by Nancy Holder
Well, she was here now, and if this were invasion… so be it.
She summoned her fortitude and walked to the trunk. The shadows moved, unnerving her. Nothing was quiet in this uneasy mansion.
She inserted the key into the lock, and it gave a click! as it opened, the sound reverberating through the vast, frigid space.
She pulled back the lid, to discover the trunk’s function as a travel desk, clean and organized, containing neatly stacked papers and folders. She selected a package and examined its contents. Inside was a letter from a bank. In Milan. Addressed to a name she recognized:
“Enola,” she murmured. “Sciotti.” She put it together: “Enola Sharpe. Lady Sharpe. E. Sharpe. E.S.”
She looked into the drawer again. There were three envelopes, each bearing cancelled date stamps: 1887, 1893, 1896. She took them. And:
“A phonograph.” She remembered the wax cylinders she had found in the otherwise empty linen cupboard on the night of the first… haunting. There. She’d uttered the word—if silently.
Haunting.
Who had wanted her to find them?
She took the phonograph out. It wasn’t as heavy as she had anticipated, and she was glad of that. She set it down and began to shut the trunk when—
Tap. Tap. Tap.
It was the same sound as before, and it produced the same effect: Chills ran down her spine and she braced herself for another terrifying visitation. As with the first time, the sound was coming from the direction of the vats. She put down the phonograph and tiptoed around the puddled floor toward them, ear cocked, trying to listen over the roaring of her heartbeat in her ears. It was coming from the final vat. As with the others, the lid was padlocked shut.
As she approached, it ceased.
She looked around and found a large stone. Hefting it, she slammed it down on the padlock. Once, twice. It broke. She took it off and opened the lid.
The vat was filled with clay, fresh and malleable, thick as custard. As she leaned over it, she accidentally dropped the key into it, and it sank. Dismayed, she thought a moment, then removed her blouse and slid her arm into the liquid, which was thinner than she expected. It was cold and slick between her fingers. Frightened, she leaned in further until her arm was shoulder-deep, breathing in the earthy odor as it coated her nose and throat. The rooting was strenuous and she was getting nervous. Her entire body tingled; her face was icy yet flushed with heat. The tapping in the vat had stopped when she grew near; what if she encountered… something…
Her courage began to fail her. Yet she had to retrieve the key. If Lucille knew that she had taken it…
What? she thought defiantly. I am the lady of the house. By rights all the keys belong to me.
Still, it took all her courage to keep looking. What if something grabbed her and pulled her in? Or came up behind her and pushed—
There.
Her fingers wrapped around what had to be the key. She drew her arm out of the clay. Uncurling her hand, she gazed down at her open palm. Yes. She had it.
Following the sound of the dripping water, she discovered a broken pipe and vigorously washed herself off. The clay was difficult to prize off the teeth of the key, but she managed it. She gave herself an inspection, grabbed up the phonograph once more, and darted into the lift. The lever balked but she went up.
* * *
The bride did not see the distorted skeleton as it floated to the top of the open vat. Blood-red bones. A gaping maw contorted into a soundless shriek. Hollow eyes staring, searching. It floated on memories and horrors.
It floated through sheer will.
Tap, tap, tap.
Like typewriter keys.
* * *
Thomas had called Lucille outside to share in his joy. Now here she was, as nervous and excited as he. Their fortunes depended on the success of the harvester, and it had chugged along nicely as he made his recalibrations and coaxed it to life. But this was the acid test—seeing if it would start up and perform without the constant adjustments and fiddling.
As she looked on, he ordered Finlay to start the machine again. The coal burned; the water boiled; the pressure of the steam made it all happen. The various parts of the engine moved with the precision of an automaton, and the harvester belt carrying the buckets glided up and down in perfect working order. It was a thing of true beauty, and the mechanical parts glittered against the weak winter sun.
Thomas’s elation knew no bounds. “I knew it! I knew it!” he cried. “We’ve done it! We can reopen the factory in the spring! We can start again. Lucille! We can start again!”
He could see that she was genuinely moved as she embraced him tightly. After all the struggles, the disappointments, now there was victory, vindication… he was not a failure.
“Oh, if only Edith could see it,” he blurted. The words were out of his mouth before he realized what he was saying.
Lucille pulled away. She stared at him in disbelief.
“Edith?” Her voice shook. “I did this with you. For you. I did it!”
He put his arms around her again, trying to recapture the moment, to backtrack. Mentioning Edith at this life-changing moment was a stupid blunder. He never wanted to hurt Lucille, ever.
Nor Edith, he thought wildly, panicking. Neither of them.
“Of course we did,” he placated her. “We did this together. No one else.”
“Lady Sharpe,” Finlay said. “We need more coal to test the steamer.”
Edith is now Lady Sharpe, he thought, but that, too, was a thought best left unspoken.
“Would you mind?” Thomas asked his sister, who, as the mistress of Allerdale Hall all these long years, had maintained tight control on their supplies. “Sparing a bit more coal?” Thomas wondered if Edith had noticed that the only room in the house that had been heated with regularity was their bedroom.
Stiffly Lucille grabbed at her key ring, hurt and uncertainty evident in her movements. Then she looked down to select the proper one for the coal bin. Her lips parted and, without another word, she ran toward the house.
* * *
It watched the sister’s eyes widen in horror. Watched her bolt away from her brother and race into the house. It knew what she knew: that a key was missing. That someone had taken it. And as the sister raced to confront the culprit—for who else could have taken it?—the innocent little thief stepped from the lift and took a few steps. Then, and only then, did she realize that her high-button boots were caked with red clay. While the sister shouted, “Edith, Edith, Edith!” from somewhere distant in the house, she unfastened them with trembling hands and carried them and E.S.’s phonograph down the hall toward her bedroom.
The sister was charging up the stairs. She was crazed, wild, panicked.
The bride sailed into the bridal chamber, stashed her dirty boots and the player under her settee, then draped herself across it with a throw drawn over her clothes. She shut her eyes, feigning sleep, but it could see her chest heaving, her arms trembling.
Then she said groggily, “I’m here.”
The sister swept into the room, fighting to catch her breath without giving away that she had been running. An earnestness born of cunning supplanted the violence of her expression.
“I want to apologize for my behavior this morning,” the sister said, as if all her care and thought were for peace between the two of them. Then, “Child, are you feeling all right?”
Equally adept at performance, the bride groaned and turned weakly. The sister put down her key ring and laid a hand over her forehead, taking her temperature. Glanced at the document that the bride’s solicitor had told her to sign.
She had not done it.
“I felt a little sick,” the bride murmured. “That’s all. Do you mind getting me some cold water?”
“Of course, of course,” the sister replied. A consummate actress.
Deliberately leaving her keys in the bedroom, she went into the kitchen to pump some water. Her face was grim, set.
While she was there, the bride slipped the key back onto the key ring, then settled back down on the settee.
The sister returned with the water. Handing it to her brother’s new wife, she said kindly, “I should let you rest. You’ll feel better soon.”
Then she grabbed up the keys. A quick examination revealed that the key labeled ENOLA was no longer missing.
That the bride had furtively returned it.
That there were small clumps of red clay on the floor of the elevator.
And that the sister knew.
* * *
Night had fallen on the day of Thomas’s greatest triumph, and he had come to Lucille’s room to discuss everything that had happened on this momentous occasion. Lucille’s room was a vivarium for her living insect colonies and a crypt for the unfortunate many she had chosen to kill and display instead. Vast arrays of mounting tools, pins, and knives cluttered nearly all the flat surfaces, and curio cabinets contained bizarre trinkets such as a shrunken head from Borneo, a voodoo doll from the American city of New Orleans, and misshapen animal fetuses suspended in formaldehyde. Her bed, however, remained free of her bizarre proclivities and was always clean and sweet-smelling. She had kept the finest linens that ever Allerdale Hall contained and sprinkled them with herbs to keep them fragrant.
His sister fed all her idiosyncratic passions.
Now she faced Thomas as they conferred. She seemed unusually animated tonight, frantic in the old way, the bad way, but when he asked her what was wrong, she would not say. Her eyes glistened with need and fear, and he remembered all that she had done for him. What she had endured for him. He had to be here for her. It was their pact.
“Just for me, Thomas,” she said. “Say that you love me.” He regarded her. “Ding, dong, bell,” he began, and she sat back, delighted.
“Ding, dong, bell,
Pussy’s in the well.
Who put her in?
Little Johnny Thin.
Who pulled her out?
Little Tommy Stout.
What a naughty boy was that,
To try to drown poor pussy cat,
Who ne’er did him any harm,
But killed all the mice in the farmer’s barn.”
They seemed odd now, these rituals of theirs. Over time, spending nearly all their waking hours together until… well, until they hadn’t, they had created their own rites and ceremonies, dreamed of other lives: of parties, and friends, and Christmas. During the troubled times, they had done anything to comfort one another, keep each other sane.
He was no longer certain that it had worked.
He held out his arms and she slipped into his embrace as he led her in a waltz. Chopin soared in his memory and he found himself thinking of Buffalo. So very different from here. Not as cold, not as dark, not as dead.
Why did I take Edith away from all that? Why did I go through with it?
He whirled his beautiful, dark-haired sister around the attic, swirling in a circle as moths revolved around them. Her black fairy attendants, she used to call them. She had cultivated generations of moths to make them as sooty-hued as ravens.
Lucille was gazing into his eyes and he could feel her weaving her spell around him. How old had he been when he had first surrendered? She was incredibly strong-willed, far more so than he. That was both a blessing and a curse. Lucille had kept them alive. Now they would begin to thrive. She had worked out the plan and except for a few unexpected hiccups—bumps in the night, literally—it was going well.
They danced. She was his most perfect partner. When they waltzed, a candle contained in their shared clasp never, ever went out.
One-two-three, one-two-three…
In the darkness, a danse macabre.
CHAPTER TWENTY
THE ATLANTIC OCEAN
ALAN WORE A heavy beaver coat over his evening clothes and stood at the railing of the transatlantic steamer in his top hat. The magnificent dinner was concluded, but in truth, he had not eaten very much. He was proving to be a disappointing table companion, of that he was certain: circumspect, brooding, taciturn. A young lady and her mother were on the hunt for a suitable husband, and he was certain he had been struck off the list the previous night. Even if he had been able to be charming, their obvious disappointment at his profession had been almost comedic.
Some of the male first-class passengers were gathering for port and cigars in the smoking room, but he had no stomach for conversation and he was very tired. Since boarding the night before, time had taken on a new urgency: Having determined that all might not be well with Edith, he could not wait to be at her side.
He stared down into the rushing dark water so far below, recalling his first voyage to England to go to medical school. On the way home he had pondered the nature of visions and studied some of the hair-raising photographs he had purchased from a classmate. Mediums were conducting séances all over Britain—and many of them were being exposed as frauds. People wanted so badly to believe in an afterlife where their loved ones continued to exist.
But what he had spoken about with Edith was something different. It was not so much continued existence as continued expression. An emotion, a presence, continually repeated but unnoticed by most until someone with the mechanical or organic means became aware. Glowing emanations of ectoplasm also signified such manifestations. He had seen pictures of such phenomena as well. But a spirit with volition and purpose was a different entity altogether, was it not?
The arctic air prickled his face. As he absently toyed with the backs of his gloves, he caught the scent of cigar smoke on the frigid breeze.
“There is so much more below the surface,” said a gravelly voice close to his elbow. The British accent belonged to a distinguished gentleman perhaps ten years older than he, also dressed in fur, with a large Cossack-style hat that nearly covered the entirety of his head. He was barrel-chested under the greatcoat, with ruddy cheeks and a pointed beard flecked with gray. The man gestured toward a huge mountain of ice floating on the water. It seemed dangerously close, but they had passed several that evening at roughly the same distance.
Alan tipped his hat but said nothing. The man positively reeked of brandy.
“…of the iceberg,” his fellow passenger continued. “What we see above the surface is estimated to be one-tenth of the mass of the thing. There’s ninety percent more below the water line, stretching out in all directions.”
When the man took a puff on his thick cigar, tears welled in his eyes—from the cold air or the smoke? Or was he maudlin from drink?
“I am sure that we’re sailing too close,” he confided nervously. If we scraped against it, it would gouge a hole in our hull.” Steadying himself on the rail, he looked down at the oily black sea and shuddered. “What a terrible place to die.”
“But surely the captain knows his business,” Alan countered, wishing to calm the poor man.
The man grunted. “I only hope that God does.” He reached inside his fur coat and pulled out a silver flask. Unscrewing the top, he offered it to Alan. “Napoleon brandy,” he said. “The finest.”
“Thank you, sir, but no,” Alan demurred. “This is a unique experience and I do not wish my senses to be dulled.”
“That’s the only way I can endure it.” The man took a swallow and kept the open flask in hand. “Dear Lord, there are more of the bloody things ahead.”
Indeed, an entire family of them, large and small, glittered in the moonlight. Safely guiding the ship through them would be a singular challenge. It was clear from the expression on the gentleman’s face that he was beginning to panic. Alan determined to distract him as best he could.
He extended his hand. “I am Alan McMichael,” he said. “At the risk of sounding patronizing, I’ve crossed before this time of year, and all ended well, sir.”
“I see.” The man managed a weak smile and inclined his head as if acknowledging Alan’s kindness. “I am Reginald Desange.” His expression did not change as he s
tared at the icebergs.
“Is your final destination Southampton?” Alan inquired, attempting once more to engage him.
“I have business in London,” Desange replied, prying his gaze from the horizon and looking directly at Alan for the first time. “And you?”
“I’m off to Cumberland,” Alan replied, and the man made a face.
“The weather in the north of England is beastly this time of year. Well, actually, it’s beastly any time of year. The proper word is ‘brutal.’”
Alan smiled resignedly. “And yet I must go.”
“May I be so rude as to inquire as to your business there?”
It was a bit forward to ask, but Alan could see that the distraction was helping the man calm down, and truth be told, Alan could do with distracting, too. He permitted himself to think for a moment of Edith and all her lovely books and dreams. “Well, I am Sir Galahad, sworn to rescue a dear lady in distress.” He shrugged, abashed at his attempt at poesy. He was a man of science, not a fanciful writer like Edith.
“In Cumberland?” The man seemed incredulous.
“Yes.”
“You’ll find no castles there. But I believe I read about some Roman ruins. Mining or some such. There is an ancient pit in that region…”
Alan nodded. “As a matter of fact, my destination concerns mining of clay.”
The man raised a brow. “Now I remember. Some wine vessels in the British Museum, quite red, were donated by the family who own a modern-day adjoining mine.” He slid a glance at Alan, who realized he shouldn’t speak further for fear of revealing too much about the identity of the lady in question. He did not want to cause a scandal.
“How interesting,” he said blandly.
The Englishman must have sensed that Alan was done speaking on the subject. He put his flask back in his pocket and lightly tapped the rail with his gloved hand.
“Well, Sir Galahad, I wish you luck on your quest. And I exhort you to dress warmly for your journey to the north.”