by Jim Powell
The mansion’s owner
Mr. Harris is checking my work again, fourth time today. This safe room my boss
Settle and I are building for him. He gauges the vaulted doorframe, the drywall
hiding steel like smooth limestone masked the rough blocks of ancient pyramids.
Harris sneers at me like I’m some pharaoh’s slave.
He’s into Egypt big
time, like I was in middle school. Glass cases show off his collection—figurines,
amulets, painted potsherds. But downstairs there’s another secret room—reached
via a panel in the library—that Settle built last year to protect precious, and
my bet illegal, artifacts. I’ve snuck in there though its chill creeps me out. Papyrus
scrolls, golden scarabs, god-headed staffs, a mummy’s sarcophagus—without the mummy, thank Isis! On one wall
that crazy old artist Taft (he who newsworthily drowned in the estate’s pond) painted
a mural with the god Horus’s head replaced by Harris’s own hawk-like face! The
man is obsessed—with Egypt and himself.
We’ll be finished tomorrow,
Settle reminds him. My last day on any job? We’ve been at it two months, but last
week I got this feeling from Harris’s look that something was off. He’s the
type who’d as soon kill me as scowl. I said this to Settle who laughed at my
concern, clapped me on the back like I’m his buddy. But really there’s no one
who’d much miss me. Settle deposits Harris’s checks and cuts me cash. He’s
dependent on these rich guys, as were those architects for the pyramids, right?
I’m mere labor and could quit anytime, just not show up, but it would be my
last day of any work anywhere up here in ritzy Hamlin County. Times are tough since
the union died and Settle reminds me I’m lucky to be the help here—so don’t be
a hindrance. Guess I’ll wait for my pay and see what turns up next.
Harris smirks as if
he’d actually recognize quality work. “Good job, Settle, and almost on time.” He
gives a thumbs-up as he glances at me. Settle gives me a nod as he follows Harris
out. But left alone, I don’t feel safe in his safe room.
A “safe” room—safe
from what? I put on the mask and open the paint can. Harris’s a big shot, smiles
photogenic in the paper though he’s skinny and bald. Arts gigs mostly, “benefits”
that guys like me see no benefit from. His friends might be jealous, but no one
except the IRS poses danger to more than his ego. Only losing wealth causes
alarm. I mean the estate has armed guards. And there aren’t a lot of Egyptian art
thieves around except in movies. Kidnap his over-bleached wife or chubby
college son? Who could stand them long enough to collect the ransom? Harris claims
to be a self-made man but some say his business is nothing but a Ponzi … a
pyramid scheme so to speak!
The paint fumes burn
my eyes and haze my vision. These walls would quickly close in on me all alone,
even if I was as rich as Harris. The room’s empty now, but even equipped with comfort
and cameras, such safety seems twisted. No marble bathroom with gold fixtures
can shine up the windowless gloom.
Fear of anything
outside himself, maybe that’s it, security for its own sake—one small step from
paranoia. Like Pharaoh feared the Jews, or Pilate feared Jesus. Some omen Harris
sees in our stained clothes and weathered faces, as if we threaten him with
some sturdy silence he wants to control. If I fought back—against what?—there’d
be no winning. Better to let this chamber be a giant canopic burial jar to
store Harris’s cold heart.
I shake my head to
clear the giddy vapors, but keep painting. After this only cleanup’s left. Settle
will stay on, overseeing the dig for a weather shelter beneath the six-car garage.
A tornado this spring took tiles off the roof and apparently tizzied Mrs. Harris
like she’d been bitten by an asp. Other projects loom down the road—a
basketball barn, a second guest house, an infinity pool the size of infinity.
Mr. Harris’s got 200 acres and his own golf course following the creek that
wends like the Nile through his empire, so the possibilities seem endless. Settle
will have work here for life! I only hope he calls me back when the new construction
starts.
The big boss looks
in again to see how I’m doing. Holding his nose he does look like Horus, a
uniquely ugly superstar. I heard rumors he may run for office, Mayor or even
Governor. Con or not, Harris’s so rich he must know things I don’t. Maybe I’d
vote for him and let the wealth trickle down to me. What would I have to lose?
He directs Settle to
the unfinished wall, painting strokes in the air before he backs out. Settle
nods at me, exits, then shuts the door tight. He’s not a bad guy. I’ll work for
him again in a second if I get the chance. So I tidy up a corner and move to
the final wall, the narrow one beside the bathroom door. I feel like I’m moving
slowly, the closed air heavy with the paint’s reek. My brush moves in slow
motion from can to wall until I find my pace, a rower on a barge, bondsman
fanning with a palm. There’s no use arguing with the gods, old ones or new.
My vision is dizzy,
but the job looks pretty good. A sandish gold that compliments the floor’s tile.
Other colors swirl in my eyes. What special pieces from his collection will Harris
hold here, precious as himself? I wonder what vessel will store his soul, and
picture him hiding here, scared as the rest of us, trapped and waiting for his
end. I tremble to think of such a life without death, so secure, a corpse preserved
for all eternity.
END
Jim Powell holds an MFA
from Bowling Green State University and teaches creative writing at Indiana
University-Purdue University-Indianapolis (IUPUI). He received a Creative
Renewal Fellowship from the Arts Council of Indianapolis for 2011-13 and has
fiction recently published in Bartleby Snopes, Crack the Spine, and Storyscape,
and forthcoming in On the Edge of the Prairie, and Fiction Southeast. He served
as Executive Director of the Writers Center from 1979-1999.