Frightful Fables: Flash Fiction

Second Sight

The tiny bell above the public house's door tinkled, signaling the entry of the woman with the silvery, meticulously coiffed hair. A pungent haze tickled her eyes, and a shallow breath caught in her chest. She half expected them all to turn and stare, but they didn't. The tavern's patrons carried on, telling their bawdy jokes and laughing their raucous laughs. She was thankful for the dark.

Her feet moved with effort across the sticky floor, toward a doorless entryway at the far end of the bar. A lantern flickered, illuminating the painted face of a sultry woman in a glittering green turban. The matronly guest would have guessed the bombshell to have been no more than thirty-five years of age. She would have been wrong; Madame Eva was a master of illusions.

"Come, sit."

"I-I'm here because..."

"Madame Eva knows why you've come. We shall have a joyous reunion, so long as you're open to such supernatural consort."

"I myself'm a pious woman, and we People of the Book are warned against such counsel. But a bosom friend referred your, uh, services, and I trust my Lord will forgive me. Why, when King Saul called on the woman at Endor - Tell me, are you...?"

"A witch? Of sorts. Although I'm Methodist by birth...all the same to a devout Catholic woman such as yourself, I'm sure."

The woman blushed. "I didn't come to have my faith mocked. I want to know - can you put me through to my dear Lonnie?" Her eyes welled in tears.

For the next eleven minutes, the woman was enraptured, as if during a particularly moving sermon. She laughed, she cried, and with puff of smoke and a flash of light, it was over. She left exhausted and satisfied, effusing gratitude and ugly tears of joy. Her fingers, shaking with adrenaline and damp with sweat, clutched and crumpled the automatic photo in her palm.

Madame Eva sighed.

Simpleton.

With a single deft hand, she undid her corset and sucked in a breath. With her free hand, she turned up the lights and grabbed a washcloth. She had just taken a swipe at her face when the bartender entered.

"You got another client. Says it's urgent business."

"That's what they all say," Eva retorted, dabbing at a collection of sweat from her ample décolletage. "No walk-ins after last call. "

"Aw come now, Sal."

Immediately, he knew he'd made a mistake. Sallie's glare gave confirmation.

"Fine, but he's desperate. I can't turn him out in the cold."

"That's rich! You'd evict your own pa if there was a buck in it for you." Then, "Oh, alright. But dim the lights on your way out."

Moments later, a pitiful figure shuffled into the quarters. His back arched at an impossible angle and his sunken face conveyed a sadness beyond words. For a moment, Sallie considered turning him away; she couldn't take this poor creature's pension money. But Madame Eva could.

He lowered himself into the seat across from her, undoubtedly still warm from the last occupant's ample backside. "Name's Barnaby Sellers," he introduced himself in a labored tone.

"Good evening, Mr. Sellers. Are we looking to make a specific connection this evening?"

He nodded. His eyes gleamed intently, and his closed fists came to rest on the table.

"Very well then."

Mr. Sellers's gaze invaded her own, and she had to look away. His eyes were pregnant with a great knowing.

"Mr. Sellers, you'll have to excuse me. I - "

The dwarfish old man lifted himself up to rest on his haunches, leaning forward across the table. He didn't break eye contact, not even once, as he began to speak.

"He's a fairly young chap," he intoned with a sudden hint of glee. "But he's so very cold and bloated, sunk somewhere along the riverbed, where schools of 'ittle bitty fishies nip at his fingers and his toes..."

The blood in her veins congealed in that moment. The sullen man's contagiously sorrowful frown upturned into a sadistic grin.

"How did you -"

"We know all," the man answered enigmatically. Rotten peals of laughter wheezed from his lungs, exposing the few teeth that remained in his jaw. "We are all knowing."

Madame Eva guffawed, feigning boldness. She groped for the six-inch blade she kept strategically tucked under the table cloth. Searching for the cool metal of...

...the knife balanced between the impish man's grimy fingers.

"Looking for something?"

She heaved herself away from the table and leaped to her feet. She reeled backward, coming to rest against the room's far wall.

He made no move to follow her, or even to stand from his hunched position. He was clearly enjoying this exchange. "Murderess," he wheezed through grinning lips.

She sputtered indignantly. Why should she have to explain herself to this bedraggled vagabond?

He simply giggled in response, an absurd and ill-fitting trill.

"That is enough," she seethed, channeling her fear into courage. She charged from her resting place across the room and moved as if to pass the enigmatic visitor. With a single motion to stand, he stopped her in her tracks.

"Here you are," he extended a hand, palm up, offering to return the knife to its rightful owner. The blade was wedged between his thumb and an index finger. He had nicked himself, and blood oozed from a centimeter-long cut along his lifeline.

Was this some kind of trap? Some kind of mind game?

"You don't want it, then? Fine, I'll take it!"

He gripped the blade's wooden handle between his balled-up fists and, in a single, swift motion, thrust the blade deep into his abdomen. Madame Eva gasped as blood gushed from the point of impact. His face registered no pain, however, and the same malevolent grin decorated his face. As he hit his knees and toppled to the floor with a sickening thud, Madame Eva's screams rose to a swell that drowned out the bar commotion outside.