Shadows on the Wall Chapter 91

CHAPTER 91:  Transition

Voiceover by Donna Wandrey: “A night of terror on the great estate of Collinwood in the world of Parallel Time … a world that Barnabas, Julia, and Angelique all wish madly to leave.  But dark forces have conspired to keep them there … and as agendas arise and evil powers gather their forces for a final assault, there may be a death at Collinwood … or more than one.”

1

 

            “Where is she?” Roxanne snarled, as unpleasant now as she had been sickly sweet only a moment before.

            A spasm of fear flashed over Alexis’s face, and she backed away.  “Who are you talking about?” she cried.  Her voice sounded lamb-like in Roxanne’s ears, dreadful and ululating.  It seemed that she was more sensitive than ever these days, that even the sound of water dripping off a rainspout blocks away from her tiny hovel in Collinsport could send her into a frenzy.

            Roxanne stepped into the massive foyer of Collinwood and looked around appraisingly.  “You know who I’m talking about,” she said.  “She’s here, I can feel her.”

            “Get out of here, Roxanne,” Alexis said.  “I’ll call for help.  I’ll call Quentin.  He’ll put you out quickly enough!”

            “He,” Roxanne said pleasantly, and smiled a big smile, “would never make it in time.”

            They stared at each other.

            “This is ridiculous,” Roxanne said eventually.  “We aren’t evenly matched.  This wouldn’t be a fair fight in the slightest.”

            “I’m not interested in fighting you,” Alexis sobbed.  Her eyes were wet and weak looking.  “I don’t understand what you want or why you’re here, but I want you to leave … now!”

 

            “Yes, Miss Drew,” Victoria Collins boomed triumphantly from the head of the staircase.  Roxanne’s head whipped up and her eyes glared narrowly.  Tom stood behind his benefactress, and his face twitched and his eyes glowed.  Victoria was smiling.  “Why don’t you do as our dear Alexis bids you and leave?”

            Roxanne said nothing at first.  Then she began to smile. 

                       

            A moment later and she had disappeared utterly.

            Alexis uttered a long, quavering scream.

            “Shut her up,” Victoria snapped at Tom, who nodded, loped down the stairs, and took Alexis by the elbow and tried to lead her in the direction of the drawing room.

            “Let go of me!” Alexis shrieked and jerked away from Tom.  “Don’t you touch me, either of you!”  Her teeth were bared and her face was wet with her tears.

            “Weak, weak, weak,” Victoria sighed as she descended the staircase.  “Don’t be afraid of little miss Roxanne, Alexis dear.  She’s all talk.”

            “She … she just disappeared!” Alexis gasped.  “I’ve never seen anything like that!”

           

            “Yes,” Victoria said, “well.  That’s Collinwood for you.  Kooks.  A lot of kooks.”  Tom grinned and shook his head. 

            “She isn’t human,” Alexis sniffled.

            “So few people are,” Tom muttered, “these days.”

            Victoria shot him a look; he shrugged and turned away, still grinning.  “What did she want?” Victoria asked, turning her attention back to the wilting woman with the lank blonde hair and frightened blue eyes.

            “She didn’t say,” Alexis whispered.  “Not so that I could understand, I mean.  And then she … oh, and then she … d-d-disappeared –”

            “Yes, we all saw that,” Victoria snapped.  “I want you to look at me, Alexis.  Look into my eyes … as deeply as you can …”

            “No!” Alexis cried, her face white and horrified.  She tried to run, but Tom shot out an arm and seized her.  His long white fingers dug into the meat of her arm, and she yelped like a terrified rabbit. 

            “Hold her,” Victoria said grimly.  She glided across the foyer and stood before Alexis and smiled gently.  “You don’t have to be afraid of me, my dear.  I want to help you.  I can help you forget.  Wouldn’t you like that?”

            “Leave me alone,” Alexis moaned.

            “Look into my eyes,” Victoria said.  Her voice began to echo and rumble.  “As deeply as you can.  Look at me, Alexis.  Just … look.”

It took a long time – seconds that, to Victoria, sweat beginning to bloom on her forehead and her eyes burning with her concentration, felt like forever – but at last Alexis finally did as she was bade.

2

 

            Carolyn took her mother’s hand and held it tight, and together they gazed solemnly at the corpse of Roger Collins.

            “Oh,” Elizabeth said, and pressed her face into her daughter’s shoulder.

            “It’s all right, Mother,” Carolyn said, but it wasn’t all right.  Uncle Roger was dead … and worse.

            Something … had been at him.

            His throat was in ribbons; his eyes gazed forward in abject horror, and his mouth gaped slightly, revealing a gray hint of tongue; his chest had been opened as if something had exploded from within, leaving behind a black and white and red opening through which his ribs, broken and cracked, protruded. 

            “We have to leave this house,” Elizabeth said.  She lifted her face and wiped away at her tears.  “We must take the children and go.  Close it.  Quentin will just have to understand.”

            “It’s a beast,” Carolyn whispered.  “And a curse.  It will follow us, Mother, don’t you understand that?  It knows us.”

            “If it’s an animal,” Elizabeth said, “then surely it can be destroyed.  But no one can seem to find it!  Buffie … Maggie … and now … Roger …”  She uttered a hoarse sob and turned away. 

            “We’ll die,” Carolyn said dreamily, and took her mother by the hand.  “We’ll all die.”

            “I’m going to call the police,” Elizabeth said and reached for the telephone that had sat, undisturbed the past few months until the recent events that all seemed centered on this room …

            … and suddenly there wasn’t a telephone there.

            There wasn’t anything there.

            Carolyn and Elizabeth clung to each other and looked around at a room that had been rendered empty, lined with shadows, and floating with skeins of dust.  Only the moon flowing in through the window offered them any illumination.

            “Mother,” Carolyn whimpered.  “Oh Mother, what’s happened to us?  Are we dead?”  She seized Elizabeth by the shoulders and shook her until her head snapped back.  “Are we dead?”

            But Elizabeth could only stare at her with wide, frightened eyes.

3

 

            “We can’t go back to Collinwood,” Julia said, and puffed at her cigarette.  She aimed the burning red eye at its end at Angelique.  “They’ll never believe you are who you say you are.  And even if I could pass for Hoffman, eventually I’d make some sort of slip up.  The fact is, none of us know enough about the people in this time to pass for one of them.”  Her eyes narrowed.  “Not even you, Barnabas,” she said.  He said nothing, but looked down fixedly at his cane as he had done ever since they’d left Eagle Hill.

            “I’m afraid I haven’t the faintest idea what we should do,” Angelique said.  Her eyes were downcast and shadowed; the three of them stood inside the carriage house which, fortunately, seemed to be at least temporarily abandoned.  Every inch of it was covered in a thick patina of dust; Julia had briefly considered dropping an ash onto one of the coverlets in hopes that a spark would catch in Angelique’s dress, sending the witch – former witch – witch – former witch up in flames.  But no, Julia had sighed and puffed at her cigarette.  That was too cruel.  And Angelique could still prove helpful. 

            “We should go back to Collinwood,” Julia said decisively, “sneak in through the servant’s entrance, and try to get to the East Wing.  We can hole up in one of the rooms until we have a chance to get to Angelique’s room … and then …”

            “And then what?” Angelique said.  “We just wait?  Sitting around, terrified that someone will discover us?”

            “It’s the only option,” Julia said, her voice growing ever stonier.  “We must return to our time at once.”

            “And how do you propose we do that?” Angelique said nastily, and Julia wished madly for that spark.  “I have lost my powers, Julia.”

            “Barnabas made it here without the benefit of your powers,” she snapped back.

            Barnabas said nothing.  He only looked at his cane.

            “We should find someone in the village,” Angelique suggested, “someone involved in the occult.  That wolfman, whoever he was – he could help us!”

            “Or betray us to that Roxanne woman,” Julia said.  “She warned us to leave this time as quickly as we could, and I, for one, think she was right to do so.”

            “And I think you are a fool, Julia Hoffman!”

            That was it.  Julia’s hand had snapped out almost before she knew it was going to, and Angelique’s head rocked back, there was a very loud sound, and suddenly Julia’s hand stung with a ferocious and quite welcome heat.

 

            Angelique stared at her, gape-mouthed.  One hand rose unsteadily to her cheek and the fingertips grazed the spot, which had begun to flame.  Her wide eyes shimmered with tears.  “You’ll be sorry you did that,” she snapped, and turned away before either Barnabas or Julia could see that there were teardrops about to fall.

           

            But Barnabas only continued to stare at his cane.

            Julia reached out her hand, bit her lip, then drew her hand back.  Maybe, she thought uneasily, maybe that was too far.  “Angelique,” she said, and her voice was unsteady.  She swallowed, and heard only a dry click.  “Angelique, I’m –”

            “Don’t say it,” Angelique whispered.  She remained where she stood, shoulders hunched and trembling, head bowed, hands clenched into tight fists.  “I don’t want to hear you tell me that you’re sorry.”

            “That was uncalled for, I’ll admit it,” Julia said.  “Angelique, please.  After everything …”  She cast an uneasy eye at Barnabas, who, disturbingly, seemed as catatonic as he had when they led him into the carriage house.  She flicked her ash onto the floor and her eyes back at Angelique.  “We need to work together more than ever before.  I’ll try … I promise I will.”

            Angelique glanced over her shoulder and snuffled.  “No, Julia,” she said, and Julia blinked.  The other woman turned around to face her head on.  Her face was wet and the place where the flat of Julia’s hand had come in stinging contact with her arrogant cheekbone stood out in sharp relief against the porcelain of her face.  Her eyes were red and glared a stark green color.  Julia swallowed again, and took a quick drag from her cig.  But Angelique only said, “I’m sorry.  I … I have a tendency to lose my temper.  As you may have gathered.”

            Barnabas made a small sound, and both women glanced at him.  “Barnabas?” Julia said softly, and laid a firm hand on his shoulder.  She didn’t see how Angelique’s eyes narrowed.  “Barnabas, are you with us?”

            “I’m with you, Julia,” Barnabas said.  His voice was a ghost, dry, a whisper, just a husk.  He laughed once and they winced; it was a dreadful sound, worse than his whispers.  “I just don’t know where I am.”

 

            “We will find a way,” Angelique said.  The determination that had been missing only moments ago had come back with a vengeance, and Julia stared at her.  Angelique only shrugged.  “I promise you, Barnabas, we will find a way back to our own time.”

            “Our own time?”  He shook his head.  “It isn’t possible.  I know where we are.  I’ve figured it out.”

            They exchanged more worried glances.  “It’s a parallel world, Barnabas,” Julia said, “just as Eliot –”

            “No.”  His voice was strong suddenly, vehement.  “No, it isn’t.  It isn’t a parallel world, another time.  And there is no way back.”  He looked up for the first time, and his red-rimmed eyes scanned the face of the two women who loved him.  Both felt winded at the sight of those eyes, so empty were they, so beyond anything resembling even simple despair.  There was nothing there.  Absolute nothing.  “We won’t ever go back.  It isn’t possible.”  He licked his lips.  There was no saliva to moisten them.  “Because this is hell, you see.  Hell.  And no one ever escapes from hell, not really.”  And he dropped his eyes once again.

4

            Her eyes swallowed Alexis; the pupils expanded until they devoured everything else in the world and became two swirling black holes.  Victoria watched with satisfaction as Alexis’s own eyes grew wider and wider, as her own pupils expanded to meet them.  “Excellent,” she said, a cobra swaying before a mouse.  “Now tell me.  What brought Roxanne Drew to Collinwood?  What did she want?”

            Alexis opened her mouth, then turned her head away.  A tiny and completely uncharacteristic smile of pleased deviltry danced across her face.  It was entirely too Angelique for Victoria’s comfort.  “I told you,” Alexis simpered, “I don’t know.”

            Victoria snarled.  She raised a pale hand; the fingertips danced with crackling black sparks.  Alexis merely laughed again.  “My sister was a witch, Victoria,” Alexis sang, “and even if that isn’t what you are – because I’m not entirely certain what you are – did you really think that, based on my relationship with her, I wouldn’t protect myself from witchcraft somehow?”  And she fingered a single delicate bead that hung from a thin chain around her neck.  “It’s pure silver,” she said to Tom as he reached for it, “in case you were wondering.”

            “She knows,” Tom whispered.

 

            “Of course I know,” Alexis said.  “Angelique and I are twins.  We shared everything, even when we hated each other.”  She closed her eyes and muttered a word neither of the others could understand, and suddenly Tom was shoved backward as if by an enormous and invisible fist.  He struck the wall by the front door and slid to the floor where he sat, eyes half-lidded, a trickle of blood dribbling slowly from his right nostril.

            “You don’t have any real power,” Victoria said.  “I can tell.  I can feel you, my dear Alexis.”

            “Then perhaps you’ll be able to feel this as well,” Alexis said pleasantly, and a moment later Victoria burst into flames.

5

            “I wouldn’t,” Roxanne said, and laid a hand on Quentin’s shoulder.  He turned to face her, his eyes wild, his face a white shock in the darkness outside Collinwood’s front door, and though he tried to shrug her off, her grip was iron-firm.  “Let’s let them play by themselves, what do you say?”

            “Let go of me,” Quentin said, each word slow and deliberate.

            Roxanne released him, but positioned herself so that she stood between him and the door.  An orange glow flickered through its crack, and thin purple plumes of smoke began to rise into the air before them.  “Whatever you say,” Roxanne said, “but I would advise against it.”

             “Something is burning!” Quentin cried.

            Roxanne examined his face carefully, then shook her head.  “But that isn’t why you’re in such a mad dash to make it back inside your ancestral home,” she said, “is it.”

            Quentin opened his mouth, then closed it again.  He blinked, confused.  “I … don’t know,” he admitted.  “I heard Cousin Barnabas … I overheard …”  He shook his head.  “But he isn’t Cousin Barnabas at all.  I don’t know what he is.”

            “Of course you do,” Roxanne said.  “He’s a vampire.”

            “A vampire,” Quentin sighed.  A sob began to build in his chest, and he gritted his teeth against it.  “Another goddamn vampire.  He killed Maggie, didn’t he.”  A tear slid effortlessly down the curve of his cheek.

            “No,” Roxanne said, and Quentin’s eyes opened wide. 

            “How do you know?” he said.  “I don’t even know you.”

            “You know me well enough,” she said, and touched his cheek.  “Remember, Quentin.  The times you would come to me before you ever met Angelique Stokes …  I ordered you to forget them, my Quentin Blue Eyes, and you did, just as I bade you, you forgot me … and it should have been forever.”  A shadow passed over her porcelain face.  “But then this town – this accursed house – called me back, and I had to come.  I couldn’t ignore the call.  I never could.”  She drew her hand away; Quentin was watching her warily, confusion and suspicion passing like clouds over his face. 

            “I don’t know you,” Quentin said, but he sounded doubtful.

            “Remember,” Roxanne whispered, “remember …”

            He took a shuddering step away from her suddenly, then reached out and crushed her to him.  “Roxanne!” he cried.  “Roxanne, it’s you!”

 

            “Yes,” she purred, and nestled her head against his chest.  “It’s your Roxanne.  I’ve come back to you.”

            “Why did you make me forget?  Why would you do that to me?  God, I love you so much –”

            “Because it isn’t safe for you, Quentin,” Roxanne said.  “I told you, I explained.  Because of who you are – and because of what I am.”  She stepped carefully out of his embrace.  “And I’m only allowing you to remember now because you are in grave danger.  You and the entire family.”

            “You don’t care about my family,” Quentin said.  “You told me that a million times.”

            “But I do care about you.  I told you that a million times as well.”

            “True,” Quentin nodded.  “But things are different now.  There are monsters …”  His brow furrowed.  “What do you mean, what you are?”

            “I don’t have time to explain to you.  There are evil forces at work at Collinwood, and they will destroy you if you let them.”

            “Then I won’t let them.”

            She smiled and shook her head.  “Oh Quentin.  Always so brave … and so stupid.”

            “Hey –”

            “Don’t be offended.”  She stroked his cheek again, but tenderly.  “You must beware Angelique, Quentin.  She wants you dead.”

            His nostrils flared.  “Angelique is dead,” he said.

            “How I wish I could believe that,” Roxanne said darkly.  “The fact of the matter is, she may be dead, but she is still dangerous.  Like the head of a rattlesnake – separated from its body, it can still bite you, still infect you with its poison.  Angelique still holds power.  You truly are a fool if you don’t understand that.”

            “I’ll fight her then,” Quentin grinned and tried to slide an arm around Roxanne’s waist.  “With you beside me –”

            “You won’t have me beside you,” Roxanne said, neatly skirting his arm.  “I’m sorry, my darling, but that is how it must be.”

            “Don’t talk like that,” Quentin said.  “Please, Roxanne.  I’ve lost so much –”

            “And you will lose more.  You are under a spell, whether you realize it or not.  I’m … I’m not certain whose spell, that’s the problem.  But until I figure it out, you won’t be safe at Collinwood.”

            “Cousin Barnabas?”

            “It isn’t Barnabas,” Roxanne said.  “He’s a victim as much as anyone else in this family.  There is a curse working on you, on all of you, and it stretches across time and space.  Barnabas Collins may be a vampire, but he is not a threat to you.”  Her eyes clouded.  “At least, not yet.”

            “What does that mean?”

            She looked back at him and tried to smile.  “Never mind,” she said.  “Go into town.  See your son.  But stay away from Collinwood, Quentin.  You will remember that, even if you have forgotten everything else.”

            “Why would I forget you?  I just found you again!”

            “Because you must,” Roxanne whispered.  There was something he detected in her voice … a trace of emotion, the barest hint of a sob …but her eyes were dry.  Wide, a dark blue that was almost lilac, eyes that a man could drown in, and love it while he did …

           

            Forget, Quentin … forget once again …

 

            “Forget,” he whispered.

            “Stay away from Collinwood,” Roxanne commanded. 

            “I will stay away from Collinwood.”  His lips barely moved.  His eyes stared into hers.

            Roxanne stood on her tiptoes to brush her cold lips against his.  “Goodbye, my love,” she whispered.  “Forever.”

            Quentin blinked and passed a hand over his face.  “What?” he said.  “What?”  He glanced around, but he stood by himself before the front door of Collinwood, where there was no longer any orange glow (orange glow?) but where a few tendrils of smoke continued to rise lazily.

            Why should there be smoke coming from Collinwood?

            He smiled.  It was a daffy smile, completely lovely and loony, and it made him look boyish and even more handsome.  She loves me to look this way, he thought.

            Who? 

            He shook his head.  Didn’t matter.  There was no smoke escaping from Collinwood.  Hallucination – it had to be.  Besides, why was he about to go in the house?  He had to visit Daniel – Daniel was his responsibility.  Now that Maggie was gone, Daniel was his life.  That was how it had to be – the only way it could be now.

            So thinking, Quentin spun around and began to walk back to his car.  He paused for only a moment and glanced up at the sky.  There was a name on his lips; he could taste it, could almost remember …

            Then it was gone.

            Oh well.  He had to get to the hospital.  Daniel was waiting.

6

            “We’ll be all right, darling,” Elizabeth said.  Carolyn continued to cling to her, even as they cracked open the door to the room that had been Angelique’s and peered out into a hallway that was as dusty and gloomy as the room they had just inhabited. 

            “No we won’t,” Carolyn whispered.  She was trembling uncontrollably, like a little animal.  “Mother, where are we?”

            “I don’t know,” Elizabeth admitted, then, firmly, said, “But it won’t do us any good to lose our heads.”

            “It’s Angelique,” Carolyn said.  “She’s responsible for this.  We were in her room –”

            “Whether it’s Angelique or not,” Elizabeth said, “we need to stay calm.  We’re still in Collinwood.”  Her nose wrinkled.  “I think.”

            “But whatever could have happened to it?” Carolyn wailed.  “Mother, it looks … abandoned!”

            “Time travel,” Elizabeth said thoughtfully.  “Perhaps we’ve gone somewhere else in time.  As preposterous as that sounds –”

            “Nothing sounds preposterous anymore,” Carolyn said.  “Not to me.”  Her eyes widened suddenly.  “Mother,” she said and brushed her fingertips against her throat.  Joy flooded her face and bloomed in her cheeks.  “Mother, they’re gone!  They’re gone!”

 

            “What are you talking about?” Elizabeth asked.  She had continued a few steps down the hallway toward a door at the end, and she stopped now and glanced back at her daughter.

            “The marks,” Carolyn said.  “The marks on my throat!  They’re gone!”

            “What marks?”

            Carolyn shook her head.  “The bite marks,” she said.  Her face darkened.  “Tom’s bite marks.”

            “Tom!”

            “He’s a vampire, Mother,” Carolyn said.  “He did this to me.  Made me his slave.  He’s a monster.  But whatever’s happened – wherever we’ve gone – it undid whatever hold he had over me.  The marks are gone, and I can think clearly again for the first time in … oh god, months!”

            “Tom a vampire,” Elizabeth said.  “It hardly seems possible.”

            “It is possible.  Mother,” Carolyn said, her face brimming with exciting, “I just thought of something.  Something Will talked about – something he wanted to write about in his next book … Mother … have you ever heard of … Parallel Time?”

7

            Tom leaped to his feet, and for a moment Alexis was sure he would throw himself at Victoria in an attempt to smother the flames so he could save his lady love.  A smirk rose on her face as she watched his muscles bunch … then relax, as he drew back flat against the wall.  The flames danced in his brown eyes; his mouth worked, and his face, if possible, grew even paler. 

           

            But Victoria wasn’t finished.  Her hands burst forth from the flames and rose into the air, and for a moment Alexis was certain that the woman was chanting somehow …

            “Damn it,” she hissed.

            The flames died away, revealing Victoria Collins, unscathed, not even singed.  Her face was a twisted mask of fury and triumph.  “That,” she snapped, “was completely uncalled for.”

            “You had it coming,” Alexis said.  “You’ve had it coming for months.  You monster, you beast … thinking you could come in here, swoop in and take my sister’s husband, her child –”

 

            “And just what were you planning on doing, dearest Alexis?” Victoria snarled.  “Surely you haven’t been hanging around Collinwood for the past six months because you’ve been in mourning for your sister.  You hypocrite.  You’ve had your eye on Quentin Collins ever since Angelique’s death, if not before!”

            “No, that isn’t true!” Alexis cried.  She gathered her composure and smoothed the wrinkles in her dress.  It was a losing battle.  Washing and drying her clothes properly just hadn’t been a priority ever since …

            Alexis smiled.  Well, ever since that special night.

            Victoria’s eyes narrowed.  “What are you smiling about?  Certainly you know I can’t allow you to live.  In the parlance of the horror films, I’m afraid you know too much, my dear.”

            “And what,” Alexis said, examining one gnawed and ragged fingernail, “what makes you think that I will allow you to live?”

            Victoria’s mouth opened, closed, then opened again.  Then she pealed a burst of wicked, nearly hysterical laughter.  “You can’t be serious,” she cackled.  “My darling Alexis, you may have some talent, I’ll grant you that, but to come up against me … against me – do you know who I am?  Do you know what I am?”

            “I’m afraid I don’t care,” Alexis said.  “Things are about to get very interesting, Victoria dear.  Very interesting indeed.”  And with incredible nonchalance, before Victoria and Tom’s widened eyes, Alexis walked steadily, head held high, to the grand staircase.  She mounted it and walked slowly and calmly up the steps, paused for a moment at the top, nodded her head at them graciously, and continued through the door and out of their sight.

8

            “I want him.”

            “I know you do.”

            “And I will have him.”

            “I’ll bring him back.  Just as soon as I can.  I’m in great danger, this very moment.  She won’t wait much longer to destroy me.”

            “She won’t destroy you.”

            “You don’t know that.”

            “I do.  Because I’m going to destroy her first.”

            “You aren’t strong enough.”

            “I am.  You have seen to that.”  The voice trembled and wheezed, grated like the wrought iron gates of the mausoleum at Eagle Hill.

            “I’m afraid.”

            “You mustn’t be.”

            “I can’t help it!  You didn’t see her face!”

            “Did you do what I –”

           

            “Of course!  But it didn’t work.  She’s stronger than we thought.”

            “She is nothing.  She was always nothing.  But she doesn’t matter now.  You know that.”

            “I know that.”

            “Only Quentin matters.  Bring him to me, Alexis.  If you ever loved me … you’ll bring him to me.”

            “I will, I swear that I will.”

            The creature tottered into the light and reached out with one rotted, wizened hand.  Alexis wanted to recoil, but she wouldn’t allow herself the luxury.  This was what she wanted – what she had killed for – for the moment to come, for the glory that had been promised … the lure of eternal life.

            And even though she was decomposing, even though her flesh clung to her bones in wet and purple tatters, even though mere strands remained of her once famous golden mane attached in damp patches to the skull that gleamed in the moonlight, Angelique Stokes Collins was still alive.

            Still alive.

            “I believe you,” she grated.  “You won’t fail me.  You never have, sister of mine.”

            Together, their insane laughter, nearly identical, even now, filled the dusty room in Collinwood’s deserted West Wing like a flock of maddened crows.

 

TO BE CONTINUED ...