Africa

He thought about knocking but there wouldn’t be much point; the door was always open. Even when they were making love Diana never locked the door. She had no need to; the sultry smell of the darkness within kept even the landlord away.

He turned the handle and entered the apartment. It was large and lavishly furnished, with a bay window that overlooked the bustling Covent Garden Market. Diana hadn’t been sparing with the frills and lace either, she liked trinkets and toys; old ones that had been preserved in this sterile cage like they belonged to a different era altogether. It made him cringe.

         Diana was where she usually was, sitting on the sill and looking out of the window at the busy streets. “Where have you been, Kinglsey?” She said.

“The theatre” He replied setting his bag down on the floor and opening it. She looked no more than ten years old; button nose set into a round face beneath sky blue eyes on pale skin. She wore pastel dresses under white pinafores and her long golden hair was always swept away from her face and secured on top with a ribbon that allowed elegant ringlets to cascade down her back. Today she wore the same blue as her eyes.

“Oh Kingsley, you are sweet” She let out a light chuckle “Was it The Globe again? Taming of the Shrew again?”  He ignored her. He was rummaging in his bag past the change of clothes, past the toothbrush and wallet, for something that must have fallen to the bottom. “Then again, who am I to laugh at the mindless frivolity on which you spend your money” She continued pretending not to watch him. He could sense her anticipation though; it hung in the unnatural air like tenderizing meat. At length he produced a small draw-string pouch. He heard Diana catch her breath.

She jumped down from the window sill and padded across the room to snatch it from his hand. She shook the bag, the familiar chink of the contents made her grin wickedly. She turned away from him when she opened it but Kingsley knew she was still smiling as she pressed the opening to her nose and inhaled deeply. He stood up; at his full height she barely reached his waist.

Satisfied that he had delivered correctly she turned back and bade him kneel again in front of her. She threw her thin arms around him and planted her rosy lips upon his ebony ones.  No amount of black magic could disguise her experienced lips or the way in which she held him to her breast. They had lain together before, naked and entwined in each other’s arms; the white of her skin against the blackness of his like Yin and Yang.

He broke away and she paid him.



Later that afternoon Kingsley stood in the kitchen spreading butter on a scone; there were no separating walls in the apartment so he could still see Diana sitting by the window. The draw-string bag was still clasped in her tiny hands. The fading light of the day was illuminating her lazy smile and half-open eyes as she watched the merchants pack away their stalls. Sometimes they would see her and wave.

As far as Kingsley was aware Diana had not left the apartment for a long time, several years perhaps, she was perfectly content where she was. To sit and watch the world unfold at her feet and gaze dreamily at herself in the mirror, that was what she did all day; alternating aimlessly between the two. And she was happy.

         Kingsley finished buttering the scones, arranged them on a tiered cake stand and brought them to her. Then he sat on a footstool opposite and watched as, without turning or thanking him, she brought one to her lips. “Tell me about Africa” She said.

         She always wanted to know about Africa and she asked him every time with the same wistful enthusiasm as the first. She would absorb his words as if they were paintbrushes, etching the landscape beneath the very fabric of her being. He told her of the wildlife, the folklore and the stifling of the sun, but never of the brutality he had to commit every time he returned. They never talked about it. It was an understanding they had; like not talking shop at the dinner table.

“Why don’t you see for yourself? I will take you” He said was feeling bold. Diana looked at him, his enormous frame upon that dainty stool, and began to laugh. She had a crisp sing-song laugh.

“Why would I want to do that when I can hear all about it from you?” She said.

Sometimes she disgusted him. Diana knew exactly what Muti involved and probably relished it from the safety of her urban fortress. She knew that innocents had to be slain and parts of their bodies harvested to make the spell so that she could keep her youth.

Diana asked him to tell her about Africa again but he refused and they sat in silence for a long time. Then he rose, picked up his bag from the floor and slung it over his shoulder.

         “Wait” called Diana as he made his way to the door. “I haven’t dismissed you yet!” Kingsley turned back; she had got up from the window sill and was standing rigidly a few feet away. “When will you bring me some more?”

         “When will I bring you some more bones from the fingers of children?” he said “Next Thursday at the latest.”

         “Good” She sighed, deeply relieved. Kingsley watched her walk to her dressing table and sit down. It was a woman’s dressing table and the mirror had to be tilted at an angle so she could see herself fully. She placed the pouch on the table and took out the bones. They were particularly small bones which she arranged in a neat row in front of her. Then she picked up the brush and swishing her locks across her shoulder began stroking the ends. Kingsley came up behind her; there wasn’t a hair out of place or an imperfection on her body. She let him run his hand across her neck and he thought about breaking it as he had done to children looking half her age.

         “Isn’t it wonderful” She said as she admired herself “That such small objects can produce such a powerful result, it’s funny I don’t think of them as human, it’s easier that way I suppose.”

         Kingsley took a step back. “Yes, it is.” He said slowly. “Because the magic only works if they are human bones”.

         “Yes, it’s funny that isn’t it?” Diana let out a small laugh; turning to him as she did so. Kingsley looked serious.

         “But these are not human bones” He said “They are chick bones from the market.”

         Diana stared at him unbelieving for a moment and then began to laugh, not her usual sing-song laugh but a deep chesty laugh. She caught her throat and raised her large eyes to meet his fixed gaze.

“What?” she breathed as she turned to face the mirror.

“They are not human bones; they are chick bones from the market.” He repeated.

She watched in horror as the years began to cloud her porcelain face. Her body began to stretch and fill out as the middle ages of life took hold only to disintegrate into that of the elderly. Wrinkles like craters laced themselves across her skin as it became sallow and loose. Her eyes reddened and sank and her lips curled in as the teeth began to fall from her rotting gums. She was rotting, the spell was breaking.

She screamed until her voice was hoarse, she stared until her eyes could see no more; she heard the cracking of her skin until her ears were of no more use. She fell onto her knees to find that they shattered under the force and she fell backwards. That hair that had been so luscious was now thin and grey.



Finally her soul left that wretched body, twisted and withered beyond recognition and Kingsley wondered how many, like him, there had been before. The final expression on that ancient face was set as a perfect merger of the Grecian Theatre masks. One side of her hollow mouth curved upwards in a horrible unspoken ecstasy and the other was down like a cry of anguish. And what a thespian she had been!

He stepped over her and scooped up the bones; he would have to destroy these carefully. London would never be ready for the controversy of Medicine Murder and the police would be all over human bones like flies. He was lucky really; nobody would be all that suspicious. Eventually someone would notice that the old lady had stopped watching from the window, raise the alarm and that would be that.

He was at the door before he chanced a look around, the room seemed different somehow, or was that because Diana seemed different? He pulled the door open; she was ugly and she would be found like this, unlike those who gave their lives for her. But where would he go now? Back to Africa probably, but not before he had seen Othello at the Globe again.