Free A Natural History of Hell: Stories by Jeffrey Ford Page B

Pretty boy.”
    Jundle dropped a little pile of turds, grumbled, and trotted off.
    “Done and done,” said the old lady. “Now let me make you kids a snack.”
    She led us into her house, through the kitchen and into the parlor, all lace doilies and puffy furniture in pea green. There was a small chandelier above, its pendants glinting, and below a braided rug in blue and silver.
    “You can sit on the love seat,” she said and pointed at a small couch. “I ’ ll be right back. Gon fetch you some of my special cookies.”
    When she left the room, we saw it. It had been sitting behind her on a shiny wooden pedestal. No, not a radio, but a big clear glass ball with a man ’ s head floating in it. I jumped at the sight and Alice whispered, “What?” And “what” was right—a head with wavy black hair, waving in the water, a black beard and mustache, eyes shut and mouth part way open to show a few teeth. At the bottom of the glass ball there was sand and a little hermit crab scuttling around in it. Tiny starfish were suspended around the head.
    Mrs. Oftshaw suddenly appeared with a tray full of cookies and two glasses of what looked like yellow milk. “Have a treat,” she said and laid it down on the little table in front of us. She backed away, and said, “Go ahead.”
    The cookies were fat and misshapen, the color of eggplant, with shreds of something sticking out all over. Neither of us made a move for them. She sat down in the armchair next to the pedestal. “I see you ’ ve met Captain Gruthwal,” she said and pointed to the floating head.
    We nodded.
    “Have a cookie, and we ’ ll wake him up.”
    Alice leaned over first and took one of the lumpy “treats.” I followed her lead. The thing was soggy as a turd and smelled like what Pa used to pull out of the gutters in spring. We bit into them at the same time, like biting into a clod of dirt, but the taste was better than sweet and made me shiver. One bite and you wanted another till the thing was gone. We each ate two more, and every time one of us would slip one off the tray, the old lady nodded and said, “That ’ s right. That ’ s right.”
    After the third, we sat back. I don ’ t know about Alice but my head was spinning a little and I felt kind of good all over. I looked at her and she smiled at me, lids half closed. “Drink your peach milk,” said Mrs. Oftshaw. It seemed like a good idea, so I did and so did Alice. I can ’ t recall what the peach milk tasted like, whether peaches or something else. We put the empty glasses on the tray, and the old lady turned to face the glass globe beside her.
    “Wake up, Captain Gruthwal,” she said. “Wake up.”
    I swear, Alice screamed louder than me when the eyes of the floating head opened and stared at us. “Captain,” said Mrs. Oftshaw. “These children want to know about the big-headed boy.”
    The floating face grimaced, as if annoyed at being awoken. Its eyes shifted toward the old lady and then rolled up, showing only white. The captain ’ s mouth opened wider and then wider, and I thought he would scream in the water. We waited for a torrent of bubbles and the muffled sound, but instead something showed itself from within the dark cavern. It was a pale knob, like a diseased tongue but much larger. It filled the rim of his lips and continued to squeeze itself out from inside him. Two tentacles emerged and then more. “ An octopus, ” I said and gagged.
    “Ugghh,” said Alice and turned her face from the sight.
    “Watch it, child,” said Mrs. Oftshaw. “Watch it good. The captain ’ s gonna show us something.”
    I felt Alice’s hand on my shoulder, as the octopus, now free, swam, pulsing its tentacles in circles around the floating head. As the pale sac of life swept in orbit around the captain, its ink oozed out of it in black plumes. Alice’s grip tightened as the face and everything else inside the globe was slowly obscured.
    “Like a dream,” said Mrs. Oftshaw, and out