The Tale of Halcyon Crane

by Webb, Wendy

  I saw myself screaming, holding my arms in front of me to fend off a girl in a white dress: Patience—but her face was not the face I had come to know. It had morphed into a grotesque worm-eaten skull, its flesh paper-thin and flaking. Her eyes were gone—only empty black holes remained—and she was yelling, “We weren’t invited to this party! You didn’t invite us to this party!”

  Julie was crying and cowering in the corner, and then Persephone was upon her, scratching and pushing her, tearing at her dress, and finally putting her tiny hands around Julie’s throat.

  Seeing all this, I was stunned into a stupor. I couldn’t shake the images from my view and I couldn’t move; the images held me captive even though I wanted to get up from that bench and run more than I had ever wanted anything in my life. This scene now before me was what my mind had locked away.

  • • •

  I kept screaming and fighting against this unseen enemy—unseen by my father, that is. I knocked over lamps and tore bedding off beds, I fell and tumbled and screamed. My father was just standing there—paralyzed with shock, I assumed—until one of them—Penelope—knocked into his legs and he felt, with certainty, her presence there.

  He dove into the fray and tried to grab whatever it was that was torturing me. In doing so, he turned Penelope’s wrath against him. She flew at him, scratching his face and biting and tearing his shirt—he could not see her, but I was seeing it all—until he was backed into the wall near the open window.

  I couldn’t catch my breath. There I was again, on top of a roller coaster, about to plunge toward the ground whether I wanted to or not.

  In the confusion, with me fighting off Patience and my dad fighting off Penelope, Persephone saw her opportunity and took it, pushing Julie out of the open window. I ran to the window and watched her fall. She locked eyes with me as she tumbled all the way to the ground, mouthing my name. The last thing I saw was her terrified face before her skull hit a rock, making a sickening cracking sound.

  My father didn’t see exactly what happened, but he saw me leaning out of the window. When he looked out the window, he saw, to his horror, the body of Julie Sutton lying on the ground.

  “Oh, my God,” I murmured to myself. “He thought I did it!”

  Noah flew through the house, down the stairs, and outside, stopping only when he reached Julie. I watched from the window as he attempted CPR, but it was useless; she was dead. He called the police and the Suttons.

  “It was the girls,” I whispered. “They killed Julie. But my father thought it was me. That’s why we left the island.”

  The vision swirled into view again. My mother was away when it happened, so my dad asked Mira to come to the house that evening. She did, and he told her everything that had occurred during the day—by that time, of course, the whole island knew there had been a death at Hill House. And Mira hatched the plan for escape—leaving the island. Within Noah’s panic, she saw a clear road leading to what she wanted, so she took it.

  “I’m going to take the blame, Mira,” I heard my father say. “Just so long as none of this touches Hallie.”

  Mira shook her head. “Your daughter is in grave danger,” she told him slyly. “I can feel it. This is not the end of the matter. You need to get her out of here. With you in prison, who is going to watch over Hallie? Your wife?”

  Noah sat down hard on one of the kitchen chairs, defeated.

  “Listen,” she said, in low conspiratorial tones. “I know a man on the mainland. He can come up with a whole new identity for you. For us. We can run away together and start a new life somewhere, pretending that this never happened.”

  I put my head in my hands, feeling the beginning throb of a migraine. Or was it my father’s head I felt hurting? Somehow, I could see it in his eyes. He never intended to take Mira with us; she was merely his means of escape.

  “I’ve given Madlyn several chances to see that something is very wrong here,” he murmured, nodding. “Hallie’s in danger, that’s never been more clear. But Madlyn won’t see it. All she keeps saying is that she herself was perfectly safe growing up in that house. But Hallie’s life could very well be at stake.”

  Noah arranged everything with the man on the mainland: a new driver’s license, birth certificate, college degree, everything. And he waited for the right time. Meanwhile, the police investigation was turning nasty, as was island opinion. Everyone was horrified by Julie Sutton’s death and there was only one person who could be responsible: Noah Crane. He allowed the police to believe that he was the one who killed that poor girl. Never once did the harsh eye of blame come to rest on me.

  I saw my father and Mira cooking up an escape plan. She would tow a fishing boat to the designated site; she would find our overturned kayak, thus making everyone think we had died. Noah would send for her later, when he reached our destination.

  Still, he waited and wondered. Was leaving really the right thing to do? The last straw came the day Madlyn showed him the latest photo she had taken of me, swinging in the backyard. Noah saw it loud and clear, his mute daughter calling out: Help me. That was it for my father. He tried, one last time. “Can you not see she is in danger here? Can you not see that, Madlyn?” But she was as blind as I had been during my first years of life.

  It was time to go. In the middle of the night, Mira towed a fishing boat to the enormous arched rock formation known as the Ring, where she left it moored securely, along with a change of clothes and some supplies. The next day, after kissing my mother goodbye, Noah Crane paddled the double kayak toward the north side of the island with me sitting still, as I knew to do, in the front seat. Young as I was, I knew that keeping one’s center was the most important part of kayaking. If you lost it, you’d tip. My dad had taught me that.

  Noah knew we were just minutes away from death, a death he had carefully planned. He was paddling toward a remote part of the island that could not be seen from shore, a spot that few people frequented. It was a tricky thing, dying. The calm weather that was perfect for kayaking on this great lake called many people to the water. It was difficult to find the solitude he needed. He scanned the horizon. If he saw any other people nearby—a kayak, a sailboat, even a swimmer—he would have to abort the plan and try another day.

  My dad’s face was stern and determined. He was so close. The plan seemed to be falling into place perfectly. Nobody was around, as far as the eye could see. Just a few more strokes. He poured on the steam, as though he were paddling for his life; in a way, he was. His arms began to ache, his muscles tiring. Still, he couldn’t stop now. It was really happening. He was really doing it.

  If Madlyn didn’t believe we were dead, she would surely hunt us down and bring me back to the island; my father would go to jail. But Noah wasn’t worried about failure on this day. He was a methodical man, and he had calculated every eventuality. His plan would work.

  The image shifted slightly, and I saw my dad withdrawing money from his bank account again and again and again, sums not large enough to attract notice, but enough. It was easy for him to squirrel this money away for himself, and he had traveled to the mainland to open a bank account under his new name, Thomas James. He had managed to stockpile almost six figures. He had a few thousand more stuffed into his jacket pocket. Not a fortune, but enough to start us in a new life.

  I could see it on his face; the enormity of this thing was overwhelming to him. What he was doing was illegal, never mind the cruel immorality of taking a child away from her mother. He still loved Madlyn and knew he always would. But love comes a distant second to the safety of your child. He told himself that, over and over, until it took root in his soul.

  I saw my dad think of all these things that day, as he paddled his kayak under the Ring. Local legend had it that the Ring was the gateway to the spirit world. It would be our gateway, too.

  “See that, Daddy?” I called to him, silently, from my mute world. (I was not to speak a word for two years because of the trauma.) I was staring back to
ward shore. Then I turned my head and looked back at him, the fear apparent in my eyes. Noah had no idea I was also seeing the girls, standing on the shoreline, angry. He tried to say something to me, but the words caught in his throat. If he had had any moments of doubt about what he was doing, they were put to rest. Thank God he was getting his daughter away from this accursed place.

  He passed through the Ring and found what he knew would be there, a fishing boat tethered to a rock on the sandbar, all gassed up, ready to go. Mira had stuck to their agreement. Now, Noah prayed. Please let us get away. He slowed his paddling and floated onto the bar.

  “Hallie, we’re going to do something fun today,” he said, in a voice that was not quite his own. “Are you ready?”

  I nodded and smiled, always up for a fun adventure with my dad.

  “Okay,” he began. “I want you to climb out of this kayak very carefully and stand on the sandbar. Can you do that?”

  Of course. I was delighted that my father trusted me enough to do this important thing. He had never let me get out of the kayak before until we were on shore. But I wasn’t afraid. I knew I could do it. I slithered out of my seat and stood on the sandbar, wiggling my toes inside my sandals.

  Then my dad did the most curious thing. He got out of the kayak, too, and turned it belly up, shoving it out into the water. Then he threw his wallet and hat into the water. I watched it all float away.

  “This is our boat now,” he said, motioning toward the fishing boat. “Look. I’ve got some things in there for you.”

  What could those be? I waded to the boat and looked in. Two backpacks, a hat, an old jacket, and a blanket sat on the bottom of the hull.

  “Climb in,” Noah said. “This is the surprise I was telling you about. We’re going on an adventure, just you and me. Now, I want you to crawl into the boat and get under the blanket, and stay there until I tell you to come out. You’re hiding. It’s a game. Can you do that for me?”

  Sure! It was simple. I hid under blankets all the time. I did as I was told, shivering with anticipation, wondering what would come next.

  Noah untied the boat and started the engine. As we puttered slowly away, he put on a fishing hat with a wide brim and an old jacket he had stuff ed in the boat. He took out a fishing rod and laid it over the side. Anyone watching from shore would see a lone man out fishing, not a father and daughter in a kayak.

  It was done. We were dead, or would be, hours from now, when Madlyn began wondering why we hadn’t come home. Noah imagined the frantic search, the cries of anguish when the kayak was found, the funeral of father and daughter. He pushed those thoughts out of his head and focused instead on the next tasks he would have to accomplish: finding an isolated spot to ditch the boat, hailing a taxi, getting to the airport. I saw all this swirling around my father’s head like an ethereal to-do list.

  Thomas James was glad his daughter was obediently huddling under the blanket so she couldn’t see the tears in his eyes as he steered the boat toward the opposite shore.

  This vision blurred, and I heard crying, a baby’s cry, and knew the tale wasn’t over. I saw Mira holding an infant. Was this my father’s child? I sat there in stunned silence for a moment or two as the vision floated out of view. Was there anything else about Mira I didn’t know? She had never told me she was a mother. I wondered if the baby had survived. Did I have a brother or a sister somewhere? Had my dad known?

  I shook my head, sweeping the last wisps of the vision away, and suddenly became aware of my surroundings again. Iris was still sitting next to me on the bench. She now seemed impossibly tired, as though this tale had sucked the life out of her. I also saw that the bright November day had turned dark and foreboding, as it had on so many other days here. Clouds were swirling and turning above us; the wind was changing direction; the horizon looked dark and threatening. A storm was brewing. It was time to go inside.

  “Iris,” I said, taking her cold hand in mine, “let me help you into the house.” But Iris shook her head.

  “My work here is done for the day, miss.” She started to stand up from the bench on what looked to be painful and creaky legs, but then I remembered what I wanted to ask her.

  “May I ask one more thing before you go?” I spoke gently, holding her steady.

  “What is it, child?” She was dead tired; I could see that clearly.

  I began hurriedly. “Iris, my father took me away from here because of the girls. They’re still here, and they have harmed Will—pushed him down the stairs and scratched him. I want to live in this house for the rest of my life. It’s my legacy, my family history. I don’t know how to thank you for telling it all to me. But right now, I need to know one more thing: How do I get rid of the girls?”

  Iris’s smile was weary. “They’re just children, Halcyon, and spirit children at that. You are a living adult. As such you are much more powerful than they are. You now know how to use your gift. You must simply tell them what to do.”

  “And what is that, exactly?”

  “To go, of course,” she said. “They have been earthbound for too long now, doomed to stay in a house where they have committed murder and mayhem for generations. They are confused and lost without their mother and father. They view new people coming to the house as intruders, strangers to be feared—especially other children—Jane, Charles, Amelia, all the poor babies, Julie Sutton. And now your Will intrudes. You must tell them their family is waiting, Halcyon, or he will continue to be in danger. They’re not aware that they are dead, you see. It’s time for them to go where they belong.”

  “That seems too easy,” I said, unconvinced.

  Iris wrapped her arms around my shoulders and brushed her paper-thin cheek against mine, pressing her lips to my face. “I have done what I was to do, Halcyon. I have kept your family’s lore safe and tucked away in my heart until you arrived. And I have shown you their faces and told you their stories and, in the doing, helped you unlock your gift. You’re correct, child, in knowing that you belong in this house. Three little girls, even murderous ones, cannot take that away from you.”

  I got the strangest feeling, then, that Iris had somehow taken us outside of real time and space, as though we were shadowy figures floating somewhere in the ether as she told her stories.

  When I finally pulled away from her, I was up to my calves in snow. How long had I been standing there in Iris’s embrace? I whirled around, and all I could see was a wall of white. No house, no trees, no garden, no Iris. Only the blizzard that had suddenly descended upon me.

  · 31

  Why hadn’t I noticed that it had started to snow? Had I simply lost all awareness of everything around me? I couldn’t see the house, and I had no idea which way to turn. It’s just like the storm that killed the girls. This idea gave me a very sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, but I knew I had to be strong in order to get Iris and me back to the house.

  “Iris!” I called, reaching blindly into the snow for her. “Iris!” But there was no answer. I bent down to the bench—perhaps she had simply sat down?—but she wasn’t there. She had wandered off into the storm.

  The last thing I wanted to do was look for Iris in a raging blizzard. I wanted to get back to my warm house. But I knew I had to find her. And so I put one foot in front of the other, slowly and slower still, calling out her name. I rubbed my bare arms for warmth. That’s all I’d need, to freeze to death out here. Then I’d be another of Iris’s strange family tales. But whom would she tell? The last Hill—me—would be gone.

  Then I heard it, soft and faint in the distance. “Hallie! Hallie! Where are you?”

  Will! All of a sudden I remembered I had told him that morning I’d meet him on the cliff for a picnic. Surely he didn’t think, in this weather . . . But there it was again. “Hallie! Hallie!”

  “I’m over here!” I screamed. “By the garden!”

  “Hallie?” But his voice was getting fainter and fainter. He was going the wrong way.

  I started runn
ing toward the sound of his voice, stopping only when I remembered that there was an actual cliff somewhere nearby.

  “Will!” I called out, and then, remembering, “Iris!” I had two people to find in this storm.

  But I heard no response from either of them. I could see nothing but whiteness swirling in the air before me. I had no idea where I was, and no idea how to get back to the house. I was lost.

  “Will!” I tried again. “Will!”

  The silent snow wrapped around me. Panic was setting in as the whiteness descended around me, piling up at a very rapid rate. Now it was nearly to my knees, and I was having great difficulty moving around. I thought how restful it would be simply to sink to the ground and let that blanket of snow cover me. I slumped to my knees, almost giving up.

  But then I heard it: laughter. “You’re ice cold!” I heard a voice say. “Hallie! You’re ice cold!”

  I heard the voices clearly. It was the girls, I was sure of it. “Come on! You can’t stop now! You’re ice cold. Come and find us!”

  Were they trying to lure me off the cliff? No. I remembered how Hannah always believed they had saved her life in that storm. Their voices were getting louder and louder, as though the words were being shouted into my own ear. I put one foot in front of the other and began to move. “You’re getting warmer! Warmer now, Hallie!” A few more steps and then: “Colder! Colder! Turn around before you freeze!” I turned and walked another couple of steps. “Warmer! You’re getting hot!” A few more steps. “You’re burning up! You’re burning!”

  My foot hit something hard and tall. I recognized it immediately as the stone wall adjacent to the stairs leading from the drive to the house. I was home. I was saved. I climbed the stairs blindly, feeling each one with my foot as I went.

  “Hallie!” I heard, louder now. It was Will.