The Manor

by Scott Nicholson

  Still…

  It was almost as if the figure had life. As if the true heart of the wood had always been this shape, as if the bust had always existed but had been imprisoned in the tree. The face had been caged, and Mason had merely inserted the key and opened the door.

  He shook his head in disbelief. "I don't have any idea where you came from," he said to the bust, "but you're going to make the critics love me."

  The love of the critics meant success, and that meant money. Success meant he'd never have to step foot in another textile mill as long as he lived, he wouldn't have to blow chunks of gray lint out of his nose at every break, he wouldn't have to wait for a bell to tell him when to take a leak or buy a Snickers bar or race the other lintheads to the parking lot at quitting time. Sure, he still had years of carving ahead, but success started with a single big break.

  He was already planning a corporate commission, the gravy train for artists. He'd buy Mama a house, get her some advanced text-reading software and an expensive computer, and then find all the other ways to pay her back for the years of handicap and hardship. Best of all, he could make her smile.

  Or maybe he was being suckered by the Dream Image, the high that came after completing a work. He still had to treat the wood, do the fine sanding and polishing. A hundred things could still go wrong. Even as dry as the maple had been after years in the forest, the wood could split and crack.

  Mason rubbed his shoulder. His clothes were damp from sweat. The weariness that had been building under the surface now crested and crashed like a wave. Even though he was tired, he felt too excited to sleep. He took one last look at the bust of Korban, then covered his work with an old canvas drop cloth he'd found in the corner.

  The first red rays of dawn stabbed through the ground-level windows. Mason's stubble itched. Back in his old life, he'd be on his third cup of coffee by now, waiting on the corner for Junior Furman's pickup to haul him to work. The start of another day that was like a thousand other days.

  Mason traced his way back across the basement, ducking under the low beams and stepping around the stacks of stored furniture. He finally found the stairs and went up to the main floor. The smell of bacon, eggs, and biscuits drifted from the east wing, and kitchen-ware clanged in some distant room. Mason's stomach growled. An older couple passed him in the hall, steam rising from their ceramic coffee cups. They nodded a wary greeting. Mason realized he probably looked bleary-eyed and unkempt, like an escaped lunatic who'd broken into the medicine cabinet.

  When Mason reached his room, he looked at the painting of Korban again, marveling at how closely his sculpture resembled that stern face. But the face seemed a little less stern this morning. And the eyes had taken on a little more light Don't be bloody DAFT, he chided himself in William Roth's accent.

  Mason took a long, hot shower, then lay in bed as dawn sneaked through the cracks in the curtains. In his mind's tired eye, he saw Korban's face, then that dissolved away and he saw Anna. Then his mother, features worn, made even sadder by the pathetic light of hope that somehow still shone in her diseased eyes. Then he pictured Miss Mamie, with her haughty lips. Ransom, clutching his warding charm. Korban, dark pupils holding wretched secrets. Anna, soft and somehow vulnerable, harboring her own secrets.

  Korban. His mother. The bust. Anna.

  Miss Mamie. Ransom.

  KorbanAnnaMissMamieAnnaKorban.

  Anna.

  He decided he liked Anna's face best, and thought of her until he slept and dreamed of wood.

  CHAPTER 12

  Anna woke before the first rooster's crow broke the black silence. Across the room, Cris rolled over in her sleep. The darkness behind Anna's closed eyes wasn't as total as the room's darkness. Streaks of blue and red flared across the back of her eyelids.

  She slipped into her robe and went into the bathroom. The antique plumbing used gravity to flush the toilets, and the water pressure was inconsistent, though the central heating ensured plenty of hot water. She lit a globed lantern before extinguishing her flashlight, then stepped into the shower and turned the taps.

  Under the dull drumming of the water, she forgot the pain in her abdomen. She hadn't dreamed last night, though the questions had swirled around and around as she spun down the drain of sleep.

  Where was her ghost? Who was Rachel Faye Hartley? Why was Miss Mamie so curious about Anna's ''gift"? How much time did she have left? What would happen after that time expired?

  And the biggie, would anyone even care?

  She peeled back the shower curtain and wrapped a towel around her. The room had grown colder, and with the water turned off, the steam hung heavy on her skin. It coated the mirror above the sink, and though she wasn't in the mood to gauge the darkness of the circles beneath her eyes, she wanted to make sure she could pass for hale and hearty.

  She was about to reach up a corner of the towel to wipe the mirror when the room grew even colder, as if a wind had crept through the crack beneath the door. Her blurred face in the mirror breathed mist.

  Then the water collecting on the mirror ran in streaks, and Anna didn't believe her eyes. Because even somebody who saw ghosts didn't see things like this.

  Letters formed, as if drawn by the tip of an invisible finger, the symbols silver in the soft glow of the lamp.

  "G-O"

  CHAPTER 13

  "Did you get any footage this morning?" Adam leaned against the bureau and folded his arms.

  Paul put away his camera. "I have to save my batteries. I only have four. That gives me about eight hours of juice. And there's no way to recharge them out here."

  Adam watched Paul stack the equipment in the closet. His partner had a cute body, he had to admit. But Adam sometimes wondered if their relationship was built on anything besides the physical. Paul liked Times Square, and the place gave Adam the creeps. Paul liked coffeehouses and parties, and Adam liked curling up on the sofa with a good book. When it came right down to it, Paul was late-night MTV and Adam was weekend VH-1.

  And there was the issue of adoption. Adam was ready to raise a child, to share the wealth of love in his heart. He had plenty of money from his inheritance. Enough to pay the adoption fees and lawyers, enough for the courts to be satisfied that Adam had that most-desired parental quality: that Adam would be able to afford whatever outrageously expensive toy was trendy each Christmas, so the child wouldn't grow up as a social outcast, snubbed by peers and forever despised by advertisers.

  Adam was afraid in some small part of himself that he only wanted a child to tie Paul down. Paul was a bit of a free spirit, and even unknowingly hurt Adam by going on a weeklong cruise with an older man before Adam had mustered the courage to share his feelings. Paul had been faithful since, but Adam wondered if perhaps the right temptation had never arisen. In fact, he thought maybe you couldn't even call it "faith" until that faith had survived a test.

  "What do you want to do tonight?" Paul said. "Go down for drinks?"

  "You could have joined me for lunch."

  "Look, we don't have to spend every damned second together, do we?"

  Adam didn't answer, because something shifted in the mirror, a flicker cast by the fireplace.

  "What's wrong?" Paul said.

  Adam rubbed his eyes. "Nothing. I'm just a little messed up, I guess."

  Paul grinned. "Oh yeah. Maybe you saw the woman in white. And you thought I was lying."

  "Too many other weird things are happening. I just saw-"

  "Saw what?"

  "I don't know. Just the reflection of the painting. I feel like… like everything's going out of control. I mean, we're fighting all the time and I'm supposed to care about your stupid video when you won't even listen to a word I say. And this place, it's getting on my nerves."

  "Come on, this is only our third day here."

  "And these problems are supposed to just go away?"

  Paul's face clenched in anger. "I don't have time for this right now. In fact, I never have time for t
hese pointless arguments. All you want to do is talk in circles."

  "Look, I don't mind paying for this vacation, but I thought you were going to be working on your project-"

  "Oh, here we go with that crap again. You and your money."

  Adam was on the verge of tears. Paul scorned tears and would say Adam was being a silly little girl. And Paul would say it with the smug superiority of someone whose emotions were always in check. Except the emotion of anger.

  "Oh, Princess," Paul said, coming to him, hugging him. "Did someone upset the tea cart? Do you need another forty mattresses so you won't feel the pea?"

  "Go away." Adam pushed Paul's arms from around his waist. "You bastard."

  Adam's vision blurred from rage. This was crazy. He never lost control like this.

  "Fine, Princess," Paul said. "Don't bother waiting up for me."

  Adam sat on the bed as the door slammed. He wished they'd never come to Korban Manor. He stood and grabbed the bedstead, then started pulling the twin beds apart. When he had them in separate corners of the room, he looked up at the portrait of Korban.

  "Paul can have the woman in white, and I'll have you."

  The fire roared its approval.

  The horses were beautiful, sleek, their muscles bunched in grace. No wonder they were Anna's favorite animals. Once, before the fatalistic oncology report, she had dreamed of owning a stable and boarding horses. But that dream was as fleeting and insubstantial as all the others, whether the dream was of Korban Manor, Stephen, or her own ghost.

  She heard an off-key whistle, what sounded like an attempt at "Yankee Doodle," and turned to see Mason walking down the road toward the barn. He waved and stopped beside her at the fence, then looked across the pasture as if watching a movie projected against the distant mountains.

  "So, how's the ghost-hunting going?" he asked.

  She didn't need this. Stephen was bad enough. At least Stephen believed in ghosts, though his ghosts had energy readings instead of souls. But Mason was just another self-centered loser, probably a blind atheist, cocksure that nothing existed after breath ceased. Atheists were far more proselytizing and smug than any Christian Anna had ever met.

  "You know something?" she said. "People like you deserve to be haunted."

  Mason spread his arms in wounded resignation. "What did I say?"

  "You don't have to say it with words. Your eyes say plenty. Your eyes say, 'What a lovable flake. She's bound to be impressed by a great artist such as myself and it's only a matter of time before she falls into my bed.' "

  "You must have me confused with William Roth."

  "Sorry," she said, knowing she was taking her frustration and anger out on a relatively innocent bystander. But no one was completely innocent. "I'm just a little unraveled at the moment."

  "Want to talk about it?"

  "Yeah. Like you'd understand."

  "Look, I've seen you taking your long walks, sneaking out at night with your flashlight. So you like to be alone. That's fine. So do I. But if weird things are happening to me, they're probably happening to you, too. Maybe even worse stuff, because no way in hell would I go out there in the dark." Mason nodded to the forest that, even with the explosion of autumn's colors, appeared to harbor fast and sharp shadows.

  "What weird things are you talking about? I thought you were a skeptic."

  "Ah. I figured I'd arouse your scientific curiosity, if nothing else. Have you seen George around?"

  "George?"

  Mason moved closer, lowering his voice as if to deter an invisible eavesdropper. "How long does somebody have to be dead before he becomes a ghost?"

  Anna looked at Korban Manor through the trees, at the widow's walk with its thin white railing, where her dream figure had stood under the moonlight. "Maybe it happens before they're even dead."

  "Okay. How about this one? Can you be haunted by something inside your own head? Because I'm seeing Ephram Korban every time I close my eyes, I see him in the mirror, I see him in the fireplace, my hands carve his goddamned face even when I tell them to work on something else."

  "I think the shrinks call it 'obsessive-compulsive disorder.' But that describes every artist I've ever known. And ninety-nine percent of all human males."

  "Hey, we're not all assholes. And I wish you'd get off your personal vendetta against everybody who has a dream. Some artists are normal people who just happen to make things because we can't figure out how in the hell to communicate with people."

  "And some of us are normal people who search for proof of the afterlife because this life sucks in so many ways and humans always disappoint us. Ghosts are easier to believe in than most of the people I've met."

  "Truce, then. Obviously we're both crazy as hell. For a minute there, I was afraid we didn't have anything in common."

  That brought an unfamiliar smile to Anna's lips. "All right. Let's start over. I guess you've heard all the ghost stories. About how Ephram Korban jumped to his death off the widow's walk, though the best legends claim that one of the servants pushed him to his death because of the usual reasons."

  "What reasons are those?"

  "Unrequited love or requited love. Why else would you want to kill somebody? And, according to gossip and even a few parapsychology articles, Korban's spirit wanders the land, trying to find a way back into the manor in which he invested so much of his time, money, and energy."

  "You don't believe it?"

  The horses heard a call from the barn and took off at a gallop. "I wish I were that free," she said. "Maybe I'll get to be a horse in the next life."

  "The downside is, you'd have to die first. Like Ephram Korban."

  "Well, he has a grave site up over that ridge, but a grave's nothing but a hole in the ground. I haven't seen his ghost."

  "You really think ghosts are here?"

  "I know they're here. When your life burns up, you leave a little smoke behind. And don't ask me to prove it, or you'll remind me of someone I've spent the past year forgetting."

  "I'll take your word for it. Maybe I'll ask Ransom to let me borrow one of his charm bags. Says they keep restless spirits away."

  "Can't hurt," Anna said. "I'm going down to the barn. Care to join me?"

  "I'm heading there anyway. Miss Mamie has all but demanded that Ransom help me find a whopping big log to turn into a life-sized statue."

  "Ah, you poor suffering artists. Always having to please the critics."

  "You poor critics, always having to fake that world-class cynicism."

  By the time they reached the barn, Ransom had led the horses under an open shed built onto one wing of the barn. He hooked the cinch under the belly of the big roan, whose ears twitched as if this were a familiar game. Two lanterns blazed inside the barn, dangling from the dusty rafters. Leather straps and gleaming bits of metal hung along one wall, and four saddles were lined on a bench beneath the pieces of harness.

  "Well, hello there, young 'uns," Ransom called in greeting. He looked a bit longer at Anna and glanced at the sky with a frown.

  "Need any help?" Anna asked.

  "Don't need none, but I sure do like company. You know your way around a horse?"

  "One end eats and the other doesn't," Mason said.

  "And one end might kick you in the crotch, if you send off vibes of stupidity." Anna rubbed the nose of the chestnut, and in seconds it was nuzzling her neck, blowing softly through its nostrils. If only she were that good with men. Back when she cared about such things, anyway. Or ghosts. It would be a welcome change for them to rush out of the land of the dead with open arms and a smile.

  She snapped the reins on the bridle and fed the leather through the steel rings. "These guys are great," she said to Ransom.

  "They sure took a shine to you."

  "I was raised around horses once."

  "Once?" Mason asked.

  "A long story, one of many," she said.

  "Watch out, Mason," Ransom said. "A woman with secrets is generally bad news. Wi
ll you folks give me a hand hauling out the wagon?"

  They headed for the interior of the barn, Ransom pausing to push the sliding wooden doors farther apart. He was about to step inside when he looked above the barn door and grabbed the rag-ball charm from around his neck. He waved it and closed his eyes, whispering something rhythmical that Anna couldn't hear.

  "Danged if they ain't changed it again," Ransom said. He rolled a wooden barrel to the door, climbed on it with trembling legs, then stood and turned the horseshoe that was nailed above the door. He hung it so that the prongs pointed up, toward the sky.

  "Does the luck not work the other way?" Anna asked.

  "That charm is a heck of a lot older than what you might reckon. It's come to mean 'luck' to most people, but signs get watered down and weakened 'cause people forget the truth of them. Same as a four-leaf clover."

  "Sure, they're magically delicious, like the cereal."

  "Used to be, it gave the person carrying it the power to see ghosts and witches. Back when people believed."

  Anna caught Mason's look. "So points-down on the horseshoe is bad, right?"

  "It's practically throwing open the door to every kind of dead thing you care to imagine. I like for the dead to stay dead." He again gave Anna that sad, distant look. "Too bad not everybody around these parts feels the same way."

  Mason helped Ransom down from the barrel. Anna tethered the horses to a locust post and followed the men inside the bam. Horse-drawn vehicles were lined against a side wall. The hay wagon stood nearest the door. Beside it were two sleighs, a surrey with its top folded down, and a fancy carriage with a lantern at each corner. All of the vehicles were restored and maintained in the kind of condition that would send antique dealers scrambling for their checkbooks. The aroma of cottonseed oil and leather fought with the hay dust for dominance of the barn's air.

  A large metal hay rake sat in the far corner, slightly red from rust. There was a single seat for the operator, and a coupling in the front to yoke the draft animals. The large steel tines of the rake curled in the air like a claw.