You can take me to the airport, if you want, she told him.
He sighed deeply. Youre going to go no matter what I say, arent you?
Yes.
He came over to her and drew her into his arms, hugging her tightly. She was touched by the gesture; she had thought that he didnt want her going because he was so ambitious, and he liked to work together, with her at his beck and call whenever he had an idea.
But he seemed genuinely concerned.
She drew away from him. He was so gorgeous.
Its okay. Ill see to the house and his things. I owe Cutter that much. And I want to have a funeral for him. Then Ill be back. It will all be fine. Really, she assured him.
No. Thats not what will happen. Youll go home, youll see old friends. You wont want to come back here.
I left as a teenager. My life is here, she said. Ill be back.
He wagged a finger at her. If youre not back immediately, Ill be down there to get you. Ill take care of you. And if theres anything bad, wellIm psychic, you know.
She laughed. No, I didnt know. But by all means. Key West is beautiful. Come on down.
He sniffed.
At last he left, still offering dire warnings to her.
She needed to pack, but she wandered out to the porch and gazed at the pool she shared with the others who lived in the group of old bungalows. She stared at the water.
Cold water. Even heated, it was still cold, in her mind.
Key West had warm water. Beautiful, warm water.
A sudden scream startled her and brought her back inside. She had a habit of keeping the television on for company. One of the movie channels was running an all-day marathon of classic horror movies.
Someone was running from a werewolf.
She smiled and sat, and then stretched out on her sofa, watching the television. As she did so, her eyes grew heavy. A nap would be great; she had tossed and turned through the night.
As she felt herself nodding off, she thought about fighting sleep.
She knew that she would dream.
It seemed that a scene from a movie was unfolding. The house was distant at first, sitting on its little spit of land. The water around it was aqua and beautiful, as it could only be around Florida and the Caribbean.
But then dark clouds covered the soft blue of the sky, and the ocean became black, as if it were a vast pit of tar.
The camera lens within her dreaming eye came closer and closer, and the old Victorian with its gingerbread façade came clearer to her view. She heard a creaking sound and saw the door was open, that the wind was playing havoc with the hinges.
She was in the house again, and she heard the screams and the wailing, and she saw her father, as she had seen him that day, holding her mother, the sound of his grief terrible. She ran toward him, screaming herself, calling for her mother.
Then Cutter himself came running down the stairs, crying out in horror. He sank down and she felt herself freeze, just standing there as she had on that day.
Then her mother and father and Cutter all faded to mist, and she stood in the empty house, alone. There were boxes and objects, spiderwebs and dust, and there was something else in the house as well, something that seemed like a small black shadow, and then seemed to growdark, stygian, filling the house with some kind of evil.
The mummy rose from its sarcophagus and stared at her with rotted and empty eyes. It pointed at the black shadow, and its voice was as dry and brittle as death as it warned, The house must have you. Its up to you. Now youyou must come, and you must stop it from growing, from escaping. Its loose, you see, the evil is on the loose, and its growing.
The mummy wasnt real. The mummy was dead. Liam had said so.
Terror filled her. She heard her name called. She turned. Liam was there, a tall, lanky teenager, reaching out to her. Come here, come to me, it isnt real, the mummy is dead, its in your imagination, in all the stories. Dont believe in it, Kelseytake my hand.
There seemed to be a terrible roar. She turned, and the mummy was a swirling pile of darkness, a shadow, and the darkness was threatening to consume her.
Kelsey awoke with a start. She was in her charming living room, in her charming bungalow apartment, and she had fallen asleep with the television on.
And the movie channel she watched was showing Boris Karloff in The Mummy.
She laughed aloud at herself, turned off the TV, and decided that she was going to get things done, batten down the house, pack so she could leave in the morning, and then get a good nights sleep. She wasnt a coward; she had spent her childhood with Cutter, and really, she had to have some kind of sense of adventure.
I owe you, Cutter! Im so sorry. I should havecome to see you. I never should have let you die alone like that.
Please forgive me.
She wasnt afraid.
The house was just a house.
And Cutters mummy was just preserved flesh that could now find a good home in a museum. Everything in perspective.
Cutter himself needed to rest at last, in peace.
She would see to it.
Liam shouted the officers name. Ricky!
There was no answer. As he reached the bottom of the stairs, however, he saw him on the floor, caught in the glow of light from his own fallen flashlight.
Ricky!
He rushed over to the man. Hunching down, he called for backup and an ambulance. He instantly checked for Rickys pulse, and was relieved to find that it was beating steadily.
Ricky groaned, and moved.
Lie still. Where are you hurt? What happened?
There was no sign of blood anywhere near Ricky.
As Liam spoke, Ricky opened his eyes, staring at Liam for a moment and then jerking around in panic. He stared across the room in the darkness. Liam aimed his flashlight beam in the area that seemed to be causing Ricky so much fear.
His light fell upon a suit of armor.
Ricky let out a scream, trying to choke it back.
Ricky, Liam said evenly, its a suit of armor. Probably real, historic and worth a mint.
It moved! Ricky declared.
Liam walked toward the armor. It was just that. Metal. It was buckled together by leather straps that had been made to replace the originals. They were probably period, but not historic.
The metal display stand was not on rollers. It hadnt moved.
Liam turned to look at Ricky. He was rubbing the back of his head. It appeared that the man had seen the armor and backed himself into the edge of one of the display cases on the other side of the room.
I swear to you, it moved! Ricky told him.
Hed called for an ambulance. Even as Ricky stood, rubbing his head, and Liam checked all around the suit of armor, they heard the sound of a siren. Help was on its way.
Ricky winced, looking sheepish. It moved. Im telling you, it moved.
Its dark down here, and youve heard all kinds of rumors about this place, Liam said. He sighed, shaking his head. Or maybe it did move, Ricky. Maybe a trespasser was in here, hiding behind the suit of armor, and when you knocked yourself out, he got away.
Rickys mouth fell open. He was young, twenty-five years old. He was a good officer. Strong, usually sane and courteous. He could break up a barroom brawl like no other.
He protested weakly. Nono, I would have seen a person. He cleared his throat. Oh, Lord, Lieutenant Beckett, pleasemaybe we could not mention this? he asked hopefully.
Liam was irritated; he might have just lost his chance of finding whoever had broken in. But he said, Im not going to say anythinghell, I dont want half the idiots in this city starting all kinds of rumors about haunted houses and animated suits of armor. Let the paramedics check you out. Just say you crashed into the display shelf, and thats what Ill say, too. Its the truth.
He walked out. The paramedics were exiting their ambulance with their cases in their hands.
Its a knock on the head, self-inflicted, Liam said. I think hes fine, but check him out, please.
The paramedics nodded and headed for the house. A patrol car came sliding up to park beside the rescue vehicle. He sent the two officers inside, telling them to secure the residence before they left.
He stepped down to the lawn and looked back at the house. He felt the presence behind him and didnt turn.
Did you see anything? he asked softly.
No, I was with you, Bartholomew said.
Well, what do you think?
I dont like the place, if thats what you mean.
Is there anything in it? Anyone?
I sensesomething, Bartholomew said.
Im telling you, this has to do with something human, Liam said flatly.
Maybe. Im human, Bartholomew protested.
Youre a ghost.
But I was human. Evil isntit isnt necessarily human.
Liam groaned softly. We both know that human beings are the ones who carry out physical cruelty and injury to one another.
Well, we dont actually know everything, Bartholomew said.
If I were going to be hounded by a ghost, Liam said, youd think it would be one who knew a little more about eternity.
Theres no one in the house now, Bartholomew told him indignantly. No one who isnt supposed to be there. No one human.
Someone else was in that house tonight, Liam said with certainty.
I think so, too, Bartholomew said.
And now?
Whatever is in there isnt human, Bartholomew said quietly. So, what now?
There was nothing else to be done for the night.
Now? Hell, Im heading back for a new batch of fish and chips, Liam said. But as he walked toward his car, he hesitated. It was dark now on the little peninsula. But there were three acres surrounding the house. There was a strip of beach on the property, and near that there were mangrove swamps and bits of pine and brush on higher ground. The house itself was built up on a large slab of coral and limestone, but surrounding it were dozens of places where someone could conceivably hide, or places where one might stash a small vessel like a canoe, or
Hell. A decent swimmer could make it across to the mainland easily.
In the darkness, someone could hide with little chance of actually being discovered. He would need a helicopter and megalights to find someone in the night.
He made a mental note to get an electrician out there in the morning.
When he reached OHaras, he found Katie, David and Jamie at a table, all dining on fish and chips themselves.
Well? David asked curiously.
Teenagers, he said.
They mess anything up? David asked.
They were huddled together in the kitchen, terrified, Liam said. They thought the shadows were coming after them.
Katie laughed. I can well imagine that place at night. They must have been scared out of their wits.
Hey, that place is frightening to an adult, Jamie OHara said.
Liam was surprised that Jamie might have ever found anything frightening. He was a solid man with gray hair, bright eyes, and the calm confidence that made him a good man in any situation andin Key Westa good barkeep. He could stare down any man about to get in a brawl, and if a punch was thrown, he had the brawn to walk an unruly guest right out to the street.
Hed been both a friendand something of a parental figure to all of them.
Cutter Merlin was born and bred right here, and he was popular with folks when he was a young man. He was our version of Indiana Jones, I suppose, Jamie said. When he got older, thats when folks started talking about him. They said that he got himself into too many places that maybe he shouldnt have gone. It wasnt until his daughter died, though, that folks started saying that he might have been a Satanist, or a witch. Trying to explain that wiccans, or witches, practiced an ancient form of religion that had to do with nature and that Satanism meant worship of the Devil didnt seem to go over. After his daughter died, people said everything in the world about him. Hed signed the Devils book. He held Black Masses. You name it, people said it.
He was a nice old man, and a great storyteller, Katie said. I was out there a few times. Kelsey is a few years older than me, but we were in a sailing class together, and we all went to her place for a picnic after the final day. Cutter was great. He dressed up in a suit of armor, then showed us how heavy it was and why a knight needed a squire. He was wonderful.
Jamie shrugged. Well, you know how people gossip, and you know how rumors start. People said that his daughter died because hed signed a pact with the Deviland that was why Kelseys father got her the hell out the minute he could after his wife passed away.
I wonder if it occurred to people that he might have been in tremendous painand that he wanted to raise his daughter without her having to remember how her mother had died on the stairs. A tragic accident, David said.
Liam hesitated, thinking about the things the M.E., Franklin Valaski, had said the day before when he had studied Cutter Merlins mortal remains and mentioned the mans dying expression, comparing it to that of his daughter.
She had fallen, but her eyes were open, her lips ajar
And Cutter had been found with a relic in his hands and the book in his lap.
In Defense from Dark Magick.
Just what the hell had the old bastard been up to?
I wonder if Kelsey will come back? Katie mused. Actually, I wonder what shes like now. Do you think she became a Valley girl?
I dont know, Liam said. He was curious. He wanted to see her. It had been a long time. Other women had come into his life, and other women had gone. She was the only one who had ever teased his memory in absence. I dont know, he repeated with a shrug.
And he suddenly prayed that she had become a Valley girl, that she would stay away and that whatever cursed the Merlin house, human or other, would never touch Kelsey.
The next night, it was a dinner of shepherds pie that he had to leave. It had just arrived, and the call came from the station.
It was Jack again.
Lieutenant, I know you found kids last night, and I cant believe theyre back, but weve just gotten another call. This time it was from a tourist who is staying at a bed-and-breakfast across the way. He saw lights on at the Merlin house, and hes certain he heard a scream.
Liam set his fork down. There are lights on because I had an electrician out. The lightbulbs are all new. I left a light on inside the living room, and one on the front porch.