Evan Hunter - Lizzie

“It’s been far too long, hasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Say it.”

“It’s been far too long, yes.”

“But what is it you want?”

“Everything. You.”

“Now? This instant?”

“Yes, now,” Maggie said.

“But what of Mrs. Borden?” Lizzie said, smiling, teasing her now. “Surely her marketing is done by now, isn’t it?”

Maggie turned swiftly to look at the clock.

“There’s time,” she whispered.

“But it’s almost nine-thirty.”

“There’s yet time!” Maggie said urgently.

“And Mr. Borden? Are you not fearful of his return?”

“He’ll be at his bank, his banks. We’ve time yet.”

“Then it shall be now, of course,” Lizzie said, and again smiled.

“Yes, now,” Maggie said.

“Will you not ask for it then?”

“Yes, now, I want it.”

“Then ask your Mistress Puss politely,” Lizzie said.

“Yes, please.”

“Am I not your mistress then?”

“You are, yes, you know you are.”

“Then can you not address me as...?”

“Mistress Puss, yes. Please, Mistress Puss,” she said, and reached out to pull Lizzie to her.

“Lizzie? Is that you?”

Mrs. Borden’s voice.

On the landing outside.

“Lizzie?”

Both women sat immediately upright.

Footsteps approached the door.

The door opened.

Mrs. Borden stood in the hallway, looking into the room, aghast at what she saw. She was still wearing the heavy dress she’d had on when she left the house, but another dress was folded over her arm, the green dress that had earlier been in the clothespress at the top of the stairs. She’s come back to change her clothing, Lizzie thought in an instant. The heat outdoors has driven her home! How long had she been standing outside there on the landing? How much had she heard? And what difference did it make; her eyes now recorded all there was to see, the two naked women, Maggie reaching for her chemise and clutching it to her breasts, Lizzie’s mouth open in surprise.

“Oh,” her stepmother said.

Only that.

She continued staring into the room, knowledge narrowing her eyes. She shook her head as though trying to clear it. Maggie was scrambling off the bed now, hurrying to where she’d earlier hurled her dress to the floor, her stockings lying like twisted black snakes beside it.

“Dress yourselves!” Mrs. Borden said sharply. “The shame! Your father shall know of this!”

Lizzie leaped off the bed.

“No!” she said. “Wait!”

But for what? What was there to say to this dumpy little woman who stood in the hallway like a messenger of God come to strike her dead as surely as the prussic acid would have yesterday? How to explain, what to explain, to this woman who stood there motionless, her mouth set, her eyes blazing with the discovery she had made? The words delayed her stepmother for a moment, but only that, as though their urgency compelled her to reexamine the evidence of her own eyes, her hesitation allowing Lizzie time enough to rush to the door and out into the hallway where Mrs. Borden, shaking her head again, now turned toward the stairway leading below. Lizzie moved swiftly, blocking her path as if trying to keep her from a father already in the house.

“Get out of my way,” Mrs. Borden said.

The women stood there in ludicrous confrontation, Lizzie naked save for her bellyband and the menstrual towel pinned to it, Mrs. Borden sweltering in her heavy dress, the lighter-weight dress still folded over her arm.

“Do you hear me?” she said.

“You mustn’t tell him,” Lizzie said.

“I shall tell him all!” her stepmother said fiercely. “Get out of my way!”

“No,” Lizzie said, and shoved out at her, wanting only to keep her from the steps that led downstairs, fearful she might at once go running into the street to search for her father, babble to him what she had witnessed in the bedroom. Mrs. Borden stumbled back from the force of the push and almost lost her balance, arms coming up, the green dress falling to the floor, her eyes opening wide in astonishment. Lizzie took a step toward her, immediately penitent, her hand outstretched.

“I’m sorry,” she said at once. “I didn’t...”

“Don’t touch me!” her stepmother said.

“Mother, I...”

“Mother?” Mrs. Borden said. “Don’t you dare!”

“Please, I meant no...”

“Stay away from me!”

“I beg of you...”

“Monster!” Mrs. Borden said. “Unnatural thing!”

The words were like a physical blow, staggering her.

In blind retaliation against the words, she bunched her fist as a schoolgirl might and struck out ineffectually at her stepmother, the punch only glancing off her shoulder, her eyes nonetheless widening in fear. Lizzie’s own fear was suddenly replaced by unreasoning anger. Her stepmother’s look of terror, her instantly defensive posture, served only to confirm the hurtful surmise that she was indeed monstrous and unnatural, a creature capable of inflicting serious harm. She immediately rejected this deformed image of herself, blind anger rising to dispel it, suffocating rage surfacing to encompass and engulf the hopelessness of her secret passion, the chance discovery by this woman who stood quaking now against the closed door to the guest room, the fearsome threat of revelation to her father, the unfairness and stupidity of not being allowed to live her own life as she chose to live it!

Her stepmother turned away suddenly, fumbled with the knob on the door and threw the door open. She slammed the door shut behind her, tried to hold it closed as Lizzie shoved against it, and then stumbled back into the room, almost falling, when Lizzie shoved against it with all her might, the door banging back against the wall from the force of her fury. Her stepmother regained her footing, backed away from Lizzie as she advanced, darted as though to run toward the windows, rushed instead into the narrow space between the dressing case and the bed, discovered the wall, made a small, squealing sound, turned yet again — and found Lizzie standing there in silent, savage rage, blocking all escape. Unseeingly Lizzie reached for the candlestick on the dresser’s marble top, her hand closing familiarly and fiercely around the stem, the base turning up, the taper toppling from its pricket.

“No, don’t,” her stepmother murmured, and Lizzie struck her.

She swung the candlestick downward from the right, catching her above the left ear and opening a bloody gash some two inches long. Stunned, her stepmother backed away from her, twisting her head to avoid any further blows, and Lizzie struck her again, on top of the head this time, a little back of the crown line, the edge of the candlestick penetrating the scalp and the skull, and yet again immediately, the next blow nearly parallel to the other, blood splashing onto the dressing case’s marble slab and upper drawer, her stepmother twisting away, stunned, turning, falling to her knees, blindly grasping the air for support as Lizzie struck her again from behind.

The blow caught her stepmother on the back, to the right of her neck where it joined the shoulders, splashing blood onto the lower drawer and faceboard of the dresser case, and she fell flat to the floor and tried to clasp her hands behind her twisted head, her face close to the wall as Lizzie straddled her and struck her again, and again, and again, blood splashing up onto the northern wall and the faceboard of the bed, Mrs. Borden’s fluttering fingers stopping, her body quite still now. And now the candlestick fell with frenzied regularity, a dozen blows raining upon her stepmother’s head, opening a large crater in her skull, the cuts radiating out from it like the ribs of a fan or the fingers of a hand, smashing the bones and laying open the brain, drops of blood spattering up onto Lizzie’s face and naked arms, her shoulders, her breasts.