CHAPTER
85: Lifetimes
by Nicky
(Voiceover by Grayson Hall): “Collinwood,
as it exists in the mysterious world of Parallel Time, a world Barnabas Collins
has entered through a warp in time that exists in an abandoned room in
Collinwood’s East Wing. Barnabas still
suffers from the curse of the vampire and the recent loss of Victoria Winters,
the woman he loves. But will this world
contain any solutions for him? Will it
ease his heartache; will it soothe the savage beast that still raves inside
him? Or will he find himself trapped
there … forever?”
1
Tom
Collins looked out the window into the ebony blackness of early summer and
thought, This is the time, and found
that he was smiling. His hands were
clasped neatly behind his back; the fingernails were glossy and manicured, as
always, as he always insisted they be.
What good was having all the Collins fortune at one’s disposal, Tom
always thought, if one couldn’t look good?
“What
are you smiling about?” The voice was
bitter, as usual, and the words slightly slurred. That was usual as well. The voice’s owner preferred to keep herself
well medicated, usually with brandy, though, and his nostrils twitched. Yes, tonight it was brandy.
He
caught a glimpse of her reflection in the glass before him. Her long blonde hair hung over both her
shoulders; her cornflower eyes were half-lidded and spidered throughout with
red veins. Carolyn Collins Stoddard
Loomis had been a beautiful woman once, but since the divorce proceedings had
begun, Tom thought she was beginning to lose her beauty, bit by bit. It was as if it were being drained out of
her, he thought, amused. “I am smiling,”
he said, “because I am happy.”
“What can
you possibly be happy about?” she sniped.
“Why,” he
said, affecting surprise as he turned to face her, “because my favorite cousin
is returning to his ancestral home this evening, complete with new bride in
tow. She’s rather like a Barbie doll if
I remember correctly. Never left the
box. You knew her when she was a child,
didn’t you? I thought you might remember
better than me.”
“I can’t
say,” Carolyn said darkly.
Tom came
forward and touched her chin with the tip of his finger. Those glossy, well-trimmed nails were always
sharp as well, and Carolyn drew in a breath.
His eyes burned into hers. She
couldn’t look away. “Doesn’t matter,” he
said at last, and turned away from her.
He didn’t have to see look at her to know that she had slumped, and that
she was very near to tears. That amused
him as well. “I suppose. There’s nothing we can do. It isn’t as if Quentin doesn’t give us an
allowance, isn’t that right, my darling cousin?
Regularly. And on time.”
“He does,”
Carolyn admitted. A tear shimmered in
her eye, then ran slowly down her cheek, leaving a trail in its wake like a
snail’s, glowing under the moon.
“So what do
we have to worry about?” Tom asked.
“That question, in case you wondered, was rhetorical.” The monstrous good humor had drained from his
voice, and he was looking, once again, out into the shadows of the night. His face had stiffened and froze, his eyes
dark. “What indeed?” he whispered.
“Oh, excuse
me!”
Tom glanced over his shoulder at
the woman who had wandered into the drawing room and stood now before the
fire. Carolyn was looking at her too,
and she seemed relieved. She was probably
the only one in the great house to ever feel relief in the presence of this
particular … person. Or dishrag.
Alexis Stokes, the sister of the
previous mistress of the house, now regrettably deceased, was a pale,
washed-out little thing that always reminded Tom of a wet puppy. She had returned to Collinwood just before
her sister’s passing, and she and Carolyn had become good friends. After Will decided to leave her, Tom figured
Carolyn could use a friend. Certainly he wasn’t her friend. No, Tom Collins was no friend of
Carolyn’s. “I didn’t know anyone was in
here,” Alexis said now, her voice meek and irritating. He could smell her weakness. It rose off her, metallic and offensive.
“You
needn’t worry, Miss Stokes,” Tom said, boredom and archness combined in his
tone. It wounded her, as he knew it
would. “Soon, there won’t be anyone in
here but you.”
“I’ll stay
with you, Alexis,” Carolyn said swiftly, “if you want company.”
“That would
be lovely,” Alexis said, and cast an uneasy glance at Tom. “There’s a storm brewing, and they make me so
nervous.”
“You?” Tom
purred. “Imagine.”
Alexis
ignored this, but Carolyn shot him an irritated glance. “Let me pour us some sherry,” Alexis said.
“Carolyn
has had quite enough,” Tom said.
“Don’t tell
me what to do,” Carolyn snapped. “I am
not a child.”
“You belong
to me,” Tom said through gritted teeth, so quiet that Alexis could not hear …
but Carolyn could. Her face blanched,
and all the color drained from it. She
swayed where she stood, and would have fallen if Tom’s hand hadn’t snaked out
and dug into her shoulder. She moaned
quietly. “Don’t you?”
She glared
at him, then nodded slowly. He released
her. She stumbled away, just in time for
Alexis to turn and see. “Oh, Carolyn!”
she cried, and set the drinks she had poured onto an antique table that had
been in the family since the late 17th century. Tom rolled his eyes. No coaster, of course. As Alexis ran to Carolyn, he moved swiftly to
the table and removed the drinks, sweating around the rims, of course, and set
them on the marble mantle above the fireplace.
“I’m all
right, Alexis,” Carolyn said, and put a hand to her forehead. She smiled wanly. “Just … tired. Will and I had an argument today. I’m afraid it took more out of me than I
thought it had.”
“Let me
help you to the couch,” Alexis said.
“No,” Carolyn
protested, her eyes on Tom. “No, I think
I should go to bed.” Tom nodded,
smiling. “It’s late.”
Alexis
glanced at her watch. “I suppose it
is. I thought Quentin was due back this
evening. I’m so disappointed that he and
Maggie haven’t arrived yet.”
“They’ll be
here,” Tom said. “Don’t you worry.”
“I’ll help
you to your room,” Alexis said, and walked by Tom, darting nervous glances in
his direction, took the glasses from where he had placed them on the mantle,
and followed Carolyn out of the room.
Tom watched
them go. The look of bored disdain never
left his features. “You heard all that,
I assume?” he remarked, seemingly to empty air.
The woman who
had stood, listening and unseen in the shadows that grew thickest in the corner
of the drawing room took a step forward.
She brushed errant strands of dark hair out of her face. “I heard,” she said. “That poor woman. That poor fool.”
“Who?” Tom
said. “Alexis?”
“Alexis,”
the woman agreed, then hissed, “Stokes.”
“You
needn’t overreact. She isn’t a threat to
you,” Tom said.
“Isn’t
she?”
“Of course
not. Look at her. She’s a drowned rat. You’re …” and he tittered. “… not.”
“That’s
very flattering of you.”
“I aim to
please.”
“Yes,” the
woman said, and sidled up next to him.
She ran the tip of one red-painted fingernail down his cheek. He shivered.
“Yes, you do.”
“She won’t
upset your plans.”
“No. I suppose you’re right.”
“Hoffman
watches her. Hoffman is always
watching.” He winked. “I wonder what Angelique would think, her faithful
servant now your faithful servant.”
“The best
thing Angelique ever could have done for me was to die,” the woman said, and
laughed her throaty laugh. “A
stroke. Too delicious. Even more delicious that the séance was her
idea in the first place. Who knew that
it would terrify her so much that one of the arteries in her mind would just …
burst?”
“You are
cruel,” Tom said, smiling, “and duplicitous and wicked.”
“You love
it.”
“I surely
do.” They kissed then, their tongues
dueling like frantic serpents. “We are a
debauched family,” he said after the kiss had broken. “We are given to tragedy and to evil.”
“Debauchery,”
the woman said.
“Always.”
“When
Maggie arrives, we will see that her reign as mistress of Collinwood is
short. This house is mine.
Quentin Collins has no right to it.”
“And after
you marry him?”
“I will
destroy him.”
“Then?”
“You,” she
said, “and me.” They kissed again.
After a
time, as the clock in the foyer chimed the midnight hour, they parted. Tom had errands, and she …? Why, she must prepare. Yes, she had many preparations to which she
must attend.
On the way
out, she watched as Tom passed Buffie Harrington, a fiery slip of a girl with
eyes that usually blazed even if she never said more than two words to any of
the family who employed her. She was
always chicly dressed, festooned with brightly colored bangles and earrings and
bracelets that clicked and clacked together like castanets. Or bones, which was a disturbing
thought. She didn’t like to be reminded of
bones.
She watched
Tom watching Buffie, and felt a cold shiver of jealousy. Should she?
Tom didn’t really belong to
her; he didn’t belong to anyone. And
neither did she.
Buffie
smiled at Tom and batted her long, fake eyelashes.
“That will
be all for tonight, Miss Harrington.”
They both turned to look at her, this dark-haired woman who desired this
house so much, and their expressions were dismayed. She smiled her frosty smile, Buffie nodded
without saying a word, then turned around and disappeared through the doorway
that led to the servant’s quarters, which she shared with Julia Hoffman and
Anthony Trask, the butler. Tom didn’t
say a word. He offered her own wintery
smile back at her, nodded as Buffie had, then disappeared.
She stood
alone in the drawing room, moving about aimlessly. She allowed her fingers to run over the edge
of the hideous green sofa Elizabeth adored and had insisted be dragged down
from the West Wing. After Angelique’s
death, of course. Angelique would never
have stood for anything so hideous in her living room, and for once, she
thought, we are in agreement. For a
moment she felt something like nostalgia, then realized it was for Angelique. She almost laughed aloud. The idea!
That bitch was gone forever, and good riddance too! She began to laugh just then, but froze a
moment later. She sensed something, and
looked wildly around. “Who is in this
room?” she cried, then demanded in her harshest voice of command, “Show
yourself!”
She waited,
but no one materialized. No one
appeared. She remained alone.
Her
shoulders slumped. How she hated that
word, “alone.” Even dear Tom couldn’t
make her feel safe or loved. He wasn’t
capable of loving, and that was her fault as well.
She set her
jaw; her mouth trembled. Things would be
different this time. She swore it. She would be the mistress of Collinwood as it
was meant to be. And everyone who had
ever mistreated her – Elizabeth, Roger, Carolyn, even Chris, Tom’s twin brother
– they would pay. Every one.
I promise you that.
After she
left the drawing room, Barnabas Collins materialized slowly. He had hovered for
a long moment outside the window, watching and listening, in the shape of a
bat. He hadn’t been able to hear clearly
every word of the conversation that transpired within the great house that was
so like his own, but he didn’t care. He
had seen her, and that was
enough. The heart that didn’t beat in
his chest strained and grew.
“I have found
her,” Barnabas whispered. “Victoria is
alive!”
2
Julia
Hoffman never intended to be a housekeeper.
Once, a million years ago it seemed, she had dreams (oh, and how it
hurt, and worse, embarrassed her to
think on them!) that she would never tell anyone, had never even told Angelique,
and she had loved Angelique more than anything in this world. But Hoffman knew Angelique well enough to be
able to imagine the smirk on her mistress’ face, the way she would roll those
enormous blue eyes of hers and simper, “Oh Hoffman, really. A doctor? How absurd.”
No, she
couldn’t have borne that.
Now she began
to tidy the room after aiming a harsh glare at that simple and yet somehow
lascivious Miss Harrington (“That will be all, Buffie,” Hoffman had growled in
her lowest, most leonine of tones). The
room was to belong to the New Mrs. Collins (and how that title grated her, oh,
and how!), straightening the coverlet on the bed (purple), brushing away dust
from the curtains (sea-foam green), vacuuming the carpet (the lightest possible
shade of lavender). She hated it. Worse, Angelique would have hated it. She would have laughed her delightful,
crystalline laugh, waved her hand through the air, and, choking, gasped, “Oh,
Julia, can you believe it? Really and truly? My darling, gauche hardly begins to
describe this … this décor!”
“Oh,
Angelique,” Hoffman whispered, and allowed her fingers to lightly brush the
purple pillowcase.
“Still in
mourning, are we? Poor Hoffman. All in black.”
Hoffman stiffened. It was Roger Collins, Quentin’s cousin that
he (for some reason that escaped her) allowed to live at Collinwood, with his
sister Elizabeth and her divorcee daughter Carolyn. Roger was perpetually drunk, and gay as a
goose. That’s what Angelique always
said, “Even though,” she would add with a titter, “he does try so hard, Hoffman, you wouldn’t believe it. Like a tiny puppy, always snuffling at my
feet. I caught him trying on one of my
dressing robes one evening, can you imagine?”
Disgusting. A disgusting man, a fairy
and a drunk.
“I am not,”
Hoffman said, her tone as stiff as her posture.
She turned to face him. Her
eyebrows were arched imperiously, her nostrils flaring, mouth tight, chin
thrust out like a lance. “What are you doing in here? Shouldn’t you be in her room? Conducting your
own peculiar brand of mourning?”
“Shouldn’t
you?” Roger smiled at her and swirled
the contents of his drink. “My dear, you
look positively ghastly. You are due a vacation, Miss Hoffman,
wouldn’t you agree?”
“I don’t
think so.”
“You
needn’t sound so bitchy with me. I know
what you think of me; I know what you all think of me. And I don’t care.” He threw back the rest of the drink and
stood, weaving and blinking at her. “You’re
as bad as the others, thinking she’ll come back.”
“She isn’t
coming back.”
“How well I
know it.” His voice had become maudlin
now, syrupy. He peered remorsefully into
his empty tumbler. His face
darkened. “That … that Victoria. Collins.
Ha. She isn’t a Collins, not
really.”
This
diatribe never failed to bore her. “She
is documented,” Hoffman said, “her father was a diplomat from England and her
mother was Mrs. Stoddard’s younger sister.
Your younger sister too, Mr.
Collins.”
“Louise,”
Roger said, “was adopted.”
Hoffman
accepted this silently. That was a fact
never spoken, not around Collinwood.
“She’s a
witch,” Roger said, and hiccuped. He
smiled. “Victoria Collins. The witch.”
“You just never
learned to spell.” Hoffman’s lips
twitched. She rarely made jokes, but she
quite enjoyed those when she did.
“She thinks
she should have Quentin to
herself. What is the attraction,
honestly?” He sneered. “As if you
would know.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“No, of
course you wouldn’t. Hmmph. Doesn’t matter. Quentin is already married, and poor little
Vicki can throw herself into the sea for all I care.”
“You should
go to bed.”
“Perhaps I
will.” He swayed against the
doorway. “You may finish your duties, Miss Hoffman. Good evening.” Weaving and wobbling, he was gone.
She watched
him go, her eyes wide and ferocious. She ground her teeth for a moment, then
smoothed the white apron that always lay over the black dress she was never
without, forced her hands not to tremble, then turned back to the room. For a moment she was overwhelmed with the
desire to take the lovely lacy pillowcase between her teeth and shred it like
an animal … but only for a moment. She
smiled icily instead, and smoothed away a wrinkle.
A doctor,
she thought, and smirked. Honestly. I
hate people too much to ever try to cure them.
Or perhaps,
she thought, hovering just outside the room, perhaps it’s only the Collins
family I hate.
3
“Darling,”
Elizabeth Collins Stoddard said, stroking her daughter’s hair, “darling, it
will be all right. I promise. Everything will be okay.” She glanced for a moment at Buffie
Harrington, who stood helplessly in the doorway, wringing her hands. Only a girl like Buffie, Elizabeth thought
dryly, and not without some amusement, could make hand wringing an act of
delicacy. “That will be all, Miss
Harrington,” Elizabeth said, and smiled as warmly as she could under the
circumstances.
Buffie
nodded, whispered, “Thank you, Mrs. Stoddard,” and disappeared the way she had
come.
Carolyn
wiped away the tears that stained her face.
“I want another drink,” she said, the petulance in her voice magnified
by the nasal foghorn quality that came from her crying.
“Do you
really think that’s wise?”
Carolyn
sobbed. “I do,” she said after a
moment. “I really do. It’s the only thing that dulls the pain, you
know.”
Elizabeth
looked down. “Yes,” she said
quietly. “I have some idea.”
“Will isn’t
coming back,” Carolyn said. She scrubbed
madly at her face; when she removed her palms, her eyeliner was smeared black
across her cheeks. She looked, Elizabeth
thought, alarmed, quite mad. “He’s gone
forever, isn’t he.”
“I don’t
know.”
“Why should
he come back here?” Carolyn moaned, and pulled at her long golden tresses. “His muse is dead. He’ll never write another book because his
precious Angelique is dead, Alexis isn’t a worthy substitute, the Old House
burned down, and I’m an enormous and repulsive drunk. Isn’t that true? Aren’t I an enormous drunk, Mother?”
“Carolyn –”
“I’m
sorry. I’m very sorry. Wallowing in self-pity. Not attractive, certainly not for a
Collins. But I’m not a Collins, am
I. I’m a Stoddard. Or a Loomis.
Or I was. Does that make a difference, do you suppose?”
“Darling,
you mustn’t torture yourself.”
Carolyn’s
face darkened. “You don’t know torture.”
“That isn’t
fair –”
“Get out,”
Carolyn whispered.
“Carolyn –”
“Get out,
get out, get out!” she shrieked.
Elizabeth drew back in alarm, scurried to the door to her daughter’s
bedroom, then turned back to her.
“You’ll feel better, darling,” she said.
“Soon. You just need some sleep.”
But Carolyn
had turned her back to her mother and stared furiously at her bedroom wall.
She stayed
that way for a minute or two, then sat bolt upright in her bed. Her terrified eyes darted around in their
sockets like trapped animals. “No,” she
moaned. “No, please, not now … can’t you
leave me alone?”
“I’ll never
leave you alone,” the voice whispered harshly, dark with amusement, echoing
around the room. “You are mine. You will always be mine.”
Carolyn
buried her face in her pillow and whispered, “Will … oh please, Will, save me …
save me please …” She stayed there until
the icy cold hand fell on her shoulder and pulled her from the bed and into the
embrace of a monster.
4
Chris
Collins never wanted to step foot inside Collinwood again. Or go anywhere near the estate, even. He had completed his final year of law school
in Boston with every intention of not returning to Collinsport, the town from
which he had run from as fast and as far as he possibly could … but then of
course he had fallen in love with a local guy, and the local guy wanted to
stick around (“For maybe just a year,” he had promised before doing something
extra nice as they lay together in their hotel room, still in the middle of
their decision-making process), and how could Chris say no?
Said local
guy lay beside him now, chewing on his earlobe, sending spirals of electricity
shivering up and down his body. His toes
curled involuntarily. “Don’t you have to
be somewhere?” Sebastian whispered suddenly, and Chris blinked at him and rose
up on his elbows.
“Now?” he
said. He looked down at their very
not-clothed bodies, then back up to the tousled golden hair that grew shaggy
around the craggy face he loved above all others. Sebastian Shaw’s body was long and tawny and
nicely muscled. Chris didn’t usually
like muscular guys – that’s what he always said – but in Sebastian’s case …well,
sometimes exceptions had to be made. “I
thought we were gonna … you know …”
“Oh,”
Sebastian purred, “we will, we will. I
just thought – well, didn’t Tom say …”
“Damn,”
Chris whispered. The only Collins he had
deigned to see since his return to town was his twin, and even that meeting had
been uncomfortable. Tom was different
somehow since the last time they met, though Chris couldn’t put his finger on
it. Something about his eyes, maybe,
which seemed sharper or clearer, or his face, which possessed shadows it had
never held before. Still, Chris had
vowed to have nothing more to do with his family, and there were no other
exceptions to be made for that
particular promise.
“What is
it, babe?”
Chris
sighed heavily. “Tom wants me to look at
our father’s will again, just to be certain that Collinwood really and truly
belongs to Quentin.”
“Do you
think it does?”
Chris
glowered. “Yes,” he said.
“I remember
Quentin Collins,” Sebastian said. He
chewed for a moment on the already ragged end of one fingernail. He looked, Chris thought, very young and very
innocent. Cherubic, even. He resisted the urge to pounce on him and
begin the ravaging, but just barely. “He
was kind of a bully, wasn’t he?”
“Kind of,”
Chris said, and sighed again. “Elizabeth
believes that marriage to Maggie Evans will mellow him – in the “long run” –
but I find that difficult to believe.
Impossible, actually.”
“It might
be nice to live at Collinwood,” Sebastian said dreamily. Chris’ eyes narrowed. Sebastian noticed, then smiled. “Don’t worry, Christopher. I get it.
Your dad didn’t want you to live there.
That’s cool with me.”
“Good,”
Chris said firmly. “I don’t believe in
curses, but …” His voice trailed off,
and he looked out the window. The moon
was nearly full, sailing through the unencumbered June skies. He frowned.
He had felt a twinge just then, as if a goose had waddled, quacking,
over his grave.
“A cursed
house,” Sebastian said. He ran a hand
through his shaggy hair. “Meh. Probably not as cool as it sounds.” He smiled wickedly, and when he smiled like
that, he still looked cherubic, but there was nothing innocent about him at all.
“Come here, baby. Let me show you
something that is.”
5
Barnabas
stood staring, his eyes red-rimmed and shocked, at the Old House … or the place
where the Old House used to be. It still
stands in my time, he thought, but here, in this strange place, they have razed
it, destroying it utterly. There was not
even a hint that it had once existed.
Perhaps, he thought, perhaps it never did; perhaps Collinwood is the
only house that stands on this estate.
A wave of
depression passed over him, and he turned away from the house. This wasn’t his world, his home; he didn’t
know any of these people.
But there
was Victoria.
He bowed
his head. Yes, that was true. She was alive in this time. Would she recognize him? Was that possible? Could it be that there was some connection
between the denizens of this Collinwood and those he left behind? If that were true, then it might be possible
that she could love him, maybe did already, and that they could traverse the
time barrier, return to his Collinwood and …
And
what? Live happily ever after?
“Who are
you?”
Julia?
He spun
around. Julia Hoffman stood before him,
her hair pulled back, exposing the dome of her forehead, all in black. “You followed me!” he cried. “How is this possible?”
“I don’t
know you,” Julia said. Her eyes narrowed. “What are you doing on this property?”
Of course,
he thought miserably, he should have recognized her immediately. He had seen her once before, when he had only
been able to peer into this room. The
woman glaring before him was the Julia Hoffman of this time. What was she
wearing? A heavy black dress, sensible
black shoes with heavy rubber soles, and what seemed to be some kind of white
apron. His eyes widened. She wasn’t … she couldn’t be … a maid, could she? “Pardon me,” Barnabas said as smoothly as he
could. “My name is Barnabas
Collins. I’m a cousin from England. Perhaps you recognize me. There’s a portrait of me hanging in the foyer
at Collinwood.”
Each of
Julia’s words dripped icicles. “There is
no portrait hanging in the foyer,” she said, “of you, or anyone else. Now tell me who you are.”
“I told
you,” Barnabas said. “My name is
Barnabas Collins.”
“Then you
must be a ghost,” Julia said smugly.
“The only Barnabas Collins I
ever heard of died in the 18the century.”
“I am his
descendent.” She wasn’t buying it. He was going to have to do something
drastic.
Julia’s
forehead wrinkled as she studied him closely, and then she suddenly took a step
away from him. Moonlight glinted off her
enormous green eyes as fear replaced the anger and coldness she had exhibited. “Stay away from me,” she said. “Don’t come any closer.”
“I’m sorry,
Julia,” Barnabas whispered. He was
nearly panting. His eyes had begun to
glow a sullen red.
“How did
you know my name?” Julia cried. She
turned to run, and he seized her arm.
“I’m sorry,
old friend,” he snarled, revealing the vampire fangs. She screamed, but only once, as he sank them
into her throat, and held her tightly in his icy embrace.
6
As Buffie
entered the forgotten room in Collinwood’s West Wing, a part of the house that
had been walled off in 1897 by Judith Collins after the tragedy that had
occurred there, a tragedy caused, in part, by her brother Carl and the dark
magicks he embraced, she couldn’t help but smile to herself. The Collins family were bastards; worse, fools.
Even Quentin, the so-called master of the house. He had to be a fool not to see what was
happening all around him. Elizabeth and
Roger, greedy and toad-like by turns, waiting for their monthly handout like
scraps for dogs; Carolyn, who drank more than she ate; Tom Collins, son of the
former master of the house and still clinging to Collinwood like a leech,
waiting for his rightful inheritance that was never going to come; Daniel,
Quentin and Angelique’s mopey son; Damion Edwards, Quentin’s so-called best
friend; Julia Hoffman, the nominal housekeeper and Angelique’s, ahem, “bosom
buddy”; and, of course, Anthony Trask, the butler. Buffie actually liked him. He was quiet, kept to himself, but he was,
somehow, always a perfect gentleman around her.
She glanced
around the room now and shuddered. It
was festooned with cobwebs. Enormous,
laden with dust. She didn’t to think
about the kind or size of spider that could weave webs that big. It was obvious that Hoffman’s cleaning agenda
never brought her into this room.
The door
creaked open, and in the dim light from the candle that she held, Buffie could
just make out the silhouette of the person she was scheduled to meet …
again. She caught her breath for a moment;
the silhouette held no substance, no form.
It was as if a shadow had come to life.
Then she
smiled. She was being ridiculous, of
course. Typical Buffie Harrington. Her mother, god bless her besotted soul,
always told her she was a girl with feathers for brains. But here she was, working up in the big house
on the hill for more money than anyone down in Collinsport did, and wouldn’t
they just give their eyeteeth for the secrets she was in on, wouldn’t they
just!
They all
thought the house was haunted. She
sneered. Let them. If there were any ghosts, she hadn’t seen
any. Not even that of the late Mrs.
Collins, Angelique Stokes, whom Buffie remembered from high school as a prissy
ice queen, a bitch in the girls’ bathroom who smoked and would punch you in the
boob if you caught her, even if you wouldn’t ever tell, not in a million
years. And boob punches hurt.
Boys whined about their precious testicles, but there was a special kind
of torment that came after being punched in the boob. And Angelique – why, she knew how to torment
people. She specialized in it. But Angelique was dead, and here Buffie was
instead.
“Did you
bring it?” she asked now. She was unable
to disguise the eagerness in her voice.
Well, so what? She wasn’t proud.
The figure
nodded, didn’t say a word. Buffie
frowned. That wasn’t exactly
unusual. It wouldn’t look good for
either of them if they were caught up here.
“I hate to
keep meeting like this,” Buffie said, “but, you know, you know how it
goes. The poor just keep getting poorer,
while the rich get richer.”
She thought
the figure stifled a laugh.
“I suppose
you want the dirt first,” she said. She
felt a stab of disappointment. She
thought they’d trusted each other more than this! “It isn’t a lot. Just that Tom Collins is weirder than we
thought. I don’t even know which room
he’s living in anymore. I think he might
be shacking up with Vicki, but she’s even harder to keep an eye on than he
is. But he disappears at night, I think
he heads into town to pick up hookers on the docks, you know how the girls down
by The Eagle are, and my friend Lavonna said she thought she saw him there the
other night with Bitsy Pettibone, who would have thought, Lettie Pettibone’s
only daughter an enormous tramp, she was always mean to me in school, deserves
what she gets, but anyway, since
Lavonna saw her with Tom Collins, no one has seen Bitsy since. So that’s the skinny, I guess. Can I … can I have it now?”
The figure
smiled, then laughed again, its most peculiar laugh. Buffie wanted to laugh too, until the
figure’s hand flashed out, and it flashed because it seemed to be holding … was
it a butcher knife? yes, belatedly, Buffie realized that’s exactly what it was;
but by then it was too late, and the knife had already punctured one of her
lungs and sizzle-slashed across her throat.
She was dazzled by the gout of blood that was almost black in the
darkness of the room; she stuttered to her knees, clasping her throat and
choking. Her visitor stood in place, as
if waiting, then, as if in response to a silent signal, knelt beside the dying
girl.
Buffie tried to speak, but she had no
words. Tears rolled down her cheeks and
mingled with the blood that still poured from the gash in her throat. She wanted to ask why, but she couldn’t make
sense of the gabble in her brain. Her
hands beat the bare boards of the dusty old floor in a mad tattoo.
She was
dimly aware that there was something being pressed to her chin, just where the
wound was – a goblet? A glass? Something to be filled … with her blood?
The thought
filled her with horror and she tried to cry out, but she died before she could.
Her eyes
were wide when her head dropped and thumped undramatically against the
floorboards.
The figure
grunted, moved the dead girl’s head to the side, and finished filling what was,
indeed, a goblet with the remainder of the blood that only now dribbled from the
wound in Buffie’s throat.
It stood
then, looked down at her incuriously, made a small sound.
Then it
left the room, and closed the door behind it.
And
Buffie Harrington stared into nothing all the rest of that night.
TO BE CONTINUED ...
