by Lara Parker
They were gone as quickly as they had come, the song barely finished, but Quentin had heard her say they were staying at the Collinsport Inn and that Stoddard had business in town for a few days. The tavern was emptier than a tomb after their departure and she left him with the song, Crosby’s soothing tones caressing the lyrics: a memory of love’s refrain.
In a daze, Quentin cleared the table, hesitating a moment before his cloth wiped away the water ring of her glass. There was something strange, and he felt disoriented, his mind a blur; he must get away; he was not supposed to be here. Damn Blair! He thought it must still be a memory from the war and he tried to shake off his anxiety, though it still persisted and his mind was in a fog. But his body was still buzzing with the rush of seeing her, strange as it had been. He had never stopped loving her, not even for a day, and thoughts of her had filled his fantasies all the years they had been apart.
He tried to claw his way out of the dream. This was not the time or the place. Why was he here? He was closing the tavern for the evening, turning the sign in the window, when he heard a soft knock on the outside door. His heart leapt. Could it be?
Liz stood in the moonlight, her gloved hands trembling, and her warmth betraying her nervousness, but she maintained her veneer of tranquillity. She had become a skilled actress. “Hello, Quentin.”
He nearly stumbled as he stood back to watch her move past. He was unable to speak, but managed to offer her a seat in the darkened barroom, before he switched on a lamp. The etchings on the walls of old sailing vessels hung in the gloom. Smoke left from the customers’ cigarettes that evening created a thin haze. She sat with her hands resting on the table and looked into his eyes.
“I— I wanted so much to see you again, and I don’t know whether I will be able to get away tomorrow. Paul is insanely jealous.”
Quentin could barely contain his joy at her words. “But where is he now?” he asked.
“Passed out.” He remembered her laugh, like water falling in a stream. “He’s a sot who drinks himself into a stupor every night.”
“Oh, my dear…”
“It’s nothing. So many men drink. Especially in Hollywood.”
He took her hands and smiled. “They tried to stop all that, but we didn’t let them, did we?”
She laughed softly, deliciously. “You mean the way we fought the Bureau of Prohibition? It hadn’t a chance.”
“And so,” he said kindly, “your career goes well?”
“Actually, it’s not what everyone thinks. It’s rather hard to make a living.”
“But I thought—”
“That fame brought wealth?” She shook her head. “Sadly, no. Only scrutiny. Notoriety. And worry.”
He hesitated to broach the subject, but he could not resist. “And your marriage? I take it that you are happy? In spite of the drinking…”
“Oh, Quentin…” Her eyes flooded and she lowered her head. “What happened to us? We were so happy…”
“You didn’t know?” He was confused.
She looked at him accusingly. “Why did you leave so suddenly?” She seemed to fade, and her voice wavered in the air. “… So suddenly…”
“Oh, but Elizabeth. It was your father, Jamison. He learned my secret.”
“Secret?” Her eyes were searching his, exposing the pain of years of feeling betrayed. “What secret? You loved another? I always knew girls adored you, but I thought—”
“No. No. I had to go. Liz, you must believe me.” Her mouth was so close.
“It doesn’t matter … it’s all in the past…”
He saw her fading again and struggled to bring her back in the only way he knew. He reached for her and what had seemed a dream suddenly became real. She was in his arms, her body folded against him. When he looked at her, he was amazed. She was a girl no longer but a full-blown rose, a woman whose beauty was all curves and soft flesh, her eyes luminous, a pearl of saliva on her red lips. Life had made her melancholy but deeply aware, and she looked up at him in longing so profound he thought he would break apart. Everywhere he touched her she moved to him, fragrant, silky, and his body sang to hers. But even as he was deep in a trance, his passion rising, he felt her turn to smoke and something stabbed his heart, and he knew it was not real after all, it was the séance, and he had come back to a different time, the time when it had all gone so wrong. Desperately he grabbed for Blair before the dream became a nightmare, but he was still alone with her and she was lying by his side. Reaching up to stroke his mouth with her fingertips, she whispered, “I love you.”
Then they were both in the parking lot behind the Collinsport Inn and Quentin had just loaded Liz’s suitcase into the back of her Kelly green Cadillac. He was trembling with excitement; his life was renewed. She had agreed to divorce her husband, and they were going away together, this time forever, to find whatever happiness they could. Nothing would stop them now.
Just as he was reaching for the car door, he heard her voice catch in her throat and she cried out as if in pain to someone approaching, “Get away from here and leave us alone!”
Startled, Quentin turned to see standing in the doorway of the Inn, Paul Stoddard, swaying drunkenly, a .38 caliber pistol in his grip, his legs spread in an awkward stance. He held the gun in his quivering hands, tried to aim, but the barrel jerked in circles before he fired two shots. The first went wild, grazed Quentin’s pants leg and bounced off the fender of Liz’s convertible. But the second ricocheted off the pavement and struck him in the groin; he doubled over and rolled to the ground. Elizabeth screamed, as Paul fell to his knees babbling for her forgiveness, the gun sliding from his hand. She picked it up, stared at it a moment, and threw it in the backseat of the car.
The ambulance, the white gurney, and the searing pain were all a blur. He was helpless, jostled by orderlies, while he tried to lift up and see her above the crowd that gathered like a pack of barking dogs. Paul Stoddard was in a drunken stupor but leaned into the reporters and sneered to their scribbling pencils: “Just shot the sonofabitch who tried to break up my home.” The police and newspapermen with their infernal flashing cameras all questioned Elizabeth, who stood in a glowing light and endured the storm of attention with perfect calm.
Quentin looked on in disbelief as she insisted in her sweetest voice that her husband “had been upset for many months over bankruptcy proceedings,” and shaking her head, firmly denied any romance between “a Mr. Collins and myself.” Being wheeled into the hospital bandaged, unable to walk, bulbs flashing, Quentin saw her look back at him one last time before she drove away in the elegant car with the top folded back, her hair flying in the wind, and her face ravaged with tears. Worse than the pain of the bullet as he watched her go was the agony of knowing he would never see her again.
And then, suddenly, the sounds and dark waves of the dream folded into themselves, and he was back in the library at Collinwood. The windows outside were dark except for a blue glow in the sky as it delivered the moon. Quentin’s mind was reeling, his vision distorted, and his head fell forward against the polished wood of the table. The room was ribboned with shadows, the candles had all burned down, and Blair was saying, “Mr. Collins. Wake up now. Mr. Collins, it’s over. Wake up.”
Twenty-three
His quarry within his grasp, Barnabas moved stealthily toward the library window where he could see the candlelight burning on the table and Quentin and Blair hovering over it. Anticipating the encounter, Barnabas could feel his chest expanding and his breath growing ragged. Happily, he was strong once again, his supernatural powers flowing like liquid silver through his veins. Surprise was his ally as he moved over the snow, his cape a broad wing, his dark head lowered, the cane gripped in his hand.
Hesitating a moment by the window, he could hear the murmuring of voices, and then he made out Blair’s flat nasal tones, shrill with excitement as if the man had inherited a fortune and meant to spend it all in one night.
“Calm down, man. You have no reason
to blame me! These things are unpredictable, and a trip into the past is never a sure thing. However, you will be glad to learn that our bargain is no longer applicable. You need not reveal the identity of the vampire”—his voice was rising in pitch—“I have the vampire, chained in my laboratory, and I plan to begin the dissection this very evening!”
Barnabas reeled back from the window. Could he be serious? Blair had trapped a vampire. How? The man must be insane. Blair had neither the strength nor the ingenuity to perform such a task. Had he in some fiendish manner captured Julia, and—what a misfortune!—was she destined to a terrible fate if she was not able to save herself?
For a moment Barnabas was paralyzed with indecision. When he looked back, Blair was no longer in the room, and he heard the sound of a motorcar starting up in front of the house.
His cane struck the window with the deafening sound of exploding glass. It shattered the casement in the shape of a starburst, and through it Barnabas glimpsed Quentin standing there alone, his expression hopelessly acquiescent as though he had been expecting Barnabas all along.
“Please, my good man,” Quentin murmured, “don’t harm me.”
Barnabas was shaken. He tried to compose himself. Furiously, he searched for an excuse, some way to cover his abrupt behavior. “I— I was— I intended to catch Dr. Blair, unawares—”
“Dr. Blair has left.”
Quentin moved behind the table, watching Barnabas warily, his body tensing as he hunched over, arms dangling at his sides, but he managed to say in a low voice, “Not here, not now.”
“Then where?” said Barnabas, looking through the window, aware that Quentin was stalling for time. He knew he still had the advantage, but in a moment that would no longer be the case. Yet he hesitated, conflicting urges uncoiling within his body, both guilt and desire for revenge flushing their poisons into his blood.
His visage growing darker and with a catch in his voice, Quentin said, “Take me to the Old House and chain me so that I cannot escape tonight. Can’t you do that? I am the most wretched of men.” He shivered and hung his head. “I have caused so much unhappiness, and I would rather die than become what I am cursed to be. Barnabas, believe me, I no more want to harm those I love than you do.”
Here was a solution. Was there time? Barnabas could see the change coming on. Quentin’s hands sprouting fur and his skin darkening, and his voice gravelly. “Please help me. Stop me. I beg of you. Or leave me to my fate.”
Barnabas looked again through the shattered glass behind him. Behind him, the full moon had emerged a swollen sphere surrounded by a halo of blue light. Craters gaping, it pulsed with a fiendish fire, and at the instant its beams penetrated the broken shards, Quentin’s face betrayed his anguish. He threw back his head and uttered a howl that tore the night’s silence.
Barnabas braced himself, grasping his wolf’s head cane, but Quentin stood, still a man, shaking his head, his hands clenched. He stared at Barnabas in supplication, confused and desperate, as he fought the moon’s power. His eyes were orbs of lunacy when he turned and leapt through the casement, the sharp slivers raking his body, and then, uttering garbled sobs, he staggered over the snow and down toward the sea road. Barnabas followed stealthily, drawn by some primal instinct of the hunt. No longer strong enough to kill the monster—he knew to engage in a match would be disastrous—he still stalked his old enemy. Drawn by a morbid curiosity, even a fascination that shamed him, he wanted to witness the transformation. Again he wondered whether he was being drawn to his own fate, to be destroyed by the wolf man. But when he thought of those who were also in danger—David and Jacqueline, so innocent and helpless, unable to shield themselves—he knew he must protect them. He had promised himself to watch over Jacqueline, and David was the last in the line; his life meant more to Barnabas now than his own.
Barnabas searched stealthily among the trees, but finding no beast in the forest, he hesitated and wondered whether to wander further or to return to Collinwood and keep his vigil there and, if the monster came upon them, be prepared to sacrifice himself. But first he must find Blair. He felt a fleeting concern for Julia. Was she the vampire imprisoned by the demented scientist?
Passing the cemetery, he saw a dark shape up ahead hurrying through the snow. Still in the form of a man, Quentin stopped and looked up at the moon with such torment that even Barnabas felt pity. Why had he not suffered the transformation? Quentin held up his hands as if he could prevent the beams from reaching him, then ducked into the shadows of larger trees and stumbled down the road, head bowed, his gait dogged with purpose. He did not stop until he reached the curve to Widow’s Hill, and for Barnabas, the unthinkable suddenly seemed imminent. He watched Quentin trudge through the snow, his boots digging into the drifts, and then, covering the rise in leaps, the poor man raced toward the cliff as though he were determined in the only way he knew to stop his rampage.
Barnabas felt his throat tighten. Here at this precipice, his beloved Josette had chosen death when she saw the horror her life would become. So with the werewolf. Rather than face existence as a hideous creature doomed to an eternity of shame, would Quentin choose the same fate and leap to the rocks below?
How often he had said to himself, I would rather be lying in a coffin with a stake though my heart than to be what I have become. For the first time he realized what courage it required to live as he did, every hour facing his hideous propensities, trying to carve out a life without remorse. How clever was the Devil? What temptations had he inflicted on his followers? What desperate choices? Evil had a thousand faces, all of them shameful; goodness had but one.
As he watched the lone figure approaching the rock face, Barnabas searched for some way to save Quentin, to bring him back from the brink, but the desperate man lumbered toward the cliff’s edge with the instincts of a brute and the resolve of a human. When he reached the edge, he swayed and raised his head. His silhouette was carved against the ice-white moon, and when he cried out to the swirling stars, it was with all the wretchedness of a soul already in hell.
Barnabas drew back in shame. He could not bear to witness Quentin’s final moments. More than anything he wanted to weep, but his eyes were tearless, and his heart beat relentlessly in his ears as he began the lonely journey back to Collinwood.
* * *
A howling wind was coming off the sea when Jackie raced to the cliff’s edge with the cumbersome painting banging against her legs. Stumbling toward Widow’s Hill dragging the heavy canvas, she cried out, “Quentin!” but her words were swept away in the tumult. The sea beneath was frothed with spume, each ripple edged in silver, and the waves curled against the rocks as though offering a sweet embrace.
Jackie called again, “Quentin!” and he turned, searching for the source of her voice. The wind whipped around her body, her coat flapped in the air, and her hair was strung out in tangles as she lifted the painting like a sail and was buffeted, barely able to stay on her feet. She could feel the vibrations of the portrait entering her fingertips as she approached the dark figure, and she whispered a prayer that the image had captured the spell.
At last she was close enough to see Quentin’s chest expanding and smell his foul odor, but she could tell that, even though the moon was like a meteor in the black sky, he had not yet endured his metamorphosis. His bloodred eyes gleamed and he panted, his hot breath flowing around her, as he glared at her in perplexed confusion. Jackie slammed the painting on the ground at his feet and backed away, saying, “There! There is your portrait!”
She was trembling, but certain with all her being that she had succeeded, that the painting would prevent the change. Quentin shook as he approached the canvas on the rocks, reached for it, then his body convulsed. As the moon flashed, his massive form was sucked into his image like into the mouth of a whirlwind. He doubled over, fell to the ground, and the shape that lay on the snow was not a wolf’s but a man’s.
When Quentin lifted his head, his chiseled face was perfect once mo
re, the dark hair, and the alabaster cheeks—all magically restored. Jackie stared in awe as Quentin rose to his feet, and the singing wind blasted them both alone on the rock-strewn crag. The air was vibrating in waves, the sky reeled with stars, and the full moon came into her arms.
Quentin staggered toward her, his face awash with relief. Weak with gratitude, he reached for the painting at his feet. All that he was and all he would ever be glimmered on the surface of the canvas, and his image was so clear he could have been gazing into a mirror.
Then, out of the wailing tempest, Jackie heard the sound of Angelique’s laughter, the haunting melody traveling up and down the scale, like the sad music that came from the grave.
Quentin looked at Jackie in awe then leaned over to grasp the frame, but at that moment a burst of wind came off the sea with such ferocity it blew them both back from the edge. Quentin cried out, “No! Oh, God!” as the canvas was ripped from his fingertips. He stumbled at the edge of the precipice. The painting lifted, caught the currents of air, and flying just out of Quentin’s reach hovered a moment before it tumbled, revolving slowly over the chasm, and then flickering like a new comet, it spiraled down, crashed into the rocks, and was swallowed up by the waves.
Gaping at the hungry foam that swirled onto the sand, Quentin let out a deep groan and his hands went to his throat. He hunched over and his shape darkened again. Silvered fur burst from his body.
“Run,” he growled, and Jackie watched in horror as the wolf man began to emerge. His hoary shoulders were frosted by moonlight. The wind shrieked with the sounds of the booming surf, and the beast’s rank odor made her stomach clench. When it opened its huge jaws, she scrambled away, and she looked back just as the werewolf climbed against the moon a second time that night and rent the sky with its wails.