I lifted up the letter and examined the document beneath it. It was the manifest from a ship, a freighter, also dated 1901. While, as with the rest of the papers in the box, nothing was circled, my attention immediately went to a name low in the column labeled “crew”, knowing without knowing how, that this was his. The name was “Marcus Reilly.” The name should have been foreign to me, I should never have been able to pick it out so easily, but I did. It was as if I were reading about an old acquaintance from high school whose name I had misplaced but not forgotten.
When I finally picked up the last set of documents, there was no photograph attached this time. The top paper was a sloppily-written promissory note dated July 22, 1835 from an Joquin Hebert to an Edmond Montague for a house on Toulouse Street. I read over the handwritten I.O.U., which also featured a number of items besides the house and land proper, such as furniture, including beds and drapes. Near the top of the list of belongings being transferred was included “One adult female Negro house slave, age unknown, Virginia.” Virginia. That name sounded almost too familiar. It bothered me tremendously that the person receiving the house had been a slave owner. While I found slavery an abominable practice, I didn’t know why, in this specific instance, it bothered me so much. Why did I register such a level of disappointment in this particular man, a man I didn’t even know? The following paper, which, like all the rest, showed none of the signs of age or yellowing that it should have, was another official, stamped document that set my mind to ease. This one was dated ten days after the first two, declaring Virginia now to be a free person of color, able to come and go as she pleased. My faith in this unknown homeowner was restored. Why had it troubled me so much to think of this man as someone who could have kept another human being as a slave? Why was I interested enough in some dead guy to register that degree of disappointment? My reaction confused me.
“This is really interesting, Geoffrey,” I said as flatly as I could, lest I give away any clue that the contents of the trunk had actually had any impact upon me. “Thanks for sharing your find with me.”
“So you’re going to keep up the act, huh?” he asked without flinching.
“What act, Geoffrey?”
“Your innocent act.”
“Exactly what is it that I’m supposed to have done? Why don’t you enlighten me?”
“Okay, take a good look at these, then. They were on the bottom of the wooden box, separate from the other documents.”
He handed me a set of three photos, which were unlike any other photographs I’d ever seen, more life-like, more realistically 3-D than any pictures I had ever come across in my entire life. These photos, along with the rest of the papers in this box, were set aside from the others in the trunk for a reason. These people were special, these people were different. They were still around, in one way or another and their presence would not let the owner of the box forget they existed. With one glimpse of these photographs, all shot against a strange metal background, my head began to swim, my vision began to blur as memories returned to me, too quickly, as if the wall behind which they had been held prisoners crumbled to nothing in a split second. I bit my lip to stay the “oh” that wanted so much to escape unbidden. I was more upset than ever that I had to engage in this important process of discovery under the malevolent eye of Geoffrey, whom I was growing to hate more and more with every passing moment.
I didn’t recognize one of the people, but I recognized Virginia and Marcus. My hands began to tremble and I shuffled through the papers I’d already set aside, hoping that by doing so, Geoffrey would not notice my upset. Once I had regained control, I returned to the last set of photographs. Regathering my courage, I carefully pulled out the photos of Marcus and Virginia and studied them slowly, trying hard to recapture my composure.
The young man staring back at me from the photograph, light eyes and complexion, straight, stringy hair, gone so many years, knew me as well as I knew him. As my outer vision began to blur, my inner vision came fully into clear focus. Marcus. Of course, this was the young man that kept popping up on Bourbon Street, the young man who indelicately and often rudely urged me to continue my course, their cause.
I studied the photo of Virginia last because I’d always found solace in her quiet strength and I certainly needed that right now. How could I possibly have forgotten Virginia, the woman who appeared at the apartment that I had rented for what was supposed to be less than a week’s vacation? I knew now how she was linked to the house on Toulouse Street. She had come with it.
I now remembered who I was and what I was supposed to do, I now recalled the point of this whole endeavor, at least as much as I’d been told. The game, the quest to rescue Edmond, the man in the portrait, the man in my dreams, the one who had drawn me to New Orleans, the man, who had, several times, himself rescued me in a way I could never have thought possible, from within the confines of my own dreams. Yes, I now remembered everything in perfect clarity.
I looked at the photographs and I remembered these people, no longer alive, but not exactly dead, either. But what of that third man? I did not recognize him. Who was he? Then I recalled that Edmond had mentioned a third person, one I had not met yet. Was this Zachary? His must have been the voice calling me up to the third floor. The baseball player’s photo wasn’t even in this stack of photos, notably missing. Who was this fourth person named Max? I only knew of one guy named Max, but it couldn’t possibly be the same fellow. Could Max the bartender and Max the baseball player be the same person, I wondered? No, I told myself, I was letting my imagination run away with me. After all, I supposed, Max was not an uncommon name. The baseball player was handsome, the bartender, ugly. It was impossible. Why, they weren’t even the same height, for one was 6’4”, the other shorter than myself. But that would be a moot point in this place, wouldn’t it? What was it that Ben kept saying, about Arrosha changing all of them, making them all beautiful? Maybe if she could make people oh so beautiful, she could make them oh so ugly as well.
As I stared at these papers, a second set of memories resurfaced. I now fully remembered the Crypt and that the reason the people in this house seemed so familiar to me was because I had run into them there. I remembered Ben and Illea in particular because they had seemed so nice; and I remembered Geoffrey for the opposite reason, for he had seemed so mean, especially to the bartender. I remembered Rochere in both her old and young guises and that she and Arrosha were one and the same.
I now knew everything in horrific detail that had been hidden from me up until now. I remembered how I got here. I now remembered the second door at The Crypt, I now recalled being one second in the back room of a bar in the French Quarter, the next second in a hot, humid yet colorless swamp only walking distance from this mansion and its perennially perfect climate. With a shudder, I remembered those horrible creatures in the swamp that tried to feed off me, the ones that chased me to this house. I realized now why I could see the art’s eyes glow and Geoffrey couldn’t. The amulet, it let me see something that the others could not. I wanted to scream out, but Geoffrey was still watching me too closely, so I bit my lip and clasp my hands together, fighting my normal reactions. I had to put on a good front. That might buy me more time and I hoped that in the moonlight, he hadn’t noticed.
Now that I knew how I got here, the realization that I had no idea how to get back unnerved me horribly. This was no ordinary place, no real place on any real map. There was no way I could simply walk out the door and keep going until I found a road and followed it to the nearest town or fishing camp, at least, where I could find a phone and call someone. This place existed outside of any reality of which I’d ever heard tell. Even if escape were possible, it would have been a moot point, for the creatures that had attacked me earlier were surely still lurking out there, watching for me on that bayou road, sitting in wait to kill me before I could make it far.
Wait, I thought to myself, I’d had that thought before, I’d sought a plan of escape before, since
I’d been here; that thought was not a new one. When was it that I’d remembered? It came to me in a flash. The night after the essence, before the purge, that was when my memories had come back to me, at least partially. What had caused me to forget them again? Was it the purge itself? No, that shouldn’t have done it. It must have been something I’d ingested. Was it the essence that had made me forget? No, if anything, the essence had helped me remember. The water, it had to be the water. Of course, that was it. I didn’t remember much of my recovery from the ghoul attack; I’d been far too ill for that. But I did remember that I’d had an awful lot of the water at that time. I’d tried to resist it, because Edmond had warned me not to drink anything that came from Rochere. And I did resist it, didn’t I? The necklace amulet was on its way to healing me when somebody put an I.V. line into my arm and forced it into me. Who was it that did that to me? Ben was there, true, and Illea, but they weren’t the architects of it. It was Arrosha herself, aided by Geoffrey, that slimy reptile. I felt as if I’d been raped.
I needed to get back on track. I had to find a way out of here fast. It was more than just survival, I needed to resume the quest, I needed to find Edmond and give him my necklace. The necklace! Did I still have it? My fingers flew to my neck. Thank God, I thought as I touched upon it. It had buried itself under my skin and become so light, so unnoticeable, I could hardly feel myself wearing it. In an unguarded moment, I breathed an audible sight of relief.
“Remember something finally?” Geoffrey remarked snidely.
For a split second, I’d been so terrified that I’d lost the necklace, so relieved to find I hadn’t, that I had let myself react physically.
“No, no, it’s nothing,” I said, trying to sound as convincing as possible. “It’s just that, well, all these people, it’s all just so sad, so tragic.”
“Bullshit. You’re a bad liar,” he snorted. “So you’re not going to tell me, huh?”
“There’s nothing to tell,” I said as blandly as I could. This much was true. There was absolutely nothing that had come to me that I wanted to share with Geoffrey. “I still don’t understand why you think these people have anything to do with me. You said you had proof that I was guilty of some offense that I still don’t understand,” I lied. “I see no proof.”
“Okay, if you want to play it that way, we’ll play it that way. You really are a stupid little snit, aren’t you, Ashley, thinking you could play me like you played Ben. You see, I remember you from the city. By virtue of staying clear of our special water, my mind wasn’t wiped clean of that memory like the others’ were. You were that bitch that came into The Crypt. Our own private club and you had the nerve to come into it. How did you even see it anyway? Nobody’s supposed to be able to see it until they’ve taken essence first! Tell me. Tell me!”
“I don’t know,” I said, trying not to sound as scared as I was. “I really don’t know. I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to be able to see it.”
“There’s something rotten about you and I’m going to expose it before Arrosha makes the mistake of transforming you. You see, Ashley, I haven’t yet shown you quite everything I found.” He reached behind the trunk, retrieved another envelope. “Here’s all the proof I need. You see, I found this at the apartment where you were staying.”
“What were you, stalking me?” I asked.
“You might want to say that.” He answered, quite proud of himself. “I know about that place on Toulouse Street. I’ve known for a long time. I’m the only one here that does, besides Arrosha herself. She told me to keep an eye on it a long, long time ago. And for a long time, I was a very good boy. I did as I was told. But then, one day, after the outsider water kicked in, I woke up and stopped being such a good boy. And looky what I found. Goes to show you what a wee bit of that old initiative will get you, doesn’t it? Just going that one little extra step? Now, I’d have to say that this pretty much falls under the heading of proof, wouldn’t you?”
“It’s an envelope, Geoffrey. That hardly qualifies as proof.”
“Hold on a second. I’m getting to that. This is too juicy for me to rush. Now, I’ve kept an eye on that apartment for what is it, over thirty years? That’s a long time for nothing remarkable to have happened, isn’t it?”
“I suppose.”
“It was interesting. Sort of. People came and went. Mostly came in healthy and went out sick if they left at all. Then you came along. I have to tell you that I didn’t like you from the beginning, so I decided to keep an even closer eye on you. With the key Arrosha gave me – Ben doesn’t have one, by the way – I let myself into the apartment. I can’t believe you were willing to live like that, even for a few days. It’s so low-rent. I found it oddly fitting for you, though, to be perfectly honest.
“So I looked around the place and went through a few things, but there wasn’t anything there but your clothes and stuff. I have to ask you, the pictures in your wallet, is that your family?”
“Geoffrey, you went through my purse?” I felt incredibly violated now, realizing that the man I hated most in the world had been toying with my personal property while I was gone.
“Yeah,” he said, as if bored, “but don’t get in a snit. It was pretty dull. Just like your clothes.
“This was early this morning, as a matter of fact. Since Arrosha had accepted you and you were starting to look passable, if I didn’t find anything incriminating, I made up my mind to try to make nice. It was about that time that I decided to leave the place, because it was obvious none of the rest of that house had anything to do with you. But before I went out that courtyard gate, I took one last look around and caught a glare off of something shiny. I went over to that spot and noticed a weird-looking patch in the dried up dirt on the far side of the courtyard, by the old slave quarters. I didn’t notice it when I walked in, but as I walked out, I guess the sunshine must’ve hit it just right and something glinted. Let’s just say it caught my attention. At first, I figured it was just some garbage.
“But going that extra step, I checked it out and guess what? It wasn’t just garbage, now was it? At least not the ordinary kind. So I looked at it hard and up close now, and my, my, what did I spy with my little eyes? Something’d been buried there recently. Very recently. And to make it even better, whoever did it put ashes on the top and scattered chicken feet and bones and feathers all around it. Must be some kind of hoodoo, I suppose. I figured that since you’re the only one stayin’ there, that somebody must have been you.”
“I don’t know who buried that stuff, Geoffrey, but I know that it sure as hell wasn’t me,” I protested. “I don’t even know how to do hoodoo.”
“Oh, so now you remember? How very convenient. I had a feeling that you would have to drop your act when I showed you the proof. It gets even better. Don’t you want me to tell you what else I found?”
“I’m sure you’re going tell me whether I want you to or not.”
“Damn straight, babe. Damn straight. You see, when I walked over to that spot to study it up close, I saw what it was that was glinting in the sun, what caught my eye. It was this.” He held up a small, shiny piece of metal.
“It’s a clip, Geoffrey. You can buy them in any office supply store. I still don’t know what this has to do with me,” I told him.
“True, but this isn’t just any old clip.” he said, holding it back up as if he were a trial lawyer and I was the accused.
He removed the contents of the envelope and threw them at me. They were duplicate 3-D pictures of Virginia, Marcus and the unfamiliar man.
“More photos, Geoffrey? You’ve already shown me these,” I said, feigning indifference as best I could. “I still see no proof.”
“But these photos are different, you see. These were buried with that clip. That clip, you see, is connected with these people. That proves you’re connected with these people.
“Take your time, my dear. I don’t want you to feel pressured just because I’m here. I want you to look at them
close. Recognize any of these characters?
Of course I recognized Virginia and Marcus, but he didn’t have to know that. “Like I said, Geoffrey, anybody can buy those clips by the gross in any office supply store. I still don’t see how it proves I’m connected with these people.”
“But it wasn’t just sitting all alone and lonely like it is now,” he said, savoring the moment. “You wanna guess what I found attached to it? Look familiar?”
He held up my photo ID badge from work, with my picture on it, the plastic lanyard, torn from its clip, lying limp across its top.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
While I wanted to scream at him and demand he hand my work badge over to me, I bit my lip and said nothing. I didn’t want to give Geoffrey any more power over me than he had already.
“Why, if I’m not mistaken, it’s the pre-essence you. I almost forgot how ugly you were. Tell me, what would your ID badge be doing buried in a hoodoo pile with photos of these other people, the same people I found in Arrosha’s secret trunk? Don’t bother to lie to me. These people are all connected somehow and now I know that you’re connected to them.
“Speechless?” he said with haughtiness upon my silence. “I had a feeling you would be. You see, my darling little Ashley, when I first got up the nerve to enter this room a mere few weeks ago, it had nothing to do with you because I didn’t even know at that time that you even existed. Initially, I simply wanted to find out more about Arrosha so that I could feel closer to her, be more connected to her, hopefully be more useful to her and able to serve her better.”
The Nightmare Game Page 47