Carrying the moaning boy, Righteous fought toward the lake. By the time they’d reached the shore, their clothes were little more than smoking rags. People by the hundreds were immersed in the oily water. Boats were darting here and there, picking up swimmers. Most of the yachts had already been stolen from their slips, and those that remained were afire. Righteous went into the lake up to her neck, then wet Ludlow’s face and hair to keep the cinders from burning him.
It was almost an hour before she lifted the boy into the hands of soldiers aboard a ferryboat, then climbed up herself. Ludlow, his clothing tattered and his face puffed with burns, stood at the railing, watching Chicago’s destruction. When Righteous touched his arm, he pulled quickly away.
Lord God! she thought. She had realized, as she would tell a reporter in another few hours, the truth of the matter: with both his mother and father gone, Ludlow Usher at thirteen was in control of everything—the estate, the family business, all the other businesses that had belonged to Mr. Cordweiler. He was, Righteous knew, the wealthiest thirteen-year-old boy in the world.
She watched him, waiting for him to cry, but he never did. He held his spine as stiff as an iron bar, his attention riveted to the fire on shore.
The soldiers were helping a man and woman aboard from a rowboat. Both were well dressed, the man in a dark suit with a diamond stickpin, the woman in the dirty remnants of a red ballroom gown. The man regarded Righteous and Ludlow and turned to one of the soldiers. “Sir,” he inquired, “must we share this vessel with niggers and tramps?”
Rix came to the end of Righteous Jordan’s story. He glanced over the other articles. Chicago had burned for twenty-four hours, and the fire had destroyed more than seventeen thousand buildings. One hundred thousand people were left homeless. The flames had been helped along by at least nine firebugs. The firemen had been slow to react that night because they were so tired; during the week before the Great Fire, they’d answered more than forty alarms.
He looked up at the portrait of the brooding Ludlow Usher. Thirteen years old and one foot in hell, Rix thought. How had he kept his sanity?
Rix had found the answer to Dunstan’s question about the death of Cynthia Usher. Tomorrow he would take this newspaper to him. But the cane—how and when had Ludlow gotten the cane back from Randolph Tigré?
Printed in small type in several columns on the next page was a listing of businesses that had been destroyed. They were not in alphabetical order, and Rix had to read patiently before he found what he was looking for.
Uriah Hynd and Company, Grocers.
A grocery store? Rix thought. Hudson Usher was spending fifteen thousand dollars a whack on groceries from Chicago? Why didn’t he simply buy his groceries in Asheville?
Rix carefully folded the paper and rose from his chair. For now, the questions would have to wait. He blew out all the candles except those in one candelabra, and used it to light his way upstairs.
And when he opened the door to his room, the golden light illuminated Puddin’ Usher—lying languidly in his bed, waiting for him.
She smiled sleepily, yawned, and stretched. Her breasts peeked over the top of the sheet. “You been a long time,” she said huskily. “Thought you’d never come to bed.”
He closed the door, alarmed that someone might hear. “You’d better get out. Boone will—”
“Boone ain’t here.” Her eyes challenged him. “Ol’ Boonie’s long gone to his club. You ain’t gonna turn me down this time, are you?”
“Puddin’,” Rix said as he put the folded paper on his dresser, “I thought you understood what I told you. I can’t—”
She sat up and let the sheet drop away. Her breasts were fully exposed, and she wet her lips with her tongue. “See how much I need you?” she asked. “Now don’t tell me you don’t want some of it.”
The candlelight flattered her, made her look less harsh and more vulnerable. Rix’s body was responding. She stretched like a cat. “You’re not afraid of Boone, are you?” she asked teasingly.
He shook his head. He couldn’t take his eyes off her.
“Boone says you can’t keep a woman,” she said. “He says you’re a half-step short of bein’ queer.”
Rix set the candelabra down.
“Come on,” she insisted. “Let’s see what you can do.”
He started to tell her to get out; he wanted to say it, but suddenly he couldn’t make himself. A thin smile had begun to play around the edges of his mouth. Why not? he thought. It would be wrong, yes—but hadn’t it been wrong for Boone to treat him like dirt all these years, to crow and caper and plot all kinds of nasty little tricks? This was the chance to pay him back that Rix had been waiting for. He brushed away the small voice inside him that urged him not to.
“Why not?” he said, and his voice sounded like that of someone he didn’t know.
“Good.” She kicked off the sheets, her body wantonly exposed to him. “Blow out them candles, then, and let’s get to it.”
32
BOONE WAS DRUNK ON Chivas Regal, and he’d lost seven thousand dollars in two fleeting hours at the country club poker table. It was dawning on him that his old buddies were conspiring to cheat him. As they laughed and clapped him on the back and lit his Dunhill cigars for him, Boone silently mulled over how he would destroy them.
He took his red Ferrari through the quiet streets of Foxton at almost ninety, whipping past an old battered pickup truck coming from the opposite direction. For spite, Boone rammed his hand down on the horn; it blared several notes of “Dixie.” As the car roared out of Foxton, Boone sank his foot to the floor and the Ferrari leaped forward like a rocket.
He would buy the Asheville Heights Country Club, he’d decided. For whatever price. Maybe the board members would put up a statue of him in the foyer. The least they could do was to name the club after him. In a few days he was going to be one of the richest men in the world. Dad can’t hold on much longer, he thought—but he had mixed emotions, because he loved the old man. Walen had taught him how to be tough; he’d taught him that no one could be trusted, that everybody was out to make a killing. They’d had long talks, when Boone was younger, about how money was what made a man a success. Money is power, Walen had told him many times; without it, the world will run over you like a steamroller. He’d pointed to Rix as an example of what Boone should avoid: Rix, Walen said, was a dreamy, unrealistic coward who would never amount to his weight in shit. It had pleased Walen for Boone to beat on his younger brother.
Still, there was something about Rix that scared Boone. Something deep, something hidden away from everyone. He’d seen it spark in Rix’s eyes several times in the last few days: a hatred and bitterness so twisted it could commit murder. And Rix had tried to stab him in the dining room. Boone regretted not having smashed his teeth out right in front of everyone. Rix would’ve gone crying to his room.
Boone slid the Ferrari around curves, barely tapping the brakes, grinning at the thrill of speed. Katt thought she was going to get everything, he knew—but she was dead wrong. He had Puddin’ to thank for Katt’s downfall: the last time Katt had jaunted off to New York for a weekend, Puddin’ had rummaged through her closet for a dress to wear and had discovered the entrance to her Quiet Room. Puddin’ had shown him what she’d found in there, and Boone had taken it straight to Walen, who at that time hadn’t yet sealed himself in his own Quiet Room. Boone would never forget the old man’s expression of shock and disgust. Prob’ly buyin’ the shit in Asheville, Boone had said. Prob’ly spendin’ a damned fortune on it, too.
Walen had told him to put it back where it had been, and that he would take care of Katt in his own way.
Boone knew what that meant. Dad might be stringing her along now, but she’d been cut out of the inheritance.
Rain began to patter on the windshield. Boone quickly slowed down. He wasn’t so drunk he wanted to end up as a bloody smear on the road. As he rounded the bend and drove toward Usherland’s gates, he hit the s
witch under the dashboard and the gates opened smoothly for him, then closed again when he’d passed through.
He couldn’t bear to return to that room where Puddin’ lay sleeping. She thinks she’s got me by the balls! he snorted. Well, after he got his hands on all those billions, he could have his choice of beautiful women. Puddin’ wasn’t as pretty as she used to be. The beauty-queen gilt had rubbed off, and underneath was pure country cardboard. He drove slowly past the dark Gatehouse and followed the road toward the Lodge.
What a showplace the Lodge was going to be when he moved in! He was going to throw out all those damned dusty antiques and suits of armor and shit, put some nice new furniture in. There would be a whole floor full of video games, and in the basement he’d have grottoes of fake rock, where colored lights played on steamy water. He’d have a master bedroom with red walls and a huge bed draped in black fur, and there would be a mirrored ceiling. There would be no end to the parties, and if he wanted to, he’d ride his horses right up and down the corridors.
Boone often went to the Lodge to walk in it, visualizing how it would look once he lived there. Sometimes he told Puddin’ and his mother that he was going to the stables, but instead he’d go to the Lodge. It was the most beautiful place in the world, he thought. Its majesty and immensity sometimes almost made him cry; and in the silence of the Lodge he could sit in an overstuffed chair and know that soon—very soon—all of it would belong to him.
He’d never feared the Lodge. The Lodge loved him, too, and wanted him as its master. In the dreams he’d been having for the past few months, he’d seen the Lodge aflame with lights, and figures drifting past the windows as they would at the party Boone planned to give as soon as he moved in. Lately the dreams had been coming almost every night, and in some of them he’d heard his name called by a soft, beckoning voice that had brought him up from sleep in eager exhilaration.
The Lodge wanted him. The Lodge was waiting to embrace him, and he would love it all the days of his life.
Boone drove across the bridge and parked under the porte-cochere. Then he got out in the misty rain, stumbled around to the trunk, unlocked it, and retrieved his bull’s-eye lantern and a map he’d made of the first floor. He clicked the lantern on and shone it up the steps.
The Lodge’s front entrance was open. Several times he’d come out here before and found the door wide open. He’d mentioned it to Edwin, who’d promised to keep an eye on the place. There was little danger of someone breaking into the Lodge, Boone knew. Not with all those stories about black panthers and the Pumpkin Man roaming near the estate. Boone’s guess was that the Lodge was shifting, and the door wouldn’t shut properly anymore. From the looks of the deep cracks in the walls, the house was under a lot of internal pressure. Reinforcing the Lodge would have top priority when Boone took over.
He followed the beam of his lantern into the Lodge. At once he felt giddy with pleasure; he was back in his favorite world again, and he almost shouted with joy. He moved through the foyer, past the massive fountain with its carved statues, and into a cavernous reception area with royal blue sofas and chairs, mahogany tables, and flags from every country in the world hanging from the ceiling. The silence in the Lodge was complete as Boone continued through a series of huge rooms. Entering a winding corridor, Boone followed it for perhaps forty yards and then opened a large sliding door. Beyond it was the main study, and Boone’s flashlight picked out familiar sights: several black leather chairs arranged around a low rosewood coffee table, a dark slab of a desk with lion’s heads carved into it, a rug made from the hides of polar bears, and shelves filled with a variety of decanters and glasses. A short stairway led down to a door that Boone had found was securely locked. He crossed the room to the fireplace of black marble; the charred remnants of the last fire he’d lit in here still cluttered the hearth. Beside it was a brass barrel of wood left over from Erik’s day, and some newspapers Boone had recently brought in. He spent a few minutes getting new pieces of wood arranged in the hearth—banged his head against the marble and cursed drunkenly—and then stuffed paper under it, touched his cigar lighter’s flame to it, and stepped back as the fire quickly grew. The old, dried-out wood burned fiercely. The room took on a festive glow. Boone put his lantern aside and went to the shelves.
He’d finished off some damned fine whiskey the last time he was here at night. He sniffed at several decanters before the delicious aroma of cognac filled his nostrils; with a satisfied grunt, he poured himself a glassful and then sat down behind the desk. Going down, the stuff was as mellow as melted gold. He might sleep here tonight, he thought. Just pull up a chair in front of the fire, to help cut the chill, and he’d be fine. He thought of old Erik sitting at this desk, signing important papers. He and Erik would’ve gotten along just dandy, he was sure. They would’ve respected each other.
Boone drank his cognac and listened to the fire burn. He felt at peace here, safe and secure. He smelled woodsmoke instead of his father’s decay. How much longer he could stand living in the Gatehouse, he didn’t know. Sipping the last of the fragrant cognac in his glass, Boone paused. He put the glass down and cocked his head to one side.
Lying on the coffee table, next to a large cigar box, was something that hadn’t been there this afternoon.
It was a bulky book, trimmed in gold. Boone stood up and went over to it, playing his fingers across the fine leather. He took it nearer the fireplace and opened it.
Inside were old photographs glued to the pages. Boone knew Erik had loved pictures; walls of the Lodge’s first floor were covered with photographs from Erik’s time. But what kind of photographs these were quickly became apparent. Boone’s stomach clenched involuntarily.
They were pictures of corpses.
Soldiers, Boone realized. Frozen in every position of death. They were pictures taken on the battlefield, in field hospitals and morgues, closeups of soldiers tangled in barbed wire or blown apart at the bottom of muddy trenches, bodies almost denuded of flesh, ripped to pieces by land mines or grenades, crushed into the earth by trucks or tanks. As far as Boone could tell from the uniforms and the backgrounds, they were of World War I vintage. Another series of pictures showed decapitated bodies, followed by heads on slabs. Boone stared at death in all its grisly forms, and though the fire was strong and warm, he felt his skin crawling.
The book held several hundred pictures. Some of them, separated from the glue, drifted down around Boone’s feet. Erik had loved pictures, Boone thought. And maybe these were the kind of pictures he loved the best.
Something slammed elsewhere in the Lodge, making Boone jump. A door, he thought, his mental processes sluggish. Did somebody slam a door?
And then it came to him with chilling, sobering clarity: the front door had slammed shut.
Boone stood very still, listening. Mutilated corpses with the faces of young boys stared up at him. Boone dropped the book on the floor and stepped away from it, wiping his hands on his pants. Then he took his lantern and went out into the corridor.
It seemed much colder now in the Lodge; he could see the faint plume of his breath, curling from his mouth. He retraced his steps along the corridor.
Then, abruptly, he stopped.
“No,” he whispered, and his voice echoed around him no no no no…
His light had fallen upon a wall of rough stones, where no wall had been when he’d come through the corridor before. He approached it, touched it; the stones were cold, and very real. Stunned, he retreated and tried to think how he’d gotten turned around. Careful, Boonie old boy, he told himself. There’s no problem. Just get back to Erik’s study, right?
He walked to the study’s open doors and stopped on the threshold. His light shone into the interior of the Lodge’s elevator. The study was gone.
He looked into the room across the corridor, and found that it was a music room with a white grand piano, a pump organ, and a harpsichord. On the ceiling was a painted blue sky with fleecy clouds. In all the times Boone
had come into the Lodge and strode down this corridor, he’d never before seen this chamber. The next arched doorway led into a large parlor decorated with feminine frills and painted pale pink. His map, which shook as he held it close to the light, showed no such room on the first floor. Shaken, Boone stood outside the elevator where the study had been a few minutes before. Okay, he said mentally, I’ve just gotten a little bit fucked-up here. No problem. I’ll keep walkin’ until I find a room that looks familiar, and then I’ll figure my way out.
The corridor led him on, twisting and turning, branching off to each side, passing staircases that vanished beyond the range of the light. Boone saw no room he recognized through any of the dozens of doorways. His palms were sweating, his face frozen into a crooked, disbelieving grin. He was dizzy and disoriented. What had happened to Rix could happen to him, too, he realized. Oh Jesus Christ! he thought. I’ve got to find the way out!
And with a final twist to the left, the corridor ended at a wide staircase that ascended into darkness.
Boone examined the map. He’d found ten staircases in his explorations of the Lodge’s first floor, but he’d never seen this one before. If he didn’t know where he was, the map was useless. I’ll go back, he decided. I’ll sit my ass down in front of that elevator and wait for somebody to see my car out front. No problem.
Boone had taken only a few steps when his legs locked. He gave a soft, scared whimper.
His path was blocked by another wall, adorned with old framed pictures of the Lodge.
He laughed nervously, a strangled sound that echoed faintly around him. That wall hadn’t been there before. The corridor had sealed itself behind his back. But the pictures indicated the wall might have been there for fifty years.
The air was turning bitterly cold, and Boone could see his breath whirling before him. He guided the light over the wall. Atop the picture frames was a thin layer of dust. He hammered at the bricks with his fist, but, like the rest of the Lodge, the wall had been built to endure for generations.
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