Page 12 of Clutching Cthulhu’s Pearls (Time for Monsters)

No time for stealth. My riding boots thunder on the aged hardwood floors. I explode into the breeding room with a crash of the door and the clatter of instruments falling off the walls. They ring as they ping off the floor. I can’t believe I didn’t know this room existed. While the door is concealed as part of the wall, the noises within aren’t dampened. I kick myself for not questioning anything. Why did I waste so much attention on moping?

The door to the nursery is locked on my side. My fingers shake as I turn the locks. What will I find? A small creature, previously kept in a cage? Another sentient hybrid child? Another woman? I squeeze my eyes shut to block out the fear and pull. My nose is met with the musty odor of a sealed room and molding soft furnishings.

I fight against my lady’s training to gather the pillows and rugs to air them out. Oh, to run the blankets, towels, and tiny baby things through my modern washing machine! The books could use an afternoon in the summer sunshine as well. My hatchlings would love this room once I spruced it up. I creep inside to get a closer look inside the cradle.

Luckily, it’s empty.

My eggs shift, sending a jolt of love and affection to my heart as I rub my belly. If it weren’t for the rest of the house—and its diabolical owner—this would be a cozy place to raise a baby. Once they grew into a toddler, they would need fresh air, sunshine, and room to play…did Phin get those things when he was a toddler? Did he get to explore the outdoors with the security of his mother watching over him before he was abandoned outside to live in the swamp? How long was he caged in this room?

I push sentimental musings from my mind to focus on the pile of picture books on the floor. Gathering each one in my arms, I’m tempted to take them all. Will the weight slow me down? Can I open the doors one-handed? What if I drop one?

Harriett, stop being silly and move!

No, wait! The book on the rocking chair seat is thicker than a child’s book. On the cover is a picture of a princess, knight, and dragon, but the title has worn off. This is Phin’s storybook—I feel it in my bones. I dump the picture books onto the chair to claim the precious book. My hands feverishly grab anything close that may benefit my hatchlings. A few nappies, a receiving blanket, and a stuffed frog join the book in my arms as I flee the room.

Running smack into Leopold’s scowling face.

“Nesting, Dear Harriett?”

“Yes,” I reply, attempting a steady voice so he doesn’t notice I’m gulping for air from sprinting around the house. Intuitively, I lower my bounty to sit between Leopold’s body and my eggs. I hold his skeptical gaze as I conceal the blood splatters on my clothes. While Leopold ignores women’s fashion, he would take great interest in why I’ve paired a nightshirt with gardening pants and riding boots. He’s clever enough to figure out I’m escaping.

Oh heavens, the blood on my hands from Phin’s surgery is damning too.

“Glad you selected a few trifles. Your baser instincts will emerge as your incubation progresses, but you mustn’t be embarrassed by them. You must tell me everything, for the good of the experiment and mankind as a whole. The documentation is your duty as much as it is mine,” he says, grabbing my arm.

He sees me. He talks to me, but he doesn’t recognize me as Harriett. His glazed eyes miss the stains on my nightshirt. His ears are too full of future fanfare and plaudits from his guests to hear the uneven clomp of my boots as he drags me back to my rooms. No matter how I try to balance us, my limp tugs on his arm with each step. When he jerks on my bedroom door handle, why doesn’t he question why it’s still locked? He doesn’t ask me how I got out. The distraction of his impending fame puts him behind the eight-ball. Best of all, he rationalized my stealing Phin’s storybook, or he missed it under the baby blanket.

Nesting. What a Patsy.

“Now be a good dear and change into something matronly,” he says, patting my head like a child. If I weren’t shaking with fear for my eggs, I’d smack his hand away. “I have three guests in the parlor who require coffee and light refreshment—nothing too heavy, as we will tour the labs while you clean up. Then it will be your turn in the spotlight. Isn’t it wonderful that you will get the attention you always pestered me to give you?”

“Yes, wonderful,” I say, failing to keep the sarcasm from my tone.

“See, I knew you would grow into the wife I needed,” he says, planting a slimy kiss on my cheek.

“Yep,” I reply with a fake smile that squints my eyes. “You’re the bee’s knees.”

I might have laid it on a little thick, because his brow drops like an iron trellis blocking the drawbridge to freedom. A breeze blows through the gaping open window like a tattletale. He pushes me further into the room, both hands squeezing my shoulders. He must suspect something. I cry out at the bruising pressure on the delicate place where my collarbones meet the joints. His thumb digs into the pressure point. Tears bloom in my eyes. My mouth drops open wide, but his expression silences my scream.

This is a test. If it were a punishment, he’d be yelling questions. For Leopold hates nothing more than knowing less than someone else—especially a woman.

I can’t alert the scientists that I’m less than cooperative if I’m on Leopold’s side. He’s evil enough to hurt me to press the issue. I’m not surprised in the slightest. However, the fact that Phin hasn’t come up in this conversation says he—and the dungeon that held him—isn’t part of today’s tour. If the hybrids reached the swamp without detection, Phin is safe. I hold an image of them building a raft while Phin supervises in my mind’s eye to distract me from the pain.

Three…two…ah, it worked.

Leopold releases me with a shove. I’m careful to sit on the bed without throwing my feet in the air and flashing my muddy boots. His smirk of triumph churns my insides. I’ll give him this victory, but he will celebrate it alone.

“Not more than five minutes,” he warns as he backs out the door.

I nod like a docile wife until the door’s latch quietly clicks shut. No lock engagement. Do I dare run through the house? Do I try the window again? Damn, my rope of sheets isn’t attached to my bedpost. It lays uselessly in a heap in the grass below. I don’t dare to hope it will cushion my fall. My knee twinges in agreement. Going through the house is my only option, which means fooling anyone who may cross my path.

My gardening dress isn’t the finery I usually wear to entertain, but I can’t pass up the tool’s pockets. He did say to dress matronly. I sigh at my glittery flapper dresses as I bid them farewell once more. Knowing the frigid water of the swamp intimately makes me long for thermal underwear, not beaded fringe.

I add a thermal layer under my riding pants and jam the storybook into my biggest pocket at the hem of my apron. It weighs down the heavy dress, but I can still run. Trinkets with dual purposes, such as hat pins, fasteners, and half-empty gin flasks, fill the smaller pockets. I exchange the laces of my boots with longer ropes. I may need rope, thicker than the suture string I gave Ruth, in my raft life.

I’ve never lived on a raft, but the opportunity brightens my face to a smile, rivaling the late afternoon sun. An aura of fancy washes over me, and I pin the receiving blanket I stole from the nursery to my shoulders. Not only will it keep my hands free, but it will enhance my demure appearance should I get caught. I tuck my hairbrush in my apron strings after running it through the snarls on top of my head on the way out the door.

With my chin held high and my upper lip stiff as a board, I march down the hallway. Eyes trained on the top of the stairs, I don’t turn to my left or right in case I trigger myself with a glance into the wrong room. If I calmly exit the house, I’ll make it to Phin. One foot forward turns into one step, which increases to one hallway. I made it to the stairs!

Rhythmic. Serene. Unhurried.

There’s the front door. Too close to the front parlor where men’s laughter and cigar smoke leak from underneath the door. My heart breaks as I glide past an exit and the den of my enemies. The back door will give me a straight path to the swamp without windows to give my exit away. Plus, there’s the added bonus of my footsteps disappearing into the kitchen in case Leopold listens to my movements.

Ten feet. Three steps. No, no, don’t speed up. I can’t allow Leopold to suspect anything. Even steps, calm breathing, rubbing my belly, I must be the picture of domestic bliss. The kitchen door creaks as I open it—a signal that I’m obedient.

My veneer shatters as soon as I enter the kitchen.

Phin’s puddle on the table. Snipped ends of suture thread. Bloody hand prints on the kettle.

“Want to explain, Harriett?” Leopold leans against the countertop, wiping his hands on a fresh dish rag. “I came in here to put the kettle on, to help you serve our guests, and look what I found. Either you hunted a very large animal and butchered it, or you’ve been playing doctor.”

“Did Mr. Breyers hunt this morning? Perhaps he—”

“Do you doubt I know the whereabouts of my staff? I know Mr. Breyer’s activities this morning didn’t include hunting. He was disciplining a naughty specimen and got quite messy—almost as messy as this room. Do you know which specimen required discipline? Do you know the fate of your precious Phin?” His evil smile brightens to the sinister glow of a full moon.

“Phin? What happened to Phin?” I play dumb so I can inch closer to the back door. Leopold doesn’t exercise. I can outrun him. I must distract him long enough for a head start.

“Last I saw Phin, he was no more than a puddle of flesh—shaped like the stain on this table. Tell me, Harriett, did you sneak into the dungeons? Did your sinful ways lure your corrupted soul into the bowels of this house? Were you jealous that I never took you down there?”

“There’s no dungeon in my home,” I say with more bravado than I feel. Leopold rears back as if I’ve slapped him. “Everything in this house is half mine, and I’d never allow a dungeon to be built inside it. That is inhumane.”

“Your home? Your home! This home is mine. The estate is mine. The labs and observations are mine! Humane? Humane! You want to talk about humane. I am the human in this house now that you are full of eggs. You’re an animal, an incubator, a cunt for me to fill and empty as I see fit. Nothing is yours. You! Are! Mine!”

Silence descends over the house as Leopold remembers we have visitors.

Soft, leather shoes of gentlemen squeak as they leave the parlor. I imagine their wingtips flashing as they race down the hallway and into the kitchen.

“You’ve ruined everything!”

Leopold’s hair waving is the flag to wake me from my musings as he lunges for my throat. I duck at the last moment, falling onto my hands and knees. Ruth explodes from the pantry, yielding the large ceramic bowl as a weapon. Leopold collides with her, but she’s much taller than me. His fingers bury into the muscles around her ribs instead of around my neck. Clang! She wacks the back of his head with the bowl.

“What the devil?” Dr. Alexander Breakfield, the coroner, exclaims from the doorway. Behind him peeks Dr. Herman Moldenman and Dr. Jacob Ledernoskoff from the University of Louisville.

“Run, Harriett, run!” Ruth screams as she throws Leopold’s motionless body to the floor. She bats a path to the door with her bowl using forehand and backhand strokes.

The scientists retreat to the hallway, screaming like children.

My dress glides over the dry patches of blood as I shuffle under the kitchen table and across the room. One last glance over my shoulder… Leopold is out cold, but for how long? Part of me hopes Ruth killed him, but I guess that’s the wicked part he and Mr. Breyers saw in me.

“Come on, Harriett, Phin’s waiting for you,” Ruth says, swinging me into her arms.

She tips the bowl upside down to fit over my belly as we cross the threshold. I shield my eyes from the burning rays of the sun, hoping they burn the sins from me before I reach Phin. Phin, who doesn’t have a mean or callous bone in his body, deserves a better mother for his hatchlings, but I’ll do my damndest to love him the best I can.

Visions of hatchlings, rafts, and Phin swim through my head, along with the black dots of the vapors. As the adrenaline drains from my body, the terror of all I’ve been through this day seeps into my bones. My eyes roll as if the energy to focus them is more than I can handle. I’m in no way out of danger, but the respite of allowing Ruth to care for me is intoxicating. My body has no more resources. I’ve done everything to ensure our survival. My consciousness gives up its grip on my mind as I nod off to the gentle swaying of Ruth’s footsteps.

Harriett

“She’s fine,” Ruth barks as I’m jostled awake.

I clutch her arms in terror.

“Leopold? Ruth? Phin? Don’t let them have me! I won’t let them take my babies!” I yell before scanning my surroundings. The hybrids’ facial expressions range from horror to pity to amusement at my outburst. “Sorry, I was dreaming.”

“We know, dear, we have those nightmares too,” Ruth says as she sets me onto a raft next to Phin’s wrapped body. If it weren’t for his smile peeking through the fresh bandages on his face, I’d think he was dead.

“Not for long,” I reply, recovering my strength. “Come with us. If the aquatic hybrids take turns swimming, we can all…”

“No,” Raymond says, handing me a pole taller than myself. “You must live the raft life.”

“I’ll swim alongside and help you navigate the tributaries to the big river, but then I must turn back. My brothers and sisters of the swamp need me,” Thomas says before he slips into the murky water.

“They can come too. I’ll need help when the Ohio River reaches the Mississippi. Will this raft withstand the current or be blown apart? I’ll have my hatchlings…and Phin may still be injured…we need you as much as you need to come with us,” I plead.

“Do it for us so that we can dream of your happiness,” Roy finishes as he pushes us from the shore and towards the tributaries of the Ohio River.

I sob openly as we drift away from their forlorn faces. All I wanted was companionship, and now I’m more scared and alone than ever…