October 31, 1875—
It is my wedding day.
I had not expected ever to have a wedding, so ill have I been, and even today I am not certain it would not have been better for me to have died. But I know I must marry Monsignor Melchior Conway, or suffer eternal damnation, for that is what both my father and the Monsignor have told me.
The Monsignor came from Philadelphia three months ago. Our own priest asked him to come, so certain was he that I was possessed of the Devil I do not remember the Monsignor's arrival, for it was during the time when I was confined to my bedroom, of which I remember very little. What I do remember I now record here.
I was in the cellar of our little house when I noticed a strange mist rising from a hole in the earthen floor. As I breathed the mist, everything in the basement changed.
All because golden, and images appeared before me—beautiful images. A being appeared, and touched me in a way I should not have permitted.
I became ill the next day, and cannot bring myself to write the things they say I have done. They say I have been a wanton, and committed mortal sins, which is why the Monsignor came from Philadelphia.
At our first meeting—of which I have no clear memory—I took the Monsignor to the place where my illness began. I do not know how long we prayed in the cellar that night, but it cannot have been long enough, for the Monsignor insisted we go back the next night, and the night after that.
The silence in the little room on the second floor of the rectory was complete as Father MacNeill finished reading the pages that Cora Conway had cut from the Bible and hidden in the music box. But why these pages?
My illness soon began to retreat in response to the Monsignor's prayers, but I am told that my health now depends on him. He will give up his religious vocation to marry me, which Father says I must do, though to marry a priest seems to me the gravest of blasphemies.
There was an inch of space in which nothing had been written, and then Loretta Villiers Conway's hand began again:
It is done.
I am married to the Monsignor by his own authority, for neither he nor Father were able to prevail upon our priest to marry us. Sister Mary Anthony came to our house after supper, and though she would not set foot indoors, she gave me a gift of two small crosses made of pure gold, which she said could protect me, and one of my children as well. Then she begged God to forgive me my sins.
I suspect that He will not.
Nor will He forgive Monsignor Melchior, for I believe I know the truth of what lies in our cellar. It is Evil itself that resides deep within that hole, and I fear the Monsignor has become its Servant.
I have this day married the right hand of Evil.
The Monsignor has ceded himself—and the eldest son of all the generations to come—to the Evil that dwells beneath this house, and I know we shall prosper on this Earth, but I know also that we are damned—damned for all Eternity.
Why hadn't Cora cut from the Bible all the pages detailing the sins of the Conways? Even as he posed the question in his mind, he knew the answer: In Cora's mind, it was only this darkest secret that must be kept; all the rest might have been attributed to madness, but these first entries—the ones she'd hidden—proved the damnation of all the Conways' souls.
It was finally Monsignor Devlin who spoke. His voice quavered, as if the burdens of his years had suddenly grown heavier. "An exorcism," he breathed. "So that's how it started—an exorcism."
"A failed exorcism," Father MacNeill corrected. "He came to banish Satan, but gave up his soul instead."
Through the open window, the bells of St. Ignatius began to toll the darkest hour. Both priests shivered. An evil had been unleashed on St. Albans on a Halloween more than a century earlier. Now, on this Halloween midnight, had it spread over the town once more?
"Kimmie? Kimmie, come on!"
It was Jared's voice calling her name, and at first she didn't see him. Then she spotted him, fifty yards ahead of her, beckoning to her. They were in a meadow, and he was running toward a lake, and in a few seconds they would both plunge into the cool water, popping through the surface a moment later, laughing and splashing. She broke into a run, doing her best to keep up with him, but Jared was faster than she, and plunged into the lake before she could even get to the shore. She stopped at the edge of the water, watching to see where he'd come up, her eyes looking first one way, then another.
But he didn't come up.
"Jared!" she called out. Then again: "Jared?" When her brother still didn't appear, she ran a few yards along the lake's edge, first in one direction, then in the other.
"Mommy!" she called out. "Mommy, help! Jared's gone!"
But when she looked around, her mother was nowhere to be seen.
Then, as clearly as if she'd heard him shouting the words, Jared called to her again.
"Help me, Kimmie! Help me!"
With no thought but to save her brother, Kim dove into the water, plunging deep as she searched for her drowning twin. At first she saw nothing except sunlight filtering through the clear water, but as she plunged deeper and the light faded, she caught a glimpse of him.
He was far below, looking up at her, his hand extended as if reaching out to her. But as she watched, he sank deeper into the watery darkness, until she could hardly see him. She tried to dive faster, kicking as hard as she could, but no matter how fast she swam downward, Jared was always just a little beyond her reach. The water seemed to be turning to jelly around her now, and she struggled against it, straining to reach her brother before he disappeared completely. Then, for one fleeting moment, the tips of her fingers touched his. She tried to clutch at his hand, but he fell away into the blackness, disappearing.
Kim stopped swimming and let herself drift in the darkness. A great emptiness—as dark as the water surrounding her—yawned within her, and as she slowly let herself sink into it, the pain of not having been able to save her brother began to ease.
The darkness deepened.
Then, somewhere in the darkness, a point of light appeared. As Kim watched it, it slowly grew brighter. At first she thought she must be floating back toward the lake's surface. But when she finally opened her eyes, the water was gone.
She was back in the great cathedral-like chamber, which had somehow grown even vaster than before. Tonight there was no trace of the shimmering light she'd first seen here; tonight she felt as if she were utterly lost in the shadows that filled the huge space. Then, far ahead of her, she once again beheld the inverted cross, suspended in the shadowy light as if by some unseen force. Mesmerized, Kim moved toward it. As she did, the candles spread on the altar beneath the cross burst into flame. As the light grew, Kim saw the eviscerated body of an animal on the altar, a dagger plunged through its heart, its blood dripping into a silver chalice.
Two robed and hooded figures appeared at either end of the altar. They moved closer together, and for a moment her view of the altar—and the cross—was blocked. The two figures bent over, and a terrible feeling of apprehension came over Kim.
She tried to back away, but some unseen force held her in place.
Then the two hooded figures stepped aside and she once again beheld the cross.
A tiny figure, its face contorted in pain, was affixed to it.
Silver spikes had been driven through each wrist.
A third punctured the child's feet.
Blood dripped from a wound in the child's chest, oozing down the neck and face to mat into the already reddish hair.
Molly!
Kim screamed out loud, and in an instant that seared itself into her mind, the two robed figures whirled around.
Her father and her brother stood glowering at her, their faces contorted with hatred.
She screamed again, and jerked awake.
For a moment her head swam with the dying remnants of the dream. Her heart was pounding so hard she could hear it, and her skin was clammy with sweat.
A dream! she told herself. It was on
ly a dream!
She eased herself back down onto the pillow and tried to erase the last fragments of the dream from her memory, but the faces of her father and brother kept looming up in the darkness, leering at her, almost taunting her.
She turned over in bed, but still the dream stayed with her, only now it was the twisted face of her baby sister she saw, hanging upside down from the inverted cross, impaled by the nails, her life slowly ebbing away.
Then the earlier dream came back to haunt her, the dream in which she'd seen Jared killing Scout.
She had convinced herself that it, too, had been just a dream. But when they'd gone to find Scout, he'd vanished from the house.
As the first faint light of dawn etched the sky with silver, Kim got up from her bed and tiptoed out onto the landing. The great house lay silent around her, and as she made her way around to Molly's room, she had the eerie feeling of unseen eyes following her.
She paused before the door, shivering in a sudden chill that seemed to come out of nowhere.
Finally, her hand trembling, she reached for the knob, twisted it, and slowly pushed the door open.
The chill reached deeper into her, touching her soul.
She stepped into the room, straining to catch a glimpse of her sister in the gray light of dawn, but all she saw was a mass of rumpled bedding.
"Molly?" she whispered, edging closer to the child's crib. "Molly? Are you okay?"
There was no movement at all from the crib. Kim, standing by its side, looked down at the tangle of sheets and blankets. Please, she prayed silently. Please let her be all right.
She reached out, took the edge of the blanket, and pulled it aside.
And there lay Molly, sound asleep, her thumb tucked in her mouth.
Choking back a sob of relief, Kim bent down, gently kissed the sleeping child, and tucked the blanket back around her.
All Soul's Day
CHAPTER 33
Jake Cumberland's cabin looked peaceful enough when Corinne Beckwith pulled into the little clearing next to the lake. Jake's hound was lying in the dust, and he sat up when she got out of the car, cocking his head as if trying to decide whether to sound an alarm. "It's okay," she said soothingly, moving slowly toward the dog with one hand extended. The dog stood up and edged closer to her, and Corinne made certain to stay just beyond the reach of his chain until he'd sniffed at her fingers, whimpered softly, then extended his tongue to have a lick. "Good boy," she said, bending down to scratch his ears as she gazed at the house. "I bet you're hungry, aren't you? Well, that's why I'm here. First we'll find you something to eat, then we'll start thinking about where you're going to live from now on." Though Corinne was certain the dog couldn't understand her words, something in her tone must have told him that his master wasn't coming back. Whining, the dog dropped down into the dust, and Corinne crouched beside him. "I know, boy," she said, stroking his coat. "You're going to miss him, aren't you?" Patting him once more, she stood up and turned toward the cabin. It looked utterly deserted this morning, as if it, too, knew that its sole occupant had abandoned it forever. Corinne took a step toward it, but then the dog was back on its feet, growling.
"Are you going to let me take a look, or are you going to try to rip my throat out?" Corinne asked. As she reached out to him again, the dog pressed himself against her legs, looked at her through bloodshot eyes. "Guess you're not going for the throat, huh?"
Corinne straightened up once more and continued toward the cabin, and the hound followed her. When she moved up onto the porch, though, he yelped, and when she reached for the doorknob, he barked loudly.
Corinne eyed the dog speculatively, uncertain whether the bark was a warning or the animal was merely eager to get inside. Unwilling to risk arousing the dog's guarding instincts, she moved to the window, shaded her eyes against the glare of, the morning sun, and peered inside. As her eyes adjusted to the relative gloom inside, she saw the strange designs that had been smeared on the cabin's wall with some kind of rust-colored paint.
Paint ... or blood?
Feeling queasy, Corinne stepped back from the window. Her hand dropped to the hound's head. "Who was it?" she asked. "Who was here?" She stepped off the porch, fished in her purse for her cell phone, and a moment later was talking to her husband. "You better get out here, Ray," she told him. "Something terrible went on in Jake's cabin last night, and after what happened in the jail, no one's going to be able to blame this mess on him."
Twenty minutes later Ray Beckwith stood with Corinne in the center of Jake's shack, his expression grim as he studied the strange and bloody symbols that stained the walls.
"Looks to me like someone was out here doin' more of Jake's voodoo stuff last night."
Corinne nodded. The first thought that had come to her when Ray had told her of Jake's death was that someone had turned Jake's own magic against him. Though Corinne had no more faith in voodoo than in any other religion, she knew that for followers of voodoo, the knowledge that someone was casting a spell had sometimes resulted in the sickness—or even death—of the victim.
The power of suggestion: if you believed you could be killed by magic, then you could be.
And if someone had let Jake know what kind of ritual would be performed, and when...
Corinne could almost see Jake awaiting the hour in his cell, feeling the power of the voodoo "magic" surround him. His belief alone could have made him hang himself. But as she scanned the pentagrams and symbols on the walls, her eyes kept going back to a cross whose transverse bar was far below the midpoint.
A Christian cross, inverted?
"What about Satanists?" she asked.
Ray Beckwith groaned out loud. "Now you're starting to sound like Father MacNeill. Next thing, you'll be trying to blame this on the Conways, just like he did with the cemetery yesterday morning." He started toward the door.
"Where are you going? You haven't even searched the cabin."
"Gonna get the dog," Beckwith replied. "Maybe he can lead us right to whoever was here."
The hound made no objection as Beckwith replaced its chain a few minutes later with a strong leather lead he kept in the trunk of the squad car. But when he tried to coax it into the cabin, the animal turned recalcitrant, pulling and tugging at the leash as Beckwith tried to pull him through the front door. When the officer kept tugging, the hound snarled and snapped at him.
"Jesus!" Beckwith snatched his hand back just in time and glared at the dog. "What's going on with him?" he asked. "He musta been in here a million times before."
"Well, he's not going in now, and he didn't want me going in earlier," Corinne told him. "The question is, what does that mean?"
Beckwith scowled. "It means Jake had a stupid, stubborn good-for-nothin' animal here, that's what it means!"
"Or it means whatever happened in here last night scared him so much he doesn't want to go near the cabin," Corinne said.
Rechaining the dog, they went back into the cabin. As Corinne watched, her husband repeated the search he'd carried out the afternoon before.
Two minutes after he began, he lifted Scout's severed head from the trunk. "Oh, Jesus," he whispered. "Look at this."
As Corinne Beckwith's stomach threatened to betray her, she forced herself to look at the grisly object in her husband's hands. "I know that dog," she whispered. "It belonged to Jared Conway."
CHAPTER 34
Morning did nothing to dispel the terrors Kim had felt the night before. As she came downstairs, fingers of panic still reached out to her. Although everything in the cavernous entry hall looked exactly as it had yesterday, it felt strangely ominous even in the morning light. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs, Kim found herself shivering, as if the terrible chill she'd felt at the door to Molly's room as dawn was beginning to break had now spread down the stairs. As she passed through the dining room on her way to the kitchen, she stopped to gaze at the trompe l'oeil mural her mother was painting on the wall opposite the windows. The perfectl
y executed French doors, the faux terrace, even the balustrade outside, looked exactly as they had yesterday afternoon, but now, with the sun flooding in the windows opposite, it looked as if her mother had done something to the garden beyond the terrace. Kim studied the mural for several minutes before she realized what had changed.
The garden seemed to be dying. The flowers that appeared so perfectly fresh and lifelike only yesterday looked this morning as if they were starting to wilt, and the green of the trees seemed to have faded, as if the painted foliage were somehow starting to turn brown. But why would her mother have done it?
Kim moved closer to the wall, to see if some kind of wash had been applied to the whole garden, but it was almost as if each flower, each leaf, had taken on a faintly unhealthy cast. The mural, which a day earlier had given the whole dining room a bright and cheerful feel, now sent a somber mood over the room.
Kim turned away.
As she pushed open the kitchen door, she unconsciously braced herself against Scout's enthusiastic morning greeting. In the fraction of a second it took for her to remember that Scout was no longer in the house, the strange feeling of unease she'd had as she came downstairs notched up. Turning on the stove and setting a pot of water to boil, she went to the back door, stepped out onto the porch, and called out to Scout. As she waited for the dog to respond, she sucked the morning air deep into her lungs, and felt some of the tension that had been building inside her start to abate. She called out to Scout three more times, and when the big retriever didn't appear, she went back into the house.
Her father and brother were in the kitchen now, standing at the counter, their backs to her. The memory of the two robed and hooded figures she'd seen in her dream came to mind, and when first Jared, then her father, turned to look at her, another memory snapped into focus. The expression she'd seen in their eyes—the terrible look of hatred—recurred to her.