There was nothing in the morning papers about any mysterious child murder and as the day wore on I lived in a sort of apprehensive daze. Waiting.
Jim stayed outside with Jeremy, scouting the area, and I cleaned the yard. The snow had disappeared days ago. It’d be hard, dirty work but maybe it was what I needed to get my mind off the night before. Keeping busy was sanity and I was in doubt of mine, so I threw myself into the yard work with a vengeance. I pulled weeds and picked up old dirt-encrusted beer bottles and rusted soda cans ancient enough to go to a museum. Our yard must have become the dumping ground for the entire neighborhood.
I put on gloves and dug hunks of glass out of the dirt. I threw stray rocks out into the street until I thought my arm would fall off. By afternoon, I was caked with grime and sweat and every bone in my body ached, but it felt good. There was satisfaction in doing a hard job well. The yard was shaping up.
In the years since I’d forgotten how immense my grandmother’s grounds were. It could have been a park.
After a quick glass of iced tea I’d picked up earlier with other needed supplies from the local market, I resumed work and rearranged my grandmother’s greatest pride and joy. Like my mother, she’d had her rock garden and we’d collected pretty rocks for her, too. But it was all but empty now, as the rocks had long ago been scattered and lost. There was nothing left but weeds and crumbled dirt. I wondered where those exquisite hunks of stone had disappeared to. Maybe the neighborhood kids had carried them away or the years had eaten them.
I was unceremoniously squatting in the rock garden, digging my heart out like a kid in a sand pile, when a shadow fell across me. I raised my head and there was Mister Largo, our friendly lawyer, standing over me, an amused smile on his thin lips.
“I didn’t know women still did that,” he teased, putting out a very clean hand to help pull me to my feet.
“Oh, this?” I motioned to the mounds of dark rich earth that lay around me. “I’m trying to get the rock garden back into shape. It used to be so unique.” I smiled. “It’s going to take a lot of work.”
“You said the same about the house, too. I see you’re meeting the challenge admirably.” He was inspecting the house and the grounds with his eyes. “It’s beginning to look like a home again.” From him it was a compliment and I accepted it as such. I thanked him and led him inside.
I noticed his reluctance to stay inside too long. From the minute we entered the kitchen his attitude became one of restrained nervousness. He covertly perused everything in the kitchen and commented on how nice everything looked. His hawk eyes didn’t miss a thing, but I knew he was here for something beyond idle curiosity.
“The letter.” He pulled a long, fat envelope from his suit’s inner pocket and handed it to me, as if it was a fragile piece of glass. “I brought it this time.”
The look of self-satisfaction on his face should have smothered him, I thought. Did he already know what was inside? Possibly. He must have read my mind.
“It’s never been opened. It’s been in my brother’s safe all these years, undisturbed. We respect our client’s trust.”
Handling the bulky package, I knew why he was smiling. He was curious to know what was in it, too. Suddenly excited like a child with a gift to open, I tore the end of it and pulled out the contents, a thin, folded letter yellowed with age and a stack of old wrinkled bills—twenties and fifties. My mouth must have fallen open because I heard Mister Largo laugh in unsuppressed glee at my good fortune.
“I don’t believe it. There must be thousands here,” I exclaimed, stunned. I sifted the flattened bills through my trembling fingers. I felt like someone who’d unearthed a hidden treasure, as I imagined what all the money could mean.
“Quite a windfall, I’d say,” Mister Largo commented, still gaping, while eying the cash as I counted it.
Something, a tiny wad of old, wrinkled tissue paper, fell out of the envelope. It was what I thought it was until I picked it up and the weight gave me a clue it was something more.
I picked up the bundle and began parting the paper. Mister Largo, the hawk, watched.
I felt the shape of the object and guessed what it was before either of us saw the glint of dull gold.
My great-great-grandmother’s ring.
Its miniature leaves, once so delicately engraved, were worn with age. My smile died as I thought of the history the ring brought with it. History best forgotten.
Some intangible presence whispered behind me. “The gift,” I murmured out loud.
“What?” asked Mister Largo.
“Huh?” I asked intelligently and became aware of the lawyer’s anxious expression. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“I said, the ring is beautiful. Then you said something about a gift.” He looked at me expectantly. Did he know the ring’s story?
“Oh, yes. It was given as a gift to my grandmother from her grandmother. And now from her to me. It’s sort of a family heirloom, you’d say. It’s worth my weight in sentimental gold.” I laughed weakly and before I knew what I was doing, I slipped the fragile circle over my left pinkie. It fit, a ring that had been forged in the fires of Hell, for me.
I returned my attention to the letter, after I’d counted and slapped the money into a neat pile in my hands. “Five thousand and fifty dollars. Will this come in handy,” I breathed, laying the cash on the table so I could read.
Mister Largo stood there while I did. I knew he was dying to know what it said, but I kept him in suspense. I’ve had a few pleasant surprises in my life, but the letter and the money had to take the grand prize. The ring was a different sort of surprise, another story altogether. The past was jumping out to grab me.
Dearest Sarah,
I know when you read this letter, I will no longer be on this earth. I hope you and the rest of the family don’t grieve over me too long. Believe me, I’ve had an interesting, long and exciting life. We all have a limited time here on this planet and mine was well spent. I had love, your mother, and you children. I was a lucky woman. Well, enough of that. I’m writing you to let you know something that I’ve been sure of for a while now, you have a special gift, child. Perhaps you know what I’m talking about. Your unique psychic ability. It’s a gift with awesome responsibilities, I know.
My grandmother on my mother’s side had it but not as strongly as I see it in you.
It’s one of the reasons you, of all my grandchildren, have held an extra special place in my heart. Your life will not be easy as I have read the tarot cards and foresee great trials and heartbreaks for you. So I’m trying to help with this inheritance I’m bequeathing you. The house has always been yours. It’s been a safe sanctuary for me as it will be for you, if you want it to be. I have a feeling you’ll need a safe place someday. It is a good house; a house where evil dares not enter. It was built that way and for a good reason. When you have the gift there are dangers. You must have a sanctuary where you will be protected.
The ring is a part of your legacy. The money is a bonus. Call it future upkeep for the house, though you may use it any way you see fit according to your needs.
There isn’t really anything else important enough to put down in this kind of letter. I feel strange writing it, but something stronger than myself has compelled me to do these things for you, my sweet Sarah. I wish you a happy life and I can tell you, I grieve more over the thought of leaving you here alone on this earth, than anything else. I’m not afraid to die but I hate the thought of you facing your future and the tribulations I know will assail you alone. For the cards never lie. This was the best I could do. I have but one warning:
Never doubt, child, that there’s terrible evil in the world and never say anything is impossible. I wish you luck, a good life, and remember me with love.
Love always,
your grandmother Elizabeth Summers
There was no date on the letter. With a sigh, I folded it and stuck it in my jeans pocket. The look of disappointment spreading over the lawyer’s face was obvious.
I wasn’t going to share my grandmother’s letter with a near stranger. I treasured it and Jim was the only one I wanted to show it to and maybe Jeremy someday when he was older.
Mister Largo, when he saw I wasn’t going to appease his curiosity, muttered his good-byes in record time and left. I was glad. I needed some time alone to savor my letter and the gift.
Outside, I worked on the rock garden and felt the sun on my shoulders. For a short time the horror of the night before and the horror I was waiting for seemed far away. I hummed a song my grandmother used to sing when I was a child. I let my mind fill with memories of the house and my grandmother when she was alive. What would she say if she knew that everyone in our family, but Jim, Jeremy and I, were dead? Perhaps she knew. She was as dead as they were. Perhaps they were all in heaven together. I hoped so.
I yanked out more weeds, dug up rocks and rinsed them off carefully in the kitchen sink until they glittered as they had in years past. All around me I saw my grandmother kneeling beside me in the dirt, sitting on the porch, walking the yard and smiling at me. I had no doubt she was still here. She’d never left this house.
My eyes traveled the length of the lawn and settled on the worn frame of my grandmother’s house. It was strange, as it was the first time I saw the similarities in her house and my childhood home. I stared up at the yawning windows, wiped the dirt from my fingers on my jeans and moved closer. Why hadn’t I noticed it before?
The houses did resemble each other. A lot.
“Sarah, what are you looking at?” Jim’s voice caught me inspecting the upstairs windows.
Approaching quietly, he’d surprised me and I jumped. I tore my eyes away from the house. Jeremy was climbing the tree behind us and I followed his skinny body crawling through the branches. The tree was old and very big. It reminded me of the way Jim and I used to sneak out of the house when we were kids and scramble up or down the trees in our own yard.
“The house.”
Jim was studying it now, too. “What about it?”
I caught his look and the suspicious appraisal he gave me. “Oh, nothing, really. I was thinking about what bad shape it’s in,” I fibbed. I was probably being over-emotional after last night and didn’t want to go into what I’d been thinking, with Jeremy so close and Jim so jumpy. Why give him anything else to worry about?
He was still staring at the house, his face pale, and when I met his eyes, they were full of questions I couldn’t answer. I was afraid he’d noticed the similarity, too. After a second or two his gaze shifted to the rock garden and his smile was thin. “Like mother, like daughter. You going to collect rocks now, too?”
I strode into the garden and picked up a handful of the dirt. “I don’t know, really. Do you remember the beautiful rock garden our mother used to have at the old house?”
“Of course I do. There was this gigantic gold-veined hunk of white stone I used to hide my little toy cars under so you wouldn’t find them.”
“You’re kidding?”
“No. You always thought you were one of the guys and you were forever taking our toys. I hid a lot of stuff, especially from Charlie.”
This last he said with a touch of regret. We’d all hid things from poor Charlie. Even our love, until it was too late.
Jim was kneeling beside me. “I used to love searching for fool’s gold. You know the yellow stuff that looks like real gold?”
“I remember.”
“Where are all those rocks now, Sis? Do you think there are any of them out there lying around?”
Neither one of us was aware of how closely Jeremy was eavesdropping, sitting up there in the tree, a timid squirrel, all eyes and ears.
“There might be, but I don’t think either of us wants to go snooping around the old homestead.” A shadow fell across us and I looked around. There was nothing and no one there, I could see.
“We’d be crazy to and, besides, I wouldn’t let you. Not after last night. Not even in the brightest daylight.”
“I understand,” I said.
“If I wasn’t such a coward—” He didn’t finish because I remembered the letter in my pocket and the money in the kitchen hidden behind the canned goods I’d picked up that morning at the store. I guess I’d been so intrigued by what I imagined about the house it had slipped my mind.
I grasped his arms and shook him, I was so excited. “Wait until you see what I got special delivery today. You’re not going to believe it.”
“Yeah, what?” He returned my grin with a faint smile, my excitement catching. “Since I’ve come here I’ll believe anything.” But behind the curve of his lips I could see the apathy our situation was creating in him.
In other words, for my sake, he’d pretend he cared. As if nothing actually mattered anymore. The roads all led to the same lion’s den.
I was hoping the money and the letter would cheer him up. I couldn’t help but think the letter held a key for our salvation. Jim might be able to shed some light on it all. When he read the letter, perhaps he’d see something in it I hadn’t.
I drew the crumpled piece of paper from my pocket and waved it in front of his nose.
“What’s that?”
“It’s a letter, from grandmother.”
“She’s dead,” he reminded me, his eyes following the scrap of moving paper.
“Of course. This is the letter the lawyer has been saving for me since she died. I had to move into the house to get it. Well, I got it this morning. The lawyer drove over a little while ago and presented it to me.”
“Oh, that letter.” He seemed disinterested already “What does it say?”
I handed it to him.
When he finished reading the first thing he asked about was the money.
“It’s in the house. I didn’t feel like carrying it around in my pocket. Over five-thousand-dollars in cash. A stack of bills as thick as your hand. You want to see them?”
He followed me towards the house. “You think there’s something in the letter which might help us with our dilemma, don’t you?”
“I’m praying so. What do you think?” My hands were behind my back, fingering the golden ring on my left hand. I was waiting for the right moment to show it to him.
“I don’t know. By the way the letter is written, I don’t think she had any idea what was to happen. To our family, I mean, though she was a perceptive old lady.” He leveled his gaze at me as we climbed the porch steps to the house. I was poised on the top step, by the door. I turned to Jim, brushing the loose dirt off the ring. I tried to pull it off, but the ring was stuck fast.
“I don’t think she had the answers we’re seeking.” He looked back at the tree Jeremy was crouched in; raised his hand and signaled the boy to come in too.
I moved my hand so he could see the ring. His face was void of expression, but I could tell something was going on inside his head. He recognized the ring, I’m sure, yet said nothing.
We heard the car drive up, though couldn’t see who it was.
Without a word, Jim shuffled down the steps to greet our guest. I idly toyed with the ring, still trying to pull it off, then trailed him outside.
Chapter Fourteen
Jeremy peeped through the branches of the tree at his mother and uncle as they were talking. He snapped off a nearby branch and twisted it around and around until it broke, and slowly tore off the leaves. His eyes came to rest on the mausoleum they now lived in. He’d hated it at first. Hated it. Now he wasn’t so sure. He missed the city all right and, yes, he missed their old apartment but he had to admit he’d never had so much room to himself. He’d never been out in the country. He liked the trees. Th
e grass. The open sky. There wasn’t another house in sight. And their new home was so neat. All those rooms.
His mother was having a ball redecorating it. If this was what it took to make her happy again, he could put up with it. She’d been sad since the divorce and at least she wasn’t crying in her sleep anymore, which counted for something.
He cocked his head, trying to hear what they were saying, but couldn’t quite make out their words. They were walking away now. He traced cracks in the tree’s bark with his fingers and played make-believe in his head. He imagined there was no one else in the world but him, no house down there, no mother and uncle. He was adrift in this tree, deep in a forest where he could see no sky, only other trees. And it was dark, oh, so dark, and he could hear children.
Children playing. He shook his head and smiled. There was something strange about this place. He could feel it. It was keeping secrets. Secrets he wanted to know.
Like those woods over there. He shivered alone in the tree and thought about the ruined building his mom had shown him when they’d first arrived in town. Her old home, she’d said. The place seemed to cry, and he wondered why.
His mother wouldn’t speak about her childhood much as he’d tried to weasel it out of her. He was sure she was hiding something or trying to protect him for some reason. He knew there’d been a lot of her family at one time, but he didn’t know where they all were now. Maybe she hated them and that’s why they never saw them.
He believed something awful had happened at that old ruined home. He hadn’t thought about it much before. It was coming here that reawakened his curiosity about his mom’s family and her childhood. His eyes moved towards the forbidden woods. A smile flickered on his lips. The idea crossed his mind that some of those sparkly rocks his mom and uncle had been talking about before were laying out there somewhere waiting to be found. He could go collect them.
She’d never know he’d been there if he didn’t tell her.
Humming to himself, he retrieved the Slinky from his pocket and, grasping the last end coil, he let it unwind down through the thick branches. He jiggled it slightly when it got stuck. It bounced, and sunlight glinted off the metal links, golden and bright. His mother had given it to him a long time ago. He remembered her casual remark as she’d handed it to him that they didn’t make them like they used to when she was a kid. Too thin, too cheap nowadays. Cheap or not, he loved it anyway. He let go and watched as it collided with the ground below and recoiled into a tight little circle like a shy snake.
Evil Stalks the Night Page 14