“I thought you said the trees were talking to you,” Callie said.
“That’s right.”
“But there aren’t any words written in your book.”
“Trees don’t talk in words,” Rose said, as if stating a fact Callie should know.
Callie paged through the book more carefully. She saw limbs, branches, twigs, bare and fully leafed, but no messages that she could decipher. “I can’t read any of the messages you wrote,” she admitted. “It’s beautiful, though. You have a real artistic talent.”
She flipped the pages again, and that’s when she saw the harp. It was a different rendition of the image she had seen in the painting on the wall at Ann’s house, part of her collection of sacred imagery. In Rose’s sketch, the harp was clearly made of oak. There were oak leaves coming out of the ends of each string. And what appeared to be a pair of flowers.
“The Oak of Two Blossoms,” Callie said.
“You know it?” Rose was delighted that Callie understood one of her drawings.
“It’s a harp.”
“It’s Dagda’s harp.” Rose smiled at her.
Callie made Rose repeat the name, just to make sure she’d gotten it right.
“He’s a Celtic god.”
Even before she’d sent Rafferty the contents of the old love letter the Goddesses had had her recite, Rafferty had told her about his conversation with Ann. How Dagda was one of the Celtic gods, known to tryst with Morrigan—a nickname most likely appropriated by Leah Kormos. The letter, and the plan to “take him,” made sense if that were the case, as well as Leah’s murderous anger at the party. But now Callie was nervous…Hadn’t Ann said that the harp’s music killed its enemies? Was that possible?
Of course not. It was legend. But it was still bothersome to see the image in Rose’s Book of Trees.
Rose was disappointed when Callie cut their visit short. Rose tucked her book back into her bag.
“You can’t sleep outside, Rose. Whatever messages the trees are sending you, they’re going to have to tell you in the daytime. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Rose nodded. “Don’t court the strike.”
“Exactly,” Callie said.
Callie hadn’t been able to reach Rafferty by phone, so she’d gone to the coach house to tell him about the harp. “I don’t know what it means, but it is something. My gut tells me it’s a fairly disturbing something.”
Rafferty said he’d talk to Ann about it and asked if Callie wanted to come along.
“I’ll wait here, if that’s all right with you,” she said. The more she liked Paul, the more she couldn’t stand Ann Chase. All she could think of was Paul touching Ann, rubbing her neck and shoulders and not stopping there…“You know she’s talked to the press.”
If he knew it, Rafferty didn’t comment. “I’ll call you if I learn anything new.”
It was just four o’clock, so she walked over to the tearoom to join Towner and Zee. “I hope Rose really will stop sleeping outside,” said Callie, sipping her Difficult-Tea. She’d acquired a taste for it over the past few weeks. “She is required to be in the house by curfew. They can send her back to the hospital if she isn’t. Or they’ll give her bed to someone who will follow the rules.”
“She can’t come back here,” Zee said to Towner. “Your husband is catching hell because the whole town thinks Rose lives at his house.”
Callie stared into her tea. She didn’t want to discuss with Towner what people had been posting online about Rafferty, though she suspected Towner knew. Some were calling for his dismissal. Many were calling for much worse. What hateful things people felt free to say when their anonymity was protected. “I need to get a place of my own nearby,” she said. “Then Rose can be released to me.”
“You need to stay where you are,” Zee countered. “You don’t understand the toll living with Rose would take on you. She needs to be in a permanent facility, where they can administer her meds and monitor her behavior.”
Callie shook her head. “I don’t think she needs all that.”
Zee sighed. “Denial is a powerful thing.”
Callie took a sip of tea.
“Just stay where you are for now,” Zee said.
“Besides,” Towner teased. “You wouldn’t want to leave Paul.”
Callie noticed every oak she passed on the drive back to Pride’s Crossing. Even without their leaves, they were easy to recognize. Their thick elephant-skin bark stood out. And Rose was right: Oaks did seem to stand alone. While other trees gathered together in groves, the oaks were solitary. Rose claimed that oaks “courted the strike.” That their solitary nature made them stand out, and, for that reason, they were more often struck by lightning. Was that true, or another of Rose’s delusions? Perhaps it was a more accurate description of Rose than of the trees, Callie mused. Rose had been standing alone for a long time, and her singular nature certainly courted trouble.
“Does anyone know where the phrase courting the strike originates?” Callie asked the Whitings at dinner that night. “Are oak trees known for this?”
No one knew the answer, but Finn said, “You aren’t taking up Rose’s practice of dendrolatry, I hope.”
“Dendrolatry?”
“Tree worshiping.”
“The oak has a special place in Celtic lore,” Paul told her when Finn went after another bottle of wine and was out of earshot. “But don’t mention Celtic connections to my father. He equates Celtic beliefs with Satanic ones.”
Callie sighed. “History casts a long shadow around here.”
They stayed for coffee and dessert. As the maid cleared the table, Emily stood up. Both Paul and Finn stood as well.
“I’m sorry to cut this short,” Emily said, “but I’m going upstairs. I’m exhausted.”
Emily did look tired. She and Finn had been in Boston all day for appointments with her doctors.
Finn walked Emily to the stairs, then came back to the table.
“How did it go today?” Paul asked his father.
“All right,” Finn said. “Nothing terribly new.” He walked out of the dining room and into the library. Callie could hear the elevator descending.
“Where’s he going?”
“To get more fortification, I expect. That’s how he handles difficult days. Let’s get out of here before he comes back,” Paul said.
“Yeah?”
“I assure you, he won’t even miss us.”
“Where to?”
“John Pizzarelli’s playing at Scullers tonight.”
“I heard Pizzarelli play the last time I was in New York,” she said.
“Does that mean you do or don’t want to go?”
She stood, giving him a thumbs-up. “It means I do.”
He smiled. They quietly walked out through the pantry just as Finn came back carrying a dusty bottle of Barolo.
They stayed at Scullers for two sets, then went to an after-hours place back in Beverly, a private smoky cellar club that smelled of weed and sold fancy desserts to those who’d smoked enough of it to require such exotics. Ann and her coven of young witches arrived as they were leaving. Ann kissed Paul hello, lingering before greeting Callie.
“Later,” she mouthed to Paul. He laughed but didn’t reply.
It took everything Callie had not to punch her.
Paul held the door, and Callie climbed into the car. He went around and got in, starting the engine. The lights popped on, illuminating the tangle of witches with Ann in the middle. Spotlighted, Ann turned and blew Paul a kiss.
“Unbelievable.” Callie glared at Ann.
“What?”
“How does she know we’re not on a date?”
“We’re not?” Paul feigned horror and disappointment.
“You know what I mean. How does she know we’re not involved?”
“She knows.”
Meaning what? “You talk to her about me?” Callie said, seething. Had Paul confided their relationship status to Ann?
Or was this something Ann just knew, the same way she intuited all the other personal things she wasn’t supposed to know? Callie couldn’t decide which idea she hated more.
“What is this, high school?” His tone had an edge.
Maybe not back in high school, but certainly in college. Callie would have relished going head-to-head with Ann Chase over a guy. But not now. “I doubt Ann remembers her time in high school. It was so long ago.”
It had been a nice night, almost as if it were a date, but Ann Chase and her scary entourage had caused Callie’s mood to nose-dive.
They drove back to Pride’s Heart in silence. Instead of heading to the boathouse, Paul drove her directly to the main house, the tires crunching on the gravel driveway as he braked. The house was dark, the windows reflecting the black sky.
“Thank you for a lovely evening.” Callie didn’t hide her sarcasm. She rifled through her purse. “Damn it. I forgot my key.”
“I have a key,” Paul said calmly, but he made no effort to give it to her.
She started to open the passenger door. He reached across as if to unlock it, the same way he had that first day, only this time his hand didn’t reach for the door but lingered on her shoulder. He pulled her close.
“What are you doing?”
“What do you think?”
“Isn’t Ann waiting for you?”
“Shut up.”
He kissed her, then kissed her again, his arms tightening around hers. He pulled back until he was looking into her eyes, his lips barely touching hers, his breath sweet from the brandy and chocolate they’d shared at the club.
Immediately a light came on in a third-floor window and then in the hall.
He released her, reaching to open the door. Then he walked around to escort her up the steps, pulling out his key just as Darren opened the front door.
“High school.” He sighed, nodding to Darren as he started down the stairs.
“Good night,” she said.
At the bottom of the steps, Paul turned and flashed the killer grin.
If coming events are said to cast their shadow before, past events cannot fail to leave their impress behind them.
—HELENA BLAVATSKY
“I’m sorry to tell you, Rafferty, but it’s not any of them,” Mickey said. “It took me a while, but I went through each of their family trees. Twice. Not one of the Goddesses or Rose herself was related to Sarah Good. It has to be this Leah person. Do you have the mother’s name yet?”
“I’m working on it.”
“You’ve got to find another line, Rafferty. That one is sounding pretty lame.”
No, Rafferty thought, standing in the store, amid holiday decorations, with Mickey in his full pirate regalia, talking about the familial ancestry of the Goddesses was what was lame. Rafferty was frustrated. He’d reached a dead end.
It had been a long day. He’d been down to the storefront on Essex Street where the Left Hand Path had once been located. The whole first floor was deserted now. Though pop-up costume shops, cheesy haunted houses, and psychic reading studios opened here every year at Halloween, no one ever took a permanent lease on the space, and it was showing signs of neglect.
The place had recently been swept clean. There were no clues to be found, and, even if there had been, it would have been difficult to tell what was left from the shop and what was detritus from a temporary Halloween business. He was, however, able to talk with the property owner about the Left Hand Path.
“It was a strange place,” the owner said. “The woman who ran it gave everybody the horrors. She used to conduct spells in the back alley, and the noises were terrible.”
“I heard there were animal sacrifices,” Rafferty said. It was in the police complaints. “That’s why the town wanted to shut them down. Is it true?”
“I don’t know,” the landlord said. “Someone once left a dead cat on the front steps,” he admitted. “I remember because I was the one who had to clean it up.”
“That must have been pleasant.”
“All I know for certain is that the other witches in town took an active part in trying to close the shop. They started rumors that drove customers away, and they kept them up until the owner packed her things and left in the middle of the night. Owed me two months’ back rent.”
Rafferty had a growing pile of books sitting on the table in his home office. He’d borrowed some on Celtic mythology from Ann and had bought some books on black magic from Pyramid, amid stares from some of the patrons. He could just see what they’d be posting tomorrow. Chief of police signs the devil’s book.
He’d tried to get all the information he needed online, but what he found was limited and contradictory. Ann told him it was unreliable as well. “If you want in-depth information about Celtic gods and goddesses, Rafferty, you’re going to have to open a book.”
Luckily she had an extensive library, and Pyramid Books had even more. He’d read the Celtic books looking for more information on Dagda and Uaithne, the killer harp. There wasn’t much. Dagda was a prolific god, both sexually and in battle. After one skirmish, Dagda’s enemies stole the magic harp. But Dagda had bound the music until he alone summoned it, so the harp wouldn’t play. When the god finally called for the harp, legend said it “sprang from the wall, killing nine of Dagda’s enemies” on the way back to its master. The story was vague; it never detailed exactly how the “Oak of Two Blossoms” committed its lethal act. When he looked up “The Four-Angled Music,” the other title of the painting Callie mentioned she had seen at Ann’s house, he found almost nothing; the term was another name for the harp.
He had the books lined up on his bedside table. He’d started reading the ones on black magic. Both Ann and Towner had warned him against spending too much time with those books, for different reasons. Ann said she was afraid it would give him ideas. She was kidding, of course, but you could never tell with Ann. As for Towner, the books gave her the creeps. “Can’t you take them to the office?” she asked. “They’re giving me nightmares.”
Towner was right, the books were a little creepy, especially their covers, which were darkly dramatic. So he’d taken them to his study, where she wouldn’t have to look at them. There, he’d finally turned up something useful. In one, The World History of Black Magic, in the section on Africa, he’d read a chapter about the magical powers of the “hair of the unpigmented human.” It was said to be a powerful ingredient in spells, especially love potions. He thought about Susan’s white hair, one of the trophies taken from her body.
Evidently superstitious beliefs about albinos were a problem to this day in sub-Saharan Africa. They led to murders and brutal mutilations. Albino skin was often used by believers to make an amulet to produce wealth and success. Something the ostracized shop owner had sorely needed for her own spells. The second trophy had been a piece of Susan’s skin.
When he’d first received Mickey’s pronouncement that none of the others were related to Sarah Good, Rafferty had inked in Leah’s name on the fifth petal, under Sarah Good’s. Now, if he could only find some trace of Leah or her sister…
The tree is a mediator between the living and the dead. Where a limb is malformed, where her branches twist and weave into one another, or where a wound on bark remains unhealed, all these imperfections are sacred pathways between the realms.
—ROSE’S Book of Trees
“What are your plans for Christmas?” the social worker asked when Callie visited the shelter. “Generally, our guests join their families for dinner…”
“Well, I don’t know yet,” Callie stalled. Towner and Rafferty were traveling to New York to spend Christmas with his daughter, Leah, so the tearoom would be closed. And taking Rose to their house, even for a few hours to cook her a holiday meal, was not an option.
“Rose can come to Pride’s Heart for Christmas dinner,” Paul suggested, when Callie told him about her dilemma.
“I don’t know.” Callie imagined Rose in a fancy dress, sitting throu
gh endless courses and telling the area elite about conversations she had with talking trees.
“Our Christmas dinner is not like Thanksgiving,” he assured her. “It’s a quiet meal, just family and a few very close friends.”
“Still,” Callie said. “We don’t know how she’ll…behave. Maybe I should take her out somewhere?”
“Where?” Paul said. “Where could you possibly take her that you’d both be comfortable in public together? She’s been through enough. You’ve been through enough. Let’s give her a nice Christmas dinner.”
“I’m happy to report that Rose has been sleeping inside,” the social worker said the following day. It had been raining, off and on, for the last few nights. “Whatever you said seems to have worked. She must feel good to be out of the rain.”
Callie smiled noncommittally, and Rose, dressed in dark slacks and the red sweater that Callie had given her during their last visit, grunted. Callie would never say it aloud, but she could understand why Rose had preferred to sleep alfresco. The shelter was anything but inviting. It was a converted industrial space, and someone had convinced them that Aztec white was preferable to institutional green, so the place was almost blinding in its reflective brightness and fluorescent lighting. The big factory windows were too high to allow for any outside views. The small artificial Christmas tree at the far end of the “family room” was the only nod to any of the December holidays, and it was dwarfed by the cavernous space.
“The bed is lumpy,” Rose complained. “It’s full of marbles.”
“It really isn’t,” the social worker said, smiling. “She’s doing well.”
Rose rolled her eyes.
When the social worker left, Callie repeated the verdict. “You’re doing well.”
“I don’t know why she always talks about me as if I’m not in the room.”
Callie had been wondering the same thing. “Do you want to come to Pride’s Heart for Christmas dinner, Rose? The Whitings would love to have you.” Paul had already run the idea by Emily. “Can I tell them you’ll come?”
The Fifth Petal Page 29