The Lonely Hearts Hotel(20)
Furthermore, there was a business room, a billiard room and a greenhouse. There was a room with a little swimming pool in it. There was a lone pair of boy’s trunks floating on the water like some sort of sea turtle. There was one room that was filled with artifacts from someone’s travels. There was a shrunken head in a glass case. Rose asked if she might have a peek through the telescope that pointed out a window, as the sun had just gone down.
“Oh, very well,” said the maid. “But please don’t make a habit of it.”
When Rose peeked through the telescope, her eye was the first to gaze into it in the past five years. The household had given up entirely on looking at the heavens. Rose jolted back and stumbled a couple of steps. She had not expected to see the moon so close up. It was terrifying. It no longer looked like the surface of a scuffed, white figure skate. It was gray and busted up and angry. It looked like it was made of gunpowder. It was as though she had just opened the door to find someone standing there naked. It was difficult to look at the moon. She thought that she had seen a face in it.
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THE MAID INFORMED ROSE that Mr. McMahon was often away on business or slept in his apartment downtown. When he did come home, it was always late at night after they’d all gone to bed. On the other hand, his wife barely left the house.
They stopped at the master bedroom to say hello to Mrs. McMahon. She was lying in bed on top of the covers, fully dressed. She had on a beautiful blue velvet dress with buttons on the front, and a pair of black boots. She also had a wet rag lying on her forehead. McMahon’s wife had a fantastic and voluptuous figure. She herself knew that it was her body that had won Mr. McMahon over when he was young. He would do anything to see her gigantic breasts. Even with the rag over half of Mrs. McMahon’s face, Rose could tell that she was a great beauty.
“Well, go and meet the children. Hazel and Ernest. They are truly possessed. And I’m not just saying that because I’m their mother.”
There was little evidence of any children living in the house, outside of the nursery, which she hadn’t seen yet. Still, she did see their tiny SOS signals as she went from room to room. In the art room, there was a pencil drawing of a boy whose head had fallen off. There was blood spurting out of his neck and head. On the glass of the window in the room with the pool someone had written HELP with the tip of their finger.
They turned down the corridor toward the nursery. A little blond boy who looked to be about six years old, wearing a zebra mask and holding a whip in his hand, was standing at the end of the hall. The maid practically jumped out of her skin when she turned and saw him there.
“I’ve been putting up with bullshit from lions for too long,” he said.
A girl came out of the room with a hobbyhorse in her hand, which she planted firmly on the ground as though it were a spear. She had dirty-blond hair and brown eyes, and looked to be about seven. She was naked except for her underwear and socks.
Rose had the feeling that the children were wild. That when she stepped into the bedroom, it would be an overgrown jungle with lush tropical vegetation and wild boars and butterflies with wings as large as tennis rackets.
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THE MAID CLAPPED HER HANDS loudly in the direction of the children. They both jumped like small animals and hurried, shouting, into the nursery. She led Rose into the nursery and left her with the children to get acquainted. The nursery was a large room, painted light blue, and had small cumulus clouds painted along the top edges of the walls. There were splendid toys on all the shelves and an exquisite dollhouse modeled on a Victorian manor. Hazel and Ernest just stared at Rose.
“Did you see the wolf come in through the back door?”
“What—what—what—what the hell are you talking about?” they demanded.
“I met him in the backyard just before I put the washing on the line. He was trying to steal some of your father’s clothes.”
They both ran to the window to look out to the backyard to see whether they could spot the wolf.
“He’s not there anymore. I confronted him about taking your father’s clothes and he said he’d ask your mother if he could have some of them.”
“Are you crazy?” screamed Hazel. “You can’t send a wolf up to see Mama! He might eat her.”
“Well, I’ll see what’s going on up there.”
“Mama doesn’t like to be disturbed,” Ernest said.
“Well, if she’s being eaten by a wolf, I’m sure she won’t mind me interrupting.”
“Hurry, please!” cried Hazel.
Rose went down the stairs. The children looked at each other, at once terrified for their mother and impressed by Rose’s bravery. When Rose walked back up to the nursery, she was wearing one of McMahon’s suits and a top hat she’d discovered in a hall closet.
“I hear there were some children looking for me. I am Mr. Wolf.”
Hazel stood up from her chair so abruptly that it toppled over behind her. She began applauding, so happy that she was getting a story without asking for one.
“Look at me. I’m not a monster. I just want some clothes so that I can get a regular job. Oh, perhaps I’ll eat a child once in a while. That’s my nature. But only the very naughty ones. Only the ones who skip school and who I catch going down the street in the middle of the day. Or I wait outside the candy store to see which child has been a glutton and then I gobble them up. Or I toss little pebbles up at windows—and see which children are up late at night. If they are up late at night, of course, it is because they want to be eaten by me.”