The Cure for Dreaming(16)
“Oh—my Lord!” I sank back against my chair and grabbed the armrests. “Oh, God!”
Henri Reverie kneeled on the floor in front of me, and he had turned into the most delightful creature upon which my eyes had ever feasted. Flawless skin. A perfectly structured nose. Sumptuous red lips that looked ripe and full and ready to be touched. Pure blue eyes with bottomless pools of dark pupils that reflected his sincerity and concern. Concern for me.
“Do you feel all right, Miss Mead?” he asked in a voice like a distant echo, as if spoken from the opposite end of a tunnel. He leaned forward on his knees, and I couldn’t help but reach out and sift my hand through his hair, which slid through my fingers like golden threads of sun-bright silk. The rest of the world darkened into shadow around him. All I could do was look at him—really look at him.
“Olivia!” snapped Father, also in a faraway voice. “Why are you touching him?”
I lifted my face toward Father to try to describe Henri’s confounding beauty, but my tongue froze when I caught sight of a fiend in a white coat standing in the lobby where my father should have been. The brute’s red eyes gleamed bright and dangerous, and his skin went deathly pale and thin enough to reveal the jutting curves of the facial skeleton beneath his flesh. His graying beard resembled the flea-infested fur of a rat.
“What is it?” asked the fiend, his canine teeth as sharp as the fangs of a wolf or the deadly tip of a scythe. “Are you cured or not?”
I clutched the armrests until my fingers ached, and my knees knocked against each other with the thumping of bones and a wild rustle of skirts. I opened my mouth to shout, You look like a monster! What’s wrong with you? Get away from me. I hate you!
Yet only three limp words emerged from my lips.
“All is well.”
bolted.
I didn’t even wait to see what Mr. Dibbs and his bloody tooth socket looked like back in the recesses of the operatory. The monstrous version of Father shouted something about catching me, but I darted out the front door and down the street before anyone could chase me down.
Outside, the world felt as if it had tipped sideways and knocked everything askew. The air had grown too thin to breathe. Shop windows reflected blinding sunlight that throbbed behind my eyes. The city had turned as bright and vivid as a theater stage at the height of a performance, yet the noises of my surroundings—carriage wheels, trotting hooves, peddlers hawking wares from carts—sounded muffled and tinny. Even my sense of smell dulled as my eyes viewed the world with startling clarity. I saw two women across the street with blood on their necks. A man in a business suit and derby hat came my way, and his face was as gaunt and pale and fanged as Father’s.
I panted and slid my hand across the cold sandstone walls for support and somehow managed to run across the street and down the next block—before I stopped in front of an establishment that was caging up women.
Yes, caging women.
On a corner lot where a regular storefront should have stood, a giant copper cage held five ladies prisoner. Their shoulders and hats squished together in a crowd of feathers and fine wool dresses, and they buried their noses inside some sort of pamphlet that distracted their attention from the freak-show absurdity of their situation.
Out in front of the entrapment, a female carnival barker—I didn’t even know women could be barkers!—in a red-striped jacket and a straw boater hat yelled, “Welcome! Welcome! Come see the only proper place for women and girls.”
A young blond woman in a tailored blue suit took a pamphlet from the barker and climbed inside the cage with the other ladies. The barker promptly shut the cage door and locked it tight.
“Miss Mead!”
Footsteps ran toward me, and before I knew what was coming, Henri Reverie grabbed me by my arm. “Are you all right?”
The hypnotist had returned to his shady young showman appearance, and he smelled as dusty and smoky as the letters Mother wrote from backstage dressing rooms. Sounds regained their full volume. Henri’s hair lost its brilliance.
“Th-th-they’re caging up women,” I said. “They’re locking them up right here . . .”
I turned and pointed, but instead of the copper cage, I saw a brick building with a wide white banner hanging above the glass door.
HEADQUARTERS
THE OREGON ASSOCIATION OPPOSED TO THE
EXTENSION OF SUFFRAGE TO WOMEN
A slender middle-aged brunette with an entire stuffed quail perched upon her hat—not a strange female carnival barker—stood in front of the opened door, and she caught my eye and said, “Would you like to come inside and see what we’re all about, dear?” She held out a pamphlet and smiled with a fine pair of false front teeth, undoubtedly fitted by Father. “Read about the hair-pulling, face-scratching women of Idaho who turned into heathens once their state allowed them to vote. We’ll teach you about the proper sphere for ladies.”
I yanked myself free of Henri and continued down the block.
Henri followed, and our feet clapped across the sidewalk in near unison. He caught me by my elbow before I could cross another street. “What are you seeing?”
“All is well.”
“Tell me.” He grabbed both my shoulders and turned me around to face him.
“All is well!”
“I need to know if everything went as planned with our session. Tell me what you see.”