The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror. Fifth Annual Collection

The small-town writer is mistaken. First of all, Lorenzo began pestering me long before his wife passed away. I remember how he used to undress me boldly with his eyes when I was standing by her sickbed, and I was torn between feeling sorry for him and my scorn for his weak, sentimental mooning. I finally married him out of pity and not because I was after his money, as this story falsely implies. I refused him several times, and when I finally weakened and said yes, my family thought I’d gone out of my mind. They believed that my marrying Lorenzo and taking charge of his huge house would mean professional suicide because my designer clothes were already beginning to earn me a reputation. Selling the so-called family heirlooms, moreover, made sense from a psychological as well as from a practical point of view. At my own home we’ve always been proud; I have ten brothers and sisters, but we’ve never gone to bed hungry. The sight of Lorenzo’s empty cupboard, impeccably whitewashed and with a skylight to better display its frightening bareness, would have made the bravest one of us shudder. I sold the broken-down furniture and the useless knickknacks to fill that cupboard, to put some honest bread on the table.

But Rosa’s miserliness didn’t stop there. She went on to pawn the silver, the table linen, and the embroidered bedsheets that had once belonged to Rosaura’s mother, and to her mother before her. Her niggardliness extended to the family menu, and even such moderately epicurean dishes as fricasseed rabbit, rice with guinea hen, and baby lamb stew were banished forever from the table. This last measure saddened Don Lorenzo deeply because, next to his wife and daughter, he had loved those criollo dishes more than anything else in the world, and the sight of them at dinnertime would always make him beam with happiness.

Who could have strung together this trash, this dirty gossip? The title, one must admit, is perfect: the unwritten page will bear patiently whatever poison you spit on it. Rosa’s frugal ways often made her seem two-faced: she’d be all smiles in public and a shrew at home. “Look at the bright side of things, dear, keep your chin up when the chips are down,” she’d say spunkily to Lorenzo as she put on her best clothes for mass on Sunday, insisting he do the same. “We’ve been through hard times before and we’ll weather this one out, too, but there’s no sense in letting our neighbors know.” She opened a custom dress shop in one of the small rooms of the first floor of the house and hung a little sign that read “The fall of the Bastille” over its door. Believe it or not, she was so ignorant that she was sure this would win her a more educated clientele. Soon she began to invest every penny she got from the sale of the family heirlooms in costly materials for her customers’ dresses, and she’d sit night and day in her shop, self-righteously threading needles and sewing seams.

The mayor’s wife just walked in; I’ll nod hello from here, without getting up. She’s wearing one of my exclusive models, which I must have made over at least six times just to please her. I know she expects me to go over and tell her how becoming it looks, but I just don’t feel up to it. I’m tired of acting out the role of high priestess of fashion for the women of this town. At first I felt sorry for them. It broke my heart to see them with nothing to think about but bridge, gossip, and gadflying from luncheon to luncheon. Boredom’s velvet claw had already finished off several of them who’d been interned in mainland sanatoriums for “mysterious health problems,” when I began to preach, from my modest workshop, the doctrine of “salvation through style.” Style heals all, cures all, restores all. Its followers are legion, as can be seen by the hosts of angels in lavishly billowing robes that mill under our cathedral’s frescoed dome.

Thanks to Lorenzo’s generosity, I subscribed to all the latest fashion magazines, which were mailed to me directly from Paris, London, and New York. I began to write about the importance of line and color to a successful business, and not only for advertisement, but for the spiritual well-being of the modern entrepreneur. I began to publish a weekly column of fashion advice in our local gazette, which kept my clientele pegged to the latest fashion trends. Whether the “in” color of the season was obituary orchid or asthma green, whether in springtime the bodice was to be quilted or curled like a cabbage leaf, whether buttons were to be made of tortoise shell or mother-of-pearl, it was all a matter of dogma to them, an article of faith. My shop turned into a beehive of activity, with the town’s most well-to-do ladies constantly coming and going from my door, consulting me about their latest ensembles.

The success of my store soon made us rich. I felt immensely grateful to Lorenzo, who had made it all possible by selling the plantation and lending me the extra bit of money to expand my workshop. Thanks to him, today I’m a free woman; I don’t have to grovel or be polite to anyone. I’m sick of all the bowing and scraping before these good-for-nothing housewives, who must be constantly flattered to feel at peace. Let the mayor’s wife lift her own tail and smell her own cunt for a while. I much prefer to read this vile story rather than speak to her, rather than tell her “how nicely you’ve got yourself up today, my dear, with your witch’s shroud, your whisk-broomed shoes, and your stovepipe bag.”