Coldheart Canyon: A Hollywood Ghost Story

FOUR

Tammy knew there was trouble brewing the moment she set eyes on Katya. The woman was smiling down at them beatifically, but there was no warmth or welcome in her eyes; only anger and suspicion.

"What happened?" she said, straining for lightness.

"It's over," Todd told her, coming up the stairs, his hand extended toward her in a placatory manner. No doubt he also read the signs in the woman's eyes, and didn't trust what he saw there.

"Come on," he said, laying his palm against her waist in a subtle attempt to change her direction.

"No," she said, gently pressing past him so as to go down the stairs. "I want to see."

"There's nothing to see," Jerry said.

She didn't bother to sweeten her expression for Brahms. He was her servant; nothing more nor less. "What do you mean: there's nothing to see?"

"It's all gone," he said, his tone tinged with melancholy, as though he were gently breaking the news of a death to her.

"It can't be gone," Katya snapped, pushing on past Jerry and Tammy and heading down the stairs. "The Hunt goes on forever. How could Goga ever catch the Devil's child?" She turned at the bottom of the stairs, her voice strident. "How could any man ever catch the Devil's child?"

"It wasn't a man," Tammy piped up. "It was me."

Katya's face was a picture of disbelief. Obviously if the idea of a man bringing the Hunt to an end wasn't farcical enough, the notion that a woman—especially one she held in such plain contempt—had done so, was beyond the bounds of reason.

"That's not possible," she said, departing from the bottom of the stairs and heading along the passageway.

She was out of Tammy's view now; but everyone could hear Katya's bare feet on the floor, and the doorhandle being turned—

"No!"

The word was almost a shriek.

Jerry caught hold of Tammy's elbow. "I think you should get out of here—"

"No! No! No!"

"—that room was the reason she stayed young."

Now it made sense, Tammy thought.

That was why Jerry had sounded as though he were announcing a death: it was Katya's demise he was announcing. Denied her chamber of eternal youth, what would happen to her? If this was a movie, she'd probably come hobbling back along the passageway with the toll of years already overtaking her, her body cracking and bending, her beauty withering away.

But this wasn't a movie. The woman who strode back into view at the bottom of the stairs showed no sign of weakening or withering: at least not yet.

"That bitch!" she yelled, pointing at Tammy. "I want her killed. Todd? You hear me? I want her dead!"

Tammy looked up the stairs to where Todd was standing. It was impossible to read the expression on his face.

Meanwhile Katya ranted on. "She's spoiled everything! Everything!"

"It had to end eventually," Todd said.

As Todd spoke Tammy felt the pressure of Jerry's hand on her arm, subtly encouraging her to head on up the stairs while there was still time to do so. She didn't wait for a second prompt. She began to ascend, keeping her eyes fixed on Todd's face. What was he thinking?

Look at me, she willed him. It's me, it's your Tammy. Look at me.

He didn't, which was a bad sign. It would be easier to obey Katya if he didn't think of Tammy as a real human being; didn't look into her eyes; didn't see her fear.

"Don't let her go!" Katya said.

She was coming up the stairs now, taking them slowly, her pace casual.

Todd just stood there, and for once Tammy was glad of his passivity. She slipped by him without being apprehended, and headed on to the top of the stairs.

"Todd!"

The cry was from Jerry, not from Katya. Tammy looked back. For some reason, Todd had caught hold of him, and was preventing him from following Tammy.

From the expression on his face, it was clear Jerry knew he was in trouble. He struggled to pull himself away from Todd, but he was much the weaker man.

"I looked after you, didn't I?" Katya said to Jerry. "When you didn't have a friend in the world, I was there for you, wasn't I? And now you let this happen."

"It wasn't my fault. I couldn't stop it."

Katya was right in front of him now, her palm flat against his chest. She didn't seem to be exerting any pressure, but whatever power she was exercising through her hand was enough to make him sink back against the wall.

"It wasn't your doing?" Katya said incredulously. "You could have killed her. That would have stopped her interfering."

"Killed her?" Jerry said, plainly horrified at the idea; as though he'd not realized until now that the stakes were so high, or that the prospect of murder—casual, inevitable—was so close. Perhaps, most of all, not realizing that the woman he'd obviously fallen in love with should now show herself to be as cold as the Queen of Hell.

"You little fake!" Katya said, putting her hand on Jerry's head and ripping at the hair sewn into his scalp. She pulled, and a flap of skin came away in her hand. Blood ran down over Jerry's face.

"Jesus, Katya," Todd said. "There's no need—"

"No need to what?" she broke in, her face perfect in its fury, those wonderful bones, that exquisite symmetry, finding in rage its best purpose. "No need to punish him? He knows what he did."

She tossed away the flap of hair and skin and slapped Jerry across his face. Tammy had witnessed this kind of cruelty from her before; the last time Zeffer had been its target. And, just like Zeffer, Jerry seemed almost mesmerized by her show of fury, powerless to defend himself against her.

But Tammy wasn't about to watch him kicked half to death the way Zeffer had been kicked, even if in some twisted way Brahms was ready to accept that fate.

"You know how pathetic you are?" she said to Katya. "Slapping around old men? Pathetic. He didn't do anything down there. I did it. I did it all. Tell her, Todd."

"It wasn't Jerry's fault. It wasn't Tammy's, either."

"Yours, then?" Katya said, shifting her burning gaze to Todd.

As she spoke she put her hand on Jerry's face and pushed him. He reached out to stop himself tumbling back down the stairs, but there was nothing to catch hold of. Down he went, head over heels.

Tammy peered over the stairwell. Jerry was sprawled at the bottom, still breathing, but apparently unconscious. She was almost grateful. Better that Katya dismiss him, and come after her instead. She could still run; she could still defend herself. And she certainly wasn't about to be hypnotized by the bitch's gaze.

She didn't wait for Katya to start up the flight in pursuit of her. She left the banister and headed into the kitchen.

"She's crazy."

It was Todd. He'd followed her in, shaking his head. "You gotta go!" he said to Tammy.

"Catch her!" Katya yelled. She was obviously taking her sweet time coming up the stairs, confident, even now, that she had this under control. "Todd? You hear me? Catch her!"

"What are you: her dog?" Tammy said. "Is that what she's reduced you to?"

"Just go," Todd said. "She's all I've got left."

"She'll kill you too if it suits her," Tammy said. "You know it."

"Don't say that," Todd begged. "I've got to stay with her. If I don't, what have I got? You were at the party! You heard what they said. It's all over for me. I don't have anything left, except her. She loves me, Tammy."

"No she doesn't."

"She does."

"No! She's just using you. That isn't love."

"Who the hell are you to say—"

"—as good as anybody else. Better, where you're concerned. The years I wasted thinking about you."

"Wasted?"

"Yes, wasted. I wanted you to love me. But you never did. Now you want her to love you. And she won't. Not ever. She's incapable of love."

It hurt him to hear that. It hurt because he believed her, much as he didn't want to. It was the truth. She knew it, and so—to judge by those despairing eyes of his—did he. His gaze went to the window. He studied the glass for a time.

"Do you think they're still out there?" Todd said.

"What? The dead? Yes . . ."

Even as she was speaking she was thinking about Zeffer's last request. The madness of the Devil's Country had put it out of her head.

"Suppose I said I knew a way to get them into the house?" Tammy said.

"Is that possible?"

"It's possible," Tammy said cautiously.

He went back to the door he'd just stepped through. "How?" he asked, lowering his voice.

Tammy was still uncertain of his allegiances. She didn't want to tell him everything in case he was still going to side with Katya. But on the other hand, she needed his help.

"It's just something somebody told me," she said. She wanted to believe she had him on her side, but she was far from certain.

Katya was calling from the stairs again. "Todd? Have you got her?"

"Close the door," Tammy said. "Keep her out." She started to look around the kitchen. Which of the drawers was most likely to contain a knife? A good strong steak knife. No, better, a fat-bladed chopping knife. Something that wouldn't snap under pressure.

"Todd?" Katya sounded as though she was in the hallway.

"Close the door," Tammy repeated. "Please."

Todd glanced back in Katya's direction. Then, God bless him, he closed the door.

"What are you doing?" Tammy heard her say.

"It's all right!" Todd called back to her.

Tammy started going through the drawers, as quickly as possible. There seemed to be dozens of them. Did she want aluminum foil and plastic bags? No. Spoons and ladles? No. Cutlery? There were a few knives in here, but they were too flimsy for her purposes. She needed a blade she could use to dig at the wood. If she didn't get the icons out of the threshold, the ghosts would stay out there.

"Todd! Let me in!"

"You have to go," Todd said to Tammy.

"Not until I've got a—"

Yes! A knife! The ninth drawer she opened was a treasure trove of knives; large, small, middle-sized. Knowing she could only have a few seconds left before Katya came in, Tammy simply gathered up a handful of knives—five or six—and headed back to the passageway.

As she reached the door, she heard Katya's voice from across the room.

"You think you're going to save yourself with those?"

Tammy looked back over her shoulder. Katya had pushed the door open, and shoved Todd aside, raising her hands as she approached, ready to take Tammy by the throat.

Todd raced ahead of her to stand between the two women.

"Hey now," he said. "Let's just calm down. Nobody's going to hurt anybody."

Katya seemed to listen to him. Her agitation quieted. "All right," she said, looking at Todd with wide, dark eyes. "What do you suggest?"

Tammy didn't trust this little performance at all; but it gave her time to back off toward the door. As she reached it, one of her hastily-collected knives slipped from her hand. She bent down to pick it up, and in attempting to do so, lost her grip on all the others. She cursed as they went spinning across the polished tiles in all directions.

"Pick them up, Todd," Katya said.

"Later," Todd replied, his tone still mellow.

In response she slapped him, hard, across his already-wounded face, striking blood from it. "I want them picked up."

He stared at her for a minute. Then, very calmly, he caught hold of her hand and said: "Don't do that."

"You want to hit me back?" Katya said. "Go on. If that's what you want to do, then do it! No, you won't, will you? You're too damn weak. All you men. Too damn weak."

As if to prove the point she pulled her hand out of Todd's grip and pushed past him, heading straight for Tammy.

Faced with the choice of waiting a few seconds to see if Todd would come to her rescue, or making an escape while she could, Tammy snatched up the first knife to hand, which was neither the largest nor the toughest of the blades, and made a run for the door.

Katya came after her; Tammy stumbled as she got up, and Katya would probably have caught her if Todd hadn't finally found the courage to put his arms around Katya from behind, and hold her back.

"All right!" he yelled to Tammy. "Go!"

Tammy didn't need a second invitation. She ran out into the passage and slammed the door after her. It had a lock but regrettably no key.

She looked down the passageway to the back door. There was a glass panel in it. The glass wasn't flawless, but it was clear enough for Tammy to see the shapes of the ghosts, assembled like a pack of hungry dogs eager to be let into the house. She could hear the odd, listless murmuring they made, the words like objects that had been used so many times they had lost all their shape.

Did they know, somehow, that she was on her way to let them in? Was that why their murmuring became a little more urgent as she opened the door, and the silvery stare in their eyes a little brighter?

"Wait," she said to them. "I'm going to do this. But you have to wait."

There was noise from the kitchen behind her. Plainly Katya was attempting to persuade Todd to go and fetch her—probably kill her. Tammy couldn't make sense of the words, and that was probably for the best. She couldn't afford to be panicked any more than she already was, or she'd screw this up.

Tammy glanced back over her shoulder, to check that Katya wasn't already in the passageway, then she went down on her hands and knees and examined the threshold. The wood was worn with time, and rot had got into it, softening it. She ran her fingers over the full length of it, clearing away the dirt. The area smelled vaguely of vomit, but she supposed that was the rot she was smelling. At three- or four-inch intervals along the length of the threshold there were metal markers, like nails with large, elaborately configured heads, hammered into the timber. She dug around one of them with the nail of her forefinger. It seemed very solidly embedded in the wood. But she had no doubt she was on the right track, meddling with these things, because as soon as she started to do so the ghosts' murmuring became almost reverent in tone; worshipful.

She looked up at them. The light they emitted had grown brighter; either that or they'd narrowed their eyes. Yes, that was it; they narrowed their eyes to study what she was doing.

"This is it, isn't it?"

They answered the only way they could: they fell completely silent. This was not a procedure they wanted to put at risk by making so much as a single sound.

There were five icons in the threshold, the middle one slightly bigger than the other four, which was a circle with two irregularly-shaped "arms" coming from it, at noon and seven o'clock on its dial.

She dug her knife into the center of the symbol. "Okay," she said softly to it, "out you come."

The wood was so wormy it crumbled beneath her knife-point. She dug deeper, exposing parts of the icon that were still clean. It gave off a subtle iridescence, like mother-of-pearl. Her confidence growing, she kept digging until she had cleared the wood away around the whole thing. Then she put her knife-tip under the rim and tried to lever it out. Much to her disappointment, it wouldn't budge; not even a little bit.

"Damn," she said softly.

She worked at it a little more, then remembered the old school adage, trotted out before every test. "If you can't answer the first question, don't waste time on it. Move on to the next one."

That's what she did. She moved left, and started to stab at the wood around the icon at the far end of the row. If anything, the threshold was even more rotted here than it was at the center; the wood came away in fat splinters.

There was more noise from the kitchen shouting now, but she ignored it. Just kept digging. Bigger splinters flew. She felt a rush of certainty. She was going to do this. She pressed the knife under the edge of the icon. There was a moment of resistance, then the pressure of the blade on a nerve in her hand sent a spasm of pain up her arm. She yelped. And in the same moment the icon jumped free of the wood, landing on the tile outside.

The din from the kitchen suddenly became very specific. She heard Todd say:

"Don't do that."

It was a voice she'd never heard from him before, not even in a movie. There was fear in his voice. Something Katya was doing, or was about to do, had made him afraid. Not a very comforting thought.

Without wasting time looking over her shoulder, she quickly went to the other end of the threshold, and started to work there. Though there was plenty of light between the trees, she was cold. There was a length of clammy flesh down her spine, and another across her shoulderblades, as though somebody had painted a cold cross on her skin. Her teeth chattered lightly.

But again, she was in luck. The wood around the icon came away in three or four large pieces. She pressed the knife as deep under the device as it would go and levered. The thing shifted instantly; and as it did so the same spasm she'd felt before ran up her arm. It wasn't a nerve she was striking, she realized. It was a jolt of energy given off by the metalwork as it was levered out. It hurt so much she dropped the knife for a moment, to massage her hand. Her fingers were getting numb.

She looked up at her silent witnesses. "Yes, I know," she said. "Hurry up. I know."

She picked up the knife again, and moved left. Long strips of splinters had already come out of the wood at that end, so some of the work was done. And now she had a technique. She ferreted around with the knifepoint close to the metal, looking for a weakness; then she dug out a few large pieces of wood, and went in for the kill. The third one was the easiest so far, except for the pain, which was excruciating. It ran all the way up to her shoulder joint, and into her neck. Her hand was beginning to feel stupid with numbness. Still, there were only two icons left to move. Surely they weren't beyond her capabilities.

Some instinct made her go back to the middle icon, thinking that she might get lucky. But it was a waste of time. The damn thing was as immovable as it had been previously. She went on to the right of it, and dug around the second of the remaining pair. The wood was just as vulnerable as it had been on the other side, but her numbed muscles were nowhere near as strong now as they'd been a minute ago. She took both hands to the blade, but she wasn't as smart with her left hand as she was with her right, and it added little by way of leverage. Her breath was coming in short gasps, her frustration mounting.

She glanced up at the ghosts, as though the fierceness of their need to be inside would lend her some strength. To her surprise she found that one of them had come forward and crouched down to examine one of the icons. It apparently carried no power now that it was out of its place in line, like a letter lifted from a curse-word, and rendered harmless. The man was so close to her she could have touched him if she'd raised her hand.

Very quietly, the dead man spoke.

"The bitch is coming," he said.

Tammy glanced over her shoulder. There was nobody in the passageway behind her, yet; nor was there any sound from the kitchen. Still she didn't doubt that what the man had said was true.

She willed her hands to grasp the knife a little harder, and they seemed to oblige her, just a little. She pushed the blade deeper into the wood and the icon shifted. She twisted and felt what was by now a familiar jolt of power from the metalwork. This time it passed through both hands. The icon was spat from the wood, and fell, spinning, on the tiles.

But she had no reason to celebrate. Her hand was now so weak that the knife fell from her grip and clattered on the floor between her knees. There was no feeling remaining in her right hand; and her left was not going to be much use to her on the remaining icon.

Still, what choice did she have? She picked the knife up in her left hand anyway, and using the numbed wrist of her right, guided it to the hole she'd dug around the central icon. Perhaps if she just wriggled the point of the blade around for long enough, she'd locate a weak spot. She leaned forward, to put the weight of her body into the calculation.

"Come on," she murmured to it, "you sonofabitch . . . move for Momma."

There was a sound behind her. A soft sound. A groan.

She looked back, fearing the worst, and the worst it was.

Todd had swung around the doorjamb coming from the kitchen, his hand clutching his lower belly. There was blood running between his fingers; and blood on his trousers, a lot of it.

"She stabbed me," he said, his tone one of near-disbelief. He kept his eyes fixed on Tammy, as though he couldn't bear to inspect the damage. "Oh Jesus, she stabbed me."

He leaned forward, and for a moment Tammy thought he was simply going to fall over. But he reached out and caught hold of the lips of one of the four alcoves carved into the walls of the passageway.

"You have to get out of here," he said to Tammy.

She got to her feet, ready to help him, but he waved her away.

"Just go! Before she—"

Comes, he would have said. But it was academic. Katya was there already, coming round the corner, the knife in her hand, his blood on it. Todd turned back to look at her.

She was moving at her old, leisurely pace, as though they had all the time in the world to play out the last reel of this tragedy.

Todd reached into the alcove and found an antique pitcher there. His body blocked what he was doing from Katya's view, but even if she'd seen what he was up to, Tammy thought, she would still have kept coming. She had the knife, after all. And more than that, she had the certainty that Todd had nowhere else to go; nowhere to fall, finally, except into her arms; into her knife. That was what the pace of her approach announced: that she expected him to die in her embrace.

Todd grasped the pitcher and swung it round. It caught Katya's shoulder, and shattered, shards of ceramic flying up into her face.

The impact was sufficient to throw her back against the wall, and the knife dropped from her hand, but the effort had used up a significant part of what was left of Todd's energies. He stumbled across the passageway, his arms outstretched, and fell against the opposite wall.

His face was ashen, his teeth clenched—his eyelids lazy with pain.

"Let them in," he murmured to Tammy. "What are you waiting for? Let. Them. In!"

At the other end of the passageway, Tammy felt Katya's gaze fix on her. A ceramic chip had nicked the skin beneath her eye; a single drop of blood ran down over her flawless cheek. She didn't trouble herself to wipe it away. She simply dropped to her haunches and casually picked up the knife.

Even in the chaos of her thoughts, the symmetry of all this was not lost on Tammy. Two women, each with a knife. And dying between them, the man they'd both loved; or imagined they had.

As Tammy's mother had been fond of saying, when the subject of love had come up in conversation, as it would from time to time: it'll all end in tears.

Well, so it had. And more to come, no doubt. Plenty more to come.

She tore her gaze from Katya, picked up the knife with her left hand and guided it with her right back to the assaulted wood around the middle icon.

Again, she leaned into the task, put every pound to work. She twisted the knife to the left. A few small splinters came away. She twisted again, this time to the right, wanting nothing in the world as much as she wanted that sickening jolt through her bones. She could see more of the icon's depth now, embedded in the wood. It went far deeper than the others, she saw. That was why it refused to budge. It wasn't just wider, it was longer.

She glanced up at the ghosts. They'd missed nothing of what was going on in the passageway. Eyes like slits, they'd all come a little closer to the threshold, daring its consequences.

Behind her, Todd said: "Tammy?"

He was sliding down the wall, his gaze fixed on her. Katya had apparently used the knife on him again, but hadn't lingered to finish him off. She was moving past him, her eyes on Tammy.

"It'll all end in tears . . ." Tammy murmured to herself, and then turned one more time to the challenge of the central icon.

For the last time, she threw her weight down upon it, using her weakened left hand and her benumbed right to twist the knife-blade in the groove beneath the metal ridge.

Another two or three small splinters came away.

"Come on," she begged. "Please, God. Move."

Katya was right behind her now. She could feel her presence at her back. And of course Tammy was a perfect target, right now, but there wasn't a thing in Hell she could do about that, not if she wanted to keep going, keep pushing, keep hoping the damn thing would—

It moved!

She looked down at the icon, and yes, God love it, the thing had lifted out of the wood a little. Scarcely at all, in truth, but movement was movement.

She twisted again, using what little strength her left hand had. And suddenly the jolt came up out of the icon with such force that it threw her backward, so that she landed in front of Katya, deposited before her like a sacrificial lamb.

The pain in her hands and her arms was so severe this time that she had difficulty staying conscious.

The image of Katya loomed above her, knife in hand. Blotches of darkness invaded it from the corners of her sight. But she held on by force of will, determined not to lie there passively while Katya leaned over and slit her throat.

"You interfering bitch," Katya said, raising the knife. She took hold of Tammy's hair, pulling back her head to expose her throat.

But before she could deliver the cut, something else drew her attention. It seemed she had not realized until this moment that all her defenses had been breached.

"Jesus Christ," she said.

Weak as she was, Tammy was still capable of feeling a little satisfaction as she saw the look on Katya's face go from murderous intent to puzzlement, and then—very suddenly—to fear.

"What have you done?" she murmured.

Tammy didn't have the energy or the wit for a pithy reply. But she didn't really need one. Events would speak for themselves now.

The door was open and the threshold cleared.

After years of frustration and exile, Katya's long-neglected guests were coming back to reacquaint themselves with the mysteries of the Devil's Country.