Lasher

Thirty-three

THE MEETING IN the dining room began at one o’clock. The nurses had promised to call Michael if there was the slightest change.

The dining room required no artificial light at this time of day. A flood of sun came through the south-facing windows, and even the north window on the street. The murals of Riverbend showed infinitely more detail than ever they did by the light of the chandelier. A sterling-silver coffee urn gleamed on the buffet. Extra chairs, of which there were many, were pushed back to the white-painted rail.

As the family sat around the oval table, in somewhat uneasy silence, the doctor spoke first.

“Rowan is stable. She is taking the liquid diet well. Her blood work is better. Her fluid output is good. Her heart is strong. We cannot expect recovery. But it is Michael’s wish that we conduct this case as if Rowan were indeed going to recover; that we do everything to stimulate Rowan and to make her as comfortable as we can. This means music in the room, or perhaps films, or television, or radio, and certainly conversation on sensible subjects in a calm way. Rowan’s limbs will be exercised daily; her hair will be groomed and maintained in a fashionable style. Her nails will be manicured. She will be cared for as lovingly as if she were conscious. She has the means for the best, and the best she shall have.”

“But she could wake up,” said Michael. “It could happen-!”

“Yes,” said the doctor. “It’s always possible. But it’s not probable at all.”

Nevertheless, everyone was in agreement. Everything must be done. Indeed, Cecilia and Lily expressed their relief at these ideas, as they themselves had felt rather hopeless after their long night sitting by the bed. Beatrice said Rowan could undoubtedly feel this love and this care. Michael mentioned that he didn’t know what kind of music Rowan really liked. Did any of them know?

The doctor had more to say.

“We will continue intravenous feeding for as long as the body can successfully metabolize the food. Now there may come a time when the body cannot do this; when we have problems with the liver and kidneys; but that is down the road a bit. For now Rowan is receiving a balanced diet. This morning the nurse swore Rowan sucked a tiny bit of fluid from a straw. We will continue to offer this. But unless there is some real ability to take nourishment in this way-which I doubt-we will continue to feed through the vein.”

Everyone nodded.

“It was only a drop or two,” said Lily. “Just like a baby’s reflex, sucking up the fluid.”

“This can be rewarded and strengthened!” said Mona. “Christ, maybe she likes the taste of the food!”

“Yes, surely that would make a difference to her,” said Pierce. “We can try periodically to…”

The doctor nodded placatingly and gestured for attention:

“At any time,” he said, “that Rowan’s heart does stop, she will not be resuscitated by artificial means. No one will give her any injections, or pump oxygen into her. There is no respirator here. She will be allowed to die as God wills. Now, because you ask me, I must tell you. This could go on indefinitely. It could stop at any time. Patients like this have been known to survive for years. A few have come back, true. Others die within days. All we can say now is that Rowan’s body is restoring itself-from her injuries, from the malnutrition she suffered. But the brain…the brain cannot be restored in the same way.”

“But she could live into another era,” said Pierce eagerly, “into a time of some momentous new discovery.”

“Absolutely,” said the doctor. “And every conceivable medical possibility will be explored. Neurological consultations will begin tomorrow. It is easily within our means to bring every neurologist of note to this house to see Rowan. We will do it. We will meet periodically to discuss treatments. We will always be open to the possibility of a surgical procedure or some other experiment which could restore Rowan’s mentation. But let me remind you, my friends, this is not very likely. There are patients throughout the world in this condition. The electro-encephalogram confirms that there is almost no brain activity in Rowan at all.”

“Can’t they transplant a piece of somebody’s brain into her?” asked Gerald.

“I volunteer,” said Mona dryly. “Take as many cells as you want. I’ve always had more than everybody else here.”

“You don’t have to get nasty, Mona,” said Gerald, “I was just asking a simple-”

“I’m not getting nasty,” said Mona, “what I’m suggesting is that we need to read up on this and not make inane statements. Brain transplants aren’t done. Not the kind she needs, anyway. Rowan is a vegetable! Don’t you get it?”

“That’s unfortunately the truth,” said the doctor softly. “ ‘Persistent vegetative state’ is only a little kinder, perhaps. But that is the case. We can and should pray for miracles. And a time will come when perhaps the collective decision will be made to withhold fluids and lipids. But at this juncture such a decision would be murder. It cannot be done.”

With a few handshakes and thank-yous, the doctor now made his way to the front door.

Ryan took the chair at the head of the table. He was a little more rested than yesterday, and seemed eager to make his report.

There was still no news whatsoever of Rowan’s kidnapper or captor. There had been no further assaults on Mayfair women. The decision had been made to notify the authorities about “the man” in a limited way.

“We have made a sketch, which Michael has approved. We have added the hair and the mustache and beard described by witnesses. We are requesting an interstate search. But no one, and I mean no one, in this room is to speak of this matter outside the family. No one is to give any more information than is necessary to the agencies who will cooperate with us.”

“You’ll only hurt the investigation,” said Randall, “if you go talking devils and spirits.”

“We are dealing with a man,” said Ryan. “A man who walks and talks and wears clothes like other men. We have considerable circumstantial evidence to indicate he kidnapped and imprisoned Rowan. There is no need to bring in any chemical evidence right now.”

“In other words keep the blood samples under wraps,” said Mona.

“Exactly,” Ryan said. “When this man is caught, then we can come forward with more details of the story. And the man himself will be living proof of what is alleged. Now Aaron has some things to say.”

Michael could see this was no pleasure for Aaron. He had been sitting silent throughout the meeting, beside Beatrice, who kept her fingers wrapped protectively about his arm. He was dressed somberly in dark blue, more like the rest of the family, as though he had put his old tweed style away. He looked not like an Englishman now but a southerner, Michael thought. Aaron shook his head as if to express some silent appreciation of what lay before them all. Then he spoke.

“What I have to say won’t come as a surprise to you. I have severed my connection with the Talamasca. Things have been done by members of our Order-apparently-which have violated the trust of the family. I ask that all of you now regard the Talamasca as a hostile agency, and do not give any cooperation to anyone claiming connection with it from now on.”

“This wasn’t Aaron’s fault,” said Beatrice.

“How interesting that you would say this,” said Fielding dourly. He had been all this time as quiet as Aaron, and his voice now commanded immediate attention, as it usually did. His brown suit with its pinstripe of pink seemed as old as he was. He seemed bound to exercise the privilege of the very old-to say exactly what he thought.

“You realize,” he said to Aaron, “that all this began with you, don’t you?”

“That’s not true,” Aaron said, calmly.

“Ah, but it is true,” said Fielding. “You were in contact with Deirdre Mayfair when she became pregnant with Rowan. You have…”

“This is inappropriate, and badly timed,” said Ryan. His voice was steady but uncompromising. “This family investigates everyone who becomes involved with it by way of marriage or even sometimes in casual social affairs. This man was, as much as I dislike to admit it, thoroughly investigated by us when he first came here. He is not connected with what happened. He is what he says he is-a scholar, who has been observing this family because of his access to certain historical documents regarding it, about which he has been painfully and fully candid from the start.”

“You’re sure of that?” asked Randall. “The history of the family as we know it-is the history which this man had given us, this Talamasca File on the Mayfair Witches as it is so audaciously called, and now we find ourselves embroiled in events which make sense in terms of this file.”

“Oh, so you two are in this together,” said Beatrice in a cold small voice, very unlike herself.

“This is preposterous,” said Lauren softly. “Are you trying to imply that Aaron Lightner was responsible for the events he documented? Good heavens, have you no memory of the things that you yourself have seen and heard?”

Ryan interrupted: “The Talamasca was thoroughly investigated in the nineteen-fifties by Carlotta,” he said. “Her investigation was hardly sympathetic. She was looking for legal grounds to attack the organization. She found none. There has been no grim conspiracy originating with the Talamasca against us.”

Lauren spoke up again, decisively, drowning out at once the other voices which struggled to be heard.

“There is absolutely nothing to be gained from pursuing this question,” she said. “Our tasks are simple. We take care of Rowan. And we find this man.” She looked at the others, one by one, first those to her right, then those to her left, then those across the table from her, and finally at Aaron. She went on:

“The historical records of the Talamasca have been of invaluable help to us in tracing the history of our family. Anything which can be verified has been verified without a single contradiction or flaw.”

“What the hell does that mean?” demanded Randall. “How do you verify nonsense like-?”

“All the historical facts,” said Lauren, “which have been mentioned in the narrative have been checked. The painting by Rembrandt of Deborah has been authenticated. Records regarding the Dutchman Petyr van Abel, still extant in Amsterdam, have been copied for our private family files. But I will not get drawn off into a long defense of the documents or of the Talamasca. Suffice it to say they have been helpful to us throughout the time of Rowan’s disappearance. They are the ones who investigated the visit of Rowan and Lasher to Donnelaith. They are the ones who have placed in our hands the most detailed physical descriptions of this person, which our detectives have only confirmed. It is very doubtful any other agency of any kind, secular, religious or legal, would have given us this kind of assistance. But…Aaron has asked us to break off formal contact with the Talamasca, and with reason, and that we will do.”

“You can’t sweep it all under the table,” said Fielding. “What about that Dr. Larkin?”

“No one knows what has happened to Dr. Larkin,” said Ryan. “That we all have to accept. But Lauren is correct. We have no material evidence of any wrongdoing on the part of the Talamasca. However, our contact has been exclusively through Aaron. Aaron is our friend. Aaron is now a member of the family through his marriage to Beatrice…”

“Yes, very convenient,” said Randall.

“You’re a fool,” said Beatrice before she could stop herself.

“Amen to that,” said Mona.

To which Ryan immediately said, “Pipe down.”

He seemed to realize it was more than a little inappropriate, or at least Mona did everything in her power to freeze him into humiliation with her brilliant green eyes slitted like those of a basilisk. But he only patted the back of her hand by way of apology and went on.

“Aaron has advised us…as our friend, and as our kinsman, to have nothing further to do with the Talamasca. And we shall do as he asks.”

Once again, several of them began to speak at the same time. Lily wanted to know more about why Aaron had turned on the Order. Cecilia wanted to remind everyone that there was a man from the Talamasca asking questions around the neighborhood, the neighbors had told her, and Anne Marie wanted “just a little more clarification on a point or two.”

Lauren brought them all to silence. “The Talamasca has confiscated medical information. It has refused to share its present knowledge of this case with us. It has cut itself off, as Aaron would explain to you if we gave him the opportunity! But you will not. We are moving forward. It’s that simple. Report any mention of the Order to the office; answer no questions; continue to preserve all security measures.” She leant forward, lowering her voice for emphasis: “Maintain closed ranks!”

There was an uneasy silence.

“Michael, what do you have to say?” asked Lauren.

The question surprised him. He had been watching it all in a detached way as if it were baseball or football, or even chess. He had been drifting in and out of memories of Julien, Julien’s words. Now he had to conceal his thoughts. To speak them frankly and openly, that wouldn’t help anybody. Yet somehow the words came quietly out of his mouth.

“I will put an end to this man, whenever and wherever he’s found. No one will keep him safe from me.”

Randall began to speak. So did Fielding. But Michael put up his hand.

“I want to go back upstairs and be with my wife. I want my wife to recover. I want to be with her now.”

“Other business quickly and finally,” said Ryan. He opened his large leather folder and removed several sheets of paper covered with typewritten words. “Ah, no blood or tissue of any sort was found in St. Martinville in the area where Rowan’s unconscious body was discovered. If she did suffer a miscarriage there as the doctors believe, the evidence is long gone.

“The area is public. And there had been at least two rainstorms during the day, while Rowan lay there, and another after she was found. We have sent two skilled detectives back to the site. But as of now, we have no clues from there as to what really happened to Rowan. We are combing the surrounding area thoroughly for anyone who might have seen Rowan, or heard or seen anything that can be of help.”

There were a few resigned nods.

“Now, Michael, we are prepared to take the rest of this meeting downtown. It concerns the legacy, it concerns Mona. We’ll leave you here now, with Aaron, and we’ll be back later this evening, if you will allow.”

“Yes, of course,” said Michael. “We’re fine here. We have settled into a routine. Hamilton is upstairs with the nurses. Things are going as smoothly as one could expect.”

“Michael,” said Lauren. “I know this is a difficult question. But I must ask it. Do you know the whereabouts of the Mayfair emerald?”

“Oh, for god’s sakes!” said Bea, “that cursed thing.”

“It’s a legal matter,” said Lauren frostily. “Legal. We must seek the emerald and place it around the neck of the designee.”

“Well, if it was up to me,” said Fielding, “I’d go get a piece of green glass at Woolworth’s. But I’m too old to go downtown.”

“Wasn’t there a fake made of that thing by Stella?” asked Randall coldly, “so she could fling it from a Mardi Gras float?”

“If there was,” said Lauren, “she threw it from the float.”

“I don’t know where it is,” said Michael. “I think you asked me that when I was still sick, when I was in the hospital. I haven’t seen it. I think you searched this house.”

“Yes, we did,” said Ryan. “We thought perhaps we had overlooked something.”

“He probably has it,” said Mona softly. No one responded.

“That could be,” said Michael. He gave a little smile. “He probably has it. Probably considered it his very own. But you never know…” He tried not to look like a lunatic, but it was suddenly very funny to him. The emerald! Did Lasher have it in his pocket? Would he try to sell it? That would be a hoot.

The meeting had clearly come to an end. Bea would go up to Amelia Street. The others would go downtown.

Mona threw her arms around Michael and kissed him and then ducked out as if she didn’t want to see his anxious or reproving look. He was a bit stunned; it was like all her sweetness was clinging to him, and then there was this emptiness where she had just been.

Beatrice gave Michael an urgent kiss, then took leave of her new husband, swearing to collect him later for supper and to make Michael eat something as well.

“So many people are trying to make me eat something,” Michael murmured at the sheer wonder of it. “Ever since Rowan left. Eat, Michael, eat.”

Within moments, they were gone. The big door had shut for the final time. There had been that faint vibration throughout the house that always sounded damaging, Michael thought, but probably wasn’t.

Aaron remained at the far end of the table, across from Michael, leaning on his elbows, his back to the windows.

“I’m happy for you and Bea,” Michael said. “You get the poem I sent to you with Yuri? The note?”

“Yes, he gave it to me. You must tell me about Julien. Tell me what happened, not as some snoop from across the Atlantic, but as your friend, please.”

Michael smiled. “I want to tell you. I want to relive every second of it. I’ve been sort of jotting it down up there, you know, so I won’t forget. But the truth is, Julien had one purpose. It was to tell me to kill this thing, to stop it. That I was the one who was counted upon for that.”

Aaron appeared to be intrigued.

“Where’s your friend Yuri?” asked Michael. “He’s still on good terms with us, isn’t he?”

“Absolutely,” said Aaron. “He’s up at the Amelia Street house again. He’s trying again, through Mona’s computer. Mona said he could use her computer to contact the Elders, but the Elders are not acknowledging his pleas for clarification. It’s all rather terrible for him, I think.”

“But not for you.”

Aaron was thoughtful for a moment, then he said, “No…Not as much…”

“Good,” said Michael. “Julien was suspicious of the Talamasca, I guess you got that from my note. Julien had more to say on it…but it all came down to the same thing-this creature is treacherous and deceitful; and it has to be destroyed. I’ll kill it as soon as I can.”

Aaron seemed fascinated by this.

“But what if you had it in your power? What if you had it contained where it couldn’t…”

“No. That’s the mistake. Read the poem again. I’m to kill it. Go upstairs and look at my wife again, if you have any doubts. Go hold her hand. I’ll kill it. And I will have a chance to do it. Evelyn’s poem and Julien’s visit have promised me that.”

“You’re like a man who’s experienced religious conversion,” said Aaron. “A week ago you were philosophical, almost despairing. You were actually physically sick.”

“Well, I thought my wife had abandoned me. I was grieving for my wife and for my own courage, both of which had been lost. Now I know she didn’t mean to abandon me.

“And why wouldn’t I be like St. Paul after his vision on the road to Damascus? You realize I’m the only one living who has seen and spoken to this thing?” He gave a little laugh. “Gifford, Edith, Alicia…I don’t even remember their names. All dead. And Rowan mute now, just like Deirdre. But I’m not dead. I’m not mute. I know what it looks like. I know the sound of its voice. And I’m the one to whom Julien came. I guess I do have the conviction of a convert. Or maybe just the conviction of a saint.”

He reached into his jacket pocket, drew out the medal that Ryan had returned to him, the medal which Gifford had found Christmas Day by the pool. “You gave this to me, remember?” he said to Aaron. “What’s it like when St. Michael sinks his trident into a demon? Does the demon wriggle and scream for its mother? Must be difficult to be St. Michael. This time, I will find out.”

“Julien was its enemy then? Of this you’re sure.”

Michael sighed. Ought to go upstairs. “What would the nurses do if I got in bed with her? What would they do if I just snuggled up to her and held her in my arms?”

“It’s your house,” said Aaron. “Lie beside her if you wish. Tell them to sit outside the door.”

Michael shook his head. “If only I knew she wanted me near her. If only I knew she wanted anything at all.”

He thought for a long moment.

“Aaron,” he said. “If you were he-Lasher-where would you be right now? What would you be doing?”

Aaron shook his head. “I don’t know. Michael, tell me why Julien was so sure Lasher was evil? Tell me what Julien knew.”

“Julien went after its origins. He went to Donnelaith to investigate the ruins. It wasn’t the famous circle of stones that mattered to him. It was the Cathedral. A saint named Ashlar. An early Highlands saint. The thing had something to do with the Christian times in that glen. Something to do with the saint.”

“Ashlar, I’ve heard the story of St. Ashlar,” said Aaron quietly. “It’s in the Latin files in the archives. I remember reading it, but not in connection with this case. Oh, if only they hadn’t locked Yuri out of the computers. What has Lasher to do with this saint?”

“Julien never quite figured it out. He thought at first the thing was the saint-a vengeful ghost. But it wasn’t that simple. Yet the thing did originate there, in that place. It didn’t come from heaven or hell or all time or whatever lies it always tells the witches. It started its dark destiny in the Glen of Donnelaith.” He paused. “What do you know about Ashlar?”

“It’s an old Scottish legend. Very pagan actually,” said Aaron. “Michael, why didn’t you tell me these things?”

“I am telling you, Aaron, but it doesn’t matter. I’m going to kill it. We can find out all about its past after it’s dead. So what do you know about Ashlar, the Scottish saint?”

“Ah…something about the saint returning every so many hundred years. It’s in books here and there. But I never realized it had to do with Donnelaith. There’s another mystery for you. Why wasn’t it in the files? We cross-reference. We are so careful. But I never saw a mention of any legends connected with Donnelaith. I assumed there was no relevant material.”

“But what story did you hear?”

“The saint had special physical characteristics. From time to time someone would be born having those characteristics. And he would be declared the reincarnation of the saint. The new saint. All very pagan. Not Catholic at all. In the Catholic Church if you are a saint, it’s because you are in heaven, not migrating into new flesh.”

Michael nodded. Gave a little laugh.

“Write it down for me,” said Aaron. “Everything Julien told you. You must.”

“I will, but remember what I said. Julien only had one message. It was to kill the thing. Not to be ‘interested in it,’ but to wipe it out.” Michael sighed. “Should have done it at Christmas. Should have killed it. I could have, probably, but naturally Rowan didn’t want me to. How could she? This newborn thing, this mystery. That’s what always happens. It seduces people. And now it’s flesh, and what is the old prayer, ‘And the word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us.’ ”

Aaron nodded. “Let me say it once aloud to you,” he said in a low voice, “so I don’t say it over and over forever in my heart and soul. I should have come here with you on Christmas Eve. I should not have let you come up against it alone, come up against it and her.”

“Don’t condemn her.”

“I don’t. I don’t mean that. I mean I should have been here. That’s all I mean. If it matters, I don’t intend to desert you now.”

“It matters,” said Michael, with a shrug. “But you know, I have this curious feeling. It’s going to be easy now that I’ve made up my mind. Kill it.” He snapped his fingers. “That’s my problem. I was afraid to do that from the start.”

It was eight o’clock. Dark, cold. You could feel the cold if you put your hands on the panes.

Aaron had just come back for supper with Yuri. Yuri was returning to the Amelia Street house to talk to Mona. Yuri had blushed when he said he was going. Michael had realized the reason why. Yuri was taken with Mona. Then Yuri had stammered, “She reminds me of myself at her age. She is unusual. She said she would show me all her computer tricks. We will…talk.”

Flustered, stammering, blushing. Ah, the power of Mona, thought Michael. And now she had the legacy to contend with, as well as everything else.

But there was something pure about Yuri, pure and loyal and good.

“He can be trusted,” Aaron had said quietly. “He is a gentleman, and he is honorable. Mona will be quite safe in his company. Never fear.”

“No one has to fear for Mona,” said Michael, a little ashamed, and getting just a wisp again of those sensual moments, when he’d held her and knew it was wrong and that it was going to happen and so what?

There were so few times when Michael had done bad things and said, So what?

Aaron was asleep in the upstairs bedroom.

“Men of my age nap after meals,” he had said apologetically. He had gone to lie down. He was utterly exhausted, and Michael wouldn’t talk anymore about Julien just now, and maybe that was best because Aaron needed the rest.

Just you and me now, Julien, Michael thought.

It was quiet in the house.

Hamilton had gone home to pay some bills. Bea would return later. Only one nurse was on duty because all the money in the world could not procure another, such was the shortage. A nurse’s aide, very capable, was upstairs in Aunt Vivian’s room going into her third quarter hour on the phone.

He could hear the rise and fall of the woman’s voice.

He stood in the living room, looking out into the side yard. Darkness. Cold. Remembering. Drums of Comus. A man smiling in the darkness. Suddenly Michael was a small child again, and would never know what it meant to be strong or to be safe. Fear had kicked in the door of childhood. Fear had laid waste the safety that had been Mother.

Drums and torches on Mardi Gras Night struck terror. We die when we get old. We are no more. No more. He tried to imagine himself dead. A skull in the earth. This thought had come to him often in his life. I will be that way someday, absolutely. It is a certainty, one of the few in my life. I will be dead. I may be a skull in the earth. I may be a skull in a coffin. I don’t know. But I will die.

It seemed the nurse’s aide was crying. Not possible. There was the soft vibration of steps. The front door closed. That was all so far away from him, people coming, going. If she took a turn for the worse, they’d shout his name.

And he’d run upstairs, but why? To be there when the breath left her. To hold her cold hand. To lay his head on her breast and feel the last of the warmth in her. How did he know it would be like that? Had anyone ever told him? Or was it just that her hands were getting colder and colder and suffer and suffer, and when he looked at her nails, her pretty clean nails, they were faintly blue.

“We will not manicure them,” the nurse had said. “You can scrap that part of the plan. We have to be able to see their color. It has to do with oxygen. She was a beautiful woman.”

Yes, you said that before. But she hadn’t. It had been the other nurse who had said it. How many other insensitive things had they said?

The movement of the dark trees outside chilled him. Chilled him to look at it. He didn’t want to be here, staring out the window in the cold empty side yard. He wanted to be warm and be with her.

He turned around and walked slowly back across the double parlor, beneath the cypress arch, a beautiful ornamental thing. Maybe he should read to her, softly, so that she could tune it out if she hated it. Maybe play the radio for a while. Maybe play Julien’s Victrola. That mean nurse who didn’t like the Victrola was no longer here.

He could send the nurses out of the room, couldn’t he? Gradually it had been penetrating to him. Do we need these nurses?

He saw her dead. He saw her gray and cold and finished. He saw her buried, more or less. Not the whole detailed picture, step by step, and strewn over time. Just the concept, in a flashing light-a coffin sliding into a vault. Like Gifford. Only it was here, their cemetery on the edge of the Garden District, and he could walk over there any day, and lay his hand on the slab of marble that was only four or five inches from her soft dark blond hair. Rowan, Rowan.

Remember, mon fils.

He turned. Who had said this? The great long hall was hollow and empty and slightly cold. The dining room was altogether dark. He listened, not for real sounds, but for supernatural ones, for the voice again. Remember, yes, I will.

“Yes, I will,” he said.

Silence. All around him silence, wrapping up his spoken words and making them loud. Making them sharp in the stillness, like a movement, like a drop in temperature. Silence.

There was absolutely no one about. No one in the dining room. No one visible at the top of the stairs. He could see Aunt Vivian’s room was no longer lighted. No one talking on the phone. Empty. Darkness.

And then it penetrated to him. He was alone.

No, couldn’t be. He walked to the front door and opened it. For one moment, he could not take it in. No one at the black iron gate. No one on the porch. No one across the street. Just the solemn empty silence of the Garden District, deserted as a ruined city beneath the motionless street light, the soft clumps of oak leaves. The house as still and undisturbed as it had ever been the first time he saw it.

“Where are they?” He felt the sudden thrust of panic. “Christ, what’s going on?”

“Michael Curry?”

The man was standing to his left. In the shadows, almost invisible, except for his blond hair. He came forward. He must have been two inches taller than Michael. Michael looked into his pale eyes.

“You sent for me?” the man asked softly, respectfully. He extended his hand. “I’m sorry, Mr. Curry.”

“Sent for you? What do you mean?”

“You had the priest call the hotel for me, you asked that I come. I’m sorry it is over.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Where are the guards who were here? Where is the watchman who was at the gate? What happened to everybody?”

“The priest sent them away,” said the man gently. “As soon as she died. He told me on the phone that he was sending them away. That I was to come and wait here, by the door, for you. I’m sorry she’s dead. I hope she knew no pain or fear.”

“Oh no, I’m dreaming. She’s not dead! She’s upstairs. What priest? There’s no priest here! Aaron!”

He turned, staring into the deep darkness of the hallway, for a moment unable to make out the red carpet of the stairs. Then he bolted, taking the flight in one bound after another, and rushing to her closed door.

“Goddamnit, she didn’t die. She didn’t. They would have told me.”

When he felt the knob, and realized he couldn’t open it, he was about to ram it with his shoulder. “Aaron!” he shouted again.

A click inside. The little lock turning. The door popping back, just a little as if of its own accord. Doors all have their own pace and rhythm, their own way of opening or closing. Doors in New Orleans are never neat or efficient about it. In summer this door would swell up and scarcely close. Now it danced open.

He stared at it, at the white wooden panels. Inside the candles gleamed as before. Flicker on the silk of the tester, on the marble fireplace.

Aaron was speaking to him. Aaron said a name behind him. It sounded Russian. And the blond man said softly:

“But he asked for me, Aaron. He called me. The priest told me. He asked that I come.”

He walked into the room. The candles were the only light. They were blazing on the little altar, and the Virgin’s shadow rose up the wall, jittering and dancing as before. Rowan lay in the bed; her breasts rose and fell beneath the pink satin of the new gown they’d put on her. Her hands curled inward. Her mouth was open. He could hear her breathing. She was alive. Unchanged.

He fell on his knees next to the bed; he laid his head down on it, and he cried. He took her cold hand and squeezed it, and felt its pliancy, and what tiny bit of human warmth was actually there. She was alive.

“Oh, Rowan, my darling, my darling,” he said. “I thought…” And then he sobbed like a child.

He just let the sobs come out slowly. He knew Aaron was near him. And he knew the other man was there too. And then slowly he looked up and he saw the figure standing at the foot of the bed.

The priest. The thought sprang from him instantly when he saw the old-fashioned cassock of black wool, and the white Roman collar, but it was no priest.

“Hello, Michael.”

Soft voice. Tall as they had said he was. Hair long and black and over his shoulders, beard and mustache beautifully groomed and gleaming, a sort of horrid Christ or Rasputin, with his blanched and tearstained face.

“I too have been weeping for her,” the man said in a whisper. “She is near death now; she will bear no more; she will love no more; only a little milk was left in her; she is all but gone.”

He was holding to the bedpost with his left hand.

“Lasher!”

Perfectly monstrous suddenly-a man who was taller than an ordinary man. A slight figure, but the perfect incarnation of menace with its blue eyes fixed on him intently, mouth vivid beneath the black gleam of the mustache, white fingers long and bony and almost twined around the bedpost. Monstrous. Kill it. Now.

He was on his feet in an instant, but Stolov had him around the waist. “No, Michael, no, don’t hurt him. You can’t do it!” And then another man, a stranger, was grabbing him around the neck, and Aaron was begging Michael to hold off, to wait.

The figure by the bed remained motionless, secure. It wiped at its tears with a slow languid right hand.

“Hold on, Michael. Hold on,” said Aaron. “Stolov, I want you to let him go. You too, Norgan. Step back, Michael, we have it surrounded.”

“Only if he will not kill it,” said Stolov. “He must not kill it.”

“The hell I won’t,” said Michael. He arched his back, trying to throw off Stolov, but the other man had his arm too tightly around Michael’s neck. Stolov loosened his grip, catching his breath.

The creature looked at him. The tears continued to move, silent, eloquent.

“I’m in your hands, Mr. Stolov,” Lasher said. “I’m all yours.”

Michael jammed his elbow into the gut of the man behind him, then flung him backwards against the wall. He threw Stolov to the side. He was on Lasher in an instant, hands locked around his neck, the creature drawing in his breath in ragged terror, and grasping at Michael’s hair. Down they went onto the carpet. But the two other men had Michael, they were pulling him loose, wrenching him with all their strength, and Aaron, even Aaron was pulling his fingers off the creature. Aaron. Dear God.

For a moment Michael almost blacked out. The pain in his chest was sharp and relentless. He felt it in his shoulder and then going down his left arm. They had let him go because he was sitting back against the fireplace, unable now to hurt anybody, and Lasher, still struggling for breath, was climbing slowly, groggily to his feet. A lean figure in the flowing black cassock. The men stood on either side of Michael.

“Wait, Michael!” pleaded Aaron. “There are four of us against it.”

“Don’t hurt it, Michael,” said Stolov, tone as gentle as before.

“You’re letting it get away,” said Michael in a hoarse whisper. But when he looked up he saw the tall willowy figure peering down at him, the blue eyes still filled with tears, and the tears running down the smooth white cheeks. If Christ came to you, Michael thought, you would want him to look like this. This was the way painters had rendered him.

“I am not escaping,” said Lasher calmly. “I will go when they take me, Michael. The men from the Talamasca. I need them now. And they know it. And they will not let you hurt me again.” He turned towards the figure in the bed. “I came to see my beloved. I had to see her before they took me away.”

Michael tried to get to his feet. He was dizzy and the pain came again. Goddamnit, Julien, give me the strength to do it. Damnation. The gun, the gun is there by the bed. It’s right on top of the table, that big gun! He tried to say it out loud to Aaron. Shoot it. Pull the trigger and blow a hole in its head as big as an eye!

Stolov knelt in front of him. Stolov said: “Be calm, Michael, be calm. Just don’t try to hurt him. We will not allow him to leave this place, until we ourselves take him away.”

“I am ready,” said Lasher.

“Michael,” said Stolov. “Look at him. He is helpless now. He is in our power. Please be calm.”

Aaron stared at the creature as if spellbound.

“I warned you,” said Michael softly.

“Do you really want to kill me?” asked Lasher, tears welling continuously as if he had as many of them as a little child. “Do you hate me so very much? Just for trying to be alive?”

“You killed her,” Michael whispered. It was such a small, insignificant sound. “You did that to her. You killed our child.”

“Don’t you want to know my side of it, Father?” said the creature.

“I want to kill you,” said Michael.

“Oh, come now. Can you be so cold and unfeeling? Can you not care what was done to me? Can you not care why I am here? Do you think I meant to hurt her?”

Grasping the mantelpiece with one hand and Aaron’s hand with the other, Michael finally managed to get to his feet. He was weak all over, almost nauseated. He stood there, breathing slowly, thankful that the pain was gone, and staring at Lasher.

How beautiful the smooth face, how beautiful the soft black mustache and the close-cut beard. The Jesus of Dürer’s painting. And the deepest most exquisite blue eyes, mirrors to some unfathomable and seemingly wondrous soul.

“Oh yes, Michael, you want to know. You want to hear everything. And they will not let you kill me, will you, gentlemen? Not even Aaron will allow it. Not until I’ve said all I have to say.”

“Lies,” whispered Michael.

The creature swallowed as if struck by the condemnation, and then once again he wiped his eye with the back of his right hand. He did it as a child would, on the playground, and then he pressed his lips together and took a deep breath as if he would give way, as Michael had before-to sobs as well as tears.

Behind him, on the bed, Rowan lay oblivious, eyes staring into space, undisturbed, protected perhaps-unreachable as before.

“No, Michael,” he said. “No lies. That I promise you. We know better, don’t we, than to believe the truth will excuse anything. But lies you will not hear.”

Once again, the dining room. Only this time the light coming through the windows was the dim golden light of the lamps in the yard.

They sat around the table in the shadows. Both the doors were closed. Lasher sat in the place of authority, at the head of the table, one great white hand splayed on the wood before him, staring down at it as if he were dazed.

He raised his head and looked about him. He looked at the murals as though taking up one detail after another and releasing it again to the gloom. He looked at their faces. He looked at Michael, who sat near him just to his right.

The other man, Clement Norgan, was still sore from Michael’s jabbing him, still sore from having been cracked against the wall. He sat across the table, red-faced, trying to catch his breath still, drinking sips from a glass of water. His eyes moved from the creature to Michael. Stolov sat to Norgan’s left.

Aaron was beside Michael, holding on to his shoulder, holding his hand. Michael could feel the tightness of Aaron’s grip.

Lasher.

“Yes, in this house, again,” the creature said, voice tremulous yet deep and confident in its own beauty, its perfect accentless enunciation.

“Let him speak,” said Aaron. “We are four men. We are resolved he will not leave here. Rowan is resting untroubled. Let him talk.”

“That is correct,” said Stolov. “We are together. Let him explain himself to us all. You are entitled to such an explanation, Michael. No one contests it.”

“Trickster always,” said Michael. “You sent her nurses away. You sent the guards away. So clever. They believed you, Father Ashlar, or did you use some other name?”

Lasher gave a long, slow, bitter smile. “Father Ashlar,” he whispered, running his pink tongue along his lip and then closing his lips quietly. For one instant, Michael saw Rowan in him, saw the resemblance as he had seen on Christmas Day. The fine cheeks, the forehead, even the tender line of the long eyes. But in the depth of the color and in the bright open look to them, they were Michael’s eyes.

“She doesn’t know she is alone now,” said Lasher solemnly. He spoke the words slowly, eyes moving again around the vast dark room. “What are nurses anymore to her? She does not know any longer who stands by her, who weeps for her, who loves her, who sheds tears. She has lost the child which was inside her. And there will be no more. All that will happen now will be without her. Her story is told.”

Michael started to rise, but Aaron held him, and the other two glared at him across the table. Lasher remained unafraid.

“And you want to tell us your story,” said Stolov timidly, as if gazing at a monarch or an apparition. “And we are ready to hear.”

“Yes, I will tell you,” said Lasher with a small, almost brave smile. “I will tell you what I know now, flesh and blood that I am. I will tell you all of it. And then you can make your judgment.”

Michael uttered a short, mirthless laugh. It startled the others. It startled him. He gazed steadily at Lasher. “All right, mon fils,” he said, pronouncing the French carefully, correctly. “Remember your promise to me. No lies.”

They looked at one another for a long moment, and then the creature lapsed back into solemnity, only wincing slightly as if he’d been struck.

“Michael,” he said, “I cannot speak now for what I was in the centuries of darkness; I cannot speak now for a desperate, discarnate thing-without history or memory or reason-that sought to reason-rather than suffer, grieve and want.”

Michael’s eyes narrowed. He said nothing.

“The story that I want to tell is my own-who I was before death separated me from the flesh I dreamed of forever after.” He brought his two hands up and crossed them for one moment on his chest.

“In the beginning,” said Michael mockingly.

“In the beginning,” the creature repeated, only without the irony. He went on, slowly, words heartfelt, imploring. “In the beginning-long before Suzanne said her prayer in the circle-in the beginning-when I had life, true life in me, as I have it again now.”

Silence.

“Trust us,” said Stolov. It was almost a whisper.

Lasher’s eyes remained fixed on Michael.

“You don’t know,” he said, “how eager I am to tell you the truth. I dare you-I dare you to hear me out and not to forgive.”