where the eyes and mouths had once been. He caught sight of the whorl of navels in the centre of the hides. He saw the black discs that were the nipples.
When the detached skins reached the inheritor of the Kirkwood’s bloody fortune, they enclosed him. Sheets of human wrapping paper. They formed a parcel of Jeremy Kirkwood. His silhouette struggled inside for a while … but as time passed the struggles stopped … then even the silhouette was gone. Dissolved away. Dissipated. Broken down into slime and hair.
Newton managed to follow the paper-thin human remains that billowed and flapped across the dunes to the sea. He glimpsed peeled faces that formed part of those rippling sheets of skin. Although his senses still reeled after being struck by a section of the Tin House, he knew deep down that those skins that had once housed the bones of men, women, and children were truly free. Now they were heading for the ocean. Newton wondered if, given the right tides, favourable currents and enough time, the waters from which all life once emerged would finally carry its precious cargo back home.
THE FOX
Conrad Williams
The wind came for us as soon as we laid our heads on the pillows, as if it had been waiting for that moment. It spanked against the canvas, testing the guy ropes that were meant to keep the tent grounded. I kept thinking it would tear free at any moment and sail off into the sky. Kit was sleeping. Perhaps the weather didn’t affect her as much as it did me, or maybe she was able to shut it out; she was often talking to me about the powers of meditation. I concentrated on sleep but succeeded only in detecting another sound scampering around beneath the howl of the wind. It overcame the squeak of the tyre on the rope hanging from the oak branch, and the lowing of the cows in the next field, aggrieved at being out in such violent weather. It was something stealthier than that. Something that I almost dismissed as nothing, but for the way it kept coming back, like a heartbeat; trotting, slick. It might have been my wife’s breathing, and I might have believed that had I been tired enough.