Portrait of Mary Davis the Horned Woman — oil on canvas 1668

by Joshua Jones Lofflin

The British Museum, artist anoymous

She sits in profile, the Lady Mary Davis of Saughall, her magnificent horn curling downward like — well, you don’t like to say what it resembles, but you can tell what your boyfriend is thinking, the way he simpers and leers. The horn creeps out from the back of her head, then follows the contours of her oily hair as if not wanting to draw attention to itself, so demure and discreet and wholly unlike Lady Mary’s male contemporaries, those men whose horns universally sprang from their foreheads in pairs or, in one case, a trio of protrusions that their bearer said was a manifestation of the Holy Trinity. He maintained the blasphemous claim even as Alderman William Edwards (1611–1673) lit the brands beneath the false prophet’s feet.

It’s a small miracle Lady Mary survived the superstitions of her time, perhaps because she raised funds for the Church of Saughall’s restoration after its destruction during the English Civil War. (The origins of the fire, unknown; how convenient, your boyfriend says.) Or because, unlike the male heretics, she never claimed her horn had healing powers. (No? your boyfriend asks, And she didn’t let anyone touch it?) She called such acts vulgar and un-Christian, but she did allow her likeness to be distributed for a fee of five shillings per etched broadsheet, for charity. (Charity, your boyfriend repeats, drawing air quotes above the word with a smirk.)

Maybe her survival wasn’t due to a miracle but wealth, as useful then as now — though would it protect her from scientific inquiry? From biopsies they promise won’t hurt, and besides it’d only be a small sample? You touch the nodule behind your scarf. It hums beneath your fingertips. Not a pulse — there are no capillaries running its length — but it does vibrate. Purrs, your boyfriend says. You can’t believe you let him touch it. Last night, he tried to suck it. Don’t be weird, you told him. And those times you’d woken with it wet and throbbing and your boyfriend next to you breathing too evenly. Was it sweat or saliva?

He wants you to take off your headscarf and pose in front of Lady Mary’s portrait. You’re so much prettier than she was, he says, as if it’s a compliment to be compared to some oily-haired woman over four centuries dead. Instead, you send him to the gift shop, tell him to find something nice. You hope they don’t have a print of her emblazoned on a coffee mug or t-shirt. You adjust your headscarf, look to see if the bored security guard is watching. She doesn’t smile at you. She’s already told you twice to step back from the painting, as if you might reach out and touch it. Or maybe it was your boyfriend she was worried about. The way he stared at the horn. The way he licked his lips.

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Joshua Jones Lofflin is an award-winning writer with work in The Cincinnati Review, SmokeLong Quarterly, Wigleaf, and elsewhere. His stories have been anthologized in The Best of the Net, The Best Microfiction, The Best Small Fictions, and ECO: The Year’s Best Ecofiction. He lives in Maryland. Find him online at jjlofflin.com.