The Isle of Blood

“Oh!” she cried, sitting up and digging into her purse. “I nearly forgot! Here, I have something for you.”

It was her photograph. Her smile was slightly unnatural, I thought, though I liked her hair. It had been styled into corkscrew ringlets, which more than made up for the smile.

“Well, what do you think? It’s for luck, and for when you get lonely. You’ve never told me, but I think you are lonely a great deal of the time.”

I might have argued; bickering was our normal mode of discourse. But I was leaving, and she had just given me her photograph, and a moment before I’d thought of kissing her, so I thanked her for the present and went on with my packing—that is, rearranging what was already packed. Sometimes, when Lilly was around me, I felt like an actor who did not know what to do with his hands.

“Write me,” she said.

“What?”

“A letter, a postcard, a telegram… write to me while you’re away.”

“All right,” I said.

“Liar.”

“I promise, Lilly. I will write to you.”

“Write me a poem.”

“A poem?”

“Well, it doesn’t have to be a poem, I suppose.”

“That’s good.”

“Why is that good? You don’t want to write a poem?” She was pouting.

“I’ve just never written one. The doctor has. The doctor was a poet before he became a monstrumologist. I bet you didn’t know that.”

“I bet you didn’t know I did know that. I’ve even read some of his poems.”

“Now you̵ the liar. The doctor said he burned them all.”

Being caught in a lie did not faze Lillian Bates. She simply moved on, remorseless. “Why did he do that?”

“He said they weren’t very good.”

“Oh, that’s nonsense.” She was laughing again. “If one burned every bad poem that’s been written, the smoke would blot out the sun for a week.”

She watched as I tugged my hat from the top shelf of the closet. Watched as I turned it in my hands. Watched my face as I ran my finger over the stitching on the inside band: W.J.H.

“What is it?” she asked.

“It’s my hat.”

“Well, I can see it’s a hat! It looks too small for you.”

“No,” I said. I stuffed the hat into my bag. It had been his first—no, his only—gift to me. I was determined never to misplace it.

“It fits,” I said.

I had the dream that night—my last night in New York and the last night I would have it.

The Locked Room. Adolphus fumbling with his keys.

The doctor said you’d want to see this.

The box on the table and the lid that won’t come off.

I can’t open it.

The box trembles. It mimics the beat of my heart. What is in the box?

Thickheaded boy! You know what it is. You’ve always known what’s in the box. It isn’t what’s inside he wanted you to see: It’s the

box!

I pick it up. The box trembles in my hand. It beats in time with my heart. I’d been wrong; it was not the doctor’s. It belonged to me.

I was not down for breakfast promptly at six the next morning. Mrs. Bates came up to check on me; I heard her hurrying up the stairs, and then the bedroom door burst open and she stood gasping in the doorway. I noticed she was holding an envelope.

“William! Oh, thank God. I thought you had left.”

“I wouldn’t leave without saying good-bye, Mrs. Bates. That wouldn’t be proper.”

She beamed. “No! No, it most certainly would not. And here you are, and here is your bag with all your things, and I suppose you have not changed your mind?”

I told her that I had not. An awkward silence came between us.

“Well,” I said finally, and cleared my throat. “I’d better go.”

“You must say good-bye to Mr. Bates,” she instructed me. “And thank him for all he’s done.”

“Yes, ma’am8221;

“And, forgive me, William, but really, you must think I’ve gone mad if you think you’re leaving this house with your hair looking like that.”

She found the comb beside the washbasin and ran it through my hair several times. She did not seem pleased with the outcome.

“Do you have a hat?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I dug into my bag for the hat with my initials. I heard what sounded like the soft cry of a wounded animal and looked over at her.

“William, I must apologize,” she said. “I do not have a bon voyage present for you, but, I will say in my defense, I had hardly any notice that you were leaving. It was literally sprung on me at the last moment.”

“You don’t need to give me anything, Mrs. Bates.”

“It is… customary, William.”

She sat on the bed. I remained standing beside my little bag, turning the hat in my hands. She was tapping the envelope upon her lap.

“Unless you would consider this a gift,” she said, nodding to the envelope.

“What is it?”

“It is a letter of acceptance to Exeter Academy, one of the most prestigious preparatory schools in the country, William. Mr. Bates is an alumnus; he arranged it for you.”

“Arranged what?”

“Your acceptance! For the fall term.”

I shook my head; I didn’t understand. The hat turned; the envelope tapped.