Free Fun House by Benjamin Appel Page A

Quipper’s.” She stared at me for a second and then hurried to her closet. Swiftly, she took off her white Formfitte and pulled a black St. Ewagiow dress out of the closet. She put it on, turned towards me and touched the attached silver skull pin. “Death the Glorious!” she said in a low sad voice. “Death, the Victorious!”
    “Are you mad?” I exclaimed.
    Her blue eyes, the eyes of my wife Ruth, flashed angrily. “Let’s not waste time. I’ll prove you can make love to a skeleton if you have to.”
    “Assignments!” I shouted. “Whose assignments? The Board’s! They’re so damned rigid, so damned inflexible — ”
    She lifted her head towards the ceiling, and it was amazing how she had managed to transform her round plump face so that it seemed thin and hollow-cheeked, “I have seen the light!” she exclaimed as if talking to that infernal mushroom. “Death, the Glorious, the Victorious! Oh, to die in victorious fusion!”
    She carried on in this way for another minute like a genuine St. Ewagiow. It was as if she were inside some sheath, some embalming fluid that sealed her in from anything I could say.
    “Gladys!” I begged her. “Let’s see Sonata!”
    Suddenly, she became herself again. “You fool, do you want to get us all into trouble? We have our instructions from the Board. Make love to me! Pretend I’m Cleo! See if you can memorize these lines. They’ll impress her.”
    “Please, Gladys, darling — ”
    “Don’t darling me! Memorize these lines.” And she recited:
    “We will soon drink from eternity
    Where we will discard all infirmity …”
    “Who wrote them?” I muttered.
    “R. Night Bauden, the poet laureate of the St. Ewagiow. The British Government put him in prison after the St. Ewagiow bombings in London in 1991.”
    I memorized the lines and she recited two more:
    “There is no help this side of the grave
    Who says otherwise is prophet false and knave …”
    “Damn!” I shouted. “Gladys, this is mad, mad, mad!”
    She slapped my face. “I’m trying to help you do your duty, you fool.” She put her arms around my waist and in that low sad voice she whispered. “Kiss me, skeleton. For what are we but skeletons temporarily paroled to life?”
    I tried to push her away, and she became angry. “How many days do you think there are to the 4th? You simply have to make love to that St. Ewagiow.”
    “I guess you’re right,” I said gloomily.
    “Let’s have those lines of R. Night Bauden.”
    But I had forgotten them, and she looked at me with disgust. “You simply have no head for cultural things!” she said. “You better try a system, some quantitative system. You might try kissing her fifteen times in succession. Can you remember that, my stupid little sparrow?” She seized me and began kissing me and between kisses she said, “I love you!” Fifteen times, she said it, and when she was finished I didn’t want to let go. She laughed and wriggled out of my arms.
    “Damn!” I said.
    “Compliment her eyes. Maybe you can remember these lines?” And she recited:
    “The eyes of a woman are her glorious prize
    Until the worms make the final seize …”
    I shook my head, and she said. “When you see her take along some of R. Night Bauden’s pamphlets. He’s written one on the subject of Universal Redemption. His argument is that since the earth is doomed eventually to become a frozen planet, time is on the side of the St. Ewagiow. They can fail in their historic mission, but Death, the last kind Mother, will eventually grant mankind Universal Redemption.”
    “Gladys, must I?”
    “You must, darling,” she sighed. “You better go now, I think you’ll acquit yourself with sextinction.” But despite the inevitable humor her face was unsmiling.
    “You don’t want me to go, Gladys.”
    “Go, go!” she shouted angrily.
    Well, what could I do? (Ruth, forgive me. I did it for you and our children, for everybody’s children.)
    I went back to suspect