Rope Trick

The black car slithers down the road, sneaks to a halt in the shadows between two streetlights. The headlights dip, then are extinguished completely. In the four a.m. silence of a polite residential area like this, it almost seems to breathe as it sits there, purring contentedly to itself. There is a faint whine as one of the darkened rear windows opens, only by an inch or so. If anyone were awake to hear, they would be able to make out the faint sounds of muffled conversation – a few words of Arabic, instructions barked from unseen figures, then the engine is shut off, and a deeper silence falls.

A few minutes later, so quietly it’s barely audible; a sound rises from the vehicle. It sounds like some kind of flute, the notes fitting together in ways rarely heard by western ears. The music flits between calming drones and short bursts of flurried melody, and then hits a high note with a touch of vibrato. As the note is held the frayed end of what appears to be a length of rope appears through the gap in the open window, and is lowered to the tarmac.

The droning, pulsing note continues and as the rope reaches the road surface it seems to bend by itself, and then starts to work it’s way across the street. As it reaches the far kerb, its other end is out of the car – about fifteen feet long and an inch thick, it coils itself at the edge of the pavement, one end rising up as if sniffing the air. The rope sways to and fro, in time with the pulsing modulation of the flute’s voice. Then the note cuts off, and the rope crumples to the ground like a hamstrung marionette.

A new tune can be heard faintly from the car window, and the rope twitches into life once more. The music is faster now, more urgent, purposeful, and the rope’s movements reflect that as it swiftly slithers under a nearby gate, it’s scratchy hemp surface hissing across the gravel path towards a glossy green door. A trill of the flute and the leading end rears up towards the letterbox, flips it open and starts to feed itself through into the house.

There is a faint clatter as the last inches of the rope drop into the hallway. The rope pauses, seemingly unsure, and then starts to twine itself around the banister; loop after loop spiralling its way up the stairs to the darkened landing. The music can still be heard, a faint and slightly tinny reproduction, almost as if the strands that make up the rope are vibrating in sympathy with the melody that instructs its movements.

The bedroom door is ajar, and the rope, still quietly singing, creeps into the room. A man lies alone in the bed, snoring quietly, the covers half kicked from him in the summer heat. One leg hangs over the edge of the bed, and the rope stops to examine the appendage, an exploratory sniff and the foot is withdrawn to the safety of the mattress.

Now the two ends of the rope begin to act independently. The inquisitive leading end creeps up onto the mattress, and eases itself alongside the sleeping figure, which rolls to one side. The other end reaches for the ceiling, focusing on the light fitting above the bed. Once, twice, the rope embraces the man’s neck – not tightly, in fact barely touching him. The man stirs slightly and the rope freezes, waits for him to relax, then continues its work.

Meanwhile, on the ceiling, the midsection is clinging to the light fitting, and the furthest end of the rope has wrapped itself around a chair, and gently laid it down beneath the bulb. The fibres of the rope are singing louder now, the music approaching a frantic crescendo, the notes of the flute being augmented as the hemp fibres add their own excited harmony.

The man’s eyes flick open as rope and flute emit a high pitched, ululating wail – harmonies feeding other harmonies in a point of perfect resonance. His mouth opens to scream. The entire rope becomes taut, as if pulled by a counterweight. The light fitting strains momentarily as the rope feeds around it, and the man’s cry is choked off at birth as the loops of rope around his neck tighten, cutting off his air supply and hoisting him from the bed in one dreadful whiplash tug.

The man dances in the air, panicked hands scrambling to remove the noose from his neck. A stream of hot piss stains the mattress and splashes against the fallen chair below. The rope jerks once, twice, making sure of the job, and then as the music dies away rope and man fall slack. His corpse dangles at the centre of the scene, rotating slowly in the faint streetlight that creeps through a crack in the curtains.

Outside, we hear an engine start, and a black car drives away.