Krewe of Hunters, Volume 1: Phantom Evil ; Heart of Evil ; Sacred Evil ; The Evil Inside

by Heather Graham

  “Hello?” she called.

  John Alden came and opened the door for her. “Miss Duffy. What a surprise. Only it’s not a surprise—right? Sam probably just called you.”

  “True,” she said.

  “He’s upstairs. Come on in. Though why he called you, I don’t really know. You don’t seem to react well at a crime scene, and I’m damned glad. That makes you nicely human.”

  He meant to be nice. She smiled. “I’m okay.”

  “And you’re FBI, eh?”

  She laughed. “Tougher than I look, I guess.”

  “But you must get lots of blood and guts,” John said.

  “I do, but—”

  “No, no, sorry for being abrasive. You’re right—when it stops bothering us, we need to get the hell out of law enforcement.”

  Jenna heard footsteps coming down the stairs and then Sam’s voice. “Jenna! You’re here.” He glanced at John. “We happened to talk. She was in the area.”

  “Of course,” said the cop.

  Sam grinned at him. He looked at Jenna again. His expression was grave and yet, he seemed relieved. Maybe he’d been afraid she would refuse to come, after the way they had parted. He had almost called her a charlatan.

  “Jenna, here’s what I know, what I suspect. Earnest Covington was known to leave his door open. He wasn’t afraid of thieves. So, he either left his door open and the killer walked in—and caught him in front of the hearth—or he let his killer in, they came into the parlor together, and then the killer struck. I’ve a hunch it was the former rather than the latter. I think that Earnest Covington was just about to go through his mail, something he probably wouldn’t be doing with company. Plus, the first letter in the mail grate is from his son. There’s a picture in it, and he might have been about to admire his grandsons.”

  Jenna looked at him and nodded. “Makes sense. I’m going to just take a look around, too, then.”

  “Makes sense,” Sam replied, and began a conversation with the policeman that seemed more like a smokescreen for her than anything real.

  She walked back to the door to let her mind encompass what had taken place, while she tried to let her heart imagine Earnest Covington. She closed her eyes and had an impression of an older man—the perfect grandfather figure. He’d had white hair, he’d been lean and weathered, a man who had worked through his prime, and was still fierce in his thoughts and opinions. His life was somewhat lonely, but he didn’t mind—his wife was gone, and he wanted no other. He lived to tell the occasional visitor what Salem had been like before they’d gone modern-day witch crazy, before they’d become so commercial and when the House of the Seven Gables hadn’t been blocked from view by a dozen gift shops hawking witch T-shirts.

  As she thought these things, it seemed that a shadowy haze slipped over her, and the house. She had a sense of coming home and leaving the door open. Who would want his old stuff? The sofa with the upholstery that was all lumpy, or the TV that barely worked and certainly wasn’t attached to any newfangled gadgets. He walked into the living room, having just been for a stroll down the street. He smiled, thinking of the letter his son had sent. Wretched boy, falling in love with a foreigner, and heading off with her to Australia. It was with a heavy heart that he thought of the daughter-in-law he’d met at the wedding but never seen again. She’d died in a flash from a virus that no one had been able to stop. So now, of course, his son was still in Australia, but Earnest hoped that he’d come home soon enough, when the boys were a little bit older and his in-laws learned to live with their loss. For now, he had the pictures that Andrew sent, like these new ones….

  He hadn’t really heard the door open; he just became aware that someone was with him.

  He’d been puzzled at first; in fact, he had laughed.

  “If you’re looking to do something creepy at the old Lexington House, it’s down the street at the end of the block,” he said, not unwarmly.

  The costumed intruder just stared at him.

  “Private residence!” Earnest said, growing aggravated. He’d seen similar costumes before. It was like something out of the old days when the Puritan ministers tried to scare their flocks with pictures of an evil, horned and tailed devil. Of course, this person didn’t really have a tail. He was wearing a cloak, with a hood, the horns stuck out from the hood. The mask was red and black—of course, the devil was red, like a fierce, burning fire—or black, in the way that a heart could be black, and the costume was damned creepy and scary.

  “Hey!” he said. “My house—I don’t remember inviting you in!”

  The person stood very still for a moment—almost as if he was confused, or uncertain.

  Then, the figure drew its hands from beneath the folds of the cape.

  Earnest was briefly aware of a shining blade.

  He barely had time to throw his hands up to protect his face….

  And all to no avail.

  He was aware of a crunch as the ax hit his skull; he was even aware of the warm spray of blood that sailed around him, oddly beautiful. Red like the devil himself….

  He hit the floor.

  And knew he was dying.

  * * *

  “Jenna!”

  She gave herself a shake, mentally and physically, and refocused. Sam was standing in front of her; his hands were on her shoulders. His eyes, gray and sharp, were hard upon hers.

  She knew that John Alden was standing right behind him.

  She wasn’t going to say anything in front of the man who already thought she was a squeamish crackpot, especially not in front of John, who had yet to judge her as such.

  “Yes, I’ve pictured it as you said, Sam,” she said simply, “and I believe that you’re right. I think that Earnest Covington came in and left his door open. I think he might have been anticipating the pleasure of looking at the pictures again. The killer just walked right in and killed him.”

  Sam nodded. He turned to John Alden. “Thanks, John. I’m not trying to let killers loose on the streets, I swear. I appreciate your helping see to it that the defense has all the facts.”

  “Well, I don’t want the prosecution losing on a technicality—as in the defense not having everything it’s legally due,” John said. He looked at Sam. “Hey, come on, I’m not a mean or horrible man! I feel sorry for the kid. But I feel even sorrier for Peter Andres and Earnest Covington…. And the Smith family, of course.”

  The last was definitely added as an afterthought, Jenna was certain.

  “All right then, we’ll get out of your way, John,” Sam said.

  “I drove you here,” John reminded him.

  “I have a car,” Jenna said quickly.

  “All right. Keep me posted if you need anything else,” John said.

  “Will do,” Sam told him.

  He opened the door for Jenna, nudging it with his elbow. They walked outside.

  “The car is down the street, at the grass by the cliff-side park,” Jenna said.

  He nodded, walking alongside her. They passed Lexington House and both of them paused. Crime-scene tape still roped off the entire property. Fierce signs warned the curious off: arrests would be made for trespassing and interference.

  “Covington’s house is seriously just a block away,” Jenna murmured.

  “Yep.”

  “Well, you won’t have a problem in court as far as the Covington killing is concerned—if Malachi is charged.”

  “Oh?” he asked her.

  “I went to see the grocer. He’s convincing. Sedge swears up and down that he saw Malachi several times during the hours when the M.E. says that Covington was killed.”

  “Well, that’s great. You, uh, just decided to interview him?”

  She looked at him. He wasn’t angry; he was slightly amused.

  “I have a feeling that my people skills may be better than yours, at times,” she said.

  He nodded and took her elbow. Even by the light of day, Lexington House had a depressing facade, and it seemed th
at the windows were horrible eyes with evil intent—watching out for the unwary.

  Sam had drawn his eyes from the house. “So?” he asked.

  “So?” she repeated.

  “What did you really see?” he asked her.

  She groaned. “I’m not talking to you about anything—just the facts, man.”

  “Actually, please. I’m sorry. Tell me what you really saw, felt…or imagined in your mind.”

  Imagined in your mind. Was that his way of saying that he was interested in her visions revealed?

  She stopped walking again and stared at him. “I saw that the killer wore a costume again. I’m not sure that either of these two men knew, even as they died, who did it. The costume could just be some kind of a logical choice because it is Salem, where people are known to have a deep and profound belief in both God and the devil, or the person really believes that they need to dress up as something to get away with murder. Right now, though, in either case, with Haunted Happenings going on, who in the world is going to really notice anyone in costume?”

  She expected him to groan and say that, of course, even if she might have some kind of special ESP—it wasn’t telling them a thing.

  He didn’t. He looked at her, as if perplexed. “Now Haunted Happenings is going on. Now you might not notice someone in a costume. Peter Andres was killed six months ago.”

  “True,” Jenna admitted.

  They reached her car and the park at the cliff. He didn’t get in but walked past it and started up the path that led to the cliff. It wasn’t a high cliff, but rather a rise created from the jagged granite that was the solid base of so much of the area.

  There were scattered trees, creating a copse here and there, to the northern portion of the little park. Where the ground leveled at the top of the rise, there was a walkway to the edge, which overlooked the water. Sam followed the path, and Jenna followed Sam.

  White waves crashed with a fury in the autumn wind that rushed around them, stronger here, or so it seemed, than when they’d been down on the sidewalk by the neighborhood of old houses.

  Sam stood staring out over the water.

  “I used to come here myself,” he said, looking out. “It was always a great place to come and work out whatever adolescent problems I was having.” He turned to look at her. “Malachi said he was here when his family was murdered. I can imagine him coming here often. Somehow, being here makes you realize that your problems aren’t so great, there’s a vast world out there and we’re only a small part of it. I always loved the way the ocean seems angry here. I don’t remember ever coming when the waves weren’t white capped, and the crash of the sea against stone wasn’t loud and passionate.”

  “It’s a beautiful little area,” Jenna agreed.

  He pointed to the trees. “Kids come here to neck. And smoke pot.”

  She laughed. “Did you come here to smoke and neck?”

  He grinned. “Sure. I was a kid once. Believe it or not.”

  “Actually, I even vaguely remember.”

  He studied her. “You would have been accused of witchcraft, back in the day, you know.”

  “Possibly,” she said. “I like to think I would have kept the concept of seeing or feeling the past to myself. But thank God I don’t have to as much in this century.”

  He sat down on the grass by the cliff. Puzzled, she joined him. “Of course, if you’d been one of the magistrates, Sam Hall, you would have laughed the whole thing out of existence, since you don’t believe in anything.”

  “I never said that I don’t believe in anything,” he said, plucking a blade of grass from the ground and running it through his fingers. He looked at her. “The law was quite different then, you know. We’ve come a long way. The colony was English. And the entire Christian world believed in witchcraft. It was a way to cast and apportion blame. To explain the unexplainable. I don’t know why, but I keep thinking that there is some kind of answer in this that has to do with the past. The thing is, witchcraft was illegal and punishable by death back then. If you commit murder in death penalty states nowadays, you may be executed for the crime. It’s the law. A judge is legally and morally responsible to hand out sentences that conform to the law. Now, we have the concepts of legal and illegal searches, individual rights and so on. The people of 1692 weren’t protected that way—they seldom had any kind of representation. When I decided to go into the law, I would pretend that I had been Rebecca Nurse’s defense attorney. If I’d been there, of course, she wouldn’t have hanged.”

  “I’m sure she’d appreciate that,” Jenna said, smiling.

  He grinned in turn.

  “Salem and Salem Village were in turmoil. The Puritans might have adhered to strict teaching, but they weren’t above wanting to make money. At the time, the Porters and the Putnams and others—even though some of the families were actually intermarried—were having all kinds of land disputes. They’d been around for many years, so I’d say a good part of the population was related in one way or another. But, hey, it’s hard to imagine, but true, that in royal and noble families brothers and nephews killed one another over a crown. So, it’s not so hard to believe that they let bitterness carry them away here. Whether or not they really knew it, the people were probably letting their anger with each other prejudice their belief in what was happening. Hey, if you’re really mad at someone, it’s easier to think ill of them. And I think about kids—maybe they weren’t malicious, maybe they even believed part of what they were saying—you tell a lie often enough and it becomes real in your own mind.”

  “One of the first women accused was Sarah Bishop,” Jenna said. “She was supposedly disagreeable, and her husband’s children from a previous marriage also wanted property she owned. They say, too, that she wore a scarlet bodice—not very Puritan of her!—and had drinking parties. She’d been accused before, so she was an easy target.”

  “One of the first people hanged,” Sam said. “She wouldn’t confess to being a witch.”

  “And Malachi will not confess to being a murderer,” Jenna said.

  Sam nodded. “He’s an easy target, too,” he said softly. “And I’m willing to bet he’s being targeted for a reason. It looks like all evidence is against him—just as, to the Puritans, it looked as if there was solid evidence against those they executed. And Giles Corey—pressed to death because he wouldn’t make a plea. The old bastard didn’t intend to let anyone get a hold of his property, and by the legal system, not giving a plea protected his property.”

  “I’d have let them have my property,” Jenna said. “Life is so much better.”

  Sam laughed. “Me, too, probably. But by the law, if he didn’t plead, he couldn’t be tried, and because he wasn’t tried, he died in full possession of his property. And to force someone to make a plea so that they could be tried, they were pressed. Giles Corey was an old buzzard—he testified against his own wife. But he endured two days of pain—his tongue bulged out and the sheriff had to put it back in his mouth with his cane, and the old man still endured. ‘More weight!’ is all that he ever said, according to the records, and witnesses were horrified. What happened, of course, wasn’t caused by any one person, but belief mingling with old grievances and the social structure and laws of the day. The thing is, we’ve come far, but we’ll never get past being human. Malachi isn’t accepted in society. Good people will easily believe he could be a killer. I have to prove reasonable doubt, and that’s going to be hard. He wasn’t arrested for murdering Peter Andres or Earnest Covington; he was arrested for the murders of his family. I have all kinds of motions filed, but since he wasn’t legally accused of the other murders, I most probably won’t be able to use the fact that he was seen elsewhere when Earnest Covington was murdered. It depends on how all the motions filed sit with the judge. I have to prove reasonable doubt in those murders, and since he was covered in their blood…”

  “His explanation is reasonable,” Jenna pointed out.

  Sam stood and offered
a hand down to her. “Bridget Bishop wasn’t really hanged for what she did. She was hanged for who she was.”

  “You believe that Malachi is facing the same fate?” she asked.

  “Yes. But with one big difference.”

  “The law has become more equitable?” Jenna asked.

  Sam grinned. “No,” he said. “He has me.” She was startled when he touched her cheek in something that was almost a tender gesture.

  “And,” he added, “he has you.”

  7

  Sam joined them again that night at dinner, but it wasn’t much of a social occasion. He spent half of his time on the phone with his assistant in Boston, discussing the paperwork he wanted done. During the meal, he talked earnestly with Jamie, wanting to know more about the boy’s psychological makeup. Jenna spent most of the evening listening, and realizing that the more she watched Sam, the more she was drawn to him. She hated to admit the fact—even to herself, or especially to herself—that there was something about the testosterone-filled energy he exuded that was seducing her.

  Sam mentioned that he was going to visit Malachi in his hospital-slash-jail cell tomorrow, and then head to his office to deal with some of the massive amounts of paperwork that seemed to go with every sneeze. It had to be done—it was the major part of the game of law. Jamie was going to accompany him and spend time with Malachi.

  “The law these days is demanding,” Sam began. “But ultimately it’s a good thing. The witchcrafts trials couldn’t have existed today, but we learned a lot about ‘hearsay’ evidence because of the injustices of the past. And, thank God, there’s no longer such a thing as ‘spectral’ evidence. But, the paperwork! I really want to talk to the Yates kid, but his mother has threatened me with every lawsuit in the book if I go near him. I’m going to have to have help on that. And I’d also like to have an interview with Samantha Yeager, find out what, if anything, her connection to the Smiths was. But I have to head into Boston and the office for a few hours. You should probably come with us,” Sam told Jenna.

  “I’m afraid I would be worthless helping you with legal paperwork,” she told him.