This story received an Honourable Mention in Ellen Datlow’s Years Best Horror and Fantasy of 2002

Suffer the Little Children

R C Daniells

The children run wild. There’s eight of them and their mother’s no better than you’d expect. As for their father, he only comes back long enough to pick a fight. Not many people want to live this far out of town. It’s a good twenty minute walk, though I can’t get around like I used to. Still, you can’t choose your neighbours so when they moved in two years ago I tried to welcome them, but they were too proud to accept Christian charity.

The radio’s crackling, breaking up the rubbish they call songs nowadays. End of a decade, end of an era, the Deejay says. World’s been going downhill since they assassinated the US president. Camelot, they called it, death of a dream, but I can’t forget that poor little boy, saluting at his father’s grave.

I’ll be glad to put this decade behind me. Free Love? Nothing’s free in this world. People from my generation had it tough. Two wars and the depression. Evan and me, we had to carve a home out of the bush and fight every day to stop the bush reclaiming what we’d made. Seems all my life’s been a battle and now, when I want a bit of peace, I’m plagued with these kids from down the road.

I squint into the setting sun. The youngest girl is wandering up the street stark naked again. Even though she’s not two yet I caught her in my kitchen yesterday trying to pinch a biscuit hot out of the oven. Of course I didn’t give her any. Feed them once and you’ll never get rid of them.

Something the same shade as the dusty dirt road is slinking along behind her. My heart does an uneasy flip flop. It’s one of those goannas. Seems since Evan died seems the lizards have been getting bigger. From nose to tail-tip they’re as long as a tall man and bold -- you wouldn’t believe the number of times I’ve chased them off!

Scavengers have a nasty bite, and she’s so small ....

Levering myself out of the rocking chair, I hurry down the front steps, my swollen feet aching, joints protesting. I grab a rake, waving it over my head. ‘Be off with you!’

The goanna scurries into the long grass on the road’s verge. The girl gives a start and looks up at me.

‘As for you, get along home. And put some clothes on.’

She regards me with the unselfconscious stare of the very young. These children have no shame. I caught three of the boys with a kitten on Christmas Day. Poor thing’s probably dead by now. Between them and the goannas it’s a wonder my hens still lay. I need those eggs. The Australia Day Show’s coming up, and my sponge cake has won thirty-two times.

Our prize ribbons were Evan’s pride and joy. I’m keeping an eye on the melon patch. There’s a beauty that looks about ready to ripen by the end of the month. After Evan died I entered his melon in last year’s show. It didn’t win, but I reckon this melon could.

As I leave the rake beside the steps I glance under the house. I no longer go in there, not since I found that huge carpet snake. Under the house was Evan’s territory, that and the car. I sold it when he died.

On the veranda I get the breeze from the valley but it’s still fearful hot. Air’s thick enough to cut. The heat rises off the roof of the house opposite, making the bush behind it shimmer. Their frangipani tree’s dropping blossoms. I’ll have a word with them when they come back from holidays.

Everyone’s gone off and left me here with that family. Last night the mother sent her eldest girl for mosquito coils. They’d burnt the last one and the mossies were awful bad, coming up from the creek, she claimed.

I told the girl that her mother should darn their mosquito nets. The Lord helps those who help themselves. People shouldn’t have children if they can’t take care of them.

It’s a struggle for me, too. I should sell the house but how can I walk away from forty years of memories? It would grieve Evan to see the place like this. The railings are coming off the veranda and the stumps are sagging. We built our place on the burnt-out remains of an old farm house, nothing but a blackened chimney. It saddened me to see someone’s dead dreams reclaimed by the bush. From that day to this we’ve fought to hold back the rain forest. Its creatures are always invading my vegetable garden. I never know when I’m going to come across a big blue-tongue lizard, or a frill-neck that’ll rear up and hiss at me. They seem bolder since Evan went.

The day he died he was sitting on the veranda enjoying the view, when he suddenly cried out for me to come and see something. But by the time I got there he was dead and whatever he’d seen was gone. Doctor said his heart just gave out.

Of course I miss him. He would have taken a broom to the possums last night when they raided my mango tree, grunting and fighting up and down the verandas, leaving their messes. No better than him and her, when he’s been out drinking.

I can see two of their kids now, creeping back from the bush with tins. They’ve been fishing for eels in the creek. My dinner’s on the cooling rack, a meat pie. The pastry’s thick and crusty just the way Evan liked it. Don’t expect the kids’ll get hot food tonight.

I turn away. From the front veranda I can see across the valley where blue-black clouds are gathering. Lightning flickers like a petulant child. Storm should bring cooler weather. With this scorcher of a summer the water tank’s been getting low.

Nearly time for dinner.

I make my painful way down the hall, past the faded photos of Evan on the police cricket team. No photos of children fill the gaps. The lord chose not to bless us. Though why he would give her all those children and leave Evan and me childless ....

Sunlight glints through the leadlight glass in the kitchen door. As my hand closes on the knob I hear excited childish voices. Righteous indignation fills me. I throw the door open catching four boys and the middle girl, wilder than any boy, in my kitchen.

I grab the broom and go for them. They shriek and caper about the table taunting me, the little devils. My second-best china tea pot hits the floor, smashing to smithereens. When the pie lands face down on the lino they run for it.

I slam the door behind them, head spinning. Sinking into the chair by the kitchen table I fan myself with the tea towel. I am so angry I could wring their scrawny necks. God forgive me.

Evan didn’t talk about his work much, but he did say more murders were committed during high summer in the tropics because the heat drove people mad. Going troppo, they call it. I’m not surprised.

My perfect pie lies at my feet, spoiled by those little heathens. I kneel down to scrape it up but I won’t throw it in the bin where they might find it. For now, I leave the ruined pie on the draining board and get rid of the broken china.

I need a good cup of tea, no, something stronger. I keep a bottle of brandy for plum puddings. I don’t hold with drinking, but tonight when I pour half a glass my hands tremble. The brandy sears all the way down, bringing tears to my eyes. Lord, why do you let them plague a poor old woman like this?

As if to mock me, their laughter echoes from the vegie patch. Grabbing the broom I throw open the back door. Soon as they see me, they’re off. I hobble down the steps, sick with dread. I know what I’ll find before I get there.

White light blinds me. I blink and discover Evan’s prize watermelon, hacked to pieces. Green skin split open, bright pink pulp smashed!

The heavens open with a crack of thunder so profound I fall to my knees in the rich black dirt. Down comes the rain, buckets of it, soaking my hair, running down my neck. The cool is welcome until I start to shiver. With an effort I get up and stagger through the mud to the back steps. The gutters are overflowing and water pours off the veranda roof.

I close the back door and stand there, dripping on the lino. After a moment I flick on the kitchen light. The flypaper strip hangs from the ceiling, dead flies dotting its sticky length. Its shadow sways on the wall. The rain roars on the corrugated iron roof. I feel besieged, overwhelmed.

A hot bath will stop these shivers.

The single bulb flickers and dies. I could just sit down and cry -- but I don’t. One of the last things Evan and I did before he died was buy a new gas stove. Thank God we didn’t buy electric. I can still heat a bath. No fear of running out of water now.

By the time I’ve cleaned up and had my bath I feel ready to confront that woman about her children. I dress for visiting. Still no electricity but the storm has passed and the air is steaming, dripping. It is light enough to walk down to her place.

I keep to the road to avoid the long grass. Never know what it could hide. Snakes like the hot weather.

Their father’s rusty ute sits in the drive way. I go past it to the kitchen where she’ll be getting tea. The rich smell of roasting meat greets me, making me wonder how she makes ends meet.

Door’s open. I climb the steps and calling hello. I startle her standing at the kitchen table, slicing the roast by the light of a candle while the smallest children wait for their share.

‘The Lord knows I’m a reasonable woman,’ I tell her. ‘But this can’t go on. Today your children deliberately destroyed my prize watermelon. The one I was going to enter in the show!’

She frowns and calls the older children. They shuffle in, gnawing at bones, curious eyes glinting in the candle’s flickering light. Before I can tell her who’s to blame the father stalks in, plate in one hand, beer in the other.

‘What’s this all about?’ he demands. Suddenly he curses, eyes wide with horror. ‘Bloody Hell! You didn’t feed me that?’

I don’t understand. The roast lies there on its back, legs extended, tail .... Tail?

‘It’s a bloody g ...goanna!’ He gags, shoves his beer and plate onto the table and runs from the room.

The children chortle, fighting over his meat. Their mother looks across at me and I see her clearly for the first time. Cruel laughter lights her eyes. Suddenly I realise she isn’t the victim. She’s manipulating him, her and her brood are driving the poor man to drink and worse. There’s a wrongness about her that suddenly brings back a memory.

When I was no more than three I opened the door to the outhouse and found a snake coiled on the floor. The snake lifted its head and regarded me. Primitive terror closed around my heart, squeezing the breath from my chest. I dared not move. My fear had been instinctive and it had saved my life, Dad said.

This is what I feel now, and I freeze. Then she shakes her head, and she looks just like a mother worn down to nothing by poverty and ignorance. I no longer have the will to carry this confrontation through.

Without a word I turn and flee the kitchen. I don’t even feel the pain in my hips as I rush down the back steps. I hurry at a shuffling run up the road.

I’m half way home when his ute roars past me, heading for the pub, no doubt. With this normalcy returns and I feel silly. So she cooked up a goanna. My mum fed us rabbit if the boys could catch one.

It’s dark by the time I get home and I fill a kerosene lamp, adjusting the flame. Mosquitoes come with the night, persistent and angry. I light the coils and their familiar acrid smell comforts me. When I change into my nightgown my stomach grumbles making me think of dinner. The power is still off so its just as well we didn’t get rid of the ice box. It’s on the back landing.

I‘m putting fresh water in the cooling tray when I hear shuffling from the yard below. It’s either one of those wretched goannas digging the pie out of the compost, or the children. Both as bad as each other.

The steps creak. I reach for the broom. The goannas have taken to prowling the verandas looking for food, scratching at the doors. Seems the bush is trying to invade my very home.

It’s a relief when the blond head of the eldest girl appears in the dim light. Then I remember I’m wearing my nightgown and stiffen.

‘Mum says she’s awful sorry ‘bout the melon,’ the girl whispers from the second top step. She blinks her fringe from her eyes and wrinkles her sunburned nose. She’d clean up pretty. A wild flower growing on the rubbish heap. ‘Mum sent this over.’

She pulls her hand out from behind her back, offering a lemon. It’s late in the season and the lemon’s over-ripe, probably half rotten. I thank her as I take it, meaning to toss it in the compost. Perhaps I’ve been too judgmental.

She gives me a relieved smile and glances into my lamplit kitchen. ‘Your place is so pretty.’

On impulse I beckon her inside and select a jar of mulberry jam from the pantry. When I was a child jam was a real treat. ‘This is for your mother.’

Her smile warms me. It strikes me that God moves in mysterious ways. Maybe the children are his blessing in disguise.

Her father’s ute roars down the dirt road and she shudders. ‘Better go. Dad’s in a funny mood.’

I don’t say what I really think of her dad. She scurries off, I walk around the veranda to check that all the windows and French doors are locked on three sides of the house. The air is the same temperature as my skin, promising more rain, and the mossies are terrible. I am so weary it is an effort to go through my nightly ritual.

After I kill all the mossies that have hidden inside my net and tuck in the ends, I’m safe. I lie there, in the heat of the closed up house on the stiff, starched sheets and pillow cases, but sleep eludes me. I can still see the father’s expression as he realises he’s eaten goanna. I smile, serves him right. Men with their weakness for alcohol and anything in a skirt!

A sharp cry pierces the night. A woman’s tirade is answered by a deep male voice. The language makes me blush. I turn over, shutting my ears to it.

Silence, then her pitiful pleas.

His voice berating her. Crack. Crack.

Gun shots?

I am out of bed, pushing the netting aside, swollen feet on the cool polished floor before I realise it. Fear for her makes my heart thunder.

Were they gun shots or a car back firing? Should I call the police? He’s always knocking her around and she never reports it.

I open the window which looks down the dead-end street. The air is cooler outside, filled with the sounds of the night. My blood drums in my ears, along with the whine of the mosquitoes and the cries of the bats as they fly overhead to invade the town and raid the fruit trees.

The single streetlight isn’t on and their house is only a pale shape, with the dark bush behind it. No lights in the windows. The moon comes out from behind a cloud. Now I can see the overgrown yard, the lemon tree. Nothing moves.

I am about to go back to bed when a little shadow runs towards the bush on the high side.

Crack. It falls and does not move. A little body lost in the long grass.

My breath catches in my throat. Their father’s gone troppo. I must call the police. Fumbling, I close the window.

I don’t dare light the kero lamp, just as well I know every step of my house. It’s very dark because the verandas hold back the moonlight. My fingers shake. For a moment I can’t remember the number I used to know by heart. Two shots in rapid succession make me whimper. I clutch the receiver and find the right hole by counting around the circle. I’m on the third digit when I realise there’s no dial tone. I jab the receiver’s cradle but the phone lines are out.

I imagine the children running, bent double in the long grass as he stalks them. I must get help. But what can I do? I could creep down the back steps and walk into town, but it would all be over by the time I got back.

There’s a soft, persistent tapping at the living room’s French doors. I freeze. The back doorknob rattles.

Some of the children must have escaped. They’ve run to me. They’ll bring him down on me. My heart falters, I feel ill.

I can hear their little voices pleading. Let me in. Let me in!

I taste bile on my tongue. They scurry along the veranda, taping at the windows, trying the locks. Weeping.

Lord, you said, suffer the little children to come unto me, but not like this. I’m just an old woman against a man with a gun. Fear overcomes me. I sink to the floor, pressing my back against the wall under the phone table.

Huddling there, I look deep into the dark night of my soul and find I am less than I thought I was. God, give me strength!

But before the Lord can, heavy footsteps thud up the front stairs. The verandah boards shift under the father’s weight. The children shriek. Lord, strike down this man and deliver us from evil!

But my prayers fall on deaf ears. The father chases them. The children scream and run for the back steps.

I can’t get enough air. I still hear the echo of their voices, pleading with me to take them in. I failed them.

The creaking boards tell me the devil himself has returned. He taps on the front door calling my name. ‘You gotta listen to me. We’re both in danger. Those kids, they’re evil, just like their Mum. For Chrissake open the door!’

He means to silence me. My mouth is too dry to swallow.

He moves along the veranda. A gentle drumming on the roof heralds more rain. It drowns out his footsteps. I strain to hear him. With one shove he could force the French doors. There’s nowhere to hide, nowhere to run.

I will not cower here. Lord, you said, Vengeance is Mine, but it’s clear I must look after myself. I stand up and prepare to confront the devil.

My mind runs faster than my feet. There are no weapons in the house, Evan had seen too many accidental shootings, but we do have the gas. I can still save the children.

‘Just a minute. I’ll get my robe,’ I call, then I scramble to the kitchen and turn the gas on. Through the dining room windows I see him marching around the veranda, heading for the back door.

I undo the lock then move to the far side of the kitchen with the kero lamp and matches ready. The rain drowns the sound of the hissing gas jets. One giant ball of flame and he’ll be on his way to hell where he belongs.

He opens the back door, dark against the night.

‘Come in,’ I tell the devil. ‘I’ll just light the lamp.’

There’s a taunting childish cry from the garden. He forgets me and charges down the steps, his weight making the whole house shudder.

I run after him, though I don’t know what I can do.

Lightning illuminates the yard as I reach the bottom step. The children have climbed the mango tree. Their father stands below, shot gun raised.

Suddenly, something rears up behind him. It’s tall as a man, tail extended for balance, short forearms extended, jaws open. I’ve seen small lizards stand up and run on their back legs, but never goannas. Another, then another rear up, surrounding him.

He screams. Fires. Misses. They strike before he can fire again.

The lightning fades and night closes in, leaving the after-image on my mind’s eye. There’s a terrible scuffling, a grunting that isn’t him. Lightning flashes again. I see long, sturdy shapes pinning him on the ground, tearing at him, tails swaying. The children cheer and jeer, little savages dancing on the tree limbs.

Then the dark reclaims the night. I cannot move. He was right. I was blind to their true nature.

The rain steadies, drowning the dying sounds. Soon they’ll be coming for me.

I’m shaking so bad, I can hardly climb the steps. Heart in my mouth I run into the kitchen, almost skidding on the wet lino. I slam the door shut and lock it. The matches spill as I try to light the lamp.

Small, cool hands take them from me.

‘Not yet,’ the eldest girl warns. ‘There’s still some gas about. I turned it off and opened the windows, but ...’

Something scrapes at the door. A protest dies in my throat as she opens it. The children file into the kitchen, heavy with the scent of the cool night air and the fecund bush. She silences them with a word here and a quick cuff there.

Lightning flares. I see my kitchen has been invaded by feral figures, streaked with mud and blood. A blond haired boy of about five whimpers, holding his side.

‘Up on the table,’ she orders.

‘I’ll get my medicine chest,’ I tell them in a surprisingly steady voice.

But the middle girl stops me. ‘We look after our own.’

The other children move in on him. In the dim light they seem to be licking his wounds. The world goes grey.

When it clears I find myself sitting on the kitchen chair, my head in my hands. God has abandoned me. The heart just goes out of me.

Finally the eldest girl lights the lamp and turns to face me. Her brothers and sisters stare unblinking.

‘You’re not going to tell anyone what you saw,’ she says. ‘No one would believe you. Dad didn’t believe. Then when he did, he killed Mum because he didn’t understand. He tried to fight the bush. He refused to see that if you accept it, it will look after you. Or make sure that you’re looked after.’ She looks at me speculatively. ‘Will you look after us?’

As I look deep into her eyes, I realise the bush has not only reclaimed the land, it has laid claim to me.

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